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Michel Legrand was one-of the most gifted musicians of his generation. Born in a musical family, he studied at the Conservatoire in Paris where his precocious talents revealed themselves. Everyone noticed his entry into the jazz world in 1954 with an album of French popular songs for which he wrote jazzy arrangements. That first album’s success gave Legrand the right to make an album of his own with Columbia (Philips making a deal with Columbia US). This new album, entitled 'Legrand Jazz', was a sequel featuring legrandissime arrangements of American jazz standards. You could already, and even with tunes heard a thousand times, hear that distinctive Legrand style and the phrases, themes and leitmotifs that later appeared in 'Umbrellas of Cherbourg' or 'The Young Girls of Rochefort'. These album’s four sides feature all the ingredients composing Michel Legrand style that still “fills the world with envy.”

“After all is said and done, after 30 years, after a
pandemic which shattered the world, after
thousands of kilometres travelled and many more
thousands of notes played and sung, what
remains?
“A deep love and respect for great music and the
greatness in music, a deep love for the humanity
that is brought to life by it, a deep appreciation for
the gift of friendship and for the power and
resonance that brought and kept us together all
these years, and for that curiosity and passion, that
meticulous quest to unveil the deepest mysteries
of music, that drives us always onwards.
“Finally, we’ve given it a name: ‘Afterallogy’.” - Noa
LP pressed on 180g vinyl.

Five years on from Birdy’s last studio album ‘Beautiful Lies’, it may sound like a long break between albums but for Birdy, taking time to stop, experience the world and find out who she really is, was a necessary circuit break. Travelling to Nashville, home to the greatest heartache songs ever written and visiting LA drawing from classic artists Joni Mitchell and Nick Dave was the perfect way to seek inspiration. These gorgeous surroundings and collaborators seemed to know, instinctively, how to draw the words out from Birdy imbued Young Heart with strokes of the artists who had gone before.

‘Young Heart’ is quite the departure from Birdy’s previous album, 2015’s dramatic Beautiful Lies. Where Beautiful Lies was a fairy tale, Young Heart is a gritty realist portrait of the artist in pain, looking for the light.

Speaking of Young Heart, Birdy says: I’m so proud of this album, my last record was a lot more theatrical–there was a lot going on, it was a big production. Whereas this is quite stripped back -anything that didn’t need to be there, isn’t. There’s no decoration. This album just feels very personal – I’ve grown up a lot over the past five years and have experienced new things that have shaped my understanding of the world, but also of who I am as an artist. This album means a lot to me -I want to protect it.”

Some fresh material from Olivier Romero is always welcome here . Two new tracks with his special vibe between minimal and house’s micro voices .This time , the collaboration for the remix is coming from Paul Walter with 2 different versions.Sure that every one will find a preference in these 4 differents tracks that made an eclectic release!.

Just in time for the holidays comes a brand new Christmas classic from Academy Award-winning composer Michael Giacchino (Up, Ratatouille & Lost) and if the world ever needed a shot of positivity right now then this is it!

The idea of writing a Christmas single happened whilst hosting a Christmas party with Richard Kind at the Royal Albert Hall in 2019. During that party, they heard a radio announcement regarding a Christmas song competition, and they immediately began trying to

write a song and find someone to sing it! Throughout the party, guests turned up, but no one wanted to sing the song, that is until Himesh Patel and UK band Itchy Teeth knocked on the door and took up the challenge. Himesh was fresh from starring in Danny Boyle’s film Yesterday, and Itchy Teeth were the band that performed with him throughout the movie.

Recalling classic Christmas earworms such as Wings ‘Wonderful Christmastime,” the single is written by Michael Giacchino, Elyssa Samsel and Kate Anderson and performed by Itchy Teeth. The B-side is a beautiful smokey lounge version of Christmas Number One performed by the John Robert Wood Yule Sextet.

The LTD 7’ comes complete with a digital download card and is presented in gatefold Christmas card cover, ready and waiting to be given as a gift and inscribed with your very own holiday greeting.

Let us see 2020 out in a flurry of positivity, optimism and fun, so get ready to be singing this song around the christmas tree this year with all your family (even if that mean doing so on Zoom)

Happy Holidays!!!

Number nine of the serie LANOIRE sarted in 2014, "Greyhound" is a step back into 50's rhythm N Blues, with some obscure sides and never re pressed singles or 78's. The gatefold sleeve is fully documented with picture and liner notes, for a complete immertion into the best of the genre...

Modern sounds for the 21st century featuring modal, progressive and esoteric contemporary jazz from the UK, Spain, Netherlands, Finland, USA, Belgium, Canada, South Africa, Sweden, Germany & Italy.

The first 12 volumes of our hugely popular Spiritual Jazz series have unearthed a wealth of historic recordings in the genre, collating a variety of works from the '50s to the '80s by artists from all around the world.

And so, with Volume 13, we turn our attention to what's happening NOW.

Over the course of 24 tracks and spanning 2 x 2LPs, we present an overview of the contemporary exponents of Spiritual Jazz; musicians who are intent on bringing something personal to the table, as much as they recognize the importance of those who have paved the way for them. We feature music recorded within the past 20 years and from 15 different countries, including modern classics from veterans Steve Reid and Idris Ackamoor, providing a vital link between the past masters and the enlightened new generation.

It's pioneers such as John Coltrane, Sun Ra, Pharoah Sanders et al, with their innovations in reaching another plane of consciousness that was and remains uppermost in the minds of exponents of Spiritual Jazz. Fittingly, several of the artists featured on this compilation, such as Cat Toren and David Boykin, are practitioners of the art of music therapy and sound healing, and have absolute conviction in the role of song as solace. The pioneers may no longer be with us, but their saintly selves loom large, shining a light in the darkness, inspiring many a brave new disciple today, as this album will testify: the new wave of jazz is gathering pace and still sounds fresh, vibrant and as relevant as ever.

Available as 2 x 2LP sets each with gatefold sleeves, extensive liners, download card & pics inside.

Bobby Would LP#2. Wistful waltztime psychobeat for warding off / wallowing in the 2020-21 Weltschmerz. Swelling and smearing the vision of 2018’s skeletal rock’n’roll heartbreaker Baby, most of the songs here are ballads – minimalist, ultra-hypnotic but lavishly melodic space-punk lullabies and bright, bruised expressions of jingle-jangle mourning. Highs, lows and heavenly blows. BW’s guitar is, more than ever, a thing of fearsome and filigree beauty, moving effortlessly from misty, mellifluous DIY pop-dreams to wailing vertiginous whiplash leads and dazed, epiphanic, angels-wept metha-drone, ringing in infinity - and tethered to this earth only by his beloved monotone, numbed-out, serial-killer croon. Spinning in its own orbit, but with recognisable dabs - perhaps - of Phantom Payn / JG39, Les Rallizes Denudes, Gary War, Peter Gutteridge’s Pure...and of course Bobby’s own work in Heavy Metal and Itchy Bugger.

Introducing the first 7" single from bassist & composer Shay Hazan and his quintet from Tel-Aviv, Israel.

Dedicated to saxophonist Albert Beger, a mainstay of Israeli jazz and Hazan mentor, 'Berber's Cha Cha' is an uptempo piano-led waltz, redolent of classic Prestige Records soul-jazz, especially when some urgent horn charts turn up the heat. It's a corker!

While on the underbelly, 'Old Tart' sounds like nothing less than a lost gem from the Brecht/Weil songbook. Lugubrious and magnificent, this world-weary vocal cut is more than a match for the nominal A-side.

Destined for the hippest jukeboxes in the hippest joints in the country, this milestone tenth release in Jazzman's estimable JAZZ45 series keeps standards impossibly high.

Our JAZZ45 label features original artwork and original music on each and every release, and are limited to just 600 copies worldwide!

The album was intended as an experiment using musical styles Brubeck discovered abroad while on a United States Department of State sponsored tour of Eurasia, such as when he observed in Turkey a group of street musicians performing a traditional Turkish folk song that was played in 9/8 time, a rare meter for Western music. Columbia president Goddard Lieberson took a chance to underwrite and release Time Out. It received negative reviews by critics upon its release, but despite this, it became one of the best-known and biggest-selling jazz albums, charting highly on the popular albums chart when 50,000 units sold for a jazz album was impressive. It consequently produced a Top 40 hit single in "Take Five", composed by Paul Desmond, and the one track not written by Dave Brubeck. The cover art is just as important as the LP itself featuring specific artwork created by S. Neil Fujita best known for his covers for CBS Records, which introduced abstract art to jazz LP packaging.

