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Strictly Limited to 450 copies each of the Picture sleeve and Picture Disc • All of these versions recorded over 4 days in March 1972 at Strawberry Studios, Chateau d’Hérouville, France and are different recordings to those released at the time .• Images on the picture disc taken from ‘top of the pops’ performance of Metal Guru • Image on the picture sleeve is backstage at ‘top of the pops’ for the recording of Metal Guru • These are the very last in the highly successful series of ‘alternative singles’ • Taken from returned tapes to the Bolan family with all royalties going to The Light of Love Foundation for the Marc Bolan School of Music & Film

Originally released on Argo Record in 1963 this was Etta James's fourth studio album. Produced by Chicago master Leonard Chess, the man who first saw the potential for James to go into a more pop-oriented direction, this essential album release consisted of her ten top record hits in the past three years. An incredible array of songs in various moods such as the "Something got a hold on me", "All I could do was cry" and "At Last", all hits that would literally make the R&B sound of the 60's

Triumph breeds confidence, and with confidence comes an expansion of ambition, a focus of ability, an emboldening of audacity. De-Loused In The Comatorium had risked everything Omar and Cedric possessed on the wildest of gambits, the most impossible of dreams: making sense of the riot of influences ricocheting about Omar’s head, and memorialising their departed friend Julio Venegas through Cedric’s magical realist roman-a-clef. It Clouds Hill shouldn’t have worked. But it did, and with that fiendish tightrope act successfully accomplished, the duo stretched the wire even further and higher, over a figurative fiery pit peopled with lions, crocodiles, piranha and other sharp-toothed beasts not yet known to man. Because how do you make great art without taking great risks? Frances The Mute was no De-Loused Part Two. For one thing, the band’s configuration had changed, in the most painful way. Shortly before the release of De- Loused, sound manipulator and founder member Jeremy Michael Ward passed away, a wound Omar says the group never recovered from. But even though his inspired fucking- with-the-sonic-parameters is absent from Frances The Mute, his spirit and influence can still be determined, the album’s concept derived from a diary Ward had encountered in his day-job in repossession. “Jeremy picked up lots of interesting stuff when he was a repo man,” remembers Cedric. “Weird things, including this diary, He let us read it a bunch of times. It was by a guy who’d been adopted and was searching to find his real parents. It was very surreal, it didn’t make much sense – the guy might’ve been schizophrenic – but it was very inspiring. It felt like how certain music helps you escape your boring every-day life. The names and scenes in the diary directly inspired these songs.” Some of the tracks pre-dated De-Loused, having their origins in early demos Omar recorded at the duo’s Long Beach home Anikulapo, songs such as The Widow and Miranda The Ghost Just Isn’t Holy Anymore. Cedric had heard these jams in their embryonic state and began working in his mind on what he could bring to them. “I was attracted to The Widow like you would be to a lover, right?” Cedric remembers. “I sang over it with Omar while we were touring De-Loused in Australia on the Big Day Out, like, ‘Okay, I’ve got something for this.’” A potent ballad, laden with emotional crescendos and evoking the epic drama of Ennio Morricone – an effect aided by an elegiac trumpet part performed by Flea – The Widow would become The Mars Volta’s first song to chart on the Billboard Top 100, capturing the album’s potent sorrow and widescreen sprawl in miniature. Indeed, the lush sound of the album, the depth of detail and breadth of instrumentation, belies its grungy roots. Having tasted the luxury of Rick Rubin’s mansion, Omar veered in the opposite direction when recording Frances, cutting the album in what he describes as “a shithole... Basically a warehouse with one little air conditioner on its last legs, awful wiring and a console you couldn’t rely on. We were there night and day – I would literally lock engineer Jon DeBaun in there. He slept on a mattress in the vocal booth.” A considerably more complex and ambitious album than its predecessor – four of its five tracks lasted over ten minutes in length, with its closing epic Cassandra Gemini spanning over half an hour – Frances The Mute wasn’t recorded “live” by an ensemble, but with the individual musicians coming into the “shithole” and recording the parts Omar had scripted for them separately. “They had to have absolute trust in me,” Omar remembers, “Like actors trust their director.” In addition to the core band – now fleshed out with incoming bassist Juan Alderete, and Omar’s brother Marcel on keyboards and percussion – the album featured guitar solos from John Frusciante, saxophone and flute by future member Adrian Terrazas-Gonzales, a full string section, and piano played by Omar’s hero, salsa legend Larry Harlow. “It was a childhood dream come true,” Omar says. “We recorded with him in my hometown in Puerto Rico, and my father flew in to watch the session. Larry was a perfect gentleman, and a very lively spirit.” The album’s fevered intensity infected even the staid string section, Cedric remembers. “When they performed the part on Cassandra Gemini, ’25 wives in the lake tonight’, one of the guys in the orchestra played so hard he broke his bow, this real old, antique bow. And you could see his ‘classical’ side come out – like, ‘I broke this playing a fuckin’ rock song??’ He was pissed off. But I was like, ‘Fuck yeah, man, that’s on the record! You’ve got to realise things like that are cool.’” The album also features field recordings of “the coqui of Puerto Rico” during the opening minutes of Miranda That Ghost Just Isn’t Holy Anymore. “We took a page out of the Grateful Dead’s book there,” laughs Cedric. “They recorded air. We recorded fuckin’ frogs in Puerto Rico.”

