Originally released in 1994, Jeff Buckley's solo debut "Grace" is now considered by many to be one of the best albums of the 90s. "Grace" displays a dazzling array of influences from an artist still developing his craft.

Following the success of the Record Store Day 2024 vinyl reissue of ‘Songs To No One’, Knitting Factory Records is making Jeff Buckley & Gary Lucas’ incredible album available again on opaque blue denim vinyl (LP1) and opaque white vinyl.

This album captures Jeff Buckley at the very beginning of his devastatingly short career. Jeff is accompanied by his original writing partner, guitar virtuoso Gary Lucas, and a small cast of ‘90s New York music luminaries. These recordings form the intimate foundation of Jeff’s incredible body of work.

TRACK LISTING

1. Hymne À L'Amour
2. How Long Will It Take
3. Mojo Pin
4. Song To No One
5. Grace (Studio Demo)
6. Satisfied Mind
7. Cruel
8. She Is Free
9. Harem Man
10. Malign Fiesta (No Soul)
11. Grace (Live)

'Grace' is the only complete studio album by Jeff Buckley, originally released on August 23, 1994. After the death of Jeff Buckley in 1997, the album grew to be one of the most important album's of the 90s. The album was produced by Andy Wallace who had mixed Nirvana's album "Nevermind".

In addition to seven original songs, the album included three covers: "Lilac Wine", based on the version by Nina Simone, "Corpus Christi Carol", from Benjamin Britten's A Boy Was Born and "Hallelujah" by Leonard Cohen. Jeff recorded the album with bassist Mick Grondahl, drummer Matt Johnson and guitarist Michael Tighe.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Mojo Pin (5:41)
A2. Grace (5:22)
A3. Last Goodbye (4:32)
A4. Lilac Wine (4:31)
A5. So Real (4:40)

B1. Hallelujah (6:51)
B2. Lover, You Should've Come Over (6:41)
B3. Corpus Christi Carol (2:56)
B4. Eternal Life (4:52)
B5. Dream Brother (5:26)

In a cramped club on the lower east side of Manhattan, armed with only an electric guitar, Jeff Buckley stunned audiences with his mysterious, emotionally uncompromising live sets, packed with eclectic covers and his own originals. The four-track Live at Sin-e EP, released in 1993 was his debut release for Columbia Records; here it's expanded with an eight-page, full color booklet of photos and liner notes. The set includes live versions of favorites like 'Grace', 'Last Goodbye' and Leonard Cohen's 'Hallelujah'.

TRACK LISTING

1. Be Your Husband [Live]
2. Lover, You Should've Come Over [Live]
3. Mojo Pin [Live]
4. Monologue - Duane Eddy, Songs For Lovers [Live]
5. Grace [Live]
6. Monologue – Reverb, The Doors [Live]
7. Strange Fruit [Live]
8. Night Flight [Live]
9. If You Knew [Live]
10. Monologue - Fabulous Time For A Guinness [Live]
11. Unforgiven (Last Goodbye) [Live]
12. The Twelfth Of Never [Live]
13. Monologue - Cafe Days [Live]
14. Monologue - Eternal Life [Live]
15. Eternal Life [Live]
16. Just Like A Woman [Live]
17. Monologue - False Start, Apology, Miles Davis [Live]
18. Calling You [Live]
19. Monologue - Nusrat, He's My Elvis [Live]
20. Yeh Jo Halka Saroor Hae [Live]
21. Monologue - I'm A Ridiculous Person [Live]
22. If You See Her, Say Hello [Live]
23. Monologue - Matt Dillon, Hollies, Classic Rock Radio [Live]
24. Dink's Song [Live]
25. Monologue - Musical Chairs [Live]
26. Drown In My Own Tears [Live]
27. Monologue - The Suckiest Water [Live]
28. The Way Young Lovers Do [Live]
29. Monologue - Walk Through Walls [Live]
30. Je N'en Connais Pas La Fin [Live]
31. I Shall Be Released [Live]
32. Sweet Thing [Live]
33. Monologue - Good Night Bill [Live]
34. Hallelujah [Live]

'The Grace EPs' by legendary singer-songwriter Jeff Buckley, is comprised of the following EPs: 'Peyote Radio Theatre' [July 1994], 'Last Goodbye' [January 1995], 'So Real' [June 1995], 'Live From The Bataclan' [October 1995] and 'The Grace EP' [February 1996], This unique package contains all five twelve inch vinyl records each in their own full colour jacket, a double sided full colour insert with extensive liner notes, all carefully packed in a heavyweight leather laminate textured 15mm-spined outer sleeve.

The five discs that make up the Grace EPs box-set are a collection of live performances, B-sides and studio versions from songs that originally appeared on Buckley's "Grace" album. 'Peyote Radio Theatre' and 'So Real' were promotional-only releases that weren't commercially available. The others are rare imports: 'Last Goodbye' came out in Japan, 'Live from the Bataclan' in France and 'The Grace EP' in Australia. This EP set features "Last Goodbye", "Grace", "So Real" and two amazing live versions of his classic hits "Hallelujah" & "Mojo Pin". The Grace EPs also features a whopping 12-minute version of Van Morrison's "The Way Young Lovers Do," a medley of "Je N'En Connais Pas la Fin/Hymne A l'Amour," Hank Williams's "Lost Highway," and a 14-minute take on Alex Chilton's "Kanga-Roo." Finally there is a bonus track added to the The Grace EP; "Tongue," a spooky ambient 11-minute studio instrumental.

TRACK LISTING

Peyote Radio Theatre:

Side A
1. Mojo Pin
2. Dream Brother (Nag Champa Mix)

Side B
1. Kanga-Roo

So Real:

Side C
1. So Real (Live)
2. Grace (Live)

Side D
1. Dream Brother (Live)

Live From The Bataclan:

Side E
1. Dream Brother (Live)
2. The Way Young Lovers Do (Live)

Side F
1. Medley: Je N'En Connais La Fin/Hymne A L'Amour (Live)
2. Hallelujah (Live)

The Grace EP:

Side G
1. Grace
2. Grace (Live)
3. Mojo Pin (Live)

Side H
1. Hallelujah (Live)
2. Tongue (Rehearsal Demo)

Last Goodbye EP:

Side I
1. Last Goodbye
2. Mojo Pin (Live "Chocolate Version")

Side J
1. Kanga-Roo (Album Version)
2. Lost Highway (Live)

Recently discovered in the vaults – 10 previously unreleased and virtually unheard studio recordings.

Including covers of Bob Dylan, Sly & The Family Stone, The Smiths, Led Zeppelin, Bukka White and Jevetta Steele, in addition to the first ever studio recording of his signature song ‘Grace’ and ‘Dream Of You And I’, an unheard original recording which informs the deeply intimate and profoundly personal mood of the album. These recordings represent the breadth of Buckley’s influences and talent for interpretation.

Recorded prior to the sessions which would become his seminal debut album ‘Grace’, these tracks offer a unique insight in to the creative process of a developing genius and inimitable immerging talent.

The Columbia/Legacy release of Jeff Buckley's You and I has been overseen by the artist's mother, Mary Guibert.

TRACK LISTING

1. Just Like A Woman (Bob Dylan Cover)
2. Everyday People (Sly & The Family Stone Cover)
3. Don’t Let The Sun Catch You Cryin’ (1st Recorded By Louis Jordan)
4. Grace (original Studio Version)
5. Calling You (Jevetta Steele Cover)
6. Dream Of You And I (original)
7. The Boy With The Thorn In His Side (The Smiths Cover)
8. Poor Boy Long Way From Home (Bukka White Cover)
9. Night Flight (Led Zeppelin Cover)
10. I Know It’s Over (The Smiths Cover)

Jake wrote all eleven songs, played most of the instruments, and produced most of the album (Jacknife Lee produced 3 tracks). The results are simply staggering. Following the incredible success of his first two albums, the double platinum 2012 debut ‘Jake Bugg’ and the top five 2013 follow-up ‘Shangri La’, this new disc firmly establishes Jake as one of Britain’s most exciting talents.

Recorded in London, Los Angeles and Nottingham, highlights are many and include the moving ‘Love Hope And Misery’ driven by a huge chorus, the stomping ‘Bitter Salt’, the soulful ‘Never Wanna Dance’ and the defining title track.

TRACK LISTING

1. On My One
2. Gimme The Love
3. Love, Hope And Misery
4. The Love We’re Hoping For
5. Put Out The Fire
6. Never Wanna Dance
7. Bitter Salt
8. Ain't No Rhyme
9. Livin’ Up Country
10. All That
11. Hold On You

Produced by Metrophonic at Metrophonic Studios in London, Jake returns to his roots on the rock-driven A Modern Day Distraction – a record that turns up the noise while shining a light on the injustice he’s seen dealt to the family and friends he grew up with. Fiery and engaged, the record was born out of a frustration of societal inequality. Bugg found that a time had come when he just couldn’t look away. “People might say ‘What do you know?’ or ‘Just stick to music’. I’ve got a bit of money, but we all know the people this affects. I was just writing it because it was the way I felt. It pisses me off – especially in a country like ours where we have the means and funds to take care of the people suffering the most, but we choose not to.”

Now 12 years and six albums since he emerged with his streetwise and spritely, Mercury-nominated, chart-topping, self-titled debut, one might forget he was just 18 at the time. He’s put in the hours and achieved so much, but he’s only 30 and still seeing the front rows of his shows getting younger.

In that spirit, Bugg still feels his best work is ahead of him: “You just have to put your songs out into the universe and hope for the best.” 

Fifth album from Nottingham born singer-songwriter Jake Bugg and his debut on RCA Records.

‘Melinda Latino’ is taken from the awesome ‘Melinda’ OST written by Butler & Peters, released in 1972. This is a heavy track right from the first beat - harps and breakbeats, leading into a soul piano mood, huge strings and backing vox. Jimmy Smith’s version of Barry White’s ‘I’m Gonna Love You Just A Little Bit More Baby’. A very dope intro break leads into crazy vocal chops before heating the main melody, in true Jimmy Smith style. Taken from his ‘Black Smith’ LP for Pride, released in 1974.

Sometimes it can take years to find your calling. Not so, for wanderer Julie Byrne; whose power of lyrical expression and melodic nous seems inborn. But often, what comes naturally demonstrates against speed. Julie’s second album Not Even Happiness has taken time to evolve, but as it spans recollections of bustling roadside diners, the stars over the high desert, the aching weariness of change, the wildflowers on the coast of California and the irresolvable mysteries of love. Her new album archives a vivid world that would've otherwise been lost to the road and in doing so, Byrne exhibits her extraordinarily innate musicality.

In fact, some of the album’s songs took two years of fine tuning to get where they needed to be. And if you were to ask her why the follow up to 2014's Rooms With Walls And Windows has taken so long, you’d only be greeted with a bemused smile as though it's the strangest question she's ever been asked; “Writing comes from a natural process of change and growth. It took me up to this point to have the capacity to express my experience of the time in my life that these songs came from.”

Having counted Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Northampton, Massachusetts, Chicago, Illinois, Seattle, New Orleans as her home in recent years. For now, Julie has settled in New York City where she moonlights as a seasonal urban park ranger in Manhattan. Whether witnessing the Pacific Northwest for the first time (‘Melting Grid’), the morning sky in Colorado after staying up through the night at a house party in the mountains of Boulder (‘Natural Blue’), recording the passage of freight trains on the outskirts of Buffalo, New York ('Interlude'), or a journey fragrant with rose water; reading Frank O’Hara aloud from the passengers seat during a drive through the desert of Utah into the rainforest of Washington State (‘All The Land Glimmered Beneath’), Not Even Happiness is Julie’s beguilingly ode to the fringes of life.

Self-taught on the guitar after picking it up when her father became ill and could no longer play the instrument himself, Julie readily admits she can’t read music and doesn't even listen to it all that much - the first vinyl she owned was indeed, her own. Recorded with producer Eric Littmann (Phantom Posse), Julie laid down the new album in her childhood home in western New York state and offers an altogether bigger picture to its predecessor through a wider, yet subtle, exploration of instruments and atmospherics, Not Even Happiness reveals an artist who has grown in confidence over time.

Byrne's debut album was released back in January 2014 on Chicago based DIY label Orindal after initially being as two separate cassettes releases. Rooms With Walls and Windows went onto become a true modern-day word of mouth success story (it would have to be for an artist who shuns all forms of social media) and ended the year being voted number 7 in Mojo magazine's best albums of the year, with the Huffington Post calling it "2014's Great American Album". A collection of hushed intimate front porch psych-folk songs, that unknowingly recalled the greats, but felt very much for our time. It saw her travel to Europe over two summers playing the Green Man festival and End Of The Road, as well as lesser trodden tour paths around Europe.

Julie Byrne will take the songs from Not Even Happiness (the first release on a new record label Basin Rock, based in the Lancashire / Yorkshire border town of Todmorden) on the road throughout 2017.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Lightly strummed and impeccably arranged folk guitars meet with swaying and mournful vocals all purposefully and beautifully delivered as a shining example of minimal affectations with maximum results.

TRACK LISTING

1. Follow My Voice
2. Sleepwalker
3. Melting Grid
4. Natural Blue
5. Interlude
6. Morning Dove
7. All The Land Glimmered Beneath
8. Sea As It Glides
9. I Live Now As A Singer

'I believe the use of noise to make music will continue and increase until we reach a music produced through the aid of electrical instruments which will make available for musical purposes any and all sounds that can be heard.' - John Cage 1937. Although John Cage occasionally worked in large, sophisticated studios - for example, when he composed Fontana Mix in 1958 - his approach to electronic and tape music was often uncomplicated, makeshift, and pragmatic, employing simple tabletop devices: tape machines, phonograph cartridges, contact microphones, record players, portable radios, etc. He developed a soundworld that was utterly new, radical and demanding. It heralded the age of the loudspeaker, mass communication and Marshall McLuhan's 'global village.' The hiss, crackle and hum of electronic circuits, and the disembodied sounds, snatched by radio from the ether, spoke of the 20th century.

Langham Research Centre works within the tradition firmly established by Cage, using resources that would have been available to him. For the realisation of Cartridge Music, moving iron phonograph pickups were sourced and restored. These have a knurled screw designed to hold a steel phonograph needle and, in the piece, other objects are inserted and amplified: pieces of wire, toothpicks, paperclips, etc. The realisation of Fontana Mix includes the individual mono tracks from Cage's original tapes created in 1958. These are played using open-reel tape machines. These practices ensure we work within the limitations that Cage experienced and enable us to get close to the soundworld he inhabited. (Robert Worby, LRC).

TRACK LISTING

CD:
01 Fontana Mix With Aria 1958 / 13'36
02 Imaginary Landscape N°.5 1952 / 3'00
03 WBAI 1960 / 7'00
04 Cartridge Music 1960 / 10'00
05 0'00'' 1962 / 2'36
06 Variations I 1960 / 10'00 Tracklisting LP

VINYL:
SIDE A
01 Fontana Mix With Aria 1958 / 13'36
02 Imaginary Landscape N°.5 1952 / 3'00
03 WBAI 1960 / 7'00

SIDE B
01 Cartridge Music 1960 / 10'00
02 0'00'' 1962 / 2'36
03 Variations I 1960 / 10'00

Released in October 1974, Fear is an incredibly important in the 50+ year career of John Cale - This re-issue faithfully replicates the original 1974 Island Records UK release and is pressed onto high quality 180g vinyl.

Fear marked Cale's return to recording in London after the best part of a decade in America. Signing to Island, he made fast friends with two key admirers, Phil Manzanera and Brian Eno, who assisted him in returning his music to the rawer sound of his earlier work, as opposed to the lush textures of his previous studio album, Paris 1919. The tense, clipped "Fear Is A Man's Best Friend" harks back to the work of the Velvet Underground, as does the standout, "Gun", eight minutes of overdriven bleakness with Eno duelling with Cale's guitar solo on synthesisers. Much is rightly made of these tracks, but there is also the sweetness of the gospel of "Buffalo Ballet" and the Beach Boys homage "The Man Who Couldn't Afford To Orgy". The pretty, semi-autobiographical "Ship Of Fools" offers listeners an opportunity to hear Cale reference the South Wales city of Swansea, its seaside suburb, Mumbles and his home village of Garnant.

In its often-skeletal simplicity, the often triumphant Fear is an album that brought an angular aggression with it.

TRACK LISTING

Fear Is A Man's Best Friend
Buffalo Ballet
Barracuda
Emily
Ship Of Fools
Gun
The Man Who Couldn't Afford To Orgy
You Know More Than I Know
Momamma Scuba

Domino Records reissue John Cale’s classic live album ‘Fragments Of A Rainy Season’, featuring his revered interpretation of Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah’ amongst many solo versions from his enduring catalogue and previously unreleased outtakes.

‘Fragments Of A Rainy Season’ was the first live John Cale album to feature him performing solo and ‘unplugged’ - before that term became a mid 1990s buzzword.