Columbus, Ohio’s Rudolph Johnson drew comparisons to John Coltrane during his career; like the jazz legend in his later years, Johnson eschewed drugs or alcohol and spent his time every day either meditating and rehearsing on his horn. You can definitely hear
a little bit of Coltrane in Johnson’s playing on this, his 1971 debut release for the Black Jazz label, the first of two he recorded for the
imprint and the first he recorded as a leader after some sideman work (most notably for organist Jimmy McGriff); his ability to explore the upper registers and overtones of his tenor sax while retaining control is quite striking. Of course, this being a Black Jazz release, along with the bebop sounds of “Sylvia Ann” and the mid-‘60s Blue Note stylings of “Sylvia Ann,” there’s the soul jazz of “Diswa” and the groove funk of “Devon Jean,” all played by, as is typical on Black Jazz releases, by top-notch sidemen including drummer Raymond Pounds, who’s layed
with everybody from Stevie Wonder to Pharoah Sanders to Bob Dylan, and pianist John Barnes, whose work is very familiar to Motown fans (Supremes, Temptations, Marvin Gaye). Bassist Reggie Jackson, who appeared on the Walter Bishop, Jr. Coral Keys record we previously released, rounds out the quartet. First vinyl reissue of another stellar Black Jazz release!

Mondo, in collaboration with Walt Disney Records, is proud to present the premiere vinyl release of John Powell's brilliant score to SOLO: A STAR WARS STORY.

The origin story of science fiction’s greatest rogue is a Star Wars story through and through: a rollicking adventure, full of humor and suspense - and in the grand tradition of the franchise, features an epic sweeping score worthy of the biggest screen (or, in this case, speakers) imaginable.

John Williams' new "The Adventures of Han Theme" kicks things off in a spectacular fashion, setting the tone for John Powell's fantastic original score to enter the Star Wars canon (only the third composer to ever tackle the film series in its 40+ year legacy).

Han Solo Theme and original Star Wars music by John Williams
Score composed and adapted by John Powell
Pressed on 180 Gram Black Vinyl with artwork by César Moreno

NEP was a loose multimedia collective formed in 1982 Zagreb, ex-Yugoslavia. The founder Dejan Krsic collaborated with various artists in a quest of re-thinking the stale concepts of art history, position of the author and the barriers between pop and elitist high culture. Heavily influenced by Walter Benjamin and Andy Warhol in theory and Brian Eno and Kraftwerk in music, Krsic created NEP as an umbrella term (meaning Nova Evropa or New Europe) of diverse rule-breaking activities, covering graphic design, music, photography, video, news-media and theoretical work. Musically NEP focused on experiments in ambient and tape-music, self-released and hard to find compilation tapes like "The Cassette Played Poptones" (1988). Deeply immersed in pop-culture, politics and art theory Krsic's search for perfect pop music with cutting critical edge peaked in 1989, the year 'Decadance' track was conceived in studio. Fox & His Friends published the single in 2017 with Snuffo Remix on B-side. It received rave reviews in music press like MixMag and DJ Mag and it is still played on dance-floors around the world. But the story around the NEP is musically (as well as artistically) much wider: for the first time Fox & His Friends team compiles best cuts from unreleased and rare NEP tapes, covering the period from 1985 to 1989 on POP NOT POP abum. Dejan Krsic is now famous graphic designer and art historian in Croatia. Other collaborators include Laibach and Borghesia photographer Jane Stravs, artist and TV director Gordana Brzovic, Jovan Culibrk, now Bishop at The Serbian Orthodox Church and Anja Rupel, singer of cult Yugoslavian synth-pop group Videosex as well as the other members of Videosex, Iztok Turk and Janez Krizaj who produced some of the tracks. Other collaborators were talented producers Robert Logozar and Davor Daga Devcic, singers Linda Cooper, Natalija, Alexx Kovacs... The list of collaborations is long. Some of the memorable moments on POP NOT POP album are early demo version of Decadance 'How Do I Dance To This Music?' with blue movies samples and drum machine experiments like early Cabaret Voltaire, then Krsic's reinterpretation of legendary Kraftwerk's Trans Europe Express anthem as 'Transcendance', or 'Radical Chic', where Dejan himself and Anja Rupel from Videosex make lovely couple of dandy-esque fashionistas, singing chart-friendly radio synthpop tune that contrasts the A-side (The 'NOT POP' side) - full of experiments, dark wave and industrial nods to Test Department and Cabs. B-side is 'THE POP' side that will surprise most of the NEP followers from their early experimental cassette days. Sunny, danceable, joyfull pop that reveals the many faces of NEP. As Kraftwerk today is more of a concept than a band, NEP does the same by re-writing its products (musical, graphical, theoretical, activist) and constantly puts them in permanent state of change or re-mix. In the future, only NEP logo will be enough to consider something an art piece, and NEP will be everybody who wants to, as their Art Manifest claims. Until that day comes, 'POP NOT POP' is a document of how the vivid and creative were art-scenes in socialist Yugoslavia. Some of the graphic work, cut-ups from theory and Manifesto are also included on this LP, designed by Dejan Krsic aka NEP himself. This release is made from the original master tapes and published for the first time on vinyl.

Generative music seems to imply a systems approach to music, or a system that once created can utilise randomness in a creative way. The benevolence of nature’s creativity belies this musical term, and can flip the word ‘generative’ to mean to involve constantly flowing creativity with purpose. In Europe there was a time in the Pagan Renaissance when architecture would mirror nature’s generative quality. Sculptures and columns were to imply animation or movement.

That’s where Milan W.’s album comes through in 2020. His music involves the night shadows of Europe’s architecture and its growth. In Bloom personifies itself by showing Antwerp’s influential ‘Night Play’: a term that can relate to many European cities such as Bologna, Vienna, and so on and so on. The leftovers of Renaissance and gothic architecture are everywhere in Europe still; layers of ruins that can generate the impression of simultaneous time periods. Tracks like Spa and Helium Queen reveal and revel in the power of shadow movement that is generated by the night. In Milan W.’s past works, the poignant and simple creative play of dark wave and synth beat music was his vehicle for expression, but now on In Bloom he departs to a touching sidereal impressionism allied with Coil’s instrumental pieces on Horse Rotorvator — an album whose cover portrays the potential powers of the pavilion just as Milan W. is portraying the generative soul and alienation of Europe’s ‘Night Play’. Because of In Bloom we can come to believe that there is a secretive energy in alienation, a playfulness that is alight at Night.

This reissue of pianist Dave Brubeck’s classic 1959 album ‘Time Out’
features the classic quartet of Brubeck with Paul Desmond on alto sax, Eugene Wright on bass and drummer Joe Morello.
The bonus album is ‘Countdown - Time In Outer Space’ recorded in 1961 by the same line-up. The 20-page booklet contains complete information with specially prepared liner notes by Penguin Guide to Jazz’s writer Brian Morton and by France’s prestigious Jazz Magazine. “Time Out by the Dave Brubeck Quartet has never lost its power of fascination. On these unforgettable tunes, Dave Brubeck and his alter ego Paul Desmond seem to be painting a canvas. Every note is like a touch of colour, expertly distilled, subtly hypnotic, ideally thought. “ Jazz Magazine

Audiophile reissue of the first RSD release from legendary jazz bassist Ron Carter, the most-recorded jazz bassist in history and member of the second great Miles Davis Quintet (1963 - 1968).
180g double vinyl, gatefold sleeve.
Carter leads his “Foursight” quartet on this live recording from Sweden recorded in November 2018. The group includes drummer Payton Crossley, tenor saxophonist Jimmy Green, the and star pianist Renee Rosnes.
“With us, nobody knows exactly what happens when,” Carter praised the Foursight Quartet’s unique selling point. “This is precisely why every concert is a real challenge. We almost always play 35 to 40 minutes without a stop at the beginning. No breaks, just slight changes that show the beginning of a new song. If we were a classical music band, it would be called a symphony with five movements.
This kind of thing only works with this band!”