Legendary Utrecht DJ and producer P.A. Presents (Peter Aarsman) returns with his first new release since 2000 with this vintage techno stunner, Swirling Gas. This EP also marks the first new music on U-TRAX in more than 21 years, kicking the label s comeback into a higher gear.
Peter ironically is the only artist on U-TRAX that actually is born and bred in the city of Utrecht. Even more irony lies in the fact that he hasn t lived in the city (or stadsie in Utregs, the local dialect) for the past 25 years.
Peter knew he wanted to be a DJ since he was ten years old, in a time when this was still a very unusual career to dream about. Long before house music had landed in Europe, Peter was fiddling around with disco and italo 12 -es and all those years of training is what made him the superior DJ that he still is today. In terms of skills, flair, energy and feel for the dance floor, there are probably not a lot of DJs that can rival with Peter.
While the era of house of techno of the late 80s and the 90s brought him countless DJ gigs, his reputation didn t cross the city borders much, until he bought his first gear and started producing techno music himself. Again, his DJ background proved helpful with producing his tracks, as most of his tracks are dancefloor orientated and usually have an impeccable timing.
Peter debuted with the mini-album Salicylic Acid on U-TRAX in 1993, followed by the Flight Stimulator EP a year later. Both are classics today, but neither brought him as much fame as his 12 Entangled did on Deviate, a record label that was started by a couple of our friends from Utrecht a year prior to U-TRAX. Entangled made it to many charts and compilation albums, including Carl Craig s mix CD as part of !K7 s DJ-Kicks series.
Besides two releases on U-TRAX and three 12 -es on Deviate, Peter recorded a full length album for the latter label. Unfortunately, before the album ever saw the light of day, Deviate closed their doors and the tracks remained on the shelves for the next 17 or so years. These tracks still sound surprisingly fresh and original today and we are super excited to be able to release some of them on this Swirling Gas EP!
The title track Swirling Gas obviously gets its name from the documentary sample that the track kicks off with. The almost heartbeat-like electro rhythms, layered choruses and dreamy synths will give you goose bumps all the way to the soles of your feet.
Raw is quite another thing, but way more complicated and sophisticated than the title suggests. An in-your-face electro bass drum pattern supports layer after layer of additional rhythms, some even touching on salsa, and then big fat layers of pulsating synths take you away into deep space. A unique track that will instantly reward the DJ that has the guts to play it for her/his audience.
Drum Magic on the flipside is exactly that: a magic techno trip built around complicated syncopated drum rhythms, which should serve the adventurous DJ well as a foundation for mixing all sorts of weird stuff on top of. We can t wait to see videos appear with creative mixing ideas.
Final track Freaky is opening with some heavy pounding, yet jumpy beats before it opens up into a bit of a space trip around the 3 minute mark. Though the track has a touch of the Basic Channel sound, its echoing synth tones are very distinct and will light up any venue, no matter how big.
All tracks have been revamped and edited into more current lengths by DJ Zero One, blessed by DJ White Delight and mastered by Thee J Johanz. Label art by Bonk Artwork.

