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“A piece of music never truly comes to An end. Revisiting a theme illustrates this idea that life goes on.” These are the words of Wayne Shorter, uttered in 2018 upon the release of Emanon, his final opus. On this record, the octogenarian uses dusky hues to shade in the passions of his youth - drawing and science-fiction, as well as the causes he has defended all his life - the fight against ecological upheaval and structural racism. This sentiment did not fail to resonate with Julien Lourau, who has reached a stage in life where he has begun to look back over certain pages written by the man he has always considered one of the masters of his trade. Five years later, this Parisian native has also chosen to revisit his glory days, offering reworked versions of specific tracks composed by his titular elder throughout the 80s. “When I play this music, I find myself back in my teenage bedroom. These are my standards, and they remind me of autumn in Rambouillet.” At that time, after practising his scales, Julien would also play Dungeons & dragons, and immerse himself in SF as well as heroic fantasy - epic influences which are not without a certain connection to the dreamworlds Shorter conjured up, as another fan of landscapes beyond the grasp of reality.

This album features four themes taken from Atlantis, which came out in 1985, and two from Joy Ryder, released three years later. To these, he has added a composition penned at around the same time for Sportin’ Life, the penultimate LP by Weather Report. This is rounded off by a tune taken

from Native Dancer, the record which, ten years earlier, in 1975, brought together this saxophonist who learnt his trade alongside Art Blakey, before joining Miles’ second quintet, and Brazilian Milton Nascimento.

“Between Native Dancer and Atlantis, Shorter did not release anything under his own name, but he took the time and care to really perfect his writing. Upon his return, he injected a very Brazilian form of subtlety into his compositions, especially rhythmically. And from a harmonic point of view, these themes are extremely sophisticated, and reveal truly singular colours. In fact, he decided to display the score as if it constituted the liner notes of Atlantis.”

Julien Lourau is a fan of every Wayne Shorter era, from his Blue Note days, where Mr Gone defined the bases of a truly unique repertoire, all the way to his final quartet - a reference like no other. He decided to focus on this “highly electric” period, which is not necessarily Shorter’s best known, nor his most widely appreciated - despite being a unanimous reference, Shorter has nonetheless never had a direct descendent. In Lourau’s line of sight there lies a desire to focus on typically South American tonic accents which characterise this repertoire, twinned with the ambition to switch up their actual sound “by attempting to open up onto a production highly influenced by eighties fusion". However, he admits that modifying the structures of these most unique of worlds constituted a fresh challenge. “There’s this labyrinthine harmonic system where you’ve no idea how it holds together, but where it’s actually impossible to touch the slightest element without the whole edifice wavering. It is in fact a very difficult thing to achieve!”

In order to successfully transcribe all this creativity free of obstacles, Julien Lourau once again called upon the help of Mathieu Debordes. From January 2023 onwards, Mathieu endeavoured to break down all the musical elements, on paper, before creating any actual music. The record was therefore constructed on the faith of these scores, without necessarily transiting through a creative residency - just two live gigs, to make sure the setup worked. Besides Mathieu Debordes and his synthesisers, Julien Lourau has assembled an ad hoc team by his side. On the bass, according to the track, we can hear erstwhile companion Sylvain Daniel or a new acolyte on the fretless bass, Joan Eche Puig.

Stéphane Edouard, on percussion, even dives headfirst into an unlikely proto-rap of sorts, on Pearl On The Half Shell (where, on the original version, Bobby McFerrin adjusted his interventions in a rather madcap style). Aesthete and drummer Jim Hart as well as pianist Leo Jassef also figure on this release - both were present on previous project devoted to label

CTI. “At sixteen, I wanted to sound like Michael Brecker rather than Ben Webster - that was equated with modernity in those days”, adds Julien with a smile, as for him, all this rings out a little like a logical next step, a joyful immersion into the fountain of youth. And if, for this record, he plays the soprano more than ever, the saxophone Shorter set in his sights on, he never tries to replicate an unattainable ideal note by note. What would be the point?

“Wayne Shorter is not just a saxophonist’s saxophonist. In fact, I don’t know a single person who has risen to challenge of his solos. I have not done it myself either, but on the other hand, I have retained a lot of his phraseology. His way of approaching the instrument reveals a more evanescent language, a work on colour and shape. Keeping this in mind has allowed me to gravitate towards certain elements, that in hindsight, I find echoes of in my work, even in Groove Gang.” Shorter etches out these phrases, creating a groove within which Lourau had traced subtle punctuation, managing, from a highly written base, to create fresh apertures, promises of a great escape. Emblematic of this standpoint, his regal version of Ponte de Areia, originally a wonderful dialogue between Milton Nascimento and Wayne Shorter. Here, the Frenchman takes liberties with the original melodies, without ever growing distant from the original spirit, extending one section with delicacy, offering a rubato development and then a groove “like a little suite”. Julien Lourau also renews with an accomplice from last century, Magic Malik, who lends his high-pitched vocals to the track. Though they had not recorded together for more than twenty years, the two of them got on as if they had only ceased collaborating yesterday, everything flowed naturally. The track was wrapped up in just one take, much like other themes, such as opener Who Goes There where the flautist deploys smooth, enchanted and smoky wisps.

Fundamentally, reflecting of the sleeve which features a child playing with a ball, image that could symbolise the sun just as much as the moon, Julien Lourau manages to translate the ambiguous candour which characterizes Shorter’s work - solar and crepuscular at the same time, that of a visionary and poet definitively situated outside of all chronology, but with whom Julien shares surprising and ‘timely’ coincidences. Shorter was born August 25, 1933, the same day as Julien’s father, “if we take time zones into account”, and who died on Lourau’s birthday, March 2, 2023. Should we take this as a random fact? Or could we not see here the sign of a destiny connecting the agnostic Frenchman to the man who, as a fervent Buddhist, believed in the transmission of his spiritual flow ?

The late percussionist Milford Graves was one of the most unique artists the world has ever seen. Born in Jamaica, Queens in 1941, he began his career in the early '60s as a part of New York's vibrant Latin jazz scene. His focus quickly turned inward, shifting towards a practice that explored the very nature of self. From his work in the New York Art Quartet and collaborations with Albert Ayler, Sonny Sharrock and more to his important contributions during NYC's loft era – he is, simply put, free jazz royalty.

In April 1966, the duo of Graves and pianist Don Pullen played at Yale University. As John Corbett writes in the liner notes, "This performance was something of a turning point for Graves. Until then he had been working in other people's bands or collective ensembles. He was phenomenally busy. In 1965 alone, he recorded with NYAQ (two LPs), Giuseppi Logan Quartet, Paul Bley Quintet and Lowell Davidson Trio, and he made his first recording released under his own name, Percussion Ensemble. Every one of these is important in its own way, but none of them quite anticipate how radical was the music that he and Pullen would unleash that evening in New Haven."

Originally released on the artists' own Self-Reliance Program label, this legendary one-night performance would be split into two volumes: In Concert At Yale University and Nommo. While rooted in African rhythms, Graves' music has its own sense of time. As the drummer stated in a 1966 DownBeat interview, "Time was always there, and the time I see is not the same as what man says time is. It works by impulsion."

The late percussionist Milford Graves was one of the most unique artists the world has ever seen. Born in Jamaica, Queens in 1941, he began his career in the early '60s as a part of New York's vibrant Latin jazz scene. His focus quickly turned inward, shifting towards a practice that explored the very nature of self. From his work in the New York Art Quartet and collaborations with Albert Ayler, Sonny Sharrock and more to his important contributions during NYC's loft era – he is, simply put, free jazz royalty.

In April 1966, the duo of Graves and pianist Don Pullen played at Yale University. As John Corbett writes in the liner notes, "This performance was something of a turning point for Graves. Until then he had been working in other people's bands or collective ensembles. He was phenomenally busy. In 1965 alone, he recorded with NYAQ (two LPs), Giuseppi Logan Quartet, Paul Bley Quintet and Lowell Davidson Trio, and he made his first recording released under his own name, Percussion Ensemble. Every one of these is important in its own way, but none of them quite anticipate how radical was the music that he and Pullen would unleash that evening in New Haven."

Originally released on the artists' own Self-Reliance Program label, this legendary one-night performance would be split into two volumes: In Concert At Yale University and Nommo. While rooted in African rhythms, Graves' music has its own sense of time. As the drummer stated in a 1966 DownBeat interview, "Time was always there, and the time I see is not the same as what man says time is. It works by impulsion."

