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we will be wherever the fires are lit, a sort of sequel to Tashi"s first DC release Stateless, takes the torch and storms forward, with ten improvised acoustic guitar anthems. These musical thoughts are torn from the fabric of Tashi"s life and music. "Strumming in opposition to the towers" (as he puts it) is part of an existence that is always political, even in its most abstract iterations - a truth laid bare in these deep, raw performances.

Back in 2019 when we launched Vinyl Fanatiks we dropped the first two of the Ellis Dee Project series. Well, its taken us a while but 5 years later we follow up with Part 3! And what an absolute monster release it is!

A little bit of extra info on the remix that Rennie sent me today (25.9.24):

'I was honoured to be asked to remix Dance Factor for a couple of reasons. Firstly, Roy AKA Ellis Dee was the first person in the Rave scene I met and he made the time to encourage me and believe in me and he became one of the most important DJs in the scene. Secondly, it was literally my first ever remix out of about 100. It’s a bit crazy, but back then, things were pretty crazy. I even had hair!'


b b1 | Dance Factor Rennie Pilgrem Remix)

"We're happy to announce the repress one of El Búho's more emblematic album and a key release on downtempo scene.

On Camino de Flores, his second full-length album, El Búho reimagines electronic music through the lense of the natural world and its rich soundscapes.

Drawing on the inspiration of traditional rhythms and sounds, notably from Latin America, Camino de Flores is an album that transports you to another place. Following the success of his first LP, titled Balance, El Búho is back and takes us on a journey from high mountains to cascading waterfalls, from a dusky rainforest to a crackling fire beneath a clear, star-filled sky. The album charts a pathway between traditional rhythms, the sound of the natural world, IDM electronica and a deep, enveloping dancefloor sound."

"Back in stock due to popular demand, the 11th release in our signature Brazil 45’s series came in the form of João Bosco - O Ronco Da Cuica and Antonio Adolfo E A Brazuca – Transamazônica. Two jewels from Brazil’s rich musical heritage.

On the A side, prolific guitarist João Bosco’s MPB masterpiece ‘O Ronco Da Cuica’. Originally appearing on his 1976 ‘Galos de Briga’ LP released on RCA Brazil, it had yet to have had an official 7” release. It’s an intoxicating blend of passionate vocals, feverish cuica and deftly picked acoustic guitar.

On the flip, Antonio Adolfo E A Brazuca’s track ‘Transamazonica’ is an all-time classic Brazilian jazz fusion gem. Taken from the hard-to-find 1971 self-titled LP on Odeon Brazil, it again had never been released on 7”. Adolfo was the founder of Trio 3-D and later played with Elis Regina."

A magical and inspirational collaboration between musicians from Burkina Faso - including West African griot and balafon player Seydou "Kanazoe" Diabate and guitarist Abdoulaye "Debademba" Traore - alongside French jazz vocalist and flutist Clotilde Rullaud. In the streets of Burkina Faso, the phrase "ka nana ye" can be heard everywhere. It means "it's not easy" but also implies that things will be okay. With the album Kananaye, which takes its name from this popular saying, things can only get better. Its foundational multiculturalism, conscious lyrics, intertwined traditions, and contemporary grounding are essential qualities in these times when optimism has become a survival virtue. It's not easy, but it will get better - provided we make the effort, crossing borders where others seek to close them. Clotilde Rullaud, Abdoulaye Traore, Achille Nacoulma, Seydou Diabate and Boubacar Djiga, the creators of Kananaye, are dedicated to this cause.

Dublin’s most dedicated Detroit district has just assembled a fresh set of space shuttles ready to take off. Xistence Records is known best from its true to the cause, hypnotic rhythms forged to the ethos of the classic Motown techno. The label owner Phil Robertson brings three variations for galloping grooves on whirling synth fields, with pulsating percussion here, chimey chords there, and even French Kiss-esque stabs appear somewhere. Last but not least, John Beltran joins the show with a beautiful Transmatic acidic bliss as his reimagination of ‘Lonely Moments’. Mesmerising.

Rasmus Littauer (School Of X), Musiker hinter gefeierten Releases und Kollabos mit Liss, Trentemøller, Mø und Deb Never, veröffentlicht seine neue LP "Seventh Heaven". Da der verworfene Erstentwurf nach einer Wiederholung früherer Werke klang, erweiterte Rasmus das Team und gab die Produktion in fremde Hände. So wurden die Songs mit neuer Band und dem Produzenten Søren Buhl Lassen (Lucky Lo, Brimheim) aufgenommen, was Raum für Rasmus schuf, sich auf Musik und Songwriting zu konzentrieren, während die Band School Of X' intensive Live-Energie und vielschichtige Musik in eine dynamische Performance kanalisierte, die energetische Ausbrüche mit zarten, intimen Momenten ausbalanciert. Die LP ist per Sticker versiegelt und nicht cellophaniert.

John Prine's 2016 album, For Better, Or Worse, available on vinyl from Oh Boy Records.

Featured artists include Miranda Lambert, Amanda Shires, Kacey Musgraves, and Susan Tedeschi.

John Prine's 1986 release, is available on LP from Oh Boy Records for the first time since its original pressings. Some classics on this one!

Lyrical polymath and spoken-word extraordinaire Emmeline blends genres and influences on this DVDinspired mixtape, released by Lewis Recordings. Citing both the ‘dark stream of consciousness’ and ‘early
influence of film, music, and literature’ on her creativity, West-Yorkshire born Emmeline takes us
through a musical and visual journey, of navigating her early 20s and a new move to London. Made in
collaboration with a range of exciting new production talent, such as Dom Valentino (Skepta, Greentea
Peng), John Foyle (FKA Twigs, Sampha), Cameo Blush and The Still Brothers.

a centrifugal spin collapses inward
sucked into the ground
vibrating with the quake beneath the crust
the folding repeats itself in time
an echo amid the buildings of a primordial era

with closed eyes
the shapes begin to take form
in the debris
objects clump together into conglomerates

a scream
trapped in water-retaining cells
the moss that embeds itself after
a short passage of time
you talk back
but I can’t hear you

something springs forth
somewhere

a remnant that remains

—
Strange Meridians is an album by multidisciplinary artist upsammy. It is released by adventurous electronic music label topo2 on November 21, 2024. The record is pressed on 180 grams of ICCS-certified bio-vinyl, housed in a heavy full-colour sleeve, and comes with a download-code to the full release. Mastering is done by Isabel Schröer at Scape Mastering and artwork by courtesy of Thessa Torsing and Kees de Klein. Poetry by Thessa Torsing with editing by Eelco Couvreur.

Maai proudly presents a split EP featuring two distinguished Barcelona based talents. On the A side, the Peruvian trio of JJ Beteta, Alonso Bauer and Stefan Cukic delivers a dynamic array of tracks. "Layers" kicks off with an energetic blend of dusty breaks, setting the vibe for the EP. Following this, "Go The Data" takes over with its driving acid bassline, strong rhythm, for a dark and hypnotic vibe. The trio wraps up their side with "Wonky Afthermath," a subtle yet funky combination of deep, groovy elements and breaks that keeps the energy flowing.

