Following the all-area smasher "Pinball" and super classy "EchoLow" Black Acre orphanage for sonic outsiders welcomes a true pioneer in the form of legendary DJ N-Type. "Dark Matter" is a departure from the DNA scrambling rippers we've come to expect without sacrificing any of N-Type's trademarked impact. Here he gets all Edgar Alan Poe on the beat as etheric winds slice into the sub and our nocturnal narrator depicts ghostly happenings. The heavyweight bruiser kick / snare tag team anchor the impossibly subtle midrange growl as bongolian tribalist procussion keeps the riddim rolling. Sprinkle some arpeggiated synthetic angel dust over the mix and you've got an original take on a well-practiced classic form. On the flip we unearth the long requested often speculated over "HP Sauce". This long awaited lost dub reeks of the sheer rudeness that kicked off modern dub music, lazer bass rips deep wounds into the rugged halfstep riddim and ultra low-end dabbling squeezes oxygen outta the dance. DJ support from Hatcha, Caspa, Walsh and Mary Anne Hobbs.

N1_SOUND & Ras Yunchie join forces on an 8-track LP that transcends both definition and generation. INNA DJ STYLE, out November 7th, marks the Toronto veteran singer’s first-ever vinyl release.

Pairing four vocal cuts with four dub versions on the B-side, "Inna DJ Style" bridges experimental dub, digi, and roots, embodying what Ras describes as an open sound - one that draws from reggae traditions while boldly breaking new sonic ground.

N1_SOUND first encountered Ras’ distinctive voice and soaring falsetto at Toronto sound system parties. A cornerstone of the city’s reggae scene, Ras Yunchie has been performing since 1983 and remains a vital presence more than 40 years on. His contributions have been recognized with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the National DJ Association, alongside titles such as DJ of the Year, DJ Sound Champion, and winner of the 1985 DJ Sound Clash.

While the rhythms pulse with heavy bass and the three-dimensional lead melodies synonymous with N1_SOUND, it’s Ras’ vocals that make "Inna DJ Style" truly shine. Each track was recorded in a single take and left largely untouched - a testament to the raw talent and enduring artistry of the 61-year-old singer. Across the four vocal cuts, the alchemy of contrasting styles, influences, and lived experience highlights how collaboration can push sound and genre into bold, unexpected territory.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Digi dub and dancehall vibes here with a fresh, contemporary flavour and plenty of fire in its belly. An ace collaboration by two well respected sound bwoys.

TRACK LISTING

1. Show Them How
2. Try
3. Straight To The Top
4. Never Knew
5. Show Them How (Dub)
6. Try (Dub)
7. Straight To The Top (Dub)
8. Never Knew (Dub)

NAD aka Dan Tyler of the legendary Idjut Boys arrives at Duca with a bouncing 4 track of obscurities, all wrapped in a sheen of echo and reverb.

The Idjuts’ have released on a myriad of labels, including Noid, U Star and Smalltown Supersound, being one of the originators of the 90s edits revival, DJing the globe including to almost cult-status in Japan, as well as remixing the likes of DJ Harvey, Brian Ferry and Dimitri From Paris

A master of editing, Dan’s move to Oslo has seen him step out solo to remix the likes of Todd Terje (Olson), Mudd (Claremont 56) and King Sporty (Emotional Rescue) and not forgetting running the Record Mission edits label with old friend Nick The Record.

"Das Wordy" hits with a bump, the gastarbeiter NAD rockin’ like Tom Tom Club on Stasi steroids. La nouvelle musique of "Histoire De Cul" sweeps the catwalk, sweeping past Le Palace queue, hitting Cuevas’ dancefloor to 'effet sensuel'.

Rocking out is NAD’s nature, "Kropps Smack" a body with a mind of its own, come down, come all night…boody language.

"Release The Pigeon" is a smooth ride home, the music nomad, the gypsy man, one of these days he’ll settle down.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Immediately causing quite the stir amongst Picc staffers, customers and further afield into the leftfield disco upper echelons - new EP from the legendary maverick Dan Idjuts and it's a fabulously wonky trip into the dubbed-out, disco-not-disco thud, rattle and strut, with elements of new wave thrown in for good measure. Unmissable!

TRACK LISTING

A1. Daw Wordy
A2. Histoire De Cul
B1. Kropps Smack
B2. Release The Pigeon

NAD return to Funtown for another double pack of heavy hitting splices. From the low-slung disco-funk of opener "Riding High" to the slap-bass-driven, horn blasted funk stomp of "Afro Kissed" and back through the early hip-hop-disco meets Brit funk jive of (the very appropriately named) "Skate Groove", and the mellowed Rhodes jam, "Make It Right", which sounds like it's been recorded in the palm-shaded balmy confines of a tropical paradise. It's a right royal set throughout which our Idjut edit supremo delivers with his usual stylish finesse. Unmissable! 

TRACK LISTING

A. Riding High
B1. Make it Right Tonight
B2. Skate Groove
C1. Afro Kissed
C2. Edito
D. Love Downer

Heavenly Recordings release a 20th anniversary vinyl of Nada Surf’s classic album Let Go. This is the first time Let Go has appeared on Heavenly vinyl.

Let Go was the third album by the New York trio Nada Surf (Matthew Caws, Daniel Lorca, Ira Eliot). By the time it was released on Heavenly in the summer of 2002, the band had already witnessed a good deal of the highs and lows of the music industry, having had a breakout MTV hit before being dropped by their US label and having to go back to 9 to 5 jobs. Sessions were entirely self-funded, with the band paying the producers in dollar bills earned from the merch table at their shows.

When a cassette of the album initially arrived at Heavenly, it was with no preconceptions, just a “you’ll like this” nod from a mutual friend. And they were right. Let Go is a power pop masterpiece - all soaring melody and closing time melancholy. It quickly became the soundtrack to day and night in the office and on release picked up glowing reviews from Q (“melodic… mature… intelligent… wistful” 4*), Rolling Stone ("Nada Surf show enough smarts and panache to leave most of their Nineties-rock peers eating hot dust” 4*) and Entertainment Weekly (“a comeback effort that grows more popular with each spin”).

Twenty years on, Let Go is getting its first ever vinyl release on Heavenly. This new cut reinstates the UK tracklisting over four sides of vinyl (previous pressings were over three sides with one side left blank - us neither).

TRACK LISTING

A1 Blizzard Of ’77
A2 The Way You Wear Your Head
A3 Fruit Fly
B1 Blonde On Blonde
B2 Inside Of Love
B3 Hi-Speed Soul
C1 No Quick Fix
C2 Killian’s Red
C3 Là Pour Ça
D1 Happy Kid
D2 Treading Water
D3 Paper Boats 

Born in 1952, Albert Nadeau was a French-Caribbean singer ,organist and songwriter from Martinique, known for blending local Caribbean rhythms with funk, soul and reggae inflections.

After fronting the local group Les Leopards, he recorded a small but potent set of tracks in the late 1970s that showcased his raw, emotive voice and taste for groove-driven arrangements.

At the heart of that period stands 'I Am Black' from his 1977 solo LP. The track is a slow- burning tropical- funk/ reggae cut built around a loping groove, organ- based chords and Nadeau's gritty, passionate lead vocal. Musically it sits between biguine-tinged island rhythm and 1970s funk/soul. Though it never entered the mainstream charts, 'I Am Black' is admired for the way it bridges Caribbean musical tradition with the Black Power and soul currents of its era, it has in recent years become one of the most sought-after Caribbean songs.

Brother Mudada, born Alan Fortune, is a veteran Trinidad & Tobago calypsonian who began his career in 1961. He is known for socially conscious music that reflects calypso's tradition of political and cultural commentary. Over the decades, he earned major recognition in the Caribbean, including winning the Calypso Monarch title in St. Thomas, U.S. Virgin Islands, in 2004 and later receiving a national honor, the Hummingbird Silver Award, for his contribution to music and culture. One of his most influential songs is 'Forward Ever', a calypso anthem centered on perseverance, resilience, and collective struggle. The lyrics encourage listeners to "struggle on," using patience, wisdom, and understanding like weapons in life's battles, and remind them to help others along the way. The song's message and Mudada's delivery have helped solidify his standing as a cultural voice for determination and unity within Caribbean society.

TRACK LISTING

1. Albert Nadeau - I Am Black
2. Brother Mudada - Forward Ever

Here to remind us that music is not just an audible experience, Minneapolis/New York’s Nadine make melodies that transcend acoustics. Their debut album oh my is collection of sophisticated modern pop songs that resonate in the gaps, the space between deadlines and timelines.

More akin to poetry set to music, Nadine is all about exploring feeling. Whilst most poets revel in the personal, Nadine's process is collaborative whose core is singer Nadia Hulett (part of the loose collective Phantom Posse) and Julian Fader and Carlos Hernandez (both of Ava Luna). The trio's practice is marked by their commitment to playfulness, curiosity, and fluidity.

Nadine's songs have one foot standing firm in pop, but ebb and flow with exploration and experiment. Polyphonic melodies swing and gambol, instrumental layers take generous flourishes and unexpected turns with an ear to the wondrous and occasionally weird, crafting jazz-tinged lounge-pop all held together by Hulett’s characteristic vocals, strong with a sincerity and gentleness that holds the listener. Let go of old ideas. Listen for tricks of the light. What does it feel like?

TRACK LISTING

Side A:
#53
Nook
Ultra Pink
Plinth
Not My Kinda Movie
New Step
That Neon Sign

Side B:
Pews
Contigo
Little Self In The Garden
Can’t Be Helped
Peace In The Valley

Nadja’s latest full-length offering Labyrinthine, recorded during the pandemic and concurrently with their Southern Lord album Luminous Rot, finally sees a CD release on the band’s own label, Broken Spine.

Labyrinthine explores themes of identity and loss, monstrosity and regret, extreme asceticism, the differences between labyrinths and mazes, taking inspiration from Haruki Murakami’s Killing Commendatore, Ursula K. LeGuin’s The Tombs Of Atuan, and Victor Pelevin’s reinterpretation of the story of the minotaur and Ariadne, The Helmet Of Horror.

While this might be Nadja’s heaviest, doomiest album to date, it is unique in the band’s extensive catalogue as each track features a guest vocalist: Alan Dubin, legendary American vocalist from O.L.D., Khanate currently Gnaw; Rachel Davies, vocalist and bassist from the British band, Esben & The Witch; Lane Shi Otayanii, a Chinese multi-media artist and vocalist in Elizabeth Colour Wheel; and Dylan Walker, American vocalist from grindcore / noise band Full Of Hell. Nadja has released numerous albums on many different underground labels—Alien8 Recordings, Daymare Records, Robotic Empire, Hydrahead Records, Gizeh Records, and Important Records, to name a few. The duo has toured extensively around the world, including performances at such festivals as SXSW, FIMAV, Roadburn, Donaufest, Le Guess Who, Incubate, and Unsound, and has shared the stage with such artists as Earth, OM, Khanate, Tim Hecker, Ben Frost, and Godflesh.

Mixed by DAVID PAJO (Slint, Tortoise, Will Oldham and more..) Nadja is a duo of multi-instrumentalist Aidan Baker and bassist Leah Buckareff—active since 2005—and making music which can be described as ambient doom, dreamsludge, or metalgaze. Nadja’s signature sound combines the atmospheric textures of shoegaze and ambient/electronic music with the heaviness, density, and volume of metal, noise, and industrial. For their new album, Luminous Rot, the duo retain their overblown/ambient sound, and explore shorter and more tightly structured songs reflecting their interests not only in metal, but post-punk, cold-wave, shoegaze, and industrial. 

Thematically, Luminous Rot explores ideas of 'first contact' and the difficulties of recognising alien intelligence. This was in part inspired by reading such writers as Stanislaw Lem and Cixin Lui -- in particular, theories on astro-physics, multi-dimensionality, and spatial geometry in "The Three Body Problem" -- as well as Margaret Wertheim's "A Field Guide To Hyperbolic Space," about mathematician Daina Taimina's work with crochet to illustrate hyperbolic space and geometry.

The album was recorded between their home studio, Broken Spine Studios, or Nadja’s live rehearsal studio, both in the district of Lichtenberg, Berlin. Luminous Rot marks the first album mixed by someone else, who in this case was David Pajo. The band comment, “as big fans of Slint, we thought he might fore-front the more angular, post-punk elements of our music - the mix is quite different from our previous albums. But, as usual, we had James Plotkin (Khanate, OLD, etc) master the album as we trust his ears and aesthetic, as he's mastered numerous records of ours.”

TRACK LISTING

1 Intro
2 Luminous Rot
3 Cuts On Your Hands
4 Starres
5 Fruiting Bodies
6 Dark Inclusions

Ethereal dream gloom from a voice so unique they had to create an entirely new genre to contain all four octaves.

Mixing classical music with synthesizer and acoustic guitar, Happy Rhodes’ ‘ecto pop’ never quite broke outside upstate New York, but that didn’t stop gothic Americana queen Marissa Nadler from reinterpreting ‘Where Do I Go’ in 2018.

Both the original and cover have been paired here, housed in an elegant black and silver sleeve, with embossed braille lettering for the visually impaired.

TRACK LISTING

Marissa Nadler ‘Where Do I Go’
Happy Rhodes ‘Where Do I Go’

The eighth album from Marissa Nadler, For My Crimes, is the sound of turmoil giving way to truth. The songs stare down the dark realization that love may not be enough to keep two people together through distance and differing needs. By asking these difficult questions about her relationships, Nadler has found a stronger sense of self and a sharper voice as both a songwriter and a vocalist, culminating in her most evocative entry in an already impressive discography. 

Following the release of 2016’s acclaimed Strangers, Nadler’s relationships were put to the test as she left the Boston area on tour. She wrote throughout 2017 about this tension, and ended up with three times as many songs as she needed. But after reviewing the demos with her co-producers Justin Raisen and Lawrence Rothman, Nadler wrote a flurry of tight but no less intense new songs in the week before arriving at Rothman’s Laurel Canyon studio, House of Lux, in early January. She considered it a challenge to herself, applying new strategies and structures to the craft of “slow music” she’s honed over the last 15 years. From that group of songs came nearly all of the singles on For My Crimes, some of the most indelible of Nadler’s career.

The opening title track is classic Nadler: a sweeping, vaguely Southern drama of voices, strings, and acoustic guitar, that walks the fine line between character song and personal indictment by metaphor. “For My Crimes” spawned out of a songwriting exercise in which Nadler wrote from the perspective of someone on death row, but the song casts a dark shadow over an album that turns marital conflict into inner reflection. Helping Nadler dig down into the song’s remorseful soul is her old friend Angel Olsen, who serves as a distraught echo from beyond in the chorus.

“Blue Vapor” has an intoxicating raw energy luring you in, somewhere between Springsteen and a grunge band playing MTV Unplugged back in the day. It feels at once tight and improvisational, balancing on little more than Nadler’s steady strumming and vulnerable harmonies with Kristin Kontrol (of Dum Dum Girls), until the heavy, purposeful style of Hole drummer Patty Schemel conjures chaos in the second half. This slow burn feeling is all too appropriate for a song centred around repeating patterns and creeping numbness in a relationship. “Blue Vapor” names that strange ambivalence and turns it into a chant that hangs in the air long after the song ends.

Dreaminess and eeriness have often been two sides of the same coin in Marissa Nadler songs. Where “For My Crimes” and “Blue Vapor” come from her dark side, the album has plenty of moments that twinkle in their sadness and sentimentality. “I Can’t Listen to Gene Clark Anymore” is one of those highly specific songs you’ll get if you’ve ever lost a favourite band to your own broken heart. It sways perfectly in its bittersweet-ness, like a slow dance you never want to end. After the strings swell and the bass pedals kick in, Nadler coos, “Cause I remember/The songs you sang/To me when it was you/I was falling for.” Later, closing track “Said Goodbye To That Car” turns a final odometer reading into a rhythm for a catchy, wistful hook: “1-1-9-6-5-7, and the engine blew/“1-1-9-6-5-7, and I thought of you,” Nadler lulls, harmonizing with herself. It’s an ingenious way to capture the end of an era in one small moment, and she moves as delicately as you would handling an old photo with her sweet oohs.

Bolstering the intimacy of these songs is the strong feminine energy that defined their recording. Between Rothman’s fluidity with both gender and genre (as heard on his 2017 album The Book of Law), and Raisen’s track record of successful collaborations with strong women (Olsen, Kim Gordon, Charli XCX), Nadler felt empowered to explore without judgement in the studio. With the exception of a single saxophonist, every player on the album is a woman of notable pedigree and distinct style, many of whom have played with Nadler over the years. In addition to the cameos by Angel Olsen and Kristin Kontrol, Sharon Van Etten sings backup on “I Can’t Listen to Gene Clark Anymore” and “Lover Release Me.” Mary Lattimore joins on harp for “Are You Really Gonna Move to the South,” while the great experimental multi-instrumentalist Janel Leppin plays strings throughout the record.

These women and others helped make For My Crimes as dynamic as it is intimate, but Nadler’s mesmerizing voice—stripped of nearly all reverb—is what sits at the center of these songs. You can hear the emotional range of her performances more than ever before, from the spectral harmonizing of “Are You Really Gonna Move To The South” to the cheeky boredom of “All Out Of Catastrophes,” two other highlights. As a singer, she has never sounded more confident than she does here.

Adding to the album’s deeply personal feeling is its abstracted artwork, featuring Nadler’s original oil paintings. Though Nadler is a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design and a semi-retired art teacher (she has one student left—a 95-year-old named Doris), For My Crimes marks the first album cover bearing one of her paintings. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Nadler has never failed to tickle the feels with her own brand of gothic acousticry, slowly morphing from quiet folk ballads into grand, echoic anthems. Layering Nadler's haunting vocals on top of each-other to great effect and underpinned with a spine-tinglingly haunting instrumental sensibility, this is without a doubt, her greatest work. Beautiful.

TRACK LISTING

1 For My Crimes
2 I Can't Listen To Gene Clark Anymore
3 Are You Really Going To Move To The South?
4 Lover Release Me
5 Blue Vapor
6 Interlocking
7 All Out Of Catastrophes
8 Dream Dream Big In The Sky
9 You're Only Harmless When You Sleep
10 Flame Thrower
11 Said Goodbye To That Car

Marissa Nadler has spent the past two decades crafting a singular body of work defined by spectral beauty, haunting lyricism, and a voice that feels both ancient and intimate.