Legendary Utrecht DJ and producer P.A. Presents (Peter Aarsman) returns with his first new release since 2000 with this vintage techno stunner, Swirling Gas. This EP also marks the first new music on U-TRAX in more than 21 years, kicking the label s comeback into a higher gear.
Peter ironically is the only artist on U-TRAX that actually is born and bred in the city of Utrecht. Even more irony lies in the fact that he hasn t lived in the city (or stadsie in Utregs, the local dialect) for the past 25 years.
Peter knew he wanted to be a DJ since he was ten years old, in a time when this was still a very unusual career to dream about. Long before house music had landed in Europe, Peter was fiddling around with disco and italo 12 -es and all those years of training is what made him the superior DJ that he still is today. In terms of skills, flair, energy and feel for the dance floor, there are probably not a lot of DJs that can rival with Peter.
While the era of house of techno of the late 80s and the 90s brought him countless DJ gigs, his reputation didn t cross the city borders much, until he bought his first gear and started producing techno music himself. Again, his DJ background proved helpful with producing his tracks, as most of his tracks are dancefloor orientated and usually have an impeccable timing.
Peter debuted with the mini-album Salicylic Acid on U-TRAX in 1993, followed by the Flight Stimulator EP a year later. Both are classics today, but neither brought him as much fame as his 12 Entangled did on Deviate, a record label that was started by a couple of our friends from Utrecht a year prior to U-TRAX. Entangled made it to many charts and compilation albums, including Carl Craig s mix CD as part of !K7 s DJ-Kicks series.
Besides two releases on U-TRAX and three 12 -es on Deviate, Peter recorded a full length album for the latter label. Unfortunately, before the album ever saw the light of day, Deviate closed their doors and the tracks remained on the shelves for the next 17 or so years. These tracks still sound surprisingly fresh and original today and we are super excited to be able to release some of them on this Swirling Gas EP!
The title track Swirling Gas obviously gets its name from the documentary sample that the track kicks off with. The almost heartbeat-like electro rhythms, layered choruses and dreamy synths will give you goose bumps all the way to the soles of your feet.
Raw is quite another thing, but way more complicated and sophisticated than the title suggests. An in-your-face electro bass drum pattern supports layer after layer of additional rhythms, some even touching on salsa, and then big fat layers of pulsating synths take you away into deep space. A unique track that will instantly reward the DJ that has the guts to play it for her/his audience.
Drum Magic on the flipside is exactly that: a magic techno trip built around complicated syncopated drum rhythms, which should serve the adventurous DJ well as a foundation for mixing all sorts of weird stuff on top of. We can t wait to see videos appear with creative mixing ideas.
Final track Freaky is opening with some heavy pounding, yet jumpy beats before it opens up into a bit of a space trip around the 3 minute mark. Though the track has a touch of the Basic Channel sound, its echoing synth tones are very distinct and will light up any venue, no matter how big.
All tracks have been revamped and edited into more current lengths by DJ Zero One, blessed by DJ White Delight and mastered by Thee J Johanz. Label art by Bonk Artwork.

New Zealand dreampop luminaries French For Rabbits have dedicated nearly a decade to creaming warmly detailed and expansive music together. Their third, prophetic, LP The Overflow is set for release via Reckless Yes (UK), AAA Records (NZ/Aus), and A Modest Proposal (Italy) is described by the band as their most “immediate and honest” record to date. The Overflow draws on the influence of contemporary artists Laura Jean, Hannah Cohen and Hundred Waters alongside the storytelling of folk and rap music, and even references 90’s cultural touch points such as Moby, Enya and The Lion King. Whilst its inspirations are diverse-the result is a singular album that is confident in its delivery. The album follows on from their elegantly stated second LP The Weight of Melted Snow and their 2014 break-out Spirits, which received millions of streams, and song placements everywhere from the Vampire Diaries to Netflix’s Never Have I Ever TV series. On their new album, the group, led by Brooke Singer, sweeps forward with their most dazzling body of work to date-from the introverts’ anthem ‘The Outsider’ to the unfurling end-of-the-world statement piece “Nothing in my Hands”. Written and recorded mostly in 2020 in Wellington, the songs on The Overflow cover a wide range of topics, with the common threads of introversion and anxiety woven throughout. Yet, on first listen, you could be forgiven for mistaking the album’s subject matter for something lighter and more upbeat, resplendent with featherlight vocals and delicate layers