Reggie Soul real name Reginald Stone is just one of many illusive recording artists who had a very limited recording career for a handful of small independent Chicago labels then disappeared into obscurity, Reggie reputedly left Chicago in the mid 1970’s for the lone star state of Texas never to be seen or heard from again!

Reggie’s recording legacy is the sum total of 3, 45 singles two of which he recorded under the supervision of respected Chicago songwriter and producer Clarence Johnson., firstly the funk outing “I Got Jody” backed with the soulful “I Feel So Bad” for Red Balloon Records, “I Feel So Bad” was composed by Lee Sain who recorded his own version under the title of “Baby Don’t Leave Me” for the Broach label. Reggie Soul’s “I Got Jody” also came out as a B-side on Nation Time Records, the A-side was a version of the James Brown song “Soul Walkin’ but this side was credited under the mis-credited artist name of Reggie Smith?

Finally, Reggie’s third release “My World Of Ecstasy/Mighty Good Loving” was released on the Scott Brothers own Capri Records label in 1968. Both sides of the 45 were written by Reggie with Charles and Walter Scott, arrangements were provided by John Jackson and Bill McFarland who provided the horn section to many of the Scott’s future productions. The Scott Brothers of which there were several (all musicians) had begun their own careers during the late 1950’s recording under the group name of The Masquerades on the Formal label. Often referred to as The Scott Brothers Orchestra with Howard Sephus Scott at the head of their growing musical dynasty they formed their own company Capri Productions circa 1968, their initial recording productions were Fred Johnson (Shi-Lush Records) and the aforementioned Reggie Soul & The Soul Swingers. The Scott’s were also the house band in one of Chicago’s Southside’s most popular night clubs ‘The Bonanza Lounge on 7641, South Halsted. The Scott’s often used the Bonanza as a source of finding future artists for their labels, such as The Soul Majestics, Judson Moore, Bobby Jones & Duke Turner amongst others, they even recorded a live performance on The Bonanza Lounges’ resident comedian Randolph Browner which gained a release on the Shi-Lush label.

“My World Of Ecstasy” like several Capri 45 releases were heavily imported into the UK, often sold in soul packs before finding favour with aficionados of the Crossover Scene in the late 1980’s with it’s popularity still remaining high to the present day.

Soul Junction through their licensing deal with Scot-Tees Publishing would like to present the first release of their Capri Records series.

and Sebastian Kokus and the prolific Ulf Schütte, the Hamburg-based trio has tirelessly expanded upon its sound and extended its musical style. After 2022’s »S/T« documented the results of their first jam sessions as a newly-founded group, »V.A.« started even more modestly and became an even bigger undertaking. Originally conceived as a small one-off release, it grew into a full record which sees the group embracing dub music, collaborating with Peaking Lights’ Aaron Coyes and inviting other artists—No UFO’s, Seekers International, Coco Em—who reworked select tracks in true dub style. »V.A.« is marked by inconsistency, openness, and heterogeneity in the best sense of those words: ever-changing, constantly surprising and consistently in motion.

The starting point for »V.A.« was a Hamburg concert in December 2022 together with Coyes, who played a solo set as Peaking Lights. On the request of the event organiser, Cloud Management teamed up with him for a jam session after the gig, laying the foundation for a track that the group took to the studio before sending it to Coyes to record vocals for it. Another song quickly followed and even though the band initially intended to release »PST« and »0rten Pitch« as standalone 7” single, they soon decided to have others create versions of the two tunes to round them off in the form of a 12” EP. Once more though, one thing led to another and now »V.A.« collects five original pieces by Cloud Management as well as three—four on the digital version—remixes by other artists.

Collaborating with Leipzig-based Canadian producer No UFO’s, the Canadian Seekers International collective, and Kenyan multi-disciplinary artist Coco Em came about organically. As fans of their friend Konrad Jandavs’ work for labels such as Spectrum Spools, Root Strata and his own Nice Up International, Korf, Kokus and Schütte asked him for a remix and granted him full creative freedom for his take on »PST«. Jandavs also connected them with the prolific Richmond-based soundsystem worshippers, who present their take on the same track on this record as well as a version of »Electric CD.« Also this track appears three times on the record, having been re-rubbed by Emma Mbeki Nzioka, who was introduced to the the trio by its label Altin Village & Mine.

There isn’t really a common thread running through the rough digi-dub of No UFO’s take on »PST«, Seekers International’s traditionally-minded yet infinitely playful dub-psychedelia and Coco Em’s bass-heavy, percussive, pulsating take on »Electric CD.« However, as a group dedicated to staying in flux at all times, Cloud Management ended up embracing the creative differences between their own work and those of their respective collaborators. In calling it »V.A.,« they paid tribute to their somewhat loose, but conceptually consistent concept of giving various artists full creative licence over their own work. Neither a true album in the strict sense of the world nor just a compilation, »V.A.« is actually the essential Cloud Management record: ever-changing, constantly surprising, consistently in motion.

Flora Yin Wong’s ravishing interiority finds lucid expression on an absorbing second album for Modern Love, manifesting her instrumental storytelling in a syncretic bind of supernatural themes with hyperrealist, concrète sound design.

Through ten parts, Flora crystallises the ennui that followed an uncanny, disorienting trip to East and Southeast Asia. “On an unexpected stopover in Hong Kong after five years away, my friends took me to a Bazi reader one night - something I was curious about, but much of a ritual for them - ” Flora recalls. “My father told me that when I was born, he had obtained an auspicious reading that since stayed like a guiding talisman with me. It was almost past midnight but people were still lined up, rather shaken and visibly upset, to see the old man. He had kind eyes and asked me why I was there and I said I was at a crossroads. He asked me my time and date of birth, and told me to pick one of his four little white canary birds as a vessel for divination.”

This was the final stretch of an ultimately aimless few months across the continent, including a 20 year overdue return with her father to his adoptive family in his hometown Kuala Lumpur - for many reasons, ended up as a strange and uncanny trip. She spent solitude in a haunted house during the quiet snowfall of Kyoto, where she might have offended some spirit... and nights in mountain temples with South Korean monks, and an equally strange feeling return to the Island of the Gods.

“It culminated in what felt like a final disillusionment with Asia - sudden deaths and a breakdown in beliefs - somewhere I never really have or will be able to connect with. The process of the reading summoned a final blow to my gut - an overwhelming sense of rootlessness, and understanding that all there is is emptiness and entropy. No birth-divined protection, just a measurement of the night sky based off nothing and everything.”

Heavy with a sense of nightmarish dissociation and grief, Flora read about Giuseppe Tartini’s ‘Violin Sonata in G Minor’, aka the Devil’s Trill Sonata, a notoriously tricky c.18th composition which attempted to transcribe music heard in a dream, which the composer felt he could never fully bring into reality. It’s this soporific motif that binds and underpins ’Cold Reading’, finding Flora chasing the dragon of fleeting fantasy through passages of etched melancholy, pinched with hypnagogic jerks that linger in the memory.

From her use of the ‘Devil’s Trill’ Sonata in ‘All My Dreams are Nightmares’ through evocations of subtropical humidity in the Bryn Jones-esque, resonant hand-played percussion of ‘Konna’ and ‘Banjar’, to a breathtaking dreampop denouement ‘Nectar Dripping’ and the Enya-like lush of ‘Beautiful Crisis’, Flora blooms her ideas with an openended ambiguity so often missing from so called Ambient music, ushering the listener into a soundworld that disturbs and displaces, just as much as it calms.

A collection of structured piano improvisations and their surrounding sonic environments, an album in four parts: Songs From a Distant Summer | From November For Snow | Together Recorded between 2011-2013, the album was never intended to be a direct response to the seasons. The coincidence of the recordings having been made at points within the seasons was only pointed out at a later date by a friend. Alongside wishing to avoid any parallels or associations being drawn with Vivaldi’s masterpiece, the title - “The Seasons Are Not Four” - a line from a poem by Syrian poet Adonis , appeared to fit perfectly - recognising our relationship to time but also alluding to the impossibility of truly categorising it. Due to label arrangements and complications the majority of these recordings have remained unreleased for a decade. One notable exception being the piece “I Promise”, that went on to amass in excess of 24 million streams - an unfathomable prospect for a piano-less pianist recording a reunion between himself and a piano at a point of not having played one for several months. The Seasons Are Not Four serves as a sonic record of real-time responses to the character of a piano, to transient states of being and to disparate, fleeting moments in time - some will hear Summer in Winter, others- Autumn in Spring; distant conversation beyond the sounds of a hesitant human shuffling fingers against wooden keys, the ticking of a grandfather clock or the song of birds outside masking passing traffic. - ‘The Seasons Are Not Four, a week is not seven days, a year is more than it is, and less’ Adonis

Recital presents the first full-length vinyl LP by sound artist Asha Sheshadri. Whiplash combines elements of sound poetry, diary-like narrations, and delicate incidental music. Sheshadri has crafted a unique and marvelous album.

