Search:the let go

823 is a multifaceted Perth-based record label, fashion brand, and artistic community, founded by Australian producer and all-around creative, Ta-ku (846k monthly listeners on Spotify). With an ethos of attention to detail and appreciation for the everyday things in life, 823 doesn’t stick to any particular genre. 823’s releases include Cabu’s (800k Monthly Listeners on Spotify) “So Far To Go” EP, Ta-ku and matt mcwaters’s duo project “Black and White,” which featured Masego collaboration “Flight 99” (14 million streams on Spotify), their debut release with Australian producer and instrumentalist Kuzich, and multiple sold out clothing capsules. “All Things Considered Vol. 1” set off a collaborative series of curated compilations, featuring both budding and well-established artists around the world including Idealism, Wun Two, pastels, SwuM, Jinsang, Saltyyyy V, and more. “All Things Considered Vol. 2” sees the continuation of this project, this time in partnership with fellow Perth-based powerhouse, Butter Goods.

Butter Goods is a Perth clothing brand rooted in skating culture and style, but drawing inspiration from hip-hop, jazz, and music at large. Butter Goods has been featured in major publications, including GQ, Complex, and HYPEBEAST. They’ve collaborated on releases with Peanuts and Puma, and have reached international levels of popularity. Butter Goods co-founder Garth Mariano’s deep love for and eclectic tastes in music drive his creativity, and are front and center in his partnership with Ta-ku and 823 on “All Things Considered Vol 2,” where the two team up to curate a wide-ranging compilation.

Arriving on September 2nd, 2022, “All Things Considered Vol. 2” is an exploration of Ta-ku’s and Mariano’s extensive and often overlapping musical palettes in two parts. The record pays homage to the love of instrumental music and hidden gems of new school jazz and funk that act as a source of inspiration and nostalgia for the both of them. The collaboration brings together over a dozen producers and instrumentalists from Sydney to Chicago, including Jadu Jadu, Gnarly, Tenderlonius, silentjay, and more. Side A is curated by Ta-ku and 823. It’s as much a love letter to the past as it is a nod to the future of beat-making. Featuring sample heavy, drum looped beats, sprinkled with the occasional ear candy for the attentive listener, it presents cruisy soundscapes & easy listening. Side B is curated by Garth and Butter Goods. It’s a raw and eclectic companion to Side A, leaning heavily into the texture and grit of multi-layered jazz and funk-driven beats.

As with any 823 release, the project is as visual as it is sonic. The artwork and visualizers are a celebration of Garth’s love of thrift culture and old nature documentaries, fused with 823’s design aesthetic of bringing everyday inspirations to the forefront. CRT style visuals are paired with 90’s spin, slide and fade away transitions. When partnered with the music, each visualizer could easily work as the intro for an episode of a VHS series of nature docos.

1st single, “senzu bean,” arrives on July 7th and kicks off Side A, showcasing Ta-ku’s hip-hop-centric tastes. Sydney producer Jadu Jadu teams up with UK-based TAMBALA, apltn, and Makzo for a vibrant instrumental. From a head-nodding bassline beneath fuzzy synths, to soft horn licks sprinkled over electronic drums, “senzu bean” is sonically rich and multilayered.

2nd single, “Too Much” by UK producer saaaz arrives July 20th. It’s a moody and low-tempo beat that builds itself up over time, complete with cryptic vocal samples and syrupy drums and bass. Also off of 823’s Side A, “Too Much” maintains a laid-back hip-hop theme but with saaaz’s signature and definitive lo-fi twist.

3rd single, “Goodmorning” from Baro Sura and silentjay of Melbourne arrives August 3rd, kicking off Butter Good’s Side B. The track is bright from start to finish and is a sun-filled track perfect for closing out the summer with. Final single, “Fool’s Gold” by Los Angeles producer L.Dre arrives August 17th. The infinitely creative beatmaker layers soft hums and the sounds of crashing waves over crisp drums and an infectious bassline. Together, it makes for a beat that sounds like it was made outside, under the sun, and is best enjoyed in the same way.

Focus track, “Seventh Wonder” by Tenderlonius, comes off of Side B, and is a window into the ideas and palettes on both sides of the compilation. The beat slowly fades in, one sound at a time, until it reaches a full-fledged groove, soaked in synths, bass, and horns, that’s impossible not to move to.

On the whole, “All Things Considered Vol. 2” is a forward-focused, sonic journey into the minds behind two of today’s great creative brands, and is as artistically eclectic and varied as those minds are, and a proud follow-up to its first volume.

LP contains A2 poster on uncoated stock.

A tumultuous selection of recordings from Black Ark, Perry's legendary studio and hotbed of creation. Rare 12" versions, unreleased mixes and featuring a stellar line-up, including:

Drums: Mikey ‘Boo’ Richards, Lowell ‘Sly’ Dunbar

Bass: Boris Gardiner, Radcliffe ‘Dougie’ Bryan

Guitar: Earl ‘Chinna’ Smith, Ernest Ranglin, Robert ‘Billy’ Johnson, Lynford ‘Hux’ Brown

Keyboards: Winston Wright, Robbie Lynn, Keith Sterling

Percussion: Noel ‘Scully’ Simms, Lee Perry

David Sylvian describes his 2nd solo album for his own Samadhisound label as being: “A modern kind of chamber music. Intimate, dynamic, emotive, democratic, economical”. Recorded in London, Vienna and Tokyo, the 8 songs and 1 instrumental on ‘Manafon’ bring together “the world’s leading improvisors, and innovators, artists who explore free improvisation, space-specific performance and live electronics” including Evan Parker, Keith Rowe, Christian Fennesz, Sachiko M, Otomo Yoshihide, John Tilbury and members of Polwechsel. This is the first time on 180gram vinyl for this 2LP set

VINYL REPRESS FINALLY ON THE WAY..

*Since the release of 2011’s award winning debut, 'No Time for Dreaming', Charles Bradley has transformed from a rising star in the Daptone galaxy into a bona-fide headliner, now affectionately known across the globe as "The Screaming Eagle of Soul."

*The popularity of 'No Time For Dreaming' resulted in an appearance on 'Later With Jools Holland' in 2012 and such glowing reviews as:

-LEAD 4/5 BOXED REVIEW IN MOJO : “THE GRIT AND GUSTO OF OTIS REDDING, THE RAW POWER OF JAMES BROWN, THE SMOULDER AND SHUDDER OF JAMES CARR, TOGETHER THEY MAKE AN INTOXICATING SOUND.
-LEAD 4/5 REVIEW IN Q MAGAZINE : “THERE'S A NEW/OLD SOUL MAN ON THE BLOCK. 'NO TIME FOR DREAMING' HAS THE GRITTY FEEL OF THE REAL THING, A MAN WHO HAS KNOWN MOSTLY HARD TIMES AND TELLS IT WITH A PLEADING, THROATY ROAR AND BLOOD-CURDLING SCREAM WORTHY OF JAMES BROWN . A REAL FIND.”

*The raw emotion and soulfulness of Bradley's voice lifts him up among the greats of the golden age of Soul - Otis, JB, Wilson Pickett, and Darrell Banks. Anyone who has had the privilege of hearing him sing has experienced how Bradley can captivate an entire audience with a simple "Ooooo..."

*Bradley and writer/producer/multi-instrumentalist Thomas “TNT” Brenneck returned to Dunham studios and recorded the most exciting Daptone release to date, Victim of Love. On this album, Bradley moves past his "Heartaches and Pain" to the great promise of hope and love. Though quite at home among the music that has affirmed Daptone as the world’s #1 authority on Soul Music, Victim of Love proves to be a genre-bending masterpiece, picking up where the early 70’s Temptations left off and edging boldly forward into psychedelic soul exploration.

Sieben lange Jahre nach der letzten Platte ist „The God Machine“ der sehnsüchtig erwartete Schulterschluss zwischen den frühen Neunzigern und der ausgebufften Raffinesse der Gegenwart. Ein beeindruckendes Album, das die letzten Werke keineswegs ignoriert, aber Komplexität und, Orchesterwucht bewusst in den Hintergrund rückt. „The God Machine“ ist das „Imaginations From The Other Side“ des Jahres 2022, komponiert, arrangiert und vor allem entfesselt von einer Band, die 27 Jahre Zeit hatte, ihren Stil zu perfektionieren. Dieser Spagat ist durchaus als Marschrichtung zu verstehen. „Wir wollten nicht einfach unsere Qualitäten von 1995 herausstellen, aber wir wollten diesen komplexen Weg definitiv nicht auf ewig weitergehen. ‚The God Machine‘ ist ein Neuanfang für uns. Wir haben die Weichen neu gestellt und uns auf gewisse Dinge besonnen, die wir auf den letzten Alben ein wenig vernachlässigt haben.“

„The God Machine“ ist, das wird schnell offenbar, die mühelose Spitze ihres bisherigen Schaffens. Ein Album, das gar nicht erst versucht so zu tun, als wären es noch die Neunziger, und sich stattdessen auf die Muskelerinnerung der damaligen Zeit verlässt. Hochgradig infektiös, beseelt von den Frodos, Peter Pans und Kapitän Nemos der Vergangenheit, ein packendes, aggressives, hochmelodisches und bei aller Zugänglichkeit brillant arrangiertes Album, beseelt von Magie und dennoch kein reiner Eskapismus. Ein modernes Meisterwerk in der Tradition jener Werke, mit denen BLIND GUARDIAN in den Neunzigern nach den Sternen griffen.

Picture Vinyl

Sieben lange Jahre nach der letzten Platte ist „The God Machine“ der sehnsüchtig erwartete Schulterschluss zwischen den frühen Neunzigern und der ausgebufften Raffinesse der Gegenwart. Ein beeindruckendes Album, das die letzten Werke keineswegs ignoriert, aber Komplexität und, Orchesterwucht bewusst in den Hintergrund rückt. „The God Machine“ ist das „Imaginations From The Other Side“ des Jahres 2022, komponiert, arrangiert und vor allem entfesselt von einer Band, die 27 Jahre Zeit hatte, ihren Stil zu perfektionieren. Dieser Spagat ist durchaus als Marschrichtung zu verstehen. „Wir wollten nicht einfach unsere Qualitäten von 1995 herausstellen, aber wir wollten diesen komplexen Weg definitiv nicht auf ewig weitergehen. ‚The God Machine‘ ist ein Neuanfang für uns. Wir haben die Weichen neu gestellt und uns auf gewisse Dinge besonnen, die wir auf den letzten Alben ein wenig vernachlässigt haben.“

„The God Machine“ ist, das wird schnell offenbar, die mühelose Spitze ihres bisherigen Schaffens. Ein Album, das gar nicht erst versucht so zu tun, als wären es noch die Neunziger, und sich stattdessen auf die Muskelerinnerung der damaligen Zeit verlässt. Hochgradig infektiös, beseelt von den Frodos, Peter Pans und Kapitän Nemos der Vergangenheit, ein packendes, aggressives, hochmelodisches und bei aller Zugänglichkeit brillant arrangiertes Album, beseelt von Magie und dennoch kein reiner Eskapismus. Ein modernes Meisterwerk in der Tradition jener Werke, mit denen BLIND GUARDIAN in den Neunzigern nach den Sternen griffen.

Tansparent Red Vinyl

Sieben lange Jahre nach der letzten Platte ist „The God Machine“ der sehnsüchtig erwartete Schulterschluss zwischen den frühen Neunzigern und der ausgebufften Raffinesse der Gegenwart. Ein beeindruckendes Album, das die letzten Werke keineswegs ignoriert, aber Komplexität und, Orchesterwucht bewusst in den Hintergrund rückt. „The God Machine“ ist das „Imaginations From The Other Side“ des Jahres 2022, komponiert, arrangiert und vor allem entfesselt von einer Band, die 27 Jahre Zeit hatte, ihren Stil zu perfektionieren. Dieser Spagat ist durchaus als Marschrichtung zu verstehen. „Wir wollten nicht einfach unsere Qualitäten von 1995 herausstellen, aber wir wollten diesen komplexen Weg definitiv nicht auf ewig weitergehen. ‚The God Machine‘ ist ein Neuanfang für uns. Wir haben die Weichen neu gestellt und uns auf gewisse Dinge besonnen, die wir auf den letzten Alben ein wenig vernachlässigt haben.“

„The God Machine“ ist, das wird schnell offenbar, die mühelose Spitze ihres bisherigen Schaffens. Ein Album, das gar nicht erst versucht so zu tun, als wären es noch die Neunziger, und sich stattdessen auf die Muskelerinnerung der damaligen Zeit verlässt. Hochgradig infektiös, beseelt von den Frodos, Peter Pans und Kapitän Nemos der Vergangenheit, ein packendes, aggressives, hochmelodisches und bei aller Zugänglichkeit brillant arrangiertes Album, beseelt von Magie und dennoch kein reiner Eskapismus. Ein modernes Meisterwerk in der Tradition jener Werke, mit denen BLIND GUARDIAN in den Neunzigern nach den Sternen griffen.

