My Soft Machine is a deeply personal body of work; a narration of Parks’ experiences as she navigates her 20’s and the growth intertwined. Explained ever-articulately in her own words below...

“The world/our view of it is peppered by the biggest things we experience - our traumas, upbringing, vulnerabilities almost like visual snow. This record is life through my lens, through my body - the mid 20s anxiety, the substance abuse of friends around me, the viscera of being in love for the first time, navigating PTSD and grief and self sabotage and joy, moving through worlds with wonder and sensitivity - what it’s like to be trapped in this particular body. There is a quote from a Joanna Hogg film called the Souvenir, it’s an A24 semi-autobiographical film with Tilda Swinton - it recounts a young film student falling in love with an older, charismatic man as a young film student then being drawn into his addiction - in an early scene he’s explaining why people watch films - “we don’t want to see life as it is played out we want to see life as it is experienced in this soft machine.” So there we have it, the record is called....My Soft Machine.” - Arlo Parks

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: The superb Arlo Parks returns following her 2021 Mercury prize win, with a hugely personal and beautifully evocative selection of downbeat synth gems and woozy, wistful R&B. Parks has proved once again that both her songwriting and production talents are endless.

TRACK LISTING

Bruiseless
Impurities
Devotion
Blades
Purple Phase
Weightless
Pegasus Ft. Phoebe Bridgers
Dog Rose
Puppy
I'm Sorry
Room (red Wings)
Ghost

One of the most important voices in British folk music Shirley Collins returns with Archangel Hill, her third album for Domino. Due for release on May 26th, it showcases another peerless collection of songs chosen by Collins, some from traditional sources but others from favourite writers of hers.

Produced by Ian Kearey - Shirley Collins’ musical director - the arrangements were shared between Collins, Kearey, Pip Barnes, as well as Dave Arthur and Pete Cooper, players from The Lodestar Band.

All of the songs on Archangel Hill were recorded last year except for “Hand And Heart”, which was taken from a live performance at the Sydney Opera House in 1980 and features an arrangement by Shirley’s beloved and talented sister Dolly Collins.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: There are few artists more legendary in folk circles than the great Shirley Collins, and 'Archangel Hill' perfectly illustrates why. Warm, evocative folk songs, bathed in Collins' weathered vocals. Thoroughly lovely, bathed in the warm haze of summer.

TRACK LISTING

1. Fare Thee Well My Dearest Dear
2. Lost In A Wood
3. The Captain With The Whiskers
4. June Apple
5. The Golden Glove
6. High And Away
7. Oakham Poachers
8. Hares On The Mountain
9. Hand And Heart
10. The Bonny Labouring Boy
11. Swaggering Boney
12. How Far Is It To Bethlehem?
13. Archangel Hill

Pozi are the sort of band to tackle the creative cycle of deconstruction and rebuilding with relish. Second album ‘Smiling Pools’ is testament to that. An LP that sees them at their most expansive yet, it follows a gradual swelling of their sound across two EPs proceeding the urgent, self-enforced minimalism of their debut album ‘PZ1’ in 2019.

The trio of Toby Burroughs, Rosa Brook, and Tom Jones quickly established something of a foundational template on that first album: a hyper-skeletal sound palette of drums, bass and three distinct vocals disrupted by Rosa’s churning violins, from which emerged biting social observations and political angst – debut single and angry retort to the 2017 Grenfell tragedy KCTMO still takes pride of place in their live set.

These hallmarks haven’t fully gone away over time but from that urgent energy there has emerged greater confidence and a playful desire to push further out from the loose genre tag of post-punk they were initially saddled with.

“We want our music to evoke a feeling and emotion rather than just being a commentary. I feel that the tracks on Smiling Pools demonstrate that we’re taking our music to a different place and we want to bring the listener along on that journey.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: While PZ1 was a statement piece from a band determined to make an impact (and make an impact they did), 'Smiling Pools' shows a development that could only come from a band at ease with their process and inter-band chemistry. It's bold, melodic in parts and yet still true to the moody post-punk adjacent noise we've come to love from them. a stunning and endlessly deep work.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
1. What You Came For
2. Slightly Shaking Cells
3. Failing
4. Pest Control
5. Somnambulance
6. Through The Door

Side B
7. M6 Toll
8. Heavenly
9. Faulty Receiver
10. Shut Up
11. 24 Deliveru
12. A Walk In The Park

From ‘OK Computer’ to ‘Screamadelica’, history has shown that a band’s third album is when shit starts to get real. When, after an introductory debut and a second that tests new waters, the particular alchemy of a group stamps its personality in ways that no other configuration of individuals can do; when the outside voices have been tempered and all that’s left is a perfect cocktail of confidence, skill and momentum. It’s a theory that’s been proven time and time again, and one that Newcastle trio Demob Happy are underlining with ‘Divine Machines’: a third album that harnesses their delicate tightrope of heaviness and melody, sweetness and riffs, and rides it up to the stratosphere.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: 'Divine Machines' shows Demob happy have perfectly harnessed the psychedelic heft and 60's leaning rock and / or roll of bands like The Dandy Warhols or one-time psych pals The Brian Jonestown Massacre. It's playful and melodic but filled with moments of unyielding heft and soring riffs.

TRACK LISTING

Token Appreciation Society
Voodoo Science
Earth Mover
Tear It Down
Musuclar Reflex
Are You Thinking?
Super-fluid
She's As Happy As A Man Can Be
God's Coffee
Run Baby Run
I Have A Problem (i Ignore)
Divine Machines
Hades, Baby

Life is horribly dark right now. And yet, it is not unfunny.

That’s the sentiment that animates Water From Your Eyes on their new album, and first for Matador, ‘Everyone’s Crushed’. On the follow-up to the Brooklyn duo’s 2021 breakthrough, ‘Structure’, Rachel Brown (they/them) and Nate Amos (he/him) find silliness and fatalism dancing in a frantic lockstep, using heart palpitating rhythms and absurdist, deadpan lyrics to convey stories of personal and societal unease. Described by Brown as Water From Your Eyes’ most collaborative record ever, it’s a swollen contusion of an album: experimental pop music that’s pretty and violent, raw and indelible.

‘Everyone’s Crushed’ is shot through with unresolved tension, its nine tracks skittishly refusing to seek out resolute endings or stick to traditional structures. Many songs were written using serialism and microtonalism, and at times evoke the futurist-pop moves of Japanese composer Haruomi Hosono and the brutalism of Glenn Branca. “Barley” is a dance-rock track sequenced in alien tonality, with Brown speaking garbled transmissions (“One two three/Counter/You’re a cool thing count mountains”) over a bed of hallucinatory guitars. “14” leans into contemporary classical, with curtains of overlapping de-tuned strings underscoring lyrics that Nate describes as something out of a “gross-out horror movie”: “I’m ready to throw you up.”

Water From Your Eyes still possess an off kilter, shitposty quality. ‘Everyone’s Crushed’ manages to reference classic rock twice – first, on “Barley,” when Brown accidentally invokes Sting with the lyric “walk in fields of gold,” and again on “True Life”, when they sing: “Neil let me sing your song/It’s been this way for so long/Give me another chance.” Those weren’t the song’s original lyrics – Brown and Amos initially wanted to interpolate the bridge to “Cinnamon Girl” – but this is a typically meta compromise for the pair, a way to turn “True Life” into a song about writing the song “True Life”.

‘Everyone’s Crushed’ maps the liminal space between humor and darkness, between cracking up and freaking out. In the album’s closing moments Brown speaks in direct terms, “Clap those hands/Buy my product/There are no happy endings/I’m spending/I’m spending.” It’s playful and totally serious, punky bordering on anarchic, and a resolution to the record’s opening sentiment - “I just wanted to pray for the rain/Wishful thinking for sunny days.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Ashley says: A wonderfully bold, jagged juxtaposition of gritty electronics and swooning guitar riffs, all topped with perfectly measured vocals and soaring harmonies. It's steeped in post-punk and electronic history, but lightened with a melodic sensibility that could only have bloomed from the past 20 years of pop history.

TRACK LISTING

1. Structure
2. Barley
3. Out There
4. Open
5. Everyone’s Crushed
6. True Life
7. Remember Not My Name
8. 14
9. Buy My Product

The Girl Is Crying In Her Latte marks Sparks’ first release on the venerable Island Records label in close to five decades, following such classics as 1974’s landmark Kimono My House, highlighted of course by the indelible hit single ‘This Town Ain’t Big Enough For Both Of Us’. The new album is described by Ron and Russell Mael as a record that is “as bold and uncompromising as anything we did back then or, for that matter, anytime throughout our career.”

The album includes such instantly intriguing new musical vignettes as ‘Mona Lisa’s Packing, Leaving Late Tonight’ and ‘Nothing Is As Good As They Say It Is’, songs which once again display Sparks’ seemingly ceaseless ability to craft complete, intricately detailed stories within perfect three-and-a-half minute pop masterpieces. Both characteristically timeless and unequivocally modern, The Girl Is Crying In Her Latte once again affirms that, after more than a half century making such masterpieces, Sparks remain inimitable, ingenious and, as ever, utterly one of a kind. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: The sound of Sparks is uniquely theirs, bold pop chorus' and snappy vocal hooks, blooming from subtle and minimalistic to grand and orchestral without batting an eyelid. The title track is particularly enjoyable, showing both innovative groove and classic, Sparks melodies.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Girl Is Crying In Her Latte
2. Veronica Lake
3. Nothing Is As Good As They Say It Is
4. Escalator
5. The Mona Lisa's Packing, Leaving Late Tonight
6. You Were Meant For Me
7. Not That Well-Defined
8. We Go Dancing
9. When You Leave
10. Take Me For A Ride
11. A Love Story
12. It's Sunny Today
13. It Doesn't Have To Be That Way
14. Gee, That Was Fun

Albert’s Favourites label founder Scrimshire is set to release bold new album 'Paroxysm'. In the last few weeks of October 2022, Scrimshire wrote a new collection of songs with the descriptive working title "Scream". A direct response to the absurdity of the breakdown in the UK government, the horror of the treatment of refugees arriving on our shores and the callous disregard for the trauma being caused to low-income people or anyone considered "other". The anger, sadness, mourning, and frustration he felt was poured into these recordings.

Originally named “Scream 8”, ‘Unity Gain’ was one of the early outpourings from those sessions. Piano and drums bubble up until it fully boils over with huge stabbing synthesiser and string sounds in an outburst of frenetic energy. "Division seems to characterise our daily experience”, says Scrimshire. “How does a society stop the callousness and corruption from seeping into its bones?".

Singer Faye Houston features on both ‘Eyes Shut’ as well as, alongside saxophonist, composer, and multi-wind instrumentalist Tamar Osborn, on ‘Flames’. About the latter Scrimshire explains, “One person can breathe fire into your life and the world, leaving an indelible mark. The album was influenced hugely by a friend we sadly have lost. I think of it like the heat you still feel after a fire has gone out”.

London-based poet and emcee The Repeat Beat Poet captures moments of time, thought, and feeling on ‘What Is The State Of Our State’, a furious yet succinct stream-of-consciousness diatribe in two parts. From afrobeat and reggae-influenced London band Soothsayers, clarinetist and saxophonist Idris Rahman features on ‘Your Invasion Is A Lie’, an ever-progressing, cosmic-jazz track.

The elegiac ‘Unforgotten, Unforgiven’ features saxophonist Nat Birchall, on which Scrimshire says "This is dedicated to the politicians who have forced refugees into life-threatening decisions. Pushing people into the hands of traffickers, into small boats and too many beneath the waves of our seas. Who force the lives of men, women, and children into more danger, in the hope of escaping war, poverty and persecution only to meet more cruelty and persecution. It won't be forgotten, and it won't be forgiven".

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Paroxysm is the epitome of emotive, rich spiritual jazz, bringing together flickering percussion and rich bass rolls that both surprise and transport the listener. It's an intense experience, but so beautifully balanced and perfectly measured that it never comes across as anything less than a bracing and fascinating listen.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Permeate
A2. Unity Gain
A3. Eyes Shut Feat. Faye Houston
A4. What Is The State Of Our State (Part 1) Feat. Repeat Beat Poet
A5. Your Invasion Is A Lie Feat. Idris Rahman
B1. Unforgotten, Unforgiven
B2. What Is The State Of Our State (Part 2) Feat. Repeat Beat Poet
B3. Flames Feat. Faye Houston & Tamar Osborn
B4. Refuge (Interlude)
B5. Refuge

Hania Rani announces "On Giacometti" a tender meditation on the life and art of Alberto Giacometti and family.

"On Giacometti" is a collection of beautiful recordings inspired by the renowned artist and family and features some of Rani's most profoundly delicate compositions to date. Invited by film director Susanna Fanzun, to score her forthcoming documentary on the legendary artist Alberto Giacometti, Hania Rani took herself to the Swiss mountains to compose in blissful isolation. As Rani explains eloquently below the compositions are based on improvised melodies, simple harmonies and structures and inspired by the silence of the mountains as Rani returns to her main instrument, the piano. The results are beguilingly reminiscent of her beloved debut album Esja, but with subtle extra layers of synthesiser, and on two tracks cello from friend and long-running collaborator Dobrawa Czocher.

'On Giacometti' is presented as a limited edition LP with bespoke packaging featuring Les Naturals -Chocolat (Gmund) sustainable recycled paperboard made from 100 % recovered paper with Foil Artwork by Łukasz Pałczyński. Plus Double sided printed insert and download code inside.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: I'm a big fan of ambient and modern classical music, and Hania Rani is one of my more recent artist discoveries, and one of my absolute favourites. Tender prepared paino pieces a-la Frahm, echoic room sounds and shimmering reverb. Soft strong sweeps and pad-like swells offset the more frantic piano pieces with panaceas of calm. Stunning.

TRACK LISTING

1. Allegra
2. Spring
3. Stampa
4. Struggle
5. Morning
6. In Between
7. Knots
8. Dreamy
9. Storm
10. Time
11. Mountains
12. Annette
13. Alberto

Kassa Overall is a Grammy-nominated musician, emcee, singer, producer and drummer who melds avant-garde experimentation with hip-hop production techniques to tilt the nexus of jazz and rap in unmapped directions.

On ANIMALS, his kaleidoscopic Warp Records debut, Kassa engages with themes of race and mental illness and pushes his subversive vision further with an allstar roster of collaborators including Danny Brown, Wiki, Lil B, Shabazz Palaces, Nick Hakim, Laura Mvula, Theo Croker and more.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Kassa's debut for Warp Records draws a rare path between modern jazz and classic R&B, moving deftly from sleazy nu-lounge grooves to clattering percussive breaks and wonky minimalistic pop.

TRACK LISTING

1. No Camera
2. Anxious Anthony (feat. Anthony Ware)
3. Ready To Ball
4. Clock Ticking (feat. Danny Brown & Wiki)
5. Still Ain’t Find Me (feat. Tomoki Sanders, BendjiAllonce, Mike King & Ian Fink)
6. Make My Way Back Home (feat. Nick Hakim &Theo Croker)
7. The Lava Is Calm (feat. Theo Croker)
8. No It Ain’t (feat. Andrae Murchison)
9. So Happy (feat. LauraMvula & Francis And The Lights)
10. It’s Animals
11. Maybe We Can Stay (feat. J. Hoard)
12. The Score Was Made (feat. Vijay Iyer)
13. Going Up (feat. Lil B, Shabazz Palaces & Francis And The Lights)

Rhoda Dakar is back with her first solo album in seven years with Version Girl, a collection of reggae and ska covers by artists and songwriters she admires. Rhoda Dakar began her musical career as lead vocalist with all female 2Tone band, The Bodysnatchers. They only ever released two singles, 'Let's Do Rocksteady' and 'Easy Life'. After a year together they split and Rhoda went on to guest with The Specials in Europe and the USA, having featured on their second album, 'More Specials', for which she won the first of her seven gold records. After their demise, and before joining Jerry Dammers' new project, she recorded The Bodysnatchers' first original song, 'The Boiler', a harrowing tale of date rape, which was inevitably banned. The Special AKA spent the next two years recording 'In The Studio', spawning a top ten hit with 'Free Nelson Mandela'.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Dakar takes these classics and gives them all a deep makeover into grooving Reggae, laid-back ska and swooning Lovers Rock reworks. Topped with Dakar's perfectly fitting vocal accompaniments.

TRACK LISTING

1. Version Girl
2. Stop Your Sobbing
3. Everyday Is Like Sunday
4. What A Wonderful World
5. Hangin’ ‘Round
6. Song To The Siren
7. Walking After Midnight
8. The Man Who Sold The World
9. Comme Un Arbre
10. As Tears Go By
11. Love Hurts
12. Peace, Love And Understanding 

Intergalactic prog-ravers HENGE launch ‘Alpha Test 4’.The album, the band’s third, is a collection of indescribable sounds garnered from far off worlds.

Side A contains six blistering, energetic tracks designed to stimulate and educate - each one taking the listener on a brief, adventurous musical encounter beyond their wildest imagination. It features the single “Get A Wriggle On”, a joyous electro/prog banger calling for immediate action to tackle the climate crisis looming over Earth, along with a glitchy vignette about malfunctioning robots called “Self Repair Protocol”. Side A also contains squelching paeans for the virtue of discovery, both in the galaxy (“Wanderlust”) and the mind (“Altered State”), as well as a trippy tribute to one of the most resilient creatures known to humans, “Tardigrades”.

The mind-expanding Side B, meanwhile, sees HENGE collate a batch of cosmic, melody-melting epics. Listeners will be taken on a psychedelic journey through the arpeggiated radiations of “Ra” to the Space Rock salute of Asteroid, arriving at the love letter to Earth that is “First Encounter”.

HENGE have been delighting audiences across the UK and Europe since they landed on Earth seven years ago. Their music - known as “Cosmic Dross" - escapes definition, but occupies a space between rave and prog rock that nobody knew existed - going ‘where no band has gone before’. Ultimately, HENGE spread a message of hope that leaves audiences feeling amused and uplifted in equal measure.

TRACK LISTING

Get A Wriggle On
Self Repair Protocol
Wanderlust
Tardigrade
DNA
Altered State
Ra
First Encounter
Alpha Test 4
Asteroid

Baby Rose is undeniably a once-in-a-lifetime artist. She burst onto the scene with her 2019 debut project To Myself, which has amassed over 25 million global streams to date and landed her early co-signs by SZA, J. Cole, James Blake, Kehlani, and LeBron James. Later the singer received a Grammy nomination for her contribution to Dreamville’s Revenge of the Dreamers III album and was also featured on albums from Big Krit and Matt Martians.

Through and Through will show Baby Rose like we have never seen or heard her before. Sonically, the album see’s Rose carving out a lane for herself that is unrestricted by genres and showcases her extraordinary range as a skilled singer, songwriter and executive producer. Paired with her once-in-a-lifetime voice, Through and Through will exist like nothing else in music right now. 

At first, Gia Margaret called her new album ‘Romantic Piano’ to be a bit cheeky. Its spare, gentle piano works share more spirit with Erik Satie, Emahoy Tsegué- Maryam Guébrou and the ‘Marginalia’ releases of Masakatsu Takagi than they do with, say, a cozy and candlelit date night. But in that cheekiness lies hidden intention: across the gorgeous set, “Romantic” is suggested in a more classic sense, what the Germans call waldeinsamkeit. Its compositions conjure the sublime themes of the Romantic poets: solitude in nature; nature’s ability to heal and to teach; a sense of contented melancholy. “I wanted to make music that was useful,” says Margaret, vastly understating the power of the record. ‘Romantic Piano’ is curious, calming, patient and incredibly moving — but it doesn’t overstay its welcome for more than a second.

Margaret’s debut, ‘There’s Always Glimmer,’ was a lyrical wonder, but when an illness on tour left her unable to sing, she made her ambient album ‘Mia Gargaret’ (another cheeky title!) which revealed a keen intuition for arrangement and composition not fully shown on ‘There’s Always Glimmer’s lyrical songs. ‘Romantic Piano’, too, is almost totally without words. “Writing instrumental music, in general, is a much more joyful process than I find in lyrical songwriting,” she says. “The process ultimately effects my songwriting.” And while Margaret has more songwriterly material on the way, ‘Romantic Piano’ solidifies her as a compositional force.

Originally pursing a degree in composition, Margaret dropped out of music school halfway through. “I really didn’t want to play in an orchestra,” she said of her decision, “I really just wanted to write movie scores. Then, I started to focus more and more on being a songwriter. ‘Romantic Piano’ scratched an old itch.” ‘Romantic Piano’ does indeed touch on a rare feeling in art often only reserved for the cinema — a simultaneous wide-lens awe of existence and the post-language intimate inner monologue of being marooned in these skulls of ours. How very Romantic!

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A:
1) Hinoki Wood
2) Ways Of Seeing
3) Cicadas
4) Juno
5) A Stretch
6) City Song

SIDE B:
7) Sitting At The Piano
8) Guitar Piece
9) La Langue De L’amitié (feat. David Bazan)
10) 2017
11) April To April
12) Cinnamon
13) A Hidden Track (Physical Only)

Welsh post-punk unit Chain Of Flowers return with their lofty and long-simmering sophomore full-length, rich with reckonings, reverb, and redemption: Never Ending Space. Despite some of the songs dating back a few years, the record first began materialising in earnest during the pandemic, by which point most of the band had relocated from Cardiff to London. Reunited and rejuvenated, they picked up where they left off, booking two multi-day sessions at Hackney hub Total Refreshment Centre with producer Jonah Falco. In this time they successfully channelled their kinetic chemistry into 10 full-blooded anthems of torn dreams, poetic delirium, and “hope stretched too far.”

Musically, Never Ending Space skews notably more maximal than the group’s previous work, fleshed out with trumpets, saxophone, synth, percussion boxes, and spoken word. (Smith jokingly calls them The Chain Of Flowers Orchestra). Yet the songs still swing and soar with a charged heart, ripe with hooks, drama and ragged melody. Opener “Fire (In The Heart Of Hearts)” stirs to life on a tide of wiry guitar and defiant horns, facing down the embers of love that still glow in the wake of pain: “Peace came tumbling like a shower of bricks / The mind twists slowly till everything fits.” A tense energy ripples throughout – from the nocturnal rush of “Serving Purpose” and “Amphetamine Luck” to the bruised battle cries of “Torcalon” and “Old Human Material.” Outliers like “Praying Hands, Turtle Doves” hint at proggy possible futures, while instrumental vignette “Anomia” offers an intriguing glimpse at a lesser heard facet of the band: swaying, shadowy, subdued.

The album’s title track is also its closing cut, a stomping, sparkling ode to “the wrong side of the night, where time goes to die.” Smith describes the scene: “Everyone’s talking, screaming, trauma bonding, but no one’s listening. Broken dialogue. Shouting over each other. You want to switch off, but everyone’s too fucked.” The guitars spiral and slide towards the oblivion of dawn, the chance to crash and do it all again. The song’s refrain captures the elision of time, spilling through the haze of days, from chaos to acceptance: “I can’t see the clock through the shrouds of smoke / Does it matter? / Common ground / In a never ending space.”

TRACK LISTING

1. Fire (In The Heart Of Hearts)
2. Cosmic Whip
3. Serving Purpose
4. Praying Hands, Turtle Doves
5. Amphetamine Luck
6. Torcalon
7. The Wall
8. Old Human Material
9. Anomia
10. Never Ending Space

GUT, the brand new album from Ivor Novello winning musician and composer Daniel Blumberg.

An unflinchingly raw and personal album. A suite of six songs performed entirely by Blumberg comprising an extraordinary, soaring vocal take and an unconventional palette of bass harmonica, Steinberger ebass, synthesiser and electronic drums. The album makes reference to the intestinal disease Blumberg has suffered over the last few years, its songs tracing a body stripped back and rebuilt: renderings of pain, frustration and fatigue in ballads made sinew and bone.

New York director Brady Corbet (Vox Lux, Childhood of a Leader) has made a film to the album shot on 16mm, which will be released at a later date.

GUT is Blumberg’s third solo record on Mute following the release of Minus (2018) and On&On (2020), as well as his award winning score for the film The World To Come (dir. Mona Fastvold, 2021).

TRACK LISTING

1. BONE
2. CHEERUP
3. HOLDBACK
4. BODY
5. KNOCK
6. GUT

‘The Portable Herman Dune’ Vol. 3 is the final part of Herman Dune’s acoustic anthology, in which 22 years of songwriting are laid bare, stripped to the most intimate bone. Though sonically naked, the songs are bundled up in emotion and loaded with life.

Emerging from Reading in the late 1980s, Chapterhouse burst onto the British music scene with 1990’s ‘Freefall’ EP and the critically acclaimed album ‘Whirlpool’. Impossible to categorise, the band were quickly embraced by both the music press and a global audience, and soon found themselves part of the emergent shoegaze scene alongside contemporaries such as Slowdive and Ride.

Curated by the band and overflowing with previously unheard material, ‘Chronology’ charts Chapterhouse’s progress through two brilliant albums, a number of classic singles and EPs, remixes by contemporaries such as Global Communication, Drum Club and Spooky, and their attempt to write and record an ultimately unrealised third album. Told through new interview material, previously unseen imagery and design overseen by the band themselves, this is the story of one of the most individual and enigmatic bands of their era, and one who continue to be cherished by both their original fanbase and a generation of new fans drawn to the shoegaze scene’s revival over the past decade.

Packaged in a hard slipcase box, complete with mini LP replica wallets and a 64 page booklet, and five years in the making, ‘Chronology’ is a definitive, in-depth set which will inspire nostalgia among fans of a certain age and creativity among those currently exploring similar sonic territory.

TRACK LISTING

Freefall, Sunburst & Whirlpool
1. Ecstasy Ii
2. Need (somebody)
3. Inside Of Me
4. Sixteen Years
5. Something More (sunburst)
6. Satin Safe
7. Rain
8. Feel The Same
9. Breather
10. Pearl
11. Autosleeper
12. Treasure
13. Falling Down
14. April
15. Guilt
16. If You Want Me
17. Something More

Pearl, Mesmerise And Courtyard Demos
1. Come Heaven
2. In My Arms
3. Mesmerise
4. Precious One
5. Summer Chill
6. Then We’ll Rise
7. For What It’s Worth (demo)
8. Confusion Trip (demo)*
9. Raised From Inside (demo)*
10. Get To Me (demo)*
11. Dream On (demo)
12. Never Enough (demo)*
13. In The Way (demo)*
14. If You Try (demo)*
15. Until You Try (demo)
16. Walk Water (demo)*

Blood Music And B-sides
1. Don’t Look Now
2. There’s Still Life
3. We Are The Beautiful
4. Summer’s Gone
5. Everytime
6. Deli
7. On The Way To Fly
8. She’s A Vision
9. Greater Power
10. Confusion Trip
11. Love Forever
12. Picnic (new Edit)
13. Age
14. Frost

Pentamerous Metamorphosis (blood Music Retranslated By Global Communication)
1. Alpha Phase
2. Beta Phase
3. Gamma Phase
4. Delta Phase
5. Epsilon Phase

Rarities And Remixes
1. Ecstasy I (demo)
2. Falling Down (freefall)
3. It Won’t Be Wrong
4. Losing Touch With My Mind
5. Die, Die, Die
6. Mesmerise (extended Remix)
7. Precious One (extended Remix)
8. We Are The Beautiful (spooky Extravaganja Mix)
9. We Are The Beautiful (spooky’s Ugly As Sin Mix New Edit)
10. Don’t Look Now (drum Club’s Sitar Trance Mix New Edit)
11. Montpellier Freeway*

Demos 1994-1995
1. Too Late (demo)*
2. Ocean Arms (acoustic Demo)*
3. Help Yourself (demo)*
4. More Than I Can Take (demo)
5. Let The Sunshine In (demo)*
6. Every Gift (demo)*
7. Feel (demo)
8. We Can Fly (demo)*
9. Another Life (demo)*
10. Medusa (demo)*
11. I Saw You (demo)*
12. Brighter (demo)
13. Make A Wish (demo)*
14. Zerodown (demo)*
15. Looking Back (demo)*
16. Crazy Kane (demo)

*previously Unreleased

This compilation is a fundraiser for Faslane Peace Camp. Not so far from Glasgow Faslane Naval Base is home to Britain's abhorrent Trident nuclear missiles. The camp has been there, protesting since 1982 and is still active to this day. We hope in our lifetime we will see those missiles leave Scottish soil. We have so much respect for those who have dedicated their lives to protesting these weapons and it seemed an obvious choice that the proceeds from this release should go to help them, and the Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

This is a double vinyl retrospective compilation of some of the most radical music ever made, a musical force that changed lives. Covering the years 1979 - 86 and including classic tracks from Crass, Poison Girls, Flux Of Pink Indians, The Mob, Zounds, Annie Anxiety, The Ex, ATV plus 10 more, all newly remastered by iconic Punk mastering engineer Daniel Husayn.

It has been lovingly compiled by JD Twitch and Anarcho legend Chris Low and was ten years in the making. There are also a couple of previously unreleased mixes included. It comes as a high quality double vinyl pressing, and has a full colour sleeve with back and front images designed by the legendary Gee Vaucher. It also comes with a 6 page fold out poster on one side with detailed sleeve notes, recollections and essays on the other side.

Anarcho Punk was the one sub-genre of Punk that emerged in isolation from the rock & roll establishment. During its pioneering days of the early 1980s it thrived in opposition to the music industry, existing as a fiercely underground alternative to the bands, labels and venues of the commercialised mainstream Punk scene. It continues to do so. Anarcho Punk represented one of the last truly underground and autonomous music movements ever witnessed and remains a movement that has never sold out and has never gone away.

The major differentiation between the Anarcho Punk acts and the more traditional Punk outfits was that for the former, albeit often more due to musical limitation than intent, the message was more important than the music. Standard song structures were often dispensed with in favour of a relentless lyrical polemic accompanied by a similarly uncompromising aural assault. As the scene grew, so did the diversity of records that emerged under the Anarcho Punk umbrella: from D & V (drums & vocals) to the proto-EBM synth-pop of Belfast’s one-man Hit Parade and the Dadaist Beefheart hybrid of The Cravats. In later days the two biggest acts of the scene, Flux of Pink Indians and Crass themselves, both released LPs which had more in common with improv Jazz than hardcore punk.

The resounding victory of Anarcho Punk is that it is now the unifying soundtrack to a culture of resistance that spans Scotland to Indonesia and remains without compromise. It is still as removed from mainstream music and oppositional to conventional culture as it was over forty years ago and shows no sign of changing. Quite the opposite: the more popular Anarcho Punk becomes the less it has to engage with the music establishment and the more control it can enjoy. In 2023, that message remains as uncompromising as ever.

TRACK LISTING

A1 Zounds Can't Cheat Karma 00:02:43
A2 Honey Bane Girl On The Run 00:03:59
A3 Crass Bloody Revolutions 00:06:45
A4 Annie Anxiety Hello Horror 00:05:40
B1 Flux Of Pink Indians Tube Disasters 00:04:07
B2 Andy T Death Is Big Business 00:01:29
B3 Poison Girls Underbitch 00:04:18
B4 Alternative Anti-Christ 00:04:41
B5 The Cravats Rub Me Out 00:05:47
C1 The Apostles Mob Violence (unreleased Studio Version) 00:04:13
C2 Lack Of Knowledge We're Looking For People 00:04:03
C3 Hit Parade Here's What You Find In Any Prison 00:03:08
C4 Hagar The Womb Idolisation 00:02:48
C5 Alternative TV The Force Is Blind 00:03:48
D1 Chumbawamba Revolution 00:04:46
D2 The Ex Aye Carmela 00:03:13
D3 D&V Conscious (Pilot) 00:02:58
D4 The Mob No Doves Fly Here (unreleased Studio Version) 00:06:20

• A 76 track celebration of all things Manchester from 1977 to 1981.

• A comprehensive look at the city’s sounds featuring Buzzcocks, Joy Division, New Order, The Fall, John Cooper Clark, Durutti Column, A Certain Ratio, The Freshies, Slaughter & The Dogs, Magazine and many more.

• Includes tracks featuring many future stars of the Manchester music scene, such as Mick Hucknall (Simply Red), Martin Coogan (The Mock Turtles), Graham Massey (808 State), Mike Joyce (The Smiths) and Chris Sievey (Frank Sidebottom).

Back in 2017, Cherry Red unveiled a mammoth 7-CD compendium entitled ‘Manchester North Of England’, which attempted to document the city’s vibrant music scene from punk to Britpop. Six years on, ‘Keeping Control’ is the sequel, a modest triple-disc retrospective concentrating on music from the punk and post-punk years.

‘Keeping Control’ boasts the “name” bands out of Greater Manchester from that period, however, the underlying musical story of this box set lies with the lesser-known Manchester Musicians Collective. A catalyst for many musicians at the time, the MMC organised gigs, other activities and encouragement to the many and varied talents emerging in the region during punk and its aftershocks.

Louise Alderman, co-founder of the Manchester Musicians Collective, has written a foreword for the box set, which is named after the MMC’s short-lived fanzine. Via Louise’s band mate in Manchester Mekon, Frank Ewart, we also have a few previously unissued tracks by acts closely affiliated with the organization. At the time, the Collective was celebrated across two albums, ‘A Manchester Collection’ and ‘Unzipping The Abstract’ (both 1980) – and most of the artists from these releases are represented.

Beyond the MMC, Manchester enjoyed a thriving independent scene from 1977 onwards, inspired by Buzzcocks’ debut EP on New Hormones, Rabid, TJM, Object Music, Absurd, Bent and last but certainly not least Factory … each of them carved a different furrow. Outside of the gravitational pull of London, which exerted such a strong pull across the South of England, Manchester evolved its own unique identity, often mixing sharp humour with seemingly bleak, desolate-sounding music (reflecting the city’s hardship during that time).

