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Near the end of fifth grade, Eli Edwards’ mom gave him $20 and told him to go find a friend. His team had won its soccer game that day, so they were out celebrating at a local pizza parlor with games. But, more importantly, there had been one other Black kid that day on the pitch in Spanaway, WA, a Tacoma suburb and military-base town at the rainy northwest corner of the United States. That kid just happened to be Xayvien Young. An instant deep connection was formed between Edwards and Young—Eli and Xay, as they prefer to be called were inseparable— and now twelve years later they are the electrifying, boundary-skipping duo Casi.

Along the way, Eli had relocated to Los Angeles with the indie rock band Enumclaw he had helped found, but he found himself flying home maybe a little too much. He was ostensibly visiting his girlfriend, but he spent most of his time with Xay. They cut tracks in every bit of free time they found until they had an epiphany: Maybe this music they’d made together for a dozen years was actually something special. Casi’s 10-track, self-titled debut out on Carpark Records is the electrifying proof they needed.

On the record, they enthusiastically explore every musical interest they have ever had—explosive hip-hop and unbridled hardcore, high-gloss nü metal and a little bit of emo—as a pair. These songs don’t ignore genre lines; they delight in destroying them, in finding ways to slam hip-hop and hardcore, emo and nü metal together until it seems illogical that they were ever apart. Take “Jumper,” where heavy metal guitars and face-kicking drums stir the moshpit for rabid verses about crushing ICE and the lessons you learn riding the poverty line. And take closer “Bridges,” where the melodic imprint of Deftones meets the relentless confessions of Death Grips. Here are the hard, funny, and loud stories of two 23-year-olds, screaming about the world over a breathless composite of all the music they’ve ever loved.

When Eli was in Los Angeles, Xay missed his friend. But in his absence, he also felt the spark of inspiration. Music was something that had just been their childhood hobby, but now Eli was in a rock band that had press accolades and tours. He got serious about the craft. Eli would write about the dislocation and isolation he felt in California, while Xay would document the hardships of being a young Black man with a complicated family while working menial jobs in Spanaway.

This isn’t a coming-of-age album for Casi; it is, instead, a raw and riveting snapshot of that process, painful as it can be. “Eleven87” is a breakup song, a soul beat springing beneath arching emo vocals. And “Intrusive Thoughts” treats that topic like a punching bag, Eli and Xav fighting against the mental habits that keep them down. These 10 songs instantly close that gap.

Mr. K’s latest is a sureshot double-sider with two much-loved classics given the exclusive treatment from the edit master.

The Shades Of Love, a powerhouse female vocal trio led by the sensational Meli’sa Morgan, dropped an absolute boogie bombshell in 1982 on their first collaboration with superproducer Patrick Adams. ‘Body To Body’ has an easy midtempo swing that’s perfect for a dancefloor (or roller rink!) with a chunky bass line and crisp claps pushing things along, giving Morgan’s sultry vocals the perfect springboard. Previously only available as a 7-inch on obscure Dutch and Brazilian pressings… but that was a remix version, this custom edit by Mr. K is from the version Larry Levan made famous at the Paradise Garage, a welcome addition to any dance 45s crate.

Taking things back to the early days of disco music, Crown Heights Affair provide a shimmering slice of uplifting magic on ‘Dreaming a Dream’. Originally an instrumental break of a vocal song, this wordless take became a hit in its own right when it was released as a single in 1975. That famed version, however, sadly ends far too early. The magnificent waves of sparkling keys, rushing

Irgendwann um das Jahr 2024 tauchte Vorhex Angel scheinbar aus dem Nichts auf: keine Social-Media-Präsenz, keine Identitäten, lediglich ihr Name tauchte hier und da auf einem Flyer in Nashville oder New Orleans auf. Wer neugierig genug war, um ihre Live-Show zu besuchen, konnte mit einer Vielzahl unerwarteter Dinge konfrontiert werden, die die Sinne anregten: aufwendige Bühnenbilder, Stroboskoplichter (oder alternativ völlige Dunkelheit), brennende Gegenstände, vor dem Auftritt eingenommene Rauschmittel. Die Musik bei diesen Auftritten passte zu dem Mysterium. Sie war laut, unberechenbar und verdammt viszeral. Wenn die beiden Live-Veröffentlichungen der Gruppe und ihr Debüt ,Heavenly" tatsächlich viszeral sind (Raven Sings the Blues nannte sie ja ,Erben des Strudels von High Rise"), dann ist der Nachfolger ,Drain" sicherlich ihr intellektuelles Werk. Seine sieben Tracks führen den Hörer vom Morgen bis zur Nacht, ein weitläufiges experimentelles Doppelalbum mit überlebensgroßen Gitarrensoli, spacigen Drone-Exkursionen und Momenten von kraftvoller Intensität durch das gesamte Werk. Zum ersten Mal sehen wir, wie Vorhex Angel ihren hämmernden Klangangriff gegen stimmungsvolle und dramatischere Gefilde eintauschen. Die Band - bestehend aus den Brüdern Jake und Jamin Orrall von JEFF the Brotherhood und Kunal Prakash von Silver Synthetic - erweitert die Grenzen des Vorhex-Angel-Konzepts, lädt neue Musiker in ihren Kreis ein, geht mehr Risiken ein und erntet dafür umso mehr. ,Drain ist keine Musik, die man im Hintergrund beim Kochen laufen lässt", warnt Kunal, bevor er zwinkert: ,Vielleicht ist sie etwas für besonders abenteuerlustige Köche." Vorhex Angel verspricht, dass noch mehr kommen wird. Mehr Jams, mehr unerwartete Wendungen - allein in diesem Jahr können wir mindestens eine Tour und mindestens zwei (!) weitere Alben erwarten. Vorerst gibt es ,Drain" zu feiern, sich damit auseinanderzusetzen, damit der Hörer wie die Musik selbst ein- und ausatmen kann, mit reichlich Raum für gedankliche Kontemplation. SPA Sometime around 2024, Vorhex Angel emerged seemingly out of the ether: no social media presence, no identities, simply their name popping up in Nashville or New Orleans on a flyer here and there. Those with enough curiosity to attend their live show could be met with any number of unexpected things to spike the senses: elaborate stage dressing, strobe lights (alternatively, complete darkness), burning things, pre-performance ingestibles. The music at those functions matched the mystery. They were loud, unhinged, and visceral as all hell. If the group's two live releases and debut Heavenly are indeed visceral (Raven Sings the Blues did name them "heirs to the maelstrom of High Rise"), then followup Drain is surely their cerebral offering. Its seven tracks guide the listener from morning to night, a sprawling experimental double album with larger than life guitar solos, spaced-out drone excursions, and moments of potent intensity throughout. For the first time, we see Vorhex Angel trade their pummeling sonic onslaught for moody and more dramatic pastures. The band-revealed to be brothers Jake and Jamin Orrall of JEFF the Brotherhood and Silver Synthetic's Kunal Prakash-push the parameters of the Vorhex Angel concept outward, inviting new players into their circle, adding more risk and generating more reward. "Drain is not in-the-background cooking-type music," warns Kunal, before winking: "Maybe it is for particularly adventurous chefs." Vorhex Angel promises there will be more. More jams, more left turns-just this year, we can expect at least one tour and at least two (!) more albums. For now, there is Drain to celebrate, to sit and chew on, to allow the listener to breathe out and in like the music does, with ample room for cerebral contemplation.

