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Optimo Music presents “Janara” the new album from Italy’s José Manuel. We always have our ears open for music that is unique, powerful and that can conjure up a ritualistic atmosphere, and this meistrerwerk did all that, and then some. We knew we had to release it after the first listen.

We’ll let José tell you about it….

This album is a result of the necessity of exploring and opening my mind to new musical horizons, by testing the main traditional instrument of the Italian region Campania, whose name is “Tammorra”. It is a big drum, which must not be confused with the typical tambourine, made from a wrap of wood shaped in a circle and covered with dried skin (almost always goatskin or sheepskin). This instrument was used during playful events, especially during rituals and ceremonies, such as the frequent devotional pilgrimages in honour of the Virgin Mary. By using this instrument, the sound, the rite and the magic could take possession of the mind and the body creating a perfect union. Also, the dancers, as if they were bitten by a tarantula and possessed by a strange evil, launched themselves to an uncontrolled dance by moving every part of their body.

In addition to the Tammorra, I also inserted some texts, which have been written by some Neapolitan friends and interpreted with Neapolitans voices, in honour of the “JANARA”. The Janara represents a popular belief of the Southern Italian regions, particularly of the Benevento area. The Janara is one of the many types of witches represented by folktales belonging to the rural tradition.

The Janara was expert in medical herbs, which were also be used for her magical practices, such as the manufacturing of ointment. The ointment gave her the power to become incorporeal with the same nature as the wind. According to the tradition, in order to snatch the Janara it was necessary to grab her by the hair. It was also said that if anyone was able to capture the Janara during her incorporeal moment then Janara herself would offer protection to them and their family for seven generations, in exchange for her freedom.

With this work I hope that the listener might get carried away by the spirit of this pagan and popular legend that can be still be considered as current. As a matter of fact, the folk tales speak of a probable comeback of the Janara, who after being burned at the stake seems to be thirsting for revenge for the evil suffered.

The imaginative talents of writer Neil Gaiman come to vinyl with this collection of three full-cast radio dramas based on his bestselling works. This highly collectible box set presents 5 x 140g gold
vinyl, in three individual sleeves (two gatefolds plus one single LP). Each one features an exclusive sleeve note by Neil Gaiman plus full cast, credits and broadcast details.
A frameable, full-colour print of Neil Gaiman, signed by the author himself, is also included. These are strictly limited to 750 copies.
Stardust, adapted by Dirk Maggs (Sandman, Good Omens) tells the story of Tristran who goes in search of a fallen star and enters the world of Faerie.
Norse Mythology is Gaiman’s retelling of myths populated by gods and monsters, all featuring tricks and trust, fiery endings and new beginnings. Chivalry tells the tale of Mrs Whitaker, who discovers the Holy Grail in a charity shop… The cast for these three productions features the crème de la crème of acting talent: Eleanor
Bron, Diana Rigg, Glenda Jackson, Matthew Beard, Sophie Rundle, Frances Barber, Maggie Steed, Derek Jacobi, Natalie Dormer, Colin Morgan, Nathaniel Martello-White, Kit Harington and many more, plus cameo appearances by Tori Amos and Neil Gaiman. A superb soundscape of music and effects accompanies each one.

PM Warson grew up in an English town, in a post 9/11 world, drifting into financial crisis, against the staple suburban musical landscape of heavy rock, the ghost of the New Wave, and the fading star of the Indie Boom of the Noughties. He found his own fit in the form of Rhythm & Blues from half-a-century before, drawn in by records in the family collection, engaging at a visceral level, abstract from any subcultural connotations. While an outlier stylistically, he found camaraderie and direction among musically inclined peers, saving up two summers straight for a Rickenbacker guitar, getting the taste for playing live with an archetypal teenage power trio. After a move to London to study, he was without a band for a while. The Rickenbacker was sold for an archtop, and he delved deeper into his musical vocabulary - delta blues, Americana, early jazz and Rock'n'Roll. Meanwhile, via the capital's blues clubs and soul nights, he discovered a new setting for the music that had enticed him the first place, existing, not in a vacuum, but alive and in the moment.