TRACK LISTING

DISC ONE
1 BUZZCOCKS Orgasm Addict
2 SLAUGHTER AND THE DOGS The Bitch
3 THE NOSEBLEEDS Fascist Pigs
4 THE DRONES City Drones
5 THE PANIK Murder
6 V2 Nothing To Do
7 JILTED JOHN Jilted John
8 GYRO Central Detention Centre
9 SALFORD JETS Lookin’ At The Squares
10 JOHN THE POSTMAN’S PUERILE Kawalski Of The Seaview Has Got The Best Hairstyle I’ve Ever Seen
11 ALBERTO Y LOST TRIOS PARANOIAS Fuck You
12 JOHN COOPER CLARKE I Don’t Want To Be Nice
13 THE TEARDROPS Pompous
14 PASSAGE Slit Machine
15 SPHERICAL OBJECTS Sweet Tooth
16 STEVE MIRO Smiling In Reverse
17 JOY DIVISION Digital
18 THE SMIRKS American Patriots
19 NOTSENSIBLES Lying On The Sofa
20 48 CHAIRS Psycle Sluts
21 EDDIE FICTION UFO Part 2
22 MELLOTRON Warriors From Space
23 SPEED She’s All There
24 GENOCIDE Renegade
25 SISTER RAY Suicide
26 EDDIE MOONEY & THE GRAVE I Bought Three Eggs
27 GERRY AND THE HOLOGRAMS

DISC TWO
1 THE FALL Flat Of Angles
2 STEROID KIDDIES Seaside Teaser
3 DIRECT HITS Back To The Sixties
4 FOREIGN PRESS Crossfire
5 CRISPY AMBULANCE Motorway Boys
6 I.Q. ZERO Insects
7 ACCIDENT ON THE EAST LANCS. We Want It Legalized
8 THE OUT Who Is Innocent?
9 GODS GIFT These Days
10 MUD HUTTERS Danger
11 PATHETIX Love In Decay
12 PRIVATE SECTOR Just Wanna Stay Free
13 THE FRANTIC ELEVATORS Hunchback Of Notre Dame
14 FAST CARS You’re So Funny
15 MISS KATE Ebony Eyes
16 GROW-UP The Best Thing
17 PROPERTY OF… Dance Like You’re Dead *
18 THE DISTRACTIONS Doesn’t Bother Me
19 THE DURUTTI COLUMN Sketch For Summer
20 BET LYNCH’S LEGS Riders In The Sky
21 THE HOAX Storm Trooper
22 MANICURED NOISE Metronome
23 MAGAZINE A Song From Under The Floorboards
24 VIBRANT THIGH Walking Away
25 ENIGMA Play With Fire
26 THE STILL 9.5
27 SPURTZ Boyfriends Or Your Money Back
28 THE CHARLIE PARKAS Space Invaders

DISC THREE
1 IF ONLY Puppet Masters
2 THE CHEATERS (I Wanna Be A) Policeman
3 MANCHESTER MEKON Must Have More Wheels
4 BATHROOM RENOVATIONS Apathetic Hell
5 THE LIGGERS Recorded Or Live *
6 SECTION 25 Knew Noise
7 THE DIAGRAM BROS. There Is No Shower
8 THE THINGS Pieces Of You
9 DISLOCATION DANCE Familiar View
10 MARTIN HANNETT The Music Room
11 BLUE ORCHIDS The Flood (Demo) *
12 KEVIN HEWICK Haystack
13 ELECTRA COMPLEX Magic *
14 HAMSTERS Animal
15 BITING TONGUES You Can Choke Like That
16 THE FRESHIES Wrap Up The Rockets
17 LUDUS Hugo Blanco
18 MOTHMEN Temptation
19 A CERTAIN RATIO Waterline
20 BEE VAMP Lucky Grills
21 NEW ORDER Everything’s Gone Green

Another instalment of badass Funk from the Disco era with Supafunkanova Volume 3 which has been selected by prolific DJ, producer, remixer and record collector Woody Bianchi. Woody digs deep into his collection, compiling a high-quality album filled with lesser-known disco, funk and boogie. As the title suggests, Supafunkanova focuses on the funkier end of the 70’s & 80’s, showcasing some of the bumpier grooves recorded in the disco era when even James Brown had to take notice of the Saturday Night Fever inspired disco explosion. It will come as no surprise to hear some particularly hard to find gems have been unearthed here, and ones that aren't just rare and expensive (if you can even find a copy!) but genuinely merit being re-issued. With expansive sleeve notes by Woody himself to give you an in depth insight to the music, artists and personal discovery of each record.

TRACK LISTING

A1 Chosen Few – Dancin’ All Over The World
A2 The Freex Machine – Freex Funkatized
A3 Nzimande All Stars – Sporo Disco (Woody Bianchi Edit)
A4 The Firebolts – Firebolt Hustle

B1 Aggression - Tag (Woody Bianchi Edit)
B2 The Movers – Onthekele Beer (Jwala)
B3 World - You Got The Power
B4 Joe & Lee – Black Gold Disco Moving Machine

C1 Joe Pugliese - Plie And Isolation
C2 The Family Tree - As
C3 Pressure Point - Straight To The Point
C4 John Blair - Momma Said Shut Up

D1 The Headquarters - Sweetie
D2 Wylie - Fan-tasy (Woody Bianchi Edit)
D3 Cania - Visions
D4 Montreal - Night People

Eyes of Others is the studio alias of Edinburgh based John Bryden, a self-christened ‘post-pub couldn’t get in the club’ producer.

Having announced their signing to Heavenly Recordings last November with the release of a 10” vinyl-only 6-track EP, Bewitched By The Flames, which sold out immediately through independent shops and mail order, Eyes Of Others is now set to present their debut, self-titled album.

Marrying the anything-goes, freestyle magpie tendencies of Beck and The Beta Band to the electronic stylings of primetime 80s New Order by way of the spacious moods conjured by King Tubby, Eyes of Others debut’s whimsical demeanour is the perfect sonic balm to the utter confusion of the outside world. As is its sense of almost Balearic musical freedom. Such a mindset is fundamental to the music according to Bryden.

“I was thinking where’s my spot?” Bryden reflects about the pick & mix quality of the album. “The music is later than a gig but it’s not full-on early morning club fare. It’s the in-between space where I was imagining where my music works.”

But his beguiling tunes are perfect for the music soundtracking the afters too. As the dawn breaks and the sun begins to rise. “Maybe there aren’t enough venues opening at 7am!” he laughs, before quickly adding: “I don’t think it will catch on unfortunately.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Andy says: Beta Band meets Peaking Lights round at Arthur Russell's flat, in an "all back to mine", late night/early morning vibe.

TRACK LISTING

Once, Twice, Thrice
Safehouse
Escalation
At Home I Am A Leader
New Hair New Me
Ego Hit
Mother Father
Jargon Jones And Jones
Come Inside
Big Companies, Large Tentacles 

Recorded in caves, crypts, and shopping centers, Mandy, Indiana's debut album' i've seen a way' is everywhere at once: Their first recordings emerged around 2019, with a smattering of early singles released not long after, culminating in 2021's critically acclaimed' EP which saw the band draw early cosigns including a remix from Daniel Avery and support slots from Squid, and Gilla Band.

The latter's Daniel Fox mixed several of the tracks on the album alongside Robin Stewart (Giant Swan) and the album was mastered by Heba Kedry (Ryuichi Sakamoto, Bjork). Like Thomas Bangalter locked in This Heat's Cold Storage fridge studio with Special Interest for a weekend, keeping their setup minimal for maximum effect. Buried found sound samples, sprawling percussive experiments are arranged via oblique references to film soundtrack strategies and experimental video games.. "We take inspiration from films where the language of cinema is disrupted," explains Fair, who takes Julia Ducournau's narrative detournements as a key influence. "We want to alter textures, create clashes, and craft those moments when what you're expecting to happen never comes - by subverting expectations you keep an audience on its toes." Though 'i've seen a way' was painstakingly crafted, where Mandy, Indiana thrives is the unexpected - and the resulting album sounds like nothing that has come before it.

TRACK LISTING

Love Theme (4K VHS)
Drag [Crashed]
Pinking Shears
Injury Detail
Mosaick
The Driving Rain (18)
2 Stripe
Iron Maiden
Peach Fuzz
(?>?<)? :??:*:??'?,??:*:???'? (Crystal Aura Redux)
Sensitivity Training

Back in 2012, Thee Oh Sees made their first appearance at Austin Psych Fest, performing an electrified set at Emo's East. The first of many Levitation appearances down in Austin, this show has been mixed by John Dwyer and mastered for vinyl by JJ Golden. Now immortalized on glorious 12" colored wax. "I think this was our first time at levitation but our millionth time in the amazing and tough as nails city of Austin, Texas. Brigid Dawson, Mike Shoun, Petey D and myself had already laid the live show out in front of crowds here, so it wasn't our first rodeo and certainly not my last. Our love is obvious here as we bring forth a short but sweet set of hits and deep cuts. This is also the version of the band with Lars "Fingers" Finberg of Intelligence fame as second banana drummer. So enjoy some primal and sensual double drumming and as a side note, no one died at this show. Thanks as always to Levitation for making shit happen" - John Dwyer 


The first Austin Psych Fest was held in March 2008, and expanded to a 3 day event the following year. The event quickly developed into an international destination for psychedelic rock fans, with lineups spanning the fringes of indie rock, from up-and-comers to vintage legends, and capped off with headline performances from co-founders The Black Angels, along with Tame Impala, The Flaming Lips, The Brian Jonestown Massacre, Thee Oh Sees (in various forms) and many more. LEVITATION helped spark a movement, inspiring the creation of similar events across the globe and a burgeoning psych scene that would soon ignite. The series captures key moments in psychedelic rock history, and live music in Austin, Texas, pressed on beautiful limited edition colorful vinyl pressings - each an eye popping visual representation of the music contained within. The artists and sets showcased on Live at LEVITATION have been chosen from over a decade of recordings at the world-renowned event, and document key artists in the scene performing for a crowd of their peers and fans who gather at LEVITATION annually from all over the world.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Dream
2. Devil Again
3. Tidal Wave
4. Enemy Destruct
5. Robber Barons
6. Block Of Ice
7. Meat Step Lively
8. Minotaur

SOS is the second studio album from GRAMMY award winning singer SZA, and the follow up to 2017’s major label debut album Ctrl. The genre-blending album contains elements of pop, R&B, soft-rock, gospel, and hip-hop. SOS features guest appearances from Travis Scott, Don Toliver, Phoebe Bridgers, and the late Ol’ Dirty Bastard. SZA worked with a variety of hitmaking producers including Ctrl collaborators ThankGod4Cody and Carter Lang, along with Jeff Bhasker, Rob Bisel, Benny Blanco, Kenny “Babyface” Edmonds, Emile Haynie, Rodney “Darkchild” Jerkins, Jay Versace, and more.

TRACK LISTING

Vinyl Tracklisting:
1. SOS
2. Kill Bill
3. Seek & Destroy
4. Low
5. Love Language
6. Blind
7. Used
8. Snooze
9. Notice Me
10. Gone Girl
11. Smoking On My Ex Pack
12. Ghost In The Machine
13. F2F
14. Nobody Gets Me
15. Conceited
16. Special
17. Too Late
18. Far
19. Shirt
20. Open Arms
21. I Hate U
22. Good Days
23. Forgiveless

CD Tracklisting:
SIDE A:
1. SOS
2. Kill Bill
3. Seek & Destroy
4. Low
5. Love Language
6. Blind
SIDE B:
1. Used
2. Snooze
3. Notice Me
4. Gone Girl
5. Smoking On My Ex Pack
6. Ghost In The Machine
SIDE C:
1. F2F
2. Nobody Gets Me
3. Conceited
4. Special
5. Too Late
6. Far
SIDE D:
1. Shirt
2. Open Arms
3. I Hate U
4. Good Days
5. Forgiveless

Sarabeth Tucek emerges from a decade-long hibernation with a new double-album ‘Joan of All’ under the new moniker SBT – a longtime nickname given to her by the many musicians she has worked with throughout her career.

After retreating from the fevered pace of the record business to concentrate on other creative endeavors, Sarabeth began to piece together the music that would eventually become her most ambitious, personal project yet – the sprawling double-album Joan Of All, which will be released world-wide on 19th May 2023 via her own freshly-minted imprint Ocean Omen.

Sarabeth Tucek officially broke onto the music scene 2003 performing a series of spellbinding duets with Bill Callahan on the acclaimed Smog album Supper. This was swiftly followed by a memorable appearance in the prize-winning Brian Jonestown Massacre documentary DiG! Sarabeth also contributed material to their 2005 EP release, We Are the Radio. One of Sarabeth's compositions covered by the band on that EP, "Seer," would later be retitled and released in 2006 as Tucek's debut single, "Something for You”, which became Steve Lamacq’s Single Of The Week on BBC Radio 6 Music.

Her self-titled debut album produced by Luther Russell and Ethan Johns hit stores the following year and garnered rave reviews in the press, leading her to supporting Bob Dylan and unfaltering support at the BBC.

In 2011, Sarabeth followed up her extraordinary debut with a raw, uncompromising album entitled Get Well Soon, praised as an unflinching meditation on the subject of grief. This release made many year-end lists and the title track was featured on the first season of HBO’s Girls. The new album features lead-off single “The Gift”, as featured heavily on Marc Riley’s BBC 6 Music show, which is taken from the double A-side 7”, “The Gift / 13th St. #2”. Also featured on the album is an entirely different, heavier version of the flip side, entitled “13th St. #1”.

Sarabeth will support the epic Joan Of All with a 18-date tour of the UK May/June 2023, including a BBC 6 Music live session for Marc Riley.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Joan Says/Amber Shade
The Living Rool
Cathy Says
The Gift

Side B
The Box
Work
Make Up Your Mind
!3th St. #1

Side C
Swings
Happiness
Something/Anything
Sheep

Side D
The Tunnel
Unmade/The Dog
Creature Of The Night

Composer, multi-instrumentalist and singer/songwriter Sufjan Stevens announces the album Reflections, a studio recording of his score for the ballet by choreographer Justin Peck, performed by pianists Timo Andres and Conor Hanick. 

Reflections was originally commissioned by Houston Ballet to accompany choreography by Peck and premiered March 21, 2019. Written for two pianos and eleven dancers, Reflections marks the sixth collaboration between Stevens and Peck, following Year of the Rabbit (2012); Everywhere We Go (2014); In the Countenance of Kings (2016); The Decalogue (2017); and Principia (2019).

The studio recording was engineered, mixed and mastered by Ryan Streber at Oktaven Studios. Reflections is characteristic Stevens: dynamic, melodic, memorable, emotionally resonant and playful (one track is titled “And I Shall Come To You Like A Stormtrooper in Drag Serving Imperial Realness”). It is about “energy, light and duality,” Stevens says. “I’m constantly thinking about bodies moving through space when I’m writing for ballet — that is what has informed this music, first and foremost.”

This is Stevens’ second recorded release of his compositions for piano—following The Decalogue in 2019—and his first written for two pianos. There is a long tradition of composing for duo pianos—from John Adams’ “Hallelujah Junction” to Mozart’s Sonata for Two Pianos in D Major—and Stevens was happy to further explore the form. “Although I've never taken a lesson,” he says, “the piano was my first true love. Having two of them at my disposal was an exciting opportunity and gave me a real catharsis about the expansiveness of the instrument.”

Self-taught as both a pianist and a composer, Stevens’ first instrument was the oboe, which he started playing in 5th grade. He played in orchestras from high school through college and listened voraciously to recordings of classical music alongside pop radio. But Stevens would often take breaks from the oboe by improvising on the piano, working out music he had heard in passing — pieces by Chopin, Rachmaninov and Bach. “I learned by ear, in a very rudimentary way, inspired by a wide range of music,” he says. “A lot of the work that I compose is anachronistic as it doesn't follow a genealogy of aesthetic. It can be a cornucopia of styles.” That's the case with Reflections, where listeners may detect a hint of Debussy, Stravinsky, Philip Glass and even Bruce Hornsby.

TRACK LISTING

1. Ekstasis
2. Revanche
3. Euphoros
4. Mnemosyne
5. Rodinia
6. Reflexion
7. And I Shall Come To You Like A Stormtrooper In Drag Serving Imperial Realness

*BIG FANFARE!!* New album from Inga Copeland who I'm hoping you're aware of via the cult group Hype Williams which she was in with Dean Blunt. A modern muse of mythical status, Inga's smeared synth-pop musings and radioactive downbeat exercises have become highly treasured amongst underground aficionados, reddit forum users and NTS listeners alike.

Stylistically it exists in that liminal / hypnogogic space between reality and dream world, with melancholic undertones reflecting, unfortunately, the current mood of our fractured country. With songs resembling traditional structures soon dissipating into the ether or crumbling into fried motherboards it draws comparisons with the recent Bar Italia album in terms of construction if not stylistic content. Her deliberately-almost-broken voice compliments the sorrowful machine music beautifully - the perfect ballad to soundtrack the end of humanity.

Her 'first and last' album, which has previously only been released digitally, gets a highly coveted vinyl edition here - if you're reading this and its still in stock then lucky you - click that buy button or hurriedly scamper up to our counter with this in your hand - proud in the knowledge that you've snaffled a piece of modern electronic music treasure everyone’ll be fighting over in a couple of weeks. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Bedroom blues, rain dappled electronica, exotic downbeat; Inga Copeland's liminal music is a music journalist's fantasy or horror, depending on how eloquent they might be feeling that day.

TRACK LISTING

01 Faith
02 Light Up
03 A&E (Copeland Audacity Mix)
04 B.M.W.
05 Obsession 2
06 A World In Danger III (ft. Scratcha DVA)

Some people have commented that Tinariwen have always been a country band, albeit a North African take on that most North American of genres. That idea is magnified on new album Amatssou, which finds the Tuareg band’s trademark snaking guitar lines and hypnotic rhythms blending seamlessly with pedal steel, piano and strings from guest musicians including Daniel Lanois, the embellished arrangements lending the songs an epic, universal application.

Full of poetic allegory, the lyrics call for unity and freedom. There are songs of struggle and resistance with oblique references to the recent desperate political upheavals in Mali and the increasing power of the Salafists. “Dear brothers all rest, all leisure will always be far from reach unless your homeland is liberated and all the elders can live there in dignity,” Ibrahim Ag Alhabib sings on ‘Arajghiyine.’ The album’s title Amatssou is Tamashek for ‘Beyond The Fear’ and it fits - Tinariwen have always been characterised by their fearlessness - and as Bob Dylan once said, the power of rock’n’roll is that it makes us “oblivious to the fear” as the music gives us the strength and resilience to confront adversity.

In the two decades since Tinariwen emerged from their base in the African desert to tour the globe, they have got to know many renowned country, folk, and rock musicians from the USA including Kurt Vile, Stephen O'Malley, Jack White, and Wilco. Tuareg nomads and cowboy drifters. Camel trains and mustang horses. The timeless horizon of the endless Sahara and the wild frontier of the Old West - several thousand miles of ocean may divide the desert blues of Tinariwen and the authentic country music of rural America but the links are as palpable as they are romantic.

TRACK LISTING

Vinyl Tracklist:
A1. Kek Alghalm
A2. Tenere Den
A3. Arajghiyine
A4. Tidjit
A5. Jayche Atarak
B1. Imidiwan Mahitinam
B2. Ezlan
B3. Anemouhagh
B4. Iket Adjen
B5. Nak Idnizdjam

CD Tracklist:
1.  Kek Alghalm
2.  Tenere Den
3.  Arajghiyine
4.  Imzad (Interlude)
5.  Tidjit
6.  Jayche Atarak
7.  Imidiwan Mahitinam
8.  Imzad 2 (Interlude)
9.  Ezlan
10.  Anemouhagh
11.  Iket Adjen
12.  Nak Idnizdjam
13.  Tinde (Outro)

It’s only fitting that Khruangbin’s first ever official live releases would be double albums paired with their tourmates: artists whose music they love and admire, friends who’ve become family along the way. Khruangbin’s ‘Live At’ series of live LPs traces just one small slice of the band’s flight plan through the years: it’s a taste of some of their most beloved cities, stages and nights. Each release comes with a limited edition unique album cover exclusive for the recording’s home turf, just a little something extra for the fans that bring a little something extra. Most of all, Khruangbin’s ‘Live at’ series ignites both sides of the band’s magic: the warm, prismatic feeling of their albums and the bewitching energy of their performances.

‘Live at Stubbs’ features performances by Kelly Doyle, Ruben Moreno, The Suffers and Robert Ellis and Khruangbin.

TRACK LISTING

Side A:
1. Kelly Doyle: Woman Trouble
2. Ruben Moreno: At The Trailride
3. The Suffers: Don’t Bother Me
4. Robert Ellis: Nobody Smokes Anymore
5. Khruangbin: Blind Man Can See It / (It’s Not The Express) It’s The Monaurail
6. Khruangbin: Bin Bin
Side B:
1. Khruangbin: Friday Morning
2. Khruangbin: Number 4
3. Khruangbin: People Everywhere (Still Alive

Drop a needle on Psyché's debut album and you'll see visions, or rather Mediterranean visions, be they of waves of heat shimmering above dunes of sand, or of women dancing around a bonfire on a rocky plain, or of bushy cliffs overlooking emerald-green and turquoise sea. The name Psyché is of course ancient Greek for 'soul' or 'mind', signifying the band's love of psychedelic funk, but also the wide range of Mediterranean influences – from Southern Europe to the Balkan Peninsula, and from Anatolia to the Maghreb – that provide an endless source of inspiration for their hypnotic sound and minimalist style.

Psyché members Marcello Giannini (Guru, Nu Genea, Slivovitz), Andrea De Fazio (Parbleu, Nu Genea, Funkin Machine) and Paolo Petrella (Nu Genea) have been active in the Naples music scene for almost two decades, most notably during the first wave of the new Neapolitan Power movement (Slivovitz, Revenaz Quartet). Over the years they have often crossed paths and collaborated on side projects in various genres (math-rock duo Arduo and, more recently, synth-pop duo Fratelli Malibu), before working together as the rhythm section of Nu Genea's live band. Following their first tour with Nu Genea in 2018, they started Psyché with the intent of exploring more minimalist styles and making music with just a few elements.

A unique combination of psychedelia, groove and improvisation, the music of Psyché goes back to the roots of our future; it evokes visions of a mythical past, blending centuries-old music traditions and mixing them with modern genres. Like a warm Mediterranean breeze, it travels across lands, seas and eras, distilling essential rhythms and cosmic pulsations.

The album's opener "Kuma" (titled after the first ancient Greek colony on the Italian mainland, now an archeological site near Naples) is like a vibrant, magical wave. With its deliberately simple harmony and sharp guitar riffs, it travels across the Mediterranean from Italy to North Africa, first lapping gently on Greek and Turkish shores – with some compositional elements reminiscent of Italian pop legend Lucio Battisti – and then speeding up and landing on the driving, syncopated rhythms of afrobeat. While listening to it your eyes fill with images of small white houses shining in the sun, of fig trees heavy with fruit, of spice bazaars and colourful medinas, and you can almost feel the desert wind blowing in your hair.

The journey continues with two examples of Psyché's bold and elegant approach to contemporary afrobeat and cumbia fusion: "Cumbia Mahàre" and "Amma". The former combines minimal synths and exhilarating rhythmic patterns of drums, percussion, guitar and bass, drawing us into the movements of an imaginary ritual dance (the term mahàre was used in Southern Italian dialects to indicate witches). Next is the cinematic and mysterious ambiance of "Angizia" (a snake goddess worshipped by the Marsi in ancient Italy), another fascinating mixture of different sonic traditions and cultures where hip-hop/funk drums are blended with Maghreb influences, Balkan echoes, and hypnotic, Theremin-like synths that have sort of a sci-fi movie quality to them.

The title track "Psyché", with its uptempo afro-rhythms, ethereal vocalizations and refined percussion, is almost a manifesto of the band's style and confirms the freshness of their minimalism, which is not afraid of taking in the sun of lands confined between the sea and the desert. The following "Manea" (named after the Roman-Etruscan goddess of the dead) is an afro-funk number with smooth and introspective dreamy jazz touches, and with an arrangement dominated by a guitar that, dripping notes like drops of water, creates a delicate, cinematic sound. Next, we come to "Hekate" (the Greek goddess of magic, witchcraft and crossroads), a track that fuses psychedelia, spacious Latin guitars and a fast, tight groove. The album comes to a close with the exquisite melodic ballad "Kelebek", which seamlessly combines hip-hop drums and dreamy guitars, and whose warm, flowing sonorities and evocative atmospheres conjure the image of a butterfly (which is what kelebek means, in Turkish) floating over the Mediterranean and, from there, the world.

TRACK LISTING

1. Kuma
2. Cumbia Mahàre
3. Amma
4. Angizia
5. Psyché
6. Manea
7. Hekate
8. Kelebek

Led by producer & notorious tape operator Björn Wagner (of Mighty Mocambos, Bacao Rhythm & Steel Band and Mocambo Records), Magic Source follow up on their rootsy cosmic debut LP "Earthrising" and last year's EP "Riviera Drive", whose stunning flute jazz cover of “Genius of Love” is also featured on this longplayer.

Further exploring the more unusual facets of disco in its otherworldly and international stylings, "Voyage Spectral" travels through a wide musical scope, ranging from lost tropical grooves and Mediterranean funk, to outernational boogie and cosmic sci-fi soundtracks. All 100% organic - created by real musicians with real vintage instruments, captured on 16-track analog tape.

An all-star cast of musicians invites you to a fantasy trip where angelic voices blend with spaced-out synths, ethnic string instruments interplay with sharp horn lines while the rhythm section is holding down a polyrhythmic puzzle of guitars, clavinets, B-3, drums and percussions.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Essential for anyone with a penchant for Nu Genea, a highly musical outernational disco record with some real dextrous instrumentation. Worth it for the Talking Heads cover but the other tracks are all killer too.

TRACK LISTING

Saturn Moon Dive
Superglider
Speed Boat To Atlantis
Dreaming Of You
Pyramide
Genius Of Love
Rainy Afternoon In Paris
Space Of Mind

‘L.A. Shit’ is the new LP from the punch-throwing, shit-kicking country outfit fronted by Fat Creeps bunder Gracie Jackson, featuring contributions from King Tuff, Emmett Kelley (Cairo Gang, Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, Ty Segall Band) and Bobbie Lovesong.

Gracie Horse weaves stories into her songs. On ‘L.A. Shit’, her debut record with Wharf Cat, she takes us into the past half a decade of her life. We see her as a traveling nurse, living in big blue expanse of Wyoming, dancing with a man in a crisp white Stetson, eating chicken wings in a hazmat suit, commenting on how strange a place like Los Angeles can be, how loaded it is with wannabe cowboys and fast food restaurants. It’s a record of immaculate country music, the kind of stuff you’d put on blast in your truck as you drive down empty stretches of highway. It’s also a vulnerable record, full of lyrics about the intensity of being alive, all told with a sense of humour and self-awareness.

While some of the songs on ‘L.A. Shit’ are over a decade old, Gracie started writing the record in earnest during the pandemic. She’s a nurse, injured her neck in the line of duty, and suddenly found herself out of work. She had a creative explosion, putting memories into words and melodies in her home studio that she shared with her husband. Particles of songs from years past became beautifully realized. Everything was clicking in the way that it should. She found herself able to express the sometimes inexpressible. She did what all good country music should do: she created a patchwork of experiences in a way that is both deeply earnest and absolutely charming.

In addition to being Gracie’s own major artistic statement, ‘L.A. Shit’ is a community effort. To make it, she enlisted countless friends in the Los Angeles Area, many of whom are touring and session musicians who were stuck at home during the pandemic. “I’m grateful,” she says of the experience, “I’m proud that I get to show off my friends on this record.” Indeed, ‘L.A. Shit’ is that kind of big family affair. It’s as country as country can be. Funny, heartbreaking, brutal.

TRACK LISTING

Hollow Her
By The Light Of His White Stetson
What I'm Missing
Northwind
Bakup Slowly
Run Ricky Run
If You're Gonna Walk That Straight Line Son, It's Only Gonna Hurt
Hollow Head (Reprise)
Winds Of The New West

Indigo De Souza announces her new album All of This Will End, the anticipated follow-up to her acclaimed 2021 breakthrough album Any Shape You Take. All of This Will End marks a warmer and unmistakably audacious era for her. It’s a statement about fearlessly moving forward from the past into a gratitude-filled present, feeling it all every step of the way, and choosing to embody loving awareness.

Across 11 songs, the album is a raw and radically optimistic work that grapples with mortality, the rejuvenation that community brings, and the importance of centering yourself now. These tracks come from the most resonant moments of her life: childhood memories, collecting herself in parking lots, the ecstatic trips spent wandering the Appalachian mountains and southern swamps with friends, and the times she had to stand up for herself. “All of This Will End feels more true to me than anything ever has,” she says.

TRACK LISTING

1. Time Back
2. You Can Be Mean
3. Losing
4. Wasting Your Time
5. Parking Lot
6. All Of This Will End
7. Smog
8. The Water
9. Always
10. Not My Body
11. Younger And Dumber

After more than a decade of non-stop touring, acclaimed Austin songwriting duo, Kelsey Wilson and Alexander Beggins, quietly stopped touring as Wild Child. Headed in different sonic directions, the pair didn't know if they would ever make another Wild Child record. Then, what felt like the "end of the world" brought them back together. Pandemic lockdowns closed stages and drained bank accounts. As artists from all backgrounds took their shows to the internet, Wild Child was no different.

Wilson and Beggins got together to practice for a series of online performances for devout fans, and within 30 minutes they wrote the first single for what would accidentally become Wild Child's fifth album, End of the World. Mixed by Matt Pence (Jason Isbell, Elle King) and including contributions from guitarist Charlie Wiles (Paul Cauthen, John Moreland, Orville Peck), End of The World sees the pair find catharsis in art amid compound disasters.

As Wilson describes it, “I just started signing about things that were freaking me out. Wearing a mask for a year. Global warming. There's no heat, no water. It was like a dirge to begin with. But by the end we were all screaming and laughing that, yes, this might be the end of the world, but we're all together right now, making music in my living room by candlelight. It's all OK."

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A

1. Bottom Line
2. Cheap Champagne
3. Could’ve Fooled Me
4. Dear John
5. End Of The World
6. Good Luck

SIDE B

1. Love On A Bad Day
2. Photographs
3. Ride With Me
4. Sleeping In
5. Underwhelmed
6. Wearing Blue

The Telescopes are an all embracing concern that began in 1987, the only constant being sole composer/ instigator, Northumbrian born Stephen Lawrie. The band’s line-up is in constant flux, there can be anywhere between 1 and 20 members on a recording.

The Telescopes were initially signed to Cheree Records then moved on to What Goes On Records where they became regulars at the top of the indie charts before gaining more mainstream success on signing to Creation Records. The Telescopes are now with Tapete Records. The previous album for the label – Songs Of Love And Revolution saw a return to the indie charts in 2021, including a Dinked edition with remixes by Anton Newcombe, Lloyd Cole and Third Eye Foundation. The Telescopes music has constantly pushed at it’s own boundaries, it overlaps many genres following its own course, inspiration led.

Time has shown The Telescopes music not only withstands repeated listening but also reveals something new with each listen, it has been described by the British music press as 'more a revolution of the psyche than a revolution of the sidewalk'; a thread consistent throughout a highly influential body of work spanning over 30 years. The Telescopes have been cited as an influence on many artists across genres, around the world. The first five albums have all been re-issued by renowned labels such as Cherry Red, Bomp! Rev-Ola, Space Age Records, Weisskalt, Glass Modern, Fuzz Club and many more.

Of Tomorrow is the 15th album from The Telescopes, the fifth for Tapete. The album was created entirely by Lawrie at his studio in Shropshire, it is a departure from what the press often refer to as a ’wall of throb’ when describing the dense merge of noise and sound synonymous with most of The Telescopes output. Of Tomorrow marks a complete change in dynamics. Here we have the poetry of motion, solid grooves to the fore, leaving crystallised trails across a fluttering undercurrent of uplifting rhythm and hooks. Lawrie’s voice, usually treated as an instrument equal to the rest of the sound now takes the reins, engaging the listener in a melodic swirl of radiant harmony that speaks, sometimes in a whisper, of love as revolution. Every song on the album stands it’s ground, each one unique. Everything from the composition to the performance, arrangements and production are leaps beyond previous offerings. This is an album to get lost in on the dance floor or headphones in equal measures.

TRACK LISTING

1. Butterfly
2. Everything Belongs
3. Where Do We Begin?
4. Only Lovers Know
5. (The Other Side)
6. Under Starlight
7. Down By The Sea

Throughout 2022, The Wedding Present’s ‘24 Songs’ series saw the legendary indie band release two new tracks a month as double A sided 7”s, ultimately creating a much-sought-after box set. David Gedge has now re-curated full-length versions of all twenty-four tracks for a new compilation album that will also comprise five bonus recordings including one featuring The Wedding Present’s first guitarist, Peter Solowka.

‘24 Songs’ was a doff of the cap to The Wedding Present’s ‘Hit Parade’ project of 30 years previous. That series proved to be a real milestone for the band with them becoming only the second-ever artist to achieve twelve Official UK Top 40 hits in a calendar year – at the time something that only Elvis had achieved!

David Gedge says: “When it came to compiling the ‘24 Songs’ album, I decided not to sequence the tracks in chronological order. With six sides of vinyl, you have six ‘beginnings’ and six ‘ends’ to play with, and I felt that the opportunity to build some kind of a musical journey was too good to miss! Listening back to this collection, I have to say that I genuinely believe that, for this project, The Wedding Present have recorded some of the best tracks in our history. I loved releasing the singles, but it’s satisfying to have them all rounded up together.”

“The idea of releasing another collection of twenty-four tracks did initially seem quite daunting,” admits David Gedge in the deluxe-CD sleeve notes but, with Jon Stewart (also of Sleeper) having joined the band at the end of 2019 and their subsequent writing partnership flourishing, he began to feel confident that they would be able to produce a year’s worth of music. And, with one of the UK’s most influential independent record labels by their side in Clue, a key partner to EMI North who will be distributing the record - there was no looking back.