On the B side, Canarian artist Javier Carballo, performing under his Look Perry alias, offers a captivating contrast. "I Can't Love U" introduces a track enriched with otherworldly pads and synths, creating an immersive sonic environment. The EP concludes with "Stone Pilots", which takes listeners on a smooth journey through intricate breaks, providing a perfect counterpoint to the A side’s energetic flair. This split EP showcases a rich tapestry of local talent and diverse electronic sounds.

The making of a maiden album can be a capricious process. One moment of outright musical flow paired with another period of sustained creative struggle are feats experienced by seasoned producers the world over. So when Miraclis was forced to hole away in his makeshift studio - in the midst of a global pandemic - the stage was set for something magical. Now it will see the light of day for the very first time.

Having released two singles on Secret Teachings to critical acclaim already this year, Chilean talent Miraclis will accomplish a milestone achievement in July with the release of his debut album: Origin Of Truth.

Difficult experiences were fundamental to the creation of such work, as were Miraclis’ inherent musical interests. He explains: “Origin Of Truth had its birth during the pandemic. I created it as a way of communicating to myself the sensations and feelings that were spinning around my head at the time. I've always been inspired by Bristol trip hop, as well as classical rock, and these genres definitely contributed to the making of these melancholic tracks. In a way I wanted to fuse all the musical influences that were part of my childhood, up until this point now, so this album really means a lot to me. It was my way of communicating, when there was a lack of social contact and communication itself was hard to come by.”

It's this meditative quality that initially drew Damian Lazarus to the project. “It’s a record that has its roots in electronic music, but it’s a very alternative, very deep, melancholic album. I find it both soothing and stirring at the same time, and that’s a quite interesting juxtaposition in that it feels edgy but delicious at the same time,” says Lazarus. “The fact that this was written in this place surrounded by the most incredible desert landscapes makes this a very important piece of work to me. It doesn’t sit in any particular genre, which is why it feels right for a Secret Teachings release. It hints at so many genres that I as a DJ am quite into, and it feels like a first as it’s unique and unclassifiable. That mystical, esoteric, edgy feel makes this a perfect release for the label.”

Sonnet opens proceedings, with ghostly vocals residing next to raw instrumental elements throughout. Miraclis’ signature guitar riffs soon converge on saddened keys, paving the way for Scienter. It takes the form of an instrument-based, electronic-inspired cut, building slowly before reaching a crescendo midway through via an enrapturing acoustic solo.

Floating Child comes next, brimming with a darker intensity courtesy of broody synth pulses and rhythmic hi-hats, as Shiver arrives next. There’s a rock-leaning sensibility to the piece that gives way to earnest lyrical offerings, opening swiftly into the breakbeat-esque world of Perceptions. Hard-hitting drums act as the focal point, with electric chords adding depth and intrigue, whilst Bright continues in a similarly heartfelt vein.

Introspective pads leave us feeling pensive, ahead of Interstellar taking us on a celestial journey through warped bass tones. Acting as the LP’s penultimate number, it’s a four-and-a-half minute showcase of guitar-based musical goodness and one that perfectly sets the stage for Trapped, a closing saga of suitably emotive proportions.

Miraclis earned his stripes as a DJ under the name Max Clementi in his native Chile, as well as Spain after a stint at the Barcelona SAE Institute. Playing and writing music since his parents gave him his first guitar at age twelve, he found himself inspired by synth wave, electronic pop, trip hop, and psychedelic rock of the ‘80s and ‘90s, drenching himself in music by the likes of Massive Attack, Tricky, Depeche Mode, and Nine Inch Nails. However, it wasn’t until he had to move back to Pucón to take care of his father during the pandemic that he began working on what would become Origin Of Truth.

Serendipity seems to play a large part in Crosstown Rebels’ new label Secret Teachings. Just look at the story of how Damian met Miraclis in the first place. It involved a chance midnight encounter in Pucón, Chile at a woodland campfire after the DJ was locked out of his hotel room. This meeting of minds was the start of a remarkable friendship, where Miraclis invited Lazarus to stay at his house and break bread with his family. The two kept in touch, exchanging music and ideas as a result.

James Brown had several incredibly talented funky divas in his late 60s and early 70s stable, including Vicki Anderson and Marva Whitney. But as great as those two powerhouse singers were, Lyn Collins was the strongest hitmaker of that funky JB era. Her strong voice and commanding stage presence - which earned her the nicknames The Female Preacher and Mama Feelgood - quickly proved to be a potent addition to the People Records universe. In the spring of 1972 her second single, the driving and ridiculously funky “Think (About It)” hit the R&B music world like a ton of bricks. As fans young and old know, thanks to its timeless, relentless groove and powerful vocals, “Think” gained a powerful second life in the 1980s thanks to the hip-hop generation, fueling the platinum smash “It Takes Two,” by Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock in 1988 and additionally sampled by dozens of hip-hop and dance music artists up to the present day. But Collins was far from a one hit wonder: she was as vocally adept on ballads as she was with full-blown funk. She proves this throughout her debut album, which was released in 1972 on James Browns new People Records - the imprint's second full-length release. To wit, aside from the title smash: a powerful and emotional cover of Bill Withers "Ain’t No Sunshine"; the socially progressive "Women’s Lib"; the Gamble & Huff-penned "Never Gonna Give You Up" (originally done by Jerry Butler); and even a daring, muscular take on the song “Fly Me To The Moon,” made famous by, among others, Frank Sinatra. Throughout Think (About It), Collins shows that she was a vocal force to be reckoned with. Backed by a James Brown assembled musical crew that included Pee Wee Ellis, Fred Wesley and, of course, James Brown himself, the platter was bound to impress and succeed. And that it did.

Hybrid is a word used indiscriminately in our daily lives. This record isn't a hybrid; it's beyond hybrid, post-hybrid, so to speak. Does this phrase sound complicated to you, and are you never overly convinced by music theory and its caricatural aspect? Then forget what you’ve just read and listen to both sides of this record. You'll soon realise that these tracks are deliciously deft, drawing their essence from dub while leaving room for some skillful jazz writing. For those of you intrigued by melodies, the art of musique concrète or the exploration of dub music’s deviant angles, this record will easily find its place on your turntable.

The two sides of the record are cut with play, improvisation and effects, while leaving room for themes and ideas. If this record’s first chapter was born from a request to remix and pay homage to Jackie Mittoo, its themes tell another story. They have been declined and even reduced to an explosion point. The tracks are also driven by subtle details of musique concrète, giving the record the effect of an intimate musical production – but, above all, one of uncategorisable beauty.

In Androo’s case, this is hardly surprising. He is a craftsman who is unassailable in every respect, a poetic dynamiter and, for this reason, one of the most unpredictable musicians in Geneva (and beyond). His appetite for dynamite is perhaps an indication of his conception of music as, first and foremost, an experience. His highly personal and inventive tribute to figures from free jazz and contemporary music proves the point. But perhaps it is also an indication of his attachment to Jean-Luc Godard. You'd have to imagine Androo at his mixing desk without a pre-written script. The idea of editing infuses the record. The two sides are very much in this style and spirit: (un-)shot, meticulous, (ir-)reverent. In this respect, this record is a formidable proposition, and perhaps difficult to understand, but not striving to be understood.