A chance audition thrust him into full-time work as a touring musician. He found himself, blissfully under-qualified, serving an apprenticeship alongside conservatoire-trained jazz musicians and session pros. Meanwhile, the inevitable downtime in new cities on the road allowed for significant crate-digging between coffee spots and sound checks, while feeding off the knowledge of the players around him. Becoming more and more interested in production, ever-drawn to the Golden Era of record-making, he befriended the proprietors of Soup Studio, then an all-analogue facility based on Cable Street. He started moonlighting on production projects and learning the inner workings of a studio environment. A network was building, and when it was time to break out on his own, everything was in place.

Shedding the construct of a 'band' or a 'singer-songwriter', and perhaps the monoculture of contemporary music-making, he started cutting sides with a band of friends and acquaintances found along the way. Without any wider ambition, it was as much about the process as the outcome, evoking the R'n'B records of the '50s and '60s in practice rather than emulation. His first effort, the ramshackle "You Gotta Tell Me" became a de facto single, and after being urged to press a few copies to vinyl by a friend, it began to cause a few ripples on the local DJ scene. Meanwhile, a wild, off-the-cuff cover of 'Hit The Road Jack' caught the attention of a London music agency, giving his lineup an outlet for playing out. This included house-band sets at London establishments such as the Blues Kitchen, Old Street Records and notably at the opening of the Mary Quant Fashion Exhibition at the V&A Museum.

Heavyweight (180gm), double black LP.

Gatefold sleeve with 16 page booklet and download code insert.

Rich in musical associations yet utterly singular in its voice, joyous with an inner tranquility, the music of Natural Information Society is unlike any other being made today. Their sixth album in eleven years for eremite records, descension (Out of Our Constrictions) is the first to be recorded live, featuring a set from London’s Cafe OTO with veteran English free-improv great Evan Parker, & the first to feature just one extended composition. The 75-minute performance, inspired by the galvanizing presence of Parker, is a sustained bacchanalia of collective ecstasy. You could call it their party album.

This was the second time Parker played with NIS. Joshua Abrams: “Both times we played compositions with Evan in mind. I don’t tell Evan anything. He’s a free agent.”

The music is focused & malleable, energized & even-keeled, drawing on concepts of ensemble playing common to musics from many locations & eras without any one specific aesthetic realization completely defining it.

“The rhythms that Mikel plays are not an exact reference to Chicago house, but that’s in there,” Abrams says. “I like to take a cyclic view of music history, can we take that four-on-the-floor, & consider how it connects to swing-era music? Can we articulate a through line? I dee-jayed for years in Chicago & lessons I learned from playing records for dancing inform how I think about the group’s music. The listener can make connections to aspects of soul music, electronic music, minimalism, traditional folk musics, & other musics of the diaspora as well. It’s about these aspects coming together. I don’t need to mimic something, I need to embody it to get to the spirit, to get to the living thing.”

For jazz fans, the sound of Parker’s soprano & Jason Stein’s bass clarinet might evoke Coltrane & Dolphy, even though they didn’t necessarily set out to do that & they play with complete individuality. Abrams sees a bridge to the historical precedent, too. “Since we first met in the 1990s, one of the things that Evan and I connected on was Coltrane’s music,” he says. “I hoped that we would tap into that sound world intuitively. In this case, I think that level of evocation adds another layer of depth, versus a layer of reference.”

Indeed, this is a performance in which the connections among the ensemble & the creative tension between improvisation and composition build into a complex mesh of associations & interactions. While the band confines itself to the territory mapped out by Abrams’ composition, they are remarkably attentive & responsive, making adjustments to Parker’s improvisations. When Parker’s intricate patterns of notes interweave with the band, the parts reinforce one another & the music rockets upward. Sometimes, Parker’s lines are cradled by the group’s gentle pulse & an unearthly lyrical balance is struck.