TRACK LISTING

24 Songs
1. I Am Not Going To Fall In Love With You
2. Memento Mori
3. That Would Only Happen In A Movie
4. We Interrupt Our Programme
5. We Should Be Together
6. Strike!
7. Science Fiction
8. Summer
9. Each Time You Open Your Eyes
10. We All Came From The Sea
11. Monochrome
12. Kerplunk!
13. Don’t Give Up Without A Fight
14. X Marks The Spot
15. You’re Just A Habit That I’m Trying To Break
16. Plot Twist
17. Whodunnit
18. A Song From Under The Floorboards
19. Telemark
20. Astronomic
21. Go Go Go
22. Once Bitten
23. La La La
24. The Loneliest Time Of Year

5 Songs
25. White Riot
26. Panama
27. Jump In, The Water’s Fine [Japanese Edit]
28. We All Came From The Sea [Utah Saints Remix]
29. Teper My Hovorymo

Deluxe DVD:
Featuring The Band Playing Live During The ‘24 Songs Launch’ Event At The Old Market, Hove, In January 2022, Plus A Fascinating Fly-on-the-wall Documentary Filmed As The Songs Were Being Written, Arranged And Recorded. 

Led by the freewheeling vision of Will Turner and Georgie Fuller, The Heavy Heavy “write and play music with that lick of madness that makes early Fleetwood Mac and peak Stones so thrilling” (The Guardian), blending Turner's roots as a studio musician with Fuller's operatic, irresistibly raspy vocal range and background in the London theater.

This expanded edition of their debut EP ‘Life and Life Only’ features runaway hits like the Top 5 AAA radio-charting “Miles and Miles,” current Top 15 breakout “Go Down River,” and rapturous opener “All My Dreams” in addition to hypnotic, harmony-laden takes on Father John Misty’s “Real Love Baby,” Crosby, Stills & Nash’s “Guinnevere” and a previously unheard rendition of Jonathan Wilson’s “Desert Raven,” plus a roaring live recording of “Man of The Hills” and an acoustic arrangement of “Go Down River.”

TRACK LISTING

1. All My Dreams
2. Go Down River
3. Man Of The Hills
4. Miles And Miles
5. Sleeping On Grassy Ground
6. Why Don’t You Call
7. Desert Raven
8. Man Of The Hills (Live)
9. Real Love Baby
10. Guinnevere
11. Go Down River (Acoustic)

Ride guitarist and songwriter Andy Bell has taken yet another musical detour, this time collaborating with Essex-based duo Masal on an incredible new album of ambient, astral jazz.Tidal Love Numbers is released via Sonic Cathedral on May 19, and is made up of four mesmerising, meandering instrumental tracks that combine Andy’s incredible guitar playing with analogue synths and harp.

Andy’s history in Ride, Oasis and numerous other bands is well-known, and his solo career has also taken off; his most recent album, Flicker, was one of last year’s finest. Masal, meanwhile, came together in Leigh-on-Sea after a chance meeting in a charity shop.Al Johnson has performed and released records as Alien for a number of years now, while Oz Simsek studied classical harp while growing up in Turkey, before joining a jazz band. Since relocating to the UK she has worked with the likes of Viv Albertine and Gazelle Twin. The duo connected over a shared love of electronic and world music and released their debut album Charity Shop in 2020.The collaboration with Andy came about after they supported him at an Andy Bell Space Station gig in Chelmsford during Independent Venue Week at the start of 2022. They got chatting on the night, and bonded over Promises, the collaboration between Floating Points, Pharoah Sanders and The London Symphony Orchestra.“After hearing it, I felt there was something in that area for me, if I found the right collaborators,” says Andy, explaining how the hugely acclaimed 2021 release was effectively the starting point for this new project. “So, I was kind of on the lookout from that point. I’ve always loved the sound of harp music – Alice Coltrane and Joanna Newsom are both firm favourites – and so, when I met Oz and Al, it seemed like it could be a good combination.” “The moment Andy mentioned his love of the Floating Points/Pharoah Sanders album, I knew we were thinking along the same lines,” says Oz. “As a lifelong shoegazer, Al already shared a common musical background and direction, but we got chatting over texts and emails and very soon we were exchanging musical ideas.” Andy was inspired by the likes of William Basinski, Harold Budd, Ariel Kalma’s Osmose and Babe, Terror’s Ancient M’ocean, while Masal shared their love for Prince Lasha, Turkish prog and folk, medieval harp music and Guitarrorists, a 1991 compilation of outsider guitar sounds. The end result – sympathetically mastered by Andy’s Ride bandmate Mark Gardener – lands somewhere between Mary Lattimore, psych-folk guitarist Sandy Bull and Spacemen 3’s Dreamweapon, with the four pieces subtly ebbing and flowing from pastoral picking to psychedelic bliss to noisy drones and back again, all punctuated by Oz’s heavenly harp.

Despite their length, the tracks never outstay their welcome, and their stream-of-consciousness titles add to the sense of intrigue.

“I wanted super-long titles like Felt,” explains Andy. “And I wanted to cram into them as much imagery and emotion as possible.”

It worked – this is an incredibly satisfying trip; as focused and vivid as it is fuzzy and vague. It’s time to float away with the Tidal Love Numbers.

TRACK LISTING

1. Murmuration Of Warm Dappled Light On Her Back After Swimming
2. The Slight Unease Of Seeing A Crescent Moon In Blue Midday Sky
3. Tidal Love Conversations In That Familiar Golden Orchard
4. A Pyramid Hidden By Centuries Of Neon Green Undergrowth

“The Become EP is a collection of 5 songs from the Once Twice Melody sessions. We didn’t think they fit in the world of OTM, but later realized they all fit in a little world of their own. To us, they are all kind of scuzzy and spacious, and live in the spirit realm. It’s not really where we are currently going, but it’s definitely somewhere we have been. We hope you enjoy these tunes.” - Alex and Victoria/Beach House.

Become featuring the songs “American Daughter,” “Devil’s Pool,” “Holiday House,” “Black Magic” and the title track, and was produced by Beach House, with mixing by Alan Moulder (track 1), Trevor Spencer (tracks 2, 3, 5), and Caesar Edmunds (track 4), and mastering by Greg Calbi and Steve Fallone at Sterling Sound.

TRACK LISTING

1 American Daughter
2 Devil's Pool
3 Holiday House
4 Black Magic
5 Become

End of Everything is the intrepid seventh album from Mega Bog, a nightmarish experimental pop ensemble led by Erin Elizabeth Birgy. In 2020, Birgy was surrounded by seemingly endless turmoil: mass death, a burning planet, and a personal reckoning when past traumas met fresh ones. Living in Los Angeles, against the backdrop of brilliantly horrifying forest fires, she questioned what perspective to use moving forward in such dumbfounded awe. Deciding to seize something tangible, she produced a record that spoke of surrender, of mourning, and support in the face of tumultuous self-reflection.

Writing on piano and synthesizer, instead of the familiar guitar, Birgy explored a spectrum of new sounds to illuminate a state of volatility and flux that was both universal and personal. Speaking of this transition, she describes the need “to feel… instantly. I didn’t want to dig into secret codes. I no longer wanted to hide behind difficult music. I was curious to give others the same with the music I create; to make music someone could use to explore drama, playfulness, and dancing, to shake the trauma loose.” Heavy grooves, metal guitar squeals, Italo disco bass lines, rhapsodic synth layers, and huge choruses stomp around the delightfully sanguine pop drama. Where previous records stretched out into the abstract and ethereal, End of Everything delivers a hit straight to collective awareness and healing.

A seemingly disparate jukebox of sounds – ranging from Thin Lizzy, Bronski Beat, Franco Battiato and Ozzy Osbourne to 90’s house classics like Haddaway’s ‘What is Love’ and Corona's ‘Rhythm of the Night’ - foregrounded a new punchy theatricality in Birgy’s music. The songs she was creating at home followed suit with bolder hooks and more dancefloor energy than she’d ever dared before.

While an ecological narrative is clear with songs like “Anthropocene” lamenting a blazing atmosphere—“City skies turn black in the daytime / I see a burnt up alligator / What the fuck?”—End of Everything is an incredibly personal record, charting a journey through Birgy’s own psyche. Midway through producing the record, Birgy made the personally necessary choice to get sober and work through stored debilitating experiences that had begun affecting her ability to communicate creatively.

Thrilling melodies grow to ascend throughout the length of a song, clutching your hand and whispering in your ear one minute before screaming off a cliff edge the next. The soft and the guttural nuzzle and crash of heads, where every moment holds the multitudes of all possible dimensions stirring each other through the veil.

TRACK LISTING

1. Cactus People
2. The Clown
3. Love Is
4. Don't Doom Me, Now
5. All And Everything
6. Anthropocene
7. Complete Book Of Roses
8. End Of Everything

The Murlocs had visions of creating a quintessential country-rock record when they begin recording their 7th LP - a collection of sublimely mellowed-out songs inspired by iconic albums like "Sweetheart of the Rodeo" and "Exile on Main St" - but the record soon took on its own unruly character. Spiked with The Murlocs’ signature breed of sharply crafted garage-punk "Calm Ya Farm" twists country-rock convention into a free-flowing album fully in touch with the frenetic energy of modern life. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Initiative
2. Common Sense Civilian
3. Russian Roulette
4. Superstitious Insights
5. Centennial Perspective
6. Queen Pinky
7. Undone And Unashamed
8. Captain Cotton Mouth
9. Catfish
10. Smithereens
11. Forbidden Toad
12. Aletophyte

Temps is a 40-strong international music collective, consisting of artists across multiple genres, fronted by a cartoon alligator.

Featuring such geniuses as Quelle Chris, John Dieterich, Joana Gomila, Laia Vallès and Seb Rochford, Temps’ ten-track debut Party Gator Purgatory was produced, curated and devised by UK stand-up comedian James Acaster. Released via Bella Union, this mind-bending opus rose from the ashes of an aborted mockumentary made with Louis Theroux’s money.

Vast in scope and scale, and fizzing with an experimental energy, the trippy Party Gator Purgatory manages to blend a host of ideas, guests and moods into an album that draws you into its own unique world. “I became completely obsessed with this project,” states Acaster as he hand-draws the album’s artwork himself, using a trio of highlighter pens, “it was all I focussed on for two years and we ended up making my favourite thing ever. I hope people enjoy it.”

TRACK LISTING

1 Lookaliveandplaydead (feat. Quelle Chris, Mal Devisa, Denmark Vessey, Foonyap)
2 Kept (feat. NNAMDÏ, Gaston Bandimic, Xenia Rubinos, Satomi Matsuzaki, Law Holt, Quelle Chris)
3 PartygatorR.I.P. (feat. Xenia Rubinos, Denmark Vessey, Quelle Chris, Bb Tombo)
4 No,no (feat. Quelle Chris, Xenia Rubinos, NNAMDÏ, Shamir)
5 At(moves) (feat. Quelle Chris, Wheelchair Sports Camp, Mal Devisa)
6 Partygatorpurgatory (feat. Babar Luck, Law Holt, Gaston Bandimic, Bb Tombo)
7 Ificouldjust (feat. Yoni Wolf, Quelle Chris, Shamir, Montaigne, Ami Dang)
8 Bleedthemtoxins (feat. Joana Gomila, NNAMDÏ, Shamir, Quelle Chris)
9 Partygatorresurrection (feat. Open Mike Eagle, Me Oh Myriorama, Montaigne, Low Growl, Bb Tombo)
10 Slowreturn (feat. Yoni Wolf, Shamir)
11 Fitinthiscostume (feat. Ami Dang, Emma Daman, Blanck Mass, Me Oh Myriorama, Gaston Bandimic, Law Holt, Public Speaking, The Growth Eternal)
12 Firstbirthday (feat. NNAMDÏ, Public Speaking)
13 Partygatorpoltergeist (feat. Me Oh Myriorama, J Thoubbs, The Growth Eternal)
14 Lastbirthday (feat. Gaston Bandimic, Blanck Mass)
15 Belongbetween (feat. Quelle Chris, Wheelchair Sports Camp, Law Holt, Babar Luck, Mal Devisa, Public Speaking)

Welcome to Orville’s Discotheque: a synth-drenched concept album brought to you by indie singer-songwriter from Somerset, Jeremy Tuplin.

Set in a world slightly left of reality, the record tells the story of a flawed disco-enthused antihero and his romantic travails. The album charts the stumble and fall of a self-obsessed dancing antihero and his romantic travails. The single sets the scene of the first time the album’s protagonist, Orville, sees his new romantic interest, Eugenie, whilst performing in a disco club night; fascinated by her dance moves that include “hula hoop hips”, “loose helicopter arms”, and whatever else. The lyricism blends self-deprecating humour with poetry, whilst the sound marks another step in the continued evolution of Tuplin’s musical vision, incorporating his lyrical songwriting and intricate storytelling within a loosely defined genre of “indie disco” - or even “dark disco” and “devilish disco” that he references in the song itself. The track was recorded with Tuplin's band, The Sad & Lonely Disco Band at Marketstall Recording Studio in Star Lane, East London. It features Mark Estall on bass, Samuel Nicholson on lead guitar, and Jason Ribeiro on drums, with Tuplin on vocals, synthesizers and rhythm guitar.

"This is the first song I started writing after finishing recording Violet Waves, just after the whole lockdown/global pandemic thing hit." Tuplin explains. "Just chugging away at these chords with no real intention or rush to write or think about the words or what the song could be about, just letting the vocal melody swim over it with word-less sounds." He continues to say "The notion to start writing about dancing and “disco”, possibly arose out of some kind of subconscious desire to return to being able to do that kind of thing. Which is interesting because I now see myself as a bit of a recluse." Jeremy Tuplin is an indie singer-songwriter from Somerset. Lyrical and genre-bending, his music blends alt-folk, indie rock and synth pop with the occasional psychedelic soundscape thrown in for taste. 

TRACK LISTING

1. It's A Real World
2. Dancing (On Your Own)
3. Eugenie
4. Idiot Love
5. L.O.V.E.
6. Love Town
7. Wonderful Time
8. Futureman
9. Better Man
10. Why'd You Go And Look At Me Like That
11. Devil Dances
12. The Mirrorball
13. A Dancer Must Die
14. Dance On 

Singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and producer Lindsay Olsen is the brilliant mind behind the warped and magical project Salami Rose Joe Louis. New album “Akousmatikous” is packed with experimental pop, abstract beats and bedroom R&B/jazz songs connected by a dystopian sci-fi narrative. It features collaborations with Brijean (Ghostly International) and Soccer96 (The Comet is Coming’s Danalogue x Betamax) plus Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, Juuwah, Sergio Machado Plim, Jason Lindner, Dakim and Dan Nicholls also contribute.

TRACK LISTING

1. Akousmatikous (feat. Soccer96)
2. Dimensional Collapse
3. Always On My Mind
4. Fireflies
5. Dimcola Reprise
6. Propaganda (feat. Brijean)
7. Zee Complex
8. The Giddy Aquatic
9. Sugar Coating
10. Proof Is In The Pudding
11. Cathartic Interlude
12. Pushing Me
13. Gradients
14. Losing Steam
15. Zaza Flip
16. Exhaustion And The Open Mind

Like a long-lost Holy Grail album from the mid-seventies, Kirk Degiorgio’s latest project explores both Modal Jazz and Seventies Jazz Fusion in the Library album format. Side One swings with a vengeance with its tight arrangements built around acoustic bass, electric piano and glorious analogue synth leads and side 2 takes us on a journey of funk fuelled, percussive workouts and heavy breaks. The contribution of renowned session drummer Chris Whitten adds to the authenticity of the album as does the use of vintage, analog synths. The Library album was predominant in TV and film studios in Italy and France with composers creating background, incidental and scene music for use in TV and movie production.

In recreating the sound library format Kirk Degiorgio has revelled in both the creative freedom and the test of melodic capability that the short form of the Library album allows. As Kirk says, 'the skill with this kind of composing is to be able to express your ideas and thoughts in a maximum of two minutes at a time.'

Kirk Degiorgio is a DJ, composer and music lover whose influences, from family and then going out to clubs from under-18 discos to attending the Belvedere Arms and 'Shoom' and working in Reckless Records, cover all genres of Black music. From Soul, Jazz-Funk, Funk and then House and Detroit Techno Kirk has a love and an appreciation for how all these sounds work together and evolve from each other.

TRACK LISTING

1. Kiriath-Arba
2. Cincinnati Sunrise
3. Shinar
4. Chicago Shift
5. The Oakland Feel
6. Beersheba
7. Pittsburgh Patrol
8. Khmunu
9. Watts Awakening
10. Beth-El
11. Mittani
12. Dayton Daydreams
13. Harlem Homerun
14. Amurru
15. Shechem
16. Baltimore Beatdown

A transatlantic collaboration between five musicians from the UK jazz collective Steam Down (and DoomCannon) plus eight musicians from Colombia's folk, jazz, hip-hop, salsa and electronic scenes and groups such as Ondatropica, Frente Cumbiero and La Perla.

TRACK LISTING

1. Puente Cósmico
2. Goldmine
3. Arroyo
4. Caminito
5. Borrachero
6. Giver Of Light
7. El Tigrillo Mono
8. Reflection

After "Afro Exotique - Adventures In The Leftfield, Africa 1972-88" was enthusiastically embraced by heads, collectors and core Africa Seven enthusiasts alike, we dived back down into the vaults, and hope we've come up with another volume of listenable esoterica from roughly the same period.

"The Quest", courtesy of fleeting 1978 leftfield supergroup Afro Cult Foundation (featuring Joni Haastrup, Remi Kabaka and friends) sets the tone-bar high and sideways, with 4.50 mins of atmospheric, effected solo piano drift to get things started.

Congolese ensemble band "Orchestre Lipua Lipua" introduces gently lilting Soukous with 1977's, "Distingue", before BG and Fibre's "Thanks and Praises" introduces some wobbly, Moog tinged Lagos reggae shuffle to proceedings.

Akwassa's 1974 funker "I Don't Want Nobody" peels off into a Hammond / wah wah / moog mini odyssey half way through, before Tongolese chanteuse Akofa Akoussah's stirring "Ramer San Rame" introduces emotional charge into proceedings.

Francis Bebey's "La Condition Masculine" (1976) is a centre piece of the album, with it's skippy drum machine rhythm and spoken world vocal, but we'll admit, we probably wouldn't have used it if we'd read a translation of that vocal first.

Benis Cletin's "Jungle Magic" (1979) acid funk intro then gives way to a blatant, and at times slightly unhinged homage to the all conquering (at the time) "I Feel Love", Sorry Bamba's "M'Bife Je T'Aime" keeps the leftfield funk groove rolling, before the mournful, immersive croon of Gregoire Lawani's "Elle M'a Mordu La Langue" brings proceedings to a reflective close.

TRACK LISTING

1. Afrocult Foundation - The Quest (Version Piano Solo)
2. Orchestre Lipua-Lipua - Distingue (Edit)
3. B.G. And Fibre - (G#) Thanks And Praises
4. Akwassa - I Don't Want No-Body (To Tell Me)
5. Aura - I Got To Make It
6. Akofa Akoussah - Ramer Sans Rame
7. Francis Bebey - La Condition Masculine
8. Benis Cletin - Jungle Magic
9. Sorry Bamba - M'Bife Je T'Aime
10. Gregoire Lawani - Elle M'a Mordu La Langue

Yo! Boombox is the new instalment of Soul Jazz Records’ Boombox series on the early days of hip-hop on vinyl and features some of the many innovative underground first-wave of early rap and disco rap records made in the USA in the period 1979-83.

The album includes the first releases of seminal groups such as Grandmaster Flash & The Furious Five and The Funky Four Plus One More through to a host of rarities and little-known obscurities such as the Carver Area High School band’s ‘Get Live 83’, an awesome record made at a Chicago high school.

The album is released as a deluxe triple LP complete with 3x full inner sleeves of extensive sleeve notes, exclusive photography and original label artwork. There is also a very-limited one-pressing only special deluxe version that comes with an extra bonus super-rare 7” single of ‘Magic’s Rap’ by Magic’s Trick, aka ex-marine Magic Fraga, a record that was only ever available on US military bases! The album also comes as a deluxe double CD pack with 30-page booklet and slipcase.

Yo! Boombox also features the stunning photography of Sophie Bramly, one of a very select group of photographers (alongside Henry Chalfant, Martha Cooper, and Joe Conzo) who were allowed full access to document the exciting early days of hip-hop in New York.

These first exuberant wave of innocent, upbeat, party-on-the-block rap records were the first to try and create the sounds heard in community centres, block parties and street jams that first took place in the Bronx in the mid-1970s. Where the first DJs – Flash, Kool Herc and Bambaataa – were back-spinning, mixing and scratching together now classic breakbeat records like The Incredible Bongo Band’s Apache or Babe Ruth’s The Mexican, these first pre-sampling rap records were all made using live bands, often replaying then current disco tunes. As Chic’s ‘Good Times’ was to ‘Rappers’ Delight’, the songs here feature then-current dancefloor hits such as the Tom Tom Club’s ‘Genius of Love’, Cheryl Lynn’s ‘To Be Real’, MFSB’s ‘Love Is the Message’ while MCs rapped over the top, creating a unique new sound. In fact, the links between disco and rap date back earlier to the ‘party style’ MCing of figures such as the legendary DJ Hollywood or radio DJs like Frankie Crocker.

This new Soul Jazz Records collection celebrates these first old-school rap records, bringing together rare, classic and obscure tracks released in the early days of rap.

TRACK LISTING

Vinyl Tracklisting:
Side A:
1. The Carver Area High School Seniors - Get Live '83 (7.43)
2. Mike T - Do It Any Way You Wanna (6.53)
Side B:
1. Chapter III - Real Rocking Groove (Rap & Breaks) (6.34)
2. Sinister Two - Rock It, Don't Stop It (7.59)
Side C:
1. Sangria - To The Beat Y'all (5.18)
2. Funky Four Plus One More - Rappin' And Rocking The House (6.54)
3. The Just Four - Girls Of The World (Genius Rap & Breaks) (7.07)
Side D:
1. Eye Beta Rock - Super Rock Body Shock (8.42)
2. Funky Constellation - Street Talk (Madam Rapper) (9.49)
Side E:
1. Kool Kyle The Starchild - Do You Like That Funky Beat (Ahh Beat, Beat) (8.38)
2. The Just Four - Jam To Remember (6.56)
Side F:
1. Grandmaster Flash And The Furious Five - Super Rappin' No. 2 (7.18)
2. Silver Star - Eei Eei O (7.16)

7" Single (comes With LP Format SJRLP530-7 Only)
A. Magic's Trick - Magic's Rap (4.19) MONO VERSION
AA. Magic's Trick - Magic's Rap (4.19) STEREO VERSION

CD Tracklisting:
CD1
1. The Carver Area High School Seniors - Get Live '83 (The Senior Rap) (7.43)
2. Mike T - Do It Any Way You Wanna (6.53) Click At 0.43
3. Chapter III - Real Rocking Groove (Rap & Breaks) (6.34)
4. Sinister Two - Rock It, Don't Stop It (7.59)
5. Sangria - To The Beat Y'all (5.18)
6. Funky Four Plus One More - Rappin' And Rocking The House (6.54)
7. The Just Four - Girls Of The World (Genius Rap & Breaks) (7.07)
CD2
1. Eye Beta Rock - Super Rock Body Shock (8.42)
2. Funky Constellation - Street Talk (Madam Rapper) (9.49)
3. Kool Kyle The Starchild - Do You Like That Funky Beat (Ahh Beat, Beat) (8.38)
4. The Just Four - Jam To Remember (6.56)
5. Grandmaster Flash And The Furious Five - Super Rappin' No. 2 (7.18)
6. Silver Star - Eei Eei O (7.16)
7. Magic's Trick - Magic's Rap (4.19)

Is there a curse that says Brian ‘BC Camplight’ Christinzio cannot move forward without being knocked back? That the greatest material is born out of emotional trauma?

Whilst making his new album The Last Rotation Of Earth, Christinzio’s relationship with his fiancé crumbled after nine inseparable years. The album follows this break-up amid long-term struggles with addiction and declining mental health. The outcome is an extraordinary record, with Christinzio describing it as “more cinematic, sophisticated, and nuanced than anything I’ve done before. And more desperate”.

That Christinzio has bettered his previous album is an achievement, given that Shortly After Takeoff received the best reviews of his life. “A masterpiece,” said The Guardian’s 5 star review, “a half hour or so that roils with anxiety, stuns with beauty and, occasionally, provokes laughter.” Even then, fate intervened when the album was released in April 2020, just as Covid and lockdown kicked in, so he was unable to tour the record until late 2021. The Philadelphian then joked, “I can't wait to make an album that isn’t surrounded by some awful tragedy.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A wonderful return for Brian Christinzio, full of soaring pop songs and perfectly manicured melodies, as you'd expect. What's not so expected however is how BC's self-confessed pains and setbacks have resulted in such a wonderfully jubilant end-result. Heartfelt, grand and full of nuance, 'The Last Rotation..' is by far his most refined and enjoyable outing yet.

TRACK LISTING

Side A:
1. The Last Rotation Of Earth
2. The Movie
3. It Never Rains In Manchester
4. Kicking Up A Fuss
Side B:
1. She's Gone Cold
2. Fear Life In A Dozen Years
3. Going Out On A Low Note
4. I'm Ugly
5. The Mournin

Alison Goldfrapp has set a towering bar for British synth-pop in the 21st century and she’s only just getting started. The magnetic London-born singer, songwriter and producer’s seven albums with Goldfrapp were fuelled by an unfailing modernity and a sixth sense for sounds that were more timeless than any trend. With the release of her debut solo album The Love Invention- an electrifying dance-pop suite - her multi-faceted musicianship reaches a new peak.

The Love Invention marks Alison’s reawakening as a dancefloor priestess, in an intoxicating showcase of the disco and house influences that have always been at the heart of her musical DNA. “So Hard So Hot” bottles the ephemeral joy of a dancefloor with its anthemic house beat, disco handclaps, and an exquisitely alluring vocal from Alison. The sense of uninhibited liberation courses through album highlights like “In Electric Blue,” a yearning synth-pop confection with a chorus as blissful as love’s first butterflies. On “NeverStop,” she is flooded with the rush of an all-encompassing love over a buoyant, rubberised beat; the sublime synth-pop of “Fever” is an ode to the intoxicating majesty of the dancefloor, with a chorus that explodes as if setting off a glitter cannon.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Alison Goldfrapp has been at the forefront of electronic music for a good few decades now, both with Will Gregory and now on her own. 'The Love Invention' sees Alison veer dramatically into synth-heavy dancefloor grooves, crisply produced house and rich 303 sweeps. While there is very little that would sound bad with Goldfrapp singing atop it, this is the perfect mix of drive and wooze.

TRACK LISTING

NeverStop
Love Invention
Digging Deeper Now
In Electric Blue
The Beat Divine
Fever
Hotel (Suite 23)
Subterfuge
Gatto Gelato
So Hard So Hot
SLoFLo

This is the Pennine Edition - unique to a selection of shops in Yorkshire, Lancashire and Cumbria - all formats include an exclusive embroidered patch.

Standers is the second full-length album by Craven Faults. It follows a trilogy of long sold out EPs, 2020’s Erratics & Unconformities LP, the Enclosures mini-album and a series of studio performances entitled Live Works.

Meticulously curated, each release moves the Craven Faults story forward. Each one a self-contained analogue electronic journey across northern Britain, viewed through the lens of a century in popular music. Studios, venues and movements. Technology and ingenuity. Vibrations. Lines drawn to connect those moments of inspiration.

On Standers, there’s a sonic shift. A new palette to paint from and further refinement of the craft. We’re no longer exclusively travelling overland. Familiar landscapes are viewed from a different perspective. There’s a growing obsession in how this island came to look the way it does, and how its ancient and modern history affects its current population. Landscapes shaped by the elements, and then by countless conquerors and settlers. Livestock and machinery. Money, religion and politics.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Craven Faults' releases don't stick around for long, it's both incredibly evocative and endlessly rich synth work that people just can't get enough of (myself included). That in mind, it's safe to say if you like any sort of hypnotic oscillations or saturated slo-mo cosmic ambient etc, then this is absolutely for you. Another triumph.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Hurrocstanes (16:32)
B1. Severals (7:55)
B2. Meers & Hushes (12:21)
C1. Sun Vein Strings (18:18)
D1. Idols & Altars (7:07)
D2. Odda Delf (10:06)

Ambient demigod Brian Eno and modern bass & Boiler Room poster boy Fred Again team up for a rather unexpected curve ball. It seems that Brian has taken the lead on "Secret Life", forcing the young upstart to ditch his rampant, ADHD-fueled finger drumming and inferno-causing bass-garage-house hybrids for an exercise in what his next door neighbour (true story), and mentor, specializes at - the most serene ambient music around.

It's a delicate, spacious listen; with Eno's famous use of reductive techniques allowing the most precious of elements all the room they need to sparkle - like a tiny Faberge Egg presented in a vast, grandiose, but pin-drop silent gallery. The use of silence given plenty of reverence. There's smeared vocal and string manipulations that reverberate from almost heavenly realms, and in parts, it's like the antithesis to Burials recent dystopian ambient project "Antidawn" - exploring the more optimistic territories of the Skyrim metaverse in a non-linear structure which suspends time and allows you to drift in and out of its liminal reality.

It'll sit comfortably by your side on a rain soaked day languidly pottering around the home, or set the perfect atmosphere for your next art show installation; or even serenade your new born into a dreamlike slumber. I can't help feeling its one of those albums that'll be really affected by the environment in which it is aired. Like much of Eno's work, it's a subtle listen that I'm convinced will reward the deeper and more attentive listeners.

Produced by Brian Eno and Fred Gibson (aka Fred Again) 4th April 2020 - 23rd December 2022

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Everyone loves a bit of Eno, right? This collaboration sees Fred Again's chopped-up synthpop / alt r&b hybrid given the Eno treatment and sloooowed into a beautiful, restorative slice of stargazing ambient. A great collaborative endeavour, with more than a little classic Eno.

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
01 I Saw You
02 Secret
03 Radio
04 Follow
05 Enough
06 Pause
Side 2
01 Safety
02 Cmon
03 Trying
04 Chest
05 Come On Home

Originally called 'Love Island' - until "Linus didn't make the audition process so we jumbled it around" (or, possibly, for legal reasons) - Third Man London's first signing settled instead on 'Island of Love'.

For the label, an island within the UK music scene is exactly what Karim, Linus and Daniel are: feedback-fuelled adolescents with a depth of songwriting unheard since Teenage Fanclub's formative 'Catholic Education', and late '80s Dinosaur Jr. So mind-bendingly good are the group that Third Man co-founder and owner Ben Swank presented an offer approximately thirty seconds after they played the opening weekend of Third Man's new Soho digs (...new to the extent that the drummer left the stage with paint up his back).

Bonded by playing in various punk, hardcore and metal bands in their hometown of London, Island of Love's now double frontmen, Linus and Karim, would write and share demos between their family homes. The lo-fi, fuzzy fruits of these sessions melded into 2020's seven song 'Promo Tape', followed by 2021’s Third Man EP ‘Songs of Love’. Now, no longer a bedroom project, they present their adrenaline-filled debut, awashed with guitar distortion, Linus and Karim's dark harmonies and contemplative lyrics beyond their teenage years. This special release is sure to go down in both the TMR history books as well as mosh pits nationwide

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Island Of Love's debut is a roaring mix of 90's grunge, huge walls of sound and sharp distorted riffs twist under an undeniably tempering vocal performance from both guitarists. 'Grow' is the quintessential mid-point between grunge, pop-punk and indie, full of grit and swimming with earworm melodies.

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
1. Big Whale
2. Fed Rock
3. Grow
4. Blues 2000
5. Sweet Loaf

Side 2
1. I've Got The Secret
2. Losing Streak
3. Weekend At Clive's
4. Charles
5. Never Understand
6. It Was All Ok Forever

"Okemah Rising is the final installment of the Woody Guthrie/Dropkick Murphys collaboration, so we wanted to bring it home with a bang. Whereas the goal of This Machine Still Kills Fascists was to raise consciousness, Okemah Rising intends to raise the roof. Sure, it has one or two tender moments, but all in all it’s much more of a party than TMSKF. Even a party record can have a message though – we’ve felt that on the road over the last few months as we’ve played Okemah Rising songs “Gotta Get to Peekskill” and “I Know How It Feels” on tour all over the world. Every night, when the audience is singing along with Woody's words, his steadfast defense of the working class, and his fight against social injustice and the abuse of political power comes across loud and clear. So as long as Dropkick Murphys are involved, Woody’s message will always be heard."

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Another 'collaborative' outing from Dropkick Murphy's and Woody Guthrie, putting Guthrie's lyrics to their Celtic influenced rock and roll. While Guthrie's lyrics are rousing on their own, the combination of Dropkick Murphy's traditional but driven folksong, and his pertinent vocal musings are another level.

TRACK LISTING

1. My Eyes Are Gonna Shine
2. Gotta Git To Peekskill
3. Watching The World Go By
4. I Know How It Feels
5. Rippin Up The Boundary Line
6. Hear The Curfew Blowin
7. Bring It Home
8. Little Boy
9. Run Hitler Run
10. I’m Shipping Up To Boston - Tulsa Version

These days everyone loves The Fall, but rarely has a band's rise to cult status been quite as lengthy, unpredictable and unprecedented as that of those lovable Mancunian misfits who went through more line-up comings and goings than anyone sane would bother to count. Martin Bramah, The Fall's singer until Mark E Smith's lesser guitar skills caused them to swap places, was, per Daryl Easlea, "possibly the last true equal to Smith in the group" and likewise the longest survivor of the original line-up. Yet while The Fall was later famous for their legendary productivity, Bramah often went great spans of time between releases, releasing fewer albums in thirty-five years (under any guise) than he has in the last seven with Blue Orchids - who already have a fantastic new album in the can. What caused HOUSE Of ALL to come together is something of a mystery. Bramah has joined forces with four other mighty Fall alumni: Steve Hanley, The Fall's longest-serving bassist, as well as his brother Paul Hanley, who drummed on what may be the best run of Fall records, from "Grotesque" to "Bend Sinister". The three have also played together as Factory Star, for a brief period. Joining them are two surprise members - drummer Simon Wolstencroft, who joined the Fall around the time Paul left, and more surprisingly, guitarist Pete Greenway, The Fall's longserving and final guitarist who has, to our knowledge, never played with the other four before. And the album? Recorded in a burst of intense creativity, we won't tempt to propagandise you, the album speaks or itself, but it wouldn't be a false boast to say that it stands with much of the best Fall or Blue Orchids music, displaying an energy and psychic impulse all its own, each member playing as sharply and with as much drive as ever, around manic motorik grooves and a shocking lack of 'compromise'. It's an album of depth which demands multiple visits to uncover its many dimensions, yet it still satisfies upon first listen. The album will be supported by a week-long tour in late May, with more surprises to come. "[Bramah]'s lyrics are brilliant - some of his best ever. It stands up against the Fall at their very best. It's unimaginable, A Fall Album Without MES." - Ged Babey, Louder Than War. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Martin says: There is certainly some echoes of the jagged groove of The Fall here, but House Of All is more of a modern take on Smith's golden era band. It's both wonderfully reminiscent while being entirely a thing all of it's own. A bunch of very talented musicians showing their best side.