Personnel: Ron Carter (bass), Renee Rosnes (piano), Jimmy Greene (tenor saxophone), Payton Crossley (drums)

It’s 2020, the year Pop Ambient turns twenty-one years old, a spritely young adult waltzing out of its teenage joys and tears. Pop Ambient has always stood for a certain classicism and elegance, a kind of beatless music that’s diaphanous and hazy, gossamer and glittering. It’s a music that’s no less inviting for its slow pace and becalmed nature, with a different kind of tension bubbling under the surface. For twenty-one years, KOMPAKT co-founder Wolfgang Voigt has curated a series of peerless compilations that repeatedly find refreshing answers to a simple question – What happens when the dancefloor is empty, and everyone’s home to drift away?

As with many other Pop Ambient compilations, Pop Ambient 2021 offers a welcome platform to contributions from both old friends and new faces. It opens with the gorgeous, slo-mo drift of “Of A Vessel”, from new Kompakt signings Blank Gloss. Sending their music out into the world from their home in Sacramento, this duo makes music that’s featherlight and luscious, the muted chime of a guitar over here, the steady hum of a halatial drone over there; everything in its right place, and nothing overdone. The poise is all. Neozaïre (Tobias Sawitzki aka Noorden) and Seventh World (Juho Hietala aka Blamstrain) are our other two new voices, the latter closing (the CD version of) Pop Ambient 2021 with a long, lambent dreamsong, Neozaïre offering us two gaseous, morphing driftworks, “Vor den Toren Europas” and “In Verschwenderischer Fülle” (CD only), etched across with bell-like arpeggios.

Pop Ambient has always felt like a field for play for the KOMPAKT cognoscenti, and 2021 is no different, with Joachim Spieth collaborating with Pepo Galán on the sidereal visions of “Libration”, while Leandro Fresco teams up with Thore Pfeiffer on the lovely “Abejorro”. Pfeiffer also contributes two lovely solo miniatures of abstract longing. Yui Onodera calls in again, long distance, for their fourth Pop Ambient running, with the refracted, glinting lightscapes of “Cromo 5” and “Monochrome”, while there are also star turns from Max Würden, both solo and in Reich & Würden (with Luis Reichard), and Morgen Wurde, who drops by with the ‘ethereal drama’ of “Mittsommer”.

Pop Ambient gets the balance right: visions and soundscapes, long-distance communications and intimate asides, sweetness and light, drama and dreaming, all wrapped up in floral abstractions – a most beautiful distraction.

Wir schreiben das Jahr 2020, das Jahr, in dem Pop Ambient einundzwanzig Jahre alt wird – das entspricht etwa einem lebenshungrigen jungen Erwachsenen, der gerade aus den letzten Teenager-Freuden und Leiden herausgewachsen ist. Pop Ambient steht seit jeher für eine gewisse Klassik und Eleganz, beatfreie Musik, die, transparent und leicht verschwommen, zart und glitzernd leuchtet. Musik, die trotz ihrer Langsamkeit und ihrer sanften Natur unter Spannung steht, weil hier immer etwas unter der scheinbar ruhigen Oberfläche brodelt.

Einundzwanzig Jahre lang hat KOMPAKT-Mitbegründer Wolfgang Voigt diese einzigartige Compilation-Reihe kuratiert, die immer wieder neue Antworten auf eine einfache Frage findet: Wie füllt man die Leere nach dem Club?

Wie viele andere Pop Ambient-Compilations bietet auch Pop Ambient 2021 eine Plattform für die musikalischen Beiträge von alten Freunden und einigen neuen Gesichtern. Es beginnt mit dem wunderbaren Slo-Mo-Drift von "Of A Vessel" von Blank Gloss, einem neuen Kompakt Signing. Das Duo stammt aus Sacramento in Kalifornien und sendet von dort seine überaus leichte und sinnliche Musik in die Welt hinaus – ein zartes Zupfen an einer Gitarresaite hier, das gleichmäßige Dröhnen eines prunkvollen Soundscapes hier; alles ist hier am richtigen Platz und passiert ohne übertriebene Betonung. Gelassenheit ist alles. Neozaïre und Seventh World sind zwei weitere Neuzugänge. Hinter Seventh World steckt der finnische Produzent Juho Hietala aka Blamstrain, der (die CD Version von) Pop Ambient 2021 mit einem epischen, flackernden Traum names “Light The Waves Before Dawn“ beschließt, während Neozaïre, ein Seitenprojekt von Tobias Sawitzki aka Noorden, zwei gasförmige, sich immer wieder morphende und abdriftende Tracks abliefert: "In Verschwenderischer Fülle" (CD only) mit seinen glockenartigen Arpeggios und “Vor Den Toren Europas“.

Pop Ambient fühlte sich immer schon an wie ein Experimentierfeld für eingefleischte KOMPAKT-Künstler, und auch 2021 ist das nicht anders: zum Beispiel Joachim Spieth’s Kooperation mit Pepo Galán ("Libration") oder Leandro Fresco, der mit Thore Pfeiffer das liebevolle "Abejorro" produzierte. Pfeiffer steuert mit “Grape“ und “Center“ zwei weitere Solo-Miniaturen voller abstrakter Sehnsucht bei. Der japanische Klangkünstler Yui Onodera meldet sich mit den gebrochen-glitzernden Lichtlandschaften von "Cromo 5" und "Monochrome" bereits zum vierten Mal auf Pop Ambient zu Wort, während Max Würden sowohl solo, als auch als Teil von Reich & Würden (mit Luis Reichard) ebenso wie Morgen Wurde schon zu den Stars dieser Compilation gehört.

West coast composer, artist, and producer Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith has chartered a pioneering career with multiple critically-acclaimed albums since 2015. Following the release of The Kid in 2017, Smith focused her energy in several directions. She founded Touchtheplants, a multidisciplinary creative environment for projects including the first volumes in her instrumental Electronic Series and pocket-sized poetry books on the practice of listening within. She's continued to explore the endless possibilities of electronic instruments as well as the shapes, movements, and expressions found in the physical body's relationship to sound and color. It is this life-guiding interest that forms the foundational frequencies of her most recent full-length, The Mosaic of Transformation, a bright, sensorial glide through unbound wave phenomena and the radiant power discovered within oneself. "I guess in one sentence, this album is my expression of love and appreciation for electricity," says Smith. While writing and recording, she embraced a daily practice of physical movement, passing electricity through her body and into motion, in ways reflecting her audio practice, which sends currents through modular synthesizers and into the air through speakers. Not a dancer by any traditional definition, she taught herself improvisatory movement realizing flexibility, strength, and unexpectedly, a "visual language" stemming from the human body and comprised of vibrational shapes. Understood as cymatics, as Smith says, "as a reference for how frequencies can be visualized," much like a mosaic. Smith describes her first encounters with this mosaic; "the inspiration came to me in a sudden bubble of joy. It was accompanied by a multitude of shapes that were moving seamlessly from one into the other...My movement practice has been a constant transformation piece by piece. I made this album in the same way. Every day I would transform what I did yesterday...into something else. This album has gone through about 12 different versions of itself." As it has arrived, in a completed state, The Mosaic of Transformation is a holistic manifestation of embodied motions. Smith's signature textural curiosity that fans have grown to adore pivots naturally into a proprioceptive study of melody and timbre. Airy organ and voice interweave with burbling Buchla-spawned harmonic bubbles. "The Steady Heart" quivers to life, peppering blasts of wooden organ between winding vocal affirmations. As with a body, moving one portion requires a balance and counterbalance; here, subtle tonal twitchy signals fire in conjunction with coiling arias to create a mesmeric core. When the beat arrives at the midway mark, a swooping and jittery waltz, a sense of stasis in motion, a flow state, is sonically achieved. As soon as it syncs, it disappears back into the swirling ebbs of electric force. Other tracks stray into more ruminative physical realms. "Carrying Gravity" is built around string-like pads that expand and contract like a solar plexus, becoming taught and then loose. If the record could be summarized in a single movement, it is the 10-minute closing suite, a rapturous collage called "Expanding Electricity." Symphonic phrases establish the piece before washes of glittering electric peals and synthesized vibraphone helix into focus. Soon, Smith's voice grounds it all with an intuitive vocal hook, harmonized and augmented by concentric spirals of harp-and-horn-like sounds. Smith's music doesn't capture a specific emotion as much as it captures the joys of possessing a body, and the ability to, with devotion and a steady open heart, maneuver that vessel in space by way of electricity to euphoric degrees.