Drummer Mikel Patrick Avery is locked-in, playing with hellacious long-form discipline, feel & responsiveness. Jason Stein’s animated, vocalized bass clarinet weaves in & out with Lisa Alvarado’s harmonium to state the piece’s thematic material; the pulsing tremolo on the harmonium brings a Spacemen 3 vibe to the party. Abrams ties together melody & rhythm on guimbri, a presence that leads without seeming to. Like his bandmates, he shifts modes of playing frequently, improvising & then returning to the composed structure.

“As specific as the composition is, the goal is to internalize it & mix it up,” Abrams says. “The idea is to get so comfortable that we can make spontaneous changes, find new routes of activity, stasis & byways every gig. It’s like a web we’re spinning. If someone makes a move, we all aim to be aware of it, make room for it. Experiencing & listening is what it’s about, & Evan supercharges that.”

& “supercharged” is the word for this album. With Parker further opening up their music, descension (Out of Our Constrictions) is the sound of Natural Information Society growing both more disciplined and freer, one of the great bands of its time on a deep run.

Aguirre edition: Mastered by Helge Sten, Audio Virus, Oslo. Lacquers by Dubplates & Mastering. Liner Notes by Theaster Gates. LPs pressed on premium audiophile-quality vinyl at Pallas Records. US 2xLP edition available thru Eremite records.

TRANSVITAEXPRESS is a psycho-phonic tale of the afterlife. Maybe one of the weirdest italian albums ever released.

'TRANSVITAEXPRESS is the sonorous realization of an idea that had been developing in me for some time and to which the encounter with the poet Barbarino gave the decisive push. I used the "tape-sound" technique, that is the organization and integration of sounds, noises, speech, song and rhythm, of which the resulting sound, being the result of electronic manipulation of the sound events themselves, is audible, therefore repeatable, only by means of magnetic tape. The sound material is, in part, reportage, so the work often takes on the character of a “disc-truth”, in part it is a faithful reconstruction of parapsychological events. We have defined this work "Psycho-phonic tale" in fact it is a sound experience, that is, a journey into the world of sounds of an "afterlife", rooted in us due to childhood, ancestral reminiscences, superstitions, legends, anxieties, utopias and above all fear. Fear of the mystery, fear of the unknown.

TRANSVITAEXPRESS is therefore the sound representation of these cultural and existential limits, and is therefore a critical, liberating, provocative work. I certainly do not expect, and perhaps I do not want someone after having listened to tell me that it is "beautiful".

TRANSVITAEXPRESS is the name of a train full of ... that travels in an afterlife so "beyond" that it coincides with the most central point of my ego. Perhaps the most logical "end-continuation" of life, the least imaginative, the least corrupt. The distortions, things that are too, or too little, defined, realistic situations, clichés, monotheisms and captions are embedded in the most traditional dream fabric, the most suitable in my opinion to promote approaches with the mysterious, with the esoteric, with the magical.'

M. GIOMBINI

Veteran NYC based Scottish electronic musician Drew McDowall's latest work is his loftiest, most liturgical, and least industrial outing to date —and potentially the apex of his recent discography.Named after an ancient Greek word for votive offering, Agalmaexudes a hooded, devotional aura, creaking and keeling under vast rafters of stone, stained glass, and shredded wires. It's a music of majesty and mystery but also modernity, McDowall's refined modular system shape-shifting strings, piano, pipe organ, and choral masses into disorienting synthetic mirages of the sacred. He cites the intersection of “joy, terror, and the elegiac” as a centering inspiration –or, phrased more bluntly, “that 'what the fuck is going on' feeling.”



