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These obscure shellac 78s have managed to cross about 70years without brakes or sand damages. This fine selection of very rare and never released sides on vinyl are coming right away from Jamaïca in the early 1950"s ! Tracklisting: 01. Innocentay-Gimme De Rum 02. Duke Of Iron-Kuckeemoonga 03. Jamaican Calypsonians-Not Me 04. The Four Deuces-Four Day Morning 05.Count Owen-Bull Dog 06. Lord Beginner-Black Market 07. The Charmer-Back To Back Belly To Belly 08. Lord Melody-Mama Look A Booboo 09. Bedasse-Night Food 10. Cecil Knott-Banana 11. Young Tiger-Single Man 12. Count Casher-Trek To England 13. Louise Bennett-Bongo Man 14. Count Bernadino-Changa

The life-affirming energy at the heart of Sven Väth‘s recent album Catharsis is revisited, reanimated, and remixed by some of the most exciting names around, closing the circle on a superlative burst of
recent work that has not only given us the epic original LP, but also the extraordinary compilation What I Used To Play.

Roman Flügel, Benjamin Damage, Robert Hood, Planetary Assault Systems, Mano Le Tough… do we need to go on? This hand-picked list of luminaries have answered the call and certainly don’t disappoint, each fusing their signature sound with Sven‘s DNA to create a wild, uncompromising companion piece to the original album.

True to form, the running order is very much rooted on the dance floor, Silvi‘s Dream, revisited by Damiano von Erckert, explodes like a Balearic sunrise. Dreamy strings with a touch of Detroit create a lovely atmosphere while the beautiful piano sound goes right into your heart and appears as if you could feel the warm sun on your skin. Roman Flügel’s acidic rework of What I Used To Play is a homage to the 80s and the early sound of electronic music which creates nostalgic feelings and offers a greatly produced retro soundscape à la Kraftwerk. Staying close to the original, but with the perfect amount of spin, it’s a symbiotic interplay of synthetic bass pads, and a tiny bell melody. Robag Wruhme’s cranking minimal funk takes us down The Worm-hole. A concise interference sound builds
up sustained tension, tangled but structured, deep and yet driving. Robag took over the deep and dirty rhythms of the original perfectly and delivers a versatile piece. This opening salvo oozes quality and
sets things up perfectly for the electrified celebration of hi-octane technology come.

Jonathan Kaspar‘s growling interpretation of We Are provides a melancholic atmosphere with fascinating percussion parts. Zaps shoot through the air like small laser pistols while we let ourselves
be carried away by the bass, the frisky vocal stutter effect is the icing on the cake. Speeding things up, the euphoric trance that engulfs Krystal Klear’s epic version of Feiern. Expansive strings increase up
to ecstasy and guide us to a love-filled unity. This remix is sure to be an excellent peak-time smasher for the open-air season. On to a wild ride of pure techno with Benjamin Damage, who delivers a dry and uncompromising Berlin Techno version of Mystic Voices. Harder pace but the string synthesizer harmony brings light to an otherwise gloomy environment. Next up is Luke Slater’s PAS Deep Heet Mix to add a retro nineties vibe to proceedings on Nyx. Entering a rough space with gigantic clap impacts, we are blessed with straightforward Techno. Shimmering and spooling, this groove hits the
mark. Then, as if it was ever in doubt, Sven‘s lofty place in the techno firmament is underlined by a peak-time contribution by non-less than Detroit legend Robert Hood. Unmistakable, you must recognize the signature Robert Hood drive on Butoh. Chord stabs fulfill the Detroit feeling with offtaking string elements and high-energy vocal transformations. It’s a warm embrace that triggers emotions. Planetary Assault Systems then blasts things ever deeper into the cosmos on a second outing of Nyx. Reduced and to the point but of course, true to form, with powerful tribal percussion parts and intensive cutting hi-hats.

