Search Results for:

FIRE RECORDS

Kristin Hersh

Clear Pond Road

    Kristin Hersh’s new album is a cinematic road trip; a series of personal vignettes from a fiercely independent auteur, sitting plush with layers of all-consuming strings and mellotron. It’s a watershed moment in a career overflowing with creative firsts and inspirational thinking; an elegant piece of personal reportage, a home movie caught in time.

    Previously, the juxtaposition of light and dark has been essential to the drama of Throwing Muses and 50FOOTWAVE, but this solo set is something of a departure; more inward looking, quieter but outspoken, underpinned by background noise for ambience and awkwardness.

    “Passion sounds less angry, more grateful, I think,” Kristin muses, “sweeter, sadder. And somehow, no less alive… over car engines and rain in New England and whistling ducks and wind chimes in New Orleans, it all sounds wistful to me.”

    ‘Clear Pond Road’ is a life-affirming statement, a further part of the jigsaw, a very personal memoir, from street signs to snapshots; a late blossoming and coming-of-age from a true icon of independence. The record is both intimate yet expansive, written largely within the confines of Hersh’s home, making the proceedings ever more personal.

    “Few artists understand the intensity of living one’s art like Hersh” The Guardian

    “A fearless rock innovator” New York Times.

    TRACK LISTING

    Side A
    A1 Bewitched Reruns
    A2 Ms Haha
    A3 Dandelion
    A4 Constance Street
    A5 Thank You, Corner Blight
    Side B
    B1 St. Valentines Day Massacre
    B2 Reflections On The Motive Power Of Fire
    B3 Eyeshine
    B4 Palmetto
    B5 Tunnels

    THALA

    In Theory Depression (EP)

      Rising artist THALA finds strength in her vulnerability on new EP In Theory Depression. After forging a path in hazy, lo-fi indie, this forthcoming release is home to her sharpest, boldest songwriting yet, rendering these deeply personal explorations of self in vivid, ‘90s influenced indie-rock, and looming, psych-inspired walls-of-sound.

      Recalling the tangled indie-rock of Holly Humberstone, Soccer Mommy, and Phoebe Bridgers, and underpinned by spiky, surging guitars, the songs unearth tenderness, even as they rage.

      In Theory Depression marks the artist’s most introspective writing yet, but as much as the lyrics excavate from hidden depths, they’re often paired with widescreen, cinematic-sounding melodies. It brings to mind both the dazzling soundscapes of Mazzy Star, the witty bite of Liz Phair, and the subtle punk influences of Juliana Hatfield, who also spins the genre’s more relentless strains into snarling and bittersweet alternative pop.

      THALA has just wrapped up a joint UK tour, alongside showcases at Austin’s SXSW and with Brighton’s Great Escape festival also on the horizon. Having already won the backing of BBC Radio 1’s Jack Saunders, Wonderland Magazine and Clash, THALA’s ascent is only set to continue.

      TRACK LISTING

      A1 You Had 2
      A2 Curtain Call
      A3 Easy Out
      B1 Are You Thinking Of Me
      B2 Sink
      B3 In Theory Depression

      Brigid Mae Power

      Dream From The Deep Well

        ‘Dream From The Deep Well’ is the new album from celebrated Irish singer songwriter Brigid Mae Power. Recognised as a purveyor of dreamier pop with folky leanings, this new album is a departure; a unique marriage of traditional stylings and very modern melodies; a breath-taking soundtrack which underpins her gorgeous vocal.

        Filled with personal tales of offspring and grandparents, the lovelorn and the lost, it’s the essence of re-imagined folk music, from the traditional intro and outro that act as bookends. It’s folk music, but not as we know it. In these ever-confusing and often annoying times, Brigid brings us modern folk for modern folk, with her evocative vocal, doubling back on itself with strings, steel guitar, horns and mellotron adding to its baroque loveliness. It’s waving back at her rootsy past, daubing new colours on a much-loved canvas. ‘Dream From The Deep Well’ is a new visionary beginning from a gifted songwriter.

        Elsewhere, there’s the lovelorn longing of her version of Tim Buckley’s ‘I Must Have Been Blind’, alongside a moving tribute to the late Ashling Murphy, a 23-year-old Irish primary school teacher and traditional Irish musician who was attacked and killed while jogging along the Grand Canal just outside Tullamore, County Offaly. It's a harrowing story, delivered with overwhelming compassion. In the best tradition of old school folk music, it opens up a pressing issue to a wider audience.

        It's an album that’s politically primed and socially aware; a broadside for us all, this is Brigid Mae Power’s most complete album yet.

        “Her haunting voice, an instrument that raises the everyday to a near-mystical realm.” The Guardian.

        “The Irish singer-songwriter flits between past and present; between traditional and modern forms; between the heaven in her voice and the earthbound epiphanies of her words.” Pitchfork.


        TRACK LISTING

        Side A:
        A1 I Know Who Is Sick
        A2 Counting Down
        A3 Maybe It's Just Lightning
        A4 I Must Have Been Blind
        A5 The Waterford Song
        A6 Ashling
        Side B:
        B1 I'll Wait Outside For You
        B2 Dream From The Deep Well
        B3 I Don't Know Your Story
        B4 Some Life You've Known
        B5 Down By The Glenside

        Decisive Pink (Kate NV + Angel Deradoorian)

        Ticket To Fame

          Angel Deradoorian and Kate NV are Decisive Pink - Ticket To Fame is their highly anticipated debut. After teasing the single ‘Haffmilch Holiday’ the duo amassed a rapturous response, with The Guardian calling it “a space-age-dancefloor swoon that brings to mind Kate Bush’s Waking the Witch” and the New York Times highlighting the single as “substantive and thoroughly hypnotic”. On their first LP they do not disappoint, calling on Kate NV’s experimental pop leanings and Angel Deradoorian’s taste for atmosphere and otherworldliness, Decisive Pink have created a playful and abstract album designed for escape and enchantment.

          Electronic pop at it’s finest, the debut points to the fact that life is a puzzle, but you can still get a lot from living it. ‘Destiny’ is a smart take on the nature of belief, built on a question-and-answer format, where Angel plays a role as the seer, and Kate the enquirer. The poppy beat is reminiscent of Talking Heads’ ‘The Great Curve’, from Remain in Light. There again, it could be a sinister take on Will Powers’ ‘Kissing with Confidence’. The synth squeaks, squelches and toots sound like the timid affirmation of the initiate.

          Ticket to Fame is also unashamedly romantic in atmosphere and tone. Romance is to be found in the simple pleasures, such as listening to a blackbird on the instrumental ‘Rodeo’, where warm synths, a melancholic guitar pattern and hissing rhythm combine with some vocal snippets to form a soothing contemplation. Then there is ‘Ode to Boy’; a perfect pop track. The walking into the room of “more than just an ordinary boy” (doubtless “drunk with fire”) allows a set of initially different, and shortened synth patterns to build to a glorious affirmation of the power of love.

          TRACK LISTING

          Side A
          A1 Haffmilch Holiday
          A2 What Where
          A3 Ode To Boy
          A4 Destiny
          A5 Potato Tomato
          Side B
          B1 Cosmic Dancer
          B2 Rodeo
          B3 Interludé
          B4 Dopamine
          B5 Voice Message

          RVG

          Brain Worms

            A pivotal record for contemporary times; bright, free, adamant, optimistic. Brain Worms is RVG’s fullest, most pristine album yet.

            All throughout Brain Worms, it’s apparent that this is a band in very fine form. Album opener ‘Common Ground’ sets the tone for what’s to come; a shiny, thrilling, punch of an album, with all the beloved RVG hallmarks. Vager’s voice is unfiltered and commanding as ever when delivering her clever, not-quite-ironic lyrics. Here, though, those lyrics feel so much less resigned to yearning, and so much more defiant and joyous.

            ‘Tambourine’ is the only Covid song Vager wrote when “trying not to write Covid songs”, and it’s a painfully honest portrait of grieving mid-isolation. ‘Brain Worms’ tells the all-too-familiar story of a person falling down the internet rabbit hole and finding comfort in conspiracies. ‘Nothing Really Changes’ is a keys-heavy new wave-ish thing, while closer ‘Tropic of Cancer’ sparkles with Vager’s self-assured new manifesto: I know what I’m like, and I know how I get. If you think I’m strange, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

            Bloxham, Nolte, and Wallace are flawlessly adept in bringing Vager’s songwriting to life. Recorded in London at Snap Studios with James Trevascus (Nick Cave & Warren Ellis, PJ Harvey), all ten tracks surge with lush sounds and clear intentions and the magic of an acoustic guitar once owned by Kate Bush, given to her by Tears for Fears (who, legend has it, wrote ‘Everybody Wants to Rule the World’ on it).