As a career collaborator himself, with stints in Coil, Psychic TV, and countless other shorter-lived partnerships, it's telling that McDowall chose this project to gather such an impressive spectrum of peers. Italian synthesist Caterina Barbieri, American drone organist Kali Malone, prolific multi-instrumentalistRobert Aiki Aubrey Lowe, operatic Humanbeast vocalist Maralie Armstrong-Rial, Saudi producer MSYLMA, and warped futurist beat-makers Bashar Suleiman and Elvin Brandhi cameo across the album's 42 minutes, contouring McDowall's nuanced negative spaces with shudders, shadows, and shivering flickers of serenity. Each of them shines in their spotlight, elevating these elusive alchemical states into surreal revelations of texture and transcendence.



McDowall's original working title for the record is revealing: Ritual Music.He speaks of his creative practice in ceremonial terms, negating binaries by seeking the middle path to anuminousequilibrium that erases the distinction between the inner and outer worlds.These compositions feel similarly processional and intuitive, at the crossroads of holiness and hallucination, the sacred vertigo of yawning naves rising into untouchable night skies. It's a vision of industrial music as enigma and invocation, cryptic hymnals of shroudedbeautysummoned in catacombs and crumbling cathedrals.



Despite its depths, Agalmais also an album of immediacy and emotion. Celestial laments of and for times of unrest and suffering. McDowall characterizes his initial intention for this music as an to attempt to convey experiences he felt incapable of putting into words: “To try and approach sublimity, or at least acknowledge it in some way.”Agalmamore than acknowledges the ineffable –it embodies it.

The Besnard Lakes have passed through death and they’r e here to tell the tale. Nearly five years after their last lightning-tinted volley, the magisterial Montreal psych-rock band have sworn off compromise, split with their long-standing label, and completed a searing, 72-minute suite about the darkness of dying and the light on the other side. The Besnard Lakes Are The Last of the Great Thunderstorm Warnings is the group's sixth album and the first in more than 15 years to be released away from a certain midwestern American indie record company. After 2016's A Coliseum Complex Museum - which saw Jace Lasek and Olga Goreas attempting shorter, less sprawling songs - the Besnards and their label decided it was time to go their separate ways; with that decision came a question of whether to even continue the project at all. What use is a band with an instinct for long, tectonic tunes - rock songs with chthonic heft and ethereal grace, five or 10 or 18 minutes long? How do you sell that in an age of bite-sized streaming? How do you make it relevant? "Who gives a shit!" the Besnard Lakes realized. Ignited by their love for each other, for playing music together, the sextet found themselves unspooling the most uncompromising recording of their career. Despite all its grandeur, ...The Last of the Great Thunderstorm Warnings honours the very essence of punk rock: the notion that a band need only be relevant to itself. At last the Besnard Lakes have crafted a continuous long-form suite: nine tracks that could be listened together as one, like Spiritualized's Lazer Guided Melodies or even Dark Side of the Moon, overflowing with melody and harmony, drone and dazzle, the group's own unique weather. Here now, the Besnard Lakes finally dispensed with the two/three-year album cycle, taking all the time they needed to conceive, compose, record and mix their opus. Some of its songs were old, resurrected from demos cast aside years ago. Others were literally woodshedded in the cabanon behind Lasek and Goreas's "Rigaud Ranch" - invented and reinvented, relishing this rougher sound.

Elusive UK producer Kilig brings a six-track EP spanning the British sound palette - forward, complex, with inflections of jungle and garage - to the new Shall Not Fade Classic Cuts imprint. Off the back of releases for Scuffed and Origins in 2020, kilig pairs their intimate knowledge of London's rave scene with more minimalist tinges for What My Mind Needs EP, a simmering club record soaked deep in ambience.

Taking sombre organic vocal samples and delicately placing them over a sharp two-step rhythm, opening track "Closer" is intangible, fantasy-like - the memory of music in your ears after you've left the club. There are echoes of Burial's seminal Untrue across the EP. Kilig aptly reflects the certain melancholy of British club music in the gritty "Overthinking" and mournful "Without You", an ensemble of distorted vocals and dramatic droning synth.

