Cerca:someone else

STEWART COPELAND'S KLARK KENT war das erste Soloprojekt eines Mitglieds von The Police. Die innovative Musik von KLARK KENT, die 1978 mit einer Reihe von Singles begann und 1980 in einem selbstbetitelten Debütalbum gipfelte (das kürzlich als limitierte Vinyl-Veröffentlichung zum Record Store Day neu aufgelegt wurde), war seit dem 1995 erschienenen Album Kollected Works nicht mehr erhältlich.

BMGs umfassende neue Sammlung KLARK KENT (erhältlich als Deluxe 2CD/2LP-Set) enthält neu remasterte Versionen aller ursprünglichen Singles, des kompletten selbstbetitelten Albums von 1980 sowie zwei unveröffentlichte Studioaufnahmen.

First color pressing. This debut ACL performance on August 9, 2003, captures songs from Neko Case’s three seminal solo releases at the time, combining elements of country, gospel and punk for a very unique sound. That’s why pundits often find the music hard to classify. Which is a good thing. Her voice has been described as lush, torchy, melancholic - even scary (someone once wrote that “she sings like Patsy Cline’s ghost”). She certainly doesn’t sound like anything else on today’s hit parade. Neko began her career as a drummer in a punk band, but it wasn’t long before she started experimenting with songwriting and singing. She also continues to perform as a member of The New Pornographers, but her solo work is where her songwriting skills shine most. As she herself says, “I want to write songs that are timeless...maybe just something more like a novel than a short story.” After the show, Neko took the time to write the ACL staff to thank everybody for making her, her band and friends feel so welcome. “I feel very proud of how the show turned out...It’s so great to find out that something you admire so much is run by good people. Be proud! You kick ass!” You, too, Neko… – Terry Lickona (producer Austin City Limits)

Now on vinyl - limited to 200 copies. Brazilian composer, guitarist and singer Pedro Rosa release his debut album ´Midnight Alvorada". Pedro, who was born in São Paulo in Brazil but has lived in Spain for over 15 years, has a long musical road behind him and soon share his debut album that reveals his most intimate and respectful relationship with music and composition since he was 10 years old. Midnight Alvorada is an invitation to see with someone else's eyes. Above all, to feel with the heart of the other.

The album features a combination of rhythms, such as samba, baião, ijexá, bossa nova and waltz and features the participation of prominent names in Brazilian music, such as Jurandir Santana, Mônica Salmaso, Vanessa Moreno, Zé Luis Nascimento and Ivan acerdote.. "This album was conceived with my songwriting partner Rafael Mourão, who wrote 8 of the 10 songs on the album in partnership with me.

Rafael is an extension of me and vice versa. A bizarre similarity in the way of seeing and feeling the universe " says Pedro. In Midnight Alvorada, Pedro had great support from Jurandir Santana, an instrumentalist, composer and music director residing in Barcelona. "Jurandir, who has been one of those favorite musicians for a long time, and I started to have an increasingly strong friendship. He is an artist who is motivated by the sound. If he likes

Teichmann + Söhne’s »Flows« is not so much the result of a collaborative process as it is a process in itself. Over the course of nine pieces, the Gebrüder Teichmann—Andi and Hannes—and their father Uli repeatedly find common ground between the very different musical styles, sound aesthetics, and subcultural codes they have internalised throughout their lives. The source material out of which the album evolved was culled from several recordings of rehearsal sessions in preparation for the trio’s concerts that took place between the years 2012 and 2022. The three added only a few overdubs to those recordings but edited them rigorously to both preserve and transform the spirit of their unlikely collaboration. The combination of Uli’s background as a versatile jazz artist and multi-instrumentalist with his sons’ penchant for dub techniques, modular synthesis, and live sampling as well as their interest in electronic dance music take on ever-different shapes. »Flows,« released on the occasion of Uli’s 80th birthday, is as joyful, lively and free-spirited as its makers.

It took the three musicians decades to get together to jam. Uli and Lu, the mother of Andi and Hannes, ran the legendary Jazzclub Kneiting between 1978 and 1983 while he also made a name for himself as a musician who, besides jazz, is knowledgeable in a plethora of music styles from all over the world and has an instrument collection to match. Naturally, Andi and Hannes rebelled against this versatility by opting for simplicity. Already as pre-teens, they formed a punk band and once they got a whiff of the burgeoning techno scene, strayed even further from their father’s path. They eventually moved from their native Regensburg to Berlin where they made a name for themselves with a slew of releases on seminal labels like Disko B or Kompakt before starting to more regularly collaborate with musicians from the realms of Contemporary Music, Improv, and Sound Art. Even after Uli had finally contributed some saxophone licks to the brother’s 2011 »They Made Us Do It« LP, it indeed needed someone else to make them do it, i.e. finally get together to reconcile their musical differences in a creative way.

Finding out that the three had never performed together, Yoichi Osaki from Berlin’s iconic Miss Hecker venue, a focal point of the city’s so-called Echtzeitmusik (real-time music) and Improv scene, scheduled them to play their first concert on April 1, 2012. Even though the date was chosen deliberately, things got serious very quickly and this first joint concert proved to be the first of many. It also laid the foundation for »Flows« since the three would start recording their rehearsals. Revisiting the roughly 90 recordings, some of which clock in at a full hour, after ten years of playing with each other then started what Hannes describes as a »form-finding process.« It was a holistic one and involved all three of them, extending also to their choice of cover artwork, a piece created by Lu, who died in 2016 and to whom the album is dedicated. For the collage, she had used photos of the place where it all began, Regensburg, and the river that flows through it, the Danube. This made the piece, coincidentally created around the time Teichmann + Söhne started playing their first concerts together, correlate perfectly with the working process of the three musicians on a visual level.

Similarly, Teichmann + Söhne can be thought of as a human-musical collage. It is a meeting of three different musicians who all have in common that they have occupied alternative spaces and perfected a variety of musical styles and subcultural codes throughout their lives. When those flow into each other, this necessarily creates something that is as unique as the nine tracks collected on this album. While it is mostly Uli who takes the lead on pieces like the appropriately titled »Im Zwischen« (»In the Inbetween«), the brothers respond by live sampling his playing, thus serving as a creative interface between acoustic sounds and electronic responses. This in turn provides a framework in which Uli can improvise on a variety of acoustic instruments like the saxophone and the clarinet as well as a mandolin and glockenspiel or even percussion. This indeed makes their music flow—across different generations, between different musical ideas and genres, into previously uncharted territory.

If you were to ask for a defining Habibi Funk track, there are a few that come to mind: from Fadoul’s “Sid Redad,” Dalton’s “Soul Brother” to Ahmed Malek’s “Omar Gatlato.” However, none are as widely connected with us at this point as Hamid Al Shaeri’s “Ayonha.” We heard the track for the first time when we were working on selecting tracks for your first compilation and we instantly loved it. We obviously had heard of Hamid El Shaeri’s music before, but only material from his Al Jeel phase when he was already the full-blown
superstar he is now.

Listening to his releases from the early 1980’s opened a whole new door for us. At the time, Hamid had just left Libya to pursue his career in Egypt via a detour in London, where he recorded his first album. Hamid’s distinct sound of the sound is quintessentially reliant on heavy synths and so it was particularly important to purchase these synths in a timely manner. “Whenever a new one synthesizer would come out, we would have to buy it immediately, otherwise someone else would get their hands on that sound.” London also played an important role for Hamid as a musical epicenter.

He fondly reminisces about the many live shows he attended there, including some of the biggest international musicians like Freddie Mercury and Michael Jackson. After returning to Cairo where he also recorded his following albums, he connected with SLAM! for the
release of his debut, laying the foundation of a collaboration that lasted for 5 albums. Luckily, we were able to connect with Hamid through our friend Youssra El Hawary, whose extensive network has opened many doors for us within the Egyptian music scene. We met Hamid for the first time probably in 2016 at his office / rehearsal studio in the outskirts Cairo. We were expecting a larger-than-life
character in-line with his status as a certified superstar, yet the actual person turned out to be very approachable and super easy to connect with. He liked the idea of an effort to amplify his early works again,
which, when originally released, were far from an economic success.