Singer/Songwriter-Kunst aus UK, prominent mit dabei Paul Weller! In Zusammenarbeit mit Paul Weller als Produzent und Co-Autor seines 5. Studioalbums veröffentlicht der Liverpooler Troubadour Steve Pilgrim das schmerzhaft melancholische ,Beautiful Blue" auf Ltd Vinyl und CD. Auf dem Album wirken Paul Weller, Steve Craddock und Rachael Jean Harris mit Streicherarrangements von Hannah Peel mit. Ein Text von Paul Weller war die einzige Inspiration, die Steve Pilgrim brauchte, um die Arbeit an seinem mit Spannung erwarteten sechsten Album ,Beautiful Blue" zu beenden. Er spielt seit mehr als einem Jahrzehnt Schlagzeug und singt mit der lebenden Legende Paul Weller. Skizzen von Liedern, Melodien und Akkordfolgen wurden der Anfang einer gemeinsamen Schreibrichtung von Pilgrim und Weller und brachten das Material an einen neuen Ort, der den sanftmütigen Scouser auf eine Art und Weise anspornte, die nur Weller hervorrufen konnte. Stücke wie ,Test of Faith", ,Don't Let The Mirror Break You", ,One With All", ,Universe" und ,Where Our Love Goes" erinnern an Pilgrims frühere Arbeiten, sind aber mit einer Wärme und Klassik versehen, die man auf dem gefeierten Album ,True Meanings" seines Co-Autors findet. Mit der Unterstützung des Toningenieurs und Klangzauberers Charles Rees und den Streicherarrangements der renommierten Hannah Peel ist Beautiful Blue" das Werk eines Künstlers, der seine Stärke im Stillleben findet und am lautesten schreit, wenn er flüstert. Die Songs auf diesem Album sind stromlinienförmig, ohne Fett und bieten ein komplexes akustisches Gitarrenspiel, das sich in und aus einprägsamen Melodien ('New Sky'), wogenden (das wunderschöne Titelstück) und umwerfend zarte Gesangsharmonien ('Everyday') einfügt.

-Heavy Metal Sampler mit Underground-Hits und Kultsongs
-umfasst die „goldenen Achtziger“ mit Stücken von 1981 bis 1988
-Vinyl only (keine digitale Version)!
-EYECATCHER: attraktives Cover mit Hommage an die Serie
„Stranger Things“
-bedruckte Innenhülle mit Essay über den 80s Metal und viele Fotos
-mit einem neuen Vinyl-Remaster des Manilla Road Klassikers
„Necropolis“
Trotz dem Vinylboom, der in szenestarken Musikrichtungen
noch deutlicher ist als in der Popmusik, gab es in den letzten
Jahren bisher wenige Compilations auf LP. Dabei waren
Zusammenstellungen ein ebenso wichtiger Teil der Siebziger und
Achtziger, eben in der Zeit, als die Schallplatte das gängige Medium
war und ein Mixtape eben nur ein Tape war.
„Heavy Metal Things“ spielt natürlich auf die erfolgreiche TVSerie „Stranger Things“ an, die in den Achtzigern spielt und bei
den Jugendlichen einen ganz eigenen Lifestylewunsch erzeugt hat.
Trotz der spannenden Handlung erlebt man eine Zeit, die in einigen
Punkten doch einfacher und entspannter war – trotz dem Kalten
Krieg und unsicheren Atomkraftwerken. Die Schallplatte (und
erstaunlicherweise sogar die Kassette) gehört in diese Zeit, die sich
mit der Hochphase des Heavy Metal überschneidet. In Szenekreisen
taucht daher oft die Floskel „goldene Achtziger“ auf, denn so
ziemlich jedes Metal-Subgenre wurde hier erfunden oder klang
wenigstens bereits an. Ein ruppiger, teils noch von der Gesellschaft
geächteter Stil wurde zu einem kommerziellen Erfolg. Auch die
Neunziger, gespickt mit Grunge und Crossover, konnten die Rückkeh
des traditionellen Heavy Metal in den 2000ern nicht verhindert. Und
durch die Serie „Stranger Things“ werden Jugendliche auf Songs un
Bands aufmerksam, die in Folge nach über 30 Jahren wieder in die
Charts schiessen.
Trotzdem ist die LP „Heavy Metal Things“ keine Compilation mit
den großen Hits der Mega-Acts in diesem Segment. Im Gegenteil!
Hier wird gezeigt, welche spannenden Acts aus den USA und
Europa zunächst nicht mit dem Massenerfolg gesegnet waren,
allerdings von neugierigen und interessieren Genrefans mittlerweile
entdeckt wurden. So konnte man auch in den letzten Jahren Bands
wie Manilla Road bei Festivals wie dem Hellfest, Sweden Rock
oder Maryland Death Fest sehen. Kultgruppen wie Griffin (USA),
Witchfynde, Malleus oder Dark Wizard kehrten auch zu den
Bühnen zurück. Der Underground ist im Heavy Metal in der Tat
eine größere Sache, als man bei dem Begriff zunächst annehmen
müsste.

In the gutter lie sun dried leaves, scraps of paper, burnt matches and cigarette butts. It is early morning; the sun rises with warm grace. you've come to the right party... you see, the body of a young man sitting by a pool, nobody important, really. Just a movie writer with a couple of "b" pictures to his credit. He always wanted a pool. Well, in the end he got himself a pool, but let's go back some time and find the day when it all started in “Hollywood,” the place where they pay a thousand dollars for a kiss and fifty cents for your soul.

Three years after he celebrated “Sketch of Japan” EP, Superpitcher returns to Mule Musiq, bringing an epic super-pitched 40 minutes trip named “Hollywood”, that perfectly works as the score for the above remixed opening scene of a famous movie on the trances of Hollywood, the cage, that catch our dreams. It’s a slow grower, incorporating some of core elements of the city of celluloid dreams: action, drama, romance - all epic noir and yet so flooded by light. As ever the producer and DJ from Paris garnished his long building up and going down voyage with se-ducing melodies, glamorous pop, and psychic rhythms, creating the hippy dance ambiences he is famed for. Even though the twelve inch comes in accustomed a/b chapters, “Hollywood” should be perceived in one go to feel the depth of Superpitcher’s tropical leaning story arc, that stretches the idea of a track into a dream of satin teardrops on flickering velvet lights. It paints sonic celluloid pictures of ghostly creatures, while a female/male voice is the music’s constant melodic companion, injection Janus-faced longing dream pop spheres on the overall tripping house melancholy. A heroic electronic drama, elegant as Tamara de Lempicka painting. It asks for endless rides on the Hollywood freeways. in the back the sun – a big orange ball – sinking slowly below the horizon.

You've come to the right party... you see, the body of a young man sitting by a pool, in the back a long, graceful bar, bathed in soft light, filled with elegant customers. There's nothing else, just us and the music and those wonderful people out there in the dark, ready for a divine dance in closeup.

ORIGINAL RELEASE: 1984!
Und wieder buddeln Golden Core eine vergessene Perle
aus dem German Metal Underground, auch wenn das Wort
Hardrock hier ebenso angebracht wäre. 1984 veröffentlichte
die Band STARSTRUCK aus Karlsruhe ihr einziges
Lebenszeichen: Die LP „Thru´ To You“. Damit war man
regional nicht weit weg von GAMA Records, die ihren Sitz in
Kirchheim/Teck hatten und das Potenzial der lokal bereits
angesagten Gruppe erkannten. Aufgenommen wurde die Platte
im Spygel Studio mit Engineer Batze Kramer. Eben dieser hat
auch kultige Scheiben von Bands wie Tyrant, Stormwitch,
Bloody Six, Vampyr, Gravestone, Restless oder Necronomicon
veredelt. „Thru´ To You“ ist purer Zeitgeist und dazu passt
auch das Cover, welches beim genauen Hinschauen viel
Humor beweist.
Karlsruhe, Stuttgart, Heidelberg – melodischer Heavy Metal
war in diesem Großraum immer schon mehr angesagt als im
Ruhrgebiet oder im Norden. Nur München wurde noch bekannt
für seinen Hang zum AOR. Starstruck balancieren geschickt
den Mittelweg zwischen Härte und Radiofreundlichkeit, was
bei den gut arrangierten Songs und dem spielerischen Können
hätte zum Erfolgsrezept werden können. Leider war die Firma
GAMA nicht in der Lage, das Album adäquat zu promoten.
Immerhin wurde es ein Jahr später von Mausoleum (Belgien)
lizensiert, 1990 kam es dann auch erstmals auf CD (Aurophon,
in der Brainstorm Serie, die Sammler nur zu gut kennen).
Letztere Version kann man heute nicht mehr unter 70 Euro
(siehe Discogs) bekommen…
Golden Core machten auf Starstruck bereits 2021
aufmerksam, denn sie sind mit einem Track auf der
Compilation „The Best And The Rare Of GAMA Records“ zu
finden. Zum ersten Mal gibt es nun eine remasterte Version
des kultigen Albums auf CD, später im Jahr auch auf Vinyl.
Auch wenn die weniger bekannten Bands des GAMA-Kataloges
von Einigen immer noch belächelt werden…in den letzten
Jahren hat sich gerade in Südamerika und Osteuropa eine
große Fanbase in diese Richtung entwickelt, aber auch
weltweit wird der hart rockende Sound der Achtziger geliebt
und gerne kopiert. Starstruck waren mittendrin!

LP on classic black vinyl. The long-awaited new album from the best pop band in Scotland... The Orchids were making sophisticated pop music right back in the early 1990s when Sarah Records first started. Their songs were as emotionally pure as anything else on that label, but they were always a step ahead of their peers in terms of song arrangements and musical ambition. With a casual, unpretentious air they made writing perfect pop songs seem easy, almost accidental, and several great releases followed. The Orchids gained a passionate following: people knew a good thing when they heard it and they hugged it close. But maybe now it’s time for the rest of the world to be let in on the secret. The songs themselves are a beautiful mix of strength and gentleness. They wrap you in a powerful embrace, making you feel comfortable and secure – and then whisper their insecurities and anxieties into your ear. They say: ‘it’s OK to admit weakness. It’s OK to be fragile. That’s where true strength comes from’. From Glasgow, and proudly Scottish, the band shares a musical lineage with other great groups from that city, from Aztec Camera to Orange Juice, Lloyd Cole to Teenage Fanclub - bands that specialise in song-writing that can tell big stories through small personal fragments, that can make the ordinary extraordinary. Ian Carmichael has helped the band create a perfectly produced masterpiece. He subtly accentuates the drama of the songs, with a sophisticated choreography and gloss that never overwhelms the tenderness of the music. In ‘This Boy Is A Mess’ (the first single from the album), the lyric confesses frailty while the arrangement gets stronger and stronger. It is bittersweet and exhilarating at the same time. ‘I Want You, I Need You’ has harmonies as big as a house – but the yearning message remains intimate and close. ‘I Don’t Mean To Stare’ is an elegant version of the song that first appeared on Skep Wax compilation Under The Bridge. Album opener ‘Didn’t We Love You’ daringly opens up empty spaces where the reverb of the drums is the only thing you can hear... and then floods your ears with a harmonised chorus, sweet guitar melodies and sweeping effects. Even then, the lyrical lament, expressing the desire to live in a better place - a place unspoilt by the greedy phonies who’ve taken over – comes across as clearly as if Hackett were leaning over for a friendly chat in the snug bar of The Orchids’ favourite Glasgow pub. Dreaming Kind will be released as a CD, digital download and vinyl LP.

REPRESS

Acid bass, slow funk and cosmic energy make for a mind expanding trip in the Liquid Canoe.
Load up on edibles, make it a macro-dose and let the music lead the way.

Whether you’re hard at work on a Hamburg allotment, basking in the heat of a Balinese beach or enjoying the cool waters of the Salish Sea, remember that the same sky stretches over all of us.
And if you forget your finger for a minute and soak in the heavenly beauty instead, you might just catch the cosmic vibrations of Liquid Canoe, the latest members of the Growing Bin family.

A loose ensemble, Liquid Canoe is the brainchild of Wolfgang Matthes, a lost Angelino who’s swapped the rush and push of a mega city for the space of the Pacific Northwest - and listening to this eight track offering, you’ll realise that space is the place. Armed with an array of vintage synths and programmed rhythms, Wolfgang sketched out a slew of inter dimensional transmissions, inspired by the commune electronics and space rock of 70s Germany and inhabited by the spirit of the boogie. Inviting friends to drop by and lend their own instrumental skill, Wolfgang quickly turned Liquid Canoe into a true collaboration. Finalised in a converted stable on Galiano Island, the LP is a perfect marriage of the electronic and organic, shimmering arps and spheric synth bass intertwined with American primitive guitar, nuanced hand percussion and glassy chimes. As this mind expanding collection stretches out towards infinity, you’ll hear Floyd-ian funk, cosmic dub, tangerine daydreams and micro-dosed ambience, all imbued with the memories of New York lofts, Bay Area warehouses, skyscraping pines or the world wide web of fungi. Liquid Canoe taking you on an oarsome trip.