Since her 2004 debut Ballads of Living and Dying, the Boston-born singer-songwriter has become a revered figure in the worlds of dream- folk, gothic Americana, and atmospheric rock. Across acclaimed releases like Little Hells, July, and For My Crimes, Nadler has seamlessly woven tales of longing, mystery, and memory with ethereal instrumentation and poetic depth. With New Radiations, Nadler pares back to a more minimal, drumless sound--letting her voice and fingerpicked guitar take center stage. The album feels intimate and clear- eyed, offering a quiet yet resonant collection of songs that reflect an artist ever attuned to the power of subtle transformation.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: It's a folky week this week isn't it! While Marissa Nadler's sound can fall anywhere within the hilariously broad remit of 'Singer-Songwriter', in this instance we get the deeply moving sound of beautifully produced guitar and Nadler's famously evocative vocals, but draped atop a core of haunting goth-country and ambient drone. Mixed by Randall Dunn (Earth / SUNN O))) ), which might not surprise you all that much when you hear it. Brill.

TRACK LISTING

It Hits Harder
Bad Dreams Summertime
You Called Her Camellia 
Smoke Screen Selene 
New Radiations 
If It's An Illusion
Hatchet Man
Light Years
Weightless Above The Water
To Be The Moon King
Sad Satellite

Startisha introduces Naeem as a restlessly creative artist with an impressionistic, genre-bending album. As a complete work, Startisha exemplifies artistic daring and emotional intelligence while exploring new ideas and sounds, and philosophically excavating the artist’s histories. Startisha may be loaded with impressive collaborations and left-field sounds, but don't get it twisted—this music comes straight from Naeem's heart, representing the journey he's taken to get to this point as well as what lies in the future for him.

Baltimore-hailing Naeem Juwan has spent much of the last decade stretching his creative legs in a variety of ways: he's hit the road with artists ranging from the Avalanches and Bon Iver to Big Red Machine and Mouse on Mars, took part in a 37d03d residency in Berlin, and was selected as the music resident in 2019 for New York's Pioneer Works space. Through it all, he's been building the songs that make up Startisha, a record a half-decade in the making that featured Juwan pulling from creative circles all across the U.S. to craft a truly unique document of sound.

After studio sessions in Philadelphia and New York, Juwan decamped to Minneapolis and holed up in Justin Vernon's home studio, where Startisha continued to come together with contributions from Vernon, Ryan Olson (Gayngs, Polica), Swamp Dogg, Velvet Negroni, Francis and the Lights, and regular collaborators Amanda Blank and Micah James. The guest spots came together "very organically. I originally didn't want any features at all. Over time, meeting people and sharing the record with them, things just kind of happened."

For Juwan, the challenge inherent in Startisha was to “write songs from a personal place, and to write love songs – both things I’ve never done before.” The album kicks off with a gorgeous cover of the Silver Apples classic "You and I," reinterpreted for today's fraught times. He describes “Stone Harbor” as “a simple love song to my boyfriend, written in and name after the shore town he and his family spend their summers, Stone Harbor, NJ.” On “Simulation,” the album’s first proper single, Juwan offers a kind of treatise of creative resistance on art and culture. “I had been reading a few books, such as Trickster Makes This World: Mischief, Myth, and Art, and they helped me solidify feelings I’ve had all of my life about surviving a society of institutions that presents fictions as fact, and often use these fictions to diminish my worth, or to convince me to join their gangs. So I wrote this song to remind myself, and hopefully everyone that hears it, that nothing is real, and our greatest defense in this life is our own creativity, and finding great faith in whatever sigils and icons we choose to guide us.”

TRACK LISTING

A
01/ You And I
02/ Simulation (feat. Swamp Dogg, Justin Vernon)
03/ Let Us Rave (feat. Velvet Negroni)
04/ Woo Woo Woo (feat. Amanda Blank, Micah James)
05/ Us
B
06/ Stone Harbor
07/ Right Here
08/ Startisha
09/ Tiger Song

'Lush Life' is the Sonar Kollektiv debut EP by German singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Flo Naegeli.

Originally hailing from the Bavarian forests of southeastern Germany, Naegeli began his musical journey at the age of seven as a folk accordionist, later switching to electric guitar and developing a disciplined approach to songwriting and musicianship that led to formal music studies and a professional career. After moving to eastern Germany, he gradually stepped away from band projects to focus on solo work, embracing self-production tools to realise a sound that blends soulful songwriting with warm, organic instrumentation.

Written and largely recorded by Naegeli himself, 'Lush Life' is a deeply personal yet accessible collection of songs reflecting on fatherhood, family relationships and friendship.

Tracks such as 'Love By The Hour' and 'Freedom' explore his relationships with his father and mother respectively, while 'Closer' reflects on intimacy and emotional resilience, and “Shake” captures the bittersweet feeling of separation from a close friend. Despite the introspective themes, the EP carries a strong sense of optimism and warmth throughout. Flo’s soulful vocals and assured arrangements are supported by select guest musicians on drums, trumpet, cello and strings, resulting in a sound that feels both intimate and uplifting.

'Lush Life' positions Flo Naegeli as a distinctive new voice within the Sonar Kollektiv catalogue, combining emotional depth with broad appeal across soul, indie and modern singer-songwriter fans.

TRACK LISTING

1. Shake
2. Freedom
3. Closer
4. Quiet Power
5. Colorblind
6. Love By The Hour

Belgian producer Sim Nagai continues his sonic wanderlust with 'Up North', a fifteen-track escapade that masterfully brings together vintage aesthetics and contemporary beat craftsmanship.

His third album for Cold Busted, this collection flows like a half-remembered dream through landscapes familiar and strange, proving his quick ascent in the downtempo scene was no accident. 

Among the highlights is 'Love Explosion', where ringing melodies cascade over booming drum fills like summer rain on a tin roof. A siren's voice emerges through psychedelic flourishes, while snatches of turntable wizardry add complexity to the not-so-quiet storm. 'Childhood Years' is another highlight, with its twinkling keyboards and jazzy boom-bap rhythm creating a river of memory that carries listeners downstream through moments of captured youth. The middle section shines particularly bright with 'Your Smile', as jazz guitar and Rhodes keys transport listeners to a velvet-draped lounge where tomorrow's classics transform into shimmering funkiness. 'Mystery Girl' arrives like a twisty ghost from the '80s dance-pop realm, its vocal hook "Girl I can't beat this mystery" echoing through time. 'Another Summer With You' rounds out the highlights with dreamy filtering and indie-inspired guitar riffs, feeling like a midnight cruise in a neon-lit dreamscape.

TRACK LISTING

1. Night Skies
2. Love Explosion
3. Lush
4. Interlude (Gas Station)
5. Childhood Years
6. Hard Chilling
7. Your Smile
8. June 21st
9. Mystery Girl
10. Magic Highway
11. Spacing
12. Red Sun
13. Another Summer With You
14. If You're Wondering
15. They Walked Into The Arms Of Time

‘There are dreams that I still remember. Although it has been decades since I had those dreams, they continue to pulsate, circulating their pellucid blood, vital and fresh as if dreamt just last night’. Singing bowls, bronze bells and gongs resonate through the mindful layers of Japanese percussionist and ambient producer Kazuya Nagaya’s music. In Zen Buddhism, bells are believed to wash away the cares of the mortal world, as the listener follows the resonance of the bell into the silence and stillness within all beings. It is a penetration into the depths of one’s self.

Nagaya’s music is rooted in Buddhist (Zenzhu) philosophy and sensibilities unique to Japan. Concurrently, his work and interests are also contemporary and traverse a broad spectrum of cultures. ‘There are dreams that I still remember. Although it has been decades since I had those dreams, they continue to pulsate, circulating their pellucid blood, vital and fresh as if dreamt just last night. There is one thing I have known all along. Someday I will have to face the messages from my unconscious. I will have to decipher their meaning and change my life accordingly. The messages from my unconscious are like a knocking on the door of my mind. For many years the sound reverberated, but I payed it no attention’

Nagaya started out to pursue his talents in literature and is also an award-winning writer and a connoisseur on Japanese Literature, Buddhist Folktales and Zen Philosophical Works. These interests breathed life into his music, and the sensibilities and philosophical views which he developed during his literary years are now reflected in most of his music today. He spends half the week teaching courses at his University in Tokyo, and the other half composing and writing in his home in the Japanese Alps, where he resides with his wife, and many adopted cats and dogs. ‘Dream Interpretations’ was composed at a difficult time in Nagaya’s life. While he worked, he listened closely to the sound of the knocking that reverberated from the paths of his unconsciousness and transformed that into music. In other words, this music is his dream interpretation.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A beautifully rich and hypnotic combination of traditional Japanese percussion, Buddhist bells and ambient beauty ripple through Naguya's work, which remains in motion without ever feeling hurried. Not entirely ambient, but thoroughly relaxed and wildly transcendent. Just listen.

TRACK LISTING

1. Thanatos
2. Mother Wading In The River
3. Dream Interpretation I
4. Tibetan Philosopher
5. Wolfman's Dream
6. Dream Interpretation II
7. Heathen
8. The Book Of Sunken Memory
9. Dream Interpretation I (Old Theatre Mix)

Nai Palm releases this deluxe reissue of ‘Needle Paw’ via Brainfeeder Records.

Naomi ‘Nai Palm’ Saalfield is the composer, guitarist and tour de force frontwoman of three time Grammynominated group Hiatus Kaiyote.

Nai and her group have been co-signed by Erykah Badu, accompanied by Q-Tip, and sampled by Drake, Kendrick Lamar and Anderson .Paak.

Upon its original release in 2017, Pitchfork gave ‘Needle Paw’ an 8.0, saying of Nai, “her performance as vocalist, producer, arranger, and musical director confirms her talents - and, in her interpretive care, reaffirms listening as an act of love.”

For fans of Erykah Badu, Moses Sumney, Little Dragon, Jordan Rakei, Nick Hakim.

“On her solo debut, Nai Palm abandons her band Hiatus Kaiyote’s expansive future-soul aesthetic in favor of acoustic intimacy; it is, above all, a testament to the power of the voice.” - Pitchfork (8.0).

“‘Needle Paw’ is a sea of vowel runs and stressed syllables, interwoven throughout angelic backing vocals and gospel-like notes.” - Billboard.

TRACK LISTING

Wititj (Lightning Snake) Pt 1
Atari
Crossfire / So Into You
Haiku
Mobius
Molasses
Have You Ever Been (To Electric Ladyland)
Atoll
When The Knife
Blackstar / Pyramid Song / Breathing Underwater
Borderline With My Atoms
Homebody
Wititj (Lightning Snake) Pt 2

A former architect of the cult DiY sound in Nottingham, as well as being a member of downtempo outfit Bent, Nail is a house making machine whose own distinct fingerprint is all over everything he makes. His sound is raw but never hostile - he always finds a neat sample to bring some soul to his louche, loose drums. This EP for his In The Dance label starts with 'And So', a wonky sound infused with sensual whispers, while 'Before' blends woozy pad work with deep drums and prickly percussion. 'Grief' is a sombre affair with bluesy sax lines weaving between the dusty drums, and 'Size A Dat' gets choppy, playful, and funky. Another majestic EP.

TRACK LISTING

And So
Before
Grief
Size A Dat

Death Is Not The End sub-label 333 turns up the gold again with this repro of the much in-demand Flames cut of Nairobi Sisters' Promised Land. Sampled by Q-Tip for "Whateva Will Be" (appearing on ATCQ's final long-player) and on a range of earlier 90s boom-bap era productions, it is not at all hard to figure out why it's a coveted record. That break is as low-slung and funky as it gets, and best showcased on the superbly stripped-back dub on the flip.

The Nairobi Sisters were singers Terrie Nairobi and Judy Mowatt (later of the I-Threes, alongside Rita Marley & Marcia Griffiths). Promised Land was originally recorded together with The Gaytones for Sonia Pottinger's Gay Feet label, with this later version cut for Winston Jones' Brooklyn-based Flames Records. It is issued here under license from producer and songwriter Jones - the original singer and composer of Stop That Train (later made world-famous by Keith & Tex's version) with his Spanishtonians in the early 1960s - who later moved from JA to NYC where he established and ran the Flames label, a core imprint in Brooklyn's reggae scene from the mid-1970s until the early 1990s. 333 has licensed a range of Flames-era productions from the now Texas-based Jones, so keep and eye out for more as it comes... but for now, jump on this before it's gone!

TRACK LISTING

1. Promised Land
2. Promised Land Dub

Geins't Naït returns to Offen, this time he enlists Scanner (living experimental electronics legend , Robin Rimbaud) to join him in his land of loop. These two veterans have clocked up many combined decades of experimentation between them, and this their first jointly composed material, has the feel of wisdom at work. It's a huge pleasure for Offen Music to release this special record.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Slow
A2. 65
A3. 63
A4. Slo1
B1. Miki
B2. Gilles
B3. OB

Surrender yourself into Naked Lights’ dark and intense orbit! From the first few seconds through to the end, On Nature is intensely addictive and welcomely unpredictable. Shades of post-punk, dub, even anarcho-punk are thrillingly blended into wholly futuristic shapes that defy easy categorization.

The cross-talking guitars speak their own thorny language, the atmosphere is wide-focus and carries a subtle tang of danger, and it’s topped off with unique vocals that are as in-your-face as they are intriguing and foreign. An altogether refreshingly vital listen, Naked Lights’ On Nature comes courtesy of Castle Face Records.

TRACK LISTING

1. New Carrion
2. Pictus
3. On Nature
4. Nicht Leiden
5. Hedges
6. Mechanical Eye
7. Blue Ink
8. Mostly Bag
9. Pool On A Platter
10. Clock Support
11. Silouette
12. Barrel
13. Peep Hole
14. Trepanning
15. Undo

An abrasive mix of the explosive and the melodic, the level of agression hints at a powerful live performance where the full naked spectacle can be appreciated.

Tight dynamic guitar driven songs from this local four piece who met at a Queens Of The Stoneage gig. There's an obvious influence from Josh Homme and co., but the songs are by no means derivative.

Twelve years after their last critically acclaimed album All Is Fever (2013), Naked Lunch return with their new record Lights And A Slight Taste Of Death. And they’re doing so not only with style- and genre-defining albums like Songs For The Exhausted (2004) or This Atom Heart Of Ours (2007) — the latter earning them an Amadeus Award in their Austrian homeland — but also with countless high-energy live performances under their belt. And now, following lineup changes and internal reshuffles, comes this — one might almost say — outrageous record, on which, as seems to be the case with every Naked Lunch release, everything is once again at stake. Lights And A Slight Taste Of Death is a 14-track tour de force; demanding and harsh, yet tender and embracing. It's an intimate self-examination, spanning grand ballads to sweeping, sky-storming pop.

The year is 2000. After only ten years performing and recording, the Austrian group Naked Lunch had reached the end of the line. They had experienced a meteoric rise throughout the 1990s: less than four years had seen the group move from a mold-infested rehearsal room in an Austrian town to a five-star hotel on Times Square. Imagine endless tours, outrageously expensive recordings in studios from Bochum to New York, an extended stay in London and collapsed major-label deals – imagine, essentially, what the band themselves called “an utterly pointless burning through money”. Eventually, the group returned to their hometown. What remained were mostly disillusioning experiences in the pop business and a huge amount of debt.

Most of us would probably have thrown in the towel at that point. Alas, these men did not. Having grown into a quartet, the band decided to hit the reset button and start over. Together with producer and friend Olaf Opal (including work with The Notwist, International Music, etc.), they barricaded themselves for almost three years in the newly built studio of bassist Herwig Zamernik to work on an album that would eventually be released in 2004 under the name 'SONGS FOR THE EXHAUSTED'.

“The recordings were shameless, insanely intense, exhausting, and at times even disturbing. At the same time, all that long work was also somewhat cleansing and rewarding. Rewarding in the sense that they allowed us to return to a ‘to hell with what others think’ attitude. We were able to create freely again. That’s how this record emerged, and for us it meant a new beginning, a turning point – or rather a kind of rebirth.” (Oliver Welter)

'SONGS FOR THE EXHAUSTED' became not only a milestone in the band’s career. It was also, in a way, a farewell to an unrestrained era and an admission of the exhaustion that resulted from it. The album certainly isn’t easy fare. The record is dark, at times even obstructive. Yet it has the ability to embrace us and, as Anja Plaschg alias Soap&Skin once put it, “to comfort us in feverish nights.” 'SONGS FOR THE EXHAUSTED' was – and remains even today – “a masterpiece once thought impossible!” (Austria’s Der Standard, 2004)

TRACK LISTING

1. God
2. First Man On The Sun
3. King George
4. Stay
5. Lost It All
6. In Your Room
7. The Deal
8. Man Without Past
9. Solitude
10. The Retainer 

Naked Raygun were an extraordinary staple in the Chicago music scene—beginning in the early 80s and continuing until their quiet demise in the early 90s. Their music showed the world that punk rockers could play and be really good at it. Founded in Chicago in 1980 by Marco Pezzati, Jeff Pezzati, and Santiago Durango, Naked Raygun released six albums during their eleven-year career that would change the sound of punk rock indefinitely. The band is widely recognized as being one of the most influential punk bands of the 80s. Their anthemic style incorporated politics in a uniquely accessible way, melding pop and hardcore into one cohesive sound that would later be dubbed "The Chicago Sound."

Shortly after their first release, 'Basement Screams', Durango left to join Big Black permanently and was replaced by John Haggerty, whose unique style of buzzsaw guitar would define Raygun's sound for their next four albums. Additionally, Pierre Kezdy replaced Camilo Gonzalez and Eric Spicer took over drums for Jim Colao. In 1990, Haggerty left the band to start Pegboy. Bill Stephens joined the band for their final studio release entitled 'Raygun...Naked Raygun'.

TRACK LISTING

1. Home Of The Brave
2. Dog At Large
3. Knock Me Down
4. Mr. Gridlock
5. The Strip
6. I Remember
7. Those Who Move
8. The Envelope
9. Backlash Jack
10. Peacemaker
11. New Dreams
12. Slim
13. Rocks Of Sweden

Naked Raygun were an extraordinary staple in the Chicago music scene—beginning in the early 80s and continuing until their quiet demise in the early 90s. Their music showed the world that punk rockers could play and be really good at it. Founded in Chicago in 1980 by Marco Pezzati, Jeff Pezzati, and Santiago Durango, Naked Raygun released six albums during their eleven-year career that would change the sound of punk rock indefinitely. The band is widely recognized as being one of the most influential punk bands of the 80s. Their anthemic style incorporated politics in a uniquely accessible way, melding pop and hardcore into one cohesive sound that would later be dubbed "The Chicago Sound."

