Search:the 8 of space

The first remix EP of Noema's new album, ONE, contains five exciting tracks reimagined by rising producers Kalabrese, Lauer, Mehmet Aslan, Panthera Krause, and Shubostar. Noema's ONE is a comprehensive art piece that includes music, remixes, interactive performance installations, videos, costumes, and choreography. In ONE, Noema tells the story of his interdimensional space explorations, in which he manifests as four different entities. Because of the energetic state of humanity, these entities became trapped in our dimension and now put on performances to re-power their portal, so that we can all be interdimensional again! During the performances five actors invite up to 120 people from the audience to join the action. Sun Ra meets Steve Reich meets Larry Levan - imagine it as a "happening" from the 70s.

Soundtrack of the documentary program for Japanese art history, “Japan: Its Heart and Form” which was aired on NHK educational channel from 1987 to 1988. Akira Mitake worked on it, and after the dissolution of Ippudo, he produced music for the media and provided music to many artists, mainly pop music. It’s an electronic work that expresses the silence, space, romance reminiscent of Japanese spirit. The entire contents has a mysterious atmosphere, “Yasha” and “Keisetsu” are particularly captivating, evoking the beauty of Japan. Truly amazing piece left by the talent behind Masami Tsuchiya, who can be interpreted as ambient music.

The debut album from junodream addresses the dilation of space in modern life.
The threads that bind us have been thinning lately. emotional, social and physical distances are widening between people; loneliness, anger and anxiety fill these gaps. we want to capture that idea in this album

The debut album from junodream addresses the dilation of space in modern life.
The threads that bind us have been thinning lately. emotional, social and physical distances are widening between people; loneliness, anger and anxiety fill these gaps. we want to capture that idea in this album

A Whiter Shade Of Pale ist noch heute ein Klassiker und wird mit der englischen Rockband PROCOL HARUM für immer in Verbindung stehen. PROCOL
HARUM gründeten sich 1967 und lösten sich mit dem Tod von Gary Brooker im Jahr 2022 auf. Weltweite Charterfolge und ausverkaufte Tourneen
können die Briten vorweisen. Diese 12inch Schallplatte enthält legendäre Hits & Klassiker, aufgenommen im Jahr 1977.

Ritual Earth and Kazak offer such fantastic spaced out and mind boggling music in Chapter 9 of Ripple Music's split series Turned To Stone. Don't miss out on the brilliant songs the two bands have created.

Sign Libra's third album Hidden Beauty is an intimate voyage through feminine nature, guided by the arts of subtext, musical collage, and mysterious allusions. Elegantly arranged, enigmatic, and mischievous, Hidden Beauty seeks to "release the invisible and bring fragility to the surface." From the rainforests of Closer to the Equator (Sounds of the Dawn, 2016 / Antinote, 2018) to the surreal lunar landscape of Sea to Sea (RVNG Intl., 2020), Agata Melnikova, the Latvian musician behind the Sign Libra symbol, has developed a signature blend of evocative composition with lyricless, ethereal vocalizing. Hidden Beauty attends to a closer space than her first two albums, a playfully layered pastiche of refined references, drawing musical inspiration from the assortment of Erik Satie, the early work of Mylène Farmer and Laurent Boutonnat, and 90s R&B. The first inklings of Hidden Beauty arrived in 2019, with the basic contours of the album sculpted in 2020 and early 2021. Like Sea to Sea, Hidden Beauty was invented as a solitary creative effort, but this time under uniquely hermetic impositions. Tethered to the world only by screen, the artist sought inspiration from an unlikely array of activities: new, unorthodox approaches at composing, learning French, a virtual pedagogical practice, and plenty of jubilant dancing in her flat, sunglasses on, to 90s dance music. Hidden Beauty moves inward from the distant spaciousness of Sea to Sea in favor of a "chamber-like" sound, reflecting the intimate environs of its creation. Balancing the New Age balletic resonance of Closer to the Equator and the cosmic-dancerly tracks of Sea to Sea, Hidden Beauty combines deft, postmodern arrangements with popular, contemporary suggestions. The reverb drenching her previous recordings is sponged up in the songs of Hidden Beauty, giving the exercises contained within a feeling of presence, and closeness. And always Agata's crystalline vocal furnishings, less a lead vocal than a first instrument, the ever-returning counterpoint in a beatific swirl. The other hidden elements of this work are plenty, and perhaps best left concealed for the listener's enjoyment. Or perhaps they are hidden in plain sight and sound, depending on what the puzzle pieces reveal to your imagination. Sign Libra's Hidden Beauty will be released in vinyl, Japanese import CD, and digital editions on November 3, 2023. A portion of the proceeds from this release will benefit Coral Guardian, a non-governmental organization working internationally and with local communities to protect coral ecosystems.

Finnish Electro flashback! For the first time on vinyl, German label Electro Empire rereleases Polytron's crispy analogue produced and 808-loaded Electro Empire theme song from 2003. The Finnish ElectroBass cruiser is accompanied by another classic, the Polytron 2003 remix of Pimeyden Jousi (Bow of Darkness) by legendary gothic rockers Two Witches from 1988. With vocoderized Finnish vocals and dark synth work, this remix is pure Electro-Disco magic. For fans of raw analogue Electro like DJ Overdose, Cosmic Force or I-F's Space Invaders Are Smoking Grass.

Kepler is free” represent the brand new Athenian Urban Jazz scene in full. You may say that they actually started the whole scene with their debut album "Teegarden" by Veego Records, an instant sold out! Voted by local music portals as one of the best albums of 2020 and probably one of the best debuts ever when it comes to the Greek jazz game. “Kepler Is Free” jazz rock ensemble makes expansive music that straddles the line between '70s soul-jazz, alternative hip-hop, and experimental electronica.

The name of the band is inspired by a retired space telescope launched by NASA to discover Earth-size planets orbiting other stars. Named after astronomer Johannes Kepler. Founded in November of 2018 by Sokratis Tsentoglou (drums) who gathered George Migdanis (electric guitar), Nikiforos Nugent (keys), Spyros Zardas (trumpet) and Vasilis Alexopoulos (bass guitar), they all came together from different musical backgrounds in order to create original and groundbreaking material.

Commuting over their shared love of jazz and hip-hop, they composed their debut album, “Kepler”, with five tracks that highlighted their love for the music of GoGo Penguin, Badbadnotgood and Alfa Mist.

The fact that all the members were young and had not played in other Jazz bands before was something that shook the Greek Jazz community. ''Second Light'' was recorded in difficult conditions and was delayed quite a while until it was finished due to the pandemic.

The band played a handful of sold out shows in Athens over the last few months proving with their performance and the attendance that the band created a crossover from Jazz to pop audience. "Juno" track was a smash hit on legendary "En Lefko'' Radio station over the last two years. Worth to mention that just a month before the release of their second album Kepler is Free collaborated with LEX, one of the most famous rappers in Greece with the "Spike Lee" track.

Trystero comprises Scottish/Luxembourgish producer Thomas Lea Clarke (aka MR TC) and Low Bat, otherwise known as one half of the formidable duo Jean-Luc. Their debut album, Sfumare e Vedere, was conceived over three days aboard Urban Boat, a 1960s barge transformed into an arts and performance space. Moored along the river just outside of Paris, the duo embarked on a joint residency, discovering their complementary creative energies and a mutual passion for all things strange and psychedelic.

As frontman, Low Bat is a fire-powered poet, his unparalleled stage presence resonating through Trystero's music. The French native and fluent German speaker has a natural flair for languages. For this project, he sings in a combination of Italian and English about love, loss, and class struggle, constructing surreal wordplay about pelicans and puttanesca. Meanwhile, Clarke's drone-lead electronic accompaniment takes its cues from sizzling acid, 1990s snap rhythms, post-punk, krautrock and shoegaze. Firmly rooted in these tripped-out genres, Trystero journeys to entirely new cosmic dimensions.

In the midst of the pandemic, Enjoy Jazz Festival has developed a musical project whose members will be recruited new every year and then debut at a concert on UNESCO International Jazz Day, April 30. The members come from the jazz scene of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. "We wanted," festival director Rainer Kern stresses, "not only to revitalize the fragile network of outstanding creative minds, but also to rethink it artistically as a rolling system." Two experienced and renowned band leaders, Alexandra Lehmler and Erwin Ditzner, now curate an annually changing ensemble of outstanding artists of the most diverse provenance. As part of a voluntary commitment, the ensemble is to be organized in a sustainable, diverse, and, in three years at the latest, completely gender-equal
and climate-fair manner. Thus, as a commitment to the goals of the "European/Local Green Deal" (and with reference to the jazz standard "On Green Dolphin Street"), the name Green Dolphin Orchestra was created. Another special feature: The renowned Oriental Music Academy Mannheim (OMM), a long-standing partner of the Enjoy Jazz Festival, receives a white card, so that musicians with a migration background or protagonists from other musical cultures are always part of this "orchestra of many" and constantly expand its sound language.

The project has a free improvisation approach with changing personnel. "We actually even thought of drawing lots for the different formats within the band pool," explains saxophonist Alexandra Lehmler. "We decided against it in the case of the first concert and instead put together curated formations." And drummer Erwin Ditzner adds, "In principle, however, this procedure remains an option." It was important to the two of them to also mix the genres represented by the individual musicians in such a way that free space for something truly new could emerge. "We wanted to challenge ourselves," Lehmler sums it up. The only restriction: a time code was assigned to each sub-project. "Each formation was given a time limit, although it was possible to virtually override this limit by spontaneous
reshuffling," says Ditzner, explaining one central of the few rules. "In concrete terms, this meant that after eight minutes, the improvisation in progress was either ended or new musicians simply joined in the ongoing creative process, while others took themselves out of the game."

Alexandra Lehmler summarizes the artistic impact of the ensemble as follows: "We really cross-fertilize each other. In order to push this process even further, we forced ourselves when putting together the ensemble not to fall back on our 'favorite playing partners', i.e. musicians with whom one feels particularly at home. In other words, we consciously wanted to step out of our comfort zone with this project." The present pieces were recorded live in Heidelberg during the ensemble's premiere concert on the occasion of International Jazz Day on April 30, 2022.

The concept of naught (Ø) has challenged Salvatore Mercatante throughout his musical career, specifically, trying to understand how the idea of ‘nothing’ fits into the realm of sound, and at the same time, exist in a world of influence at every turn. In the absence of everything, are we able to create something truly free?
As a lifelong New York-based musician, Mercatante’s influences and productions run a wide spectrum. Just as happy producing 80s-inspired horror soundtracks as he is refining acute drum patterns over and over again, Salvatore is the first to ask himself, where next? When a musician’s output can be influenced today by so much, and there is no self-defined or perceived artistic goal in mind, how do you start from a place of nothingness, again and again?
This approach has born many minimal and experimental albums of note in the past, but with Ø, Salvatore ended up with an almost controlled maximalist approach. Beginning with open spaces and allowing sonic textures to live and evolve past where you may expect, Ø allows the space between notes to become equally as important as the notes themselves. Walls of noise, soaring soundtracks, dense techno, glittering IDM, and minimal glitch, sit side-by-side to present an all-encompassing palette of sonic possibility.
Often, even without any intent, what can be born from nothing will somehow transpire back into something more recognizable. It’s human nature after all. A subtle fingerprint, as a sequence, melody, pattern, or drum kick. Whether Salvatore intended for this record to represent his defining sound or not, only time will tell.
Mastered by Giuseppe Tillieci @Enisslab, Rome, Italy.
Artwork by Brandon Locher
Written and produced by Salvatore Mercatante

Oxford indie-folk quartet Stornoway followed up their celebrated 2010 debut album, Beachcomber"s Windowsill, in 2013 with Tales From Terra Firma. Ten this year, Tales From Terra Firma is an album of stories - birth, death, marriage and coming of age. Featuring the singles "The Bigger Picture" and "Farewell Appalachia", it was recorded and produced by the band in the main at their own Oxford space, bringing in mix engineer George Shilling (having loved his work with Teenage Fanclub, a huge infl uence on them) midway to help them achieve their vision. It worked too. By being true to themselves and remaining oblivious to outside infl uences, they made a truly special album where life is unfurled for the listener. The Guardian said in their full marks review that there"s "no curse of the second album for Stornoway, who"ve stretched out without losing sight of the intimacy of their charming debut." For its sleeve, the band worked with the artist Kirini Kopcke who used fragments of lyrics as her start point to create a picture for each "tale" on the album, presenting a strip cartoon-like depiction of the adventures in the life of the main protagonist.

Dutch dance troupe ISOTOOP inaugurates its label with a quaternity of sly rhythms to mystify and elevate. Adhering to ISOTOOP’s unstated yet practised mantra of many growing as one, the culprits behind the pieces are none other than core family members Shoal (Kenny Kneefel) and Vand (Viktor van der Riet), unifying for the first time under the name of Voal.

The longtime friends and compatriots in sound meld together to form a distinct entity; aligned as one, but audibly a product of their individual approaches. Across the four cuts, the two producers share a singular vision of club music, designed to initiate movement and shake the floor, while leaving essential space for thought and imagination.

From the low-down and dirty funk of ‘Carpet Crawler’ to ‘Take My Hand’s bleary and dazed downtempo, evaporating in its final moments into transcendent closing ambience, Voal journey through a wide landscape of club electronics with a fervent pulse. Pinned between the two slower joints are ‘Lucifer’, a consecutive tumble through iterated rolling percussion and minimal basslines, and the kinetic, high-tempo fiesta of ‘Saffron’, a sure-fire favourite for the ecstatic midnight.

Thick like warm tar, and airy as steam, Voal’s debut whets the appetite for more.

Written by Freddie Hudson

Nachpresssung 2021 als Audiophile Black Vinyl! Doppel-LP auf schwarzem 180gr Vinyl. "Aufheben" oder "Aufhebung" ist ein deutsches Wort mit einigen scheinbar gegensätzlichen Bedeutungen. Über das bloße Aufheben eines Gegenstandes oder das Aufheben einer Regelung hinaus benutzt Hegel den Begriff, um zu erklären, was passiert, wenn These auf Antithese trifft. Als neues Album von THE BRIAN JONESTOWN MASSACRE wurde ,Aufheben" im Studio von Anton Newcombe in Berlin und in der berühmt-berüchtigten DDR-Radiostation ,Studio East" aufgenommen. Mit dabei: Matt Hollywood als Originalmitglied der Band. Außerdem versammeln sich hier Will Carruthers (SPACEMEN 3 , SPRITUALIZED) , Constatine Karlis (DIMMER) und Thibault Pesenti (ROCKCANDYS); zum Gesang trägt Eliza Karmasalo (auf Finnisch!) bei. Hier trifft sich der traditionelle Sound des BRIAN JONESTOWN MASSACRE mit vermischten östlichen Einflüssen und bringt die gesamte Verrücktheit mit, die man in den letzten 40 Jahren entdeckt hat. Das BRIAN JONESTOWN MASSACRE hat sich über die Jahre hinweg zu einer musikalischen Kommune für respektierte Musiker entwickelt und brachte seit den 90er Jahren große Bands hervor: BLACK REBEL MOTORCYCLE CLUB, THE WARLOCKS, THE SILVER ROCKETS, THE BLACK ANGELS, THE RAVEONETTES und THE DILETTANTES (um nur ein paar zu nennen) sprießen aus dem musikalischen Stammbaum des BRIAN JONESTOWN MASSACRES. Die Konstante: Frontmann Anton Alfred Newcombe.