Asha Sheshadri is a visual artist and musician, who “meditates on meaning, context, and impermanence” (Joshua Kim). Moves freely between video, writing, sound, and photography. Her forms flow together to create unpredictable observations of the overlooked, while documenting personal and political networks within our collective, imperfect memory.

“This record is an alternate approach to the autobiographical ‘confessional’ – I wanted to stitch together some pivotal sketches in self-understanding and forgiveness. While their designs may seem affectively disparate, they are in fact quite interrelated. My intention (as with past recordings) is to task the listener with tracing the contours of the narrative (or lack thereof). Each track contains sound from video work, excerpts from writers I admire, ethnographic methods, recovered and recycled voice/text memos, photographs from personal and public archives, and research-driven fictions. These sources expand and collapse into each other, only to reveal the eponymous "whiplash". To me, the feeling of "whiplash" is the collision of: a refracted ambivalence towards what was once real, the endless cycle of reckoning with wherever "home" has taken place, the fraught process of anchoring one’s self in the wake of slow-release trauma, and how (if even possible) to translate all of this into artwork.” –Asha Sheshadri, 2023

“Place is security, space is freedom: we are attached to the one and long for the other. There is no place like home.” –Yi Fu Tuan, Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience.

All tracks arranged & recorded by Asha Sheshadri; in bedrooms, living rooms, libraries, bars, airplanes, backyards and parks across North America.
Mastered by Sean McCann.

By the early '70s, Milford Graves had more or less stopped gigging. Having learned his lesson the hard way in multiple-night runs like a legendary Slugs' residency with Albert Ayler, he knew that the level of energy that he put out during a performance would be difficult to sustain over the long haul. A concert was a kind of absolute ritual for him, after which he would be totally spent, emotionally and physically. Graves rarely left anything on the table. Any musical performance was an opportunity to present an amalgamated version of all the things he had learned. He was an innovator and a teacher at his core, and the concert venue was one of his first classroom settings.

In March 1976, Verna Gillis invited Graves to perform on WBAI's Free Music Store radio show. For the date, he chose to present a trio lineup which he had been occasionally playing – featuring two saxophonists who were dedicated to the drummer's vision. Hugh Glover is almost exclusively known for his work with Graves, while Arthur Doyle would gain exposure later for an obscure record that he made two years later, Alabama Feeling, which would become a highly collectable item among free jazz enthusiasts.

Originally released in 1977, Bäbi remains one of Graves' most seminal recordings. The music played by the trio was ecstatic. Extreme energy music, buoyant and joyful. It relied on Graves' new way of approaching the drum kit, in which he had opened up the bottoms of his skin-slackened toms and eliminated the snare. Graves' art was always unblemished by commercial interests, and this album is its finest mission statement.

Berlin-based Swedish bassist and producer Petter Eldh returns with a new Koma Saxo album Post Koma, out on We Jazz Records, 10 November. The title Post Koma aptly describes the vibe of this one: The Koma Saxo sound continues its evolution, morphing into a holistic vision of jazz now and soon, where live instrumentation and repurposed sampling lose their boundaries.

Over the course of its three iterations (self-titled debut in 2019, LIVE in 2020, Koma West in 2022) Koma Saxo has sounded at times "liquid" and postproduced, at times raw and direct, at times acoustic and at other times oddly electronic (even while still being made with acoustic instruments). Post Koma is a culmination of this sonic study by Eldh, resulting in a music vision that never second-guesses throwing tasty hooks and everlasting melodies out the window after a mere bite of them. But fear not: there are even more new ideas just around the corner.

Eldh's compositions and ideas merge together in a way that just flows. There are quality musicians in the mix, including Koma Saxo live band members Sofia Jernberg, Jonas Kullhammar, Otis Sandsjö, Mikko Innanen, Maciej Obara and Christian Lillinger, but that's like saying that a cake includes flour and sugar. This music is not about playing, it's essentially about how the music is and how it takes its shape, so you quickly lose track of who did what, and that's all in the benefit of encountering this music as an entity that is constantly challenging itself while moving forward. The musicians are valued contributors, and an integral part of what's here, but this is far from traditional jazz playing where a band sits in a room playing takes after takes of compositions on sheet.

That being said, this is jazz to the fullest. That is, music that understands its past but always moves forward, and is never afraid of taking risks. Petter Eldh uses jazz as a starting point, not the end goal. This gives his music edge and mobility beyond what can be contained on one album. In a way, an album, then, becomes a snapshot of a creative process in constant flux and evolution.

Opening track "Koma" is literally drum & bass. It only consists of those two elements, yet what comes out of it is an open invite, a way of clearing your palette. It would be useless to describe individual tracks beyond that, but there's a strong sense of deliverance to the set. It feels like an ending, and also like a new beginning.

Berlin-based Swedish bassist and producer Petter Eldh returns with a new Koma Saxo album Post Koma, out on We Jazz Records, 10 November. The title Post Koma aptly describes the vibe of this one: The Koma Saxo sound continues its evolution, morphing into a holistic vision of jazz now and soon, where live instrumentation and repurposed sampling lose their boundaries.

Over the course of its three iterations (self-titled debut in 2019, LIVE in 2020, Koma West in 2022) Koma Saxo has sounded at times "liquid" and postproduced, at times raw and direct, at times acoustic and at other times oddly electronic (even while still being made with acoustic instruments). Post Koma is a culmination of this sonic study by Eldh, resulting in a music vision that never second-guesses throwing tasty hooks and everlasting melodies out the window after a mere bite of them. But fear not: there are even more new ideas just around the corner.

Eldh's compositions and ideas merge together in a way that just flows. There are quality musicians in the mix, including Koma Saxo live band members Sofia Jernberg, Jonas Kullhammar, Otis Sandsjö, Mikko Innanen, Maciej Obara and Christian Lillinger, but that's like saying that a cake includes flour and sugar. This music is not about playing, it's essentially about how the music is and how it takes its shape, so you quickly lose track of who did what, and that's all in the benefit of encountering this music as an entity that is constantly challenging itself while moving forward. The musicians are valued contributors, and an integral part of what's here, but this is far from traditional jazz playing where a band sits in a room playing takes after takes of compositions on sheet.

That being said, this is jazz to the fullest. That is, music that understands its past but always moves forward, and is never afraid of taking risks. Petter Eldh uses jazz as a starting point, not the end goal. This gives his music edge and mobility beyond what can be contained on one album. In a way, an album, then, becomes a snapshot of a creative process in constant flux and evolution.

Opening track "Koma" is literally drum & bass. It only consists of those two elements, yet what comes out of it is an open invite, a way of clearing your palette. It would be useless to describe individual tracks beyond that, but there's a strong sense of deliverance to the set. It feels like an ending, and also like a new beginning.

Formed in 1987 in Umeå, Sweden, Meshuggah has been called "one of the ten most important hard and heavy bands" by Rolling Stone and enjoys the respect and admiration of fans and musicians alike. It is impossible to talk about experimental or avant-garde metal without mentioning this truly groundbreaking band: MESHUGGAH mix ultra-complicated rhythmic patterns with massive riffs and aggressive growls, combining death metal, mathcore, thrash and progressive metal to create their unique style. The year 2023 now marks the 25th anniversary of one of the band's first milestones, "Chaosphere".

Originally released on November 9, 1998, Meshuggah's third studio album shows the band toning down some of the thrashier sounds of earlier releases in favor of the more technical, polyrhythmic and groove-oriented sound they would explore on subsequent albums.

The album includes the songs "New Millennium Cyanide Christ", "Corridor of Chameleons" and "Neurotica", among others, which are some of the band's most streamed tracks.