From there on in, the collection gradually re-enters the atmosphere, burning with a phosphorescent, melancholy glow. Harald Björk extrapolates Being In Love into a hypnotic groove for the early hours. A playful and atmospheric electronica interpretation to soothe our souls due to disharmonious synth pads and a dreamy deformation of the original melody. Mano Le Tough harnesses the ethno-rhythms
and brooding energy of Catharsis into a low-slung, tribal stomper. Anomalous organ parts ring out and link up with a trance-like sequence, summer feelings arouse as you feel like you can almost smell Ibizan air. The collection comes full circle with a second equally seductive interpretation of Silvi‘s Dream by Florian Hollerith. Stripped-down and hypnotic, the homage to Sven's girlfriend Silvi is extended as a reverence to Sven himself. Sven's profound vocal clearly infuse time and space and leave a forever-lasting memory of love.

By accident or design, it somehow leaves us with the reassuring sense that, although this specific part of the journey may be drawing to a close, the mission of the man behind it all most definitely isn't.

written & produced by: Sven Väth & Gregor Tresher

Attarazat Addahabia & Faradjallah's album came to us as quite a mystery. Our friends from Radio Martiko got access to the studio archive of the Boussiphone label and a reel labeled “Faradjallah” was among the items they had found there. After listening to the selection of reels they borrowed, Radio Martiko felt it was not a fit for their label and helped us licensing it from Mr. Boussiphone instead. We knew nothing about the band. We just had the reel with the music but very little information. What we knew was that the music was incredible and very unique. Gnawa sounds were combined with funky electronic guitars, very dense layers of percussions and female backing vocals more reminiscent of musical styles further south than Morocco. We started asking around whether anyone knew the band with no immediate success until we asked Tony Day, a musician from Morocco who helped us during our search for Fadoul’s family. His sharp memory came through once again, remembering all the names of the Attarazat Addahabia band members and even how to contact the bands singer and leader Abdelakabir Faradjallah. After visiting him at his home in Casablanca with our Moroccan colleague Sabrina multiple times, he shared his personal story. His father arrived in Casablanca from Aqqa at the age of six and his mother came from Essaouira. Abdelakabir was born in the neighbourhood of Benjdia in 1942. Abdelakabir Faradjallah studied fine arts in Casablanca, graduating in 1962. He also played soccer in the second team of "Jeunesse Societe One". His brother-in-law Ibrahim Sadr worked for one of the biggest football teams of the time in Morocco called "Moroco Sportive Union", which allowed him to travel to France occasionally. While Ibrahim was never part of the band he brought along a few instruments from trips.


Yet the majority of the instruments they could not afford to buy were build by Faradjallah and Abderrazak, Faradjallah's brother who passed away early. For instance they had built a Spanish guitar and a drum made of wood barrel and sheepskin by themselves.During the 1950s Faradjallah was booked as a singer for surprise parties with friends. He started to write his first songs including "L’gnawi" in 1967 and wanted to make people discover Gnawa culture, or maybe rather his take on the culture to be more exact. Faradjallah recalls his first interaction with the genre in the streets of the Dern neighbourhood, where he used to go to elementary school. Gnawa is one of the essential musical genres of Morocco. It combines ritual poetry with traditional dances and music linked with a spiritual foundation. Musically a lot of influences originated from West Africa as well as Sudan. Gnawa is usually played by a selection of specific instruments such as the qaraqab (large iron castanets centrally associated with the music), the hajhouj (a three string lute), guembri loudaâ (a three stringed bass instrument) and the tbel (large drums). People would put shells on their clothes and instruments and use incense at their parties. "Sidi darbo lalla - lala derbo khadem..." came from Gnawa verses Faradjallah used to sing when he was 14. The lyrics tackle a global (im)balance of power and the question of social status in this course. The band Attarazat Addahabia was formed in 1968. The original line-up included 14 members, all from the same family. They played their first small concerts here and there starting in 1969. Later in 1973 they performed bigger shows for instance at the Municipal Theatre followed by the "Al Massira Show" at Velodrome Stadium in downtown Casablanca. Their first album "Al Hadaoui" (the one you are listening to) was recorded at Boussiphone studios in 1972 and was never released before. Nobody seems to remember the exact reason why Boussiphone ended up deciding not to put the album out. The album's title track also served as the basis for Fadoul's "Maktoub Lah", who frequented the same circles as the band for some time.