Erstauflage als "Sparkle Starlight Vinyl" 2LP mit Etching auf der vierten Seite. Im technischen Sinne war jedes bisherige Album des französischen Trios SLIFT eine Fantasie - ein Mix aus Genres und Formen, der es der Band ermöglichte, zu improvisieren und so lange zu jammen, bis sie sich scheinbar gemeinsam ins All zu winden schienen. Ihr gefeiertes drittes Album, "Ilion" aus dem Jahr 2024, war eine Science-Fiction-Geschichte, aufgebaut aus 10- bis 13-minütigen explorativen Eskapaden, die oft mit Doom Metal oder Stoner Rock begannen, bevor sie sich frei in glorreiche instrumentale Vergessenheit drehten. Doch mit einer gewissen absichtlichen Ironie heißt SLIFTs viertes Album tatsächlich "Fantasia". Es ist ihr bisher schlankstes und direktestes Album. Es ist auch ihr bisher fesselndstes Album, eine pointierte Saga über die Überwindung internationaler Umbrüche, vorgetragen von einer Band, die mit voller Kraft vorangeht und dabei keine einzige Sekunde verschwendet. Obwohl nur Jean und Bassist Rémi Fossat verwandt sind, ist SLIFT im Grunde eine Band von Brüdern. Mit Schlagzeuger Canek Flores sind sie schon seit der Highschool befreundet, und 2026 markiert ein Jahrzehnt zusammen in diesem Trio. Sie proben mit religiöser Regelmäßigkeit in einem Keller auf dem Land in der Nähe von Toulouse, in dem Jam-Raum, in dem sie schon lange ihrer Vorliebe für langatmige Wunder frönen. Für die Albumaufnahmen zu "Fantasia" überquerten sie die französische Nordgrenze nach Belgien, um in dem riesigen Live-Raum der Daft Studios ein kompaktes Set aus schlanken, agilen und druckvollen Songs aufzunehmen. Die vielfältigen Einflüsse der Band sind offensichtlich: Das Album erinnert an Clutch in voller Wildheit, John Coltrane, Charlie Parker, den sowjetischen Schriftsteller Michail Bulgakow, Pink Floyd und Black Sabbath aus der "Master of Reality"-Ära. Und das klangliche Gewebe wird durch das gekonnte Mixing von Kurt Ballou (Converge, Cave In, High on Fire) unterstützt. Den Songs fehlt es nicht an der Komplexität oder Intensität, die SLIFT zu einem aufstrebenden Star der Heavy-Musik gemacht haben; sie haben einfach neue Wege gefunden, die Komplexität ihrer Vergangenheit in jedes Stück einzuflechten, wie ein Wandteppich, der jedes Mal, wenn man hinschaut, eine neue Ebene offenbart. Damit vermitteln sie eine bestätigende und dringliche Botschaft: Gemeinsam können wir die Zeiten, in denen wir leben, noch immer verändern. Heutzutage ist es furchtbar leicht, sich machtlos zu fühlen. SLIFT setzt sich auf "Fantasia" direkt mit dem modernen Ansturm von Grausamkeit und Absurdität auseinander, sei es die Gleichgültigkeit gegenüber unserem Heimatplaneten oder zueinander. Aber in diesen acht Songs geht es darum, auf eine verborgene Kraft zu vertrauen, um zurückzuschlagen, um an eine Welt zu glauben, in der etwas, das wir noch nicht in Worte fassen oder definieren können, nicht nur einen Weg bietet, den Status quo zu durchbrechen, sondern ihn vielleicht sogar vollständig zu zerstören. SLIFT sind laut, heavy und aggressiv in diesen Hymnen. Sie bereiten sich auf einen Kampf vor, von dem sie glauben, dass wir ihn noch gewinnen können.

Soul Jazz Records celebrate 25 years of working in partnership with Studio One with brand new editions of FIVE of their bestselling CLASSIC Studio One collections all released on limitededition one-off pressing coloured double vinyl. Also available in new limited-edition card wallet CD editions. The new edition featured albums are Studio One Funk, Studio One Dub, Studio One Ska, Studio One Roots and Studio One Classics. Studio One Roots set the standard for Soul Jazz Records’ long-standing series and features many of the classic artists from Clement 'Sir Coxsone’ Dodd’s mighty roster of reggae. This album includes Freddie McGregor, Willie Williams, Cornell Campbell, Alton Ellis, Devon Russell alongside some of the defining in-house groups of Jamaican reggae history - The Sound Dimension, Brentford All-Stars, The Skatalites, New Establishment and more. The album is filled with a mixture of seminal cuts and super-rarities from the vast vaults of 13 Brentford Road.

Stand-out tracks include Alton Ellis’s ‘Blackish White’, a surreal and powerful Afro-centric dream, Count Ossie’s Rastafarian drummers’ genre-defying interpretation of Booker T and The MGs ‘Meditation’, Willie Williams aweinspiring versioning of the Skatalites' seminal Rastafari anthem ‘Addis Ababa’ and many, many more. Original sleevenotes by Lloyd Bradley (author of When Reggae Was King), compiled by Mark Ainley (Honest Jons), high-quality Soul Jazz mastering, wicked images of Count Ossie and the Mystic Revelation of Rastafari on the cover, and a rare image of Clement Dodd and musicians inside the studio at Studio One on the full colour inner sleeves. “There isn't a weak number across these 16 tracks, from the Gaylads’ ode to ‘Africa’ and Devon Russell's version of the heavyweight ‘Drum Song’ rhythm, to stunning instrumentals such as Jackie Mittoo and the Cyclones with nyahbinghi drummer Count Ossie on ‘Meditation’, Lenny Hibbert’s sparkling vibe work over Mittoo's ‘Ghetto Organ’ and The Sound Dimension’s ‘Congo Rock.” Pitchfork “The music of this compilation is of a rare, rare beauty and is essential to anyone's reggae collection.” All Music

Debut vinyl release from San Francisco indie pop trio The Kitchenettes. After a quietly beloved 2024 demos tape, The Kitchenettes return with their first vinyl release: a sparkling three-song 7" that updates the timeless indie pop template of Marine Girls, The Cat's Miaow, and Lois for 2026. Across the three tracks, the band moves gracefully between tender, jangling pop and brighter, upbeat moments, revealing an impressive range of mood, tempo, and texture. Formed by Morgan (The Umbrellas, Telephone Numbers) with Emily and Sequoia (The Snogs),writing collaboratively and trading vocal duties, the band crafts effortlessly charming indie pop built on jangly guitars, loose harmonies, and a homespun DIY spirit. Short, sweet, and full of heart, it's a perfect introduction to one of San Francisco's most charming new indie pop groups.