Its combination of improvisation and composition is underpinned by a razor-sharp precision and dexterity that's hard to ignore, especially if you're curious about the art of sound mixing and the romantic accidents. It has a dexterity that transforms musical grids into romantic essays and sketches. A romanticism in which Androo takes us on a liberating musical experience that makes us forget the inertia of the ramping formatting of the record industry. In any case, this record is an invitation to (un-)think the category, and will delight any ear curious to wander into territories of intuition where the word hybrid no longer makes sense.

Text by Carl Åhnebrink

Japanese ambient owes a great debt to Masahiro Sugaya, whose work has been re-assessed and taken on all the more importance in recent years. The now cult musician and composer released his The Long Living Things album in 1988 for the performing arts company he belonged to, Pappa Tarahumara. Though it was overlooked for many years, it is now in sharp focus and gets a deserving reissue on vinyl for the first time ever by P-Vine which he also belonged to, and has long been overlooked by all but a few enthusiastic music lovers. One track from it was Grammy-nominated and rich of the record is minimalistic, with soft interwoven sequences that keep you afloat amongst the warming pads.

CWPT welcomes Acopia to the label with a reissue of the cult Australian bands self-titled sophomore album, available on vinyl outside of Australia for the first time.

Based in Melbourne/Naarm, Acopia’s music is a careful control of tension and release, sparseness and warmth, momentum, and space. Across ten tracks, the band’s three members move across post-punk lamentation, shoegazing DnB, smoldering trip hop and subdued electronic pop, as they carve out their own hazy world of romanticism and restraint.

The highly anticipated follow-up to the band’s stellar 2022 debut, ‘Chances’, this is a deeply emotionally sensitive record, equal parts refined and relatable, and a listening journey that is immediately understood while revealing new layers with each subsequent listen.

Alongside the physical release of ‘Acopia’, CWPT will also release two digital-only remixes of the band, courtesy of Daniel Avery and JD Twitch.

2 years after his critically acclaimed “Ultrachroma” album, Kangding Ray returns to ARA with a decisively dance- floor LP named “ZERO”.

As the artwork suggests, his different explorations and influences converge into one point on this record, where sound becomes a raw vibration, precisely engineered to bring bodies into movement.

This record marks both a return to the source of his sound in its purest shape, with hints of his debuts on the experimental label raster-noton, as well as the hypnotic journeys he is now for with his DJsets.

As an artist who is constantly reshaping his own sound in search of new forms, Kangding Ray offers here a singular take on modern dance music, driven by a visceral and futuristic approach.

“When an audio signal crosses the X-axis, there is an infinitesimal moment of silence.
ZERO is inspired by this quiet instant, a point of inversion where vibrations die and are reborn at the same time” . KR

Dennis Bovells produktive und vielseitige Karriere umfasst ein riesiges Spektrum an Musik: von Dub Poetry über Lovers Rock und Post-Punk bis hin zu Disco, Pop und mehr. Seine Produktionsarbeit umfasst so unterschiedliche Persönlichkeiten wie The Slits, I Roy, Maximum Joy, Fela Kuti, The Pop Group, Janet Kay, Saada Bonaire, Orange Juice, Golden Teacher, Steel Pulse und mehr.

Diese Zusammenstellung konzentriert sich auf die Zeit während und unmittelbar nach Bovells Engagement beim Jah Sufferer Sound System und gräbt tief, um deepe Cuts und weniger bekannte Versions zu finden, hauptsächlich aus den Jahren 1976-1980, samt eines umwerfenden und weniger bekannten Dub des ikonischen Tracks "Silly Games". Sorgfältig restauriert und remastered bei Dubplates & Mastering in Berlin, sodass diese Jahrzehnte alten Tracks makellos und dynamisch klingen und so angeordnet sind, dass sie den Hörer auf eine Reise durch Bovells Produktions- und Arrangement-Genie mitnehmen.

Die beiliegenden Sleevenotes sind das Ergebnis eines langen Gesprächs mit Dennis über diese Zeit seines Lebens, mit Erinnerungen an jeden einzelnen Track und faszinierenden biografischen Anmerkungen. Die Vinyl- und CD-Versionen weisen unterschiedliche Cover auf, wobei jedes Format ein einzigartiges Foto von Syd Shelton verwendet.

Belgian-born producer Gratts and pioneering Chicago vocalist Robert Owens first collaborated on 'Brighter Future' back in 2021 after meeting in the streets of Kreuzberg years before. The pair now join forces again for follow up 'Today', a powerful and emotive, 90s inspired deep house cut with layered backings and Owens' lilting affirmations soaring above. The extended club version takes you straight to house music's ecstatic heydays, while the twelve also includes an acapella tool for those singalong moments. On the flip, Mark Hand's slower, soulful rendition takes things into sideroom territory. Finally, 'Mount Olympus', home to the Greek deities, fuses a rattling drum machine, arpeggiated synth lines and a potent analogue bassline - with added bonus beats to bang the box and get weird!

Continuing our quest to get all of the classic early AMT albums released on vinyl, we turn to 2004’s 'Mantra Of Love’, and with the help of Makoto Kawabata’s studio wizardry, we’ve made it possible.

This latest instalment in the ‘Acid Mothers Temple Vinyl Archives - First Time On Vinyl’ series (as with the three previous SOLD OUT releases in the series) have all been meticulously put together with the help of Makoto Kawabata with the original CD artwork recreated for these vinyl editions from archive photos stored in the vaults at the Acid Mothers Temple in Osaka, Japan and the original audio remastered by James Plotkin.

Here’s what others had to say upon it’s original CD only release back in 2004 …

“Acid Mothers are strong folk. You'd think they'd tire quickly, all tucked away on their island, strewn about on tree roots while baking their lungs and throats to a knotty green tinge. But instead of waltzing through life like hippies, they manage to not only tour and put out records every year, but also to fill those albums with 30-minute jams and assorted freakouts. And while evil jam bands would fill that space with guitar work taken from the Classic Rock Manual of Clichés, Makoto Kawabata and company assault listeners with frighteningly dense walls of white noise, psychedelic swirl effects and, yes, even guitar solos-- albeit ones that are more Merzbow or Keiji Haino than Gary Rossington. Truly, AMT's endurance and threshold for cosmic lashings are both worthy of admiration.

But how much AMT can you take in one sitting? If there's anything this band has taught us-- via records such as 2002's Electric Heavyland and the ferocious Acid Mothers Temple & the Melting Paraiso U.F.O-- it's that they're not afraid to reach for the upper regions of consciousness. On Mantra of Love, they offer two titles over the course of one hour, never faltering along the way, and it's as if we listeners are just brief visitors passing through a never-ending, spontaneous group trip. For all I know, Kawabata has hundreds of hours of this stuff on his hard drive-- at any single moment, this record's sheer volume of sound is a clamor to behold. However, if you aren't dialed into that the particular space AMT inhabits (for me, it's the mystical fire-baptism standby), you might not hear their glorious noise for all the, well, glorious noise.

"La Le Lo" begins as a lengthy psychedelic ballad sung by Cotton Casino (who doubles on "beer & cigarettes"), who is accompanied by her own ghostly backing vocals. The band is playing a mantra as Casino waxes earth-mother stylings to the moon. The serenity is broken by a patented AMT rave led by Kawabata's electric sitar (!) solo. Ace rhythm section Tsuyama Atsushi ("monster bass") and Koizumi Hajime hold things together, as does the generally decent recording quality (not a given for these guys), but the real money is in effects-- lots and lots effects. Much like France's Richard Pinhas or AMT's countrymen in Les Rallizes Denudes and High Rise, the band understands the collaborative power of solo + overdriven Moog sirens and screams. And, also like those artists, Acid Mothers can go on all night if need be. About 25 minutes into this piece, any hell that hadn't already broken loose gets its due, and the band speeds to a fiery climax before winding down into glimmering astro-ambience.