While he was down to assist with an interview and his blessing for the project he also told us that for any license we needed to speak with the original label SLAM! who released these songs, still held the rights and also remained in business over the decades though they didn’t actively release any new music. Hany Sabet had started SLAM! records in the early 1980s and focused on cassette tape releases, the
format that expedited the success of a new generation of record labels in Egypt. By the mid 1980’s, SLAM! had become one of the most successful and economically dominant record labels in Egypt, with Hamid El Shaeri being just one of their key artists, alongside Mohamed Mounir, Hanan, Hakim, Mustafa Amar and many more. Luckily, Hany Sabet turned out to be a friend of our colleague Malak Makar’s father, which probably helped to warm him to the idea of licen- sing “Ayonha” to this - in the scale of his world - tiny label
from Germany. Eventually “Ayonha” ended up becoming a widely successful release and either Hany or we brought up the idea of a full album dedicated to Hamid El Shaeri’s work on SLAM!.


"Maktoub Aleina” is the first single and will be released January 14th. Following the massive success of "Ayonha,” “Maktoub Aleina” is another mid-tempo groover with a beautiful, synth-forward melody, that brings together a lovely combination of soul, disco and Arabic pop music of the highest order, giving a taste of full album. The second single, “Yekfini Nesma Sotak” will be released January 28th and combines Hamid’s unique formula of soul and pop, held together by a catchy synth melody. “Yekfini Nesma Sotak” picks up the
pace a bit, making the uplifting mood of the track even more powerful. Third single, arriving February 11th, is “Dari Demou’ek,” one of the stand out tracks of Hamid’s early recordings done for SLAM! in the early 1980s. Dominated by a disco infused bassline, the track offers a lot of space of the funky production to shine while Hamid inserts his vocals at all the right moments. A masterpiece of disco touched by Arabic pop music.

Full album arrives February 25th. This release is dedicated to Hany Sabet, the founder of SLAM! and his wife Rosemary Jane Sabet (who
took the photos we used for the cover and the booklet), who sadly passed away during the time it took us to prepare the release.
Vinyl comes with an extensive booklet with an interview with Hamid as well as unseen photos

If you were to ask for a defining Habibi Funk track, there are a few that come to mind: from Fadoul’s “Sid Redad,” Dalton’s “Soul Brother” to Ahmed Malek’s “Omar Gatlato.” However, none are as widely connected with us at this point as Hamid Al Shaeri’s “Ayonha.” We heard the track for the first time when we were working on selecting tracks for your first compilation and we instantly loved it. We obviously had heard of Hamid El Shaeri’s music before, but only material from his Al Jeel phase when he was already the full-blown
superstar he is now.

Listening to his releases from the early 1980’s opened a whole new door for us. At the time, Hamid had just left Libya to pursue his career in Egypt via a detour in London, where he recorded his
first album. Hamid’s distinct sound of the sound is quintessentially reliant on heavy synths and so it was particularly important to purchase these synths in a timely manner. “Whenever a new one synthesizer would come out, we would have to buy it immediately, otherwise someone else would get their hands on that sound.” London also played an important role for Hamid as a musical epicenter.

He fondly reminisces about the many live shows he attended there, including some of the biggest international musicians like Freddie Mercury and Michael Jackson. After returning to Cairo where he also recorded his following albums, he connected with SLAM! for the
release of his debut, laying the foundation of a collaboration that lasted for 5 albums. Luckily, we were able to connect with Hamid through our friend Youssra El Hawary, whose extensive network has opened many doors for us within the Egyptian music scene. We met Hamid for the first time probably in 2016 at his office / rehearsal studio in the outskirts Cairo. We were expecting a larger-than-life
character in-line with his status as a certified superstar, yet the actual person turned out to be very approachable and super easy to connect with. He liked the idea of an effort to amplify his early works again,
which, when originally released, were far from an economic success.

While he was down to assist with an interview and his blessing for the project he also told us that for any license we needed to speak with the original label SLAM! who released these songs, still held the rights and also remained in business over the decades though they didn’t actively release any new music. Hany Sabet had started SLAM! records in the early 1980s and focused on cassette tape releases, the
format that expedited the success of a new generation of record labels in Egypt. By the mid 1980’s, SLAM! had become one of the most successful and economically dominant record labels in Egypt, with Hamid El Shaeri being just one of their key artists, alongside Mohamed Mounir, Hanan, Hakim, Mustafa Amar and many more. Luckily, Hany Sabet turned out to be a friend of our colleague Malak Makar’s father, which probably helped to warm him to the idea of licen- sing “Ayonha” to this - in the scale of his world - tiny label
from Germany. Eventually “Ayonha” ended up becoming a widely successful release and either Hany or we brought up the idea of a full album dedicated to Hamid El Shaeri’s work on SLAM!.


"Maktoub Aleina” is the first single and will be released January 14th. Following the massive success of "Ayonha,” “Maktoub Aleina” is another mid-tempo groover with a beautiful, synth-forward melody, that brings together a lovely combination of soul, disco and Arabic pop music of the highest order, giving a taste of full album. The second single, “Yekfini Nesma Sotak” will be released January 28th and combines Hamid’s unique formula of soul and pop, held together by a catchy synth melody. “Yekfini Nesma Sotak” picks up the
pace a bit, making the uplifting mood of the track even more powerful. Third single, arriving February 11th, is “Dari Demou’ek,” one of the stand out tracks of Hamid’s early recordings done for SLAM! in the early 1980s. Dominated by a disco infused bassline, the track offers a lot of space of the funky production to shine while Hamid inserts his vocals at all the right moments. A masterpiece of disco touched by Arabic pop music.

Full album arrives February 25th. This release is dedicated to Hany Sabet, the founder of SLAM! and his wife Rosemary Jane Sabet (who
took the photos we used for the cover and the booklet), who sadly passed away during the time it took us to prepare the release.
Vinyl comes with an extensive booklet with an interview with Hamid as well as unseen photos

Erste offizielle Vinyl-Neuauflage.

POP TRASH war das 10. Studioalbum der englischen New-Wave-Band DURAN DURAN. Es wurde ursprünglich am 19. Juni 2000 veröffentlicht und ist seit der Erstveröffentlichung auf CD nicht mehr zu erhalten. POP TRASH war das letzte Album der Band, auf dem das Trio Simon Le Bon, Nick Rhodes und Warren Cuccurullo. Das Album Artwork, das von Andrew Day entworfen wurde, zeigt einen mit Strasssteinen verziertes Auto, das Liberace gehörte.

Celebrated composer, performer, saxophonist, soloist, band leader, educator, activist, and mixed-media artist Matana Roberts returns with a new installment of their acclaimed Coin Coin series. For over a decade, Coin Coin has been the central artistic project for Roberts, a remarkable exploration of American ancestry and the nature of memory through "sound quilting": modern composition that draws on a wide range of musical sources and traditions, along with research-driven historical and genealogical narratives that yield prose and poetry both spoken and sung, field recordings, and graphic scores. The Quietus declares "when the 12-album cycle is complete, it will be regarded as a singular masterpiece of 21st century sonic and narrative art" and Pitchfork calls it "one of the most provocative ongoing bodies of work by any American musician." Coin Coin Chapter Five: In the garden... is the first new recorded audio chapter since 2019 and centers upon reproductive rights, summoning the story of a family ancestor who died in early adulthood, from a cause kept obfuscated and hushed, shrouded in disinformation and shame. Roberts reimagines diaristic and oral narratives, delivered in strident streams of spoken word that punctuate the hour-long work, with recurring musical themes frequently accompanied by the declarative refrain "my name is your name / our name is their name / we are named / we remember / they forget." As Roberts writes in the accompanying liner notes essay: I find it absolutely disgusting that the same trauma my grand ancestor, whose story we are telling in this chapter, is closely mirroring the experiences of some poor soul today as I write this... Our aforementioned grand, who perished at a young age, leaving her growing children motherless, did not have to die. The negative consequences of her death have reverberated down through generations in my family line, in the same way that a similar resounding might happen for someone else's ancestral line generations from today. While often jazz-adjacent, and with Matana's inimitable saxophone and indomitable voice at the core, Roberts situates Coin Coin outside the Jazz genre and within heterodox pathways of post-modern composition, electroacoustic music, sound collage, experimental voice, and sound art. In the garden... undeniably continues to express and expand upon the project's magnificent iconoclasm, nonetheless being the most jazz-inflected chapter since Coin Coin Chapter Two: Mississippi Moonchile(2013). Recorded in Brooklyn with a stellar acoustic ensemble that includes Stuart Bogie, Gitanjali Jain, Darius Jones, Matt Lavelle, Mike Pride, Ryan Sawyer, Corey Smythe, and Mazz Swift, abetted by some sparkling pieces featuring modular synthesis courtesy of album producer Kyp Malone (Bent Arcana, TV On The Radio), In the garden... traverses a vivid stylistic array of thematic overtures, excursions and set pieces, ranging from spacious textural invocations to gorgeously tempered horn-led compositions to driving free jazz and exhilarating through composed bursts of cacophony. With storytelling spoken-word lead vocals by Roberts channeled recurringly throughout, alongside various other deployments of layered and group voices, the album is alternately a meditation and fever dream of narrative potency. This is some of the most intense and intensive music Roberts has composed and captured to date, richly conceived and deeply felt, restless yet focused, unflinchingly substantive and unique. Coin Coin Chapter Five: In the garden... channels epigenetic trauma and tragedy with teeming complexity and fierce beauty _ a eulogy, testimony, and celebration, melding music and language in a stunning polychromatic flow of vernaculars and poetics. A powerful work of subjective commemoration and historical-cultural communion that speaks indelibly to the present moment.