Shortly after their first release, 'Basement Screams', Durango left to join Big Black permanently and was replaced by John Haggerty, whose unique style of buzzsaw guitar would define Raygun's sound for their next four albums. Additionally, Pierre Kezdy replaced Camilo Gonzalez and Eric Spicer took over drums for Jim Colao. In 1990, Haggerty left the band to start Pegboy. Bill Stephens joined the band for their final studio release entitled 'Raygun...Naked Raygun'.

TRACK LISTING

1. Home
2. Fever Island
3. The Grind
4. Jazz Gone Bad
5. Prepare To Die
6. The Promise
7. Holding You
8. Strange Days
9. In My Head
10. Camarilla
11. Terminal
12. Last Drink
13. Love Battery
14. Running Free

Vivien Goldman-style dubby post-punk synth pop.

With a handful of twitching insta-sketches, each addled with late-nite D.I.Y. quiver, the duo’s side-hustle sprouted in classical easy/cheap fashion [see the demo tape on their Public Nipples imprint for evidence].

As “global” concerns slowed, compatriots Michael Zamora (a superbly slanted multi-instrumentalist late of BAD BAD) and Alejandra Alcala (the region’s one true bass supervisor, also of bright lights BLUES LAWYER and PREENING) joined Sermeńo & Jordan as additional exposed flesh.

In full form, Naked Roommate has not only become a must-see, ever-evolving live act, but architects of Do The Duvet, one of the most intriguing and inspired recordings to come out of 2020’s American subterranea.

Do The Duvet proffers leftfield hijinks via punk execution, answering all the questions posed by questionable post-punk revivalism with sour lemon sneering and cherry-sweet smiles. It’s a fever dream, really…A flailing, sparking wire of hyper-compressed rhythms (breathing and synthetic), devolved guitar work and minced electronic compost. The resultant congealed groove is suitable for club situations and/or living space pulsations alike. Either way, the landlord is pissed.

Jordan’s beat programming, presumably inspired in part by recent obsessions with unjustifiably discarded electro sounds, manages to elicit physical response without veering into genre clichés like decay dance or Armageddon rave.

Instead, movement is prompted by sheer playfulness and high humour: see the sleepily sampled City sax on “Fondu Guru” or the comically taut bassline from “Credit Union”, itself a dreamwork born straight from a lovingly held-tight 99 Records 12”.

Thematically, Do The Duvet bounces between dissections of bourgeois trickery, the absurdity of domestication and the recognizable insanity of living in this particular age.As narrator, Sermeńo’s vocal presence is time-capsule great: a commanding grand-slam performance, alluring yet switchblade-dangerous in terms of wit and gaze. So totally wonderful.

What do you really own, anyway? What if your home does not even exist? Why not simply Do The Duvet and answer these queries yourself?
Mitch Cardwell 

TRACK LISTING

01. Mad Love
02. We Are The Babies
03. Fondu Guru
04. Credit Union
05. Je Suis Le Bebe
06. Fake I.D.
07. Fill Space
08. (Do The Duvet Pt. 2)
09. Repeat
10. (Re) P.R.O.D.U.C.E.

Oakland’s Naked Roommate have been slinking around the Bay Area lighting up stages, shaking asses & confounding listeners since 2018, when the group - originally just the duo of real-life partners Andy Jordan & Amber Sermeno (both formerly of The World) - self-released a cassette of demos (2018’s “Naked Roommate”). Members Michael “Mig” Zamora & Alejandra Alcala (Blues Lawyer) joined soon after to augment the sound & live band with their proper full-length album “Do The Duvet”, co-released in September of 2020 via UK label Upset! The Rhythm & Trouble In Mind. 2024 finds the lineup expanded even further to incorporate the horn section of Geoff Saba & Jeanne Oss on tenor & alto saxophones as well as percussion & marimba as the band readies their sophomore effort, the dizzyingly ecstatic ”Pass The Loofah”.

Recorded by members Andy Jordan & Mig Zamora from 2021-2023 as time & restrictions allowed, “Pass The Loofah” retains the wild energy of their debut, but leans into the rhythmic throbs perpetuated by forbears like Kid Creole & The Coconuts, Lizzy Mercier Descloux & ESG; the signature sound of UK’s On-U Sound & NYC’s 99 Records, but with a decidedly West Coast irreverence & a knack for absurdist exposition. Make no mistake, this is music designed to make your body MOVE & Naked Roommate won’t stop until they ’ve made sure every ass is shook. The band freely incorporates elements of the dancier side of post-punk (think A Certain Ratio or Liquid Liquid) as well as disco, funk, & house music. However, the group’s uplifting melodicism belies a deeper subtext, understanding the importance of the sense of community of dance music & the culture surrounding it and leaning into a Neo-socialist lyrical context. Shit is fucked, & we get thru it by helping one another & acknowledging & addressing the failures of disaster Capitalism & tech-bro hegemony (a state the band is all-too familiar with, living in The Bay Area) Take the first single “Bus”; a four-on-the-floor banger & salutary paeon to the ups & downs of the people’s transport that throbs & pulses with a late-night sashay (and a bridge that launches the tune into the stratosphere).

Elsewhere, “Fight Flight ”s funky horn stabs and Sermeno’s slinky vocals swoon over Numan-esque synth squiggles that are fortified & funkified toward the dance floor. “Broken Whisper ” edges into new territor y for the group, adding a Caribbean flavor a’la Kid Creole or The Specials that punctuates the persistent & synthetic beats underneath. Meanwhile instrumental interludes like “Ducky & Viv”, “G-Y pt. 1” & “G-Y pt. 2” oscillate into zones of sci-fi meets soap opera soundtracks, sounding not unlike the electronic experiments of UK industrial pioneers Chris & Cosey. Album closer “I Can’t Be Found” might be the album’s secret weapon; It ’s swooning synth melody & processed vocals recall early Daft Punk or MGMT by way of Derrick Carter & The Au Pairs. It ’s a beautiful song; perfect for the late night (or early morning) car ride home from the club.

TRACK LISTING

No Kicker
Fight Flight
Successful Friend
Ducky & Viv
Bus
Broken Whisper
G-Y Pt. 1
Sunblot
Reasons Why
Yob
G-Y Pt. 2
I Can’t Be Found

LuckyMe are very proud to present ‘Youth Mode’, the debut release from Naked.

Naked are an Edinburgh-based group consisting of Agnes Gryczkowska, Alex Johnston and Grant Campbell, who mix cold, neon-lit beats, glacial bass and guitar sculptures, filtered under hypnotizing and ephemeral vocals.

Their music speaks to a post-millenial, post-digital urban ennui - non-belonging and the pure, absolute loneliness of crowds. It is about the interaction of accelerating technology and the inherent sense of a terminal decline between the physical and hyper real - between man and machine, our bodies, senses and the industrial substances and digital technologies we surround ourselves with.

Deluxe EP with printed / debossed sleeve and digital download card.
Recently produced tracks for Mykki Blanco. Forthcoming album produced by Jacques Greene.

For fans of Mogwai, FKA Twigs, Salem, Optimo, The xx.

"His songs sound like memories, as familiar as they are foreign. I’m addicted to this record.” - Cate Le Bon. In a time rife with alienation, Magic Touch, the third album by the ubiquitous and mysterious Jack Name, offers the comfort of contact. With a body of work that ranges from the catchy to the cacophonous, Name has earned the reputation of a musician who’s difficult to define. For over a decade, he’s been a fixture in the Los Angeles underground. His songs have appeared on albums by U.S. Girls (Heavy Light, 2020) and White Fence (Family Perfume, 2012); he’s produced recordings for Cass McCombs and collaborated with Ariel Pink; and his experimental music has been performed at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles.

Magic Touch reveals yet another side of Jack Name. While it’s every bit as intricate as his previous releases, 2014’s Light Show and 2015’s Weird Moons, here he’s done away with the dense production of his earlier work to make a record that feels stark, personal, and effortlessly natural. With Magic Touch, Name brings his lyrical and conceptual focus away from the dream worlds of his first two albums and back to Earth: a simpler place, or so it seems, where humans are falling in and out of love, struggling with loneliness, reaching for connections to each other, and, for better or worse, affecting each other. In a year like 2020, it’s a place that feels familiar and far away all at once. The almost subliminal story arc of Magic Touch reminds us that touch itself is magic.

TRACK LISTING

1. Karolina
2. Do You Know Ida No?
3. Having A Good Time
4. A Moving-on Blues
5. I Came To Tell You In Plain English
6. Dudette
7. Losing My Way
8. Empty Nights
9. Kick-around Johnny
10. Sacred Place

This compilation brings together eight tracks by Yassine Nana and his group, recorded between 1984 and 1989, during a key moment in Mauritania’s musical history. A central figure of one of the country’s most respected musical families, Yassine stands at the crossroads of a long-standing tradition and a period of deep transformation in form, sound and production.

Recorded in Mauritania as well as during stays in Paris and Rabat, these songs integrate drum machines, synthesizers and electric guitars into Saharan musical structures. Influenced by reggae, soul and new wave, the group develops a sound that reflects the circulation of music and technology in the 1980s, while remaining firmly rooted in Mauritanian languages, themes and melodic systems. Love, travel, exile and music itself run through lyrics sung in Hassaniya and classical Arabic.

Originally released on cassette and long confined to local circulation, these recordings offer a rare perspective on African popular music of the period, seen from Nouakchott. A body of work that documents a Mauritanian modernity, both popular and exploratory, now brought back into circulation by Les Disques Bongo Joe and Sofa Records.

TRACK LISTING

1. Boustan El Achar
2. Fatma
3. Samraa
4. Telephone
5. Messager Aala Ettayper
6. Biqalbi N'thab
7. Ma Ahla Lilat Samar
8. Bouaamrane

Fool's Gold Vinyl is for Indies only. RIYL: Purling Hiss, Neil Young, Jim Shepard, Roy Montgomery, Peter Laughner, Circuit Rider. Nebraska songwriter David Nance returns to Trouble In Mind with his fifth (proper) studio album "Staunch Honey", his follow-up to his acclaimed 2018 album "Peaced and Slightly Pulverized". Returning to the home-recorded magic of his early albums, "Staunch Honey" was recorded entirely to tape by Nance himself at his Omaha home with scattered assistance from his longtime live bandmates Jim Schroeder & Kevin Donohue."Staunch Honey" is the culmination of two years of hard work - Nance worked and reworked the album three times over, recording & rerecording songs until they sounded just so - a stunning batch of sonic manna that hums with feeling and mood; expertly crafted, but sounding simultaneously off-the-cuff. Nance dials back the squalling feedback & raging guitars found on "Peaced..." into something a bit mellower, like the soundtrack to a late-night drive or late night hangs. Rusted & dusted with mid-fi, stoney brilliance.

"The Merchandise" kicks off the album, loping into earshot with an off-kilter countrified gait, not unlike a front porch jam session. This vibe permeates the album, other tunes like "Save Me Some Tears", "Gentle Traitor" & "When The Covers Come Off" burn with casual intensity, while rockers like "My Love, The Dark and I" and "Sell It All Night" sizzle with a six-string fury. "Black Mustang" - the penultimate number - is a real standout, with a subtle banjo plucking in the background & a palpable yearning and melancholy. Nance's true gift as a songwriter lies in his ability to craft poetry and personas that feel "lived-in". There's a world-weariness to his lyrical and musical approach, but rooted in joy, love and above all; passion. Many of the tunes on "Staunch Honey" feel like classics, but that's because in Nance's hands - they are. Not content to let the album go by without the rumble of guitar, "If The Truth Ever Shows Up" closes out the album. It's an instrumental jam with Nance wrangling and riffing on a gut-punching guitar solo for 6-plus minutes that feels very much like the end credits to a long-lost midnight movie

TRACK LISTING

1. The Merchandise
2. My Love, The Dark And I
3. This Side Of The Moon
4. Save Me Some Tears
5. July Sunrise
6. Gentle Traitor
7. Learn The Curve
8. When The Covers Come Off
9. Sell It All Night
10. Black Mustang
11. If The Truth Ever Shows Up

With an intuitive understanding of melody and dynamics, Nancy Elizabeth brings a refreshingly Northern turn of phrase to her debut album, "Battle And Victory". The Lancashire-born singer's down-to-earth songs are brought to life by her warm and unaffected voice. Unpretentious but effortlessly ambitious, Nancy turns the retro, less-is-more aesthetic of the current acoustic revival on its head. Not content with writing and singing all the songs herself, the 23-year-old also plays most of the instruments, including guitar, khim, Indian harmonium, Appalachian dulcimer and bouzouki, amongst many others. The album was recorded in a 17th Century white stone cottage in the remote Welsh countryside, and a village hall outside Manchester, resulting in an intimate, uncontrived gem of a record. Using a minimum of recording equipment, the heartfelt honesty of her songs is revealed, extending to grander, more complex arrangements when the occasion calls, and bringing in friends to add cello, horns and percussion. While her work is never in thrall to any particular artist or genre, Nancy's music calls to mind aspects of artists as diverse as The Incredible String Band, Talk Talk and Led Zeppelin.

"Wrought Iron" is the second album by Wigan's Nancy Elizabeth, following the success of 2007's "Battle And Victory". Largely focused on piano-led songs (Nancy's instrument of choice this time), the album is a more understated affair than the guitar and harp-centred debut. The quality of the songwriting is stronger than ever, with a more personal, emotional edge to this album. Recorded in a remote corner of North Wales following time spent in rural Spain and the Faroe Islands, the album's arrangements reflect a sense of space and solitude. The album is as much influenced by the minimalism of Arvo Pärt and Steve Reich as by the choral harmonies of Judee Sill and the bare expression of Leonard Cohen's early records. Nancy recorded with James Yorkston on his last album "When The Haar Rolls In", as well as a forthcoming album of traditional folk songs as part of The Big Eye Family Players. She also recently collaborated with Japanese artist Susumu Yokota on his album "Mother", and contributed to the Lal Waterson tribute album "Migrating Bird". "Wrought Iron" should appeal to fans of PJ Harvey's "White Chalk", Talk Talk, Beth Gibbons, Laura Marling, Blue Roses and Alela Diane.

While Nao's previous project propelled the singer-songwriter into a new stratosphere with its cosmic, coming-of-age themes, the songstress is now entering a brand new chapter with ‘And Then Life Was Beautiful’ - where ‘Saturn’ untangled the knots of late twenties soul-searching, ‘And Then Life Was Beautiful’ goes a step further by setting out a clarified sense of purpose. Now a mother of a young daughter, NAO is more confident in herself and her voice than ever. A pandemic album, written and recorded throughout never-ending lockdowns, the project celebrates life’s ups and downs, reaching out a hand to guide listeners through what hurdles may confront them next. It includes previously released tracks ‘Antidode’, featuring Nigerian superstar Adekunle Gold, ‘Woman’, featuring Lianne La Havas, which she recorded with her new-born daughter strapped lovingly to her chest, as well as ‘Messy Love’, a stunning offering loaded with strummed guitar grooves and drum rhythms rooted in 90s R&B.  

Other notable stand-out tracks include ‘Wait’, a stripped-back track which takes an intimate look at how you make mistakes to develop a relationship, and ‘Postcards’, highlighting a gorgeous vocal interplay of NAO and serpentwithfeet, who features alongside her on the track. For ‘Good Luck’, R&B crooner Lucky Daye jumped on board.

She says: “Life isn’t perfect; we still go through ups and downs, but it can be beautiful as a whole. I do think it’s a hopeful album, in an honest way – it’s not shiny or all ‘isn’t this great!’ and ‘party party party.’ But it’s hopeful in that through every rough patch, every dark patch or struggle we always come out again. That’s what life is. You keep going. But most of all you try and step into a place of gratitude so that you can see life in all of its beauty.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A silky smooth mix between soaring synth pop and grooving R&B, wonderfully bringing together Nao's gorgeous vocals and a distinctly modern mash-up of styles into a cohesive and jubilant whole.

TRACK LISTING

1. And Then Life Was Beautiful
2. Messy Love
3. Glad That You’re Gone
4. Antidote (feat. Adekunle Gold)
5. Burn Out
6. Wait
7. Good Luck (feat. Lucky Daye)
8. Nothing’s For Sure
9. Woman (feat. Lianne La Havas)
10. Better Friend
11. Postcards (feat. Serpentwithfeet)
12. Little Giants
13. Amazing Grace

Nap Eyes’ latest full length, ‘Snapshot Of A Beginner’, is proof that sometimes the late bloomers bloom brightest. Eight years and four albums into it, the artistic arc of Nap Eyes finds itself tracing a line alongside frontman Nigel Chapman’s daily tai chi practice. Those first years and albums are the cold mornings in the park: the measured movements, the joint aches, the self-doubt. With each new release, an incremental and invigorating step forward. And with the end of each album and tour, a return to the beginner’s practice. And now, ‘Snapshot Of A Beginner’ - Nap Eyes’ boldest, most concentrated and most hi-fi album to date - a study of that repeated return and all that it can teach you.

Almost all the songs of Nap Eyes are whittled into their final form from Chapman’s unspooling, 20-minute voice-and-guitar free-writing sessions. Each member - drummer Seamus Dalton, bassist Josh Salter or guitarist Brad Loughead - then plays a crucial role in song development, composing around the idiosyncratic structures and directing the overall sound and feel of the songs. Until now, that final song construction and recording has been mostly done live in a room. But for ‘Snapshot Of A Beginner’ the band went to The National’s neuvo-legendary upstate NY Long Pond Studio, working with producers Jonathan Low (Big Red Machine, The National) and James Elkington (Steve Gunn, Joan Shelley), the latter of whom also did pre-production arrangement work with the band.

It took Nap Eyes a long time and a long practice to reach this artistic zen but one gets the feeling throughout ‘Snapshot Of A Beginner’ that this balance is going to hold.

Previous album ‘I’m Bad Now’ was described by Uncut as “as much a modest masterpiece as ‘Spring Hill Fair’ [by The Go-Betweens] or ‘Tigermilk’ [by Belle and Sebastian].”