The second track, "L'Ambition dans le Miroir", also begins as a minor ballad featuring Casino's haunting solo vocal. The Mothers set her up with a faux-blues drag and a thick buffer of synth-rays; when Casino actually enters, she fights for airtime with an array of falling stars and cosmic dust. However, this time there is no overwhelming solo to power the comedown. Casino intermittently coos in the background while droning horns keep the auxiliary pixie haze from evaporating. As they showed on In C and La Novia, AMT are more than adept at creating calmer storms-- listeners just have to catch them in the right light. Mantra of Love doesn't necessarily capture the most inspired moments in their canon but as usual with this band's records, it's rarely at a loss for moments of horror or grandeur.”

Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. : Cotton Casino - Vocal, Beer & Cigarettes - Tsuyama Atsushi - Monster Bass, Vocal, Cosmic Joker - Higashi Hiroshi - Synthesizer, Dancin' King - Koizumi Hajime - Drums, Percussion, Sleeping Monk - Kawabata Makoto - Guitar, Bouzouki, Electric Sitar, Violin, Hammond Organ, Speed Guru

The drums of fire scorch the age. With his young and talented Sound Limited, Takeshi Inomata heralds the arrival of the golden age of jazz rock in high spirits. Drummer Takeshi Inomata, who led the Japanese jazz scene with his precise stick work and musicality with an eye on the times, formed Sound Limited at the end of the 1960s, influenced by the brass rock music that was flourishing at the time. He said, “I wanted to fuse jazz and rock and bring together young musicians to play music with vitality. I want this group to be a group with a large scale that is not confined to the small frame of modern jazz,” he said, launching a new axis. Their first album, “The Sound of Sound Limited” (1970), became their masterpiece. It is a masterpiece that is full of energy and enthusiasm throughout the album, starting with “Theme~Mustache,” which has become one of the most beloved and iconic songs of the band.

Drums, Music Director – Takeshi Inomata

Electric Bass – Jun Suzuki

Electric Guitar – Ryo Kawasaki, Shigenori Kamiya

Flute – Toshiaki Yokota

Mixed By – Eiji Uemura

Organ – Yusuke Hoguchi

Tenor Saxophone – Takao Uematsu

Trombone – Shigemichi Domoto, Takashi Imai

Trumpet – Shunzo Ohno, Takashi Kumagai

On alene et, Michaela Turcerová, a Copenhagen-based, Slovakia born musician, takes minutiae — the tiniest scrapes and breathiest hums — and distorts them into sprawling, collaged webs that barely resemble the instrument in its natural state. Each shard, when pieced together, makes a rhythmic, undulating sound born from the subtlest motions.

Alene et marks Turcerová’s debut as a soloist, putting a spotlight on the exploratory approach she has developed on her own and across a variety of collaborations. She has long studied the quiet excavation of her instrument, pulling it apart to find a new vocabulary. To develop this language, she unearths shards of sound from the instrument, muting it or bringing out its scratchiness and grittiness. Primarily working with open-ended scores and improvisation, she is inspired by various percussive music, looking to deep sonic awareness to guide her. As a soloist, her music harkens to the abstracted electronics present across the Editions Mego catalog or the distorted ruminations of Nyege Nyege tapes. And no matter where she goes, she is constantly in the pursuit of the unknown — the hidden elements of music that come to life through experimentation and listening.

With alene et, Turcerová presents her singular language on the saxophone to the fullest. To make this music, she placed many microphones close to her instrument, zeroing in to each sound and examining it from multiple different angles. She emphasizes the percussive possibilities of her instrument, puzzle-piecing each note into pulsating webs. Each track highlights a different side of the saxophone — the bristling distortion and amplification of a column of air as it blows through her saxophone’s body, the trickling tapping of the keys as she places her fingers onto them.

At its core, alene et presents Turcerová’s curiosity. The saxophone lives many different lives within her hands, shapeshifting through the uncovering of its possibilities. She shows us how the instrument is an ever-changing entity, a distorted and blown out drone with a thousand shards poking out from inside of it. But more than just a showcase of an individual instrument, alene et feels like a statement of the act of exploration. Turcerová is an excavator, always looking for new worlds hidden within her saxophone, and leaving room for more to come alive with each listen.

His unmistakable mix of cold currents and warm melodies has made Martin Matiske a regular here at Bordello A Parigi.

Amore Galattico is the German artist’s third release with us, an intergalactic voyage with a synthesizer as a guide. The title piece is a bold, yet fragile, composition. Woven around slender drum patterns are flows and shifts, key changes and scaling notes where astral washes blend with romantic flourishes. Beats are bolstered and fortified by harmonic richness in “Cuore”, an analogue space opera of daring complexity and unsurpassable execution. Matiske’s twenty five years of experience are plain to hear in this quartet. His range and musical skill are coupled with an uncanny ability to balance contrasting tones. Glacial chords are buttressed by low juddering bass in “Heaven Knows”, the listener pulled ever skyward in this sublime work. The curtain fall maintains the cinematic and dramatic quality that underscores the EP. Striking synthlines shimmer before understated rhythms, a radiant finale on an EP that takes inspiration from the stars themselves.

Less than a year after Botanical Illustration takes patience and Skill EP, Giovanni Natalini aka CO-PILOT, comes back on Simona Faraone’s label, New Interplanetary Melodies, with the Green Machine album, which is its natural prosecution: inside it we also find the three tracks previously published by the same label in audio cassette format only (NIM001- MC).

Green Machine is a concept album, which takes up and develops the ecological issues already treated by the artist in his previous work, namely the increasingly tricky dichotomy between nature and machine and the harmful impact of humans on it.

The A side opens with the already published Botanical Illustration takes patience and Skill (A1), an 8 minutes suite in which the powerful Live drum breaks are perfectly combined with synths and vocal samples, transporting us to the tops of exotic mountains, to continue with the ecstatic Himawari (A2) that sounds like a “desert session” made on Mount Fuji, for a result of pure musical mysticism and finally, Mother Love Nature pt.1 (A3), a track that takes us back to more familiar territories, winking at the most experimental British trip hop of recent memory and Mother Love Nature pt.2 (A4) characterized by a background of modular synths and nature sounds effects that precede Giovanni’s powerful drums, underlining once again this perfect fusion of organic and synthesized sounds.

Side B opens with the psychedelic choruses of Dancing Like Fela (B1) supported by synthetic arpeggios and a frenetic drumline sounds like a breakbeat. Continuing along this side, we come to the unsettling use of vocal samples on the beautiful Halo (B2), the ethereal and danceable art-pop of Lost You - In Translation - (B3) to conclude with the evocative Playing the Zurna in Ulan Bator (B4), a track with a pressing rhythm and elegant arrangements that once again underlines Giovanni Natalini’s mastery in mixing sounds and suggestions that are apparently far away but that always find the right place.