Polish beats-wizard Emapea returns to Cold Busted for a quick double-shot of crucial dub and phat riddims. Released on 7-inch vinyl, Emapea’s new single celebrates the return of the good life with choice sounds for ‘zoning out’ in the global dancehall. “Same Old Same Old” occupies the A-side with a potent downtempo skank and an infectious sing-song vocal. The vibe is introspective and heady, as echoed percussion swirls through the soundsystem speakers. Flip the wax for “Drop the Bass,” a deeper dancefloor cut with a prominent boom-bap beat and bouncy bass line. Maximum dub pressure is exerted, with splashes of delay effects and rhythmic flourishes as an emcee gives “direction to the entire planet.” In the hands of a top selector, Emapea’s new tracks are ready to move the soul.

Critically allaimed debut full-length available for the first time on vinyl. First pressing of 3,000 on “pear” vinyl. Originally released in 2006 on Absolutely Kosher Records, Shut Up I Am Dreaming is the first full-band effort from Montreal’s Sunset Rubdown, a project previously reserved for the solo experiments of Wolf Parade’s Spencer Krug. Alongside Michael Doerksen (guitar), Jordan Robson-Cramer (drums, keys, guitar), and Camilla Wynne-Ingr (keys, percussion, vocals), Krug and his new band recorded the songs in just five days with the help of engineers Jace Lasek and Dave Smith at Breakglass Studios. Though met with praise by fans and critics alike, placing 15th on Pitchfork’s Top 50 Albums of 2006, Shut Up I Am Dreaming was never made available on LP. Now, fifteen years later, Krug is having the album pressed to vinyl via his own tiny record label, Pronounced Kroog. Remastered for vinyl at Greymarket Mastering by Harris Newman (the same engineer who mastered the original), and with original cover art by Matt Moroz reformatted for LP jacket, this first-ever pressing of a now cult classic will be available this winter. After a decade and a half of earnest inquiries, Sunset Rubdown fans are finally able to add Shut Up I Am Dreaming to their record collections. About time!

Brand new music from Warpaint's jennylee (Jenny Lee Lindburg). Newtopia is the first release of a series of singles, culminating in full album to come on RSD 2022.

Feeling is at the core of jennylee’s music. Having spent the past decade defining the grove that allows Warpaint the luxury to drift between genres and eras, jennylee’s solo record proved more loose, open, and driven by the rhythm of the heart.

Critically acclaimed LA quartet Warpaint have been confounding expectation since the band’s inception in 2004. Releasing their third album ‘Heads Up’ to rave reviews in 2016, Warpaint remain on top of their game; cementing themselves as one of the bands of a generation.

Acid lovers unite! Techno House Connoisseurs release their 2nd record with 5 tracks that blanket the acid genre offering something for everyone. Acid extraordinaire Acidulant kicks things off with a jacking, stompy monster meant for the warehouse with 808 beats and a crispy 303 throughout.

Jon Lee of Tilted records in Seattle is next up and his production shines with a moody, tech house gem that is sure to get the floor heated with it's warpy and bleeping layers on top of rubbery acid lines. A real treat!

Canada's Jay Tripwire shows why he is at the forefront of the production game with his acid ripper Kneel to Zod. This track oohs and aahs with it's heavy percussive rhythms and psychedelic leanings. A brilliant 303 wobbles throughout the 8 minute workout with dreamy synths and a wicked breakdown. More dance floor magic from Mr. Tripwire.

