Before they became Black Sabbath, the band were known as Earth - a blues-driven powerhouse already making a name for themselves in the mid-60s. This new release presents rare early recordings from that era, remastered from long-lost tapes and acetates. Featuring previously unheard tracks, demos, and alternative takes, the collection captures Earth’s evolution as they pushed toward the heavy metal sound that would soon change rock music forever.

TRACK LISTING

1. Blue Suede Shoes
2. Evenin’
3. Wee Wee Baby
4. “Untitled”
5. Free Man
6. Song For Jim (Guitar Version)
7. Song For Jim (Flute Version)
8. Wicked World
9. Warning

EARTHBALL are an avant/noise/rock wrecking ball of a band from Nanaimo, Canada. Rooted in total improvisation, free expression, and a deeply psychedelic sensibility, EarthBall operate on pure instinct.

They hurtle onwards in a combustion of spontaneous composition, shooting from the hip, as they fall out of the sky ablaze. The group encompasses Isabel Ford (vocals, bass), John Brennan (drums, percussion), Jeremy Van Wyke (vocals, guitar, trumpet), Kellan Maclaughlin (guitar, talkbox), and Liam Murphy (saxophone). Each member brings a rich and varied musical history, with past and present projects including Shearing Pinx, Plan Your Future, Kamikaze Nurse, Eschatons, and Psychedelic Dirt. Collectively and individually, they have collaborated with artists such as Deerhoof, Raven Chacon, Chris Corsano, and William Hooker, deepening the band’s exploratory reach and collective language.

Since forming in 2021, EarthBall have released six cassettes and three fervently received LPs on Upset The Rhythm, including November’s widely acclaimed Outside Over There. Their latest release, Actual Earth Music - Volume 3 & 4, follows the first instalment in the series and captures two mind-quaking highlights from last winter’s European tour. This is EarthBall plunging to full fathom five, transforming into something rich and strange - channeling the fleeting moment as it fractures, erupts, and dissolves into the unknown.

Side A captures a thumping performance at Cave12 in Geneva. Frazzled from a white-knuckle alpine descent, the group settles into a hypnotic sprawl, stretching time and form across a colossal 53-minute set (with the first 22 minutes presented on the LP; the full performance appears on the CD edition). The Cave12 recording is a study in tension and release; ruminative, volatile, and barely contained. Drums stumble and surge, saxophone howls cut through the air, and Ford and Van Wyke’s voices briefly pull together the circle twice, before the tumult lapses into a spinning maelstrom.

Side B meanwhile presents a scorched excerpt from EarthBall’s crushing performance at Le Guess Who? Festival. As Van Wyke reflects: “Having the most excellent Dwarfs of East Agouza play before us only heightened our intention to bring the noise. Listening back, the thing that strikes me most is how we truly were operating in the ever-elusive but always sought-after ‘group mind’. Ninety-degree changes are super tight. Izzy and I are finishing each other’s sentences. Liam’s horn is cradling our outer and inner space. Kellan’s talk box rains down like the voice of a reawakened spirit, and all this havoc is safely stowed in the rumbling ox-cart of John’s solid drumming”.

Actual Earth Music - Volume 3 & 4 marks another ascent in EarthBall’s ever-expanding, totemic discography, an ecstatic storm of raw immediacy and unfiltered expression. 

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A 01. Live at Cave12
SIDE B 02. Live at EKKO

Earth’s third album, 1996’s 'Pentastar: In the Style of Demons', is a classic of languid riff-worship, oozing with a thick, fuzzed-out goop that melts together Black Sabbath, Hawkwind, Hendrix, drone, and ambient music. The result feels like a long, lonely drive through the desert, with inner and/or outer space as the only destination.

Arguably the band’s most rock-oriented album, 'Pentastar: In the Style of Demons' features the enduring “hit” single, 'Tallahassee'.

This 30th anniversary edition is on green vinyl, and features a limited-edition wraparound art print with a reinterpretation of the album cover by contemporary artists Matt McCormick.

TRACK LISTING

1. Introduction
2. High Command
3. Crooked Axis for String Quartet
4. Tallahassee
5. Charioteer (Temple Song)
6. Peace in Mississippi
7. Sonar & Depth Charge
8. Coda Maestoso in F (flat) Major

Sudanese-American artist Dua Saleh continues their boundless ascent with 'Of Earth & Wires', a resolutely warm, spiritual, and frenetic album exploring notions of home, humanity, and renewal.

Featuring contributions from Justin Vernon (Bon Iver), aja monet, Gaidaa, and more, Saleh threads and deconstructs indie, R&B, and electronic pop with flashes of Sudanese folk, UK dance, and reggaeton, sounds intrinsic to their story, all held together by ambitious, future-facing production and clear-eyed lyricism.

Saleh’s soulful, gritty, shape-shifting style has found fans from The New York Times to NME, alongside their breakout role in the Netflix series Sex Education, making 2024's Ghostly International debut, 'I SHOULD CALL THEM', a proper arrival. The highly anticipated 'Of Earth & Wires' responds to the moment as both a watershed in their career and an urgent dialogue with struggles faced on a universal level.

TRACK LISTING

1. 5 Days
2. B Re A T H E
3. Flood (feat. Bon Iver)
4. Cállate
5. Firestorm
6. I Do, I Do
7. Keep Away (feat. Bon Iver)
8. Glow (feat. Bon Iver)
9. Speed Up
10. Anemic (feat. Gaidaa)
11. ALL IS LOVE (feat. Aja Monet)

Kilbey Kennedy is the long-standing collaborative project between Steve Kilbey (The Church) and Martin Kennedy (composer and producer behind All India Radio). Since their first release in 2009, the duo has forged a singular sound - an “ultimate convergence of influences, that shimmers with a strange beauty accentuated by its dark and haunting undercurrents.” - The Music

TRACK LISTING

1. Reverie
2. Jezebel
3. Dysphoria
4. The Dryad
5. Turkey
6. You Are The One
7. Disobey
8. Serafina
9. My Today
10. Formless Realms
11. Things We Did On Earth

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2026 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON SATURDAY APRIL 18TH ON A FIRST COME FIRST SERVED BASIS, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

IF THERE ARE ANY REMAINING COPIES THEY WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE ONLINE AT 8PM (BST) ON MONDAY APRIL 20th).

1000 copies on Transparent Yellow vinyl. Earth, the pioneering project of Dylan Carlson, laid the groundwork for drone metal with their very first release, 1991’s Extra-Capsular Extraction - a three-track EP that features Kurt Cobain on “A Bureaucratic Desire for Revenge, Part 2.” A cornerstone of heavy minimalism and sludge, this debut marks the arrival of the genre’s original pre-drone gods. Reissued for the first time in 20 years and pressed on colour vinyl. “The fountainheads of drone metal” Pitchfork.

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2026 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON SATURDAY APRIL 18TH ON A FIRST COME FIRST SERVED BASIS, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

IF THERE ARE ANY REMAINING COPIES THEY WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE ONLINE AT 8PM (BST) ON MONDAY APRIL 20th).

500 copies on Classic Black vinyl. A mesmerising, super rare ten-track collection of songs from Pearls’ mainstay Tom Rapp; a stripped-down study of love, hate and the state of the world, recorded over 50 years ago and still as poignant and incisive today. Featuring music never released or set to vinyl from Tom Rapp’s private collection, created with the blessing of Tom’s family. Remastered from the original reel-to-reel tapes. “Tom Rapp is a musician from another era, I sometimes think he belongs among medieval troubadours, singing to knights and nobles.” The Voice.

Sasha's collaborative hot streak continues with Manchester-based duo Cortese. The pair were last on Last Night On Earth in 2024.

Cortese are new school artists with an emotionally rich mix of garage, breaks, and house. They head up their own Plaza Recordings and, as well as appearing on Sasha’s LUZoSCURA compilation, they dropped their 'All U Do' EP in December 2024. Following gigs in support of mainstays like Bicep and Mike Skinner, they now hook up with one of dance music's most recognisable names.

The result is 'One', a deep and heavenly odyssey with warm, supple drums infused with subtle garage swing. Wordless vocals bleed into the mix, heightening the sensuality, as the majestic arps and shimmering chords light up the airwaves. It's an irresistible invitation for the dancefloor to take off on a wave of cautious hope and optimism without ever losing sight of the grounding groove.

On the flip and the fantastic 'U Disappear' is an Ibiza anthem in the making - the synths are widescreen and sun-kissed, while the bass is dark and transportive. Balearic piano chords ripple through the mix alongside arching pads and soft, wordless vocals, lending a dreamy edge to what is a powerful track, both physically and spiritually.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: A brilliant collaboration that combines Sasha's years of progressive excellence with Cortese youthful energy which results in a heady, clubwise concoction that's hard to resist.

TRACK LISTING

A. One
B. U Disappear 

Heavyweight psychedelic improvisers EarthBall are back with their third and most monstrous record to date: ‘Outside Over There’. Born from the haunted basements of Nanaimo, Canada, the quintet thrives on spontaneity, shaping improvisation into jagged hallucinations and ecstatic eruptions.

Recorded live-off-the-floor in 2024 in Jeremy, Izzy, and Kellen’s basement, and mixed by drummer John Brennan, ‘Outside Over There’ is an album that feels both summoned and inevitable. Each track lands with uncanny purpose, as if uncovered rather than written.

The opener, '100%', features a cameo from comedian and English icon Stewart Lee, who lent his blessing for the band to use a fragment of his stand-up. The album was mastered by John Dieterich (Deerhoof), with liner text contributed by longtime comrade John Olson (Wolf Eyes). 

TRACK LISTING

1. 100%
2. Helsinki
3. Outside Over There
4. Seeing Docks Unlock
5. Hellfire Relations
6. Where I Come From
7. Behind The Mall
8. And Music Shall Untune The Sky

John Andrews has spent the past few years tucked away in Red Hook, Brooklyn - a neighborhood that sits just beyond the natural drift of the city. Once shaped by maritime industry and later a haven for artists in search of vast warehouse space, its history and isolation give it a quiet magnetism. 'Streetsweeper', the fifth album by John Andrews & The Yawns, reflects that vantage point-tranquil, self-contained, and curious about the movements most people overlook. Just a few cobblestone blocks from the freight-ship-lined harbor, Andrews wrote dozens of new songs at his electric piano. Nine of them found their way to Los Angeles to be recorded with Luke Temple, who played guitar and some bass. Drummer Noah Bond and bassist Kevin Louis Lareau, both longtime members of The Yawns and Cut Worms, form the rhythm section. Will Henriksen of Florry played fiddle on 'Something To Be Said', while Emily Moales of Star Moles sang harmonies recorded remotely by Kevin Basko at Historic New Jersey. Red Hook may not be the easiest neighborhood to reach, but that distance gives it a singular glow-one Andrews sneaks into every note of Streetsweeper. The Super 8 video for 'Something To Be Said', shot by Hilla Eden, wanders through its streets like a hazy love letter. The album offers a similar invitation: step off the main road, linger a little, and notice the small, overlooked moments that make a place-and a life-rich. Andrews has swept those margins with care, leaving songs that listen, observe, and stay with you.

TRACK LISTING

1. Something To Be Said
2. Friends In Misery
3. What's Good?
4. Goodbye Dirty Snow
5. The Last Word
6. Though & Through
7. Olivia
8. My Memory
9. Johnny's Dreams

This 2026 reissue of Isolée’s 'Beau Mot Plage' revisits one of the most quietly influential tracks of early-2000s minimal techno and deep house.

Presenting a trio of reworks that stretch its sun-bleached elegance in different directions. Built around Isolée’s signature warm chords, skittering rhythms, and hypnotic restraint, 'Beau Mot Plage' remains a masterclass in subtle groove and emotional economy.

The A-side opens with the Heaven & Earth Re-Edit, Luke Solomon and Rob Mello's extended take that amplifies the track’s balearic glow while preserving its intimate pulse. This is followed by the Freeform Five vs Idjut Boys Beats version, which nudges the original toward a looser, club-ready feel, adding bounce and attitude without sacrificing its understated charm. On the B-side, Freeform Reform Parts I & II delivers a deeper, more exploratory reconstruction.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Heaven & Earth and Free Form Five offer up fresh interpretations of Isolée's tropical flavoured, minimal techno anthem. Even the bloody Idjut's get invited along!

TRACK LISTING

A1. Beau Mot Plage (Heaven & Earth Re-Edit) 
A2. Beau Mot Plage (Freeform Five vs Idjut Boys Beats) 
B. Beau Mot Plage (Freeform Reform Parts I & II) 

New “Inversions” of drone rock pioneers Earth’s debut release. A collaboration between Dylan Carlson and Black Noi$e (Armand Hammer, Danny Brown, Earl Sweatshirt) formed in mutual respect and appreciation for one another. Both artists were intrigued by the creation of vast musical landscapes and the connection of music, with its ability to transport the listener. The music of Earth was recognised and celebrated for moving at a glacial pace and yet this new collaboration surprisingly saw Black Noi$e slowing things down even further.

The debut, which originally came out in 1991, notably featured Kelly Canary and Kurt Cobain on vocals on the tracks 'A Bureaucratic Desire for Revenge Part 2' and 'Divine and Bright'. Black Noi$e reimagines the original recordings with his experimental sensibility and innovative multi-instrumental, cross genre exploration. Applying contemporary electronics to the heavy droning bass and guitars and languid rhythms, this inversion oscillates and reverberates with a different kind of energy whilst simultaneously highlighting the much loved low slow and distorted properties of the original.

‘Extra Capsular Extraction’ was the first music Dylan made with Earth and his first time in a recording studio, which he recalls at the time as being “terribly exciting”. It also marked the first time collaborating with others and seeing it reified into a tangible object or product, a spirit that Dylan has carried through to the present. The original album is a document of a specific period and Dylan’s creative development. These inversions of 'Extra Capsular Extraction' are, to quote Dylan, “an exciting way to reintegrate them into the present time and with my more expanded conceptions of musical endeavours”.

TRACK LISTING

1. A Bureaucratic Desire For Revenge Part 1 (Black Noi$e Inversion)
2. A Bureaucratic Desire For Revenge Part 2 (Black Noi$e Inversion)
3. Ouroboros Is Broken (Black Noi$e Inversion)
4. Geometry Of Murder (Black Noi$e Inversion)
5. German Dental Work (Black Noi$e Inversion)
6. Divine And Bright (Black Noi$e Inversion)
7. Dissolution I (Black Noi$e Inversion)

Ushering in a new era, Berlin based, New Zealand heavy psych duo Earth Tongue lower the castle gates on their third album 'Dungeon Vision', a trove of fuzz-drenched anthems produced by garage rock luminary Ty Segall in Los Angeles.

Guitarist Gussie Larkin and drummer Ezra Simons spent the Berlin winter of 2025 refining the album’s twelve tracks in their self-described “windowless cave” rehearsal space, crafting a record that channels both isolation and the duo’s live intensity. With the songs finally taking shape and a studio deadline looming, they flew to Los Angeles to turn their hard-won ideas into the real thing. Once there, the band and Ty captured lightning in a bottle, recording and mixing 'Dungeon Vision' in just ten days at Altamira Sound.

Tracked live to tape, 'Dungeon Vision' pulses with human energy, fuzz guitars, bone-battering drums, and hauntingly tuneful vocals. Ty Segall’s influence is all over the record with Ty choosing the best takes based on feel rather than technical perfection. The “king of fuzzy guitar tones” pushed the duo to find new sonic textures while championing their raw chemistry.

“Ty’s been a big driving force,” says Ezra. “We supported him in New Zealand back in 2023, and he’s backed us ever since even bringing us on tour through Europe and the UK in 2024.”

Since their emergence in 2016, Earth Tongue’s world-building, visuals, and relentless touring have earned them global attention and a cult-like following. Their 2024 album 'Great Haunting', also released on In The Red Records, received a Taite Music Prize nomination and saw them win Best Group at the 2025 Aotearoa Music Awards. They’ve toured extensively, sharing stages with the likes of Queens of the Stone Age, IDLES, Acid King, Brant Bjork and Kikagaku Moyo.

With 'Dungeon Vision', Earth Tongue deliver their most immersive work yet, a richly human, fuzz-soaked journey that bottles the magic of their live show and cements their reputation as one of the most exciting psych rock acts on the planet.

TRACK LISTING

1. Dungeon Vision
2. Demon Cam
3. Flashlight
4. Body Of Water
5. Watchtower
6. Orbit Of A Witch
7. Symmetry Dripper
8. 1000 Curses
9. Silver Eye
10. Living Hell
11. Harvester
12. Ritual

Siren Selector launches its mixtape series with a companion release to Remy Solar’s - ‘Heavy Terrain’ cassette.

“Jamaican music grows in rings like an old tree. From a core of early riddims, the genius of Studio One, versions of original basslines and melodies evolve over time New releases of the same tune follow each other through the 70s, 80s, 90s, into this millennium. Generations of the same family. And then there’s the unreleased versions, the frontier dubs built strictly for sound systems, held close by those who got them and only gradually circulated into the wider audience of selectors and collectors. These are the ones where the bass is heavier, the echoes more mind- bending, the effects wilder and the drums harder. Older sound followers tell stories of how these dubs defined dances, flattened opponents in clashes, inspired a dozen rewinds. Younger followers remember these tales and pass them down. These dubs are folklore.

Who knows how many such versions there are in the vast worldwide archives of Jamaican music? Not me. But as a little taster of a lifetime’s musical journey you can open your ears right now to a few moments: Lacksley’s Castell’s “Unkind”, transported from the sprightly riddim which underpinned it on his Princess Lady album and reengineered into a thunderous version of Ras Michael’s None A Jah Jah Children; “Deceivers” by the Heptones, stripped back into something simultaneously ethereal and bathyspheric; Keith Hudson’s “I’m No Fool” emerging from a pressure cooker of bass and drum; Jah Lloyd’s “Black Moses”, busting down walls with its epic echo and siren opening.

I started collecting these dubs in the late 90s. We were going to Shaka at the Rocket, Aba Shanti in the Arches, then Imperial Gardens. Entebbe somewhere off Mare Street. Iration Steppas in Kingsland Road, Jah Tubby’s in the Rec. We were doing our own parties at the time in east London, Bohemia Place, then Trenz, Dungeons, the old social services office by London Fields. Building up a sound, taking it on the road, crew sitting on the speaker boxes in the back of a Mercedes 508. Under the stars or in warehouses with sweat dripping from the ceiling, lugging crates and amps across fields or up flights of stairs, stringing up boxes under bridges, in car parks or on roundabouts. Waiting for the moment to drop the dubs.

This tape is dedicated to my crew and all the music providers and anyone who also knew or wants to know these moments.“

Fifty Physical Copies - 60 mins - No digital

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Tape heads - this was made for your cassette player! Nowt like dub on tape, especially when you've got all the juicy analogue artefacts present and correct. This and Remy's mixtape, also out this week, should have your tape machine singing with bass!

TRACK LISTING

A1. Side A Dubs
B1. Side B Dubs

'Land' is the first in a series of earth inspired sonic journeys, part sound meditation, part immersive psychedelic nature trip. Incorporating field recordings, shack instruments and spoken words from cosmic adventurers.

It originated as an installation at the 14 Hour Technicolor Drone event in Sept 2025 whereby all listeners fell into a deep nature/dream slumber.

TRACK LISTING

1. Land A
2. Land AA

Multi-instrumentalist, producer, and artist Shabaka (a.k.a Shabaka Hutchings) third solo album 'Of The Earth', his first solo album to be released via his own label 'Shabaka Records’, and an album entirely written and produced by Hutchings himself.

'Of The Earth' sees Shabaka return to his signature saxophone sound, alongside accomplished electronics and production, as well as traditional woodwind and percussion instruments from around the world, a combination indicative of Hutchings’ diverse talents and the overall sound on 'Of The Earth'.

Hutchings is highly regarded for his work with The Comet Is Coming, Sons of Kemet, Shabaka and the Ancestors, and from his two most recent solo projects 'Perceive its Beauty, Acknowledge its Grace', and 'Afrikan Culture’. As a musician he has also worked with a wealth of prestigious artists such as Andre 3000, TURNSTILE, Floating Points, Mulatu Astatke, The Sun Ra Arkestra, Lianne La Havas, Saul Williams, and more.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A brand new album from super-skilled multi-instrumentalist and producer, Shabaka Hutchings. 'Of The Earth' keeps things familiar in the most part with an off-kilter music-concrete style backdrop, topped with Shabaka'a characteristic, deeply jazzy saxophone noodling. Encompassing world music, funk and traditional folksong, 'Of The Earth' stretches out gracefully into the peripheries of His already established sound.

TRACK LISTING

1. A Future Untold
2. Those Of The Sky
3. Go Astray
4. Step Lightly
5. Call The Power
6. Dance In Praise
7. Ol' Time African Gods
8. Marwa The Mountain
9. Light The Way
10. Stand Firm
11. Space Time
12. Eyes Lowered

Though Death in the Business of Whaling arrives as Searows’ second album, it’s the product of many firsts, including his first time recording outside the creative cocoon of his bedroom. His 2022 debut Guard Dog was written, recorded and self-produced in Duckart’s Portland home and independently released with little expectation as to how it would be received. The music soon found a passionate audience that were already sharing snippets of Duckart’s music via communities on TikTok and received co-signs from prominent artists such as Ethel Cain and Gracie Abrams, both of whom he went on to support on tour.