(Cargo Collective Title) RIYL: Silver Mt Zion, Rachel’s, Grails & Do Make Say Think. 180g LP, custom window-cut letterpress jacket with artworked 300gsm inner + DL. Esmerine presents Everything Was Forever Until It Was No More, its first album in five years, following a celebrated run of Juno Award winning and nominated records throughout the preceding decade. Founded by ex-Godspeed You! Black Emperor percussionist Bruce Cawdron and cellist Rebecca Foon (Saltland, Silver Mt Zion, Set Fire To Flames), the acclaimed instrumental music ensemble and has long embroidered emotive chamber works using threads of post-classical, post-rock, Minimalism, neo-Baroque, jazz, pop and a wide array of folk traditions. Esmerine conjures a distinctive and immediately identifiable sound that consistently defies the trappings of “fusion”, forging emotive cinematic soundtracks under the overriding sonic sensibilities of postpunk grit, Wall-of-Sound, drone and dark ambient. Recorded by longtime co-producer Jace Lasek (The Besnard Lakes), the new album manifestly carries on in this fine tradition. Everything Was Forever Until It Was No More completes Esmerine’s “Anthropocene” triptych: a series of album-length meditations that began in 2015. The album title itself has minor meme status in eco-artistic circles, appropriated from its original context Alex Yurchak’s 2005 book about the collapse of Soviet Russia by several exhibitions and works interrogating artistic production in the age of environmental crisis. (Foon is also well-known for her climate activism as co-founder of Pathway To Paris.) The album grapples with existential tensions between atmosphere and airlessness, seclusion and claustrophobia, forbearance and satiation, scarcity and abundance; it is one of Esmerine’s most restrained and wistful works. Instrumental densities ebb and flow, melding into each other with gauzy timbral warmth, sometimes tracing fleeting tendrils outwards, but always rotating around the saturnine gravitational force of a darkly glowing sonic center. Everything Was Forever Until It Was No More is like a somber forest lit by a closely-orbiting opalescent planet; it could be the alternate score to Von Trier’s Melancholia or Cormac McCarthy’s The Road.Esmerine planted these compositional seeds before pandemic rooted everyone in place, under the auspices of a grant from the Canada Council for the Arts and a 2019 residency at Le Château de Monthelon in France. Lasek then began documenting the band between lockdowns in various stripped-down configurations with spartan remote equipment at the rural Québec homesteads of Cawdron and Foon, culminating in final sessions at Foon’s converted barn in summer/fall 2021, notably with extensive use of the barn’s resonant acoustic piano. Brian Sanderson appears on his fourth Esmerine album since joining in 2012, continuing to expand the ensemble’s ethnomusicological sensibility and melodic sound palette with guitars, ngoni, ekonting, hulusi, and brass horns of all sorts. Everything Was Forever… also signals the full integration of bassist Philippe Charbonneau, who joined Esmerine as a touring member pre-pandemic and plays throughout the new album, along with sound design contributions via synth, tape echo and other processing. Everything Was Forever Until It Was No More features the pandemic collage artwork of Maciek Sczcerbowksi, in a second Esmerine album art collaboration following their Juno award for Album Package of the Year for Lost Voices in 2015.

Black Truffle is thrilled to announce Drumming Up Trouble, the first release of previously unissued music by Alvin Curran on the label. Collecting works recorded between 2018-2021 and a side-long epic dating back to the early 80s, as the title suggests, Drumming Up Trouble focuses on a hitherto almost unknown aspect of Curran’s encyclopaedic and omnivorous musical world: his experiments with sampled and synthesised percussion. As Curran’s wonderful, wildly sweeping liner notes make clear, his fascination with drumming belongs to the radical investigation of music’s fundamental elements that has marked his output since the beginnings of MEV, who aimed (as he says in a recent interview) to return ‘in some collective way to a non-existent start time in the history of human music’. Whatever kind of music our proto-human ancestors played, he writes, ‘drums were front and centre in the mix. Drums rule!’

In a paradox typical of Curran’s approach, Drumming Up Trouble interrogates this most ancient dimension of music with contemporary technology. On the first side, we hear recent pieces performed using the sampling software and full-size MIDI keyboard setup Curran has refined since the 1980s. Two of them are wild real-time improvisations, primarily utilising an enormous bank of hip-hop samples. Building from polyrhythmic layers of drum machine fragments to wild cacophonies of clashing vocal samples, scratching, and frantic pitch shifting, these energetic and at times hilarious pieces occupy a space somewhere between John Oswald’s Plunderphonics, Pat Thomas and Matt Wand in the Tony Oxley Quartet, and the propulsive Kudoro/Grime fusion of Lisbon’s Príncipe label. They are improvisations are accompanied by two austere, minimal compositions realised in collaboration with Angelo Maria Fallo: ‘End Zone’ for orchestral bass drum and high oscillator, and ‘Rollings’, where a snare roll is gradually stretched and filtered by digital means into ‘floating electronic gossamer’.

The incredible breadth of Curran’s output makes it pretty unlikely that a listener familiar with his work would be surprised to find it branching out in a new direction. But no degree of familiarity with his work can really prepare for side B’s epic and bizarre ‘Field it More’. It’s perhaps best to let the maestro describe this unhinged and infectious offering in his own words: ‘It features an 8 bar funky minimal riff à la James Brown, played on synth and an-out-of-tune piano, synced to a pre-paid patch on the Roland drum machine. Over this is laid a heavily processed track of the voices of dancer Yoshiko Chuma and movie-maker Jacob Burckhardt discussing an upcoming performance of theirs at the Venice film festival, capped by a track of my playing an increasingly out of control blues over the top of all of the above’. Only Pekka Airaksinen’s Buddhas of the Golden Light comes to mind as a reference point that might even vaguely compare to this wild home-brew of drum-machine funk, mad improvisation and squelching electronics, which eventually dissolved into a massive, layered cluster. Ancient and modern, synthetic and human, hysterical and rigorous, Drumming up Trouble is 100% Curran.

Danish Artist Troels Hammer has released 5 albums to date, with his sixth House of Memories due out later this year. As yet there has only been a sampler 12” on vinyl. Therefore ‘An introduction’ LP is a compilation of tracks exclusive to Vinyl for fans and new listeners to enjoy.

Troels was discovered by the Danish producer Kenneth Bager in 2012 and has already gained great recognition for his music on both the Danish and the international scene

The style is instrumental and moving in the area between nu-classical, lounge, dance, ambience and electronica. When Troels Hammer sits down at the piano, the music flows through him and brings the audience in a mood that is both relaxed and intense. He himself says that he creates music you can go in and out of –and get carried away by.

New Darius album, featuring Wayne Snow, Kadhja Bonet, Benny Sings...

After the release of his last EP "OASIS (Prelude) on Roche Musique, Parisian producer Darius reveals his second album "OASIS" with the powerful track "EASE YOUR MIND". A groovy dancing track reminiscing of his early trademark electro dance sounds with catchy R&B lead from Devin Tracy. The acclaimed and certified artist is now ready to unveil his new project, teased since the release of the +10 Million streams "EQUILIBRIUM" in 2020.

"Art is awe, art is mystery expressed," writes Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith. "Art is somatic, even if it is experienced cerebrally. It is felt." The central mysteries of Smith's ninth studio album, Let's Turn it Into Sound, have to do with perception, expression, and communication: How can we communicate when spoken language is inadequate? How do we understand what it is we're feeling? How do we translate our experience of the world into something that someone else can understand? For Smith, a self-described "feeler," the answers are inspired by compound words in non-English languages, translation, sculptural fashion, dance, butoh, wushu shaolin, and other forms of sensory and somatic experience. Just like fashion uses lines, shapes, colors, textures, and silhouettes to communicate on a sensual level separate from the conscious mind, Let's Turn it Into Sound strives to use sound to communicate what words alone cannot. "The album is a puzzle," Smith says. "It is a symbol of receiving a compound of a ton of feelings from going out into a situation, and the song titles are instructions to breaking apart the feelings and understanding them." The energized "Is it Me or is it You" comes from traversing the gaps between how you see yourself and how another might see you, through a filter of their own projections. The hushed sense of revelation that brackets "There is Something" refers to the feeling of walking into a room and being subconsciously aware of the dynamic present. All the while, Smith interprets these feelings through sound. This auditory interpretation process, driven by earnest curiosity, led Smith to record some thoughts and questions that popped up along the journey in Somatic Hearing_a booklet which accompanies the album. Over three frenzied months, recording alone in her home studio, Smith allowed herself to pursue new experiments to accompany her usual toolkit of modular, analogue, and rare synthesizers (including her signature Buchla), orchestral sounds, and the voice. She created a new vocal processing technique, and gave herself permission to pursue a pacing that felt intuitive, rather one that followed typical song structures. She walked around in the windiest season with a subwoofer backpack and an umbrella, listening to the low end of the album amidst 60mph gusts. She listened to herself, and, in doing so, to an inner community which suddenly opened to her. Underlying the album is a dynamic relationship between what Smith describes as six distinct voices, each a multifaceted storyteller. By acknowledging these characters, she was acknowledging her whole being: the woven plurality of self, the complex process of noticing and resolving inner conflicts, and the joy of finding harmony in flux. "I started to feel so embodied by all of these characters. This is all the felt, unsaid stuff my inner community wants to communicate but it doesn't have the English language as its form of communication, and so this album was a form of giving space to let it talk and not judge it and just let it play." By not adhering to expected song structures, each song feels even more like a conversation, with each character getting to express themselves in full.

"Art is awe, art is mystery expressed," writes Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith. "Art is somatic, even if it is experienced cerebrally. It is felt." The central mysteries of Smith's ninth studio album, Let's Turn it Into Sound, have to do with perception, expression, and communication: How can we communicate when spoken language is inadequate? How do we understand what it is we're feeling? How do we translate our experience of the world into something that someone else can understand? For Smith, a self-described "feeler," the answers are inspired by compound words in non-English languages, translation, sculptural fashion, dance, butoh, wushu shaolin, and other forms of sensory and somatic experience. Just like fashion uses lines, shapes, colors, textures, and silhouettes to communicate on a sensual level separate from the conscious mind, Let's Turn it Into Sound strives to use sound to communicate what words alone cannot. "The album is a puzzle," Smith says. "It is a symbol of receiving a compound of a ton of feelings from going out into a situation, and the song titles are instructions to breaking apart the feelings and understanding them." The energized "Is it Me or is it You" comes from traversing the gaps between how you see yourself and how another might see you, through a filter of their own projections. The hushed sense of revelation that brackets "There is Something" refers to the feeling of walking into a room and being subconsciously aware of the dynamic present. All the while, Smith interprets these feelings through sound. This auditory interpretation process, driven by earnest curiosity, led Smith to record some thoughts and questions that popped up along the journey in Somatic Hearing_a booklet which accompanies the album. Over three frenzied months, recording alone in her home studio, Smith allowed herself to pursue new experiments to accompany her usual toolkit of modular, analogue, and rare synthesizers (including her signature Buchla), orchestral sounds, and the voice. She created a new vocal processing technique, and gave herself permission to pursue a pacing that felt intuitive, rather one that followed typical song structures. She walked around in the windiest season with a subwoofer backpack and an umbrella, listening to the low end of the album amidst 60mph gusts. She listened to herself, and, in doing so, to an inner community which suddenly opened to her. Underlying the album is a dynamic relationship between what Smith describes as six distinct voices, each a multifaceted storyteller. By acknowledging these characters, she was acknowledging her whole being: the woven plurality of self, the complex process of noticing and resolving inner conflicts, and the joy of finding harmony in flux. "I started to feel so embodied by all of these characters. This is all the felt, unsaid stuff my inner community wants to communicate but it doesn't have the English language as its form of communication, and so this album was a form of giving space to let it talk and not judge it and just let it play." By not adhering to expected song structures, each song feels even more like a conversation, with each character getting to express themselves in full.

In the late 1950s, Tina Turner (née Anna Mae Bullock) caught a performance of Ike Turner’s Kings of Rhythm at St. Louis nightclub and practically begged Ike to let her sing with the band. Ike refused, as only men were allowed to sing in his group at the time, but she persisted, and once he heard Tina sing he wouldn’t let her stop. Since that fateful meeting, the world of R&B has never been the same. Ike & Tina Turner’s Kings of Rhythm Dance is their second long player, originally released in 1961, and it is full of stompers, rippers, and all around rocking R&B magic. Ike’s guitar tone and style are the perfect complement to Tina’s unmistakable voice. Now nearly impossible to find an original LP at a reasonable price, Destination Moon once again saves the party by putting another R&B classic back in print. Features the original hit version of “It’s Gonna Work Out Fine”.