Their shows sometimes could go as long as 12 hours, starting at 5pm in the afternoon, with an occasional break here and there. In the 1980s the band took a brief break. Faradjallah recalled the reason for that break like this: "Zaki, the bands drummer, had fallen in love with a young girl from Mohammedia. Soon after, he fell very ill. The group members were convinced that the girl had given him ‘s'hor’ (a kind of local Moroccan version of "black magic"). For four years, the whole group stopped playing. It was unthinkable to find another drummer to replace Zaki, even temporarily." So they waited four years for Zaki to "get back on his feet" before going back on stage. Apart from very few gigs here and there Faradjallah stopped playing music in the mid 1990s. Some members from the younger generations formed a new band and still play frequently to this day. Faradjallah runs a television repair shop coupled offerings beverages and snacks in the Belevedere /Ains Sbaa district of Casablanca. While Faradjallah was primarily a musician, he would work for the local cinema and paint their posters for new movies by hand and he designed all artworks and cover posters of the band.

And this eventually led to him participating actively in our first exhibition dealing with Habibi Funk’s work in Dubai 2018. He helped us by creating calligraphic complementations on large photo prints for that show.

Stephen Steinbrink discovered a short YouTube video of a street magician who approaches a highschooler walking home in Barstow, California. “Here, let me show you my idea,” he says, as he places a quarter on the kid’s hand. The magician performs some relaxed flourishes, and the coin vanishes. In silence, the kid stares at his hand at the nothing where there once, indisputably, was something, until his wonder finds a single word: “Cool.” The title of Disappearing Coin, the new album from Oakland songwriter Stephen Steinbrink, comes from this short clip. “When I look at it now,” he says, “I relate to the kid, who’s obviously uneasy in his body, and going through the experience of being a teenager in the early 2000s growing up in a bleak desert town like I did. I also relate to the coin, an inanimate disc of possibility. And I relate to the magician, an absurd facilitator of sending what is tactile and concrete into the wispy conceptual realm.” “I’ve watched it probably a hundred times,” he says. “It cracked me up but also blew my mind open the feeling of wonder I experienced watching this video became a guide as I navigated new ways of staying in the realm of what’s both real and magical.” Following the 2018 release of Utopia Teased, Steinbrink completed an apprenticeship in the nearly-lost art of Stained Glass, becoming a glazier at a studio that over three years, fully restored the enormous 90-year-old windows in San Francisco’s Grace Cathedral. He committed to his Buddhist study, beginning lay monastic training before the process was thwarted by the pandemic. He dove deeper into music production for other artists, engineering two albums by Boy Scouts released on Anti- Records in 2018 and 2021. Steinbrink delighted in the way these pursuits pulled at the thread of ego’s tapestry and decentralized him from his craft, allowing him to embody a new role as a creative caretaker engaging in practices that felt communal and restorative. “As I slowly began writing for myself again, I tried to imbue my new songs with this sense of playfulness and wonder I felt while exploring these other interests.” He says. Feeling unlocked from the pressures of perfection that he often felt in his earlier work, creating Disappearing Coin felt buoyant and healing. “The album feels like an integration of all of my past musical selves zeroing in on the present,” Steinbrink explains, “I felt free to explore new ways of writing, through different perspectives, experimenting with fictional songwriting, visual archetypal language, and total collaboration.” This “total collaboration” was a joyous new venture after years of solo performing and recording. The album can be seen as a 42 minute session of show and tell, the manifestation of Steinbrink repeating the mantra of “Here, let me show you my idea” to himself over and over. Disappearing Coin is at once a welcome return for the veteran Steinbrink and the debut of a totally new artist, one who has found a new path to himself with new goals of openness, curiosity, and self-acceptance. “Recalls the magic pop purity of Arthur Russell...its minimalism manages to feel enlightened and transformative.” PITCHFORK // “Melodic and self-assured. Steinbrink delivers his knotted lyricism with a smooth lilt.