Label CEO Dave Zam AKA Space Ace revisits his 2019 Acid Odyssey release and reworks the original into a bass heavy punisher. Adding on more percussion and layers of 303 with dramatic deep synths it promises a glimpse of what the label seeks to achieve.

Lastly, LA's Praus brings another cosmic diamond to THC records with Luigi's Illusion. Praus continues to impress with lush layers of atmosphere and rich percussive elements followed by a whopper of a baseline with wiggling acid all throughout. Buckle up.

When Berus debuted in January 2021 on Kommerz Records with his “Voyage EP”, he had no idea how precise the title would be for the coming months. A little over a year before the release of “Voyage” the Berlin based multi-instrumentalist and producer had taken his focus away from his, more than a decade lasting, house and techno career towards a new sound, inspired from neo soul and hip-hop. Whilst his electronic projects found home on Kerri Chandler's Madhouse Recordings and DVS1’s infamous Mistress and gained his moniker Frag Maddin worldwide attention, it was part of his progress to focus on himself and Berus, his real name. He took this step not knowing it would lead him into a dark journey of self revelation, identity finding and for the foremost new hope: blue hope.
Berus was born to a Zaza family in Kurdistan, which eventually migrated to Germany escaping prosecution and discrimination of the nationalist regime in Turkey. The family settled in Hamburg and Berus grew up to be a New Release Information
musician. He played the drums, formed teen punk bands and started producing at an early age experimenting and shaping his future as an artist.
Since the beginning of his career Berus releases can be seen like a diary, always expressing his very personal state at the time. For the work on “Blue Hope” two main topics fall into the production of the album: love relationships and seeking identity.
There is a blue melancholy and reflection leading through the album. On “Talk to Me (Karþýlýklý)” Berus opens up about his feelings of true love and the need to set free when they are not answered. Whilst the incredible Mulay who is featured on “Holy Waters” answers with her female perspective. And there is hope. The hope (“Dream On”) and fears (“Being Alive” feat. Sedric Perry) of a young migrant generation. “Blue Hope'' is a coming of age story that’s relatable and yet unique, honest but vulnerable and for the foremost: 100% Berus.
The album is a neatly curated mixtape and delivers a wide range of styles like the jiggy sounding Mike Nasa on “On Me” all the way to “Wholesome” on which Barne delivers a John Mayer-esque performance.
On “Blue Hope” Berus gathered a mixture of old friends and new talent around him to produce the record. The outcome is an LP referencing different influences without the use of any samples.

Killswitch Engage first shook the structure of heavy music upon climbing out of snowy industrialized Western Massachusetts in 2000. A musical outlier, the band pioneered a union of thrashed-out European guitar pyrotechnics, East Coast hardcore spirit, on-stage hijinks, and enlightened lyricism that set the pace for what the turn-of-the-century deemed heavy. 2002’s Alive Or Just Breathing became avowed as a definitive album, being named among “The Top 100 Greatest Metal Albums of the Decade” by Decibel and celebrated by everyone from Metal Hammer to Revolver. Not only did they bust open the floodgates for dozens to follow, but they also garnered two GRAMMY® Award nominations in the category of “Best Metal Performance” in 2005 and 2014, respectively, and gold certifications for The End of Heartache (2004) and As Daylight Days (2006). The group landed three consecutive Top 10 debuts on the Billboard Top 200 with Killswitch Engage (2009), Disarm The Descent (2013), and their career high best bow at #6 with Incarnate (2016). The latter two releases would also both capture #1 on the Top Rock Albums and Top Hard Rock Albums charts. Their total streams have exceeded half-a-billion to date. Along the way, the boys have shared stages with some of the biggest acts in the world and have sold out countless headline gigs in six continents across the globe.
In 2019 the quintet—Adam Dutkiewicz (lead guitar), Joel Stroetzel (rhythm guitar), Mike D’Antonio (bass), Justin Foley (drums), and Jesse Leach (vocals)—sharpened every side of this signature sound on their eighth full-length and first for Metal Blade, Atonement. The vision they shared two decades ago crystallizes like never before as evidenced by the first single “Unleashed,” “The Signal Fire” (feat. Howard Jones), “Crownless King” (feat. Chuck Billy), and “I Am Broken Too.”