2026 repress of classic fifth album by U.K. Psychobilly legends DEMENTED ARE GO! Originally released in 1993 on FURY RECORDS / U.K.! Spark "Douche" Retard - Screaming and Ranting * Antenormous "The Horse" - Death Beat and Keyboards * Lightning Lex Luther - "Geetar" And Distortions * Gray Boy "Get Off My Land" Grant - Big Bass Fiddle More classick (sic) DEMENTED ARE GO! This time around "Tangenital Madness On A Pleasant Side Of Hell", the Demon Ted's rumbling full-length from 1993 on Fury Records UK! Filled with thrill killers, "Tangenital Madness On A Pleasant Side Of Hell" is definitely one of the best 90's DEMENTED ARE GO records that was recorded, with hits such as "Brand New Corpse", "Mongoloid", "Zombie Stalk" and "Queen Of Disease". Sick! Sick! Sick! Black vinyl LP w/ printed inlay.

2026 repress of classic fourth album by U.K. Psychobilly legends DEMENTED ARE GO! Originally released in 1991 on FURY RECORDS / U.K.! Mark 'Sparky' Phillips - vocals * Antanoid 'Horseman' Thomas - drums * Lex 'Luther Boy Wonder' - Guitar * Billy 'Space Cadet' Munster - Slap bass Initially released by the legendary rockabilly / psychobilly label Fury Records in 1991, DEMENTED ARE GO's "Orgasmic Nightmare" is brought back to life again for all you cellar beasts and demon angels! Twelve tracks of 100% psychobilly mayhem for all you stompers and wreckers out there! Classic (black vinyl here)!

2026 repress of classic fifth album by U.K. Psychobilly legends DEMENTED ARE GO! Originally released in 1993 on FURY RECORDS / U.K.! Spark "Douche" Retard - Screaming and Ranting * Antenormous "The Horse" - Death Beat and Keyboards * Lightning Lex Luther - "Geetar" And Distortions * Gray Boy "Get Off My Land" Grant - Big Bass Fiddle More classick (sic) DEMENTED ARE GO! This time around "Tangenital Madness On A Pleasant Side Of Hell", the Demon Ted's rumbling full-length from 1993 on Fury Records UK! Filled with thrill killers, "Tangenital Madness On A Pleasant Side Of Hell" is definitely one of the best 90's DEMENTED ARE GO records that was recorded, with hits such as "Brand New Corpse", "Mongoloid", "Zombie Stalk" and "Queen Of Disease". Sick! Sick! Sick! Black vinyl LP w/ printed inlay.

2026 repress of classic fourth album by U.K. Psychobilly legends DEMENTED ARE GO! Originally released in 1991 on FURY RECORDS / U.K.! Mark 'Sparky' Phillips - vocals * Antanoid 'Horseman' Thomas - drums * Lex 'Luther Boy Wonder' - Guitar * Billy 'Space Cadet' Munster - Slap bass Initially released by the legendary rockabilly / psychobilly label Fury Records in 1991, DEMENTED ARE GO's "Orgasmic Nightmare" is brought back to life again for all you cellar beasts and demon angels! Twelve tracks of 100% psychobilly mayhem for all you stompers and wreckers out there! Classic (black vinyl here)!

On her second album, Sawt El Doumouh (The Sound of Tears), Beirut-based Sandy Chamoun summons flickers of light from sadness. Influences from the Arabic tradition of Tarab – one of the first styles Chamoun learnt to sing – and polyphonic Cantu are reinterpreted and reimagined through her voice and electronics, synths from her SANAM and Ghadr bandmate Anthony Sayhoun, and live percussion from Ali Hout.
Marked by its times, the record isn’t what Chamoun had planned. “I wrote the lyrics between October 2023 and September 2025,” she explains. “The plan was to write about nature, since the album’s concept was inspired by Cantu, a tenor Sardinian ritual that celebrates humanity’s victory over nature. I intended to visit several places and regions in Lebanon and write a track for each, but after the genocide and the war in Lebanon, everything changed.”
“I chose the title because many mornings during this period I woke up crying silently. I remember a dark story from school: a teacher yelled at a small boy while he was crying and told him to cry without making any sound. I feel we are still living in that condition in the region — forced to die or suffer without making any noise.”
Sawt El Doumouh is a gorgeous refusal to be silent. It opens with a booming drum. Over keening autotune Chamoun’s pure voice cuts through, burying the despair to illuminate rays of hope. On “Ward W Shok” a shuffling swing gives way to a righteous organ interlude. The title track sees a choir of Chamoun’s vocals lull and lap. Drums arrive and indignation stirs, what’s mournful begins to stride.
Chamoun’s tracks are as beautiful as they are defiant. Why write songs in the face of horror? Perhaps because music can hold onto something better. By turning to song, Chamoun catches the hopeful glints and sparks that persist and strive outside the terror. In SANAM and Ghadr she often borrows lyrics from Arabic writers through the centuries, listening to what their words say in the present while reminding us the world can and has been different to how it is now. Solo she writes her own words, and the way her songs alternately soar and sigh evokes hopeful pluralities and suggestions of other, kinder realities. Even hearing someone cry is a connection to humanity.
It’s a possibility conveyed in the album’s most jubilant moments. “Shahed” is an incandescent dance of percussion and levitating synths. “I wrote it after I saw a photo of a small boy on a horse on the beach in Gaza,” Chamoun recalls. “I imagined a fantasy where the boy lives in the water and watches the terrifying reality on the shore, trying to bring water to put out the fire. Shahed is the witness who lives far from the shore, enjoying the water and trying to help. You can hear this duality: the percussion is desert-like, while the vocals and synths evoke the feeling of water.”
Although it comes from darkness, in Chamoun’s music we can hear faith in something beyond it.

"It's about being really ambitious, and seeing enhanced beauty in the world, and knowing that seeing things in that way isn't unrealistic," she continues. "It's about striving for that ultimate freedom." Recorded in a joyful stay at Wales' residential StudiOwz, 'Tell Me It's A Dream' rings with the audible fizz of friends hanging out and having fun. Though many of its lyrics began during a complicated time for Walton, the record itself is a testament to choosing life and pleasure and the people that make it all worthwhile. "A lot of the record is about stretching outwards and acknowledging how far love can take you; about expressing how I feel about the people I love through music in ways that words can't," she says. "It was important to capture that lightness from the recording, because that spirit is in a lot of the songs." Frequently euphoric and brightly emotional, the songs themselves aim heavenwards. 'Heart To Heartbreak' cracks through the clouds of a break up, taking influence from emotionally-rich bands like The Cure and Prefab Sprout to translate the feeling at its core. "This is a song about feeling like everything in your life has shattered but realising that relationship was holding you back and the world is opening up," she says. "I wanted this song to feel really visual, like things are starting to sparkle and look colourful again.

Re-Release auf clear, purple marbled Vinyl.