'The Space Lady's Greatest Hits' features the best of these recordings - mostly covers of 60s pop and psych alongside interstellar originals and features archival photographs and liner notes from The Space Lady herself. "Greatest Hits" contains The Space Lady's personal favourites; her haunting take on The Electric Prunes' "I Had Too Much To Dream (Last Night)," a frantic "Ballroom Blitz", and an unbelievably perfect version of "Major Tom" - amidst other reconstructed pop music.

Die Band feiert ihr 20-jähriges Album Jubiläum.
Spiritualized und Fat Possum Records kündigen die Wiederveröffentlichung von Amazing Grace an, als Teil der zweiten Ausgabe des The Spaceman
Reissue Program: Kuratiert von J Spaceman. Die 180-Gramm-Vinyl-Album Version wurde in London von Ton-Ingenieur Matt Colton für Vinyl neu
gemastert und wird in einem von Mark Farrow gestalteten Gatefold Cover präsentiert.
Zusätzlich zur Wiederveröffentlichung werden Spiritualized im November eine US-Ostküsten-Tournee anführe, bevor sie im Dezember im
Vorprogramm von Queens of the Stone Age auftreten.

The heavyweight trio of Keiji Haino, Jim O’Rourke and Oren Ambarchi return with their 12th and most epic release to date, the triple LP With pats on the head, just one too few is evil one too many is good that's all it is. Documenting the entirety of their final performance at the dearly departed Roppongi home of Tokyo underground institution SuperDeluxe in November 2018, the music spread across these six sides splits the difference between the guitar-bass-drums power trio moves and experiments with novel instrumentation that have defined the trio’s decade of working together. Containing some of the most delicate music the three have committed to wax since the gorgeous 12-string acoustic guitar and dulcimer tones of Only wanting to melt beautifully away is it a lack of contentment that stirs affection for those things said to be as of yet unseen (BT011), this wide-ranging release also offers up some of their most blistering free rock performances yet.

The side-long opening piece finds Haino on a single snare drum in duet with O’Rourke on unamplified electric guitar, playing in the lovely post-Bailey vein heard on his classic 90s recordings with Henry Kaiser and Mats Gustafsson. Spiky dissonance and ringing harmonics interweave with flowing melodic fragments as Haino single-mindedly explores the resonance of the snare like an untutored Han Bennink. On ‘Right brain, left brain; right, left; right wing, left wing. Just how many combinations can be made from these?’, O’Rourke moves to synth and electronics, joined by Ambarchi on drums, who at first focuses on sizzle cymbals before hypnotic cycles of gentle tom rhythms combine with electronic burbles and flutters to suggest a dream collaboration between Masahiko Togashi and Jean Schwarz. Ambarchi’s percussion is then joined by Haino on wandering, overblown flute, before the man in black switches back to the snare for a bizarre, stuttering drum duet.

For the first trio performance, Haino makes another new addition to his seemingly infinite catalogue of instruments, this time a homemade contraption he refers to as ‘Strings of Dubious Reputation’. Joined by O’Rourke on increasingly spaced-out electric guitar and Ambarchi on skittering percussion, Haino’s wonky, slack strings adds a definite ‘musique brut’ edge to this side-long performance, certainly one of the most enchantingly odd in the trio’s discography. When the group reconvene for the second set, spread out across the final three sides, they seem ready to breathe fire from the first instant. O’Rourke slashes distorted chords on the six-string bass, Ambarchi breaks into his signature irregular caveman thump, and Haino squeals and squawks on heavily delayed oboe before unleashing an overpowering electrical storm when he first picks up the guitar. For over half an hour, the trio pound out one of their most relentless performances, a constantly rearranging kaleidoscope of tortured fuzz guitar, insanely busy bass riffing and propulsive, tumbling drums. A hushed atmosphere initially reigns on the final long piece, given the mournful title ‘There are always things I wish to say but I can only convey them in this language August 6 August 9’. Haino’s clean guitar strumming calls up the shimmering tones of his PSF classic Affection, gradually building to a surging wall of sound, bass and drums lumbering through a roar of jet-engine guitar. Arriving in a deluxe trifold package with photos by Lasse Marhaug alongside inner sleeves with extensive live images, this epic release is perhaps the most remarkable document yet of this unique trio’s stamina and continuing inventiveness.

The Vampisoul chicas are back. And for the third time. And, although collectors and connoisseurs have never stopped playing the songs by these Spanish female singers, here they are again, sounding as vibrant as they did half a century ago. Because these children of their times, the musical decades of the 60s and 70s covered by this compilation, boldly ventured into the limited spaces of freedom open to female artists back then. And they did so with attitude, in search of the right repertoire, proudly presenting new, daring personal projects often breaking away from the demure tone adopted by mainstream local female singers. And they were canny about it too. Realizing that the censors working back would just listen to the song that the record company flagged up as the listening target on the A side and not bother to flip the single over, they recorded many of their racier songs on the B side. That exciting dark side of singles, which have long tempted collectors. Lacking the freedom and visibility enjoyed today, these daring records by these female singers went as far as they could and a few managed to go beyond. The songs on this compilation tell everyday stories, narrating small socio-musical conquests revolving round the enduring theme of young love. Sass, sex, boy-girl rivalry, the defense of liberating women's fashion and, saying what women think loud and clear, all characterize these grooves. Performed in a variety of musical styles ranging from ye-yé, twist, disco, beat, popcorn, flamenco pop to Northern Soul, and, even more surprisingly, sung in an everyday, natural and self-assured tone that must have ruffled some feathers. As in previous volumes of "¡Chicas!", this third compilation includes female singers from outside Spain but whose career, their decision to sing in Spanish or their long tours and local stays, and occasionally permanent residence, meant their albums were created, recorded or produced here in Spain. It's a winning proposition for everyone. Take the band Los Bravos, four of the singers that passed through the ranks of this quintessentially Spanish group were foreigners. It's part of our open-door policy. Spain is different. In every sense. But let's get down to the serious stuff and the ritual: vinyl on the turntable and needle poised ready to play. Third volume of Vampis' ¡Chicas! series, an irresistible collection of ye-yé, twist, disco, beat, popcorn, flamenco pop and even Northern Soul! From the early 60s and in the middle of a difficult political and social context, Spanish female singers - and those who moved to Spain - disregarded conventions and overcame all barriers to be part of a music movement that shook the Spanish society of the period. Many of the 24 tracks are reissued for the first time, including very hard-to-find records. It includes extensive notes by Vicente Fabuel featuring all the original record sleeves and artist photos.

Vladislav Delay's complete "Hide Behind The Silence" series. Intuitive and raw music, momentary and reflective, released on Ripatti's own label Rajaton.

Stillness is a myth. Consider concepts such as ”still water”, or ”still air” for that matter. Go to a restaurant, ask them for a glass of still water, hold it against the light and see where we’re at. Even though the water itself has been captured and imprisoned in the glass, it never stops breathing. It’s filled with tiny particles, dancing. Everything can be explained on a molecular level, but since we’re not scientists – and even if you happen to be – it’s the natural world of perception that moves me.
Still air is very similar. A hot summer’s day with zero wind feels completely still. It’s the closest I have felt to complete stillness. Or for a more urban adaptation, imagine the same vibe inside a normal apartment. In those moments, revelations and mind- blowing experiences can be had with experiments in stillness.
Try this: Just sit down for a minute on a sunny day, making sure there’s enough natural light. Do absolutely nothing. Try not to breathe for a bit. (If you need a mental anchor, you can play Cage’s 4’33” in your head but nothing else.) Watch the tiny dots of dust dancing :..’ ̈.:; ́ ́*°.,’:,. ̈ ̈ ̈ ̈:,.’
The movement is crazy, but the feeling of stillness comes from witnessing how subtle it is. In (perceived) complete stillness, every act of microscopic mobility seems to speak volumes. Yet, it feels both reassuring and oddly threatening that the stillness is never complete. What if we would need absolute stillness? Or is it just enough that we can perceive something as such? Extremes attract, so for both water and air, extraordinary movement is equally fascinating. That is also a luxury item of sorts. For us to enjoy a very ”loud” body of water or air, we need to be safe, in enough control of the situation. So when you are, it’s worthwhile to pay attention and take it all in.
A rapid flowing free with extreme strength and just barely in control. Look at that water go! No still water on this one, only ”sparkling”. A windy day when birds seem surprised how hard it is to fly, but in the end they make it. Trees bend but don’t break. The wind shows you its movement but doesn’t hurt you. It feels friendly, like a big clumsy dog that doesn’t quite understand its size.
It’s beautiful to be a guest of the elements, but not at the mercy of them. A new kind of dialogue forms.

Q&A with Sasu Ripatti:

1) Tell us something about the EP series ”Hide Behind the Silence”, what’s the idea and what can we expect?

Exploration of inaction. Of many kinds. In arts and in personal life, or at bigger and more serious levels. Questioning myself as a human being as well as an artist. Acknowledging the growing activism all around, and the very clear need for it, and how it reflects my own inaction.
Musically speaking, after Rakka, Isoviha and Speed Demon, I finally found some relief, but more importantly lost the need to go musically ever more outward and intensive. I felt quite strongly certain periods/moods from the past and they made me revisit some musical ideas or states of mind I was exploring early on.
It’s about live moments being captured, not much premeditation or editing. More intuitive and raw, even though the end result (to me) feels and sounds quite introspective and calm. It’s not very ambitious. Momentary and reflective.

2) Your music doesn’t sound very silent. Does it come from somewhere behind the silence?

Oh, this time to me it sounds quite quiet and playing with space if not silence. I don’t know what’s actually behind silence, but I think silence is the source of everything. We just don’t understand it yet.

3) What kind of thoughts or experiences gave inspiration to this series?

Writing this in Nov ’22, it’s not a stretch to say the world has been really unwell. Sometimes, like Mika Vainio put it, the world eats you up. I feel a bit like that. And I try to hide in my studio and stay away from it all, but it’s getting harder by the day. I’ve been questioning myself and thinking if what us artists are doing is worth anything, and whether it’s just a selfish thing I’ve been doing for the past 25 years, running away from everything. I haven’t come to a conclusion yet.

4) Is it easy for you to be in silence, or around silence?

Absolutely. I not only hide behind silence but I also love silence. It’s only since I started going back to nature as a grown-up person that I sensed and was enveloped by silence, true silence. I have begun to appreciate it a lot. I think all the people should spend more time in silence.

All tracks composed and produced by Sasu Ripatti.
Artwork by Marc Hohmann, photography by Shinnosuke Yoshimori.
Mastering by Stephan Mathieu for Schwebung Mastering.
Vinyl cut by SST Brueggemann.
Publishing by WARP Music Ltd.

Sasu Ripatti's complete "Dancefloor Classics" series. Music for imaginary dancefloors, released on Ripatti's own label Rajaton.

”Look up, into the light” she said, while the camera shutter clicked. ”Like this? Does it look holy?” His neck felt stiff. Her reply: ”Yes, just like that. What do you mean holy? Like religious? ”No, more like trying to look very far, somewhere beyond what we can see.” ”Okay, stand still, I’m going to come close to you now. The light hits your face great.” click, click, click.
He noticed her fingernails. They were not polished. Natural. Even somewhat rugged, as if something wore out the fingers slightly. What had these hands held besides the camera? What made the edges of her fingernails drift off?
He thought it’s weird to look straight into the camera. The photographer had closed her left eye, the one not looking into the lens. Then it opened, she looked up, perusing the surroundings, then she closed her eye again, then looked up, closed, looking up, very quickly. It all seemed very professional. Maybe she calculated the light, making sure it’s close to perfect. ”What will these photos look like?” – the thought popped into his head briefly. It was liberating to think it wouldn’t matter.
”What’s that song playing?” he asked. ”Wait a sec, Ol’ Dirty Bastard?” she replied. ”Oh yeah, right. But the sample?” ”Hey, could you look up again, like that. No, lower.”
New directions: ”Look out from the window, turn left.” ”My left or yours?” ”Yours, I always try to think from the direction of my model.” How professional! This is a good shoot, so natural. Should I worry about how the photos look like? No, I don’t want to. His thoughts bounced around. What would the story be like? It’s a big newspaper, everyone will read it. Maybe someone drinks coffee and eats a stroopwafel while they do it. Will they place the waffle on top of the mug for a brief while, so that it gets hot and the syrup melts a little? Then it feels wet, and you can bend the cookie.
She broke his train of thought off midway through: ”Now turn right, but look left, and slightly up, but don’t turn your face right.” ”Umm, like this? Sounds like a set of pilates instructions.” she laughed ”You do pilates?” ”Yeah, it’s hard sometimes. Have you tried?” ”No”, she said. ”I’m not good for sports that are done in groups.” ”Yeah, but in pilates you can just be inside your mind, drowning in your private thoughts.”
”What are you thinking in pilates?” she asked, taking more photos. ”Well, mostly just which way is right. And which left.” click, click.

Q&A with Sasu Ripatti:

1) Tell us something about the EP series ”Dancefloor Classics”, what’s the idea and what can we expect?

I’ve been slowly writing these sort of dance music pieces and finally curated them together for a conceptual release. I like to create music for a dancefloor that exists only in my imagination and doesn’t try to suck up to the standardized reality.

2) Your vinyl format is 10” which is quite special (as opposed to LP / 12”). Why did you choose it?

It’s my favourite format, absolutely. The size is perfect, and you can make it sound really good @ 45 rpm. And you still can make great artwork.

3) You seem interested in sampling/repurposing, what does it mean to you as an artist to approach something already existing from a new angle? How does the source material inform you about the approach to take?

I guess i could flip it around and just say I’ve outgrown synths or electronic sounds to a great extend, and having gotten rid off all my synths already good while ago I’ve used samples as my main source material a lot. It’s obvious on this series that i’ve sampled existing music, but I also sample instruments and things in the studio and resample my own library that I have built over the years, it’s quite large. To me the end result matters, not so much how I get there. Once I have something on my keyboard and play around, it’s all an instrument, though with sampling other music it becomes a really interesting and complex one as you’re possibly playing rhythm, but also harmonic content and maybe hooks or whatever, all at once.
I never sample premeditadedly, like listening to records and looking for that mindblowing 3 sec part. I just throw the cards in the air and see what lands where, just full intuition and hopefully zero mind involved, playing tons of stuff, trying things, just recording hours of stuff. Then comes the interesting part to listen to hours of mostly crazy stuff and finding that mindblowing 3 sec part.

4) What is your relationship with the dancefloor (conceptually and/or in experiences / as a performer)?

Very complicated. I have never really felt comfortable on a dancefloor but have always wanted to. There’s something in club music, in theory, that really speaks to me. It has never really materialized for me – speaking mainly from a performer’s point of view who goes to check on a dancefloor for a moment after a concert. I never have DJ’d or felt much interest towards it. But again, I love the idea and concept of DJing. As well as producing music for imaginary DJs. Lately, as in the past 10+ years, I haven’t even performed in any sort of club spaces. So my relationship to the dancefloor is quite removed and reduced, but there’s quite a bit of passion and interest left.

All tracks composed and produced by Sasu Ripatti.
Artwork & photography by Marc Hohmann.
Mastering by Stephan Mathieu for Schwebung Mastering.
Vinyl cut by SST Brueggemann.
Publishing by WARP Music Ltd.