In contrast to the jaundiced punk truculence of ‘Sabotage/Live’ (1979) or ‘Even Cowgirls Get The Blues’ (1986), ‘Fragments Of A Rainy Season’ gives us Cale at his most melodic and moving, a mellowed and certainly a soberer man in a Yamamoto jacket and a lopsided haircut running through a selection of his prettiest songs. It’s a Cale many love deeply, a man alone at a concert-hall Steinway revisiting the pop-rock of ‘Paris 1919’ and ‘A Child’s Christmas In Wales’, as wistful and whimsical as any 70s singer songwriter holding court at LA’s Troubadour club. It’s the Cale who disavowed the spiky nihilism and decadence of the Velvets, inspired instead by melodicism of Paul McCartney and Brian Wilson (to whom he’d paid haunting homage on ‘Slow Dazzle’s brilliant Beach Boys pastiche ‘Mr. Wilson’). It’s the Cale who improbably took a staff job at Warner-Reprise in LA and - for an all-too-brief moment - became part of the Burbank producers’ mafia alongside Lenny Waronker and his laidback chums. (Lest we forget, 1973’s ‘Paris 1919’ featured members of Little Feat and The Crusaders among the backing musicians.)

Cale being Cale, ‘Fragments Of A Rainy Season’ isn’t all rueful tenderness. The deceptively jaunty ‘Darling I Need You’ is flippantly introduced as a song about “religious awakening in the southern part of the United States,” while Elvis’ ‘Heartbreak Hotel’ is no less gothic in the solo version here than it is in the Grand Guignol horror show of the original on ‘Slow Dazzle’. ‘Guts’ is as close as Cale ever came to Lou Reed at his most withering.

It’s easy to forget that - years before Jeff Buckley and The X-Factor - he was the first artist to recognize the hymnal majesty of Leonard Cohen’s ‘Hallelujah’, or that it was his original 1991 reading of the song that popped up on the soundtrack of ‘Shrek’.

TRACK LISTING

On A Wedding Anniversary
Lie Still, Sleep Becalmed
Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night
Cordoba
Buffalo Ballet
A Child’s Christmas In Wales
Darling I Need You
Guts
Ship Of Fools
Leaving It Up To You
The Ballad Of Cable Hogue
Chinese Envoy
Dying On The Vine
Fear (Is A Man’s Best Friend)
Heartbreak Hotel
Style It Takes
Paris 1919
(I Keep A) Close Watch
Thoughtless Kind
Hallelujah
Fear (Is A Man’s Best Friend) (Outtake)*
Amsterdam (Outtake) *
Broken Hearts (Outtake) *
I’m Waiting For The Man (Outtake) *
Heartbreak Hotel (Outtake - Strings) *
Fear (Is A Man’s Best Friend) (Outtake - Strings) *
Paris 1919 (Outtake - Strings) *
Antarctica Starts Here (Outtake - Strings) *

* = Bonus Track (REWIGCD107X & REWIGLP107X [& REWIGLP107 As
Digital Download] Only)

Recorded quickly between John Cale producing Patti Smith's Horses and his going out on an Italian tour, Helen of Troy became Cale's third and final studio album for Island Records - This re-issue faithfully replicates the original 1975 Island Records UK release and is pressed onto high quality 180g vinyl.

Helen Of Troy is a raw, fascinating listen. The title track with its horns and spoken word is one of Cale's best: after the sweet bubblegum of "China Sea", the album gets increasingly stripped down – the acoustic guitar and piano of "Cable Hogue" and the punkish cover of The Modern Lovers' "Pablo Picasso" have long been favourites on the album. "Leaving It All Up To You" – in which Cale becomes increasingly disturbed – garnered controversy at the time and was actually removed from later pressings of the album because of its references to the Manson murders. Cale never lost his ability to shock. Taking its title from the opening line of Johnny Cash's "I Walk The Line", "I Keep A Close Watch", a track Cale would record again several years later, with its Robert Kirby-arranged strings and horns, is the closest Cale has veered toward a power ballad.

It is a work of great beauty among all the jagged edges of Helen Of Troy.

For nearly 60 years, or at least since he was a young Welshman who moved to New York and formed The Velvet Underground, Cale has been reinventing his music with dazzling and inspiring regularity. There was the bewitching chamber folk of Paris 1919 followed instantly by the gnarled rock of Fear, the provocative and spare song cycle Music for a New Society followed more than 30 years later by mighty and unabashed electronic updates. Once again, here is Cale, reimagining how his music is made, sounds, and even works. His engrossing 12-track MERCY moves through true dark-night-of-the-soul electronics toward vulnerable love songs and hopeful considerations for the future.

On MERCY, Cale enlists some of music’s most curious young minds: Animal Collective, Sylvan Esso, Laurel Halo, Tei Shi, Actress. They’re only some of the astounding cast here, brilliant musicians who climb inside Cale’s consummate vision of the world and help him redecorate there. Cale turned 80 in March, and he’s watched as many peers have passed away, particularly during the last decade. MERCY is the continuation of a long career’s work with wonder. Cale has always searched for new ways to explore old ideas of alienation, hurt, and joy; MERCY is the latest transfixing find of this unsatisfied mind.

The writings and recordings that shaped MERCY piled up for years, as Cale watched society totter at the brink of dystopia. Trump and Brexit, Covid and climate change, civil rights and right-wing extremism—Cale let the bad news of the day filter into his lines, whether that meant contemplating the sovereignty and legal status of sea ice melting near the poles or the unhinged arming of Americans. Lessons from a life (still being) richly lived floated to the fore, too, nodded to on the previously released “NIGHT CRAWLING.” If we’re always regretting our past, aren’t we conscripting ourselves to permanent disappointment?

During “STORY OF BLOOD,” after the piano prelude gives way to a frame-rattling beat and synthesizers that feel like sunshine splashed across a snowfield, the voices of Cale and Weyes Blood’s Natalie Mering slide past one another, two phantoms trying to find a partner amid the modern din. “Swing your soul,” they both sing in aspiration. In the final verse, Cale remembers this existence is not just about himself. “I’m going back to get them, my friends in the morning. Bring them with me into the light.” The accompanying video by Emmy-winning director Jethro Waters is a mix of disturbing and serene featuring both Cale and Weyes Blood. Its deep tones and religious images emphasize the track’s dark, spiritual mood.

Cale elaborates: “I’d been listening to Weyes Blood’s latest record and remembered Natalie’s puritanical vocals. I thought if I could get her to come and sing with me on the ‘Swing your soul’ section, and a few other harmonies, it would be beautiful. What I got from her was something else! Once I understood the versatility in her voice, it was as if I’d written the song with her in mind all along. Her range and fearless approach to tonality was an unexpected surprise. There’s even a little passage in there where she’s a dead-ringer for Nico.”

TRACK LISTING

1. Mercy Feat. Laurel Halo
2. Marilyn Monroe’s Leg (Beauty Elsewhere) Feat. Actress
3. Noise Of You
4. Story Of Blood Feat. Weyes Blood
5. Time Stands Still Feat. Sylvan Esso
6. Moonstruck (Nico’s Song)
7. Everlasting Days Feat. Animal Collective
8. Night Crawling
9. Not The End Of The World
10. The Legal Status Of Ice Feat. Fat White Family
11. I Know You’re Happy Feat. Tei Shi
12. Out Your Window

'MIXology' is a companion release to the aforementioned 'POPtical Illusion' and 2023’s 'MERCY', featuring previously unreleased songs and alternate versions taken from the albums’ sessions. Tracks 1-4 are from 'MERCY' and in line with the album’s collaborative spirit featuring guest appearances from Tony Allen and Tei Shi; tracks 5-7 are from 'POPtical Illusion'.

TRACK LISTING

1. Clap Clap
2. I Know You're Happy (feat Tei Shi) (Chill Mix)
3. Long Way Out Of Pain (feat Tony Allen)
4. 1000 Years
5. Invention Of Language
6. The Adventures Of SupaCane
7. Standing Next To You

John Cale was never very kind to his solo debut, ‘Vintage Violence’. When it was released in early 1970, Cale had been out of The Velvet Underground for less than two years. He wanted to prove he could be the songwriter, the person penning the words and melodies behind which a band could work. “I was masked on ‘Vintage Violence’,” he wrote much later. “You’re not really seeing the personality.”

Indeed, Cale’s personality as a polyglot seemingly interested in everything emerged more and more on his next two solo albums, his only two for Reprise: 1972’s bracing and exploratory classical sojourn, ‘The Academy in Peril’, and 1973’s masterclass in anxious but accessible songcraft, ‘Paris 1919’.

By reissuing both records in tandem affirms the artistic fearlessness Cale then fostered at the edge of 30, when all of music seemed like one inviting playpen.

Remastered from the original tapes and includes previously unreleased outtakes.

Liner notes written by Grayson Haver Currin.

TRACK LISTING

Child's Christmas In Wales (Remastered)
Hanky Panky Nohow (Remastered)
The Endless Plain Of Fortune (Remastered)
Andalucia (Remastered)
Macbeth (Remastered)
Paris 1919 (Remastered)
Graham Greene (Remastered)
Half Past France (Remastered)
Antarctica Starts Here (Remastered)
I Must Not Sniff Cocaine (Remastered)
Hanky Panky Nohow (Drone Mix) (Remastered)
Child's Christmas In Wales (Rehearsal 1) (Remastered)
Half Past France (Intro Chat) (Remastered)
Macbeth (Take 11) (Remastered)
Hanky Panky Nohow (Guitar Mix) (Remastered)
Fever Dream 2024: You're a Ghost 

Despite the album’s playful title, Cale’s second album in just over a year still contains the same feelings of fierce and inquisitive rage that were present in 2023 album MERCY. He remains angry, still incensed by the willful destruction that unchecked capitalists and unrepentant conmen have hoisted upon the wonders of this world and the goodness of its people. But this is not at all MERCY II, or some collection of castoffs, as throughout his career of more than six decades, Cale has never been much for repetition. His vanguard-shaping enthusiasms have shifted among ecstatic classicism and unbound rock, classic songcraft and electronic reimagination with proud restlessness.

And so, on POPtical Illusion, he foregoes the illustrious cast to burrow mostly alone into mazes of synthesizers and samples, organs and pianos, with words that, as far as Cale goes, constitute a sort of swirling hope, a sage insistence that change is yet possible. Produced by Cale and longtime artistic partner Nita Scott, POPtical Illusion is the work of someone trying to turn toward the future – exactly as Cale always has.

TRACK LISTING

1. God Made Me Do It (don’t Ask Me Again)
2. Davies And Wales
3. Calling You Out
4. Edge Of Reason
5. I’m Angry
6. How We See The Light
7. Company Commander
8. Setting Fires
9. Shark-Shark
10. Funkball The Brewster
11. All To The Good
12. Laughing In My Sleep
13. There Will Be No River

Following on quickly from Fear, and capitalising on that album's energy Slow Dazzle is another fiery release by Velvet Underground founder John Cale - This re-issue faithfully replicates the original 1975 Island Records UK release and is pressed onto high quality 180g vinyl.

Released in March 1975, initially, the album offers a false sense of mellow security: "Mr Wilson", a tribute to Brian, the leader of Cale's beloved Beach Boys starts the on a much sweeter note than "Fear Is A Man's Best Friend", as does "Taking It All Away"; by "Dirty Ass Rock'n'Roll" Slow Dazzle is off to darker terrain, business as usual. Cale, however, cannot resist a pop song and a ballad – "Ski Patrol" is a great two-minute vignette, and "I'm Not The Loving Kind" is soul-baring.

The album's reputation, however, rests on two tracks – "Guts", a bald telling of Cale's wife's infidelity and his pitch-black cover of Elvis Presley's "Heartbreak Hotel". 50 years later, these songs still pack a tremendous punch.

TRACK LISTING

Mr. Wilson
Taking It All Away
Dirty-Ass Rock 'N' Roll
Darling I Need You
Rollaroll
Heartbreak Hotel
Ski Patrol
I'm Not The Loving Kind
Guts
The Jeweller

John Cale was never very kind to his solo debut, ‘Vintage Violence’. When it was released in early 1970, Cale had been out of The Velvet Underground for less than two years. He wanted to prove he could be the songwriter, the person penning the words and melodies behind which a band could work. “I was masked on ‘Vintage Violence’,” he wrote much later. “You’re not really seeing the personality.”

Indeed, Cale’s personality as a polyglot seemingly interested in everything emerged more and more on his next two solo albums, his only two for Reprise: 1972’s bracing and exploratory classical sojourn, ‘The Academy in Peril’, and 1973’s masterclass in anxious but accessible songcraft, ‘Paris 1919’.

By reissuing both records in tandem affirms the artistic fearlessness Cale then fostered at the edge of 30, when all of music seemed like one inviting playpen.

Artist-sanctioned reissue, remastered from the original tapes.

TRACK LISTING

The Philosopher (Remastered)
Brahms (Remastered)
Legs Larry At Television Centre (Remastered)
The Academy In Peril (Remastered)
Intro (Remastered)
Days Of Steam (Remastered)
3 Orchestral Pieces: A) Faust b) The Balance C) Capt.
Morgans Lament (Remastered)
King Harry (Remastered)
John Milton (Remastered)
Temper *

* = CD Only Bonus Track (included With LP As A Digital download)

Vintage Violence is John Cale’s first post-Velvet Underground album and was originally released in 1970. Cale's signature sound with the Velvets was purposefully rough and aurally challenging, but Vintage Violence is a startlingly user-friendly piece of mature, intelligent pop with a smooth, satin finish. The Welsh rocker shows a pop craftsman at work on ten tracks that reference everything from Country Rock to Beach Boys harmonies to The Band-style Americana and beyond.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A
1. Hello, There
2. Gideon's Bible
3. Adelaide
4. Big White Cloud
5. Cleo
6. Please

SIDE B
1. Charlemagne
2. Bring It On Up
3. Amsterdam
4. Ghost Story
5. Fairweather Friend

First time vinyl repress of this John Cale album, originally released on the Opal label in 1989, produced by Brian Eno.

“‘Words For The Dying’ has at its heart The Falklands Suite, Cale’s baroque if heartfelt response to the Anglo-Argentinian War, which finds him setting the poems of his beloved Dylan Thomas to music. When building songs around another’s words, the results often sound forced, but Cale does a magnificent job of compressing Thomas’s lyricism into neat melodic phrases, themselves just components of a vast harmonic mega-structure scored for the USSR’s Orchestra of Symphonic & Popular Music of Gostelradio. A project that could easily have collapsed under the weight of its own ambition is instead a late masterpiece, thanks to Cale’s deep-seated compositional genius, and unobtrusive but resonant production from Brian Eno.” - Kiran Sande

TRACK LISTING

The Falkland Suite
Introduction
There Was A Saviour
Interlude I
On A Wedding
Anniversary
Interlude II
Lie Still, Sleep Becalmed
Do Not Go Gentle Into That
Good Night

Songs Without Words. II
The Soul Of Carmen
Miranda

Set in the pressure cooker of fresh adulthood, Jahnah Camille’s defiant new EP 'My Sunny Oath!' is a guitar-based grab at self-acceptance. Romping through alt-rock, lo-fi grit, and sardonic grunge with unflinching momentum, the new six-song collection channels Jahnah’s era-agnostic songwriting influences, from The Sundays and Liz Phair to Minnie Riperton and Japanese Breakfast. Largely written before a breakout year including tours opening for Luna Li, Tops, and Blondshell, 'My Sunny Oath!' is set in stormy self-development. Dreamily layered vocals, modern shoegaze sheen, and keyboard lines accompany Jahnah’s ear-worming guitar parts and coyly detached tone, as she pushes through the muck of outgrown relationships, misogyny, and hometown anxiety with the help of producer Alex Farrar (Wednesday, Indigo De Souza, MJ Lenderman). The clear-eyed sonic expansion of 'My sunny oath!' marks a decisively bold, exploratory new direction for Camille’s sound with fearless hooks and swirling production abound. It’s a messy, vulnerable, and inviting picture of early adulthood.

TRACK LISTING

1. Close To Heaven
2. What Do You Do?
3. Rocket
4. Summer’s Scorch
5. Sit With You (Pain)
6. Away, Again.
7. Flesh
8. Roadkill
9. Elliot
10. Paper Doll
11. Carnival Sounds

I Want Blood is the new solo album from Alice In Chains guitarist and vocalist Jerry Cantrell. Co-produced by Joe Barresi (Tool, Queens of the Stone Age), the album has an energy that rivals any of Cantrell’s previous work – powerful, nuanced, and electric. It features Duff McKagan (GUNS N' ROSES), Robert Trujillo (METALLICA), Gil Sharone (TEAM SLEEP, STOLEN BABIES), Mike Bordin (FAITH NO MORE) and backing vocals from Lola Colette and Greg Puciato (BETTER LOVERS, ex-THE DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN). 