Personified, reinvigorated, and re-imagined!

Tech-metal outfit FALLUJAH expand horizons and solidify their position as one of America’s most exciting artists on their new album, Xenotaph, through Nuclear Blast. The Bay Area-based quintet’s confidence in the lineup that made their previous album, Empyrean (2022), such a resounding success—earning high marks from Metal Injection, New Noise, and Guitar World—has been reconfigured slightly, with guitarist Sam Mooradian (INHALE EXISTENCE, SAM MOORADIAN) and drummer Kevin Alexander (DISEMBODIED TYRANT. BROUGHT BY PAIN) bringing their jaw-dropping musical proficiency to the fold, as vocalist Kyle Schaefer, guitarist Scott Carstairs, and bassist Evan Brewer enter a new chapter with FALLUJAH. Moored by singles ‘Kaleidoscopic Waves,’ ‘Labyrinth of Stone,’ and ‘Step Through the Portal and Breathe,’ Xenotaph is FALLUJAH personified, reinvigorated, and re-imagined.
As a details-oriented record Xenotaph benefits from moments of low tension, atmospheric delight, and Schaefer’s winged clean vocals. This
dynamic isn’t particularly new to Fallujah, but the group spent considerable time honing what each song needed—from blast-laden speed runs and jazz-fusion solos to vocal restraint and brutality—which resulted in a brighter, more exhilarating experience. Musically, it truly feels like the listener is embroiled in the album’s sci-fi concept and Peter Mohrbacher’s stunning cosmogonic cover art, which is aesthetically in line with his previous covers (Dreamless and Empyrean) for FALLUJAH. Close encounters with ‘Step Through the Portal and Breathe’, ‘Labyrinth of Stone,’ and ‘Kaleidoscopic Waves’ spark wonder and stimulate the soul.

Full colour sleeve with rare use of the Italian only movie artwork.

A few years ago I issued the soundtrack to Virgin Witch, the score to an underground 1971
kinky British London / posh stately home horror that seemed more like an excuse to show as
many racy cars and devilish nude scenes as possible. This fleapit film was written by Hazel
Adair - the writer of legendary long-running TV series Crossroads, and her business partner at
the time Ken Walton (yes, the wrestling commentator). Virgin Witch was cheap and successful
enough to allow the whole team another go at the sexploitation game through their newly
formed production company Pyramid Films. Sex Clinic was the quick follow up; I say Sex Clinic,
the initial cinematic title was Clinic Xclusive, which was also called With These Hands, which
was also called La Masseuse Perverse. This film also came out in 1971 and they used the
musical services of Ted Dicks once again. Dicks had originally met Adair in 1960 through a cast
member performing in his first musical, Look Who’s Here.

If you are not aware of the great Ted Dicks, his quick bio reads as follows: born London 1928,
was educated through both grammar and art school and after National Service flirted with both
art and music. He worked with a series of very talented song writers - including Barry Cryer -
finally sparking properly with writer Myles Rudge. Together “Dicks and Rudge” had a hit with
their musical And Another Thing which starred Lionel Blair and Bernard Cribbins. Their talents
were spotted by producer George Martin and they followed this show success up with a series
of truly classic novelty pop chart hits, again with Cribbins - “Hole In The Ground” and “Right Said
Fred”. If you are not aware of the classic A Combination Of Cribbins LP they wrote, go and find
it. It includes “Gossip Calypso”, a triumph of novelty song writing that somehow manages to
squeeze in the lyric “Oxy-aceteline welder”, and is possibly the only song ever to do so. They
wrote further hits (winning an Ivor Novello for “A Windmill In Old Amsterdam”) and were in
constant demand throughout the 1960s and 1970s, working with artists such as Petula Clark,
Matt Munro, Bruce Forsyth, Topol and Kenneth Williams.

By the late 1960s Ted had also penned a handful of instrumental library cues including the
classic “Busy Boy” for the Standard Library company that got picked up as the theme for the
brilliant TV kids fantasy show Catweazle in 1970. It’s a light, kooky, hummable tune that lodged
its way deep in the mind of any child under 12 over the following decade.

When I first got the reels for Sex Clinic I’m not sure what I was sonically expecting - much of
Dicks’ music blends musical hall with jazz and some brilliant novelty - and maybe I was also
imagining a different kind of film to the one that was actually made. Turns out Sex Clinic is more
like a sleazy drama than an erotic adventure - I’ve read reviews that call it “nothing more than a
naked Crossroads”. Even knowing this I had no idea what the music was going to sound like. So
I was thrilled when it was almost the musical opposite of what I imagined. We have here a great,
easy jazz score. Not a proggy, wild or free jazz score, this is lightish, vibes-led, bluesy and really
charming, which gets slightly more lively when the naked pool party sequence kicks off, and
drifts effortlessly into more seductive midnight moods as and when required. And having now
seen the film, musically it’s unusually at odds with the on screen nudity, blackmail and revenge.

But like most of Ted’s work, the music sticks in your mind. Unlike the film. Which I suggest you
try and avoid unless you like watching plump randy middle aged men with terrible hair pursue
women half their age.

TRACKLISTING: There were no notes or titles to any of the cues on the reels. So I have just simply labeled the sides as per the reels that came in:

Mastered by Paul McGeechan and manufactured at Seabass Vinyl, Finished Business marks a powerful new chapter for a band whose story has always been defined by unfinished potential. Formed from the embers of original UK country pioneers Evangeline, OneDay40 released their critically acclaimed debut album Unfinished Business in 2007, earning the BCMA Award for Best Album. Early momentum followed, including a Nashville record deal and an offer of a US tour. But as life intervened, the four members gradually drifted apart, placing the band on an extended, unplanned hiatus. Two decades later, lead songwriters John Naismith and Billy Matthews, after whom the band is named (being born just 364 days apart) reconnected in 2022 to compare notes. What began as a casual reconnection quickly evolved into the concept for a new album. Original members George Adams (vocals) and Andy Holmes (drums) soon rejoined the fold, completing the writing team and reigniting the band's creative spark.

Season 2 formed in late 2024, bringing together seasoned Melbourne musicians with previous and current projects including Parsnip, The Stroppies and Phil and the Tiles. The five piece, comprising Carolyn Hawkins, Claudia Serfaty, Charlotte Zarb, Freya McLeod and Matt Powell, quickly set to work writing winsome, DIY, shimmer-pop hits that careen through your mind in a gratifying dizzy rush.

With a clear collective vision and little time to waste, Season 2 spent 2025 writing and recording, appearing live only a handful of times. Finally, this April, the band are primed for their debut release, a full-length album entitled 'Power of Now'. ‘Power of Now ‘is a cerebral explosion of melody, hooks, drones and rhythm. In the vein of The Feelies, The Vaselines and The Clean, Season 2 have whipped up a sonic whirlwind. It's a giddy thrill of snappy slap, catchy gang vocals and crystalline guitar refrains.