SLIFT's ILION is a towering work of rock music, a steamrolling record that starts at the highest peak and never lets up. If that sounds overwhelming, trust that this Toulouse trio have you in good hands. Their third full-length feels massive and oceanic, merging the furious intensity of metal and the wigged-out guitar heroics of psych rock with post-rock's epic sense of scale. ILION is the kind of music where you listen to it and think to yourself, "This came from only three people?" It sure did, and SLIFT's utter ferocity is way more than a tempest in a teacup. It reaches outwards for miles and creates new zeniths within unforeseen horizons of rock. SLIFT is made up of brothers Jean and Remí Fossat, and Canek Flores, who first met the brothers Fossat at school. After the band formed in 2016, they quickly made their 2017 debut EP, Space Is the Key, which merged stoner rock's heaviness with the sugar-rush qualities of garage rock. From there, things only got weirder: The trio experimented with faster tempos and bongos(!) on the following year's full-length La Planeté Inexploreé, and in 2019, their KEXP session recorded at the Trans Musicales festival in Rennes became a viral sensation, racking up more than 1.4 million YouTube views. UMMON from 2020 represented SLIFT's pivot towards the celestially crushing confines of psych-metal, marked by Remí's rolling basslines and Flores's relentless skin-pounding. But nothing in their catalog could prepare you for ILION, a huge and melodically dense record that at once recalls Godspeed! You Black Emperor's perpetually uplifting surge, the passionate burn of post-hardcore legends _And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead, Led Zep's psychotic blues-rock mysticism, and the psychedelic swirl of Swedish greats Goat.

SLIFT's ILION is a towering work of rock music, a steamrolling record that starts at the highest peak and never lets up. If that sounds overwhelming, trust that this Toulouse trio have you in good hands. Their third full-length feels massive and oceanic, merging the furious intensity of metal and the wigged-out guitar heroics of psych rock with post-rock's epic sense of scale. ILION is the kind of music where you listen to it and think to yourself, "This came from only three people?" It sure did, and SLIFT's utter ferocity is way more than a tempest in a teacup. It reaches outwards for miles and creates new zeniths within unforeseen horizons of rock. SLIFT is made up of brothers Jean and Remí Fossat, and Canek Flores, who first met the brothers Fossat at school. After the band formed in 2016, they quickly made their 2017 debut EP, Space Is the Key, which merged stoner rock's heaviness with the sugar-rush qualities of garage rock. From there, things only got weirder: The trio experimented with faster tempos and bongos(!) on the following year's full-length La Planeté Inexploreé, and in 2019, their KEXP session recorded at the Trans Musicales festival in Rennes became a viral sensation, racking up more than 1.4 million YouTube views. UMMON from 2020 represented SLIFT's pivot towards the celestially crushing confines of psych-metal, marked by Remí's rolling basslines and Flores's relentless skin-pounding. But nothing in their catalog could prepare you for ILION, a huge and melodically dense record that at once recalls Godspeed! You Black Emperor's perpetually uplifting surge, the passionate burn of post-hardcore legends _And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead, Led Zep's psychotic blues-rock mysticism, and the psychedelic swirl of Swedish greats Goat.

New pressing on limited pink vinyl. "...Holy Wave is certainly dreamy in a sense, but theirs is the kind of dream that's more vivid than blurry, more present than passing." – Consequence // "They've got the far-off, dreamy vocal wash of the shoegazers, but their guitars and hooks are anything but subtle." – Pitchfork // Suicide Squeeze is thrilled to announce a reissue of Holy Wave's Freaks of Nurture! Freaks is a hauntingly hypnotic journey through auditory lands of melodic bliss and passively happy psych rock hallucinatory dreams. Holy Wave is a band of multi-instrumentalists from El Paso, TX. Since moving to Austin in 2008, they have cemented themselves as a unique national and international touring circuit force. After perennial performances at Levitation (Austin Psych Fest) and countless tours and festival appearances in the USA, Europe, Latin America, and Africa, Holy Wave is poised to continue expanding into new spaces and places worldwide. With the recent release of their latest album, Five of Cups, this is the perfect time to revisit this crucial

For PACKS, making a record isn’t a means to an end; the making of the record is a communal experience, bottled up for the public to hear. On third album Melt the Honey PACKS explores a state of contentment, even bliss, long elided. The self-produced record honors the unpretentious disaffection of the grunge movement and the inventive arrangements of Guided By Voices, whose prolific output has inspired PACKS since their inception.

To make Melt the Honey, PACKS traveled to Mexico City, where Madeline Link had spent significant time as an artist-in-residence at Casa Lü. Over the course of 11 days, PACKS practiced new songs in a rented studio space. From there, they took a bus to Xalapa where they worked as artists-in-residence at a house known as Casa pulpo, an architectural feat removed from the bustle of city life. “The house has no straight lines, it puts you in a creative mindset,” Link says. Melt the Honey, is an outward-facing testament to the wonderfully strange details of daily life, vividly rendered by a songwriter who knows they’re worthy of reverence. Out January 19th on Fire Talk.

For PACKS, making a record isn’t a means to an end; the making of the record is a communal experience, bottled up for the public to hear. On third album Melt the Honey PACKS explores a state of contentment, even bliss, long elided. The self-produced record honors the unpretentious disaffection of the grunge movement and the inventive arrangements of Guided By Voices, whose prolific output has inspired PACKS since their inception.

To make Melt the Honey, PACKS traveled to Mexico City, where Madeline Link had spent significant time as an artist-in-residence at Casa Lü. Over the course of 11 days, PACKS practiced new songs in a rented studio space. From there, they took a bus to Xalapa where they worked as artists-in-residence at a house known as Casa pulpo, an architectural feat removed from the bustle of city life. “The house has no straight lines, it puts you in a creative mindset,” Link says. Melt the Honey, is an outward-facing testament to the wonderfully strange details of daily life, vividly rendered by a songwriter who knows they’re worthy of reverence. Out January 19th on Fire Talk.

Story Of Collapsed Dimention unfold in 4 tracks multi-genres musical accompaniment and 12 frame comics, as artwork. The EP symbolizes a journey of personal transformation, the courage to confront the unknown and fight against circumstances and suffering. In order to become something new, we need to give up what we are now.

The tracks span across various styles, including funky house with a live-band feel, featuring infectious rhythms and vibrant instrumentation. There is a breakbeat track infused with a groovy bassline seized from NBA Live 95 on Sega Genesis, accompanied by turntablism hard drops and scratchy sounds that add an edgy and gritty vibe.

B-side explores psychedelic frequency modulations of polyharmonic intertwined with jungle-oriented breaks, creating a mesmerizing fusion of intricate melodies and rhythmic complexity. Finally, the EP concludes with an electro banger that has been accidentally reinvented with its captivating energy and a profound message.

Overall, the EP showcases a diverse and dynamic musical journey through these genres, offering a rich and immersive listening experience or valuable universal DJ-tool.

The artwork features hand-drawn comics by the talented artist Larisa Shalyapina, script and production by CDA.

The unique texture, blurriness, and overall quality of the illustration are meticulously preserved through a process of manual assembly and duplication, resulting in a visually captivating and tactile experience.

Used gear: Roland MC-808, Roland MC-505, Moog Subphatty, Waldorf Wave XT, MAM33, Volca FM, Volca Bass, Tascam Midistudio 644, Jomox t-resonator II, Boss Digital Delay, Teletron SAQ-206B Amp, KME Sound GBA 80 Bassbox, Culture vulture distortion, Distress compressors. DAW Ableton.

conceptualization:

Tracks are written during frequent relocations, capturing experienced moments and raw emotions. As the physical changes in our living environment are comparable to the collisions and evolving paths within the domain of knowledge reflected in the trials of spiritual awakening.

In Berlin, a city of expats, it has a special relevance to people who came here to find themselves. It also resonates with those who have been brought here by circumstances.

Record id released with all Ukrainian brothers and sisters in heart.

While we find comfort in our safe spaces, it is inevitable that some stress will eventually provoke us to take action. We may long for that period of comfort and feel a sense of anger or sadness for what once was. Once the truth is revealed, much like the unveiling of light, there is no turning back — a path to enlightenment shall be accepted.

Within the EP, each track serves as a chapter for this path.

A1

First track encapsulates escapism by chasing a feel-good sense in the run from responsibilities into fantasy-land. In the moment of careless life in careless time, where the future is sacrificed in the name of immediate pleasure.

A2

Robotboy incorporates a superficial state of mind with a reactive personality rooted in a narcissistic ego, dishonestly denying the righteous path. Subconscious struggle from hedonistic lifestyle with no relief.

B1

A deeply intimate and personal, embodied introspective sentiment kept hidden from the world, revealing when we’re alone and usually stifled with distraction and entertainment. Nostalgic feeling of loss follows us during the abandonment of a beloved place. Overwhelming weight of regret in presents.

B2

Taking action of the first step makes us unstoppable and disclosure of knowledge leads to destruction of the illusory world. Finding out the truth, same as seeing the light, excludes the retreat into darkness. As comprehension is the way to enlightenment.

With their profound take on electronic music, Animistic Beliefs have steadily solidified their spot in the global underground. Influenced by cultural concepts such as ancestry, animism and mythology, as well as the languages of political techno, punk, bubbling and IDM, Linh Luu and Marvin Lalihatu consistently translate their visions into sensitive productions as well as high-octane live performances. On MERDEKA, the artists explore and embrace their cultural heritage in all of its pride, pain and complexity. It symbolizes Animistic Beliefs' breaking free, coming to terms with their changing selves and letting go of external expectations. The record rethinks childhood memories, confronts the generational trauma left by (post-)colonialism, and re-connects Linh and Marvin â?? respectively of Vietnamese-Chinese and Dutch-Moluccan descent â?? with their formative cultures. MERDEKA marks their first step in an overall departure from western club music. For its layered sound, Animistic Beliefs once again draw from the past, present and future of global club music, creating a sonic space where fast techno, warped breakbeats and ambient soundscapes make way for the augmented influence of (Southeast Asian) tribal music. The record incorporates Indonesian scales and recordings of the Tahuri (a wind instrument made out of a conch shell), Totobuang (Gamelan-like gongs) and Tifa drums, known as â??the Moluccan heartbeatâ??. In true Animistic Beliefs fashion, MERDEKA will set fire to sweltering clubs and (sleepless) dreams. Yet, for the artists, it is essential to amplify the stories that spark that flame and keep it burning. The release of MERDEKA follows CACHE/SPIRIT, their ongoing collaboration with visual artist Jeisson Drenth, which extensively explores the artistsâ?? intersectional identities. As such, the latest album is the next step within a bigger, introspective investigation. More unapologetic than ever, MERDEKA embodies a turning point on Animistic Beliefsâ?? ongoing journey towards self-acceptance â?? fuelled by the sound of urgency.

Car Therapy Sessions is an EP of new and re-imagined songs by Faye Webster recorded at Spacebomb Studios with a 24 piece orchestra. The orchestra was headed by Trey Pollard who was responsible for both conducting and arranging, and Drew Vandenburg produced and mixed the EP. Car Therapy Sessions will be available on vinyl in the fall and is available to pre-order on April 13th. "I have a vivid memory of walking around London in 2018 listening to a mix of Jonny, which I had just written. I remember thinking "I want to perform this song with an orchestra". I truly have had my heart set on it since then, always talking about it and figuring out how or when to make it happen," says Webster. On the EP, Webster reimagines three songs from her critically acclaimed 2021 release I Know I'm Funny haha and 2019's Atlanta Millionaires Club. The songs "Kind Of", "Sometimes" and "Cheers" take on a cinematic and glimmering new sheen. In addition to the title track -"Car Therapy" - she also shares a sprawling and emotional work - "Suite: Jonny" - which combines fan-favorites "Jonny" and "Jonny (Reprise)." The two songs originally appeared on the Atlanta Millionaire's Club tracklist, two different views on the same narrative. Here they're presented together. It's remarkable how beautifully Webster's work can take on this orchestral treatment. Like Cole Porter, or Judy Garland - her delicate and emotional delivery packs a gut punch when dramatized by the EP's robust arrangements.

2024 Repress


Recorded in 1989, this is one of the rare and sought after recordings by Larry Heard. Never been available since 1990 and a departure from his more familiar style that he released as Mr Fingers, Fingers Inc. and The It). Gherkin has been an outlet for his more experimental and techno-orientated productions. 6 tracks on this record, and everyone seems to have their own favorite... but worth mentioning are the dramatic opener ''Meltdown'', the cosmic ''Saturn V'' and the incredible extra terrestial ''Strange Creatures''. Tracks that are the foundation of the house we live in! - essential!

On Natura Morta, Sven Wunder is exploring art as a bridge between nature and the human ability to judge and observe in eleven musical compositions with brightly colored textures and an emphasis on vibrant melodies.

Throughout human history, we have depicted the world we live in through art. By reworking what we see in the world, the simplest things have helped us understand the beauty of nature and to evaluate the material world that we have created around us, as a window to a constantly changing reality, through our own perception. It is that absolute reality that appears in the seam of human and nature and that can be revealed through art.

Still life painting, also referred to as Natura Morta (”dead nature”) in Italian, stretches back to ancient times. Some of the earliest works, found in Pompeii, depict commonplace objects such as fresh autumn fruits alongside man-made objects such as a small amphora and a small terracotta heap with dried fruits. These two-thousand-year-old paintings give a snapshot of Roman life, and also creates a link to time and space. A slice of life has been created by binding the earth’s pigments with extracts of oil, made from nuts and seeds, painted with brushes, made from a variety of fibers, such as trees and hair from animals. While life wanes with each brushstroke, by shifting reality into the past, art exists to make us come alive, being a living image of a dead thing, a surface and a symbol with symbolic powers of its own. Still life works celebrate material and ephemeral pleasures by returning to nature as the ultimate source for our standards in art as well as in life itself.

Natura Morta collects pieces from a continuous variety of melodies — supported by a decisive rhythm section — creating a musical kaleidoscope of ever-changing colors. Sven Wunder brings life into this rich assortment of musical implications by fusing and combining melodic instruments with each other in a setting that spans from a classical to a modern idiom. The author evokes this panoramic portrait by articulating an instrumental dialog between a chamber orchestra and a jazz ensemble. The result is a musical celebration of material pleasures that also serves as a reminder of the brevity of human life. This album was produced with financial support from the Swedish Arts Council.

2001, Yorkshire, England. SUBDUB is in full strength shaking down Leeds' city walls with regular parties, community events & sound system sessions. Active since 1998, the devoted crew push UK Dub music forward, inviting key players of the scene to play at their events powered by the mighty Iration Steppas sound system. Session after session, the SUBDUB imprint nurtures a loyal community of skankers while building close ties top artists in the field. A solid reputation that resonates amongst dub-heads around the globe. After 3 years of existence and having already put out 3 singles on their Tandori Space Records label, the idea of putting out a SUBDUB compilation album sparks. Producers get involved and the ‘Digital Africa’ project takes shape! But when the test presses finally arrive, the difficult financial situation and bleak state of the vinyl market at the time force the project to get shelved…

22 years on, while on a pilgrimage to SUBDUB and stopover at the Tribe Records HQ, the Dubquake team see the dusty test presses emerge from the record store vaults and get a taste of the incredible music through the shop's speakers… Unreleased & exclusive tracks by Iration Steppas, Jah Warrior, D.BO General, Vibronics, The Disciples, Tena Stelin, Nucleus Roots, The Bush Chemists & Freedom Masses. 12 undiluted UK Dub cuts from the 90s pressed on to 2x12” vinyl discs, with a 13th bonus digital track. Pure sound system business, raw dubs inna vanguard style!