2x10” in 350 gsm widespine jacket w/interior colour flood + 300 gsm printed inners + 20”x 10” fold-out insert + DL card

The undoubted Queen of British Soul and 2023 Olivier Award winner, Beverley Knight returns with a brand new album The Fifth Chapter - on September 29th on Tag8/BMG. The album Includes the first single “Last One On My Mind” which was ROW on R2 and the follow up “Systematic Overload ” which we expcct to also be a R2 favourite
Zoe Ball will be playing Systematic Overload as a first play on R2 on 17th September. Beverley appears at R2 In The Park on 16.09 with appearances on Vernon Kaye TOMY, Rylan KaRyoke appearance confirmed live and interviews with Graham Norton, and a Chris Evans session on Virgin. Press to include Guardian, Sunday Times, and Attitude.
The Fifth Chapter comes on the back of what has undoubtedly been Beverley’s most successful period ever as the iconic Ms Knight celebrates 30 years making music with several top 10 albums and over a million UK albums sold.
UK national TV appearances will support the album release - we expect Royal Variety, Strictly, Sunday Brunch, The One Show and BBC Breakfast news performances and interviews, while Beverley has already appeared on ITN News, and GoggleBox on the launch of the album.
Beverley will take on her biggest ever UK tour throughout October and November, to over 30,000 people, ending with a headline date at the London Palladium on November 14th. The album brings together some of the greatest contemporary songwriting talent including Diane Warren, Seb Coe, Ollie Green and Andrew Roachford, as well as co-production with the likes of AC Burrell, Jimmy Hogarth, Mitch Allen & Josh Cohen/DJ Waldie, The Fifth Chapter is a spectacular journey through the inspirations that have defined her incredible career.
Beverley has collected numerous awards and accolades including an MBE, three MOBO Awards, numerous Brit and Mercury Music Prize nominations and, most recently, an Olivier Award for her role as Emmeline Pankhurst in the critically acclaimed musical SYLVIA at London's Old Vic Theatre. She also recently appeared as a judge on Starstruck alongside Adam Lambert, and Shania Twain.

A former pizza delivery driver and now self-taught full-time musician, CRi first caught the attention of tastemaker press with early single ‘Rush’ and his subsequent ‘Someone Else’ EP. Not long after, he joined the Anjunadeep roster in 2019 and gained attention from the label fanbase, and radio titans Pete Tong, Annie Mac and Jason Bentley with his ‘Initial EP’.

His debut album ‘Juvenile’ exceeded expectations, being nominated for a number of awards, including Best Electronic Album at the JUNO Awards, and three separate titles at the 2021 ADISQ Awards, including Electronic Album of the Year and ‘Revelation’ of the Year, which CRi won. Since the release of ‘Juvenile’, CRi has released three singles, an EP and remixes for Bob Moses and Lane 8; become one of the first electronic acts to headline Montréal Jazz Festival to an audience of 45,000; and performed around the world once more, writing as he went.

Since the slower days of the pandemic lockdown, and Quebec’s tentative reopening of nightlife and music venues, CRi’s life has become much more fast-paced once again; a transformation that has been infused into every beat of his new album ‘Miracles’. The vinyl release of ‘Miracles’ comprises 14 tracks, including two standout prior singles, ‘Something About’ and ‘Losing My Mind’ (feat. Jesse Mac Cormack), which, combined, have already accumulated 10 million streams between them.

The other twelve tracks on ‘Miracles’ (including 3 bonus vinyl-only recordings) showcase Christophe’s signature warming synths, in addition to an impressively wide range of sounds, from drum and bass, to indie, from electronic and chillout, making this work his most expansive to date. After the album’s release, CRi will be heading on a live tour of North America, stopping off in seven cities, including Los Angeles, Denver, Toronto and, of course, his hometown of Montréal, where he’ll be headlining at iconic venue MTelus, which regularly plays host to indie-electronic stars, including, recently, Metronomy, Jungle, Monolink, Max Cooper and Amtrac, and is a perfect spot to celebrate his rise in this scene, before he takes his live tour to Europe in early 2024. ‘Miracles’ is out 22nd September, 2023.

A Grey Area is the brand new album from GRAMMY nominated Canadian singer-songwriter JP Saxe, featuring singles I Don't Miss You, Everything Ends (feat. Lizzy McAlpine & Tiny Habits) and Moderación (Con Camilo) via Arista Records/Sony Music. A Grey Area follows up on JP's hit 2021 album, Dangerous Levels of Introspection.

"One Sunday afternoon in 1990, I had a phone call from Keith saying that Sarah Records had received the demo cassette the two of us had recorded on a 4-track in a friend's shed and were interested in putting out two of the songs as a single. T

hey were Clearer and Alison. Delighted by this news, we booked some recording time with a studio we'd regularly used in our previous incarnation as Feverfew, the White House in Weston-super-Mare.

This was the first time we'd ever played a note of music that was using someone else's money, so the pressure was being felt. We recorded Clearer, Fearon and Chelsea Guitar, with Clearer becoming Sarah 55, the first of eight singles for the band across two labels. At that time, we were still toying with a name for ourselves and had settled with the Art Bunnies.

While driving us back home from Weston, though, I declared that I really couldn't see how people would take us seriously with a name like that. Disappointed, Keith (Girdler) then got out a piece of paper upon which he'd written several other contenders. These included Opal Trumpet, the Smiling Monarchs and (thankfully) Blueboy."

A Colourful Storm presents Blueboy's singles collection and the band's final retrospective release. Beautiful gatefold sleeve designed by Sarah Records' own Matt Haynes with original artwork insert, postcard and liner notes by Paul Stewart.

With the label MPS, post-war musical history was written in Germany:
noble music productions with many international greats come from the
Black Forest and are timelessly legendary
Some treasures from the archive of the label are released by HGBSBlue on highquality vinyl.
The Hampton All Stars played at the first concert of the festival "VS swingt" back
then. MPS boss Brunner- Schwer was there at the mixing desk. Some of these
recordings were released in 1978 as the MPS LP "Alive and Jumping" (MPS
15469).
"Hamp" and his All Stars were really into it and brought the audience in the Black
Forest, known as rather reserved, to a frenzy, especially after the break. The old
master worked his magic on the vibraphone, of course, but also played drums
and piano and sang with an irrepressible sense of rhythm as one who had
unmistakably internalized swing. The top trumpeter Cat Anderson was another
internationally known musician in the eight-piece all-star band with which "Hamp"
toured Europe at the time. And there was someone else who was one of HGBS's
personal favorites: pianist and organist Milt Buckner. Buckner's block chords had
not only influenced Oscar Peterson and George Shearing, but also inspired the
passionate piano freak Brunner- Schwer. The live recording with Hampton's All
Stars in Villingen was the last record of Buckner, who died a few weeks later in
the USA of acute heart failure.
The musicians can be heard in exuberant joy of playing, with "Hamp" standing out
sovereignly on vibraphone and drums, as well as Buckner with soulful organ
playing. Everything sounds unspent fresh and cheerful and shows Hampton and
his fellow players in top form. This rousing swing, which should appeal not only to
jazz fans, is available exclusively on LP.
- Unreleased live recording from 1977 in Villingen, Germany
- The last recording of organist Milt Buckner
- High-end vinyl quality 180 gr. vinyl in gatefold, matt finish with embossed
printing

Bekannt für seine ultrapersönlichen Texte und umwerfendes Songwriting auf der Schnittstelle zwischen tiefschürfenden Balladen und stadiongroßem Pop, ist Cian Ducrot aus Irland in den letzten zwei Jahren zu einem der wichtigsten UK-Newcomer avanciert, indem er erst TikTok, Insta & Co. und dann auch noch die offiziellen Charts auf den Kopf gestellt hat. Ein überraschend nahbares Songwriting-Genie, das nicht nur musikalisch kein Blatt vor den Mund nimmt – und in seinen Socials auch mal mit Chorverstärkung die Londoner U-Bahn per Flashmob zum Implodieren bringt: Jetzt steht der für seine „erfrischende Ehrlichkeit“ (Clash) gefeierte Singer-Songwriter mit dem ersten offiziellen Albumstatement in den Startlöchern: „Victory“ erscheint auf Vinyl und CD am 04. August. Darauf vertreten sind auch die jüngsten Singlehits „I’ll Be Waiting“, „All For You“, ”Part Of Me” und die aktuelle Single „Heaven“.