Formed in 1987 in Umeå, Sweden, Meshuggah has been called "one of the ten most important hard and heavy bands" by Rolling Stone and enjoys the respect and admiration of fans and musicians alike. It is impossible to talk about experimental or avant-garde metal without mentioning this truly groundbreaking band: MESHUGGAH mix ultra-complicated rhythmic patterns with massive riffs and aggressive growls, combining death metal, mathcore, thrash and progressive metal to create their unique style. The year 2023 now marks the 25th anniversary of one of the band's first milestones, "Chaosphere".

Originally released on November 9, 1998, Meshuggah's third studio album shows the band toning down some of the thrashier sounds of earlier releases in favor of the more technical, polyrhythmic and groove-oriented sound they would explore on subsequent albums.

The album includes the songs "New Millennium Cyanide Christ", "Corridor of Chameleons" and "Neurotica", among others, which are some of the band's most streamed tracks.

Celebrating the 30 anniversary of this legendary cult band from Argentina, with more than 150 releases in labels from Japan, Europe, Oceania, Latin America and USA and shows played and their music presented all over the world. A nondescript, experimental, truly original band with a story to match their legacy. LP includes fold out insert. At last! A comprehensive compilation documenting the exciting career of the legendary experimental Argentinian cult band. A career overview through eight of their most mesmerizing compositions. The fact that their drummer and singer Miguel Tomasin has down syndrome not only makes them one of the longest-running and most notable inclusive rock bands of all time, but also allows us to appreciate the importance of Miguel's creative contribution, both for his singular way of singing and for his inimitable verbal inventions. For his work with the band, Miguel stands as one of the most relevant personalities with down's syndrome in the world and his name appears mentioned in diverse books of neuroscience and neurodiversity. Their long list of collaborators includes luminaries such as Lee Ranaldo (Sonic Youth), Pauline Oliveiros, Damo Suzuki (Can), The Nihilist Spasm Band, Michael Snow, N U Unruh (Einstürzende Neubauten), Alan Licht, Pajarito Zaguri, Acid Mothers Temple, John Oswald and many more.

For new beginnings, one must sometimes look into the past. Amb.Caveti has done such thing by inviting producer Martin Abrahamsson to the label under the moniker Deltidseskapism. Originally released in 2004 on Source Records, Martin’s aptly titled ‘Nattmusik’ mimics exactly that - the long drawn out winters of Sweden.

Floating basslines and ethereal high’s leave the imagination to roam, whilst rhythmic clicks and cuts maintain focus on the journey ahead. It’s one for the drive home or late night wander, amidst the icy fog and solitary streetlights.

This is one of Tito Puente’s best original albums released under the label of Tico in the 60s. The album features one of his best hits, “Oye Cómo Va,”. Tito Puente and his orchestra lay down a driving irresistible beat that moves from beginning to end in a pulsating performance and create an added appeal with their ensemble singing which lends an authenticity to the music. Pressed on 180g black vinyl with a tip-on-jacket. US Import.

Both sides contain a mix of the following tracks:

A1 Off– Electrica Salsa
A2 J.J. Bronson– Jack Your Body
A3 Cruisin' Gang– America
A4 Solid Strangers– Vision
A5 Les Lee San Francisco– Love Can't Turn Around
A6 MC Miker G. & DJ Sven– Celebration
A7 Albert One– For Your Love
A8 Charly Danone– You Can Do It
A9 Fancy– Lady Of Ice
A10 Max-Him– Melanie
A11 Daydream (2)– In The Night
B1 Off– Electrica Salsa
B2 J.J. Bronson– Jack Your Body
B3 Cruisin' Gang– America
B4 Solid Strangers– Vision
B5 Les Lee San Francisco– Love Can't Turn Around
B6 MC Miker G. & DJ Sven– Celebration
B7 Albert One– For Your Love
B8 Charly Danone– You Can Do It
B9 Fancy– Lady Of Ice
B10 Max-Him– Melanie
B11 Daydream (2)– In The Night

When Kronos plays a piece, they become fellow composers, true collaborators. Without them, we wouldn’t have the kind of string quartet playing that we find around us today. There are two kinds of string quartet playing: the ‘Before Kronos’ and the ‘After Kronos’.” – Philip Glass

‘Kronos Quartet has broken the boundaries of what string quartets can do.’ – New York Times

Nonesuch releases Kronos Quartet’s acclaimed album Kronos Quartet Performs Philip Glass on vinyl for the first time to coincide with Kronos Quartet: Five Decades, a year-long celebration marking the quartet’s 50th anniversary. Originally released in 1995, the album features David Harrington (violin), John Sherba, (violin), Hank Dutt (viola) and Joan Jeanrenaud (cello) performing Quartet No. 2 (Company) (1983), No. 3 (Mishima) (1985), No. 4 (Buczak) (1990), and No. 5 (1991), the first piece Glass wrote especially for Kronos. Recorded at Skywalker Sound in California, the album was produced by Judith Sherman, Kurt Munkacsi and Philip Glass. The cover art features Francesco Clemente’s painting The Four Corners (1985). At the time of the album’s release, the New York Times said, ‘It contains some of Glass's best music since Koyaanisqatsi. His ear for sumptuous string sonorities is undeniable,’ while the Washington Post called it ‘An ideal combination of composer and performers.’ It was a top 10 hit on Billboard’s Top Classical Albums, and spent 12 weeks on Billboard’s Classical chart.



In his original liner note, critic Mark Swed wrote, ‘Glass’ string quartets may contain his most intimate music. They are works through which a very public composer, perhaps the most important opera reformer of our age and a longstanding collaborator in large-scale music theater, holds up a mirror to himself and his way of composing. “In an odd way,” Glass explains, “string quartets have always functioned like that for composers. I don’t really know why, but it’s almost impossible to get away from it. It’s the way composers of the past have thought and that’s no less true for me. It’s almost as if we say we’re going to write a string quartet, we take a deep breath, and we wade in to try to write the most serious, significant piece that we can.” Glass says that as he sat down to write String Quartet No. 5, he had discovered that perhaps not taking a serious tone might be the most serious way to deal with it. “I was thinking that I had really gone beyond the need to write a serious string quartet and that I could write a quartet that is about musicality, which in a certain way is the most serious subject.”’



Glass’ first numbered quartet was written in 1966; however, he did not return to the string quartet medium until 1983, when he provided incidental music for a dramatization of Samuel Beckett’s prose poem, Company. During those 17 years, Glass had formed an ensemble and developed his style in a series of increasingly elaborate pieces for it. String Quartet No. 3 is also adapted to dramatic music, this time from his score to the 1985 Paul Schrader film, Mishima. It was with the music of Mishima that Kronos became associated with Glass, recording the string quartet sections of the soundtrack and subsequently working extensively with the composer on all five of his numbered quartets. Kronos also gave the first concert performances of Company and Mishima. String Quartet No. 4 was composed in remembrance of the artist Brian Buczak, who died of AIDS in 1988.



As Kronos’ anniversary season continues with further concerts around the world, Nonesuch will reissue Black Angels on vinyl on February 16. First released in 1990, the award-winning album includes George Crumb’s title piece, which inspired David Harrington to found the quartet. Called ‘an unusually elevated and searing Vietnam War protest’ by the New York Times, it sets a dark, powerful tone for this collection, which addresses the political/physical/spiritual consequences of war. Also featured are works by Charles Ives, István Márta, Thomas Tallis, and Dmitri Shostakovich. ‘Stylishly packaged, intelligently programmed, superbly recorded and brilliantly performed,’ proclaimed Gramophone. ‘In short, very much the sort of disc we’ve come to expect from the talented and imaginative Kronos Quartet.’ The Evening Standard included it among its ‘100 Definitive Classical Albums of the 20th Century’.



Born in Baltimore, Maryland, in 1937, Philip Glass is a graduate of the University of Chicago and the Juilliard School. By 1974, he had created a large collection of music for The Philip Glass Ensemble. The period culminated in the landmark opera, Einstein on the Beach. Since Einstein, Glass’s repertoire has grown to include music for opera, dance, theatre, orchestra, and film. His scores have received Academy Award nominations (including Kundun and The Hours, as well as Notes on a Scandal) and a Golden Globe (The Truman Show). Recent works include his memoir, Words Without Music, his first Piano Sonata, opera Circus Days and Nights, and Symphony No. 14. Glass received the Praemium Imperiale in 2012, the US National Medal of the Arts from President Barack Obama in 2016, and 41st Kennedy Center Honors in 2018.