The rest of the record pushes into a more euphoric atmosphere - the title track is a soaring rave number while "Clocking In", a wild beast of a track, glitches and confuses. "I Wanted To Call & Tell You" swells in waves of breakbeat, bringing together the emotional core of the record, fading to gentle keys, the dream of raves to come in 2021.

Isasa’s fourth LP is a guitar excursion from a skillful, humble guide. Minimal, contemplative songs, rich in atmosphere and warm in spirit.

Some musicians give their name to their first album, signifying introduction. Some hold it in reserve — it took Wire 39 years to get around to calling an LP Wire. But whenever they do so, they are making a statement. For Conrado Isasa, an acoustic guitarist from Madrid, Spain, the decision to call his fourth album Isasa reflects the fact that his music’s relationship to his own identity has evolved. Isasa presents an artist whose work reflects that he knows and accepts where he comes from.
Between 1993 and 2003, he played electric guitar in the hardcore metal band Down For The Count and the post rock combo, A Room With A View. These were collective statements, communications between small groups and a select underground community. After the latter group’s demise, Isasa stepped back from recording, and for a while from guitar playing as well. He spent some time learning to play the trumpet, but was inspired to return to the guitar in 2007 after he heard Geoff Farina play a Mississippi John Hurt song for the encore of a Glorytellers gig. Then came another period of learning, during which he studied the playing of Hurt, John Fahey, Jack Rose, and Glenn Jones.
Performing as Isasa, he made three records, each of which can be heard as confrontation with an artistic challenge. Las Cosas (2015) is between the man and his acoustic guitar; what could he do with his fingers, a slide, six steel strings, and a box of wood? Los Días (2016) faces the broader issue of how to deal with the requirements of the American Primitive guitar style. Like Fahey, Rose, and Jones, Isasa sought to make an album that used a cohesive sequence of guitar and banjo instrumentals to express personal experiences. With its references to the sights, sounds, and tastes one might encounter in Madrid, it is like a poetic diary written with the distance that comes from having mastered a second language. After making that record, Isasa toured parts of the United States, and played at The Thousand Incarnations Of The Rose, a festival that gathered representatives of American Primitive guitar’s past, present, and future in Takoma Park, the town where the style’s original synthesist, John Fahey, was born. Insilio (2019) began to look beyond that style, dealing with Hindustani raga forms and adding other instrumental textures.
And now comes Isasa. The name suggests something very personal, and it’s true that it draws upon Isasa’s closest relationships. Two compositions are either named for or feature the voices of his children, but their presence helps this music to transcend the purely personal. For what could be more universally shared than the joy and love one feels for children? Others invoke concepts — absence, liberty, love, reunion. They may mean one thing to Isasa, and another thing to you, but by sharing his reactions to them, he invites you to recognize yours. Isasa isn’t just using his experiences to tell you about his life; he is using what he knows about life to help us know a little more about ours.

Violence Unimagined. The title tells you everything you need to know about Cannibal Corpse's fifteenth hellish opus. Comprised of eleven tracks, it is state of the art death metal played with passion and breathless precision, making for another flawless addition to what is inarguably one of the premier catalogues the genre has thrown up. Ever improving on the genre they helped define, 2017's Red Before Black stands as one of the highlights of their career. Following it up wasn't exactly easy, but Cannibal Corpse have somehow managed to raise the bar yet again. Already well known for the level of extreme technicality they bring to every record, on Violence Unimagined, Cannibal Corpse have further upped their game.

Following the Four Tet, Batu, Damian Lazarus, remixes of electronic hero Krust’s critically acclaimed album ‘The Edge Of Everything’, the A-list versions keep flowing with Calibre, LCY and Flynn each re-working a different track from the LP on Krust - TEOE Remixes #2.

Fellow D&B don Calibre turns ‘It’s A Lot’ into a warm, glowing two-step roller with serrated analogue bass and a subtly masterful musicality befitting of his classical training.

Rising new school queen LCY is clearly a kindred spirit, rivalling Krust with her future-facing breakbeat science that’s equally as compelling and inventive as the original, but also totally unique.