TRACK LISTING

Aynebite 
But Wilful I Am
Dominus Ruinea
Harlequin Duke
Magic Sound
Minerva Disrobed
There's More
Turning Of The Years

Esben and the Witch — comprising Rachel Davies, Thomas Fisher and Daniel Copeman — began in Brighton in 2008, later decamped to Berlin, and is now split three ways across the UK, Germany and the US. Their winding geographical journey feels representative of their path as a whole. The band have snaked through various scenes and sonic worlds across their 14 years together, while always squirming away from an easy genre classification. Their first two albums, 2011’s Violet Cries and 2013’s Wash the Sins Not Only The Face — both released on Matador Records — offered gothic, electronic-tinged dream pop and post-rock. Beginning with the Steve Albini-produced A New Nature (2014, self-released on their own Nostromo Records), they came to explore heavier post-punk and metal textures, which they intensified through 2016’s Older Terrors and 2018’s Nowhere (both via Marseille-based metal label Season of Mist).

Hold Sacred represents a reset in many ways. After Nowhere, Davies felt exhausted and disenfranchised with music, and for a while entertained the possibility that Esben and the Witch had come to an end. If they were to make a new album, they needed to take everything back to basics. They departed from their record label, returning to independence through Nostromo. They expanded operations, too, with the launch of Haus Nostromo, an online emporium and journal through which they branch away from purely music, selling “a curated collection of books, zines, art prints, clothing and more”. It’s aimed at building community, celebrating the act of collaboration, and offering an ethical, passion-driven and truly DIY platform for artists across various mediums. “Similar to the spirit of Esben, it’s always been essential for us to do everything on our own terms,” says Davies.

In the summer of 2019, the band retreated to a villa outside of Rome, with no expectations or pressures but simply the intention to enjoy each other’s company and see what musical inspiration may arise from that. This is where the rough sketches of the songs that would form Hold Sacred came to be. “It was a wonderful, restorative retreat,” Davies says. “It felt free again, and a reminder that perhaps there was still a spark left for us to unearth.”

The songs that were emerging were different than any previous. They’re brooding, gentle, almost ambient; there are no live drums, and the instrumentals comprise simple, sparse guitar and keys. “We wanted to create a softer, calmer record; a record we’d listen to when we need soothing, like the ambient records we find comforting and, dare I say, almost spiritual,” says Davies. The band used no outside producers or engineers, keeping the process limited to the three of them from start to finish — harkening back to the spirit of their earliest days when Copeman would record them in his bedroom and bathroom.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Brittle, atmospheric post-rock instrumentals and beatless ambient excursions beautifully accentuated by the haunting vocals of Rachael Davies. Swimming with gothic charm, but undeniably beautiful 'Hold Sacred' is new territory for the band, and sounds every bit as necessary as the rest of their canon.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Well
2. In Ecstasy
3. Fear Not
4. Silence, 1801
5. True Mirror
6. A Kaleidoscope
7. Heathen
8. The Depths
9. Petals Of Ash 

Madison’s latest project, I Hope You Can Forgive Me, represents an evolution in her career as she finds ways to improvise and self-produce in the midst of an ever changing global pandemic landscape. I Hope You Can Forgive Me builds upon that next step sonically while exploring themes of love, self preservation, fear, and conjuring. What comes out of this work and Madison’s career thus far is a commitment to leave - leave fear and doubt behind in order to make space for what is next to come, all with a sense of style, fun, and invitation to dance through it

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: McFerrin presents a beautifully manicured selection of new soul ballads, musically edging towards the glimmering guitars and shimmering percussion of Chic but with her stunning athletic vocals bringing things into funky R&B territory.

TRACK LISTING

1. Deep Sea
2. Fleeting Melodies
3. Testify
4. Run
5. God Herself
6. OMW
7. (Pease Don’t) Leave Me Now
8. Stay Away (From Me)
9. Utah
10. Goodnight

James Ellis Ford has been hidden in plain sight for his entire two-decade-long career. The composer, multi-instrumentalist, producer and songwriter has worked with some of the biggest names in music, from Arctic Monkeys to Depeche Mode via Foals, Gorillaz and Kylie Minogue and as part of Simian Mobile Disco and The Last Shadow Puppets’ touring band. 

This year he takes centre stage with a bewitching debut solo album, ‘The Hum’. It is as much a homage to the tender and eccentric English pop music of Brian Eno and Robert Wyatt as it is love letter to his wife and son’s Palestinian roots; as much exploration of the pastoral verve of Canterbury prog as it is informed by the dynamics of modern hip-hop production; as much a madcap Radiophonic voyage into the cosmic unknown peppered with Can-like grooves. With ‘The Hum’, James Ellis Ford has finally come out of hiding.

TRACK LISTING

01. Tape Loop #7
02. Pillow Village
03. I Never Wanted Anything
04. Squeaky Wheel
05. The Yips
06. Golden Hour
07. The Hum
08. Caterpillar
09. Emptiness
10. Closing Time

Born and raised in Manor Park, East London, she relocated to Nottingham whilst working for a children's charity and initially only considered making music as a way of having fun with friends. However, a chance encounter lead to her earning a place on Future Bubblers - Gilles Peterson's development programme devoted to discovering and nurturing fresh UK talent - and enthused by the experience, Lacey recorded some songs in her living room, then in 2017 self-released her debut EP, 'Black Moon'. The more polished 'When The Sun Dips 90 Degrees' EP followed in 2018, and then 'Morning Matters' EP in 2020 – the EP's title track has clocked up over 14 million plays on Spotify and also saw Yazmin make her COLORS debut performing 'On Your Own'.

TRACK LISTING

Flylo Tweet
Bad Company
Late Night People
Fools Gold
Where Did You Go?
Sign & Signal
From A Lover
Eye To Eye
Pieces
Pass It Back
Tomorrows Child
Match In My Pocket
Legacy
Sea Glass

Highly anticipated would be an understatement; since their inception Overmono have purposefully cultivated a fanbase that heralds them as one of the UK’s most original contemporary live electronic acts.

A run of ground-breaking club EPs between 2020 and 2022 built momentum and culminated in their breakthrough club single, “So U Kno”, which encapsulated the hearts of clubbers and went on to become a bonafide phenomenon as dancefloors re-opened; featuring in end of year lists published by Resident Advisor, Pitchfork, DJ Mag and Mixmag. Since then, Overmono have been named ‘Best Live Act’ at the prestigious DJ Mag Best of British Awards, taken their custom audio-visual live show to the most credible festivals across the globe, including Glastonbury, Movement Festival, Dekmantel and to sold-out crowds in London, LA and NYC as part of their debut headline tour last year. And, they have produced innovative releases including their instalment of their ‘Fabric Presents’ DJ mix series and collaborations with the likes of Joy Orbison.

Now, Overmono return to present their most ambitious release to date. Across the twelve-track project, Overmono journey through a powerful distillation of their musical career so far; incorporating “So U Kno” alongside new music that propels them beyond the dancefloor. Good Lies remoulds and interweaves captivating vocal cuts into a series of multi-genre electronic sounds that flits effortlessly between euphoria and melancholy.

Talking about their debut album Good Lies, Overmono says: “Across the last two years, we have spent so much time on the road, making music whenever we could. Moving around all the time was always really inspiring and got us experimenting a lot and having fun with how we created chords or chopped and pitched vocals. This album is really a letter of love to the journey so far and marks where we want to take things. Much love, T&E x

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: It's been an incredible trajectory for brothers Overmono who've practically become a household name amongst future music lovers and a must-see live act. Now they present their debut album and it's a sonic masterpiece. The album format allowing for intimate moments of sonic exploration alongside their rugged stadium-ready productions.

TRACK LISTING

1. Feelings Plain
2. Arla Fearn
3. Good Lies
4. Walk Thru Water
5. Cold Blooded
6. Skulled
7. Sugarushhh
8. Calon
9. Is U
10. Vermonly
11. So U Kno
12. Calling Out

Moby’s second album on Deutsche Grammophon following 2021’s Bestselling Album & Chart Success “Reprise”.

Digging further into his catalogue, Moby has reimagined fifteen of some of his most iconic tracks for his new album “Resound NYC”, featuring tracks that he wrote between 1994-2010 while living in New York City, and the new versions feature a vibrant, brass-heavy sound. From the sublime desperation of “When It’s Cold I’d Like to Die” to the manic stomp of “Extreme Ways” (best known as the theme from the “Jason Bourne” film franchise), the reworked tracks burst forth with boundless energy. Guest vocalists on “Resound NYC” include Nicole Scherzinger, Gregory Porter, Ricky Wilson (Kaiser Chiefs), Mylene Farmer, Amythyst Kiah, Lady Blackbird, Dougy Mandagi (The Temper Trap) and more.

TRACK LISTING

LP1, SIDE A
In My Heart (Resound NYC Version) Feat. Gregory Porter
Extreme Ways (Resound NYC Version) Feat. The Temper Trap
South Side (Resound NYC Version) Feat. Ricky Wilson
Flower (Find My Baby) (Resound YNC Version) Feat. Amythyst Kiah
LP1, SIDE B
In This World (Resound NYC Version) Feat. Nicole Scherzinger, Marisha Wallace
Helpless (Resound NYC Version) Feat. Margo Timmins, Damien Jurado
Signs Of Love (Resound NYC Version)
The Perfect Life (Resound NYC Version) Feat. Ricky Wilson
LP2, SIDE C
When It’s Cold I’d Like To Die (Resound NYC Version) Feat. P.T. Banks
Slipping Away (Resound NYC Version)
Second Cool Hive (Resound NYC Version) Feat. OUM, Sarah Willis
Hyenas (Resound NYC Version)
LP2, SIDE D
Last Night (Resound NYC Version)
Run On (Resound NYC Version) Feat. Danielle Ponder, Elijah Ponder
Walk With Me (Resound NYC Version) Feat. Lady Blackbird

After much anticipation, Sub Focus has today announced that he will be releasing his new album ‘Evolve’ on May 12th via EMI Records. The album will be the third full-length solo LP by the acclaimed, London-based electronic music producer and artist - following his 2009 debut ‘Sub Focus’ and 2013’s ‘Torus’ and the collaborative album ‘Portals’ with Wilkinson in 2020. ‘Evolve’ will feature 14 tracks, including the recent UK Top 30 hit ‘Ready To Fly’ with Dimension. …Drum & Bass has never felt stronger or more popular as a genre and I’m proud to have been a part of such a thriving scene for so long. I’ve dabbled with multiple genres in the past but this time I wanted to make an album that speaks to my D&B core, with breakbeats laced through every track as a backbone."

Markus Popp is endlessly curious, and his music as Oval is delightfully inventive. Since pioneering albums in the 90s ‘systemisch’ and ‘94diskont.’, Oval has continually excavated new spaces in electronic music, leaving an indelible mark on the landscape.

New album, ‘Romantiq’, finds Popp delivering his most light and delicate tones to date. Like the plucking of harp strings, Popp’s organic and playful approach to sound is warm and bright. Oval continually, confounds with his ability to conjure such lithe, evocative sonics from software. 

‘Romantiq’ evolved from an audio visual collaboration with digital artist Robert Seidel for the grand opening of the German Romantic Museum, where a huge outdoor projection covered the museum building. Popp sought a more expansive definition of the romantic, conjuring flickering images that glitch, evolve and collapse in on one another - opulent neo-chamber music lit by the paradoxically heart-warming screen glow of social media flirtations.

Popp crafted dozens of short vignettes that each sought to evoke a specific mood or emotion. Processed period instruments trace luxuriant spaces that shift from low-lit chambers to glistening palatial grandeur, glitching through past, present and future. Swelling atmospheres emerge like perfume, rich scents flooding the senses before evaporating on the breeze. ‘Romantiq’’s musical oxytocin is made from ancient instruments processed and edited by a modern electronic master with the utmost deftness and delicacy.

TRACK LISTING

1. Zauberwort
2. Rytmy
3. Cresta
4. Amethyst
5. Wildwasser
6. Glockenton
7. Elektrin
8. Okno
9. Touha
10. Lyriq

Ky is the new “solo” project of Ky Brooks, best known as vocalist/lyricist of noise trio Lungbutter and a slew of other Montréal-based out-music projects like 8-person queer punk band Femmaggots and experimental/improv trio Nag. Power Is The Pharmacy is an album of cerebral and visceral artpunk “mainly about grief, death, the fear of loss, losing dreams, losing youth, people, public space, ultimately oneself” an emotionally electrifying collection of songs fuelled by Ky’s piercing poetry, both spoken and sung, delivering an incisive blend of socio-political observation and spiritual sadness, swirling through vortices of disenchantment and re-enchantment.

The seeds of Power Is The Pharmacy were planted in pre-lockdown performances where Big|Brave’s Mat Ball played tape loops to Ky’s poems, with their intent “to figure out how to make music that involved singing in a more melodic way and use parts of my voice I wasn’t using with Lungbutter and other noise/punk projects.” Then pandemic hit, along with Canadian pandemic income support, allowing for Ky’s acquisition of a couple of mini-synths. Songs took on all kinds of further re-shaping in the isolation of Montréal’s intense lockdown winter 2020-21. Then devastating tragedy struck (as it had for so many) in spring 2021 when Lungbutter drummer and dear friend Joni Sadler died suddenly of a brain aneurism. Ky describes “All The Sad And Loving People” as “the most direct piece of writing I’ve done in response to Joni’s passing” and the song’s haunting, devotional simplicity is a numinous album highlight among many.

Power Is The Pharmacy careens through hissing bruitist synthscape, free/jazz sprinkles, soft-focus gauze, coldwave and ambient-to-thick sludge, all anchored by Ky’s superbly sly, searching, serrated lyrics and voice. The album ranges from trenchant spoken-word tracks like “Power Is The Pharmacy (Teeth)” and “Work That Superficially Looks Like Leisure”—which repeats the line “Suddenly! / No not suddenly! / But with a fantastic regularity and remarkable softness! / I woke up and decided I knew how to work!” to the haunting electro of “The Dancer” and “All The Sad And Loving People” (most overtly evoking Big Science-era Laurie Anderson, a recurring stylistic touchstone). The album’s second half brings Ball’s incendiary noise-improv guitar to the fore, along with Ky’s voice more fiercely and soulfully unleashed, on heavy incantatory cuts like “Revolving Door”, “Dragons” and the quasi-operatic cabaret of “Listen! Avoid Magic! Be Aware!”

Ky enlisted a diverse crew of fellow Montréal iconoclasts to flesh out this gripping voyage through unruly stylistic and mood swings of experimental song, including the aforementioned Mat Ball, synth maven Nick Schofield, saxophonist James Goddard (Egyptian Cotton Arkestra), bassist Joshua Frank (Gong Gong Gong) and drummer Farley Miller (Shining Wizard). Ky composed all the music, plays synths and guitars, asked all these friends to “not under any circumstances play any particular thing” and then and mixed the album “for 10 million years.” The album draws its title from A Critique Of Black Reason by Achille Mbembe, as quoted in the liner notes: Power is the pharmacy, thanks to its capacity to transform the sources of death into a seeding strength, or to convert the resources of death into the capacity for healing. And it is because of its dual ability to be the force of life and the principle of death that power is at once revered and feared. But the relationship between the principles of life and death is fundamentally unstable.

TRACK LISTING

1. Power Is The Pharmacy (Teeth)
2. All The Sad And Loving People
3. Work That Superficially Looks Like Leisure
4. The Dancer
5. Revolving Door
6. Listen! Avoid Magic! Be Aware!
7. Dragons
8. Elvin Silverware
9. The Replacement

DEAD SEA APES are back with a passion to deliver their most essential and cohesive album to date. Formed in 2009, DEAD SEA APES have become a fixture of the psych scene, sharing stages with the likes of Part Chimp, The Heads, Acid Mother Temple and Mugstar while producing a distinctive body of work, ranging from psychedelic punk to experimental dub, from freeform jams to constructions of loops and drones. Following a slew of collaborations and split releases, REWILDING sees them return to a power trio of Brett Savage (guitar), Jack Toker (bass) and Chris Hardman (drums). From the chaotic blast of opener ‘Denialist’, beaming out like a maniacal emergency broadcast, through to the monolithic pounding of the title track, REWILDING is unrelenting, taking in blown-out guitar wails and jet black psych noise while the irrepressible rhythm section moves from claustrophobic motorik beats to a thunderous rolling juggernaut. These blackened pearls have been recast and refined over the course of the past three years, strung out deeper than the night and now embodying our present uncanny, disorienting times, as we emerge into an altered world to find Mother Nature reasserting herself while the human madness intensifies, locally and globally. Savage and uncompromising, this is DEAD SEA APES at their most direct and visceral. 

What better way to celebrate Spare Snare's 30th birthday than reuniting with Steve Albini to record their 12th album, in Leith, assisted by Rod Jones of Idlewild. Featuring 10 brand-new songs written over the past year, the album shows off the Dundee band’s new six-piece line-up, along with two legendary guests. Gary Barnacle and Terry Edwards, who met for the first time on the session, duet on more than half the album, bringing a new texture and urgency to the Spare Snare sound.

TRACK LISTING

1. Brutal
2. Hold Your Sex
3. Ring To Me
4. Bleached Out Rainbows
5. Wi-fi
6. I Have You
7. Have A Go
8. Hey Won't You
9. Where Does It All Go
10. That's About It 

2023 marks the big comeback of Fatoumata Diawara.

After LAMOMALI (the afro-pop project of -M- awarded a Victoire de la Musique (French Grammy equivalent) and a double platinum album), her solo album FENFO (nominated for the Grammy Awards and the Victoires de la Musique) and successful international collaborations (Gorillaz, Disclosure…), one of Africa's greatest voices presents LONDON KO. Distinguished guests (-M-, Angie Stone, Roberto Fonseca, Yemi Alade, Ghanaian rapper M.anifest) and 6 tracks co-produced with Damon Albarn: a perfect combination between synthetic sounds and traditional Malian rhythms; a dive into an eclectic and an absolut avant-garde universe. Bamako versus London, London Ko, a story to follow and share!

TRACK LISTING

1. Nsera
2. Somaw
3.Sete
4. Seguen
5. Massa Den
6. Mogokan
7. Blues
8. Moussoya
9. Netara
10.Yada
11. Tolon
12. Dambe
13. Dakan
14. Maya

Nina Grollman’s moniker, Softee, isn’t just a sardonic nod to the thrifty, soft-serve giant, it’s an earnest - sometimes painfully so - descriptor of the Brooklyn based artist’s approach to love and music. Her work is a kaleidoscopic exploration of wrought emotion, tinged with influences as sundry as Robyn, Janet Jackson, and the pure, unfettered melodrama of 80s pop. But whether she’s wrestling through a heartbreak, or making sense of her sexuality, Softee weaves her anxiety and unrest into urgently joyful, angsty queer pop. Her song “Crush,” featured on the 2022 Queer as Folk reboot, was described by Rolling Stone as “a swooning synth-pop gem that opens up at the bridge with a stream of strings that give the song a vintage disco feel, like glittery teardrops hitting the dance floor,”. Back in the day, the Moorhead, Minnesota born artist remembers Fargo-esque winters in her makeshift bedroom studio: recording Katy Perry covers and uploading them to Youtube, writing songs, and unleashing the emotional rhythm that would eventually lead her to experiment with loop pedals across New York City DIY stages alongside Linda Diaz, Sir Babygirl, Blaketheman1000 and Francesca D’Uva.

TRACK LISTING

Side A:
The Floor
Isn't Enough
Molly
Natural
Come Home
Side B:
Fix It (Feat. Namir Blade & Jordan Webb)
Grief
Real Love
Red Light Green Light
U + Me Forever (WDYT) 

A globe spanning ( France, Italy, Germany, USA, Belarus, Sweden, Russia, Australia, Canada ) covers album of the late great Marc Bolan songs starting with the earliest cover in 1965.

Covering a huge range of genres and styles.

A response to the U.S Hit album Angel Headed Hipster which opened up the songs of Bolan to a new American audience by using big names and TV advertising …this concentrates on quality recordings by lesser known artists 

TRACK LISTING

CD Tracklist
Disc 1
1. Beyond The Rising Sun (Il Faut Trouver Son Coin De Ciel) - Sylvie Vartan
2.The Third Degree - Andy Ellison & Boz Boorer
3. Menthol Dan - Andy Ellison & Boz Boorer
4. Pictures Of Purple People - Automatic Shoes
5.Child Star - Witchwood
6.Chateau In Virginia Waters - Swervedriver
7. Stacey Grove - Marsha Hunt
8. Travelling Tragition - Fair Folk (CD Only)
9. Eminesque Head - Puretongue (CD Only)
10. Cat Black (The Wizard’s Hat) - Chris Connelly & The Liquid Gang
11. Lofty Skies - Automatic Shoes
12. Wind Cheetah - Catherine Lambert
13. Elemental Child - The Charms
14. Visit - Tarwater
Disc 2
1. Cosmic Dancer - Mair 
2. Lean Woman Blues - Alison MacCallum (CD Only)
3. Jeepster (Alt Version) - The Polecats
4. Raw Ramp - Black Bombers
5. Ballrooms Of Mars - Kelly Reilly
6. Spaceball Ricochet – Speedtwinn
7. Life’s A Gas - Mexican Dogs
8. Children Of The Revolution - Burn It To The Ground 
9. Life Is Strange ( Dziunaje Zyccio) - Illa Falazynski
10. Calling All Destroyers - Rachel Stamp
11. Soul Of My Suit - Chris Braide
12. Visions Of Domino - Schwefel
13. Prelude – Jewel - Buick Mackane

Vinyl Tracklist:
Side A
1.Beyond The Rising Sun (Il Faut Trouver Son Coin De Ciel) - Sylvie Vartan
2.Third Degree - Andy Ellison & Boz Boorer (Exclusive)
3.Pictures Of Purple People - Automatic Shoes
4.Stacey Grove - Marsha Hunt
5.Chateau In Virginia Waters - Swervedriver
6.Child Star - Witchwood
Side B
7.Cosmic Dancer - Mair (Exclusive) 
8.Wind Cheetah - Catherine Lambert
9.Elemental Child - The Charms
10.Visit - Tarwater
11.Cat Black ( The Wizard’s Hat ) - Chris Connelly & The Liquid Gang
Side C
12.Children Of The Revolution - Burn It To The Ground 
13.Lofty Skies - Automatic Shoes
14.Ballrooms Of Mars - Kelly Reilly
15.Spaceball Ricochet – Speedtwinn
16.Jeepster - The Polecats
17.Soul Of My Suit - Chris Braide
Side D
18. Calling All Destroyers - Rachel Stamp
19. Menthol Dan (Dan The Sniff) - Andy Ellison & Boz Boorer
20. Raw Ramp - Black Bombers
21. Life’s A Gas - Mexican Dogs
22. Life Is Strange - Illa FalaZynski
23. Visions Of Domino - Schwefel 

The popularity of Brazilian music from the 60s, 70s and 80s has experienced quite the renaissance; artists such as Gal Costa, Gilberto Gil, Arthur Verocai, Joyce et al, have become household names to an international audience passionate about global sounds.

However, even for die- hard fans and collectors of Brazilian music of the past, discovering contemporary Brazilian artists is not always easy, nor accessible. But, if you know where to look, you will see that there is a resurgence well underway that can be epitomised by an exciting new wave of Brazilian artists beginning to break through and gather momentum overseas. It's with thanks to Sound and Colours, a website devoted to promoting Latin American music and culture, that we can help shine a light on one particular collective, bursting with creativity and camaraderie.

'Hidden Waters: Strange and Sublime Sounds of Rio de Janeiro' is compiled by Joe Osborne (founder of specialist Brazilian music platform Brazilian Wax) and Russ Slater (editor at large of Sounds and Colours). Focusing solely on the 'Rio Scene', rather than taking on the mammoth task of tackling Brazil as a whole, this collection presents 20-plus ground-breaking artists selected from Rio's resurgent music scene. By presenting a snapshot into the pulse of the city and the vibrant musicians that live in it, 'Hidden Waters' collates tracks from a wide spectrum of musical genres from the avant-garde edge to bossa nova, samba, Candomblé, lofi rock, jazz and funk.

'Hidden Waters' showcases musicians such as iconic Rio mainstays Negro Leo & Ava Rocha, Brazilian jazz upstart Antônio Neves, critically lauded Avant- pop trailblazer Thiago Nassif, breakthrough artists Ana Frango Elétrico and Letrux, lofi psych rocker Lê Almeida, plus the Latin Grammy-winning Bala Desejo who are set to explode onto the world stage. The music featured on 'Hidden Waters' is unequivocally Brazilian, swelling with samba, bossa nova, funk, and jazz. But it's within the album's blend; from sunny psychedelia to dusky synth- pop via experimental electronics, that marks the compilation as the sound of modern, multicultural Rio.

This comprehensive compilation comes with album artwork designed by Rio music's leading album artwork designer, Caio Paiva. It features essays by professor and music critic Bernardo Oliveira and music journalist Leonardo Lichote, plus extensive notes on each track by the artists themselves.

Featuring ground-breaking artists from Rio's resurgent music scene, intent on bringing an avant-garde edge to bossa nova, samba, jazz and funk.

TRACK LISTING

Ana Frango Elétrico - Saudade
Pedro Fonte - Clichê
Bala Desejo - Lua Comanche
Ava Rocha - Boca Do Céu
Exército De Bebês - Avós Da Experiência
Thiago Nassif - Soar Estranho (feat. Arto Lindsay, Vinicius Cantuária & Gabriela Riley)
Negro Leo - Mulato
Mari Romano - Amélie
Rosabege - Sigo Num Site Mármore
Dora Morelenbaum - Vento De Beirada
Cadu Tenório & Juçara Marçal - Candombe - La Cacundê Iauê
Jonas Sa - Gigolô
Troá - Bandeide
Marcelo Callado - Simbora (feat. Silvia Machete)
Ovo Ou Bicho - Moços
Lê Almeida - Apreço Antigo
Vovô Bebê - Briga De Família (feat. Ana Frango)
Joana Queiroz - Dois Litorais
Raquel Dimantas - Flecha Azul
António Neves & Thiaguinho Silva - Das Neves
Letrux - Dorme Com Essa
Os Ritmistas - Sambolero

Groundbreaking Scottish composer, producer and multi-instrumentalist Erland Cooper shares his ambitious fourth studio album Folded Landscapes. Known for merging modern classical-electronic music with evocative storytelling and conceptual art, Erland shares his urgent observation on climate change, temperature and time. This poignant chamber string work figuratively and literally thaws over seven movements, unfolding with electronics, poetry, soprano, piano, harpsichord, field recordings and samples. The work features Scottish Ensemble, UK Poet Laureate Simon Armitage and other voices including activist Greta Thunberg, multi-award winning conservationist Dara McNaulty and & visual artist Norman Ackroyd. Field recordings of the natural world include the California wildfires and crashing glaciers.

The creative process mimicked the rising temperature of the piece from glacial to a threatening burn - musicians were recorded in subzero temperatures and the audio master tape was sun-burnt on the hottest day in UK history. The heat, moisture, salt and sunlight worked its way into the fabric of the tape, which has been mixed into the finished work, underscoring the work with an unsettling burn that crackles and pops.

A percentage of the copyright share will go to Brian Eno’s EarthPercent charity as a beautiful way of embedding the planet as a stakeholder in musical creativity and raising money for climate/environmental organisations. The Earth’s share of the song - and its income - will be directed to EarthPercent to redistribute to organisations tackling the climate crisis. Folded Landscapes is released on Mercury KX.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: The wonderful Erland Cooper presents his newest suite of soaring instrumentals and warming storytelling, this time focusing on the environmental crisis and including prominent climate change voices and pertinent field recordings. It's huge and beautiful, and exactly what we'd expect from Cooper.

TRACK LISTING

Movement 1 [6:42]
Movement 2 [5:03]
Movement 3 [3:53]
Movement 4 [7:09]
Movement 5 [6:51]
Movement 6 [3:57]
Movement 7 [9:01]

Durand Jones’s Wait ‘Til I Get Over is a memoir and a love letter. It is the story of Jones’s life, his growth and revelations, the wisdom of his hometown and the wisdom he could only gain once he left. In it, he writes through Hillaryville’s contradictions: the pristine beauty and the ragged roads; his teenage desire to leave and his adult desire to honor his tangled roots; the plantation history and the ups and downs of the Black community that made homes of this reparation town. “Hometowns have a way of keeping a part of you,” says Jones, “and if I’m making something young-me would be proud of, Hillaryville is a big part of that.” Jones finds something transformative in his memories there and the life he has led since, ultimately claiming and embracing his whole self.

The result is vulnerable, personal, touching on Jones’s relationship to church life, to his mother, to his queerness, to his worth. “I wish I could tell my younger self ‘you don’t have to stick to the dreams people have for you,’” says Jones, “’you can dream bigger. You are more than capable, you are more than able. I think about some nerdy punk kid in the rural south who needs to hear that now.’” Wait ‘Til I Get Over does exactly that.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Jones' solo endeavour here shows echoes of the deep American Soul his 'Durand Jones & The Indications' project is rich with, but filled with a warm, excited, and mildly chaotic jubilance. There are uplifting moments of gospel euphoria and brittle, soulful minimalism but always with Jones's impeccable songwriting style and unmistakeable voice.

TRACK LISTING

1. Gerri Marie
2. The Place You’d Most Want
To Live (Interlude)
3. Lord Have Mercy
4. Sadie
5. I Want You
6. Wait Til I Get Over
7. That Feeling
8. See It Through (Interlude)
9. See It Through
10. Someday We’ll All Be
Free (feat. Skypp)
11. Letter To My 17 Year Old Self
12. Secrets

Raving Ghost is an album populated by mysterious characters in various states of danger – cursed lovers, doomed souls, women deliriously haunted by unseen forces. Over the course of its 11 spellbinding tracks, Olivia Jean amplifies that drama with her wildly melodic take on garage rock, handling each riff with the power and precision she’s previously shown as a member of the Black Belles and as an in-demand session/touring musician who has played with legends like Wanda Jackson.

Featuring backing from such top musicians as My Morning Jacket keyboardist Bo Koster, Jellyfish co-founder Roger Joseph Manning Jr, and drummers Carla Azar (T-Bone Burnett, Nikki Lane) and Patrick Keeler (The Raconteurs, The Afghan Whigs), the album is a feverish collision of goth- punk, power-pop, and classic garage, charged with an energy so intense that the speakers to several of Valentine Recording Studios’ vintage amps ended up blowing out during the sessions. A stunning evolution of the retro-surf sound featured on Olivia Jean’s critically acclaimed past solo work, Raving Ghost ultimately proves the most magnificently heavy and mesmerizing output yet from an endlessly fascinating artist. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Martin says: Olivia Jean presents a sleek, enjoyable mid-point between lo-fi garage rock and melodic goth-pop, all topped with Jean's psychedelic vocals. Brilliantly produced and presented too, classic Third Man.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE 1
1. Raving Ghost
2. Too Late
3. Spider
4. Trouble
5. I Need You
SIDE 2
1. Ditch
2. Fun
3. Fate
4. Orinoco Flow
5. Godmother
6. Don't Leave

Westerman — the London-born, Athens-based pop maverick — has returned with his new album, ‘An Inbuilt Fault’.

The album’s nine songs took shape throughout the depths of the pandemic, and soundtrack Westerman’s reckoning with two years of intense isolation, loneliness, heartbreak, and dread. Through it all, the album is visceral and live-sounding, full of the sound of breath and the idiosyncratic gestures of acoustic instruments. It creates a spatial feeling, sounding like musicians assembled in a room, passing evolving ideas back and forth. Co-produced with producer & percussionist James Krivchenia (Big Thief), ‘An Inbuilt Fault’ musically references everything from Talk Talk’s delightfully strange and ethereal brand of pop, David Byrne’s bag of rhythmic tricks, Cat Stevens’ fireside warmth and much more.

‘An Inbuilt Fault’ follows Westerman’s acclaimed 2020 debut ‘Your Hero Is Not Dead,’ a graceful and self-reflective project which earned him a spot as one of the most talked about new artists of the year thanks to profiles from Pitchfork (‘Rising’), Stereogum (‘Artist To Watch’), and Rolling Stone (‘Artist You Need To Know’).

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Slices of crisply produced pop music sprout out of hypnotic acoustic guitar and jagged jazzy percussion. It's wonderfully dynamic, but also not at all over-produced or overworked, and provides the perfect bed for Westerman's woozy, pitch-perfect vocal syrup. Beautiful.

TRACK LISTING

1. Give
2. Idol; RE-run
3. I, Catallus.
4. CSI: Petralona
5. Help Didn't Help At All
6. A Lens Turning
7. Take
8. An Inbuilt Fault
9. Pilot Was A Dancer

On Everything Harmony, the fourth full-length studio release from New York’s The Lemon Twigs, the prodigiously talented brothers Brian and Michael D’Addario offer 13 original servings of beauty that showcase an emotional depth and musical sophistication far beyond their years as a band, let alone as young men.