TRACK LISTING

CD
1. Vilified
2. Off The Rails
3. Afterglow
4. I Want Blood
5. Echoes Of Laughter
6. Throw Me A Line
7. Let It Lie
8. Held Your Tongue
9. It Comes

LP
SIDE A
A1. Vilified
A2. Off The Rails
A3. Afterglow
SIDE B
B1. I Want Blood
B2. Echoes Of Laughter
B3. Throw Me A Line
SIDE C
C1. Let It Lie
C2. Held Your Tongue
C3. It Comes
SIDE D – Spoken Word Tracks
D1. Vilified (Spoken Word)
D2. Off The Rails (Spoken Word)
D3. Afterglow (Spoken Word)
D4. I Want Blood (Spoken Word)
D5. Echoes Of Laughter (Spoken Word)
D6. Throw Me A Line (Spoken Word)
D7. Let It Lie (Spoken Word)
D8. Held Your Tongue (Spoken Word
D9. It Comes (Spoken Word)

On the Echoing Green is an elegant work of lush, shimmering sound, rendered with a singular touch by eternal electric romantic Jefre Cantu-Ledesma. In contrast to the haze and hermetic process of previous albums, Green was conceived as a deliberate experiment in clarity and collaboration: “I was interested in trying to bring out more overt pop elements, to let them come to the front and be present. I also have more trust now in letting things happen – trusting other people’s musicianship, and being open to people’s ideas. Eventually, things emerge.” What emerged from this bond are eight rapturous and richly melodic slow dives of swirling guitar, bass, synthesizer, piano, and drum machines, dramatically accented in places by heavenly arcs of voice courtesy of Argentinian singer-songwriter Sobrenadar. Cantu-Ledesma encouraged chemistry and intuition in the studio by beginning the album without any demos for reference; he and his collaborators pursued patterns and hypnotic textures across long-form improvisations until gradually songs began to take shape. This is music of growth and grandeur, of ascent and exploration, played with purpose and passion by a craftsman in tune with the beauty of sound and the harmony of light. In his words: “[This album] feels like spring – things coming alive, blooming, emerging from winter.”

TRACK LISTING

1. In A Copse
2. A Song Of Summer
3. Echoing Green
4. The Faun
5. Tenderness
6. Vulgar Latin
7. Autumn
8. Dancers At The Spring
9. Door To Night

Essex-born, Liverpool-based songwriter James Canty returns with a new five track EP.

EP title track 'Love' is packed with harpsichords, synthesisers and electronic flourishes, coming across like some amazing future-retro psych-folk experiment. The collection of tracks follows two years on the road across Europe for Canty, with the five songs written and recorded in the home studio of producer and Obscenic Records chief Joe Wills.

TRACK LISTING

Love
Deborah
Strangers
Putney Bridge
Burning Alive

"This 6 song symphony of sound juxtaposed with chaos and long stills of almost nothing starts the only way I’d expect it to. The first track “Ballast” comes in with murderous hits, cracks, and drills. It’s hard to put into words exactly what you are listening to. And, that’s what I love about Mr. Cary’s tracks. But, somehow Jeff has forged a signature sound. I have been listening to noise for awhile now. I haven’t hear anything quite like it.

[3:30] as a full body of work is not just a digitally distorted camero with the gas pedal to the floor going through a time warp. It is dynamic and almost peaceful at times. With tracks like “Phosphor” and “Node” where you find yourself lost in an ambient sound scape of breathed gesters and things off in the distance. I admire Jeff’s way of knowing when to hold back or be minimal in his approach while yet still having some sort of rage you can’t quite pinpoint but you know it’s there and you can feel it and it’s about to burst and you like it.

I have seen Jeff live countless times. I got a chance to see him at one of his most recent performances at Club K where he performed a few of these new tracks live. Being a drummer for over 15 years I tend to latch onto the rhythm of any song I hear. Even in noise I somehow subconsciously makeup a beat I bop my head up and down to. I noticed that I didn’t have to magically make an esoteric drum section for Jeff’s performance. It was already there. Tracks like “1001″ make you feel as a drummer or drum machine is being forced through a grinder with a distortion pedal in the chain.

It’s a very purifying experience listening to Jeff Carey‘s works on [3:30]. It’s not for everyone.. But, it sure is hell for noise enthusiasts like me. But, hey.. If you’ve never listened to a “noise” artist before or haven’t gotten down with that scene. Try it out. You might just like this one." - Gutter Magazine.

In celebration of its 35th anniversay, MONDO is pleased to present the original soundtrack to John Carpenter's HALLOWEEN. This release features the most comprehensive version of the soundtrack, never before released on vinyl, cut at 45RPM for the best possible sound quality.

By now everyone should know John Carpenter is not only a celebrated filmmaker but also a musical maestro whose soundtracks have become synonymous with the genres of horror, suspense, and science fiction. His innate talent for composition and his deep understanding of how music can elevate storytelling have left an indelible mark on the world of cinema, and a haunting presence in people’s record collections.

Anthology II continues the celebration of his compositional genius via an excellently sequenced collection of some of his most iconic pieces of music from his extensive filmography, all newly recorded with his musical collaborators Daniel Davies and Cody Carpenter.

The compilation opens with “Chariots of Pumpkins” from Halloween III that perfectly captures the eerie essence of the cult classic film with its pulsating synths and haunting melodies. The listener is engulfed by a sense of unease and anticipation, before being thrust into “69th St. Bridge” from Escape From New York, a dynamic track that encapsulates the futuristic and gritty nature of the film via the use of throbbing bass lines, driving rhythms, and electronic textures. The record has also an isolating tone as it skulks through ambient leaning tracks such as “Fuchs” and “To Mac’s Shack” from The Thing, and “Walk to the Lighthouse” from The Fog, all of which display a slower tempo, foreboding undertones and an ethereal atmosphere that feels like a distant whisper. All of which has been cautiously laid in preparation to the grand finale. The iconic and instantly recognizable ”Laurie’s Theme” from the original Halloween. Its simple yet menacing piano melody which has become synonymous with the horror genre, concludes the album by striking fear into the hearts of listeners.

These tracks represent just a fraction of John Carpenter’s impressive musical repertoire. With each haunting note and pulsating beat, his soundtracks continue to resonate with audiences, forever etching his name in the annals offilm music history.

TRACK LISTING

1. Chariots Of Pumpkins (Halloween III)
2. 69th St. Bridge (Escape From New York)
3. The Alley (War) (Big Trouble In Little China)
4. Wake Up (They Live)
5. Julie’s Dead (Assault On Precinct 13)
6. The Shape Enters Laurie’s Room (Halloween II)
7. Season Of The Witch (Halloween III)
8. Love At A Distance (Prince Of Darkness)
9. The Shape Stalks Again (Halloween II)
10. Burn It (The Thing)
11. Fuchs (The Thing)
12. To Mac’s Shack (The Thing)
13. Walk To The Lighthouse (The Fog)
14. Laurie’s Theme (Halloween)

John Carpenter’s soundtracks for the most recent Halloween trilogy, made alongside his frequent collaborators Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies, marked the legendary director and composer’s return to film scoring after nearly two decades away. 2018’s Halloween, 2021’s Halloween Kills, and 2022’s Halloween Ends were all directed by David Gordon Green, who engaged Carpenter early in the pre-production process, ultimately enlisting him as both an executive producer and soundtrack composer for the trilogy. Now, for the first time, a deluxe, 2xLP expanded edition of the Halloween End score is being made available by Carpenter’s longtime label, Sacred Bones Records.

TRACK LISTING

1. Where Is Jeremy?
2. Halloween Ends (Main Title)
3. Laurie’s Theme Ends
4. The Cave
5. Tire Slash
6. Cool Kid
7. Drags To The Cave
8. Evil Eyes
9. Transformation
10. Because Of You
11. Walk With Me
12. Requiem For Jeremy
13. In The Restaurant
14. Bridge Fight
15. Kill The Cop
16. Corey And Allyson
17. Side Of The Road
18. Corey And Michael
19. Slap
20. Corey’s Requiem
21. Take The Mask
22. The Junk Yard
23. Where Are You?
24. Suicide
25. What Did You Do?
26. Bye Bye Corey
27. The Fight
28. Before Her Eyes
29. The Procession
30. Cherry Blossoms
31. Halloween Ends

John Carpenter’s soundtracks for the most recent Halloween trilogy, made alongside his frequent collaborators Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies, marked the legendary director and composer’s return to film scoring after nearly two decades away. 2018’s Halloween, 2021’s Halloween Kills, and 2022’s Halloween Ends were all directed by David Gordon Green, who engaged Carpenter early in the pre-production process, ultimately enlisting him as both an executive producer and soundtrack composer for the trilogy. Now, for the first time, a deluxe, 2xLP expanded edition of the Halloween Kills score is being made available by Carpenter’s longtime label, Sacred Bones Records.

TRACK LISTING

1. Logos Kill
2. Hawkins Discovered
3. Flashback
4. Spit
5. Hey Kid
6. The Myer’s House
7. Cops Explore
8. Irst Attack
9. Stand Off
10. Halloween Kills (Main Title)
11. Let It Burn
12. He Appears
13. From The Fire
14. Strodes At The Hospital
15. Cruel Intentions
16. Phone Call
17. Massacre
18. Someone’s In The Car
19. Halloween Trick
20. Back At The Hospital
21. Goodbye Michael
22. Gather The Mob
23. Rampage
24. Frank
25. Search
26. Frank And Laurie
27. Evil Dies Tonight
28. The System Failed
29. Blood On The Door
30. Disturbed Man
31. Violent Return
32. Hallway Madness
33. It Needs To Die
34. Look At Me
35. Reflection
36. Hunting A Killer

John Carpenter’s soundtracks for the most recent Halloween trilogy, made alongside his frequent collaborators Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies, marked the legendary director and composer’s return to film scoring after nearly two decades away. 2018’s Halloween, 2021’s Halloween Kills, and 2022’s Halloween Ends were all directed by David Gordon Green, who engaged Carpenter early in the pre-production process, ultimately enlisting him as both an executive producer and soundtrack composer for the trilogy. Now, for the first time, a deluxe, 2xLP expanded edition of the Halloween score is being made available by Carpenter’s longtime label, Sacred Bones Records.

TRACK LISTING

1. Intro
2. Aaron Meets Michael
3. Halloween Theme
4. Laurie’s Theme
5. Aaron And Dana Enter Laurie’s Compound
6. Laurie’s Past
7. Prison Montage
8. Laurie Breaks Down
9. Karen’s Flashback
10. Lumpy Explores Crash
11. Michael Kills
12. Hawkins Arrives At Crash Site
13. Dana’s In The Shower
14. The Story Of Judith’s Death
15. The Gas Station
16. Michael Kills Again
17. Gas Station Aftermath
18. The Shape Returns
19. The Boogeyman
20. The Shape Kills
21. Hawkins Called To Babysitter’s House
22. Laurie Sees The Shape
23. Babysitter Aftermath
24. Sartain Meets Laurie
25. Looking For Allyson
26. Wrought Iron Fence
27. The Shape Hunts Allyson
28. Talking To Cops
29. Allyson Discovered
30. Gun Closet
31. Halloween Theme (I’ve Got Eyes)
32. Sartain’s Gone Mad
33. Say Something
34. Through The Woods
35. Ray’s Goodbye
36. The Shape Attacks Laurie
37. The Shape Is Monumental
38. Searching For The Shape
39. Mannequin Panic
40. Death Drum
41. The Shape And Laurie Fight
42. The Grind
43. Trap The Shape
44. The Shape Burns
45. Halloween Triumphant

John Carpenter’s soundtracks for the most recent Halloween trilogy, made alongside his frequent collaborators Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies, marked the legendary director and composer’s return to film scoring after nearly two decades away. 2018’s Halloween, 2021’s Halloween Kills, and 2022’s Halloween Ends were all directed by David Gordon Green, who engaged Carpenter early in the pre-production process, ultimately enlisting him as both an executive producer and soundtrack composer for the trilogy. Now, for the first time, expanded editions of all three scores are being made available in a deluxe box set by Carpenter’s longtime label, Sacred Bones Records.

TRACK LISTING

Halloween Ends Tracklist:
1. Where Is Jeremy?
2. Halloween Ends (Main Title)
3. Laurie’s Theme Ends
4. The Cave
5. Tire Slash
6. Cool Kid
7. Drags To The Cave
8. Evil Eyes
9. Transformation
10. Because Of You
11. Walk With Me
12. Requiem For Jeremy
13. In The Restaurant
14. Bridge Fight
15. Kill The Cop
16. Corey And Allyson 
17. Side Of The Road 
18. Corey And Michael
19. Slap
20. Corey’s Requiem
21. Take The Mask 
22. The Junk Yard
23. Where Are You?
24. Suicide 
25. What Did You Do? 
26. Bye Bye Corey
27. The Fight
28. Before Her Eyes
29. The Procession
30. Cherry Blossoms
31. Halloween Ends

Halloween Kills Tracklist:
1. Logos Kill
2. Hawkins Discovered
3. Flashback
4. Spit
5. Hey Kid
6. The Myer’s House
7. Cops Explore
8. Irst Attack
9. Stand Off
10. Halloween Kills (Main Title)
11. Let It Burn
12. He Appears
13. From The Fire
14. Strodes At The Hospital
15. Cruel Intentions
16. Phone Call
17. Massacre
18. Someone’s In The Car
19. Halloween Trick
20. Back At The Hospital
21. Goodbye Michael
22. Gather The Mob
23. Rampage
24. Frank
25. Search
26. Frank And Laurie
27. Evil Dies Tonight
28. The System Failed
29. Blood On The Door
30. Disturbed Man
31. Violent Return
32. Hallway Madness
33. It Needs To Die
34. Look At Me
35. Reflection
36. Hunting A Killer
37. Righteous Intention
38. Morbid Discovery
39. Unkillable
40. Payback
41. Michael’s Legend
42. Back To His Sister’s Room
43. Final Kill
44. Michael Answers
45. Halloween Kills (End Titles)

Halloween Tracklist:
1. Intro
2. Aaron Meets Michael
3. Halloween Theme
4. Laurie’s Theme
5. Aaron And Dana Enter Laurie’s Compound
6. Laurie’s Past
7. Prison Montage
8. Laurie Breaks Down
9. Karen’s Flashback
10. Lumpy Explores Crash
11. Michael Kills
12. Hawkins Arrives At Crash Site
13. Dana’s In The Shower
14. The Story Of Judith’s Death
15. The Gas Station
16. Michael Kills Again
17. Gas Station Aftermath
18. The Shape Returns
19. The Boogeyman
20. The Shape Kills
21. Hawkins Called To Babysitter’s House
22. Laurie Sees The Shape
23. Babysitter Aftermath
24. Sartain Meets Laurie
25. Looking For Allyson
26. Wrought Iron Fence
27. The Shape Hunts Allyson
28. Talking To Cops
29. Allyson Discovered
30. Gun Closet
31. Halloween Theme (I’ve Got Eyes)
32. Sartain’s Gone Mad
33. Say Something
34. Through The Woods
35. Ray’s Goodbye
36. The Shape Attacks Laurie
37. The Shape Is Monumental
38. Searching For The Shape
39. Mannequin Panic
40. Death Drum
41. The Shape And Laurie Fight
42. The Grind
43. Trap The Shape
44. The Shape Burns
45. Halloween Triumphant

It’s been a decade since John Carpenter recorded the material that would become 'Lost Themes', his debut album of non-film music and the opening salvo in one of Hollywood’s great second acts. Those vibrant, synth-driven songs, made in collaboration with his son Cody Carpenter and godson Daniel Davies, kickstarted a musical renaissance for the pioneering composer and director. In the years since, Carpenter, Carpenter, and Davies have released close to a dozen musical projects, including a growing library of studio albums and the scores for David Gordon Green’s trilogy of Halloween reboots. With 'Lost Themes IV: Noir', they’ve struck gold again, this time mining the rich history of the film noir genre for inspiration.

Since the first 'Lost Themes', John has referred to these compositions as “soundtracks for the movies in your mind.” On the fourth installment in the series, those movies are noirs. Like the film genre they were influenced by, what makes these songs “noirish” is sometimes slippery and hard to define, and not merely reducible to a collection of tropes. The scores for the great American noir pictures were largely orchestral, while the Carpenters and Davies work off a sturdy synth-and-guitar backbone. The noir quality, then, is something you understand instinctively when you hear it, as in connected in an emotional way.

The trio’s free-flowing chemistry means 'Lost Themes IV: Noir' runs like a well-oiled machine - the 1951 Jaguar XK120 Roadster from Kiss Me Deadly, perhaps, or the 1958 Plymouth Fury from John’s own Christine. It’s a chemistry that’s helped power one of the most productive stretches of John’s creative life, and Noir proves that it’s nowhere near done yielding brilliant results.

TRACK LISTING

1. My Name Is Death
2. Machine Fear
3. Last Rites
4. The Burning Door
5. He Walks By Night
6. Beyond The Gallows
7. Kiss The Blood Off My Fingers
8. Guillotine
9. The Demon’s Shadow
10. Shadows Have A Thousand Eyes

Indie's Exclusive 7" Bonus Track:
1. Black Cathedral

In 2018, David Gordon Green’s Halloween, starring icon Jamie Lee Curtis, slaughtered the box office, earning more than $250 million worldwide, becoming the highestgrossing chapter in the four-decade franchise and setting a new record for the biggest opening weekend in history for a horror film starring a woman. The film had the distinction of being the first film in the series with creator John Carpenter’s direct involvement since 1982’s Halloween III: Season of the Witch. Carpenter served as an executive producer, a creative consultant, and, thrillingly, as a soundtrack composer, alongside his collaborators from his recent solo albums, Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: John Carpenter is obviously one of the most legendary figures in the soundtracking biz, and in the newest iteration with Cody &co, we get possibly his strongest late-career work to date. 'Halloween Kills' is a wonderfully evocative, perfectly pitched soundtrack from one of the true masters. Everything you'd expect.