In our latest chapter of Spiritual Jazz, we return to the source – the Impulse! label, and the monumental influence of its most prominent artist, John Coltrane.
Since the first release in the series back in 2008, we have mapped out the growth of the spiritual sound in jazz. Spiritually energised and politically conscious, the spiritual sound in jazz music is one of the most important currents in the music. Our series has charted the growth of the style from early experiments at Blue Note and Prestige to European excursions, exiled experimentalists, and sounds from across the globe. But whenever you think of spiritual jazz, it's a fair bet that the double exclamation mark and orange and black spine of Impulse quickly comes to mind. Home to John and Alice Coltrane, Pharaoh Sanders, Yusef Lateef, McCoy Tyner and countless other musical pioneers, Impulse! was the most important and forward-thinking jazz label of the 1960s. With the music-first attitude of an independent but the clout of a major, producers Creed Taylor and Bob Thiele made Impulse the defining imprint of a crucial decade. They hand picked the top players of the moment and gave them freedom to record the music they wanted, setting out their stall with a bold slogan – 'The New Wave Of Jazz Is On Impulse!'

Here we dive deep into the Impulse! catalogue, bringing celebrated masterpieces from Alice Coltrane and Pharaoh Sanders into the arena, together with lesser known cuts from Phil Woods and John Klemmer as well as straight-up classics such from Yusef Lateef and Elvin Jones. Fifty years on and the new wave of jazz still sounds fresh, vibrant and as relevant as ever.

Lamunai Records presents Curiouser and Curiouser, a treasure trove of millennial music era from a duo pop group called Santamonica from Jakarta, Indonesia.

The concept of this album is making music from a trip to the adventures of Alice In Wonderland, an eclectic mix of pop, bossanova, electronics, waltz and shoegaze. From Astrud Gilberto and Antonio Jobim, Pizzicato Five meets My Bloody Valentine or Stereolab's 60s sensitivity to Broadcast. A collection of multi-layered analog audio sets, the noise of Joseph Iyup's noisy guitar combined with Anindita's fairy voice melodious lines of strange lyrics wrapped in curling beats, very dynamic, very rich. Listening to the album, on several tracks, we can hear French Pop's acrobatic 5/4 beats until the roar of the wall of
sound becomes a combination that is difficult to imagine at the time and is still very relevant to listen to now.

Now, for the first time ever, one of the phenomenal albums of the 2000's Indonesia wave is now available in a limited format in 2xLP-Gatefold-Marble colors vinyl with an additional 1 song that has never been released before.

Albert Ayler’s 1969 album New Grass has been misunderstood from the day of its release. The album fi nds Ayler experimenting with soul music and digging back into his R&B roots (he started his career playing saxophone with Chicago bluesman Little Walter), fusing it with the avant-garde free jazz (the one element of the record which garnered consistent praise) and adding the vocals of Rose Marie McCoy, The Soul Singers and Ayler himself. As if predicting the divisiveness of the record to follow, Ayler speaks directly to the listener and explains that New Grass is nothing like his albums before — that it is of “a different dimension of his life” — in the album opener “Message from Albert.”

New Grass deserves reconsideration, if not for the heavy grooves and surprising arrangements, then for its bravery in challenging norms of the time; by the ‘60s, jazz was well-accepted as a uniquely American art form, while soul as a genre was very much still seen as primitive. Ayler melds them together and creates something novel, adventurous, and completely his own. At the time of its release, despite its divisive reception, New Grass helped break down the unnecessary walls dividing genres and revealed music’s potential freedoms. The album has gone on to infl uence generations of Jazz, R&B, Funk, Hip Hop, Post Punk, No Wave and unshrinking artists like Pharaoh Sanders, Alice Coltrane, Funkadelic, Jungle Brothers, Red Krayola, Sonic
Youth and Mark E. Smith.

Third Man Records can’t recommend this record highly enough. We are confi dent that it won’t take but one listen for you to understand New Grass is an undeniable healing force

Black Vinyl Edition

The Log and the Leeway follows a 6 year journey of personal exploration and drastic change for Bram Bosteels and his singular Kaboom Karavan universe. What entails is a sound-curiosity of rare format, following a metamorphosis that goes beyond the musical.

Early in the process, Bram was struck by the word/concept of a Leeway : the gradual departure from an intented course due to external influences. Following a boyish fascination for explorers travel journals, logbooks and the far fetched corners of the world, he could not have forseen how fitting of a title he had chosen. Drastically all of a sudden one day, completely unexpectedly, Bram experienced his own father dying in front of him from a rare disease. Shocked and confused by this intense encounter, his perspectives and musical course departed from its original path. But at the same time it was an enlightenment and a necessary influence for him to realise the initial idea and finish this album, started over half a decade before.

The ones familiar with Kaboom Karavan already know that nothing really sounds quite like it. Bram’s musical (and non-musical) universe is of the rare breed that seems to be entirely his own. Self-contained, but never opaque. Quite the opposite actually. Bram never pushes us away, instead, by listening to his music we are given view to a synesthetic wunderkammer of images, places, objects and possibilities. Distant but magnetic, alien but intimately familiar, Kaboom is folk music from another dimension. Listening to The Log and the Leeway is like waking up next to a bonfire in the middle of a swamp wearing somebody else’s clothes: You may not know how you got here, but whatever is happening seems to very directly involve YOU. What will happen?

Note from Erik K Skodvin (Miasmah): All the sounds, fabrics, instrumentation and stories that binds The Log and the Leeway together go far beyond what can be touched up in this simple writeup. As someone who have followed this journey since the beginning, and seen it shift from lighthearted fun to the most crepuscular personal experience, heard the stories behind (almost) every field recording and gone through boundless amounts of clips, visual details, notes, and inspirations – I can only say that it is with great pleasure and certain nostalgia I can present this record in full through Miasmah and close this quite extraordinary chapter. Bram is without doubt the most fascinating person I know. Like I told him in April 2020 during a trying time: “If everything fails, we´ll open a Kaboom Karavan museum” - an idea that might not be as far-fetched as it sounds.

Featuring: Cover painting by John Lurie. 16 page booklet of Musical illustration / collagés by Walter Dhoogh & Erik K Skodvin that more or less connects (or confuses) the dots between the music and stories behind. Mastered by Lupo at Loop-O

A record to be enjoyed to its very last second AM Jazz is set to place this songwriter where he just might, finally, receive the recognition he deserves; from unsung hero to a truly worthy candidate for being called up to join the City of Manchester’s ranks of great musical icons. Whether you prefer to know him as Mr. Roberts or simply call him Al, it’s time to become acquainted with the real Jim Noir.

Tossing his bowler onto the hat stand and sliding on his slippers, AM Jazz sees ‘Jim’ putting his feet up whilst Alan Roberts takes the lead. A creative masterpiece for the record player and the mantlepiece, it’s a multi-layered album that features close friends including those dearly departed, and is his truest record to date, by a songwriter painting his own hypnotic Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.

“I haven’t 'felt' like Jim Noir for a long time. I’m not sure I ever did; it was a construct of other people’s imaginations,” reveals Al. “AM Jazz is definitely the kind of music I make generally. It harks back to when I started making music years ago and didn’t worry about capturing a particular style. It will be nice to show people more of that.

It's the best album I've written; real hypnotic minimalism, the good stuff!” 15 years since he recorded the first ever 'Jim Noir' EP, AM
Jazz is the record all Noirheads won’t be surprised Al had inside him.

Letting the Beatlesesque stylings of his most recent album Finnish Line be (5 years ago no less), AM Jazz suits the Noir repertoire of his catalogue so far and is another homegrown offering which sees the Daveyhulme composer tinkering in his suburban Manchester studio once more, with the magic of his computer work sorcery, analog and tape recordings.

“For this I went back to the slightly more haphazard way I wrote my first album, Tower Of Love, wherein I’d use things in front of me, or a bit wrong like headphones for a microphone, to make the most Hi-Fi Lo-fi album ever.”