After taking time out from working together to focus on separate musical projects, maverick composer Alan Roberts (Jim Noir) and crowd-rousing vocalist Leonore Wheatley (International Teachers of Pop / The Soundcarriers) have re-joined forces to introduce Co-Pilot. Each the other’s wing person, they’re plotting an escape through Manchester’s claustrophobic grey skies with the pencil case colour of a hand-sewn multi-coloured primary school patchwork quilt. “We are both the creators in charge of navigating Co-Pilot’s overall sound which changes from track to track,” Leonore hints at what to expect. “There are about 6 different genres on one album, it's a pick n mix record!”


Happy in the haze of many boozy hours the album was recorded over just a few months whilst holed up and hanging out in Al’s city centre Dookstereo studio. The former Mill allowed the pair to relax, laugh and create without constraint. Armed with their original demos and vocal recordings from Al’s flat, they’d nip by the offie to pick up some Dutch courage before setting to work: building arrangements from a drum beat and basic chord pattern, the pair were so in tune they rarely spoke, allowing only the music to lead the way. “We’d communicate through nods of agreement or grimaces of dismay,” Leonore recalls. “Using the instruments with Al in production mode, we let the sound dictate the process whilst being drunk enough to follow it.”
The sound of life coming full circle after honing their separate crafts, Leonore had previously played keys and vocals in Jim Noir’s live band before moving on to front International Teachers of Pop for two critically lauded albums of joyous dancefloor filling bangers - their self-titled debut (2019) and Pop Gossip (2020). During that time Al would further expand Jim Noir’s universe with AM Jazz, which was celebrated as the no.1 album in Piccadilly Records’ ‘End of Year Review’ (2020), followed by the Deep View Blue E.P. (2021) cementing his status as one of Manchester’s finest songwriters.
As Leonore added her vocal magic to Al’s early demos of what would eventually become Co-Pilot’s ‘Spring Beach’ and a crooked original version of closing track ‘Corner House’, the vibe was prophetic “like the ending of Grease as Danny and Sandy take flight through the clouds”, letting their imaginations fly. The songs were the catalyst to spark a new phase of the pair working together, picking up where they left off. “From messing about with sounds during rehearsals in the very beginning it was always clear we liked the combination of sounds we made,” Leonore recalls.
Powered by a ‘try anything’ approach, Co-Pilot blends the musical DNA of what you’ve come to expect from each of the pair’s previous flight paths. “Whatever is switched on or nearby gets used. There's no 'correct' for us. If it sounds good, record it,” Al tells. United through typically turbulent wonky pop and lurking samples, whether culled from 70s TV themes or recreations of past and found sounds (see Al’s 60s tropicalia guitar on ‘Brick’, or the innocent ‘Swim to Sweden’ which opens with an ice cream van jingle Al recorded from his bedroom window) their process offers up a bucket load of Easter eggs. The album even features snippets from dearly departed pal Batfinks whilst ‘Motosaka’ is perhaps the most expensive 2-minutes on the album, featuring a Columbia Records Japan-cleared sample of Ryuichi Sakamoto’s ‘Thousand Knives’. Its synth squelches and Tom Tom Club funk also received the blessing of Haroumi Hosono, Godfather of Japanese Electronica, who agreed to being sampled in an original version of the song. “We just kept listening back and hitting gold,” Al recalls. “I was thinking ‘yeah, not sure what this is but I like it! We were buzzing with what we had made.”
But the sound wouldn’t come without self-imposed instrumental challenges. Thanks to an old mellotron sample on ‘Move To It,’ the moog riff and nautical accordion breaks on ‘Swim To Sweden’ and the 6/8 and 7/8 jaunt of ‘Brick’, time signatures were lovingly skewed to create Co-Pilot’s unique mood. “It was a bastard getting the drums right,” Leonore reveals, “but I like the wonkiness”. Levelling up through the lyrics, the words of smoky and evocative ‘She Walks In Beauty’ are based on a Lord Byron poem, with the sentiment of remembering Leonore’s late grandparents. “I wanted to see how much I could get away with just singing on one note, and how I could harmonically change everything else around it vocally,” she says. Elsewhere ‘Can You See’ was written from the perspective of a concerned sister to a brother which tells of keeping someone safe. “The lyrics are quite metaphorical about day-to-day happenings, people loved and lost. Others are rhythmic nonsense! It’s up to the listener to figure out what’s true.”
It’s clear from Al’s productive production techniques and Leonore’s knack for vocals and lyricism, Co-Pilot’s course is engineered by two aeronautically adept sonic storytellers. “We share a pretty similar sense of humour,” Al tells, “It is funny listening to this quite serious album but knowing we were giggling as we recorded it all. It’s been great to have another brain to bounce off.” Their destination might be unknown, but the clouds are about to part for a sound that is light years ahead. “You'll like at least one song,” Leonore suggests, “and hopefully them all.”

THE LEGENDARY 1980 ALBUM REMASTERED FROM THE ORIGINAL TAPES.
• 2LP SET WITH 12” X 12” BOOKLET.
• INLCUDES THE PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED ‘COMS 1-3 RDX SUITE’ (TAKEN FROM THE ‘COMMERCIAL
ALBUM’ MULTITRACK TAPES).
• PRODUCED WITH THE RESIDENTS AND THE CRYPTIC CORPORATION.
• THE SEVENTH IN A SERIES OF VINYL RE-ISSUES OF THE RESIDENTS’ CLASSIC 70S ALBUMS.
Formed in the early 1970s, The Residents have now been charting a unique path through the
musical landscape for 50 years. In celebration of that remarkable and unlikely anniversary, we
present an expanded vinyl edition of the classic 1980 LP ‘Commercial Album’.
Following almost a decade spent attempting to redefine what pop music could be, but with zero
hit singles to show for it, The Residents finally caved and produced their own pop music album as
the 80s dawned. But rather than have each song repeat the same minute of music three times as
per the traditional pop format, The Residents produced no less than 40 one-minute pop
masterpieces, and invited the listener to do the repeating bit themselves if they felt the need.
The resulting ‘Commercial Album’ both showcased the incredible depth of the group’s musical
palette and proved definitively that they could easily be as big as The Beatles if they wanted to.
Probably bigger, actually.
Featuring a breathless collage of toe-tappers, memorable melodies, instrumental experiments
and guest performers (Fred Frith, Chris Cutler and XTC’s Andy Partridge among them), the
record has since acquired legendary status among both fans and confused onlookers alike.
Alongside the original album, this 2LP edition presents the ‘COMS 1-3 RDX Suite’ – a brand new
interpretation of (almost) the entire album, produced by the group using the original multi-track
tapes – and a brand new sleevenote essay shedding new light on the album’s production.
‘Commercial Album’ is the latest in The Residents’ extensive ongoing pREServed series – expect
more throughout 2023 and 2024. Possibly even 2025 too, the way things are going.

Shapes of Rhythm is proud to present the self-titled debut LP of Turkish psychedelic pop from MLDVA & Çınar Timur. This record is a celebration of the classic music and culture typically of the 70s and 80s, but which also leans into western jazz funk and soul jazz moments. If you're into the Turkish music legends of the 70s and 80s such as Barış Manço and more recently Altın Gün or Derya Yıldırım & Grup Şimşek, you've come to the right place.

MLDVA were formed in Krakow, Poland in 2013 as a DJ and production outfit. Under the influence of Greek and Turkish folk and psych-rock music they began to transform into a band, taking up instruments including the Saz which is one of the most recognisable trademarks of the Turkish sound. Two years later in 2015 they invited Turkish instrumentalist Çınar Timur to join them and this completes the line up on their debut. This electric album is packed with excellently-recorded expansive tracks which are full of energy, psychedelic deep grooves, hard-hitting breakbeats and everything else you'd expect with classic Turkish sounds.

The instrumental double-header of Neşat Erkaş' Zülüf Dökülmüş Yüze, moving into the time-honoured traditional Kozan Dağıis the perfect opening track. The introduction is an overture of sorts with two minutes of Çınar Timur's pondering guitar. This tees up the record perfectly before heading into a break-beat driven workout with the band matching Çınar's evocative and energetic riffing. The result is a tight sound and a heavy groove that sets the tone for what's to come.