TRACK LISTING

01.Logos Kill
02. Halloween Kills (Main Title
03. The Myer’s House
04. First Attack
05. Stand Off
06. Let It Burn
07. He Appears
08. From The Fire
09. Strodes At The Hospital
10. Cruel Intentions
11. Gather The Mob
12. Rampage
13. Frank And Laurie
14. Hallway Madness
15. It Needs To Die
16. Reflection
17. Unkillable
18. Payback
19. Michael’s Legend
20. Halloween Kills (End Titles) 

When the new Halloween movie hits theaters in October 2018, it will have the distinction of being the first film in the series with creator John Carpenter’s direct involvement since 1982’s Halloween III: Season of the Witch. Carpenter serves on the new David Gordon Green-directed installment as an executive producer, a creative consultant, and, thrillingly, as a soundtrack composer, alongside his collaborators from his three recent solo albums, Cody Carpenter and Daniel Davies.

The new soundtrack pays homage to the classic Halloween score that Carpenter composed and recorded in 1978, when he forever changed the course of horror cinema and synthesizer music with his low-budget masterpiece. Several new versions of the iconic main theme serve as the pulse of Green’s film, its familiar 5/4 refrain stabbing through the soundtrack like the Shape’s knife. The rest of the soundtrack is just as enthralling, incorporating everything from atmospheric synth whooshes to eerie piano-driven pieces to skittering electronic percussion. While the new score was made with a few more resources than Carpenter’s famously shoestring original, its musical spirit was preserved.

“We wanted to honor the original Halloweensoundtrack in terms of the sounds we used,” Davies explained. “We used a lot of the Dave Smith OB-6, bowed guitar, Roland Juno, Korg, Roli, Moog, Roland System 1, Roland System 8, different guitar pedals, mellotron, and piano.”

Unlike the Lost Themes albums, where the composers wrote the soundtracks for imaginary movies, Halloween saw the Carpenters and Davies collaborating on music set to images for the first time. Though it marked a significant change from their previous creative process, the trio thrived under the constraints and tight deadlines that film scoring work demands.

“Being limited by the length of time in scoring the sequence, we focused on the director’s tempo, timing, and vision,” Davies said. “He would tell us what he had in mind, how long the cue should be, what emotion he wanted, and we would take it from there. It’s only the three of us, there is no elaborate system. We wrote, performed, and orchestrated everything.”

For John Carpenter, who reunited on the new film with original Halloween star Jamie Lee Curtis, composing the score felt like a homecoming. Not only had he not worked on a Halloween movie in 35 years, he hadn’t composed a soundtrack since his 2001 sci-fi thriller Ghosts of Mars.

“It was great,” Carpenter said of the experience. “It was transforming. It was not a movie I directed, so I had a lot of freedom in creating the score and getting into the director's head. I was proud to serve David Gordon Green’s vision.”

For Cody Carpenter, John’s son, and Davies, his godson, it was surreal to work on something that means so much to generations of fans, and that they grew up around.

“It was an honor for us to be involved, and we are really happy to be a part of something that so many people are anticipating and excited about,” Davies said. “Working together with both the director of the new Halloween and the creator of the original Halloween was really a fantastic experience.”

TRACK LISTING

1. "Halloween Theme" 2:21
2. "Halloween 1963" 3:11
3. "The Evil Is Gone!" 4:08
4. "Halloween 1978" 2:50
5. "The Boogeyman Is Coming" 0:40
6. "The Shape" 1:43
7. "The Hedge" 1:35
8. "He Came Home" 2:40
9. "Trick Or Treat" 0:39
10. "The Haunted House" 1:43
11. "The Devil's Eyes" 1:39
12. "The Boogeyman Is Outside" 1:27
13. "Damn You For Letting Him Go!" 1:34
14. "Empty Street" 0:33
15. "See Anything You Like?" 2:22
16. "Lock The Door" 2:53
17. "He's Here?" 0:55
18. "Light's Out" 2:49
19. "Cut It Out" 1:19
20. "Tombstone" 1:19
21. "The Shape Stalks Laurie" 1:35
22. "Turn Around" 0:33
23. "Unlock The Door" 2:53
24. "The Hanger" 3:04
25. "Call The Police" 0:28
26. "Last Assault" 1:34
27. "Was That The Boogeyman?" 0:32
28. "End Credits/Halloween Theme (Reprise)" 3:36

The John Carter and Bobby Bradford Quartet/Quintet were critical to the progressive jazz movement around Los Angeles in the late 60s alongside the likes of Horace Tapscott. Both hailed from the Watts area and trumpeter, Bradford played with a woodshedding Ornette Coleman for two years in the early 60s when the legendary free movement leader decided not to record for a while but wanted to hone his trademark sound on the saxophone. Multi-reed player, Carter also worked with Coleman who brought them together to lead their own band.

Their first outing on Flying Dutchman was “Flight For Four” as the Carter Bradford Quartet that was released in 1969. This is the second album they recorded where Carter and Bradford were supported by Tom Williamson (bass), Buzz Freeman (drums) and another uncredited bass player on four extended improvisations – ‘The Sunday Afternoon Jazz Blues Society’, ‘The Eye Of The Storm’, ‘Loneliness’ and ‘Encounter’.

The album has been out of print on vinyl since 1971 and Ace are delighted to release it with audio taken from hi-res digital transfers from the original masters.

TRACK LISTING

Side One
1. The Sunday Afternoon
Jazz Blues Society
2. The Eye Of The Storm
Side Two
1. Loneliness
2. Encounter

A delicate collection of songs for meditation on spiritual struggle, The Leaves Fall is a window into the parallel reality of Justin Carter. Centered on his intimate vocals, pointed with hints of Arthur Russell and John Martyn; the eight tracks are buttressed by warm acoustic guitars, vibraphones, organs and flourished with modern production. They are familiar but distant, like ghosts living in the present. Carter grew up in a country house in rural North Carolina, a place with a pecan tree and abandoned train tracks in the front yard. On long car rides from home to his dadʼs work as a school teacher, his ears were filled with the prog of Yes, the vocals of Al Jarreau and the complexity of Christopher Parkeningʼs take on Bach. It was his father, who himself has moonlighted as a guitar player and songwriter for nearly 50 years, that taught Carter to sing and play in his early teens.

The Leaves Fall was written on and off over the course of about five years, a secret to most. Carter is more familiar, alongside Eamon Harkin, as co-founder of popular New York parties Mister Saturday Night and Mister Sunday, and their label offshoot, Mister Saturday Night Records. As the Mister thrived, his songwriting continued to tick along in the background, days and weeks stolen here and there to write and record in various locations – from remote studios in the Catskills to basements in Venice Beach.

The album features Jason Lindner, pianist on Bowie's final masterpiece, Blackstar; cello from Archie Pelago's Greg Heffernan; and programming by LIES Records and The Trilogy Tapes producer Marcos Cabral. It was mixed by Benjamin Tierney, who also worked his magic on Kamasi Washington's The Epic. It finds its context in the world of Planetarium, a new listening session established by Carter and his Mister Saturday Night DJ partner, Eamon Harkin, where live music is mixed amongst hours of records to create an immersive, communal listening experience focused on quality hi-fi sound in non-traditional spaces; the album will presented in this manner when toured.

“Nothing makes me happier than to see people letting go. My ambition in all my creative work is to make moments where that can happen. As a DJ, I use othersʼ music to create those moments, but itʼs always been in me to make my own music for that purpose. After twenty-five years of writing music for myself, it makes me really happy to have something to share with others.” - Justin Carter

TRACK LISTING

1. Great Destroyer
2. Infinite Pieces
3. Know It All
4. With The Old Breed
5. The Island
6. What Can You Tell Your Children About Hope?
7. Leaves
8. A Presence

Arguably the best of the American Recordings series.
Once again Cash worked with Tom Petty on a couple of tracks including the Neil Diamond-penned "Solitary Man".
The album also includes stunning covers of Bonnie Prince Billy, Nick Cave and U2.

STAFF COMMENTS

Laura says: The Rick Rubin produced American Recordings totally rejuvenated Cash's career, and they're all great. This one just edges it for me with amazing covers of Bonnie Prince Billy, Nick Cave and (suprisingly) U2.

TRACK LISTING

I Won't Back Down
Solitary Man
That Lucky Old Sun (Just Rolls Around Heaven All Day)
One
Nobody
I See A Darkness
The Mercy Seat
Would You Lay With Me (In A Field Of Stone)
Field Of Diamonds
My Time
Country Trash
Mary Of The Wild Moor
I'm Leavin' Now
Wayfaring Stranger

"Johnny Cash At Folsom Prison" fully captures Cash's gritty intensity and hard-headed humanity, capturing a high-energy set performed for an equally spirited audience. With a set list tailored for the occasion, Cash focuses on songs dealing with crime and imprisonment, balancing dark subject matter with wry, playful humor. The album opens, appropriately enough, with the venerable "Folsom Prison Blues," and continues with such outlaw anthems as "Cocaine Blues," "25 Minutes to Go, "The Wall" and "I Got Stripes," alongside such Cash classics as "I Still Miss Someone," "Orange Blossom Special" and "Jackson," with the latter track featuring Cash's wife and frequent duet partner June Carter. The album closes on an inspirational note with "Greystone Chapel," a song written by convict Glen Shirley, which Cash and his band learned especially for this show.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
1. Opening Announcements From Hugh Cherry
2. Blue Suede Shoes - Johnny Cash / Carl Perkins
3. This Ole House - Johnny Cash / The Statler Brothers
4. Announcements And Johnny Cash Intro From Hugh Cherry
5. Folsom Prison Blues
6. Busted
7. Dark As A Dungeon
8. I Still Miss Someone

Side B
1. Cocaine Blues
2. 25 Minutes To Go
3. I'm Here To Get My Baby Out Of Jail
4. Orange Blossom Special
5. The Long Black Veil

Side C
1. Send A Picture Of Mother
2. The Wall
3. Dirty Old Egg-Suckin' Dog
4. Flushed From The Bathroom Of Your Heart
5. Joe Bean
6. Jackson - Johnny Cash / June Carter
7. I Got A Woman (with June Carter)

Side D
1. The Legend Of John Henry's Hammer
2. June's Poem
3. Green, Green Grass Of Home
4. Greystone Chapel
5. Closing Theme And Announcements

Johnny Cash's two legendary prison concerts packaged together. If you don't already own these two album, you need this!

Perhaps even more so than its predecessor, "Johnny Cash At San Quentin" captures Cash at his most raw and uninhibited. The artist's raucous rapport with his captive audience is obvious on an inspired mix of Cash classics ("I Walk the Line," "Folsom Prison Blues"), jailhouse ballads ("Starkville City Jail," "San Quentin"), traditional tunes ("Wreck of the Old 97," "There'll Be Peace in the Valley") and well-chosen covers (Bob Dylan's "Wanted Man," the Lovin' Spoonful's "Darling Companion"). The album's most popular track, though, remains the Shel Silverstein-penned novelty number "A Boy Named Sue," which became the biggest hit single of Cash's career.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
1. Wanted Man
2. Wreck Of The Old 97
3. I Walk The Line
4. Darlin' Companion
5. Starkville City Jail

Side B
1. San Quentin
2. San Quentin
3. A Boy Named Sue
4. (There'll Be) Peace In The Valley
5. Folsom Prison Blues

Double LP pressing featuring essential cuts from Johnny Cash''s back catalogue, including: Ring Of Fire, Hey Porter, Folsom Prison Blues, A Boy Named Sue and many more!

TRACK LISTING

Side A
1. Hey Porter
2. Cry, Cry, Cry
3. I Walk The Line
4. Get Rhythm
5. There You Go
6. Ballad Of A Teenage Queen
7. Big River
8. Guess Things Happen That Way

Side B
1. All Over Again
2. Don't Take Your Guns To Town
3. Five Feet High And Rising
4. The Rebel-Johnny Yuma
5. Tennessee Flat-Top Box
6. I Still Miss Someone
7. Ring Of Fire

Side C
1. The Ballad Of Ira Hayes
2. Orange Blossom Special
3. It Ain't Me, Babe - Johnny Cash With June Carter Cash
4. The One On The Right Is On The Left
5. Jackson - Johnny Cash With June Carter Cash
6. Folsom Prison Blues

Side D
1. Daddy Sang Bass
2. Girl From The North Country - Bob Dylan & Johnny Cash
3. A Boy Named Sue
4. If I Were A Carpenter (Live In Denmark) - June Carter Cash / Johnny Cash
5. Sunday Morning Coming Down
6. Man In Black
7. One Piece At A Time

Introducing the new album from Johnny Cash titled 'Songwriter'.

Johnny Cash recorded an album’s worth of unreleased, self-penned songs in 1993 ahead of him signing with American Records and his releases with Rick Rubin that re-established himself as one of world’s best songwriters to a new generation of fans. Songwriter’s 11 songs have been updated by his son John Carter and longtime producer David Ferguson.

In early 1993, the legendary Johnny Cash found himself between contracts in his then nearly 40-year career and recorded an album’s worth of songwriting demos at LSI Studios in Nashville of songs he’d written over many years. LSI at the time was owned by his son-in-law Mike Daniels and daughter Rosey, and he wanted to help the family financially while also record some songs special to him. Not long after the fruitful session, Johnny met producer Rick Rubin, and the recordings were shelved as the two embarked on an important and prolific musical partnership that revitalized the Man in Black’s career that would last the rest of his life.

Some thirty years later, John Carter Cash, the son of Johnny and June Carter Cash, rediscovered the songs and stripped them back to just Johnny’s powerful, pristine vocals and acoustic guitar. Along with co-producer David “Fergie” Ferguson, the two invited a handpicked group of musicians that played with Johnny, including guitarist Marty Stuart and the late bassist Dave Roe, along with drummer Pete Abbott and several others, to the Cash Cabin, a hallowed space in Hendersonville, Tenn. where Johnny would write, record and relax, to breathe new life into the tracks, taking the sound back to the roots and heart of the songs.

TRACK LISTING

Vinyl:
Side A
1. Hello Out There
2. Spotlight
3. Drive On
4. I Love You Tonite
5. Have You Ever Been To Little Rock?
Side B
1. Well Alright
2. She Sang Sweet Baby James
3. Poor Valley Girl
4. Soldier Boy
5. Sing It Pretty Sue
6. Like A Soldier

CD:
1. Hello Out There
2. Spotlight
3. Drive On
4. I Love You Tonite
5. Have You Ever Been To Little Rock?
6. Well Alright
7. She Sang Sweet Baby James
8. Poor Valley Girl
9. Soldier Boy
10.Sing It Pretty Sue
11. Like A Soldier

Bonus Disc (2CD):
1. I Walk The Line (1988 Version)
2. The Night Hank Williams Came To Town (with Waylon Jennings)
3. Sixteen Tons
4. Long Black Veil (1988 Version)
5. Cry, Cry, Cry (1988 Version)
6. Guess Things Happen That Way (1988 Version)
7. Get Rhythm (1988 Version)
8. Ring Of Fire (1988 Version)
9. Folsom Prison Blues (1988 Version)
10. Cat's In The Cradle
11. Hey Porter
12. Wanted Man

The Sound of Johnny Cash is the eighth studio album by American singer-songwriter Johnny Cash. Among other songs, it contains "In the Jailhouse Now", a Jimmie Rodgers cover which reached #8 on the Country charts, and "Delia's Gone", which Cash would re-record years later, on American Recordings, in 1994. Cash would also go on to record a significantly slower, more ballad-like version of "I'm Free from the Chain Gang Now", which was ultimately released in 2006 on American V: A Hundred Highways as the last track on the album. During the recording sessions for the album, Cash rerecorded his Sun Records hits "Folsom Prison Blues", "Hey, Porter" and "I Walk the Line", but none of these versions were ultimately used on the album and sat unreleased until the 1990s. On Side B you will find the album Now There Was A Song! ,the fifth studio album by American singer Johnny Cash. It features songs by notable country singers Ernest Tubb, Hank Williams, and George Jones.

TRACK LISTING

A1 Lost On The Desert
A2 Accidentally On Purpose
A3 In The Jailhouse Now
A4 Mr. Lonesome
A5 You Won't Have Far To Go
A6 In Them Old Cottonfields Back Home
A7 Delia's Gone
A8 I Forgot More Than You'll Ever Know
A9 You Remembered Me
A10 I'm Free From The Chain Gang Now
A11 Let Me Down Easy
A12 Sing It Pretty, Sue
B1 Seasons Of My Heart
B2 I Feel Better All Over
B3 I Couldn't Keep From Crying
B4 Time Changes Everything
B5 My Shoes Keep Walking Back To You
B6 I'd Just Be Fool Enough
B7 Transfusion Blues
B8 Why Do You Punish Me
B9 I Will Miss You When You Go
B10 I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry
B11 Just One More
B12 Honky-Tonk Girl 

Johnny Cash (1932–2003) was a legendary singer-songwriter whose deep voice and storytelling made him one of the most influential figures in American music. Blending country, rock, folk, and gospel, he created timeless songs like “I Walk the Line,” “Ring of Fire,” “Folsom Prison Blues.”, “I Got Stripes,” and “Oh Lonesome Me.” Known as The Man in Black, Cash’s music spoke to themes of love, faith, and redemption, leaving an enduring mark on generations of artists.