Amanaz were serious, and they made a serious stab at an album. They titled their album Africa, according to original band member Keith Kabwe, “because of how it was shared and how its inhabitants were butchered and enslaved, its resources stolen… all the atrocities slave drivers committed. “ Thus, their “Kale,” a blues sung in Nyanja, that traced the continent’s arc from slavery to Zambia’s independence closes the album. Kabwe and rhythm guitarist John Kanyepa have a winsome softness to their vocals, which sit politely aside the feral growl of drummer Watson Baldwin Lungu, bassist Jerry Mausala and bandleader/lead guitarist Isaac Mpofu. Africa’s vibe ranges from anxious (“Amanaz”) to escapist (“Easy Street”) to straight-up pissed-off. On the “History of Man,” his voice whiskeyburned, his distorted guitar buzzing like swarming hornets, Mpofu indicts his species.
There’s a darkness to Africa not found on any other Zamrock records, and a melancholy drifts throughout, specifically on Mpofu’s more restrained “Khala My Friend,” which stands as an effective, bleak situation for the Zambian everyman, the average citizen of a struggling, new nation, who might have had relatives in conflict-torn countries on the horizon, who might have been struggling to find his next meal, who might have seen a bleaker future than his president promised. Then there’s the clear Velvet Underground-influence on the nostalgic “Sunday Morning,” which, as Kabwe
recalls, was the first song written for the album, back in 1968, when Velvet Undergound and Nico was a new release - and the underground funk of “Making The Scene.” The album also tackles traditional Zambian music and early-‘60s rock – punctuated, of course by Kanyepa’s wah-wah and Mpofu’s fuzz guitars. But every time Amanaz get too deep, too violent, they come back with an accessible song and woo their listener back to the groove. “Green Apple” is a civil song, featuring Kanyepa’s sighing guitar. It is a perfectly arranged album, from the dichotomy of Mpofu’s and Kanyepa’s lead and rhythm guitars, to the vocal harmonies, to the rhythm section’s sense of space and time, which allows Africa’s funk to build. Inexplicably, Africa was given two separate mixes and two separate presses: one version is dry, with the vocals and drums mixed loud, the other slathered in reverb, with the vocals and drums disappearing into the mix, and with the guitar solos mixed much louder. We’ve presented them both here as they each have their appeal: it’s up to the listener to pick the one he or she prefers. This is a highpoint of the Zamrock scene and we hope that this can be seen as its definitive reissue.

Sophisticated, suave, and masterfully composed, this 45 is a sonic love letter to late 60s and early 70s soul, nodding to the giants of the genre and bowing to its unsung heroes. With inspiration from artists like The Moments, Baby Huey, The Delfonics, and especially the late Curtis Mayfield, this 7" is drenched in the era-defining tone that can only come from its origins on analog tape. From the first notes of the first track "Beck & Call", the songs shimmer and glow from one moment to the next like a summer's drive with the windows down, with a steady cruise anthem like "Daydreaming" floating by like a cool breeze. Friends since childhood, The Sextones are Mark Sexton (guitar, vocals), Alexander Korostinsky (bass), Daniel Weiss (drums), and Christopher Sexton (piano). Having known each other for so long, their musical chemistry is effortless and forms the foundation of the band's longevity and creative workflow. Despite their bond, each member has been able to channel their creativity into other acclaimed groups_Alexander and Mark with their cinematic-soul project Whatitdo Archive Group, whose acclaimed debut LP The Black Stone Affair was released on Record Kicks in 2021, and Daniel with the soul/jazz group Delvon Lamarr Organ Trio (Colemine Records). Flexing their creative muscle individually has only strengthened The Sextones' collective songwriting ability and heralds their formidable return to the spotlight. With their recent signing to Record Kicks, the self-made heroes of soul begin a new chapter in their sonic journey, ready to scale new heights and plumb deep emotional depths in service of the genre they love.