‘Digital Africa’ is finally coming out on Dubquake Records in time to celebrate SUBDUB’s 25th birthday. A forgotten compilation full of history, curated by Simon Scott & Mark Iration. Guaranteed to bring back sweet memories to veterans of the dance, a great piece of dub music education for the rest of us!

Recorded over a four-week period in early 2022, Freedom Lapse is the debut solo release of Australian multi-instrumentalist and composer Adam Halliwell. A versatile improviser and lover of performance, Halliwell has been an active contributor to numerous musical communities in recent years. The release of Freedom Lapse marks an exciting stage in Halliwell’s journey as an artist with the culmination of several important musical facets that are now becoming foundational to his practice.

As Halliwell tells us, Freedom Lapse owes its genesis to an epiphanic moment experienced whilst traversing a mountainous passage in Mexico, a place where ‘the past present and future stretch out in one place’. Entranced by this environment, its colours, the villages and local life, Halliwell listened to music that inspires him (he cites Jon Hassell here). The result: ‘complete aural, visual and spiritual completeness’, a moment of discovery, he explains. Shortly after, the material that now comprises Freedom Lapse was recorded, distilling this powerful sensorial experience into a body of music that he has now invited the world to share with him.

Throughout these recordings restrained improvised phrases and melodic ideas feature, often appearing as long refrains that soar above idiosyncratic beds of fractured percussion and junkyard bass-work. This use of contrast, which is central to the work, allows Freedom Lapse to tap the lucidity-chaos juxtapositional-style that lies at the heart of all good music in the ‘fourth-world’ idiom. Halliwell’s sensitivity to dynamics, form and narrative is potent on these recordings, which allow his winding, free-improvisations the space to unfold and extend patiently. All instruments on Freedom Lapse were written and recorded by Haliwell, with additional trumpet on Cygon Dance supplied by regular-collaborator Reuben Lewis. Freedom Lapse was mixed and produced by Halliwell and Jim Rindfleish.

The third album of the amazing dub duo NORMAL BIAS, consisting of YAC (Piotr Krupiński) and 77 (Tomasz Karczewski). "LP3" is a kind of closure to the trilogy started in 2016. By inviting Dariusz Dudziński (drummer of the legendary Polish indie band Ewa Braun, currently Titanic Sea Moon) to participate in the recordings, the Normal Bias musicians create a symbolic loop centered on the hometown of all three artists - Słupsk - the place where it all began, where Tomek and Darek years ago they shared their bands' rehearsal space in the famous "independent garage" - a city whose spirit naturally became the leitmotif of the entire "LP3".

The album was mixed again by the duo themselves under the reliable supervision of Kwazar, and the mastering (including cutting the lacquer!) was entrusted to Stefan Betke - co-founder of the famouse ~scape label from Berlin, which can also be treated as a symbol. The graphics based on Martiszu's design were completed by a Znajomy Grafik.

Gudu Records label continues a 2023 for the books with Dream Universe, a new four-track EP by Italian duo Hiver.

Based in Milan, Giuseppe Albrizio and Sergio Caio have spent the last decade honing a very special take on electro and machine funk, driven by the duo’s trademark basslines, glossy strings that drip with emotion and an overall utopian nature.

On Dream Universe, a “tribute to early ‘90s house and trance”, built around trance elements, acid bass and Detroit-inspired rhythms made on iconic synthesizers like the Alpha Juno, Juno 106 and the Roland 303, 909 and D-550, they pack more energy and emotion into their music than ever before, from the high-emotional vocal that defines the EP’s title track, to the raw bass hits that drive ‘Lodash’.

At this point, Hiver’s sound is so distinctive that you know one of their tracks the minute you hear it, but Dream Universe feels like the high water mark of their work to date; a duo in complete control of their craft.

This is the first stop on Sven Wunder’s musical journey. Wunder takes the listener somewhere around the easternmost part of the Mediterranean Sea, around the Levantine Sea, where he paints a colourful portrait and illustrates the regions flora through sound.

The fruitage is a vivid bouquet where Wunder fuses colours and pigments by using traditional and modern instruments merged with arrangements and melodies that stretches from popular to folk music by portraying tulips, red roses, hibiscus, hyacinths, chamomile, magnolia, daisies etcetera. With both fine and thick brushes are these flowers being pictured in a both modern and classic idiom.

The outcome is prismatic. It stands between Anatolian rock and European jazz-funk with ponderous drum patterns, groovy organs, far-out synthesizers, enchanting Saz and impetuous bass lines. Eastern Flowers sweeps through time and space and points towards the future. It could appeal both psych and prog listeners, folk or jazz aficionados and as well the gourmet hip hop connoisseurs.

repress !

A single sided repress of All I Remember - hand-stamped centre with the Astrophonica Logo.

'I was introduced to Damian’s Ghost by a mutual friend and what struck me immediately was how simple and clean the tracks were. The vibe and intention was clear from the outset and ‘All I Remember’ went straight into my radio show that week. Vangelis meets Jungle. Atmospheric and drawn out but ruff with it. Delicate but weighty. There’s more too so watch this space . . .' All I Remember takes the scenic route and drifts over peaks and valleys before ascending into the stratosphere. A positive outlook for your day and beyond.

A discreet but essential figure in the field of musical creation, Horacio Vaggione has been crafting an ambitious, precise and highly significant body of work for over the last fifty years, coupled with a demanding research activity. This disc offers four purely electroacoustic pieces which illustrate, each in their own way, this singular and fascinating grammar developed by Horacio Vaggione, a complex but fertile grammar which establishes a very special relationship between structure and texture, between matter and formula, to create a fascinating musical space, made up of polyphonies and metamorphoses. (François Bonnet, Paris, 2022)

--

«Schall» (1994), 07’30

Schall exclusively uses piano sounds sampled and processed with various digital techniques. The sound palette focuses on several shapes of various sizes which reiterate, altered to varying degrees, throughout the process. The granular paradigm is clearly assumed here, as is also that of the interactions between various temporal scales. Basically, there is a concern for the articulation of micro-events. The piece essentially plays with low-intensity frames, composed of various planes and punctuated by stronger objects, in a kind of polyphonic dialogue between proximity and distance. (H. V.)

«Rechant» (1995), 15’51

Initially, a few brief sounds of instrumental origin — percussions, flutes, strings. Processed by means of various digital techniques, projected on various temporal scales, analyzed and re-synthesized, worked in their parts (in their saliences), articulated in their edges as well as in their interactions, these sounds show, as Bachelard would say, «pluralism under identity». I thus tried to compose morphologies by targeting properties contained in the material and by projecting them on temporal perspectives of all sizes. The title, an allusion to the old polyphonic technique, refers to the iterative content of these morphologies as well as to the modalities of their interweaving. (H. V.)

«24 Variations» (2001), 09’50

The word «variations» applies here to the morphological transformations of the material, as well as to the various contexts in which these transformations appear. The result can be heard as a continuous interaction between sound particles of different sizes, composed of several layers, reflecting a preoccupation with detailed articulation spanning different time scales. (H. V.)

«Gymel» (2002), 09’25

In Gymel I tried to compose a space-trajectory using layered sounds, produced by morphological operations (splits, clusterings) that spread out from location to location in variously dense objects. The space was treated through phase-decorrelation, a technique which I use extensively, both to create spaces and to locate sounds and movements within a polyphonic (stratified) context. (H. V.)

There are two versions of the vinyl - classic black and triple-color limited Indie Shop edition.

Both have special insert inside with the bands bio and photos.

Generacja JAZZ is a project showing a fragment of the new wave of Polish jazz, treading its own path, creating, touring and jamming across Europe. Borders don't exist - especially musical - the new generation is engaging with nightclubs, festivals and playlists. The time has now come to show its broader perspective. We created a project which involves a handful of groups that have already racked up debut albums and festival wins, as they set out on their musical odyssey. The groups also have other things in common, like their passion, originality and, for the needs of the project, age - all the artists during the recording of this album were under 30 years old. This is the new generation - the Jazz Generation.

For the Jazz Generation record we invited five bands who had already released debut albums: Immortal Onion, Klawo, Rejoin, Twoosty Mayonez and USO 9001. We also reserved two spots on the compilation for the winners of our open call competition, whereby on the basis of the jury's choice (jury: Monika Borzym, Paulina Przybysz, Envee, Wojtek Mazolewski i Marcin Groh Grośkiewicz) we met the winning bands: Kosmos and quietet.

The sleeve artist is Kornelia Nowak, who won our open call for young designers and graphic artists. Here once again we could rely on the opinion of a prestigious jury comprised of: Beata Śliwińska Barrakuz, Bovska, Maciej Animisiewasz Grochot, Grzegorz Forin Piwnicki i Marcin Groh Grośkiewicz.

Generacja JAZZ LP is also a start of the new imprint - U JAZZ ME, which will be focused on jazz from Poland.

And here are the bands from the album:

1. Immortal Onion - A band from the Tri-City playing a broad spectrum of instrumental music.

Band members: Wojtek Warmijak (percussion), Tomir Śpiołek (piano, synths), Ziemowit Klimek (Upright Bass, synths).

The band Immortal Onion has already established itself as one of the most interesting projects of the new wave of Polish jazz, and is consistently being labelled as such abroad. After two well received albums ("Ocelot of Salvation" (2017) and"XD Experience Design" (2020) U Know Me Records) they released their third album "Screens" in 2022, which was recorded with the well known Tri-City composer and saxophonist - Michał Jan Ciesielski.

The inspiration behind the band's formation were such artists as: Esbjörn Svensson, Hiromi Uehara, Tigran Hamasyan and Tosin Abasi.

The group's guiding principle from the very beginning was the fusion of often disparate musical styles, which bore "post instrumental aggressive gay pop". Despite the stylistic discrepancies, between which they swim, the group has forged its own identifiable language, characterised by complicated rhythmical structures, energetic riffs and trance beats with lyrical melodies.

The trio has performed its original material at many venues and festivals around Europe and Asia.

2. Klawo - seven adventurous adventurers from Gdańsk, who were brought together by their love for music, halvah and throwing Frisbee. Their self-named début album, released in 2022 on the local label Coastline Northern Cuts, is an amalgam of the inspirations of each of the team members and played backwards contains tips on how to reach the Kashubian pyramids. After a win at the international competition Jazz in the Park, held in Cluj-Napoca in Romania, the band began work on their second album. Meanwhile, they were also travelling the length and breadth of Poland on a mission to infect people with the idea of Baltic Funk.

3. Kosmos is a Łódż based jazz quintet. It was formed in 2020 by Pianist Stanisław Szmigero, Saxophonist Iwo Tylman and Trumpeter Jan Ostalski. However, it wasn't until 2022 that Kosmos found its true form when Kamil Gużniczak (Upright bass) and Kacper Kuta (Percussion) joined the line-up.

Their compositions are influenced by Polish yass bands, electronic music and hip-hop. Kosmos music is a mix of lyricism, space, intensity and elements of experiment.

The band members are all eccentric characters possessing different means of musical expression - looking at them, one could even argue they are a group of oddballs. Despite this, for reasons unbeknownst to themselves, the members of Kosmos complement each other on stage and form a unified artistic vision of the world around them.

Kosmos officially released their début single "Ja" in June 2023. They regularly play concerts across Poland and recently were selected as distinguished artists at JAZZiNSPIRACJE (JAZZiNSPIRATION) - a competition held during the 13th Lublin Jazz Festival.

4. Quietet (formed at the beginning of 2023) is the result of meetings between five talented musicians with a deep passion for musical creation. Its sound is a unique blend of Jazz and classical music with a hint of hard rock. The band is inspired by the Scandinavian approach to making music, which brings a characteristic atmosphere and melodies to their work. Their music captivates listeners with its originality, refined improvisations and flawless technique. Both classical and modern musical trends feed their inspiration when creating passionate and emotional compositions.

Their works are full of sound experimentation, which equally surprise and expose new musical horizons. Through their compositions, "Quietet" aims to share their emotions evoked during performances, creating a musical journey that affects and inspires.

5. Connecting jazz with electronic music in fresh interpretations, six young musicians make up the group Rejoin. The group re-formed in 2020 after a four-year break, playing their debut concert at Lotos Jazz Festival Bielska Zadymka Jazzowa. The musicians in Rejoin have performed alongside such artists as: Urszula Dudziak, Krystyna Prońko, Marcin Masecki, Szczyl, Kuba Więcek and Paulina Przybysz.

Most of the members of Rejoin are students from the Katowice Music Academy, where they also develop their own projects. Rejoin was a recipient of the Fabryki Norblin Music Masterclass Foundation scholarship.

6. Twoosty Mayonez is something your grandad would listen to with his younger sister. The non-standard approach to jazz alongside a pursuit of strange sounds, culminated in the conceptual album entitled "Carmin". The material was created by Bartosz Wolerta (percussion) and Dominik Kaniewski (bass guitar/synths). "Triceradiplodocus" tells the story of a mechanical dinosaur that lives on the yet undiscovered planet Carmin.

The third album of the amazing dub duo NORMAL BIAS, consisting of YAC (Piotr Krupiński) and 77 (Tomasz Karczewski). "LP3" is a kind of closure to the trilogy started in 2016. By inviting Dariusz Dudziński (drummer of the legendary Polish indie band Ewa Braun, currently Titanic Sea Moon) to participate in the recordings, the Normal Bias musicians create a symbolic loop centered on the hometown of all three artists - Słupsk - the place where it all began, where Tomek and Darek years ago they shared their bands' rehearsal space in the famous "independent garage" - a city whose spirit naturally became the leitmotif of the entire "LP3".

The album was mixed again by the duo themselves under the reliable supervision of Kwazar, and the mastering (including cutting the lacquer!) was entrusted to Stefan Betke - co-founder of the famouse ~scape label from Berlin, which can also be treated as a symbol. The graphics based on Martiszu's design were completed by a Znajomy Grafik.

Big Sigh brings together the best of Marika's previous works as an indie musician and adds a new layer of epic sounds and full-bodied production. Big Sigh is the "hardest record" Marika has ever made. As the title suggests, it is a relief of sorts - of sadness, of stress and lust, but mostly relief. Co-produced with Sam Petts Davies (Frank Ocean, Radiohead, Red Hot Chilli Peppers) & Charlie Andrew (Alt J, Wolf Alice, London Grammar). Lyrically there's always romance a longside grief, with elements of vulnerability and feeling trapped. "This album took a long time I got to the end of it I was quiet. I wanted to be away from it and let it sit in its own space. Now the dust has settled and I've got to re-enter the world of big sigh, and I'm excited." Stepping into a new world, moving forward, chipping away. Breath in, breath out. Big sigh."