NOW Music is delighted to introduce our new sub-brand ‘NOW Presents…’. This new series starts with ‘NOW Presents… The 1970s’, the first-ever NOW vinyl boxset featuring 5 LPs uniquely designed to reflect the era.

The boxset is a musical time capsule of the decade that saw so many different genres find chart success. Across its 74 tracks over 10 sides of vinyl, the massive hits sit alongside enduring classics from each year. The set not only includes 5 beautifully designed front covers on the individual albums (that slot into a rigid slip case), but also features track by track annotations with chart positions and facts about the artists and songs.

Each year, 1970-1979 is presented as 1 side of each LP… Kicking off with the iconic ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’ by Simon & Garfunkel from the biggest selling album of the year, and of the decade. 1970 also includes Motown classics from Stevie Wonder, Smokey Robinson & The Miracles, and the debut hit ‘I Want You Back’ from the Jackson 5.

1971 includes the seminal ‘What’s Going On’ from Marvin Gaye, alongside Elton John’s breakthrough – the timeless ‘Your Song’, Rod Stewart’s breakthrough ‘Maggie May’, and The Who’s defining rock anthem ‘Baba O’Riley’.

The charts in 1972 began to reflect the popularity of ‘Glam Rock’ – and ‘Virginia Plain’ by Roxy Music, and ‘Metal Guru’ by T. Rex are included, as is the David Bowie-produced ‘Perfect Day’ from Lou Reed.

‘Killing Me Softly With His Song’ – one of the most beautiful songs, and vocals ever from Roberta Flack opens 1973’s side – and is joined by, amongst others, Billy Joel’s signature song ‘Piano Man’ and Bob Dylan’s ‘Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door’.

1974 celebrates Queen having their first Top 5 single with ‘Killer Queen’, and title tracks from two of the decades’ biggest selling albums: Paul McCartney & Wings with ‘Band On The Run’, and ‘Tubular Bells’ from Mike Oldfield.

John Lennon released ‘Imagine’ in 1971 – but it became a UK hit in 1975, and so, starts this side… and finds space for some of the year’s perfect pop from Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, David Essex, 10cc, and the biggest hit ‘Bye Bye Baby’ from Bay City Rollers, at the peak of their popularity.

ABBA enjoyed 7 UK Number 1’s in the 1970s, and their biggest was the enduringly popular ‘Dancing Queen’ which leads into 1976. Electric Light Orchestra had a huge hit with ‘Livin’ Thing’, as did Thin Lizzy with ‘The Boys Are Back In Town’ – plus Joan Armatrading emerged with ‘Love And Affection’.

1977 saw Fleetwood Mac release their mega-selling album ‘Rumours’, and from it ‘Don’t Stop’ is here, as is Donna Summer’s ‘I Feel Love’ – one of the most influential dance tracks of all time – and one of 1977’s favourite TV stars, David Soul, enjoyed a #1 single with ‘Don’t Give Up On Us’.

With ‘Wuthering Heights’, Kate Bush not only had 4 weeks at number 1 in 1978, but became the first female artist to achieve this with a self-written song. The Jam, The Boomtown Rats and Siouxsie And The Banshees all found consistent success as Punk & New Wave established new chart stars.

1979 concludes the set and opens with the iconic ‘London Calling’ from The Clash, and includes two of the biggest bands of the era, The Police and Blondie. A couple of years later the first video played on MTV would be ‘Video Killed The Radio Star’ from The Buggles – and it’s fitting that this is the final track on the collection, a #1 in late 1979 – it signposted the synth-pop wave that would define the early 80s…. (but that’s a different box set).