Rounding off the remixes with a rugged halftime head-nodder and bringing things full circle is Krust’s brother Flynn; a fellow member of 1989 ‘Wishing On A Star’ hitmakers Fresh 4 alongside Krust – and also a jungle legend in his own right – as half of veteran duo Flynn & Flora.

With such inspiring source material, it’s unsurprising that all of the remixers have brought their best game to this impeccable collection.

Daybreak is a journey through an everlasting sunset, a pause on it's lights and colors. Produced between Paris and London from 2018 to 2020, this 6 tracks EP opens a new chapter for Kartell, with warm and nostalgic accents.

Timeless and soulful, the project tells our relations with memories and how we travel through them. The DX7 synth and warm tape processing was a key feature during the creative process to catch the essence of how souvenirs swings in our minds.

With 3 singles and 4 contributors between UK and US, Daybreak brings and intimate and hazy groove, ranging from funk to RNB with hints of jazz and soft rock.

Probably his more personal work to date, after a 4 years break to travel and rethink his music, this EP is a tribute to why he fell in love with music in the first place.

The EP includes already 2 singles: "All in" feat. Che Lingo which cumulates 2M plays and "Time" feat. Qendresa & Coops which has 300k plays.

· First release of the Jagjaguwar 25th anniversary celebration happening in 2021. · Features production and composition accompaniment from Bon Iver, Mary Lattimore, Angel Bat Dawid, Gia Margaret, and Sam Gendel. · Limited edition Opaque Green vinyl. Over the last 12 years, Ross Gay's poems have given us indelible images and phrases of radical empathy and unabated gratitude; about community, collaboration, connectedness and hard work. They have crept into our hearts and made a home of all of us. And so we are launching our 25th Anniversary celebration with `Dilate Your Heart', our first spoken word album since titan Robert Creeley's self-titled release twenty years ago. "Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude" is given a gorgeous, slowly creeping bed of vines by Bon Iver, as Gay's unadorned voices speaks a lifetimes of Thank You's. On "Burial," harpist and composer Mary Lattimore's lunar landscape follows Gay's voice into space, telling of our endless energy exchange with nature. Chicago's Angel Bat Dawid dances with the frenetic, joyous scene Gay leads us through on "To the Fig Tree on 9th and Christian," in which a group of Philadelphia strangers scramble together to harvest the fruit of the titular urban fig tree. Songwriter Gia Margaret provides a mystical, amniotic environment for Gay's "Poem To My Child If Ever You Shall Be," a love letter to an imagined future child, treating Gay's voice like a message in a bottle to a far off idea made only of love and potential. Sam Gendel, a secret weapon collaborator, affects Gay's voice on "Sorrow Is Not My Name" to something glassy and almost singsongy. Throughout, Gay recites his poems with bright aliveness, his voice as warm and easy when he speaks about death as when he speaks about mercy, or love.