Time spent on the road touring the hushed and compelling songs from Guard Dog and subsequent projects End Of The World and flush was instructive when working out the direction his new material would take musically and lyrically, with collections of ideas for his new record starting to take real shape in late 2024. When the time came to commit them to tape, he set up shop in a converted horse barn outside of Seattle, keen to harness a greater sense of scale and space in the creation of the music, working this time with co-producer Trevor Spencer (Father John Misty, Beach House, Mary Lattimore) to expand his creative vision. The result showcases Duckart’s range as a songwriter, pushing the boundaries of his typical acoustic palette into electrifying guitars and beating drums, and writing songs that read more like folklore.

The songs became a vessel for digging deep and exploring his life and point of view, but in a way that spoke outwardly more symbolically than literally. “Something your subconscious understands before your conscious mind does. Visceral rather than literal. And that relationship to our deeper selves, our subconscious, our souls, is a major theme of the album for me. Most of these songs are about the different ways we all bump up against the human condition. Our spirit, the shadow self, our egos, trauma, love and fate. How we cope with our experiences and how we connect and take care of one another in an exceedingly dark and violent world. This record is still deeply personal to me. But it is an attempt to reveal my cards in a more coded, symbolic manner.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Beautifully shining acoustic guitar, impeccable dreamy vocals and warm synths come together into a deep orchestral wash of emotion. Impeccably produced and wonderfully written, it's another step forward from Duckart's brilliant 'End Of The World' EP.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Belly Of The Whale
Kill What You Eat
Photograph Of A Cyclone
Hunter
Dirt

Side B
Dearly Missed
Junie
In Violet
Geese

The concept tying together every last note and lyric of ‘Earth-Sized Worlds’ - the debut album from the London/Oxford self-dubbed ‘Flowerkraut’ collective Mandrake Handshake - is an awfully simple one: ‘Welcome to Space Beach’. A mantra to unite under one aesthetic roof the various creative compulsions of this complex, multi-limbed organism - varying at any one time between 7 to 10 members - it’s an album that conspires the alienating vastness of the cosmos against the warm nostalgias of home. Full of surprise, leftfield turns and closeted experimentations, tape-soaked Brazilian Sambas morphs into Kosmische Kraturock crusades, and shimmering avant-pop electronics melt into sweetened psychedelic bliss… “Welcome to the Spacebeach - the new era of the Mandrake. Here, where the sea joins the sky, and where the trees touch the stars and where we will have you stay a while”.

With news of their biggest UK headline show to date at London’s No90 (Hackney Wick) on February 28th next year, Mandrake Handshake are certainly firing on all cylinders as their debut album release draws ever closer. Having already showcased lead singles ‘Charlie’s Comet’, ‘King Cnut’ and ‘The Change And The Changing’ as they experiment further with their eccentric brand of ‘Flowerkraut’: a hedonistic, brain-frying feast of krautrock, art-pop and psychedelia.

Varying anywhere between 7-10 members - including a dedicated, flamboyant tambourine shaker - their pristine, multi-limbed spectacle of a live show has journeyed up and down the UK and EU in recent times. With multiple headline tours to their name, including a sold-out show at London’s iconic 100 Club and headline slot on the BBC Introducing stage at Truck Festival earlier this year, the group have already ticked off slots at the likes of Wide Awake, Green Man and Manchester Psych Fest, as well as shows with psych-figureheads W.H Lung, Pale Blue Eyes, Triptides and Sugar Candy Mountain, and will embark on a UK tour supporting Del Amitri in December as their profile continues to soar.

With two critically acclaimed EPs already to their name - ‘Shake The Hand That Feeds You’ (released via Nice Swan Records) and ‘The Triple Point of Water’ - Mandrake Handshake’s long list of press champions includes The Independent, The i, NME, Loud & Quiet, Dork, DIY, So Young, The Line Of Best Fit, Rough Trade, Clash, Crackand Guitar World, as well as extensive BBC 6 Music (Deb Grant, Don Letts, Gideon Coe), Radio X (John Kennedy) airplay, and being crowned BBC Introducing Oxford/Buckinghamshire's Band of the Year.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Full of surprise, leftfield turns and closeted experimentations, tape-soaked Brazilian Sambas morphs into Kosmische Kraturock crusades, and shimmering avant-pop electronics melt into sweetened psychedelic bliss

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Time Goes Up
Hypsersonic Super-Asterid

Side B
Charlie’s Comet
The Change And The Changing
Lorenzo’s Desk

Side C
King Cnut
Barranmode

Side D
Find The Tree And Dig (Deep)!
Earth Sized Worlds

October 08, 2025 – a-ha are celebrating the 25th anniversary of Minor Earth, Major Sky with a special edition release, out December 12. The album marked a defining moment in the Norwegian trio’s career. Originally released in 2000, it signaled a triumphant comeback after a seven-year hiatus, reaffirming both their lasting relevance and continued creative evolution.

The 25th Anniversary Edition pairs the original tracklist—remastered in 2019—with four exclusive live recordings from a-ha’s 2001 concert at Oslo’s Valhall Arena, now available on vinyl for the very first time. Pressed on two high-quality 180g silver vinyl LPs, this edition is a must-have for collectors and fans alike, offering a renewed perspective on a modern classic while celebrating a-ha’s enduring legacy in pop music.

Minor Earth, Major Sky tells the story of a band that, while seemingly pausing between 1994 and 2000, never stopped making music. The group has described this period as transitional: “ „No one believed that it was over, it was more that nothing kept us together at that point,” recalls Magne Furuholmen in the liner notes of the 2019 Deluxe Edition. The spark for their reunion came in 1998, when a-ha performed at the Nobel Peace Prize Concert in Oslo—a one-off appearance that unexpectedly reignited their creative chemistry and paved the way for a new album that picked up right where Memorial Beach (1993) left off.

The Anniversary Edition features the full set of remastered originals—from the soaring title track Minor Earth, Major Sky and the dreamy Velvet to the timeless hit Summer Moved On—alongside four previously unreleased live versions (Minor Earth, Major Sky, The Sun Never Shone That Day, Velvet, and Summer Moved On). Blending studio precision with live emotion, this collection offers fans a rare glimpse into a-ha’s artistic vision and stage energy during that pivotal era.

“We make a-ha music, no matter the circumstances,” Magne Furuholmen wrote in 2019. A quarter of a century later, the 25th Anniversary Edition of Minor Earth, Major Sky stands as proof of that statement—a testament to the band’s timeless sound and enduring creative spirit.

TRACK LISTING

A
1.Minor Earth, Major Sky (2019 Remaster)
2.Little Black Heart (2019 Remaster)
3.Velvet (2019 Remaster)
4.Summer Moved On (2019 Remaster)

B
1.The Sun Never Shone That Day (2019 Remaster)
2.To Let You Win (2019 Remaster)
3.The Company Man (2019 Remaster)
4.Thought That It Was You (2019 Remaster)
5.I Wish I Cared (2019 Remaster)

C
1.Barely Hanging On (2019 Remaster)
2.You’ll Never Get Over Me (2019 Remaster)
3.I Won’t Forget Her (2019 Remaster)
4.Mary Ellen Makes The Moment Count (2019 Remaster)

D
1.Minor Earth, Major Sky (Live, Oslo 2001)
2.The Sun Never Shone That Day (Live, Oslo 2001)
3.Velvet (Live, Oslo 2001)
4.Summer Moved On (Live, Oslo 2001)

Exploring hauntological soundscapes, the UK-based duo of Beck Goldsmith and Jon Dix are happy to present their debut work getting the listeners back to the inner-connection with the natural world.

Chimehours are a collaborative effort of Beck Goldsmith and Jon Dix who had already worked together on several indie folk releases in the past teaming up right now to create a new musical project in which they could express their shared love for folk horror, ghost stories and supernatural. “We wanted to do something that musically spoke to those influences and allowed us to explore the themes they raise – nature, folklore, time, community, and a sense of the uncanny,” recalls Beck.

The album concept took shape after a candlelit reading of Max Porter's ‘Lanny’ one Burns Night. Jon explains, “The themes and setting cemented our ideas and gave us a specific focus, and we imagined ourselves writing a soundtrack to the book, or to an imagined film of the book. From there, the songs came together at their own pace and distance”. Inspired by ethereal minimalism, retro cinema and folk narratives, Chimehours craft a sonic palette reflecting on the pressures of modern life and the desire for reconnection with the natural world. 'The idea of a lost child's connection with a Green Man-style character in the Lanny book also finds itself in the premiered single. Beck clarifies, “With Underneath the Earth, we wanted to capture this complicated relationship with nature and the sense of something calling to us from somewhere else – an 'otherness' that exists just outside of what we know and understand. Something old and eternal and familial, and at the same time unsettling”.

Written and produced between Derbyshire, London and Margate during lockdown and beyond, the album incorporates drones, drums, gritty guitars merging with woodwind, strings and voice textures that resist clear linearity. “We started to get bigger and bolder in our approach, and it was fun and mysterious and compulsive to bring it all together (as though other forces were at work...),” shares the duo.

TRACK LISTING

1. Branches
2. Underneath The Earth
3. Toothwort Took Him
4. Greentree
5. Making A Mountain
6. Dead Papa Toothwort
7. Bowerbird
8. Run
9. Look For Me
10. Can't Find Your Way
11. We Follow
12. Say Your Prayers
13. Dead Papa Toothwort (Decayed)

Once called “America’s Best Krautrock Band,” Møtrik has long since outgrown the boundaries of geography and imitation. On 'EARTH', their fourth full-length album, the Portland-based quintet sheds genre pastiche and boldly steps into their own orbit—less homage, more evolution. Where early sci-fi like 'Astounding Stories' imagined futures grounded in scientific plausibility, 'EARTH' occupies a realm where machinery hums with feeling and cosmic logic collides with soul. Here, synths shimmer with stardust, rhythms churn like solar flares, and vocals drift like signals from a lost planet.

From the gravity-defying pulse of 'Weightless' to the tidal reckoning of 'Ultimate Drive', Møtrik charts a course through disorientation, beauty, and the sublime unknown. This isn’t retro-futurism—it’s the future, now. No tin-cone breastplates, no cartoon ladybots, no techbro rockets. Just fully realized sonic transmissions where science meets magic, and krautrock becomes something galactic. Møtrik aren’t just referencing the genre—they’re rewriting it. Thirteen years in, it’s time to upgrade the superlative. Call them what they are: the galaxy’s best krautrock band.

TRACK LISTING

1. Ultimate Drive
2. Weightless
3. Flood Tide
4. Blaupunkt
5. Contact
6. Still Life
7. Road Sound
8. Mask
9. Køan

Helado Negro is the musical project of Roberto Carlos Lange, a South Florida-raised, North Carolina-based artist celebrated for his intimate blend of electronic textures, delicate vocals, and reflective songwriting. Drawing from his Ecuadorian-American heritage, Helado Negro’s music navigates themes of identity, community, and connection, always grounded in warmth and understated beauty.

His new five track EP titled ‘The Last Sound On Earth’ is inspired by the question of what the last sound we hear might be, the songs blend haunting production with lyrical vulnerability, grappling with grief, loneliness, disillusionment, and the search for hope. Through hypnotic rhythms and reflective lyrics, the EP dances with sadness, offering movement and music as a form of resistance and release in the face of emotional collapse.

TRACK LISTING

1. More
2. Protector
3. Sender Receiver
4. Zenith
5. Don’t Give It Up Now

A collaboration forged in the heart of the American Midwest, 'In The Earth Again' unites Oklahoma City’s noise rock institution Chat Pile with Texas/Oklahoma’s visionary guitarist and composer Hayden Pedigo.
What began as a casual split release idea spiraled into a thirty-six-minute album that threads their contrasting sensibilities into something entirely new.

Pedigo’s panoramic, primitive guitar, meets Chat Pile’s industrial decay, creating a record that explores unknown emotional registers and atmospheric depth for both, In The Earth Again sounds like a post-apocalyptic transmission from rural nowhere.

Instead of making concessions, the five artists work as a single unit, and each decision is made in support of the greater vision. The result is both intimate and expansive, a tribute to the modern wasteland.

TRACK LISTING

1. Outside
2. Demon Time
3. Never Say Die
4. Behold A Pale Horse
5. Magic Of The World
6. Fission/Fusion
7. The Matador
8. I’ve Got My Own Blunt To Smoke
9. Radioactive Dreams
10. Inside
11. A Tear For Lucas

Remastered from the original tapes by The Bricoleur at Bladud Flies!, and with the original artwork refreshed and reborn by Rob Hopeye, this 12” vinyl picture-disc comes in a full-colour die-cut sleeve, which is printed on both the outside and inside.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Dilly Song
2. Hourglass For Diana
3. Earth Covers Earth
4. Rome For Douglas P.
5. Time Tryeth Truth
6. Hourglass For Abelisk

The now-classic duet of 'Peace On Earth/Little Drummer Boy' with David Bowie from Bing Crosby's 1977 television special, M errie Olde Christmas is back on a brand new, collector's edition, picture disc 12” vinyl. The picture disc features the iconic image of David Bowie and Bing Crosby at the piano.

TRACK LISTING

1. Peace On Earth / Little Drummer Boy - Bing Crosby, David Bowie
2. White World Of Winter - Bing Crosby

David Sylvian's 'Gone To Earth' is a double album that comprises of one LP of experimental rock songs with vocals and one consisting entirely of ambient instrumental tracks. Now available with new artwork and pressed on corona white, brown and opaque black vinyl.

TRACK LISTING

1. Taking The Veil
2. Laughter And Forgetting
3. Before The Bullfight
4. Gone To Earth
5. Wave
6. River Man
7. Silver Moon
8. The Healing Place
8. Answered Prayers
9. Where The Railroad Meets The Sea
10. The Wooden Cross
11. Silver Moon Over Sleeping Steeples
12. Camp Fire : Coyote Country
13. A Bird Of Prey Vanishes Into A Bright Blue Cloudless Sky
14. Home
15. Sunlight Seen Through Towering Trees
16. Upon This Earth

Marking a new direction the band would follow in years to come, 'Hex' stands in stark contrast to Earth's previous works. While retaining the extremely heavy doom/drone metal song structure of epic riffs over simple repetitive drum beats, the guitar was inflected with country influences that favored a cleaner reverb-heavy tone layered with acoustic instruments over the band's previous predilection for distortion. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: One of the greatest albums from one of the greatest drone bands of all time AND a turning point for said drone band which turned their trajectory into what is almost certainly the 'Greatest Ever Slo-Country LP From A Band That Used To Be a Drone Band' that i've ever heard. It's perfect, and it was a surprising left turn for a brilliant band, that turned out even better. Singularly brilliant.

TRACK LISTING

1. Mirage
2. Land Of Some Other Order
3. The Dire And Ever Circling Wolves
4. Left In The Desert
5. Lens Of Unrectified Night
6. An Inquest Concerning Teeth
7. Raiford (The Felon Wind)
8. The Dry Lake
9. Tethered To The Polestar
10. Untitled 

Originally released in 2010, The Body’s 'All The Waters Of The Earth Turn To Blood' is a watershed album that changed the landscape of heavy music. Buoyed by the eclectic cast of musicians, from the undeniably potent collaboration with The Assembly of Light Choir as led by now longtime The Body collaborator Chrissy Wolpert, to guest contributors that include members of Dead Times, Fang Island, Lichens (aka Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe), Human Beast, and many more. The album’s singularly bleak, yet beautiful atmosphere not only set the tone for The Body’s career in breaking the mold, but set a new standard for what extreme music could do. 'All The Waters...' also helped spark the duo’s penchant for collaboration, which they then solidified across dozens of releases, from collaborations with Braveyoung to BIG|BRAVE, Thou, Full of Hell, Uniform, and beyond. The new reissue for 'All The Waters...' is packaged as a double LP, including a whole new Side D, which is composed of bonus material never before pressed to vinyl.

TRACK LISTING

1. Abody
2. A Curse
3. Empty Hearth
4. Even The Saints Knew Their Hour Of Failure And Loss
5. Song Of Sarin, The Brave
6. Ruiner
7. Lathspell I Name You
8. Even The Saints Knew Their Hour Of Failure And Loss
9. Ruiner
10. Sarin, How The Gods Kill
11. Here Comes The Tears

After releasing their debut album, ‘Spring Tide' in 2022, to strong reviews (4* in Mojo magazine, 5* in Morning Star with support from BBC 6Music), Liverpool-based band The Shipbuilders return with their second album 'This Blue Earth'. Singles, ‘Daydreaming’ and ‘Hills Of Mexico’ have led from the front, combining sea-sprayed bar-room jams with Morricone-hued escapist splendour.

Working once again with Danny Woodward (B.C. Camplight, Ladytron), the band has expanded to a five-piece, taking in a permanent brass section and pushing their sound to its natural limit. As ever, the band’s sound remains hard to pinpoint, but all human life is in here. There are musical echoes of Love, The Coral, The Everly Brothers and Charles Mingus, with lyrical giant touchstones such as Hemingway, Joyce and Steinbeck all feeding into a wonderful melting pot that sounds like everything and nothing you've heard. 'This Blue Earth' creates a cohesive universe around itself that begs to be explored.

Whether it is wild storytelling set to urgent drumbeats and sparkling guitars (95 Miles, Hills of Mexico), raucous, chaotic clatters (Daydreaming, Flagpole, The River) or wondrous blue-eyed melodies (Polynesia), nestled next to expansive, soaring soundscapes (On the Run, La Dolce Vita) and Merseysippi Gospel hollers (Heavy is the Weight), the album is never static or predictable and there isn't a cliché in sight.

Having supported Michael Head and The Red Elastic Band on several UK tour dates in 2024 and continuing to expand their own Club Shipwrecked nights, which has featured acts such as Andy Bell (Ride/Oasis), By the Sea, Bill Ryder-Jones, Stone Club, Roy and more, alongside having played festivals such as Kendal Calling, Sound City and LIMF, The Shipbuilders are building up to celebrate more of 'This Blue Earth' in venues around the UK through 2025. 

TRACK LISTING

1. 95 Miles
2. Daydreaming
3. La Dolce Vita
4. The River
5. Metempsychosis
6. Flagpole
7. Hills Of Mexico
8. Polynesia
9. On The Run
10. Heavy Is The Weight

In the spring of 2019, a new rock band consisting of four otherwise ordinary Okies would arise out of seemingly nowhere, swiftly turning heads with a grotesque new take on noise rock fuelled by the existential anguish that has defined the 21st Century. Taking its name from the towering mounds of toxic waste that stand as monuments to capitalism’s cruel hubris across its home state, Oklahoma City’s Chat Pile made an immediate impression, soon culminating in the release of its landmark 2022 debut album, 'God’s Country' and 2024’s expansive follow up 'Cool World'.

While the massive success of 'God’s Country' would propel the quartet from the status of underground favorites to an international sensation, Chat Pile’s mission to take rock music to new zeniths of intensity was part of the plan from the very start. In fact, during its first handful of months as an active project, Chat Pile began writing and recording some of the heaviest, hellish, and harrowing music of its entire catalogue, laying the foundation of the themes and traits that would eventually manifest in the band’s debut LP. The result of these sessions would be a pair of EPs, 'This Dungeon Earth' and 'Remove Your Skin Please', released in the summer and winter of 2019, respectively.

Initially put out by Reptilian Records in 2020, The Flenser is proud to present a special reissue of Chat Pile’s pivotal first two EPs, each compiled onto a single disc. This dual EP compilation chronicles the earliest moments of the Oklahoma City quartet’s discography, a snapshot of the band’s pre-Flenser days and of the eight tracks of noxious, nihilistic noise rock that would propel the Midwest band to a globe-spanning, underground heavyweights.

TRACK LISTING

1. Face
2. Rainbow Meat
3. Rat Boy
4. Crawlspace
5. Dallas Beltway
6. Mask
7. Davis
8. Garbage Man

Earthly Measures are proud to present the release of ‘El Buho - Cumbias Imaquinarias’, this time on wax with some added remixes.

'Cumbias Imaquinarias' is an EP that flows full circle with one of El Buho’s earliest inspirations for making electronic music; digital Cumbia. It was a scene that exploded out of Buenos Aires around 2008 and went global. The scene soon saturated and fell out of fashion, but gave birth to artists like Chancha Via Circuito, Frikstailers, El Remolon and was a big inspiration for him as a young producer.

For El Buho there was always something there; the entrancing magic of the Cumbia rhythm reimagined for the electronic dancefloor. Cumbia is a music that is globally connected but also so diverse, evolving and growing into many subshoots of this one simple rhythm. This EP presents three Cumbia’s and one Porro rhythm (a derivation of the Cumbia rhythm from the Colombian Caribbean which evolved into its own style).

Joining El Buho on remix duties for this release are ARN4L2, Lagartijeando, Auntie Flo, La Jungla, Earthly Measures x Dreems, La Forasteria and Sun Sone. Each artist offering a completely unique approach and their own magic touch to this El Buho masterpiece.