Die Zeit ist gekommen für ein neues Scanner Album nach fast einem Jahrzehnt. Wie es die bisherige Diksographie fast zwingend verlangt, ist "The Cosmic Race" ein Konzeptalbum geworden: Das Überleben auf der Erde ist immer schwieriger geworden, Naturkatastrophen häufen sich und militärische Konflikte haben ihren Höhepunkt erreicht, große Teile der Kontinente sind nuklear verseucht. Das Leben konzentriert sich auf wenige Großstädte, und die Enge und die Hitze in ihnen ist unerträglich geworden. Der Scanner (eine Mischung aus Mensch und Androide), holt einen Teil der Menschen, um sie zu einem bewohnbaren Planeten namens Terrion in einer anderen Galaxie zu bringen. Die lange Reise endet erfolgreich. Aber auch in der neuen Welt müssen sich die Menschen gegen Aliens und Invasoren von anderen zivilisierten Planeten wehren und fangen wieder von vorne an. Sie wollen ihre zweite Chance nutzen und es besser machen als auf der Erde. Da es aber auch Zweifler und Abtrünnige unter ihnen gibt, die sich der neuen Gemeinschaft widersetzen, hat der Scanner ein System entwickelt, das diese Abtrünnigen in ihren nächtlichen Traumphasen identifizieren kann. Sie finden sich in einer Twilight Zone wieder. Sie werden schließlich in Trance an riesigen Totempfählen festgezurrt, in der Traum und Wirklichkeit gegeneinander kämpfen, bis sie gereinigt werden.

Die Zeit ist gekommen für ein neues Scanner Album nach fast einem Jahrzehnt. Wie es die bisherige Diksographie fast zwingend verlangt, ist "The Cosmic Race" ein Konzeptalbum geworden: Das Überleben auf der Erde ist immer schwieriger geworden, Naturkatastrophen häufen sich und militärische Konflikte haben ihren Höhepunkt erreicht, große Teile der Kontinente sind nuklear verseucht. Das Leben konzentriert sich auf wenige Großstädte, und die Enge und die Hitze in ihnen ist unerträglich geworden. Der Scanner (eine Mischung aus Mensch und Androide), holt einen Teil der Menschen, um sie zu einem bewohnbaren Planeten namens Terrion in einer anderen Galaxie zu bringen. Die lange Reise endet erfolgreich. Aber auch in der neuen Welt müssen sich die Menschen gegen Aliens und Invasoren von anderen zivilisierten Planeten wehren und fangen wieder von vorne an. Sie wollen ihre zweite Chance nutzen und es besser machen als auf der Erde. Da es aber auch Zweifler und Abtrünnige unter ihnen gibt, die sich der neuen Gemeinschaft widersetzen, hat der Scanner ein System entwickelt, das diese Abtrünnigen in ihren nächtlichen Traumphasen identifizieren kann. Sie finden sich in einer Twilight Zone wieder. Sie werden schließlich in Trance an riesigen Totempfählen festgezurrt, in der Traum und Wirklichkeit gegeneinander kämpfen, bis sie gereinigt werden.

Die Zeit ist gekommen für ein neues Scanner Album nach fast einem Jahrzehnt. Wie es die bisherige Diksographie fast zwingend verlangt, ist "The Cosmic Race" ein Konzeptalbum geworden: Das Überleben auf der Erde ist immer schwieriger geworden, Naturkatastrophen häufen sich und militärische Konflikte haben ihren Höhepunkt erreicht, große Teile der Kontinente sind nuklear verseucht. Das Leben konzentriert sich auf wenige Großstädte, und die Enge und die Hitze in ihnen ist unerträglich geworden. Der Scanner (eine Mischung aus Mensch und Androide), holt einen Teil der Menschen, um sie zu einem bewohnbaren Planeten namens Terrion in einer anderen Galaxie zu bringen. Die lange Reise endet erfolgreich. Aber auch in der neuen Welt müssen sich die Menschen gegen Aliens und Invasoren von anderen zivilisierten Planeten wehren und fangen wieder von vorne an. Sie wollen ihre zweite Chance nutzen und es besser machen als auf der Erde. Da es aber auch Zweifler und Abtrünnige unter ihnen gibt, die sich der neuen Gemeinschaft widersetzen, hat der Scanner ein System entwickelt, das diese Abtrünnigen in ihren nächtlichen Traumphasen identifizieren kann. Sie finden sich in einer Twilight Zone wieder. Sie werden schließlich in Trance an riesigen Totempfählen festgezurrt, in der Traum und Wirklichkeit gegeneinander kämpfen, bis sie gereinigt werden.

The 3rd album from Submechanical and the hardest, most forwards
and dense collection of audio devastation yet to be released. 10 tracks
of unrelenting driven beats, noise and bass with little space or respite.
Also included are 2 remixes of Submechanical tracks: “Mash – Up –
Inna – Speaker” by Shelley Parker and “Raw” by 3.14. Mastered:
Daniele Antezza / Dadub Written: Carl Jordan / Submechanical
Artwork: Darko Kolar

Grey Marbled Vinyl

The official re-release of the scarce DJ classic. Ralf Nowy produced this unique mix of Krautrock, Space Disco and proto Techno vibes in Berlin in 1980. The collaboration featuring also famous German star producer Jack White and Tom Müller aswell Vicky Brown from UK as singer who worked together also with bands as for example Pink Floyd, Roger Waters, Cerrone and Bryan Ferry.

repress

As EarToGround Records hits its seminal tenth release we have decided to go all out sonically and visually.

As you all know Dax has been a core member of EarToGround right from the beginning. It all began with his and Chris Stanford's jointly produced track 'Programm' on ETG001.

From then on in he has worked tirelessly at his East London studio, climbing through the ranks to become the very respected and some would say inspirational producer he is now. Over the last year he has very much honed in and developed his now unique sound and recently released on much respected, high quality labels such as Deeply Rooted.

You could say his own EP on ETG has been a long time coming but we like to think ETG010 is what he has been building up to, some of his best work to date. We will let you decide

3 new solid, hook heavy, DJ and dancefloor friendly tracks from Dax as well as 2 centralized locked grooves and additional, extremely slick remix work from ARTS label boss 'Emmanuel'...

Black vinyl. Internal textured black inner sleeve. External textured white outer sleeve. 2 ETG Invader Stickers. Again the artwork is Space related. The theme this time pays homage to what can arguably be called one of the best modern SYFY films ever made.

The Key Of The Future” takes you on a thrilling sonic journey that seamlessly blends electro, breaks, and acid elements with influences of synthwave and wave music. With tracks ranging from the pulsating intensity of “Acid Train” to the mysterious darkness of “Hasta La Mañana”, the album immerses you in a spacey and energetic atmosphere that leaves you craving more. Each song offers a unique experience, from the euphoria of “Fiesta Pesada” to the introspection of “We Are Lovers”, all tied together by a sense of discovery and evolution.

This musical masterpiece opens the door to a new chapter and reflects the artist’s expertly crafted mix of influences. Get lost in the sound and let “Key To The Future” be your guide.

Following the release of his Running Wild album, Grieves let loose a flurry of new music, surprising and delighting fans with fresh new singles each week. He was able to express his growth and hunger in this new work, as the content and production ranged from light-hearted and jazzy to intense and introspective. After releasing a string of five standalone singles he compiled them all onto one sensational project with three additional unreleased tracks, and introduced it as The Collections of Mr. Nice Guy.

The Collections of Mr. Nice Guy showcased a wide range of Grieves lyrical expression, as well as his production talents. On “Perspective”, Grieves waxes about the hypocritical standards musicians often face, while “Let The Devil In” addresses the demons he grapples with personally, rapping: “That shadow on my shoulder weighs a ton, y’all pretend like my experi- ence with hell was just for fun (nah).” On the lighter side, Grieves invites Chris Webby to trade bars back & forth on “Man Down”, where the pair go on to skewer less-than-stellar MCs holding space in the industry. Meanwhile, “I’ll Be Better” delivers a melan- choly reflection on the tropes of heartbreak, letting go of the old and making room for the new. At once, The Collections of Mr. Nice Guy stands at the intersection of all things fans that have historically drawn fans to Grieves—truthful and relatable lyricism over soulful synths and drums.

An evolved, ecosystemic love expression of Carlos Niño"s self-described "Spiritual, Improvisational, Space, Collage" expression - (I"m just) Chillin", on Fire is the prolific percussionist/producer"s most singular, intentional work ever, featuring a vibrant and abundant gathering of his "friends" (i.e. the highly skilled and accomplished musicians and improvisers that make up Niño"s extensive network of collaborators)

"Impératrice" bedeutet "Herrscherrin" auf Französisch, und der Bandname ist für Nicht-Frankophone wohl am schwierigsten zu begreifen - musikalisch gesehen gibts es bei L'Impératrice nichts, was man übersetzen muss. Die Pariser greifen auf eine Reihe von Genres zurück, von Space-Disco der 70er Jahre bis zum Downtempo-Synthpop der 90er Jahre, wobei sie dabei auch die französischen Filmkomponisten wie François de Roubaix und Michel Legrand mit einbeziehen. "Albums that sold 500 copies in the 1970s are the records that interest us most," sagen L'Impératrice. "Matahari" ist das glitzernde, kinematographische Ergebnis der letzten sechs Jahre harter Arbeit, das auf einige der besten musikalischen Fundstücke und schon vergessene Schätzen zurückgreift, die sich in Plattenkisten im ganzen Land verstecken. Versehen wird das ganze mit L'Impératrice' eigenem, unnachahmlichen 21st century twist. Subtil und dennoch majestätisch, L'Impératrice haben eine strahlende Zukunft in ihrem Heimatland, aber wenn das sechsköpfige Ungeheuer drauf und dran ist, wirklich in die musikalische Königsklasse Frankreichs aufzusteigen, dann müssen sie auf ihre têtes, ihre Köpfe, aufpassen. Boisseguin hat alles richtig gemacht, seit er seinen Journalisten-Job vor sieben Jahren geschmissen hat. Wenn der leise und stetige Aufstieg von L'Impératrice zur Vormachtstellung in ihrem Heimatland Teil eines Plans wäre, dann könnte man erwarten, dass in Zukunft mit der Weltherrschaft zu rechnen ist.

Epic, grooving, dazzlingly creative, perfectly attuned blends of complex mbalax drumming, field recordings, thumping kick-drum, and cosmic, bubbling, jamming synths and electronics.

The opening is suitably liminal, haunted by a diachronic sense of times past, present, and to come: ancestral ghosts, scratched playback, scraps of old recordings, voices strangulated or just out of range; puttering drums; futuristic, kosmische keys. Part II picks up the pace; III gives the drummers some, and heightens the atmosphere of enchantment. Jon Hassell’s Fourth World music courses through a kind of Dream Theory In Dakar.

Toco SOS, the second side, is a thumping, throbbing, mesmeric future-classic; perfect for fahr’n fahr’n fahr’n on the Autobahn… in a spacecraft. Expert hand percussion, call-and-response singing, bin-trembling foot-drum, spaceways keys. Sleekly funky as prime Popol Vuh.

Both sides range expansively by way of Berlin, where Lamin resided for a few years: you can hear something of T++’s brilliant, landmark HJ record on the A, and elements of Mark Ernestus’ crucial Ndagga project, on the B.

Half an hour of stunning music; in a beautiful sleeve, with mirror lettering, and an intricate spot-gloss rendition of salt crystals, laid over a photograph of the salt mines at Lac Rose, outside Dakar.

Four dazzling, extended engagements with mbalax master-drumming.


The contribution from Holy Tongue is chase-the-devil steppers — thumping, clangorous, reverberating — super-charged with energy and atmosphere. From the off drummer Valentina Magaletti detonates a hard rain of small bombs, rounds of fire, ticking fuses. Musical co-ordinates are somewhere between classic On-U Sound crew like African Head Charge, The Mothmen, and Creation Rebel, and the experimental funk of the Pop Group and 23 Skidoo, at their funkiest. Thrillingly, the two dubs are increasingly deranged.

Adjusting the same wavelengths as her superb Workaround LP, Beatrice Dillon plays spaced-out, abstract synth-work against the bodily physicality of the ancient, shifting mbalax rhythms. The music is poised, mindful, tentative; but also limber, fleet, and magical.

Phantasmagorical and efflorescent, Lamin Fofana’s one-two is simply stunning. Both excursions are wide-open, beautiful, epic, and propulsive — the first mix is banging and headlong, the second more syncopated and serpentine — teeming with freshly sublime, funkdafied updates on Jon Hassell’s Fourth World possible musics.

The two parts of LABOUR’s Etu Keur Gui engage the same sequence of drum patterns (called bakks) from different perspectives. The duo performed portions of this piece at the opening ceremony of the Dakar Biennial in 2022, at the Grand National Theater, with thirty sabar players from the family of Doudou Ndiaye Rose. This Wolof phrase for the inner-court of a home — a meeting-place — doubles here as a metaphor for inner space on a metaphysical level; and Pan Sonic, Muslimgauze, Zoviet France, early Shackleton… all ghost across the threshold.

This expansive double pack from Silentes finds each side of vinyl taken up by one long, ever-evolving piece of music based around one original. Gianluca Favaron & Stefano Gentile go first with their take on 'Landslide,' which goes from whirring machines sounds to brain cleansing sine waves and found sound abstraction. Dub techno don Rod Modell explores emptiness on 'Landslide' (Reworked) and Carl Michael Von Hausswolf's take is an eerie one with scratchy textures and filtered synth meanderings. Rod Modell then closes out with another rework of his own remix that will leave you adrift in space.

SOURCED FROM THE ORIGINAL MASTER TAPES: 2LP SET PRESENTS 1991 ALBUM IN 45RPM SPEED FOR FIRST TIME.

PCM Digital Master to Analog Console to Lathe.

Dire Straits never made a big to-do about its final run. In classic understated British fashion, the band simply let its music speak for itself. And how. Originally released in September 1991, On Every Street became the group’s swan song – a lasting testament to the influence, musicianship, and integrity of an ensemble whose merit has never been tainted by cash-grab reunions or farewell treks. It remains an essential part of the Dire Straits catalog and a blueprint of the distinctive U.K. roots rock the collective played for its 15-year career.

Sourced from the original master tapes, housed in gatefold packaging, and pressed at RTI, Mobile Fidelity’s 180g 45RPM 2LP set of On Every Street presents the album like it has always been meant to be experienced: in reference-grade audiophile sound. Recorded at AIR Studios in London and produced by Dire Straits leader Mark Knopfler, it features all of the band’s sonic hallmarks – wide instrumental separation, visceral textures, seemingly limitless air, broad soundstages, atmospherics that you can almost reach out and feel. Each element is made more vibrant, physical, and lifelike on this collectible reissue, which marks the first time this 60-minute work has been available at 45RPM speed.

Afforded generous groove space and black backgrounds, the songs from On Every Street burst with nuanced details and vibrant colors. Dire Straits’ playing appears to float, their intricate performances organized amid hypnotic, fluid, three-dimensional arrangements. Mobile Fidelity’s definitive-sounding set also brings into transparent view Knopfler’s finely sculpted guitar lines, expressive tones, and laid-back vocals – as well as the balanced accompaniment from his band mates. Here’s a record on which you can hear the full blossom and decay of individual notes, and imagine the size and shape of the studio. It is in every regard a demonstration disc. And it happens to be filled with timeless fare.