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
"I Walk The Line"
"Folsom Prison Blues"
"Cry! Cry! Cry!"
"There You Go"
"Next In Line"
"Home Of The Blues"
"Ballad Of A Teenage Queen"
"Guess Things Happen That Way"
"It's Just About Time"
"Katy Too"

Side 2
"I Got Stripes"
"The Ways Of A Woman In Love"
"All Over Again"
"What Do I Care"
"Don't Take Your Guns To Town"
"Five Feet High & Rising"
"Frankie's Man, Johnny"
"Second Honeymoon"
"Oh Lonesome Me"
"Bonanza"

Johnny Cash “With His Hot and Blue Guitar” is the debut album from the Man in Black, featuring hits like "I Walk The Line" and "Folsom Prison Blues". Released in 1957, it was the first LP ever issued on Sam Phillips’ Sun Records label.

TRACK LISTING

A1 The Rock Island Line
A2 I Heard That Lonesome Whistle
A3 Country Boy
A4 If The Good Lord's Willing
A5 Cry, Cry, Cry
A6 Remember Me
B1 So Doggone Lonesome
B2 I Was There When It Happened
B3 I Walk The Line
B4 The Wreck Of Old '97
B5 Folsom Prison Blues
B6 Doin' My Time

Since his first recordings in 1955, Johnny Cash has been an icon in the music world. In his newly discovered poems and song lyrics, we see the world through his eyes. The poetry reveals his depth of understanding, both of the world around him and within - his frailties and his strengths alike.

He pens verses in his hallmark voice, reflecting upon love, pain, freedom, fame and mortality. Illustrated with facsimile reproductions of Cash's own handwritten pages, Forever Words is a remarkable addition to the canon of one of America's heroes. His music is a part of our collective history, and here he demonstrates the depth of his talent as a writer.

Edited and introduced by Paul Muldoon, with a foreword by John Carter Cash, this is a book sure to delight and surprise fans the world over.

Jennifer Castle’s 6th album, the moon-suffused Monarch Season an album as delicate and diaphanous as its namesake butterfly stands, in a literal sense, as her first proper “solo” album, performed alone in her coastal kitchen, windows open to the insects and the wind and the reflection of the moon on Lake Erie, entirely without human accompaniment (though a chorus of crickets provides rich interstitial support throughout.) This record is a reminder to cherish openly that which reflects off and onto me. A reminder that stone orbs only become meaningful moons when they experience the gravity and light of others.” Jennifer Castle. In autumn 2009, for the first time, monarch butterflies, known for their extensive annual North American migrations, emerged from their cocoons in outer space, onboard the International Space Station, part of a NASA experiment on the effects of microgravity on Lepidoptera. Ten years later, in autumn 2019, Jennifer Castle sat at home in her quiet coastal kitchen in Ontario, windows open to the insects and the wind and the reflection of the moon on Lake Erie her host of muses and recorded nine moon-suffused songs. It was monarch season again on Earth, and Jennifer was inspired to “see the wings in everything.” Now, a year later, we have Monarch Season, an album as delicate and diaphanous as its namesake creature.


Although created half a year pre-pandemic, Castle deliberately pursued a minimalist, homebound, and solitary process that represented, for her musical practice, a radical reduction of scale, coupled with a telescopic expansion of scope. The follow-up to her acclaimed 2018 record Angels of Death, Monarch Season is Castle’s private experiment on the effects of microgravity in this context, increased immediacy, intimacy, domesticity, simplicity, brevity, and directness on her music. Monarch Season transports the listener, from the first strains of the heavy-lidded guitar instrumental “Theory Rest,” to that lakeside kitchen at dusk, beneath a bright moon twinned in the water. It also intentionally resembles Castle’s riveting, discursive solo live performances more accurately than any other of her albums. The terrestrial vinyl and CD versions of the album include lengthier ambient segues of onsite environmental recordings between songs; you can hear the lapping of the lake. She recorded quickly, with only her longtime co-producer Jeff McMurrich to capture her guitar, piano, and for the first time on record harmonica.Jennifer dedicates her blowing to friend and mentor Kath Bloom, who played the Pink City harp.


Her airy, lambent voice renders these taut poems as elegant inscriptions within circumscription, fully present and presciently articulate, months before the age of coronavirus quarantines, about the troubles and delights to be found in aloneness, in the patient observation of our immediate surroundings. Subtle nods toward classic songcraft, and traditional ideas about songcraft are abound on Monarch Season. “NYC” features a baseball anecdote and metaphor (“we all pick teams, I guess.”) “Justice” is her take on a big-tent folk-revival protest anthem. “Did you lock my heart up? And throw away the key?” Jennifer asks on “Moonbeam or Ray,” embracing the conventional romanticism of that lyrical trope. But her answer to herself is oddly put, sad and slightly schizoid: “I hope no!” “What becomes of the broken-hearted?” begins the last song, slyly conjuring Jimmy Ruffin.


Castle posits no answer to that riddle. Elsewhere, warm personal details emerge. The gorgeous spiraling melody of “Veins” laments that the world is not changing “as fast as it should” a sentiment more relevant than ever while also insinuating that losing love feels like being stranded on the surface of the moon. Her repeated use of the word “labour” in “I’ll Never Walk Alone” “I birthed from the mouth of a cave” is metaphorical and literal, on two levels. In addition to her songwriting, Castle works as a doula, but herein her creative labour bears the fruit of these new songs, or as she calls them, “my new plays.” Monarch Season offers these songs as lapidary mirrors of solace, radiant with reflected moonlight, to whoever is listening. Look up, look around, look inward, they say, for the light of others. And then look again

TRACK LISTING

A1. Theory Rest
A2. NYC
A3. Justice
A4. I’ll Never Walk Alone
A5. Monarch Season

B1. Moonbeam Or Ray
B2. Purple Highway
B3. Veins
B4. Broken Hearted 

For Fans Of: The Weather Station, Weyes Blood, Adrianne Lenker, Phoebe Bridgers, Joan Shelley, Lana Del Rey, Cass McCombs, Angel Olsen & Neil Young.

Camelot, the legendary seat of King Arthur’s court in Early Middle Ages Britain, was probably not a real place. A corruption of the name of a real Romano-Briton city, the word “Camelot” accumulated symbolic, mythic resonances over centuries, until achieving its present usage as a near-synonym of “utopia.” In the mid-20th century alone, Camelot inspired an explosion of representations and appropriations, among them the violent, affectless Arthurian court of Robert Bresson’s 1974 film Lancelot du Lac and the absurdist iteration of Monty Python’s 1975 Holy Grail, both of which feature armoured knights erupting into fountains of blood; the mystical Welsh world of novelist John Cowper Powys’s profoundly weird 1951 novel Porius, with its Roman cults, wizards and witches, and wanton giants; and the nationalist nostalgia of President John F. Kennedy’s White House. Unsurprisingly there are fewer Camelots in more recent memory.

Camelot, Canadian songwriter Jennifer Castle’s extraordinary, moving 2024 chronicle of the artist in early middle age, charts a realer, more rooted, and more metaphorical place than the fabled Camelot of the Early Middle Ages (or its myriad depictions), but it too is a space more psychic than physical. In Castle’s Camelot, the fantastic interpenetrates the mundane, and the Grail, if there is one, distills everyday experience into art and art into faith, subliming terrestrial concerns into sublime celestial prayers to Mother Nature, and to the unfolding process of perfecting imperfection in one’s own nature. Co-produced by Jennifer and longtime collaborator Jeff McMurrich, her seventh record is at once her most monumental and unguarded to date, demonstrating a mastery of rendering her verse and melodies alike with crisply poignant economy. For all their pointedly plainspoken lyrical detail and exhilarating full-band musical flourishes, these songs sound inevitable, eternal as morning devotions.

“Back in Camelot,” she sings on the lilting, vulnerable title track, “I really learned a lot / circles in the crops and / sky-high geometry.” The album opens with a candid admission of sleeping “in the unfinished basement,” an embarrassing joke that comes true. But the dreamer is redeemed by dreaming, setting sail in her airborne bed above “sirens and desert deities.” If she questions her own agency whether she is “wishing stones were standing” or just “pissing in the wind” it does not diminish the ineffable existential jolt of such signs and wonders.

This abiding tension between belief and doubt, magic and pragmatism, self and other, sacred and profane, and even, arguably, paganism and monotheism, suffuses these ten songs, which limn an interior landscape shot through with sunstriped shadows of “multi-felt dimensions” both mystical and quotidian. The epic scale and transport of “Camelot,” with its swooning strings, gives way dramatically to “Some Friends,” an acoustic-guitar-and-vocals meditation in miniature on Janus-faced friends and the lunar and solar temperatures of their promises—“bright and beaming verses” versus hot curses which recalls her minimalist last album, 2020’s achingly intimate Monarch Season. (In a symmetrical sequencing gesture, the penultimate track, the incantatory “Earthsong,” bookends the central six with a similarly spare solo performance and coiled chord progression, this time an ambiguous appeal to … a wounded lover? a wounded saint? our wounded planet?)

Those whom “Trust” accuses of treacherous oaths spit through “gilded and golden tooth” cynics, critics, hypocrites, gurus, scientists, doctors, lovers, government, the so-called entertainment industry sow uncertainty that can infect the artist, as in “Louis”: “What’s that dance / and can it be done? What’s that song / and can it be sung?” Answering affirmatively are “Lucky #8,” an irrepressible ode to dancing as a bulwark against the “tidal pools of pain” and the “theory of collapse,” and “Full Moon in Leo,” which finds the narrator dancing around the house with a broom, wearing nothing but her underwear and “big hair.” But the central question remains: who can we trust, and at what cost faith, in art or angels or otherwise?

Castle’s confidence in her collaborators is the cornerstone of Camelot. Carl Didur (piano and keys), Evan Cartwright (drums and percussion), and steadfast sideman Mike Smith (bass) comprise a rhythm section of exquisite delicacy and depth. This fundamental trio anchors the airiness of regular backing vocalists Victoria Cheong and Isla Craig and frames the guitars of Castle, McMurrich, and Paul Mortimer (and on “Lucky #8,” special guest Cass McCombs). Reprising his decennial role on Castle’s beloved 2014 Pink City, Owen Pallett arranged the strings for Estonia’s FAMES Skopje Studio Orchestra.

On the ravishing country-soul ballad “Blowing Kisses” Pallett’s crowning achievement here, which can be heard in its entirety in the penultimate episode of the third season of FX’s The Bear Jennifer contemplates time and presence, love and prayer and how songwriting and poetry both manifest and limit all four dimensions: “No words to fumble with / I’m not a beggar to language any longer.” Such rare moments of speechlessness “I’m so fucking honoured,” she bluntly proclaims suggest a state “only a god could come up with.” (If Camelot affirms Castle as one of the great song-poets of her generation, she is not immune to the despairing linguistic beggary that plagues all writers.)

Camelot evinces a thoroughgoing faith not only in the natural world including human bodies, which can, miraculously, dance and swim and bleed and embrace and birth but also in our interpretations of and interventions in it: the “charts and diagrams” of “Lucky #8,” a daydreamt billboard on Fairfax Ave. in LA in “Full Moon in Leo,” the bloody invocations of the organ-stained “Mary Miracle,” and all manner of water worship, rivers in particular. (Notably, Jennifer has worked as a farmer and a doula.)

The album ends with “Fractal Canyon”s repeated, exalted insistence that she’s “not alone here.” But where is here?

The word “utopia” itself constitutes a pun, indicating in its ambiguous first syllable both the Greek “eutopia,” or “good-place” the facet most remembered today and “outopia,” or “no-place,” a negative, impossible geography of the mind. Utopia, like its metonym Camelot, is imaginary. Or as fellow Canadian songwriter Neil Young once sang, “Everyone knows this is nowhere.”

“Can you see how I’d be tempted,” Castle asks out of nowhere, held in the mystery, “to pretend I’m not alone and let the memory bend?”

TRACK LISTING

A1. Camelot
A2. Some Friends
A3. Trust
A4. Lucky #8
B5. Louis
B1. Full Moon In Leo
B2. Mary Miracle
B3. Blowing Kisses
B4. Earthsong
B5. Fractal Canyon

Jorja Chalmers enjoys a quiet life. The Australian born mother of two lives in Margate, the Kent coastal town that is turning into something of a cultural hub. Yet there’s another, shadow version of Jorja Chalmers, one that resides in a liminal realm; a saxophonist & composer, a brooding, vampiric, twilight soul who yearns for some sense of aesthetic transformation.

New album ‘Midnight Train’ comes close to severing the two. Constructed during the long winter lockdown, Jorja would put her kids to bed before closing the door in the spare room, building lengthy, undulating passages of cinematic terror, patching together European art-pop glamour with outsider electronics. It’s composed, intense, & challenging – but it’s also utterly exhilarating.

“I feel incredibly proud of this album,” she says. “It feels like a life’s work squeezed into one space. It feels like I’m saying something.”

TRACK LISTING

A1. Bring Me Down
A2. I'll Be Waiting
A3. Rabbit In The Headlights
A4. Boadicea
A5. Love Me Tonight
A6. Nightingale
A7. Riders On The Storm
B1. Rhapsody
B2. The Poet
B3. The Wolves Of The Orangery
B4. On Such A Clear Day
B5. Midnight Train
B6. Underwater Blood

Fans of Jenn Champion (formerly “S”) have praised her open-hearted lyrics, expertly-deployed melancholia, technical skill, and willingness to forgo conventions, but mostly they’ve praised her for making albums they could cry to. With the release of Cool Choices in 2014, Champion made what many considered the best record of her career, and a lot of people cried to it.
On Single Rider, Champion brings with her all those skills and vulnerabilities, but it is not a record for wallowing: it is a record for intense eye contact on the dancefloor. “Sometimes you are sad and you just want to dance about it,” said Champion. Side B of Cool Choices presaged Champion’s agit-pop transformation. “Let the Light In” and "Tell Me" signalled her move toward a more electronic sound, but it was the digital single “No One” (2016) that marked the clear delineation.

“I feel like a door got opened in my mind with electronic and digital music. There was a room I hadn’t explored before and I stepped in,” said Champion. While she’d initially intended to follow Cool Choices with “a rock record - guitar, a lot of pedals, heavy riffs,” plans changed. “I couldn’t pull myself away from the synthesizers and I realized the record I really wanted to make was more of a cross between Drake and Billy Joel than Blue Oyster Cult.” Soon after the release of No One, Champion’s publishers partnered her with Brian Fennell, aka SYML, and the two co-wrote the song “Leave Like That” (featured on SYML’s Hurt For Me EP). The pair hit it off, and with nearly all of Champion’s Single Rider demos completed, the timing was perfect--she was looking for a producer. “I guess you could say I pursued Brian.” Fortunately, Fennell was open to being pursued and the two spent the next five months working on Single Rider. “In the studio with Brian, I was more open than I had ever been.” With Champion’s vision and Fennell’s expertise, the record evolved from synthy roughs to a hi-fi dance album.

Despite the new direction in her sound, emotion cuts through on Single Rider in the classic Champion style, weaving simultaneously pleading-and-incensed vocals into anthemic pop songs. Champion wants her listeners to see that the rooms are all on fire and she has not given up. Taking a double “fuck you” approach to the world, to the patriarchy, all the things which screw you up and hold you back, she is dancing right on out of the disappointment apocalypse with her middle fingers in the air, and you can follow if you want to.

TRACK LISTING

1. O.M.G. (I'm All Over It)
2. Coming For You
3. You Knew
4. Holding On
5. The Move
6. Never Giving In
7. Mainline
8. Time To Regulate
9. Bleed
10. Hustle
11. Going Nowhere

Julien Chang is a 19-year-old singer, composer, producer and multi-instrumentalist from Baltimore, Maryland. Julien studied classical and jazz throughout high school but decided to start making his own music after exploring other genres and principles. Having taken a job at his local grocery store at 17, he began building a studio in his parents basement, adding new elements with each paycheck.

The result is album ‘Jules’, released via Transgressive Records (Flume, SOPHIE, Let’s Eat Grandma).

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A stunning debut from on of the future's bright lights in whatever this beautiful but impossible-to-categorise maelstrom of woozy pop melodies and warm synthy grooves is. Brilliantly dynamic, varied but cohesive, 'Jules' is an absolute triumph and veers between perfectly realised genres with ease.

TRACK LISTING

Deep Green
Of The Past
Two Voices
Moving Parts
Candy Cane Rainbow
Dogologue
Memory Loss
Somerville (Demo)
Butterflies From Monaco
A Day Or Two

Baltimore’s Julien Chang writes music that tunnels toward a series of deeper truths, investigating everyday existentialism, love and life, art and the artist. Arriving in 2019 with his critically acclaimed album ‘Jules’, Chang set a precedent with his breezy, dreamy debut and is now exacting his focus on 2022 with forthcoming new music.