            Between the four bandmates lead singer and guitarist Vager, guitarist Reuben Bloxham, drummer Marc Nolte and bassist Isabele Wallace this is the most confident they’ve ever felt in RVG. They’ve moved past their influences, pushed themselves, and tried new things. And they have made a record they can, by all accounts, call their best.

            “Brain Worms feels like the antithesis to what a post-pandemic record could easily be. For a band who were already writing music about being reclusive “we were depressed and not going outside on our first two albums” the enforced isolation and time to think gave Vager space to write about anything she wanted. And, it turned out, she was ready to write about acceptance.

            “If we could only make one more album, it would be this one,” says Vager.

            "Easily one of the most vital bands on the Aussie scene today" Rolling Stone.

            “A calling card for outsiders... dynamic and vital post-punk" The Guardian.

            STAFF COMMENTS

            Barry says: Hypnotic goth-influenced vocals and soaring melodic guitar lines weave around each-other in a sonic maelstrom reminiscent of Echo & The Bunnymen sharing a stage with Interpol. It's bold and brash, brilliantly played and undeniably huge.

            TRACK LISTING

            Side A
            A1 Common Ground
            A2 Midnight Sun
            A3 It's Not Easy
            A4 Tambourine
            A5 Brain Worms
            Side B
            B1 You're The Reason
            B2 Squid
            B3 Giant Snake
            B4 Nothing Really Changes
            B5 Tropic Of Cancer

            Come

            Near Life Experience - 2023 Reissue

              Originally released in 1996, Come’s third album ‘Near Life Experience’ was the sound of a band heading into new territory, refining their dense mix of hypnotic noise-rock, blues and rock’n’roll song-writing. Lovingly remastered, this new version features three incredible bonus tracks ‘Prize’, ‘Strike’, ‘Hurricane II’ stemming from the same era, additional liner notes and photographs.

              After Come's seminal 1994 release ‘Don't Ask Don't Tell’, bassist Sean O'Brien and drummer Arthur Johnson left the band to pursue other careers. Remaining members Chris Brokaw and Thalia Zedek recorded Near Life Experience with two different rhythm sections: one half of the album was recorded with drummer Mac McNeilly of the Jesus Lizard and Bundy K. Brown of Tortoise and Gastr Del Sol, the other half recorded with Kevin Coultas and Tara Jane O'Neil of Rodan and The Sonora Pine. Other contributors to the album included Edward Yazijian from Kustomized and Jeff Goddard from Karate, both rock bands hailing from Boston, MA.

              The title of the album resulted from "a slip of the tongue, as Zedek states, she "was telling someone [she had] had a 'near life experience,' but meant to say near death experience. Chris [Brokaw] was cracking up at the imagery of that. Thus, the phrase was chosen as the album's title.
              "Near-Life Experience is heavier, and at the same time prettier, than Come has ever sounded." CMJ New Music Monthly.

              “Come is a re-energized, even more powerful band than they used to be, and Near Life Experience is their most concise and affecting release yet.” All Music.

              Zedek and Brokaw might have compensated the loss of band members by recruiting new blood but the reward was huge, ‘Near Life Experience’ is Come’s most cinematic, diverse and accessible album.

              TRACK LISTING

              Side One
              A1 Hurricane
              A2 Weak As The Moon
              A3 Secret Number
              A4 Bitten
              A5 Shoot Me First
              Side Two
              B1 Walk On's
              B2 Half Life
              B3 Sloe-Eyed
              B4 Prize
              B5 Strike
              B6 Hurricane II

              The Lemonheads

              Come On Feel - 30th Anniversary Edition

                Expanded 30th anniversary re-issue of The Lemonheads’ classic 1993 album. The breakthrough record that took American alt rock global and catapulted Evan Dando into the hearts of a generation. With a wealth of unreleased demos, alternative versions and rarities - including covers of Victoria Williams, Buddy Holly and The Flying Burrito Brothers plus The Lemonhead’s take on the Cole Porter standard ‘Miss Otis Regrets’.

                In the 90’s Evan’s Lemonheads produced hit after a hit, a string of super cool singles: ‘Big Gay Heart’, ‘Into Your Arms’, ‘It’s About Time’, and ‘The Great Big NO’. Pure genius filling the radio waves and taking the stage... Some 30 years on; Evan is still knocking that song writing thing out of the park and ‘Come On Feel The Lemonheads’ sounds as fresh and perky as it ever did. Amid the hits on the original record are stencils and outlines for yet more magical music and now this deluxe edition adds a second disc of demos and acoustic versions, plus a host of one-offs from sessions and compilations that add further colour to the myth and how it was created.

                There’s the in-demand combo lovingly covering Victoria Williams’ ‘Frying Pan’ from her ‘Sweet Relief’ album, which is joined by an eclectic set of flipsides and out-takes, like their version of original garage punk nugget ‘Little Black Egg’ by The Nightcrawlers, Evan’s homage to Gram Parsons on the winsome ‘Streets Of Baltimore’ and Buddy Holly’s melancholy ‘Learning The Game’. Evan knows a good song when he hears it, as ‘Come On Feel The Lemonheads’ certainly proved.

                TRACK LISTING

                Disc One
                Side A
                A1 The Great Big No
                A2 Into Your Arms
                A3 It's About Time
                A4 Down About It
                A5 Paid To Smile
                A6 Big Gay Heart
                A7 Style
                A8 Rest Assured
                Side B
                B1 Dawn Can't Decide
                B2 I'll Do It Anyway
                B3 Rick James Style
                B4 Being Around
                B5 Favorite T
                B6 You Can Take It With You
                B7 The Jello Fund ( + Lenny - Hidden Track)
                Disc Two
                Side C – Alternative & Acoustic
                C1 Big Gay Heart (Demo)
                C2 Being Around (Alternative)
                C3 Into Your Arms (Acoustic)
                C4 Down About It (Acoustic)
                C5 Deep Bottom Cove
                C6 Acoustic Rick James Style
                C7 It's About Time (Acoustic)
                Side D – Covers & Curiosities
                D1 Miss Otis Regrets
                D2 Learning The Game
                D3 Little Black Egg
                D4 Streets Of Baltimore (Acoustic)
                D5 Frying Pan
                D6 He's On The Beach
                D7 Favorite T (Live In Session)

                Immaterial Possession

                Mercy Of The Crane Folk

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

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

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

                  TRACK LISTING

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

                  Born Heller

                  Born Heller (RSD23 EDITION)

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

                    Josephine Fosterís stunning collaboration with Jason Ajemian. Back on vinyl for the first time in over 16 years, this special edition features liner notes from former Chicago reader journalist Peter Margasak and new artwork. A ìremarkable... terrifyingly beautiful nightmareî (Pitchfork ????) of new folk, circa 2004. A minimal serenade for austere times; an off-kilter romance of voice and instrument compared to the brevity of early Bjork, featuring Fosterís fragile, hushed vocal, straight from old weird America, brought to life by way of Ajemianís bowed bass and effects, with a nod to the traditional English folk of yore in its construction. ìArrestingly bare.î Tiny Mix Tapes

                    The Bevis Frond

                    Hit Squad (RSD23 EDITION)

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

                      Available for the first time on vinyl, with updated artwork from band leader Nick Saloman. From the fuzziest West Coast psyche to lilting acoustic work by way of Beatlesy power pop and some gorgeous organ flurries, ëHit Squadí contains some of the Frondís most realised songs. From the faux-60s spy-film styles of the title track, the all-out rock of ëDragonsí and ëDoing Nothingí, the classic psych-rock of ëThrough The Hedgeí, to the epic psychedelic melancholy of ëFast Falls The Eventideí. ëHit Squadí has Saloman playing to his strengths, but not resting on his laurels.î AllMusic. A magnificent uplifting collection of tales about every manís trials and tribulations mixed with escapist visions and beautiful pop songs; the evocative ëHigh Pointí is worth the entry fee alone.

                      Come

                      Gently Down The Stream (RSD23 EDITION)

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

                        Lovingly re issued on double vinyl for the first time since 1998. Come's final chapter sees Thalia Zedek and Chris Brokaw at their peak, refining their incredible blend of dissonant blues and cathartic noise-rock heightened by the intricate guitar dual-play and the added melody that permeates the songwriting. Includes full album download and new liner notes.