Remarkably, On Every Street almost never came to light. Dire Straits initially dissolved in September 1988 after touring behind its blockbuster Brothers in Arms and suffering the departure of two members. At the time, Knopfler professed his desire to work on solo material; bassist John Illsley also explored side projects. But Knopfler’s decision in 1989 to form the country-leaning Notting Hillbillies reignited a spark to reconvene his primary band and craft a fresh batch of songs. Six years removed from Brothers in Arms, Knopfler, Illsley, keyboardist Alan Clark, and keyboardist Guy Fletcher teamed with A-list session pros – steel guitarist Paul Franklin, percussionist Danny Cummings, saxophonist Chris White, guitarist Phil Palmer included – to create what still stands as an unforgettable farewell.

The platinum record brings the band full circle in that it returns Dire Straits to a quartet formation; finds the group refreshingly out of step with the era’s prevailing trends; and sees Knopfler and Co. knocking out song after song with the deceptive ease of a punter tossing back a pint at a pub. That subtle cool, clever poise, and innate control – signature traits that no other band ever matched – dominate On Every Street. Knopfler’s clean, virtuosic six-string escapades unfurl with dizzying melodicism and economical efficiency. Led by his winding fills and focused solos, Dire Straits traverse a hybrid landscape of rock, jazz, country, boogie, blues, and pop strains with near-faultless prowess.

More than any other entry in the group’s oeuvre, On Every Street welcomes quick detours down back alleys and into the depths of human souls. What makes it more brilliant is its staunch refusal to cater to commercial expectations or take advantage of prior successes; every passage feels true, every measure echoed in the service of song. It’s evident in the humorous satire of “Heavy Fuel,” closeted desperation of the witty “Calling Elvis,” and shake-and-bake bounce of “The Bug.” It pours from the album’s darker corners, as on the high-and-lonesome melancholy of the title track and bruised emotionalism of “When It Comes to You.”

Hinting at the open-minded approaches and boundless curiosity he’d embrace as a solo artist, Knopfler doesn’t limit himself when it comes to style or subject matter. Look no further than “You and Your Friend,” a shuffle whose all-inclusive lyrics encourage an array of interpretative meanings. Another of the album’s deep cuts, “Iron Hand,” comes on as one of the band’s most memorable moments – the narrative addressing the abuses of power at the 1984 Battle of Orgreave during the U.K. miners’ strike. Given cinematic heft by the expert production, the true-fiction account puts into perspective the richness, poetry, and depth of On Every Street.

“Every victory has a taste that’s bittersweet,” sings Knopfler on the title track. At least that bittersweetness seldom sounded so damn good on record.

Telephone Explosion proudly presents the self-titled debut LP from Toronto’s UH HUH, out physically and digitally on April 14, 2023. The album features eight tracks of dub-damaged art rock which conjure a potent vision of spaced-out 1980s post-punks feeding their angular rhythms and bass-heavy grooves through layer upon layer of grime-spattered spring reverb.

There is a palpable sense of discovery and exploration throughout UH HUH’s 37 heady minutes. Elastic basslines and serpentine guitar phrases throb and glide, cutting through dubwise reverberations like hands moving through an opaque cloud of reefer smoke.

Formerly known as Teenanger, the reconfigured (and reinvigorated) group’s newfound sense of sonic identity is put on display the moment the door kicks open. The percolating spaciousness of opener “Somewhere Beyond” is followed by the cyclical grooves of “Redemption Pause.” Vocalists Christopher Swimmings and Melissa Ball each take respective turns at lead vocal duties, showcasing their contrasting yet complimentary styles.

“Babylon”, a slab of overcast, loping funk features both singers on the same track, alternating between Swimmings’ stoned syncopation and Ball’s saccharine melancholy. This juxtaposition leans against a backdrop of reverb-soaked drums, watery guitar chords and rippling trumpet.

The slinking, fractured grooves of “Rain (In The Afternoon)” and “Citrus Song” call to mind the deranged minimal dub-wave of Naffi or Vivien Goldman. Both songs feature lyrical content heavily inspired by the Florida swamplands, although the aural landscape on these tracks is decidedly more brutalist than Boca Raton. Two of the songs included here are reworkings of previously released Teenanger numbers. “Blinds Drawn” is reduced to its core elements of bottom-heavy rhythm, spliced guitar shanks and Swimmings’ murmured ruminations. “Good, You”, on the other hand, is completely re-imagined as a blissed-out melt of opiated bossa nova.

After countless hours of experimentation during the album’s recording sessions at Toronto’s Studio Z, the band decided to send their drum machines, snare drums and percussion through an obscure 1960’s Japanese Guyatone guitar amp with a notoriously ecstatic spring reverb sound. The result was immediately inspiring.

The dank, busted and clanking tones produced by the Guyatone evoke a muggy, humid atmosphere that mimics the photo on UH HUH’s cover. The process of re-amping is literally the means through which UH HUH found the sound of this record. UH HUH is a record that asks more questions than it does provide answers. This is searching music that requires that the listener lean into it, the more time you spend in between the beats, bars, notes contained within, the more vivid the picture becomes.

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At one time participating in ground-breaking medical scientific research, in another a relentless road-trip, hoovering up rare records and tapes, in the nooks and crannies of France, Algeria, or any country that he happens to land in. And then there’s his long standing show for Rinse France.

Following his slamming mix for the Japan Blues show on NTS last year, he kindly offered up a selection for Japan Blues’ first tape release. Algeria is the focus of this tape, taking a brief dip into Sameer’s broad collection, coinciding with his research for his documentary film about the social history of Rai music, "Rai is not Dead" for Arte.

Words from the Hadj: “The medehates are traditional vocal formations of women from western Algeria. Their main role is to give some compliments to the future wife during a wedding, and pray to all the saints through long songs which could last for hours, until reaching a sort of transcendental state amplified by looped percussions, traditional flute, and violon notes. Exclusively for women, no men (including young boys) admitted. This ceremonial tradition gave an intimate space for women to speak out about taboo topics like men-women relationships, love, sins like alcohol consumption etc. Since then, some of them started freely to mention all of that in this small circle and some of them have been recorded live for release on 7″. I picked up a few from my collection in order to make this mix. They represent one of the most powerful and wildest roots of the raw traditional form of rai which appeared in the 50/60s in Algeri

Straight from the heart of downtown Bruxelles comes Instructor, a band that formed out of a group of friends who have been working hard to grow a local DIY scene centred around the Cobra Jaune Club. The CJ might as well be a time warp back to the CBGBs of the 80s, a truly raw punk affair where all freaks are welcome. Anyone who’s anyone on the hardcore punk tour circuit in the past 5 years will tell you playing the Cobra Jaune is what dreams are made of, bringing together punks and skins, together as one. Very much catching this vibe musically as well, Instructor sound like they got together in an alleyway and made some instruments out of garbage cans to play Breakdown’s ‘87 Demo and Kickback’s Cornered LP. As hardcore gets more and more polished, the truly meat-and-potatoes variety is becoming a rare sight, but that’s exactly what you get with Instructor, with bucketloads of attitude and energy from people living and breathing the life. Vocalist Dario sounds like he has smoked 2 million cigarettes, whilst guitarist Bert whips out some wild solos only a mother, and punk enthusiasts, could love. And that’s the point. Recorded at Spector Studio, a DIY space where analog equipment is crafted on-site, and with artwork by the infamous hardcore artists Spoiler and ‘Diamond’ Dave Decat, this is a snapshot of all things great from Belgium

Northern Minimalism 3, the latest album from Mat Handley performing as Pulselovers, is a deeply personal “love letter to South Yorkshire, or at least to Doncaster and Sheffield”, not just the urban environment but the region’s post-punk and electronic-pop legacies.

Inspired by the concept of spreading a project over multiple formats taken from Virgin Prunes’ ‘A New Form of Beauty’, this is the first full album in Pulselovers’ on-going ‘Northern Minimalism’ series following a 7” and 10” release on other labels over the past few years.

Taking a different approach than the rurally-inspired ‘Cotswold Stone’ album, ‘Northern Minimalism 3’ delivers a sprawling, genre-hopping release that is less focused on melody but explores suburban drones and industrial rhythms.

“The term “Northern Minimalism” was coined by Simon Berkovitz of Sensory Leakage, who released my “Live at Doncaster College” tape in 2020,” adds Handley.

“I loved the description and wanted to use it to pay tribute to the early electronic and post-punk sounds I was listening to in the first two or three years of the 1980s, particularly The Human League (mk1), Cabaret Voltaire, John McGeoch (Magazine) and Eric Random.”

Repress of Hey Colossus' twelfth studio album from 2019 on a limited coloured edition to mark the bands 20th anniversary. This edition is on transparent lime w/ marbles smoke effect and limited to 200 copies. Genre: Alternative / Noise Rock Hey Colossus are one of Europe's great live bands. Since 2003 the 6-piece has been driving around the continent with their "pirate ship" backline of broken amps and triple-guitar drang, elevating audiences in every type of venue imaginable; a doctor's waiting room in Salford, an industrial unit in Liege and a vast field next to a river in Portugal. Four Bibles is their twelfth studio album and the first to be released by London label Alter. Recorded by Ben Turner at Space Wolf Studios in Somerset, it's their most direct album yet and follows a well-documented trajectory of evolution that began (in the truest sense) with 2011's RRR for Riot Season and continued across three albums for Rocket Recordings. Lead vocalist Paul Sykes sounds more in focus than before, dialling down the effects and using reverb / delay to carry his lyrics rather than smother. The band has also fine-tuned to leave some room for extra depth. Piano, electronics and violin (by Daniel O'Sullivan of This is not This Heat / Grumbling Fur) all find a way in amongst a familiar mesh of interlacing guitars, wrapped round a taut rhythm section. Like every other Hey Colossus record before, the line-up has altered and the sounds reflect this. From the weight of "Memory Gore", to the subtlety and swag of "It's a Low", via the sonic extremes of "Palm Hex/Arndale Chins" this is exactly as the band are live; raging & rail-roading but somehow in control. Grooves for those who want to dance or for those who want to hug a wall and nod...bleak dystopian imagery submerged in relentless rhythms and low-end rattle. The songs breath life and soul - Hey Colossus have never sounded fresher or more on point.

Mega rare soundtrack to the obscure Venezuelan sexploitation film “Sobre la Hierba… Virgen” originally released in 1976 and almost impossible to find in any condition. The album includes a wide variety of music to enjoy, from thrilling psychedelic jazz-funk to spacey experimental tracks, killer drum-breaks or romantic instrumental tunes. Composer and keyboard player Schneider had an outstanding body of work for the TV/film industry and recorded with the likes of Baby Bell, Grupo Syma, Vytas Brenner as well as huge mainstream artists like José Luis Rodríguez and Pecos Kanvas. He was also producer to Phirpo Y Sus Caribes’s highly collectable only LP, a brilliant Afro-Latin funk masterpiece. His much sought-after 1975 solo album on Polydor anticipated the sounds comprised on “Sobre la Hierba… Virgen”, featuring a variety of exotic arrangements ranging from Latin mood to jazz funk to electronic psychedelic. “Sobre la Hierba… Virgen” is one of the best recordings of Pablo Schneider at the peak of his career.

Gonzalez Smith's debut album: "Roll Up A Song" is an album of classic popular songs with music by Jay Gonzalez and lyrics by Pete Smith. Best known as the guitarist/keyboardist for rockers Drive-By Truckers, Jay's musical tastes range from 'baroque' to 'A.M. Gold' and 'power' pop. His collaborations include local pop legends The Possibilities, power pop stalwart Scott McCaughey (The Young Fresh Fellows), and performances with Chris Stamey of The dB's and Bill Berry of R.E.M. Pete Smith, acclaimed lyricist, made waves with his contributions to the legendary jazz composer Gary McFarland's album "Butterscotch Rum". His journey led him to comedy writing for Adult Swim's animated shows. Classic pop composer Brent Cash's exceptional string arrangements elevate the album's depth and emotion, enriching Gonzalez and Smith's melodies and lyrics. Jay Gonzalez and Pete Smith are like a modern day Bacharach/David, if Burt spent his nights tearing it up with one of the best live rock bands in America, and Hal was a writer for Space Ghost Coast to Coast and The Brak Show. Their debut album as Gonzalez Smith, "Roll Up a Song," is a seamless fusion of power pop, piano ballads, bossa nova, and pure spun sugar confection. Jay brings the same multi-instrumental compositional skills found on his first three solo albums, and Pete pens lyrics by turns honest, romantic, arch and comedic, sometimes in the same verse. The results are so stellar, it's a shock to find out that the Drive-By Truckers guitarist/keyboardist and the Adult Swim comedy scribe haven't been writing together for decades. Arriving in December 2023, via Bobo Integral Records, "Roll Up A Song" transcends eras and genres. It's a harmonious journey, uniting melodies and lyrics into a timeless masterpiece. Get set to roll up the music, immersing in captivating soundscapes.

James Ruskin's Blueprint Records welcomes Setaoc Mass to the label's ever-increasing roster of techno artists. As a DJ and producer, Setaoc Mass is part of a select cut of young artists who are absorbing techno's legacy and carrying the torch into tomorrow. Whilst overseeing his own imprints, SK¦eleven and SKX, his releases push a galvanising brand of techno steeped in a sense of urgency, ever-propulsive with acute detailing and nods to a futuristic space-age.

A1 - Healing Properties
Opening his Spatial account with Healing Properties, Eusabia immediately throws down the gauntlet showcasing an inimitable versatility with breakbeats, permeated with a jungle flex so rarely captured in the atmospheric D&B landscape. Pivoting effortlessly as the track progresses from drumloop to thunderous drumloop with a simmering haunted atmosphere and deep, weighty basslines to yearning filtered vocal samples, this track has it all.

A2 - The Space Between
Smooth jungly synthwork seizes the foreground before crisp breaks begin to reveal our direction through The Space Between, jittery key stabs and familiar old school FX create a unique sci-fi style backdrop as the breaks drive the vibe forward, switching and weaving in style, constantly mixing it up to ram the point home that you cannot fully appreciate a Eusabia track until every second has been consumed - many times over, as The Space Between demands.

AA1 - Scope of Understanding
A more contemplative piece, Scope of Understanding strips things back with a synthwave-esque vibe tinged with intrigue and allure. Soon the breakbeats leap into gear and develop with an incredible level of refined detail, expertly edited, chopped and cut to a darkly undertone of sub bass and subtle micro melodies. Scope of Understanding will leave you in awe of the quickfire ideas Eusabia can conjure in the space of 6 minutes.

AA2 - Self Reflection
A smooth atmospheric introduction ushers in a thumping drum tools workout, somehow perfectly in sync with the calm harmonies dancing around in the composition. Certainly a track to enjoy both on the discerning dancefloor and while driving home with rain lashing at the windscreen at 2am, Self Reflection's synths and breaks conclude the EP in style leaving a long lasting memory of a Spatial debut you will not forget.

Words by Chris Hayes.