"UMC celebrate the 50th anniversary of The Band’s classic fourth album, Cahoots, with an assembly of newly remixed, remastered and expanded 50th Anniversary Edition packages, including a multi-format Super Deluxe 2CD/Blu-ray/1LP/7-inch vinyl box set along with a 2CD and 180-gram half-speed-mastered black vinyl. All the Anniversary Edition releases were overseen by principal songwriter Robbie Robertson and sport a new stereo mix by Bob Clearmountain from the original multi-track masters. The box set and CD configurations boast a bevy of unreleased recordings, including Live at the Olympia Theatre, Paris, May 1971, a rousing bootleg partial concert consisting of 11 tracks culled from the initial throes of a European tour that found The Band perched at the top of their live game; and early and alternate versions of “Endless Highway” and “When I Paint My Masterpiece” along with six other early takes, outtakes, instrumentals, and stripped-down mixes.
Exclusively for this box set, Clearmountain has also created new Dolby Atmos and 5.1 surround-sound mixes of both the album and four bonus tracks, presented in high resolution on Blu-ray, alongside the new stereo mix. Every new audio mix has been mastered by Adam Ayan at Gateway Mastering. The lift-top box set also includes an exclusive reproduction of the Japanese pressing of The Band’s 1971 7-inch vinyl single for “Life Is A Carnival” b/w “The Moon Struck One” in their new stereo mixes; a 20-page booklet with new notes by Robbie Robertson and extensive insider liner notes by Rob Bowman; three classic photo lithographs, one each by Barry Feinstein, Richard Avedon (his infamous eyes-closed group portrait from the back cover) and noted New York artist/illustrator Gilbert Stone (who painted the still stunning stretched-out portrait of The Band on the album’s front cover); plus a wealth of additional material and other historical data from the original recordings sessions. The limited-edition 180-gram black vinyl release that features a tip-on jacket also contains a photo lithograph by Barrie Wentzell that’s unique to the package."

British duo The Boy Least Likely To are not new to Christmas music. It started in 2005 with a charming cover version of ‘Little Donkey’ on a give away CD single, followed three year later by the first Christmas original they recorded, ‘The First Snowflake’, that made it into an episode of Grey's Anatomy. In 2010, the band released the album ‘Christmas Special’, with mostly originals, including the single ‘George And Andrew’, that came with a much watched and liked video. Last year, The Boy Least Likely To released a new Christmas song ‘It Will Still Be Christmas’, that reflected the difficult time the world was going through in 2020. What was still lacking in The Boy Least Likely To Christmas discography was a Christmas 7”. That is now also taken care of, as the band recorded two new Christmas songs for the ninth edition of the Snowflakes Christmas Singles Club. The nostalgic sounding original ‘Two Christmases’ is typical for the somewhat bittersweet nature of many of the duo’s songs, as it is about a recently divorced couple who, for the first time, will celebrate Christmas separately, one after the other, so that their children can celebrate Christmas with both their parents. On the flipside of the record, The Boy Least Likely To rework Shakin’ Stevens number one hit ‘Merry Christmas Everyone’ into an uptempo cross between indie pop and western swing. The record comes on white vinyl and is limited to 300 copies.

The Boy Least Like To are composer/multi-instrumentalist Pete Hobbs and lyricist/singer Jof Owen, both originally from Wendover in Buckinghamshire, England, who met at school and began making music together in 2002. They debuted in 2003 with the 'Paper Cuts' 7” on their own label To Young To Die. In 2005 the duo released their first album, 'The Best Party Ever', that made it into Pitchfork's top 50 albums of 2005. Three more albums followed (2009's 'Law Of The Playground', 2010's 'Christmas Special' and 2013's 'The Great Perhaps') and in 2018 the career spanning collection 'The Greatest Hits', including classic tracks like 'Be Gentle With Me' and 'Hugging My Grudge' was released. Their music, once described in Rolling Stone as sounding like what would happen "if all your childhood stuffed animals got together and started a band.” incorporates influences from all over the indie landscape (twee pop, indie country, jangle pop, piano pop) and blends it into something that is unmistakingly To Boy Least Likely To – often joyous and uplifting, sometimes melancholic, with lyrics that reflect our everyday fears and anxieties, as it’s not all sunshine in our lives. In 2021 the band celebrated the slowly opening world by releasing a new digital single, 'Get Into The Summer', a joyous burst of fresh energy, showing that the band’s music is for all seasons

“And now for a gentleman who’s come all the way from Kingston, Jamaica and a place called Cling Cling Avenue. We present to you the one and only, the Originator, the Godfather, Daddy U Roy!”