Nonesuch’s relationship with Glass began in 1985, with the release of the score for Paul Schrader’s Mishima featuring Kronos Quartet. Over the years other Glass works on Nonesuch have included Einstein on the Beach (1993), Kronos Quartet Performs Philip Glass (1995), Music in Twelve Parts (1996), Glass Box (2008), as well as the soundtracks for Powaqqatsi (1988), Kundun (1997), Koyaanisqatsi (1998), and The Hours (2002), amongst others.



For 50 years, San Francisco’s Kronos Quartet – David Harrington (violin), John Sherba (violin), Hank Dutt (viola), and Paul Wiancko (cello) – has challenged and reimagined what a string quartet can be. Founded at a time when the form was largely centred on long-established, Western European traditions, Kronos has been at the forefront of revolutionizing the string quartet into a living art form that responds to the people and issues of our time. In the process, Kronos has become one of the most celebrated and influential groups of our era, performing thousands of concerts worldwide, releasing more than 70 recordings of extraordinary breadth and creativity, and collaborating with many of the world’s most accomplished composers and performers. Through its nonprofit organization, Kronos Performing Arts Association, Kronos has commissioned more than 1,000 works and arrangements for string quartet – including the Kronos Fifty for the Future library of free, educational repertoire. Kronos has received more than 40 awards, including three Grammy Awards and the Polar Music, Avery Fisher, and Edison Klassiek Oeuvre Prizes.



Kronos is prolific and wide-ranging on recordings. The ensemble’s expansive discography on Nonesuch includes three Grammy-winning albums: Terry Riley’s Sun Rings (2019), Landfall with Laurie Anderson (2018), and Alban Berg’s Lyric Suite featuring soprano Dawn Upshaw (2003); the 40th-anniversary boxed set Kronos Explorer Series; Nuevo (2002), a Grammy- and Latin Grammy–nominated celebration of Mexican culture; Pieces of Africa (1992), a showcase of African-born composers that simultaneously topped Billboard’s Classical and World Music charts; and Folk Songs (2017), Nonesuch’s 50th album with Kronos, which featured Sam Amidon, Olivia Chaney, Rhiannon Giddens, and Natalie Merchant singing traditional folk songs.

What are the differences and similarities between human and artificial sound, between oscillations generated by vocal cords and synthesizer voices, voltage amplified by speakers? On Silencio, his latest album for Tresor Records, Moritz von Oswald works with a 16-voice choir to explore this concept.
Drawing from the ensemble works of long-standing inspirations Edgard Varèse, György Ligeti and Iannis Xenakis, von Oswald and Vocalconsort Berlin delve into the space between sounds, creating a deeply textured collection that shifts between light & ethereal and
dark & dissonant.
As masterfully demonstrated in the early work of von Oswald and Mark Ernestus’ influential Basic Channel project, repetition and reduction are key elements here, much in the tradition of techno and minimalism. The vast dynamism of the human voice adds to the
profound weight of electronics while offering up a rhythmic source and sonic noise palette unexplored in von Oswald’s repertoire. In Silencio, von Oswald dredges a dank murk, pulling clouds over a distant pulse. It hangs, ready to take on new forms.
The compositions were written in von Oswald’s Berlin studio on classic synthesizers, such as the EMS VCS3 & AKS, Prophet V, Oberheim 4-Voice and the Moog Model 15. These abstract recordings were transcribed to sheet music for choir by Berlin-based Finnish composer and pianist, Jarkko Riihimäki and performed by Vocalconsort Berlin in Ölberg church in the city’s Kreuzberg district, only few metres down the road from where Dubplates & Mastering and Hard Wax opened their doors for music enthusiasts for many years so long. The recordings of the choral versions were then incorporated into the synthesized parts of the album and brought into anew electronic context; in Silencio, the focus is not on using one means to imitate the other, but to sonically discuss the tensions and harmonies between the two worlds and create a dialogue between them.
The relationship between von Oswald and Tresor Records goes back thirty years, all the way to Blake Baxter’s Dream Sequence in 1991 - which von Oswald engineered alongside Thomas Fehlmann. The collaboration with Fehlmann lived on, seeing the duo team up as 3MB with Eddie Fowlkes or Juan Atkins. More recently, the Detroit-Berlin connection continued as Juan Atkins & Moritz von Oswald present Borderland.
For von Oswald, Tresor Records and also the participating guest musicians of the choir, this release brings together audiences from other musical areas, cross-pollinating; Silencio is an album that stands for itself beyond the musical genre boundaries.

The soundtrack features orchestral, big band, rock, and hip-hop compositions, the score was recorded at Abbey Road and Air Studios and evokes both the intensity and the sardonic humor found within the main themes of the film. Speaking of the music, Nicholas Britell says, “When I first began working with Adam McKay on the score for VICE, Adam’s initial instinct was that the score should have a symphonic scope to match the size of the story we were telling. Over the course of more than one year of composing, I wrote a score which utilizes a full symphony orchestra, while also exploring the sounds of big band jazz, rock, and hip-hop. There is a subtle – and at times not-so-subtle – dissonance in the music which weaves in and out of the themes, harmonies, and textures. This idea of dissonance became a central element within the nature of the score.”

Take the 101 north out of Los Angeles, and you'll pass by Agoura Hills, where the core duo of the band Dub Thompson grew up. Whatever you see in that town won't readily prepare you for the music they wrote while there, but you're free to look."Most everyone who's in a group who's our age lives on the Internet," says guitarist Matt Pulos. "The kinds of things that have shaped our band aren't anchored to any one time or place."Pulos and his bandmate, drummer Evan Laffer, are currently both 19 years old, and are putting that line of thought to the test; their musical influences travel from the Midwestern malaise of Big Black and Pere Ubu, to Kraut pioneers Can and Kraftwerk, while bowing to the British belligerence of The Fall and This Heat.Recording the album while living with Foxygen's Jonathan Rado at his rented house in Bloomington, the band had its first taste of a heavy Indiana summer, and all the humidity and insect life that buzzes along with it. "We woke up every day, ate hard-boiled eggs and stood on a porch," says Pulos of the experience.Their first collection of songs slyly unties the shoes of genre and convention, shapeshifts mischievously, and tramples on the promises delivered on the name itself.There are only eight songs on this rangy debut.Intense blasts of hook-filled noise rock ("Hayward!"), rocksteady marionette stomp ("No Time"), hypnotic bouts of doomy poetics ("Epicondyles"), outlandishly sexy groove rock ("Dograces"), and a number of other bite-sized forays into parts unknown are made manifest across 9 Songs. The vibes are strong here. Pulos sings and plays like he's working out long-standing grudges, pulling the most sinewy tones from an acoustic guitar and ripping huge chunks of demon flesh out of his electric. Laffer matches him step for step on the drums, an exacting presence behind the kit who pushes even the band's more placid moments into bouts of tension. Together they succeed in animating their musical ideas to startling, almost unnatural life. Reverb units, keyboards, samples and processing gluing everything together, saturated in the August heat and worn in until they sound second nature, it's like somehow you've been listening to these songs forever.

The Moon Also Rises gathers songs that Johnny and Robert have written together since finishing their first joint album, Lost In The Cedar Wood (2021). At its heart are the oldest themes of all: death and renewal, darkness and light. The first five tracks are songs of burial, shadows and memory, while the final four are songs of awakening, light and love. The album turns around a central song, ‘The Sun Also Rises’, which stands with a foot in both dark and light. * Johnny Flynn's sixth album, and the second co-written with his friend Robert Macfarlane. Out 10th November 2023 on Transgressive * Gathers songs that Johnny and Robert have written together since finishing their first joint album, Lost In The Cedar Wood (2021). At its heart are the oldest themes of all: death and renewal, darkness and light. The first five tracks are songs of burial, shadows and memory, while the final four are songs of awakening, light and love. The album turns around a central song, 'The Sun Also Rises', which stands with a foot in both dark and light * Fuses poetry, story, landscape, history, nature and myth into a series of rich, strange songlines that criss-cross time and place, joining winter to spring, ancient to present and birth to death. As the Sun sets, so the Moon rises as its echo; as one light dies, another, altogether different light is born * Partly recorded in an old Methodist chapel -now the home of Johnny and Rob's friends, Cosmo and Flora Sheldrake * Produced by Charlie Andrew (Alt-J, Marika Hackman)