                        The Groundhogs

                        Crosscut Saw (RSD23 EDITION)

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

                          Available for the first time on vinyl since 1976, pressed on silver wax and featuring a limited edition foil embossed sleeve with extensive liner notes. Crosscut Saw sees the reformed Groundhogs with second guitarist Dave Wellbelove, sparring with the legendary Tony McPhee."Musically I'd gone back to the basics," McPhee told Sounds, the addition of a doodle of synth and a second guitarist notwithstanding. As a result; "Riffs galore permeate." (AllMusic). A suitably explosive prog-pleasing follow up to 1992's 'Who Will Save The World' and 'Hogwash' rekindling the fire of the blues in a new, heavy progressive setting, all set for a new guitar-powered age.

                          Half Japanese

                          The Band That Would Be King (RSD23 EDITION)

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

                            The seminal album from Half Japanese back on Limited edition Orange vinyl and featuring updated artwork and liner notes from Jad Fair and producer Kramer. This is the Zen of Half Japanese, of prolific songwriter Jad Fair; wide-eyed crooner, humorous raconteur and spontaneous storyteller. A genre-bending romp through the mind of the man, originally released in 1989 in a purple patch for the group, preceded by "Music To Strip By" and "Charmed Life". "Half Japanese were a song machine," attested Pitchfork, while AllMusic saw this album as a collection of "humorous lo-fi rock'n'roll hit singles."

                            Jazz Butcher

                            Dr Chomondley Repents: A Sides, B-Sides And Seasides (RSD23 EDITION)

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

                              Double vinyl release of Jazz Butcher favourites, oddities, unheard alternate versions + a live radio session from LA's KCRW - many of which have never been on vinyl. Features extensive liner notes and exclusive artwork. The compilation gathers a raft of indie chart hits, plus a host of truly eclectic Butcher tunes from his early Glass recordings through his time at Creation. ìThe Jazz Butcher is one of the most brilliant incisive pop writers that Britain has produced since the glory days of Ray Davies and Pete Townshendî Alan McGee, Creation. This collection compiles an essential alternative world view, tracing pop culture through the kaleidoscope of the ë80s and beyond, filled with a unique brand of wit and wisdom.

                              Bardo Pond

                              Peel Sessions (RSD23 EDITION)

                                THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2023 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON SATURDAY APRIL 22ND 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 24TH).


                                Never released material from the band's 2001 and 2004 BBC Peel Sessions, a unique insight into the bandís development. Bardo Pond let it all go in their ideal live setting, morphing and expanding their beautiful drone-rock compositions. Artwork designed and created by Michael Gibbons of the band, this also includes a full album download.

                                Giant Sand

                                Center Of The Universe (RSD23 EDITION)

                                  THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2023 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON SATURDAY APRIL 22ND 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 24TH).


                                  Expanded double LP edition of the early ë90s Giant Sand gem, including a second previously unreleased disc featuring live recordings from Sub Pop's Vermonstrous Festival, 1992. With new liner notes and commentary from Howe Gelb. An everyday tale of answering machines, petroglyphs and a Takamine guitar; true stories from Joshua Tree: ìAnother fascinating set of desert-fried rock ëní roll, serving up one winner after another.î (AllMusic). A masterpiece of psychedelic desert-rock, a spiritual cousin to the Meat Puppets' ëUp On The Suní and Kyuss's ëSky Valleyí.

                                  Death And Vanilla

                                  Flicker

                                    Death and Vanilla return with ‘Flicker’, presenting their unique pop music that defies categorisation. Housed in a beautifully austere post-ironic de-constructed sleeve; ‘Flicker’ is a modern reflection on these difficult times. World crises notwithstanding, they return reborn, re-arranged and revitalised after assimilating dub reggae, the motorik spirals of Can, the modal meander of Philip Glass and The Cure’s dreamier pop sounds; plus the twice removed symphonic ambience of Spiritualized and Talking Heads under heavy manners from Brian Eno. By osmosis their period of transition since 2019’s much darker ‘Are You A Dreamer?’ has hatched new eclectic electronica anthems riddled with melody lines, and layered for lush love.

                                    Forming in Malmö, Sweden, Death And Vanilla gravitated towards vintage musical equipment; from vibraphone, organ and mellotron, to tremolo guitar and Moog synthesisers. Soaking up soundtracks from the 60s and 70s, listening to library music, kosmiche, French Ye-ye pop and 60s psych, Marleen Nilsson, Anders Hansson and Magnus Bodin were fashioned by the city’s austere industrial past and flat pack present, and all in the shadow of the Orsesund Bridge that links their dreamworld to mainland Europe and a darker reality.

                                    Death And Vanilla at once sound like everything is possible; but nothing else at all. There is a flicker of hope for everyone.

                                    “Deploying vintage instruments in their quest for melancholic utopia.” - Electronic Sound

                                    “Baroque pop through a dreampop filter.” - The Guardian.

                                    STAFF COMMENTS

                                    Barry says: It's hard to define exactly what it is Death and Vanilla do. It's deeply psychedelic but rooted in classic songwriting, taking familiar progressions and twisting them into perfectly produced fever dreams. 'Flicker' has a ton of melody, is warm and brooding but remains resolutely listenable, and endlessly fascinating.

                                    TRACK LISTING

                                    Side A
                                    A1. Out For Magic
                                    A2. Baby Snakes
                                    A3. Find Another Illusion
                                    A4. Perpetuum Mobile
                                    Side B
                                    B1. Looking Glass
                                    B2. Mercury's Rising
                                    B3. Fearless
                                    B4. Transparent Things
                                    B5. Perpetuum Reprise

                                    Bas Jan

                                    Baby U Know - 2023 Reissue

                                      Limited edition red vinyl reissue with DL card of the agit pop four-piece’s second album, Baby U Know. A heady collision of Raincoats-esque indie and ESG-paced rhythms fed through a kaleidoscopic pagan folk filter. The follow up to their critically acclaimed 2018 debut Yes I Jan, this release is a wordy slice of state-of-the-art social commentary wrapped in a perfectly-balanced soundscape that veers from funky minimalism to baroque dream pop.

                                      With a hint of Ari Up styled vocals backed by a harmonious chorus of concern touching on everything from incantations, essential causes and systematic shopping, all underpinned by a raking violin and bewitching electronic hum.

                                      TRACK LISTING

                                      Side A
                                      A1 Progressive Causes
                                      A2 Sex Cult
                                      A3 All Forgotten
                                      A4 My Incantations, Herbs & Art Have Abandoned Me
                                      A5 Vision Of Change
                                      Side B
                                      B1 Shopping In A New City
                                      B2 You Have Bewitched Me
                                      B3 Baby You Know
                                      B4 Too Good To Be True
                                      B5 Profile Picture – OTO Version

                                      Bardo Pond

                                      Volume 3

                                        “Obviously, Bardo Pond are the greatest band in the world” VICE

                                        Super rare recordings from 2002 and pressed on vinyl for the very first time. The third in the band’s series of limited-edition releases showcasing jam sessions and other miscellany. Like Fugazi on acid, a rage for the Velvets, a mantra with real purity of tone.

                                        Somewhere between the ‘Dilate’ album in 2001 (“a combination of Kyuss and Spacemen 3” NME) and ‘On the Ellipse’ in 2003 ("Nowhere is feedback more melancholic, more emotive, than that fashioned by Bardo Pond” Brainwashed), Bardo Pond transcended into a mantra-like, multi-layered, cross-dimensional, wah wah powered nirvana.

                                        In some circles, they say, spaceships wafted them away and they only returned some-time later, mind-altered and bedraggled, ears ringing. But that is the stuff of supposition.

                                        As we already know, there is no ‘off’ switch on Bardo Pond, they are never knowingly unplugged. Indeed, the modal evolution of their sound continues unabated.



                                        TRACK LISTING

                                        Side A
                                        A1 Sifaka
                                        A2 Ecstasy Dub
                                        Side B
                                        B1 Lomand
                                        Side C
                                        C1 Tanked
                                        C2 Trimurti
                                        Side D
                                        D1 Blue Turban 

                                        Faten Kanaan's fifth LP Afterpoem is a mysterious, smudgy, bittersweet, and uniquely playful album. Deeply melodic, it continues her poignant exploration of counterpoint as a narrative tool.

                                        From the repetitive structures of modern minimalism and early music/baroque influences - to more languid textural ebbs & tides, there's a warmth in her use of electronic instruments that gives the album a curiously timeless feel. Composing intuitively, her music has often been described as 'strange', mostly because it creates its own world - one that isn't easily categorised.

                                        The album's title refers to the haze of a poem's intended meaning being abstractly fleeting and barely graspable. Glistening threads of understanding still touch us - the poetry becoming intimately personal, and no further literal explanation is needed.