Everything Harmony successfully blends the brothers’ distinct personalities while giving voice to their eclectic influences. Opening the album with the unassuming acoustic folk of plaintive “When Winter Comes Around,” which echoes the sophisticated grandeur of classic Simon & Garfunkel recordings, they immediately switch things up to the sunny classic pop motif of “In My Head.” “Corner of My Eye” channels an Art Garfunkel-like vocal melody over a moody, vibraphone-tinged backing track suggesting the chamber pop of Brian Wilson.

While they had no grand concept for Everything Harmony, both the D’Addarios felt a “palpable mood of defeat” prevailed while writing and recording it. “New To Me” was inspired by their shared experience with loved ones suffering from Alzheimer’s, “What You Were Doing” is dressed in the tortured jangle of vintage Big Star, while “Born To Be Lonely,” written after watching John Cassavetes’ Opening Night, deals with what Brian calls “the fragility that often comes with age.”

Everything Harmony is a unified song cycle born of shared blood and common purpose. With two musical heads being better than one, there’s no shortage of ideas to draw on. Their only impediments are time and the challenge of keeping up with their own prolific musical inspiration. “We share an intuition and tend to be influenced by one another,” says Brian, “so the lyrical ideas on this record tend to complement each other. Writing has never been the issue for us. It’s completing, editing and compiling that takes the time. We’re trapped in a web of songs!”

TRACK LISTING

1. When Winter Comes Around
2. In My Head
3. Corner Of My Eye
4. Any Time Of Day
5. What You Were Doing
6. I Don’t Belong To Me
7. Every Day Is The Worst Day Of My Life
8. What Happens To A Heart
9. Still It’s Not Enough
10. Born To Be Lonely
11. Ghost Run Free
12. Everything Harmony
13. New To Me

ATUM is a rock opera presented in three acts by inimitable American rock band The Smashing Pumpkins. The album tells an epic interplanetary story set in the not-too-distant future, though the songs themselves respectively stand on their own in the Pumpkins pantheon. This is the final installment in a concept album trilogy, which began with 1995’s Melancholy and the Infinite Sadness and then continued with 2000's Machina/The Machines of God. The album features three original members of the band - William Corgan, James Iha, and Jimmy Chamberlin - as well as longtime guitarist Jeff Schroeder. Corgan had been developing the idea for the rock opera for years, and the pandemic gave him the time off the road to meticulously complete it in the grandiose way he had intended.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: As Mellon Collie & The Infinite Sadness is one of my favourite albums of all time, it's impossible not to be excited by this epic culmination of the trilogy that includes that and 2000's also-excellent Machina (Machines of God). A huge, expansive collection, spanning the Pumpkins' wide tonal palette.

TRACK LISTING

1. Atum
2. Butterfly Suite
3. The Good In Goodbye
4. Embracer
5. With Ado I Do
6. Hooligan
7. Steps In Time
8. Where Rain Must Fall
9. Beyond The Vale
10. Hooray!
11. The Gold Mask
12. Avalanche
13. Empires
14. Neophyte
15. Moss
16. Night Waves
17. Space Age
18. Every Morning
19. To The Grays
20. Beguiled
21. The Culling
22. Springtimes
23. Sojurner
24. That Which Animates The Spirit
25. X Ray
26. Pacer
27. In Lieu Of Failure
28. Cenotaph
29. Harmageddon
30. Fireflies
31. Intergalactic
32. Spellbinding
33. Of Wings
34. Audio Story

From the instrumental cinematic-soul outfit behind 2021's critically acclaimed The Black Stone Affair comes Whatitdo Archive Group's most recent foray into the realms of the esoteric and arcane, and their most adventurous album to date.

After The Black Stone Affair enthralled record collectors by traversing the cinematic landscape of an imagined 1970s Spaghetti Western, Palace Of A Thousand Sounds finds Whatitdo Archive Group entrenched deeper in the worlds of mid-century exotica and library music—from the Tropicalia-steeped Amazon to the minor key tonalities of the far-out Near East.

When the dust finally settled from their debut album, composer and tireless sound scientist Alexander Korostinsky set out to discover the band's new direction, with the ultimate goal to breathe new life into the mid-century era sound with the compass of modernity as his guide.

From its conception in 2021, Palace has sought to carry on a legacy set in motion by the likes of Martin Denny, Les Baxter and Juan García Esquivel. Korostinsky, guitarist Mark Sexton, and drummer Aaron Chiazza recorded the album in marathon sessions from Korostinsky's Studio "A," in Reno, Nevada—a mysterious sonic laboratory where the year 1970 has yet to happen, and vintage analog equipment interfaces with modern musical perspectives and experimental recording techniques to produce era-defining sounds.

Not content to appeal to the sensibilities of armchair anthropologists, Palace Of A Thousand Sounds finds the band interrogating the genre itself while making studious tributes to the real places and times it draws from. It's in this tension between here and there, fantasy and reality, that Whatitdo Archive Group find their groove.

Drawing from a century of pop and folk sounds from around the world the way only 21st-century crate-diggers can, Palace is rooted in an undercurrent of heavy funk that is decidedly here and now. Whatitdo Archive Group showcase the breadth of their influences with disarming confidence, equally at home behind sweeping harp, loungey vibraphone or Turkish bağlama saz. A lush seventeen-piece orchestra commanded by award-winning composer Louis King (Janelle Monáe, Monophonics) completes the instrumental mélange, enticing listeners to imagine a borderless planet unified by melody and rhythm.

The album is unafraid to explore the strange and uncomfortable in pursuit of an authentic musical identity, subverting expectations in pursuit of forwarding the genre while paying homage to its past. Fans will appreciate the architectural complexity of the record accessible only through multiple listens—each visit to the palace yielding new details to marvel at, curiosities to ponder, grand mysteries to explore.

Once the needle drops, W.A.G carefully guides you from room to room, sound to sound within the walls of the album's sonic palace. Listening becomes an aural journey providing glimpses into different worlds both real and imagined; you are everywhere and nowhere all at once—a guest in the grand halls and hanging gardens of time and sound.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Cinematic and engrossing arrangements which drift between stylistic boundaries. This Milanese group should be on the radar of lovers of global grooves and esoteric exotica.

TRACK LISTING

1. Enter The Palace
2. Beyond The Crimson Veil
3. Astral-Desia
4. Delirium
5. Exotique
6. Sun Harp
7. The Cashmere Chamber
8. Iron Tusk
9. Secrets In The Sand
10. Mirage
11. Ritual Of Gods
12. The Second Moon
13. Forbidden Cove

Fase Luna is the ocean-inspired, wobbly-pop filled third album, by LA Priest, aka Sam Eastgate – due for release May 5th via Domino. Following 2020’s GENE, named after a modular drum machine that Sam designed using 150 electrical circuits he’d built himself, Fase Luna strips things back to little more than Sam and his guitar: nine sunshine-streaked tracks of pure bliss.

Recording in Mexico and the rainforests of Costa Rica, Fase Luna draws inspiration from each area’s mythical history and ancient connections to the ocean, drawing heavily on both to pack Fase Luna with stories of spirits and imaginations of life on the ocean bed. Raw and unfiltered, Fase Luna offers a one-way ticket to another world.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: 'Fase Luna' brilliant walks the path of Demarco-inspired woozy pop, with tape warble and shimmering affected guitar lines warping around each-other. It's brilliantly loose, perfectly laid back and results in an otherworldly experience all round. Lovely stuff.

The second collaborative album from Laetitia Sadier [Stereolab & solo] and Brazil's Mombojó. Release via Stereolab's Duophonic Super 45s imprint.

Modern Cosmology is a musical ensemble composed of six individuals of the human race, none of which are cosmologists or astronomers, although Felipe S. - who sings and plays the guitar - knows quite a bit about reading astrological charts. He shares his frontperson duties with one Laetitia Sadier who, by virtue of her singer-songwriter career both as a solo artist and as part of the Stereolab ‘groop’, happens to be one of the key figures of her bandmates’ musical formation.

Their paths first crossed when Marcelo - also on guitars - lent his amp for some of Laetitia’s solo concerts in Brazil under the condition that he got to meet his musical idol, and along came his brother Vicente - who plays the drums - and keyboardist Chiquinho. The four lads, plus Missionário José on bass, are collectively called Mombojó, an established band on the Brazilian alternative scene. 

“What will you grow now?” started in late 2016 on a recording session Mombojó did on a motorboat up the Capibaribe river in their Recife hometown. The title track was recorded there and then during this fluvial jam session, and the other backing tracks were recorded about a year later at a recording studio at the local University, after which Laetitia had a bunch of new material to add words and melodies to, from her Brazilian friends and bandmates with love. Life happened, COVID happened, new albums by Laetitia and Mombojó also happened, and between this and that Modern Cosmology managed to get six new tracks ready for release.

In current times we tend to feel so disconnected that a lot is said everywhere about connection, but this album is not about connections per se, or at least not about first connections. As the title teases, this album is about growth, deepening connections and strengthening bonds, about delving into the next chapter, about realising that now that we have drawn attention to a number of important issues, how do we avoid addressing them without falling in the same pits we have before? 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Saier and Mombojó return for another endlessly inventive selection of Latin-leaning electronic soul and easy-listening pop nuggets. Funky, but while remaining distinctly laid-back, it's a perfectly honed and wonderfully rich sound.

TRACK LISTING

1. Making Something
2. Le Train Ne Passera Pas
3. Consent For Life
4. What Will You Grow Now?
5. Trauma Release Makes Free
6. A Time To Blossom 

Glasgow-based twin-sibling duo Cloth (Rachael and Paul Swinton) release ‘Secret Measure’ their first full-length release on Rock Action Records (Mogwai, Arab Strap, The Twilight Sad) following the four-song ‘Low Sun EP’ (2022). The album was produced by Ali Chant (Yard Act, Katy J Pearson, Squirrel Flower) at Toybox Studios.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Angular post-rock structures and flickering percussion sit perfectly below the hypnotic hushed vocals. Driven, dreamy and full of moments of unexpected syncopation and cumulative heft. A feat of songwriting prowess, and a really enjoyable listen.

‘Silver Haze’ was produced by Randall Dunn, who has also worked with the likes of Sunn O))), Boris, Earth, Zola Jesus, and Marissa Nadler, all of whom are artists that SQÜRL cite as inspirations. The album enlists Charlotte Gainsbourg, Anika, and Mark Ribot as collaborators, resulting in a communal offering that shares an energetic lineage with the New York School of Poets.

‘Silver Haze’ expands on SQÜRL’s passion for creating rich textural sounds, finessed by a keen ear for production. The band is known for playing with everything from analogue synths to broken radios and pulling inspiration from painters, writers, and birds on the street. ‘Silver Haze’ is a poetic journey of spoken words, dynamic instrumentals, drone riffs and distorted effects, one that features tubular bells and a cello in addition to their signature stacks of delay, encircling the listener in a warm oscillation both delicate and devastating.

TRACK LISTING

1. Berlin '87
2. The End Of The World
3. Garden Of Glass Flowers Feat. Marc Ribot
4. She Don't Wanna Talk About It Feat. Anika
5. Il Deserto Rosso Feat. Marc Ribot
6. John Ashbery Takes A Walk Feat. Charlotte Gainsbourg
7. Queen Elizabeth
8. Silver Haze 

Taking his cue from seminal mix albums of days gone by, Glenn Astro is back with a compilation of original productions from a cast of fictional artists on “Nothing Is Real”. Across 13 tracks, the Tartelet mainstay celebrates the thrill of discovery which came as standard listening to new entries in series’ like X-Mix and DJ Kicks, moving between head-nodding downtempo, ambient techno, broken beat and all manner of chill-out room delights. You might be left wishing artists such as DJ 1999, Mental Trance and Eye Soul8r had actual discographies to go and explore, but as Astro himself is keen to point out, ‘nothing is real.’

Astro has never been shy to embrace classic tropes and tones in his past albums for Tartelet, Apollo and Ninja Tune, but he’s drawing on a different set of influences for this album and embracing the flexibility afforded by using imagined aliases for varied production styles.

‘I had the idea to do a mixtape, preferably with unknown dance tracks that also reflect that whole 90s/early 00s vibe,’ Astro explains. ‘Instead of digging for some records that haven’t been sourced yet or trying to find those forgotten treasures, I made the tracks myself. That way I had full control over BPMs, feel and the whole arrangement of tracks. I thought of a few alter egos and started producing the tracks in the order that I intended to play them in a mix. In the end a whole compilation of tracks emerged.’

While the concept might suggest you’re going to hear a lot of over-familiar sounds, don’t be fooled. Astro is inspired and inquisitive, channeling the experimental spirit of the 90s and early 00s when electronic music was still continually being redefined in all kinds of micro-scenes. In many cases, Astro’s productions slip into the cracks between genres rather than specifically mimicking a style.

Even if the reference points are detectable, the end result is a curious blend as indebted to ambiguity as the overall concept of the compilation. Like the spine-tingling sensation of hitting play and awaiting the waves of unknown sonics on one of those seminal mixes, you never know exactly what you’re going to get as you take the trip through “Nothing Is Real”.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: A brilliantly conceived project which sees Glenn attempt to recreate the halcyon sounds of 90s downbeat which he does with staggeringly authentic results. Light up a joss stick, roll up your finest indica a get fully submerged in this post-xtc glow.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Glenn Astro & Mental Trance - Intro Track
A2. Glenn Astro & Crystalline Reality - The Growl
(crystalline Mix)
A3. Glenn Astro & Eye Soul8r - Autumn Subs
A4. Glenn Astro & Dj 1999 - The Abyss
B1. Glenn Astro & Brain Liquor - Jaque?
B2. Glenn Astro & Crystalline Reality - The Growl
(night Mix)
B3. Glenn Astro & Mental Trance - Mental Trance
B4. Glenn Astro & The Foundation - Steppers
Worldwide, Unite!
B5. Glenn Astro & Dj 1999 - Almost Pleasant

‘Mercy Of The Crane Folk’ is the beautifully accomplished second album from Athens GA’s Immaterial Possession. A theatrical soundscape littered with subconscious flashbacks, retro keyboard flurries, wandering Morricone-esque guitar and dreamy Sumac-like harmonies.

Featuring the ethereal eerie dream pop of former artist commune residents Cooper Holmes and Madeline Polites, with drummer John Spiegel and Elephant 6 descendant Kiran Fernandes (keyboards, clarinets, flutes). Additional contributions come from drummer Jon Vogt who can be heard on ‘Mercy Of The Crane Folk’ and ‘Birth Of Queen Croaker’.

It’s a haunting and immersive trip into the inner psyche of these nomadic soothsayers; a psychedelic dance party from a half-lit underground world; breathlessly eerie and all consuming; a salubrious sojourn that sounds like nothing else. Filled with a kind of peculiar optimistic uncertainty that any quest to make sense of a drowsy recollection of simpler and far better times would have; ‘Mercy Of The Crane Folk’ is soft and serene summoning up a fanciful folkloric place where, undoubtedly, the mysterious crane flock prosper.

TRACK LISTING

Side One
A1 Chain Breaker
A2 Mercy Of The Crane Folk
A3 To The Fête
A4 Medieval Jig
A5 Siren's Tunnel
Side Two
B1 Current In The Room
B2 Ancient Mouth
B3 Cypress Receiver
B4 Birth Of Queen Croaker
B5 Red Curtain

Tom Trago returns to Rush Hour after 10 years with a wonderfully accomplished mini-album. During the years he spent living in Amsterdam, when his DJ career seemed to become an unstoppable juggernaut, Tom Trago was a regular visitor to Deco Sauna, a local institution that helped him decompress and de-toxify his body. Eventually, a more extended period of decompression was needed, with Trago moving to the coast to reassess his priorities and spend more time with his young family.

‘Deco’, his sixth album and first for Rush Hour in a decade, was recorded following an extended absence from club dancefloors, as Trago cut back on DJ commitments to prioritize family life. When he returned to the studio, often with his daughter by his side, Trago initially struggled to get back into the groove. The desire to make dancefloor-focused music had – temporarily, at least – deserted him; instead, he found himself drawn towards a desire to create electronic lullabies and music that reflected his more pastoral environment (his home backs on to a patch of woodland in which he would walk every day).

Returning to his most familiar synthesisers – and specifically the first synthesiser he bought, on credit, as a young DJ and wannabe producer – Trago set about navigating different musical routes without the straight-jacket of club-focused dancefloors. Occasionally, old friends from Amsterdam would join him in the studio – Tracey and Maxi Mill, both of whom are part of his Voyage Direct label roster, contributed to tracks on the album – but for the most part the production process was a solo endeavour: musical therapy for an artist determined to do things differently after years spent making club hits and sweat-soaked peak-time workouts.

The results are rarely less than spellbinding. Trago sets his stall out with opener ‘Dark Oak’, a gorgeous, colourful, sun-bright scene-setter co-produced by Tracey that layers tumbling lead lines, chiming melodic motifs and kaleidoscopic chords atop the gentlest of bubbly beat patterns. Maxi Mill lends a hand on ‘Central Park’, a deep and hypnotic excursion marked out by rhythmic bleeps, minimalistic beats and layered melodies, and the summer sun-down rush of ‘Never Peace a Puzzle’, where kaleidoscopic synth sounds, meandering solos and looped electronic stabs rush towards a dancefloor of the mind.

Trago’s desire to create electronic lullabies for his young daughter comes to the fore on ‘To Be Left Unlocked’, a hypnotising fusion of spacey electronic motifs, Steve Reich style (synth) marimba melodies and slowly building musical intensity, while the echoing Fender Rhodes riffs, squelchy synth-bass, glistening guitar notes and sparse, snappy post hip-hop beats of ‘When The Sky Is Watching Us’ doff a cap to the producer’s roots as a bedroom beat-maker.

Given the project’s genesis, it’s perhaps fitting that Trago chose to conclude proceedings with ‘It Might Be Forever’, the album’s most rejuvenating, immersive, and vibrant moments. Both feature sustained chords painted with vivid aural brush strokes and come blessed with the merest hint of a rhythmic pulse - a thread that subtly runs throughout Trago’s most mature and musically rich album to date.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: The Rush Hour stalwart takes time off from the club to get introspective and intimate with his synths. The results are deliciously serene and complex, with the producer's expert approach landing somewhere in an enchanted forest full of neon flora and giant mycelium entities. An epic home listen that'll reward exponentially through solo listening.

TRACK LISTING

A Dark Oak
Central Park
Never Peace A Puzzle
To Be Left Unlocked
When The Sky Is Watching Us
It Might Be Forever

For Northern Ireland-originating rockers Therapy?, resilience and survival have become watchwords.

Enduring over three decades as the musical, cultural and social landscapes have shifted around them, the trio have forged and retained a powerful and lasting connection with a dedicated fan base around the world, doing so by putting their emphasis on the music, solidifying a hard-won reputation as forward-thinking writers and a fierce live proposition in the process.

As Therapy?'s fourth decade finally gets underway in earnest, sixteenth album 'Hard Cold Fire', written and pre-produced during an unprecedented time for music, is hefty, compact, and accessible, a distillation of everything that has made them what they are - hewn from County Antrim basalt, still possessed of their stoicism, but casting a renewed focus on catharsis and healing.

TRACK LISTING

1. They Shoot The Terrible Master 
2. Woe 
3. Joy 
4. Bewildered Herd 
5. Two Wounded Animals 
6. To Disappear 
7. Mongrel 
8. Poundland Of Hope And Glory 
9. Ugly 
10. Days Kollaps

A rare blend of eloquent lyrical craft and explorative musicianship, the songs of Tiny Ruins are etched into the memories of crowds and critics worldwide.

Traversing influences that cross genre and era, the artistry of Hollie Fullbrook and her band spans delicate folk, lustrous dream pop and ebullient psychedelia. Building on the sparse arrangements and a novelist's eye for detailcultivated over the past several years, the group's greatly anticipated fourth album is out on Marathon Artists and Courtney Barnett's label Milk! Records.

Where the third album Olympic Girls was suffused with loss and existential emptiness, with fourth album Ceremony, Hollie Fullbrook's evolution as Tiny Ruins has reached an apex of power, as she's become a deft bandleader of incredible musicians. Ceremony has many moods, ranging from intense minimalist 'Diving & Soaring' that evokes a classic folk vibe through to the heavier Neil-Young & Crazy Horse inspired 'Dorothy Bay', boppy danceable 'In Light of Everything', and the hooky, uplifting 'Dogs Dreaming'. Noodly 70s electric guitars, eclectic percussion and prominent bass make it their most listenable and accessible album to date. The songs are all of a theme - exploring the coastal shores of the Manukau Harbour and working through a psychological 'shellscape', while tending toward a joyful / hopeful take on the passing of time.

Ceremony is Hollie's highest achievement, an album about confronting confusion, loss, dislocation and ultimately, realising the beauty of life's unpredictable paths.

TRACK LISTING

1. Dogs Dreaming
2. Daylight Savings
3. Diving & Soaring
4. In Light Of Everything
5. Out Of Phase
6. Dorothy Bay
7. Seafoam Green
8. Earthly Things
9. Dear Annie
10. Sounds Like
11. The Crab
12. Waterbaby

Two-Piers, the label that brought you ‘Pop Psychédélique (The Best of French Psychedelic Pop 1964-2019)’, ‘Garage Psychédélique (The Best of Garage Psych and Pzyk Rock 1965-2019)’ and ‘Music for the Stars (Celestial Music 1960-1979)’ bring you ‘Waves of Distortion (The Best of Shoegaze 1990-2022), a magical journey through the history of the Shoegaze scene from its inception to the current exponents on the scene championing the sound. A perfect introduction to all that is glorious and great about ‘Shoegaze’, and if it takes the listener down a rabbit warren to discover more then job done

‘Waves of Distortion’ brings in some of the OG (original ’gazer) classics – Ride’s peerless ‘Vapour Trail’, Lush’s ‘Sweetness and Light’ from 1990 and Chapterhouse’s ‘Pearl’ from 1991. They are all incredible and timeless tunes. Then there are some others that were never really a part of that other great music press construct, The Scene That Celebrates Itself, in the case of The Telescopes and their fantastic 1991 single ‘Flying’, and Spirea X’s ‘Chlorine Dream’ from the same year – both are indicative of the post-rave psychedelia that coloured everything at the time and fit perfectly within the Shoegaze scene at the time.

Once we get to 1992, there’s a bit of a gap in the chronology as shoegaze was all too hastily dismissed in the country that birthed it, ignored in favour of grunge and then Britpop, the feedback fading away along with the bands that made it. But something amazing happened. when the s-word was used elsewhere in the world, rather than having negative connotations, it was merely a descriptive term. So, the flame was kept burning in the most unlikely places, waiting for everyone else to catch up once again. It’s no surprise, then, that there are bands on this compilation from America (Ringo Deathstarr, Beach House), Australia (Lowtide, Flyying Colours), Sweden (Echo Ladies) and everywhere in between.

Since the turn of the century, successive generations have returned to the sound, taking it to new and exciting places. Thanks to the internet and streaming and listening to music without context the echo got louder and louder. The original scene may have morphed into a myriad of things, from acoustic Americana to ambient techno and post-rock (as evidenced by Mogwai, who appear here with ‘Kids Will Be Skeletons’), but it was only a matter of time before things came full circle. However it was Slowdive’s reunion six years later that finally made people sit up and take notice. There were scores to settle, too. The backlash Slowdive had faced the first time around went beyond mere music criticism into outright hatred. Their return and self-titled album from 2017 somehow managed to be their best yet and one of the finest examples of the genre to date. It brought in yet another generation of fans – the likes of bdrmm and Horsegirl, both included here, weren’t even born when Slowdive first existed, they were discovering them anew.

So, it’s fitting that this compilation begins with ‘Slowdive’s opener, ‘Slomo’. Neil Halstead and Christian Savill’s chiming guitars seemingly awakening from a 22-year slumber as the song gradually comes into focus. This was more than just a rebirth; it was a reaffirmation that this hard to define genre is here to stay.

And that is why we are here now, all these years later, listening to a compilation that joins the dots between all of this stuff, from the beginning to the present day. The beautiful noise that has soundtracked the past 30 years and will continue to do so for many more. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Liam says: This comp looks like it's raided my iPod classic circa 2017, full to the brim of absolute shoegaze classics and hidden gems. With cuts from shoegaze forefathers Slowdive and Ride, to more contemporary additions from the likes of DIIV and bdrmm, this is a must have for shoegaze veterans and newcomers alike! Mega, MEGA stuff!!!

TRACK LISTING

2LP Vinyl:
A1) Slowdive – Slomo
A2) Chapterhouse – Pearl
A3) Ride – Vapour Trail
A4) Blind Mr Jones – Henna And Swayed
A5) The Telescopes – Flying
B1) Lush – Sweetness And Light
B2) Spirea X – Chlorine Dream
B3) Kitchens Of Distinction – The 3rd Time We Opened The Capsule
B4) Pale Saints – Sight Of You
B5) Lowtide – Alibi
B6) Ringo Deathstarr – Kaleidoscope
C1) Horsegirl – Billy
C2) Air Formation – Daylight Storms
C3) DIIV – Taker
C4) Bdrmm – A Reason To Celebrate
C5) Flyying Colours – Long Holiday
C6) Echo Ladies – Overrated – Robin Guthrie Version
D1) Beach House – Lazuli
D2) Mogwai – Kids Will Be Skeletons
D3) Fleeting Joys – Go And Come Back
D4) Ultra Vivid Scene – Mercy Seat
D5) Galaxie 500 – Ceremony

2CD:
CD1
1) Slowdive – Slomo
2) Chapterhouse – Pearl
3) Ride – Vapour Trail
4) Blind Mr Jones – Henna And Swayed
5) The Telescopes – Flying
6) Lush – Sweetness And Light
7) Spirea X – Chlorine Dream
8) Kitchens Of Distinction – The 3rd Time We Opened The Capsule
9) Pale Saints – Sight Of You
10) A.R.Kane – Lollita **
11) Airiel – In Your Room **
12) Lowtide – Alibi
CD2
1) Ringo Deathstarr – Kaleidoscope
2) Horsegirl – Billy
3) Air Formation – Daylight Storms
4) DIIV – Taker
5) Bdrmm – A Reason To Celebrate
6) Flyying Colours – Long Holiday
7) Echo Ladies – Overrated – Robin Guthrie Version
8) The Daysleepers – Flood In Heaven **
9) Astrobite – Crasher **
10) Beach House – Lazuli
11) Mogwai – Kids Will Be Skeletons
12) Fleeting Joys – Go And Come Back
13) Ultra Vivid Scene – Mercy Seat
14) Galaxie 500 – Ceremony

** Exclusive Tracks To CD Format

Charly Records presents DEEP FRIED FUNK In 1987 with the Family Funktion team (Norman Jay & Judge Jules) Femi Fem and Marco Nelson compiled the groundbreaking album ‘Got To Get Your Own (Some Rare Grooves)’ for Charly Records. This, and its follow up volume introduced us to a strange world of obscure singles on exotic sounding labels and gave us a glimpse of what went on with members of James Brown’s gang when they stepped away from the Boss.

Over the ensuing decades funk has been a thread through a number of emerging scenes, from acid jazz to the smartly named Deep Funk and was also mined relentlessly by hip hop and dance producers who were looking to the past, to create something for today.

Some of these records, featured here, are now famed as classics of the genre by the likes of New Orleans producer Eddie Bo who became revered by collectors and found a new lease in life, and Lee Fields who has gone from being an obscure Carolinian artist to having his new recordings featured on TV programs. Deep Fried Funk is the descendant of those earlier Charly compilations and begins its journey with some ever-green cuts that have remained popular ever since that time. It also gathers together records from Chicago to New Orleans with many points in-between to deliver a comprehensive overview of some of the greatest, sweatiest funk ever made. Get ready to dance!

• Funk classics and super rarities brought together for the first time.
• Compiled by renowned collector and authority Tim Brown.
• Curated and annotated in London by Dean Rudland (Acid Jazz).

TRACK LISTING

Disc: 1
1. Let The Groove Move You
2. Gossip
3. Stick It In Your Ear Hole
4. Brothers And Sisters
5. Searchin' (Part 1)
6. Hot, Funky, And Sweaty
7. Pop, Popcorn Children
8. Double Determination
9. You Move Me, Pt. 2
10. Son Of A Son Of A Slave
11. Get Up (If You Want To Be Somebody)
12. Everybody Gonna Give Their Thing Away To Somebody (Sometime)
13. Gossip, Gossip
14. A Hunk O' Funk
Disc: 2
1. Never Gonna Let You Go
2. My Heart Would Never Lie To Me
3. S.G.B. (Stone Graveyard Business)
4. Get Out Of My Window
5. Two Fools
6. Itch And Scratch
7. I Don't Dig No Phoney - Part 1
8. Bad Thing
9. Funky Belly
10. Comin' To Bring You Some Soul
11. What Do You See In Her?
12. Mr Bump Man (Give Me A Hand), Pt. 2
13. Moon Walk
14. Fairchild

It's time to face the music. Still reeling from the loss of Gamora, Peter Quill rallies his team to defend the universe and one of their own - a mission that could mean the end of the Guardians if not successful. Featuring a stellar line-up of tracks perfect for any hero saving the galaxy.

TRACK LISTING

1. "Creep" (Acoustic Version) - Performed By Radiohead
2. "Crazy On You" - Performed By Heart
3. "Since You Been Gone" - Performed By Rainbow
4. "In The Meantime" - Performed By Spacehog
5. "Reasons" - Performed By Earth, Wind And Fire
6. "Do You Realize??" - Performed By The Flaming Lips
7. "We Care A Lot" - Performed By Faith No More
8. "Koinu No Carnival" (From "Minute Waltz") - Performed By EHAMIC
9. "I'm Always Chasing Rainbows" - Performed By Alice Cooper
10. "San Francisco" - Performed By The Mowgli's
11. "Poor Girl" - Performed By X
12. "This Is The Day" - Performed By The The
13. "No Sleep Till Brooklyn" - Performed By Beastie Boys
14. "Dog Days Are Over" - Performed By Florence + The Machine
15. "Badlands" - Performed By Bruce Springsteen
16. "I Will Dare" - Performed By The Replacements
17. "Come And Get Your Love" - Performed By Redbone

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 

A brand new album of unreleased material from Black Country, New Road, recorded at the historic music venue Bush Hall, in London at a series of unique shows at the end of December 2022. Mixed by John Parish and mastered by Christian Wright at Abbey Road, the new album and material marks a new chapter for the band as a six-piece.

Fresh from the success of ‘Ants From Up There’ and with a full touring schedule ahead of them in 2022, Black Country, New Road aka Lewis Evans, May Kershaw, Georgia Ellery, Luke Mark, Tyler Hyde and Charlie Wayne, wrote an entire new set of material to perform. Playing to swelling crowds at festivals, including triumphant performances at Primavera, Green Man and Fuji Rock, they entered a new musical phase as they navigated and developed songs that were just weeks old. They also toured the US and headlined two sold-out shows in New York.

These new performances have seen the band garner widespread support from across the board with Rolling Stone UK describing their Green Man set as "unmissable", and the Guardian going on to say that they were "greeted by something close to rapture." These performances have also attracted a profile from the NY Times, multiple glowing live reviews, and a nomination for Best Live Performer at the AIM Independent Music Awards last year.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: The almighty BCNR return for a stylistically off-piste but unusually blistering selection of jagged arty rock and soaring instrumentals. Waves of crushing groove and soaring vocals, blasts of activity and languid lulls aplenty. It's a wonderfully weird concept, but it's perfectly executed by this hugely talented bunch.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Up Song - Live At Bush Hall
The Boy - Live At Bush Hall
I Won’t Always Love You - Live At Bush Hall
Across The Pond Friend - Live At Bush Hall
Laughing Song - Live At Bush Hall
Side B
The Wrong Trousers - Live At Bush Hall
Turbines/Pigs - Live At Bush Hall
Dancers - Live At Bush Hall
Up Song (Reprise) - Live At Bush Hall

‘Pearls’ sees the dancefloor diva back where she belongs. Thumping with 70’s funk infused basslines and infectious grooves towed by sonic synthesisers, the track was co-written and produced by Coffee Clarence JR, Sarah Hudson and legendary British producer Stuart Price. The track is riding high on captivating energy that seems like it could’ve emerged straight from a mirror ball.

“Pearls is a record that doesn’t take itself too seriously but demands you to have a dance. It’s inspired by divas like Donna Summer, Evelyn Champagne King, Teena Marie and Chaka khan and I guess attempts to show - in lightness - all the hats I try to wear (usually at the same time). It’s the second song you will hear from my collaboration with Stuart Price and Coffee - with the wonderful addition of Sarah Hudson - and hopefully gives you a taste of the fun we have working together. “ Jessie also added, “That! Feels Good! stems from over 10 years of understanding who I am, and who I enjoy being as an artist and the thrill of performance. “

The new single follows recent release ‘Free Yourself’, that offered a taster session to Jessie’s upcoming studio album. ‘Free Yourself’ went on to have the biggest week one streams in both the UK and internationally ahead of any other Jessie single to date.

‘That! Feels Good!’ is the follow up album to 2020’s ‘What’s Your Pleasure?’, which proved her status as one of the UK’s most influential artists and became her highest charting album to date. It included singles ‘Save A Kiss’, ‘Spotlight’ and Barack Obama approved ‘Remember Where You Are’ (added to his NYE playlist). Last year saw Jessie support juggernaut Harry Styles in the USA, gain 2.4 billion global streams and complete a fantastic run of live shows including career defining sets at Glastonbury and Primavera. She continues to cement herself as a formidable force and at the forefront of UK pop.

STAFF COMMENTS

Liam says: Following on from her incredible disco odyssey 'What's Your Pleasure?', 'That! Feels Good!' sees Jessie Ware fully diving into high camp. Lead single 'Free Yourself' is empowering disco floorfiller, whilst 'Pearls' serves as a long-lost Chaka Khan-esque funk cut that has 'Ru Paul's Drag Race Lipsync For Your Life' written all over it. It's infectious, sultry and undoubtedly got the potential to be the party record of the year - Mega, mega stuff!!