TRACK LISTING

A1. La Cumbia Del Cafe Martinez
A2. Anglo-Colombian Expedition
A3. La Cumbia De La Ansiedad
A4. Porro Del Tucan
B1. La Cumbia Del Cafe Martinez (ARN4L2 Remix)
B2. Anglo-Colombian Expedition (Auntie Flo Remix)
B3. La Cumbia De La Ansiedad (La Jungla Remix)
B4. Porro Del Tucan (Lagartijeando Remix)

The new debut Album by Dogshark, 13 tracks of raunchy grooves, crushing rock and soulful blues.

TRACK LISTING

1. Sun Going Down / John The Revelator
2. Blockchain
3. AI's Rise
4. Perfect Evening
5. Mind Of Man
6. Hold My Coat
7. Too Sweet (Type 2 Blues)
8. Cliché
9. Thru-Gether
10. Tired
11. Drop That Attitude
12. Spaceships
13. Fool No More

After the incredible success of the film Easy Rider, Dennis Hopper was given complete freedom to direct and star in the bizarre, surrealist The Last Movie – released in 1971. Filmed in a drug fuelled haze in Peru with Hopper, Peter Fonda, Kris Kristofferson, Dean Stockwell, Michelle Phillips, Russ Tamblyn, and Samuel Fuller – there has never been a soundtrack to this film until now! Featuring the first ever performances of Kristofferson’s legendary “Me and Bobby McGee” plus sublime country-folk songs from John Buck Wilkin, Peruvian folk & dance music – all recorded live on set in Peru – nothing was overdubbed! Plus, provocative movie dialogue from Dennis Hopper, Sam Fuller and others – coupled with the ambient sounds of the mountains and villages of South America – reissue producer Pat Thomas and Hopper Estate archivist Jessica Hundley have assembled a groovy listening experience that will melt minds. Packaging includes rare vintage photos, detailed liner notes, et al. The Last Movie audio recordings are being released for the first time on CD taken from the original movie reels!

TRACK LISTING

1 Opening Scene
2 Good For Nothing Is Good Enough For Me
3 Me And Bobby McGee
4 The Party Walk
5 Billy Don't Shoot
6 Rolling
7 La Di Da
8 Daydream
9 Conversation
10 Only Once
11 I'm The Hottest
12 Un Baracho, Baracho
13 Maria Suenas, Dos Claveles
14 Chinchero Chant
15 Sympathetic Scarecrow
16 Music!
17 The Final Procession
18 Only Once
19 Boo-hoo In Tinseltown 

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2025 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON SATURDAY APRIL 12TH ON A FIRST COME FIRST SERVED BASIS, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

IF THERE ARE ANY REMAINING COPIES THEY WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE ONLINE AT 8PM ON MONDAY APRIL 14th.

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2025 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON SATURDAY APRIL 12TH ON A FIRST COME FIRST SERVED BASIS, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

IF THERE ARE ANY REMAINING COPIES THEY WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE ONLINE AT 8PM ON MONDAY APRIL 14th.

'Song of the Earth' is performed by Longstreth with members of his band Dirty Projectors — Felicia Douglass, Maia Friedman, Olga Bell —and the Berlin-based chamber orchestra s t a r g a z e, the album also features Phil Elverum (Mount Eerie), Steve Lacy, Patrick Shiroishi,Anastasia Coope, Tim Bernardes, Ayoni, Portraits of Tracy, and the author David Wallace-Wells.

Longstreth wrote the first draft in six manic weeks for a commission arranged by s t a r g a z e. He felt disoriented and also galvanized bythe moment: the pandemic chaos, the ‘radical psychedelia’ of new fatherhood, the novelty of writing for large ensemble. Then he spentthree years revising, rewriting, rearranging, and recording in studios and homes in the Netherlands, Los Angeles, and New York City.

'Song of the Earth' marks Longstreth’s biggest-yet foray into the field of concert music. It received its US premiere in a March 2024 sold-outperformance at Disney Hall in Los Angeles with the LA Philharmonic. Work-in-progress performances also took place between 2022 and2024 at the Barbican in London, Hamburg Elbphilharmonie, and Muziekgebouw Amsterdam.

Just as Dirty Projectors’ 'Rise Above' sounds nothing like 'Damaged' — the Black Flag album upon which is based — 'Song of the Earth' bearslittle resemblance to its namesake, Gustav Mahler’s 1908 song-poem Das Lied Von Der Erde. But Longstreth notes that “it is saturated withthe Mahler work’s themes, feelings and spirit of dissolved contradiction.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: An entrancing selection of warm orchestral minimalism, brittle folky timbres and swooning, scattered busts of harmony and melody. Bold, uncompromisingly cinematic and wonderfully immersive.

TRACK LISTING

1. Summer Light
2. Gimme Bread
3. At Home
4. Circled In Purple
5. Our Green Garden
6. Walk The Edge
7. Opposable Thumb
8. More Mania
9. Spiderweb At Water's Edge
10. Mallet Hocket
11. So Blue The Lake
12. Dancing On Our Eyelids
13. Same River Twice
14. Armfuls Of Flowers
15. Twin Aspens
16. Uninhabitable Earth, Paragraph One
17. Kyrie / About My Day
18. Shifting Shalestones
19. Appetite
20. Bank On
21. Paper Birches, Whole Scroll
22. Raven Ascends
23. Blue Of Dreaming
24. Raised Brow

Earthstar Mountain is an ode to curiosity.

It asks what it means to live a life: how do we decide which direction to take? How do we stay there? And what happens when the rug is pulled from under our feet? Once again working with her partner and collaborator Sam Evian at their home studio Flying Cloud, Hannah Cohen's fourth full-length album Earthstar Mountain, is a keepsake of Cohen's time in the Catskills, built over the course of 2020-2024, as blurred, shimmering memories come into focus to produce a collage of echoes and sonic souvenirs.

Featuring contributions from Sufjan Stevens, Clairo, Sean Mullins, Liam Kazar, Oliver Hill and more, Earthstar Mountain is a love letter to the Catskills and in the interconnectedness of all things: in her past, present, future and alternative selves, in her friends--here and gone--and in the mountain that peers through her windows.

TRACK LISTING

Dusty 
Draggin'
Mountain
Earthstar
Rag
Una Spiaggia
Summer Sweat
Shoe
Baby You're Lying 
Dog Years

‘Actual Earth Music - Volume 1 & 2’ presents two caustic, yet alluringly unreal live sets from Canadian noise-rock entropy hunters Earth Ball. Following on from the group’s critically appraised ‘It’s Yours’ LP (released 2024 on Upset The Rhythm - UTR164) this release captures the band at the peak of their powers, playing live, composing spontaneously.

Side A features Earth Ball live at The Fox Cabaret in Vancouver, supporting Wolf Eyes on August 4, 2023. Jeremy Van Wyck from the band considers this “the gig that sent us into orbit, really. Causing Olson & Young to wax poetic about our interstellar jams to a fine bloke across the big sea. Upsetting our casual rhythm and forcing our hand. All that talk led to an LP, ‘It’s Yours’, and a full UK tour the following spring”.

Now, with the birth of this live series ‘Actual Earth Music’, it seems only fitting that Volume 1 should be this gig. It’s a doozy. Listening back is a pure revelation. Earth Ball whip up a vortex of thrashing wild energy, the ecstatic release is off the charts. “You don’t always catch every nuance of the jams as they come down. I mean, this one felt good, but upon listening back to the tapes, it sounded very good” confides Jeremy. “It reminded me of Von Trier’s Melancholia: the sound of a large sphere coming toward you to bring doom. However, this one reverses course, heading away to some other shore, bathing you in reflective bliss before saying goodbye—instead of ending humanity as we know it”.

Volume 2 occupies Side B of this LP, showcasing a collaborative summit from the second night of their recent Café OTO residency on May 21, 2024. This event featured Earth Ball laying down three separate sets—all collaborations. This second recording presents their opening performance and features pivotal UK improv luminary Steve Beresford on piano and free-jazz phenomenon Chris Corsano on drums.

TRACK LISTING

01. Live At The Fox Cabaret
02. Live At Café OTO With Steve Beresford & Chris Corsano

Running Time: 42 Mins 

Linking music and literature, building a bridge between the written and the sung–only the greats have managed to do this in the past. Leonard Cohen, Scott Walker, and Patti Smith were just some of the shining stars that Anna B Savage orientated herself towards as a teenager. Born on the anniversary of Bach’s death, the young musician spent her birthday every year in the Green Room of the Royal Albert Hall watching her parents perform compositions by the grand master. That shaped her.

Today, thanks to albums such as her debut, “A Common Turn” (2021), and the incredibly sensual art-pop opus “in|FLUX” (2023), the singer-songwriter is one of the truly exceptional talents on the British independent scene. In her music, otherworldly vocals nestle up against chamber orchestral compositions, delicate arrangements rise up and blow away, and the musician’s highly eclectic sound grows song by song into an experience that lingers for days and weeks. Potentially life-changing.

A sense of rootedness is at the heart of Anna B Savage’s third record You and I are Earth, a record that is as much about healing as it is an unbowed sense of curiosity, and, more simply, “a love letter to a man and to Ireland.” Following on from her critically acclaimed records ACommon Turn and in|FLUX, You and I are Earth manages to convey a sense of intimacy, while also being open-ended. Gentleness is as radiant a touchstone on the record as earthiness, something that Savage attributes to the place she finds herself at present, both geographically and emotionally. And quite literally the record bears witness to a particular piece of earth-Ireland, and Savage’s relationship to it as her new home. That process is brilliantly rendered on Agnes, a complicated piece of work featuring AnnaMieke that turns on tropes of duality and transformation. It mirrors an unsettling experience that Savage had through meditation, which ultimately ended in an immersive, beautiful feeling, “I felt like I was part of the earth, completely connected to the mycelium network, felt like I was where I was meant to be.”

In many ways, that experience framed the album’s artwork, a photograph taken in some woodlands in Co. Sligo, with Savage looking up at the trees, their fractals reflected in her eyes, mirroring something she had felt in her meditation, bringing us back full circle, and to that sense that we are essentially in unison, or at least striving to be, that “you and I are earth”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: A beautifully tender mix of flickering acoustic guitar, dynamic chord changes and airy bucolic lyrical themes, perfectly presented in Savage's athletic vocal style. It's a wonderfully enthralling, constantly twisting tapestry of melody and rhythmic drive, and shows just how influential Savage's unique style could be.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
1. Talk To Me
2. Lighthouse
3. Donegal
4. Big & Wild
5. Mo Cheol Thu
́
Side B
6. Incertus
7. I Reach For You In My Sleep
8. Agnes
9. You & I Are Earth
10. The Rest Of Our Lives 

Jacob Long’s fourth full-length for Kranky began as a notion to reimagine Earthen Sea as a “piano trio,” inspired by a year-long immersion in the ECM label catalog, but the compositions soon grew more complex.

Elements were chopped and resampled, then layered with bass, drums, percussion, and additional keys. The result is a fusion of live band acoustics and downtempo loops, sculpted into nine smoke-and-mirror dubs of fractured jazz, soft-focus noir, and trip-hop dust: Recollection.

Like the title implies, Long’s playing and production share a mood of pensive movement, shuffling and rippling like uncertain memories at strange hours.

From looming fog (“Present Day,” “Neon Ruins”) and shadowy breaks (“Another Space,” “Cloudy Vagueness”) to rosy glows (“Clear Photograph”) and smeared reverie (“White Sky”), Recollection deftly wields its palette of gradient color and subdued states of beauty.

His is a music of reduction and reflection, kinetic but oblique, attuned to the silhouettes of sound.

TRACK LISTING

1. Present Day
2. Another Space
3. Sunlit Leavin
4. A Single Pub
5. Neon Ruins
6. Clear Photograph
7. Cloudy Vagueness
8. Abstract, Tell
9. White Sky

“A huge thing for this record was to make it feel as close to our live show as possible,” says Tom Sharkett of W.H. Lung’s latest album. “We didn’t want it to sound live but we wanted to capture the excitement of the live performances.”

This is something that has become paramount to the group in recent years as they have undeniably blossomed into one of the most joyous and arresting live bands in the country. “The reason I’m in a band is to play live music,” says singer Joe Evans. “For me, music is live music. That’s what it’s for, to be played with people.”

The five-piece band, also featuring Chris Mulligan, Hannah Peace, and Alex Mercer-Main, decided to try something new on their third album after two incredibly successful collaborations with previous producer Matt Peel. In order to capture the energy, spirit and dynamism of their live shows, they relocated to Sheffield to work with Ross Orton (MIA, Arctic Monkeys, Working Men’s Club) who was able to harness this side of the band to remarkable effect. “Ross is the Sheffield Steve Albini,” says Evans. “He’s the king of not overthinking it and trusting the process of the art of recording songs. He was always there to stop us fucking around with cerebral stuff and get it down.” Sharkett echoes this too: “He was the exact producer we needed without us even realising. His productions and mixes are bombastic, lively and in your face and that’s exactly what we wanted.”

However, while this album is rooted in a sense of capturing a moment and a sparky liveness, that’s not to say it’s a raw or ragged record. It is still a meticulously composed, delicately layered and pristinely produced piece of work that, in true W.H. Lung style, runs the gauntlet from dance to pop to indie while still capturing that distinctly unique quality that is unquestionably their own. “It was a really big thing for me to realise what made us sound like us on this record,” says Sharkett. “I think the album sounds a lot more confident and self assured because of it. Some songs sound just so much like Lung and I’m really proud of that. I’m not sure we’ve done that as consistently across the other records.”

While the band have drilled deeper into finding their own singular identity, it’s not a record resting on its laurels. It’s a significant leap forward, expanding on their solid foundations while also breaking new ground. “The big difference with this record is its directness in every sense,” says Sharkett. “The songwriting is more upfront. Previously we’d focused a lot on vibe and production as opposed to just writing songs. The overall mission here was to revert to a classic songwriting structure and for the production to come afterwards.”

And so what you have on this record are deeply considered and well-crafted songs, then recorded with blistering intensity in the moment, and then given a touch of experimentation afterwards. Then throw in Orton’s contributions to the band and it’s proven to be a real winning formula. “He brought a real dose of magic to the songs we’d written,” says Sharkett. “And brought an extra bit of wonk and quirkiness each time.”

Such quirkiness is apparent from the opening ‘Lilac Sky’ which very briefly samples a learn to speak Spanish 12” before whirring atmospherics, hypnotic bass, and shimmering synths began to propel the song for launch. “I like it when there’s really clear punctuation at the start of a record,” says Sharkett. “It’s almost like a statement of intent and I wanted something like that, where if people knew the tune they could identify it within the first second.”

It’s also the perfect album opener in more than one way, setting the tone for an album rooted in exploration. “I went out onto Hampstead Heath one day when it was dusk and the sky was mad and I’d just taken some mushrooms,” recalls Evans. “I was thinking: just remember this, this is how things really are. So maybe this track acts like an invocation or a calling for the rest of the album. It’s about listening closely, paying attention, and being overwhelmed with an open heart.”

On ‘Bliss Bliss’ the band almost veer into anthemic indie territory, with its rousing chorus, euphoric lashes of synths and a vocal delivery that is festival headline worthy. “I sang it like I was singing a song I’d forgotten from when I was a teenager,” says Evans of his impassioned performance. It was a fresh approach for the band. “I thought the guitars felt too college rock at first but I just went with it,” says Sharkett. “It’s a completely different style of guitar playing for me and something much more traditional in the indie world but I was enjoying that.”
In many ways this was another foundational song for the LP. “This was the first instance of us writing more traditional songs for the album,” says Sharkett. “It kind of embodies our balance between being a live conventional guitar band and the shiny, synthy side of Lung to me. It feels like the perfect culmination of our experience as a band so far.”

The band’s ability to write more traditional and conventional songs is clearly a skill they’ve taken to with ease, at times there’s an almost Springsteen-like quality – but if he'd ever had an ecstasy period – to tracks such as ‘Thinner Wine’ and ‘Bloom and Fade’. While ‘How to Walk’ was constructed with one thing only in mind: that it would absolutely slay on stage. “I can’t wait to play this live,” says Evans. “We wanted a song to represent our live set, a new big one, and this is it.” Once again it leans towards the anthemic, with its driving, propulsive charge complete with incandescent synths and vocal melodies so irresistible you can already hear them being sung in unison by a crowd.
It’s an incredibly difficult feat to pull off a record that is more rooted in traditional songcraft while also capturing the power of a live performance, as well as pushing sonics into experimental new directions while working with a brand new collaborator. But here the band has managed to do just that.

And the album’s closing song ‘I Will Set Fire To The House’ is a perfect example of such a thing. It’s a song that feels immaculately constructed but also very much alive and of the moment as its radiating synths engulf from the off, and Evans’ vocal is silky but powerful and in perfect symbiosis with Peace’s. It’s a song that captures the endless joys of music playing long into the night. “It may be a bit of a bloody bombastic way to end an album saying ‘and we’ll dance into the sunrise’,” says Evans. “But fuck it.” 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: For those of you that haven't already heard of W.H. Lung, their Piccadilly lauded albums ‘Incidental Music’ (2019) and ‘Vanities’ (2021) were impeccably forged slabs of driven Krautrock percussion and soaring hooky indie vocals. While 'Every Inch Of Earth Pulsates' doesn't steer away from the oft-instrumental drive of those earlier efforts, it's imbued with a vigorously optimistic edge. Those always-present throbbing basses and snappy, rock-solid percussive tethers work gradually into bright, stadium ready hands-in-the-air anthems and soaring, jangling shoegaze. While there are moments of post-punk minimalism or thoughtful, rippling unease it is always tastefully offset with a burst of neon shine or change of direction. W.H. Lung's discography has always veered towards the big stage sound, but it's never been more perfectly fitting for the summer festival circuit. A refreshingly uplifting, sunny day of an album.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Lilac Sky
Bliss Bliss
Thinner Wine
Bloom And Fade

Side B
How To Walk
Flowers In The Rain
I Can’t Lie
The Painting Of The Bay
I Will Set Fire To The House

Soul Jazz Records’ new collection, ‘Electro Throwdown - Sci-Fi Inter-Planetary Electro Attack on Planet Earth 1982-89’, is a journey into the outer reaches of electro, a galactic roller-coaster ride of turbo-charged sci-fi grooveology.

The album is comprised of mainly private-press and independent label electro jams of the highest calibre (with some as rare as spaceships landing on Mars) all created in the 1980s, at a time when a vocoder, a Roland TR-808 drum machine and a groove was all that was needed to get the party started.

With a few notable exceptions (Michael Jonzun’s Jonzun Crew and The Packman) the album features mainly under-the-radar killer tracks from a host of one-off artists and back-room electronic pioneers – including Pretty Tony, Planet Detroit (James McCauley, aka Maggotron) and Rich Cason – who together helped shape the sound of electro across the USA from Miami to New York, Los Angeles and beyond during the 1980s. 

TRACK LISTING

1. The Rickie Clark Company - Time To Throw Down (6.32)
2. The Troids - Boogie Troids (5.49)
3. The Packman - I'm The Packman (6.37)
4. Pretty Tony - Fix It In The Mix (5.57)
5. Jazaq - All Systems Go (5.26)
6. Rich Cason - Killer Groove (4.07)
7. The Jonzun Crew - We Are The Jonzun Crew (6.24)
8. Ozone Layer - Planetary Deterioration (Electro Mix) (4.53)
9. Bill Williams And Bileo - Robot People (3.31)
10. Extra T's - E.T. Boogie (5.28)
11. Planet Detroit - Invasion From The Planet Detroit (4.21)
12. Professor X - Professor X (Saga) (4.24)
13. Mo-Jo - Jump, Stomp And Twist (Instrumental) (6.07)

The definitive collection of Denny’s early home demos authorized by her estate, with Sandy's daughter Georgia Lucas’ own charming drawings of her mother making their first appearance on an official Denny release, plus previously unpublished images of Sandy’s 1960s passport and driver’s license. And extensive sleeve-notes by re-issue producer Pat Thomas. 

Included are two different rare demos of her classic ‘Who Knows Where the Time Goes’ from 1967 (before she recorded it with Strawbs) and another from 1968.

‘She had this amazing talent, this incredible voice - she played Who Knows Where the Time Goes, and I nearly fell off my chair.' - Linda Thompson

Plus, a host of songs penned by Sandy including ‘Boxful Of Treasures’ which was later rewritten as the song ‘Fotheringay’ (from Fairport Convention’s What We Did On Our Holidays album). ‘Fotheringay’ also appears here in demo form.

“She needs to be re-evaluated. She wrote a kind of song that's very rarely written now - emotional, musically interesting, sung really well - serious songwriting. She was head and shoulders above the rest. And she remains so." - Ashley Hutchings (Fairport Convention founder).

Also featuring heartfelt covers of songs by Jackson C Frank, Fred Neil, Anne Briggs, Dylan, and many traditional folk songs.