.- "Wishah" (meaning veil in Arabic) is a composition in five stages, written by Youmna Saba between 2021 and 2022, for voice, oud and electronics. Following her previous solo works "Njoum" (2014) and "Arb’een" (40) (2017), this album marks a significant turning point in Saba's journey. Created after leaving Beirut and settling in Paris, "Wishah" reveals a profound shift in her musical expression, informed by rigorous research in the sonic properties of sung Arabic phonemes and their role in shaping synthesised electronic sounds. The album employs a digital extension for the oud, a concept developed by Saba in her research project 'Taïma’. This device enhances the oud's sonic range, seamlessly integrating synthesised electronics. It also amplifies subtle, often overlooked sounds generated during playing, such as resonances and fingerboard friction. The composition is organized into five distinct stages, each contributing to a process of gradual revelation. As the tracks unfold, they strip away layers of constructed emotions and perceptions that have been intricately woven over time, to expose a space that no longer exists. Wishah is a farewell to home. Youmna Saba (born in Beirut, 1984) is a musician, composer and musicologist. Her current research focuses on instrument and space resonances in different sonic and musical contexts. With four albums to this date, she has collaborated with musicians of different musical expressions such as Kamilya Jubran, Floy Krouchi, Mike Cooper and the Neue Vocalsolisten ensemble, and has taken part in numerous artist residencies. She is the laureate of the first sound residency at Quai Branly Museum, Paris (2022-2023) with her research project and installation “La Réserve des Non-Dits”, now on view at the museum; and a laureate of the music residency program at the Cité Internationale des Arts, Paris (2020-2021).

The long-anticipated debut album "Infernal Fractality", set for a late 2023 release, unleashes a relentless onslaught of sonic brutality that has consumed over half a decade of tireless devotion from the band's enigmatic founder, Ødemark (known for his work with 3rd Attempt, Ovate, and Necrocave). Ødemark, an artist driven by both the fiery passion of psychedelics and a relentless pursuit of extreme metal's uncharted territories, has woven these elements into an epic, violent, and boundary-defying soundscape that delves deep into the realms of the Luciferian ideals, non-duality pointers, and the mystic principles found in his own psychedelic experiences.

THE LAST EON was formed to push the boundaries of the established but dormant industrial black metal sound pioneered by bands such Thorns and Mysticum and to its maximum exponential, with the vision of "creating the most intense music in history", objective that took 6 years of obsession, a couple burnouts, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers and outers, to map the depths of the psychedelic experience that would be distilled into "Infernal Fractality". With the help of drummer Jarle Byberg, Ødemark created this whole beast by himself.

After years of pushing every conceivable boundary, and breaking every possible rule and standard in composition, production and sound design, the masterpiece was ready for the crucible of Zardonic's mastering process, who consolidated the behemoth of a more than 300 track project into a time-space shattering soundscape of cosmic proportions.

Mainman Ødemark states: “I wanted to push the limits of what extreme metal can be, and materialize a vision for the future of electronic black metal that required me to rebel against every single rule in my mind of what black metal is, to create what black metal can be. This included also the theme and lyrics, spreading awareness of the mind expanding psychedelic experiences and self exploration within the black metal culture.”

The long-anticipated debut album "Infernal Fractality", set for a late 2023 release, unleashes a relentless onslaught of sonic brutality that has consumed over half a decade of tireless devotion from the band's enigmatic founder, Ødemark (known for his work with 3rd Attempt, Ovate, and Necrocave). Ødemark, an artist driven by both the fiery passion of psychedelics and a relentless pursuit of extreme metal's uncharted territories, has woven these elements into an epic, violent, and boundary-defying soundscape that delves deep into the realms of the Luciferian ideals, non-duality pointers, and the mystic principles found in his own psychedelic experiences.

THE LAST EON was formed to push the boundaries of the established but dormant industrial black metal sound pioneered by bands such Thorns and Mysticum and to its maximum exponential, with the vision of "creating the most intense music in history", objective that took 6 years of obsession, a couple burnouts, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers and outers, to map the depths of the psychedelic experience that would be distilled into "Infernal Fractality". With the help of drummer Jarle Byberg, Ødemark created this whole beast by himself.

After years of pushing every conceivable boundary, and breaking every possible rule and standard in composition, production and sound design, the masterpiece was ready for the crucible of Zardonic's mastering process, who consolidated the behemoth of a more than 300 track project into a time-space shattering soundscape of cosmic proportions.

Mainman Ødemark states: “I wanted to push the limits of what extreme metal can be, and materialize a vision for the future of electronic black metal that required me to rebel against every single rule in my mind of what black metal is, to create what black metal can be. This included also the theme and lyrics, spreading awareness of the mind expanding psychedelic experiences and self exploration within the black metal culture.”

Clear Vinyl

On Rock Island, their second LP, Palm produces evidence of a distinct musical language, developed over time, in isolation, and out of necessity. On the island, melodies are struck on what might be shells or spines. Rhythms are scratched out, swept over, scratched again. Individual instruments, and sometimes entire sections, skip and stutter. There is the sense of a music box with wonky tension or a warped transmission in which all the noise is taken for signal.

Like other groups so acclaimed for their compulsive live show, Palm has been burdened by the constant comparison between their recorded material and their touring set. On Rock Island, they render this tired discussion moot, using the album form to present that which could never be completely live, reserving for performance that which could never be completely reproduced.

Despite appearing behind the instruments typical of rock music, Palm trades in sounds of their own making. On these songs, one of the guitars and the drum kit are used as MIDI triggers, producing an index that can be combed through later and replaced with new information. The percussion is sometimes augmented so as to suggest a multiplication of limbs. The strings are manipulated to choke, crack, and hum like other instruments, or other bodies, might.

Working again with engineer Matt Labozza, the band spent the better part of a month in a rented farmhouse in Upstate New York. With the benefits of time and space, Palm recorded the various elements piecemeal, only rarely playing together in groups larger than two or three. While some members tracked, others holed up in the next room, experimenting with quantization, beat replacement, and other methods borrowed from electronic music. Even accounting for the many labors that brought them to be, these materials seem produced by an organic logic. Their complex friction forms a habit of thought, scores a network of grooves on the floor of the mind.

This is music with dimensionality. Sonic objects are deployed, developed, and dissected in various states of mutation. The listener flits about between the field and the lab. The tone is warm in a way only the sun could make, the pace as forceful and as variable as a gale. Whether one locates Rock Island in a sea or in a refinished attic (as in Greg Burak's album cover), whether one escapes to there or is banished, its psychic environs are charted clearly enough. Only at this remove from the mainland can we sense the conditions necessary for such a strange species of sound.

Emerging from the heart of Brussels, Azo is poised to set the electronic music world ablaze with her latest EP, "Astroculture," scheduled for release on SNC Recs. Featuring four vibrant original tracks and a stellar remix from Offenbach Frankfurt's very own Maruwa, this EP takes listeners on an ecstatic journey through the realms of acid, trance, and high-energy drums.

Azo has consistently captivated her audience with a rich tapestry of influences. Renowned for her rock-solid radio shows and dazzling productions, she skillfully blends a myriad of musical elements to create a sound that is uniquely her own.

Inspired by the enigmatic and pulsating vibes of Electro, Trance, and the expressive melodic flavors associated with Rave culture, Azo's "Astroculture" EP promises a sonic exploration like no other. Each track invites her audience to embark on an exhilarating adventure, guiding them through a musical landscape that defies boundaries and expectations—just as the scientific endeavor of astroculture explores new possibilities for cultivating plants beyond the boundaries of Earth.

The EP wouldn't be complete without the hypnotic remix by Maruwa, a vital contributor to the scene. Maruwa's reinterpretation adds a fresh twist to Azo's sonic canvas, enhancing the EP's already electrifying atmosphere.

Azo's "Astroculture" EP is set to ignite dancefloors and inject a surge of energy into the new club season. With its intoxicating beats and boundless creativity, it's a must-listen for electronic music enthusiasts worldwide.

Don't miss out on this sonic adventure. Join Azo on her "Astroculture" journey as she delivers an EP that's as unique and mesmerizing as the artist herself. Experience the magic of Azo's musical journey and get ready to dance like never before.

Listen Here Limited-edition double green/ red vinyl. 12 tracks spread across three sides and a screen-printed fourth side. We are very pleased to announce a special 10th anniversary vinyl version of this classic Dean Wareham live album, recorded over two nights in London back in December 2013 and featuring a mix of songs by Galaxie 500 and Luna as well as solo material. It is pressed on double red and green vinyl, with the 12 tracks spread across three sides and a screen-printed fourth side. The recordings were mixed by Britta Phillips and have been remastered especially for this release by Mikey Young (of Eddy Current Suppression Ring, Total Control and others). The new artwork by Marc Jones includes a printed insert featuring photos from the shows, which almost didn’t happen at all after Dean and his band got stuck on a train between Manchester and London. “We left Piccadilly Station at 12:15 but stopped rolling after just 20 minutes,” he recalls. “A voice informed us that a tree had fallen on the track somewhere up ahead, and this tree was on fire. We sat there for a couple of hours and started to think about alternate ways to get down to London, someone sent out a plea on Twitter and one kind fan did offer to drive us, if only there was a way to get off the train. But at around 3 o’clock the train lurched forward at last, we made it to Euston and cabbed it straight to St Pancras Old Church. “I’m not a believer but there’s something special about playing in churches, especially one that dates to the 12th century; the cavernous spaces and wooden pews make you speak softly and play quietly too – if you play too loud the sounds will just bounce all over the place. And the engineer doesn’t need to add reverb to your vocals – it is there already. “Nat from Sonic Cathedral promoted the shows and had the presence of mind to record them to multi-tracks, and I’m so glad he did. When we got back to Los Angeles, Britta mixed the live tracks, and the result is this record

KID FRANCESCOLI, leader of the French Riviera Touch is back with the stellar album SUNSET BLUE out Sept 22nd 2023.

After a first sold-out world tour (over 200 concerts in Europe, USA, Asia...), and successful hits such as Nopalitos, Blow Up or Moon (now certified diamond, with more than 200 millions streams), the Marseille-based producer, crooner and multi-instrumentalist, Mathieu Hocine, is eager to share his most accomplished LP ever. This fine collection of soulful songs honor his Mediterranean roots, with elegant and pop melodies. His most recent success and the creation of his first original soundtrack with AZURO, installed him as one of the best French songwriters of his generation, with a unique signature sound.

"I live in Marseille, I spent my childhood in Corsica, I have Algerian origins, my first vacations with friends were in Barcelona, vacations with my first girlfriend in Roma,... Then, I had the chance to perform in Morocco, Greece, Turkey and Egypt: each time I spent time in the Mediterranean region, the people I met there made me feel like I was part of the same country. This shared multiculturalism is really comforting, it has its own poetry and strength, bringing uniqueness and empathy to the people. It is essential for me. I love my city: it’s the perfect place to feel good with sun, sea, family, friendships, love... It gets me emotional, bringing tears with a smile".

With his new musical gem, Mathieu Hocine unveils 11 elegant tunes of his finest craft: sunbathed French Touch (Run Run, 1986), romantic chillwave (Corsica), uplifting synthpop (You Are Everywhere, Like Magic), electronic-soul (Casino Soul), cinematic disco (Solaris), cosmic R&B (Sweet and Sour, Take Time), … Everything is in this record.

For the first time ever, Kid Francescoli paid tribute to his mixed origins with his collaboration with world-renowned lute and mandolin player Hakim Hamadouche (Rachid Taha, Patti Smith, Brian Eno, Tricky...), whom added Algerian patterns to the introspectives songs Drift in Blue and The Morning After.

"My ambition is to create pictures in people's heads with music, to transport them instantly into a movie"

SUNSET BLUE is an instant-crush album: crystal-clear, strong, personal but universal at the same time.

It's an ecstatic soundtrack for this moment when time is suspended, the golden hour when everything seems possible. It feels like Love is in the air, you're living your best life and you're at the right place at the right time. This album embodies this magic moment where we would like to last forever… Like an epiphany, Kid Francescoli's new album is a moment of pure pleasure, a soothing way to escape reality.

"I see myself as a melodist.I would like my music to feel like velvet. There's something cinematic, classy about it, and yet comforting. It's very simple, popular and synonym of love and passion"

His friend French 79 co-produced the album, while the american rapper Bamby H2O brought his NYC swag (on Sweet & Sour), Stan Neff (Polo & Pan, Kungs, Christine and the Queens...) took care of the mix and Alex Gopher (Daft Punk, The Blaze, Bon Entendeur...) added a final touch of magic when mastering. Nicolas Despis (known for his work with Etienne Daho, Hoshi, Juliette Armanet... and many famous French rappers) later joined this dream-team to craft custom-made artworks. SUNSET BLUE is a deeply personal quest, a human adventure for Mathieu Hocine (whom explores his maghrebian origins, his feminine side, his subconscious space, ...). It's a male's work, but don't get it wrong, this LP would be nothing without women’s touch : Julietta (on Run Run and Take Time), Sarah Gaugler from Turbo Goth (on You Are Everywhere and Like Magic), and iOni (on Drift in Blue).

“Music has this magical power to broaden your vision of the world. It's fascinating because, like dreams, it's the kind of irrational things science can't explain and that makes life exciting."

Planets aligned perfectly on this project and thanks to this five-star cast of collaborators, Kid Francescoli achieved his personal holy grail : he orchestrated a great 21st century pop-music album.SUNSET BLUE is a new turning point between organic and electronic, both a mediterranean travel and a Californian dream, a bridge between Ennio Morriconne and modern electronic music.

Also, while it might be called SUNSET BLUE in honor of the sea and the Portuguese / Brazilian concept called “saudade”, but it is a really optimistic album, whose true colors would rather be "yellow-orange-red" in nod to the sun.

Created in the midst of the world tour, SUNSET BLUE is a direct result of the lives’ energy and fans’ joyful vibes: going back in the studio after smiling, singing and dancing with people all around the world inevitably gave Kid Francescoli the desire to retranscribe this ecstatic feeling in music. This album is a sensitive experience, from sunrise to sunset, from first track to last one. It’s an exploration of an everlasting summer, reaching its climax in the very final seconds of the track Corsica, making us want to press play and dive into this jewel all over again.

A beautiful cosmic trip, whether you like to stay in bed cocooning, to travel far, far away or to dance ‘till dawn, to catch the first rays of light.

Make sure to catch Kid Francescoli on his next world tour to have a good time.

1STEP Process 180g 45rpm Double LP Pressed on VR900-Supreme Vinyl!
Mastered From The Original Analogue Master Tapes by Bernie Grundman!
Super-Luxe "Monster Pak" Jacket with a Rich 36-Page Booklet & Striking Outer Slipcase!

New lacquers cut for every 500 pressings!

Strictly Limited To 7,500 Numbered Pressings!

There have been more than 40 U.S. releases (and hundreds more worldwide) of Stan Getz's cultural touchstone album and for good reason: few recordings better capture the breezy warmth and easy-going sophistication of Brazilian bossa nova for an American jazz audience. Fewer recordings can replicate the you-are-there presence and flawlessly tight studio acoustics. Only Getz/Gilberto has Billboard Top-10-charting singles like "The Girl from Ipanema." When Impex Records jumps into this densely-populated fray with our own production, we need to bring maximum value and prestige to it. Challenge accepted. We worked directly with Stan's wife Monica Getz and their son Nicolaus to create the most authentic, best-presented Getz/Gilberto ever.

Exclusive to Impex's 1STEP Getz/Gilberto includes an insightful new interview/essay by Charles Granata featuring Monica reminiscences of the making of this record, the subsequent cultural phenomenon, and Stan's battles with some pretty heavy demons. Also unique to this release are two bonus tracks: an alternate mono 7" mix of "The Girl from Ipanema" (without the added echo, thank you very much) and a live recording of "Corcovado" from Carnegie Hall. Finally, the large-format, 36-page booklet features dozens of rare photos, the original album notes, and a fascinating personal remembrance from Monica Getz herself, celebrating her late husband's work and an inside look at Stan's family life while making the record!