TRACK LISTING

1. That! Feels Good!
2. Free Yourself
3. Pearls
4. Hello Love
5. Begin Again
6. Beautiful People
7.Freak Me Now
8. Shake The Bottle
9. Lightning
10. These Lips 

Yves Tumor’s highly anticipated follow-up to ‘Heaven To A Tortured Mind’. Produced by Noah Goldstein (Frank Ocean / Rosalía / FKA Twigs / Rihanna / My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy).

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Never one to go with expectations, Yves Tumor has moved from jagged electronics and woozy lo-fi hip-hop to a strikingly modern, wildly inventive mash-up of classic rock, soul and noise that's just on the right side of unfathomable. Their constant musical evolution is both baffling and thoroughly enjoyable.

TRACK LISTING

01. God Is A Circle
02. Lovely Sewer
03. Meteora Blues
04. Interlude
05. Parody
06. Heaven Surrounds Us Like A Hood
07. Operator
08. In Spite Of War
09. Echolalia
10. Fear Evil Like Fire
11. Purified By The Fire
12. Ebony Eye 

‘Thank God! It’s The Dream Machine…’ is the hotly anticipated debut album from The Dream Machine. A self-produced collection of 12 tracks exploring everything from love and loss to angels, dogs and The Devil. Recorded on an 8-track in the winter of 2021 in the bands rehearsal space. The album treads a familiar path of 60’s inspired pop anthems, psychedelic-tinged country, punk, doo wop and everything in-between.

The Dream Machine take their name from ‘Dream Machine’ an invention that recreates hallucinations similar to psychedelics without taking substances with their music being portrayed as enigmatic, mysterious and very psychedelic. Formed in 2021, the band have already gained widespread support including Steve Lamacq, Radcliffe & Maconie and Chris Hawkins on BBC Radio 6 Music, John Kennedy on Radio X, Gary Crowley on BBC Radio Londo, Dave Monks on BBC Introducing in Merseyside as well as repeat plays across Amazing Radio.

STAFF COMMENTS

Martin says: The Dream Machine brilliantly toe the line between jangling psychedelic 60's influenced pop and soaring northern indie. It's both melodically rich and full of hooks, but never strays into pastiche.

TRACK LISTING

1. Lola, In The Morning
2. Tears
3. Children, My England
4. Sweet Mary
5. TV Baby/Satan's Child
6. The Time Around
7. White Shadow Blues
8. Intermission
9. Away For The Summer
10. The Last Temptation
11. Always On My Mind
12. Angel Of The North

7" With Dinked Edition Only:
Side A
Before The Rain
Side B
01. Rama Go

Manchester band The Lottery Winners new album ‘Anxiety Replacement Therapy’, features collaborations with Boy George, Frank Turner, and Shaun Ryder.

A mammoth step forward, ‘Anxiety Replacement Therapy’ is on one level a set of 10 absolute anthems (and three interludes from a mystery narrator). These are mass singalongs in waiting from a band who’ve specialised in bringing people together over their previous two albums.

Scratch the surface, however, and there’s a world of empowerment and defiance, tackling subjects such as austerity, as well as of course, anxiety, mental health and its medications, and ADHD. It helps that these messages come wrapped with some of the best choruses you’re likely to hear all year.

“Each of the albums in my collection are a self-help tape for me,” explains singer Thom Rylance. “If I listen to Paul Simon’s Graceland, it’s because I know it’ll put me in a good mood. If I play The Queen Is Dead by The Smiths, it’s because I want to embrace feeling sad. We wanted to present ‘Anxiety Replacement Therapy’ as a self-help tape for anyone playing it.”

The album features guest spots with their friend and previous collaborator Frank Turner on the moving and stirring ‘Letter To Myself’ , as well as Boy George who puts in a bravura performance on the summery ‘Let Me Down’ which recalls the emotional intensity of his work with Culture Club, and Shaun Ryder who brings his freewheeling brilliance on the already incisive austerity anthem ‘Money’, reprising his iconic “Call the cops!” refrain from Happy Mondays’ 1990 classic ‘Step On’.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Featuring some pretty huge collaborators (including 'Not not Stephen Fry'), the Lottery Winners' newest LP is a heartfelt message to both those suffering from anxiety and those dealing with the results of it. Full of beautifully written songs and calming interludes, ART is rich and deep and excellently portrays an important message. Lovely.

TRACK LISTING

1. [PLAY]
2. Worry
3. Burning House
4. Money (ft Shaun Ryder)
5. Long Way Down
6. Sertaline
7. [PAUSE]
8. Letter To Myself (ft Frank Turner)
9. Jennie
10. Let Me Down (ft Boy George)
11. Not Alone
12. Anxiety Replacement Therapy
13. [STOP]

Live In St. Kilda is a twelve song live album from a one-time-only show in which Kid Congo Powers was backed by The Near Death Experience. Kid Congo says, “How did I hook up with The Near Death Experience you may ask? One fine day Kim Salmon, my long time Scientists Surrealist Beast of a friend, wrote from Australia to ask me to play at his book launch for his biography Nine Parts Water, One Part Sand: Kim Salmon And The Formula For Grunge on November 9th, 2019. The launch was to take place at the Memo Music Hall in St. Kilda, a seaside suburb of Melbourne. A royal command performance for the king of Kim? How could I say no to such an honor? What to do about a band? It did not take more than a minute for each of us to suggest Harry Howard and The Near Death Experience as the logical choice. I was a massive fan of the band already and we shared crossed paths as expats claiming out our musical in 1980s London. Harry with Crime And The City Solution and These Immortal Souls, Dave and Clare with The Moodists, Kim with the Scientists and me with Gun Club and Fur Bible. Needless to say it was fantastical to get together and make a playlist for Kim featuring covers by Suicide and Shangri La, with mine and NDE’s songs as well. The night was magic—I still am floating on a surrealistic pillow remembering the night. Enjoy the racket, enjoy the love, enjoy this record of friendship and celebration.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Snapping garage percussion and screaming guitars lay the foundation for Kid Kongo Powers' unmistakeable vocals and scathing live show. Featuring the Near Death Experience members instead of the usual Pink Monkey Birds has lent his sound an even more raw edge, accentuated by the live setting. Hefty.

TRACK LISTING

1. LSDC
2. I Found A Peanut
3. Black Santa
4. La Llorona
5. The Only One
6. Sophisticated Boom Boom
7. New Kind Of Kick
8. Diamonds, Fur Coat, Champagne
9. She Doesn't Like It
10. Sex Beat
11. When He Finds Out
12. Garbage Man

The triumvirate of Roky Erickson, Tommy Hall and Stacy Sutherland had to feature. Transcendent slower songs (often) don’t feature full band performances – so, no Splash One. The song had to be a band original. So, no Baby Blue. 13 unlucky for some. This compilation launches a new phase in the 13th Floor Elevators catalogue and previews the forthcoming series THE QUEST FOR PURE SANITY: the release in optimal quality of all surviving source material for all of the band’s recordings. ‘

13 OF THE BEST’ has been mastered separately to vinyl, CD, and streaming for the best possible sound quality for each format. Each original source has been referenced to the earliest vinyl pressing and meticulously transferred at 96khz 24- bit resolution. Multitrack tapes of the original recording sessions have been newly mixed in strict accordance with the records as first released. ‘You’re Gonna Miss Me’, the band’s seminal single, is presented here for the first time in true stereo. Taken from the original multitrack session tape, the song has been mixed to stereo in accordance with the iconic mono 45 as recorded and engineered by Walt Andrus. ‘Slip Inside This House’ viewed by fans and critics alike as the Elevators’ masterpiece and one of the key psychedelic recordings of the era, is included on the LP as the edited mono single mix so the loudest possible cut can be achieved. The eight-minute stereo version is included on all other formats. ‘Never Another’, ‘Dr Doom’ and ‘Livin’ On’ from the band’s final sessions have been newly mixed but without the overdubs added almost a year after recording. While the session tapes survive, the overdubs do not. ‘Livin’ On’ features Roky Erickson’s original superior vocal performance instead of the overdub used on the ‘BULL OF THE WOODS’ LP. What is uniquely presented here is 100% Elevators as mixed and intended for the LP. No embellishments!

‘13 OF THE BEST’ is produced by 13th Floor Elevators official archivist and historian Paul Drummond who has also written sleeve notes with full track-by-track information.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: There's not much you can say about the 13th Floor Elevators that hasn't already been said, but this stunning collection has been remastered and collected with care and attention, giving Erikson & Co's psychedelic meanderings their finest sheen yet. Ace collection.

TRACK LISTING

1. You’re Gonna Miss Me
2. Through The Rhythm
3. Roller Coaster
4. Reverberation (Doubt)
5. Kingdom Of Heaven
6. I’ve Got Levitation
7. She Lives (In A Time Of Her Own)
8. Slip Inside This House
9. Earthquake
10. Never Another
11. Dr Doom
12. Livin’ On
13. May The Circle Remain Unbroken

Five years after Sundfør redefined her career with the folk-inspired, emotionally-effervescent album Music for People In Trouble, the Norwegian musician, artist and producer delves even deeper into her personal mythology on the soul-bearing blómi.

Meaning “to bloom'' in Norse, blómi takes very unique aspects of Susanne’s life story, like the academic work of her grandfather who is a linguist specialising in Semitic languages, and her own life-changing experiences as a new mother, to weave together a colourful tapestry unlike anything she has released to date.

Sundfør wrote blómi, above all, as a love letter to her young daughter, a missive to a precious new life entering an unstable world. In the title track, which is anchored around a lush, driving piano arrangement and skin-tingling saxophones, Susanne imparts all her wisdom to her daughter, urging her to take her words with her through life. Pairing her lyrics with hints of Norse language and mythology, Susanne harks to indigenous Nordic cultures who built matrilineal societies and worshipped divine feminine deities. These roots, this passing from mother to child, is at the core of the music on blómi.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Tender plucked folk guitar and Sundfør's strong vocal presence combine beautifully atop orchestral flourishes and rich, traditional Nordic themes. It's a fascinating and constantly rewarding listen.

TRACK LISTING

1. Orð Vǫlu
2. Ashera's Song
3. Blómi
4. Rūnā
5. Fare Thee Well
6. Leikara Ljóð
7. Alyosha
8.

Visceral yet inherently soulful, 'Hardly The Same Snake' is the sound of the Johannesburg-born, Doncaster-raised artist Doya Beardmore finally finding his voice – both literally and figuratively. In practical terms, that involved finding the courage to foreground his gravelly baritone in these gloriously genre-agnostic productions. But it also meant branching out beyond his safety net to figure out the artist he truly wanted to be.

As Skinny puts it today, “This album is what I would have created the first time round had I rated my own voice.” The idea of forging your own path – and shedding skin, so to speak – is integral to 'Hardly The Same Snake'. Begun pre-pandemic and completed in the spring of 2021, it’s a defiantly outward-looking record contemplating family, religion and major life milestones, from parenthood to death. Where previously Skinny relied on dream diaries as his primary lyrical resource, this time he took notes at design exhibitions, using these unfiltered observations as a jumping off point for songs. If this superb second album proves anything, it’s that it doesn’t matter how much Skinny errs on the side of self-deprecation – he remains one of the UK’s most fearlessly original voices.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Skinny Pelembe's latest opus takes the perfectly manicured multi-genre mashup of 2019's brilliant 'Dreaming Is Dead Now' and pushes even further outwards into euphoric neo-soul, jazz and synthwave. It's a heady mix, and one that could only be so perfectly executed by a talent like Skinny.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
1. Same Eye Colour
2. Hardly The Same Snake
3. Deadman Deadman Deadman
4. Don't Be Another

Side B
5. Oh, Silly George
6. Charabanc
7. Like A Heart Won't Beat
8. Well, There's A First
9. Secret Hiding Place

The Orb’s pulsating discography grows ever more huge, with their 18th album, and 3rd helmed by core duo Alex Paterson and Michael Rendall. Despite the connotations of its title, here they continue to rollick freely without inhibition across ambient, house and dub, but also tangent into poetry, pop, full-blown drum ‘n’ bass and actual reggae.

The LP features electronic musicians David Harrow (whose CV includes Anne Clarke, Psychic TV, Razormaid, Adrian Sherwood and Andy Weatherall) and Gaudi (whose credits include Max Romeo, Capleton, Johnny Clarke and Desmond Dekker). Other guests include Orb regular Youth, violinist Violeta Vicci, Kompakt records alumnus Leonardo Fresco, Metamono man Jono Podmore, Guitarist and Alex’s old schoolchum David Lofts, plus vocalists Eric Von Skywalker, Andy Cain and Rachel D’arcy. ‘Prism’ begins with the epic winding journey of ‘H.O.M.E’, which features a poem by Paterson, and traverses through dark ambient into star-surfing Fingers-style house, before ‘Why Can You Be In Two Places At Once…’ kicks into a funked-up, afrobeaty chug.

With Paterson’s decades-long love for Jamaican music and output oft drenched in the dubwise, it should come as little surprise that The Orb have now gone full reggae, on the ebullient nostalgia tale of Von Skywalker’s youthful romance, ‘A Ghetto Love Story’. The album then disappears down a wormhole of rubadub head-music called ‘Picking Tea & Chasing Butterfiles’, which sounds like Colourbox meets Popul Vuh in Shanghai, and also echoes back to Weatherall’s Ultrabass II remix of ‘Perpetual Dawn’.

Flipping the script entirely, by sprinkling a large bag of disco dust, is the slinky boogie wonderland of ‘Tiger’ (the name and nickname of Paterson’s son and late brother respectively), which juxtaposes but somehow coheres with the melodica-tinged thunderous bass music of ‘Dragon Of Oceans’ and it’s Sirius B gazing wordplay. The expertly-executed, floaty 90s trance dance of ‘The Beginning Of The End’ works very nicely within its own familiar parameters; which contrasts sharply with ‘Living In Recycled Times’, which ignites over ten plus minutes into fully-fledged, rave-ready D&B fire, which although out of their comfort zone still sounds very Orb.

Music for the ‘Prism’ of your mind, the album ends with its title track – a big ambient epic in done in fine style – as awe inspiring as the cold, infinite expanse from whence it came.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: There are few bands making electronica today that have a more profound impact on afterparty culture than The Orb do, mostly owing to their perfectly manicured mix of euphoric acid, crisp dub and otherworldly melodies. 'Prism' has all of that in spades, moving effortlessly from dancefloor to the sofa and everything in-between. Classic Orb.

TRACK LISTING

1. ‘H.O.M.E’
2. ‘Why Can You Be In Two Places At Once When You're Not Anywhere At All’
3. ‘A Ghetto Love Story’
4. ‘Picking Tea Leaves & Chasing Butterflies’
5. ‘Tiger’
6. ‘Dragon Of The Oceans’
7. ‘The Beginning Of The End’
8. ‘Living In Recycled Times’
9. ‘Prism’

Full Dose is back! Once again exporting their distinctive brand of mutated dub directly from Glasgow's Southside. The label's 13th release is the work of a new name: Brollachan - "a shapeless darkness that craves bodily form".

As the name would suggest, the music itself evokes a certain eeriness. Brollachan fuses this with the metallic textures and airy rhythms commonly heard on Full Dose records. Tracks like "Hall" could well be written by a smoked-out mythical being, with deep subs and spring reverb-laden tones throughout. Quality stuff.

This juxtaposition of influences continues throughout the release. "Graze" has a particular aquatic feel. Sonar-esque synths punch through the haze and sustained synth sounds keeps the track in midwest territory.

Despite the obvious variety on show here, Brollachan of course keeps fans of the Full Dose sound on-side. "Mad Dawg" is a grimey take on this. General MIDI style sounds appear throughout the intro. This is complimented by intricate drum programming and a growling bassline, to give us a track straight from the 22nd century.

13 releases in and the tight-knit crew behind Full Dose continue to promote a sound that is both unique and reliable - Brollachan is no exception!

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Imagine if Huerco S and Equiknoxx collaborated on a grime LP for Night Slugs. They might conjure up summat as weird and wonderful as this. Suspended in a thick sub-tropical haze yet focussed on the future - a truly innovative album of bass and squiggles that should find favour right across the board. TIP!

TRACK LISTING

A1. BBB
A2. Brown Leaf
A3. Graze
A4. Long & Narrow Rooom
B1. Mad Dawg
B2. Symbiosis
B3. Dome Head
B4. MV03

Eliott Litrowski and Voiski began collaborating in 2021. Cracki Records’s 10th anniversary Compilation was the trigger: the two artists locked themselves in the studio to create what has become since their signature sound: The Friendship Spacecake, a perfect alliance, driven by their common love for analogic synthesizers, between Eliott Litrowski’s hybrid electro and Voiski’s post-trance aesthetics. One is living in Copenhagen, the other in Paris, yet creating an album together quickly became the next obvious step.
Drifting between electro, trance and Italo, and their vision of an uncompromising, colorful and positive club culture.

Oberheim 6, Jupiter 8, TR808, Roland JX8P, Microwave XT and FutureRetro XS, are all limitlessly pushed to their last breath, creating an almost retro-futuristic decor for the artists to sonically parade their skills.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Face-melting synths that take you straight down the tryptamine super highway. There's some real talent on display here as Superski eek out the most lysergic morsels from the equipment. The Italo-influenced arrangements prevent them from drifting too far down the wormhole and keep focus. A special record indeed!

TRACK LISTING

It's Always Fun At The Beginning
Espace Supertemporel
Tropical Cyclone
Ajax Planet
Positive Energy
Sentimental Rainbow
The Friendship Spacecake
Internet Killed The Internet Star

Blanck Mass (Fuck Buttons, Benjamin J Power, The Editors) scored the new Amazon Prime series ‘The Rig’, staring Iain Glen and Emily Hampshire.When the crew of the North Sea stationed Kinloch Bravo oil rig is due to return to the mainland, a mysterious fog rolls in and cuts off communication with the outside world. The crew are then driven to the limits of their endurance and loyalties are forced into a confrontation with forces beyond their imagination.

“With ‘The Rig’ being the first TV show I have scored, I feel lucky to have worked with the team behind the show on a score which to my mind is my most concise and unified palette-wise in recent memory,” says Power. “The setting of the physical oil rig presented a very specific visual and sonic identity for me. The creaks and groans of the giant metal sculpture and how it is in a constant battle with the nature fed itself into the scoring process. This score is perhaps my most elemental to date and it was a joy to work on.”

TRACK LISTING

The Rig (Main Titles)
Wake Up
Omen
Fossils Digging Fossils
Flesh Meets Floor
Vision
Ghost
Helideck
S.B.V Lights
Body, Rejecting
Circles
Leck
Search For Hutton
Spiderdeck
Alwyn / Discovery
Surrender
No Fire Without Flare
We’ll Bring Him In
Survivors, Arriving
Person Unknown
Don’t Let Him Out Of Your Sight
ROV
The Altar
Fissures Spread
Sleep Tight
The Charlie
Rose Takes Control
Bigger Than All Of Us
It’s Quitting Time
System Priming
Life Remains In Life
The Wave
The Rig (End Credits)

46 years after releasing the ground-breaking debut, “Damned Damned Damned”, The Damned return with “DARKADELIC”, their twelfth studio album. The album, from the band that launched punk and invented goth, once again innovating and expanding upon their unique universe. The “The Invisible Man” track is a showcase for Captain Sensible’s riffadelic guitarwork and David Vanian’s snarling baritone vocals. “DARKADELIC” barrels along from there and features some of The Damned’s sharpest song writing and genre-bending performances reaching peaks with other tracks such as “You’re Gonna Realise” and “Beware of the Clowns”, drenched in classic horror movie references, nods to swinging 60’s London, and a refined palette of musical influences. The Damned will indeed paint the world DARKADELIC in 2023.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Invisible Man
2. Bad Weather Girl
3. You’re Gonna Realise
4. Beware Of The Clown
5. Western Promise
6. Wake The Dead
7. Follow Me
8. Motorcycle Man
9. Girl I’ll Stop At Nothing
10. Leader Of The Gang
11. From Your Lips
12. Roderick

Music has always been a key part of Peace’s life. Since the age of 17 he’s been heavily involved in it, from watching his brother making music to being a part of Ammi Boyz. He started to build his name and a bit of a small cult fan base, mainly due to crashing sets and rapping nursery rhymes.

Peace’s new EP, “Peace of Mind”, marks a transition toward a heavier Brit Pop/Indie Sleaze sound influenced by notable UK bands from the 90s/2000’s such as: Blur, Bloc party, Arctic Monkeys & The Wombats

Produced by the legendary Mati Schwartz (Yungblud, Massive Attack), “Peace of Mind” is, at its heart, a coming of age record.

TRACK LISTING

1. Country Life
2. Achilles Heel
3. Veronica
4. Groundhog Day
5. Kaleidoscope

Josh Ritter has been thinking a lot about space exploration. It has nothing to do with his spellbinding new album, Spectral Lines, except that in a way, it really does. “The Voyager spacecraft went up in ’77 and now it’s out there in a place that no one’s ever been before, and it’s sending back all these messages,” Ritter says. “I feel like songs do that in their own little way. They’re probes: they go out into the world, and sometimes you hear stories back from them, but really, they go off on their own.” Ritter, too, is sending back messages, in the form of 10 new songs that are atmospheric and impressionistic. Like the recently launched Webb Telescope, or Voyager all those years ago, he’s looking for signs of life, reaching for a sense of commonality, something that feels universal in this infinite universe. Spectral Lines, his 11th album, finds those shared experiences in songs that push beyond the bounds of Ritter’s previous work. Recorded with longtime collaborator Sam Kassirer producing, it’s an album full of wonder and light as Ritter considers the ideas of love, devotion and what it means to be connected, to each other and to ourselves. “I think it’s important for us to share some of our most basic and common experiences with each other, however we can,” he says. “That’s kind of what we really, really need right now.” Spectral Lines is the follow-up to Ritter’s 2019 album Fever Breaks, which made a strong showing on the Billboard Americana/Folk and Independent Albums charts and drew praise from Rolling Stone, NPR and The Associated Press. Ritter began releasing albums in 1999, and started a collaboration with Bob Weir in 2015 that resulted in Weir’s 2016 album Blue Mountain. Ritter made his debut as a fiction writer in 2011 with the best-selling novel Bright’s Passage; his second book, The Great Glorious Goddamn of It All, came out in 2021.

TRACK LISTING

1. Sawgrass
2. Honey I Do
3. Horse No Rider
4. For Your Soul
5. Black Crown
6. Strong Swimmer
7. Whatever Burns Will Burn
8. Any Way They Come
9. In Fields
10. Someday

Everything clicks on Safe to Run, the fourth album from singer, songwriter Esther Rose. It's the quiet culmination of years spent fully immersed in a developing artistry, and presents Rose's always vividly detailed emotional scenes with new levels of clarity and control. As with previous work, her songwriting transfigures the chaos and uncertainty of a life in progress, but here she introduces a newfound pop element that attaches unshakably catchy hooks to even the darkest stretches of the journey. Rose takes an unblinking look at her own vulnerabilities as well as more universal concerns, somehow never taking herself too seriously in the process. This manifests as a critique of the insidious sexism of the music industry on "Dream Girl," but quickly melts into a hazy memoryscape of the dive bar drama and suspended hovering of her early 20s on "Chet Baker." The song "Safe to Run" (a gorgeous duet with Hurray for the Riff Raff's Alynda Segarra) directly merges the personal with the global, superimposing feelings of spiritual displacement onto the larger, looming dread of climate grief. Rose breathes in the ecstasy of the natural world in one line and makes fun of herself a few bars later. There are ghosts in the room for most of her songs, but she's invited them in and is cracking jokes with them over a drink or two. Ultimately all of these new advancements become twinkles of light in the background as they fold into the big picture impact of the songs themselves. Esther Rose translates her world into eleven curious and captivating scenes. While the songs are stunning one by one, absorbing Safe to Run as a whole feels like witnessing something taking shape, experiencing the headspins of the elevation and the slow return to equilibrium as the clouds start clearing.

TRACK LISTING

Stay
Chet Baker
Spider
Safe To Run (feat. Hurray For The Riff Raff)
St. Francis Waltz
New Magic II
Dream Girl
Insecure
Levee Song
Full Value
Arm's Length

Legendary Slovenian group Laibach return with their new EP LOVE IS STILL ALIVE, via Mute.

The EP is a 40 minute country, dance and electronic masterpiece, featuring different versions of the song Love Is Still Alive. The original song is taken from Laibach’s soundtrack for the sci-fi action film Iron Sky: The Coming Race, and centres around Milan Fras’ unmistakable gravely vocal over an old time country western accompaniment, a musical curveball from a career that defies genres. The Coming Race is the sequel to Iron Sky, which Laibach were commissioned to compose the score for in 2012. The Finnish dark comedy achieved cult-status and raised more than $1 million via crowdfunding. This release follows a series of important theatrical performances and releases from Laibach, and supports their Coming Race tour dates (2022/2023).

TRACK LISTING

1. Love Is Still Alive I (Moon, Euphoria)
2. Love Is Still Alive II (Venus, Libidine)
3. Love Is Still Alive III (Mercury, Dopamine)
4. Love Is Still Alive IV (Neptune, Oxytocin)
5. Love Is Still Alive V (Uranus, Prolactin)
6. Love Is Still Alive VI (Saturn, Insomnia)
7. Love Is Still Alive VII (Jupiter, Tristitia)
8. Love Is Still Alive Viii (Mars, Dysphoria)

In March 2022, Mark McCambridge embarked on a trip to Spacebomb Studios in Richmond, Virginia to record the third ARBORIST album. Working alongside Matthew E White (Producer) and recording with the legendary Spacebomb House Band they completed what has become 'An Endless Sequence of Dead Zeros', set to be released on Kirkinriola Records in April 2023. Belfast native Mark McCambridge played his first show as ARBORIST supporting James Yorkston. A solo tour followed before impressive performances led to notable support slots alongside Low, Cat Power, Echo and The Bunnymen and Guy Garvey. Arborist came to the attention of critics with their debut single, the Americana tinged, “Twisted Arrow”, that features an astonishing duet with Kim Deal of The Breeders. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Dreaming In Another Anguage
2. Matisse
3. Black Halo
4. O Margaret
5. One Morning, Mid-November
6. The Weeping Rot
7. Unkind
8. Dewdrop, Cherry Oak
9. Alabaster Skin

Reports of their demise have been greatly exaggerated - the North has risen again. Close to five years since their last record, Leeds denizens AUTOBAHN re-enter the fray with the release of their third record, Ecstasy of Ruin via Tough Love. Half a decade is both a long time and no time at all: forever changes while some things remain eternal… So it goes that AUTOBAHN may have re-emerged with many of the hallmarks of their characteristic blend of industrial post-punk intact, but under the bonnet they’re a much leaner, more focused machine. AUTOBAHN 3.0.

If 2017’s The Moral Crossing was a record defined by its dramatic rhythm section, then it’s not insignificant that the 2023 incarnation of AUTOBAHN arrives shaved to a four piece and sans their previous drummer. The change necessitates an evolution. Live drums have given way to drum-machines and sample-based percussion, and with it see the band reconfigure their typically blackened aesthetic into a hardened take on Electronic Body Music. As with their previous record, it’s an entirely self-produced collection, recorded between two self-built studios on a range of analogue equipment, the ghosts of their industrial forefathers haunting the circuits. Indeed, some of Ecstasy of Ruin was made with pieces salvaged from Martin Hannett’s legendary studio. The mark of their presence is clear and AUTOBAHN certainly feel part of the long tradition of crepuscular music to emanate from Northern Britain, be that the transgressive activities of COUM Transmissions from Hull, Sheffield Steel City or the gothic history of their very own hometown. It’s a noble torch they carry.

Still, if Ecstasy of Ruin forms part of a rich lineage, it also speaks to right now. No album opens with a song titled ‘Post-History’ and closes with another called ‘Class War’ without some concession to the current condition and its place within it. Industrial music by its very nature is a physical concern, often placing the human body and its experience in the context of technology, reflecting the varying trevails of late capitalism. AUTOBAHN strive towards some kind of articulation of that conflict. The music is unrelentingly taut and terse, and the vocals of frontman Craig Johnson are invariably intense, though lyrically there are repeated allusions to beauty, empowerment and, ostensibly, hope. As such, the title of the album is an instructive one - there’s some kind of bliss in all this mess. AUTOBAHN don’t so much push against the pain as ride it out to its (il)logical ends. As Johnson implores on the title track, “focus on living, the pain wont be forgotten”. It’s a relatable sentiment. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Post-history
2. Silver
3. Acid Child
4. Fields Of Blood
5. Tension
6. Cylinder
7. Ecstasy Of Ruin
8. Breather
9. Vanity
10. Class War

For Fans Of... Adrian Quesada, Black Pumas, Chicano Batman, Brainstory, Drugdealer, Sugar Candy Mountain.

The sophomore album from Rudy De Anda, and a prolific follow up to 2020's 'Tender Epoch'. Produced by Adrian Quesada of the Black Pumas. Recorded in Austin, Texas at Electric Deluxe Recorders. LPs include digital download card. In 2020, Rudy De Anda moved his homebase out of California for the first time. He was headed East. Somewhere in the back of the U-Haul, among the boxes and baggage, was a mostly finished record. Upon arriving in Chicago, Rudy quickly found the final pieces of his new LP, Closet Botanist. The Electric Deluxe recording studio is owned and operated by Adrian Quesada (Black Pumas), who helped produce and engineer Rudy’s new LP.

“In the past, I’ve done most of my recording in California,” Rudy explained. “The new location changed the vibe. The band and I were 100% focused on the process.” Rudy’s previous releases have grown synonymous with California sunshine. He was born in Los Angeles and spent most of his formative years in Long Beach. “People often tell me my music reminds them of the beach and the sun,” Rudy said of his older songs. Closet Botanist isn’t a total departure from Rudy’s beachy, psych-rock roots, but it does sound more mature. Rudy points to The Velvet Underground and The Kinks for direct inspiration. “I glorify those bands I’m a 60s psych-rocker at heart.” For the seasoned listener, there’s a trail of psychedelic breadcrumbs to find throughout the track list. Rudy dedicates the album to those who love so hard that they neglect to water their own garden. Even in a much colder climate, the closet botanist continues to grow. 

TRACK LISTING

1. In My Shoes
2. Hey Mr. Sun
3. June Gloom (Smilin')
4. Miel
5. Tu Mirada
6. WYD
7. Por Ti
8. Coronado / Where Are You Baby
9. The Murder Mystery Pt. 2
10. I Can't Change You

Summer Forever And Ever succeeds Blue Gene Stew, 2019’s debut by the Wolfmanhattan Project, a collective unit co-starring three musicians familiar to In The Red listeners: singer-guitarist Mick Collins, front man of the seminal Detroit-bred garage units the Dirtbombs and the Gories, singer-guitarist Kid Congo Powers who played in such legendary bands as the Gun Club, the Cramps, and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, and drummer-vocalist Bob Bert, whose skin work has distinguished albums by Sonic Youth, Pussy Galore, Lydia Lunch’s Retrovirus, and Jon Spencer and the HITmakers.

The group was founded as a studio project by three musicians who are kept busy by their primary bands. Blue Gene Stew was written and recorded quickly. Powers says, “I think that the new record was much more a group effort. I think there’s more of a group kind of sound, as eclectic as it is. I feel like we all played together, as opposed to playing on each other’s songs.” Bert notes that the band’s music is grounded in spontaneity: “Me and Mick went in and had a couple of rehearsals, and I would come up with a beat, he would come up with a riff. I still have a cassette Walkman, believe it or not, and we’d put it down on that. It wasn’t even a full song. We’d just put down a bunch of ideas. When it came to recording we’d lay down the basic tracks and work out different things, and a lot of it was made up on the spot. It really is a great collaboration.” Recorded and engineered by Mark C. of Live Skull at his studio, Summer Forever And Ever finds Powers playing piano and the Kaoss touch-pad effects unit and Collins playing synthesizer, in addition to their usual instruments. The album reflects the same eclectic mix of musical styles heard on the debut. References and sometimes even direct quotes from sources as diverse as the Andrea True Connection, Captain Beefheart, the Count Five, and Eurythmics leap out of the speakers.

TRACK LISTING

1. Like Andrea True
2. Countdown Love
3. Summer Forever
4. Respectable Pigs
5. Hypnotize Too
6. H Hour
7. Silky Narcotic
8. Very Next Song
9. New In The World
10. Raised/Razed

Sex Pistols bassist and Rock Hall Of Fame inductee Glen Matlock has crafted a timely and politically pertinent new rock album that’s perfectly in tune with the chaos of our times. Backed up by a collection of legendary players, (in)famous cohorts, and rock royalty including the likes of Earl Slick, and Clem Burke; Glen Matlock has never sounded better. And his new solo album Consequences Coming proves once again that he is undeniably one of the greatest songwriters of his (or any) generation. As the original bassist and songwriter of the Sex Pistols, Glen Matlock is responsible for co-penning some of history’s most iconic songs, “Anarchy In The UK,” “God Save The Queen” and “Pretty Vacant”. After his time with The Sex Pistols, Matlock went on to form several well-regarded bands including Rich Kids (with Midge Ure). He has collaborated with such artists as Iggy Pop, and Primal Scream, and is also a highly in-demand player, playing live with the likes of the legendary reformed Faces. Most recently, Glen has signed on as the touring bassist for legendary punk / new wave band Blondie. On the album Matlock says, “The album was written and recorded in Britain over the last 18 months or so with a posse of seasoned but en point performers.” says Matlock. “All done during the debacle that is Brexit and the rise and fall of the turgid Trump episode in the US. These songs reflect my take on the whole sorry mess that has ensued.” “The tunes are pretty catchy too…” Black vinyl edition with printed inner sleeve with lyrics. The CD is in card packaging with a 12-page booklet.