TRACK LISTING

CD - Disc 1
Blues Run The Game
Milk & Honey
Soho
It Ain't Me Babe
East Virginia
Geordie
In Memory (The Tender Years)
I Love My True Love
Let No Man Steal Your Thyme
Ethusel
Setting Of The Sun
Boxful Of Treasures
Who Knows Where The Time Goes (1967)

CD - Disc 2
Carnival
They Don't Seem To Know You
Gerrard Street
Motherless Children
She Moves Through The Fair
The Time Has Come
A Little Bit Of Rain
Go Your Own Way My Love
Seven Virgins
Blue Tattoo
Cradle Song
Quiet Land Of Erin
Fotheringay
Who Knows Where The Time Goes (1968)

Veteran electronic music composer Jill Fraser’s new work takes stock of generations and lifetimes of memory, speculating on how the spirit of our songs might be interpreted after we’re gone. With her 1978 Serge Modular, Prism Modular and Ableton Push 3 in the circuit path, she recomposes a stack of American revival hymns, making new creations for the future. A fluent meditation upon mortality and rebirth amid numinous infinities of dimensional sound.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
When We All Get To Heaven
Amen 1

Side B
Earthly Pleasures
Beautiful Summer

Side C
Message Of Mercy
Amen 2

Side D
Monarch Of The Sky
I Stand Amazed

The saying goes that "God only gives you what you can handle." Well God didn't grow up in my atheist, Wiccan, fame-laden, oversexed, teetotalling, drug-free, cloistered, chaotic, non-communicative, workaholic, feral-feeling house.'For Moon Unit, daughter of musician Frank Zappa and his 'manager', Gail, processing a life so unique, so punctuated by the whims of creative urges, the tastes of popular culture and the calculus of celebrity, has at times been eviscerating. But it is her deep sense of humour and unshakeable humility that keeps her - and this memoir - pinned to the ground. A child-star at age 14 after her accidental international hit single (recorded with her father), 'Valley Girl', turned her into a reluctant celebrity, Moon Unit Zappa's life has been utterly extraordinary from her birth in 1967 into a family that was already blessed/cursed as music royalty thanks to the acknowledged genius of Frank.

But what are the consequences of growing up in a family who spend most of their time naked arguing about sexual/extra-marital liaisons and practising white magic in a free-for-all state of nonconformist, virtuoso abandon?Earth to Moon is a reckoning with self-esteem, the ghosts of the past and a mother and a father who, in the process of leaving their mark upon on the world, scarred their first daughter on home soil. Brutally self-deprecating and funny as hell, it belies a rose-tinted perspective on the 70s and 80s west coast American scene, from within the belly of the beast of the rock and roll world.

2024 edition - 180 Gram, Tip On Sleeve . One of the rarer records of the mythical Strata East.

The recording of Earth Blossom, the John Betsch Society's one and only album, seems something of an enigma nowadays. For even though Nashville is clearly one of the towns in the US with the highest number of recording studios, who would have thought that the capital of country music would give birth to one of the forgotten masterpieces of 1970s spiritual jazz. The path leading to the album starts in 1963 when John Betsch, originally from Jacksonville in Florida, arrives in Nashville to study at Frisk University. He is a young drummer and joins Bob Holmes trio. Holmes is one of the towns major jazz organists and pianists; he becomes Betschs mentor and, over the space of two years, John will play alternately with him and with the trumpeter Louis Smiths group. However, in 1965, John leaves town to go to the prestigious Berkeley University in Boston and do a two-year course along with his fellow debutants with names like John Abercrombie, Ernie Watts and Alan Broadbent. Two years later, he is invited by a pianist friend, Billy Chilf, to join the legendary singer/songwriter Tim Hardins group. Just after Woodstock, John Betsch and Tim record a psychedelic album Columbia will never release together with the members of the future group Oregon: Colin Walcott, Glen Moore, Paul McCandles and his friend Billy Chilf. But he soon leaves this group to return to Nashville where he hooks up again with his friend Bob Holmes. Two years later, he is accepted on Archie Shepp and Max Roachs famous course at the University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMASS) and for the next four years he participates in this collective of intellectuals and musicians under the aegis of the two masters.

During this period he returns to Nashville to form his Society whose music is obviously influenced by the Afrocentric ideas of the UMASS student and political movement. However, the album, recorded in one day and in one take, also bears the hallmark of their generations psychedelic experiences, and in the themes and playing of the musicians we can hear a less violent form of music than the radical free jazz of New York or Chicago. Nature and environmental themes are the inspiration behind tracks touched by the spirit of Coltrane but also of Flower Power.

After Amherst, John Betsch joins Marion Browns group in 1976, leaves Tennessee for good and makes his home in New York over the next ten years or so. He plays and records with Dollar Brand, Kalaparusha Maurice McIntyre and many others, before heading off to France. He has lived in Paris for the last twenty years and played in Steve Lacy, Mal Waldron and Archie Shepp bands, as well as forming groups of his own. He now lives in Paris and plays with many musicians/bands.

TRACK LISTING

Ode To Ethiopia
Earth Blossom
Open Pastures
Song For An Untidy Lady
Ra
Darling Doria
Get Up And Go

Originally released in 1994, Mother Earth’s ‘The People Tree’ is a gem of an album that encapsulates a love of soul, funk and folktinged ‘70s rock. To mark its 30th Anniversary, it is set for a special edition 2LP reissue that includes the original album, three previously unreleased tracks, and a further six that have neverbefore been on vinyl. It has been remastered from the original analogue recordings.

One of the best-loved albums in Acid Jazz history, it was the product of over a year of sessions, led by label-founder Eddie Piller, and features guest appearances from Paul Weller, Dee C Lee, and Brand New Heavies’ Simon Bartholomew. Bonus tracks include the previously-unreleased alternative ‘Apple Green’ with a distinctive female backing vocal, an alternative version of ‘Illusions’, and the title track.

First-time vinyl cuts include the alternate master of ‘Jesse’, ‘A Trip Down Brian Lane’ and the heavy funk of ‘Slide Sweet Baby’. The album is presented in a beautiful ‘wide-spine’ layout, with two printed inner sleeves, adorned with in-depth notes form Eddie Piller and unseen photos from the original cover shoot by Gerald Mankiewicz.

TRACK LISTING

1. Institution Man
2. Jesse
3. Startdust Bubblegum
4. Mr. Freedom
5. Dragster
6. Find It
7. The People Tree
8. Apple Green
9. Time Of The Future
10. Saturation
11. Illusions
12. A Trip Down Brian Lane
13. Jesse (Alternate)
14. Institution Man (Edit)
15. Warlocks Of The Mind (Pt. 1)
16. Time Of The Future (Alternate EP Mix)
17. Find It (Radio Edit)
18. Almost Grown
19. Apple Green (with Harmony Vocal)
20. Illusions (No Horns Mix)
21. A Trio Down Brian Lane (7” Mix)
22. Slide Sweet Baby
23. The People Tree (No Mellotron)
24. Jesse (Brendan Lynch Radio Mix)

December 2012 I showed up totally exhausted in Vancouver BC after touring stupidly and relentlessly for however many straight months and got a job at a call centre raising money for the Red Cross. It was a scent free office but one time this woman cooked a piece of fish in the microwave for 10 minutes on low and hot boxed the whole office - we got sent home early no pay. There was the other woman I named the Call Centre Coltrane because her pitch and routine usually involved improvised flights of fancy that went off in both directions at once somehow landing back down with a credit card number and a donation. I used to sleep under the desk. I was there a few months and at the time I reconnected with John Brennan who I had played with briefly in Montreal at the Mutek Festival. In Montreal John was running an experimental music night at a burrito shop downtown called Garbage Night. While in Vancouver I began connecting with the music scene there and would go hang out with the Shearing Pinx lads who I think lived with Sydney the bass player at the time. I knew Nic and Jer from an AIDS Wolf Tour and was so stoked to get to know them both better. I really fell in love with that era of Vancouver's music scene.

Fast Forward to today. 2024

Actually it was the dying days of 2023 but you get it and John asks if I'll sit in with Earth Ball and I keep thinking about Earth Balance, the vegan butter everyone eats here. I brought my aching bones and my ipads on the beautiful ferry named the Queen of Oak Bay and out to Nanaimo BC, home of the nanaimo bar (a dessert treat - special to this region - that seems to be more popularly found under the weird glass sneeze guards in office building deli's out east in Ontario.... anyhoops ). No one in Nanaimo wants to talk to me about the famous treat. I asked a couple of people. Silence. Nanaimo is like London, Ontario but more fried and by the sea. The town is filled with blown out old sea dawgs with tin coffee pots and loose leaf tobacco, then there's the usual streetfolk you find in this part of the Canadian Pacific Northwest and a bunch of bohemians who I guess have left Vancouver behind - that fine city having become uninhabitable for those not making over 100k a year. And then up the way are all the retirees. Yup Nanaimo is a strange one. They mined the shit out of this region and Nanaimo is surely haunted by those buried in mining shafts or maimed by the heavy machinery or blown up by accident in the explosives store house. And when Earth Ball fire up the amps in Izzy and Jer's basement you can hear the voices of the ghosts hum through electrical lines and out the speakers, Kellen's hued feedback, Izy's sturdy basslines, Jer's paperbag guitar tone and rumble pack zaps, Liam's (aka the Kid) sheets of sound and Brennen's multidirectional drums. You wouldn't guess Earth Ball was auto-composing and from what my rat brain can tell - the lyrics are improvised too...Improvising lyrics and singing them is the hardest thing to do in all of music.. Izzy and Jer are pros. And their attitudes are pro too.

TRACK LISTING

1. Moon FM
2. Antifreeze
3. Through & Through
4. A Need To Cool Down
5. Flash In The Pan
6. Hollowgramma

“Earth, Our Planet?”: A call for environmental awareness. This time, Pedro Vian - the founder of Modern Obscure Music - presents his fourth solo album (following his 2020release, "Ibillorca"). "Earth, Our Planet?" promises to immerse us in a moving odyssey, crossing the boundaries of musical genres to provoke an urgent meditation on the protection of our planet. On this occasion Vian has composed the album influenced by the myth of the eternal return, the compositions are long and repetitive, generating
states of pure
trance.

Pedro Vian, singular for his fusion of genres and styles, ventures into even more complex territories in "Earth, Our Planet?". From the first listen, it is evident that this work treads the line of convention and breaks the boundaries of electronic and experimental music with artistic dexterity. The album weaves together texture, hypnotic rhythms and melody. Each track reveals his distinctive ability to create immersive landscapes, guiding the listener into deep emotional introspection. This is not just music; it is a transformative experience. The beauty of this album lies not only in the musical vision. The album features high-calibre collaborations that add layers of creativity and elegance. Trumpeter Pierre Bastien, whose early productions left an indelible mark on Aphex Twin's Reflex label, infuses "A Day in Rotterdam" with a unique emotional resonance. Violinist, Asia, renowned for her avant-garde approach and ability to conjure unique landscapes, elevates the album's opening tracks "Urobóros" and "Les Tambours Subterraniens". Their skill and sensitivity intertwine perfectly
with Vian's artistic vision. In addition, Italian producer Daniele Mana, with whom Pedro Vian collaborated closely on his previous album "Cascades", known for his experimental approach and talent for creating extraterrestrial atmospheres also contributes to "Les Tambours Subterraniens". His artistic perspective adds more complexity and texture to the piece, pushing the boundaries of contemporary electronic music. There is also a collaboration with Raül Refree, an artist with whom Vian worked with last year, presenting
“Font De la Vera Pau”, an album that The Guardian defined as 'a wonderful piece of electroacoustic music, a captivating mix of strings and analogue synth drones which sometimes flirts with Alice Coltrane-ish spiritual jazz'.

With "Earth, Our Planet?", Pedro Vian not only offers up some of his best work to date, but it is also a call to reflect on our relationship with the natural world. As a part of a planet where environmental awareness is more crucial than ever, he urges us to protect and preserve our world as an extension of ourselves. This extensive work is a statement, Vian addresses the
notion that too often we prioritise immediate needs over the well-being of the planet. It highlights the fact that we often consider the Earth as a possession when, in reality, we are but a part of it.

TRACK LISTING

1. Uróboros
2. Les Tambours Suterraniens Feat. Mana
3. Satan’s Voice
4. Lucid Dreams
5. Un Storia Infinita
6. The Limit Of Nothing feat. Raul Refree
7. A Day In Rotterdam Feat. Pierre Bastien
8. Your Face Shines More Than The Sun
9. Hipódromo
10. Crema Lent

The long lost 1968 debut album by singer-songwriter, Scott Fagan, once tipped to be bigger than Elvis, is set for release on 9th February 2024 via Earth Recordings. ‘South Atlantic Blues’ will be reissued for the first time in its original artwork, with an iconic portrait of Fagan by famed rock photographer, Joel Brodsky, following a widely celebrated 2015 release.

Revisiting his mystical, mythical, and deeply soulful masterpiece, this psych-folk gem doffs a Tropicalia hat direct from downtown New York. “His songs embrace a broad sonic fantasia, swirling in ’60s New York R&B and ’40s jazz, as well as the Caribbean rhythms of calypso, meringue and Pachanga.” New York Times

Scott Fagan’s story is worthy of a movie in itself. A swinging hipster who landed in 60s Greenwich folk scene, escaping the abject poverty of his U.S. Virgin Islands upbringing, Fagan found himself mentored by the Brill Building’s Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman, and feted as the next big thing. “Forget Rodriguez, forget Searching for Sugar Man,” says Sharyn Felder, daughter of the late Doc Pomus, the legendary songwriter who signed Fagan to management in 1964. “Scott was so much more. He was cut from a different cloth.”

‘South Atlantic Blues’ is the perfect soundtrack to this tale, an epic song cycle wrapped around an impassioned love story, driven by Fagan’s dense, allusive lyrics, and production by Elmer Jared Gordon (Pearls Before Swine) and rich arrangements by Horace Ott (Nina Simone, Sam Cooke, The Shirelles). The Earth Recordings reissue coincides with a resurgence in activity for Fagan, with a new album in the works – the never-recorded soundtrack to ‘Soon’, the 1971 Broadway rock musical he co-wrote and starred in – and a documentary ‘Soon: the Story of Scott Fagan’ currently filming through Scissor Kick Films, from director Marah Strauch, writer Chris Campion (who rediscovered the singer-songwriter in 2015), and producer Eric Bruggeman.

TRACK LISTING

A1. In My Head
A2. Nickels And Dimes
A3. Crying
A4. The Carnival Is Ended
A5. South Atlantic Blues
B1. Nothing But Love
B2. Tenement Hall
B3. In Your Hands
B4. Crystal Ball
B5. Madam-moiselle

Life is what happens between curtain rise and curtain fall - And when you're in the middle of your performance, it can be tough to un-blur, categorize, and interpret the details buried within the perpetual collapsing rubble of past, present, and future - Chayse Porter will release his third studio album, Endless / Boundless via Earth Libraries, nine new musical excavations and epiphanies the Birmingham-based songwriter dug up from life's bedrock and polished to a shine in his basement lair

How to describe Porter's solo work...mischievous pop? Cotton candy spun with barbed wire? Beatle-esque, Burt Bacarach-inspired soft rock left to freeze in the warped confines of a funhouse mirror? Whatever your preferred descriptor, Endless / Boundless is a fresher, more direct record than the high-concept psyche excavations of Chay's Palace, his 2022 sophomore album.

Lyrically, Endless ruminates on unrequited love, toxic American exceptionalism, and, in one of the record's lighter moments, unexpected kindness from strangers. There's jubilant dream pop (opening stunner "Bleeding Hearts"), shoegaze with threats of violence ("Lead Pipe Cinch"), and a cinematic instrumental centerpiece best enjoyed with eyes closed ("Copter").

With the record on the way and a live band assembled and ready to go, Porter has left listeners a trail of breadcrumbs in anticipation.

TRACK LISTING

Bleeding Hearts
Rolls Of 35
Vertigo
Lead Pipe Cinch
Copter 
Flowers In Chains
Must Be Nice
Flowers In Chains
Endless
Boundless 
Land Of Disenchantment

'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.

‘Elephantasia’ is a glorious folk opus from 1972, long lost and attaining a legendary reputation for its candour and creativity, from the late Bangor-born singer/songwriter Dave Evans. Finally, the LP sees the light of day again via Earth Recordings, it is a true gem from the vaults of British folk history. For fans of Nick Drake, Bill Fay and Davy Graham – with a touch of Michael Chapman, Bert Jansch and Fahey for good measure.

Dave Evans’ story is like a Pinter play; he sailed the seas in the merchant navy, was taught guitar in a brief interlude by the “mythical” Morocco John, wound up sharing a room with Steve Tilston in 1963 when they attended Loughborough Art College and ran the local folk club, while learning to make stringed instruments, the art of wine making and ceramics. Over the next year, Dave got a domestic 2-track reel-to-reel tape recorder and experimented with its two speeds to produce the tracks ‘Elephantasia’ and ‘Lady Portia’. He pulled in members of local prog band Squidd, including latter day Hawkwind member Steve Swindells on keyboards, John Merritt on bass and Rodney Matthews on drums, who also designed the ‘Elephantasia’ album cover, and went on to become a renowned fantasy artist.

‘Elephantasia’ the album was originally released in 1972, fully exposing Dave’s finger picking style, lilting vocal and his dalliance with the tape manipulation. It sold around 2000 copies and over the years became a talked about rarity, deemed too progressive for folk, too folk for the new prog heads. In best plot-thickening style, Dave tried two more releases and then disappeared. The scant sleeve notes recounted the songs’ creation, featuring tales of experimentation in sound inspired by elephants, old memories recounted with all of the unpleasant bits edited out, storylines for escapists, the residents of St Agnes Park, broken beauty queens and a fat feline. It’s an eclectic but beautifully fluent narrative from a finger picking maestro with a warm and engaging vocal style that wowed Peel and Whispering Bob back in the day.

Dave Evans sadly died in April 2021. Earth Recordings is proud to reissue ‘Elephantasia’ for the first time in over 50 years, in collaboration with his estate and original Village Thing producer Ian A. Anderson.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
A1 Only Blue
A2 Elephantasia
A3 Lady Portia
A4 That's My Way
A5 On The Run
Side B
B1 St. Agnes Park
B2 Beauty Queen
B3 Ten Ton Tasha
B4 Earth, Wind, Sun & Rain
B5 Take Me Easy

Did you know there are horses on the cover of Earth 2: Special Low Frequency Version? There are at least three in the right hand corner, gathered inexplicably near a white canvas tent, a human possibly perched among its folds. As widescreen and vast as the cover may seem, those little details—the horses, the possible human, the faint wisp of white clouds—give it depth and wonder, something to which the imagination can return.

Did you know that the music on Earth 2—repressed now for its 30th anniversary, back in its original artwork, and accompanied by a riveting set of remixes that demonstrate the reach of what Dylan Carlson long ago called “ambient metal”—works much the same way? The surface is massive and obvious, the meatpaw riffs of Carlson and bassist Dave Harwell pounding and swiping and pawing at the speakers, a true bludgeon in three-dimensional sound. Listen, though, for the details in the corners, for the finesse beneath the force, and Earth 2 reveals new levels of depth and wonder.

The widespread impact of Earth 2 suggests that others have indeed been leaning in, listening to these minutiae and making something new of them. A masterpiece without many genre precedents, Earth 2 surely helped send doom metal down its more modern drone, ambient, and avant-garde avenues. Those descendants are obvious. Perhaps more surprising and gratifying are the ways it has influenced electronic music, modern composition, and even hip-hop by realigning our senses of tempo, time, and texture. Earth 2 engendered a rearrangement of expectations, regardless of preferred form.

TRACK LISTING

1. Seven Angels
2. Teeth Of Lions Rule The Divine
3. Like Gold And Faceted

Originally released in the fall of 2003, The Earth Is Not A Cold Dead Place was a watershed moment for Explosions In The Sky, and a landmark album for underground and experimental music. Its iconic sound would become a touchstone in film and television as it inspired a generational sea change towards introspective art rock in lieu of traditional orchestral scores.

Artfully remastered by Bob Weston at Chicago Mastering Service, The Earth Is Not A Cold Dead Place Anniversary Edition is packaged in a stunning triple gatefold with restored and expanded original artwork, housed in a heavyweight slipcase. Exquisitely pressed onto colored vinyl for the first time ever, this is the soundtrack to our everyday lives in full panoramic wonder.

TRACK LISTING

1. First Breath After Coma (9:34)
2. The Only Moment We Were Alone (10:14)
3. Six Days At The Bottom Of The Ocean (8:43)
4. Memorial (8:50)
5. Your Hand In Mine (8:17)

Bert Jansch was often quoted as saying “I’m not playing for anyone, just myself” and this feels no more apparent than on 1979’s ‘Avocet’, his beautifully meditative paean to British birds. This isn’t to say that Jansch was throwing commercial success to the wind, or was unaware of his audience, more that this album feels like a uniquely personal reflection of him. (The subject of British birds is one that Jansch held close to his heart. Indeed, just preceding this album was his 1978 split 7” single with Shirley Collins - with proceeds in aid of the RSPB.)