U Roy had visited Brighton before but there was something special about that balmy night in August 2017, when he walked out on stage at the Komedia to a hero’s welcome and immediately got the crowd cheering and dancing. There was so much warmth and excitement generated that night, and it’s all captured on this final live album of the reggae superstar’s illustrious career.

U Roy wasn’t quite the originator, but he was the first Jamaican deejay to dominate the Top 3 places on both radio stations and turn his predecessors’ simple exhortations into an artform – one that evolved into a global phenomenon. It was his performances on King Tubby’s Hometown Hi-Fi that made him the talk of Jamaica and led him to Treasure Isle studio, where he voiced hits like Tide Is High and Wear You To The Ball. From then on his catchy, uplifting rhymes could be heard on radios and jukeboxes throughout the island, as well as from behind the control tower of his King Stur Gav sound-system, where MCs like Josey Wales, Brigadier Jerry and Charlie Chaplin learnt their craft. The veteran deejay, who died in February 2021, continued recording and touring into his late seventies, and without abandoning either his musical standards or Rastafarian beliefs. At his peak, U Roy voiced for Jamaica legends like Lee “Scratch” Perry, Bunny Lee and Channel One, in addition to several European labels. What most of his recordings have in common is a sense of hope and often joy, because even Get Up Stand Up is delivered with optimism. They are the qualities that come across on this life-affirming set, recorded in front of an appreciative audience, and backed by some of the UK’s finest reggae musicians.

Back in 1994, when Lambchop first lurched lackadaisically into public view, they seemed to many people freakish, outlandish, destined at best for the pages of photocopied fanzines and the graveyard hours of specialist radio stations. A sprawling collective of Nashville musicians —eleven were credited on the sleeve of I Hope You’re Sitting Down / Jack’s Tulips, one of them apparently responsible for “open-end wrenches” —they’d named themselves after a sock puppet, inexplicably given their album two titles, and stuck a painting on the cover of a small, barefooted child holding a dog whose cock and balls are on proud display. Perhaps to counteract this bold depiction of canine masculinity, the inner sleeve offered a black-and-white shot of what the more refined sometimes call a “lady garden.” The back cover offered a painting detail of a wedding dress. So far, so weird.

Where Lambchop brought us was somewhere so singular and bewilderingly gripping that — to perhaps no one’s greater surprise than
the band themselves, whose homeland remained baffled for quite some years to come — the album ended up in British music paper NME’s Top 50 Albums of the Year. In case anyone were to consider this an anomaly, France’s similarly influential Les Inrockuptibles placed it at number 25 on their own list. Not bad for a band who had gathered since the mid-1980s, once a week, purely for pleasure, in that smoky, dimly lit basement. Not bad, either, for a record whose sessions were initially only expected to produce enough material for a handful of 7 -inch singles. Disheveled yet tender, anarchic yet intricate, I Hope You’re Sitting Down / Jack’s Tulips instead provided the springboard for a career — still ongoing, despite repeated reinventions, and still compelled by stubbornly freakish, outlandish intentions — during which Lambchop’s ever-changing line-up has continued to confound expectations. Wagner, meanwhile, remains one of our most cryptic but crucial voices, an authentic poet of the magical banal. Sure, it was weird here, but it was wonderful, too. Over a quarter century later, it still is.

Black vinyl pressing of the now sold out RSD 2020 reissue.

Cascade was originally released oct 1993 the first single from the now highly regarded LIFEFORMS album. Cascade went on to chart in the UK top 40 at No.27 and has continued to be regarded as an early piece of classic Electronica. Twenty-seven years later FSOL rebuild and create ten new compositions inspired by the original. The familiar electronic swamp of FSOL and engineer Yage can be heard as the tracks journey through fragmented melodies of the original composition.