TRACK LISTING

1. Head On A Stick
2. Consequences Coming
3. Magic Carpet Ride
4. Speaking In Tongues
5. Shine Off Your Shoes
6. Constant Craving
7. Step In The Right Direction
8. Something Bout The Weekend
9. This Empty Heart
10. Face In A Crowd
11. Tried To Tell You
12. Can’t Be Myself With You
13. This Ship

The latest offering from the Sheffield stalwarts combines a typically on point and honest world view, but combined with a sonic palette that will continue to surprise and challenge listeners who think they have Reverend And The Makers all sussed out. It's a perfect encapsulation of the band's urge to now shatter their own artistic parameters with a blend of out-and-out Pop, R'n'B, and Classic Soul.

This album comes hot on the tail of the success of the band's recent single 'Heatwave In The Cold North'. A hazy, sun drenched Barry White-inspired soul bop, the opening single from forthcoming album of the same name has become their biggest hit in over a decade, having been added to Radio 2's B list and being named their Record of the Week. The track became a Top 10 UK airplay chart fixture as the summer came to a close.

Never resting on their laurels and constantly striving to challenge perceptions of the band, Reverend and the Makers have become one of the enduring and great survivors of the British music scene. With a career spanning two decades Jon McClure and his collective of musicians burst onto the scene with their Top 5 charting debut album, 'The State of Things'. The album spawned the UK top 10 single "Heavyweight Champion of the World". The five albums since have seen the band move through several incarnations, sounds and line ups and experience all the highs, and most of the lows, that the music industry has to offer. Each album has reached the Top 20 of the UK album charts, an impressive unbroken run of six albums. These albums have seen them cut across a creative spectrum, ranging from collective efforts to the frontman's singular visions. Instead, The Makers is more a sobriquet, a statement of intent, a commitment and a guiding principle that has seen McClure consistently strive to build, innovate and grow musically and artistically. The Reverend's story is one of the great survival stories of the music industry as charisma, talent, defiance and sheer willpower sees the band start a new chapter reenergized and raring to go. With a point to prove, with 'Heatwave In The Cold North', Reverend And The Makers set about the task in hand armed to the teeth with an arsenal of their biggest, best and most accessible and ambitious songs to date.

TRACK LISTING

1. Heatwave In The Cold North
2. Problems
3. A Letter To My 21 Year Old Self
4. 26 Thousand Days On The Earth
5. High
6. I Hate It When You Lie
7. You Don't Love Me
8. Overthinking
9. The Exception
10. Living Without You

Elkka’s deep intuition is the unifying thread throughout Cardiff-born DJ and producer’s illustrious career. Vibrant releases for Local Action, Ninja Tune and her own label and party, femme culture, have marked her as an unstoppable force within the London underground. This recognition metabolised when she was awarded BBC’s prestigious Essential Mix of the Year in 2021, spotlighting her radiant blend of classic house, breakbeat and experimental electronica to the world over.

As the next curator of DJ-Kicks, Elkka is voyaging through rave euphoria. “This is a really special moment for me because DJ-Kicks has been a formative part of my musical education,” she says. An intoxicating journey through Chicago house and disco, leftfield techno, UK bass and electro-punk, Elkka conjures up an atmosphere that is as primed for the club as it is the listener’s interior world. 

TRACK LISTING

CD Tracklist:
01. Elkka - Attention, Lovers
02. Shake - Music Is The Only Way (I Can Communicate)
03. Paula Tape - Panamericana
04. Dauwd - La Nota
05. East-West - Can’t Face The Night (Club Mix)
06. Omri Smadar, Roy Shpilman - Adama
07. Pelada - No Hay
08. Herbert - Keep Time (Nobody)
09. UK Electro, Gerd Janson - ICA Beats Part 1 (Gerd Janson Edit)
10. Dan Curtin - Particle Dawn
11. Carli - Lights & Strobes
12. Jensen Interceptor - Lean Before The Interview
(Ft. Assembler Code)
13. Surusinghe - BAD GIRLS
14. Elkka - Hands
15. Anna Wall - Memories
16. Hodge, Peder Mannerfelt - All My Love
17. Mark Broom - Silenced Part 2
18. Elkka, Jeigo - Body
19. Jeigo - IHaint
20. Villager - Monocyclical
21. Breaka - Living
22. Mark Pritchard - Give It Your Choir Ft. Bibio
23. Patty Waters - Why Can’t I Come To You


LP Tracklist:
A1. East-West - Can’t Face The Night (Club Mix)
A2. Omri Smadar, Roy Shpilman - Adama
B1. Herbert - Keep Time (Nobody)
B2. Dan Curtin - Particle Dawn
C1. Jensen Interceptor - Lean Before The Interview (Ft. Assembler Code)
C2. Elkka - Hands
C3. Hodge, Peder Mannerfelt - All My Love
D1. Elkka, Jeigo - Body
D2. Villager - Monocyclical
D3. Breaka – Living

A brand new volume in the successful Stag-O-Lee series titled Exotic Blues & Rhythm. Enjoy amazing and danceable tunes from the late 50s and early 60s - a handful of Popcorn dancefloor smashes, a few grinding Tittyshakers, awesome Rhythm & Blues - most of them with an exotic twist! 14 songs on nice 10" vinyl (only)!

Drummer Tilo Weber joins forces with bassist Petter Eldh (Koma Saxo) and Elias Stemeseder, who plays harpsichord and keys here on Weber's We Jazz debut, "Tesserae", to be released 21 April 2023. The three musicians plus guests present a unique jazz trio sound for all times, without boundaries. Weber, based in Berlin, came to the attention of We Jazz Records with his his highly inspired drum work on Otis Sandsjö's Y-OTIS, and has since then also been awarded with the prestigious Deutscher Jazz Preis for the arrangement of the year in 2022.

"Tesserae" is the work of not only Tilo Weber the drummer, but also the visionary "full stack" artist on the rise, and the entire record consists of new, original compositions by Weber. Eldh and Stemeseder, both also part of the first incarnation of the Y-OTIS live band and the first album, are close musical partners to Weber, and the whole album brims with natural innovation and musical joy shared among the three. Each of the versatile musicians also move beyond their main instruments on the album, with Weber bringing on the vibraphone, Stemeseder tackling the celesta(!), and Eldh picking about acoustic guitar. It's easy to hear that all three are keen on going beyond what would be expected while creating this music.

The harpsichord dominates the first spin, as the very sound of the instrument sounds so delightfully alien to the modern trio setting. Indeed, "Tesserae" sounds at once baroque and futuristic. Flute, played on two tracks by Anna-Lena Schnabel and ney by Bastian Duncker on one selection, add levels that make the sound float at almost otherworldly dimensions (check "Sacre Sacre" for a case in point). The lead single "Nacre Nacre" introduces the trio in an apt way, snapping with an irresistible groove while moving not only from left to right, but also forward on a 3D spectrum of its own.

These added dimensions are there to be found for the repeated listens, suggesting "Tesserae" is an enduring album with plenty of mileage. The whole kaleidoscope of the sound reveals itself slowly, yet the impact is an instant one. Making something seemingly minimal turn out so colorful is no mean feat, and Tilo Weber & co pull it off here with remarkable ease. The album has a flow that grabs you from the first notes and builds monuments from there on.

Tilo Weber says:



"I was writing a lot of different music for various ensembles and instruments over the last 3 years. When I started this Trio I wanted it to represent a strong compositional trademark besides the improvisational impact of the players. Since Petter and Elias are both rhythmically versatile and experienced, I wanted to challenge them and collected all my musical odd-metre sketches and rhythmic patterns that I found interesting.

I have always dreamt about forming my own trio, but never really wanted to add another piano trio to the endless sea of them already out there. One day Elias told me about his harpsichord and that set this in motion. I had written some musical sketches for a trio setting, but wasn't hearing a piano playing this music. The sound of the harpsichord changed everything and inspired me to finish all tunes.

The music of this album might be the most "drummer-like" music I have written and released under my own name so far. My goal with these pieces is definitely to disrupt the conceptional composition with improvisations. Some pieces are connected to each other, because they share the same musical material. That's why they also have "related" titles. For example the bass line of 'Nacre Nacre' and 'Sacre Sacre' are the same but in different tempos. 'Sacre Sacre' is somehow a recycled version of "Nacre Nacre" and it creates a totally different atmosphere. 'Entrope Nestled' is somehow recycled from 'Time Traveler's Vessel'. The melody on the celesta is written out for the opening track of the album and lay foundation for the group improvisation in 'Entrope Nestled'. Then there are some conceptional pieces such as 'In Rapture and Rubble', that has a melody which is a transcription of the pitches made by water dripping into a cistern.

A lot of my inspiration comes from literature. I mostly read nonfiction and poems. The compositional aspect within written language fascinates me. Besides the actual meaning of the words and their power, there is always an ambiguous shadow which somehow reflects our irrational world.

The mystic nature of Rainer Maria Rilke's poems inspired me a lot. The ambiguity of his words stimulates the brain and you start reflecting your life and how you are positioned in the world. Following that tarin of thought, the track titles of the album assume the form of a poem. I asked Katie O'Riley to write a poem about mother pearl (nacre). The theme also inspired the album's title, 'Tesserae', because you mostly come across nacre when it's formed in a specific way.

When you watch nacre under the microscope you can see it's made of different layers, which almost look chaotic. That reminds me a lot of how we recorded the music of the album. We kept adding layers with synthesizers, guitar, vibraphone and additional flute and sax solos in a pretty random way and a short amount of time. I love exploring a creative process which becomes somehow irrational. Live, we always start a new process with these compositions, and that takes us into new territory each time around."

TRACK LISTING

1. Time Traveler's Vessel (feat. Petter Eldh & Elias Stemeseder)
2. Worn Not Weary (feat. Petter Eldh & Elias Stemeseder)
3. Nacre Nacre (feat. Petter Eldh & Elias Stemeseder)
4. In Epitaxy (feat. Petter Eldh & Elias Stemeseder)
5. Entrope Nestled (feat. Petter Eldh & Elias Stemeseder)
6. In Rapture And Rubble (feat. Petter Eldh & Elias Stemeseder)
7. Sacre Sacre (feat. Petter Eldh, Elias Stemeseder & Anna-Lena Schnabel)
8. Soul Redoubled (feat. Petter Eldh, Elias Stemeseder, Anna-Lena Schnabel & Bastian Duncker)

Volume 2 of this beautiful instrumental Soothsayers series featuring 10-tracks mixed and dubbed by Sao Paolo-based by Grammy-winning bass player/producer Victor Rice (Easy Star All Stars, Skatelites, Cedric Brooks), already popular with UK soundsystems including Channel One, Real Roots Soundsytem

TRACK LISTING

1. Glass Fish
2. Hummingbird Highway
3. Standing Back
4. Harry's Way
5. Black Sand
6. Glass Fish (Dub)
7. Standing Back (Dub)
8. Harry's Way (Dub)
9. Hummingbird Highway (Dub)
10. Black Sand (Dub)

On Garden Party, Rose City Band’s country psychedelic rock evokes the wide-open spaces of the American west and free spirits who call it home. Lead by acclaimed guitarist and vocalist Ripley Johnson, Rose City Band are some of the best players in contemporary rock: pedal steel guitarist Barry Walker, keyboardist Paul Hasenberg, bassist Dewey Mahood (aka Plankton Wat), drummer Dustin Dybvig, and features Sanae Yamada of Moon Duo on Synthesizer. At its inception Rose City Band focused on what songwriter Johnson calls “porch music”. Recorded largely at Center for Sound, Light, and Color Therapy in Portland and mixed by John McEntire, Garden Party features guest appearances by Moon Duo bandmates John Jeffrey on drums and Sanae Yamada on synths, as well as Rose City Band live performers Hasenberg on keyboards and Walker on pedal steel. With the musicians in his life in mind, Ripley’s porch has opened up for each player to step into. Despite being tracked primarily as a solo endeavor the recordings capture the twists and bends of a fully realized ensemble, and in a nod to bands such as the Grateful Dead it doesn’t stop there. “The songs won’t really be finished until we play them on the road,” says Johnson. Like all great music, Garden Party taps into the listener’s emotional center and takes them to their happy place – their sunny spot. The album is an invitation to recalibrate, a joyous ride where the band’s sounds surround and embrace you. Ripley says it best: “I always like when an album starts in one place, and ends in another” What a beautiful journey it is.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Another languid slice of new country from the brilliant Rose city Band. Evoking a sense of hazy road trips and bristling summer sunshine, these pieces flow and bloom from dusty lounge jazz into full groove-led psychedelic territory. Another smash hit from Johnson & co.

TRACK LISTING

1. Chasing Rainbows
2. Slow Burn
3. Garden Song
4. Porch Boogie
5. Saturday’s Gone
6. Mariposa
7. Moonlight Highway
8. El Rio

A leap of faith reaps extraordinary rewards on ‘Black Bay’, an album of depth, atmosphere and daring from the collective known as Silver Moth. Recorded under unusual circumstances, ‘Black Bay’ is the sound of seven storied musicians yielding to shared goals, a policy of trust in action. Between hushed incantations and molten guitars, 15-minute noise-rock epics and healing psalms, the record is a testament to connectivity and receptivity: to a union of disparate minds committing to something greater than the sum of its parts.

Stuart Braithwaite of Mogwai, Elisabeth Elektra, Evi Vine, Steven Hill, members of Abrasive Trees, Burning House and Prosthetic Head convened to improvise the album in early 2021, inspired by a Twitter exchange between Abrasive Trees guitarist/songwriter Matthew Rochford, musician Elisabeth Elektra and fellow artist Nick Hudson about the Isle of Lewis. A couple of Zoom meetings would subsequently lead to Rochford, Elektra, Vine, Braithwaite, Hill, drummer Ash Babb and cellist Ben Roberts visiting the dramatic location of Great Bernera’s Black Bay Studios on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides, where they tracked the songs in just four days: a testament to the musicians’ focused openness to their shared mission and environment.

This is an album of elemental force and evocative poise, its controlled power focused around the ego-free chemistry between the players. By abandoning all certainties, Silver Moth have found something truly special on ‘Black Bay’.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A stunning debut LP from Silver Moth here displaying every bit of the influence from the myriad heads of the collective, forging brittle ballads and thundering gothic waves from haunting vocals and hypnotic post-rock instrumentals.

TRACK LISTING

1 Henry
2 The Eternal
3 Mother Tongue
4 Gaelic Psalms
5 Hello Doom
6 Sedna

Critically acclaimed Teesside agitators Benefits return with their much-anticipated debut album ‘Nails’. In their four years of existence, much has changed for Benefits. Over lockdown they morphed from spirited guitar-led punks into overwhelmingly brutal harsh noise-wielders, whose furious, eviscerating music garnered them the kind of word of mouth following most artists can only dream of. Frontman Kingsley Hall’s spoken (and screamed) vocals acting as a righteous rebuke to the divisive, xenophobic, poisonous rhetoric coming from elsewhere, spread by those who stand to profit from the fallout, that had all but overwhelmed our public discourse.

Every time one of the band’s bracing polemics arrived it would spread rapidly across social media like an antidote to that disease and gather more to Benefits’ cause. High profile fans like Steve Albini, Sleaford Mods and Modeselektor were among those on board from the off. Effusive coverage from the likes of NME, The Quietus, Loud & Quiet and The Guardian and more soon followed.

Now, however, they are stepping things up a level, signing to esteemed indie imprint Invada who will release their debut album ‘NAILS’ on April 21. “We could have released a record at any point over the last couple of years but held back because I wanted to wait until the right people came along,” Hall says. The label’s co-founder Geoff Barrow of Portishead was one of the many who’d been drawn to the music as it made waves online, and when he came to see the group perform live in his native Bristol was immediately hooked. His faith in the band has been repaid and then some, producing a record that not only confirms the group’s brilliance, but also redefines what you thought was possible. It captures all of that validating rage that established them one of the most exciting acts in the country – skull crushing fan favourites ‘Flag’, ‘Empire’ and ‘Meat Teeth’ are all present and correct – but also pushes their sound into bold new territory, both sonically and emotionally.

Take lead single ‘Warhorse’ for instance. A playful riposte to those whose limited musical horizons have seen them question the band’s ‘punk’ credentials, the band gathered a series of crushing drum fills, and transformed them into a relentless, inherently danceable electro banger. “I love punk, I love cartoon punk, I think it’s brilliant,” Hall says. “Sometimes we get all that ‘you’re not shit, you’re not punk.’ Bullshit! Yes we are.” He also, however, knows that sometimes the best way to deliver his kind of message is to get people moving. “An iron fist in a velvet glove,” he says, hence the intensified focus on pure rhythm.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A stark, politically charged statement delivered through pummelling percussion and deftly delivered call-to-arms vocals. Moving from sparse, noisy electronics to anything-but-sparse blasts of distortion and hardcore grit. It's a savage, dense beast of an LP, and the ideal Benefits mission statement.

TRACK LISTING

Marlboro Hundreds
Empire
Warhorse
Shit Britain
What More Do You Want
Meat Teeth
Mindset
Flag
Traitors
Council Rust

On Variables, his second release for ANTI-, Alfa achieves his most fully realised, expressive musical work to date, coupling his keen ear for looping, memorably emotive piano melodies with intuitive grooves and a free-flowing jazz improvisation. Since the release of his first full-length project Nocturne in 2015, Alfa has established himself as one of the UK’s most focused, in demand and distinct musical voices. He has worked with the likes of Jordan Rakei and Tom Misch. Artists look to him for his unique blend of intimate bedroom production and expansive jazz group orchestration, since Alfa is yet to be boxed into a specific genre. His music spans everything from hip-hop beat-making to producing for artists such as rapper Loyle Carner, composing neo-classical works for the London Contemporary Orchestra, and reworking tracks from composer Ólafur Arnald’s and pioneering jazz label Blue Note.

The return to live shows has been a welcome one for Alfa and his fans, resulting in an extensive tour throughout UK and Europe. Including a sold-out headline show at the Barbican in London. Alfa Mist will be touring Europe, UK and North America in 2023 again. It is a balance between feeling and perfectionism that ultimately gives Alfa’s music its depth and capacity for repeated listening. It is also an ethos that has enabled his remarkable work-ethic to date. ‘I’ve never been a ‘one album every four years’ artist ‘ I want to put out new projects every year,’ he says. ‘Music is an extension of my life; it is the practice of creating.’

TRACK LISTING

1. Foreword
2. Borderline
3. Aged Eyes Feat. Kaya Thomas-Dyke
4. Cycles
5. The Gist
6. Genda
7. Apho Feat. Bongeziwe Mabandla
8. Variables
9. 4th Feb (Stay Awake)
10. BC

Mathieu first collaborated with Sylvian at 2011’s Punkt festival in Kristiansand, Norway, when he performed a live remix of Sylvian / Czukay’s ambient classicPlight and Premonition. “I’ve lived with Stephan’s work for many years,” says Sylvian. “After hearing his remix at Punkt I decided he’d be the right person to take an alternate approach to the Blemish files.”

“The recordings have a beautiful clarity about them due to their simple but sturdy frameworks, and their open-ended architecture makes them ideal for a project of this sort.” When Mathieu first heard Blemish, “I was quite amazed by the album, its dark beauty… . When David sent me the files from the sessions one year ago, they were a pool of wonderful material to me, detached from the songs and original album, while very much connected to David at the same time.”

A startling break from Sylvian’s previous work, Blemish is pensive and spare, wrapping a lyrical raw nerve in extended, drone-like song structures. Recorded in a relatively-quick six week burst, Blemish was “cathartic” for Sylvian. An earlier remix album, 2005’s The Good Son vs. The Only Daughter, took the material in varied and lusher directions, but Wandermüde puts it under a microscope. The catharsis of the original is tested and reinvigorated by Mathieu’s treatment, which he performs in real time.

“My work with computers is always live,” Mathieu explains. “I’m feeding selected material into a software process and record the output, which I either take as is, or discard completely. I don’t multi-track, edit or re-arrange, I’m interested in self-evolving sound with all its rough and sometimes faulty qualities. I never use effects like artificial reverb in my music, so what you hear is rather a piling up of spaces that surround the individual inputs used for my processes.

“With David’s recordings I melted them with my instruments, recorded several takes and picked the best ones. While I first processed the recordings quite heavily, it took me a while to notice that I come to better results when David’s performance shines through much more clearly. For instance with the original guitar from Blemish, I only applied a soft processing and made a room recording of playing this version back through two Fender Twin amps.”

A guest from Blemish also makes a return appearance on this album. Guitarist and electronics artist Christian Fennesz contributes to “Deceleration,”. “‘Fire in the Forest,’ just as its sister ‘Transit’ on Fennesz’ Venice album are to me perfect models for what a 21st century song can be,” says Mathieu. “Since he had only a couple of days to work on this, he came up with this rough and very beautiful recording of his guitar playing in the last moment. It was love at first sight for me.”

Wandermüde is exquisitely planned but executed in real time, drawn from old pains but breathing with new life. The title of the album – “tired of wandering” – implies a fatigue, a resignation, and an end; but the music itself crackles with suspense and anticipation, marking a moment of reflection before a journey begins.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Originally released in 2012, this beautiful mixture of atmospheric ambient and organic drone sees David Sylvian's recordings expertly manipulated by one of the leading figures in ambient music production, Stephan Mathieu. Soaring choral echoes and snippets of guitar break through the hypnotic ambient washes, resulting in a wholly meditative and thoroughly stunning end result.

TRACK LISTING

A1 Saffron Laudanum 08:36
A2 Velvet Revolution 07:50
B1 Trauma Ward 06:00
B2 The Farther Away I Am 11:10
C1 Dark Pastoral 04:05
C2 Telegraphed Mistakes 14:04
D1 Deceleration 05:22
D2 I Can`t Pretend To Care 08:40

Having previously collaborated with Al Doyle (LCD Soundsystem/Hot Chip) on their debut album, this time the duo absconded to Doyle’s studio in his own touring absence and took to production duties themselves. Laugh Like A Bomb was recorded in just three weeks before being mixed by Sheffield producer Ross Orton (Working Men’s Club / Arctic Monkeys / MIA).

“I think a lot of the process of writing this album came from pushing ourselves to our limits to get to the essential idea, and discarding anything that felt superfluous or unnecessary.” explains Baba. “There was a lot of writing, re-writing, deleting, re-recording and then just repeating that process again. A lot of times the best idea would come out of that final push when you’re too exhausted to even think and you rely on feeling.”

Returning following the release of their debut ‘Memory Device’ in 2020 and 18 months of touring across Europe and the US with the likes of Yard Act and Chk Chk Chk, Baba Ali have created an incendiary follow up with one foot firmly placed on the dance floor, the other in a state of constant frenzy. Laugh Like A Bomb showcases anxious synths and scratchy guitars that collide with concrete drum hits, pulsing bass and Baba’s snarly vocals in 40 minute collection that explores feelings of unease, abandon and desire as well explorations into the more sinister.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Stark minimal wave synth lines and snappy percussion meet euphoric hypnotic dancefloor business in a perfect clash of styles, resulting in a wonderfully evocative and singular LP. Part funk, part synth, part pop, and all hugely enjoyable.

TRACK LISTING

Hold My Head
Burn Me Out
Gold Rush!
I'm Bored
Anesthesia, Beverly Hill
Laugh Like A Bomb
Make U Feel
A Circle
Lip Service
Bankrupt Funk
Yves Klein Blue

Through Crooked Aim has the feel of a record to accompany the listener on epic journeys through strange and daunting territories. Adjust the rear-view mirror and press play as the landscape rolls behind you. Filmic. Atmospheric. Classic, Americana and Folk influences peppered throughout, It’s a journey that rolls through valleys, painting its own rich, vivid pictures inhabited by troubled, nuanced characters looking for ways to keep going.

Recording it at Old Jet in Suffolk, an old US Airforce base turned creative arts community developed and run by Quin added its own majesty to proceedings. Waking up to see herds of deer walking through the moors and mist whilst surrounded by these aircraft hangers. You can’t help but find some of that magic seeping into the recordings.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A
1. Through Crooked Aim
2. Too Hard A Stone
3. Dream Within A Dream
4. If You Knew
5. Roadside Bar
SIDE B
6. There’s Not Much Left You Can Say About Love
7. All Well I Trust
8. Industry
9. Wolf House
10. Sunrise

KILLER MIKE + El-P = RUN THE JEWELS • RUN THE JEWELS has reimagined their hit album, RTJ4, through the prism of Latin America.

Features include Bomba Estéreo, TROOKO, Baco Exu do Blues, Lido Pimienta, Akapellah, Iggor Cavalera, Sarah La Morena, Danny Brasco, Santa Fe Klan & more. Special appearance by Lin-Manuel Miranda

Artists from 10 LATAM countries - producers, rappers, singers, musicians, programmers - participated in the creation of this hybrid, groundbreaking & forward-facing project. 

Guitar virtuosos Rodrigo y Gabriela have announced the follow up to the Grammy-winning album ‘Mettavolution’. ‘In Between Thoughts...A New World’ is the duo’s first full length album in four years. It is a spontaneously composed yet unified work which brings the same expansion of consciousness that inspired its creation. Self-produced in Ixtapa, Mexico, the album sees Rodrigo y Gabriela building their original sound to include electronics and orchestral elements.

TRACK LISTING

True Nature
The Eye That Catches The
Dream
Egoland
Descending To Nowhere
Seeking Unreality
The Ride Of The Mind
Broken Rage
Finding Myself Leads Me To You
In Between Thoughts...A New World

Lightning Dreamers is new work by composer, trumpeter, post-rock and avant-jazz legend Rob Mazurek, a follow-up to the widely-acclaimed 2020 release Dimensional Stardust, which charted an 8.0 in Pitchfork and #5 in The New York Times' Best Jazz Albums of 2020.

The album, dedicated to the late jaimie branch (a protégé of Mazurek's), features a compacted version of his long-running Exploding Star Orchestra including guitarist Jeff Parker, vocalist Damon Locks, drummer Gerald Cleaver, and pianists Angelica Sanchez and Craig Taborn.

Drop the needle and immediately find this crew deep in a chromatic funk fantasy of outer-space grooves and Bartok-ian riffs. Vocalist/MC Damon Locks brings the Deltron 3030 energy while pianist Craig Taborn and Angelica Sanchez face-off from behind Wurlitzer pianos and Moog synthesizers. Parker is in absolute space shred mode.

Lightning Dreamers will connect with the 90s Chicago heads who still ride for Mazurek projects Isotope 217 and Chicago Underground -no doubt- but be sure to play it for your customers on that hip-hop-into-jazz road; the young heads who are now posthumously discovering the long form work of Pharaoh Sanders; the crowd who wandered to the Can section after hearing a Tyler The Creator sample.

The curious shopper, genre rebuffers, are Rob Mazurek's crowd: his work with IARC alone ranges from the minimal drone of our very first release, Alternate Moon Cycles, to the decimated electronic downer folk of his cold weather classic Alien Flower Sutra, a collaboration with Emmett Kelly (Cairo Gang, Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, Ty Segall, Natural Information Society, Angel Olsen).

TRACK LISTING

1. Future Shaman
2. Dream Sleeper
3. Shape Shifter
4. Black River
5. White River

The Mars Volta - Que Dios TeMaldiga Mi Corazon (acoustic album of The Mars Volta) After the successful worldwide release of the studio album "The Mars Volta", the band also releases the album as an acoustic album. The harmonic album "Que Dios TeMaldiga Mi Corazon".

The Mars Volta plays a similar game: it is subtly subversive – end- lessly inventive, but never at the cost of the song. Many of the same val- ues that made The Mars Volta’s previous albums so ground-breaking, so acclaimed, are still present here, but they are employed in different, adroit ways. The Caribbean rhythms that powered their blistering earlier records still flourish across The Mars Volta – they aren’t the foreground now, but they ripple underneath each of these tracks.

Similarly, the big rock moves and proggy complexities of their landmark releases have given way for more sonic subtlety, for immediacy and directness. But while The Mars Volta shies away from Grand Guignol flourishes, it remains a dark, power- ful and affecting listen, mature and deeply satisfying in its restraint.

TRACK LISTING

1. Blacklight Shine  (acoustic)
2. Graveyard Love (acoustic)
3. Shore Story (acoustic)
4. Blank Condolences  (acoustic)
5. Vigil (acoustic)
6. Que Dios TeMaldiga Mi Corazon (acoustic)
7. Cerulea (acoustic)
8. Flash Burns From Flashbacks (acoustic)
9. Palm Full Of Crux (acoustic)
10. NoCaseGain (acoustic)
11. Tourmaline (acoustic)
12. Equus 3 (acoustic)
13. Collapsible Shoulders (acoustic)
14. The Requisition (acoustic)

Enter Shikari are a rock band from St Albans, UK. In 2020, they released their sixth album - Nothing Is True & Everything Is Possible - which also gave them their sixth album to debut in the UK Album Chart top 5. Frequently collecting Best Live Artist awards, Enter Shikari’s seventeen-year career thus far has seen them rise from teenagers touring the UK grassroots venues, to festival main stages and arena headliners worldwide.

It was in the Spring of 2022 that the band descended to the coastal town of Chichester, and a delipidated farmhouse, to rebuild their studio setup and capture their renewed momentum on record. Using only solar power to track the album–in what Reynolds says was to “bring back some sense of naivety” – the life-giving properties and Technicolor palate of A Kiss For The Whole World were made real. Reynolds continues: “Back to basics. This band - my best friends - bundled into an old farmhouse, miles away from anywhere.

Off-grid, and ready to rediscover ourselves. This album is powered by the sun, the most powerful object in our solar system. And I think you can tell. It’s a collection of songs that represent an explosive reconnection with what Enter Shikari is. The beginning of our second act”.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
01. A Kiss For The Whole World X
02. (pls) Set Me On Fire
03. It Hurts
04. Leap Into The Lightning
05. Feed Yøur Søul
06. Dead Wood

Side B
01. Jailbreak
02. Bloodshot
03. Bloodshot (Coda)
04. Goldfĭsh ~
05. Giant Pacific Octopus (i Don’t Know You Anymore)
06. Giant Pacific Octopus Swirling Off Into Infinity…

Power trio Dommengang deliver heavy psych rock on new album ‘Wished Eye’. The album delivers super tasty, dirty guitars, serpentine psychedelic grooves, and propulsive drumming with gleeful abandon. Guitarist Dan ‘Sig’ Wilson switches from explosive to expansive on a knife’s edge, laying down wailing hooks before evaporating into bristling fuzz. Bassist Brian Markham and drummer Adam Bulgasem (Black Mountain)’s foundations play with time, galloping forward or stretching out into the cosmos. ‘Wished Eye’ is an expression of the sheer joy of making music together.

For fans of Blues Creation, Earthless, High Rise, and Acid Mothers Temple.

TRACK LISTING

Runaway
Society Blues
Last Card
Myth Time
Little Beirut
Blue & Peaceful
Petrichor
Wished Eye
Flower

Toronto-based retro-soul artist Claire Davis shares her journey of self-worth and love on her debut album "Get it Right". This lively 10-track analog soul LP was recorded to an 8-track tape machine by engineer Braden Sauder in a converted garage- studio in Toronto, owned by the renowned instrumental jazz/hip-hop group, BADBADNOTGOOD. Featuring some of the city's top-flight musicians in the R&B/Soul scene, the album was laid down live-off-the-floor in one week during the winter of 2022.

Davis shares, "My heart really lies in live performance so I wanted to recreate that experience as much as possible for this record by having the musicians all record together to tape. I feel like I personally thrive under the limitations that tape gives you; it offers the opportunity to capture a vibe of a performance more so than chasing perfection. Knowing that my favourite soul records were recorded this way gives me an even deeper appreciation for the skill and talent involved in this process."

"Get it Right" is a record born out of the faith that there's better things on the other side of fear. Whether that's breaking toxic cycles or being truly honest about what is and isn't working in life. The first song written for the record was the title-track of the album which began as a jam between Davis on guitar, producer Scott McCannell on bass, and drummer Chino deVilla. "The lyrics were inspired by my relationship with my partner and the intention that we both have to work on healing ourselves in order to make our partnership work. I'd like to think that it's a love song with a strong sense of maturity and understanding to it. And the whole record was really shaped around that idea of my relationships and experiences stemming from my own sense of self-love and my desire to live and create from an authentic place."

The songs on the album feature co-writes from Scott McCannell, Kyla Charter, and Toronto production house Safe Spaceship Music, in addition to horn and background vocal arrangements by composer La-Nai Gabriel. Musicians include Heather Crawford on guitar, Scott McCannell on bass, Adrian Hogan on keys, Chino de Villa on drums, Juan Carlos Medrano on percussion, Aphrose, Tegan Michelle Gordon and Chynna Lewis on background vocals, and horn section The Northern Soul Horns.

TRACK LISTING

1. Get It Right
2. What's Mine
3. Long Gone
4. Intuition
5. Love Stories
6. Good For You
7. Set Myself Free
8. Times Have Changed
9. Here Comes The Fall
10. Colours

Heather was Sharon Van Etten’s longtime collaborator and former band member.On Labyrinth, Heather Woods Broderick serves as our reflective host, subverting expectations of conventional songcraft with impressionistic language and quietly relentless explorations of the human experience that’s at once light and dark, more circular and less linear. “Many of us yearn for stillness and peace, as an escape from the movement all around us,” she explains when asked about the themes of the album. “Yet movement is perpetual, happening all the time on some level. It’s as wild as the wind, yet eternally predictable in its inevitability. It is linear in part, but infinite in its circuitry. Our lives just punctuate it.”

Broderick began crafting Labyrinth in March 2020, when most forms of movement were brought to a creeching halt. The Maine-born, Los Angeles-based songwriter who, in addition to her work as a solo musician, built a life playing and touring with acts such as Sharon Van Etten, Beth Orton, Damien Jurado, and Efterklang was suddenly forced off the road for the first time in her career. She used this disruption as an opportunity to pare down her creation process and construct the scaffolding for Labyrinth in her apartment. Employing only the most crucial tools at her disposal, Broderick found herself opening different artistic doors as she focused on sharpening her recording skills, capturing the majority of the album on her own before finishing the remainder with co-producer D. James Goodwin.