Chang’s second album ‘The Sale’ testify to his talents as he wrestles with enviable grace across his new 12-track catalogue, the idea of estrangement and the problematics of artistic creation. Chang leans sonically into indie-pop, with guitar-driven instrumentation burbling across punchy drums and his layered, ethereal vocals. Yet the album is still replete with touchstones of the psychedelic popcraft that enamoured listeners on his debut.

Recorded partially in his hometown of Baltimore and partially in his dorm room at Princeton, his new album ‘The Sale’ is a homegrown effort with Chang playing all instruments, bar the odd exception of a few notable cameos from Baltimore locals, classmates and old friends. Following his debut ‘Jules’ - which saw Chang earn praise from the likes of Pitchfork, Fader, The Guardian, NME, Loud & Quiet, DIY, Billboard alongside support from BBC Radio 1 & 6Music via Annie Mac Jack Saunders and Jamz Supernova - his new LP explores the discrepancy between two worlds, a struggle to get comfortable in either one of them, and ultimately an artistic fascination with this very struggle.

TRACK LISTING

1. Heart Holiday
2. Marmalade
3. Sweet Obsolete
4. Snakebit Side
5. Snakebit
6. Time And Place
7. Bellarose
8. Ethical Exceptions
9. Crossed Paths
10. Queen Of Sheba
11. Competition's Friend

'Different Rooms' is the sophomore album by Jeremiah Chiu & Marta Sofia Honer. The follow up to their critically acclaimed 'Recordings from the Aland Islands', this collection extends the path of pastiche forged by their debut: quietly multi-rhythmic, modular-trance-meets-processed-and-unprocessed-chamber strings, bewitching and bewildering field recordings all knitted tightly, an LA patchwork.

"Our studios are side-by-side. When we were writing this album, you might have found us tracking viola stacks in one studio while, in the other, we were writing through-composed themes and rearranging the material. Granular synthesis and tape manipulation are key tools we use to create variation and movement in a composition. This process often yields surprising results, capturing the emotion but expressing it in unexpected ways. It feels essential that we embrace a bit of chance.

In contrast to our first album, 'Recordings from the Aland Islands', we wanted this music to feel very present. Where 'Recordings...' was intended to transport you to another place, 'Different Rooms' is meant to meet you where you are. It's a decidedly urban album. The field recordings were captured on rain platforms, in city streets, in rooms at home, and intentionally paint a quotidian sonic image, blurring the line between what you hear in your own environment and what is on the record."

TRACK LISTING

1. Mean Solar Time
2. Long And Short Delays
3. Side By Side
4. One Of Eight
5. Before And After Signs
6. Different Rooms
7. Speaking In Parallel
8. Side By Side (Reflected)
9. Mind By A Way
10. Mean Solar Time (Reflected)

Dr. John Chowning (b. 1934) is a pioneering computer musician, composer and professor who, in 1967, discovered the FM synthesis algorithm. This breakthrough in electronic music allowed for simple, yet rich timbres described as sounding "real". With this discovery, Chowning composed singular, dramatic electronic music and changed thetimbre of music forever. Chowning utilized the potential of computers to synthesize sounds according to programmed instructions. The composer's use of his own FM algorithms, digital synthesis with computers and the new compositional concepts offered by a programmable musical structure combine to create some of the most original and unique electronic music ever created. The compositions on this LP were realized between 1966 and 1981 and the music on this LP, with the exception of 'Stria', was originally released on CD in Germany (Wergo, 1988). The version of 'Stria' included here contains a section not included on the Wergo CD. Thus, this version of 'Stria' is complete. This is the first time these purelydigital recordings have been released on an analog medium.

The original dynamics of these groundbreaking compositions have been preserved on this LP. As a result, listeners are advised to increase volume with caution. In 1975, John Chowning founded the CCRMA - Center For Computer Research In Music and Acoustics at Stanford University. Through Stanford, Chowning licensed his groundbreaking algorithms to Yamaha resulting in numerous new instruments including the iconic DX series of keyboards. In 1972, his composition Tureens which is included onthis LP, was the first to create the illusion of continuous 360-degree space using four speakers. Technical Notes All pieces on this LP are originally quadrophonic. The illusion of moving sound sources is thus projected from the surrounding environment given by four loud-speakers on the stereo-basis. 'STRIA' was composed using Chowning’s own program to compile the musical structure into note-lists and MUSIC 10 (by D. Poole/Tovar) to generate the sounds in software-synthesis.

TRACK LISTING

1. Phoné
2. Turenas
3. Stria
4. Sabelithe

‘I Promised You Light’ follows on from Clarke’s critically acclaimed 2021 LP, A Small Unknowable Thing, an emotionally charged album bubbling with courage and defiance. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Where The Light Comes In
2. Driving At Night
3. You Know Me Better
4. Workhorse
5. I Promised You Light

’Seedlings All' is Josienne Clarke & Ben Walker’s first album to be made up of all original songs, and is songwriter Clarke's most autobiographical work to date. As she explains: “For the first time I’m out there alone with a bunch of songs that expose my insecurities, fears of failure and inflated pride. They deal with my own specific thoughts and feelings about the reality of pursuing this kind of career, the cost to personal relationships, circumstance and lifestyle, and asking the question - "Is this still worth it?” They’re about trying to find an inner balance in an environment that doesn’t provide any balance or certainty. Where one day everything is brilliant and the next day it could all be over. Where one night ends in a standing ovation and the next starts by playing to an empty room."

TRACK LISTING

Chicago
Bells Ring
Seedlings All
Maybe I Won't
Tender Heart
All Is Myth
Ghost Light
Sad Day
Things Of No Use
Bathed In Light
Only Me Only

(Bonus CD)
When To Then
Milk And Honey
For All We Know

John Clarke - not to be confused with Johnny Clark - had been running with the Wackies operation for six years, ever since moving from Jamaica to New York. He'd cut memorable sevens with co-founder Munchie Jackson for the Tafari label, and with Lloyd Barnes for such Bullwackies imprints as Versatile and Wackies. "Visions Of John Clarke" was a little thrown together for its original release in 1979. Still, its sleeve carried a ringing endorsement from Bullwackies himself and the album attracted the interest of no less than Studio 1 boss Coxsone Dodd, whose bid for distribution-rights was thwarted when the Brooklyn label Makossa quickly put in for a full licence. Out soon afterwards, the new version - entitled "Rootsy Reggae" - duplicated five tracks, but with markedly different mixes, fresh edits, and sometimes new instrumentation.

British duo Josienne Clarke and Ben Walker have risen to star status lately on the English acoustic scene, earning last year’s Best Duo award from the BBC Folk Awards and across-theboard praise for two self-released albums, most recently ‘Nothing Can Bring Back The Hour’, with its lush single ‘Silverline’.

Clarke and Walker release a new EP, ‘Through The Clouds,’ via Rough Trade, featuring a handful of the best tracks from their small catalogue, rearranged anew. ‘Through The Clouds’ is meant as an introduction to the duo; in addition to ‘Silverline’ it features a new, stripped-down version of ‘Done’ (ballads on opposite sides of love and loneliness), an alternate mix of the spooky Shirley Collins cover ‘Hares On The Mountain’ and the original album version of ‘The Tangled Tree’, a brilliant showcase of Clarke’s vocal range and expression.

While The Guardian anointed them “chamber folk” (they certainly cut their teeth in that thriving part of the UK music scene), Clarke is an unusually compelling singer, sharing more in common with Sandy Denny, Gillian Welch, or even Nina Nastasia and Laura Marling, than your usual staid folk artist. Walker is a prodigiously talented guitarist and arranger and the two of them are engaging and often funny in a live setting where, in addition to their own songs, they choose covers brilliantly, from Denny, to Jackson C Frank, to Nina Simone, to death-obsessed traditional ballads.

Clarke and Walker will be recording their Rough Trade debut album for an Autumn 2016 release, with an eye toward bringing bigger, more modern arrangements and production to their beautifully-wrought songs and Clarke’s tremendous voice.

“Clarke and Walker stand out due to their originality… Impressive.” - The Guardian

“A bold success” - The Telegraph

2018 Reissue – Remastered From Original Tapes, Carefully Reproduced Original Art.

James Clarke’s Mystery Movie was released in 1974 as “modern, small group compositions in various moods. Ideally suited to the new Americanised style of T.V. and cinema film where music is used to create the mood and carry the action”. So this collection covers a lot of bases, but it does so brilliantly and has absolutely no right to be such a fantastic listen from start to finish. Mystery Movie is best known for the slick drum breaks underpinning the top-notch jazz-funk chase theme “Car Patrol”, the fuzz riffing and ARP soloing of “The Heavies” and the slow-mo strut of “Mystery Moll”. “Study In Fear” and “Empty Streets” are horror soundtrack fodder of the finest sort. However, it’s the understated, plaintive pieces that we find the most rewarding. Ambient feels and strung-out fried-folk treats, full of cyclical naïve melodies. Music that evokes the ‘downlifting’ Ronnie Lane and Ron Wood instrumentals from their great Mahoney’s Last Stand LP, as well as the beautiful soundtrack work of Jack Nitzsche and Ry Cooder. You might also recognise “Waiting Game” from being sampled by melodic downbeat masters Express Rising. Check “Relaxed Theme”, “Quiet Girl”, “Routine Procedure” and “Quietness Sustained” for a melodic, melancholic set, with the last three performed on just acoustic guitar and harp. Gorgeous work. As with all ten re-issues, the audio for Mystery Movie comes from the original analogue tapes and has been remastered for vinyl by Be With regular Simon Francis. We’ve taken the same care with the sleeves, handing the reproduction duties over to Richard Robinson, the current custodian of KPM’s brand identity.

TRACK LISTING

Mystery Prelude
Car Patrol - Title Sequence
Breathless
Breathless - Short Version
Waiting Game
Mystery Moll
Mystery Movement
The Heavies
Dirty Scene
Study In Fear
Empty Streets
Night Watch
Foot Patrol
Quiet Girl
Relaxed Scene
Routine Procedure
Quietness Sustained

Berlin-based Bretford Records releases Locust, the new solo album from Jeff Clarke (Black Lips member) – a stripped-down, melancholic change of pace from the Canadian singer-songwriter whose boisterous garage rock compositions with the bands Demon’s Claws, Hellshovel, and the Black Lips led to King Khan identifying him as one of the “unsung heroes of rock n’ roll.”

This time out, Clarke’s sincere, poetic texts are accompanied only by his acoustic guitar. The warm, dreamy, minimalist folk sound is enhanced by the recordings themselves – all done in a single session, outdoors in a forest north of Berlin, Clarke’s adopted home since 2016.

The concept for the intimate setting came from Lorenz Szukal, guitarist in legendary Berlin indie rockers Chuckamuck and die Verlierer, who recognized that Clarke’s songwriting, which he had long admired, would be equally powerful when pared down and showcased in a different light. When the two took Szukal’s mobile recording equipment into the woods, the more naturalistic atmosphere revealed a mixture of light and shadow, fragility and resilience, pain and relief in the songs.

And yet Locust is much more than a mere study in contrasts; harmonized by Clarke’s extraordinary writing, the thirteen songs of the album create a coherent ambiance in which Clarke’s voice – like the soft complaint of a lonesome wolf – blends with the vivid lyrical imagery, the subtle dynamics of his guitar playing, and an almost imperceptible echo to leave the listener in a daydream state. In daring to present his unique sensibility in such a raw, elemental setting, Locust marks a striking new direction and reveals Clarke to be a spiritual descendant of Townes van Zandt.

TRACK LISTING

01. Something Happened
02. Feathers Of A Moth
03. Bed Of Glass
04. Whips Of Holly
05. Locust
06. Left Out In The Cold
07. Hypothermia
08. Elizabeth
09. Weird Ways
10. Stolen Valor
11. Strawberry Sun
12. Kind Of Boy
13. Never Going To Run

“Disguise In Love” released in 1978, is the debut album of British punk poet John Cooper Clarke. Renowned for his quick-witted delivery and sharp humor, Clarke fuses punk rock with spoken word, resulting in a one-of-a-kind sonic experience. The album includes tracks such as “I Don’t Want To Be Nice,” “Valley of the Lost Women,” and “(I Married a) Monster from Outer Space,” highlighting Clarke’s talent for social commentary and dark comedy. Produced by Martin Hannett, known as one of the creators of the ‘Manchester sound’, the album captures the unrefined energy of the late ‘70s punk scene. “Disguise In Love” stands out not only for its incisive, observational poetry but also for its stripped-down and edgy musical accompaniment, solidifying its status as a pivotal work in Clarke’s career and a significant contribution to the punk genre.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
1. I Don't Want To Be Nice
2. Psycle Sluts
3. (I've Got A Brand New) Tracksuit
4. Teenage Werewolf
5. Readers Wives
6. Post-War Glamour Girl

Side B
1. (I Married A) Monster From Outer Space
2. Salome Maloney
3. Health Fanatic
4. Strange Bedfellows
5. Valley Of The Lost Women

John Cooper Clarke may have a doctorate and a poem on the English Literature GCSE syllabus, but don’t let that fool you: the “Poet Laureate of Punk” is still a bona fide iconoclast. In Have It, a collection of scathing new poems, the Bard of Salford puts his pen to work across a host of painfully funny critiques of modern life. 

'Nothing short of dazzling' - Alex Turner

Dr John Cooper Clarke's dazzling, scabrous voice has reverberated through pop culture for decades, his influence on generations of performance poets and musicians plain for all to see. In WHAT, the original 'People's Poet' comes storming out of the gate with an uproarious new collection, reminding us why he is one of Britain's most beloved writers and performers. James Brown, John F.

Kennedy, Jesus Christ: nobody is safe from the punk rocker's acerbic pen - and that's just the first poem. Hot on the heels of The Luckiest Guy Alive and his sprawling, encyclopaediac memoir I Wanna Be Yours, the good Doctor returns with his most trenchant collection of poems yet. Vivid and alive, with a sensitivity only a writer with a life as varied and extraordinary as Cooper Clarke's could summon, WHAT is an exceptional collection from one of our foremost satirists.

Josienne Clarke & Ben Walker release their debut album for Rough Trade. The album which is self-produced, follows their Rough Trade debut, the ‘Through The Clouds' EP, which was released earlier this year.

‘Overnight’ is their most ambitious record to date, focusing on Clarke’s extraordinary voice and lyrics, and Walker’s prodigious guitar-playing and arranging; the album features panoramic orchestration by an eclectic core of acclaimed musicians, including strings, horns, piano, double bass, and drums. The twelve songs – ten originals and two covers - recorded almost entirely live at Rockfield Studios in Wales - serve as a snapshot of the endless cycle of night into day and back again, morning light, into dusk, into black midnight, into greying dawn, and on, and on.

The album’s lilting first single, “The Waning Crescent,” is almost an answer in ballad form to the portrayal of the moon in traditional and popular music as a soothing, confessional, companion (i.e. “Blue Moon”). Coming at the darkest and stillest point in the album, the song – like the moon – brings a reassuring lightness.

Clarke explains, "I started to think about if I was the moon, what I might think and feel, and what the moon might sing back,” adding, “I’ve given it a slightly whiny, self-pitying quality because it’s whimsical and a bit funny.”


One of the poppier songs on the album, the sound of “The Waning Crescent” is meant to fit the song’s subject matter. “We’ve done vignettes before where we've taken on a musical genre because that’s what fits the concept of the song. On this one, we’ve used the ‘50s and ‘60s space-race era pop sound to deliberately compound the moon theme,” says Josienne.

Other ‘Overnight’ highlights include the stunning country/soul ballad “Something Familiar” and their marvelous take on Gillian Welch’s “Dark Turn Of Mind,” the eerie folk of “Dawn Of The Dark” and “The Light Of His Lamp,” and the traditional-leaning “Sweet The Sorrow” and “Weep You No More Sad Fountains,” the latter a traditional English ballad set to song.

Though Clarke & Walker’s previous work is very much steeped in the the folk tradition – the two in fact won the BBC Folk Award for Best Duo in 2015 – ‘Overnight’ draws just as much inspiration from more-straightforward 1970s AM radio rock like Fleetwood Mac or Neil Young as they do from folk-rockers like Fairport Convention or Joni Mitchell.

Now available on vinyl for the first time, Josienne Clarke and Ben Walker’s ‘Nothing Can Bring Back The Hour’ album from 2014.

A year in the making, ‘Nothing Can Bring Back The Hour’ builds on the blend of traditional and contemporary songwriting first explored in 2013’s ‘Fire And Fortune’.

Drawing on sumptuous chamber folk textures and rich instrumentation, this new record has a timeless yet current sound, examining and reflecting upon the theme of time past, present and future.