Bobby Oroza puts his desire for the profound on wax with his sophomore album Get On The Otherside. Musically, he has updated the formula we were introduced to on the first record. But lyrically, songs are bravely rooted in the more complicated, ubiquitous inner tangles of life like self-examination and coming to terms with the vastness of the human experience. With Coronavirus bringing the world to a halt, Bobby-a father and husband-had to do something. No tours to play or studio time to fill, Bobby found himself back in the construction yard, doing blue-collar work to provide for his family. "I was super grateful for the work-a lot of my colleagues didn't have an option like that," Bobby admits. More than a few personal hardships forced him to acknowledge and work through some brutal truths. And what came of it? Well, for one, this new record Get On The Otherside which pretty well describes what Bobby's been through: He had to demolish his ego, his old ways of thinking, and his tried approaches to anchor into a refreshed perspective with new understandings. As Bobby tells it, "I had to do some real self-searching, come to terms with what was wrong, and how much of it I was responsible for." So how does this translate to the new album? Moments of clarity as to where the real value in life lies on "I Got Love," encouraging numbers like the title track "The Otherside", and declarations of self actualization on "My Place, My Time." Even the more straightforward love songs are outside the box lyrically like "Sweet Agony" and "Loving Body." If you have never had the pleasure of catching one of Bobby's live shows you may have no idea that he is a maverick on the guitar. He lets us in on a little of that on "Passing Things" with a solo that possesses the same restrained and space that his lyrics do. As we'd expect, the songwriting still has that raw, direct edge to it. But an evolution has taken place. There are new points of view on familiar territory which in Bobby's words "For me to love, I needed to take a bigger view of love. One with less ego and more empathy" really hold true. The result is a record with Bobby's new found humility on full display and a message of encouragement to anyone who is struggling and can't see a way out. It still may be hard to nail down and define Bobby and his sound. He's no one thing more than the other. But what he's showing us now, on Get On The Otherside, is that we can also label him a soulful, philosophical optimist. Someone who can say a lot with a little, and who wants us all to know that it's us that has to do the hard lifting to truly live a life in love-both with the world and with yourself.

1972-1985 KATEBEGIAK - Prog-Rock, Psych-Folk & Jazz-Rock Music from the BASQUE COUNTRY. The album KATEBEGIAK, now published by ELKAR, contains 13 tunes on double LP gatefold edition from Haizea, Izukaitz, William S. Fischer, Magdalena, Enbor, Itoiz, Koska, Itziar, Errobi, Lisker, Amaia Zubiria & Pascal Gaigne, Gontzal Mendibil & Taldea and Urria, and the CD-Book edition adds an extra bonus track by the great unknown artist Juan Arkotxa. Complied by Mikel Unzurrunzaga Schmitz aka DJ Makala. Music produced in the 70's in the Basque Country got trapped between two earth shattering artistic currents; Ez Dok Amairu in the 60s and Basque Radical Rock in the 80's, and unfortunately, most of the lovely discs and tunes created at that magical time have been pushed to a remote (and sometimes even despised) corner of our collective memory. 60's and 80's music currents are almost opposite, and both work as magnetic poles with a very strong power of attraction, and maybe also as a burden for any of the later artistic currents. 60's generation of artists searched within their rich and ancient cultural roots to acknowledge and update them, in proud, hopeful and unforgettable folk songs. The 80's one on the other hand, worked in a flammable environment in constant social and political conflict and found in punk the perfect way to express their anger and weariness for so many unfulfilled promises and the lack of opportunities into short, noisy, direct and corrosive songs, technically sparse but full of energy and expressive power. Most of the "classic" names engraved in our memory come from one or the other like Benito Lertxundi, Mikel Laboa, Lourdes Iriondo and Xabier Lete or Kortatu, Hertzainak, Zarama, Las vulpes, Eskorbuto or Cicatriz. 70's generation and their music work somehow as the "missing link" ("katebegia" in Basque) between the two. They loved folky tunes and don't forget their ancient roots, but they also look outside for inspiration and experimentation. Just as the 80's boys and girls found punk the 70's guys found a completely different sonic and aesthetic landscape in the works of Grateful Dead, Fairport Convention, King Crimson, Soft Machine, Gong_ and worked closely with keen souls in other neighboring regions such as Maquina!, Pau Riba or Sisa in Catalonia or Smash and Triana in Andalusia. This resulted in more abstract and poetic lyrical content, much longer psych-folk-prog-jazz tunes, full of complex instrumental passages and mesmerizing structures of sheer ambition and masterful execution in many cases. But, most important of all, they found a voice of their own, rich, unique, and fascinating, and that's what makes them so valuable to us. Not only to us, but also to lots of vinyl collectors and crate-diggers around the world, who have in many cases paid fortunes for some of the original editions of LPs that are the source of tunes in this compilation. Mikel Unzurrunzaga Schmitz aka DJ Makala, DJ and producer of worldwide scope and wisdom, noticed this fact first and decided to pay homage to these wonderful tunes through this masterful and dedicated selection for your pleasure and as an open invitation to dig deeper into your adventures in the dark and hidden side of Basque popular music.

DELUXE EDITION

Das Herzstück der ersten Lou Reed Archive Series Veröffentlichung von Light In The Attic ist die Deluxe 45-RPM Doppel-LP Edition von "Words & Music, May 1965". Diese auf 7.500 Exemplare weltweit limitierte Sammlung wurde von dem mehrfach mit dem GRAMMY ausgezeichneten Künstler Masaki Koike entworfen und verfügt über einen stilisierten, gestanzten Klappumschlag, der von Stoughton Printing Co. hergestellt wurde, mit fortlaufender Foliennummerierung. Darin enthalten sind zwei 45-RPM 12"-LPs, gepresst auf 180-Gramm-Vinyl in HQ-Audiophil-Qualität bei Record Technology Inc. (RTI), mit der einzigen Vinyl-Veröffentlichung von "I'm Waiting for the Man - May 1965 Alternate Version". Eine Bonus 7" Single, die in einer eigenen, gestanzten Bilderhülle untergebracht ist und bei Third Man Record Pressing hergestellt wurde, enthält die einzige Vinyl-Veröffentlichung von sechs bisher unveröffentlichten Bonustracks, die einen nie zuvor gesehenen Einblick in Reeds prägende Jahre bieten, darunter frühe Demos, eine Coverversion von Bob Dylans "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right" und ein Doo-Wop-Ständchen, das 1958 aufgenommen wurde, als der legendäre Singer-Songwriter gerade 16 Jahre alt war. Ein begleitendes, gestanztes, 28-seitiges Buch mit Texten, Archivfotos und Linernotes enthält eine Archivreproduktion eines selten Briefes, den Reed um 1964 an seinen College-Professor und Dichter Delmore Schwartz schrieb. Das Set enthält eine CD mit dem kompletten Audiomaterial des Pakets in einer gestanzten Hülle. "Ein Tonband mit ihren frühesten Demos, aufgenommen am 11. Mai 1965 und bis heute unter Verschluss gehalten, zeigt Spuren von Dingen, die selten mit The Velvet Underground in Verbindung gebracht werden: Blues und Folk, erdig und traditionell, unsicher und zögerlich - und doch von diesem rostigen, ätzenden Lou Reed-Geist durchdrungen. Es ist eine Offenbarung." - Will Hodgkinson, MOJO. Light in the Attic Records ist stolz darauf, in Zusammenarbeit mit Laurie Anderson den ersten Titel ihrer fortlaufenden Lou Reed Archive Series vorzustellen: "Words & Music, Mai 1965". Das Album, das anlässlich des 80. Geburtstages des verstorbenen Künstlers erscheint, bietet einen außergewöhnlichen, ungeschminkten und ergreifenden Einblick in einen der wahrlich größten amerikanischen Poeten und Songwriter. Diese bisher unveröffentlichte Sammlung von Songs, die der junge Lou Reed mit Hilfe seines späteren Bandkollegen John Cale aufnahm und sich selbst als "Urheberrecht des armen Mannes" mit der Post zuschickte, wurde fast 50 Jahre lang ungeöffnet in einem Originalumschlag aufbewahrt. Der Inhalt verkörpert einige der wichtigsten und bahnbrechendsten Beiträge zur amerikanischen Popmusik im 20. Jahrhundert. Die fest in der Folk-Tradition verwurzelten Songs belegen Lous nachhaltigen Einfluss auf die Entwicklung der modernen amerikanischen Musik deutlich - vom Punk bis zum Art-Rock und allem, was dazwischen liegt. Diese Aufnahmen sind eine wahre Zeitkapsel und halten nicht nur die ersten Funken dessen fest, was die Keimzelle der unglaublich einflussreichen Velvet Underground werden sollte; sie machen Reed auch zu einem echten Beobachter mit einem angeborenen Talent, die Welt um ihn herum zu synthetisieren und in reine Klangpoesie zu verwandeln. Mit Beiträgen von Reeds zukünftigem Bandkollegen John Cale präsentiert "Words & Music, May 1965" die frühesten bekannten Aufnahmen so historischer Songs wie "Heroin", "I'm Waiting for the Man" und "Pale Blue Eyes", die Reed später mit Velvet Underground aufnehmen und unauslöschlich prägen sollte, in ihrer Gesamtheit. Außerdem sind mehrere bisher unveröffentlichte Kompositionen enthalten, die zusätzliche Einblicke in Reeds kreativen Prozess und seine frühen Einflüsse geben. Das Album wurde von Laurie Anderson, Don Fleming, Jason Stern, Hal Willner und Matt Sullivan produziert und enthält neu gemasterte Tonaufnahmen vom Originalband durch den GRAMMY-nominierten Toningenieur John Baldwin. Abgerundet wird das Paket durch neue Linernotes des renommierten Journalisten und Autors Greil Marcus sowie ausführliche Archivnotizen von Don Fleming und Jason Stern, die das Lou Reed Archiv betreuen, während die Veröffentlichung von dem mehrfach GRAMMY-prämierten Künstler Masaki Koike gestaltet wurde.

Brain Feelings is the debut EP from South London band moa moa. With glitchy synths, pulsing drums and catchy choruses, moa moa are proving that pop can be weird and accessible at the same time; the perfect psychedelic soundtrack to the comfortable tedium of life.

2021 saw moa moa ramp up the excitement around them with a pair of exquisite singles including the kaleidoscopic pop of ‘Drive’ – which features on forthcoming EP ‘Brain Feelings’ – and their Speedy Wunderground single ‘Coltan Candy’ which came out to rapturous acclaim from 6 Music’s Steve Lamacq, Huw Stephens, Don Letts, and Shaun Keaveny, and publications including NME, DIY, Paste Magazine, and Brooklyn Vegan.

The band’s debut EP ‘Brain Feelings’ explores states of emotional suppression and emotional unintelligence. James says, “I often feel that, when balancing every aspect of my life, I don’t have time left to process and express my emotions. The feelings just get stuck in my brain, making me feel insular, disconnected and less able to participate in the world.

"Ein Tonband mit ihren frühesten Demos, aufgenommen am 11. Mai 1965 und bis heute unter Verschluss gehalten, zeigt Spuren von Dingen, die selten mit The Velvet Underground in Verbindung gebracht werden: Blues und Folk, erdig und traditionell, unsicher und zögerlich - und doch von diesem rostigen, ätzenden Lou Reed-Geist durchdrungen. Es ist eine Offenbarung." - Will Hodgkinson, MOJO. Light in the Attic Records ist stolz darauf, in Zusammenarbeit mit Laurie Anderson den ersten Titel ihrer fortlaufenden Lou Reed Archive Series vorzustellen: "Words & Music, Mai 1965". Das Album, das anlässlich des 80. Geburtstages des verstorbenen Künstlers erscheint, bietet einen außergewöhnlichen, ungeschminkten und ergreifenden Einblick in einen der wahrlich größten amerikanischen Poeten und Songwriter. Diese bisher unveröffentlichte Sammlung von Songs, die der junge Lou Reed mit Hilfe seines späteren Bandkollegen John Cale aufnahm und sich selbst als "Urheberrecht des armen Mannes" mit der Post zuschickte, wurde fast 50 Jahre lang ungeöffnet in einem Originalumschlag aufbewahrt. Der Inhalt verkörpert einige der wichtigsten und bahnbrechendsten Beiträge zur amerikanischen Popmusik im 20. Jahrhundert. Die fest in der Folk-Tradition verwurzelten Songs belegen Lous nachhaltigen Einfluss auf die Entwicklung der modernen amerikanischen Musik deutlich - vom Punk bis zum Art-Rock und allem, was dazwischen liegt. Diese Aufnahmen sind eine wahre Zeitkapsel und halten nicht nur die ersten Funken dessen fest, was die Keimzelle der unglaublich einflussreichen Velvet Underground werden sollte; sie machen Reed auch zu einem echten Beobachter mit einem angeborenen Talent, die Welt um ihn herum zu synthetisieren und in reine Klangpoesie zu verwandeln. Mit Beiträgen von Reeds zukünftigem Bandkollegen John Cale präsentiert "Words & Music, May 1965" die frühesten bekannten Aufnahmen so historischer Songs wie "Heroin", "I'm Waiting for the Man" und "Pale Blue Eyes", die Reed später mit Velvet Underground aufnehmen und unauslöschlich prägen sollte, in ihrer Gesamtheit. Außerdem sind mehrere bisher unveröffentlichte Kompositionen enthalten, die zusätzliche Einblicke in Reeds kreativen Prozess und seine frühen Einflüsse geben. Das Album wurde von Laurie Anderson, Don Fleming, Jason Stern, Hal Willner und Matt Sullivan produziert und enthält neu gemasterte Tonaufnahmen vom Originalband durch den GRAMMY-nominierten Toningenieur John Baldwin. Abgerundet wird das Paket durch neue Linernotes des renommierten Journalisten und Autors Greil Marcus sowie ausführliche Archivnotizen von Don Fleming und Jason Stern, die das Lou Reed Archiv betreuen, während die Veröffentlichung von dem mehrfach GRAMMY-prämierten Künstler Masaki Koike gestaltet wurde.