Whilst a brief disappearance of Jim’s online persona may have provoked bleak theories as to his whereabouts, Al had little time for digital distraction. Whilst writing and creating with friends, he has worked on electronic pet project, FAX with former Alfie guitarist, Ian Smith, and the vintage analogue house meets electro sound of his own solo EP Granada Personnel Recovery, as well as producing local band, Shaking Chainsor, and helping long-time musical colleague, Aidan Smith with his long-awaited 'The Planets' project; “I’ve been writing in dribs and drabs when I feel like it,” Al says. “I used to write all day everyday but it’s a lot harder now I’m (feeling) over 100 years old.” Never not sonically exploring or being inspired by the sounds around him, there was even a red-carpet moment when he appeared as a film premier guest after a couple of his songs were selected for the OST of director Jason Wingard’s film Eaten By Lions.

Performing all AM Jazz’s instrumental parts himself but also, at the right moment, bringing in present and past pals along the way, sexy lounge song, ‘Hexagons’ features 'Phil Anderson' and Mark Williamson singing and playing “legendary OTT guitar solo” respectively. Meanwhile the orchestration of ‘Peppergone’ waltzes like a beautifully romantic ode to Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata – a tribute to dearly departed best friend 'Batfinks' who originally wrote the chords in his song 'Peppercorn.' “I hope he doesn’t think it’s shit,” Al jests. Listen closely and you may even find a few unsuspecting celebrity guest appearances as, perhaps, it could be the very first album to feature soundbites of podcasts sneaking onto the recordings. “I will have a podcast on if I’m recording; Adam Buxton, Athletico Mince, Frank Skinner or Richard Herring… I’m sure some mics will have picked them up, like in the old Tower of Love days,” he says referring to his breakout debut.

Culled from around 50 tunes AM Jazz moves like the time of the day, from dawn to night, stirring from the pop of ‘Good Mood’ and ‘Upside Down’s Beta Band groove. “As the album was playing, I imagined this smoky backstreet with all those neon signs outside clubs at about 4am,” Al says. Mellow ‘TOL Circle’ is like Percy Faith’s Theme From A Summer Place synthesized, capturing the style of TV library music or movie soundtrack obscurity that has always stirred Al’s curiosity, and the album plunges into a vast chasm of instrumental exploration with ‘Mystermoods,’ visiting Japan’s funky synth whiz duo Testpattern and Hakabashi Sakamoto. Darkening and deepening in intensity, ‘Eggshell’ is like an undiscovered gem from Angelo Badalamenti’s cutting room floor, the Panda Bear shimmer of ‘Lander’ is where blissful positivity and sadness meet, about another of his friends who left the world too young. “By the album’s close, its nearly time to let go and enter the ether,” he says of the album’s story. “Like one would do when they take their final sigh on this earth.”

Remastered and reissued for the first time since their original release, AOTN are proud to present three classic cover versions from the lovers rock era. Al Charles' take on the Gap Band's 'Outstanding' is a full of swagger outing that takes all the sweetest of their melodies and gives it some added bass pressure for the dancefloor.

Tough to track down previously, the Sonia version of 'Easier To Love' was always a favourite amongst lovers fans. After getting a spin on Sam Floating Point's NTS show, its popularity soared and any remaining copies were quickly hoovered up. The final release brings together two of the finest lovers singers to ever duet, the late Jean Adebambo and Trevor Walters, covering Roberta Flack & Donny Hathaway's 'Back Together Again'.

The first press of the 12 comes in a printed AOTN sleeve which is a respectful tip of the hat to the OG dub vendor disco sleeve that many of these original 12s were distributed in.

Moon Diagrams is the solo recording project of Deerhunter co-founder and drummer Moses John Archuleta. Two years after his acclaimed debut album Lifetime Of Love, Archuleta returns with Trappy Bats, a mini-LP that interweaves three brilliant new Moon Diagrams tracks with radiant reworks from Shigeto, Angel Deradoorian and Jefre Cantu-Ledesma. Trappy Bats was largely recorded in a single night as a means to process the intense intersection of Archuleta’s social, political and personal hysteria. Having been arrested for an unremembered missed court date, Archuleta spent 24 hours in a holding cell, offering ample time to reflect on his life, the current state of the nation (the jail televisions were showing a constant feed of the then-active Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville) and the other inmates. Upon being released the next day, Archuleta found himself suffering from a bout of insomnia and feeling the need to process everything through music. Here, Archuleta is in his freest and most grateful state, channelling the turmoil and confusion he was experiencing into an unencumbered fit of creativity. It’s pure, unadulterated escapism with an even more callous palette of sounds than before, clearly split between two moods. On what you might call the ‘up’ side, the title track could be the sonic spawn of Not Waving and Terrence Dixon: a snarling mix of percussive clatter and washes of orchestral tones coalesce into a pulsating groove across its almost 12-minute runtime, the underlying ’80s aesthetic making it feel like a turbo-charged Shep Pettibone remix of New Order, looped to infinity. Detroit electronica don Shigeto goes even further and implodes the track into a kaleidoscope of bone-jarring, viscerally giddy dance music. Over on the ‘down’ side, ‘Wipeout’ is a slow-motion waltz of dusty piano and clattering percussion loops that coolly stumble along with the woozy, nocturnal flare of The Caretaker or Philip Jeck. The haunted reverie ventures even deeper with a beatifically electrified ambient re-imagination by Jefre Cantu-Ledesma. Daisychain’ goes almost completely off the grid, offering up a sweetly submerged slab of constantly evolving murkiness in the vein of Demdike Stare or a dosed Andy Stott. The sweet shuffle levitates even higher with a celestial re-interpretation by sonic visionary Angel Deradoorian, formerly of the Dirty Projectors. The end result is an extended traipse through Saturday evening fever-dream techno, Sunday morning cigarette jazz-pop and every blank thought in between.

Comic book artist, graphic designer and free jazz improviser are only some of the many talents from Beirut born Mazen Kerbaj. After appearing as part of various ensembles on the label, Ariha Brass Quartet (CREP46) and Johnny Kafta Anti-Vegetarian Orchestra (CREP22), Kerbaj finally lands a solo outfit of his own onto the Discrepant dancefloor of insubordination.

14 years after his first (and only) solo album "Brt Vrt Zrt Krt" (Al Maslakh, 2005) Mazen returns with a series of subtle compositions of his own with not one but two(!) solo albums of prepared trumpet that further cement his international position as a serial trumpet botherer.

Whilst Vol. 2.1 showcases his (almost) (un)familiar arsenal of squawks, cackles, howls and squeals, Vol. 2.2 goes deep into the nether regions of waltzing drones and bell tweaks so deep that would make most cetaceans loose their concentration. The notion of being transported to a luring mutant underwater alien community is still present on these long(er) trips with the added meditative pieces being occasionally pierced by noise creepers, nothing is what you want or expect and that’s the way it should be.

If Vol. 2.1 is the classic follow up LP, this one is the beast from the deep, it comes surging and screeching from a deep oceanic sink hole, only to hypnotize you with perverted dance moves before diving back into the sinking, wettest and darkest cave in the world. Vol. 2.2 is a summons album; it shatters any bar there was with its intentional use of everything Vol. 2.1 was denied. It grabs you by wherever available way and it only releases you when you’re ready to listen to it again. Listen to both albums back to back, in no particular order and you’ll know that there’s nothing you can do but come back to it like a doped up seal stranded in a phantom island – appearing and disappearing as the music dictates it to.

Detailed, smart, commanding, groovy. These are just a few words to describe the Assorted Pieces 2 compilation. This strictly in-house production by Friendship & Decadence contains tracks from such producers as Kade, Mirage Man, Poly Sone and Waltteri. Which is a intriguing mixture indeed.

Poly Sone’s “Home killing is taping music” is a rugged and fast paced take on nordic techno. As the track was recorded on a four track cassette recorder the saturation on this cut is immense, yet pleasant. Definitely not your everyday cheapo lo-fi tune.

Deep, quirky and playful bottom heavy roller, “Calm” by Waltteri has a hint of spanish roast in its blend. Waltteri’s debut on the imprint can be perfectly paired with a fun loving crowd during midnight or even around early mornings. Psychedelic multipurpose tool.

Kade’s raw and unconventional track “Sanko” is a treat for the adventurous mind. Haunting arpeggios and vocal chops will give you the creeps, while the unrefined saturated rhythms will sooth you into a trance. Eccentric and hypnotic dance music.