Green Machine sounds like a valid attempt to finally find a “solid” balance between humans and nature, but it also demonstrates how the continuous mixing of sounds is the most effective way to escape from the homologation that is increasingly widespread in contemporary society.

The Iconic 80s Band, Berlin, Return with Strings Attached to Take Your Breath Away

Nearly 40 years after their founding, the Los Angeles-based synth pop group, Berlin, return with an album of their classic tracks_with strings attached. Working with a full philharmonic orchestra, Strings Attached sees the band revisit some of their classic tracks, from their formation in the early 1980s through to today, including, of course, the iconic theme to the movie, Top Gun, Take My Breath Away. Featuring the classic line-up of Terri Nunn, John Crawford and David Diamond, Strings Attached is perfect for both existing fans of one of the most legendary bands of the 80s and those who are being introduced for the first time.
Founded by bassist John Crawford, singer Terri Nunn, and keyboard player David Diamond, Berlin made its first national impression with the provocative single Sex (I'm A...) from the gold-selling debut EP, Pleasure Victim in 1982. The group was filled out by guitarist Rick Olsen, keyboard player Matt Reid, and drummer Rob Brill. Berlin's first full-length LP was the gold Love Life in 1984. In 1985, the group was pared down to a trio of Crawford, Nunn, and Brill. Berlin topped the charts around the world in 1986 with the single Take My Breath Away, the love theme from the Tom Cruise movie Top Gun, a track which won an Academy Award, a Golden Globe and which has cemented itself as one of the most memorable songs featured in a film of all time.

With a little bit of old and a little bit of new, Chicago's enigmatic Rudy De Anda is back with two tracks out on a super-limited 45. The A-side, 'Take Me For A Little While' is a cover of the Royal Jester's version of the track, taken from the Numero Group catalog. It's an up-tempo, irresistible tune in both Spanish and English. The B-side, '83,' is a brand new Rudy original recorded in his current home of Chicago. It's a collaborative effort that came naturally from building on grooves and jamming with his band. It's a taste of what's on the horizon for Rudy, something fresh, moody, and intriguing. It's an ode to 70s funk, with just the right amount of groove and low-fi charm. The two tracks compliment each other and make for a well rounded 45, while demonstrating the breadth of Rudy's sound.

Lily Seabird is a perceptive songwriter who can channel moments when everything feels raw and overwhelming into something healing and galvanizing. With Alas, the Burlington, VT-based artist's sophomore album, she confronts grief with palpable clarity on tracks that careen from delicate folk to blistering indie rock. While it's her second LP, it serves as a proper introduction to an undeniable and idiosyncratic voice. "Alas, sounds way more like me," she says. "This is the album I wanted to make in the first place." Though Seabird is now known as a solo artist and collaborator in Burlington's vibrant music community as the bassist for Greg Freeman and other acts, her journey started in Pennsylvania when she picked up the saxophone as a kid. At 14, she learned guitar and started performing as Lily Seabird. After a brief stint in New York City playing in bands, she moved to Vermont, which has been her home since 2018. "When I came to Vermont, I was playing solo a lot but then I started a band with Greg Freeman," she says. "Since 2018, it's been me and Greg and a bunch of different casts of characters have been in the band since then it's an ever-evolving thing. It's just us playing my songs."The songs on Alas, came from a particularly unmoored period for Seabird. "I wrote this album in 2021 and 2022 on the road, trying to figure out who I am," she says. "A lot of them also deal with the time when my close friend passed away. The title Alas, meant a lot to her." Even if the songs don't always directly tackle this specific loss, there's a sense of mourning in how relationships change and dissolve. Take "Grace," a reflection on female friendship, which features the lines, "I hope she's happy now she should be 25 / She taught me something that I thought I'd always hide." Elsewhere, the knotty and unpredictable "Dirge" finds her singing, "I don't know if I believe in god / I don't know if I know how to go on." Seabird and Benny Yurco produced Alas, which was recorded at Burlington's Little Jamaica Studios with Freeman and drummer Zack James (Benny Yurco). It's a quietly expansive album full of subdued, organic textures and moods. Songs like "Cavity" are lush and inviting with silky guitar and Seabird's expressive saxophone playing. The 10 songs on Alas, stretch out and leave space for introspection and deep listening with some tracks taking nearly seven minutes to mesmerizingly unfold. It's a remarkably assured and vital statement from one of the most promising new songwriters alongside peers Merce Lemon, Squirrel Flower, and Allegra Krieger."The album is about loss, coming of age, and sadness but there are also all these moments where happiness takes over," says Seabird. "It can be two things at once: life isn't just pain and sadness, there's also joy. They can all exist at the same time. Alas, is an expression of grief but it's also for letting go."

"When you wish upon a star… that turns out to be Saturn.

Previously unheard Ra culled from the archives and compiled based on their association to that children's film corporation with the cartoon rodent.

Jazz aficionados and Disney nerds alike will marvel at how seamlessly Sun Ra and his Arkestra put their own unique twist on both well-known and overlooked Disney songs. Pink Elephants on Parade takes nine songs from Disney’s storied catalog and recontextualizes them as beautiful, fun, and sometimes terrifying pieces of Afrofuturist jazz. The collection also shows further proof of how Ra was always willing to transcend conventions of jazz. Listen to the full album and you will likely never look at the Disney music catalog the same way ever again.

Originally known for accompanying Dumbo and Timothy’s colorful alcohol-induced hallucinations, this song is given a whole new life by Ra and the Arkestra in more ways than one. It also feels faithful to the original at the same time, with the cacophony of horns, drums, percussion, and cowbell resembling that of a marching band. However, the demented grandeur of the song is turned up to eleven with zany vocal lines (hence the high-pitched “What’ll I do” inflections) and other performances that somehow sound more evil and gruff here than they did on Oliver Wallace and Ned Washington’s version. Though the Sportsmen’s vocals from that particular arrangement had a certain creepiness to it, the Arkestra takes a previously innocent sounding song and makes Pink Elephants On Parade sound even more terrifying."

Repress!

You know it's going to be a heavy record when DJ / collector Mr Thing asks you to keep a look out for a copy on your next digging trip to Brazil. Add on top of that, being sampled by Madlib on the track 'Curls’ on his Madvillain album!

Taken from Waldir Calmon's 'Waldir Calmon E Seus Multisons' album on Copacabana (1970), from looking at this unassuming record cover featuring a middle-aged man sporting an impressive pair of glasses you wouldn't expect it to become the fabric to one of the songs from the iconic 'Madvillain’ album. But… like many things in life, you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. 'Airport Love Theme’, like its name suggests, falls into full-on lounge territory. It’s feel-good music made to be the soundtrack for a utopian world that never really was. Yet behind the silky-smooth groove is an addictive earworm waiting to be heard.

'Afro Son' taken from the same album, pushes things in a different direction towards a sound that is more firmly rooted in the Brazilian tradition. This quirky 60's-breakbeat-funk groove is reminiscent of French artist Jean Jacques Perrey's 'E.V.A.', also from 1970, in its melody and backbeat, where the Moog synthesizer of Perrey is replaced with a more orchestrated sound by Calmon. This track is magical, cinematic and breakbeat-laden with a hidden unknown exoticism.

Waldir Calmon had an active career in music working from the '50s right up until his passing in 1982. His career started early, forming his first ensemble at the age of fourteen, originally working in bands in nightclubs and writing jingles. He progressed in the early '50s to a long-running career working in television. In addition to his television work, he had success with his recording vocation, mixing in the same musical circles as greats such as Tom Jobi, João Gilberto and Doris Monteiro.