For fans of Jansch this is often the album that is singled out as his best work. The freedoms of a post-Pentangle career are much in evidence; folk rock and even trad folk give way to an album that is not only without lyrical accompaniment but really quite orchestral, classical even, in its composition. There are surprises in particular in ‘Lapwing’ (a dirge-like waltz that wouldn’t be out of place on a Nils Frahm album) and ‘Bittern’ (which speaks of Arthur Russell’s more experimental pieces).

Featuring ex-bandmate Danny Thompson, alongside Martin Jenkins (Dando Shaft, amongst others) with sleeve notes by Jansch aficionado Colin Harper (author of ‘Dazzling Stranger: Bert Jansch and the British Folk and Blues revival’).

Limited Art print edition, reissued as part of ‘Bert Jansch 80’, celebrating the enduring legacy of Bert Jansch’s peerless guitar playing and songwriting, comes with 6 high-quality, lithograph art prints (by UK illustrator Hannah Alice) representing each of the birds on the album, held in a heavy board die-cut gatefold sleeve. This unique packaging is fully interactive - the cover image is interchangeable with any of the prints, though each one is perfectly frameable too. This edition also features three bonus tracks as a download, recorded live in Italy in in 1977 (‘Bittern’; ‘Kingfisher’; ‘Avocet’), as well as Danny Thompson’s recollections of the making of ‘Avocet’, recorded by Dave Thompson (Mojo Magazine) in typical style.

TRACK LISTING

01: Avocet
02: Lapwing
03: Bittern
04: Kingfisher
05: Osprey
06: Goldfinch Bonus Tracks ( DL Only ) Recorded Live In Italy, 1977
07: Bittern
08: Kingfisher
09: Avocet

RIYL: Wet Leg, Es, Devo, LITHICS, Maraudeur, NOTS, The Staches, The Fates, Y Pants, Raincoats, Kleenex/Liliput, Chrisma.

German post-punk band Onyon scrambled our brains when we heard them for the first time last year, so much so that we signed them & reissued their eponymous debut cassette EP (originally co-released in limited quantities by the Flennen/U-Bac labels) in June of ’22. “Last Days On Earth” is the band’s latest & first proper full-length for Trouble In Mind.

The oddball, synth-soaked world of Onyon is disorienting at first - the band’s herky-jerky rhythms may operate in a familiar fashion to bands like Devo, Kleenex/Liliput or label-mates LITHICS, but Maria Untheim’s woozy synth squiggles that populate & punctuate the band’s songs keeps everything at arms-length. Flirting with the primitive cool of 80’s minimal-synth and the wire-haired cretinism of 60s garage, especially on tunes like the manic ‘Dogman’ or first single ‘Alien, Alien’. Guitarist Ilka Kellner’s six-string salvos rage unpretentiously with edges torn & frayed, rarely (if ever) soloing, but never afraid to unleash a spindly lead-line over Florian Schmidt’s rubbery bass lines & Mario Pongratz’s stuttering drum patterns that phase in & out of time imperceptibly like drunks doing their best to seem sober. Kellner & Untheim share vocal duties (in both English & German - sometimes in the same song), but the real magic comes when the two sing together, voices merging in loosely harmonic gang vocals; one deadpan, the other slightly unhinged. The group’s beguiling lyrics add to the mystique - inscrutable neu-world fables about egg machines, ghosts, worms that talk, and urges to consume newspaper that ooze a rural, old-world understanding of life & the imperceptible spaces in between reality & fiction, transmuted thru a modernist sci-fi lensflare.

TRACK LISTING

1. Alien, Alien
2. Talking Worms
3. Egg Machine
4. Goldie
5. Two Faces
6. Dogman
7. Blue Lagoon
8. Yahtzee
9. Invisible Spook
10. I Would Like To Eat The Newspaper
11. O.U.T.
12. Mower

Northern California psychedelic sorcerers Carlton Melton are brain surfers, mind trippers, … “psychlists,” if you prefer. The band will take your head for a ride, occasionally rushing at superluminal speeds through a wormhole or gliding softly on a gentle breeze in a leafy glade. Sometimes your brain needs to rage, and sometimes it needs to repose.

For a decade and a half, the band has yo-yo’ed, almost schizophrenically, between these two modes: walloping space jams with furious guitar solos in one hemisphere of the brain and ethereal, feather-light splashdowns in the other. Not to mention a track here and there that builds from the latter into the former.

But with two new releases in 2023, the band has evolved. Whether psych rock or ambient trance, their sound remains driving, organic, and flowing. With the addition of Anthony Taibi (White Manna, DDT), however, the group’s metal freak-outs are Hawkwindier and their droning kraut trances are Spacemen 3-er. In January, the quartet released the playfully spacey Resemble Ensemble, recorded in Taibi’s home studio 3D Light. October now sees the band Turn To Earth, a work with scents of Autumn, a season of death and transition. The cover art evokes a vine-covered, electric crucifix. The sound is, well, earthy but also gritty and striving towards change. The album was recorded in Fall 2022 and now harvested in Fall 2023.

Phil Becker (Terry Gross, Pins Of Light) contributed drums and percussion to a few tracks on Turn To Earth, recording the album at El Studio in San Francisco. With Becker at the helm, the synths have become more prominent (“Cosmicity,” “Roboflow,” “Migration”) and the tone heavier on the doom (“Cloudstorming,” “Unlock The Land,” title track): several moments could even serve as background music for epic dark fantasy films like Conan the Barbarian, Fire and Ice, or Heavy Metal.

As exquisite as Turn To Earth is, Melton are best appreciated as a live act: their recordings as well as their gigs are largely improvised – not so much composed as birthed. And yet their most recent tour ended abruptly and perilously. The group had to cancel its final three shows once members were admitted to Arnhem hospital in the Netherlands. Five years later, reinforcements have strengthened the band and restocked its arsenal of great tracks.

After the rockus interruptus of that 2018 tour and the tantric tease of the intervening Covid lockdown, Melton have some unfinished business. An October 2023 tour is poised to set the freshly minted quartet back onto the stages of Europe and within the cerebral folds of its fans.

Turn To Earth, sure … but keep your head in outer space.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: You know where you are with a blast of Carlton Melton. It's slowly growing psych, with sounds twisting and turning and weaving into a psychedelic monolith. 'Turn To Earth' does not disappoint, it too grows into a soaring grooving behemoth, with the help of White Manna's Anthony Taibi, bringing his airy lysergic groove to the mix of standout musicians.

TRACK LISTING

01. Turn To Earth
02. Cloudstorming
03. Vanquished
04. Cosmicity
05. Canned Head
06. Sundering
07. Unlock The Land
08. Roboflow
09. Last Times
10. Migration
11. Mutiny 

soaring wayne phoenix story the earth and sky is the debut album from multi-disciplinary British artist Wayne Phoenix. Originally conceived over a decade ago as one part of an elaborate project encompassing music, film, and performance, story the earth and sky is not only a profoundly personal and vulnerable expression unbound by Phoenix’s exploration of creative potential and mystery, but a bridge beyond the artificial boundaries that separate us all from an unfiltered voice within us all.

The impetus of this album formed around a musical improvisation that occurred in 2009 between Phoenix and Richard, a man who he was working with as a support client. Richard suffered from severe autism, and had been labeled as non-verbal. But as Wayne sat down to play the piano one day with Richard in the room, he was met with some surprising behavior. Richard began uttering some simple phrases over Wayne’s piano, his speech interplaying with the melancholic chords.

Moved, if not transformed, by the event, Phoenix began developing a vocal style in tune with our natural, unmanufactured voice as a means to accomplish boundless interconnectivity. He searched for “the voice of the child within, which has no concept of the world it inhabits, nor any means to navigate that world.”

This realization spurred a deeply creative period for the artist, spanning nearly fourteen years to date. Originally conceived as one part of a multimedia project, soaring wayne phoenix story the earth and sky, communicates the core of the artist’s creative intentions. Phoenix says that “all these works to date are the by-product of something else, which has manifested as music and has been spread over various artistic formats, not limited to any one specific discipline.”

Phoenix perpetuates this hazy aura of his work, stating “if it came to finding the converging principle that ties it all together, one could find oneself in a position similar to Rumi’s story of the elephant in the dark, in which each person felt a different part of the elephant and considered it to be the whole”

Mirroring this theme of subjectivity, the first half of story the earth and sky starts in abstract, words and thoughts left hanging in the ether. Phoenix’s broken, spoken word obscures itself in melodic white noise and distortion. As we reach the middle of the record, the smoky sound of the opening pieces begins to clear, making space for a melancholic yet musical manifestation of Phoenix’s work, that while still somewhat disarming, soars to higher heights. soaring wayne phoenix story the earth and sky focuses on the artist’s internal search and dissolves in the surrounding ambiance before eventually, and undeniably, arriving outside and beyond itself. A powerful, intentional debut from an artist determined to find and define a new form of expression.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Mood
A2. Alone
A3. Place
A4. Home
A5. ...and Sleepless Skies
A6. Burn False Messages
A7. I Gave You Power
A8. Reserve
A9. Death Is Pure Objectivity
B1. Latika’s Grace (it’s Not What You Go Through, It’s How You Go Through It)
B2. Gate
B3. Nightswim Feat. Run Rivers
B4. Cygnet
B5. The Light The Lamb
B6. One Man Island Feat. CrystalXulu

Earthtones is the musical identity of Serge Bandura, an electronic artist, former jazz musician, meditation teacher and ritualist based in LA. Kevin Nathaniel channels sound as a universal healing force through traditional African instruments and is a former student of legendary master musicians such as Ephat Mujuru and Chief Bey K. Sending files back and forth during the pandemic, the two artists deepened a musical friendship and began a dialog between the Mbira Nyunga Nyunga, the Kalimba and analog synthesizers. Their music is offered in the spirit of peace + healing for all. ‘Of The Earth’ (Full Meditation) is 21 minutes long and the B side offers 25 minutes of music.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Chakra re-alignment therapy for troubled souls or those who are simply fuming about our lack of real summer. With a modest collection of instruments and sound devices Earthtones and Kevin Nathaniel achieve some miraculously trascendendant results.

TRACK LISTING

Of The Earth Meditation
Of The Earth
Slow Emotion
Sonrise

With Too Late For Edelweiss, Matsson weaves together a sparse collection of home recordings made in Sweden and North Carolina, captured fresh off a 39- date run with the adrenaline of tour rattling through his veins. The songs on Too Late For Edelweiss have been with Matsson since he started playing music as The Tallest Man on Earth in 2006. In those early years, Matsson used to perform "Lost Highway" by Hank Williams before he had enough songs to flesh out a full set.

In July 2022, Matsson released a cover of Swedish super star Hakan Hellstrom's "For sent for Edelweiss," a precious song that has been The Tallest Man's walk-on music before every performance for over a decade and what inspired the title of this covers album. Since then, in the lead-up to this announcement, he has quietly released other selections, including Lucinda Williams' "Metal Firecracker," Yo La Tengo's "Tears Are In Your Eyes" and now "Lost Highway." Mattson explains, "When I was a teenager I borrowed a Hank Williams album at the local library, and 'Lost Highway' has been haunting me ever since. Many vocal sound checks throughout my career have heard Hank's advice."

As much as Too Late For Edelweiss feels like a scrapbook, an intimate memento with the ghosts of The Tallest Man's earlier, sparser sound hovering at the edges, it's also just the artifact of a moment - a flash of joy, of feeling recharged, of feeling good. These are the songs that happened to be in Matsson's head at the time he sat down to record. It came together so simply and easily - and in that way, it's the purest distillation of making music - and being a fan of it, charting the connective tissue of a songwriter's life.

TRACK LISTING

For Sent For Edelweiss
Metal Firecracker
Little Birdie
Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye
Blood Bank
Tears Are In Your Eyes
Fairest Of The Seasons
Pink Rabbits
Lost Highway
In My Life

Manchester jazz-funkers, Secret Night Gang return with their sophomore album “Belongs on a Place Called Earth”, via Brownswood Recordings. “Belongs on a Place Called Earth” is a record birthed from the emotional rollercoaster the world collectively faced over the past few years, as a result of the pandemic. A time which cultivated self-reflection and profound life questions leading to an evolution for the Manchester natives. This new record is undeniably a fresh & bold new sound, with the leading purpose of permeating hope & light through their music. In continued strength to strength, Secret Night Gang are carving their own lane across the British jazz & street soul scene and this upcoming album, is set to take them to new heights.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Following on from a very well received couple of releases for Brownswood, the soulful funk powerhouse that is SNG returns for 'Belongs On A Place Called Earth'. Soaring funky instrumentals, perfectly played and full of vigour, simmer beneath the silken vocals and perfect layered harmonies. Rich, sumptuous and perfect for the summer.

TRACK LISTING

1. Respect Me
2. Dkw Tomorrow Brings
3. One & Only
4. Never Ever
5. Find A Way
6. Do For You
7. Outta Ma Head
8. Ev'ry Nation
9. Things Will Work Out 

Third studio album by the American rock band, originally released in December 2005 and featuring 14 tracks which showcase the core of The Strokes' sound: staccato, poppy, memorable hooks wrapped around Julian Casablancas' voice. The album, originally released in 2005, debuted at number 1 on the UK Albums Chart and spawned the hit singles 'Juicebox', 'Heart in a Cage' and 'You Only Live Once'.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A 
1. You Only Live Once
2. Juicebox
3. Heart In A Cage
4. Razorblade
5. On The Other Side
6. Vision Of Division
7. Ask Me Anything
SIDE B
1. Electricityscape
2. Killing Lies
3. Fear Of Sleep
4. 15 Minutes
5. Size Of The World
6. Evening Sun
7. Red Light

TRACK LISTING

1. Spirit Call
2. The Lord’s With Me
3. Valley Of The Ocean
4. God Is In Control
5. Power
6. Stronger
7. Fields
8. Soul Inside My Beautiful Imagination
9. Warrior 

'Earth Is Not For Humans' is the funk definition of its not a God given right! The interstellar groove brings the outer world timing to the third planet.Be warned humans you are merely temporary visitors on the miraculous terraferma.What can be deemed more different than 'Uniquely Fresh' a jazz fusion boogie combination set in the year 2055.Lastly Shokazulu warms us down with Seeing Is Believing only Shokazulu Will Protect You.

TRACK LISTING

1. Uniquely Fresh
2. Earth Is Not For Humans
3. Seeing Is Believing

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2023 EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

Toy Balloon receives itís long overdue debut vinyl pressing, featuring new artwork. Caught somewhere between traditional folk and Janschís penchant for the blues, ëToy Ballooní, from 1998, was the elder statesman of British folkís 20th studio album. Featuring a host of fantastic solo performances along with a brace of bigger sounding moments with a band including former Dire Straitsí Pick Withers on drums and the legendary Pee Wee Ellis on sax, the mainly self-penned opus also boasts a hypnotic cover of the standard ëShe Moves Through The Fairí and an evocative reading of Jackson C Frankís ëCarnivalí.

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2023 EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

When The Circus Comes To Town receives it's long overdue first vinyl pressing, featuring new artwork. From 1995, the 19th studio album from the revered legend of the British folk community, saw Bert Jansch in a purple patch surrounded by the umpteenth folk revival and new generations "discovering" his virtuoso playing. Featuring 15 self-penned originals and bringing both sax and slide guitar into the mix on occasion, 'When The Circus Comes To Town' finds Jansch in fine voice as well as with swift fingers which feature on a brace of standout solo acoustic numbers.

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2023 EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

Double LP expanded re-issue of Pearls Before Swine's classic debut, plus unreleased extras, including demos, rehearsals and alternative versions. With faithfully recreated original sleeve and extensive notes, all created in collaboration with the Tom Rapp Estate. The psychedelic-folk debut from "one of the most erudite, literate minds in rock" a stunning piece of work, from the nightmarish sleeve art - the "Hell Panel" from Hieronymus Bosch's 15th century painting "Garden Of Delights" - to the strange yet powerful songs." AllMusic. "From moody, poetic gems to the anger and intensity of the bitter anti-war anthem, "Uncle John". Fiercely unique and individual sounding." Goldmine. "A high of psychedelic delicacy and deceptive urgency, one of his masterpieces." Rolling Stone.

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2023 EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

Double LP expanded re-issue of Pearls Before Swine's follow up to "One Nation Underground", plus a second disc of unreleased extras including demos, rehearsals and alternative versions. With a faithfully recreated original sleeve and extensive notes, produced in collaboration with the Tom Rapp Estate. "The near-brilliant follow-up intended as a defiant condemnation of the Vietnam War, it doesn't offer anthemic, fist-pounding protest songs. Instead, Tom Rapp vented his anger through surrealist poetry, irony, and historical reference." AllMusic. "A high point in his recorded output." Goldmine. "A high of psychedelic delicacy and deceptive urgency, one of his masterpieces." Rolling Stone.

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

Acid Jazz is marking its 35th Anniversary with a series of classic releases from their catalogue The first of these is Mother Earth’s debut album - ‘Stoned Woman’.

Recorded in a Tottenham industrial estate studio at the height of ‘acid jazz’, it’s a rock inflected, funky brew that heavily referenced Blaxploitation soundtracks from the early to mid 70s. Mother Earth developed a life of their own, moving through line-up changes, and leaving behind the arguably more radical sound that remains distilled in this album. A must-have for original-era acid jazz fans, marking an important time in British music.

Celebrating 30 years of Tori Amos’ debut solo album ‘Little Earthquakes.’ Amos became the voice of a generation of young girls when she delivered her first solo record in 1992. Each of the tracks on Little Earthquakes painted an evocative picture, and the album delivered 5 singles: “Crucify,” “Silent All These Years,” “Winter,” “China,” “Me and A Gun.”

The album has already received the deluxe treatment in 2006, and this 2-LP is the first time the tracks have been remastered for this format, lovingly remastered by Jon Astley at Abbey Road Studios. In 2022, to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the record, Z2 announced a graphic novel of the album. 

TRACK LISTING

LP 1
Side A
Crucify (4:58)
Girl (4:06)
Silent All These Years (4:11)
Side B
Precious Things (4:26)
Winter (5:41)
Happy Phantom (3:13)
LP 2
Side A
China (4:59)
Leather (3:12)
Mother (6:59)
Side B
Tear In Your Hand (4:38)
Me And A Gun (3:44)
Little Earthquakes (6:52)

Remastered and re-appraised 31-track collection of Pearls Before Swine rarities from the private tape collection of the late, great Tom Rapp. Also available as an expanded 45 track double CD collection.

For the first time on vinyl, this beautiful collection brings together alternate versions of Rapp originals ‘The Jeweler’, ‘Translucent Carriages’ and ‘Rocket Man’. It also includes jaw-dropping covers of Rapp’s contemporaries Cohen, Dylan and Joni Mitchell, with bonus download material featuring seven amazing live versions plus a never before released intimate show at The Other End circa 1976.

A goldmine of possibilities from a prospector with a silver tongue and stories to tell. ‘The Wizard Of Is’ is a weird and wonderful trip inside its creator’s mind, from sonnets and space hymns to stories of revolution and the war. It’s an American Gothic fantasy that straddles old tyme America and the outer edges of an imagined stratosphere.

“Extremely influential.” Rolling Stone.
“A more intoxicating version of folk psychedelia.” Wire magazine.
“Shimmering folk hymns.” Spin magazine.
“Unabashedly poetic.” Crawdaddy.