'Abundance of Power' is a bittersweet bop of ponderous bass, crisp chord flashes and grounded vocals that dwell on slighted futures and bored realities. 'Becomes a Dream' is a delirious race of scrappy strumming and flying phrases that unsettle as much as they pinball endorphins - "pour the ink into the sand, watch the dog it bites the hand". "Tell me something, elbows on the table, I'll tell you nothing, leave you tugging at the cable" they sing on the peppy future single 'Tugging at the Cable', capturing a certain innocent, wide-eyed expressiveness. Season 2 do sparky well, their songs are instant rewards, tunnelling into your subconscious and testing the dance floor. They keep everything moving, the beat and the conversation. Season 2 sound barely controlled and all the better for it, you have no choice but to be swept up.

'Power of Now' was recorded by Alex Macfarlane (The Green Child, Chateau) and mastered by Mikey Young. It will be released digitally and on LP (black vinyl) on April 24th, internationally via Upset The Rhythm and locally in Australia by Spoilsport Records.

‘Black Butterfly’ is Brooklyn Funk Essentials eighth studio album and includes the bands recent hits ‘Never Give Up’, ‘Bust The Bus Stop’ and ‘Life During Wartime’. Playlisted on BBC Radio 2 and Jazz FM and supported by Craig Charles and Cerys Matthews at 6 Music as well as many stations across Europe and the Americas. The album was produced and co-written by bassist Lati Kronlund and features Alison Limerick, Ebba Åsman and Desmond Foster on vocals.

Kronlund and Limerick have been enjoying the recent renewed interest in ‘Where Love Lives’. Kronlund wrote and produced it for Limerick in 1990, it was remixed by Frankie Knuckles and David Morales and became a club classic and was featured in this year’s John Lewis Christmas TV Ad. Arthur Baker heard the original in a club in 1991 that he contacted Kronlund about working together and they then formed Brooklyn Funk Essentials.

Since then, Brooklyn Funk Essentials have built a devoted international following and notched up over 100 million streams. Fusing Soul, Hip Hop, Spoken Word, Jazz, Latin, and, of course,
Funk, the band’s journey began experimenting with drum machines and loops in Baker’s Shakedown Sound Studio in Jersey City—hunting for that perfect beat. The early recordings featured greats such as Maceo Parker, Lenny Pickett, Tower of Power Horns, Michigan & Smiley, and Dizzy Gillespie, leading to the acclaimed debut ‘Cool & Steady & Easy’ (1994). Fast-forward to April 2024, when Kronlund reunited with Baker in Miami, rediscovering recordings featuring percussion prodigy Bashiri Johnson, which inspired new creative sparks for the next chapter of Brooklyn Funk Essentials.

British alt-rock favourites A return with PRANG, their first studio album in over 20 years, released via Cooking Vinyl. Sparked by the effervescent lead single "Hello Sunshine," the album finds the band rediscovering their identity with the carefree spirit and stylish sloppiness that defined their early days. Written and recorded free from expectation or pressure, PRANG is a vibrant, hook-laden reaffirmation of A"s enduring appeal - balancing punchy, riff-driven anthems with heartfelt, soul-baring moments. Frontman Jason Perry, now a Grammy Award-winning producer known for his work with Don Broco, McFly and Kids In Glass Houses, helms production to preserve the band"s DIY ethos and singular personality. Lyrically, PRANG is A"s most open and reflective work to date. Drawing on two decades of life experience, Perry explores gratitude, resilience, mental health and friendship with warmth and disarming honesty. The result is an album that feels both nostalgic and strikingly modern - each track its own colourful island, yet unmistakably A. Twenty years in the making, PRANG is more than a comeback; it"s a rebirth. Cathartic, melodic and life-affirming, it marks a bold new chapter for one of Britain"s most beloved rock bands.

The Charmer, Toadies first full-length studio album in nearly a decade, also happens to be one of the last records recorded by famed engineer Steve Albini (Nirvana, Pixies, PJ Harvey) before his death in 2024. The raw, guitar-driven collection places the platinum-selling band firmly back in the Alternative Rock pantheon that sparked their early success, while sounding right at home with the dozens of younger contemporary rock bands they've influenced.

More than a decade into one of contemporary folk’s most quietly extraordinary careers, Alela Diane returns with Who's Keeping Time? The Portland songwriter’s seventh full-length came as the consequence of intuition, coincidence, and community. “I came to the end of a season last year,” Alela shares. “My daughters had grown a bit. I no longer had babies waking me in the middle of the night. I could hear myself think again.” More and more, those thoughts circled music.

The ultimate spark for Alela’s return to her music community came in April of last year with the death of her close friend and mentor Michael Hurley — folk legend and indispensable presence in the Portland music scene. Tracked live in the attic of her 1892 Victorian home, Who’s Keeping Time? was produced by Sam Weber (Madison Cunningham, Anna Tivel) and brought to life with staples from the local music orbit, including members of the bands Lucius and Blind Pilot and fellow singer-songwriters Anna Tivel and AC Sapphire. Over the years, Alela's lustrous discography has gathered major critical acclaim from the likes of Pitchfork, NPR Music, The Guardian, and plenty more. UNCUT counted her work in their ambitious “50 best singer-songwriter albums” of all time roundup—a canon comprising John Lennon, Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez, Paul Simon—with Consequence echoing that significance, declaring, “Hers is a timeless sound, that of a wayfaring troubadour, which only seems to come a few times a generation.” The Portland songwriter’s seventh full-length album, ‘Who’s Keeping Time?’ will be available on LP, CD and Digitally.

Stern Records is proud to announce the first-time reissue of the self-perpetuating plunderphonic classic, Right Into The Sun by Pol Maló.

Originally released on CD-R in 1999 by Cha-Bashira Records Tokyo under the alias "Orange Head," this new 2xLP edition features fully remastered audio and new cover art by Pol. The release also includes a special riso print edition of the original artwork.

Recorded using 3-6 portable record players, plus one MD player on tracks 2 and 4. All records used were melted, warped or broken by briefly placing them on a gas heater. The records were randomly altered this way to allow the styluses to find and stay in their own loops themselves on the wavy record surfaces. No samplers or editing - live aleatoric playback recordings only.

Raw, cacophonous kinetic sound!

Pol's thoughts on the making of the album:

"Difficult to say what it was that made me interested in making music or actually audio art. In comparison, making visual art had always been there for me. But meeting several now generally known musicians as a student certainly left a very deep impact on me. While doing a DIY label and later kind of music store too, I became fascinated in accidental music, experimental sounds and all kinds of improvisations and bricolages. I think I wanted to try to make sound pieces from scratch, with the bare minimum and resulting in a way in found music. Rhythm and repetition seemed to go well with random audio coming from broken things. This way, I thought, I could create new meaning out of something existing by letting it come apart and back together again anew almost by itself. The album "Right into the Sun", I feel, can be listened to and read on various levels and I hope playback of it in all kinds of environments now will add to the original "spark" of it."