For the first time since her early beginnings, Clarke is flying solo. No label, no musical partner, no producer. Clarke is in complete control of her songwriting, arranging, producing, release schedule and musical direction. While the themes might feel familiar to her fans, the musical journey will not, with Clarke taking in a wide range of new and diverse influences across the album – from Adrianne Lenker’s ‘Hours Were The Birds’, IDLES’ ‘Colossus’, Radiohead’s ‘Airbag’ to Phoebe Bridgers ‘Garden Song’ and more, the album’s touchstones span a vast musical collage of anger and hope. Lead single, ‘Sit Out’ is frustration and defiance in sonic form. “All you stand for / Makes me want to sit out” she sings over thick, driving guitars and an almost Beastie Boys-esque drum beat.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Josienne Clarke's new album manages to take a diverse range of influences and seamlessly integrate them into a beautifully accomplished whole. The more cavernous percussion and distorted guitars perfectly offset Clarke's haunting vocals in the more meditative pieces here. A wonderful collection.

TRACK LISTING

Super Recogniser
Like This
Never Lie
Chains
If It’s Not
Sit Out
Sting My Heart
The Collector
Tiny Bit Of Life
A Letter On A Page
Deep Cut
Out Loud
Repaid
Unbound 

“In the dark night, amongst the trees, between moonlit leaves, is this super-secret, lovely lo-fi, raw, intimate, analogue album made in a cabin deep in the woods…”

Recorded straight to 1/8” tape from a book of handwritten notes in a rented cabin in the woods in the depths of the Scottish highlands deep in the middle of winter, Far From Nowhere by Josienne Clarke is her songwriting & voice in it’s purest form.

TRACK LISTING

1. We’re Never Coming Back
2. What Do I Do
3. Tiny Birds Lament
4. In The Dark Of The Night
5. Dreams Of Sleep
6. The Sucker Of Struggle
7. AI Love You
8. Bushes, Briars & Thorns
9. Ssanna
10. The Madler Horror Story
11. Afternoon Shadow
12. A Slow Burn

‘In All Weather’ is a new collection of songs in which Josienne Clarke goes it alone; musically, as this is her first solo record and in her own life, laid bare and played out in the leave-it-all-behind-andstart- anew nature of the lyrics. The songs were written in on the Isle of Bute in 2018, where Josienne relocated for a year, overlooked by a snowy Ben Nevis.

Josienne accompanies herself on pared-back acoustic and electric guitar throughout. She’s joined on the record by experimental piano prodigy Elliott Galvin, innovative jazz drummer Dave Hamblett, celebrated Scottish harpist Mary Ann Kennedy and guitarist/bassist Sonny Johns, who co-produced the record with Josienne.

TRACK LISTING

(Learning To Sail) In All Weather
Seconds
The Drawing Of The Line
Leaving London
My Love Gave Me An Apple
If I Didn't Mind
Host
Slender, Sad & Sentimental
Season & Time
Walls And Hallways
Fair Weather Friends
Dark Cloud
Onliness

In her own words, Josienne Clarke viewed her 2021 album – A Small Unknowable Thing – as a leap into the abyss. Finally free from the industry structure that had been built around her over the preceding decade and more, she released the album via her own label, Corduroy Punk Records, and handled every aspect of the album’s writing, recording, and release herself, on her own terms. Free from her previous role as one-half of a duo and losing the genre constraints she was quickly and lazily placed within, she came out of that chapter emboldened – but still not truly free.

From her home on Scotland’s Isle of Bute, Josienne began thinking about the idea of reclamation. Cutting her teeth in an industry that so often works against the artist it's supposed to support – and with a lingering idea in the wake of Taylor Swift’s ‘Taylor’s Version’ project – Josienne began revisiting the songs in her back catalogue that felt buried somehow; that had never had the spotlight she felt they deserved, for myriad reasons.

Onliness is both a wholesome project and a spellbinding work in its own right. Opening with one of her earliest compositions – ‘The Tangled Tree’ – and closed by a brand-new song, it presents a career retrospective viewed through a new lens. The album is comprised of reworked versions of fan favourites and hidden gems from a back catalogue that always glimmered, but this time they’re entirely hers, carrying everything from booming drums to intimate acoustic guitars, with Josienne's powerful yet, at times, fragile voice whispering and screaming straight into the listeners ear.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Warm, mildly distorted guitar plucks and Clarke's powerful vocals twist around each other in a hypnotic display of melodicism and drive. It's a testament to Clarke's songwriting skill that she can turn the tide of the groove in an instant, shifting into a woozy psychedelic redux. A wonderful rework of some of her classic pieces, and a great introduction for any new listeners.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Tangled Tree
2. Only Me Only
3. It Would Not Be A Rose
4. Ghost Light
5. Silverline
6. Bells Ring
7. Something Familiar
8. The Birds
9. Homemade Heartache
10. Chicago
11. Things I Didn’t Need
12. Bathed In Light
13. Anyone But Me
14. I Never Learned French
15. Done
16. Workhorse
17. Words Were Never The Answer 

On Parenthesis, I, Josienne Clarke has not only embraced her past but has also redefined herself in the present, presenting a body of work that is shimmering, warm, intimate, and at times, profoundly heart-wrenching. Throughout her career, Clarke has been both a Rough Trade-signed artist and a BBC Radio 2 Folk Award-winner, two opposing poles that neatly sum up her inability to be pigeonholed. Parenthesis, I is a masterful journey through her personal and musical evolution, drawing influence from folk greats Nick Drake and Sandy Denny, as well as more contemporary artists like Julia jacklin, Courtney Marie Andrews, Anaïs Mitchell and Lucy Dacus.

TRACK LISTING

1.  Friendly Teeth
2.  Spherical
3.  Fear Of Falling
4.  Do You Know Now
5.  Looking Glass
6.  Forbearing
7.  Most Of All
8.  Double-Edged Sword
9.  Firecracker
10.  Dead Woman’s Bones
11.  The Calm
12.  Parenthesis, I
13.  Magic Somehow

Huge spiritual jazz / organic house number from Joe and a world-class bunch of musicians. Back by popular demand, the limited-edition repress of one of Joe Claussell’s most cherished compositions has returned. Originally released in 1999 and created in collaboration with Afro–dance innovator Jephte Guillaume and the late music legend Boyd Jarvis, "Agora É Seu Tempo" first appeared on the Trip do Brazil compilation in France. It was later issued as a highly sought-after promotional 12” on Spiritual Life Music, quickly becoming a defining release in the rise of Brazilian-influenced dance music from the late ’90s onward.

In 2018, Joe Claussell revisited the piece, crafting two entirely new versions inspired by the musical spirit of New York City’s barrios. Released as a limited 7”, these remixes sold out within weeks. Now, answering the overwhelming demand, we’re pleased to announce a new limited repress of this timeless and deeply soulful classic. Warm music for the heart and soul. Move quick! 

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Deep house doesn't get much more spiritual than this! I don't even know if you could call this house; but it defo works at that magic +/- 120BPM! I reckon if you unfolded into this after a few hours of pumping house music you'll cause dancers to ascend into the heavens. Delightful music and for once, I'm not gonna knock Joe for the price tag on this one.

TRACK LISTING

A: Agora E Seo Tempo 
B: Agora E Seo Tempo SALSA Instrumental 

Influence of hallucinations induced by chewing roots from the iboga plant on the works of Joaquin Joe Claussell's Edits & Overdubs "Iboga" Compilation. The iboga plant is indigenous to the humid, tropical climates of West Central Africa, including Gabon, Cameroon, Congo, and Angola, which are home to the 2nd largest rainforest in the world. It has been used for centuries in spiritual initiation ceremonies and practices, particularly by the Bwiti tradition and religion in Gabon.

Joaquin Joe Claussell was inspired by these influences and went into the studio to create a compilation of edits and overdubs of African vibrational sounds and rhythms. The result is a collection of eleven compositions that showcase the future possibilities of this influential work.

TRACK LISTING

A1: Dark Eyes 
A2: The Ya Yo People 
A3: Street Celebration 
A4: Summer Africa 
A5: People 

B1: New Africa 
B2: Griot Ba 
B3: Afrikan Basement Qwelo 
B4: Abuja Rough 

Jen Cloher is a songwriter and performer living on unceded Wurundjeri land in Naarm (Melbourne). Cloher’s taut, terse brand of rock is charged with the static tension that comes with being an eternal misfit; they have spoken truth to power with the shrewd eye that only an outsider can possess. Admirers have naturally gravitated towards Cloher’s incisive, generous songwriting. Over the course of five albums, they have won a J Award and an AIR Award and been nominated for an ARIA and the Australian Music Prize. This year Milk! Records, which Cloher founded in 2012 with Courtney Barnett, celebrates its tenth year of releasing music by artists such as Tiny Ruins, Hand Habits, Liz Stringer and Hachiku.

On their first album in five years, Cloher finally breathes out. I Am The River, The River Is Me, her fifth album, is verdant and rich; it luxuriates in stillness, and carries itself with cool, unfussy confidence. It suggests that home is not found in a place or a politic, but in the community you keep: Inspired by Cloher’s powerful matrilineal line of wāhine Māori, I Am The River, The River Is Me is not urgent, or hurried, but it is vital, made with the care and ease of someone who knows that their past began before birth, and will continue long after they’re gone.

I Am The River, The River Is Me is an album of remarkable generosity and grace. Recorded between Aotearoa (NZ) and Naarm (Melbourne) with producers Tom Healy (Tiny Ruins, Marlon Williams), Anika Ostendorf (Hachiku) and Cloher’s longtime drummer Jen Sholakis; the album brings in trailblazing artists including Emma Donovan (Gumbaynggirr, Yamatji), Kylie Auldist, Liz Stringer, Te Kaahu (Waikato-Tainui, Ngāti Tīpā), Ruby Solly (Kai Tahu, Waitaha, Kāti Māmoe) and members of the Naarm-based Kapa Haka, Te Hononga o ngā Iwi. The entire record feels communal — a celebration not just of Cloher, but of the rich, life-filled communities that surround them.

These are fiercely political songs that never feel heavy: They are energetic and full-blooded, alive with the knowledge that to simply exist — to scream and laugh and sing and make art — is as much a form of resistance as to fight.

Finding yourself, finding your home, is an unruly, never-ending process; I Am The River, The River Is Me is not a perfect self-portrait, and it possesses no universal truth about what it means to be Māori, or to be wahine toa (a strong woman), or to be takatāpui, or even to be Jen Cloher. Instead, it captures something else — a picture of humanity and community as a gorgeous, unfathomable mess. The joy of life, Cloher seems to say, is in forgiving your moments of weakness with grace, and embracing the parts of you that are unfinished. On “Aroha Mai, Aroha Atu”, they put it simply, and perfectly: “I may have come late, but better late than never.”

TRACK LISTING

1. Mana Takatāpui
2. Harakeke
3. My Witch
4. Being Human
5. I Am The River, The River Is Me
6. Protest Song
7. The Wild
8. Aroha Mai, Aroha Atu
9. He Toka-Tu-Moana
10. I Am Coming Home

A letter in triplicate addressed to the themes of love, music and Australia, Jen Cloher's fourth album is the culmination of a period of artistic and personal growth in which the artist took her rightful place as a punk-rock figurehead of Melbourne's famous DIY music scene.

She is an outspoken advocate for artist rights and co-founder of the incredible Milk! Records label, which includes the likes of Courtney Barnett and Fraser A. Gorman among its luminaries. Since 2014, her output has been increasingly biting, witty and poetic, with her last album, the critically lauded "In Blood Memory" representing an artistic apex for the artist and garnering her a prestigious Australian Music Prize nomination.

The self-titled album, "Jen Cloher", represents another quantum leap forward for the artist. Recorded amidst the rolling greenery of South-Eastern Australia and mixed at Jeff Tweedy's famous Loft Studios in Chicago, the songs are split by Courtney Barnett's extraordinary lead guitar and anchored by the rhythm section of Bones Sloane and Jen Sholakis. The end result is bold, assured, and piercingly observed, seeing Cloher face up to painful truths with unwavering honesty and emerge triumphant.

TRACK LISTING

Forgot Myself
Analysis Paralysis
Regional Echo
Sensory Memory
Shoegazers
Strong Woman
Kinda Biblical
Great Australian Bite
Loose Magic
Waiting In The Wings
Dark Art

A new album from Sheffield's finest is always greeted with a great deal of excitement here at Piccadilly, and even more so this time around, as he teams up with the legendary Steve Albini for this new album. "Further Complications" is rockier than his earlier solo work and his work with Pulp, which is maybe explained by Albini's presence, although the record also contains a few soul numbers such as "Leftovers".

THIS IS A BLACK FRIDAY RELEASE AVAILABLE ONLINE ONLY ON FRIDAY NOVEMBER 27TH FROM 6PM.
LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.


Further Complications is the second solo album by Jarvis Cocker, originally released in the UK on 18 May 2009. This album has been remastered for RSD.

Limited run. Pressed on white vinyl – includes etched 12” of ‘You’re In My Eyes (Disco Song)’.

Wes Anderson asked Jarvis Cocker to record a new version of “Aline” for his new film The French Dispatch. The French pop hit from 1965, “Aline” was originally performed and made famous by Christophe. The song appears in a critical scene in The French Dispatch, the character Tip Top appears on a poster in the café where the revolutionary youth of Paris congregate, while the song plays on the jukebox.

Anderson and Cocker decided to collaborate on an entire album of French material from the same period, songs originally made notable by the likes of Françoise Hardy, Serge Gainsburg, Jacques Dutroc and others. And with this, the album named after Tip Top is here.

TRACK LISTING

Dans Ma Chambre
Contact
La Tendresse
Looking For You
Dutronc – Le Gent Sont Fous
Il Pluet Sur La Gare
Parole Paroles
Requiem Por En Cos
Mon Amis La Roase
Mao Mao
Elle Et Moi
Aline

Jarvis Cocker’s 2006 self-titled debut ‘Jarvis’ and his second album ‘Further Complications’ are being reissued. Both albums have been out of print for several years. 2009’s ‘Further Complications’ is joined by a 12” featuring ‘You’re In My Eyes (Discosong)’

TRACK LISTING

Angela
Pilchard
Leftovers
I Never Said I Was Deep
Homewrecker!
Hold Still
Fuckingsong
Caucasian Blues
Slush
You’re In My Eyes (Discosong) (one-sided 12”)

What if the things we keep hidden say more about us than those we put on display?

We all have a random collection of the things that made us - photos, tickets, clothes, souvenirs, stuffed in a box, packed in a suitcase, crammed into a drawer. When Jarvis Cocker starts clearing out his loft, he finds a jumble of objects that catalogue his story and ask him some awkward questions: Who do you think you are? Are clothes important? Why are there so many pairs of broken glasses up here?

From a Gold Star polycotton shirt to a pack of Wrigley's Extra, from his teenage attempts to write songs to the Sexy Laughs Fantastic Dirty Joke Book, this is the hard evidence of Jarvis's unique life, Pulp, 20th century pop culture, the good times and the mistakes he'd rather forget. And this accumulated debris of a lifetime reveals his creative process - writing and musicianship, performance and ambition, style and stagecraft.

This is not a life story. It's a loft story.

Jarvis Cocker’s 2006 self-titled debut ‘Jarvis’ and his second album ‘Further Complications’ are being reissued. Both albums have been out of print for several years. ‘Jarvis’ comes with a 7” featuring his rabblerousing classic single ‘Running The World’, which was the subject of a UK fan campaign to get it into the Christmas charts in the aftermath of the general election.

TRACK LISTING

The Loss Adjuster
Don’t Let Him Waste Your Time
Black Magic
Heavy Weather
I Will Kill Again
Baby’s Coming To Get Me
Fat Children
From Auschwitz To Ipswich
Disney Time
Tonite
The Loss Adjuster
Big Julie
Quantum Theory
Running The World (one-sided 7”)

Kalita are honoured to release the first ever compilation focusing on the musical career of Julie Coker, the queen of Nigerian television. Here they collated seven of Julie’s most sought-after Afro disco and hauntingly-beautiful Itsekiri highlife recordings, accompanied by extensive interview-based liner notes and never-before- seen photos.

After gaining fame as Miss Western Nigeria 1957, Julie began her career in the Nigerian entertainment industry as the country’s first ever (and Africa’s second) female television presenter, as well as a popular national radio host. In 1976, having been surrounded by close musical friends including Fela Kuti and Kris Okotie, Julie entered the Nigerian music scene with the now-invisible psychedelic highlife album ‘Ere Yon (Sweet Songs)’, followed in 1981 by the highly sought-after disco-centric ‘Tomorrow’ to great acclaim. Both now fetch eye-watering prices on the rare occasion that they become available for sale.

Here they selected select four recordings from ‘Ere Yon (Sweet Songs)’ and three from ‘Tomorrow’, all as contemporary-sounding today as they were when first released forty years ago. These include Julie’s ‘Ere Yon’, which was recently re-interpreted by Anderson Paak on his latest album ‘Oxnard’ released on Dr. Dre’s Aftermath imprint, and the lost Afro disco classic ‘Gossiper Scandal Monger’.

TRACK LISTING

1. Ere Yon
2. Re Hese
3. It’s All For You
4. Sogio
5. Gossiper Scandal Monger
6. Iyo-Re
7. Elelemi

Inspired by the frenzied energy of Kendrick's "DAMN" tour, J. Cole set about cooking up a new LP, "KOD" ,while he was out on the road himself. Musically inspired by Soundcloud rap, the beats (mostly produced by Cole himself) combine the bass weight and skipping hats of trap with his favoured jazz samples. Lyrically, the album deals with America's enthusiasm to medicate, Cole's own battles with addiction as a means of escape and the ultimate goal of living free from fear and anxiety. As ever, Cole manages to explore complex themes without losing his voice, the smooth beats and technical flow keeping things accessible despite the subject matter. Alongside K. Dot and Childish Gambino, Cole is one of the most important voices in rap today, and his latest LP is another classic.  