Available again on vinyl for the first time in seven years, ‘The Fact Facer’ is
now pressed on jaundice vinyl (clear with hi-melt green and yellow).
Holy Sons is Emil Amos, a musician whose chameleonic tendencies and
technical versatility has lead to him becoming an in demand multiinstrumentalist as a founding member of Grails and Lilacs & Champagne, as
well as a member of Om and a hired gun for Jandek, to name a few.
Holy Sons is at the centre of his many musical personalities and is his
longest standing project, acting as an outlet for some of his most personal
and direct songs. In Holy Sons, Amos puts his restless imagination to work
using a variety of inventive home recording methods to turn melodic slowburners into multi-layered, atmospheric missives.
While his methods and prolificacy provide a kinship with Sebadoh, Ariel Pink
and other musicians who have offered countless transmissions from their
bedroom floor, Holy Sons comes from the mind of someone who has
internalized the minutia of 70s rock music and eschews the stereotypical lofi sound for a much deeper and more varied palate.
‘The Fact Facer’, his Thrill Jockey debut, bathes Amos’ thoughtful and even
at times philosophical, songs in Technicolor darkness and reinforces Holy
Sons as his musical centrepiece. The album is a collection of home recorded
atmospheric slow-burners steeped in 70s rock with an experimentalist edge.
The songs on ‘The Fact Facer’ creep up on the listener, their fiercely
addictive melodies unravelling slowly and purposefully. Jumping smoothly
between many facets of Amos’ songwriting, the album does much to
establish him as a talented multi-instrumentalist.
From the lysergic leads of ‘Selfish Thoughts’ to the Danny Kirwan
referencing solos of ‘Transparent Powers’ and the skilful acoustic flourishes
of ‘The Fact Facer’, Amos proves himself as adept and creative a guitarist as
he is a drummer.
It is telling that Amos has built up two Holy Sons bands simultaneously: one
based in Portland and one based in New York. Wherever the wind takes
him, there are musicians willing to pick up their instruments and follow his
lead.
“The most admirable thing about Amos’s songwriting is his willingness to
leave empty space in his songs, even though multiple tracks of vocals and
instruments go into each composition” - Pop Matters
“‘The Fact Facer’ is easily Amos’ most focused offering yet, and a perfect
entry point into a back catalogue that’s sure to have listeners drinking the
Kool-Aid again and again.” - Exclaim

ick Waterhouse takes the colour blue as his hue of choice on Promenade Blue. In Nick’s musical and lyrical world, blue is a refraction of his life and memories — evoking the endless tours, marathon recording sessions, and highs and lows of success he’s experienced in his decade-long career; conjuring romances that were doomed, loves that lingered, and hope for future days of parity and partnership; summoning spirits of people who have gone but permeate his mind forever. That’s the world of Promenade Blue — one that is vivid and magnetic, buoyed by both light and density due to Nick’s newfound collaboration with producer Paul Butler (Michael Kiwanuka, The Bees, St. Paul and the Broken Bones). It’s not Gatsby’s New York in the 1920s, it’s Waterhouse’s California in the 2020s... but as anyone who’s ever listened to a Waterhouse record knows: time, though clearly pegged to the dawn of this new decade, is a more malleable concept. In no uncertain terms, Promenade Blue represents Waterhouse’s finest hour as a writer and bandleader — leveraging the musical partnerships he has built over many years to put something forth that is so fully realized and felt that it sparkles beatifically, reverberating with energy, heart, creativity, and vibe from start to finish. For fans of: Phil Spector, Brian Wilson, Leon Bridges, Nathaniel Rateliff, Jon Batiste, Charles Bradley, Lee Fields, JD McPherson, Van Morrison, Ty Segall, Allah-Las, Michael Kiwanuka, St. Paul and the Broken Bones Full one-sheet:

Orions Belte: «Villa Amorini» Jansen Records 2021 Do you remember the time the doorman ran after some drunken kids around the lake outside the club? As he dives into the lake, he scrapes his stomach on a sharp object in the water, but catches up and returns with one youth under each arm. At the same time the singer from the band playing inside, jumps from the loft hoping that the chandelier he grabs will hold him. It doesn’t. Endless afterparties and constantly trying to avoid visits from the police or the liquor control. Still nothing? This was the 90’s club scene in Bergen, and Villa Amorini was the place where everything happened. Starting as an 80’s fine dining spot, it evolved into an extravagant club with tons of artists and DJ’s in screaming shirts and oversized sunglasses. This sets the scene for Orions Belte’s second album. Still a mix of all the sounds they like, reminiscing eras they haven’t experienced, trying to navigate in their own musical atmosphere. Chaotic and calm at the same time. Villa Amorini is recorded at Norsk Riksstudio by engineer Njål Paulsberg, making sure the sounds were on point while leaving the band alone to play together for hours upon hours, chiseling out the base for the album. Where the debut was summery and a bit brighter, this album tends to lean a bit more towards the big city, night life and leftover food from the fridge. Mixed as always by the magnificent Matias Tellez.