Entstanden aus einem Live-Auftritt, offenbart ,unfamiliar music (paris)" das Wesen der Obsessionen und des Klanguniversums von Giuseppe Ielasi - einem Musiker, dessen Zurückhaltung nur von seinem Talent und seiner grenzenlosen Hingabe an das musikalische Schaffen seit fast 30 Jahren übertroffen wird. unfamiliar music (paris) ist ein bemerkenswerter Ausdruck von Ielasis Herangehensweise, einer Herangehensweise, in der Feinfühligkeit, manchmal Nostalgie und Emotionen es verstehen, mit Zurückhaltung ein Klanguniversum zu durchdringen, das um Polyphonie und Reminiszenz herum aufgebaut ist, um Texturen und Motive, die sich mit Anmut und Inspiration verflechten, verbinden und gegenseitig antreiben. ,Sparkling or Silent" des Duos Crys Cole und Oren Ambarchi ist ein eigenständiger Moment in ihren jeweiligen künstlerischen Ansätzen, ein Schritt zur Seite, der einen Fixpunkt um eine elektroakustische Methode markiert, die zwar in beiden Werken stets latent vorhanden war, sich hier jedoch als zentrale Kompositionsmodalität durchsetzt. Der elektroakustische Ansatz wird hier jedoch nicht aus formalen Gründen herangezogen, geschweige denn als ästhetische Leitlinie. Im Gegenteil, er wird als Kompositionswerkzeug betrachtet, offen für alle klanglichen Möglichkeiten, ein Werkzeug, das es dem Künstler ermöglicht, innerhalb des Klangs selbst einen verwobenen Raum zu entwerfen, in dem Erinnerungen, Eindrücke und Empfindungen eine Erzählung am Rande der Vorstellungskraft und der gemeinsam erlebten Momente weben - eine Erzählung, in die eine komplexe und sensible Klangschicht eingebettet ist, die die Grenzen zwischen künstlerischem Projekt, intimer Reise und geteilten Träumen verschwimmen lässt.

Rostams drittes Album, American Stories, erscheint am 15. Mai und ist sein erstes neues Album seit über fünf Jahren. Der iranisch-amerikanische Künstler und renommierte Produzent kehrt mit einem Album zurück, das sein Leben in zwei kulturellen Welten beleuchtet. Die Musik verwebt Elemente der amerikanischen und persischen Tradition und verbindet Fingerpicking auf der Gitarre, Pedal Steel und gezupfte Akkorde mit mikrotonalen persischen Melodien. ,Diese Verbindung von Ost und West fühlte sich wie die Musik an, die ich für dieses Album machen musste." Rostams Texte, in denen er seine eigenen Erfahrungen verwebt, sind eine Sammlung von Geschichten und Reflexionen. ,The Weight" spielt im Frühjahr 2025 auf College-Campus in Amerika. In ,Forgive is to Know" verarbeitet Rostam reale Ereignisse und den Akt des Songwritings selbst. Rostam reflektiert das Ende einer Beziehung in ,Hardy ft. Clairo" und setzt sich mit der ungewissen Zukunft der Menschheit auseinander. Das Ergebnis ist ein Album, das sich zutiefst individuell und doch unverkennbar amerikanisch anfühlt. ,Letztendlich hoffe ich, dass die Zuhörer Trost in diesem Album finden und ich möchte den Menschen ein Gefühl des Optimismus vermitteln."

Rostams drittes Album, American Stories, erscheint am 15. Mai und ist sein erstes neues Album seit über fünf Jahren. Der iranisch-amerikanische Künstler und renommierte Produzent kehrt mit einem Album zurück, das sein Leben in zwei kulturellen Welten beleuchtet. Die Musik verwebt Elemente der amerikanischen und persischen Tradition und verbindet Fingerpicking auf der Gitarre, Pedal Steel und gezupfte Akkorde mit mikrotonalen persischen Melodien. ,Diese Verbindung von Ost und West fühlte sich wie die Musik an, die ich für dieses Album machen musste." Rostams Texte, in denen er seine eigenen Erfahrungen verwebt, sind eine Sammlung von Geschichten und Reflexionen. ,The Weight" spielt im Frühjahr 2025 auf College-Campus in Amerika. In ,Forgive is to Know" verarbeitet Rostam reale Ereignisse und den Akt des Songwritings selbst. Rostam reflektiert das Ende einer Beziehung in ,Hardy ft. Clairo" und setzt sich mit der ungewissen Zukunft der Menschheit auseinander. Das Ergebnis ist ein Album, das sich zutiefst individuell und doch unverkennbar amerikanisch anfühlt. ,Letztendlich hoffe ich, dass die Zuhörer Trost in diesem Album finden und ich möchte den Menschen ein Gefühl des Optimismus vermitteln."

Swan is a warm, melodic, and emotionally direct album, blending guitars, pedal steel, and synths, with wry, heartfelt songwriting reminiscent of MJ Lenderman and David Berman- but with a distinctly antipodean voice. Fazed on a Pony is the alt country/indie rock recording project of New Zealand songwriter Peter McCall. Swan is his second full-length album. On swan McCall sings with emotional immediacy, warmth, and wit about living honestly in the face of inevitable uncertainty and disappointment. McCall's mix of wry humour, sincerity, and melodic instinct has drawn comparisons to MJ Lenderman, David Berman, and Sparklehorse. However, Fazed on a Pony lives within its own antipodean aesthetic and sound. Sonically, swan sees Fazed on a Pony expand from the Pavement-esque tuneful indie rock of previous releases to include pedal steel, fiddle, drum machines, and synthesizers. While there is a diversity of style, the album is rooted in the hallmarks of McCall's music: uplifting and catchy guitar lines that serve the song, paired with arrangements that feel both comfortable and surprising. Where the lyrics tell a sad story, the music betrays that it might just be okay in the end.

The creative bond between Atjazz and Fred Everything is a story decades in the making. It began in 1998 at The Bomb in Nottingham during a DiY label night—a label through which they both released music. That first encounter sparked a lasting friendship and a steady exchange of ideas that would continue for many years. While they collaborated regularly and remixed each other’s work, it wasn’t until the summer of 2022 that they committed to making a full-length album.

The project took shape during an 8-day stay at Martin’s (Atjazz) home in the Midlands of England, where they set themselves the challenge of writing one track per day. Their shared musical language allowed ideas to move quickly, with some tracks forming in under an hour. Over the next three years, the material was carefully developed alongside their respective album projects: Atjazz’s Starbase 17, Fred Everything’s JUNO Nominated Love, Care, Kindness & Hope, and All Is Well’s A Break In Time.

A final session in Montreal in 2024, coinciding with Fred’s 50th birthday, brought the album into focus. From there, the duo invited a select group of world-class collaborators, including Jorge Bezerra (The Joe Zawinul Syndicate / St Germain), Octavio N. Santos (SiR, Lupe Fiasco), Clyde Beats, Ernesto & The Basement Gospel, and Dominique Fils-Aimé.