TRACK LISTING

So Tired
Primordial Soup
Even Though I Can’t Read Your Mind
Mark Zuckerberg
Mystery Calling
Fool Thinking Ways
If You Were In Prison
Real Thoughts
Dark Link
When I Struck Out On My Own
Though I Wish I Could

Nap Eyes return with an allusive, ambitious third album, elevating to a new sonic clarity, depth and wavelength of succinctly stinging, guitar-centric rock and roll.

They are all Nova Scotians by raising and temperament but acclimated to life on an Atlantic peninsula linked narrowly to the rest of North America. ‘I’m Bad Now’, which follows enigmatic frontman Nigel Chapman’s quest for selfunderstanding, is their most transparent and personal to date and constitutes the third chapter of an implicit, informal trilogy that includes ‘Whine Of The Mystic’ (2015) and ‘Thought Rock Fish Scale’ (2016).

While Nigel composes songs in their inchoate form at home in Halifax, Brad Loughead (lead guitar), Josh Salter (bass) and Seamus Dalton (drums), who live a twelve-hour drive away in Montreal, augment and arrange them, transubstantiating his skeletal, ruminative wafers into discourses that transcend. The band provide ballast and bowspirit to Nigel’s cosmical mind, this album lending itself to a new sonic clarity, depth and range to match his effortless melodies and extraordinary writing.

TRACK LISTING

Every Time The Feeling
I’m Bad
Judgment
Roses
Follow Me Down
You Like To Joke Around
With Me
Dull Me Line
Sage
Hearing The Bass
White Disciple

After 3 years of silence, the Canadian band Nap Eyes have returned with their own meditations on the monstrous and familiar (or the monstrously familiar). 'The Neon Gate', their metamorphic 5th long-player, collects a cache of 9 fascinating reveries recorded over the 4 years since their last album, 'Snapshot of a Beginner' (5 of which were released episodically throughout the spring and summer of 2024). 'I See Phantoms of Hatred and of the Heart's Fullness and of the Coming Emptiness', the album’s colossal penultimate track, is, along with 'Demons', their languorous adaptation of a phantasmagorical poem by Russian Romantic Alexander Pushkin (1799–1837), one of two ambitious but adept adaptations in which singer and principal songwriter Nigel Chapman unravels knotty, century-old verse into a fluid, memorable melodies across the loom of the band’s pulsing instrumental syncretism.

This fresh engagement with narrative and lyric formality complements the 7 original songs on the record, which reveal classic Naps touchstones but also evidence of divergent impulses toward nonlinear abstraction and longform improvisational composition (resulting in their most discursive, deconstructed, and deliquescent songs to date). With The Neon Gate Nap Eyes have transmuted, as has their understanding of what a song is, what it can do, where it might go.

That all sounds deadly serious, but these songs are also as funny, quirky, and touching as ever, juxtaposing absurdist Middle Ages settings with concisely rendered quotidian details of journeys between earthly and cosmic planes (see the picaresque 'Passageway' in particular). Castles and mystical critters abound, and faith in chemistry, astrophysics, and naturalistic observation tempers the spiraling doubt that can accompany deep cogitation. So the humble titular birds of opening track 'Eight Tired Starlings' (Star Birds) must navigate light beams, curving spacetime, gravitational waves, and “billion-years-distant” galactic collisions. The pocket light beam, “complacent wizard,” and “breakfast plate” of eight-minute closing track “Isolation” (written, naturally, during COVID-19 pandemic lockdown) catalyze an uncomfortable revelation in the form of a one-liner: “how to get crushed under a gigantic / metaphysical rock.” In between, piloted by the band’s subtle, synthetic rhythms, 'Feline Wave Race' emerges from Chapman’s current improvisational writing practice and experiments with spontaneous composition. We are transported, in the company of a digital wildcat, from deep space through telescoping deep time “when the gas clouds / pass away and / the molecules / distribute / all across the fabric / of the horizon” from “the edge of the moat / of the 13th-century castle” to 1996, the year Nintendo released the jetskiing video game Wave Race 64.

The recording methodology informed how the other band members Seamus Dalton, Josh Salter, and Brad Labelle, often supplementing or supplanting their customary respective roles on drums, bass, and guitar with synth work and drum programming kept pace with this dream logic. Nigel recorded demos many involving loops and the band built recursive fractal patterns upon those skeletal armatures, often remotely (sometimes with assistance from engineer René Wilson). The origins of even the most otherworldy songs were often intimately domestic. Although most vocals were tracked live with the band, Nigel recorded his vocals for 'Feline Wave Race' and 'Dark Mystery Enigma Bird', two disjunctive fables about animals told through stream-of-consciousness narratives, in a blanket-draped children’s cardboard castle in his parents’ basement.

When they exist at all verse-chorus-verse structures often disintegrate in favor of an unhurried unfolding, an emphasis on marking, attenuating, and collapsing time over standard musical notions of progression or refrain, a foregrounding of ellipsis over resolution. Only the careening 'Ice Grass Underpass', written in 2009, predating the band’s existence but prefiguring the sonic signature of their foundational first two albums, closely resembles, with Labelle’s snowy guitar squall (also evident in his lacerating, atonal leads scribbling through 'Tangent Dissolve'), their older material. Speaking of snow: half-blinded by a blizzard and in danger of losing their way and plunging “headlong into some damned ravine,” the “master” and coachman of 'Demons' are first mystified and then petrified by eerie apparitions of uncanny but uncertain spectral nature. “Is there a witch who is getting married?” the coachman speculates earnestly. “Some goblin they’re burying?”

TRACK LISTING

1. Eight Tired Starlings
2. Dark Mystery Enigma Bird
3. Demons
4. Feline Wave Race
5. Tangent Dissolve
6. Ice Grass Underpass
7. Passageway
8. I See Phantoms Of Hatred...
9. Isolation

Anthony Naples returns with his seventh full length album, "In Studio Magic," comprised of ten new songs. A departure from the serene, dubbed out house off his last excursion; "In Studio Magic", moves in a more non-linear fashion, merging electro-acoustic elements and a dubwise sensibility into something resembling modern electro-avant-jazz! Still executed with the delicate finesse we've come to expect from this NYC legend; it's a seriously intriguing listening, allowing us access to a side of the producer's persona we haven't really been privy to before. Well worth a listen!

TRACK LISTING

A1. Harmonie
A2. Dustos
A3. Opal
A4. Fragment Memory
A5. Whisper
B1. Aris
B2. On Your Own Again
B3. May
B4. Yours Truly
B5 Perix

Pakistani-American composer Qasim Naqvi returns with 'Endling', his newest album for Erased Tapes Records. Written as a modular synth prequel to his 2023 BBC Concert Orchestral work, 'God Docks at Death Harbor', 'Endling' takes the listener on a 43-minute odyssey through an intense and beautiful landscape, set hundreds of years into the future.

“One morning my wife woke up from a dream with a phrase in her mind — 'God Docks at Death Harbor'", explains Naqvi. "I was just starting to write a new work for the BBC Concert Orchestra, and when she told me about this dream of words, it very quickly seeped into the fabric of the music. Her words were a poem to me, evoking very specific imagery. I imagined our planet hundreds of years into the future, where the human race no longer exists. I imagined a world peacefully restoring itself in the absence of us, because we’re no longer around to destroy it and ourselves. This became the tenet of the work. It was like a scenic mural that I could look at for inspiration, as I was writing this tone poem. After 'God Docks at Death Harbor' premiered in the spring of 2023 in London, the feeling stayed with me, and when it came time to think about a new record I felt compelled to continue this narrative. I imagined a prequel, about the last human on the planet — an endling, traversing a world centuries into the future. A world decayed and mutated into a strange amalgam of the natural and artificial. I envisioned the music as chapters, following this human through the crumbling landscape of the future, that was now being overtaken and absorbed by the natural world. In keeping with the tone poem tradition of 'God Docks', I created the track titles first, and their meanings became more defined as the music began to take shape.

On the album’s centrepiece 'Power Down the Heart', featuring Moor Mother, our character stumbles upon an A.I. being that is in the final moments of its life. As a kind of last rites, this ancient artificial consciousness describes the beauty, sadness and horror it has observed for hundreds of years. I wanted the music to feel like the inside of this being’s mind. I shared the music and this narrative with Camae and asked if she would be the voice of this A.I., and she came back with the perfect contribution.

All of the music on 'Endling' was made with an ARP Odyssey, Minimoog and modular synthesizer. For me, one of the many challenging and satisfying aspects of modular synthesizers involves the development of complex timbrel ideas from the ground up, which can rarely ever be repeated perfectly. The device can be organically unstable and fallible. It can feel like an organism and as the performer, you’re in control of the flow of its energy, or voltage.
This machine approach to 'Endling' was the perfect compliment to its orchestral predecessor, it felt like a different kind of orchestra from this album’s future – with the organic consuming and transmuting the artificial."

Qasim Naqvi is a percussionist, composer and synthesist. Along with being the drummer of lauded cult minimalist trio, Dawn of Midi, Naqvi is an accomplished solo artist and his passion for multidisciplinary work has brought him into the world of film, dance, installation art, and the stage of orchestral and chamber music. His concert music has been commissioned and performed by The London Contemporary Orchestra, The BBC Concert Orchestra, Crash Ensemble, Bang on a Can All Stars, Jennifer Koh, Stargaze, The Cello Octet of Amsterdam, The Helsinki Chamber Choir and others.

TRACK LISTING

1. Fires
2. Beautification Technologies
3. The Glow
4. Power Down The Heart
5. Plastic Glacier
6. Endling
7. In The Distance
8. The Great Reward

Pakistani-American composer Qasim Naqvi will release his debut album for Erased Tapes on May 3rd. 'Teenages’ captures the sound of electronics living, breathing and mutating of their own accord – almost autonomously – with only subtle, sparing but perfectly-judged and masterful guidance.

This album is one singular synergy between Qasim and his machine within a broader milieu of sound, also explored by contemporaries Sarah Davachi, Alessandro Cortini, Caterina Barbieri and also the forefather, Morton Subotnick. At points tonal, textural and rhythmic, over six evolving and growing audio organisms, the album flourishes upwards in stages, from initial micro-sonics to something bigger, brighter and anthemic.

This is Naqvi’s first non-soundtrack release, having previously established himself as a renowned composer for dance, theatre, film and installation-based art, not to mention his role as drummer in lauded trio Dawn of Midi. According to Naqvi, “my past releases like ‘Chronology’, ‘Preamble’, ‘Fjoloy’ and ‘Film’ were made to accompany visual mediums. The music was always written to enhance another form. ‘Teenages’ is the first album with its own motivating force. It’s a live multi movement work that I recorded for myself.”

With ‘Teenages’, Naqvi summoned all the material on an analog modular synthesizer – a voltage-controlled sound generating system comprised of multiple modules. Naqvi built this synth over the course of two years and amassed a collection of works for this album.

“I’ve always been drawn to the power of un-amplified acoustic music. And for me modular synthesizers are a natural progression forward from the acoustic realm into the electric. It feels like an orchestra comprised of very unusual instruments, and their orchestration and vibrational properties lie in the patching and flow of voltages through a system.

They’re also unstable and they rarely play the same thing twice in any exact way. It’s almost organic and human. It was really important for this album to capture that kind of uninterrupted behavior.”

Capturing a live feeling without the aid of heavy studio production was an important component to this release: “Even though this is ‘electronic music,’ I didn’t want to rely heavily on a computer with an array of plugins, loops and samples, or exhaustive editing as part of the writing process. I wanted to treat this work like a live piece of music and have the natural behavior of the machine shine through and sound huge, like an orchestra of electrical signals.”

Gently stuttering like a time lapse-video of a seed sprouting up from the earth, ‘Intermission’ sets the scene, before musical motifs begin to emerge on the dancing, bubbling bassline of ‘Mrs 2E’, which possesses a playful, infantile quality, like a newborn animal learning to walk after birth.

More bouncy, skewed bottom-line squelch appears on the jittery, buzzing ‘Palace Workers’, which seems to evoke life in the form of amplified insect or bat noises, with a melody that eventually unfolds into something akin to a fractal rendition of ‘Oxygene’. By ‘No Tongue’ more traditionally identifiable musical signifiers begin to emerge, with a bright and melodic synth line evoking the new blooms of spring, whereas ‘Artilect’ takes a more ominous drone tone, insinuating the dark, potential threat of artificially augmented biological intelligence.

Like a coming-of-age, the album culminates on title track ‘Teenages’ – a dynamic, technicolour symphony that was recorded in one take, with no overdubs or edits. In the year leading up to ‘Teenages’, Naqvi created a series of shorter works. These stepping-stones eventually became the first 5 tracks of the album and were part of a larger process, leading to the realization of the title track. “I wanted to show the stages of development that lead to the main act. All of these tracks share the same D.N.A., even though they seem distantly related.” Explains Naqvi.

The pieces heard prior to ‘Teenages’ chronicle both Naqvi’s understanding of writing for this type of instrument and the growth of the instrument itself: “I started with just a few modules. And naturally things had to be layered and pieced together but as the synthesizer and its components grew over time, I was able to create broader and more complex strokes in the moment. And by the time I got to ‘Teenages’, it was possible to create a robust, large-scale piece spontaneously. This is very much an experiential album for me because it was borne out of my direct experience of learning the instrument. And as the synthesizer grew over time with more components, it matured. At times I felt like it was even rebelling against my instructions or surprising me with what felt like its own choices.

When everything was finished and I was thinking about track titles, this idea of artificial intelligence came into my head; a machine that reacts to your impulses and is capable of giving you something different from what you ask, and even defying you. It felt like different stages of growth and adolescence, and that lead to the album title, ‘Teenages’.”

Deeply rewarding on close listening, Naqvi has created an inspiring and synapsestimulating new masterwork, within the analogue/modular cannon.

TRACK LISTING

1. Intermission
2. Mrs 2E
3. Palace Workers
4. No Tongue
5. Artilect
6. Teenages

With an output that has been described as, ethereal, epic and anthemic, Mancunian electronica band narcissus were tipped for big things in the mid-noughties, having signed a publishing deal on the back of some genre-bending demos and following a series of amazing live events including a 'D-percussion festival/band on the wall' double header.

The quartets' reputation was further enhanced with the release of a single 'The Window' through Manchester indie label Northern Ambition, the label was also responsible for Stephen Fretwell's early output.

Unfortunately, the collapse of narcissus' publishing deal during the recording of their debut album led to a parting of ways but time and fate have brought the band back together.

With an album already recorded, narcissus went back into the studio late 2018 and recorded a brand new track ‘burning candles’ finally released on new Manchester record label 42’s Records

TRACK LISTING

Side A Burning Candles
Side AA Flashing Blue Lights

'Satisfaction' changed everything for Narrow Head. As the group’s first full length recording, 'Satisfaction' was an unofficial progression, a signal that the Texas-based outfit was coalescing around a vision for their band and their music.

Although changes in the band’s lineup and in the individual lives of members were on the horizon, 'Satisfaction' is a result of spontaneity and a willingness to experiment. At that time, Narrow Head was comprised of Jacob Duarte (guitar, vocals), Ryan Hughes (guitar, vocals), Ryan Seelig (bass), and Carson Wilcox (drums).

Everything on 'Satisfaction' was tracked over a three day period, and the group moved quickly through the writing, rehearsing, and recording process. “It’s pretty clear we were still figuring out the dynamics within the songs and what the exact right parts were, and I think that shows in how differently we play those songs live now,” Wilcox said.

TRACK LISTING

1. Necrosis
2. Feels Like Sand
3. Ashtray
4. Cool In Motion
5. Stay
6. Nancy France
7. Paranoid Hands
8. Wallflower
9. It's Whatever To Me
10. Uncover
11. See You Around

Light-Years unites Nas and DJ Premier - two architects of the culture - for a project that bends time, memory, and sound. This exclusive Marvel x Legend Has It... Variant Edition extends that vision into the visual realm, featuring cover art by acclaimed illustrator Mike Del Mundo.

The result is a cover that feels as expansive as the music: Nas’ poetic precision and DJ Premier’s unmistakable production rendered through layered, cinematic artwork that evokes distant galaxies and inner-city constellations alike.

Crafted for collectors, this limited edition stands at the intersection of hip-hop and comic art - two storytelling traditions built on myth, identity, and evolution.

TRACK LISTING

My Life Is Real
GiT Ready
NY State Of Mind Pt. 3
Welcome To The Underground
Madman
Pause Tapes
Writers
Sons (Young Kings)
It’s Time feat. Steve Miller Band
Nasty Esco Nasir
My Story Your Story feat. AZ
Bouquet (To The Ladies)
Junkie
Shine Together
3rd Childhood

THIS IS A BLACK FRIDAY 2024 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON FRIDAY NOVEMBER 29TH ON A FIRST COME FIRST SERVED BASIS, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

IF THERE ARE ANY REMAINING COPIES THEY WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE ONLINE AT 8AM ON SATURDAY NOVEMBER 30TH).

Marking the 30th anniversary of Nas' Illmatic, the x10 trk Remixes and Rarities LP is a limited edition collector's item that pays homage to one of the greatest Hip-Hop albums of all time. Unearthed from the archives, this release features carefully selected remixes & rare tracks that add a new dimension to the iconic Illmatic experience. Immerse yourself in the evolution of Nas' artistry with this exclusive release, housed in a specially designed package that captures the essence of the album's enduring legacy.

Two legends. One record. Light-Years sees Nas link with DJ Premier for the legendary Hip Hop release that fans have been anticipating for years. A must have addition for any serious collection

TRACK LISTING

1. My Life Is Real
2. Git Ready
3. N.Y. State Of Mind Pt. 3
4. Welcome To The Underground
5. Madman"
6. Pause Tapes
7. Writers
8. Sons (Young Kings)
9. It's Time (with Steve Miller Band)
10. Nasty Esco Nasir
11. My Story Your Story (featuring AZ)
12. Bouquet (To The Ladies)
13. Junkie
14. Shine Together
15. 3rd Childhood

Nas and DJ Premier release their highly-anticipated and long awaited album. The first edition of physical products is strictly for the Day 1 Fans and Indie Retail.