VALBORG haben seit ihrer Gründung im Jahr 2002 mit jedem Album eine große Lust zu musikalischen Experimenten und Grenzüberschreitungen gezeigt. Dabei ist das Trio aus Bonn trotz aller Geschicklichkeit bei der Vermeidung von musikalischen Schubladen jedoch seinem ebenso dunklen wie harten musikalischen Markenkern stets treu geblieben. Entsprechend schwer haben sich Kritiker mit der Einordnung ihres Sounds getan und es unter anderem mit Etiketten wie "Doom", "Blackened Death Metal" und "Industrial" versucht. Fest steht, dass VALBORG auf ihrem neuen Album mit dem Titel "Der Alte" einen bewusst reduzierten Ansatz verfolgen. Die brutalen neuen Tracks kommen kurz und bündig auf den Punkt, nutzen einfache Strukturen und setzen auf extremen Gesang. Dazu kommt der typische, unerbittliche Schlagzeugbeat als Markenzeichen der Band. Unterstützt von LANTLOS-Schöpfer Markus Siegenhort, der für die gesamte Produktion verantwortlich zeichnet, haben sich VALBORG für einen rohen, ungeschliffenen Sound entschieden. Dieser stützt sich ganz auf die Gitarren, da dieses Album ohne Keyboards auskommt. Zu ihren hörbaren Metal-Einflüssen fügt das Trio weitere Elemente, zum Beispiel aus Punk und Wave, hinzu. Unter dem Strich bringt die Vereinfachung knallharte Tracks, die dennoch VALBORGs cineastische Qualitäten aufweisen und passend zu ihren lyrischen Themen bedrohliche Albtraum-Szenarien in kosmischen Dimensionen konstruieren. In den Texten lauern Schrecken und Wahnsinn der Abgründe des Weltraums, ebenso wie xenomorphe Manipulationen und apokalyptische Visionen, die sich oft auf kanonische Werke der modernen Science Fiction Literatur beziehen. VALBORG wurden 2002 in der deutschen Stadt Bonn gegründet. Kritiker haben das Trio unter anderem mit Künstlern wie GODFLESH, CELTIC FROST und TRIPTYKON sowie TYPE O NEGATIVE verglichen, doch VALBORG sind ihre eigenen Wege gegangen, die sich einfachen Kategorisierungen entziehen. Die Deutschen wurden bereits zum zweiten Mal vom trendigen Roadburn Festival in die Niederlanden eingeladen und haben auf weiteren renommierten Festivals und Touren mehrmals Europa durchquert. Die letzten Tournee spielte die Band im Vorprogramm von MANTAR und HEMELBESTORMER. Mit "Der Alte" bieten VALBORG weit mehr als nur einen bittersüßen Ohrenschmaus für ihre treue Fangemeinde: Das präzise, hart einschlagende Album ist für alle gedacht, die sich nach ebenso brutaler und dunkler wie intelligenter neuer Musik sehnen!

VALBORG haben seit ihrer Gründung im Jahr 2002 mit jedem Album eine große Lust zu musikalischen Experimenten und Grenzüberschreitungen gezeigt. Dabei ist das Trio aus Bonn trotz aller Geschicklichkeit bei der Vermeidung von musikalischen Schubladen jedoch seinem ebenso dunklen wie harten musikalischen Markenkern stets treu geblieben. Entsprechend schwer haben sich Kritiker mit der Einordnung ihres Sounds getan und es unter anderem mit Etiketten wie "Doom", "Blackened Death Metal" und "Industrial" versucht. Fest steht, dass VALBORG auf ihrem neuen Album mit dem Titel "Der Alte" einen bewusst reduzierten Ansatz verfolgen. Die brutalen neuen Tracks kommen kurz und bündig auf den Punkt, nutzen einfache Strukturen und setzen auf extremen Gesang. Dazu kommt der typische, unerbittliche Schlagzeugbeat als Markenzeichen der Band. Unterstützt von LANTLOS-Schöpfer Markus Siegenhort, der für die gesamte Produktion verantwortlich zeichnet, haben sich VALBORG für einen rohen, ungeschliffenen Sound entschieden. Dieser stützt sich ganz auf die Gitarren, da dieses Album ohne Keyboards auskommt. Zu ihren hörbaren Metal-Einflüssen fügt das Trio weitere Elemente, zum Beispiel aus Punk und Wave, hinzu. Unter dem Strich bringt die Vereinfachung knallharte Tracks, die dennoch VALBORGs cineastische Qualitäten aufweisen und passend zu ihren lyrischen Themen bedrohliche Albtraum-Szenarien in kosmischen Dimensionen konstruieren. In den Texten lauern Schrecken und Wahnsinn der Abgründe des Weltraums, ebenso wie xenomorphe Manipulationen und apokalyptische Visionen, die sich oft auf kanonische Werke der modernen Science Fiction Literatur beziehen. VALBORG wurden 2002 in der deutschen Stadt Bonn gegründet. Kritiker haben das Trio unter anderem mit Künstlern wie GODFLESH, CELTIC FROST und TRIPTYKON sowie TYPE O NEGATIVE verglichen, doch VALBORG sind ihre eigenen Wege gegangen, die sich einfachen Kategorisierungen entziehen. Die Deutschen wurden bereits zum zweiten Mal vom trendigen Roadburn Festival in die Niederlanden eingeladen und haben auf weiteren renommierten Festivals und Touren mehrmals Europa durchquert. Die letzten Tournee spielte die Band im Vorprogramm von MANTAR und HEMELBESTORMER. Mit "Der Alte" bieten VALBORG weit mehr als nur einen bittersüßen Ohrenschmaus für ihre treue Fangemeinde: Das präzise, hart einschlagende Album ist für alle gedacht, die sich nach ebenso brutaler und dunkler wie intelligenter neuer Musik sehnen!

A reissue on black vinyl of the cult 1982 soundtrack to Tron by legendary electronic pioneer and composer Wendy Carlos (The Shining, Clockwork Orange). The music, which was the first collaboration between Carlos and her partner Annemarie Franklin, featured a mix of an analogue Moog synthesizer and GDS digital synthesizer, along with non-electronic pieces performed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra. Two additional musical tracks (“1990’s Theme” and “Only Solutions“) were provided by the American band Journey. This is the first reissue of the black 18 track 1 LP vinyl. 2022 will mark the 40th anniversary of the Tron Franchise. The original film tells the story of computer engineer Kevin Flynn who finds out that an executive at his company, has been stealing his work. Flynn tries to hack into the system but instead is transported into the digital world of The Grid , where he has to battle Sark, and the imposing Master Control Program. Helped by Tron (a security program) and Yori , Flynn becomes a freedom fighter for the oppressed programs of the grid. The soundtrack perfectly captures the geometrically intense landscapes of cyberspace and the virtual gladiatorial computer game.

What happens when you let go of something you've always been passionate about? Will it come back? And if so, in what ways and with what impact?
These questions laid the foundation for Toby Whyle's debut album 'Call It A Night'.

It is a journey to find out what feels right to him-this means escaping old patterns and allowing himself to try new things. Musically, he exposes himself unreservedly to the gravitational forces of electronic music and guitar pop by orbiting these points of attraction without ever really getting caught by either of them. Each song moves along its own trajectory, fueled by Toby's thoughts and experiences.

His first single, 'No One Moves', hitting number 1 on the FM4 charts in early 2021, marked the beginning of a new adventure-a journey upon which Toby embarks entirely on his own for the first time. After his first EP, 'A Mood Of Its Own', and the release of further singles, the debut album 'Call It A Night' will be out on May 20th, 2022, on Matches Music.

PRESSTEXT
Writing songs has always been quite natural and ever-present in Toby Whyle's life. And he's written plenty of them over the last decade. However, what's new is the realisation that songwriting is one of his few means to slow down the bright and fast-paced world surrounding us. Driven by the urge to create and develop something new, he started to write again. And suddenly, this feeling of being able to pause time came out more intense and immediate than ever.

In this way, the singer, songwriter, and guitarist manages to stand back from the constant rush, carving out space to move freely at his own pace. " Each song is an empty room, and I can decide for myself how I'm going to furnish it. It might get rather chaotic with stuff piled up to the ceiling, then again there's almost nothing in it", he describes his approach to songwriting. For him, creating melodies, crafting music and lyrics is not just a means of reflecting on situations he finds himself in but also a tool of handling them. Toby's music strives to affect and inspire people in all the different phases in life, as his songs are also a result of the diverse situations he's gone through.

Aesthetics and craftsmanship play a crucial role in Toby Whyle's creative process, from crafting songs, recording and producing them, and building and maintaining a particular visual language. He aims to create high-quality and exceptional music that enthuses and delights people, which sparks energy and conveys a certain feeling.

• 180 GRAM AUDIOPHILE VINYL
• DELUXE LIFT-OFF BOX SET
• INCLUDES 20-PAGE PHOTO ALBUM
• 4LP SET FEATURING “HEARTBREAK HOTEL”, “HOUND DOG”, “IN THE GHETTO”, “WOODEN HEART” & “VIVA LAS VEGAS”
• LIMITED EDITION OF 2500 INDIVIDUALLY NUMBERED COPIES ON GOLD & BLACK MARBLED VINYL

Worldwide 50 Gold Award Hits Vol. 1 is a compilation box set by the King of Rock and Roll Elvis Presley. This four-album set was originally released in 1970, as his 38th album. The set peaked at #45 on the Billboard 200 and was certified double Platinum not long after its release. Of the 51 tracks that are featured, four made their album debut in this collection back when it was originally released: “Viva Las Vegas”, “Suspicious Minds”, “Don’t Cry Daddy” and “Kentucky Rain”.

Worldwide 50 Gold Award Hits Vol. 1 is available as a deluxe lift-off box set containing 4LP’s and a 20-page photo album. It is available as a limited edition of 2500 individually numbered copies on gold & black marbled vinyl.

Originally released in 2012,Tender Oppositesis TOPS’ debut album, nowcelebrating it’s 10year anniversary with a special edition LP. A lush array oftimelessly crafted songs,Tender Oppositesgathers its strength throughdelicate intimacy. These are moving songs that succeed earnestly,disregarding trends and myth-making, focusing instead on pure popcraftsmanship.

TOPS' tendency to opt towards making straight-forward, stripped down andhonest recordings lets their pop songwriting shine out in the open. With aheart frmly attached to their sleeves, their songcraft delves into theemotional intricacy of personal relationships, asking questions about powerand desire. Riley Fleck’s measured drumming and David Carriere’strademark guitar licks work in tandem and in service of Jane Penny’sunmistakable, wistful voice.

Kaum eine Hardrock-Band hat in den letzten Jahren so abgeräumt wie die Ladies von THUNDERMOTHER! Ihr Album "Heat Wave" (2020) erreichte Platz 6 der deutschen Albumcharts (und später einen beeindruckenden Chart-Wiedereinstieg (Platz 16) mit der Erweiterung "Heat Wave Deluxe"). Nicht mal die Corona-Pandemie konnte die Band komplett ausbremsen und so spielte man u.a. Konzerte vom Dach eines Feuerwehr-Trucks. THUNDERMOTHER sind für die Bühne geboren, ihre energiegeladenen Liveshows muss man gesehen haben. Mit Ecken, Kanten, Attitude und einem feinen Händchen für große Melodien spielt sich die Band Schritt für Schritt Richtung Rock-Olymp. Und dieser kann nun, mit dem am 19.08.2022 erscheinenden neuen Album "Black And Gold", eingenommen werden. Die Band um Frontfrau Guernica Mancini fackelt ein wahres Hit-Feuerwerk ab. Die erste Single "Watch Out" sendete bereits die richtige Message: Achtung, hier sind THUNDERMOTHER und "Black And Gold" ist ihr Meisterwerk!