TRACK LISTING

VINYL
Side A
A1 Where Is Love?
A2 Butterflies (Alternate Version)
A3 Love, You Are Not Alone
A4 Grace Street
A5 Translucent Carriages (Alternate Version)
A6 Space
Side B
B1 Rocket Man (Alternate Version)
B2 City Of Gold (Alternate Version)
B3 For Free
B4 Wizard Of Is (Alternate Version)
B5 Riegal (Alternate Version)
B6 Sail Away (Alternate Version)
B7 Footnote/When The War Began
Side C
C1 Everybody's Got Pain (Alternate Version)
C2 Crawling Towards Bethlehem
C3 I'm Going To The City (Alternate Version)
C4 Can't Go Back
C5 Prisoner Of War
C6 Another Time (Alternate Version)
C7 If You Don't Want To (I Don't Mind) (Alternate Version)
C8 (Oh Dear) Miss Morse (Alternate Version)
Side D
D1 The Jeweler (Alternate Version)
D2 The Lincoln Dream
D3 There's No Other (Like My Baby)
D4 Roadside Hotel
D5 Song About A Rose (Alternate Version)
D6 Mary Mary
D7 Crew Man
D8 Suzanne
D9 Oh Sister
D10 Full Fathom Five/I Shall Not Care
Bonus Download Tracks
1 Translucent Carriages (Live)
2 Island Lady (Live)
3 Morning Song (Live)
4 Marshall (Live)
5 Ballad To An Amber Lady / I Saw The World (Live)
6 Prayers Of Action / Candle (Live)
7 Rocket Man (Live)

CD
Disc One
1 Where Is The Love?
2 Butterflies (Alternate Version)
3 Love, You Are Not Alone
4 Grace Street
5 Translucent Carriages (Alternate Version)
6 Space
7 Rocket Man (Alternate Version)
8 City Of Gold (Alternate Version)
9 For Free
10 Wizard Of Is (Alternate Version)
11 Riegal (Alternate Version)
12 Sail Away (Alternate Version)
13 Footnote / When The War Began
14 Translucent Carriages (Live)
15 Island Lady (Live)
16 Morning Song (Live)
17 Marshall (Live)
18 Ballad To An Amber Lady / I Saw The World (Live)
19 Prayers Of Action / Candle (Live)
20 Rocket Man (Live)
Disc Two
1 Everybody's Got Pain (Alternate Version)
2 Crawling Towards Bethlehem
3 I'm Going To The City (Alternate Version)
4 Can't Go Back
5 Prisoner Of War
6 Another Time (Alternate Version)
7 If You Don't Want To (I Don't Mind) (Alternate Version)
8 (Oh Dear) Miss Morse (Alternate Version)
9 The Jeweler (Alternate Version)
10 The Lincoln Dream
11 There's No Other (Like My Baby)
12 Roadside Hotel
13 Song About A Rose (Alternate Version)
14 Mary Mary
15 Crew Man
16 Suzanne (Alternate Version)
17 Oh Sister
18 Full Fathom Five / I Shall Not Care
19 Frog In The Window (Live At The Other End, 1972)
20 There Was A Man (Live At The Other End, 1972)
21 The Jeweler (Live At The Other End, 1972)
22 Another Time (Live At The Other End, 1972)
23 Every Change Is A Release (Live At The Other End, 1972)
24 Rocket Man (Live At The Other End, 1972)
25 Love/Sex (Live At The Other End, 1972)

Bert At the BBC is a comprehensive collection of Jansch’s appearances at the BBC, featuring over eight hours of rare and unreleased recordings, including live-on-air spots, studio sessions and full concerts straight from the BBC vaults, delving further into this legendary performer’s canon. Bert Jansch was the very essence of folk music, providing inspiration for everyone from Paul Simon and Neil Young to Led Zeppelin and countless folk revivalists.

This unparalleled limited-edition compendium is available as a 4xLP and 8xCD set, housed in a coffee-table book set with a lavish 40-page book tracing the recordings from Bert’s earliest moments at the BBC. It includes interviews and insights from Lauren Laverne, Jools Holland, Johnny Marr, Jacqui McShee, Bob Harris, Bernard Butler, Mark Radcliffe and many more. Twenty broadcasters, producers and collaborators contribute at length to the booklet, with great affection for this gentle, maverick genius.

Bert’s BBC legacy remains the most significant and exciting untapped reservoir of his music. The undeniable advantage of recordings made for broadcast is that they were, by their nature, created for public consumption and, barring live-on-air appearances – which might go well or go badly, but were going out either way – were explicitly signed-off by the artist as representations of his art that were good enough to be heard.

The set is compiled by Colin Harper, author of Dazzling Stranger: Bert Jansch and the British folk and blues revival (Bloomsbury, 2000), who contributes detailed liner notes to the package. The release is mastered by IFTA award-winning engineer Cormac O’Kane.

The vinyl release features 48 tracks on LP and is accompanied by a download card with over six hours of extras spanning 1966–2009, including BBC4’s St Luke’s concert (2003), and a complete Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh concert (2004) for BBC Radio Scotland. It is also available as a special 8xCD set containing all 147 tracks and encased within a coffee-table book.

Bert Jansch At The BBC is an epic and enduring trail, 45 years in the making.

“He was that rarity, a musician who really did deserve to be regarded as a legend.” The Guardian.

“As a guitar player there was no one like him. He was jazz and blues and folk but there was a whole world in there that was just him, esoteric” Johnny Marr.

TRACK LISTING

Vinyl Tracklisting:
Disc One - Side A
A1 Whiskey Man (Guitar Club, Light Programme, 1966)
A2 Running From Home (Guitar Club, Light Programme, 1966)
A3 Interview (Guitar Club, Light Programme, 1966)
A4 The Wheel (Guitar Club, Light Programme, 1966)
A5 Orlando (Top Gear, BBC Radio 1, 1968)
A6 Thames Lighterman (Night Ride, BBC Radio 1, 1968)
A7 I Am Lonely (Radio 1 Club, BBC Radio 1, 1969)
A8 Speak Of The Devil (The Pentangle, BBC Radio 1, 1970)
Disc One - Side B
B1 Blues Run The Game (Folkweave, BBC World Service, 1977)
B2 Daybreak (Folkweave, BBC World Service, 1977)
B3 Running From Home (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1980)
B4 Up To The Stars (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1982)
B5 Heartbreak Hotel (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1980)
B6 Angie (Russell Harty, BBC1, 1982)
Disc Two - Side C
C1 Sweet Rose (Folk On 2, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
C2 Knight’s Move (Folk On 2, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
C3 The Snows (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
C4 Been On The Road So Long (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
C5 Bogie’s Bonny Belle (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
Disc Two - Side D
D1 Heartbreak Hotel (Anderson On The Box, BBC NI, 1992)
D2 Stealing The Night Away (Bob Harris, Unbroadcast, 1993)
D3 Walk Quietly By (Bob Harris, Unbroadcast, 1993)
D4 Trouble In Mind (Bob Harris, BBC Radio 2, 1993)
D5 When The Circus Comes To Town (Later... With Jools Holland, BBC2, 1996)
D6 The River Bank (Later...with Jools Holland, BBC2, 2000)
Disc Three - Side E
E1 High Days (Liz Kershaw, BBC 6 Music, 2004)
E2 Blues Run The Game (Liz Kershaw, BBC 6 Music, 2004)
E3 The Auld Triangle (Freak Zone, BBC 6 Music, 2008)
E4 A Woman Like You (Freak Zone, BBC 6 Music, 2008)
E5 It Don’t Bother Me (Mark Radcliffe, BBC Radio 2, 2006
E6 Angie (Freak Zone, BBC 6 Music, 2008)
Disc Three - Side F
F1 Empty Pocket Blues (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
F2 Courting Blues (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
F3 Rosemary Lane (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
F4 October Song (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
F5 Summer Heat (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
F6 Texas Cowboy Blues (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
Disc Four - Side G
G1 Crimson Moon (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
G2 Blackwater Side (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
G3 Train Song (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
G4 Fool’s Mate (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
G5 Carnival (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
Disc Four - Side H
H1 Running From Home (Celtic Connections, BBC Scotland, 2008)
H2 In The Bleak Midwinter (Teddy Thompson And Friends, BBC Radio 2, 2008)
H3 Angie (Radio 2 Folk Awards, BBC Radio 2, 2009)
H4 Blues Run The Game (Tom Robinson, BBC 6 Music, 2009)
H5 Fresh As A Sweet Sunday Morning (Tom Robinson, BBC 6 Music, 2009)
H6 One For Jo (Tom Robinson, BBC 6 Music, 2009)

DOWNLOAD CARD: Includes An Additional 6 Hours Of Music From The BBC Archives

CD Tracklisting:
Disc 1 (1966–77)
1. Whiskey Man (Guitar Club, Light Programme, 1966)
2. Running From Home (Guitar Club, Light Programme, 1966)
3. Interview (Guitar Club, Light Programme, 1966)
4. The Wheel (Guitar Club, Light Programme, 1966)
5. Tic-Tocative (Wonderful Copenhagen, BBC Radio 2, 1967)
6. The Time Has Come (Wonderful Copenhagen, BBC Radio 2, 1967)
7. Soho (Top Gear, BBC Radio 1, 1968)
8. Orlando (Top Gear, BBC Radio 1, 1968)
9. Thames Lighterman (Night Ride, BBC Radio 1, 1968)
10. Sarabande (The Pentangle, BBC Radio 1, 1969)
11. I Am Lonely (Radio 1 Club, BBC Radio 1, 1969)
12. Reynardine (The Pentangle, BBC Radio 1, 1970)
13. Speak Of The Devil (The Pentangle, BBC Radio 1, 1970)
14. Introduction (Folkweave, BBC World Service, 1977)
15. Poor Mouth (Folkweave, BBC World Service, 1977)
16. Blues Run The Game (Folkweave, BBC World Service, 1977)
17. Daybreak (Folkweave, BBC World Service, 1977)
18. Pretty Saro (Folkweave, BBC World Service, 1977
19. Ask Your Daddy (Folkweave, BBC World Service, 1977)
20. If I Had A Lover (Folkweave, BBC World Service, 1977)
21. Come Back Baby (Folkweave, BBC World Service, 1977)
Disc 2 (1980–87)
1. Poor Mouth (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1980)
2. Running From Home (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1980)
3. Kingfisher (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1980)
4. Let Me Sing (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1980)
5. Sovay (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1980)
6. Alimony (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1980)
7. Introduction (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1982)
8. Love Is Lost (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1982)
9. Fresh As A Sweet Sunday Morning (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1982)
10. Up To The Stars (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1982)
11. If I Were A Carpenter (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1982)
12. Sit Down Beside Me (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1982)
13. Is It Real? (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1982)
14. Heartbreak Hotel (In Concert, BBC Radio 1, 1982)
15. Angie (Russell Harty, BBC1, 1982)
16. Is It Real? (Round Midnight, BBC Radio 4, 1985)
Disc 3 (1988–94)
1. Sweet Rose (Folk On 2, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
2. Knight's Move (Folk On 2, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
3. Strolling Down The Highway (Folk On 2, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
4. This Land Is Your Land (Folk On 2, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
5. Ain't No More Cane (Folk On 2, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
6. Been On The Road So Long (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
7. Bogies Bonny Belle (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
8. Sally Free And Easy (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
9. The Snows (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
10. Poor Mouth (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
11. Heartbreak Hotel (Anderson On The Box, BBC NI, 1992)
12. Stealing The Night Away (Bob Harris, Unbroadcast, 1993)
13. Walk Quietly By (Bob Harris, Unbroadcast, 1993)
14. Interview (Bob Harris, BBC Radio 2, 1993)
15. Lily Of The West (Bob Harris, BBC Radio 2, 1993)
16. Trouble In Mind (Bob Harris, BBC Radio 2, 1993)
17. The Bonny Boy (Gloria Hunniford, BBC Radio 2, 1994)
18. Sally Free And Easy (Gloria Hunniford, BBC Radio 2, 1994)
19. Interview (Gloria Hunniford, BBC Radio 2, 1994)
20. Chasing Love (Gloria Hunniford, BBC Radio 2, 1994)
Disc 4 (1996–2009)
1. When The Circus Comes To Town (Later... With Jools Holland, BBC2, 1996)
2. Blackwater Side (Later... With Jools Holland, BBC2, 1996)
3. She Moved Through The Fair (Cunningham And Co, BBC Radio Scotland, 1998)
4. The Riverbank (Later...with Jools Holland, BBC2, 2000)
5. Crimson Moon (Cambridge Folk Festival, BBC4, 2004)
6. High Days (Liz Kershaw, BBC 6 Music, 2004)
7. Blues Run The Game (Liz Kershaw, BBC 6 Music, 2004)
8. Angie (Folk Britannia, BBC4, 2006)
9. Interview (Freak Zone, BBC6 Music, 2008)
10. The Old Triangle (Freak Zone, BBC 6 Music, 2008)
11. A Woman Like You (Freak Zone, BBC 6 Music, 2008)
12. Angie (Freak Zone, BBC 6 Music, 2008)
13. Interview (Mark Radcliffe, BBC Radio 2, 2006)
14. High Days (Mark Radcliffe, BBC Radio 2, 2006)
15. It Don't Bother Me (Mark Radcliffe, BBC Radio 2, 2006)
16. The Old Triangle (Mark Radcliffe, BBC Radio 2, 2006)
17. High Days (Celtic Connections, BBC Scotland, 2008)
18. Running From Home (Celtic Connections, BBC Scotland, 2008)
19. In The Bleak Midwinter (Teddy Thompson And Friends, BBC Radio 2, 2008)
20. Angie (Teddy Thompson And Friends, BBC Radio 2, 2008)
21. Moonshine (Teddy Thompson And Friends, BBC Radio 2, 2008)
22. Blues Run The Game (Tom Robinson, BBC 6 Music, 2009)
23. Fresh As A Sweet Sunday Morning (Tom Robinson, BBC 6 Music, 2009)
24. One For Jo (Tom Robinson, BBC 6 Music, 2009)
Disc 5 (BBC4 St Luke’s Concert 2003 & Radio 2 Folk Awards 2001)
1. Introduction (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
2. Blues Run The Game (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
3. Blackwater Side (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
4. Running From Home (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
5. Moonshine (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
6. Angie (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
7. Edge Of A Dream (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
8. Crimson Moon (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
9. Bruton Town (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
10. Train Song (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
11. I've Got A Feeling (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
12. It Don't Bother Me (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
13. Fool's Mate (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
14. The River Bank (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
15. Strolling Down The Highway (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
16. Carnival (60th Birthday Concert, LSO St Lukes, BBC4, 2003)
17. Presentation Speech (BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, Radio 2, 2001)
18. Poison (BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, Radio 2, 2001)
Disc 6 (Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh, 17/8/04, BBC Radio Scotland – Set 1)
1. Carnival (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
2. Come Back Baby (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
3. Rosemary Lane (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
4. Black Water Side (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
5. She Moved Through The Fair (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
6. Crimson Moon (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
7. The River Bank (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
8. Empty Pocket Blues (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
9. The Old Triangle (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
10. Poison (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
11. October Song (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
Disc 7 (Queen’s Hall, Edinburgh, 17/8/04, BBC Radio Scotland – Set 2)
1. Strolling Down The Highway ( Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
2. Angie (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
3. Blues Run The Game (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
4. Lily Of The West (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
5. Down Under (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
6. Summer Heat (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
7. Weeping Willow Blues (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
8. Let Me Sing (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
9. Walking This Road (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
10. La Luna (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
11. Watch The Stars (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
12. It Don't Bother Me (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
13. Step Back (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
14. High Days (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
15. Courting Blues (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
16. A Woman Like You (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
17. Texas Cowboy Blues (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
18. Candy Man (Queen's Hall, Edinburgh, BBC Radio Scotland, 2004)
Disc 8 (Extras 1968–2000)
1. I Am Lonely (Top Gear, BBC, 1968)
2. Tree Song (Night Ride, BBC, 1968)
3. I Got A Woman (Night Ride, BBC, 1968)
4. I Loved A Lass (Night Ride, BBC, 1968)
5. The Snows (Unabridged On Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
6. Knight's Move (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
7. This Land Is Your Land (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
8. Strolling Down The Highway (Night Ride, BBC Radio 2, 1988)
9. Come Back Baby (Look North, BBC Yorkshire, 1994)
10. Blues Run The Game (We Stayed In With… Jungr & Parker, BBC Radio 2, 1993)
11. Dobbin's Flowery Vale (We Stayed In With… Jungr & Parker, BBC Radio 2, 1993)
12. Paper Houses (Bob Harris, GLR, 1998)
13. How It All Came Down (Bob Harris, GLR, 1998)
14. Crimson Moon (Edinburgh Fringes, BBC Radio 4, 2000)
15. The River Bank (Edinburgh Fringes, BBC Radio 4, 2000)
16. Moonshine (Mike Harding, BBC Radio 2, 2004)
17. Angie (Radio 2 Folk Awards, BBC Radio 2, 2009)
18. Crimson Moon (John Bennett, BBC Radio Ulster, 2000)
19. The River Bank (John Bennett, BBC Radio Ulster, 2000)

Emergency on Planet Earth'' is the debut studio album by English funk and acid jazz band Jamiroquai. Originally released on 14th June 1993 it reached number one in the UK Albums Chart and sold over 1,200,000 copies worldwide. This release which marks 30 years since the release of first single ‘When You Gonna Learn’, is pressed on heavyweight transparent vinyl and presented in a gatefold sleeve with spot gloss embellishments, printed inner sleeves and 12'' insert featuring Jay Kay’s 2013 and 2017 liner notes. 

In my 50s I realised that the past slowly becomes a bigger country than the future. As always, the future is where I’m headed, but now the past and all that comes with it is stacked up behind me. And, as time on earth passes, more and more of my contemporaries have started to disappear from the planet.

I’ve made 11 albums of new material since 1987. I realise that anything I’ve ever thought that mattered, that told the real story, is in those records. It’s been 5 years since my last album of new songs. Perhaps more than before, there’s been plenty of time over the last few years to think and reflect. Like every set of work, Time on Earth is an attempt to make sense of life by making work about it.

As erstwhile editor of the NME and Q, journalist Danny Kelly wrote recently while interviewing The Loft: ‘a lifetime of listening to them has led me to believe that Pete Astor’s songs would have always found a way to reach an audience. If he’d been a Californian baby boomer, he’s have ended up in the Capitol Records building in Los Angeles, laying down late-night grooves with the Wrecking Crew for a largely-neglected, slightly gloomy, pop album that’d now be worth a fortune. If he’d been born into post-War Britain, earnest girls in sweaters would’ve fallen in love with him, and his songs, in Embassy-fogged folk clubs.’ Of course, I love this quote. And I believe that Time on Earth is most of these things. But then I would say that, wouldn’t I?

Time on Earth has songs which were written in direct response to loss and bereavement (Undertaker, Fine and Dandy); songs striving for different kinds of belief (New Religion, Time on Earth, Miracle on the High Street); stories from either end of the cycles of life (Sixth Form Rock Boys, English Weather). And a few still searching for fulfilment of the heart. (Stay Lonely, Grey Garden, Soft Switch).

I was lucky enough to be able to make the music with the help of multi-instrumentalist Ian Button (Wreckless Eric, Death in Vegas, Papernut Cambridge) on the drums, bass maestro Andy Lewis (Spearmint, Paul Weller, and DJ at London’s legendary Blow Up Club and Soho Radio), long time guitarist Neil Scott (Everything But the Girl, Denim) and last but by no means least, Sean Read (Dexys, Edwyn Collins, Rockingbirds) who recorded and produced the album at his Famous Times Studios. As you would expect, I’m convinced it’s the best record I’ve made.

Pete Astor is a musician, writer and educator. He led Creation Records’ groups The Loft and The Weather Prophets, writing songs and releasing records that helped define the sound of the label and the emerging Indie genre. He has gone on to a lengthy solo career since then; writing, recording and releasing music on a range of labels including Matador, Heavenly, Warp, EMI and Fortuna Pop. He is Senior Lecturer in Music at the University of Westminster. As well as touring extensively, he also makes records with David Sheppard as Ellis Island Sound and releases his spoken word work as The Attendant on his label Faux Lux with the help of Ian Button. Since 2017 Astor has been signed to Tapete Records, home to Robert Forster, Lloyd Cole and Comet Gain among many estimable others.

TRACK LISTING

1) New Religion
2) English Weather
3) Stay Lonely
4) Time On Earth
5) Miracle On The High Street
6) Sixth Form Rock Boys
7) Soft Switch
8) Grey Garden
9) Undertaker
10) Fine And Dandy

Noah & The Whale were one of the leading protagonists of the small but perfectly formed indie-folk scene of the early days of the 21st Century. Formed in Twickenham, the five-piece, led by vocalist and guitarist Charlie Fink, originally boasted Laura Marling in their line-up, before she left to begin her successful solo career.

Containing the Top 10 single L.I.F.E.G.O.E.S.O.N., Last Night On Earth was partially recorded in LA with producer Jason Lader. On its release in 2011, Fink spoke of capturing "that excitement of being young and being in the night," and being influenced by Bruce Springsteen. That can be heard on Wild Thing, which blends Springsteen and Lou Reed into something that is unmistakeably the group's own. The Telegraph called it "Heartfelt, spirited, lyrical, moody and mostly magnificent pop rock."

TRACK LISTING

Life Is Life
Tonight's The Kind Of Night
L.I.F.E.G.O.E.S.O.N.
Wild Thing
Give It All Back
Just Me Before We Met
Paradise Stars
Waiting For My Chance To Come
The Line
Old Joy
Tonight's The Kind Of Night (Demo)
Wild Thing (Demo)

Genre: Indie, Electronic, Latin. RIYL: Toro y Moi, Helado Negro, Rosalía, Tame Impala, Cuco.

Divino Niño are no strangers to bold reinvention. When Camilo Medina and Javier Forero—friends whose bond dates back to their childhoods in Bogotá, Colombia—moved to Chicago and recruited guitarist Guillermo Rodriguez to form a band, they were psych-pop outsiders playing live shows with a drum machine. With the addition of drummer Pierce Codina, their 2019 breakthrough and debut LP for Winspear, Foam, solidified their place as local indie rock mainstays.

Soon after, multi-instrumentalist Justin Vittori joined to round out their lineup. Once again, with their masterful, unpredictable, and eminently danceable new album, the band has done something radical: They totally upended the way they write songs, eschewing practice room jams for unrelentingly collaborative beats, implied grooves for immersive dance floor heaters, and mellow vibes for frenetic doses of reggaeton, electropop, and trap on their most adventurous and ambitious work to date.