TRACK LISTING

1. My Life Is Real
2. Git Ready
3. N.Y. State Of Mind Pt. 3
4. Welcome To The Underground
5. Madman"
6. Pause Tapes
7. Writers
8. Sons (Young Kings)
9. It's Time (with Steve Miller Band)
10. Nasty Esco Nasir
11. My Story Your Story (featuring AZ)
12. Bouquet (To The Ladies)
13. Junkie
14. Shine Together
15. 3rd Childhood

In 1994, hip-hop was going through an at-times painful growth spurt. Since NWA’s and Ice-T’s ascent in the late 80s, the rap game was no longer owned by the East Coast. After the worldwide popularity of Dr. Dre’s ‘The Chronic’ in 1992, things were looking even worse for hip-hop’s hometown. The East Coast / West Coast feud that would later indirectly claim the lives of Biggie and 2Pac was still in its infancy, but New York needed a shot in the arm. The hype behind young Queensbridge native Nasir “Nas” Jones had been in full swing months before his smash debut album ‘Illmatic’, thanks to Columbia Records’ promo machine. From his earliest appearance on Main Source’s ‘Live At The BBQ’, to his own accomplished debut ‘Half Time’ (as Nasty Nas, in late 1992), it was clear that this kid was something special. In fact, the pressure on him must have been overwhelming at times. April 19, 1994 couldn’t have come soon enough. And as soon as the first lines of ‘NY State Of Mind’ kick in, bolstered by perhaps DJ Premier’s darkest beat of all time, the entire East Coast breathed a collective sigh of relief. God’s Son had arrived. Backed by an absolute all-star cast of New York’s top-shelf producers - Premier, Pete Rock, Large Professor, Q-Tip and a youngster named LES - the album never lets up. Serious to a fault, and lyrically dense to an extent that has possibly never been matched, the 20-year old Nas stood on the shoulders of his predecessors and proudly proclaimed, “Don’t f*** with the East… we are BACK”. ‘Illmatic’ was actually a slow-burn, which might surprise fans that have come to its genius more recently. Despite an unheard-of “5 Mics” rating in The Source – breaking an unwritten rule of never awarding classic status to debuts - it didn’t go gold until early 1996, and didn’t hit platinum status until late 2001. But when you dive deeper that shouldn’t be a shock: like Black Moon and Wu-Tang’s debuts, it was a dark, hard record, made for heads in New York, not teeny-boppers in Des Moines. There were no dance beats, no crossover love songs. Just boom-bap and rhymes, skills and heart.

STAFF COMMENTS

Martin says: This album pretty much single handedly reignited the flame of East Coast hip hop. Produced by DJ Premier, Large Professor, Pete Rock AND Q Tip!! It's an authentic, masterpiece of minimal beats and street poetry that is universally recognised as one of the greatest rap albums of all time.

TRACK LISTING

40 Side North:
The Genesis
NY State Of Mind
Life's A Bitch
The World Is Yours
Halftime

41st Side South
Memory Lane (Sitt'in In Da Park)
One Love
One Time 4 Your Mind
Represent
It Ain't Hard To Tell

In 1994, hip-hop was going through an at-times painful growth spurt. Since NWA’s and Ice-T’s ascent in the late 80s, the rap game was no longer owned by the East Coast. After the worldwide popularity of Dr. Dre’s ‘The Chronic’ in 1992, things were looking even worse for hip-hop’s hometown. The East Coast / West Coast feud that would later indirectly claim the lives of Biggie and 2Pac was still in its infancy, but New York needed a shot in the arm. The hype behind young Queensbridge native Nasir “Nas” Jones had been in full swing months before his smash debut album ‘Illmatic’, thanks to Columbia Records’ promo machine. From his earliest appearance on Main Source’s ‘Live At The BBQ’, to his own accomplished debut ‘Half Time’ (as Nasty Nas, in late 1992), it was clear that this kid was something special. In fact, the pressure on him must have been overwhelming at times. April 19, 1994 couldn’t have come soon enough. And as soon as the first lines of ‘NY State Of Mind’ kick in, bolstered by perhaps DJ Premier’s darkest beat of all time, the entire East Coast breathed a collective sigh of relief. God’s Son had arrived.

Backed by an absolute all-star cast of New York’s top-shelf producers - Premier, Pete Rock, Large Professor, Q-Tip and a youngster named LES - the album never lets up. Serious to a fault, and lyrically dense to an extent that has possibly never been matched, the 20-year old Nas stood on the shoulders of his predecessors and proudly proclaimed, “Don’t f*** with the East… we are BACK”. ‘Illmatic’ was actually a slow-burn, which might surprise fans that have come to its genius more recently. Despite an unheard-of “5 Mics” rating in The Source – breaking an unwritten rule of never awarding classic status to debuts - it didn’t go gold until early 1996, and didn’t hit platinum status until late 2001. But when you dive deeper that shouldn’t be a shock: like Black Moon and Wu-Tang’s debuts, it was a dark, hard record, made for heads in New York, not teeny-boppers in Des Moines. There were no dance beats, no crossover love songs. Just boom-bap and rhymes, skills and heart.

TRACK LISTING

The Genesis
NY State Of Mind
Life's A Bitch
The World Is Yours
Halftime
Memory Lane (Sittin' In Da Park)
One Love
One Time 4 Your Mind
Represent
It Ain't Hard To Tell

Illmatic, the 1994 studio debut of Nasir "Nas" Jones, was more than just a critical success for the Queensbridge-based rapper. At a time when East Coast hip-hop was increasingly being taken less seriously than their West Coast counterparts, Illmatic's raw jazz and soul-based production, dire atmosphere, and lyrics, coupled with Nas' uncompromising flow was integral in restoring interest in the East Coast as a hotbed of hip-hop artistry. Along with key releases from Wu-Tang Clan and Notorious B.I.G., it shifted attention away from the funky, dayglo synth-based G-funk coming out of California and back to the grimy streets of New York.

After such an unprecedented debut record, expectations were understandably high for Nas' follow-up. What came next threw critics and fans for a loop, but was no less influential than Illmatic, and would become the most commercially successful album in the entirety of Nas' discography. The 1996 sophomore follow-up is titled It Was Written, and in contrast to the urban bleakness of his debut, has Nas dipping his toes into the world of mafioso rap. Amidst production from heavy hitters like Trackmasters, Dr. Dre, L.E.S., Havoc of Mobb Deep, and Illmatic-collaborator DJ Premier, among others, Nas weaves evocative narratives of gang warfare, downtrodden neighborhoods, drug deals gone awry, and gangsta triumph, against a backdrop of samples from Sam Cooke, Etta James, the Isley Brothers, and even Chuck Mangione. It Was Written is not hard up for top-tier guests either, featuring major guest turns from Lauryn Hill and Joel "JoJo" Hailey of K-Ci & JoJo. It also introduced the world to The Firm, the brief Nas-led supergroup featuring rappers AZ, Foxy Brown, and Cormega. It even managed to cause some minor controversy in the hip-hop community for its collaboration with West Coast producer Dr. Dre, at a time when the East Coast/West Coast rap feud was reaching a fever pitch, briefly attracting the ire of one Tupac Shakur.

Not only was It Was Written received warmly by critics, but it also became a major commercial success, reaching the top of the Billboard 200 charts, reaching platinum sales status four times, and alongside albums like Raekwon's Only Built 4 Cuban Linx, helped usher in the era of mafioso rap in the mainstream. It rendered chart hits out of singles like the Eurhythmics-mimicking "Street Dreams", and the Grammy-nominated "If I Ruled The World (Imagine That)", and proved to be a major influence on artists like Kendrick Lamar, Lupe Fiasco, and many more.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Album Intro
A2. The Message
A3. Street Dreams
A4. I Gave Your Power

B1. Watch Dem Niggas
B2. Take It In Blood
B3. The Set Up
B4. Silent Murder (Bonus Track)

C1. Black Girl Lost
C2. Suspect
C3. Shootouts
C4. Nas Is Coming

D1. Affirmative Action (feat. The Firm)
D2. Live Nigga Rap feat Mobb Deep
D3. If I Ruled The World (Imagine That) (feat. Lauryn Hill)

Nas King's Disease II Album Following the Grammy Award winning album, King’s Disease, the king returns to his throne with the second coming, King’s Disease II. The star-studded project offers tacit game on life, love, and loss, uplifting through action and lived experience in a way only Nas can. This is a body of work for the fans, for the day 1’s that contributed to the legacy. Alongside the decorated production savant, Hit-Boy, Nas remains rooted in lyrical prophetism while proving that he constantly reinvents the wheel. The sequel to last year’s King’s Disease features Ms. Lauryn Hill, Eminem, EPMD, Hit-Boy, Charlie Wilson, YG and more.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Pressure
2. Death Row East
3. 40 Side
4. EPMD 2 (feat. Eminem & EPMD)
5. Rare
6. YKTV (feat. A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie & YG)
7. Store Run
8. Moments
9. Nobody (feat. Ms. Lauryn Hill)
10. No Phony Love (feat. Charlie Wilson)
11. Brunch On Sundays (feat. Blxst)
12. Count Me In
13. Composure (feat. Hit-Boy)
14. My Bible
15. Nas Is Good

A legendary fan favorite Illmatic era demo, gets revisited and completed nearly 3 decades later! Available on vinyl for the first time.

TRACK LISTING

1. Life Is Like A Dice Game (Vocal Version Ft Cordae & Freddie Gibbs)
2. Life Is Like A Dice Game (Instrumental Version, Prod By Hit-Boy)

Instrumental version of the 15th studio album from American Rapper Nas.

TRACK LISTING

1. Speechless - Instrumental
2. Meet Joe Black - Instrumental
3. Ugly - Instrumental
4. 40-16 Building - Instrumental
5. Hollywood Gangsta - Instrumental
6. Wu For The Children - Instrumental
7. Wave Gods - Instrumental
8. The Truth - Instrumental
9. Dedicated - Instrumental 

Nascimento's 1972 double LP is named after the musical collective he helped to found in his Brazilian home state of Minas Gerais. Along with the help of fellow collective member Lo Borges, and with wonderful arrangements from Eumir Deodato, Nascimento seamlessly combines bossa nova with soul, pop, jazz, psychedelic and classical influences. A masterpiece on par with any of the classic releases from the more well know Tropicalia movement. Includes classics like "Tudo Que Voce Podia Ser" and "Cravo E Canela". Beautiful.

TRACK LISTING

Tudo Que Você Podia Ser
Cais 
O Trem Azul 
Saídas E Bandeiras Nᵒ 1 
Nuvem Cigana 
Cravo E Canela 
Dos Cruces 
Um Girassol Da Cor De Seu Cabelo 
San Vicente 
Estrelas
Clube Da Esquina Nº 2 
Paisagem Da Janela 
Me Deixa Em Paz 
Os Povos 
Saídas E Bandeiras Nᵒ 2 
Um Gosto De Sol 
Pelo Amor De Deus 
Lilia 
Trem De Doido 
Nada Será Como Antes 
Ao Que Vai Nascer

It's been quite some time since a full length solo Ben Nash release, and it's finally here, and so,what different from his more psychedelic folk drones he showcased way back on 'The Seventh Goodbye'. Probably best left for Ben to explain this one for you... "I recorded this new full-length record during downtime from playing with Chora and after a long break from recording any solo music. Having become somewhat disillusioned with the process of overdubbing conventional “physical” instruments repeatedly in my solo work I have spent a lot of time experimenting with different ways of inputting, manipulating and arranging sound electronically, both in a variety of computer based environments and also using an Apple iPad. This release is the first in a series that will document these experiments. All sounds on the album stem from and are sequenced within Yamaha’s TNR-I app with some minimal mix processing in Logic" - Ben Nash, Camberwell Green, September 2011. Edition of 250 copies pressed on heavy weight black virgin vinyl.

Heavy, as steel tank and spiced with ever changing tones and atmospheres. This is a document of the true power in sound and noise. In the hands of Mats Gustafsson, Dror Feiler and Lasse Marhaug, sound and noise is getting vital again. Three true masters of the unknown territories of their acoustic and electronic equipment. A modern power trio. This is the debut album by this new band.

Kate Nash’s new album ‘9 Sad Symphonies’ is her first signed to the legendary Kill Rock Stars label. The album was produced and mixed by Grammy winning Danish producer Frederik Thaae (K Flay, Jada, Crown The Empire).

Marking a new chapter in Kate’s illustrious career, the album’s lyrical scope is both deeply personal and achingly relatable, whilst its orchestral arrangements and melodies draw from Kate’s experience in the world of musical theatre.

Kate Nash is a BRIT Award-winning singer-songwriter, musician and actress known for her fearless approach to music and unapologetic storytelling. A platinum selling artist with a career spanning over a decade, she has garnered critical acclaim for her chart-topping hits and electrifying live performances. From her debut album ‘Made of Bricks’, to her latest releases, Kate’s artistry continues to resonate with audiences and has earned her a dedicated fanbase. She also captivated audiences as Rhonda in Netflix’s Emmy-nominated GLOW.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Millions Of Heartbeats
Misery
Wasteman
Abandoned
Horsie

Side B
My Bile
Those Feelings
Space Odyssey 2001
Ray
Vampyre

Nashpaints is Finn Carraher McDonald from Dublin. Following up his debut album "Blindman The Gambler”, recent activity as a member of Princ€ss and production on Maria Somerville’s “Luster” & Mel Keane’s “Airs”, Nashpaints releases his second album "Everyone Good Is Called Molly” via Dublin label MirrorWorld.

Evolving over dreamy soundscapes, reverberated vox echo back reflections of introspection and optimism. Gentle guitar strums, lapping percussion, and  all unfurl in a languid almost opiated and definitely hallucinatory fashion. 

TRACK LISTING

Molly
23
The Giver
Stretching
Boyfriend First
Link
Burning
The Kiss
Lost Dog
Desire
Maybe2
Tonight Im Thinking Of My Big Eyes

A collection of songs written by Nina Nastasia and Jim White of The Dirty Three. Nina's rare gift of a voice produces hook-laden songs about love, longing and loss, whilst Jim White’s songwriting – made famous by working with the likes of Will Oldham, Nick Cave and Smog – produces a rare songwriting talent, creating a duel and duet between two iconic artists.

After being out-of-print for nearly two decades, 'You Follow Me' is finally available on vinyl again. Remastered for vinyl by Josh Bonati in 2025, this 'You Follow Me' reissue is pressed onto limited edition Transparent Yellow colored vinyl.

TRACK LISTING

1. I’ve Been Out Walking 
2. I Write Down Lists 
3. Odd Said The Doe
4. The Day I Would Bury You 
5. Our Discussion 
6. In The Evening 
7. There Is No Train 
8. Late Night 
9. How Will You Love Me 
10. I Come After You

The hauntingly beautiful 'On Leaving' from Nina Nastasia arrived perfectly formed and long overdue, finding the hugely talented, NYC-based singer-songwriter at her best. Nina Nastasia's rare gift of a voice is an intimate, winged presence with the ability to either freeze or melt your heart, that can powerfully soar and twist, or brush ultra-gently against you, suddenly summoning goose bumps. Mojo commented on its ability to "suck the air out of the room". Simultaneously tough and fragile, her songs crackle and smolder with an intimate emotional honesty and a dark undertow.

Marking its 20th anniversary in 2026, 'On Leaving' is available on vinyl again for the first time in nearly two decades. Remastered for vinyl by Josh Bonati in 2025, this 'On Leaving' reissue is pressed onto limited edition Clear Glass colored vinyl.

TRACK LISTING

1. Jim’s Room 
2. Brad Haunts a Party 
3. Our Day Trip 
4. Counting Up Your Bones
5. Dumb I Am 
6. Why Don’t You Stay Home 
7. The Old Woman 
8. Treehouse Song
9. Lee 
10. Settling Song 
11. Bird of Cuzco 
12. If We Go to the West 

Recording once more with Steve Albini at Electrical Audio in Chicago, Nina Nastasia engaged Los Angeles instrumentalist and arranger Paul Bryan to adapt her songs into a score for a small orchestra. Featuring drummer Jay Bellerose and Chicago guitarist Jeff Parker, 'Outlaster' is aided by, all in all, a dream band.

This album is a work of lush sophistication that, with no loss of distinction or economy, transcends the reach of Nastasia's famed sparseness. The orchestra takes a more formal approach with Bryan's powerfully affecting score – hearkening back to the likes of Gil Evans and the late Phil Ochs – burnishing the record with lustrous horns and reeds and a dynamic string ensemble.

After being out of print for more than a decade, 'Outlaster' is finally available on vinyl again. Remastered for vinyl by Josh Bonati in 2025, this 'Outlaster' reissue is pressed onto limited edition Burgundy colored vinyl.

TRACK LISTING

1. Cry, Cry, Baby 
2. Moves Away 
3. You’re a Holy Man 
4. You Can Take Your Time 
5. This Familiar Way 
6. What’s Out There 
7. A Kind of Courage 
8. Wakes 
9. One Way Out 
10. Outlaster

The first new album in over a decade from world-renowned singer-songwriter, Nina Nastasia.

Produced by Steve Albini.

Riderless Horse is my first solo record, and it’s the first record my former partner, Kennan Gudjonsson, didn’t produce.

I haven’t made an album since 2010. I decided to stop pursuing music several years after my sixth record, Outlaster, because of unhappiness, overwhelming chaos, mental illness, and my tragically dysfunctional relationship with Kennan. Creating music had always been a positive outlet during difficult times, but eventually it became a source of absolute misery.

Riderless Horse documents the grief, but it also marks moments of empowerment and a real happiness in discovering my own capability. Steve Albini produced this record with me, and Greg Norman assisted. It was exactly the right environment to work on this record. We all had meals together, cried, laughed, and told stories. It was perfect. It made me realize how much I love writing, playing and recording music.

Terrible things happen. These were some terrible things. So, what to do – learn something valuable, connect with people, move the fuck out of that apartment, remember the humor, find the humour, tell the truth, and make a record. I made a record.

TRACK LISTING

1. Cork And Pour (0:12)
2. Just Stay In Bed (2:12)
3. You Were So Mad (2:53)
4. This Is Love (3:10)
5. Nature (2:57)
6. Lazy Road (2:45)
7. Ask Me (3:41)
8. Blind As Batsies (2:35)
9. The Two Of Us (2:37)
10. Go Away (2:19)
11. The Roundabout (2:09)
12. Trust (3:20)
13. Afterwards (2:34)
14. Creek And Chimes (0:33)

Nina Nastasia's rare gift of a voice is an intimate, winged presence that is able to either freeze or melt your heart; that can powerfully soar and twist, or brush ultra-gently against you, suddenly summoning goose bumps.