Using the original analog master tapes and no computers at all, Bernie Grundman at Bernie Grundman Mastering sought to keep the sense of space and tone on the master tape intact without unnecessary embellishment. Impex 1STEPs get you closer to the source, not the ideal.

We know you have many choices when it comes to enjoying this singular album. The Impex 1STEP of Getz/Gilberto cuts above all other releases with added-value content that takes you deeper into Stan Getz's life and process in a way never previously possible.

The 1STEP Process:



The Impex 1STEP process relies on short, tightly-controlled runs that require a new lacquer after each 500 pressings. This unforgiving format has the lacquer skipping the regular father-mother process, going right to a single convert and then pressing. Though this dramatically increases mastering and production costs, it also assures each run is more consistent from disc to disc, with less noise, clearer details and deeper bass.

Reducing production complexity to just a single "convert" disc between the lacquer and the press greatly improves groove integrity, diminishes non-fill anomalies and increases signal integrity from the master tape to your system.

Features:



The only release of this fundamental jazz classic crafted with the full participation of the Getz family, including never-before-seen photos and notes from Monica and Nick Getz
Exclusive new interview essay about Getz's life and the recording of the album by noted producer and historian Charles L. Granata
Exclusive ultra-luxe Impex 1STEP packaging featuring a deluxe 36-page booklet within a heavy-stock two-sleeve Monster Pack jacket and striking colour-matched slip case
Two all-analogue bonus tracks: an alternate mono 7" mix of "The Girl from Ipanema" and a live recording of "Corcovado" from Carnegie Hall
Limited to 7,500 copies

Noema’s new album is a surreal cosmic journey. The music on it is part of a comprehensive art piece that includes remixes, interactive choreography and stage design, theatre, and costumes called ONE.

In ONE, Noema tells the story of his interdimensional space explorations, in which he manifests as four different entities. Because of the energetic state of humanity, these entities became trapped in our dimension and now put on performances to re-power their portal, so that we can all be interdimensional again! During the performance five actors invite up to 120 people from the audience to join the action.

Sun Ra meets Steve Reich meets Larry Levan - imagine it as a “happening” from the 70s.

The music from ONE is loosely based on the minimal music classic “In C" by Terry Riley. It consists of 56 melodic patterns, which are repeated and consecutively played from the first to the last. Every player can move on to the next pattern at their own pace.

With its tenth record from Fortunato Durutti Marinetti, Quindi continues to celebrate songwriting and storytelling framed by curious musicality. In keeping with the label's trajectory to date, this is an album which draws on a universal human sentimentality and presents it with an uncommon flair. In the case of Toronto-based Daniel Colussi, the man behind Eight Waves In Search Of An Ocean, his melancholic poetry cuts through with a clarity which calls to mind all-time greats from Anette Peacock through to Lou Reed and Leonard Cohen.
Turin-born Colussi has drifted through various bands, guises and styles over the past 20 years, but since settling into Fortunato Durutti Marinetti as a vehicle for his songs, he's found a strong expressive impetus which transcends genre to become entirely hinged on the power of his words and melodies. The first album under this alias was a 2020 cassette album, Desire, later pressed on vinyl due to demand in tandem with the release of 2022's Memory's Fool. On each record, Colussi has found distinct arrangements of players to set the mood, ranging from gently lilting art and folk rock through to orchestrated balladry, but Eight Waves In Search Of An Ocean widens the palette of Fortunato Durutti Marinetti to create an album in which each song feels like a tale unto itself.
Colussi's renewed approach is instantly apparent as album opener 'Lightning On A Sunny Day' unfurls, informed greatly by producer Sandro Perri's input pursuing a hybrid electro-organic sound. The addition of drum machines and synths to the musical palette bring with them the strong connotations of pop while the sax and violin sounds similarly smooth and silky, and one can't help but think of John Martyn's slide into the digital sound of Sapphire or Kraftwerk's bittersweet synthetic tenderness.
Within this sound, there's still space for the energy to fluctuate according to the whims of songs. 'The Flowers' turns inward with a soft-touch composition as delicate as the petals Colussi describes falling to the floor. 'Misfit Streams' and first single 'Clerk Of Oblivion' savour the fluid, luxuriant tone of fretless bass with all the 80s connotations intact. Colussi remains the central focus whatever happens around him, in possession of the kind of unforced charisma which drives a song deep into the listener's heart. It's at once entirely his own style and yet comforting and familiar. The lyrics might sweep you into the singer's inner world, similarly to the experience listening to late 60s Tim Buckley, or you might well inhale the mellow jazziness of the harmonic movement like you would Joni Mitchell on Hejira.
The emotional direction of each track is never linear - 'Smash Your Head Against The Wall' snarls its rhythm section before the strings sow their aching beauty to cool the song's temper, winding up as a track of distinct halves jabbing at each other. "I Need You More' leaves space for spiralling flute solos and strangely stiff, militaristic drum rolls in the midst of a sweet, slightly sad synth ballad, the final wave receding back into the tidal undulations of Colussi's unique exploration of his muse.
The artist himself dubs his musical expression as "poetic jazz rock" with a sideways glance - it's not exactly poetry, far from trad jazz and it doesn't really rock, yet the tag feels uncannily like it fits, just like the curious music it's used to describe.

Repress!

On 22nd October, the Nottingham-raised and highly-praised musician/DJ/producer Matt Cutler, AKA Lone, presents his 8th album – and first in 5 years – ‘Always Inside Your Head’. It marks two major changes, with both a new label and new approach – featuring vocalists for the first time.

This deeply textural and ethereal artwork is situated high above the clouds, amidst the heavens, occupying a stratospheric state where swathes of synthesized vapour and azure rays sound like a literal breath of fresh air.

A varied selection of music influenced the record, but two main influences were Cocteau Twins and My Bloody Valentine. “I wanted to approach a range of different styles, but attack them from their angle in a way, so for example on 'Inlove2' I tried to imagine what a Balearic / acid house tune might sound like if it were produced by Kevin Shields”, comments Lone.

Another key example of Cutler’s strange but successful combination of elements is the halcyon bliss of ‘Echo Paths’, where his trademark fat drums and love for hip hop meet double-time pan pipes, dub effects and dream pop, mixed into a wonderfully lysergic concoction.

This rarefied auditory stratus was previously evident in tracks like ‘Alpha Wheel 4 (Ambient Mix)’ from ‘DJ Kicks’, ‘Under Cherry Blossoms (Minds Eye Reprise)’ from ‘Ambivert Tools, Vol. 2’, ‘Pulsar’ (from ‘Ambivert 4’), and ‘How Can You Tell’ (from ‘Abraxas’), but is now more fully-fledged, broader in scope and even more celestial.

In addition to the above, the LP exists somewhere between trip hop on Mo' Wax, 90s Warp, intelligent drum & bass and ambient house. There are heavier forays too, like ‘Mouth Of God’, where darker clouds emerge, but are pierced like acid lightning with fierce, tearing tech-step bass.

Although still firmly rooted in club culture – here Lone shows a definite leaning towards a song-based sound, with several tracks edging towards the same crossover space as the nineties hits which also inspired him – particularly William Orbit’s production on Madonna's 'Frozen', and Olive's 'You're Not Alone'. This is especially evident on the bright, spacious brilliance of 'Hidden By Horizons', where vocals and synths swirl around one another, with crisp breakbeats and reggae rolls pushing purposefully through the ether.

Despite initially seeming almost entirely sunny of disposition, upon deeper immersion there’s lot more beneath the album’s surface, both in its deep pools of immiscible layered elements, and also thematically. When recording Cutler kept in mind a loose narrative based on birth, death, and our existence in-between.

He then extended this idea to reach what may happen after death, which is reflected in the sequencing: By penultimate track ‘Undaunted’ the life reflected in this longplayer has come to an end, which is then followed by 'Coming In To Being And Passing Away' – an afterlife epilogue, which evokes a transition from this world to the next.

Having firmly re-established his underground roots, through a series of killer EPs on his newly birthed imprint, 49North - the Spooky and Animated legend now turns his attention to solo album number 1 - his first ever, as Duncan Forbes.

Laying its first foundations some 5 years ago now - ‘Return Of The Strobelight Kid’ has been stealthily taking shape and developing organically ever since. And as a result, the 8 tracks which now make up the final running order, feel very much a direct reflection of all that was experienced during that time; as someone who - whilst having well and truly bought the t-shirt several times over by now - nevertheless finds themselves back on the starting grid, having to do it all over again from scratch.

But embarking on new adventures from way back on square one - is something Duncan’s no stranger to; and on this album, he invites us to join him on this journey of his, and experience all the ups, downs, twists and turns that come with such intrepid territory.

TASTEMAKER/DJ SUPPORT: Axel Boman, Steve Bug, Baikal, Ame, Len Faki, Red Axes, Agoria, DJ Sabo, Anja Schneider, Alex.Do, Oliver Huntemann, AFFKT, Smash TV, The Revenge, Joshua James, Nicole Moudaber, Tim Sweeney, John Osborn, Powel, Alexi Delano, Davide Squillace, Kasper Borke, Iron Curtis, Optimo, Musumeci, Klose One + more.

Noema’s new album is a surreal cosmic journey. The music on it is part of a comprehensive art piece that includes remixes, interactive choreography and stage design, theatre, and costumes called ONE.

In ONE, Noema tells the story of his interdimensional space explorations, in which he manifests as four different entities. Because of the energetic state of humanity, these entities became trapped in our dimension and now put on performances to re-power their portal, so that we can all be interdimensional again! During the performance five actors invite up to 120 people from the audience to join the action.

Sun Ra meets Steve Reich meets Larry Levan - imagine it as a “happening” from the 70s.

The music from ONE is loosely based on the minimal music classic “In C" by Terry Riley. It consists of 56 melodic patterns, which are repeated and consecutively played from the first to the last. Every player can move on to the next pattern at their own pace.

NOW Music is proud to announce NOW Presents…Disco, a stunning 5LP boxset featuring 80 of the greatest Disco classics ever!

Kicking off with the genre defining #1 from Donna Summer ‘I Feel Love’ followed by Earth, Wind & Fire with The Emotions and their timeless hit ‘Boogie Wonderland’, this boxset features the most enduring tracks from dance-floor legends, including Chic, Sister Sledge, Gloria Gaynor, Village People, and Grace Jones - together with Saturday Night Fever gems - ‘Disco Inferno’, ‘More Than A Woman’, and ‘If I Can't Have You’.

LP 2 opens with Amii Stewart’s stunning version of ‘Knock On Wood’, followed by Candi Staton’s ‘Young Hearts Run Free’ and Chaka Khan’s hugely successful debut solo single ‘I'm Every Woman’. Other massive debuts include ‘Boogie Oogie Oogie’ from A Taste Of Honey, Alicia Bridges’ ‘I Love The Nightlife (Disco 'Round)’, and Cheryl Lynn’s ‘Got To Be Real’. Up next is the often-covered ‘Lady Marmalade’ together with Diana Ross’ ‘Love Hangover’ which lead into #1s from Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons, (‘December, 1963 (Oh, What A Night)’), Tina Charles (‘I Love To Love’), Odyssey (‘Use It Up And Wear It Out’) and Irene Cara (‘Fame’).

LP 3 Side A is packed with groovy and romantic chart-toppers from Elton John (‘Are You Ready For Love’), George McCrae (‘Rock Your Baby’), Barry White (‘You're The First, The Last, My Everything’), and The Spinners with their ‘Working My Way Back To You / Forgive Me, Girl’ medley. Flipping over to the other side, we have the timeless smash from Baccara ‘Yes Sir, I Can Boogie’, Boney M. with ‘Daddy Cool’, and Village People’s ‘In The Navy’. Viola Wills’ Hi-NRG cover of ‘Gonna Get Along Without You Now’ and Gloria Gaynor’s ‘Never Can Say Goodbye’ bring LP 3 to a close.

Lipps Inc., Kool & The Gang, Frantique, and KC & The Sunshine Band keep the dance-floor energy levels high on LP 4 with ‘Funkytown’, ‘Ladies Night’, ‘Strut Your Funky Stuff’, and ‘That's The Way (I Like It)’. The disco-mania of the late-70s also saluted the late-70s craze for Space themed movies & tv with early Electro-pop-dance, and included here from Space and Dee D. Jackson, before Sarah Brightman’s debut with Hot Gossip, ‘I Lost My Heart To A Starship Trooper’, and Meco’s remake of the ‘Star Wars Theme / Cantina Band’ as a dance-floor classic… Giorgio Moroder productions for Sparks with ‘Beat The Clock’ and The Three Degrees with ‘Givin’ Up Givin’ In’ lead the side to a close with ‘Souvenirs’ from Voyage.

LP 5 is filled with truly monster sized dancefloor-fillers, beginning with a run of Nile Rodgers & Bernard Edwards productions: ‘Le Freak’, ‘We Are Family’, ‘Spacer’ and ‘Upside Down’ from Diana Ross. It wouldn’t be a Disco album without Earth, Wind & Fire’s ‘September’, the Bee Gees-written ‘Nights On Broadway’ covered by Candi Staton, and the Grammy award-winning ‘Best Of My Love’ from The Emotions, before another hit cover from Amii Stewart, ‘Light My Fire’. Side B features some fabulous European Disco, including Belle Epoque and Amanda Lear, and signature hits from Patsy Gallant and Vicki Sue Robinson before drawing to a close with Rose Royce’s celebrated ‘Car Wash’, and Cher’s biggest disco hit ‘Take Me Home’ – and the last dance is left to Thelma Houston with her defining anthem ‘Don’t Leave Me This Way’.

NOW Presents…Disco – the perfect collection and collector’s item for every 70s Disco lover.

C Powers (Cecilia Powers) promotes the power of community organizing in many facets of her life. She’s an interstellar producer and DJ as well as an active tenants’ rights activist in Portland, Oregon. Intersectionality is at the core of Cecilia’s perspective as a trans woman and is reflected in her organizing practices and her musical activities. Whether planning actions against unethical landlords with tenants & regularly hosting solidarity benefit parties in Portland, or fostering safe dancing spaces with her queer family when she lived in Savannah GA, Cecilia has found ways to expand upon the notion of a “community in motion”. She has released on Sorry Records, Sweat Equity, CGI Records, Proper Trax, and Niche N Bump to name a few.

This EP is four cuts of C Powers’ signature touch applied to a hybrid blend of electro, breaks, and bass. There’s high-octane energy as well as a power in the spaces between. These four tracks balance “maximum” and “minimum” and will slap the fascism right out of any environment they’re dropped in.

Juan Atkin's masterpiece compilation, the blueprint of Techno albums.... the 1993 Model 500 'Classics' compilation with some of Juan Atkins' biggest early Metroplex milestones, with some of them in exclusive remixed versions. 3 decades later Metroplex is re-releasing this collection of hugely influential tracks for a new generation to play from fresh and clean vinyl!. Just like the recent 12" reissue series, this album has been fully remastered with all the care and attention to detail you can imagine. Tracks like ,,No UFOs", ,,The Chase", ,,Techno Music", ,,Night Drive (Time, Space, Transmat)" or ,,Off To Battle" are basically techno ground zero, with the electro influence of mid-80s to late-80s Juan Atkins productions still omnipresent. 30 years on since its original release on R&S records, 'Classics' is still as gritty and timeless a statement as ever. Pure sonic futurism!