With the band unveiled, Sarı Çizmeli Mehmet Ağa, written by Barış Manço (a legend in Turkish popular music), hits a relaxed, deeper and more psychedelic groove, dominated by Wojciech Długosz's dreamy Rhodes piano, set against choppy wah-wah guitar licks that characterize that classic electric Turkish pop sound. We're introduced to Ulaş Çıbuk's vocals for the first time, telling the historic tale of a charitable village lord Mehmet Ağa from 19c Anatolia known for his generosity. He shared his fortune with people inneed and as a result, died penniless. This track also features the unique sound of Çınar's Mictrotonal electric guitar.

Bir Adım Öte is MLDVA & Çınar Timur's magnificent mellow moment, marking the halfway point in their debut. The group shows that it's not all about the frenetic in a nod to western Soul-Jazz constructs. They showcase restraint, emotion and that joy in repetition of a wonderful guitar refrain. Not content with holding this down, Wojciech Długosz's Rhodes solo steps into a world that's US-influenced Soul jazzand is a lesson in reduction and feeling. Çınar Timur then takes a solo turn, keeping it western-influenced with an on the spot improvisation. When the three minutes of solos are over, we're brought back out of thedream and towards the East again.

Adımız Miskindir Bizim kicks off like a hip hop/funk crossover tune, until the chord changes muscle in, to remind you where you are in the world. As with other tracks on the debut, the tune is marked by recurring motifs, this time from Çınar's microtonal electric guitar. We've more solo Rhodes action, thist ime busier and more urgent. The lyrics–originally written by Yunus Emre – criticizevalues such as holding grudges that destroy ideas of love, friendship and peace among people which causes hostility. Adımız Miskindir Bizim concludes with an uplifting vocal vamp which switches it up unlike any of thetracks on the LP.

In Fesupanallah– made most popular by Erkin Koray – Ulaş Çıbuk sings about the simple subject ofbeing patient with never ending problems in life, and trying to find a solution for them. This cut takes a rhythmical side-step to the rest of the album. The kick drum maps out a solid four-four, but the vocals and guitar lines move around it to impose Fesupanallah as being the record's most traditionally Turkish-sounding cut.

The album's closing track Ölüm Allah'ın Emri (another Manço classic) was recorded live in the band's more familiar surroundings of Krakow's Cheder Cafe during 2020's Jewish Culture Festival. The lyrics tell the tale of someone who has accepted death but cannot accept the separation that comes with it. We open with a dreamy, psychedelic mood before progressing into a heavy-riffing rock feeling with probing synths. Ulaş delivers his vocals over the top of a stripped back, shuffling groove. As the track progresses towards a frenetic conclusion, drummer Szymon Piotrowski cuts loose, combining with Grzegorz Dąbek's synth lines.

MLDVA & Çınar Timur's debut LP is not the sound of a band starting out. Taking time to hone their craft and let influences across the global spectrum of music mature, this is the result of years of jamming, gigging and collaborating. Now, after prestigious festival appearances and their place on Saz Power – an essential modern Turkish music compilation – they're making a lasting contribution to a rich, time-honored culture. MLDVA & Çınar Timur releases Friday 30 June 2023 on limited edition vinyl LP and digital download/streaming services on Shapes of Rhythm. Global distribution by Kudos Records.

Merging a dynamic curio of melodic guitars, disconcerting monologues and a rhythm section both technical and unruly, London’s Legss create a wholly unique and mesmerising sound. New EP Fester is a literary and disarmingly lyrical collection of art-rock songs laden with ideas and sun-licked beneath the bus smog of anxious skies.

Even when leaning into more melodic territory, there’s a pervasive uneasiness that underpins both the vocals and instrumentation. Just as you drift into the relaxing arpeggio flow, vocalist Ned Green’s soft soliloquy accelerates to an exasperated yelp and we’re jolted by discordant noise-rock stabs dragging us into Legss’ deliciously feverish and poetic world.

“The lyrics were written in the summer, when you’re sun-drunk and romantic, and the buses look like they’re kissing as they cross each other, and everyone’s got a cold sore. But beneath all the sunny games there’s a bittersweet desire to be someone or something else.” - Legss

Fresh from supporting the likes of Pom Poko and Hotel Lux, Legss release Fester via The State51 Conspiracy on 16th June. Pressed on 12” black vinyl in a sealed polybag liner.

"If you’ve ever wondered what Catharsis covering The 13th Floor Elevators might sound like, wonder no longer—and that’s only the start!" - Decibel Magazine GELD make their Relapse Records debut with their third full length, Currency // Castration! The Australian band distills a despairingly hellish vision of the world into a thundering crack to the temple through an unsparing fusion of hardcore’s bleakest violence with metal’s ruthless strength-through-conviction. GELD's abrasive take on the genre is distorted through a lense of fuzzed out psych soundscapes; vocals truly sound like unhinged barks, while guitars, bass, and drums crash against one another frenetically, each track burning brighter and brighter. Every moment of Currency // Castration is urgent. Tracks such as “Chained to a Gate” edge and scratch at a relief that is ultimately denied, toying with the nightmarish promise of a breakdown that never comes. Elsewhere, "Cut You Down" pulses with frantically itching riffs that stream forth. "Fog of War" snaps and snarls; while "Secret Prison" evinces the honed physique of Japanese hardcore fed through the broken brain of someone on a years-long Rrröööaaarrr-era Voivod spin-out. Despite the band's innovative approach to the genre, GELD makes no pretensions at being “interesting” for interesting’s sake - As vocalist Al Smith puts it, “One of the most boring things people can do is try to dress up what someone else has already contributed to a genre and make it ‘clever’… We’re more interested in finding our own position.” With Currency // Castration, GELD offers no promise of a higher purpose or resolve. Rather, they lean into dissociation, finding truth and meaning in the transcendental joy of simply escaping, surviving, existing.

Tim Brown and Donna McKean's legendary lost album "Evolver" is lost no
more! Out for the first time on vinyl, sparklingly remastered with bonus
session tracks, this Twentieth Anniversary edition of a psychedelic
masterpiece fills a crucial hole in the Lunchbox oeuvre
Recorded in the couple's 1990s Oakland basement between stays in Berlin, tour
dates in London, and dreamy sojourns up the rugged Mendocino coastline,
"Evolver" fuses jangle and jungle, ambient and dub into a striking pop statement.
Marrying refined songcraft to the serendipitous magic hidden in half-broken reelto- reel tape decks and vintage synthesizers, the LP plants its pop flag on the
terrain of magic and mystery. Dreamy jangle pop gems emerge seamlessly out of
a sea of loops, drones, and dubbed- out horn fanfares, cascades of tape echo
feedback and whispers from outer space providing a trance-inducing backdrop to
the pop sensibility for which Lunchbox is well- known. Hook- filled and hypnotic,
"Evolver" is a sublime slice of post-pop psychedelia that you won't want to miss.

Fuzzybrains' Debütalbum The Less I Know ist ein Indie Pop-Album, dem man die Spontaneität seiner Entstehung im besten Sinne anhört
The Less I Know ist der Titel von Fuzzybrains Debütalbum und auch beim Sound ist darauf weniger oft mehr. Dass das Album in den Wohnzimmern des Duos Amalia Hauser und Benjamin Steiger aufgenommen wurde ist aufgrund des eindringlich-klaren Klangs schon alleine technisch beeindruckend.

Noch mehr Spuren aber hinterlässt die dadurch entstandene intime Atmosphäre, die manchmal das Gefühl vermittelt, als würde man heimlich lauschen und den beiden unbemerkt über die Schulter schauen. Trotz der schwierigen Themen strahlen diese Songs Zuversicht aus, sie geben sich den Problemen, den Ängsten und Schwierigkeiten nicht hin, sondern möchten Wege zeigen, damit umzugehen.

The Ironsides have arrived. Changing Light is the first full-length effort from this masterful group of Bay Area musicians. It melds classic psych-soul sounds with sweeping orchestral arrangements - reminiscent of a cinematic soundtrack from a 60s European film. The Changing Light evokes strong imagery of an open road, a breathtaking view, and scenes of a vast landscape begging to be explored. Cruise up the coast, where sweeping orchestral arrangements rise and fall with the tide. As you head North, the countryside opens to an undeniable groove. Tremolo-soaked guitar tones grow on the vines, and timeless, soulful bass lines flow like wine. In higher altitudes, French horns and trumpets soar like eagles. A river below carries bellowing cello tones through a mountain pass into an expansive canyon. Down in the desert, fuzzed-out electric guitar cuts through the dry heat and leaves the listener thirsty for more. Plot a course, or just turn on the car and drive. Max recommends the latter. "The songs are inspired by landscapes - Each one could mean something to someone and create a completely different meaning for someone else." At the end of a long road, The Ironsides have found the perfect place to begin.