The result is a personal, well-constructed record that draws on the spirit of 90s deep house while applying three decades of experience to a deeply rooted, forward-thinking sound. It is a sonic testament that honours their mutual love of synthesizers, beat making, and sound design.

It is a project that took 8 days to start, 3 years to finish, and 30 years to perfect.

In an age that demands hyper acceleration, kinetic flashes and byte voracity, Blak Saagan sticks out like a sore thumb with a sprawling body of work that requires attention and unlocks profound symbols and meaning with every passage. After a 5 year gap, the Venetian composer returns with his most personal and openly political statement yet, ‘Un Sequestro Lungo 10.000 Anni’, a staggering 108 minute triple album soundtracking a dystopian city through flashes of futuristic fourth world visions, warehouse 80s rave-ups, meditative trance and dark rumblings. Following his acclaimed ‘Se Ci Fosse La Luce Sarebbe Bellissimo’ was never going to be an easy feat but Samuele Gottardello (Blak Saagan) approached the fresh canvas with a renewed sense of commitment sparking a dense parallel world inhabited by paranoia, control and repression. A world that is relieved by the figure of a woman with the body of a bird emerging from the asphalt and freeing humanity from the “sequestro” (kidnapping) to which it has long been subjected. Dystopia pushed to the limits and sadly close to our current affairs.

Redux, an ambient-folk album from Portland, Oregon musician, poet, and multimedia artist Dao Strom, is a collection of nine resurrected pieces. Reimagining songs she initially composed as a member of the Austin, Texas alt-country and singer-songwriter scenes of the early 2000s, Strom reworks these lost songs into ambient-folk mini-epics—part grounded and earthly, part ethereal and otherworldly. Drawing on an intimate yet spacious palette of folk, ambient, and experimental textures, woven through with a poetics of vulnerability and quiet emotion, Redux explores song as gently reverberant fields of layered vocals over finger-picked guitars with touches of electronics and sampling. Strom’s musical journey initially began in a roots and acoustic vein, simultaneously with her career as a fiction writer. In the years since, she has moved from Austin, Texas to Juneau, Alaska to Portland, Oregon; her work too has expanded across genres into more experimental formats of poetry, music, and multidisciplinary art. In returning to these earlier songs, Strom reclaims and revives them, exploring her relationships to time, voice, and the continuances of emotion and memory. The word redux means “brought back; revived”; a sense of something restored—earlier renditions of some of the Redux songs were recorded with Austin-based collaborators and producers; some songs were written in that time period but never recorded. Produced, performed, and recorded by Strom alone in her home studio, Redux is a return and reemergence of the artist to her own most personal, intuitive structures and atmospheres of voice, sound, and song. Released on cassette by Antiquated Future Records, and reissued on vinyl in 2026 by Disasters By Choice.

Dao Strom is an artist who works with three “voices”—written, sung, visual—to explore hybridity and contemplate the intersection of personal and collective histories. Her music releases move between “song-poem” cycles and ambient-folk albums. She is the author/composer of several hybrid projects that blend poetry, music, and visual art into unique multimodal experiences, including Tender Revolutions/Yellow Songs, a song-cycle with set of four chapbooks, jointly released by Beacon Sound, Antiquated Future Records, and The 3rd Thing Press (2025), and Instrument/Traveler’s Ode, a poetry-art collection and song-cycle released by Fonograf Editions and Antiquated Future Records (2020). Born in Vietnam and based in Portland, Oregon, Strom began her musical journey in the early 2000s, when she first began infusing into the context of “Americana” folk/roots music her own diasporic Vietnamese experience and stories. Her music has since moved in more experimental directions, resisting easy categorization, yet still maintaining tendrils of folk ethos. She also writes songs about the ineffable nuances of emotion, memory, and connection, as captured on the album, Redux, which gathers songs from across her songwriting years into an ambient-folk setting, self-produced and recorded by Strom, released on cassette in 2022 by Antiquated Future Records, and reissued on vinyl in 2026 by Disasters By Choice. As a multidisciplinary artist, Strom has presented performance and installations at venues such as the Time Based Art Festival (Portland Institute for Contemporary Art) and Moving Poets Novilla in Berlin, Germany, and has received awards from the Creative Capital Foundation, Spark Artist Award, and others. Strom is also a founding member of She Who Has No Master(s), a collective of Vietnamese women writers and artists making polyvocal poetry-art works as a means of reaching across borders.

To celebrate the 30th anniversary of its release, Happening Songs, the debut album by Dionysos, is finally being issued on vinyl for the very first time.

Recorded in 1996, the record captures the early days of a band still in its rawest form, already driven by a singular stage energy and a boundless imagination. Entirely sung in English, Happening Songs unfolds a free and inventive sonic universe where indie rock, dark humor, and surreal visions intertwine. Tracks such as "Wet," "Polar Girl," and "Screamin' Like an Egg" sketch the foundations of a poetic, strange, and deeply endearing artistic world that would become Dionysos' signature.
Long regarded as a cult album, passed from stage to stage and through word of mouth, it now returns in a brand-new vinyl edition, faithful to its original spirit.
This anniversary release is presented by EGGMAN RECORDS, the label founded by Mathias Malzieu, giving new life to this foundational work and inviting listeners to rediscover the initial spark of a project that has since become essential.
Thirty years on, Happening Songs remains the opening chapter of a unique artistic journey: inhabited, unruly, and profoundly free rock.

This is the age of post-factual lies, which is reflected in MESH's album title "The Truth Doesn't Matter" and a dark undertone that occasionally seeps into their new songs. What remains entirely true is the fact that the UK duo has a nearly uncanny knack for writing electronic hits that are as elegant as they are captivating. "The Truth Doesn't Matter" bursts out like a sparkling firework while subtly referencing three decades of electronic music spanning from GIORGIO MORODER, YAZOO, and DEPECHE MODE via GARBAGE and MASSIVE ATTACK to more contemporary artists. At the same time, MESH always maintain their easily recognisable and unique musical identity as well as the trademark sounds that they have cultivated since their beginnings in the early nineties. With "The Truth Doesn't Matter", MESH climb yet another rung on the ladder leading to electronic music heaven. Each song wriggles its way happily into the brain and sticks around leading to spontaneous whistling of melodies and the public singing of extremely catchy chorus lines. You have been warned: "The Truth Doesn't Matter" is highly infectious and leads to a happier life!"

The Charmer, Toadies first full-length studio album in nearly a decade, also happens to be one of the last records recorded by famed engineer Steve Albini (Nirvana, Pixies, PJ Harvey) before his death in 2024. The raw, guitar-driven collection places the platinum-selling band firmly back in the Alternative Rock pantheon that sparked their early success, while sounding right at home with the dozens of younger contemporary rock bands they've influenced.

LA-based producer Real Bad Man and Detroit rapper Boldy James return with their third collaborative album, Conversational Pieces, out now via Real Bad Man Records. The project features the singles “Come Back Around” featuring DC polymath dreamcastmoe, and “It Factor” featuring El-P. Their creative chemistry has never been clearer: this new album sees the duo pushing into fresh sonic territory through an expanded production palette that Real Bad Man continues to evolve and experiment with.