Svart Records are proud to present the vinyl debut of the album '8 Convulsions' (1994) by Crisis (NYC, USA) "I am really glad that Svart are re-releasing 8 Convulsions, so more people can rediscover this wonderful and intriguing heavy music." Michel 'Away' Langevin, Voivod Remastered and repackaged with the vinyl format in mind, the package comes with a large booklet full of lyrics and exclusive photos. This is the first time an album from the NYC cult band's oeuvre is pressed on vinyl. There will also be a CD edition of the remaster. Hailing from the mean streets of NYC in the year 1993, Crisis was a band that defied classification from the very start. During a time when heavy music was dominated by a mostly male presence, founders Afzaal Deen and original drummer Fred Waring envisioned a female-fronted band to run against the grain and destroy expectations. Seeking out a singer with a singular sound and presence, and found their match in groundbreaking vocalist and avant-visual artist Karyn Crisis. Soon after, a newspaper ad for a bass player was answered by Gia Chuan Wang and the original unit was formed. During their first rehearsal, Karyn became so enmeshed and driven by the music that she inadvertently destroyed a microphone stand and threw herself to the floor in an outpouring of unmitigated expression. This was barely a hint at the intensity she would soon bring to the stage and studio. Karyn’s guttural growls and angelic melodic notes meshed perfectly with the mixture of grinding guitar, pounding rhythm and deep bass tones. The underground music scene would now begin to experience the dynamic intensity of this burgeoning powerhouse band in full force. Crisis signed to Too Damn Hype records and released their debut album '8 Convulsions', now being reissued to mark its 30th anniversary. In a time where inclusivity is more crucial than ever, Crisis remains a band as diverse and distinct as the city from which they originally hailed. “The United Nations of Rock” as they’ve been called, continue to break boundaries and crush antiquated archetypes with their unprecedented sound and vision. "One of the most captivating bands I’ve ever experienced in New York City in the early 90s. They had a very unique sound where you couldn’t categorize them though they had elements of metal, punk with a very dark experimental approach, which gave them their unique sound. Just raw and relentless energy." Roy Mayorga, Ministry/Soulfly/Nausea etc 8 Convulsions is available on Svart exclusive blue/red marble vinyl, limited transparent yellow vinyl, classic black vinyl, and CD. Release date October 20th.

Svart Records are proud to present the vinyl debut of the album '8 Convulsions' (1994) by Crisis (NYC, USA) "I am really glad that Svart are re-releasing 8 Convulsions, so more people can rediscover this wonderful and intriguing heavy music." Michel 'Away' Langevin, Voivod Remastered and repackaged with the vinyl format in mind, the package comes with a large booklet full of lyrics and exclusive photos. This is the first time an album from the NYC cult band's oeuvre is pressed on vinyl. There will also be a CD edition of the remaster. Hailing from the mean streets of NYC in the year 1993, Crisis was a band that defied classification from the very start. During a time when heavy music was dominated by a mostly male presence, founders Afzaal Deen and original drummer Fred Waring envisioned a female-fronted band to run against the grain and destroy expectations. Seeking out a singer with a singular sound and presence, and found their match in groundbreaking vocalist and avant-visual artist Karyn Crisis. Soon after, a newspaper ad for a bass player was answered by Gia Chuan Wang and the original unit was formed. During their first rehearsal, Karyn became so enmeshed and driven by the music that she inadvertently destroyed a microphone stand and threw herself to the floor in an outpouring of unmitigated expression. This was barely a hint at the intensity she would soon bring to the stage and studio. Karyn’s guttural growls and angelic melodic notes meshed perfectly with the mixture of grinding guitar, pounding rhythm and deep bass tones. The underground music scene would now begin to experience the dynamic intensity of this burgeoning powerhouse band in full force. Crisis signed to Too Damn Hype records and released their debut album '8 Convulsions', now being reissued to mark its 30th anniversary. In a time where inclusivity is more crucial than ever, Crisis remains a band as diverse and distinct as the city from which they originally hailed. “The United Nations of Rock” as they’ve been called, continue to break boundaries and crush antiquated archetypes with their unprecedented sound and vision. "One of the most captivating bands I’ve ever experienced in New York City in the early 90s. They had a very unique sound where you couldn’t categorize them though they had elements of metal, punk with a very dark experimental approach, which gave them their unique sound. Just raw and relentless energy." Roy Mayorga, Ministry/Soulfly/Nausea etc 8 Convulsions is available on Svart exclusive blue/red marble vinyl, limited transparent yellow vinyl, classic black vinyl, and CD. Release date October 20th.

lim. two color Vinyl. Gatefold Cover with sticker and download code on postcard.

Welcome Back, friends, to the Yacht Soul cruise that never ends!
This theme, explored at length in the previous installment of this series, is a fertile one that just keeps on giving, and give it certainly does on the tracks we have dug up for your perusal, enlightenment, edification and enjoyment on Yacht Soul 2.
For those just joining us, the concept here concerns R&B and soul artists mining the songbooks of their white contemporaries for cover versions that serve the dual purposes of potentially garnering some crossover radio airplay as well as introducing great songs to segments of the listening public who might otherwise miss them. Some of these versions might have come about because they were personal favorites of the artist in question, others might have been strongly suggested by their labels or by the publishing company, but all of them provide an entirely new perspective on what were already fantastic songs to begin with.
So there you have it--a further dig into this nebulous concept that reveals more unexpected connections and crossed paths. Understanding the hows and whys of the way these particular covers and collaborations came to be is as fascinating as just enjoying the music itself, and there really is a lot of great music to dig into this time around! We hope you enjoy listening to it as much as we did putting it together.

VITAL SALES POINTS:

- Second volume from the YACHT SOUL series. First volume is the second best selling "Too Slow To Disco" compilation so far.…
- Extensive Global Promo by Tobias Kirsch/Germany and Special Requests UK
- Record Relase Parties planned.

On For Annette, singer-songwriter ronja summons forth a certain unbridgeable void within our existence and the acceptance of the deafening silence that comes with it. Weaving the strands of her previous release something about us with multiple openings towards more abstract territory, this 5-track EP marks her debut under the forward-thinking Unguarded label, astutely situating her music well beyond the confines of the genre.

The opening track “Nothing Makes Me Feel” beckons the listener into a discreet moment amid the early light of dawn, commencing with an up-close acoustic guitar, soon to be graced by ronja’s hushed voice, softly whispering, as if to avoid waking someone near. “Just Once”, with its weeping waltz, is about losing one’s place in the world, about choosing the imaginary over the real. Behind the strummed chords hides a soft dither of sine tones that attempts to fill the gap that cannot be filled, only to transform into quavering distortion ever after. Where language may falter, ronja turns to choral-like instrumental pieces (“Light” & “Grass from Below”), characterized by her distinctive and multi-layered flute arrangements. The absence of words here allows for a sensible stage of introspection, a fleeting and diaphanous pause, forging a passage to a more hopeful outlook. Yet, these pieces are not isolated; hints of fluttering air and cavernous depths are subtly alluded to in the earlier, more song-based tracks. In just under 18 minutes running time, the theme of loss, or the anticipation of its arrival, lingers solemnly before transcending intermediate states in “Almost There”.

Admirers of the dreamgaze band Roomer, which made waves in and around the Berlin music scene this past year, might detect faint resemblances. Nonetheless, ronja—a pivotal presence in said band—unveils a distinct effort here, striking subdued but enticing tones, a foreshadowing of what is yet to come from this luminary artist. – Luka Aron

Oslo-based sludge-metal power trio SAVER are back with a vengeance. The band's new album `From Ember And Rust' channels the bare-knuckle ferocity of their 2019 full-length debut, `They Came With Sunlight', alongside a formidable command of dynamic, texture and sonic space that belies the relative youth of the project. Having erupted into the Norwegian metal scene without warning, SAVER is the result of heavy veterans Ole Ulvik Rokseth, Markus Stole and Ole Christian Helstad combining their years of experience into one three-headed beast, hellbent on pushing the boundaries of what the band is collectively capable of. Restless by nature, SAVER are constantly refining and reinventing their sound. The band's debut record was followed by two wildly creative collaborations which saw the trio marry their signature ferocity with some unlikely creative bedfellows in order to test new depths. `Emerald', 2021's full-length release, paired SAVER's calculated minimalism with the frenetic, percussive energy of Belgian post-metal collective Psychonaut whilst last year's `Split EP' saw SAVER and Norwegian folk singer/songwriter Frodekal reinterpret a song from each other's back catalogue with hauntingly spectacular results. With this revelatory experience still ringing in their ears, `From Ember And Rust' bears all of SAVER's heavy hallmarks alongside a newfound sense of dynamic anticipation and organic progression, which ties the seven tracks together as a significant body of work in the band's ascendant trajectory. As well as sharing their years of experience making the heaviest music they can, SAVER also share a passion for the unmistakable soundscapes of classic science-fiction. Already a key component of SAVER's distinctive sound; Rokseth's otherworldly, cinematic synth work is given centre stage on `From Ember And Rust' as the band boldly embark on a new journey together. As their first non-collaborative release in four years, `From Ember And Rust' could be interpreted as the band returning to the safety of their roots. However, SAVER are more determined than ever to keep pushing their sound into uncharted territory as the world they find themselves in continues to turn.