PRSPCT Recordings and Redrum Recordz are a match made in the underground.

They bring you another groundbreaking release, this time building sonic bridges between the UK and The Netherlands.

Dutch Jungle legend Mike Redman is known for internationally spreading the Hardcore Jungle gospel as Deformer, Voodoom and under his own name since the early 90's. Recently his well received 'Roffadamn Jungle' track set international dance-floors on fire while paying tribute to the nightlife connoisseurs of bygone times, mixing UK inspired Jungle with uncompromising Rotterdam Hardcore.

This time around he's supported by the most legendary artists in the field providing stunning remixes. Such as UK Drum 'n Bass heroes Bizzy B and Ed Rush, both founders of the genre, providing remixes that knock you off your socks. He's also teamed up with hardcore legends Akira, Rotterdam Terror Corps as well as Mackadena providing that original sound of Rotterdam. Not to mention Redman's own ear-shattering remix under his alias Deformer, making this album a must-have for anyone that likes it ruff. By the way, the cover art by legendary graffiti artist Cosh is worth framing too!

Tullio De Piscopo is an Italian drummer, percussionist and singer- songwriter born in Naples, Italy. During his musical career he began working as a session drummer, playing with international artists, including Chet Baker, Gil Evans, Gato Barbieri, Eumir Deodato and many others.

His 6th solo album Acqua E Viento, released in 1983, includes the Italian #1 single “Stop Bajon (Primavera)” which also ranked to #58 in the UK Singles Chart of that same year. “Stop Bajon (Primavera)” was a favourite in Rimini (Italy) Discotheques, a Balearic Islands classic, a Chicago favourite during the early house days, and became an anthem of the Italo Disco movement. The album includes guest musicians Don Cherry on trumpet, percussionst Famoudou Don Moye and composer and songwriter Pino Daniele.

"To kick off the yearlong celebration and provide the perfect summer soundtrack, Capitol Records and UMe will release a newly remastered and expanded edition of The Beach Boys career-spanning greatest hits collection, Sounds Of Summer: The Very Best Of The Beach Boys, on June 17. Originally released in 2003, the album soared to no. 16 in the US and stayed on the chart for 104 weeks. Now certified 4x platinum for sales of nearly four and a half million albums, the collection has been updated in both number of songs and audio quality, expanding the original 30-track best of with 50 more of the band’s most beloved songs for a total of 80 tracks that span their earliest hits to deeper fan-favorite cuts and from their 1962 debut album, Surfin’ Safari through to 1989’s Still Cruisin’.
Assembled by Mark Linett and Alan Boyd, the team behind 2013's GRAMMY® Award-winning SMiLE Sessions and last year’s acclaimed boxed set, Feel Flows – The Sunflower and Surf's Up Sessions 1969-1971, Sounds Of Summer features nearly every US Top 40 hit of The Beach Boys’ incredible career, including “California Girls,” “I Get Around,” “Surfer Girl,” “Surfin’ U.S.A.,” “Fun, Fun, Fun,” “God Only Knows,” “Good Vibrations,” “Be True To Your School,” “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” “Kokomo,” “Barbara Ann,” “Help Me, Rhonda,” “In My Room,” and many others. Fifty additional tracks showcase a broad mix of songs from across their wide-ranging catalog with some of the many highlights including “All Summer Long,” “Disney Girls,” “Forever,” “Feel Flows,” “Friends,” “Roll Plymouth Rock,” “Sail on Sailor,” “Surf’s Up,” and “Wind Chimes.”
The collection boasts 24 new mixes including two first-time stereo mixes, plus 22 new-and-improved stereo mixes, which in some cases feature the latest in digital stereo extraction technology, allowing for the team to separate the original mono backing tracks for the first time.
The expanded edition of Sounds Of Summer will be available in a variety of formats, including a 3CD softpack, and as a Super Deluxe Edition 6LP vinyl boxed set on 180-gram black vinyl in two options – a standard set or a numbered, limited edition version featuring a rainbow foil slipcase and four collectible lithographs. Both versions will feature color printed sleeves that replicate the original “Capitol Catalog” sleeves that highlight the entire Beach Boys discography, and all formats will include a booklet with new liner notes and updated photos. The original 30-track version will also be available in its newly remastered and upgraded form on single CD or double gatefold LP on standard weight vinyl or as a higher-end limited edition numbered version pressed on 180-gram vinyl with a tip-on jacket and a lithograph. "