Welcome to the Last Spa on Earth. Written and recorded over the past two years, Last Spa on Earth deals in release and catharsis: confronting your darkest moments and coming out better for it. The album artwork, done by Medina, a longstanding visual artist, depicts a dreamy, yet graffiti-tagged spa, void of physical bodies so listeners can envision themselves in this unique environment. It represents the yin and yang approach Divino Niño took while creating the album: the serenity of the spa and the chaos of the party. Ultimately, the band’s desire is to provide healing in the same way one feels after sweating, shivering, stretching, and resting at the spa against the backdrop of the world’s darkness. Last Spa on Earth is the cathartic product of Divino Niño letting go of their musical preconceptions, past traumas, and future anxieties to embrace change, chaos, and each other’s contributions both to these songs and to each other.

TRACK LISTING

01. LSE
02. Nos Soltamos
03. Tu Tonto
04. XO
05. Toy Premiado
06. Ecstasy
07. Drive
08. Miami
09. Mona
10. Especial
11. Papelito
12. I Am Nobody

Sow Your Gold in the White Foliated Earth exists first as a curator’s fancy – in this case from Oslo’s Ultima Festival for contemporary music in 2014. The idea was to give revered Norwegian experimental electronic musician Helge Sten, aka Deathprod, access to seminal avant-garde composer Harry Partch’s self-designed, custom-made, specialized, invented instruments – an orchestra tuned to just intonation, using up to 43 intervals instead of the standard 12 for the most commonly used Western equal temperament.

An artist with a 30+ year career and an uncompromising reputation that reflects the emotional specificity of his uneasy, yet compelling sound, maintained throughout his expansive discography, Sten was an intriguing choice for such a project. Although he attended art school, training in electronic music and sound art, he had little experience with acoustic instruments and can neither read nor write music notation. Yet he’s been engaged with Partch’s music, and outsider art more generally, since he was a teenager. His resulting piece/composition for the project was originally intended only for performance by Cologne-based Ensemble Musikfabrik, for a series of concerts in five European cities between 2015 and 2018. It’s Musikfabrik that undertook the painstaking, expensive process of building an entire set of the composer’s creations – the second only to the originals built by Partch himself. They are the professional musicians and virtuosic instrumentalists that had to re-train and re-educate on these unknown and experimental sound sculptures in non-standard tunings. And they house this large, gorgeous physical instrumentarium and deal with the enormous logistics of working with it, sometimes shipping the fragile pieces to other locales via semi-trucks or ships.

Because of such monumental efforts, Musikfabrik are notoriously guarded with recordings of the instruments. And rightly so. They’re the only ones allowed to perform on them, too. But Sow Your Gold isn’t Musikfabrik playing. Instead, Sten spent days and nights alone with the instrumentarium in Cologne. He played the instruments himself while recording, layering the recordings and editing without effects to compose an ‘audio score’ for Musikfabrik to work from in order for the ensemble to perform the piece. (Partch also regularly worked this way, although he would transcribe afterwards. Likewise, Sten workedwith a professional arranger to create a detailed score, too.) So, that makes Sow Your Gold an even less likely rarity – partly why its release comes seven years after its creation.

If you ask Sten about the album’s title, he’ll point you to the text he borrowed it from – Michael Maier’s Atalanta Fugiens by H.M.E. De Jong, a 1969 study of a 1617 book of alchemical emblems – and notable passages dealing with alchemy, chemistry, and agriculture, all transformative processes. And while that may sound complicated, his takeaway is simple: “You have to break something down to create something new,” – a lesson he felt related strongly to his own musical process, especially in this project.

So, while Sow Your Gold in the White Foliated Earth is a piece written for specific, oddly tuned, extremely rare and unusual instruments, and for a certain ensemble – namely, some of the finest contemporary musicians in Europe – Sten grew fond of the audio score, recognizing it as coming directly from the creative process in its purest, most natural form. And so from a foliated earth, where obscure tradition, treasured scarcity, immense effort, and patient certainty layer and criss-cross, comes rugged gold, polished to shining by one outsider for another.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A:
1. I O
2. II O
3. III O
4. IV O
5. V O
Side B:
1. VI O
2. VII O
3. VIII O
4. IX O

The members of Szun Waves may not have been collectively in the same country, let alone room, for over two years, but that hasn’t prevented them from realising their third album, Earth Patterns.

The trio – comprised of producer Luke Abbott, saxophonist Jack Wyllie (Portico Quartet) and drummer Laurence Pike (Triosk/PVT/Liars) – recorded the album sessions together at the tail end of their 2019 European tour, locking themselves away in the studio for three days of improvisation. They emerged with hours of music, some inspired by their live shows, most born fresh in the studio itself, ready to be moulded into the group’s third album in five years.

However, with Laurence marooned in Australia, and Luke and Jack grounded in different parts of the UK, it meant an unexpected reassessment of the band’s creative remit, and the enforced long gestation period almost inadvertently ended up creating the most fully-formed Szun Waves record to date.

Where second album, New Hymn To Freedom, had its face tilted up to the heavens, Earth Patterns is a more grounded record, and in places, a more claustrophobic one: Wyllie’s saxophone squalls ripple in the background as Pike’s dense drums clatter, both shaped and guided by the atmospherics of Abbott’s synths. Moments of jazz harmony collide with cinematic soundscapes; long searching passages build into kaleidoscopic frenzies.

“I think the record we've ended up with is an emotional outpouring,” Abbott says. “There's a fluidity to it that feels like we tapped into something quite raw. The last record felt like drifting in space but I see this new record as a journey from the outer reaches of the universe down onto the earth, like a macrocosm to microcosm arc,” he explains.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
A1. Exploding Upwards
A2. New Universe
A3. Garden
A4. In The Moon House
Side B
B1. Be A Pattern For The World
B2. Willow Leaf Pear
B3. Atomkerne

Featuring many unreleased recordings and rarities from the cult favourite and all endorsed by the Tom Rapp estate. The grand masters of acid folk, Pearls Before Swine outline the genius of leader Tom Rapp on an album created from a dusty box of tapes left behind by the incisive tunesmith. Never before heard recordings remastered to create the perfect route into the essential ‘Balaklava’ and ‘One Nation Underground’ albums that kick started a whole genre. This new vinyl compilation was made in collaboration with, and fully endorsed, by the Tom Rapp estate. 

TRACK LISTING

1 State U
2 Translucent Carriages
3 Ring Thing (Three Rings)
4 The Jeweler
5 Harding Street
6 New Man
7 I Saw The World
8 For The Dead In Space
9 From The Movie Of The Same Name
10 Rocket Man
11 Teacup Kingdom
12 Images Of April
13 If You Don’t Want To (I Don’t Mind)
14 Sin Of Jesus 

Jacob Long’s third Earthen Sea outing for Kranky, Ghost Poems, further refines his fragile, fractured palette into fluttering arrhythmias of dust, percussion, and yearning.

Composed during the first wave of lockdowns in New York, the pieces took shape patiently from samples of piano, texture, and domestic sounds (sink splashing, room tone, clinking objects), filtered through live FX to imbue them with an intuitive, immaterial feel. Wisps of melody splinter, shimmer, and refract, like light on water; pulses accrue and dissipate, as if mapping shifting sands. Throughout, there’s a sense of matter made animate, of absences felt.

Long cites notions of “the studio as a dub instrument” and the melancholy of “7th chords on a fake Rhodes patch” as central elements in his process, transforming raw materials into rare thresholds of symbiosis and hypnosis. This is music for night skies in hollowed out cities, for views across rivers towards unknown shores: restless, placeless, and profound.

TRACK LISTING

1. Shiny Nowhere
2. Stolen Time
3. Felt Absence
4. Oblique Ruins
5. Snowy Water
6. Rough Air
7. Slate Horizon
8. Ochre Sky
9. Fossil Painting
10. Deep Sky

There’s an ancient Japanese legend in which a horde of demons, ghosts and other terrifying ghouls descend upon the sleeping villages once a year. Known as Hyakki Yagyō, or the Night Parade of One Hundred Demons, one version of the tale states that anyone who witnesses this otherworldly procession will die instantly—or be carried off by the creatures of the night. As a result, the villagers hide in their homes, lest they become victims of these supernatural invaders.

Such is the inspiration for the latest album from EARTHLESS. “My son is really into mythical creatures and old folk stories about monsters and ghosts,” bassist Mike Eginton explains. “We came across the ‘Night Parade of One Hundred Demons’ in a book of traditional Japanese ghost stories. I like the idea of people hiding and being able to hear the madness but not see it. It’s the fear of the unknown.”

Whereas 2018’s Black Heaven featured shorter songs and vocals from guitarist Isaiah Mitchell on much of the album—an unprecedented move for the San Diego power trio—their latest is a return to the epic instrumentals EARTHLESS made their unmistakable name on. Night Parade Of One Hundred Demons is comprised of two monster songs—the 41-minute, two-part title track and the 20-minute “Death To The Red Sun.”

The scenario that allowed for this kind of exploration was a stark contrast to that of Black Heaven. At that point, Mitchell was living in the Bay Area, which made it difficult for the band to get together and work on the type of long instrumental pieces they’re known for. But in March 2020, the guitarist moved back to San Diego. More specifically, he moved back the night the pandemic lockdown kicked in. Bad timing, perhaps—or maybe perfect timing.

Plus, they were all on the same page about not wanting to do another record with vocals. “In a way, I think this album was a reaction to our last record,” Eginton says. “Black Heaven was outside our comfort zone. I think it was a good record, but it was challenging to write songs in a more traditional verse-chorus-verse format. This one was more enjoyable. I’m sure we’ll do more vocal tracks in the future, but for the time being I see that album as a one-off.”

Given the record’s inspiration, it should come as no surprise that Night Parade of One Hundred Demons strikes a more sinister tone than the rest of the band’s catalogue. “It definitely has a darker, almost evil kind of vibe compared to stuff we’ve done in the past,” Rubalcaba says. “There’s more paranoia and noise, and some of Isaiah’s whammy-bar stuff kind of reminds me of these Jeff Hanneman moments in Reign In Blood, where it just seems like everything is going to hell. It’s pretty fun.”

Night Parade of One Hundred Demons was recorded in San Diego with Rubalcaba’s childhood friend Ben Moore, who’s worked with everyone from DIAMANDA GALAS and BURT BACHARACH to CEREMONY and HOT SNAKES. When Eginton wasn’t tracking his bass parts, he worked on the album’s incredible sleeve art. “He really dedicated himself to the project,” Rubalcaba says. “He’d be drawing in the studio with, like, a coal-miner’s lamp on his head while we were doing overdubs. He really knocked it out of the park.”

All told, Night Parade of One Hundred Demons isn’t just a return to the band’s traditional format—it’s a return to their very beginnings. “This album actually has the very first Earthless riff in it,” Eginton reveals. “We just recorded it 20 years after we wrote it. But we’re really happy with how this record came out. We feel it might be our finest to date.” 

The world renowned guitarist, Bert Jansch, has long been celebrated for his innovative playing style, influencing generations of musicians and fans alike.

A companion piece to 1966’s Jack Orion, The Ornament Tree gets newly reissued with liner notes from Colin Harper, who wrote the biography of Bert and the new folk Revival, Dazzling Stranger.

Bert's eighteenth studio album comprises Scottish and Irish traditional songs. Filled with ballads like the title song and instrumentals ‘The Rocky Road to Dublin’ and ‘Lady Fair’. Tradition is threaded throughout with the accompaniment of Celtic fiddles, flutes and bodhran. It features performances from Maggie Boyle, Peter Boyle, Steve Tilston and Michael Klein.

It’s been over thirty years since The Ornament Tree’s initial release, here Jansch continues to prove his importance in contemporary folk with this timeless and invigorating offering.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
A1 The Ornament Tree (Bonny Portmore)
A2 The Banks O'Sicily
A3 The Rambling Boys Of Pleasure
A4 The Rocky Road To Dublin
A5 Three Dreamers
A6 The Mountain Streams

Side B
B1 The Blackbirds Of Mullamore
B2 Ladyfair
B3 The Road Tae Dundee
B4 Tramps And Hawkers
B5 The January Man
B6 Dobbins Flowery Vale

Memories of Earth is D Rothon’s second LP for Clay Pipe Music. In the years since 2018’s critically acclaimed Nightscapes, aside from working on this follow-up, he has played pedal steel on albums by Lost Horizons (on the John Grant-fronted track Cordelia), Liela Moss and Johanna Warren. He has also contributed to two recent compilations by the Second Language label – a kindred spirit to Clay Pipe.

The catalyst for Memories of Earth was the 2019 Moving to Mars exhibition at London’s Design Museum - which created a simulation of a future Martian settlement. For Rothon this triggered recollections of a childhood fascination with space – fuelled by the moon landings, visits to the London Planetarium and being taken aged six to see Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. “I recall it as a time when a science fiction-style future seemed just around the corner,” he says. He cites as another influential experience the landmark Cybernetics Serendipity show at the ICA, which featured collaborations between artists and scientists: machines were shown alongside artwork in a spirit of postwar optimism for the positive power of new technologies. “I actually remember very little about it other than it was very noisy and somewhat scary!”

Memories of Earth reflects a spectrum of emotional responses to the idea of space travel – from the optimism and wonder of those childhood dreams to the sense of disconnection, isolation and loss we might feel on a one-way trip to Mars... or beyond. The final, bittersweet track brings us back down to earth with a sense that perhaps it’s caring for our own planet that should be our priority.
Musically Memories of Earth draws on a varied palette of influences including early prog, electronica and European film soundtracks. This diversity of styles flows together to form an album that’s coherent but full of surprises. It also benefits from vocal contributions by acclaimed US musician Johanna Warren and actress/chanteuse Claudia Barton, who wrote and performs the words for the title track – a paean to Earth’s “soft, green bacterial surface”; its “deep, wet, blue mysteries”...

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: I bloody love Clay Pipe, and this new D Rothon release is a prime example of why. Brimming with the sort of soft focus haze I love in my instrumental music, 'Memories Of Earth' is a beautifully rich journey, part jazz part ambient and entirely brilliant. As ever, it's a buy-on-sight from me.

TRACK LISTING

1. Apeman, Spaceman
2.Cybernetics Serendipity
3. Eight Million Miles High
4. Aquarius Rising
5. West Of The Moon
6.The Stars Below Us.
7. The Ghosts We Bring
8.The Spaces Between
9. Further From Home
10. Memories Of Earth

The third release in Fu Manchu’s 30th Anniversary vinyl reissue series, Return To Earth 91-93 Deluxe Edition, is the first ever update to this legendary compilation of the band’s earliest singles. These songs are the only ones recorded with the band’s original lead guitarist, Scott Votaw, as well as the only ones recorded as a three piece of the original core line-up of Scott Hill (vocals/guitar), Mark Abshire (bass) and Ruben Romano (drums). Return To Earth 91-93 Deluxe Edition features the 9 songs from the original release including the first version of fan favorite, “Ojo Rojo,” plus 2 newly discovered tracks that have never been heard before: “Ford-Natic” and an early version of “Shine It On,” which was later re-recorded for their debut album. All songs were remixed by Scott Hill along with the band’s current producing partner, Jim Monroe (Adolescents, Channel 3, Ignite) and remastered by Carl Saff for optimum fidelity. This limited edition 2,000 unit LP run is pressed on neon purple vinyl and the newly designed gatefold package includes never before seen photos of the band and flyers from their early shows. The limited edition 1,000 unit CD run also features the updated art and a digital specific remaster

TRACK LISTING

1.“Don’t Bother Knockin’ (If This Van’s Rockin’)”
2.“Ford-Natic”
3.“El Don”
4.“Pick-Up Summer”
5.“Ojo Rojo”
6.“Pinbuster”
7.“Senioritis”
8.“Shine It On”
9.“Simco”
10.“Space Sucker”
11.“Vankhana (Rollin’ Rooms)”

At first glance, Sarah Louise might seem an unlikely candidate to credit technology as inspiration for her new album, Earth Bow. After all, she has lived in rural Appalachia for the last decade, foraging numerous species of wild mushroom, concocting medicine from plants she gathers, and performing what she terms “Earth Practices” to deepen her relationship with the natural world. But it is precisely her ability to find connections between false binaries that makes this album so novel and richly immersive. Louise conceived Earth Bow as an interconnected ecosystem, meant to evolve, interact and grow. Known for her inventive guitar playing, vocal harmonies and electronic experiments, it was her use of the SP-404SX sampler that became a primary inspiration for the album’s woven nature.

“Improvising with the 404 during live shows allows me to collaborate with the music as a living system, almost the way generative music works,” she says. “I kept finding more and more samples that worked together and realized I wanted to connect the entire record—and that there were many ways it could be connected.” Through this process, what began as eight core songs blossomed into two sweeping suites. Samples—denizens of her electronic forest—move around the record with changing context like words in a sestina or phrases in the I Ching, revealing new connections with each listen. Mesmeric sounds abound on Earth Bow, from analog synth tones, to digitally manipulated sonics that she stretches and layers with a painterly touch. These electronic sounds inhabit the same environment as field recordings, ceremonial percussion, guitars and empathic vocals, weaving together her vast and borderless influences into an enveloping world. “I want this record to take people on a journey through the wonders of our incredible planet, to help people feel held by the mysteries of nature,” she enthuses. “I believe music can heal.” After a string of celebrated releases on Thrill Jockey, Sarah Louise is self-releasing Earth Bow on her new imprint of the same name.

TRACK LISTING

1. Where The Owl Hums
2. Jewel Of The Blueridge
3. Mossy Slope
4. Summertime Moves Slow
5. Earth Wakes Up
6. Your Dreams
7. Surrender To The Night
8. If You Build A Pond The Frogs Will Come
9. Where Heron Fish At Dawn
10. Healers Circle Up

Recorded at the EELS’ Los Feliz, California studio, ‘Earth to Dora’ was produced by band leader Mark Oliver Everett a.k.a. E, and performed by E, Koool G Murder, The Chet and P-Boo.

Speaking about the new record, E says: “These songs came about just before the pandemic hit and changed everything. I’m hoping they can be, maybe kind of soothing or something. To hear songs dealing with things we are dreaming about getting back to. Or maybe people are dealing with some of the topics right now as well. Just one song was done in the thick of the early pandemic days, ‘Are We Alright Again’, which is kind of a quarantine daydream I desperately needed to have.”

‘Earth to Dora’ marks the 13th full length EELS album, and first since 2018’s ‘The Deconstruction’, their first in four years, the album was released to widespread acclaim and described as “another EELS album to treasure” by MOJO, “overwhelming” by Uncut, and “a career-straddling greatest hits collection, in which all the ‘hits’ are brand new,” by CLASH.

EELS have had one of the most consistently acclaimed careers in music. The ever-changing project of principal singer/songwriter E (Mark Oliver Everett), EELS have released 12 studio albums since their 1996 debut, Beautiful Freak. In 2008, E published his highly-acclaimed book Things the Grandchildren Should Know and starred in the award-winning Parallel Worlds, Parallel Lives documentary about the search to understand his quantum physicist father, Hugh Everett III.

2015 saw the release of the band’s extraordinary Royal Albert Hall live album and concert film. In the same year, the band’s “Fresh Blood” served as the theme song to HBO’s “The Jinx” and from 2016 to 2018 E appeared in Judd Apatow’s Netflix original series “Love.” EELS released their 12th studio album, and first in four years, ‘The Deconstruction’ in April 2018 and toured America and Europe in 2018 and 2019. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: 13 ALBUMS!! There's something to be said for a band that manage to keep bringing the goods year after year, and Eels are one of the best examples. 'Earth To Dora' has all of the melodicism and hidden melancholy that we expect from the LA stalwarts.

TRACK LISTING

1. Anything For Boo
2. Are We Alright Again
3. Who You Say You Are
4. Earth To Dora
5. Dark And Dramatic
6. Are You Fucking Your Ex
7. The Gentle Souls
8. Of Unsent Letters
9. I Got Hurt
10. OK
11. Baby Let's Make It Real
12. Waking Up

One of Bert Jansch’s later recordings, ‘Crimson Moon’ is some of his finest work and sees the musician at the top of his game, with appearances from Johnny Marr, Bernard Butler and many more. Earth Recordings revisits the album on its 20th Anniversary with its first standalone cut to vinyl. Originally released in 2000, there is a brooding resonance in ‘Crimson Moon’ centred around his accomplished guitar style that brings his contemplative songwriting to the fore. Traditional ballads have touches of jazz and blues adorned by contributions from guitarists Johnny Marr, Bernard Butler and Johnny “Guitar” Hodge along with guest vocals from Bert’s wife Loren Auerbach (‘My Donald’).