Oslo-based sludge-metal power trio SAVER are back with a vengeance. The band's new album `From Ember And Rust' channels the bare-knuckle ferocity of their 2019 full-length debut, `They Came With Sunlight', alongside a formidable command of dynamic, texture and sonic space that belies the relative youth of the project. Having erupted into the Norwegian metal scene without warning, SAVER is the result of heavy veterans Ole Ulvik Rokseth, Markus Stole and Ole Christian Helstad combining their years of experience into one three-headed beast, hellbent on pushing the boundaries of what the band is collectively capable of. Restless by nature, SAVER are constantly refining and reinventing their sound. The band's debut record was followed by two wildly creative collaborations which saw the trio marry their signature ferocity with some unlikely creative bedfellows in order to test new depths. `Emerald', 2021's full-length release, paired SAVER's calculated minimalism with the frenetic, percussive energy of Belgian post-metal collective Psychonaut whilst last year's `Split EP' saw SAVER and Norwegian folk singer/songwriter Frodekal reinterpret a song from each other's back catalogue with hauntingly spectacular results. With this revelatory experience still ringing in their ears, `From Ember And Rust' bears all of SAVER's heavy hallmarks alongside a newfound sense of dynamic anticipation and organic progression, which ties the seven tracks together as a significant body of work in the band's ascendant trajectory. As well as sharing their years of experience making the heaviest music they can, SAVER also share a passion for the unmistakable soundscapes of classic science-fiction. Already a key component of SAVER's distinctive sound; Rokseth's otherworldly, cinematic synth work is given centre stage on `From Ember And Rust' as the band boldly embark on a new journey together. As their first non-collaborative release in four years, `From Ember And Rust' could be interpreted as the band returning to the safety of their roots. However, SAVER are more determined than ever to keep pushing their sound into uncharted territory as the world they find themselves in continues to turn.

Cat Power veröffentlicht am 10. November ein Live-Album Cat Power Sings Bob Dylan: The 1966 Royal Albert Hall Concert via Domino.

Cat Power Sings Dylan: The 1966 Royal Albert Hall Concert" wurde am 5. November 2022 in der berühmten Londoner Royal Albert Hall aufgenommen und zeigt Chan Marshall wie sie Song für Song eines der legendärsten und transformativsten Live-Sets aller Zeiten nachspielt. Im Mai 1966 fand das Konzert in der Manchester Free Trade Hall statt, das aufgrund eines falsch beschrifteten Bootlegs lange Zeit als "Royal Albert Hall Concert" bekannt war. Bei dem Originalauftritt wechselte Bob Dylan in der Mitte des Konzerts von der akustischen auf die elektrische Gitarre, was den Zorn der Folk-Puristen auf sich zog und den Verlauf des Rock 'n' Roll für immer veränderte. "Cat Power Sings Dylan: The 1966 Royal Albert Hall Concert" würdigt liebevoll Dylans Spuren in der Geschichte und bringt eine bezaubernde Vitalität in viele seiner am meisten verehrten Songs, einschließlich "She Belongs to Me" und "Ballad of a Thin Man"."

Yearly compilation album RADAR by KEROXEN returns with its fourth volume in the ongoing series of themed based albums showcasing the talents and misfortunes of carefully selected musical projects based or connected with the Canary Islands.

With its first volume released in 2020 aiming to promote and divulge adventurous Island based music, the Keroxen imprint now presents Vol.4 with another showcase of the various insular musical scenes made in the outermost regions – in this case, a very rare incursion outside the Canary Archipelago by way of handpicking friends and colleagues working in the further most regions we can think of. A very special showcase then, featuring the Azores Islands, Reunion Island, Canary Islands and French Guiana - a true connection of likeminded minds whom demonstrate once again that you do not need to be in an western hipster mecca to make interesting work.

The presentation format sticks to its breakable rules, with each artist offering one track per side and the full thing of course wrapped up in Pura Marquez dizzying post-tropical art.

The album opens with the Julee Cruise inspired project Akane by Tenerife’s Carolina Machado where synth arpeggios intertwine organically with her soothing voice, setting the tone for Reunion Island’s Jako Maron and his unique take on local Maloya music by way of electrifying it into a trance like looping beat. Enter French Guyana’s Daryanna Jean unique sound artistry with sampling, cutting and pasting local(?) sounds into a disorientating needle jump glitch fest. Side A eventually closes with a very Azorean take on the very English hauntological sound by borrowing those pastoral melodies and synth riffs of yesterday and transposing it to the remote Sub-Tropical fields of São Miguel island, in the Azores, courtesy of Flipping Candy.

Side B emphatically reinforces the compilation’s original concept that no matter where you are, in this post internet, post everything world, outsider music thrives and keeps raising the invisible bar, true that!

In his “Pulse Music” compositions of the mid-1970s, composer John McGuire forged a unique interpretation of European serialism. A student of Karlheinz Stockhausen, Krzysztof Penderecki and Gottfried Michael Koenig, McGuire moved to Cologne, Germany in 1970, where he become associated with the world-leading Studio for Electronic Music at Westdeutscher Rundfunk (WDR) in Cologne. Like Stockhausen, McGuire found his musical imagination both constrained and inspired by the technology that was available to him.

A conversation with sculptor Hans Karl Burgeff led McGuire to think beyond the horizon and into limitless space. For “Vanishing Points” (1985–1988), McGuire used an entirely digital set-up for the first time: a digital sequencer, eight Yamaha DX-7 synthesizers and a Studer 24-track digital tape recorder. The piece was conceived as a “sequel” to the Pulse Music series, but also a step forward from it. Whereas the Pulse Music pieces had employed steady streams of pulses, with Vanishing Points McGuire employed pulse layers that accelerate or decelerate against one another, vastly increasing the resulting rhythmic complexity.

McGuire's exploration of music technology continued in “A Cappella” (1990–1997), written for his wife, the soprano Beth Griffith, known for her recording of Morton Feldman’s “Three Voices” made in 1983. Using samples, he created a four-voice choir of voice samples and arranged them into interacting parts. The composition faced challenges due to the organic nature of the human voice compared to the precision of synthesized sounds. This process involved extensive editing and a negotiation between the "material" and the "original conception". This sort of negotiation applies as much to the composition of a single piece as it does to the work of two decades.

Xavier Boyer, the lead singer of Tahiti 80 and one of the most distinctive voices in French indie pop, returns solo with a melodic and timeless new EP entitled "Soda Coda".

After "Tutu To Tango" (2007, under the name Axe Riverboy), "Some/Any/New" (2017), and not forgetting Tahiti 80's nine studio albums, Xavier Boyer has composed five songs navigating between soft rock, folk sounds and pop experimentation. "On previous albums, I'd done everything on my own, but this time I was looking for something more lively, more organic, more collective. I also wanted to exchange ideas with other musicians.

This mini-album (the vinyl version will include five alternative versions recorded on a 4-track cassette) was created with the help of three emblematic figures from the French music scene, Mehdi Zannad (Fugu, April March, A Girl Called Eddy) on keyboards, Laurent Blot (Le Superhomard) on drums and Stéphane Laporte (Domotic, Egyptology) on mix.

Recorded between tours and studio sessions with his main band, "Soda Coda" once again confirms his talent as a melodist and his appetite for sonic adventures. The power pop of "D Day" or the lyricism of "Children Of The Sun" would not be out of place on albums by Emitt Rhodes or Richard Swift (producer of Tahiti 80's "Ballroom" in 2014). "Oh Liza" is as smooth as an Elliott Smith novelty.

The singer assumes his influences: "My aim has always been to write timeless songs without pretending it's 1975, or 1998. I want my music to remain rooted in its time." "Read The Room" blends Jamaican music and avant-garde pop with its crystalline guitars and soaring synths, while "Soda Coda" brings a touch of Soul to the EP with its distorted piano and slap-back vocals.