PAURA explores the horror repertoire from the precious CAM Sugar archives taking us on a hypnotic journey into the labyrinths of fear, through the different variations that Italian horror took on from the esoteric and supernatural to the slasher films of the early 1970s; to reinterpretations of Romantic literature and gothic fiction to the splatter films of the ‘80s; and from witchcraft to metropolitan horror. This is not a real “best of” but an eclectic menu full of mysterious voices, childlike lullabies, sweet melodies, obsessive music boxes, obstinate harpsichords, crazy distortions and threatening synthesizers, conceived as a succession of sequences, as if a film edit. The new collection includes some of the most creative music ever written and strives to do justice not only to some of the best known composers in this genre, but also to many great unsung composers: From celebrated composers like Ennio Morricone, Riz Ortolani & Stelvio Cipriani to long-forgotten personalities who fed the industrial backbone of Italian cinema such as Daniele Patucchi, Marcelo Giombini & Berto Pisano. The collection includes 6 previously unreleased tracks plus 3 tracks released on vinyl for the first time and 5 tracks available commercially for the first time (originally released only as a limited promo item).

"In the early 1960s, the great composer, arranger, and bandleader Gerald Wilson began recording a series of spectacular albums for Pacific Jazz that stand as the most significant of his lengthy career. The second of those albums, 1962’s Moment of Truth, features Wilson’s dynamic big band on an action-packed nine-song set (seven of which were composed by Wilson) with highlights including the swaggering blues of the title track, the irrepressible Latin groove of “Viva Tirado,” and a fleet-footed version of “Milestones” by Miles Davis.
This stereo Tone Poet Vinyl Edition was produced by Joe Harley, mastered by Kevin Gray from the original analog master tapes, pressed on 180g vinyl at RTI, and packaged in a deluxe tip-on jacket."

Factory Benelux presents a limited (500 copies only) 180g black vinyl edition of Part-Primitiv, the fifth studio album from post-punk trailblazers Section 25, originally released in 2007.

Recorded after a hiatus lasting almost two decades, Part-Primitiv saw founder members Larry and Vin Cassidy joined by former Tunnelvision guitarist Ian Butterworth, as well as multi-instrumentalist Roger Wikeley. Combining raw postpunk power and retro-futurist electro, the album marked a convincing return to form and drew praise from reviewers.

"Haunting, melancholic beauty - part post-rock, part trance" (Plan B)

"A vibrant, fierce collection of songs played with all the intense, live-wire energy one could want. Well worth the wait" (All Music Guide)

"The music on Part-Primitiv is informed by all phases of the band's back-catalogue, incorporating their early post-punk impulse alongside their later disposition towards electronic music. She's So Pretty is one of the band's closest brushes with pop music, while Power Base is a surprisingly straight-forward venture into techno, with its rampaging drum machine" (Boomkat)

Two tracks, Dream and Better Make Your Mind Up, were written and sung by Jenny Cassidy before she lost her battle with cancer in 2004. Best known for her beguiling vocal on 1984 club hit Looking From A Hilltop, on subsequent SXXV projects Jenny would be replaced by her daughter Beth.

Early 90's Italian house album compiled from two releases, composed and played by Marco Calderoni with help on production and writing by Giacomo Brunetti.