TRACK LISTING

A1. Intro
A2. KOD
A3. Photograph
A4. The Cut Off (feat Kill Edward)
A5. ATM
A6. Motiv8
A7. Kevin's Heart
B1. BRACKETS
B2. Once An Addict (interlude)
B3. FRIENDS (feat Kill Edward)
B4. Window Pain (outro)
B5. 1985 (intro To The Fall Off)

The idea for this album is centred around Cole's childhood. 2014 Forest Hills Drive is the address of his childhood home in Fayetteville, NC - which he bought back this year - coincidentally also in 2014. The record title celebrates this; and the album tracks centre around various times in his life: growing up, chasing his dreams and fame, and coming full circle to realize none of that matters - and rather family / friends and being able to come home is what counts.

TRACK LISTING

"Intro"
"January 28th"
€�"Wet Dreamz"
"03' Adolescence"
"A Tale Of 2 Citiez"
"Fire Squad"
"St. Tropez"
"G.O.M.D."
"No Role Modelz"
"Hello"
"Apparently"
"Love Yourz"
"Note To Self"

The Off-Season is the sixth studio album by American rapper J. Cole. The album was executive produced by Cole, Ibrahim Hamad, and T-Minus. It features guest vocals from Morray, 21 Savage, Lil Baby, Bas, and 6lack. 

This time sees Cole relaxing a little from the incendiary fire of 'KOD', with things getting a little looser in the production front too. It's a fine line between sloppy and laid-back, and though 'Laid-back' was never something Cole could come close to, on 'The Off Season', we get a little more of the unhurried production that could easily veer into the more loose side of the hip-hop spectrum. 
 
There are moments of Cole's trademark drive though, with both 'My Life' and 'Applying Pressure' acting as superb grit ofsetting the more languid offerings. It's yet another wonderful outing from Cole, and one that will surely go down as a turning point in his already considerable skillset.  

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Hydraulic subs, rapid-fire trap beats, that guttural east coast drawl; the busiest (and richest) rapper in the business returns with masterpiece no. 6

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
1. 95 South (3:17)
2. Amari (2:30)
3. My Life (3:31)
4. Applying Pressure (2:59)
5. Punchin' The Clock (1:54)
6. 100 Mil' (2:45)

Side 2
1. Pride Is The Devil (3:40)
2. Let Go My Hand (4:26)
3. Interlude (2:14)
4. The Climb Back (5:00)
5. Close (2:33)
6. Hunger On Hillside (4:04)

'The Last Donkey Show' is the latest album from everyone's favorite freaky Texas troubadour John Wesley Coleman. While Coleman's particular madman swerve still recalls Doug Sahm and Roky Erickson, this collection covers more territory than his earlier work. Does this mean the half-mad misfit has grown up? Not quite-but the songwriting chops are all there, from carney kookiness to fuzz rockers to barstool tearjerkers to dustbowl pop.

In his own words: "That's right. My new album is called The Last Donkey Show. It is a fucking roller-coaster recorded in Oakland, California, at Greg Ashley's studio The Creamery and also in the country near Lockhardt, Texas, at my good buddy's childhood home. Aaron Blount is his name. He is a bad-ass songwriter friend of mine. We ate BBQ all day and shot BB guns and had a bonfire. There is a cast of characters on this record... It's a floodgate of memories. Every song has a crazy story. I will tell them to you some time. The donkey is a symbol of hard work, humor and death. I love it! See you at town near you. Eat Gus's Fried Chicken!"

Jon Coley is something of an underground figure in Manchester's music scene. Combining soul and folk with intelligent original songwriting, and admired for his unique guitar playing (taking influence from performers such as Nick Drake, Bert Jansch, Wizz Jones and especially John Martyn) and for his passionate vocal performances, reminiscent of Van Morrison and Amos Lee.

"If All I Ever Wanted Was All I Ever Needed" is his strikingly pure, heart-wide-open debut album. Opening with the Tracey Chapman-esque, "Higher Ground" it's obvious from the start there's a warm and healing magic to Jon's voice; the mere sounding of the record certain to rekindle forgotten memories of happy times like flames around a campfire.

Jon's guitar and voice seem unseperable throughout; symbiotically elevating each other beyond their instrument's solo limitations. And his vocal range - wow! - I mean, Jon where were you hiding such an angelic falsetto?! Like golden honey flowing over polished leather, the slight gravly inflections like proplis in this sonic royal jelly.

Accompanying Jon, a beautifully intimate team of backing muscians and vocalists (all credited on the record's sleeve) which add finedrawn, unforced dynamics to this otherwise one-man operation which in parts drifts in to Mazzy Star-esque depths of emotion.

If you're looking for a charismatic and heart warming troubadour to keep you company over the coming Autumn months then look no further! Highly recommended by us all here at Piccadilly Records.

Jon has played alongside John Renbourn, Blind Boy Paxton, Michael Chapman, Ralph McTell, Jon Gomm, Wizz Jones, Dylan LeBlanc, Chance McCoy and shared a stage and billing with many more, including Foss Patterson and Danny Thompson of John Martyn's band at venues as varied as New York's Bitter End Club, and Liverpool's Echo Arena. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Whispering sweet nothings like warm treacle across a rich tapestry of English Americana; the only drinking partner you need this Autumn! Manchester's Jon Coley is an absolute joy on the ears. Debut album from this star destined for supernova status.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Higher Ground
Sympathy For Juda
Sweeter State Of Mind
Can't Blame A Boy For Trying
Last Words On A Caged Mocking-Bird
In The Night Time 

Side B
Beat Up Inside
Watch The World Burn
You Can't Make It Rain
The Easy Life
Only Call Me When You're Ready
Bigger Than Both Of Us
Blue Eyes, Whiskey And Wine

Following the kaleidoscopic ambition of 'Djesse Vol. 4', Jacob returns with The 'Light For Days' – a stripped-back, emotionally resonant body of work that is reflective of the quiet core of his artistry.

Recorded in just four days in the very room where his career first took flight, 'The Light For Days' trades scale for intimacy, spotlighting Jacob’s unmistakable voice and a deepening relationship with the guitar. The result is a collection of originals and handpicked covers that feel immediate, heartfelt, and timeless.

'The Light For Days' is a powerful reminder of the versatility that has earned Jacob seven GRAMMYs across various genres. For those who’ve seen Jacob live, this record will feel like coming home. For everyone else, it’s an invitation to see and to hear him in a new light.

TRACK LISTING

1. You Can Close Your Eyes
2. Heaven (Butterflies)
3. Thom Thumb
4. Fairytale Lullaby
5. Norwegian Wood
6. Keep An Eye On Summer
7. I Know (A Little)
8. Where Did My Apple Fall?
9. Sweet Melody
10. Icarus
11. Something Heavy

Out of all the Elektra 50th Anniversary reissues this disc featuring two Judy Collins albums from 1961 and 1962 are amongst the most suprising. Both albums are accomplished and startlingly pure renditions of folk standards that Collins somehow made her own. I'm not too sure about the Irish rebel songs but "Great Selchie Of Shule Sherry" is a groudbreaking five minute narrative song that has a timeless and majestic strength and "Pretty Saro" is a vocal masterpiece.

Imagine you've made it. You and your friends have hit the big time in music and you're going to be a star. But then, quite suddenly, it's over.

Your best friends don't want you anymore, and you're on the outside. Perhaps they're tired of your bad habits, they think you're not good enough, or they sense you just don't want it as much as they do. Whatever the cause, you're a reject.

So, what do you do next?Featuring a player rejected by both Nirvana and Soundgarden who became a decorated special forces soldier, Britpoppers who spiralled into addiction before becoming novelists and missionaries, the terrifying story of Guns N' Roses' first drummer, super-rejecting band leaders, self-destroying rappers, troubled hard rock bassists and girl-band burnouts, The Rejects takes an intimate, thoughtful look at people who've been kicked out of bands, what they experienced and what came afterwards. Coming from a writer with twenty years' music industry experience, The Rejects is a sympathetic study of some of music's most fascinating characters, and what happens when the dream comes crashing to an end. The result is a compelling alternative history of popular music.

'Live' at the Village Vanguard (Impulse! AS-10), was Coltrane’s first official ‘live’ album. Coltrane is joined here on two tunes by Eric Dolphy on bass clarinet, plus McCoy Tyner on piano, Elvin Jones on drums, and Reggie Workman and Jimmy Garrison alternating on bass. Garrison’s presence on this album makes this the first recording by what came to be known as Coltrane’s ‘Classic Quartet’. Recorded live at the Village Vanguard, New York, November 2 & 3, 1961.

Verve’s Acoustic Sounds Series features transfers from the original analog tapes mastered by Ryan K. Smith at Sterling Sound and pressed on 180-gram vinyl at QPR. The series is supervised by Chad Kassem, CEO of Acoustic Sounds, and releases are presented in deluxe gatefold tip-on packaging.

TRACK LISTING

Spiritual [13:48] (Side A)
Softly As In A Morning Sunrise [6:33] (Side A)
Chasin’ The Trane [16:07] (Side B)

'In the brief, bright arc that is the career of John Coltrane, 1963 marks a point of transition between past jazz masterpieces and future work which would transcend the boundaries of the music itself.  That year's recorded output shows movement in many directions: a look back at the past, continued examination of a familiar repertoire, exploration of more traditional formats and a look forward at compositions and approaches that would further extend the reach of jazz. John Coltrane 1963: New Directions collects all of John Coltrane’s 1963 Impulse recordings in the order in which they were recorded

5-LP, 3-CD sets include artwork featuring original collages.

The box is meant to show the growth in Coltrane’s musical journey in 1963 that ultimately resulted in 1964’s “Crescent” and, especially, “A Love Supreme” // Music comes from the original albums “Both Directions at Once: The Lost Album”, “John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman”, “Dear Old Stockholm” (released after Coltrane’s death), “Newport ‘63” and “Live at Birdland”.

Impulse! dig up a never-before-heard live recording from a private collection featuring Coltrane’s Classic Quartet augmented by Pharoah Sanders amongst others. This is one of only three known concert performances of the most iconic suite in jazz.
Recorded in late 1965 on the culminating evening of a historic week-long run at The Penthouse in Seattle, A Love Supreme: Live In Seattle is a musical revelation of historic importance, capturing Coltrane as he began to expand his classic quartet—adding Pharoah Sanders on second saxophone and Donald Garrett on second bass—and catapulting him into the intense, spiritually focused final phase of his career.

TRACK LISTING

1. A Love Supreme Pt. I – Acknowledgement
2. Interlude 1
3. A Love Supreme Pt. II – Resolution
4. Interlude 2
5. A Love Supreme Pt. III – Pursuance
6. Interlude 3
7. Interlude 4
8. A Love Supreme Pt. IV – Psalm

To mark the 65th anniversary of the album’s recording, Blue Train will be released in two special editions on September 16 as part of Blue Note’s acclaimed Tone Poet Audiophile Vinyl Reissue Series.

A 1-LP mono pressing of the original album will be presented in a deluxe gatefold tip-on jacket, while the 2-LP stereo collection Blue Train: The Complete Masters will include a second disc featuring seven alternate and incomplete takes, none of which have been released previously on vinyl, and four of which have never been released before on any format. The Complete Masters comes with a booklet featuring never-before-seen session photos by Francis Wolff and an essay by Coltrane expert Ashley Kahn. Both Tone Poet Vinyl Editions were produced by Joe Harley, mastered by Kevin Gray from the original analog master tapes, and pressed on 180g vinyl at RTI.

Blue Train: The Complete Masters will also be released as a 2-CD set and digital collection.

“Few studio experiences I’ve had can compare with the thrill of listening to the original master tapes—mono, stereo and alternate takes—of Blue Train,” says Harley. “I consider these two new versions the definitive editions of this masterpiece performance by John Coltrane.”

TRACK LISTING

2CD
Blue Train
Moment’s Notice
Locomotion
I’m Old Fashioned
Lazy Bird
Blue Train (false Start)
Blue Train (take 7)
Moment’s Notice (alternate Take 4)
Lazy Bird (take 1)
Blue Train (alternate Take)
Moment’s Notice (incomplete Alternate Take 5A)
Lazy Bird (alternate Take)

1LP
LP 1 | Blue Train | Original Album | Studio
Side A
Blue Train
Moment’s Notice
Side B
Locomotion
I’m Old Fashioned
Lazy Bird

2LP
LP 1 | Blue Train | Original Album | Studio
Side A
Blue Train
Moment’s Notice
Side B
Locomotion
I’m Old Fashioned
Lazy Bird
LP 2 | Blue Train | Alternate And Incomplete Takes
Side A
Blue Train (false Start)
Blue Train (take 7)
Moment’s Notice (alternate Take 4)
Lazy Bird (take 1)
Side B
Blue Train (alternate Take)
Moment’s Notice (incomplete Alternate Take 5A)
Lazy Bird (alternate Take)

'In 1964, the National Film Board of Canada asked John Coltrane to record the soundtrack for a French-language film titled “Le chat dans le sac” (“The Cat in the Bag”).  Amazingly, no announcement was made that the iconic Coltrane was adding new performances to this film.In June of that year, Coltrane’s ‘Classic Quartet’ entered Rudy Van Gelder’s studio and recorded five previously- recorded Coltrane originals. For many years, viewers of the film who recognized the music thought that they were listening to the original recordings, though in fact they were new and had never been heard. Now, with the release of Blue World, we can hear these newly-discovered recordings for the first time.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Naima (Take 1)
A2. Village Blues (Take 2)
A3. Blue World
A4. Village Blues (Take 1)
B1. Village Blues (Take 3)
B2. Like Sonny
B3. Traneing In
B4. Naima (Take 2)

Unique collection of the most popular and iconic John Coltrane recordings

Presented on special edition 180gram red vinyl with front and back cover photos by Chuck Stewart (1927-2017), the most important African American jazz photographer.

John Coltrane was the most revolutionary and influential tenor saxophonists in modern jazz. This selection presents the greatest hits of Coltrane's career, including five of his best known compositions, all of which became jazz standards, including the splendid 'Blue Train', 'Giant Steps' and 'Naima', and his breathtaking reading of the 'My Favorite Things', and his poignant versions of the ballads 'It's Easy to Remember' and 'In a Sentimental Mood' (on the latter backed by Duke Ellington on piano).

TRACK LISTING

Blue Train
Giant Steps
Equinox
In A Sentimental Mood
My Favorite Things
Mr. P.C.
It's Easy To Remember / Naima

In August of 1961, the John Coltrane Quintet played an engagement at the legendary Village Gate in Greenwich Village, New York. Coltrane’s Classic Quartet was not as fully established as it would soon become and there was a meteoric fifth member of Coltrane’s group those nights— visionary multi-instrumentalist Eric Dolphy. Ninety minutes of never-before-heard music from this group were recently discovered at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, offering a glimpse into a powerful musical partnership that ended much too soon.

In addition to some well-known Coltrane material (“My Favorite Things”, “Impressions”, “Greensleeves”), there is a breathtaking feature for Dolphy’s bass clarinet on “When Lights Are Low” and the only known non-studio recording of Coltrane’s composition “Africa”, from the Africa/Brass album. This recording represents a very special moment in John Coltrane's journey—the summer of 1961—when his signature, ecstatic live sound, commonly associated his Classic Quartet of '62 to '65, was first maturing and when he was drawing inspiration from deep, African sources— and experimenting with the two-bass idea both in the studio (Olé) and on stage. This truly rare recording of "Africa" captures his expansive vision at the time.

TRACK LISTING

My Favorite Things
When Lights Are Low
Impressions
Greensleeves
Africa

The seminal recordings that make up Lush Life were taped during a transitional period in John Coltrane's musical career. He had first joined the Miles Davis Quintet in 1955 and would form his own celebrated quartet with McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison, and Elvin Jones in 1960. In the intervening years, he overcame his narcotics addiction and began to expand on his own musical ideas while experimenting with both the Thelonious Monk Quartet and the Miles Davis Sextet (featuring Bill Evans and Cannonball Adderley). Lush Life was constructed with material from three different sessions, all of which produced additional material issued in other albums. While Side A is in trio format with no piano, Side B features a quintet showcasing Donald Byrd and Red Garland.

Contains new specially prepared liner notes by Penguin Guide to Jazz's writer Brian Morton and by Paris' prestigious Jazz Magazine.

"All aspects of Coltrane's conception during this period are well-illustrated on the album: the classic simplicity and haunting loveliness of the Coltrane ballad technique is here. For sheer beauty of approach and execution, his work has rarely been equalled." - ***** Franz Kofsky, DownBeat

TRACK LISTING

1. Like Someone In Love
2. I Love You
3. Trane's Slow Blues
4. Slowtrane
5. Lush Life
6. I Hear A Rhapsody
7. While My Lady Sleeps