Recorded immediately after their 2022 album Killing Nothing and revisited in 2023 following Boldy’s serious car accident, Conversational Pieces is a deliberate, reflective body of work. It captures two distinct periods in the artists’ lives—documenting their growth as musicians, fathers, and long-time collaborators. The album’s artwork, along with the accompanying single art, draws inspiration from Rorschach inkblot tests—abstract visuals that invite interpretation and spark conversation, mirroring the album’s introspective nature.

Finally… Awakening, kissed by the first tender rays of light, refracting in the small puddles along the cobblestone streets, we murmur into the glowing spring air — a quiet invocation of what began as a spark.

Guided by a subtle sense of sound, unchained by boundaries, Katia Curie, Finona Rider, Ilja Franz and Lara reshape the path ahead. Each of them a weaver of moods and layered narratives, moving effortlessly between depth and lightness. Phantasia 002

When Henry Street & Sacred Rhythm Music join forces for a remix outing, it should be obvious the source material and resulting productions are of the utmost caliber. This record proves such a case in point: Johnny "D" DeMairo & Joe Claussell team up for two takes on Candi Staton’s 1979 disco opus 'When You Wake Up Tomorrow.’ The original, whose pedigree could be inferred simply by reading Patrick Adams’ and Jimmy Simpson’s names on the label, is a faultless dance floor cut featuring all the elements you’d expect—lavish horn and string arrangements, sparkling synthesizer accents, and plenty of hand-beat drumming—along with with Staton’s peerless voice. Johnny D’s mix starts carefully, the vocal refrain accented with auxiliary percussion until the rug is pulled out from under us, the ensuing chasm making the following thrust of the track that much more powerful. On the flip.

Claussell’s take starts with reinforced four-on-the-floor, along with a studio count-in, perhaps alluding back to his previous ‘It Seems To Hang On’ edit. As the track establishes itself, ample room is afforded for interplay between bass and guitar, with all the interlacing elements aggrandizing the mood with careful shots of delay and expertly-timed pivots in atmosphere. Both sides are proof of what shouldn’t need evidence: two masters of their craft assembling two wholly new mixes that far surpass the banal copy and paste, add and subtract methodology slung by the less blessed. Pressed on white vinyl, with a custom jacket to boot.

"Nitrito" is the new album by renowned Italian singer-songwriter Nada. The Italian word Nitrito refers both to the chemical compound and to the sound horses make to communicate, the album was released last June just in Italy and is now set to be released in other European countries such as Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France and in the UK. The album was recorded in Bristol in 2024, with Nada once again entrusting its production to John Parish (PJ Harvey, Eels, Aldous Harding, Tracy Chapman, Giant Sand, Sparklehorse), who also plays most of the instruments on the record. This continues the collaboration that began with "Tutto l"amore che mi manca" (All the Love I Miss) (2004), recently remastered and released for the first time on vinyl and in a new CD edition, and continued with "E un momento difficile tesoro" (It"s a Difficult Time, Darling) (2019) and "La paura va via da sé se i pensieri brillano" (Fear Goes Away on Its Own If Thoughts Shine) (2022). "Nitrito" received an excellent four star review from the influential British magazine Mojo.

"Nitrito" is the new album by renowned Italian singer-songwriter Nada. The Italian word Nitrito refers both to the chemical compound and to the sound horses make to communicate, the album was released last June just in Italy and is now set to be released in other European countries such as Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France and in the UK. The album was recorded in Bristol in 2024, with Nada once again entrusting its production to John Parish (PJ Harvey, Eels, Aldous Harding, Tracy Chapman, Giant Sand, Sparklehorse), who also plays most of the instruments on the record. This continues the collaboration that began with "Tutto l"amore che mi manca" (All the Love I Miss) (2004), recently remastered and released for the first time on vinyl and in a new CD edition, and continued with "E un momento difficile tesoro" (It"s a Difficult Time, Darling) (2019) and "La paura va via da sé se i pensieri brillano" (Fear Goes Away on Its Own If Thoughts Shine) (2022). "Nitrito" received an excellent four star review from the influential British magazine Mojo.

The Swallows were one of Singapore’s standout bands of the 1960s, rising from the explosive Pop Yeh-Yeh movement, the regional response to the global beat-band wave, with strong garage-rock roots. Fusing surf rock, early Beatles-inspired pop, and gritty, fuzz-laden guitars with a distinctly local sensibility, they became youth icons of the era. Defined by sharp suits, infectious melodies, and a rebellious spark, The Swallows captured the restless energy of post-independence Singapore, securing their place in the island’s golden age of bands and in the wider story of Southeast Asian rock.

Bright morning. To noon and into afternoon. To dusk and the inky night.

A major new exhibition of Mammo’s music spread across a triple disc, twelve track album. Call it a compendium or summary, a network of sparking neurons and painted landscapes in techno.

It folds in all the aspects of his other identities (self-)released over the last few years into an ultimate package ~ Heaven Smile, A∞x, CoA-A, E35, Puddlerunner; really any other project Fabiano has assumed an identity under. It all finds its way into the code and format of Lateral in some way or another.

Here the ground is given for the listener to hear just how much range and individual language there is in the music he’s been making. Fully immersive, inventive and detailed while also elegant and light of touch. It’s quite a package from one of the most talented techno producers right now, gesturing towards different genres and novel ideas in beautiful and intuitive fashion.

Break the pack down for your preferred disc of the day if you like. It’s designed with that modularity in mind. Disc one sparkles with vitality and a buoyancy. The middle disc has more drive and harder bites that you may want to amplify and split out to slot in a DJ bag. Sides five and six move into deeper, dreamier and more emotional techno in twilight. Each one is a little distinct and has its own orbit.

But give it your full attention on the turntable platter too. A listen from beginning to end. There’s lovely dynamics and interplays in the narrative, and its a remarkable new body of work to let your time dilate to.

Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker.

Art by Mammo.Works.

The year that NOW’s story began, and where we started our ‘Yearbook’ series back in 2021. An incredible year in Pop music, and a fabulous selection of the years’ hits have featured on that first ‘Yearbook’, and on the ‘80-84 Final’ as part of our appreciation of 1983. Those tracks were generally the bigger hits of the year, with their Chart achievement a factor in their inclusion. However, that’s not the whole story, and our celebration of 1983 wouldn’t be complete without shining a light on some of the year’s singles that have been compiled much less frequently over the past 40 years. Welcome to the THE VAULT for 1983…Some of the tracks were Top 40 hits, some missed the Chart completely, and some were huge in the U.S. and not in the U.K. – but all are part of the wonderful Pop story of 1983. Released as 80 tracks across 4-CDs, available as a standard 4CD and as a a special edition 4CD in ‘hardback book’ packaging featuring a 28-page track by track guide, original singles artwork and a quiz and 45 tracks across 3-LPs, pressed on stunning translucent red vinyl -