Nearly two years after the release of his last full-length offering California Poppy 2, Rexx Life Raj, returns with his latest album The Blue Hour. The 12-track project includes “Save Yourself,” “Jerry Curl,” “Beauty in the Madness,” and “Balance.” Guest appearances include Wale, Larry June, Russ, and Fireboy DML. According to the artist, “This album is about transition. This album is about grief. This album is about experiencing every emotion and not running from them. This past year and a half have been so insane that I could make another 20 albums about it. From losing my parents, to moving out of places I grew up in and made me who I am, all while trying to maintain some type of balance and sanity. I tried to be as honest and intentional with this project as possible. Creating it helped me in ways I can’t even explain. I pray it does the same for someone else.”

Crown the Empire haben sich in den letzten zehn Jahren kontinuierlich als eine Naturgewalt in der Rockwelt etabliert. Sie haben die Bühne mit Slipknot, A Day To Remember, Dance Gavin Dance, Black Veil Brides, Falling in Reverse, Underoath und vielen anderen geteilt.
Bis heute hat die Band vier Studioalben veröffentlicht und wurde von Alternative Press, Billboard, Kerrang!, Nylon, Rock Sound und anderen gelobt. Der beeindruckende Katalog hat ihnen 825M Streams weltweit eingebracht.
DOGMA, produziert und gemischt von Zach Jones (Fever 333, Poorstacy, Scene Queen, Nova Twins), ist ihr bisher vielfältigstes Album, das von Angst, existenzieller Identität, Isolation und Entschlossenheit geprägt ist und Features von Courtney LaPlante (Spiritbox) und Remington Leith (Palaye Royale) enthält. Um die Veröffentlichung zu feiern, wird Crown The Empire in diesem Frühjahr mit der texanischen Hard-Rock-Band Nothing More auf Tour gehen.

UK-based Grammy-winning producer and composer Tourist (William Phillips) returns with his new album 'Everyday' scheduled to be released early 2019. The album delivers outwardly facing chill-electronic tracks that connect with a listener and convey a human story through samples, sounds and melody. Tourist remarks on his new music, "I'm interested in exploring human themes through sound. Family, mental health, loss, love." 'Everyday' is a follow up to his 2016 debut album 'U' and 2017 Wash EP which earned him critical acclaim and a legion of tastemaker fans around the world. 'U' garnered support from outlets like NPR, Vice, Billboard and Rolling Stone Australia. The single 'Run' landed #1 on BBC Radio 1 Dance Chart. Soon followed by sold out shows across the UK, US and Australia including major festival plays at Glastonbury, Coachella and Bestival. The new album introduces Tourist in a new space and demonstrates his wide scope of artistry.

Tape
"And we"re coming out of dreams / And we"re coming back to dreams" is the first thing you hear Bill say as you remake your acquaintance on YTILAER. Right out the gate, he"s standing in two places at once: meeting up with old friends behind the scenes and encountering them on the record, finding himself coming round the bend and then again as someone else on down the line. Like the character actor he played on Gold Record, writing stories about other people, telling jokes about everyone, and in singing them, becoming the songs. "You do what you"ve got to do / To see the picture" Bill"s got a full band sound going on this one, with him and Matt Kinsey on guitars, Emmett Kelly on bass and backing vocals, Sarah Ann Phillips on B3, piano and backing vocals and Jim White on drums. Jim and Matt sing on one song, too, and some other singers come in, too. Bill plays some synth here and there, and Carl Smith drifts in and out of the picture with his contra alto clarinet, as do Mike St. Clair and Derek Phelps on brass. Somehow in between them all, you might think you hear the distant sound of a steel guitar. And you might - but you might not, too. In this company, Bill continues his journey, tunneling underneath the weathered exterior of what seems to be and into the more nuanced life everything takes on in the dark. With Bill"s voice making the extraordinary leaps and bounds that measure the lives of the songs, the band follow him through passages that seem to invent themselves; other times playing with deeply soulful grooves and/or desperate intensity, as these moments come and go. There"s nothing they can"t do. "I wrote this song in five and forever / I"m writing it right now" Bill sings on "Natural Information" - an admission of the everyday alchemy he"s forever trafficking in. Time passes, triangulating the encounters that went into any one record with two out of any three others, all of it made flesh, new constitution, in our stereo speakers. If every album is its own life, it stands to reason that they"re invariably passing in the night. Cascading images flowing from the stream of consciousness. Turning like pages from the journal, unspeakably personal, then suddenly become tall tales, like a book pulled off the shelf, completely unbound. Headlines flow through. Mirror images, mirthful ones. Bill"s lyrics strain at the lines on the page, not content to separate the printing of the fact from the myth or be confined to ink on paper. They want to fly free. And they do. "I realize now that dreams are real" On YTILAER"s inner sleeve, alongside his lyrics, Bill celebrates the "exhilaration and dread" of cover artist Paul Ryan"s paintings. Paul"s another one met up with again down the road, his indelible cover imagery on Apocalypse and Dream River now an axis of meaning in the Callahanian world - and in the bright colors found in these new images, a parallel to Bill"s recognitions here. "A breath of exquisite air as we come up from drowning", sounds like the desired hope for those hearing the songs of YTILAER.

A gorgeous and gripping portrait of Fenne's last two years, Big Picture was pieced together in an effort to self-soothe. Tracked live in co-producer Brad Cook's North Carolina studio, the album delineates the phases of love and becomes a map of comfort vs claustrophobia. Though its creation took place amid personal and global turmoil, the ruminative yet candid Big Picture is Fenne's most cohesive, resolute work to date, both lyrically and sonically. "This isn't a sad album _ it's about as uplifting as my way of doing things will allow," she says. "These songs explore worry and doubt and letting go, but those themes are framed brightly." With confidence and quiet strength, each track provides an insight into Fenne's ever-changing view of love and, ultimately, its redefinition _ love as a process, not something to be lost and found. While the album was written alone in Fenne's Bristol flat - a fact intentionally reflected in its compact sonic quality - Big Picture was transformed from a solitary venture into a unifying collaboration during the recording process when she was joined by her touring band, Melina Dutere of Jay Som (mixing), Christian Lee Hutson (guitar and co production), and Katy Kirby (vocals). Notably, these 10 songs are Fenne's first and only to have been written over the course of a relationship; 2018's On Hold and 2020's BREACH both confront the pain of retrospection, saying goodbye to a love that's gone. Big Picture does the exact opposite _ rooted firmly in the present, it traces the narrative of two people trying their hardest not to implode, together. "This album is an observation of the way I think about love, the selfexamination that comes with closeness and the responsibilities involved in being a big part of someone else's small(er) world," summarizes Fenne. "It was written in a place of relative emotional stability - stability that felt unstable because of its newness, but also because of the global context. 2020 was the year of letting go, but we'd all already let go of so much and nothing felt like mine anymore. Writing always did, though, so that's what I chose to do."

ULTRAMARINE VINYL

A gorgeous and gripping portrait of Fenne's last two years, Big Picture was pieced together in an effort to self-soothe. Tracked live in co-producer Brad Cook's North Carolina studio, the album delineates the phases of love and becomes a map of comfort vs claustrophobia. Though its creation took place amid personal and global turmoil, the ruminative yet candid Big Picture is Fenne's most cohesive, resolute work to date, both lyrically and sonically. "This isn't a sad album _ it's about as uplifting as my way of doing things will allow," she says. "These songs explore worry and doubt and letting go, but those themes are framed brightly." With confidence and quiet strength, each track provides an insight into Fenne's ever-changing view of love and, ultimately, its redefinition _ love as a process, not something to be lost and found. While the album was written alone in Fenne's Bristol flat - a fact intentionally reflected in its compact sonic quality - Big Picture was transformed from a solitary venture into a unifying collaboration during the recording process when she was joined by her touring band, Melina Dutere of Jay Som (mixing), Christian Lee Hutson (guitar and co production), and Katy Kirby (vocals). Notably, these 10 songs are Fenne's first and only to have been written over the course of a relationship; 2018's On Hold and 2020's BREACH both confront the pain of retrospection, saying goodbye to a love that's gone. Big Picture does the exact opposite _ rooted firmly in the present, it traces the narrative of two people trying their hardest not to implode, together. "This album is an observation of the way I think about love, the selfexamination that comes with closeness and the responsibilities involved in being a big part of someone else's small(er) world," summarizes Fenne. "It was written in a place of relative emotional stability - stability that felt unstable because of its newness, but also because of the global context. 2020 was the year of letting go, but we'd all already let go of so much and nothing felt like mine anymore. Writing always did, though, so that's what I chose to do."