                                        "I find pleasure in music as a language that nudges and hints. There's a potential that lives in things left unsaid... meanings drifting in and out of focus... hovering like spirits. It's a romantic and earnest album... of yearning for lost places and people, while still looking out at the world with tenderness and humour".

                                        STAFF COMMENTS

                                        Matt says: Instantly transporting you to a ancient, medievalesque world - Kanaan's palette of manipulated strings, harpsicord, organ and such like conjures up vivid images of places and times you've never experienced. Its intensely absorbing music for solitary listening. Shut the curtains, light a candle and get totally engrossed. Just no animal sacrifice please - leave that to the ancients.

                                        TRACK LISTING

                                        Side A
                                        A1 Fin Août, Début Septembre
                                        A2 Trenchcoat
                                        A3 Ard Diar
                                        A4 Ebla
                                        A5 Florin Court
                                        A6 Snowing
                                        A7 Domari's Lamp
                                        Side B
                                        B1 Votive
                                        B2 La Smorfia
                                        B3 Castling
                                        B4 Falconers
                                        B5 Cascando
                                        B6 Storm Signal

                                        Neutral Milk Hotel

                                        On Avery Island (Deluxe Edition)

                                          Neutral Milk Hotel‘s explosive 1996 debut, On Avery Island, receives the deluxe reissue treatment with a yellow and red vinyl 2xLP press, complete with revised artwork and cut at 45RPM.

                                          Jeff Mangum’s songs are cryptic and crazed, his ideas fast and furious, and together they force the home-recording concept out of the basement and into a brave new world, a fuzzy masterpiece of experimental lo-fi recording.

                                          Full of rapid-fire wordplay with true and heartfelt experimentation, both ambitious and eclectic, it’s not hard to see why this has been such an influential album.

                                          Part of the fabled Elephant 6 collective, Neutral Milk Hotel won over many a music critic with this cult classic. The band are recognized as one of the most influential alternative acts to come out of the mid-90s and sowed the seeds for everything from anti-folk to the likes of Arcade Fire, Caribou and even Franz Ferdinand

                                          TRACK LISTING

                                          Side A (45RPM)
                                          A1 Song Against Sex
                                          A2 You've Passed
                                          A3 Someone Is Waiting
                                          Side B (45RPM)
                                          B1 A Baby For Pree
                                          B2 Marching Theme
                                          B3 Where You'll Find Me Now
                                          Side C (45RPM)
                                          C1 Avery Island/April 1st
                                          C2 Gardenhead/ Leave Me Alone
                                          C3 Three Peaches
                                          Side D (33RPM)
                                          D1 Naomi
                                          D2 April 8th
                                          D3 Pree-Sisters Swallowing A Donkey's Eye

                                          Amber Arcades

                                          Barefoot On Diamond Road

                                            ‘Barefoot On Diamond Road’ is the third album from Dutch singer/songwriter Amber Arcades. A record of engaging maturity, filled with slow motion builds and epic lifts that elevate it to dizzying heights.

                                            Immersed in an all-consuming wall of sound, ‘Barefoot On Diamond Road’ is like My Bloody Valentine gone acoustic, it shouldn’t work but it does; it’s a juxtaposition of textures, from skittery, uneasy dancefloor beats to symphonic kosmische, a baroque pop tapestry side-stitched with cellos and harps with a plaintive steel guitar echoing in the distance.

                                            Conceived remotely with original sparring partner Ben Greenberg (Danny Elfman, Depeche, Ryley Walker) in New York and Annelotte in Amsterdam. It’s a coming of age set in a new town with a new positivity underpinning her, as ever, beautifully crafted and highly personal observations on life, love and how it all should or could work.

                                            “This record really reveals parts of me and my relationship with being a musician and making music. It’s like a reckoning, more in the moment, realizing how important it is to do things for the right reasons and how that can change your process into one that embraces what exists, including yourself.”

                                            Amber Arcades’ new album ‘Barefoot On Diamond Road’ marks a new phase for a highly respected musician.

                                            STAFF COMMENTS

                                            Barry says: Amber Arcades' third album sees Annelotte de Graaf eschewing to some degree the woozy acoustic balladry of the brilliant 'European Heartbreak' for a much more electronic influenced sound, with fractured pads and grand percussion working their way underneath De Graaf's hypnotic vocals. It's a new direction, but couldn't be any more appropriate a development for a musician of her calibre.

                                            TRACK LISTING

                                            Side A
                                            A1 Diamond Road
                                            A2 Odd To Even
                                            A3 Contain
                                            A4 Water Stains
                                            A5 Life Is Coming Home
                                            Side B
                                            B1 Through
                                            B2 True Love
                                            B3 Just Like Me
                                            B4 I'm Not There
                                            B5 You Could Never Let Me Down

                                            Black Lips

                                            Arabia Mountain - 2023 Reissue

                                              Sixth full-length album from the gurus of Atlanta’s “flower punk” movement, from the heady daze of 2011 – finally back on vinyl and part of a series of Fire re-issues celebrating 20 years of the legendary garage rock gurus from Atlanta, Georgia. Arabia Mountain was recorded between Brooklyn and Atlanta in 2010, and with the collaborative assistance of celebrated producer Mark Ronson, Lockett Pundt of Deerhunter, and a human skull with a microphone jammed into it. “I was already a fan of the Black Lips coming into it and I definitely didn’t want to f**k up anything,” Ronson told Rolling Stone…and f**k up he did not. The production tests the limits of modern amplification, harkening to the full, meaty sound of The Stooges’ Fun House or Lola Versus Powerman by the Kinks. Unapologetic southern-fried twang, crunching through the gears with flowers blossoming everywhere. 

                                              TRACK LISTING

                                              Side A
                                              A1 Family Tree
                                              A2 Modern Art
                                              A3 Spidey's Curse
                                              A4 Mad Dog
                                              A5 Mr. Driver
                                              A6 Bicentennial Man
                                              A7 Go Out And Get It
                                              A8 Raw Meat
                                              Side B
                                              B1 Bone Marrow
                                              B2 The Lie
                                              B3 Time
                                              B4 Dumpster Dive
                                              B5 New Direction
                                              B6 Noc-A-Homa
                                              B7 Don't Mess Up My Baby
                                              B8 You Keep On Running 

                                              Black Lips

                                              Underneath The Rainbow - 2023 Reissue

                                                The seventh studio album from the mighty Black Lips is finally back on vinyl, part of a series of Fire re-issues celebrating 20 years of the legendary garage rock gurus from Atlanta, Georgia. Featuring fan favourites such as ‘Boys in the Wood’ and ‘Funny’, this is an essential slice of Black Lips history. The band convened at Dunham Studios in New York to record initial tracks with Dap Kings music director Tommy Brenneck (Cee Lo, Charles Bradley), then decamped to Nashville to record several songs with Patrick Carney of The Black Keys producing, finally rounding out the album with a couple of songs co-produced with lifetime Lips recording collaborator, Ed Rawls. 

                                                TRACK LISTING

                                                Side A
                                                A1 Drive-By-Buddy
                                                A2 Smiling
                                                A3 Make You Mine
                                                A4 Funny
                                                A5 Dorner Party
                                                A6 Justice After All
                                                Side B
                                                B1 Boys In The Wood
                                                B2 Waiting
                                                B3 Do The Vibrate
                                                B4 I Don't Wanna Go Home
                                                B5 Dandelion Dust
                                                B6 Dog Years

                                                Black Lips

                                                Satan's Graffitti Or God's Art - 2023 Reissue

                                                  Part of a series of Fire re-issues celebrating 20 years of the legendary garage rock gurus from Atlanta, Georgia. This 2017 record features a musically evolved Black Lips, who still stay true to their original blistering take on fuzzy, dirty rock n' roll. God’s Art or Satan’s Graffiti features guest contributions from Yoko Ono was produced by Sean Lennon throughout 2016. During the recording, the band isolated themselves from the outside world, infusing the album with a focused liveliness similar to the spirit that brought them together in the first place. On Satan's graffiti or God's art? founding members Cole Alexander and Jared Swilley teamed with former guitarist Jack Hines (who played in the group from 2002-2004) and additions Oakley Munson on drums and Zumi Rosow on saxophone. A sonically captivating document that is as creatively unhinged as it is precisely executed, one of the rawest and most expansive albums in the band's storied history.