For all of Broderick’s sage lyricism and vocal authority, Labyrinth never provides the listener with any easy answers. If the image of the labyrinth represents the enormity of modern life and the difficulty of navigating it, Heather Woods Broder[1]ick provides a guide to its endless kinetic wonders of being present, aware, and

connected despite its disconnects. She describes the texture of its walls, its indifferent rhythms, and the inherent poeticism of feeling lost amid the dead-ends and unexpected turns. At this point in our history, perhaps that’s all we need to keep moving.

RIYL: Sharon Van Etten, Julien Baker, Julia Jacklin, Weyes Blood.

TRACK LISTING

01 As I Left
02 I Want To Go
03 Admiration
04 Crashing Against The Sun
05 Wandering
06 Wherever I Go
07 Tiny Receptors
08 Blood Run Through Me
09 Seemed A River
10 What Does Love Care

“You’ve had your story/ time to tell you mine.” So sings Scottish newcomer Brooke Combe on ‘Over You’, one of the many soulful, defiant tracks that make up her debut mixtape. A collection she has honed through years of relentless gigging, each song has its heart in a long lineage of funk and soul, a retro sound that has earnt her endorsement from the likes of the BBC, Rolling Stone UK, The Skinny and NME. It's a style that could easily feel like pastiche, but from the very first note, there can be no doubt that Brooke’s side of the story is entirely her own; a powerful Gen-Z vocalist cutting her own path through the male-dominated indie arena.

“For me, it’s about getting every tune I have done so far out of my head,” explains Combe. “This mixtape is a little bit about the naivety of my adolescent years, but it’s also a bit of a 'who is Brooke Combe', showing people all the different sides to my music. So many people have been coming to the shows now, they've been consistent and loyal. I want them to have what they've been hearing live and to see the development so far.” 

TRACK LISTING

Vinyl:
Side A
1. Are You With Me?
2. A-Game
3. Talkin’ Bout Heartaches
4. Black Is The New Gold
Side B
5. Why'd You Say You Love Me?
6. Miss Me Now
7. Impress You
8. Over You

CD:
1. Are You With Me?
2. A-Game
3. Talkin’ Bout Heartaches
4. Black Is The New Gold
5. Why'd You Say You Love Me?
6. Miss Me Now
7. Impress You
8. Over You
+
9. Moving On
10. Teardrops (ft. Miles Kane)
11. Black Is The New Gold (Live @ The Garage, Glasgow)
12. Are You With Me? (Live @ The Garage, Glasgow)
13. Miss Me Now (Live @ The Garage, Glasgow)
14. Wish I Didn’t Miss You Again (Live @ The Garage, Glasgow)
15. Are You With Me? (Piano Cover)
16. Used To Love Me 

When Leon Michels and El Michels Affair released their fi­rst record, Sounding Out The City, in 2005, it was hard to guess what was next for Michels and his then-introduced, now-patented “cinematic soul” sound. Now, four EMA studio albums and scores of tribute and remix projects later all while producing for some of the biggest names in the industry Michels has trademarked his sound, with each project taking audiences somewhere new and pushing the boundaries of what he is known for. The man is a river, not a lake and this time he takes his golden touch into the realm of hip-hop laying down a musical bed for one of the greatest to ever rhyme into a microphone: Black Thought of The Roots crew.

Releasing on Big Crown Records, the LP is called Glorious Game and it is a remarkable debut partnership in more ways than one. Michels provides his bottom-heavy, soul-tinged production for Black Thought who gives us some of the more personal and transparent verses we've ever heard from him. Michels and Black Thought have been in each other's orbit for a while now. The two fi­rst met in the 2000s when Thought was fi­rst getting familiar with the contemporary soul scene. "Out of that whole world, Menahan Street Band was probably my favorite," recalling the funk and soul group Michels was a founding member of back in 2007. Fast forward a few years and musicians from that collective Dave Guy on trumpet and Ian Hendrickson-Smith on sax are now full time players with The Roots. This connection eventually led Leon and Thought to doing a few fundraising events around NYC and Philly together. "Before long, Black Thought was coming around the studio and would jam with us from time to time," Michels explains. "Then, fast forward to 2020 and COVID lockdowns, he just hit me up out of the blue, wanting me to send him stuff to write to. We both were looking to stay busy."

Being that Black Thought is the co-founder and emcee for, hands down, the best live-band group in hip-hop. Michels took a decidedly different approach to this project and instead of sending recorded tracks of live compositions, he pulled out the sampler and sampled himself and some records from his collection. "I'm a big fan of soul music," as if Michels has to remind us. "And part of hip-hop's appeal to me has always been the sample-based production".

For Glorious Game, Michels would make wholly composed and recorded soul songs in his studio, sample himself, then chop and/or loop up his sounds and create instrumentals for Black Thought. On some tracks he took a more traditional hip-hop approach, starting from samples of other people’s music but then adding live instrumentation on top. But for the most part, it's him reinterpreting his own compositions into something new.

The result is an organic feel of loop-based tracks that breathe and fluctuate enough for Black Thought to ‑ex on. "What I write about is determined by the equation of the producer's energy and my energy," Black Thought says. "It's about where we meet." So armed with Michels sampled and re-sampled soul cinematics, Black Thought rhymes through personal memories and distinctive.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: With Michels laying down scattered soul-infused hip-hop beats, and the legendary Black Thought on vocal duties, this was always going to be a superb outing, but it's the ease with which these talented producers work together that is really refreshing. Forging an entirely new sound through their respective, distinctive voices, 'Glorous Game' is even more of a triumph than expected. Brilliant.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
1. Grateful
2. Glorious Game Feat Kirby
3. I’m Still Somehow
4. Hollow Way
5. Protocol (feat. Son Little)
6. The Weather
Side B
7. That Girl
8. I Would Never
9. Alone
10. Miracle
11. Glorious Game (Reprise)
12. Alter Ego (feat. Brainstory)

Produced by Sean Ono Lennon, Temples’ fourth full-length album takes place in a mystical setting, an impossibly utopic island dreamed up by singer/guitarist James Bagshaw, bassist Tom Walmsley, keyboardist/guitarist Adam Smith, and drummer Rens Ottink. With its resplendent collage of psychedelia and krautrock and time-bending dream-pop, Exotico brings that world to life in crystalline detail, all while exploring an entire spectrum of existential themes: impermanence, mortality, our connection with nature and the wild immensity of the mind. Equal parts cerebral and celestial, the result is a truly immersive body of work, fully affirming Kettering-bred Temples as one of today’s most forward-thinking and endlessly inventive rock bands.

Mixed by Dave Fridmann (Beach House, Spoon, The Flaming Lips) and mainly recorded at Lennon’s studio in upstate New York, Exotico continues the collaboration begun on Temples’ Lennon-produced 2020 single “Paraphernalia.”

Although Temples created portions of Exotico at their home studio back in England, their 12 days of sessions at Lennon’s studio marked a significant departure from the self-contained approach they’d adhered to since their debut album Sun Structures (a 2014 release The Quietus likened to a series of “woozy daydreams that will embed themselves further in with each listen”).

STAFF COMMENTS

Liam says: Ooooo baby, this is a big psych-drenched odyssey from the lads in Temples. Sixteen spaced out tracks of kaleidoscopic nectar, Exotico is here to remind us that it's not just James Acaster that came out of Kettering!

TRACK LISTING

1 Liquid Air
2 Gamma Rays
3 Exotico
4 Sultry Air
5 Cicada
6 Oval Stones
7 Slow Days
8 Crystal Hall
9 Head In The Clouds
10 Giallo
11 Inner Space
12 Meet Your Maker
13 Time Is A Light
14 Fading Actor
15 Afterlife
16 Movements Of Time 

Emotive, break-beat minimalist trio GoGo Penguin are back, with their brand new album “Everything Is Going to Be OK”. Bursting with the optimism of new beginnings, with a new drummer, their new record label, (Sony Records' electronica and classical imprint XXIM Records), and a subtly updated and developed sound, the band are ushering in a more ambient era.

“Everything Is Going to Be OK” is born from a time of turbulence and loss. During an oppressive grieving period, the studio offered the band a sanctuary from real life. The resulting project, given such vibrant life here, draws its strength from a shared understanding and empathy. Life has many great aspects to it and despite the lows, we should be mindful and grateful to celebrate the highs at every turn. Through our hardships, we will emerge stronger - everything is going to be ok.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: I've loved GoGo penguin in every iteration of their sound thus far. Minimal loungy jazz business, flickering electronica and grooving soulful instrumentals, they've all been brilliant. It's a big thing then, when I say with some confidence then that the optimistic melodic turns and perfectly produced hazy flicker of 'Everything Is Going To Be Ok' is by far my favourite GGP sound yet. Lovely.

TRACK LISTING

You’re Stronger Than You Think
Glimmerings
Saturnine
Glow
Friday Film Special
Soon Comes Night
An Unbroken Thread Of Awareness
We May Not Stay
Everything Is Going To Be OK
Last Breath
You’re Stronger Than You Think (Revisit)
Parasite
Sanctuary

RIYL: Sarah Records, Galaxie 500, Algebra Suicide, Mazzy Star, early Low.

“Everyone’s hoping that nobody sees/all our little efforts at dignity”

This last line of the title track from Cindy’s fourth LP Why Not Now? works as a slogan for Karina Gill's evolving musical vision. Her music is simple out of necessity and introverted in delivery, but the songs contain vivid worlds and are quietly ambitious. With this latest batch, Gill pulled the process of making Cindy music even more inward. “Some of these songs were first recorded as demos alone in my basement. I think that process set the tone for the record…Maybe it set up a kind of starkness,” she says.

Moving on from the fixed quartet that performed the first three albums, Gill worked alongside original keyboardist Aaron Diko to develop the songs and they enlisted players from the ever-blossoming SF pop scene to realise her minimalist vision -- members of Flowertown, Telephone Numbers, April Magazine, Famous Mammals, and Sad Eyed Beatniks to name a few. The collective sounds fill out the record perfectly with John Cale-esque viola on ‘August’, lo-fi fairground organs, and a tasteful full-band sound that crops up throughout. ‘A Trumpet on a Hillside’ is the most triumphant Cindy has ever sounded, all ascending chords and a wedding march melody tumbling out of an old synth. Still, some of the best moments are Gill alone, as on ‘Playboy’, just naked guitar and voice, and when the forlorn whistling solo kicks in, it feels like the loneliest star is imploding in a distant galaxy.

While the dream-pop tag is probably still relevant, this isn’t algorithm-fed genre ambience. Gill’s vocal/lyrical presence can be as gently momentous as Leonard Cohen or as intellectually potent as any ’79-’80 Rough Trade post-punk. “In writing a song”, Gill says, ”all the disparate parts of being me momentarily correspond, like car alarms and party music momentarily matching beats.” Cindy’s Why Not Now? is that muffled street symphony inside a passing daydream.

STAFF COMMENTS

Martin says: In possibly their most stark, minimalistic statement to date, Cindy present 'Why Not Now?'. Swimming with slow psychedelic guitar and haunting echoic vocals, it's both heartfelt and deep while not eschewing the keen sense of melody they've become known for.

TRACK LISTING

1. Why Not Now (02:33)
2. Standard Candle #3 (03:02)
3. Earthly Belonging (01:27)
4. August (02:48)
5. Wednesday (02:13)
6. A Trumpet On The Hillside (04:19)
7. The Price Is Right (02:54)
8. Playboy (03:26)
9. Et Surtout (01:55)
10. Standard Candle #4 (01:49)

Spencer Cullum’s Coin Collection 2 sees the Nashville-based musician step further from the pedal steel and towards centre stage. Released on the evergreen Full Time Hobby label on 14th April 2023, this new collection of tracks is a kaleidoscopic collection of folk, jazz, and pop, cut though with immaculately-rendered songwriting.

Romford to Nashville is hardly the most well-trodden of paths, but for Spencer Cullum it was a way of getting to the essential heart of pedal steel, what was then and remains to this day his musical raison d'être. Growing up in the large East London town brought him early exposure to classic pub rock by way of his father such as Dr. Feelgood and Thin Lizzy, and farther-flung music by way of his mother, such as Talking Heads and Lou Reed. However, it was learning pedal steel from legendary English player B. J. Cole that set him on the path he still walks today. After touring with Nashville-based groups and hearing tales of “seasoned Nashville steel players”, the young musician upped sticks and found a “nice little crowd of weirdos” in his chosen city.

Cullum has always maintained a somewhat silent presence - even now saying “I still want to hide behind my pedal steel in fear” - but 2020 saw him release his debut solo effort, Spencer Cullum’s Coin Collection. Despite his project with Jeremy Fetzer, Steelism, showing off more of his talents, never before had he felt the limelight so firmly on him.

Although …Coin Collection’s modus operandi was "a very quintessential English folk record, but with really good Nashville players”, Cullum says of ...Coin Collection 2 that “I wanted to be different. I wanted to try and pull away from wearing my influences on my sleeve… I was trying to pick out ideas that were new to me. You can never escape your musical influences but I wanted them to be more hidden sub-consciously than upfront.” Though you can pick out the odd similarity to other things here and there - The Beach Boys’ Friends LP, perhaps, or The Incredible String Band, or Joni Mitchell - the thing is decidedly Cullum’s own. What’s also reassuring is that there hasn’t been some giant sonic leap from …Coin Collection, rather that the beautifully sun-kissed, English country garden, bees-buzzing-round-lager atmosphere has remained, but complicated, weirded, deepened.

Much in the same way that the album doesn’t wear its influences (Amon Duul II, Skip Spence, Ennio Morricone, Chu Kosaka, Michael Chapman) lightly but rather is steeped in them and toys with them, Cullum brought in a host of guests to turn…Coin Collection 2 loose from being a purely solo effort. Yuma Abe provides fractured, low-register chorus vocals that accentuate the ever-so-slightly mournful air to ‘Kingdom Weather’, released today as a single, while Dana Gavanski provides beautiful harmony lines in ‘What A Waste Of An Echo’. Despite the number of collaborators and players (also including Rich Ruth, Erin Rae, and Caitlin Rose) things never seem too crowded or brimming with too many ideas. Instead Cullum marshalls each moving party expertly.

Indeed, due to Cullum’s languid Romford burr (pitched somewhere between Robert Wyatt and Ray Davies), it only becomes clear when listening closely that some of the lyrics deal with weighty themes like dementia and violence. Cullum says that “I sat for a long time with the songs and wanted to find my own identity”, and …Coin Collection 2 suggests you do the same.

In the same way that Cullum provides the pedal steel undertow of many huge artists’ music - Kesha, Lambchop, and more recently Angel Olsen - the genius in …Coin Collection 2 is in its subtlety, in what it murmurs rather than shouts.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A perfectly airy, drifting collection of jazzy melodies and shimmering pop choruses, produced with more than a nod to folk-rock of the 70's but with a levity and inventiveness that's very much a modern twist. There's a wonderful space between the instruments here, bringing the focus on Cullum's wonderful voice and the pure songwriting talent. Lovely.

TRACK LISTING

1. What A Waste Of An Echo (feat. Dana Gavanski)
2. Kingdom Weather (feat. Yuma Abe)
3. Green Trees
4. Out Of Focus
5. The Three Magnets (feat. Rich Ruth)
6. Betwixt And Between (feat. Erin Rae)
7. Cold Damp Valley
8. That Same Day Departure (feat. Caitlin Rose) 

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

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

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

STAFF COMMENTS

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

TRACK LISTING

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

Call me Terry! It’s been a hot minute since we last heard from Terry, what’s he been up to? Five years on from their last album, ‘I’m Terry’, the Australian post-punk quartet proudly present their new record, ‘Call Me Terry’, for release on April 14th 2023.

Terry is made up of pairs Amy Hill & Al Montfort, and Xanthe Waite & Zephyr Pavey who started playing together for the fun of it in 2016. Seven years, four albums and three EP’s later, Terry is ready to pick up the phone again. Over the past few years Terry have kept themselves busy - but not only with Terry things. On top of numerous releases with alternating side projects (Constant Mongrel, The UV Race, Primo!, Sleeper & Snake, Chateau, Rocky, the list goes on… ) members of Terry have moved interstate, undertaken studies, had children and started new fields of work.

Terry began sharing the demos for ‘Call Me Terry’ online with each other in 2020 - as we all did - before getting together in 2021 at their trusty rehearsal space to record the beds. Overdubs were completed at Terry’s homes over the following year. Lyrically, in true Terry fashion, the record wastes no time in scrutinising Australia’s corrupt, colonial history. They sing it loud and sprawl it across the jacket of this record, highlighting the greed, privilege and entitlement of white, wealthy “Australia” which they won’t stand a second for.
Musically, ‘Call Me Terry’ still has the classic Terry sound; the four vocals singing as one gang, sharp guitars and quirky, burbling synths, the rolling bass and drums, all amidst their clever, dancey pop songs. Since day dot it’s been hard to reference a band that really sounds like Terry, which is always amazing. Truly a sound of their own!

But the sugar on top here may just be some of their finest horn, string and piano performances to date - all of which never feel crowded, cluttered or over-involved. More just excellent, necessary melodies. Rest assured Al still gives his famed Fuzz Factory a workout - and throws his tremolo into the pedal chain. It goes off. Tremolo is the order of the day for Amy and Xanthe too who also embrace the wobble, whilst Zephyr keeps the pulse of their politico-pop anchored.

Terry isn’t afraid to call the shots and Terry isn’t afraid to point the finger. Listen to what Terry has to say.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Bright, blistering melodies and perfect vocal harmonies ride atop Terry's unmistakeable cheery post-punk groove. Bringing to mind the lighter side of Joanna Gruesome, but with an off-kilter electronic sway.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A
01. Miracles
02. Centuries
03. Gold Duck
04. Balconies
05. Market
SIDE B
06. Golden Head
07. Gronks
08. Jane Roe
09. Excuses
10. Days

Multi-Award winning, hugely influential musician Feist returns with Multitudes, her sixth solo album and first since 2017’s Pleasure.

Multitudes was produced by Feist with longtime collaborators Robbie Lackritz (The Weather Station, Bahamas, Robbie Robertson) and Mocky (Jamie Lidell, Vulfpeck, Kelela). Blake Mills (Bob Dylan, Fiona Apple, Perfume Genius) and Joseph Lorge came in to mix, with Mills as a co-producer in the final stages.

Multitudes took shape soon after the birth of her daughter and sudden death of her father, a back-to-back convergence of life-altering events that left the Canadian singer/songwriter with “Nothing performative in me anymore.” As she cleansed her songwriting of any tendency to obscure unwanted truths, Feist slowly made her way toward a batch of songs rooted in a raw and potent realism which is touched with otherworldly beauty.

Largely written and workshopped during an intensely communal experimental show of the same name through 2021 and 2022, the songs on Multitudes developed in parallel with and were deeply influenced by the mutuality of the unconventional experience. The production, developed by Feist with legendary designer Rob Sinclair (David Byrne’s American Utopia, Peter Gabriel, Tame Impala) was formulated to bring people together as they re-emerged from lockdown while providing an outlet for connection between artist, art, and community.

TRACK LISTING

1. Hiding Out
2. In Lightning
3.Love Who We Are Meant To
4. Forever Before
5. Red Wing
6. Rings Off
7. Borrow Trouble
8. Of Womankind
9. Become The Earth
10. Martyr Moves
11. Calling All The Gods
12. Song For A Sad Friend

'Why Does the Earth Give Us People to Love?' is the debut album by Chicago-based Poet Laureate & singer-songwriter Kara Jackson.

'Why Does the Earth Give Us People to Love?', is a sonic invitation to process our grief. The title is a question the author is always answering. How do we give ourselves permission to yearn for the people we miss? How do we find the courage to let go of what begs to be released? How do we have the audacity to love in spite of everything invented to deter us from it?

Kara wrote and recorded the original demos in her childhood bedroom during the early days of the pandemic, drafting lyrics in bed and singing into a mic propped up on her dresser. From there she brought in Nnamdi, Kaina and Sen Morimoto to re-record the demos and help shape the production.

Wielding her voice like a honey-coated blade, Kara Jackson crafts a blend of emotional folk music and poetic alt-country. With the radical honesty of Nina Simone, the intricate lyricism of Fiona Apple and Joanna Newsom, and the straightforward, no-frills delivery of artists like Kimya Dawson, Kara’s writing blurs the line between poetry and song, demanding an attentive ear and a repeat listen.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Jackson's music is both intensely powerful and wildly understated, often relying upon an unadorned guitar and single vocal, before flourishing into orchestral swells and beautifully harmonised melodies. An arresting, cohesive debut LP with a singular sound.

Mercury Prize-nominated cross-genre composer/producer Anna Meredith releases her new project in collaboration with contemporary string quartet Ligeti Quartet. Nuc started life as a conversation between Anna Meredith and Richard Jones (Ligeti Quartet viola) after a decade of collaboration, honouring a shared attitude towards creating music which pushes boundaries whilst also speaking very directly to the listener. In addition to string and electronic recordings of Anna's music from throughout her career, performed by Ligeti Quartet, Richard also developed new arrangements of existing compositions by Anna, and Nuc came to embody a celebration of forward-thinking pop composition rooted in classical instrumentation. The result is a joyful, occasionally furious, never too serious, sometimes energetic and sometimes restful collection of tracks which dazzle with Anna’s signature compulsive harmonies, rhythmic shifts of gear and sparkling textures.

TRACK LISTING

Tuggemo
A Short Tribute To Teenage Fanclub
Honeyed Words
Solstice In
Solstice Out
Chorale
Shill
Haze
Blackfriars
Nautilus

Following 2021’s compilation This is Telex, Telex return with a vinyl and CD boxset of their full catalogue of studio albums: Looking For Saint Tropez, Neurovision, Sex, Wonderful World, Looney Tunes and How Do You Dance?

These studio albums have all been remastered and newly mixed by band members Dan Lacksman and Michel Moers, keeping the spirit of the original tracks whilst adding a freshness to produce a definitive version of each album. The boxset is a timeline of the Belgian synthpop trio’s career, from their 1979 debut up to their last studio album How Do You Dance? (2006).

“If you can find a copy of Looking for Saint Tropez – or either of their best ofs – you're in for an electro treat.” - The Guardian

“…Telex’s bubbly energy and club-ready rhythms were just as influential to the first wave of techno and house DJs and producers.” - Pitchfork [This is Telex]

Available on limited edition vinyl and CD box sets. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Unbelievably ahead of their time, the first Telex record (featured here) dates back to 1979 (!!!). Proto-techno, the group would become a feature in DJ sets by everyone from Jeff Mills to DJ Harvey. This catch-all set is extensive and thorough - everything you need to get fully immersed in this pioneering and highly influential group.

TRACK LISTING

VINYL BOX SET TRACKLIST
LP1 Looking For Saint-Tropez (Remastered)
A1 Moskow Diskow
A2 Pakmoväst
A3 Café De La Jungle
A4 Ça Plane Pour Moi
A5 Some Day / Un Jour
B2 Something To Say
B3 Rock Around The Clock
B4 Victime De La Societe
B5 Twist À Saint-Tropez

LP2 Neurovision (Remastered)
A1 A/B
A2 Réalité
A3 Cliché
A4 En Route Vers De Nouvelles Aventures
A5 Tour De France
A6 We Are All Getting Old
B1 My Time
B2 Plus De Distance (More Than Distance)
B3 Euro-Vision
B4 Dance To The Music
B5 Lakelele
B6 Soul Waves

LP3 Sex (Remastered)
A1 Brainwash
A2 Drama, Drama
A3 Haven’t We Met Somewhere Before
A4 Long Holiday
A5 The Man With The Answer
B1 Carbon Copy
B2 Exercise Is Good For You
B3 Dream-O-Mat
B4 Dummy
B5 Sigmund Freud’s Party

LP4 Wonderful World (Remastered)
A1 L’amour Toujours
A2 So Sad
A3 Raised By Snakes
A4 It Could Happen To You
A5 Second Hand
B1 Tell Me It’s A Dream
B2 Vertigo
B3 The Voice
B4 Radio-Radio
B5 Wonderful World

LP5 Looney Tunes (Remastered)
A1 I Don’t Like Music
A2 Temporary Chicken
A3 Spike Jones
A4 Beautiful Li(f)e
A5 Dingo Bells
B1 I Want Your Brain
B2 Baby, When?
B3 Peanuts
B4 Happy End (I Wanna)
B5 Rendez-vous Dans L’espace

LP6 How Do You Dance? (Remastered)
A1 On The Road Again
A2 How Do You Dance?
A3 This Is Your Song
A4 The Number One Song In Heaven
B1 J’aime La Vie
B2 White Noise
B3 Move!
B4 Jailhouse Rock
B5 Do Worry

CD BOX SET TRACKLIST
CD1 Looking For Saint-Tropez (Remastered)
1 Moskow Diskow
2 Pakmoväst
3 Café De La Jungle
4 Ça Plane Pour Moi
5 Some Day / Un Jour
6 Something To Say
7 Rock Around The Clock
8 Victime De La Societe
9 Twist À Saint-Tropez

CD2 Neurovision (Remastered)
1 A/B
2 Réalité
3 Cliché
4 En Route Vers De Nouvelles Aventures
5 Tour De France
6 We Are All Getting Old
7 My Time
8 Plus De Distance (More Than Distance)
9 Euro-Vision
10 Dance To The Music
11 Lakelele
12 Soul Waves

CD3 Sex (Remastered)
1 Brainwash
2 Drama, Drama
3 Haven’t We Met Somewhere Before
4 Long Holiday
5 The Man With The Answer
6 Carbon Copy
7 Exercise Is Good For You
8 Dream-O-Mat
9 Dummy
10 Sigmund Freud’s Party

CD4 Wonderful World (Remastered)
1 L’amour Toujours
2 So Sad
3 Raised By Snakes
4 It Could Happen To You
5 Second Hand
6 Tell Me It’s A Dream
7 Vertigo
8 The Voice
9 Radio-Radio
10 Wonderful World

CD5 Looney Tunes (Remastered)
1 I Don’t Like Music
2 Temporary Chicken
3 Spike Jones
4 Beautiful Li(f)e
5 Dingo Bells
6 I Want Your Brain
7 Baby, When?
8 Peanuts
9 Happy End (I Wanna)
10 Rendez-vous Dans L’espace

CD6 How Do You Dance? (Remastered)
1 On The Road Again
2 How Do You Dance?
3 This Is Your Song
4 The Number One Song In Heaven
5 J’aime La Vie
6 White Noise
7 Move!
8 Jailhouse Rock
9 Do Worry
10 La Bamba-X

Somewhere Under The Rainbow features Neil Young with the Santa Monica Flyers, recorded live at the Rainbow Theatre in London on Nov 5th 1973.

It is a long-cherished show that has been celebrated for its completely spontaneous and high-revved performance featuring Neil Young (vocals, guitar) with the stellar band featuring Nils Lofgren (lead and rhythm guitar, piano, accordion, vocals), Ben Keith (pedal steel guitar, vocals), Billy Talbot (bass, vocals) and Ralph Molina (drums, vocals).

In a night of high-wire performances and semi-unhinged sonics, the concert has taken on a mythic legend in the past 50 years. All the musicians were in a free-form state of mind and swung for the fences on every track. The double-disc album captures a sound and soul that still resonates loudly for its daring, and among Neil Young fans is an achievement that is as unconventional as it is unforgettable. Recording engineer Pete Long's liner notes dive right into the thick of the controversial concert, and help listeners relive a place and time that won't be repeated.

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
01 Tonight’s The Night
02 Mellow My Mind
03 World On A String
04 Speakin’ Out
05 Albuquerque
Side 2
01 New Mama
02 Roll Another Number (For The Road)
03 Tired Eyes
04 Tonight’s The Night - Part II
Side 3
01 Flying On The Ground Is Wrong
02 Human Highway
03 Helpless
Side 4
01 Don’t Be Denied
02 Cowgirl In The Sand

High Flyin' is a totally unique double-live album from the summer of 1977 recorded by a storied Northern California aggregation called The Ducks.

It was a band that often made unannounced appearances in their own backyards at clubs like the Back Room, The Crossroads Club, The Catalyst and others, featuring Neil Young (guitar, harmonica and vocals), Bob Mosley (bass and vocals), Jeff Blackburn (guitar and vocals) and Johnny Craviotto (drums & vocals).

In the magical time The Ducks existed, the rumors of their shows took on a word-of-mouth excitement that made those in the small audiences feel like the chosen few and allowed bragging rights for all who were lucky enough to be there. The quartet’s set lists included songs from a wide range of the band members' backgrounds and were often decided on the night of the shows.

This new collection of those nights, as well as two evenings at the nearby Magical Devices studio have been bootlegged for decades, and High Flyin’ is now an official release many fans never thought would happen. It continues the freewheeling spirit of The Ducks themselves and shows how rock & roll surprises remain limitless.

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
01. I Am A Dreamer
02. Younger Days
03. Gypsy Wedding
04. Are You Ready For The Country?
05. Hold On Boys
Side 2
01. My My My (Poor Man)
02. I’m Tore Down
03. Hey Now
04. Wide Eyed And Willing
05. Truckin’ Man
Side 3
01. Sail Away
02. Gone Dead Train
03. Silver Wings
Side 4
01. Human Highway
02. Your Love
03. I’m Ready
04. Little Wing
05. Car Tune
Side 5
01. Windward Passage
02. Leaving Us Now
03. Mr. Soul
Side 6
01. Two Riders
02. Honky Tonk Man
03. Sailor Man
04. Silver Wings

Kristian Matsson has never remained in one place for very long. Having spent much of the last decade touring around the world as The Tallest Man on Earth, Matsson has captivated audiences using, as The New York Times describes, every inch of his long guitar cord to roam the stage: darting around, crouching, stretching, hip-twitching, perching briefly and jittering away. Mr. Matsson is a guitar-slinger rooted in folk, and his songs are troubadour ballads at heart.

Now, Matsson returns as The Tallest Man on Earth with Henry St., his sixth studio album following 2012's There's No Leaving Now, full of vivid imagery, clever turns-of-phrase, and devastating, world-weary observations (Under The Radar) and 2015's Dark Bird Is A Home, his most personal record surreal and dreamlike (Pitchfork). Henry St. notably marks the first time he recorded an album in a band setting. My entire career Ive been a DIY person mostly fuelled by the feeling that I didn't know what I was doing, so Id just do everything myself. But now, longing for the energy that's only released when creating together with others, Matsson invited his friends to come and play.

Nick Sanborn (of Sylvan Esso) produced Henry St., which includes contributions from Ryan Gustafson (of The Dead Tongues) on guitar, lap steel and ukulele, TJ Maiani on drums, CJ Camerieri (of Bon Iver) on trumpet and French horn, Phil Cook on piano and organ, Rob Moose (of Bon Iver, yMusic) on strings and Adam Schatz on saxophone.

TRACK LISTING

Bless You
Looking For Love
Every Little Heart
Slowly Rivers Turn
Major League
Henry St.
In Your Garden Still
Goodbye
Italy
New Religion
Foothills

A gorgeous and gripping portrait of Fenne’s last two years, Big Picture was pieced together in an effort to self-soothe. Tracked live in co-producer Brad Cook’s North Carolina studio, the album delineates the phases of love and becomes a map of comfort vs claustrophobia. Though its creation took place amid personal and global turmoil, the ruminative yet candid Big Picture is Fenne’s most cohesive, resolute work to date, both lyrically and sonically. “This isn’t a sad album — it’s about as uplifting as my way of doing things will allow,” she says. “These songs explore worry and doubt and letting go, but those themes are framed brightly.” With confidence and quiet strength, each track provides an insight into Fenne’s ever-changing view of love and, ultimately, its redefinition — love as a process, not something to be lost and found.

While the album was written alone in Fenne’s Bristol flat – a fact intentionally reflected in its compact sonic quality – Big Picture was transformed from a solitary venture into a unifying collaboration during the recording process when she was joined by her touring band, Melina Dutere of Jay Som (mixing), Christian Lee Hutson (guitar and co production), and Katy Kirby (vocals). Notably, these 10 songs are Fenne’s first and only to have been written over the course of a relationship; 2018’s On Hold and 2020’s Breach both confront the pain of retrospection, saying goodbye to a love that’s gone. Big Picture does the exact opposite — rooted firmly in the present, it traces the narrative of two people trying their hardest not to implode, together. “This album is an observation of the way I think about love, the self[1]examination that comes with closeness and the responsibilities involved in being a big part of someone else’s small(er) world,” summarizes Fenne. “It was written in a place of relative emotional stability – stability that felt unstable because of its newness, but also because of the global context. 2020 was the year of letting go, but we’d all already let go of so much and nothing felt like mine anymore. Writing always did, though, so that’s what I chose to do.”

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A:
1) Map Of Japan
2) Dawncolored Horse
3) Lights Light Up
4) 2+2
5) Superglued
SIDE B:
6) Henry
7) Pick
8) In My Own Time
9) Red Deer Day
10) Half Finished

Let’s face facts here; we’re all a mess. Life in the 2020s thus far has been a litany of crushing indignities at best. Living standards plummet, lies carry the same currency as truth, and rock music - that racket that once served as countercultural force and revolutionary fire - has been neutered and subsumed into nullity.That’s unless you’re listening to The Shits. ‘You’re A Mess’ - the second album from Leeds’ filthiest sons - is a staggering assault of invective fit to reignite your ire, and a sound that constitutes a real and present threat to life and limb. Contained within these eight feral exorcisms is a merciless assault of Stoogian/stygian riffage, gloriously purgatorial abjection and intimidating aggro that takes a garage-rock blueprint and grinds its face in the dirt.If these grimy dirges and salvos of horror have a precedent, it’s in the menacing audial lineage that connects Fun House through the AmRep label, Brainbombs and

Drunk In Hell - the process where relentless negativity is alchemically transformed into profane primal salvation. Yet The Shits worship no heroes, obeying a thanatotic urge that sees no separation between death and glory.Listen to this album and you will believe once again in catharsis by way of heavy amplification. Psych-rock is dead, and The Shits are the executioners. Assume the position.

TRACK LISTING

01. In My Hotel Room
02. Waiting
03. You’re A Mess
04. The Venus (After Hours)
05. Bludgeoned To Death
06. Alone Ii
07. Ugly, Worthless
08. I Regret Nothing (Parts 1 & 2)