• Next installment in BRAZIL 45 Series.
• Sampled by Madlib on the track ‘Curls’ from his ‘Madvillain’ album.
• Quirky, cinematic, breakbeat-laden exoticism.

Am Morgen des Mardi Gras kann man sich an den kunstvollen Perlenarbeiten der Indianer erfreuen, wenn sie die Straße entlang tanzen, aber das erste, was man hört ist die Backline, bekannt als ,The Rumble". Mit sieben GRAMMY-nominierten Musikern ist The Rumble mehr als nur eine Band - es ist eine Gelegenheit, in eine ganz besondere Facette der Kultur von New Orleans einzutauchen. Bestehend aus Second Chief Joseph Boudreaux Jr. von den Golden Eagles, Trompeter Aurélien Barnes, Posaunist José Maize Jr, dem Bassisten TJ Norris, dem Gitarristen Ari Teitel, dem Keyboarder Andriu Yanovski und dem Schlagzeuger Trenton O'Neal, verbindet die Gruppe den kultigen New Orleans-Funk im Stile der Meters und der Neville Brothers - jedoch aktualisiert, modern und lebendig, wie es sich für die nächste Generation gehört - mit elektrisierenden Bläsern und der einzigartigen visuellen Pracht der Black-Masking-Karnevalstradition. Auf ihrem Debütalbum "Stories from the Battlefield" erheben The Rumble kühn ihren Anspruch als Fackelträger für die Entwicklung der Musik aus New Orleans - ein progressiver, treibender Sound, der die Konzerthallen in ganz Amerika füllt und gleichzeitig die einzigartige Tradition, die ihn prägt, fest im Griff hat. Die Musiker hier sind nicht nur Weltklasse, sie leben diese Tradition auch jeden Tag. Das zeigt sich in der gesamten Musik - von der Aufforderung ,do it for your people" in ,Take It Back" bis zur Erinnerung daran, dass man ein ,Herz aus Stahl" braucht, um zu überleben, im Titeltrack des Albums - diese Geschichten sind keine Fiktion.

1985 war das Jahr, in dem der Grundstein für die Karriere einer Band gelegt wurde, die auch fast 35 Jahre danach noch genau so aktiv ist,
wie am ersten Tag. Die Rede ist natürlich von RAGE, die zunächst als AVENGER gestartet sind, bevor es dann zur Umbenennung kam.
Nun werden die legendären Alben der Herner Metal-Legende mit Bonus-Material mit etlichen Demoversionen (inkl. bisher
unveröffentlichten Titeln) auf Doppel-Vinyls neu veröffentlicht.
„10 Years In Rage“ (1994) enthält neben dem Album etliche Bonus-Titel auf einer Doppel-Vinyl. Ein absolutes Muss für alle RAGE-Heads!

From the very beginning of her musical career, Etta James
displayed worlds of promise. As a teenager she was destined for
greatness when she rocked young America. Ballads, blues, or upbeat-you name it. Etta performed with an ability that is unsurpassed
– getting every ounce of music from each note. On this album, Etta
gives new meaning to the word “torch” with “Don’t Take Your Love
From me”, "How Do You Speak To An Angel” and “Fools Rush In
(Where Angels Fear To Tread)”. Truly, this is Etta James singing for
lovers

Dischi Fantom’s Sussurra Luce series, blurring the boundaries between text, music and voice, returns with their fifth instalment, an expanded version of Hanne Lippard’s “Talk Shop”. Sculpting a fascinating bridge between radically experimental sound practice, conceptual art, and sound poetry, across its two sides the Berlin based multidisciplinary artist taps an almost dada sensibility, delivering a suite of poems and texts where singular words and sentences are looped and repeated creating a sensory experience of the efficiency and stress found in our private as well as public life.

Roughly a year ago, we had the pleasure of exploring the first two releases from Dischi Fantom’s emerging Sussurra Luce series, Ginevra Bompiani, Caterina Barbieri, and Tomoko Sauvage’s “Il Calore Animale” and Francesco Cavaliere’s “Zoomachia Disc 1”. An extension of the Milan based cultural platform Fantom’s broad and diverse activities (exhibitions, installations, performances, etc.) across numerous artistic disciplines, the series, curated by Francesco Cavaliere and Massimo Torrigiani, delves into the “science of imagination”, working with contemporary authors to explore and blur the boundaries between text, music and voice. Now the brilliant series returns with its latest entry, the Berlin based multidisciplinary artist Hanne Lippard’s “Talk Shop”. Released in a limited edition of 200 copies and coming with an LP-sized booklet, it combines orality and textuality with the idea of loop and repetition to explore the notion of time, and it’s a stunning gesture of performative poetics that plums a startling range of subjects through its sonorous forms.

Working across the fields of text, vocal performance, sound installation, printed objects and sculpture, for more than a decade Hanne Lippard has deployed language as the raw material for her work. Working within a practice that rests at the juncture of the spoken and written word, drawing upon content appropriated from the public sphere (found text) intertwined with her own words, Lippard’s work investigates how the rise in digital communication and mediation reprograms our relationship to language, presenting the subsequent fragility of language - its flaws, oddities, and potential for misinterpretation - and its attempts to convey meaning and sense.

“Talk Shop”, the fifth instalment of Dischi Fantom’s Sussurra Luce series and Lippard’s third recorded release - building upon the ground of 2020's “Work”, issued by Collapsing Market, and 2021's “PigeonPostParis”, released by Boomkat Editions - began as a live performance. Combining orality and textuality with the idea of loop and repetition to explore the notion of time, its relationship with the world of work today, and its personification through the experience of the human body - anonymity as the spearhead of the digital economy - the conceptual underpinnings of the piece depart from the notion that the human voice has become commodified by the ubiquitous nature of contemporary productivity, and intertwined with the mechanics of capital - the voices of satnavs, smart speakers and voicemail systems - while the written word has become increasingly anonymous online.

Addressing vocal anonymity as a spearhead of the digital economy, Lippard’s “Talk Shop” - regarded by the artist as “a compilation of poems and texts where singular words and sentences are looped and repeated creating a sensory experience of the efficiency and stress found in our private as well as public life” - taps an almost dada sensibility through its unexpected layers of meanings drawn from a maximalized approach to the potential of the human voice, creating an engrossing and challenging listen from the first sounding to the last, that continues to reveal itself and unfold with every return.

Sculpting a fascinating bridge between radically experimental sound practice, conceptual art, and sound poetry, it culminates as one of the most strikingly singular creative gestures we’re likely to encounter this year. Highly recommended and not to be missed.

Hanne Lippard (Milton Keynes, 1984) explores the social forms that govern discourse. Her artistic practice, which mainly takes the form of reading and sound installations, investigates the voice as an instrument of emancipation and alienation in times of hyper-connectivity. By mixing personal thoughts and appropriating texts from advertising, slogans and newspaper articles, the text becomes a mix of private and public that regains inventiveness and authorship through the use of the voice, becoming a body of its own. Her recent artistic research has focused on the use of the female body as a container of sounds, on the conscious and unconscious automation of speech and language.