                                                  TRACK LISTING

                                                  Side A
                                                  A1 Overture: Sunday Morning
                                                  A2 Occidental Front
                                                  A3 Can't Hold On
                                                  A4 The Last Cul De Sac
                                                  Side B
                                                  B1 Interlude: Got Me All Alone
                                                  B2 Crystal Night
                                                  B3 Squatting In Heaven
                                                  B4 Interlude: Bongo's Baby
                                                  B5 Rebel Intuition
                                                  Side C
                                                  C1 Wayne
                                                  C2 Interlude: E’lektric Spider Webz
                                                  C3 We Know
                                                  C4 In My Mind There's A Dream
                                                  Side D
                                                  D1 Lucid Nightmare
                                                  D2 Come Ride With Me
                                                  D3 It Won't Be Long
                                                  D4 Loser's Lament
                                                  D5 Finale: Sunday Morning

                                                  Black Lips

                                                  Let It Bloom - 2023 Reissue

                                                    The classic third album from the Black Lips, originally released in 2005 and now back on vinyl and part of a series of Fire re-issues celebrating 20 years of the legendary garage rock gurus from Atlanta, Georgia. 16 tracks of grimy and chaotic punk, scuzzy and raw, and catchy as hell.

                                                    “Their strongest effort to date.” All Music
                                                    "The band at their trashy best; more melodic but every bit as psychotic. If The Royal Trux had listened to the Troggs instead of the Rolling Stones, they might have recorded this album. This baby is a masterpiece. Unapologetic southern-fried twang, crunching through the gears in a blitz of grimy bravado. Their music twitches with an engaging, wired vigour." ★★★★ Uncut. 

                                                    TRACK LISTING

                                                    Side A
                                                    A1 Sea Of Blasphemy
                                                    A2 Can't Dance
                                                    A3 Boomerang
                                                    A4 Hippie, Hippie, Hoorah
                                                    A5 Not A Problem
                                                    A6 Gung Ho
                                                    A7 Everybody's Doin' It
                                                    A8 Feeling Gay
                                                    Side B
                                                    B1 Take Me Home (Back To Boone)
                                                    B2 Gentle Violence
                                                    B3 She's Gone
                                                    B4 Fairy Stories
                                                    B5 Dirty Hands
                                                    B6 Workin'
                                                    B7 Punk Slime
                                                    B8 Empassant

                                                    Black Lips

                                                    200 Million Thousand - 2023 Reissue

                                                      The follow up to the widely successful ‘Good Bad Not Evil’, the 2009 album is a perfect amalgam of their high-end live shows and subculture songwriting, meshed tightly to the Lips’ distinctive howl. Finally back on vinyl and part of a series of Fire re-issues celebrating 20 years of the legendary garage rock gurus from Atlanta, Georgia. Rolling Stone, Spin, Filter, Magnet, Stop Smiling, The Fader, Anthem, Paste, and The NY Times-approved garage rock veterans’ trashy psyche pop gem. Unapologetic southern-fried twang, crunching through the gears in a haze of psychedelia. 

                                                      TRACK LISTING

                                                      Side A
                                                      A1 Take My Heart
                                                      A2 Drugs
                                                      A3 Starting Over
                                                      A4 Let It Grow
                                                      A5 Trapped In A Basement
                                                      A6 Short Fuse
                                                      A7 I'll Be With You
                                                      Side B
                                                      B1 Big Black Baby Jesus Of Today
                                                      B2 Again & Again
                                                      B3 Old Man
                                                      B4 The Drop I Hold
                                                      B5 Body Combat
                                                      B6 Elijah
                                                      B7 I Saw God 

                                                      Immaterial Possession

                                                      Immaterial Possession

                                                        The debut album from post-folk travellers Immaterial Possession, a quartet, half of whom came from an artist commune and half who were card-carrying Elephant6 alumni. ‘Immaterial Possession’ is a rich tapestry of a record, a gorgeous, melodious return to a time when influences co-habited freely and whatever was close at hand made the music of the day.

                                                        All set to Syd Barrett-era Floyd and Nico with haunting lines, it’s perfectly tinged with gamelan harmonies, evocative Spanish guitars and xylophone. Exuding mystical symbolism; they wear luscious threads, they’re part of something/anything; perhaps a neo-modern-folk commune of artists in search of a canvas to stretch out over their juxtaposed influences.

                                                        Immaterial Possession was conceived by Atlanta natives, Cooper Holmes and Madeline Polites, who met while living together at an Atlanta artist commune that was integrated into the DIY music, theatre, and arts scene. Some years later the duo moved to the neighbouring musical town of Athens, GA. They were soon joined by seasoned drummer, John Spiegel, and eventually fulfilled with multi-instrumentalist Kiran Fernandes (keyboards, clarinets, flutes) - descendant of the Elephant 6 Collective scene.

                                                        It’s eastern, it’s eerie dream pop, it’s spacious and ethereal… A perfectly wild trip, and where it ends is immaterial.

                                                        TRACK LISTING

                                                        A1 Midnight Wander
                                                        A2 See Through Stars
                                                        A3 Tropical Still Life
                                                        A4 In The Loom
                                                        A5 Phase One
                                                        B1 Bosphorus Brine
                                                        B2 Circle Of Bells
                                                        B3 Rising Moons
                                                        B4 Accidental Summoning
                                                        B5 Phase Two
                                                        B6 Nightcap

                                                        Black Lips

                                                        Good Bad Not Evil - 2022 Reissue

                                                          Bending scuzzy boundaries, ‘Good Bad Not Evil’ is a coming-of-age garage rock classic record. Full of hedonistic delinquent anthems, the fourth studio album from Atlanta punks Black Lips reaches it’s 15 year anniversary. This deluxe edition includes unearthed photos and new liner notes from Jared Swilley and King Khan. The second disc features B-sides and rarities including ‘Cruising’, ‘I Wanna Dance With You’ and ‘Leroy Faster’. ‘Good Bad Not Evil’ perfectly encapsulates the disillusionment of the mid-00s America, slammed between warehouse parties, DIY generator shows and scattered party pics, which was recorded in a little house in Atlanta that had been converted into a studio called the Living Room. Referencing Shangri-Las in the title, this is where their knack for garage gems met Motown; with bass heavy grooves (later remixed by Diplo), a certified country twang and unabashed bravado. Instant hits like ‘Veni Vidi Vici’, ‘Cold Hands’, ‘Bad Kids’ and ‘O Katrina!’ immediately became Black Lips staples. This was a band caught in the eye of the storm, the touring continued, the parties didn’t stop, this was a band bending the scuzzy boundaries of their chosen genre. The record was hailed by the likes of Pitchfork, who proclaimed, “Black Lips are a go-to band for vintage lo-fi freaks, and their raucous live shows have helped them cross over outside of crusty dive bars. ‘Good Bad Not Evil’, however, is the record where naysayers, disinterested friends and acquaintances, people on the street, and anyone else within earshot has to sit up, shut up, and listen.” …and, shut up and listen they did.

                                                          Yosa Peit

                                                          Phyton

                                                            Debut from genre-defying producer, Yosa Peit. Laurie Anderson meets Bjork; Prince overlapped with Arthur Russell and the hum of Blue Velvet, with jarred and splintered ambient production reminiscent of Aphex Twin. ‘Phyton’ gets a special expanded edition via Fire Records, featuring unreleased tracks; ‘Tyrann’, a live version of the haunting album track ‘Serpentine’ and end of the night lament, ‘Rise’.

                                                            ‘Phyton’ is a conundrum with its own humour and beauty amid the electronica soundtracking; it’s a record that’s defied genre categories when first released on Tax Free Records two years ago. Yosa’s ascension from singer to producer is now complete.

                                                            “In my head I was making a movie,” Yosa told No Wave magazine, “I dreamed up a Coen Brothers’ movie scene for a few tracks.” The result is a haunting, provocative sound; a soundscape where songs merge and splinter, a trip that’s never predictable.

                                                            "The production is super fresh" Holly Herndon.

                                                            “Warped lo-fi meets glitchy electronica and pop” The Vinyl Factory.

                                                            TRACK LISTING

                                                            A1 Precious Lies
                                                            A2 Serpentine
                                                            A3 Anthy
                                                            A4 Curls
                                                            A5 Leaf I
                                                            B1 Serious People Chuckle
                                                            B2 Elephant
                                                            B3 Leaf II
                                                            B4 Lin
                                                            B5 New Stars
                                                            B6 Palm Tree Antenna
                                                            B7 Tyrann

                                                            Download Extras:
                                                            1. Serpentine (Live Bonus)
                                                            2. Rise (Bonus)

                                                            Fenella

                                                            The Metallic Index

                                                              Jane Weavers experimental ensemble in collaboration with Peter Philipson and Raz Ullah, Fenella returns with a hallucinogenic excursion into ambient textures and hypnagogic drones on new album ‘The Metallic Index’. Taking further steps into their combined compositional universe with this follow-up to 2019’s acclaimed Fehérlófia album.