Kaum eine Hardrock-Band hat in den letzten Jahren so abgeräumt wie die Ladies von THUNDERMOTHER! Ihr Album "Heat Wave" (2020) erreichte Platz 6 der deutschen Albumcharts (und später einen beeindruckenden Chart-Wiedereinstieg (Platz 16) mit der Erweiterung "Heat Wave Deluxe"). Nicht mal die Corona-Pandemie konnte die Band komplett ausbremsen und so spielte man u.a. Konzerte vom Dach eines Feuerwehr-Trucks. THUNDERMOTHER sind für die Bühne geboren, ihre energiegeladenen Liveshows muss man gesehen haben. Mit Ecken, Kanten, Attitude und einem feinen Händchen für große Melodien spielt sich die Band Schritt für Schritt Richtung Rock-Olymp. Und dieser kann nun, mit dem am 19.08.2022 erscheinenden neuen Album "Black And Gold", eingenommen werden. Die Band um Frontfrau Guernica Mancini fackelt ein wahres Hit-Feuerwerk ab. Die erste Single "Watch Out" sendete bereits die richtige Message: Achtung, hier sind THUNDERMOTHER und "Black And Gold" ist ihr Meisterwerk!

Kaum eine Hardrock-Band hat in den letzten Jahren so abgeräumt wie die Ladies von THUNDERMOTHER! Ihr Album "Heat Wave" (2020) erreichte Platz 6 der deutschen Albumcharts (und später einen beeindruckenden Chart-Wiedereinstieg (Platz 16) mit der Erweiterung "Heat Wave Deluxe"). Nicht mal die Corona-Pandemie konnte die Band komplett ausbremsen und so spielte man u.a. Konzerte vom Dach eines Feuerwehr-Trucks. THUNDERMOTHER sind für die Bühne geboren, ihre energiegeladenen Liveshows muss man gesehen haben. Mit Ecken, Kanten, Attitude und einem feinen Händchen für große Melodien spielt sich die Band Schritt für Schritt Richtung Rock-Olymp. Und dieser kann nun, mit dem am 19.08.2022 erscheinenden neuen Album "Black And Gold", eingenommen werden. Die Band um Frontfrau Guernica Mancini fackelt ein wahres Hit-Feuerwerk ab. Die erste Single "Watch Out" sendete bereits die richtige Message: Achtung, hier sind THUNDERMOTHER und "Black And Gold" ist ihr Meisterwerk!

• 180 GRAM AUDIOPHILE VINYL
• INCLUDING PRINTED INNERSLEEVE
• 4-PAGE BOOKLET WITH LYRICS AND PICTURES
• 2019 ALBUM FEATURING ELEW, ERIC HARLAND, KASSA
OVERALL AND JAMAICAN SINGER CHRONIXX
• MASTERED & MIXED BY GRAMMY AWARD WINNING
PRODUCER BOB POWER (D’ANGELO, ERYKAH BADU)
• LIMITED EDITION OF 750 INDIVIDUALLY NUMBERED
COPIES ON TRANSLUCENT BLUE COLOURED VINYL

Star People Nation is a project described by Theo Croker himself as an intimate exploration of “the everyday rituals of blackness”. A translation of his personal, spiritual and creative experience, the album is a self-reflective collection of powerfully passionate and boundary-busting compositions that speak to our greater, shared human existence. The album features jazz pianist ELEW on “The Messenger”, which is a great combination of a smoky blues piano with a traditional swing rhythm, locking into the pocket and showcasing Croker’s mastery of the swing.

Star People Nation is available as a limited edition of 750 individually numbered copies on translucent blue coloured vinyl. The vinyl package includes a printed innersleeve and 4-page booklet with lyrics and pictures.

Ever Crashing, the second LP by Kennedy Ashlyn aka SRSQ pronounced ‘seer-skew’, is the summation of a nearly three-year journey of soul searching, songwriting, and self-discovery: “I became myself in the process of making this record.” From the first choral swells of opener “It Always Rains,” it’s clear this collection exists on an ascendant plane, capturing an artist in super bloom. Every song hits like a single, heaving with guitar, synth, strings, live drums, and oceans of Ashlyn’s astounding voice, balletic and illuminated. The tracks gleam with detail, often assembled from as many as 100 separate tracks, all of which were written and played solely by Ashlyn – a feat of world-building as daunting as it is devastating.

For her, however, the process is intrinsic and intuitive – even a matter of survival. Her 2018 solo debut emerged in response to the tragic Ghost Ship fire in Oakland, which took the life of her bandmate and best friend Cash Askew. Similarly, Ever Crashing began materializing in the wake of an ADHD and bipolar disorder diagnosis, prompting a profound personal overhaul. Ashlyn cites such periods of turmoil as a muse of sorts, when “songs begin to echo within me,” gradually reverberating clearer and more vividly. As melodies and arrangements come into focus, the songs act like containers, vessels in which to externalize and exorcise tumultuous emotions, a transformation she memorializes in the climax of “Élan Vital:” “Reeling in and out of deep despair / I am saved by song.”

From swooning end credits balladry (“Dead Loss”) to orchestral slow-burn torch songs (“Abyss”) to dizzying shoegaze heavens (“Someday I Will Bask In The Sun”), the album exudes a sense of aching grandeur and bewildered joy, rich with triumphs hard won and lost loves never forgotten. Melodies pirouette and crescendo in dazzling, elevated acrobatics, somewhere between Kate Bush and The Sundays, threaded with ethereal undercurrents of shimmering shadow. Riffs brood and sparkle over crystalline synths, buoyant bass, and patient percussion, steadily building to holy moments of tidal power, finessed to perfection by producer Chris Coady (Beach House, Slowdive, Zola Jesus). Ashlyn’s is a dream-pop of questing catharsis, vulnerable but orchestral, as dense with hooks as heartbreak.

The album’s title refers to Ashlyn’s recurring sensation of being trapped in the crest of a wave, turned and churned in the surf, mirroring the cycles of self-flagellation and surrender that she battles being bipolar. But as the poetic raptures of these songs attest, her creative process thrives at transmuting trauma into potent music of arresting beauty and hidden divinity. Ever Crashing is an aching, rare work, shaded with gradients of reverie and regret, loss and letting go, “mourning the person I thought I should be, mourning the person I never was.” But even in its pain, Ashlyn’s voice exerts a redemptive gravity, yearning to transform and transcend: “Even on the inside / I’m bracing for impact / I’m waiting to destroy my life / To become sunlight.”

Ever Crashing, the second LP by Kennedy Ashlyn aka SRSQ pronounced ‘seer-skew’, is the summation of a nearly three-year journey of soul searching, songwriting, and self-discovery: “I became myself in the process of making this record.” From the first choral swells of opener “It Always Rains,” it’s clear this collection exists on an ascendant plane, capturing an artist in super bloom. Every song hits like a single, heaving with guitar, synth, strings, live drums, and oceans of Ashlyn’s astounding voice, balletic and illuminated. The tracks gleam with detail, often assembled from as many as 100 separate tracks, all of which were written and played solely by Ashlyn – a feat of world-building as daunting as it is devastating.

For her, however, the process is intrinsic and intuitive – even a matter of survival. Her 2018 solo debut emerged in response to the tragic Ghost Ship fire in Oakland, which took the life of her bandmate and best friend Cash Askew. Similarly, Ever Crashing began materializing in the wake of an ADHD and bipolar disorder diagnosis, prompting a profound personal overhaul. Ashlyn cites such periods of turmoil as a muse of sorts, when “songs begin to echo within me,” gradually reverberating clearer and more vividly. As melodies and arrangements come into focus, the songs act like containers, vessels in which to externalize and exorcise tumultuous emotions, a transformation she memorializes in the climax of “Élan Vital:” “Reeling in and out of deep despair / I am saved by song.”

From swooning end credits balladry (“Dead Loss”) to orchestral slow-burn torch songs (“Abyss”) to dizzying shoegaze heavens (“Someday I Will Bask In The Sun”), the album exudes a sense of aching grandeur and bewildered joy, rich with triumphs hard won and lost loves never forgotten. Melodies pirouette and crescendo in dazzling, elevated acrobatics, somewhere between Kate Bush and The Sundays, threaded with ethereal undercurrents of shimmering shadow. Riffs brood and sparkle over crystalline synths, buoyant bass, and patient percussion, steadily building to holy moments of tidal power, finessed to perfection by producer Chris Coady (Beach House, Slowdive, Zola Jesus). Ashlyn’s is a dream-pop of questing catharsis, vulnerable but orchestral, as dense with hooks as heartbreak.

The album’s title refers to Ashlyn’s recurring sensation of being trapped in the crest of a wave, turned and churned in the surf, mirroring the cycles of self-flagellation and surrender that she battles being bipolar. But as the poetic raptures of these songs attest, her creative process thrives at transmuting trauma into potent music of arresting beauty and hidden divinity. Ever Crashing is an aching, rare work, shaded with gradients of reverie and regret, loss and letting go, “mourning the person I thought I should be, mourning the person I never was.” But even in its pain, Ashlyn’s voice exerts a redemptive gravity, yearning to transform and transcend: “Even on the inside / I’m bracing for impact / I’m waiting to destroy my life / To become sunlight.”

100% Heavy Power Metal im Namen des allmächtigen HAMMER KING!

HAMMER KING manifestieren sich seit ihrem Debut 2015 und dem Erfolg ihres 2021er Full Length Albums Hammer King weiter als unaufhaltsame neue Macht im deutschen Heavy und Power Metal. Unter dem Banner des mächtigen Hammer King höchstpersönlich legt die Band um den ehemaligen Ross The Boss Sänger Titan Fox ihr neues Studioalbum ”Kingdemonium” nach. Das fünfte Album der Band erscheint am 19. August 2022 über Napalm Records!

HAMMER KING machen weiterhin keine Gefangenen und liefern den perfekten Mix aus schnellen Riffs, energiegeladenen Grooves und zielsicheren Refrains. Dabei widmen sie sich einmal mehr dem Mythos des göttlichen Hammer King - ein wahres Fest für Fans von Genre-Giganten wie Powerwolf, Manowar oder HammerFall. Bewaffnet mit neuen Twin-Lead-Gitarren und neuem Bassisten macht das Album dort weiter, wo das selbstbetitelte Album Hammer King aufgehört hat. Ergänzt wird das Band Universum mit kritischeren und düstereren Tönen. Nur 14 Monate nach dem letzten Albums liefern HAMMER KING ein weiteres bärenstarkes Werk ab und zeigen eine neue Seite ihrer selbst erschaffenen Fantasy Welt voll beeindruckender Mythen und Geschichten.

Produziert von Titan Fox und HAMMER KING, aufgenommen von Charles Greywolf im Studio Greywolf und gemixt und gemastert von Jacob Hansen in den Hansen Studios (Volbeat, Destruction).

The 2nd studio full length album from the dynamic duo!

Following the commercial success of the 2021 album Unf*ckwitable and an overall banner year for the Detroit rapper, Babyface Ray comes with the aptly titled and highly anticipated album, FACE, which sees him stake his claim as “The Face of the City.” Production on the twenty-track album is largely handled by 808 Mafia, DJ Esco and others, and features appearances from Icewear Vezzo, Yung Lean, Pusha T, G Herbo, Wiz Khalifa, 42 Dugg & Landstrip Chip. With an already impressive list of cosigns from artists such as Future and Tyler, The Creator, Babyface Ray continues his all-out assault to put Motor City on the map and isn’t taking his foot off the gas anytime soon.

The second studio album by singer JoJo, The High Road was released in 2006 by Da Family Entertainment and Blackground Records. Featuring production from heavyweight producers such as Swizz Beatz and Scott Storch, the album debuted at number three on the Billboard 200. With many music critics lauding the album for its confidence and showcasing of JoJo's impressive vocal abilites, the album serves as a nautral progression for her artistry and establishes itself as a classic for fans.

Yellow Vinyl

How do you follow Volume One? With even more epic goodness, on glorious yellow vinyl, thats how! We open with a Liquid remix of Cru-l-t’s I Can’t Forget. Liquid has an amazing rave sound that has lasted 30 plus years & probably will last another 30 years to come. The Knitebreed manager, Paul Bradley, then gets remixed by a name long associated with KF & KFA, Dj Deluxe. The breaks come hard & fast in traditional Deluxe style, & he doesn’t let up! Then we have a coming together that can only be described as genius. TNO remixes Ant To Be‘s Just Anthem. TNO takes one of Ants “lightest” tracks & makes it his own with his distinct sound of darker hardcore. Wrapping up Vol. 2 is someone who really sits in the early rave style camp, Sub Fundation, with his remix of TNO’s Who Are U, taking a darker 93 style track & making it all things rave.

Two amazing originally unissued Kent Soul discoveries that were featured on their Bill Haney’s Atlanta Soul Brotherhood CD from 1998.

The late great Bill Haney, unacknowledged genius of Southern Soul and owner of the revered Chant record label was interviewed by Rod Dearlove and published in Voices From The Shadows. It was recalled that Roy Hamilton came to town to work the clubs, Bill had the dramatic song ‘My Peaceful Forest’, and somehow got the ‘The Golden Voice’ to record it - what an epic production it turned out to be!