The addition of electric guitar subtly compliments Bert’s percussive fingerpicking bringing new depth to his compositions. Title track ‘Crimson Moon’ is a take on traditional song ‘Omie Wise’ and was written about his wife Loren, ‘Caledonia’ conjures pastoral images of Scotland alongside covers of The Incredible String Band’s ‘October Song’, Guy Mitchell’s ‘Singing The Blues’ and Owen Hand’s ‘My Donald’. Otherworldly tale ‘Neptune’s Daughter’ sees a mermaid-like creature recount the death of her relatives from a poison in the sea. Passionate about nature, the song carries an underlying ecological message. Released in his 60s, ‘Crimson Moon’ proves Bert Jansch to still be an innovator and a unique talent

TRACK LISTING

A1 Caledonia
A2 Going Home
A3 Crimson Moon
A4 Downunder
A5 October Song
A6 Looking For Love

B1 Fool's Mate
B2 The River Bank
B3 Omie Wise
B4 My Donald
B5 Neptune's Daughter
B6 Singing The Blues

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2020 RELEASE AVAILABLE ONLINE ONLY AS PART OF THE AUGUST 29TH DROP DAY AT 6PM.
LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

Yellow Vinyl.After the incredible success of the film Easy Rider, Dennis Hopper was given complete freedom to direct and star in the bizarre, surrealist The Last Movie ñ released in 1971.Filmed in a drug fuelled haze in Peru with Hopper, Peter Fonda, Kris Kristofferson, Dean Stockwell, Michelle Phillips, Russ Tamblyn, and Samuel Fuller ñ there has never been a soundtrack to this film until now! Featuring the first ever performances of Kristofferson's legendary "Me and Bobby McGee" plus sublime country-folk songs from John Buck Wilkin, Peruvian folk & dance music ñ all recorded live on set in Peru ñ nothing was overdubbed! Plus, provocative movie dialogue from Dennis Hopper, Sam Fuller and others ñ coupled with the ambient sounds of the mountains and villages of South America ñ reissue producer Pat Thomas and Hopper Estate archivist Jessica Hundley have assembled a groovy listening experience that will melt minds.Packaging includes rare vintage photos, detailed liner notes, et al.The Last Movie recordings are being released for the first time ever in any audio format ñ taken from the original movie reels!

Ed O’Brien never planned to make a solo record. As a guitarist with Radiohead, who over almost three decades and nine albums have established themselves as one of the most innovative and influential musical forces of our time, he thought his artistic side had its outlet and was happy to spend any downtime from Radiohead with his family. Plus, he wondered, would it really be necessary? “Thom, Jonny and Phillip are making music,” he says, “and I’m like, ‘The last thing the world needs is a shit album by me.’”

But suddenly a switch was flicked and the songs came pouring out of him. That creative surge resulted in an album of rediscovery and adventure by O’Brien under the moniker EOB that deftly veers from moments of delicate folk to euphoric house, its songs seamlessly pinned together by unswerving melodic hooks and candid lyricism. A spirit of collaboration runs through it, from the production team of Flood, Catherine Marks, Alan Moulder and Adam ‘Cecil’ Bartlett to the extraordinary musicians O’Brien assembled to help bring these tracks to life; Omar Hakim, Colin Greenwood, David Okumu, Laura Marling, Adrian Utley, Nathan East and Glenn Kotche.

But every group of collaborators needs a leader, and this album is all O’Brien’s vision. “I wanted to make a record from the heart,” he says. “I wanted to make something direct. I wanted to talk about love, your family in the immediate and the wider sense, where we are on the planet, the bigger picture, life and death. I wanted to make a big hearted, warm and colorful album… something hopeful and full of love.”

It all started in Brazil. Ed and his family moved out to the Brazilian countryside at the end of 2012. After setting up a home studio and dabbling with the idea of making an electronic record, a listen to Primal Scream’s landmark Screamadelica was O’Brien’s eureka moment. “I thought, this is it… I want my music to have that joy, that light, the depth and breadth of that album… elements of dance, soul, ambient… Uplifting in parts.” He immediately picked up an acoustic guitar and started writing, the new direction further influenced by a trip to Rio Carnival. “Carnival was another eureka moment… an extraordinary explosion of rhythm, melody, dance, light and joy… I felt there was a thread right through Screamadelica, rave and carnival.”

The O’Briens returned home in summer 2013 and Ed hunkered down in a remote cottage in the shadow of the Cambrian Mountains in Wales to begin writing songs. As the material for the album was taking shape, Flood offered his services as producer having heard some of the demos. “I had my man, my producer… He’s probably my favorite producer. The breadth of the stuff he’s done, from Depeche Mode, PJ Harvey, U2, Foals… he’s a sonic maestro.”

They rented a big house in Wales and over three weeks, in the Autumn of 2017, O’Brien and his house band – East, Hakim and Okumu – got down the bones of the record. A year of tinkering and re-working followed at Assault & Battery Studios in Willesden, London. “The house band was so good for some tracks – but other stuff needed a different approach. Any record that I’ve been involved with, that’s been of any merit, is always a journey.”

And then, following five years of writing and recording scheduled during any possible break from the making and touring of Radiohead’s A Moon Shaped Pool, EOB’s debut was finally completed. “I see this as part of a bigger story…. A trilogy perhaps…I’ve really just started.” It has been a long, necessary process, and O’Brien has emerged a different person. “You have to keep moving and finding the things that inspire you and that resonate… there’s a music that I’m chasing… this feels like the right start.” EOB marks a new beginning for Ed O’Brien. From here, he can go anywhere.

TRACK LISTING

1. Shangri-La
2. Brasil
3. Deep Days
4. Long Time Coming
5. Mass
6. Banksters
7. Sail On
8. Olympik
9. Cloak Of The Night

Philadelphia based noise punks, Empath, featuring members of Perfect Pussy and Waxahatchee, write songs like communing with nature, bringing all their fuzzed and tripped out idiosyncrasies into harmony.

Empath began in 2016 when Garrett Koloski, Emily "Jem" Shanahan, and Catherine Elicson moved into a house in West Philadelphia together, with Randall Coon joining shortly after. Even with the simple vision to shred, there’s a natural sensitivity in the way Empath communicates. Between the contrast of Elicson’s lush, almost delicate vocals, Koloski’s boisterous drumming, and the half-harmonious wash of guitar and Shanahan and Coon’s synths, Empath equips us with a healthy dose of emotional repose. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Mixing all the best bits of shimmering synth-pop, clashing garage rock and grooving riot grrrl drive, Empath effortlessly smash out a confident and accomplished debut, brilliantly accomplished but never too serious to smile.

TRACK LISTING

1. Soft Shape
2. Pure Intent
3. Hanging Out Of Cars
4. Roses That Cry
5. Rowing
6. Heaven
7. IV
8. Decor
9. Rodeo Fever

In the mid-1970s, a force of nature swept across the continental United States, cutting across all strata of race and class, rooting in our minds, our homes, our culture. It wasn’t The Exorcist, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, or even bell-bottoms, but instead a book called The Secret Life of Plants. The work of occultist/former OSS agent Peter Tompkins and former CIA agent/dowsing enthusiast Christopher Bird, the books shot up the bestseller charts and spread like kudzu across the landscape, becoming a phenomenon. Seemingly overnight, the indoor plant business was in full bloom and photosynthetic eukaryotes of every genus were hanging off walls, lording over bookshelves, and basking on sunny window ledges. The science behind Secret Life was specious: plants can hear our prayers, they’re lie detectors, they’re telepathic, able to predict natural disasters and receive signals from distant galaxies. But that didn’t stop millions from buying and nurturing their new plants.

Perhaps the craziest claim of the book was that plants also dug music. And whether you purchased a snake plant, asparagus fern, peace lily, or what have you from Mother Earth on Melrose Avenue in Los Angeles (or bought a Simmons mattress from Sears), you also took home Plantasia, an album recorded especially for them. Subtitled “warm earth music for plants…and the people that love them,” it was full of bucolic, charming, stoner-friendly, decidedly unscientific tunes enacted on the new-fangled device called the Moog. Plants date back from the dawn of time, but apparently they loved the Moog, never mind that the synthesizer had been on the market for just a few years. Most of all, the plants loved the ditties made by composer Mort Garson.

Few characters in early electronic music can be both fearless pioneers and cheesy trend-chasers, but Garson embraced both extremes, and has been unheralded as a result. When one writer rhetorically asked: “How was Garson’s music so ubiquitous while the man remained so under the radar?” the answer was simple. Well before Brian Eno did it, Garson was making discreet music, both the man and his music as inconspicuous as a Chlorophytum comosum. Julliard-educated and active as a session player in the post-war era, Garson wrote lounge hits, scored plush arrangements for Doris Day, and garlanded weeping countrypolitan strings around Glen Campbell’s “By the Time I Get to Phoenix.” He could render the Beatles and Simon & Garfunkel alike into easy listening and also dreamed up his own ditties. “An idear” as Garson himself would drawl it out. “I live with it, I walk it, I sing it.”

But as his daughter Day Darmet recalls: “When my dad found the synthesizer, he realized he didn’t want to do pop music anymore.” Garson encountered Robert Moog and his new device at the Audio Engineering Society’s West Coast convention in 1967 and immediately began tinkering with the device. With the Moog, those idears could be transformed. “He constantly had a song he was humming,” Darmet says. “At the table he was constantly tapping.” Which is to say that Mort pulled his melodies out of thin air, just like any household plant would.

The Plantae kingdom grew to its height by 1976, from DC Comics’ mossy superhero Swamp Thing to Stevie Wonder’s own herbal meditation, Journey Through the Secret Life of Plants. Nefarious manifestations of human-plant interaction also abounded, be it the grotesque pods in Invasion of the Body Snatchers or the pothead paranoia of the US Government spraying Mexican marijuana fields with the herbicide paraquat (which led to the rise in homegrown pot by the 1980s). And then there’s the warm, leafy embrace of Plantasia itself.

“My mom had a lot of plants,” Darmet says. “She didn’t believe in organized religion, she believed the earth was the best thing in the whole world. Whatever created us was incredible.” And she also knew when her husband had a good song, shouting from another room when she heard him humming a good idear. Novel as it might seem, Plantasia is simply full of good tunes.

Garson may have given the album away to new plant and bed owners, but a decade later a new generation could hear his music in another surreptitious way. Millions of kids bought The Legend of Zelda for their Nintendo Entertainment System back in 1986 and one distinct 8-bit tune bears more than a passing resemblance to album highlight “Concerto for Philodendron and Pothos.” Garson was never properly credited for it, but he nevertheless subliminally slipped into a new generations’ head, helping kids and plants alike grow.

Hearing Plantasia in the 21st century, it seems less an ode to our photosynthesizing friends by Garson and more an homage to his wife, the one with the green thumb that made everything flower around him. “My dad would be totally pleased to know that people are really interested in this music that had no popularity at the time,” Darmet says of Plantasia’s new renaissance. “He would be fascinated by the fact that people are finally understanding and appreciating this part of his musical career that he got no admiration for back then.” Garson seems to be everywhere again, even if he’s not really noticed, just like a houseplant.

TRACK LISTING

(A)
1. Plantasia
2. Symphony For A Spider Plant
3. Baby’s Tears Blues
4. Ode To An African Violet
5. Concerto For Philodendron And Pothos

(B)
1. Rhapsody In Green
2. Swingin' Spathiphyllums
3. You Don't Have To Walk A Begonia
4. A Mellow Mood For Maidenhair 

"Earthly Delights" is a forgotten 1978 free-jazz masterpiece by bass player, composer and improviser David Wertman, alongside his Sun Ensemble. Born in 1952 and raised in Queens NY, Wertman’s distinctive upright playing style was entirely self-taught. He cut his teeth in the notorious New York Jazz lofts, jamming for hours and hours with the likes of Billy Bang, Arthur Blythe, Marion Brown, Steve Reid, Dave Pike, William Parker, Brandon Ross and Charles Tyler to name but a few.

"Earthly Delights" is the first recording by the Sun Ensemble band and features the original line-up of Greg Wall (Baritone Saxophone), Jay Conway (Drums), John Sprague Jr. (Flute and Percussion), David Swerdlove (Soprano/Alto Saxophone), and John Zieman (Synthesizer). John Sprague Jr. financed and produced the album, releasing it on his own label Sweet Earth Records, a short-lived but bountiful imprint, perhaps best known for issuing Sun Ra And His Arkestra’s 1979 album “The Other Side Of The Sun”. "Earthly Delights" is perhaps best described as loosely composed, or highly improvised, depending on where you stand on such subjective matters. Containing just 4 compositions, "Earthly Delights" explores man’s relationship with nature; at times subtle and delicate, at times wide and sweeping in its gestures. The record’s spiritual message is conveyed by heartfelt, virtuoso performances from all six players, drifting together seamlessly from one sonic wave to the next.

A highly sought-after spiritual jazz album from 1976. Passing away in 2013, David Wertman was a hugely respected upright bass player who worked closely with Dr. Lonnie Smith, Billy Bang & Arthur Blythe throughout his long career. Original artwork, plus brand new liner notes written by Will Sumsuch (5 Mag) with original photographs and poetry supplied by his widow Lynne Meryl.

TRACK LISTING

Disc: 1
1. Relations
2. Earthly Delights

Disc: 2
1. Oh John Love Trane
2. Clear Air Dancer

Commemorating thirty trips around the sun as one of metal’s most monolithic bands, Earth release their ninth studio album, Full Upon Her Burning Lips. A purge of the embellishment and panache from previous releases, Full Upon Her Burning Lips intimates Earth’s commitment to the minimalism of their primordial days.

Deconstructing the tried-and-true dynamic consisting of Dylan Carlson on guitar and bass and Adrienne Davies on drums and percussion, Full Upon Her Burning Lips taps into the Platonic ideal of Earth—an incarnation of the long running band bolstered by the authority of purpose, where every note and every strike on the drum kit carries the weight of the world. In addition to scaling back the flourishes of their hulking, drone-driven opuses, Full Upon Her Burning Lips was composed sans narrative, relying instead on their collective subconscious to hone in on the overarching muse as the songs developed.

The record was engineered, mixed, and mastered by long time associate Mell Dettmer at Studio Soli. Showcasing Carlson’s sepia-toned Bakersfield Sound guitars and Davies’ death knell drums, Full Upon Her Burning Lips mines for the expressive, nuanced, and tonally rich components of Earth’s arsenal of sound. And indeed, anyone that’s followed Earth on their journey will bask in the unadulterated hums, throbs, and reverberations conjured by Carlson and Davies.

“I feel like this is the fullest expression and purest distillation of what Earth does since I re-started the band,” Carlson says in reflection of Full Upon Her Burning Lips. And indeed, anyone that’s followed Earth on their journey will bask in the unadulterated hums, throbs, and reverberations conjured by Carlson and Davies.

TRACK LISTING

1. Datura's Crimson Veils
2. Exaltation Of Larks
3. Cats On The Briar
4. The Colour Of Poison
5. Descending Belladonna
6. She Rides An Air Of Malevolence
7. Maidens Catafalque
8. An Unnatural Carousel
9. The Mandrake's Hymn
10. A Wretched Country Of Dusk

The definitive Prince reissue series continues with a first time on vinyl for three of his essential noughties albums, "Musicology", "3121" and "Planet Earth".
On its original UK release, Prince's 2007 album "Planet Earth" was available as a free covermount CD with the Mail On Sunday, or as part of a ticket deal for his 21 night live run at London's O2 arena. While this might have caused chaos amongst record stores at the time, it did ensure that a great late Prince album was heard by the widest audience possible. Where previous albums "Musicology" and "3121" predominently dealt with funk and R&B, "Planet Earth" is more of a mixed bag, as evidenced by its three singles, "Guitar", "Somewhere Here On Earth" and "Chelsea Rodgers".

TRACK LISTING

A1. Planet Earth
A2. Guitar
A3. Somewhere Here On Earth
A4. The One U Wanna C
B1. Future Baby Momma
B2. Mr. Goodnight
B3. All The Midnights In The World
B4. Chelsea Rodgers
B5. Lion Of Judah
B6. Resolution

As part of the widely respected BBE J Jazz Masterclass Series, Koichi Matsukaze's incredibly rare and much sought-after album Earth Mother sees a deluxe repress on BBE Music.
Regarded as one of the most sought-after yet elusive albums from a pivotal era in Japanese jazz, “Earth Mother” was originally issued in 1978 on ALM, a private label home to some of the most innovative jazz, contemporary classical and free improvisational music released in Japan during the late 70s and early 80s. It was here that “Earth Mother” found a natural home among the experimental and transgressive, destined to remain in obscurity for decades until the album’s muscular, bass-driven title track was included as the opening cut on BBE’s acclaimed compilation “J Jazz: Deep Modern Jazz From Japan 1969-1984”. It was a fitting way to start such a landmark collection and the track quickly became a favourite among DJs and jazz fans.
“Earth Mother” sees saxophonist Matsukaze team up once again with legendary drummer and band leader Furusawa Ryojiro; joined by Tamio Kawabata on bass to form the core trio which is augmented by Daitoku Toshiyuki on acoustic piano and Fender Rhodes.
This is a mythic album, seen and heard by very few; often among the top wants for even the most hardcore jazz collectors. The album ranges from heavyweight spiritual jazz and post-bop burners, to Dolphy-esque experimentation (“Don't Worry About Tenor Saxophone”) and a singular take on the classic, “Round Midnight”.
To optimise the sound of the music, “Earth Mother” is now issued as a 180g vinyl double album, with exact reproduction artwork, obi strip, insert and labels plus translated notes. It is also be available on CD and across digital formats.

TRACK LISTING

1. Images In Alone
2. Earth Mother
3. Zekatsuma Selbst
4. Round Midnight
5. Don't Worry About Tenor Saxophone

The long-awaited follow up to Washington’s debut "The Epic", "Heaven & Earth" is comprised of two halves, which find Washington confronting quotidian realities with cosmic themes. A further investigation of Washington’s world building ideas, the new album explores his reckoning with current global chaos and his vision for the future.

Washington convened his band, The Next Step, as well as members of the long running collective The West Coast Get Down at Henson Studios in Los Angeles to record the 16 tracks on Heaven & Earth. The music was composed, written and arranged by Washington, with new arrangements of jazz and bebop legend Freddie Hubbard’s “Hubtones” and iconic kung fu film theme “Fists of Fury,” as well as one song by bandmate Ryan Porter. Thundercat, Terrace Martin, Ronald Bruner, Jr., Cameron Graves, Brandon Coleman, Miles Mosley, Patrice Quinn, Tony Austin and many more contribute to the album.

Clocking in at two and a half colossal hours of music, "Heaven & Earth" is available on double deluxe CD and a four piece vinyl housed in bespoke double gatefold sleeve

“The world that my mind lives in, lives in my mind.” This idea inspired me to make this album Heaven & Earth. The reality we experience is a mere creation of our consciousness, but our consciousness creates this reality based on those very same experiences. We are simultaneously the creators of our personal universe and creations of our personal universe. The Earth side of this album represents the world as I see it outwardly, the world that I am a part of. The Heaven side of this album represents the world as I see it inwardly, the world that is a part of me. Who I am and the choices I make lie somewhere in between.”
Kamasi Washington

STAFF COMMENTS

Patrick says: The man responsible for turning a younger generation of music lovers onto the passion and power of jazz returns with the bombastic brilliance of his sophomore LP. Seriously spiritual and surprisingly groovy, "Heaven & Earth" incorporates Marvin-esque soul, Old Testament intensity and soaring, searing solos into a breathtaking vision of jazz's next incarnation.

TRACK LISTING

Earth
1. Fists Of Fury
2. Can You Hear Him
3. Hub -Tones
4. Connections
5. Tiffakonkae
6. The Invincible Youth
7. Testify
8. One Of One

Heaven
1. The Space Travelers Lullaby
2. Vi Lua Vi Sol
3. Street Fighter Mas
4. Song For The Fallen
5. Journey
6. The Psalmnist
7. Show Us The Way
8. Will You Sing

Having had a wealth of self-released outings under his own name, Luke Spillane has a new, four-track epic out called 'The Salt Of The Earth'. We kick things off with the instantly frenetic 'The One And The Only', with rapidly arpeggiated saw-waves and pulsing pads riding over the insistent drum machine kicks, before introducing echoed vocal swells, helping to anchor things before floating off into a cosmic scree. 'Crown Of Life' continues the same arepggiated loop before introducing a resonant notched filter sweep, harmonic and intentionally jarring at the same time. 

The closing duo of 'Vaster' and 'Under My Wing' keep the narrative thread running through them, giving a sense of continuity and anchoring the progressive experimentation around that tried and tested central pattern. 

TRACK LISTING

1. The One And The Only 10:22
2. Crown Of Life 07:44
3. Vaster 14:37
4. Under My Wing 13:26

New Zealand’s The Cavemen are back, ready to drink, fight, fxck and play some goddamn rock and roll! “Nuke Earth” is their 3rd footlong rekkid and it’s pure, primitive motherfuckin’ GARAGE PUNK like you lust after every night when you’re licking your sexiest leather record jackets, or ‘77 punk steeped in a moldy stack of bootleg Motörhead outtake LPs. The ‘Men have gone batshit crazy, and they’re in full-on attack mode here with 13 tracks of panty dropping chaos guaranteed to land you in jail faster than you can crack one off in a grindhouse showing an “Ilsa” film. Rock’n’roll is here to stay, and it’ll always be for the crazy kids… like it or lump it! 

TRACK LISTING

1:Lust For Evil
2:Criminal Love
3:Janey
4:Batshit Crazy
5:Chernobyl Baby
6:7 Day Weekend
7:The Night Jimmy Savile Died
8:Concrete Town
9:Don’t Wanna Hang
10:Gimme Beer Or Gimme Death
11:Elvis Is Alive
12:Thug
13:Speaking In Tongues.