                                                              Loosely based on a genuine story accounting the short-lived abilities of a young psychic nurse in 1920’s London, Fenella’s niche muse justifies this celebratory return to vinyl but not once does it fall into the supposed tropes of staid hauntological-plunderphonics which repeatedly come to muddy our thirsty streams. Fenella make spirited melodic progressive pop music that pulsates with the same magnetism that fans of Jane Weaver's own The Silver Globe and Modern Kosmology have come to expect and hold closely.

                                                              Handcrafted using a generous archive of some of the best vintage equipment in the country (partly recorded at Soundgas studios in Darkest Derbyshire) the sound structures you hear at the heart of this album form the basis for Fenella's best work yet, while the individual spectral vocalisations and ethereal electronics that circle the room capture this trio's return, as peripheral visions, in full-phantasmic bloom.

                                                              "A sonic exaltation and refinement of craft, going further into the realms of atmospheric abstract cosmology blissfully morphed with the mythopoetic" The Quietus.

                                                              TRACK LISTING

                                                              Side A
                                                              A1 Pulsion (Nurse On Train)
                                                              A2 Instituts Métapsychique
                                                              A3 "A Young Girl Of Medium Height"
                                                              A4 Hexagonal Table
                                                              A5 Telekinetoscopes
                                                              Side B
                                                              B1 Shadow Apparatus
                                                              B2 The Metallic Index
                                                              B3 Lilacs Illuminate In Indigo
                                                              B4 After The Visions
                                                              B5 Stellar In Spectra
                                                              B6 Are They With You? (The Final Chord)

                                                              Josephine Foster

                                                              There Are Eyes Above - 2022 Reissue

                                                                Josephine Foster's peculiar 2000 home recorded debut There Are Eyes Above is an essential introduction to her music that’s unfolded now for over two decades. Released for the first time on vinyl, this limited edition 10-inch pressing comes packaged with brand new artwork and is adorned by one of Josephine’s illustrations.

                                                                Lo-fi and unaffected by tradition or commercialism these initial recordings are sepia-tinted, folk-art music with powered by uke minimalism; it’s outsider music that still doesn't fit in.

                                                                Just 30-minutes caught in time before her 2001 follow up Little Life - this humble first incarnation includes here for posterity super personal lullabies and a glimpse into her songwriting evolution. It’s music from an era that only exists in your mind, with a bow to Tin Pan Alley for good measure.

                                                                This super rare collection, originally only released on CDR and sold at shows, remains an essential part of the curious oeuvre of this unique songwriter and singer.

                                                                “A dissonant soprano and lyrics about benevolence and old-time faith, Foster expertly weaves ancient and modern” The Guardian.

                                                                TRACK LISTING

                                                                Side A
                                                                One Hundred Songs I Sing
                                                                Emily Told Me
                                                                Teeter Totter
                                                                Little Life
                                                                I Am A Guest In Here
                                                                Side B
                                                                Robber Song
                                                                Hey Matthew
                                                                There Are Eyes Above
                                                                Godcake
                                                                Yippee I'm Leaving
                                                                Two Not One

                                                                Giant Sand

                                                                Heartbreak Pass - 2022 Reissue

                                                                  “Gelb's semi-surreal observations lace things together perfectly.” UNCUT

                                                                  Filled with loud and lucky abandon; heady steady and direct singalongs for the heart in constant turmoil. Giant Sand’s esoteric journey to ‘Heartbreak Pass’ is an exotic journey through hails of Youngian guitars, off-the-cuff jazz piano rounds and beautiful alt-country yearning. While containing only new songs for this album, this feels like a greatest hits and as such is a perfect entry point for Giant Sand neophytes. Fire Records give ‘Heartbreak Pass’ a long overdue repress on white vinyl, with new liner notes and updated artwork.

                                                                  There’s a roll of the tongue, a couplet and some convolution underpinning Giant Sand’s 2015 opus ‘Heartbreak Pass’. So the story goes, so legend has it, a mere 30 years into their career, almost ten years ago, Giant Sand were regrouped and, for a fleeting second, someone made sense of it all (the words, the genre swapping sound, the roll call of friends and accomplices, the majesty of polar opposites attracting).

                                                                  On ‘Heartbreak Pass’ the result from this lengthy travelogue is a memoir filled with trinkets exchanged along the way. Sure, the Arizona desert is there, gritty and unforgiving but Howe's one-man-band is joined by a throng of well-wishers, this time around including Steve Shelley (Sonic Youth), Grant-Lee Phillips and Ilse DeLange (Common Linnets), The Voices Of Praise Choir, oft-time collaborator John Parish, Grandaddy’s Jason Lytle, Maggie Bjorklund on pedal steel, Italian singer/songwriter Vinicio Capossela and many more. It’s an album that travels far and shows its road weariness in places but it’s a celebration in all its ragged glory.

                                                                  In his original sleevenotes Howe pondered the fact that “The album is roughly broken into three volumes - loud and lucky abandon; heady steady and direct (Gelb's vision of Americana); and the heart in constant turmoil and something about a transponder.” He summarised: “I can't recommend it, nor do I regret it. It's been one life split into two.”

                                                                  TRACK LISTING

                                                                  A1 Heaventually
                                                                  A2 Texting Feist
                                                                  A3 Hurtin' Habit
                                                                  A4 Transponder
                                                                  A5 Song So Wrong
                                                                  A6 Every Now And Then
                                                                  A7 Man On A String
                                                                  B1 Home Sweat Home
                                                                  B2 Eye Opening
                                                                  B3 Pen To Paper
                                                                  B4 House In Order
                                                                  B5 Gypsy Candle
                                                                  B6 Done

                                                                  Howe Gelb

                                                                  The Coincidentalist And Dust Bowl - 2022 Reissue

                                                                    Released on gold vinyl, ‘The Coincidentalist’ and ‘Dust Bowl’ are two discs of Howe Gelb filled with randomness and happenstance, a typical treasure trove spanning all genres from alt country to Cohen-esque grandeur. They traverse, unflinchingly, his chameleon-like repertoire. This deluxe re-issue includes ‘Dust Bowl’ on vinyl for the very first time, with the records housed in a gatefold sleeve featuring updated artwork and liner notes.

                                                                    ‘The Coincidentalist’, originally released in 2013, features a raft of friends and collaborators including Bonnie Prince Billy, Andrew Bird, M. Ward, Steve Shelley, and Jason Lytle of Grandaddy with John Parrish on mixing duties. Ever the focal point of Giant Sand and Gelb releases, the Arizona Desert serves as a key inspiration for the record, animating the baron landscape with stories of those that have navigated them. Praise for the release was not short, with AllMusic proclaiming that it’s “one of Gelb's most realized efforts; despite its relaxed, airy presentation, it's musically and lyrically provocative, as poetic, strange, and mysterious as the desert itself."

                                                                    The accompanying collection ‘Dust Bowl’ is a personal sketchbook of songs, a more stripped back set than it’s counterpart. Featuring everything from the country blues of ‘Porch Banjo’ and ‘John Deere’, to off-kilter piano ballads like ‘The Old Overrated’ and ‘Reality Or Not’ and the deconstructed desert pop on ‘Forever And A Day’ and the fragile ‘Man On A String’. ‘Dust Bowl’ is an insider’s view of Howe’s songwriting craft, a unique insight into the man himself.

                                                                    “‘Dust Bowl’ was primarily for fans that have followed me for a while. ‘The Coincidentalist’ is for the friends of the fans.” Howe told Under The Radar. While Nightlife magazine reported that; “Without warning, the Giant Sand frontman and polymorphous countryman dropped this compilation of house recordings via Bandcamp… At a time when so much harmless, soulless folk resonates, Howe Gelb is a mandatory point of reference for any fan of the genre.”