Indignation Meeting are punky rail fans from Leeds. 15-year-old Peter is the driver - he's the drummer and lead singer, writes most of the songs, and also plays bass and trumpet on the album. The rest of the crew is his dad Michael on guitar, Hugo on bass, and with Keith, Heather and Sally often along for the ride when they play out. Here at DGHQ we loved listening to their self-released debut album Trouble In The Shed so much we eventually released it on vinyl for the first time. They now have a second album! Vocalist/drummer Peter very kindly talks us through the (train) tracks_ * "The Trainspotting Song" - Now, as a train geek, I go out filming trains an awful lot, and one thing you can't help noticing whilst out in the wilds of Staffordshire or the moors of Lancashire are a whole load of unnecessary 'Private Land' signs. This song is my response_ * "The Talyllyn Railway" - The history of the Talyllyn Railway is a fascinating one that I've long since wanted to explore, due to its unique nature as the first railway to ever be taken over by volunteers. This is the result! * "The Middleton Railway" - As a volunteer at the Middleton Railway, I had felt that a song needed to be written for quite a while. However, our guitarist Michael, ended up beating me to it! * "A Model World" - It was late one night, and I was lying on my sofa, trying my hardest to gain an ounce of enjoyment from 'Hornby; A Model World.' It was proving quite hard, due to the alarming lack of substance in the programme, so instead I decided that its name was rather good, and could be the basis of a song explaining my 'model world.' And, well, here it is! * "The Fifth Black Five" - This song is dedicated to the railway preservationists of old, who spent countless hours in cold, damp, dreary sidings, all to make sure us future generations would be able to enjoy the smell of a steam train. Thanks guys! * "Case Study" - This song is a commentary on the sensationalisation of disasters, when there's a massive tragedy and people at home just sit in their comfy sofas, watching the news and drinking tea. We know what's going on, but we can just choose to turn off the TV and forget it ever happened and continue with our lives. It also relates to the dehumanisation of those disasters you experience in school, where you have to write essays on someone who's just become homeless. It seems quite heartless sometimes_ * "Loco Motives" - This song is a fictional story of a man's personal struggle with a railway company, and the drastic measures he took to fix them_ * "That Would Never Suit His Grace" - With model railways, you always seem to get a few people who can never be satisfied with a layout or a model - no matter how hard someone's tried, there's always something to improve on, and they're never nice about it either. This song is a reality check for them_ * "Small Black Shunter" - This is our second homage to Zounds - Electrification would never be truly complete without its B-side. And this B-side is the story of a little loco who wanted to see the world. * "Rhydyronen" - Slowly but surely, we're going to pick off all of the stations on the Talyllyn Railway. Starting where Abergynolwyn left off, this is the story of our second favourite station on the TR. * "Typically English Day" - This is an homage to Mark Astronaut, a true punk genius who was gone before his time. Although there were many songs we could've picked to cover, it only seemed right to punk up one of his most popular tracks, and one of the main ones that got me into the Astronauts in the first place - Typically English Day, a heart-wrenching tale of an elderly couple trapped in the middle of a nuclear war, following their last moments before their inevitable demise. * "Just For The Record" - There is too much misinformation in the media these days, and one case I found particularly egregious was the gross misrepresentation of the strikers, who aren't so evil as the media want you to believe_

Here we have the third LP by the excellent Guy Hamper Trio, featuring James Taylor on Hamond organ, and Guy Hamper on guitar (sometimes called Childish) and what a first-class LP this is! 'Instrument of Evil' in particular has a very eerie vibe. We asked the man himself what was the inspiration for it? G.H. The track is the sequel to '7% Solution', which featured on the last Guy Hamper Trio LP (with Thee Headcoats standing in as rhythm section). A 7% Solution being the amount of morphine Dr Watson administered to Sherlock Holmes. For 'Instrument of Evil' I took Sherlock Holmes' later designation of his syringe as "an Instrument of Evil". This is originally a quote from the bible- "Wicked men do at times reject God's purpose for the state, transforming the good of civil government into an instrument of evil." Point of interest: Morphine addiction happens to tie in with another aspect of the song. In the section that nods to Elmer Bernstein's main title theme to the film of the book The Man With the Golden Arm, in which the main character is also a morphine addict. Another ingredient - we added six-string bass to that section in tribute to Jet Harris - he formerly of top group The Shadows, who recorded a great version of Bernstein's classic. To top it all off the record sleeve references the fine graphics of the great Saul Bass. The track also features contributions from Tom Morley (trumpet) and Anna Jordanous (sax) . Both Were a pleasure to work with. My job at the wheel is to basically make a playground and let Jamie, Anna and Tom loose in it with very little direction, apart from pointing out the swings and location of the roundabout. I told Tom "you're a Spanish trumpeter stood on a hill in Spain." For Anna, I think we said "go low and nasty." Other titles are taken from early poetry chapbooks I made in my youth. 'The First Creature is Jealousy' and 'Dog Jaw Woman' being examples. The title 'Incense Rising From a Censer' comes from Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov, a book I really recommend. Prayer rises to God on the smoke of the incense burning in the censer. I imagine this track being some kind of antidote to 'Instrument of Evil'. They are all excellent tracks. I imagine film companies will be queuing up to use many of them.

12” paddling pool blue vinyl, is an edition of 500. CD Digifile. Following the runaway success of their critically acclaimed 2021 second album Contender, the question for fast-rising London four-piece Fightmilk was always going to be “what next?” With a tight indie-pop sound that defined their early recordings, the answer was obvious to a band who seem hellbent on the notion of evolve or die… The band originally formed in 2015 in a Brixton pub garden by Lily and Alex, who had both, separately, just been dumped and thought being in an angry punk band would cheer them up. Then they found Nick and Healey to hold the rhythm down and make them sound good. With three albums under their belt, they’ve perfected their chaotic, melodic brand of joy and rage-filled pop with full-throated yelling and sparkling guitar riffs as their trademark. They’ve graduated from angsty whippersnappers in their mid-twenties to overgrown teenage 30-somethings with mild ongoing back and shoulder pain. Their previous 2 albums Not With That Attitude (2018) & Contender (2021) marked them out as an ambitious and rising prospect, and now on their forthcoming new album No Souvenirs the band eschew their former Britpop ties and edge further into DIY punk and heavier rock influences to reveal a leaner, meaner, more abrasive side to their cathartic lo-fi anthems. Whilst collectively diving into their passion for Jimmy Eat World, frontwoman Lily Rae made a conscious decision to strengthen her “big loud yell” with influence from Alicia Bognanno (Bully), Nat Foster (Press Club), and Missy Dabice (Mannequin Pussy). “My voice is the biggest it’s ever been and I’m constantly thrilled when people are surprised at how loud I am, considering I’m so small in stature,” she grins. “Lyrically I always look to Bruce Springsteen for inspiration but I also really enjoyed the angsty candour of Sour by Olivia Rodrigo, and Kacey Musgraves’ impeccable one-liners.” There are a few genre experiments on the record—Yo La Tengo in ‘Paddling Pool’, ‘Canines’ is part The Strokes and part Neu!, and ‘Back From Tour’ was heavily influenced by long term friends Johnny Foreigner. “You could probably make a case for ‘Inferno’ having a bit of Counting Crows to it, but we were never writing to emulate,” explains guitarist Alex. “The references and touchstones just happened along the way. As far as we’re concerned, they just sound like Fightmilk - and that’s a really nice place to be nearly a decade in.” “That said, we’ve also been REALLY picky with the songs that made it onto the album - there’s probably an-other album’s worth of songs that didn’t feel right, even if we loved them. We got really good at finding the “magic thing” in each song that made it work.” Spilling over with candid lyrics about death, doomed love, and dog bites, framed by endless punk energy and the kind of full-throated riff-rock that sounds just at home in a giant stadium as it does in a sticky-floored toilet bar, No Souvenirs is a triumphant return from the band, who are equally enthused by the album. “I only realised after we put the songs together how personal to me this album was,” explains Lily. “Not just because I’m writing about extremely specific sitcom episodes in my life (getting fired from bridesmaid duty, being bitten on the arse by a dog, being relentlessly asked when I’m going to have kids), but because whilst we were making it, I turned 30. It’s a significant age for women, especially in music, because aside from being something called a ‘geriatric millennial’, there’s an unspoken rule that there’s a cut-off point for you to have ‘made it’ and after that you have to settle down and be normal.” For Lily, writing for the album also aligned with the 10th anniversary of the death of a close friend, with the resulting track ‘No Souvenirs’ lending its title to the album as a whole. “It had taken me that long to write about it in a way I felt ok with. But I realised that I couldn’t have written it before,” she explains. “I needed that distance, and that maturity, to be able to articulate those feelings. It feels to me now like the album is about scorched earth, moving on, taking nothing with you for the next ‘thing’ - and realising that getting older is a privilege.” Bringing a huge amount of energy and joy with them whenever and wherever they hit a stage, interacting with the audience is a vital part of the Fightmilk live experience. “Without people singing and dancing at us we wouldn’t have gigs at all, so we want everyone to get involved!” says Lily of the band’s future tour plans