Similarly, The Drifter’s Charlie Thomas whilst in town to perform got to record ‘Don’t Let Me Know’, the recording comes in at just over two minutes, we have had an extended version cleared for this 7” release.

‘Reich’s music expands from minimalist austerity to more full-bodied passages and back again. Reminiscent of his earliest work, it is very beautiful.’ – Financial Times

‘The music has tender energy, and an undercurrent of melancholy. Its droning tones sometimes seem to be pulling apart – like taffy, or like Richter’s stretching spaghetti stripes of color.’ – New York Times

Nonesuch Records releases the first recording of Steve Reich’s Reich/Richter, performed by Ensemble intercontemporain and conducted by George Jackson. The composition was originally written to be performed with German visual artist Gerhard Richter and Corinna Belz’s film Moving Picture (946-3).

Reich describes Richter’s book Patterns, which served as source material for the film: “It starts with one of his abstract paintings from the ’90s. He scanned a photo of the painting into a computer and then cut the scan in half and took each half, cut that in half and two of the four quarters he reversed into mirror images. He then repeated this process of ‘divide, mirror, repeat’ from half to quarter, eighth, sixteenth, thirty-second, all the way up to 4096th. The net effect is to go from an abstract painting to a series of gradually smaller anthropomorphic ‘creatures’ (since the mirroring produces bilateral symmetry) to still smaller very fine stripes.

“Belz described the film in terms of ‘pixels’. It begins with two-‘pixel’ stripes and the music begins with a two-sixteenth note oscillating pattern. When the film moves to four ‘pixels’, the music moves to a four-sixteenth note pattern, then to eight, and sixteen,” the composer continues. “After that, I began introducing longer note values – initially eighth notes, and later to quarter notes. By the middle of the film, when the images move from 512 to 1064 pixels, the music really slows to dotted half notes. Finally, as the ‘pixel’ count begins to diminish, the music moves back into more rapid eighths and then ending with the most intense rapid sixteenth movement.”

After more than one hundred performances of Reich/Richter at The Shed in New York in 2019, it was performed in London at the Barbican by the Britten Sinfonia conducted by Colin Currie and then in Paris at the Philharmonie, where this recording was made. The Austrian ensemble Windkraft Tirol, led by Kasper de Roo, will perform Reich/Richter on September 8 at Szentrum, Silbersaal in Schwaz, and the LA Phil New Music Group, led by Brad Lubman, performs the piece, accompanied by Richter and Belz’s film, at Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles on April 1, 2023.

Nonesuch has recorded every new piece of music by Steve Reich since 1985, beginning with The Desert Music and continuing through 2018’s Pulse/Quartet, resulting in twenty-two albums and the two box sets Phases in 2006 and Works: 1965-1995 in 1997. The label will put out a collection of his complete works in 2023.

Reich released a book last month, Conversations, that includes dialogues with past collaborators, fellow composers, musicians, and visual artists who have been influenced by his work, including: David Lang, Brian Eno, Richard Serra, Michael Gordon, Michael Tilson Thomas, Russell Hartenberger, Robert Hurwitz, Stephen Sondheim, Jonny Greenwood, David Harrington, Elizabeth Lim-Dutton, David Robertson, Micaela Haslam, Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker, Julia Wolfe, Nico Muhly, Beryl Korot, Colin Currie, and Brad Lubman. Booklist said in its review, ‘Iconoclastic American composer Steve Reich is singular in his own right, and when he is in conversation with other equally iconoclastic composers, conductors, sculptors, musicians, percussionists, and video artists, sparks not only fly, they sparkle. Reich and his colleagues conduct lovely give-and-takes during which they share stories, creative approaches, and viewpoints. Reich's Conversations is the best kind of eavesdropping.’

Steve Reich has been called ‘America’s greatest living composer’ (Village Voice), ‘the most original musical thinker of our time’ (New Yorker), and ‘among the great composers of the century’ (New York Times). His music has influenced composers and mainstream musicians all over the world. Music for 18 Musicians and Different Trains have earned him two Grammy Awards, and in 2009, his Double Sextet won the Pulitzer Prize. Reich’s documentary video opera works – The Cave and Three Tales, done in collaboration with video artist Beryl Korot – have been performed on four continents. His recent work Quartet, for percussionist Colin Currie, sold out two consecutive concerts at Queen Elizabeth Hall in London shortly after tens of thousands at the Glastonbury Festival heard Jonny Greenwood (of Radiohead) perform Electric Counterpoint followed by the London Sinfonietta performing his Music for 18 Musicians.

In 2012, Reich was awarded the Gold Medal in Music by the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He has additionally received the Praemium Imperiale in Tokyo, the Polar Music Prize in Stockholm, the BBVA Award in Madrid, and the Golden Lion at the Venice Biennale. He has been named Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres and has been awarded honorary doctorates by the Royal College of Music in London, The Juilliard School, and the Liszt Academy in Budapest, among others. ‘There’s just a handful of living composers who can legitimately claim to have altered the direction of musical history and Steve Reich is one of them’, states the Guardian.

Pierre Boulez founded the Ensemble intercontemporain in 1976 with the support of Michel Guy (who was France’s Minister of Culture at the time) and the collaboration of Nicholas Snowman. The Ensemble’s thirty-one soloists share a passion for twentieth and twenty-first century music. Under the artistic direction of Matthias Pintscher, the musicians work in close collaboration with composers, exploring instrumental techniques and developing projects that interweave music, dance, theater, film, video and visual arts. In collaboration with IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique), the Ensemble intercontemporain is also active in the field of synthetic sound generation. New pieces are commissioned and performed on a regular basis. Resident of the Cité de la musique – Philharmonie de Paris, the Ensemble performs and records in France and abroad, taking part in major festivals worldwide.

George Jackson, winner of the 2015 Aspen Conducting Prize, came to attention after stepping in at short notice with Orchestre de Paris, where he stepped in for Daniel Harding. Recent highlights include leading Ensemble intercontemporain at Festival Romaeuropa, the Rainy Days Festival in Luxembourg, and Festival D’Automne in Paris, as well as conducting the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra, the orchestra of Opéra de Rouen and the world premiere of Tscho Theissing’s Genia with Theater an der Wien. His varied operatic experience includes performances at Opera North, Hamburg State Opera and Opera Holland Park, as well as conducting a new production of Hänsel und Gretel at Grange Park Opera.

Red Hot Chili Peppers will unveil their new album and twelfth full-length offering, Unlimited Love Warner Records, on April 1, 2022. It notably marks their first recording with guitarist John Frusciante since 2006 and first with producer and longtime collaborator Rick Rubin since 2011. To herald Unlimited Love, the Los Angeles band just shared the first single and music video “Black Summer.”

“Our only goal is to get lost in the music. We (John, Anthony, Chad and Flea) spent thousands of hours, collectively and individually, honing our craft and showing up for one another, to make the best album we could. Our antennae attuned to the divine cosmos, we were just so damn grateful for the opportunity to be in a room together, and, once again, try to get better. Days, weeks and months spent listening to each other, composing, jamming freely, and arranging the fruit of those jams with great care and purpose. The sounds, rhythms, vibrations, words and melodies had us enrapt.

We yearn to shine a light in the world, to uplift, connect, and bring people together. Each of the songs on our new album UNLIMITED LOVE, is a facet of us, reflecting our view of the universe. This is our life’s mission. We work, focus, and prepare, so that when the biggest wave comes, we are ready to ride it. The ocean has gifted us a mighty wave and this record is the ride that is the sum of our lives. Thank you for listening, we hope you enjoy it.

ROCK OUT MOTHERFUCKERS!” - Anthony Kiedis, Flea, Chad Smith, John Frusciante

On lead track “Black Summer,” ethereal guitar underlines introspective lyrics as the rhythm unlocks a hypnotic drum groove highlighted by evocative bass. It quietly inhales only to exhale with a massive refrain, “It’s been a long time since I made a new friend, waiting on another black summer to end,” before a guitar solo echoes to the heavens and back.

Unlimited Love resumes a three-decade partnership with Rick Rubin Johnny Cash, Adele. Their creative collaboration spans legendary albums, including the diamond-selling Blood Sugar Sex Magik 1991, Californication 1999, By The Way 2002, and Stadium Arcadium 2006.

The interplay between the band borders on intergalactic once again—yet elevated to another stratosphere altogether. Unlimited Love represents the united spirit of four individual souls still fearlessly exploring the future of their eternal friendship and musical congregation.

This summer, Red Hot Chili Peppers will launch their first tour in support of Unlimited Love. They’ve invited a dynamic cohort of guests along for the ride at select dates, including Anderson.Paak & The Free Nationals and Thundercat and will be playing stadium dates in the UK in June 2022.

From a humble storefront studio located in a shoeshine parlor on Norfolk, Virginia's Church Street, Noah Biggs built a world. Hustler by day, gambler by night, the always-in-a-suit Biggs took a gaggle of off-brand singers and combined his connections and charisma to forge timeless soul music during a period of deep upheaval. Compiled here are 25 of Shiptown's most compelling sides recorded between 1965-1977, from the likes of Ida Sands, The Soul Duo, The Anglos, Dream Team, The Grooms, Positive Sounds, Barbara Stant, Wilson Williams, Art Ensley, and yes, Flip Flop Stevens.

From a humble storefront studio located in a shoeshine parlor on Norfolk, Virginia's Church Street, Noah Biggs built a world. Hustler by day, gambler by night, the always-in-a-suit Biggs took a gaggle of off-brand singers and combined his connections and charisma to forge timeless soul music during a period of deep upheaval. Compiled here are 25 of Shiptown's most compelling sides recorded between 1965-1977, from the likes of Ida Sands, The Soul Duo, The Anglos, Dream Team, The Grooms, Positive Sounds, Barbara Stant, Wilson Williams, Art Ensley, and yes, Flip Flop Stevens.

: Thou have a bit of a reputation for doing Nirvana covers, even releasing of a full album of them titled Blessings of the Highest Order during the height of quarantine. The infamously ravenous Thou fans were stuck in their rooms, drinking every drop and begging for more and just their luck the band decided to release a full-length compilation of their non-Nirvana covers they recorded and released from 2009-2022.

All of the songs on A Primer of Holy Words appeared on limited pressings of various split EPs and benefit compilations. The range of bands being covered is wide: Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains from abandoned tribute projects; Born Against from a small press

: Thou have a bit of a reputation for doing Nirvana covers, even releasing of a full album of them titled Blessings of the Highest Order during the height of quarantine. The infamously ravenous Thou fans were stuck in their rooms, drinking every drop and begging for more and just their luck the band decided to release a full-length compilation of their non-Nirvana covers they recorded and released from 2009-2022.

All of the songs on A Primer of Holy Words appeared on limited pressings of various split EPs and benefit compilations. The range of bands being covered is wide: Pearl Jam and Alice in Chains from abandoned tribute projects; Born Against from a small press

Terrace Martins neuestes Projekt Drones beschreibt der Künstler als "Black Disneyland" - eine Mischung aus überdimensionalen, farbenfrohen Charakteren, die als Avatare von Emotionen in kleinen Welten innerhalb einer größeren Welt funktionieren. Um seine Vision zum Klingen zu bringen, rief Martin - ein dreimaliger Grammy-Nominierter, der einige der größten Namen der Rap-Szene von Los Angeles sowie legendäre Genre-Pioniere wie Herbie Hancock und Clark Terry produziert hat und gleichzeitig Teil des West Coast Get
Down ist (zu dem auch Kindheitsfreund Kamasi Washington, Bass-Architekt Thundercat und andere moderne musikalische Koryphäen gehören) - Freunde, Nachbarn und Kollaborateure an. Kendrick Lamar , Snoop Dogg , Ty Dolla $ign und James Fauntleroy tauchen im Titeltrack auf und meditieren zu Slinky Funk und R&B darüber, wie wir in Beziehungen als Automaten funktionieren können. Die Töne, für die Martin bekannt ist, tauchen auf "Griots of the Crenshaw District" auf, einer instrumentalen Jazzexplosion, die von Grammy-Gewinner
Hit-Boy produziert wurde und bei der Martin, Tenorsaxofonist Kamasi Washington und Urban Maestro Robert Glasper verschlungene Noten in die Luft blasen. Aber es macht auch Platz für Songs wie das butterweiche "This Morning" von Arin Ray und Smino und "Reflection", James Fauntleroys digitalisiertes Plädoyer für Sehnsucht und Sinnlichkeit in einem ruhigen Sturm

repress !

Italian stallions Groove Culture let loose a new 7” (only) imprint, with the inaugural release serving a high energy, high flying double dose of the good stuff. Funk & Disco at its finest from Micky More & Andy Tee - check it out!

A return to form after the departure that was 1980's muddled Panorama, the Cars' Shake It Up bursts forth with a rich assembly of synthesizers, drum machines, electronic blips, and catchy melodies that make it an early 80s pop staple. Known the world over, the famous title track proves the band's arrangement skills were in perfect shape and set the stage for a record overflowing with memorable hooks and complementary rock riffs.