More than a journey or a nostalgic trip, Soda Coda is a succession of luminous songs, and as Xavier Boyer sings on the eponymous track: "I'm singing something good, I can hear this tune lighting up my path".

Mick Jenkins, lyrical hip-hop mastermind and Chicago's Finest, returns with the album "The Patience." He chose to title it "The Patience" because it was that patience that he needed to get to the point in his career where he is now.

Waiting to get free from a label that didn't share his vision was very frustrating, especially since he had to consciously hold back his musical gems in order to release them in collaboration with a partner and team that believed in his art and supported him in his vision for his music.

During this time, Mick worked on his upcoming amazing body of work that has evolved into something very special. Mick at times compares himself to a star chef, brewing up lyrics, seasoning each line to perfection. The album is bursting with offbeat rhymes, sophisticated grooves and complex metaphors. On 'The Patience', the artist shows in an impressive way that he is one of the best in his genre.

Features on the album include JID, Freddie Gibbs, Benny The Butcher and Vic Mensa, who are no less eloquent as rappers and round out the record excellently. Also the production, peppered with live instruments and many jazz influences, makes the hip-hop hearts beat faster.

Famous Last Words is a fully realised expansion of the dystopian futurism that has captivated audiences since CASISDEAD first announced himself in 2013. Over the past decade, he"s dipped in and out of the shadows, blessing fans with cult hits while maintaining his anonymity, shunning media attention and donning various masks; a rejection of the spotlight that"s helped to create folklore around a rapper who"s widely regarded as one of the UK"s most inventive lyricists. Famous Last Words is as much a sci-fi film as it is a rap record, a labyrinth of vice, crime and faded glamour. The listener steps through a portal into a realm narrated by CASISDEAD, whose command of storytelling drops you right into the underground of a city where he is the main character in a shady network of gangsters, girls and drug deals. However, Famous Last Words isn"t a story of bravado or posturing; much of the album deals in themes of loss, regret and paranoia, a persona constantly self-reflecting amongst the madness that surrounds him. The album features a carefully and idiosyncratically curated roll call of collaborators including Pet Shop Boys" Neil Tennant, Connie Constance, Kamio and Desire. The vocalists are immersed in CASISDEAD"s hallmark 80"s-inspired synthpop soundscapes, aided and abetted by a production cast that includes Stranger Things composer Kyle Dixon and producer, composer and Italians Do It Better label founder Johnny Jewel. Meanwhile, actors Ed Skrein and Emma Rigby"s narrative weaves through the record, amplifying the widescreen, cinematic experience.

For over a decade, Dean Johnson’s rustic tenor and simply strummed acoustic guitar have been perking up ears around the Pacific Northwest and beyond. Johnson has gradually built a devoted fan base — strictly through live performances and word of mouth — singing existential cowboy waltzes, ballads about wishing one could find a way out of heaven, honest confessionals, and other heartbreakers from a unique perspective. The phrase “hidden gem” would seem appropriate here, but it’s a misnomer when talking about Dean Johnson. He shines bright, in plain sight, and it was only a matter of time before people stopped to take a look. Dean’s gentle and passionate approach to songwriting has inspired many, and his work provides the listener the opportunity to believe once more that a song can be more than the sum of its parts. If you catch even a phrase of his melodies or the sobering tone of his voice, it waltzes its way into your heart like a letter written, signed, sealed, and delivered just for you. His debut album 'Nothing for Me, Please' (Mama Bird Recording Co.) was recorded at Mashed Potato Records in New Orleans with the help of Sam Gelband and Charlie Meyer, Dean’s bandmates in The Sons of Rainier; as well as Mashed Potato regulars Sam Doores (The Deslondes), Duff Thompson and Steph Green. The record is a hazy, relaxed daydream – anthems for those who know the sweetness and coldness of quiet moments, the power and the pain of love. Whether you’ve been waiting patiently these many for Dean to release these songs, or you’re just now coming across his work for the first time, the name Dean Johnson, much like his songs, won’t soon leave your mind.

If there’s a secret to time travel, Kool Keith owns the patent. Even a flying DeLorean seems too
conventional for the Bronx legend. He’d more logically orbit throughout the galaxy in a gleaming
chrome spaceship, teaching the stars and aliens new forms of originality. He is too weird to live, too
rare to die, too uniquely ultra-magnetic to be accurately mimicked. Released on Mello Music Group,
Time? Astonishing! is the latest dimensional warp from hip-hop’s premiere astral traveler. His union
with MMG producer L’ Orange finds him exploring uncharted terrain: choppy volcanic rock planets, ice
glacier moons, new surgical procedures, and fresh rappers to toss into the ether. The scalpel remains
eternally sharp. The beats glow with radioactive grit. Hard enough to knock from your car speakers,
cinematic and plutonium-propelled enough to transport you to strange terra firma. Buck Rodgers
movie serials meet boom-bap. And along for the odyssey are a cast of the best underground MC’s of
the last decade: Blu, Open Mike Eagle, Mr. Lif, J-Live, and more. These are space symphonies and
occult odysseys, fuel for wanderers, wonderers, and all the a-likes. Welcome to the new world, even
more sinister and suspenseful than the last one. We live in astonishing times: abstract, absurd, and
indelibly Kool.

Buckle up and fasten the spaceship seatbelts! The Third Room, the multidisciplinary techno project from the industrial heart of Germany, is about to fire another satellite in the orbit. A stunning various artists series between fierce meteors, bright suns, dark moons and shining comets will continue to define the Essen-based collective's sound vision which is as diverse and timeless as space itself. Convince yourselves of a well-considered, galactical curation that contains quality tracks from talents, locals and longstays.

On the first of four releases, established producers named Beste Hira, Stranger, Alarico and OFF/GRID put out a stunning yet humble peak-time record. Four laser-beaming tunes speak for themselves and mark the beginning of the next chapter in the T3R adventure.

Don't miss to ascend to higher spheres - secure your copy and pre-order one of the limited records now!

©️ 2023 The Third Room
Mastering by Ahmet Sisman (The Third Room Studios)
Artwork by Daniel Bornmann & Elisa Jauch (Duat Agency)

Repress! With all due respect to New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Miami, the epicenter of the rap universe in 2016 just may be Chicago. With young stars ranging from Chief Keef to Chance The Rapper to Lil Bibby to Vic Mensa, the Windy City continues to push the boundaries of hip-hop music and culture.

The latest artist to emerge from this hotbed of talent is Mick Jenkins, a gifted lyricist who has built a strong buzz online with a series of acclaimed mixtapes. Now, one of those collections will be available in physical format for the first time ever, with a limited-edition vinyl pressing of “The Waters” set to hit stores soon. Originally released online in late 2014, “The Water

This is the fifth of Nat’s “one-semble” recordings where he plays all the instruments himself.
This album celebrates our collective ancestors, in particular the ones who carried the Music
in their bones and blood and spread it around the Earth, from the earliest times until now.
Music crosses continents and cultures and time itself, and when it speaks of the truth it
transcends musical genealogy, and continues a timeline from the earliest sources up to the
present day. The music in the album is inspired by many things but particularly the master
musicians - John Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, Cedric Brooks and Count Ossie.

Blackfoxy is a jazz-funk group originating from Villeneuve La Garenne in the Parisian region. The group was formed in 2011 at the initiative of Kalid Bazi and Klaus Blasquiz (the singer of the legendary group Magma with Christian Vander, Jannick Top, etc.). They are notably known for the hits "Talk About Peace" (featuring Nina Attal, MB14, and Princess Erika), dedicated to the victims of the Bataclan attacks in 2015, as well as their performance on France 4 with 50 drummers on the Michael Jackson song "Don"t Stop" & "Til You Get Enough" One of their most notable features is their ability to innovate by skillfully and uniquely incorporating elements from "Blaxploitation" film music and African, Cuban, and Caribbean musical traditions into their funk, characterized by a high-quality brass section and arrangements borrowed from both 70s and 80s Funk. Blackfoxy"s music also stands out due to the complementarity of its two singers, Klaus Blasquiz (baritone and tenor, he sings over 5 octaves!) and Sista Wyndyz. Lastly, since the attacks of 2015, Blackfoxy has been involved in the movement (sponsored, among others, by Manu Katché) to promote the values of peace through music in popular neighborhoods and rural areas in France and elsewhere.