Tape

A gorgeous and gripping portrait of Fenne's last two years, Big Picture was pieced together in an effort to self-soothe. Tracked live in co-producer Brad Cook's North Carolina studio, the album delineates the phases of love and becomes a map of comfort vs claustrophobia. Though its creation took place amid personal and global turmoil, the ruminative yet candid Big Picture is Fenne's most cohesive, resolute work to date, both lyrically and sonically. "This isn't a sad album _ it's about as uplifting as my way of doing things will allow," she says. "These songs explore worry and doubt and letting go, but those themes are framed brightly." With confidence and quiet strength, each track provides an insight into Fenne's ever-changing view of love and, ultimately, its redefinition _ love as a process, not something to be lost and found. While the album was written alone in Fenne's Bristol flat - a fact intentionally reflected in its compact sonic quality - Big Picture was transformed from a solitary venture into a unifying collaboration during the recording process when she was joined by her touring band, Melina Dutere of Jay Som (mixing), Christian Lee Hutson (guitar and co production), and Katy Kirby (vocals). Notably, these 10 songs are Fenne's first and only to have been written over the course of a relationship; 2018's On Hold and 2020's BREACH both confront the pain of retrospection, saying goodbye to a love that's gone. Big Picture does the exact opposite _ rooted firmly in the present, it traces the narrative of two people trying their hardest not to implode, together. "This album is an observation of the way I think about love, the selfexamination that comes with closeness and the responsibilities involved in being a big part of someone else's small(er) world," summarizes Fenne. "It was written in a place of relative emotional stability - stability that felt unstable because of its newness, but also because of the global context. 2020 was the year of letting go, but we'd all already let go of so much and nothing felt like mine anymore. Writing always did, though, so that's what I chose to do."

In his South London flat, James Howard gestures apologetically at the mess of books, lined A4 paper and stationary at his desk. “I butcher poetry for a living,” he explains, “It isn’t a pretty job, but someone has to do it.” This being 2022, every emerging musician needs a side-hustle to keep the house warm. In the daytime, our host writes study guides to help teachers teach poetry to pupils who would rather be elsewhere. “I make sure the poems are clinically dead by the time they reach the schools.”
An explanation punctuated by a mildly contrite shrug makes you want to lean forward and remind Howard about some of the stuff other people are doing for a living. And, more to the point, aren’t doing. Which brings us to the real matter at hand. For Howard, foregrounding his own songs hasn’t always come naturally. An enthusiastic collaborator, he made two well-received albums with his previous band Blue House and played with the likes of Rozi Plain, Alabaster dePlume and his wife Dana Gavanski, as well as running his own music night with Sam Tyler in London, Incredible Society. It’s important to mention these creative hook-ups because Howard feels that, in one way or another, they all helped to give form and shape to the lilting lunar lullabies that would ultimately comprise his ravishing solo debut Peek-A-Boo. 

Over the past 20 years, The New Pornographers have proven themselves one of the most excellent bands in indie rock. The group’s ninth album and first for Merge establishes them alongside modern luminaries like Yo La Tengo and Superchunk when it comes to their ability to evolve while still retaining what made them so special in the first place. A dazzling and intriguing collection of songs, Continue as a Guest finds bandleader A.C. Newman and his compatriots Neko Case, Kathryn Calder, John Collins, Todd Fancey, and Joe Seiders exploring fresh territory and shattering the barriers of their collective comfort zone. Newman began work on Continue as a Guest after the band had finished touring behind 2019’s In the Morse Code of Brake Lights. Themes of isolation and collapse bleed into this album, as Newman tackles the ambivalence of day-to-day life during the COVID-19 pandemic. But Newman says that Continue as a Guest’s title track also addresses the concerns that come with being in a band for so long. “The idea of continuing as a guest felt apropos to the times,” he explains. “Feeling out of place in culture, in society, being in a band that has been around for so long—not feeling like a part of any zeitgeist, but happy to be separate and living your simple life, your long fade-out.

Living in a secluded place in an isolated time, it felt like a positive form of acceptance: find your own little nowhere, find some space to fall apart, continue as a guest.” Newman discovered new vocal approaches within his own talent. There are new and rich tones to Newman’s voice throughout Continue as a Guest, from his dusky lower register over “Angelcover” to his slippery slide over the glimmering synths of “Firework in the Falling Snow,” to bold tones he embraces on the soaring “Bottle Episodes.”

Another sonic change comes courtesy of saxophonist Zach Djanikian, whose tenor and bass luxuriate all over Continue as a Guest’s alluring chassis, especially on the menacing build of “Pontius Pilate’s Home Movies.” Along with Newman’s usual collaborators, several songwriters contribute. The bursting opener and first single “Really Really Light” is a co-write with Dan Bejar (Destroyer, the New Pornographers). Then there’s “Firework in the Falling Snow,” a collaboration with Sadie Dupuis of Speedy Ortiz and Sad13. “I was feeling like I wanted some help, so I sent it to Sadie and she sent me back this complete song that had these great lyrics,” Newman says. “She included the line ‘A firework in the falling snow,’ and I was like, ‘Yeah, that’s great.’ Sometimes you need that one thing to center the song, and even though I only used a few lines of hers in the end, I couldn’t have finished it without her.”

Even as Newman embraces a collaborative spirit more than ever, Continue as a Guest is a testament to his ability to discover new artistic sides of himself. “I started out as a songwriter more than as a singer, but at some point, you have to sing your own songs,” he says with a chuckle. “For a long time, I felt like the idea of changing a song because I couldn’t hit a note wasn’t okay—I could just get someone else to sing it. But I’m learning now that my songs can actually be a lot more malleable than I thought.” And it’s in that spirit that Continue as a Guest sounds like a thrilling path forward for The New Pornographers, with songs that generate a contagious feeling of excitement for the future as well.

"And we"re coming out of dreams / And we"re coming back to dreams" is the first thing you hear Bill say as you remake your acquaintance on YTILAER. Right out the gate, he"s standing in two places at once: meeting up with old friends behind the scenes and encountering them on the record, finding himself coming round the bend and then again as someone else on down the line. Like the character actor he played on Gold Record, writing stories about other people, telling jokes about everyone, and in singing them, becoming the songs. "You do what you"ve got to do / To see the picture" Bill"s got a full band sound going on this one, with him and Matt Kinsey on guitars, Emmett Kelly on bass and backing vocals, Sarah Ann Phillips on B3, piano and backing vocals and Jim White on drums. Jim and Matt sing on one song, too, and some other singers come in, too. Bill plays some synth here and there, and Carl Smith drifts in and out of the picture with his contra alto clarinet, as do Mike St. Clair and Derek Phelps on brass. Somehow in between them all, you might think you hear the distant sound of a steel guitar. And you might - but you might not, too. In this company, Bill continues his journey, tunneling underneath the weathered exterior of what seems to be and into the more nuanced life everything takes on in the dark. With Bill"s voice making the extraordinary leaps and bounds that measure the lives of the songs, the band follow him through passages that seem to invent themselves; other times playing with deeply soulful grooves and/or desperate intensity, as these moments come and go. There"s nothing they can"t do. "I wrote this song in five and forever / I"m writing it right now" Bill sings on "Natural Information" - an admission of the everyday alchemy he"s forever trafficking in. Time passes, triangulating the encounters that went into any one record with two out of any three others, all of it made flesh, new constitution, in our stereo speakers. If every album is its own life, it stands to reason that they"re invariably passing in the night. Cascading images flowing from the stream of consciousness. Turning like pages from the journal, unspeakably personal, then suddenly become tall tales, like a book pulled off the shelf, completely unbound. Headlines flow through. Mirror images, mirthful ones. Bill"s lyrics strain at the lines on the page, not content to separate the printing of the fact from the myth or be confined to ink on paper. They want to fly free. And they do. "I realize now that dreams are real" On YTILAER"s inner sleeve, alongside his lyrics, Bill celebrates the "exhilaration and dread" of cover artist Paul Ryan"s paintings. Paul"s another one met up with again down the road, his indelible cover imagery on Apocalypse and Dream River now an axis of meaning in the Callahanian world - and in the bright colors found in these new images, a parallel to Bill"s recognitions here. "A breath of exquisite air as we come up from drowning", sounds like the desired hope for those hearing the songs of YTILAER.