Released in 2003 by Touch and Go Records (and out of print for almost two decades), 'Run to Ruin' is the third album by Nina Nastasia. It was recorded by Steve Albini at Black Box studio in Noyant-la-Gravoyère, France and at Looking Glass studio in New York. Combined with the prodigious talents of her backing band and the sparse but lush arrangements of the instruments, the songs on 'Run to Ruin' evoke haunting scenes of heartache, passion and a slightly seedy world. Nina's voice is at once delicate and intense, neither sweet nor harsh, it conveys an array of emotion moving between joy and sadness with just a moment's pause.

TRACK LISTING

1. We Never Talked
2. I Say That I Will Go
3. Regrets
4. You Her And Me
5. Superstar
6. The Body
7. On Teasing
8. While We Talk

On The Blackened Air (her second album but first for Touch and Go, originally released in 2002), Nina Nastasia and her band are not content to just support a vocal melody; they pry it apart and look down its throat. The stringed and wind instruments (viola, cello, mandolin, accordion, bowed saw, acoustic and electric guitars) reach up out of the songs into rarefied territory. Little stories of Peeping Toms and the police lights they bring with them, grave- yards and impolite family, epigrams against disaster, depression, simple forgetfulness, all delivered so effortlessly that the precision of the delivery registers long after its substance has left its mark. When she sings “I’m not hiding anything / I’m not trying to fool you at all,” in a song titled “That’s All There Is,” it is all the truth.

A generation-plus of young troubadours pine for things they never has to lose, as if sadness and depression were inevitable consequences of being alive. Nina Nastasia’s music is an antidote to all of that. The Blackened Air is a darkish record not just in title, but by examining everything without caving in to decadence or solipsism, it is a rejuvenating experience. It is informed, without affect, unique, and succinct. Above all, it is beautiful to hear and a pleasure to have in one’s home.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Run, All You...
I Go With Him This Is What It Is Oh, My Stars All For You
So Little
Desert Fly
Ugly Face
Side B
In The Graveyard Ocean
Rosemary
The Same Day Been So Long
The Very Next Day Little Angel
That’s All There Is

Mumbai-based musician, producer, and DJ NATE08 returns with his sophomore album 'Twenty Seven' - a luminous fusion of r&b, deep house, and funk-leaning grooves, pressed to a single 140g LP in black vinyl.

Three years on from his acclaimed debut 'Furaha' (which featured the breakout hit 'Primrose' with over 7 million streams), NATE08 expands his sonic palette with 'Twenty Seven': a radiant collection of tracks that balance soul-soaked vocals, late-night basslines, and warm, sun-drenched production.

NATE08, aka Nathan Thomas, has become a central figure in Mumbai’s thriving underground, working as a session bass player, live performer, and genre-spanning DJ, while making an international impact through releases on label Needwant. 'Twenty Seven' captures his full range: both organic and synthetic, smooth yet floor-ready, always driven by heartfelt groove.

From the dreamy opener 'You’re The Reason' featuring Mary Ann Alexander’s velvety tones, to the nostalgic glow of lead single 'Where Are You Tonight' (feat. Dishaan & Mallika), the album unfolds like a love letter to house music’s emotional core. Highlights include the syrupy r&b/house hybrid 'Afterlife' (feat. Dappest), the golden-hour deep house shimmer of 'Call Me Back' (feat. Sahirah), and the soul-drenched 'What Was It' featuring Jamal Bucanon. Closing track 'Stay' wraps it all with soft-focus chords and a bumpy, irresistible groove.

'Twenty Seven' is a sophisticated and inviting journey across mood, tempo, and texture, showcasing NATE08’s gift for weaving melody, rhythm, and soul into music that speaks equally to the dance floor and the heart.

TRACK LISTING

1. You’re The Reason (feat. Mary Ann Alexander)
2. Where Are You Tonight (feat. Dishaan & Mallika)
3. Call Me Back (feat. Sahirah)
4. Afterlife (feat. Dappest)
5. Waiting (feat. Benni Ola)
6. She Left Me In Summer (feat. Jamal Bucanon)
7. Nate08 - What Was It (feat. Jamal Bucanon)
8. Nate08 - Say The Word (feat. Niomí)
9. Nate08 - Diamonds
10. Nate08 - Stay

Nation of Language hail from Brooklyn, New York.

The band self-released their debut album ‘Introduction, Presence’ in May 2020.

‘A Way Forward’ marks their first album since signing to Play It Again Sam.

Pristine synth-infused pop, with a heavy 80s vibe. Think OMD, A Flock Of Seagulls etc.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: From the shuffled cosmic thump of 'Across That Fine Line' to Kreidler-adjacent instrumental sub-bass rhythms behind chorused guitars and stadium riffage, 'A Way Forward' provides a perfectly measured and impeccably manicured electronic wooze. Lovely.

TRACK LISTING

In Manhattan
Across That Fine Line
Wounds Of Love
Miranda
The Grey Commute
This Fractured Mind
Former Self
Whatever You Want
A Word & A Wave
They’re Beckoning

Nation of Language release a limited edition 7” single covering the classic single ‘Androgynous’ by The Replacements. Presenting an entirely reimagined interpretation, Nation of Language have delivered an 80s new wave production built on playful synths and punctuating drum programming. Ian Devaney’s vocals bring the unmistakable Nation of Language take on contemporary indie electronic which they are growing to define. The B-side is a new Nation of Language recording called Again & Again which is released for the first time on this 7”.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Androgynous
B1. Again & Again

Synthpop, minimal wave, post-punk, goth, new romantic — fans and critics alike have dug deeply into their vintage thesauruses to describe the beguiling work of Nation of Language. And if you can’t precisely define the band, that’s the point. Frontman Ian Richard Devaney has become prodigious in expanding what synthesizer-driven music can evoke, such that his output is as much an extrasensory journey as it is an all-too-human destination. With that experience in mind, he wrote the band’s fourth album — the spectral, spacious 'Dance Called Memory' — in the most humble of ways: chipping away at melancholia by sitting around and strumming his guitar.

Nation of Language’s first two albums, 'Introduction, Presence' (2020), and 'A Way Forward' (2021), came as pandemic godsends: gorgeous, relatable soundtracks to our collective doldrums. But it was their last LP, 'Strange Disciple' (2023), that catapulted the group from cultural standouts to critical darlings. With that release, Pitchfork wrote that the band “are learning what it means to get bigger and better.”

This is Devaney’s calling: soulfully translating individual despair into a comforting, collective mourning. The single 'Now That You’re Gone', which radiates and reverberates with a devastating wistfulness, was inspired by witnessing his godfather’s tragic death from ALS, and his parents’ role as caretakers for this ailing friend. At its heart, the song is a reflection of how friends can be there for each other, and also highlights a theme throughout the record: the pain and lost promise of friendships that fall apart.

On 'Dance Called Memory', the band once again collaborated with friend and Strange Disciple producer Nick Millhiser (LCD Soundsystem, Holy Ghost!). “What’s so great about Nick is his ability to make us feel like we don’t need to do what might be expected of us,” says synth player Aidan Noell, who, along with bassist Alex MacKay, rounds out the Nation of Language lineup. They imbued 'Dance Called Memory' with a shifted palette — sampling chopped-up drum breaks on 'I’m Not Ready for the Change' for a touch of Loveless-era My Bloody Valentine or smashing all of the percussion of 'In Another Life' through a synthesizer to cast a shade of early-2000s electronic music.

Ultimately, the hope was to weave raw vulnerability and humanity into a synth-heavy album. “There is a dichotomy between the Kraftwerk school of thought and the Brian Eno school of thought, each of which I’ve been drawn to at different points. I’ve read about how Kraftwerk wanted to remove all the humanity from their music, but Eno often spoke about wanting to make synthesized music that felt distinctly human,” Devaney says. “As much as Kraftwerk is a sonically foundational influence, with this record I leaned much more towards the Eno school of thought. In this era quickly being defined by the rise of AI supplanting human creators I’m focusing more on the human condition, and I need the underlying music to support that… Instead of hopelessness, I want to leave the listener with a feeling of us really seeing one another, that our individual struggles can actually unite us in empathy.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A perfect midpoint between longform, wall-of-sound shoegaze and glittering indie synth-pop that has the emotional intensity and instrumental heft of the former while sacrificing none of the compositional minutiae that often get lost in the waves. For me, the most impactful pieces lean more into the synth-pop aesthetic, like the stunning 'Inept Apollo', part Human League part Joy Division and ALL lovely.

TRACK LISTING

1. Can't Face Another One
2. In Another Life
3. Silhouette
4. Now That You're Gone
5. I'm Not Ready For The Change
6. Can You Reach Me
7. Inept Apollo
8. Under The Water
9. In Your Head
10. Nights Of Weight

Nation of Language announce the release of their new album, Strange Disciple. Out September 15th on Play It Again Sam, following performances at Primavera Sound, Pitchfork Festival, Outside Lands and dozens more of their biggest headline shows to date, the Brooklyn band’s third LP is one that is meant to invoke wandering, wondrous walks through city streets both foreign and familiar. In the three short years since their acclaimed debut, 2020’s Introduction, Presence, Nation of Language have sustained an increasing ascent from small, hyperlocal scenes to international stages and late-night television, while their musical evolution has embodied three distinct modes of moving through the world: lead singer and songwriter Ian Devaney imagines the band’s first album, Introduction, Presence, as taking place in a car, whereas second album A Way Forward occurred on and as a locomotive, influenced by the chugging sound of krautrock. Now, as their first record to be fully created and released outside the confines of a pandemic-instilled lockdown, Strange Disciple is centred around groove-driven songs and bouncing basslines that feel ambulatory and wayfaring, informed by the excitement of exploring new places the band never thought they would see on tour.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: It's easy to hear a lot of influence here, the echoic vocals of Tears For Fears, or the percussive skitter of OMD, but all rendered in Nation Of Language's own unique indie-rock palette. Arm-raising balladry and slowly building walls of sound, pieced together arp by arp.

TRACK LISTING

Weak In Your Light
Sole Obsession
Surely I Can't Wait
Swimming In The Shallow Sea
Too Much, Enough
Spare Me The Decision
Sightseer
Stumbling Still
A New Goodbye
I Will Never Learn

Just for the record, The National Jazz Trio of Scotland don't play jazz, nor are they a trio. And while their status as national ambassadors is not exactly official, acclaimed pianist Bill Wells has however worked with many of the key players in the Scottish indie scene from the likes of Isobel Campbell and Future Pilot AKA to the magnificent collaboration with former Arab Strap vocalist Aidan Moffat "Everything's Getting Older" on Chemikal Underground recently.

Indeed a host of Glasgow's finest have contributed to the new NJTOS album Standards Volume Two with Norman Blake from Teenage Fanclub responsible for additional studio work and lending his voice to Winter Breaks And Back To Spring. Belle & Sebastian's Chris Geddes and Stevie Jackson also helped with recordings But what sets the National Jazz Trio of Scotland apart is the vocal performances by Lorna Gilfedder, Aby Vulliamy and Kate Sugden, with the songs walking a fine emotional line between melancholy and optimism. Though the majority of the songs on Standards Volume Two are written and composed entirely by Bill Wells, there are 2 covers including a version of the traditional Scottish folk song Mary of Argyle and a delightful cover of the Moondog tune My Tiny Butterfly with Gilfedder, Vulliamy and Sugden singing in a round to great effect.

These five Cincinnati friends recorded two albums and a mini album for Brassland before signing to Beggars Banquet. Their last effort, "Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers", was touted as one of the year's best by Rolling Stone and other magazines.

The National contains two pairs of brothers - Aaron Dessner (guitars, bass) and Bryce Dessner (guitar), Scott Devendorf (guitar, bass), Bryan Devendorf (drums) and singer Matt Berninger. Matt's potent baritone intones about matters fraught and funny and sad; about record collections, missing persons and medium-sized American hearts. The songs are intense, and emotive but generally quite restrained, but on one or two tracks, this intensity spills out into a superbly abrasive blast of emotion, before ebbing back into mellowness. Wonderful!

STAFF COMMENTS

Laura says: An absolutely awesome album - one of my albums of the year in 2005 when it was originally released. Although it's perhaps a little less 'polished' than "High Violet" it still has that same compelling, claustrophic intensity too it.

TRACK LISTING

1. Secret Meeting
2. Karen
3. Lit Up
4. Looking For Astronauts
5. Daughters Of The Soho Riots
6. Baby, We'll Be Fine
7. Friend Of Mine
8. Val Jester
9. All The Wine
10. Abel
11. Geese Of Beverly Road
12. City Middle
13. Mr. November

The National's 2005 album "Alligator" saw them fulfil the promise shown on their previous two albums, and set the bar impossibly high for their follow up.

However, with "Boxer" they've created something quite stunning, in fact the opening three tracks, "Fake Empire", "Mistaken For Strangers" and "Brainy" are possibly their best songs ever. A taut rhythm section is present throughout, and complements the languid vocals and lush string arrangements perfectly. Although the strings and Matt Berninger's distinctive drawl create a solemn mood, there are plenty of upbeat moments here too, creating a rich anthemic album with just the right amount of melancholy.

TRACK LISTING

1. Fake Empire
2. Mistaken For Strangers
3. Brainy
4. Squalor Victoria
5. Green Gloves
6. Slow Show
7. Apartment Story
8. Start A War
9. Guest Room
10. Racing Like A Pro
11. Ada
12. Gospel

Previously unreleased live version of the bands Boxer album performed in full - recorded at Forest National, Brussels, Belgium, 09 November 2017

TRACK LISTING

Fake Empire (Live In Brussels)
Mistaken For Strangers (Live In Brussels)
Brainy (Live In Brussels)
Squalor Victoria (Live In Brussels)
Green Gloves (Live In Brussels)
Slow Show (Live In Brussels)
Apartment Story (Live In Brussels)
Start A War (Live In Brussels)
Guest Room (Live In Brussels)
Racing Like A Pro (Live In Brussels)
Ada (Live In Brussels)
Gospel (Live In Brussels)

Released a year before The National broke through with their third album Alligator, 2004’s Cherry Tree EP is a thrilling record which - thanks to its collection of delicate ballads and anthemic crowd-pleasers - sums up what they do best in under 30 minutes. Now a firm fan-favourite, among Cherry Tree’s seven tracks are now National classics ‘About Today’ and ‘All The Wine’, plus a thrilling live version of ‘Murder Me Rachael’ that reminds of the band’s fearsome early live performances. Cherry Tree can be seen as the record that marks the moment when The National had truly found themselves, a bridge from what went before to a band ready to conquer the World.

Having been remastered at Abbey Road Studios, the 2021 represses stay faithful to their original artwork while their stunning new masters help make these much-loved records sound as vital as ever, further emphasising the early signs of the sound that would go on to make them one of the fi nest and most beloved alternative bands of their generation.

TRACK LISTING

1. / A1. Wasp Nest
2. / A2. All The Wine
3. / A3. All Dolled-Up In Straps
4. / A4. Cherry Tree
5. / B1. About Today
6. / B2. Murder Me Rachael (Live)
7. / B3. Reasonable Man (I Don’t Mind)

The album opens with the slow drums and mournful vocals of “Terrible Love” but from the start there’s a simmering intensity that builds and eventually explodes into crashing cymbals, pummelling drums, distorted guitars and layered vocals.
A dramatic entrance to The National’s fifth album. But it’s not all this heavy, as with their previous releases it’s an album of mood swings. Where “Terrible Love” was explosive, second track “Sorrow” is mournful and melodic.
And while the album changes mood and tempo, at times warm and intimate at others dramatic, propelled by off beat drum rhythms, there’s always a palpable intensity. I read recently that they find it hard to finish songs, with one or other band member frequently rejecting material. Whether the atmosphere created here is the cause or result of this I don’t know, but either way it works perfectly. Despite Matt’s melancholy, there’s something really uplifting about this collection of beautifully crafted mini epics.

STAFF COMMENTS

Martin says: A bona fide classic, and possibly the summit of The National's already majestic canon. Moody, introspective and deeply involving, "High Violet" manages to be both clever and inventive and at the same time focused in it's somewhat bleak expression. A work of troubled genius whose (very) high points, "Afraid of Everyone", "Bloodbuzz Ohio" and the sublime "Conversation 16" would grace pretty much any album, ever. It is really that good.

TRACK LISTING

1. Terrible Love
2. Sorrow
3. Anyone’s Ghost
4. Little Faith
5. Afraid Of Everyone
6. Bloodbuzz Ohio
7. Lemonworld
8. Runaway
9. Conversation 16
10. England
11. Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks

The album opens with the slow drums and mournful vocals of “Terrible Love” but from the start there’s a simmering intensity that builds and eventually explodes into crashing cymbals, pummelling drums, distorted guitars and layered vocals. A dramatic entrance to The National’s fifth album. But it’s not all this heavy, as with their previous releases it’s an album of mood swings. Where “Terrible Love” was explosive, second track “Sorrow” is mournful and melodic.
And while the album changes mood and tempo, at times warm and intimate at others dramatic, propelled by off beat drum rhythms, there’s always a palpable intensity. I read recently that they find it hard to finish songs, with one or other band member frequently rejecting material. Whether the atmosphere created here is the cause or result of this I don’t know, but either way it works perfectly. Despite Matt’s melancholy, there’s something really uplifting about this collection of beautifully crafted mini epics.

TRACK LISTING

High Violet
Terrible Love
Sorrow
Anyone’s Ghost
Little Faith
Afraid Of Everyone
Bloodbuzz Ohio
Lemonworld
Runaway
Conversation 16
England
Vanderlyle Crybaby
Geeks

Bonus Disc
Terrible Love (Alternate Version)
Wake Up Your Saints
You Were A Kindness
Walk Off
Sin-Eaters
Bloodbuzz Ohio (Live On The Current)
Anyone’s Ghost (Live At BAM)
England (Live At BAM)

I Am Easy To Find is the band’s eighth studio album and the follow-up to 2017’s GRAMMY®-award winning release Sleep Well Beast. A companion short film with the same name will also be released with music by The National and inspired by the album. The film was directed by Academy Award-nominated director Mike Mills (20th Century Women, Beginners), and starring Academy Award Winner Alicia Vikander. Mills, along with the band, is credited as co-producer of the album, which was mostly recorded at Long Pond, Hudson Valley, NY with additional sessions in Paris, Berlin, Cincinnati, Austin, Dublin, Brooklyn and more far flung locations. The album features vocal contributions from Sharon Van Etten, Brooklyn Youth Chorus, Lisa Hannigan, Mina Tindle and more.