                                                                    TRACK LISTING

                                                                    A1 Vortexas (feat Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy)
                                                                    A2 Left Of Center
                                                                    A3 Running Behind
                                                                    A4 The 3 Deaths Of Lucky (feat. KT Tunstall)
                                                                    A5 Unforgivable
                                                                    A6 Instigated Chimes
                                                                    B1 The Coincidentalist (feat. Andrew Bird)
                                                                    B2 Triangulate
                                                                    B3 Picacho Peak
                                                                    B4 An Extended Plane Of Existence
                                                                    B5 Looking That Way
                                                                    C1 Dust Bowl
                                                                    C2 Porch Banjo
                                                                    C3 Lost Love
                                                                    C4 Man On A String
                                                                    C5 Reality Or Not
                                                                    C6 John Deere
                                                                    C7 Windblown Waltz
                                                                    D1 Redelivery Blues
                                                                    D2 Forever And A Day
                                                                    D3 Plane Of Existence
                                                                    D4 A Coffee Song
                                                                    D5 The Old Overrated
                                                                    D6 Mystery Spot
                                                                    D7 Blink Of An Eye

                                                                    Black Lips

                                                                    Apocalypse Love

                                                                      The Black Lips return with their 10th studio effort ‘Apocalypse Love’, scorched with their trademark menace, it cryogenically mutates all recognised musical bases; it spins yarns about vintage Soviet synths, Benzedrine stupors, coup de’ tats, stolen valor and certified destruction, all set against a black setting sun. Since the turn of the decade the band have transformed from austere country pioneers, into a set of Lynchian surrealists, hellbent on recalibrating the history of rock ‘n’ roll. Singer and saxophonist Zumi Rosow muses, “It’s a weird dance record, one that reflects the moment that the world’s in right now…”

                                                                      ‘Apocalypse Love’ is an album that emanates from a dive bar jukebox in the back of your mind; with a playlist that bends between tub thumping doom-glam, Plastic Ono singalongs, cocktail-shaken space age pop, Morricone reverberations and lo-fi outsider acoustic-punk, with mariachi horns, theremins, drum machines and harmonies filtering through the infectious melodies. Stand-out number ‘Among The Dunes’ is an amorphous platform-heeled anthem, a signature sax-fuelled stomper filled with trippy swagger. While opener ‘No Rave’ proffers a hypnotic locked groove, with Cole Alexander’s trademark snarl delivered over a sulphurous wall of distorted hedonism, a dystopian anthem for an apocalyptic manifesto. Meanwhile, the twisted exotica of ‘Whips Of Holly’ with its silver screen façade is like the soundtrack to a classic Theda Bara vamp-fest. As the band venture into their third decade, ‘Apocalypse Love’ is proof that The Black Lips show no sign of slowing down…

                                                                      STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                      Liam says: 10th album from Atlanta outfit Black Lips, 'Apocalypse Love' is a self-proclaimed "weird dance record" - and I'm inclined to agree. It's scuzzy, twisted and has a strange but also sincere innocence to it - like a school disco in the Red Room from Twin Peaks.

                                                                      TRACK LISTING

                                                                      A1. No Rave
                                                                      A2. Love Has Won
                                                                      A3. Stolen Valor
                                                                      A4. Lost Angel
                                                                      A5. Whips Of Holly
                                                                      A6. Apocalypse Love
                                                                      A7. Operation Angela.
                                                                      B1. Crying On A Plane
                                                                      B2. Sharing My Cream
                                                                      B3. Among The Dunes
                                                                      B4. Tongue Tied
                                                                      B5. Antiaris Toxicaria
                                                                      B6. The Concubine 

                                                                      Marina Allen

                                                                      Centrifics

                                                                        LA-based musician Marina Allen’s spectacular debut proper, and follow up to last years acclaimed 18 minute mini-opus, ‘Candlepower’.

                                                                        ‘Centrifics’ is a joyful collection of observations and questions about the self, the world, and how they interact. Awe-inspiring reflections accompany mesmerizing melodies while Allen’s extraordinary range and depth of singing showcases a wide array of influences from Karen Carpenter to Karen Dalton, from Joanna Newsom to Fiona Apple, from Cate Le Bon to Waxahatchee, via Meredith Monk and the New York avant-garde.

                                                                        Produced, engineered and mixed by Chris Cohen. Co-engineered by Jonny Kosmo.

                                                                        TRACK LISTING

                                                                        Side A
                                                                        A1 Celadon
                                                                        A2 Getting Better
                                                                        A3 Or Else
                                                                        A4 Smoke Bush
                                                                        A5 Superreality
                                                                        Side B
                                                                        B1 New Song Rising
                                                                        B2 Halfway Home
                                                                        B3 My Stranger
                                                                        B4 Foul Weather Jacket Drawing
                                                                        B5 Gardiner's Island

                                                                        Air Waves

                                                                        The Dance

                                                                          Heady with hooks and unforgettable melodies, gliding on deeply danceable grooves, always with Air Waves’ innate compassion, concision and uncanny pop sense shining throughout. A masterpiece that’s beautifully simple, instantly accessible and entirely addictive. Featuring Cass Mccombs, Skyler Skjelset (Fleet Foxes, Beach House), Luke Temple, Brian Betancourt (Hospitality, Sam Evian), Rina Mushonga, Frankie Cosmos, Lispector, David Christian, Ethan Sass, and Ben Florencio.

                                                                          ‘The Dance’ has waited three years to see the light of day and it comes to us now, blinking, smiling in the widening light of 2022 feeling more needed and necessary but also more joyous than ever before. It’s both a snapshot of these songs as they were recorded but crucially, in the intervening time those songs have had additional arrangements crafted by Nicole, created remotely and virtually, with a few like-minded collaborators. The result is simultaneously Air Waves freshest, most spontaneous yet finessed album yet.

                                                                          Nicole Schneit released their first independent album in 2009 under the Air Waves moniker, a name inspired by a Guided By Voices song - subsequent albums like 2010’s ‘Dungeon Dots’ (which featured a guest vocal from fellow Brooklynite Sharon Van Etten), 2015’s ‘Parting Glances’ and 2017’s stunning ‘Warrior’ crystallised Schneit’s vision of loose-but-focused, convivial but startling pop. ‘The Dance’ continues that trajectory but finds Schneit opening up their music to a more fluid sense of space and movement, while keeping their lyrical eye between the personal and the political, from the specific to the universal with a haiku-like directness and suggestion.

                                                                          You won’t find a better soundtrack for the solidarity, strength, romance and movement we all need right now than ‘The Dance’ - Air Waves’ best album yet.

                                                                          TRACK LISTING

                                                                          A1. The Roof (feat. Luke Temple & Rina Mushonga)
                                                                          A2. The Dance
                                                                          A3. Star Earring (feat. Lispector)
                                                                          A4. Alien (feat. Cass McCombs)
                                                                          B1. Black Metal Demon (feat. Frankie Cosmos & Merce Lemon)
                                                                          B2. Treehouse
                                                                          B3. Wait
                                                                          B4. The Light
                                                                          B5. Peer Peer

                                                                          Pulp

                                                                          It - 2022 Reissue

                                                                            Pulp’s debut and one of their most honest recordings - capturing a band at the beginning of their startling career. ‘It’ is a gentle, mainly acoustic album that hints at the musical directions Pulp would later pursue. The album touches on the majestic, theatrical ballads of Scott Walker, as well as the stark, folky song poems of Leonard Cohen. Certainly an album by a young band trying to pinpoint their direction, and absorbing many an influence from all around, ‘It’ has aged beautifully into a charming collection.

                                                                            Fire are to reissue Pulp’s 1983 debut album ‘It’ as part of the Fire reissue series with bonus material. Re-mastered and repackaged. New liner notes by Everett True. Featuring 4 Bonus tracks including single version of ‘My Lighthouse’ and alternative mix of ‘Blue Girls’, the previously unreleased ‘Sink Or Swim’ and ‘Please Don’t Worry’ from Pulp’s John Peel session in 1981.

                                                                            TRACK LISTING

                                                                            1. My Lighthouse
                                                                            2. Wishful Thinking
                                                                            3. Joking Aside
                                                                            4. Boats And Trains
                                                                            5. Blue Girls
                                                                            6. Love Love
                                                                            7. In Many Ways
                                                                            8. Looking For Life
                                                                            9. My Lighthouse (Single Version)
                                                                            10. Please Don't Worry
                                                                            11. Blue Girls (Alternative Mix)
                                                                            12. Sink Or Swim

                                                                            Pulp

                                                                            Freaks - 2022 Reissue

                                                                              Fire are to reissue Pulp's 1987 album 'Freaks' as part of the Fire reissue series with a special 2 disc release, with the second bonus disc packed with singles and B-sides from the Freaks era. Pulp had changed significantly since their debut 'It'. By this time every member bar Jarvis had moved on but the addition of Russell Senior proved to be a pivotal turning point for the band. No longer did Pulp sound pastoral, easy-natured; now they were darkly romantic, brooding, noisy and a little bit Gothic, in the way young folk who brush their hair a certain way are always a little bit Gothic.