“This track never starts” by Mirage Man lives by its name as it is a slowly unraveling and cinematic number. Regardless of its thick lower end, in the club environment this track might send the restless to acquire a beverage from the bar, but for the grounded minds who enjoy ambient this just might be the ticket. Play it yourself and see what happens.

Limited press of 150 pcs. 12” record includes a download code.

“Last night I turned into a cat. Just like that.” A Colourful Storm presents an album by Brunnen aka Freek Kinkelaar, one of the everlasting beacons of the Dutch underground. One half of fabled group Beequeen (1988-2015) with Frans de Waard and collaborator with the likes of Nurse With Wound, Paul Panhuysen, The Residents, Merzbow and Edward Ka-Spel, Kinkelaar presents The Garden of Perpetual Dreams as a newly visioned recording of a cassette from 1989. Produced with Raymond Steeg of The Legendary Pink Dots and mastered by Steeg and Peter Van Vliet (Mekanik Kommando, De Fabriek, The Use Of Ashes).

Cochemea Gastelum is coming home to connect with his roots. After nearly 15 years of touring the world with Sharon Jones and The Dap-Kings, the saxophonist offers a deeply personal album of jazz and indigenous-influenced rhythms. All My Relations¸ out February 22 on Daptone Records, is 10 tracks of mesmerizing and spiritually ascendant instrumentation. The first single 'All My Relations' is available now.

'All My Relations is a way for me to explore my roots through music. Some of it is a memory that is imagined from a time and place I've never been ('Sonora') or a musical impression of ritual ('Mitote'),' Cochemea says. 'I felt compelled to add the way I feel when I go to ceremony, when I feel connected with my ancestors, to the musical narrative.'

A California native with Yaqui and Mescalero Apache Indian ancestry, Cochemea grew up surrounded by music but without knowing much about his heritage. Both his parents were musicians, and they gave their son a heavy name meaning 'they were all killed asleep.' Cochemea has spent much of his diverse musical career - as a soloist, musical director, composer and ensemble player - exploring and iterating on roots music, and All My Relations is a capstone meditation on his own ancestry.

Originally conceived during Sharon Jones and The Dap-Kings' final year of touring, Cochemea and Daptone's Gabe Roth cast a varied but familial set of New York musicians to bring All My Relations to life. A large portion of the album was created through improvisation and collective writing, where its 10 musicians created a melodic, percussive conversation. 'It was a beautiful experience - people would start playing and we'd work up these arrangements on the spot, then record it.'

'In a sense, this record is a prayer for unity, love and the recognition that we are all part of a web, and everything we do effects everything else,' Cochemea says. 'These days there's so many lines being drawn, I wanted to focus on what unites us.'

Cochemea has a long history of uniting multiple genres with his powerful polyrhythmic sensibilities. His roots in jazz, Latin, funk and rock led to multiple tours with funk-jazz organist Robert Walter's 20th Congress, and connected him with Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings for their 2005 Naturally tour. Cochemea also played tenor sax with The Budos Band and Antibalas, and Baritone sax on the Amy Winehouse sessions, before becoming a full-time Dap-King in 2009.

In between marathon tours, Cochemea recorded a critically acclaimed solo album of soul, funk, and afro-Latin jazz, The Electric Sound of Johnny Arrow, all while doing session work for the likes of Mark Ronson, Rick Rubin and Quincy Jones. He's performed alongside Archie Shepp, Beck, David Byrne, Public Enemy and The Roots. Cochemea was also a featured soloist in the award-winning Broadway play Fela!, which led to historic performances in Lagos, Nigeria.

In 1959 Michel Giacometti moved to Portugal and dedicated the following thirty years of his life recording traditional music all over the country. In the present decade Portuguese music has been thriving and finally travelling abroad, long gone are the days those hidden gems were kept in secret in this distant corner of Europe. The discovery of current Portuguese music sparked an interest to Portuguese music, past and present.
With both of those ideas in mind, Giacometti and the interest in Portuguese music, 'Antologia de Música Atípica Portuguesa' creates an anthology of current sounds to the future. You can see it as history being made or a broad catalog of sounds that live and breathe the experimental and electronic that is happening in Portugal. The first step happened two years ago with the releasing of the first volume on this anthology, 'O Trabalho' ('The Labour') and we now move onto Vol. 2, 'Regiões' ('Regions'), with each track connecting with a different province from Portugal.
Some names return to this volume, like Live Low with the beautifully haunting 'Montemor' or Gonzo (our own Gonçalo F. Cardoso), affirming his path in building detailed and processed field recordings music. More than a list of names, or songs, this second volume of 'Antologia de Música Atípica Portuguesa' recreates a passage throughout different landscapes of Portugal, constantly leaving a trail of past, present and future. The trail doesn't limit itself to the music, but to the traditions contained in the sounds and the stories spelled by the words.
The beautifully slowed haunting-waltz 'Por Riba', by Síria (Diana Combo), sets everything in motion and builds the way to Random Gods' upbeat march 'Gazulo à Estronca da Santosa'. 'Malta Inquieta' (Ondness) embraces the most modern/contemporary side of this volume, proving that 'Regiões' goes beyond the idea of catalog or even its own concept of 'anthology' and provides music that's hard to categorize or even judge by modern standards. We are not afraid to say it: 'Malta Inquieta' is an experimental jazz-electronic modern gem.
It's followed by the guitar of Rui Carvalho, aka Filho da Mãe, with 'Manta', closing the A side with one of his enchantments. B side strikes with the aforementioned 'Montemor', setting the tone for a different trip, building up on more abstract and freeform music by Banha da Cobra ('Asylo'), Fantama ('Lamento das Beiras') and the track by Gonzo. 'Regiões' finishes with the right tone, fields recordings worked by Luís Antero, that tie the connection between Giacometti and the now - with the now still happening and building up on the story of the future 'Antologia de Música Atípica Portuguesa'.

Liška, the Czechoslovakian word for fox. Beguiling in its beauty, cunning in it's charm. Said to be one of the most intelligent animals on the planet its global family consists of thirty-seven varieties; all of them recognised, respected and feared for their persuasive, creative, resourceful and elusive nature. The Liška we will talk about today is no exception to these hereditary rules and within the grooves of this record Finders Keepers present an 'elusive' musical artefact that best exemplifies every facet of this composer's animal namesake.

Had he not been born in the small Bohemian town of Smecno in the early 1920s the story of The Fantastic Mr. Liška might have well taken a different course. Alternatively, fettered by the hampers of communism, this lifelong resident of Czechoslovakia would never quite find his seat at the same table as the likes of John Barry, Ennio Morricone, Michael Nyman and Stanley Myers, nor drop enough phonographic breadcrumbs to track his legacy. But having waited patiently behind the borders of the wider landscapes of international cinema, Liška's musical brood, spanning multiple stylistic decades and generations, has now started to walk proudly amongst his would-be, latter-day compeers. In an era where music lovers have almost become immune to adjectives like 'lost', 'rare' and 'unreleased' in a climate where previously lesser-known off-kilter master composers such as Vannier, Kirchin and Axelrod have become widely revered, it is perhaps the perfect time for discerning listeners to advance above the feeding trough and seek out this truly pioneering and revolutionary Eastern European composer. Rivalled only by the likes of Krzysztof Komeda and Andrzej Korzynski in Poland, alongside Alexandr Gradsky in Russia, and often splitting workloads with fellow Czech composers like Luboš Fišer, Zdenek Liska's filmography of over almost 300 fully formed movie scores virtually eclipses the achievements of these socialist era luminaries. Respected unanimously in both Czech and Slovakian by studio bosses, producers, directors and actors alike Liška is widely known for his ability to take the existing energy in a reel of film and literally change the polarity to suit his own interpretation while maintaining the full support from his 'client' who would in-turn end up working under this composer's creative direction. Not only was Liška a genius of emotive orchestral and coral composition, his grasp on small group arrangements and intimate, minimal scores set him above the competition. By utilising primitive sample techniques by 'looping' a films existing ambient noise, or rearranging found sounds and dialog into subtle melodic arrangements, Liška would independently develop his own techniques which had simultaneously become known in Paris as musique concre`te. It is a direct extension of these experiments that saw Liška also draw parallels with Walter Branchi (Ennio Morricone's main electronic sidekick) in Italy as well as Daphne Oram in the UK, making Liška a relatively untravelled pioneer of early electronic composition and sound design due to his unlikely global environment. Imprisoned, preserved or reserved; time has been kind to Liška's music.