The next EP on Blank Mind comes from DJ ojo. His first fully- fledged EP is the result of a mission to find balance between warmth and weirdness, structure and disorder; resulting in dripping, humid tracks with presence and a subtlety that holds sway well beyond the edge of the dancefloor.

From the crisp percussion, and elastikated synths that form ‘Coiled up’ to the furtive corridors of dubby drums and space of ‘Precise device’, there’s a staggering level of detail at work in ojo’s microcosms. Funkiness abounds in the accents on the grooves and the garnishes which quiver in and out, and quite
often you’ll hear motifs which call to mind something classic, but rendered wholly new. Take the steppas impressions drizzled into dislocated soundsystem flambé ‘Skip top’ on the B2 - a prime example of how to trigger a dopamine response without repeating someone else’s trick.

Let's go back to Italy with the dynamic duo Marvin & Guy aka Alessandro Parlatore and Marcello Giordani.

On their first release for Live At Robert Johnson they team up with another dynamic duo: Hard Ton - and you guessed right, they're Italian too.

So what else to expect than some real cool contemporary Italo Disco just in time for summer? »Save Me« comes in two different mixes: The »Disco Mix« and the »Club Mix« - both featuring the marvelous falsetto voice of Hard Ton's singer Max - himself quite a passionate singer in the field of Heavy Metal - AND Disco - yes, you heard right. But fear not, the Heavy Metal part isn't audible at all. We're talking Hi-NRG sounds galore and of course D.I.S.C.O. - the Munich style disco of someone like Giorgio Moroder doing his thing with Donna Summer or Harvey Fuqua's and Patrick Cowley's work with LGBT legend Sylvester - yes, the »You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)« Sylvester. Not a bad company to get name-dropped, right?

Especially the »Disco Mix« of »Save Me« features many of those typical sounds of said producers and is a beautiful tribute to the golden disco era. The slightly darker »Club Mix« does a great job too by pulling all dancers straight onto the floor with its drum machine generated bass drum and its euphoric claps.

Marvin & Guy's solo track, the aptly named »Supported By Your Favourite DJ« will surely be supported by everyone of our favourite DJs: It's a happy and positive track which definitely will not fail as a secret weapon in everybody's DJ bag.

Now let's get saved by Marvin & Guy - and let's support the Italian scene - it's mighty real!

Tricky is back. Back with a new studio album, False Idols, and his own label (also bearing the False Idols name), but also back in a personal sense. I was lost for ages, he says. I was trying to prove something to people, trying to do something to please other people and also myself at the same time, which is never going to work. To be honest with you, Ive been floating around since Chris Blackwell and Island. My last two albums, I thought they were good, but I realise now they werent. This album is about me finding myself again.
It opens with a cover of a Van Morrison song, Somebodys Sins, which sees Tricky and vocalist Francesca Belmonte whispering Jesus died for somebodys sins, but not mine over a sparse groaning bass. The lead single Parenthesis, which features a vocals from Peter Silberman of The Antlers, has more rhythmic grunt, which gives a different dimension to the dark gothic atmosphere that pervades the record. No-one does this kind of thing better.
The resemblance to Maxinquaye is undeniable, though the material on False Idols is gentler; more mature. Many of the songs feature artists signed to Trickys new label, including 24-year Londoner Francesca Belmonte and Fifi Rong. The album also includes collaborations with Nigeria's new global star Nneka, the afore-mentioned Peter Silberman. In the months before the albums release, False Idols will also release an EP "Matter of Time" showcasing the labels roster on new non-album material produced by Tricky.
Why the name False Idols Because theres so much bollocks going on at the moment mate, Tricky fires back. People follow celebrities and read every little thing they do. Its living vicariously through someone else. Get your own life. All this stuff is false idols. In this new album Ill stand behind every track, Tricky says. I dont care whether people like it. Im doing what I want to do, which is what I did with my first record. Thats what made me who I was in the beginning. If people dont like it, it dont matter to me because Im back where I was.

"Hello It’s Me" sings Signe Marie Rustad in her crystal clear, inimitable voice. And with that, she’s back, three years after the release of her successful third album, When Words Flew Freely. The above lyric is taken from a song bearing the same name, the first single off Rustad’s fourth album, Particles of Faith. Known for her poetic lyrics and vivid songwriting, and backed by a tight knit band that’s been with her for years, Rustad’s new album offers a natural transition from the already classic When Words Flew Freely (WWFF). However, Particles of Faith also brings something completely new and fresh. WWFF presented a broader, organic and piano-driven Laurel Canyon-sound, and less of the americana sound present on Rustad’s first two releases. Particles of Faith is harder to place in any genre, other than in the broader singer-songwriter tradition, helmed by pioneers such as Joni Mitchell and Carole King. But Rustad also points to a host of other inspirations. Alternative pop/rock from the 80’s and 90’s have always been a big influence on Rustad, and on Particles of Faith, this is more evident than ever. R.E.M., Fiona Apple, Crowded House and Tori Amos were important components both in the artist’s record collection and on her TV screen via MTV. Seeing as this era was also the golden age of the saxophone, it was only natural to include a three-minute-long sax solo, courtesy of acclaimed Norwegian jazz musician Harald Lassen – a solo that “made me cry” says Rustad. The album is produced by Rustad along with indie pop hero Kenneth Ishak. “This is the music coursing through my veins,” says Rustad about the album. Rustad has been critically acclaimed ever since her 2012 debut, but with WWFF, things really took off. Rave reviews, inclusion on several year-end lists, live performance on Norway’s biggest talk show and a booking to Norway’s biggest festival followed the release. The album was awarded a Spellemann award (Norwegian Grammy) for lyricist of the year. After widespread touring since the fall of 2019, Rustad’s performance on Øyafestivalen’s main stage in August 2022, marked the wrap up of the WWFF project, while it simultaneously introduced the next chapter, announcing the new album with the performance of two new songs. The songs on the album are snapshots from a life, and “particles of faith” refers to keeping the faith in yourself, love, the people around you and the world in general throughout everything that you endure in life. It can be a kind of strength that you may think comes from the outside, but is actually found inside of us.

"Hello It’s Me" sings Signe Marie Rustad in her crystal clear, inimitable voice. And with that, she’s back, three years after the release of her successful third album, When Words Flew Freely. The above lyric is taken from a song bearing the same name, the first single off Rustad’s fourth album, Particles of Faith.

Known for her poetic lyrics and vivid songwriting, and backed by a tight knit band that’s been with her for years, Rustad’s new album offers a natural transition from the already classic When Words Flew Freely (WWFF). However, Particles of Faith also brings something completely new and fresh.

WWFF presented a broader, organic and piano-driven Laurel Canyon-sound, and less of the americana sound present on Rustad’s first two releases. Particles of Faith is harder to place in any genre, other than in the broader singer-songwriter tradition, helmed by pioneers such as Joni Mitchell and Carole King. But Rustad also points to a host of other inspirations.

Alternative pop/rock from the 80’s and 90’s have always been a big influence on Rustad, and on Particles of Faith, this is more evident than ever. R.E.M., Fiona Apple, Crowded House and Tori Amos were important components both in the artist’s record collection and on her TV screen via MTV. Seeing as this era was also the golden age of the saxophone, it was only natural to include a three-minute-long sax solo, courtesy of acclaimed Norwegian jazz musician Harald Lassen – a solo that “made me cry” says Rustad. The album is produced by Rustad along with indie pop hero Kenneth Ishak. “This is the music coursing through my veins,” says Rustad about the album.

Rustad has been critically acclaimed ever since her 2012 debut, but with WWFF, things really took off. Rave reviews, inclusion on several year-end lists, live performance on Norway’s biggest talk show and a booking to Norway’s biggest festival followed the release. The album was awarded a Spellemann award (Norwegian Grammy) for lyricist of the year. After widespread touring since the fall of 2019, Rustad’s performance on Øyafestivalen’s main stage in August 2022, marked the wrap up of the WWFF project, while it simultaneously introduced the next chapter, announcing the new album with the performance of two new songs.

The songs on the album are snapshots from a life, and “particles of faith” refers to keeping the faith in yourself, love, the people around you and the world in general throughout everything that you endure in life. It can be a kind of strength that you may think comes from the outside, but is actually found inside of us.

Called a "slow-burning vocal-house juggernaut," and an "invigorating artist's artist," BRANDON has put together a collection of tracks featuring some of the genre's best producers, such as Chicago scene founders DERRICK CARTER & ANTHONY NICHOLSON.