Shake It Up also plays witness to primary songwriter/vocalist Ric Ocasek's increased cynicism and biting wit. While the Cars never took a rosy-eyed view of romance, the songs here impart a newfound sense of sympathy, regret, limbo, and reservation. The beauty of the Cars – and all ten tunes here – is that the music suggests something else entirely. Such subliminal emotions and dynamic contrasts act as a magnet, and the band plays as if it's in on the secret.

Apart from the party vibe of the title cut, the Cars aim for deeper targets and smarter undertones. Shake It Up is defined by an urban edginess and modern feel that comes alive on tunes such as "Cruiser" and circular "I'm Not the One," a pop gem laded with stacked vocals and keyboard lines that double as a horn section. The band's arrangements have never been better – or more involved. Absent the cheesiness that would mar the group's late-period work, the songs ride on the strength of keyboard-heavy lines and layered harmonies. You will not be disappointed.

Recorded at the band's Synchro Sound studios by famed Queen producer Roy Thomas Baker, the album takes advantage of electronic textures and varying timbres in immersing the listener in accessible albeit abstract washes of sound. MoFi's engineers made sure to capture every note and nuance; this marks the first time that Shake It Up has been remastered in any way, let alone from the original tapes.

• 180 GRAM AUDIOPHILE VINYL
• INCLUDING INSERT
• FEATURING THE BRODSKY QUARTET
• LIMITED EDITION OF 2500
INDIVIDUALLY NUMBERED COPIES ON PURPLE COLOURED VINYL

The Juliet Letters is the 14th studio album by singer and songwriter Elvis Costello. Originally released in 1993, the critically acclaimed album peaked at No. 18 on the UK album chart. The entire instrumental backing for The Juliet Letters is provided by The Brodsky Quartet. Costello had become interested in classical music around the time of Spike and began attending classical concerts. One of the ensembles he enjoyed most was the Brodsky Quartet. Once Costello and the Quartet got to know each other, they were keen on working together, eventually resulting in a full length album.

Costello described The Juliet Letters as “a song sequence for string quartet and voice and it has a title. It’s a little bit different. It’s not a rock opera. It’s a new thing.”

The album is available as a limited edition of 2500 individually numbered copies on purple coloured vinyl and includes an insert.

After three studio albums and over a decade deep into the music game, THE INTERRUPTERS deliver their new album, In The Wild. This 14-track opus is the real deal; it's a story of survival, a story of resilience, by a band being bold and rejecting the easy impulses of simply repeating what's worked before. Together during lockdown, Aimee Interrupter, partner and guitarist Kevin Bivona, and his younger twin brothers, Jesse (drums) and Justin (bass), decided to put idle hands to work. After building a home studio in their garage together, Kevin stepped up and took charge of production duties to become "the accountable one" this time around. The record took shape in an unforced and organic fashion, and the recording process was evidently a fun one, which is reflected in the sound of the album, gliding across a spectrum of breathless punk rock, doo-wop, gospel, dancehall, and the band's customary nods to the lineage of two-tone. It's further evidenced in the uplifting spirit and the glittering rollcall of guests (Tim Armstrong, Rhoda Dakar, Hepcat, The Skints) involved too. Thanks to the cocoon of the intimate environment they'd built and relaxed working practices, the results made for the most personal Interrupters album to date, as well as being the one all four feel most connected to. The follow-up to their 2018 breakthrough album, Fight The Good Fight, which spawned multiple singles including "She's Kerosene", with over 50 Million streams to date. This smash-hit sent the band to the top of the radio charts across the globe, playing live with everyone from Dropkick Murphys to Green Day. It was Spring 2020 as they were headed out on an 8-week Hella Mega stadium tour in support of Green Day, Weezer, and Fall Out Boy in the U.S., when like the rest of the world, the band's plans went kaput. The forced time at home gave them a period of much-needed rest, followed by an injection of creative energy that led the band to write over 80 songs, curate a live album and documentary film about their lives and their first trip to Japan. THE INTERRUPTERS will be back on the road in mainland Europe in 2023.

THE IRON GIANT (1999) ist ein moderner Animationsklassiker mit einer wunderschönen, sympathischen Filmmusik von Michael Kamen. Diese Deluxe Edition des 2-LP-Sets erweitert den Original-OST mit alternativen Stücken und seltenen Demos - darunter ein bisher unveröffentlichter Song, ”Souls Don’t Die”, der auf Kamens Thema basiert und von Kamen und Eric Clapton gesungen wurde. Die innovative Verpackung verfügt über eine Zuglasche, mit der sich die Augen des Roboters auf der Außenhülle öffnen lassen, und je
nachdem, welche Innenhülle sich hinter dem Cover befindet, zeigt sich ein anderes Bild.

Die wunderschöne, einfühlsame Filmmusik zu Iron Giant stammt von Michael Kamen - eine seiner letzten großen Filmmusiken und sein erster Animationsfilm, weit entfernt von den Action-Blockbustern, für
die er bekannt geworden war, aber viel näher an seinem Herzen. Kamens großartige Partitur ist voller Melodie, Humor und Sensibilität und wird von der Tschechischen Philharmonie großartig dargeboten. Sie ist so groß wie die Bedrohung durch die nukleare Vernichtung und so intim wie die Güte, die den neunjährigen Hogarth Hughes mit der außerirdischen Maschine verbindet - der beschließt, dass er lieber ”Superman” als eine Waffe wäre.

In late 1961 Spector formed Philles Records with Lester Sill, buying his mentor out the
following year. The slogan was ‘Tomorrow’s sound today’, and Phil Spector proceeded to live
up to that boast. Three-track tape machines were then state of the art, and he perfected the
method of ‘bouncing’ the tracks to get the biggest possible sound. As time went by, his ‘twominute symphonies for the kids’ would be increasingly gilded by his ‘everything but the kitchen
sink’ production including Strings, Percussion and banks of Vocals. Spector gained his
second U.S. chart-topper and his first as a Producer in 1962 with the Gene Pitney penned,
He’s A Rebel. Spector became increasingly obsessed by the production process. ‘My records
are built like a Wagnerian opera. They start simply and end with dynamic force, meaning and
purpose. I dreamed it up.’ He retired from the music business, returning only sporadically to
work with first The Beatles (their Let It Be album, plus solo LPs by George Harrison and John
Lennon), plus a handful of other artists including Dion, Cher and the Ramones.

We have two versions (two different covers) - black vinyl or multicolor, limited, hand nubered (111 copies) vinyl.

Two years after the well-received compilation "Nebula," Himalaya Collective (probably the largest team of beatmakers in Poland) returns with another release. This time the Himalayan section of 24 producers (and some exceptional guests from outside the collective) will take us on a journey into the skies. On "Latawce" (which means "Kites" in English), we will hear 24 tracks with one goal in mind - to allow a maximum two-minute flight. The premiere (not accidentally) will take place on the 1st day of summer.

The sound of each Kite has been colored thanks to the excellent mastering done by Eprom. The album's vinyl version was made in two options and with two different covers. @Eloprzemi is responsible for the design of the classic version, and the cover of the limited surprise vinyl was designed by Gbur. The limited edition is hand-numbered (111 copies), and the surprise is worth emphasizing the different colors of each vinyl! Crazy Action! Great album! The perfect soundtrack for the summer holidays 2022!

Up next on Happiness Therapy is Lyon-based mainstay Denyl Brook with his first full-length EP on the emerging label. Already a firm favourite through his contributions to the lauded Happy House series, his forthcoming I Wanna EP follows on from two recent appearances on revered UK outfit Shall Not Fade, as he returns to the French imprint in June to gift us four tracks of mood-lifting musical goodness.


Denyl Brook is swiftly becoming one of France’s most talked-about rising talents. Head of his own Silver Step Records, he’s a familiar face at Happiness Therapy, having racked up several productions on the label’s Happy House compilation series over the years. He’s also one of their resident DJs, regularly playing at their parties across his native country and beyond, and has recently landed a solid release on UK-imprint Shall Not Fade. Now, I Wanna acts as his debut solo EP on Happiness Therapy, proving that Denyl Brook is only just getting started.

Living In Clip (25th Anniversary Edition) Newly remastered for vinyl + cd in deluxe packaging. This landmark double album by Ani DiFranco, features her trio from 1995-1996 with Andy Stochansky (drums) and Sara Lee (bass). Twenty-five years later the album is recognized as a point of entry that radically expanded DiFranco’s audience, and a historically important testament to the relationship between Ani as a live performer and the devoted community she created with her fans. If there was ever a record to help you pull through until the next time the Folksinger makes her way to your town, Living In Clip is the one. Affectionately named after the state of stage amps about to blow out, the record is constructed like a show complete with the onstage humor and antics we love. The culmination of years of studio work and constant touring, Living In Clip is a tour in itself: nearly two-dozen venues provide the atmosphere for over two hours of music complete with intermission and encore. Recorded straight from the soundboard on an 8 track ADAT, digital videotape and mixed by Ani and Andrew Gilchrist – Living In Clip is conceptually designed to preserve the authenticity and pulse of a live show. There are jazzy folkalicious renditions of "Letter to A John," "Fire Door," "Diner" and "Anticipate." Amusing and sweet snippets are interwoven throughout the songs and sometimes during them - "Out of Habit" harbors a little cinematic glimpse into Ani's first days in New York City. This dynamic collection also offers The Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra playing on "Both Hands" and "Amazing Grace" at a hockey arena as well as a phenomenal version of "Shy," that was nominated for a Grammy for Best Rock Vocal Performance – Female (or whatever). Living In Clip is also considered one of Rolling Stone Magazine's essential albums of the 90's. Living In Clip includes a beautiful photo gallery that contains pictures of the sparkling faces, questionable attire and unique persons behind the road show.

King Tubby and Producer Bunny ‘Striker’ Lee are intertwined in the birth of Dub Music. After discovering a mistake that made a ‘serious joke’ (more of which later...) they went on to release the first pressings of this new musical genre namely ‘Dub Music’. Tubby’s vast knowledge of electronics and Bunny’s vast catalogue of rhythms would lay the foundations of what today is taken as a standard... the Remix / Version cuts to an existing vocal tune.

Osbourne ‘King Tubby’ Ruddock was born in Kingston, Jamaica on 28th January 1941 and grew up in the High Holborn Street area of downtown Kingston. He studied electronics at Kingston’s National Technical College and also on two correspondence courses from the U.S.A... When he had qualified Tubby began repairing radios and other electrical appliances in a shack in the back yard of his mother’s home. His work in the early days included winding transformers and building amplifiers for Kingston’s Sound Systems. Tubby built his first Sound System in 1957 playing jazz and Rhythm & Blues at local weddings and birthday parties. His reputation as a man who knew and understood both electronics and music grew steadily and as the sixties drew to a close. Tubby purchased his own basic two track equipment. He installed this alongside his dub cutting machine, a homemade mixing console and his impressive collection of Jazz albums in the back bedroom of his home at 18 Dromilly Avenue which he christened his music room.

Tubby and Striker were at Treasure Isle Studio’s one day while Ruddy from Spanish Town was working with the engineer Byron Smith....

“Tubby and myself was talking when Ruddy was cutting some dub but Smithy (engineer) made a mistake through we were talking and forgot to put in the voice. It was two track recording in those days. Ruddy said ‘No Man! Make it stay! and so they cut the rhythm. When I went over to Ruddy’s that Saturday night a dance was in progress and when they played the vocal to the tune... then he said we’re going to play ‘Part Two’. They never called it ‘Version’..and then he played the rhythm track. The song was a catchy song and everybody started to sing along and the deejay started to toast so everything went down well. On Monday morning I went up and I said ‘Tubbs the mistake we made was a serious joke. It mash up Spanish Town! The people went wild. So you have to start to do that now ‘cause when the man put on the ‘Part Two’ everyone start singing this song. It played about twenty times. I said you try Tubbs!’...Well the next Saturday night now when Tubby strung up down the farm U Roy said he’s going to play ‘Part Two’ but Tubby did it different now. He started with the voice then dropped it out and let the rhythm run and then he brought in the voice in the middle and from there Tubby started to get really popular.’’
Bunny ‘Striker’ Lee

Dynamic Sounds upgraded to sixteen track recording in 1972 and Tubby purchased, again with the help of a deal brokered by Bunny Lee. The old four track equipment and the MCI console from their Studio B. The four tracks now gave him far wider scope to work with and he began to create a new musical form where the bass and drum parts were brought up while the faders allowed Tubby to ease the vocal and rhythm in and out of the mix. It was only a matter of time before Tubby’s dub plate experiments began to make it on to vinyl and the first ever long-playing King Tubby releases would feature a collection of his mixes to a selection of Strikers rhythms. So please sit back and enjoy this historic set of sounds, mixed by King Tubby and Mr Prince Phillip Smart and another set of scorcher Bunny Lee rhythms.