I Am Easy to Find is a 24-minute film by Mills starring Alicia Vikander, and a 68-minute album by the National. The former is not the video for the latter; the latter is not the soundtrack to the former. The two projects are, as Mills calls them, “Playfully hostile siblings that love to steal from each other”—they share music and words and DNA and impulses and a vision about what it means to be human in 2019, but don’t necessarily need one another. The movie was composed like a piece of music; the music was assembled like a film, by a film director. The frontman and natural focal point was deliberately and dramatically sidestaged in favour of a variety of female voices, nearly all of whom have long been in the group’s orbit. It is unlike anything either artist has ever attempted and also totally in line with how they’ve created for much of their careers.

As the album’s opening track, ‘You Had Your Soul With You,’ unfurls, it’s so far, so National: a digitally manipulated guitar line, skittering drums, Berninger’s familiar baritone, mounting tension. Then around the 2:15 mark, the true nature of I Am Easy To Find announces itself: The racket subsides, strings swell, and the voice of long-time David Bowie bandmate Gail Ann Dorsey booms out—not as background vocals, not as a hook, but to take over the song. Elsewhere it’s Irish singer-songwriter Lisa Hannigan, or Sharon Van Etten, or Mina Tindle or Kate Stables of This Is the Kit, or varying combinations of them. The Brooklyn Youth Choir, whom Bryce Dessner had worked with before. There are choral arrangements and strings on nearly every track, largely put together by Bryce in Paris—not a negation of the band’s dramatic tendencies, but a redistribution of them.

“Yes, there are a lot of women singing on this, but it wasn't because, ‘Oh, let's have more women's voices,’ says Berninger. “It was more, ‘Let's have more of a fabric of people's identities.’ It would have been better to have had other male singers, but my ego wouldn't let that happen.”

TRACK LISTING

1. You Had Your Soul With You
2. Quiet Light
3. Roman Holiday
4. Oblivions
5. The Pull Of You
6. Hey Rosey
7. I Am Easy To Find
8. Her Father In The Pool
9. Where Is Her Head
10. Not In Kansas
11. So Far So Fast
12. Dust Swirls In Strange Light
13. Hairpin Turns
14. Rylan
15. Underwater
16. Light Years

Side 5 On Deluxe Triple – Contains 22 Minutes Of Music From The I Am Easy To Find Original Film Score – EXCLUSIVE To This Format.
Side 6 On 3LP - Etching.

The National’s second album, Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers (2003) proved a leap forward from 2001’s eponymous debut, showing a band adept at delivering warm embraces and gut punches in equal measure.

With word of mouth now spreading on the band, critics proved equally enthusiastic... Pitchfork in their glowing review called it a “Gorgeous train wreck” that “Lives up to its blunt title (with) Matt Berninger’s self-effacing barbs matched by the band’s equally potent hooks,” while Uncut also became early champions saying the album was “A genuine treasure... Livid as a bruise, this is brave, desperate, beautiful music.”

No longer a secret among those that know, Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers is an important record in The National’s discography with this new remaster showing that it’s more than standing the test of time.

Having been remastered at Abbey Road Studios, the 2021 represses stay faithful to their original artwork while their stunning new masters help make these much-loved records sound as vital as ever, further emphasising the early signs of the sound that would go on to make them one of the fi nest and most beloved alternative bands of their generation.

TRACK LISTING

1. / A1. Cardinal Song
2. / A2. Slipping Husband
3. / A3. 90-Mile Water Wall
4. / A4. It Never Happened
5. / A5. Murder Me Rachael
6. / B1. Thirsty
7. / B2. Available
8. / B3. Sugar Wife
9. / B4. Trophy Wife
10. / B5. Fashion Coat
11. / B6. Patterns Of Fairytales
12. / B7. Lucky You

The National return with their much anticipated seventh album, produced by Aaron Dessner, with additional production by Matt Berninger and Bryce Dessner. The album was mixed by Peter Katis and recorded at Aaron’s Long Pond studio in Hudson Valley, NY.

While in some ways it’s typically National-sounding, they’ve definitely added some new elements to their sound. Opening track “Nobody Else Will Be There” is a stripped back ballad with melancholic piano, and Matt’s distinct vocals, but the electronics pulsing away in the background are a sign of what’s to come with the album.

All the usual elements are there, intricate guitars, delicate piano keys, scatter-shot drums and of course Matt’s mumbling/crooning baritone, but a new layer of electronics bubbling away in the mix adds a new dimension to their sound.

As with the last couple of albums, it features mostly fairly downtempo ballads but they do ramp things up from time to time: “Day I Die”, “They System Only Dreams In Total” and the big rock-out track of the album, “Turtleneck”. It’s taken a few listens to get into it, but as a fan I’m certainly not disappointed.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Nobody Else Will Be There
A2. Day I Die
A3. Walk It Back
B1. The System Only Dreams
In Total Darkness
B2. Born To Beg
B3. Turtleneck
C1. Empire Line
C2. I’ll Still Destroy You
C3. Guilty Party
D1. Carin At The Liquor Store
D2. Dark Side Of The Gym
D3. Sleep Well Beast

Celebrating its 20th anniversary in 2021, The National’s self-titled debut album of sozzled Americana is a thing of beauty, laden with heavy hints that this was a special band in the making.

Their first release, The National arrived two years after The National formed, a time when they were juggling bandlife with needing to hold down full-time jobs. And while nods to the alt. rock artists that inspired them (Pavement, Silver Jews) can be heard, so too are the beginnings of something all their own – Matt Berninger’s stunning and unexpected lyrics being pinned to melodies that stop you in your tracks.

The National marks the start point for one of the best bands of their generation with its new master helping elevate it to new levels. A great primer to a great band.

Having been remastered at Abbey Road Studios, the 2021 represses stay faithful to their original artwork while their stunning new masters help make these much-loved records sound as vital as ever, further emphasising the early signs of the sound that would go on to make them one of the fi nest and most beloved alternative bands of their generation.

TRACK LISTING

1. / A1. Beautiful Head
2. / A2. Cold Girl Fever
3. / A3. The Perfect Song
4. / A4. American Mary
5. / A5. Son
6. / A6. Pay For Me
7. / B1. Bitters & Absolut
8. / B2. John’s Star
9. / B3. Watching You Well
10. / B4. Theory Of The Crows
11. / B5. 29 Years
12. / B6. Anna Freud

The National’s self-titled debut album marks the start point for one of the best bands of a generation.

Released in 2001, ‘The National’ landed two years after they formed and came during a time when they were having to juggle band life with full-time jobs.

And while nods to the alt. rock artists that inspired them (Pavement, Silver Jews) can be heard, so too are the beginnings of something all their own - Matt Berninger’s stunning and unexpected lyrics being pinned to melodies that stop you in your tracks.

For National Album Day 2022, the band reissue the album on white vinyl.

TRACK LISTING

Beautiful Head
Cold Girl Fever
The Perfect Song
American Mary
Son
Pay For Me
Bitters & Absolut
John’s Star
Watching You Well
Theory Of The Crows
29 Years
Anna Freud

This is the sixth studio album for the Brooklyn band, and follows 2010’s High Violet, which was No 2 in our Albums of The Year, that year.

In an interview with UK’s Uncut Magazine, front man Matt Berninger described the songs as more “immediate and visceral” than their previous work. Trouble Will Find Me possesses a directness, a coherency and an approachability that suggests The National are at their most confident.

After a 22-month tour following the release of High Violet the band returned home. Regardless of plans to wait to record new music for another year or two, guitarist Aaron Dessner began working on sketches of new songs that the other members were too inspired by to not fully realise. Matt confesses, “For the past ten years we’d been chasing something, wanting to prove something. And this chase was about trying to disprove our own insecurities. After touring High Violet, I think we felt like we’d finally gotten there. Now we could relax—not in terms of our own expectations but we didn’t have to prove our identity any longer.” The results are simultaneously breakthrough and oddly familiar, the culmination of an artistic journey that has led The National both to a new crest and, somehow, back to their beginnings—when, says Aaron, “our ideas would immediately click with each other. It’s free-wheeling again. The songs on one level are our most complex, and on another they’re our most simple and human. It just feels like we’ve embraced the chemistry we have.” The album was recorded at Clubhouse in Rhinebeck, NY. Trouble Will Find Me was self-produced and mixed by Craig Silvey with additional mixing from Peter Katis and Marcus Paquin.

STAFF COMMENTS

Laura says: With every album The National have pushed on and made a more ambitious album, constantly upping the ante with bigger arrangements and a bigger sound. So how on earth were the going to follow High Violet?
Well, it seems they’ve finally come to terms with who and where they are as a band and made an album that reflects that. The Dressner brothers intricate arrangements are still there, as are the distinctive scatter-shot drum patterns (described perfectly by film director DA Pennebaker as “like rain falling through the leaves of a tree”) and of course Matt Berninger’s rich baritone rolls effortlessly over it all, but “Trouble Will Find Me” is a more relaxed, streamlined collection, and this stripping back gives the songs room to breathe and emphasises just how good they are at what they do. There may be less angst here than in the past, but the romanticism and melancholy are still there and for me, once again they've come up with one of the best albums of the year.

TRACK LISTING

1. I Should Live In Salt
2. Demons
3. Don't Swallow The Cap
4. Fireproof
5. Sea Of Love
6. Heavenfaced
7. This Is The Last Time
8. Graceless
9. Slipped
10. I Need My Girl
11. Humiliation
12. Pink Rabbits
13. Hard To Find

* First ever anthology
* Remastered from original sources
* 2xLP housed in a deluxe gatefold tip-on jacket with 20-pg book, and download card full full anthology
* Vinyl cut by John Golden and pressed at RTI
* CD housed in a deluxe gatefold tip-on jacket with 48-pg book
* Scholarly liner notes by Punk In Africa director Keith Jones
* Unseen photos, flyers, and band ephemera

The South Africa of the late 1970s was neither the right place nor time to launch a mixed-race punk band. Yet, following the student-inspired Soweto Uprising of 1976, it was also exactly the right conditions to foster a band like National Wake, one formed in an underground commune, and one whose very name exists in protest at the divisive, racist apartheid regime. Never before collected together, Light In The Attic is set to release National Wake’s full body of work as Walk In Africa 1979-81.

Featured heavily in the Punk In Africa documentary, National Wake played punk, reggae and tropical funk, equally at home in the city’s rock underground and the township nightclub circuit. Ivan Kadey started the band with two brothers, Gary and Punka Khoza. The three were from different worlds –while Ivan was an outsider, a Jewish orphan born in the traditional Johannesburg immigrant neighborhood, Gary, Punka and their family were forcibly moved to the troubled township of Soweto under the apartheid regime. Later joined by guitarist Steve Moni, the whole band grew up against a backdrop of township unrest, social upheaval and suburban tedium that characterized apartheid-era South Africa.

National Wake released just one album, in 1981. It sold approximately 700 copies before being withdrawn under government pressure. The band subsequently disintegrated, but their influence could be traced in the racially mixed post-punk underground centered around Rockey Street in Johannesburg throughout the 1980s, their legacy transmitted through fanzines and underground cassette trading.

Sadly, Gary and Punka Khoza both passed away in their 40s. Kadey now works as an architect in Los Angeles, but his attention eventually turned back to the band as their legacy grew in the digital era, with the emergence of specialized music websites and Punk In Africa leading to their rediscovery. Czech State Radio memorably described the band as “perhaps the most dissident music scene of the 20th century: a multi-racial punk band in a fascist police state.”

In 2011, Kadey re-released the band’s self-titled album, but spoke about having more than 20 tracks that had never seen the light of day –until now. “All of these recordings put together they speak of the whole evolution of the band,” he has said. “From a sort of naive, almost belief that we could miraculously change everything to realizing what a struggle it was, and what the country was going through and what it would go through.”

TRACK LISTING

1. International News
2. It's All Right
3. Walk In Africa
4. Time And Place
5. Corner House Stone
6. Mercenaries
7. Wake Of The Nation
8. Supaman
9. Speed It Up
10. Beat Up The Lights
11. Black Punk Rockers
12. Stratocaster
13. Everybody
14. Vatsiketeni

Anchored by evocative melodies and an enthralling lyrical narrative, First Two Pages of Frankenstein signals a thrilling new chapter in the band’s beloved discography. The 11-song album was produced by The National at Long Pond Studios in upstate New York and features guest appearances by Taylor Swift, Phoebe Bridgers and Sufjan Stevens.

The follow-up to 2019’s top five hit album I Am Easy To Find, First Two Pages of Frankenstein was initially stalled while lead singer Matt Berninger navigated “a very dark spot where I couldn’t come up with lyrics or melodies at all, and that period lasted for over a year. Even though we’d always been anxious and argued quite a lot whenever we were working on a record, this was the first time it ever felt like maybe things really had come to an end.” Instead, The National “managed to come back together and approach everything from a different angle, and because of that we arrived at what feels like a new era for the band,” according to guitarist/pianist Bryce Dessner, whose bandmates also include his brother Aaron (guitar/piano/bass) as well as brothers Scott Devendorf (bass, guitar) and Bryan Devendorf (drums).

First Two Pages of Frankenstein channels the group’s revitalized chemistry into a body of work that beautifully balances elegant musicality with the National’s more idiosyncratic impulses. Tracks such as “Grease in Your Hair” and “Ice Machines” were road-tested in 2022 before they were recorded, allowing the band to hone the material in real time (another song, “Weird Goodbyes” featuring Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon, was released as a standalone track last August). “To me the power of this record has to do with the intentionality and structure of the music meeting with a lot of accidental magic,” says Aaron Dessner.

Swift duets with Berninger on the luminous “The Alcott,” continuing her recent string of collaborations with members of The National on her chart-topping albums folklore and evermore and Aaron Dessner’s Big Red Machine project. The song finds Berninger and Swift inhabiting the roles of a couple attempting to resurrect a troubled relationship, forging a finely drawn story nearly novelistic in scope. “It’s about two people with a long history returning to a place and trying to relive a certain moment in time,” says Berninger. “It’s got the feeling of a last-ditch effort to hold onto the relationship, but there’s a hint of something positive where you can see the beginnings of a reconnection.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Liam says: Succeeding on from the beautiful yet gut-punching 'I Am Easy To Find', 'First Two Pages Of Frankenstein' is another exquisite slice of moving and expansive indie from Berninger and co. Boasting huge guest spots from Taylor Swift, Sufjan Stevens and Phoebe Bridgers, this record further cements The National as the generational talent we've always known them to be!

TRACK LISTING

Once Upon A Poolside (feat. Sufjan Stevens)
Eucalyptus
New Order T-Shirt
This Isn't Helping (feat. Phoebe Bridgers)
Tropic Morning News
Alien
The Alcott (feat. Taylor Swift)
Grease In Your Hair
Ice Machines
Your Mind Is Not Your Friend (feat. Phoebe Bridgers)
Send For Me 

The surprise companion to The National's April release First Two Pages of Frankenstein, Laugh Track is the band's most freewheeling, all-hands-on-deck album in years. If Frankenstein represented a rebuilding of trust between group members after 20+ years together, the vibrant, exploratory Laugh Track is both the product of that faith and a new statement of intent. Reveling in the license to radically upend its creative process, The National honed most of this material in live performances on tour, and captured those invigorated versions in impromptu sessions at producer Tucker Martine’s Portland studio. Two nights later in Vancouver, the nearly eight-minute album closer “Smoke Detector” was recorded during soundcheck, completing a body of work bristling with spontaneity and vintage rock energy that makes a perfect complement to the songs found on its more introspective predecessor.

STAFF COMMENTS

Laura says: Released as a companion album to ‘First Two Pages Of Frankenstein’, ‘Laugh Track’ was written during the same sessions but feels more dynamic, largely due to Bryan reverting to ‘real’ rather than programmed drums. After all, it’s his fluid, scatter-shot drumming that has always been the perfect foil for Matt’s melancholy. This LP sounds much more like The National we love and closing track “Smoke Detector” possibly hints at the future direction of their evolution.

TRACK LISTING

Alphabet City
Deep End (Paul’s In Pieces)
Weird Goodbyes Feat. Bon Iver
Turn Off The House
Dreaming
Laugh Track Feat. Phoebe Bridgers
Space Invader
Hornets
Coat On A Hook
Tour Manager
Crumble Feat. Rosanne Cash
Smoke Detector

Rome is the definitive live document of The National. Recorded live (without overdubs) on June 3, 2024 at the architecturally stunning venue Parco Della Musica Ennio Morricone, named for the famed Italian film composer, the 21-track LP showcases scintillating versions of beloved songs like "Bloodbuzz Ohio," "Don't Swallow the Cap," "I Need My Girl," "The System Only Dreams in Total Darkness," “England” and "Fake Empire"; plus sharpened readings of recent tracks "Eucalyptus," "New Order T-Shirt," "Tropic Morning News" and the boundary pushing "Smoke Detector."

The double album, mixed by longtime collaborator Peter Katis, spans the band’s 20-plus years of songwriting and reveals how each song has taken on a new life in its live performance. “You have to see this band live” is often said about The National, and now, Rome is the next best thing to actually being there.

Reflecting how the band changes setlists significantly from night to night to cast fresh light on hidden gems from the catalog, Rome is marked by rarities such as show opener “Runaway,” “Lemonworld,” “The Geese of Beverly Road,” “Lit Up” and a tour de force pairing of “Humiliation” from the critically acclaimed album Trouble Will Find Me into Sad Songs For Dirty Lovers’ “Murder Me Rachael.”

The Rome encore features the election anthem “Mr. November,” and, from High Violet, “Terrible Love” and the show-closing fan singalong, “Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks.”