An essential part of the European disco history... "Livin' Up" and "Stop" by B.W.H., these two tracks are true 'milestones' and Italo-Disco in the purest form. The sound that only the most virtuous and innovative young Italian DJs and arrangers were able to create in the early 80s. B.W.H is Stefano Zito (aka Black Way), Stefano Galante, and the late Carlo Favilli, "Stop" is dubbed "the best B-side ever!", but "Livin' Up" is also incredible, making this vinyl the hottest 12" ever assembled in the Italo Domain and for decades incredibly underrated.

It was I-f's Mixed Up The Hague mix that brought this to the attention of a wider audience and have been considered one of the holy grails of Italo ever since. Here the 2 original versions from 1983 remastered with care and passion by Dom Scuteri and Claudio Casalini (Best Record) in two different editions: the classic one in black vinyl and the strictly limited one in gray vinyl. Two essential tracks available in a high quality edition.

Questions will inevitably have to be asked here as to how / why Hooj have shamelessly broken the informal UN backed agreement to NOT REMIX / RE RELEASE C*F* D*L M*R, EVER AGAIN. But after the Hooj Catalogue owners cajoled the old A +R team into a Hooj Electronic Orchestra album in 2021, the then up and coming Borai + Denham Audio were enlisted for remixes, and fast forward a couple of years, the Bristol duo are smashing it in 2023, and vinyl does indeed beckon.

And with some justification it has to be said, as the Bristol duo took chunks of the original Wim Mertens melody and somehow still managed to drag it into new terrain, introducing rough breaks and hardcore sensibilities into proceedings, for the first time in the track's 30 + years journey.

On the B - side, another star turn from the early 90's get's the BDA treatment, as Transformer 2's Fruit of Love get's a more polished/ musical approach on the Audio Redux mix ( though with no compromise on bottom end / beats dynamics) , and Borai contributes a rolling, percussive 4/4 dub.

How sad, if timely: this stunning reissue of the 1994 live album arrived in the very week that trumpeter Masekela passed away. One of the most successful ambassadors ever for African music, his fusing of the continent's rhythms and instruments with contemporary jazz and rock proved irresistible. Nearly every one of you has heard him, thanks to guess spots with The Byrds and Paul Simon. His breakthough hit from 1968 — the infectious "Grazing In The Grass" — is here, along with another 11 tracks recorded at Blues Alley, the U.S. club that gave us Eva Cassidy. Notably, despite its early-1990s origins, this is all-analogue." — Sound Quality = 90% - Ken Kessler, HiFi News, May 2018

"...Hope is one of those intensely visceral, large as life, and immediately present recordings that will make pretty much any system sound at least very good, and will cause better ones to raise goose bumps." - Wayne Garcia, The Absolute Sound, August 2008

"...The high quality original mix plus Analogue Productions' superb mastering has resulted in a terrific, very transparent sonic with great impact." - John Henry, Audiophile Audition

What more can be captured from the masterpiece that the late trumpet great Hugh Masekela left devoted fans, the effervescent Hope. Now cut at 45 RPM and spread over four 200-gram premium LPs, you're about to discover the answer to that question. The eight sides of vinyl reduce distortion and high frequency loss as the wider-spaced grooves let your stereo cartridge track more accurately. And this set is plated and pressed at Quality Record Pressings, Acoustic Sounds' own industry-lauded LP manufacturer. Virtually silent surfaces coupled with sharp delineation of musical detail are QRP pressing hallmarks.

Two Stoughton Printing old-style tip-on gatefold jackets house the four LPs, which are contained in a custom-designed slipcase reproducing the original artwork.

A longtime audiophile demonstration disc. Hope will show off your system's dynamic range as well as any record ever released. Hugh Masekela, the outstanding South African trumpeter, assembled a seven-piece group and recorded this great set live at Washington, D.C.'s Blues Alley. The songs stretch over a period of nearly five decades and serve as an informal guided tour of Masekela's life. The songs are honest and bare, and as for the sound — WOW!

Unlike a prior 45 RPM version that included seven songs, this 45 RPM reissue contains the full program as originally recorded with all 12 tracks included! Plus, as an added bonus, we've included a special insert — featuring an exclusive interview with Grammy/Emmy Award-winning engineer David Hewitt, who recorded Hope originally.