Homer Steinweiss has an incredibly storied career in music that started when he was just a teenager. He's drummed for nearly every "retro soul" group that mattered and his distinctive stickwork helped blend the raw-but-receptive soul sound back into the mainstream via the likes of Amy Winehouse & Sharon Jones. He's now one of the most in demand drummers in the world, playing with Jonas Brothers, Clairo, Solange, Adele, and Bruno Mars to name a few. With his debut solo release Ensatina, Homer is stepping to the forefront as both musician and producer. His new record is a re­ection of who he is now and a testament to how struggle often brings about a needed change. In 2020 Homer had to reckon with considerable emotional turbulence; at the same time that his band Holy Hive broke up, a personal relationship of 20+ years fell apart putting Homer in an uncertain place mentally. The fallout was signi‑cant enough for him to seek professional help. "I was going through these super manic highs and then very depressive lows," Homer describes. "And being in all that, it's just so tough to imagine that the other side is there, that it'll be ok." But, with time, professional help, and support from friends and family, Homer made it through and has been forever changed. This album is a product of that period of his life. The ‑rst song from these sessions, "Now That It's Over" perfectly sums up Homer's triumph through those tough times. It's a song of changing perspective and contemplation with haunting vocals from Hether and Flikka. "Paul (Castelluzzo_ aka, Hether), as a friend, saw me through these highs and lows," Homer points out. "I only had the one line, 'Now that it's over, I'm alright,' but he felt that lyric so much that he wrote all these sections and lyrics and basically completed the song. It was like he was writing to me." Hether also features on album standouts "Deep Sea", a modern love song, "Start Select", a juxtaposition of inspiration and melancholy, and "Forever and Ever and Ever and Ever" which is an incredible contemporary take on the B side soul ballad. Homer uses his innate gift for bringing seemingly opposing energies together on "Racecar Driver", pairing the vocals of Hether & long time friend and collaborator KIRBY to make a genre challenging banger. KIRBY also graces the album opener "Rollin'", an airy, warm-weather invoking song that her raspy voice perfectly compliments. He puts his drumming front and center on "So Get Up!", a bottom heavy infectious track that MINOVA's vocals turn into an instant hit that is sure to smash speakers. On "Wishing Well" & "Hide It Behind the Light I'm Shining Through" Homer is joined by girl named GOLDEN, who's unique voice effortlessly ‑nds the pocket in each tune. The man on trumpet, and fellow Big Crown label mate Dave Guy, puts his incomparable playing on the album closer "Goldie" which Homer says is the part of the movie where the credits roll. Making this album was a refuge for Homer and it put him back on track. Ensatina is a glimpse into the different energies and in­uences that make Homer tick. To say he was always much more than a drummer would be an understatement, and this ‑rst solo offering is just the beginning of his next chapter.

Homer Steinweiss has an incredibly storied career in music that started when he was just a teenager. He's drummed for nearly every "retro soul" group that mattered and his distinctive stickwork helped blend the raw-but-receptive soul sound back into the mainstream via the likes of Amy Winehouse & Sharon Jones. He's now one of the most in demand drummers in the world, playing with Jonas Brothers, Clairo, Solange, Adele, and Bruno Mars to name a few. With his debut solo release Ensatina, Homer is stepping to the forefront as both musician and producer. His new record is a re­ection of who he is now and a testament to how struggle often brings about a needed change. In 2020 Homer had to reckon with considerable emotional turbulence; at the same time that his band Holy Hive broke up, a personal relationship of 20+ years fell apart putting Homer in an uncertain place mentally. The fallout was signi‑cant enough for him to seek professional help. "I was going through these super manic highs and then very depressive lows," Homer describes. "And being in all that, it's just so tough to imagine that the other side is there, that it'll be ok." But, with time, professional help, and support from friends and family, Homer made it through and has been forever changed. This album is a product of that period of his life. The ‑rst song from these sessions, "Now That It's Over" perfectly sums up Homer's triumph through those tough times. It's a song of changing perspective and contemplation with haunting vocals from Hether and Flikka. "Paul (Castelluzzo_ aka, Hether), as a friend, saw me through these highs and lows," Homer points out. "I only had the one line, 'Now that it's over, I'm alright,' but he felt that lyric so much that he wrote all these sections and lyrics and basically completed the song. It was like he was writing to me." Hether also features on album standouts "Deep Sea", a modern love song, "Start Select", a juxtaposition of inspiration and melancholy, and "Forever and Ever and Ever and Ever" which is an incredible contemporary take on the B side soul ballad. Homer uses his innate gift for bringing seemingly opposing energies together on "Racecar Driver", pairing the vocals of Hether & long time friend and collaborator KIRBY to make a genre challenging banger. KIRBY also graces the album opener "Rollin'", an airy, warm-weather invoking song that her raspy voice perfectly compliments. He puts his drumming front and center on "So Get Up!", a bottom heavy infectious track that MINOVA's vocals turn into an instant hit that is sure to smash speakers. On "Wishing Well" & "Hide It Behind the Light I'm Shining Through" Homer is joined by girl named GOLDEN, who's unique voice effortlessly ‑nds the pocket in each tune. The man on trumpet, and fellow Big Crown label mate Dave Guy, puts his incomparable playing on the album closer "Goldie" which Homer says is the part of the movie where the credits roll. Making this album was a refuge for Homer and it put him back on track. Ensatina is a glimpse into the different energies and in­uences that make Homer tick. To say he was always much more than a drummer would be an understatement, and this ‑rst solo offering is just the beginning of his next chapter.