Italian directors GUALTIERO JACOPETTI and FRANCO PROSPERI gave birth to a whole new subgenre of 'non-fiction' exploitation movies with their 1962 hit MONDO CANE. After repeated accusations of forgery, unethical behaviors and war crimes, they decided to make a movie about the atrocities of American slavery as an apology of sorts. It was 1971 and the movie was FAREWELL UNCLE TOM (ADDIO ZIO TOM) The famous critic Roger Ebert called the result 'the most disgusting, contemptuous insult to decency ever to masquerade as a documentary' Naked flesh, voyeurism and violence is constantly used but gorgeous photography and a memorable score from Academy Award nominee RIZ ORTOLANI add a sickening slickness to it all: rock- beat tunes mixed with classic big band themes, waltz and funny marches and the beautiful OH MY LOVE, with the vocals from Katyna Ranieri, used, among many others by Winding Refn in his cult movie DRIVE (2011).

FIRST VINYL REISSUE EVER
LIMITED EDITION OF 500 COPIES
COMPLETE EDITION WITH EXTRA TRACKS

THIS IS NOT A REISSUE. THIS IS THE FIRST TIME THIS AMAZING MINIMAL SCORE HAS BEEN ISSUED ON VINYL

This is the first time the complete score to The Conversation has been released on vinyl. The film itself was originally released in 1974 and a 7' demo of the theme was sent out as promotional material by Paramount (PAA-0305), but a USA stock edition was never issued. In Japan the same music was also issued on a 7' at about the same time (JET-2273), with a picture sleeve, but until now nothing else has ever been pressed on vinyl.

Jonny Trunk's little obsession with this music began after I'd caught the film, late night, sometime in the mid 1990s. Musically it's an exceptional example of the 'new minimalism' in film music of the period, marking a departure (for some) from big scores to smaller, more economic ensemble sounds.

The film was written, produced and directed by Francis Ford Coppola and is still a thrilling journey into sound, mind and murder. Heavily influenced by Antonioni's Blow-Up (and not, as some thought, by Watergate), Coppola wanted to fuse the concept of Blow-Up with 'the world of audio surveillance'. The story centres around Harry Caul (Gene Hackman), a mac-wearing professional wire-tapper and clandestine bugger who gets unusually consumed by a conversation he's been paid to record. Caul is a loner, an obsessive-compulsive character with numerous neuroses that play out brilliantly throughout the film. And as he slowly pieces together the conversation fragments and forms his own story around it, his world falls apart.

Sonically this movie - all about sound - is groundbreaking in many ways, with actual 'sound Design' Provided By The Legendary Walter Murch - The Man Who Actually Invented The Term In The First Place.

For The Music, Coppola Wisely Chose A Young David Shire, His Brother In Law. Shire's Deceptively Simple Piano Theme (composed Because Of No Budget For Big Orchestra) Is One Of Tragic Beauty, Brilliantly Capturing Caul's Loneliness, His Slightly Disturbed Nature And This Trip Into Darkness. The Melody Has Both Sweet And Sour Tones, Feeling A Little Like A Slow Ragtime, Which Both Develops And Retreats Throughout The Film; There Are Even Trips Into Avant-garde Territory With Electro-acoustic Flourishes And Concrète. The Solo, Agitated Figure Of Caul, Wearing His Distinctive Transparent Mac, Is Made All The More Raw And Poignant By The Score - The Sparse And Curiously Emotional Compositions Are Unlike Any Others I Can Think Of From The Period.

The Soundtrack For The Conversation Proved To Be A Major Break For Shire, His Career Really Taking Off From This Musical Point. His Next Score Was To Be The Underground Classic Taking Of Pelham 123, Followed Up Later Ironically By All The Presidents Men - A Thriller About The Watergate Scandal.

The Conversation Went On To Win Several Awards And Nominations, And Has Become A Classic Of The 'new Hollywood' Movement. Hopefully Now This Music May Become Part Of The Renewed Interest In Old Film Soundtracks.

Those of you who have followed Lucky Brown's tireless efforts since joining the Tramp family in 2007 can hear without a doubt the progress he and his various ensembles have made in almost every musical aspect. His songwriting skills amazed us right from the start of our relationship. What deserves much more respect is that during the past years he has proved to be probably one of the most authentic and steady but at the same time most innovative creative minds on the contemporary funk scene. Sure, many of today's funk bands are able to deliver a two-and-a-half minute funk killer, what distinguishes Lucky Brown, however, is his ability to create compositions which also employ the idiom as a means to deliver an artistic message, a hard-to describe feeling, or a conscious concept, just like James Brown and Fela Kuti mastered in the 1970s. Furthermore, Lucky has developed his own trademark production and sound whose depth and honesty form a basis from which his work will ever remain timeless.

But that's nothing new as you can hear on both of his first two albums for Tamp ("Lucky Brown's Space Dream, 2011 and "Mystery Road", 2015) On "Mesquite Suite" he is forging new paths by soaking up musical styles from all over the world to infuse with his own totally unique way of producing. Perfect examples are the Mulatu Astatke-ish tracks "Pauraque" and "Mother Corn Stalk" with its distinctive New Orleans Swamp-Jazz flavor. Fans of the Menahan Street Band or El Michels Affair may see in "Taterbug" and "Estrellas De La Tierra" their favourite tracks. But it's the entirety which makes this album standout.

It has been Lucky Brown's aim to paint for the world a picture of the vernacular jazz that America's neighborhoods once crafted as their own homegrown cultural heritage. Lucky Brown's music is a rejection of the elitism, classism, and status of the music industrial complex and is an antitoxin to it's resultant homogeneity. He wants with his heart and his art to transmit an everyday people's sound, made by everyday people, dedicated to the upliftment of all people.

Tobias Kirmayer, August 2018

key-selling points:
- limited to 500 hand-numbered copies
- incl. full album download code
- double vinyl LP with deluxe gatefold cover

'Me Me Me is two... and in keeping with the name it seemed that I had no choice but to put out what is only my second ever release on my own label since launching with the debut release 'Tachyon' back in 2016.
(It's also the labels 13th release too. Spooooooky)

So here it is, a double A Side...
Side A is 'Valhalla' which attempts to be as majestic as the name suggests.
Side AA has 'Fidelity", which is me channelling big room house as much as I can, while trying to keep ahold of whatever heart strings I can tug on.
I'll let you judge if I've achieved what I'd set to do with either.

Past those brief descriptions, I still find talking about music to be mildly redundant when you can most likely listen while you're reading this, so instead I'd like to use this sales blurb to issue a massive heartfelt thanks to everybody who has supported the label in the last 2 years, as well as every artists who has trusted us with their music.

Big love to, Dj Tennis, Last Waltz, Red Axes, James Hadfield & Danny Linton, Axel Boman, Bird of Paradise, Pale Blue, Pional, Frank Butters / Cult of Glamour, Andrew Weatherall, Ess O Ess, Desert Sound Colony, Elliot Adamson, Rex The Dog, Forriner, Shit Robot, Raj Pannu, Cosmin TRG, Edmondson, Dauwd, ASOK, Vyvyvan, Paul Woolford, Christophe, Ian Blevins, Dharma, Jana, Pink Skull, Medlar, Ben Caldwell, Dos Attack, Force Majeure, Club Tularosa, Juan Maclean and AWOL!'