TRACK LISTING

Runaway
Eucalyptus
Tropic Morning News
New Order T-Shirt
Don't Swallow The Cap
Bloodbuzz Ohio
The System Only Dreams In Total Darkness
I Need My Girl
Lemonworld
The Geese Of Beverly Road
Lit Up
Alien
Humiliation
Murder Me Rachael
England
Graceless
Fake Empire
Smoke Detector
Mr November
Terrible Love
Vanderlyle Crybaby Geeks

An antidote to the tough-guy hardcore spreading from CBGB’s, emo outliers Native Nod’s unique genre juxtaposition of damaged art-rock, daring/naive songwriting, and raw, poetic vocals have set them apart from the glut of early-’90s post-hardcore. Compiled here are the band’s trio of seminal 7” EPs for the Gern Blandsten label, with liner notes by Jenn Pelly and scores of unseen photographs and ephemer a.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Bread
High Tide In Alaska
Back To Mimsey

Side B
Answers
Crossings
Tangled
Lower GI Bleed
Runner

It wasn't long before Awesome Tapes would snaffle up some more hot amapiano sounds. the genre seems to have well and truly exploded from its native South Africa and has hit a massive point of global adoration. I'm sure other cities and urban areas must be replicating what's happening here in Manchester too - with the sound a constant up-and-coming soundtrack with the youth, trend setters and club goers alike - keen for new sounds with authentic heritage; and like its predecessors kwaito and gqom it comes with style in abundance.

Hitting a cool 110BPM territory, gliding in on Reese basslines and punctuated with 808 subs; tense strings and dark synthlines make up this midtempo, late night dance music which glows with dipped neons and oozes electronic soul.

19 and 18 respectively, Kgothatso Tshabalala & Zakhele Mhlanga (DJ Zakes) are born after the onset of democracy ('ma2000') and ride a wave of youthful excitement and creativity around the Gauteng province of SA where many believe amapiano was first birthed.

"Teenage Dreams" is twelve tracks which capture both the sound of amapiano, the energy of late teenage South Africa and the excitement of merging modern production technology with fierce creative spirit. It's no wonder everyone from your mate down Moss Side, to the hippest DJs on NTS are championing this sound right now. It's fully genuine, a little bit gangsta, and is aimed squarely at the hips - a pocket rocket of fresh fire for the clubs, jeeps and yards. Check! 

TRACK LISTING

1. The Beginning (7:44)
2. Way To Cairo (6:12)
3. The Journey (7:51)
4. Teenage Dreams (7:12)
5. Rejoice Feat. TapSoul (6:51)
6. Ambassador Feat. Ubuntu Bros. (6:05)
7. Long Lasting (8:20)
8. Dead Sangoma (6:57)
9. Burning Desire Feat. Blaq K (6:22)
10. United As One (7:25)
11. Letter To Kabza De Small (5:36)
12. End Of Time (5:57)

Scenic Route follow up their now classic Nourished By Time album with the debut 7" from London's Natty Wylah. Tip for fans of Cobey Sey / Curl, Young Fathers and Wu Lu.

This year Natty Wylah has been cementing himself in London’s rich contemporary music scene with festival performances at Glastonbury, We Out Here with Silhouettes Project and a headline Southbank show as part of Nabihah Iqbal’s ‘Glory To Sound’ series. As well as contributions to Rhythm Sections, compilation ‘Shouts’ all in the run up to his next EP, "Willowisp".

"Moth Wings / FB Trap" is the perfect introduction to Natty’s world where magic, slime and reality all mix together. With his cinematic lyrics on "Mothwings", Natty conjures up the imagery of celestial moths, who when seeking the moonlight end up stuck chasing flickering artificial light bulbs. The track features the unmistakable characteristics of Natty’s sound: traipsing across hip-hop, the psychedelic and punk, all adorned with ethereal vocals and woozy synths from Poppy and Finn Billingham.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Scenic Route continue to scout out the hottest new sounds from the underground. After slaying us with that Nourished By Time album earlier in the year they now turn the spotlight on the charismatic Natty Wylah.

TRACK LISTING

A. Moth Wings
AA. FB Trap

Natural Information Society, like their partners in time Bitchin Bajas, live their days in flow motion. Rhythms come and go, instruments sound as a means to a greater end. Music is the way of their life. Their debut convergence, ‘Automaginary’, feels as natural as it does inevitable.

Both groups were first heard in 2010, both emerging from solo endeavours that accessed a vastness, more room than a single player might ultimately fill. Joshua Abrams, a questing bassist and improviser by trade, with an extensive discography of solo recordings and collaborations with a wide variety of artists, formed Natural Information Society as a conduit for the live presentation of his guimbri music. Abrams had delved into the sound of the three-stringed Gnawan lute on his own, intrigued by the instrument’s ability to provide melodic and rhythmic direction with a minimal, hypnotic palette. Over several years, many shows and three albums, Natural Information Society has featured some of Chicago’s most remarkable musicians while developing a sound situating Abrams’ compositions and playing in diverse sonic settings, amid ultimately consonant sounds from electric guitar, percussion, harmonium, reed instruments, bells, vibes and synthesizer. Over this time a core line up has emerged, featuring Frank Rosaly, Emmett Kelly, Ben Boye, Mikel Avery and Lisa Alvarado.

Cooper Crain of CAVE started Bitchin Bajas to explore his fascination with vintage electronics and recording techniques. With Dan Quinlivan on keyboards as well, Bitchin Bajas’ discography has explored a range of dynamic approaches, producing various proportions of atmosphere and soundtrack that move from becalmed stasis to synthetic beat-building with a prescient liquidity. Of late Rob Frye has joined, blowing reed and woodwind texture and naturally adding only the necessary ripple to their slow-unfurling ecstatic process.

Both Natural Information Society and Bitchin Bajas are in pursuit of the unconscious in their musical expression and through their independent methods both have ridden the wind to unseen places, using the playing as the carpet that will take them there. A multitude of influences swarm amoebically in their sounds, from the mud of ancient Afro-groove to 20thcentury classical austerity, from the clatter of freedom jazz to the 4/4 of Kraut and disco and fusion beyond.

Wrapped up in a screen-printed jacket by visual artist Lisa Alvarado, whose aesthetic sense is a touchstone for the vision of Natural Information Society.

'Totality'! It can only be good news. The second convergence of Natural Information Society and Bitchin Bajas, years removed from the first, misses no steps and posits low-key revolutions in gravity for everyone instead. LPs divide inevitably into two halves; here, the first side could be typed ‘space’ and the second side ‘time’. With loads of totally principled playing in the communal feel, both sides blur the edges warmly.

TRACK LISTING

1. Totality
2. Nothing Does Not Show
3. Always 9 Seconds Away
4. Clock No Clock

The artist formerly known as Matt Pond PA returns with the self-titled debut album from The Natural Lines. At once clearly Pond’s work yet a huge leap forward in its measured songcraft, melodic immediacy, collaborative detail and wryly questioning lyrics, the result is a gorgeous album of intimate reflections from a relocated, renamed, revivified talent.

Pond-watchers might wonder why the album took so long to arrive since Matt Pond PA’s last album proper, Still Summer (2017). But The Natural Lines was not a project to be rushed. Recorded with close collaborators and friends over a period that saw Pond make vital adjustments to his life, its stealth emergence reflects his desire to set a fresh pace for himself and come from somewhere new, somewhere more open.

Now based in Kingston, New York, with his partner and wild dog Willa, Matt explains the album’s gestation thus. “It was something different from the start. I wanted to write as purely as I could. Instead of getting stuck in the ‘tour, write an album, release an album, tour’ cycle, which is not a natural way of writing or living, I wanted to write an album and when it was done I wanted to make sure it was done. I didn’t want this feeling of, ‘Oh, we didn’t have time’, or, ‘I don’t know whether I believe in the songs but it’s coming out anyway.’ I used to be always racing to the finish line, but I’m not anymore.”

TRACK LISTING

1. Monotony
2. No More Tragedies
3. Help
4. Alex Bell
5. My Answer
6. Spontaneous Skylights
7. A Scene That Will Never Die
8. Person Of Interest
9. Don't Come Down
10. Artificial Moonlight
11. Mahwah

Dive into the cosmic grooves of Nebulous, the 8th album by UK's most enigmatic library music composer, to be released on digital and vinyl in January 2025. This 9-track odyssey takes The Natural Yogurt Band’s signature sound to an even richer galaxy with keyboardist Huw Rees aka The Oracle, who adds warped organs and electric pianos over gritty drum breaks and electric pulses, echoing the raw energy of space's farthest reaches—ideal for jazz heads seeking a unique listening experience.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: More from the singular psychedelic jazzers Natural Yoghurt Band. Rolling out their own peculiar blend of library-informed, instrumental grooves. There's elements of exotic and lounge amonst the lysergic jams.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Projections
A2. Altered States
A3. Bio Morphic Patterns
A4. Messages
A5. Nebulous

B1. Perception
B2. Poly Morph
B3. Existence
B4. Dimensions

Legendary Nature Boy returns with six slammin disco-inspired club bombs. Tracks were derived from original floppies from the early 90's. The time when Milo produced and released classics like "Ruff Disco Volume One" and "Necessary Ruffness Volumes 1 and 2"!

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Milo from the Wild Bunch digs into his DATS once again to bring us some more house jams that kick like a mule.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Bassline Jumper
A2. Dirty Games
A3. Your Body
B1. Piece Of You
B2. Unaffected (Reprise)
B3. Unaffected (Raw Demo)

Door-to-door heartbreak salesmen Nature TV peddle an elixir of jangle indie & melancholic yacht rock. Having amassed a catalogue of seven EPs – each a branch of perennial, lovelorn dream-pop folded through classy sonic interior decoration & swift compositional turns – debut album 'Unlucky for Some' continues the theme of heartbreak in high-fidelity. Like few others, Nature TV are able to missile misery at your dopamine receptors via compositions so rich they should have trust funds. It’s an almost impossible tightrope walk that only the most agile of songwriters can sustain. The result is their cleanest and leanest collection to date. An LP that hums with meticulous attention to detail yet feels as woozy as taking downers in a hot tub. An indie-jangle party band at the height of their powers, except the party has ended and they’ve been tasked with soundtracking the cleanup. Someone passed out in a patio chair barley clutching a smartphone, cigarette butts mushed into empty cans, a door pulled off its hinges, the pool now semi-septic, rain streaming down the windows, and everyone has work in the morning.

FFO Real Estate, Ducktails, Glitter Party.

TRACK LISTING

1. One Step Forward
2. Aways It Goes
3. Helpless And Hoping
4. Simple Dog
5. My Life
6. Lesley
7. Travelling Girl
8. Lay Low
9. Meds
10. Staying For The Weekend
11. Late Night
12. Secret Sisters
13. Subtle Treasures

RIYL: Holy Hive, Dream Sitch, Reverend Baron, Whitney, Damien Jurado, Kevin Morby, Cotton Jones, Cut Worms. Michael Nau is set to release his fifth full length record under Karma Chief Records on Dec 8th. All 11 tracks come together to paint a beautiful picture. The lyrics invoke the listener’s imagination throughout. They’re introspective, but vague and open-ended. The indie rock backdrop shows signs of psych-soul influence with dry and punchy drums, lush synth lines, and tastefully verb-soaked vocal production. Nau’s vocal delivery falls somewhere between crooning to a crowd, telling stories to a loved one, and musing to himself. The singer-songwriter’s relaxed attitude toward making records is discernible in the sound. A while back, veteran producer and engineer Adrien Olsen (The Killers, Lucy Dacus, Fruit Bats), approached him about recording in his Richmond, Virginia-based studio. He called a few old friends that consisted of several long-time collaborators and musicians who had participated in Nau’s various recording and touring efforts over the years. Nau and the band spent five days at Montrose Recording and left with a plan to return and finish up a few months later.

“After the first session, I took a copy of the recordings with me to overdub a few things at my spot,” Michael shared. “Then, I dumped the whole thing onto a cassette as one long stream of songs.” With the record mostly complete ,the final session at Montrose would consist of some simple overdubs and finishing touches. But somehow, in the months between, he lost the overdubs. “Going into the second session, all I had was the cassette,” Michael explained. The band got back together and performed another batch of songs. At the end of their second session, they had enough music to pick and choose from for the new full-length. “The songs, as they appear on the album, are basically how they were recorded as a live band.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Brittle ballads that are both tenderly delivered and unerringly emotive, with Nau's perfectly reverb-laiden vocal covering it all like a blanket. Mournful in points but always a joy to listen to.

TRACK LISTING

1. Sharp Diamonds
2. Painting A Wall
3. Tiny Flakes
4. Shiftshaping
5. And So On
6. One Morning In Vibrato
7. Relearn To Boogie
8. Accompaniment
9. Comes To Pour
10. Long Distance Driver

‘Michael Nau & The Mighty Thread’ is the follow-up to last year’s critically acclaimed album ‘Some Twist’ and its extension ‘The Load’ EP (feat. Natalie Prass).

The sprawling new album was recorded in guitarist Benny Yurco’s one-bedroom apartment in downtown Burlington, Vermont. Nau and his collaborators had a cool little set up going in Yurco’s spot — drums and bass took over the bedroom, the guitar amp in the bathroom, Nau’s vocals and piano in the living room, and a vibraphone in the kitchen. It’s the first time one of Nau’s records happened all in one place, and “it feels most like a band record than ever before”. Nau and this particular group of musicians held it down together as a true team, which is why Nau named the record in their honour. The songs on this layered record sound sunny and familiar, like sharing stories and worries with a close friend on a late summer day. In a gorgeous and natural way, he contemplates his own process, those feelings of uncertainty. “Making it too hard just comes easier,” Nau croons on ‘Funny In Real Life,’ an exquisite meditation on creation and self. “Truth is such a beautiful force/And every time we find the chorus/There’s no second-guessing the real/I don’t ever know how I feel.” 

STAFF COMMENTS

Andy says: The Richard Hawley of Americana returns with another swoonsome collection of mellow classics-in-waiting. Superb, as ever.

TRACK LISTING

1. Less Than Positive
2. Shadow On
3. When
4. What's A Loon
5. Far The Far
6. No Faraway Star
7. Funny In Real Life
8. On Ice
9. Funny Wind
10. Can't Take One
11. Smudge

Michael Nau returns with his new album, Some Twist, on Full Time Hobby. Some Twist is the follow up to 2016’s Mowing and its announcement comes amidst a flurry of recent activity. Two weeks ago, Nau debuted songs from Some Twist on KCRW’s Morning Becomes Eclectic and headlined two sold out shows on back-to-back nights in Los Angeles. He has received extensive BBC radio play and been selected as a “6 Music Recommends” pick. Oneoff single “Love Survive” cracked the top 50 on Spotify's Global Viral Chart and Elton John has played Nau on his Beats1 show.

The first single from Some Twist is “Good Thing”. Bright piano and fingerpicked guitar weave together throughout the song with a chorus that swells with feedback fuzz and crashing percussion. Nau’s ever-present sense of humor, one of the hallmarks of his songwriting, gives the song a wry sense of purpose amidst its reflection.

“His masterful instinct for arrangement, along with his reedy voice, earns Nau a place in the rock’n’roll underdogs’ Hall of Fame.” - Pitchfork

"A beguiling debut - a warm bath of baroque pop, country and Hazlewood-like balladry" - Uncut

“Recalls cadences of 1970s Ned Doheny and solo David Byrne, with a hint of Brian Wilson” - The Fader

"A breezy, laid-back union between country, folk, and classic pop" The Line of Best Fit

"Intimate and inviting" Q

STAFF COMMENTS

Andy says: This gorgeous LP was made in the heat, to be listened to in the heat. Michael Nau is an American singer-songwriter who’s previously been in a couple of bands, but went solo in 2016 with his lovely debut record, ‘Mowing’. It was all good and garnered decent praise, but ‘Some Twist’ is a brilliant progression and something you absolutely need in your life! Conjuring warm, 70s, analogue sounds in a country, folky, gently psychy style, these are supremely melodic songs, beautifully sung. Nau has the sweetest voice which glides between the fruity, deep croon of a more wistful Fred Neil and the light, flutey flightiness of a star-sailing Harry Nilson. Not bad, eh? But it's the texture of the album with its FX laden guitars, beat box grooves, echoes, horns, fuzz and static, which really entrances. You'll think you've stumbled upon a long-lost West Coast, classic LP. You have. But it's Nau!

TRACK LISTING

1. Good Thing
2. I Root
3. Wonder
4. How You're So For Real
5. Scumways
6. Oh, You Wanna Bet?
7. Waiting, Too
8. Scatter
9. Twelve
10. The Load
11. Done Wonder
12. Light That Ever

Iconoclastic Afghan-American street music project Naujawanan Baidar makes its long anticipated return with "Khedmat Be Khalq," its third album and first new release in three years. Originally planned as a "studio debut" in the classic sense, a veritable avalanche of setbacks tangled and delayed the recording process over a span of several years as compounded tragedies - both international and personal - disrupted the project's intended transition from simply being a ramshackle demo/home-recording outlet for founder N.R. Safi (The Myrrors, et al) into a properly working band. At the end of the day the process of assembling what would eventually become "Khedmat Be Khalq" became a lot like that of the previous two releases: gnarled and sun-baked tracks cut up and collated into a blown out collage of sound. If there is any obvious difference this time around it is perhaps to be found in the increased focus of the material. Whereas the group's previous two projects ran the gamut from sparse acoustic improvisations to tape-loop-inspired noise, "Khedmat Be Khalq" presents a more unified hybrid of Afghan folks styles and electric energy, further exploring Safi's "maximalist minimalism" approach. Tape-saturated and over-amplified Afghan rubab, armonia, and ghichak meet pounding multi-layered rhythms that at times hint at 1970s-1980s industrial music or the heady throb of German krautrock groups like Faust or Amon Düül. Perhaps nowhere is this unique combination more striking than in Naujawanan Baidar's swirling re-arrangement of the Afghan folk classic "Raftim Az Ayn Baagh" that closes the album. The rubab melody that serves as the song's core is warped into something that in all honesty wouldn't sound particularly out of place spun between early Savage Republic and Crash Worship. Lyrically the album moves away from the more abstract and impressionistic style of Safi's earlier material towards a concrete attempt to address the struggle of the Afghan masses from the complicated perspective of the international diaspora. The songs here work to draw out and examine the contradictions and challenges faced by a people once again locked in the talons of a sociopathic religious fundamentalism, connecting the country's position to the current global fight against imperialism, militarism, and resurgent fascism, and attempting to recover obscured historical fragments and lessons surrounding the proud radical history of Afghanistan's diverse population over countless decades of intensive struggle. It is here that Naujawanan Baidar's "street music" aesthetic blossoms into a sort of avant garde agitprop - a militant soundtrack angling at a revolution.