"Hugh's record is right up near the top for a lot of reasons," Hewitt says.

Hewitt and his team were afforded the time they needed, and they pulled out all the stops to pull off what's now recognized as an all-time great recording. They used better-quality microphones, they were mic-ing the room for ambient sound, and Masekela was performing for a sophisticated and appreciative audience.

"We used stuff from our stash of mics as opposed to what you'd find typically at a jazz club. We actually had control via the record label and producers, so we could take our time. We had the ability to mic the room for abient sound. ... you've got people that actually know and appreciate the music and respond accordingly. What you've got there is all the right stuff at the right time and the right people, and then something magical happens."

Listen to that magic unfold — put on this Analogue Productions 45 RPM 4LP reissue of Hope, and be transported.

Death Is Not The End sub-label 333 hit again with a reissue of a rarely encountered piece of prime UK digi, courtesy of Franklyn Bernard aka Frankie B - mixed at Fashion's A Class Studio in Clapham, and released on the Ital Stuff label in early 1986.

Frankie B began his recording career with producer Bert Douglas, first releasing on his Reggae City label in 1984 with the No More Tears 7" under his birth name Franklyn Bernard. In 1985 he then linked up with Ital Stuff - a production team consisting of three brothers who also helmed the Sweet & Bitter Band. Operating a small eight track studio in the basement of their house in Balham, Ital Stuff had recently been responsible for putting together and laying down the backing track to Dixie Peach's classic Pure Worries, released on the Jah Tubbys label in 1985. Upon playing Pure Worries to Frankie he was immediately inspired to lay down his own vocal on the track, which too features Dixie Peach contributing vocal harmonies - it was recorded late 1985 and mixed down along with a ferocious dub side at South London's A Class Studio, eventually seeing release in early 1986.

No shortage of colorful characters emerged from Cameroon’s bikutsi scene in the 1980’s and early 90’s. Gibraltar Drakus is one of the most enduring and enigmatic of the artists who helped transform bikutsi into a beautifully endless fabric of triplet rhythms that eventually reached ears around the world.

Following the advent of Cameroon Radio Television in 1987, bikutsi began to supplant makossa and soukous for domination of the local airwaves and the attention of cosmopolitan, thrill-seeking residents of Cameroon’s capital Yaoundé and beyond. Biktusi perfectly fused Beti traditional music and increasingly electronic, highly rhythmic guitarbased bikutsi. Mimicking the sound of village-based xylophone music by rigging a mute to electric guitar strings, bikutsi artists provided a relentlessly energetic dance format for those with a taste for music steeped in their hometown sensibility (countering the popular makossa that many felt sounded less indigenous).

By the early 1990’s, Les Tetes Brûlées were indisputably the most famous and influential artists in bikutsi, due in part to the innovations of their incendiary guitarist Théodore Zanzibar Epeme. Following their first European tour in 1987, the band blew up internationally but Zanzibar tragically, and mysteriously, passed away, which nearly brought an end to the band completely. In hindsight, the consensus among most Cameroonians is Zanzibar’s contributions to biktusi were transformational and immeasurable.

“Zanzibar is the one who taught me how to compose a song, and I learned a lot from Zanzibar musically. We spent whole nights working on methods and other approaches to compose beautiful songs. I owe half of everything I have today to Zanzibar!”

Swept up in all this was Gibraltar Drakus, who was the youngest member of Les Têtes Brûlées and was also the protégé of his biggest supporter, Zanzibar. So it was fitting that he dedicate his 1989 debut to their groundbreaking late guitarist who had meant so much to him. Drakus literally exploded from his first album Hommage A Zanzibar (1989), which sold over 100,000 copies despite rampant piracy. For the recording, Drakus made sure he engaged prolific producer Mystic Jim to record and mix the album. The innovation musically rests both within the guitar interplay and the discipline in the orchestration, which result in a mind-bending clockwork of cross-rhythmic harmony.