Man Power - Summer 2018

"The kind of melancholia I'm talking about, by contrast, consists not in giving up on desire, but in refusing to yield. It consists, that is to say, in a refusal to adjust to what current conditions call 'reality' - even if the cost of that refusal is that you feel like an outcast in your own time." (Mark Fisher, Ghosts Of My Life, Zero Books 2014, p. 24) In Ghosts of My Life: Writings on Depression, Hauntology and Lost Futures', the author Mark Fisher outlines - to put it in a big way - a resistant melancholy. This stands in contrast to leftist melancholy resignation', as well as something which Fisher does not talk about: its common masculine counterpart, habitual post-left cynicism - as in seen it all before'. Fisher calls this hauntological melancholy. Haunting, spooks, ghosts and apparitions are an almost constant presence on I Started Wearing Black', the second album by the Cologne-based artist Sonae (pronounced so-nah'). The term hauntology shares a fate with retro-futurism when it comes to inflationary overuse and abuse. It's a conceptual container that looks good and can hold a lot, indeed, too much. Furthermore, hauntology has its peak season behind it, a term on the threshold of its expiration date. Nevertheless, I would like to rehabilitate hauntology and use it properly to characterize I Started Wearing Black', because the term is rarely as compelling to describe music as is the case here. The most recent other example could be Asiatisch' by Fatma Al Qadiri, but with a completely different frame of reference. What are the ghosts of this music It rustles, crackles, ruffles, crunches, rattles, scrapes, sometimes a beat emerges from the constant noise, sometimes an obscure voice mumbles incomprehensibly, sometimes a melancholy piano figure is prevented by this noise from coming too much to the foreground. It definitely is eerie - to bring into play another term used by Fisher in the title of his latest book, The Weird and the Eerie'. In British pop-jargon, eerie first occurred to me more often when referring to particularly leftfield, spooky and... well... ghostly dub, a bass-heavy, echoing noise, from Augustus Pablo to Creation Rebel to Burial. Unlike the Wald & Wagner records by Wolfgang Voigt, Sonae is not a kind of neo-romantic veiling with a tendency for escapist nebula. It is more a noise of latency. The noise signals a latent - not necessarily acute - threat, a latent uneasiness about... yes... about what About a System Immanent Value Defect' That's the name of a track on I Started Wearing Black' where something that sounds like a French Horn (or a foghorn) battles for attention through or against the background noise. An email from Sonae: The piece 'System Immanent Value Defect' should actually be called 'I See Turkey'. I wrote it for my fellow student Elif - she is a pianist and Gezi Park activist from Istanbul. Through her I witnessed the inner conflict and agitation that political circumstances can create: her feelings of guilt when there was an attack, with her safe in Germany as a student, watching the events from afar. It was horrible. When her mother begged her not to come home because she feared for her safety, I felt a cold shiver run down my spine. I started with the piece from this mood, beginning with the piano, then the noise (modulated sinusoidal curves), which reminded me of waves and the then heatedly discussed Mediterranean sea: atmospheric, melancholy motifs. In contrast is the anger, the pressure, represented in corresponding sounds - hopefully audible! - During this time I started to think about world views as they can be found around the globe, in how far they held by societies and their political representation. I realized that I know of no political system that is actually about the people and what would do them good. It's always about positions, power, money. I thought that was a lot more frightening on a global scale than merely viewing Turkey in isolation. That's why the piece is called "System Immanent Value Defect", because our world suffers from precisely that. Everywhere, it's all about the wrong things.' Between the wrong things there are happy moments. In the title track, after 184 seconds of rattling and hissing, a beat is unleashed, like an arrow released from a spanned bow, a beatific relief, if there is such a thing. White Trash Rouge Noir' first meanders along spookily, then after 144 seconds it transforms itself into a distant cousin of Einstu¨rzende Neubauten's Yu¨ Gung', but there is no Big Male Ego to be fed here, and the black in the album title is a completely different type of black from that of the Neubauten. Furthermore, I Started Wearing Black' was finished long before the black dresses were worn at the Golden Globes as a sign of protest against sexual violence. Sonae writes that she herself started wearing black some time ago. Her reasons are so-called personal ones: ... resulting from an individual situation (lovesickness), I started to wear black (gaining weight and feeling ugly).' The political dimension of gaining weight, feeling ugly and therefore dressing in black in I Started Wearing Black' lurks within the noise and never becomes explicit and only rarely manifest - or a manifesto. Sonae writes about the track We Are Here': A piece for minorities... in this case, considering the current pop-feminist discourse, explicitly for women. Female artists have long been saying loud and clear that 'we are here' and 'electronic music is not a boys club!' But this pop-feminist moment should only be seen as one part of the dedication of the piece. It is for minorities, for the oppressed, who didn't belong enough.'

Klaus Walter

2x12"

Tinfoil is the project of DeFeKT and Sunil Sharpe. Initially forged as a studio collaboration in 2014 (and later as a live show), the pair have since racked up an impressive catalogue of 12s on their own self-titled label. Tinfoil's sound is unique in today's scene, reflecting the versatility of both artists, plus a combined know-how of techno and electro. Their music comes primarily from live studio jams, enforced by a desire to get quickly to the point in what they do. This is no surprise given the fast, technical way in which they each perform solo.

For their debut album, Tinfoil provide a varied but cohesive collection of tracks. Following the intro's epic synth blasts, they open with a bang through 'Caravan Life' - a sinister, bassline-driven destroyer that builds and builds over a blend of claps, filter zaps and crying feedback. 'Beads' continues in a heads-down vein, this time with a more musical EBM type bass and knocking rimshots that mark the first appearance of Sunil's role-playing, haunting lead vocals.

'Friendly Safe Fumes' marries playful bass notes to a singing lead line, as fizzling closed hats and busy claps whip things into a frenzy. Next enter the otherworldly mutant electro of 'Meadow Pulse', signaling a well-timed lull in mood to explore a silkier side to Tinfoil's production. 'Every Saturday Night' starts with a taxi conversation about horses and carbolic soap in bygone Dublin days, before launching into a volley of clattering beats and hip-shaking FM sequences.

'Multi-DOMINATION' retains some of the FM wonk and treads a broken-beated path, featuring vocals this time akin to a ritualistic chant or perhaps the murmurings of a possessed baby. 'Both Roads To Triogue' meanwhile, brings us to a short intersection, splicing odd voices with a dense tribal rhythm. 'The Wolves Of Hellfire' is Tinfoil in more minimal dancefloor mode, as drones filter in and out under a resonating bass that detonates at all the right times.

Closing with 'Resting Point', the climax becomes deadly. The beats are stepped and the bass boisterous, while pained screams become quickly uncontrolled, setting up for a crescendo of roughneck rhythms, ricocheting kicks and turbulent modular wails.

Tinfoil have been on a roll since the beginning but maybe 'On A Roll' emphasizes this a little bit more now.

Leroy Tucker- known simply as L.T. on the scene-and his band the Soulful Dynamics super rare funk 45. The band was a rotating combination of McClyde Sheely, Melissa Riley, Melvin Ausbie, Eric Williams, Collier Carruthers, Lee Berry, Virgil French, Walter Atchinson, and Charles Wakefield. Despite infectious horns and L.T.'s impassioned delivery, neither "Crazy About You Baby" nor "Everybody Needs Somebody" made a dent locally or otherwise. Like all of the Solo platters, the Soulful Dynamics record was manufactured at Monarch in Los Angelas. Dick Smart fondly recalls picking up the record at the Wichita Greyhound station with an excited L.T. in tow.

Art pop meets Mongolian throat singing, Blade Runner meets Walter Carlos (Clockwork Orange), Tom Dissevelt and Kid Baltan (Bowie's favourite band) meet Tame Impala.

The fifth album from Marsmobil has been hailed by many as their best yet. With closer ties to Minx' (2006) than the last two albums, Fairytales Of The Supersurvivor' returns to Marsmobil's signature strength of wondrously brilliant songs ( And The Fishes In The Ocean', Shadows Of The Inner Light') that blend off-the-wall cinemascope sounds with dazzling beats and punchy, powerful hooks to create uniquely distinctive art pop anthems.
As always with Marsmobil, Roberto Di Gioia writes, plays, sings and programs everything himself. Here, as on Minx', he's brought in support from a fabulous singer - the very wonderful Amber Lin, who contributes vocals on four songs. All the cover illustrations are also by Di Gioia.

Multi-instrumentalist Roberto Di Gioia needs little introduction. The curious can explore his biography, discography and extensive lists of projects and collaborations as musician and songwriter (see below) for an impression of the hugely diverse achievements of this multi-talent and brilliant musician.
As a topical heads-up, Roberto Di Gioia is also the founder of the German jazz supergroup Web Web and released the album Oracle' in September 2017. The second Web Web album will follow in early 2018, hard on the heels of the fifth Marsmobil release. Di Gioia also wrote and produced Teufelswerk' for DJ Hell and contributed virtually all the songs on Hell's latest album, Zukunftsmusik'.