                                                                              Pulp were out-of-tune with the times: but the times didn't satisfy Pulp. The album is quite marvellous. Most of these songs stand the distance of time: it was here, possibly even more than 1992's Separations, that Pulp started coming into their own as a band with a fully-realised aesthetic. The first disc is the original album, unaltered and in its entirety. The second is a bonus disc comprising of tracks from the two big non-album singles from the same era, 'Little Girl (With Blue Eyes)' and 'Dogs are Everywhere'. Two further b-sides 'Tunnel' and 'Manon' complete the second disc for the definitive 'Freaks' period release. Pulp's 'It' and 'Separations' will be reissued at the same time for the complete Pulp on Fire collection.

                                                                              TRACK LISTING

                                                                              DISC 1 :

                                                                              1. Fairground
                                                                              2. I Want You
                                                                              3. Being Followed Home
                                                                              4. Master Of The Universe
                                                                              5. Life Must Be So Wonderful
                                                                              6. There's No Emotion
                                                                              7. Anorexic Beauty
                                                                              8. The Never Ending Story
                                                                              9. Don't You Know
                                                                              10. They Suffocate At Night.

                                                                              Bonus Disc 2 :

                                                                              11. Little Girl (With Blue Eyes) (BONUS)
                                                                              12. Simultaneous (BONUS)
                                                                              13. Blue Glow (BONUS)
                                                                              14. The Will To Power (BONUS)
                                                                              15. Dogs Are Everywhere (BONUS)
                                                                              16. The Mark Of The Devil (BONUS)
                                                                              17. 97 Lovers (BONUS)
                                                                              18. Aborigine (BONUS)
                                                                              19. Goodnight (BONUS)
                                                                              20. Tunnel (BONUS)
                                                                              21. Manon (BONUS)

                                                                              Pulp

                                                                              Separations - 2022 Reissue

                                                                                Pulp’s 1992 album ‘Separations’ is part of the Fire reissue series with unreleased bonus material. Their third and last album on Fire, Pulp had already transformed from their debut ‘It’ through the dark electronic phase of Freaks and were garnering significant momentum. Now critically acclaimed and with a live reputation matched by only a few, most of the songs on Separations sound fully-realised in that undeniably Pulp manner that was soon to be experienced everywhere. And, for the first time, there was an inescapable disco pulse.

                                                                                This is the transition album where Pulp, caught between a doomed romantic outsider past and an acid-bright future, made an album that brilliantly reflects both. Remastered and repackaged. Liner notes by Everett True. Featuring 4 bonus tracks ‘Death Goes To The Disco’ and ‘Is This House’, as well as an extended version of the single ‘Countdown’ and the previously unreleased ‘Death Comes To Town’. Separations spawned two of Pulps most successful singles to date in ‘Countdown and ‘My Legendary Girlfriend’ with the latter being placed on many top singles of 1991 lists by major music publications. Pulp’s ‘It’ and ‘Freaks’ will be reissued at the same time for the complete Pulp on Fire collection. 

                                                                                TRACK LISTING

                                                                                1. Love Is Blind
                                                                                2. Don't You Want Me Anymore?
                                                                                3. She's Dead
                                                                                4. Separations
                                                                                5. Down By The River
                                                                                6. Countdown
                                                                                7. My Legendary Girlfriend
                                                                                8. Death II
                                                                                9. This House Is Condemned
                                                                                10. Death Goes To The Disco (BONUS)

                                                                                11. Is This House? (BONUS)
                                                                                12. Countdown (BONUS Extended Version)
                                                                                13. Death Comes To Town (BONUS)

                                                                                The Groundhogs

                                                                                Who Will Save The World - Reissue

                                                                                  The final instalment to the trio of masterpieces from the legendary British rock group, The Groundhogs’ gets a reissue on black vinyl for the first time since 1991. Treading more progressive realms ‘Who Will Save The World’ sees Tony McPhee moving away from the blues territory of their earlier releases and towards a heavier more psychedelic sound. Achieving Top 10 album success back in 1972, ‘Who Will Save The World’ is the last record that features the classic line up of Tony McPhee, Pete Cruickshank and Ken Pustelnik.

                                                                                  A definitive collector’s item as part of the ongoing Fire Records catalogue campaign. This special reissue features the iconic artwork with sleeve notes and an interview with the original Marvel artist Neal Adams. Also includes a bonus download of an unreleased live recording from their final live show in Pocono, USA.

                                                                                  TRACK LISTING

                                                                                  Side A

                                                                                  1 Earth Is Not Room Enough
                                                                                  2 Wages Of Peace
                                                                                  3 Body In Mind
                                                                                  4 Music Is The Food Of Thought.

                                                                                  Side B

                                                                                  1 Bog Roll Blues
                                                                                  2 Death Of The Sun
                                                                                  3 Amazing Grace
                                                                                  4 The Grey Maze.

                                                                                  Bonus Track Available As DL Only “Music Is The Food Of Thought” (Live At The Pocono Festival, Pennsylvania, 1972) 

                                                                                  Pere Ubu

                                                                                  390 Degrees Of Simulated Stereo V2.1 - 2022 Reissue

                                                                                    Originally released on vinyl in 1981. Long lost and simply breath taking live Ubu classic culled from 1981 recordings in Cleveland, London and Brussels featuring the band’s original line up. An essential pressing for all fans of the the celebrated post-punk innovators.

                                                                                    TRACK LISTING

                                                                                    Side A.
                                                                                    A1 Non-Alignment Pact
                                                                                    A2 Street Waves
                                                                                    A3 Real World
                                                                                    A4 My Dark Ages
                                                                                    A5 The Modern Dance
                                                                                    A6 Humor Me.
                                                                                    Side B.
                                                                                    B1 Heart Of Darkness
                                                                                    B2 Laughing
                                                                                    B3 Can't Believe It
                                                                                    B4 Over My Head
                                                                                    B5 Sentimental Journey
                                                                                    B6 30 Seconds Over Tokyo 

                                                                                    The Groundhogs

                                                                                    Hogwash - Reissue

                                                                                      Packaged in tri-fold sleeve that replicates the original 1971 release and featuring an extra disc of live BBC recordings from the same era. 50-year anniversary vinyl release of the original power trio’s second incarnation, now expanded with BBC In Concert versions of the album’s key tracks. An epic milestone and key prog rock definer, fusing their blues rock roots and their finely honed electric sound of the early ‘70s. This limited release replicated the original 1971 packaging, with a tri-fold sleeve, an absolute essential for fans of this seminal act

                                                                                      TRACK LISTING

                                                                                      1 I Love Miss Ogyny
                                                                                      2 You Had A Lesson
                                                                                      3 The Ringmaster
                                                                                      4 3744 James Road
                                                                                      5 Sad Is The Hunter
                                                                                      6 S'one Song
                                                                                      7 Earth Shanty
                                                                                      8 Mr. Hooker Sir John
                                                                                      9 Sad Is The Hunter (BBC In Concert, 7th December 1972)
                                                                                      10 I Love Miss Ogyny (BBC In Concert, 7th December 1972)
                                                                                      11 You Had A Lesson (BBC In Concert, 7th December 1972)
                                                                                      12 Earth Shanty (BBC In Concert, 7th December 1972)
                                                                                      13 3744 James Road (BBC In Concert, 7th December 1972)

                                                                                      The Garbage & The Flowers

                                                                                      Cinnamon Sea

                                                                                        ‘Cinnamon Sea’ is the perfect introduction to one of the most mysterious, ever-morphing underground bands from New Zealand. The Garbage and the Flowers make their long awaited return with another psychedelic masterpiece from the band that gave us 1997's cult dreampop gem 'Eyes Rind As If Beggars'. A hybrid fusion of the Velvets, Elephant 6 and any God-fearing stoned strummers you can think of, with a nod to Charlie Manson’s bedside balladry to boot.

                                                                                        On their return, the band hone their songcraft with tracks like ‘Eye Know Who You Are’, a tantalising piece of Mazzy Star on steroids, a spiralling sonic rumble, that reaches a miasmic high on every hummed chorus. It opens the Pandora’s box of this release, a sleight of ear collection of five songs from this cosmology-observing Australia-based outfit. Tracks like ‘Red Star’ exist in a land where sound levels are destroyed by savage birds. ‘On The Radio’ trips into an untuned lagoon. There’s a quasi-religious zeal to proceedings, a nod to Sterling Morrison’s Velvet strum elsewhere, everything that would have been key to the Elephant 6 conglomerate not so long ago, maybe, if you can even imagine, My Bloody Valentine unplugged.

                                                                                        ‘Cinnamon Sea’ was recorded in an abandoned courthouse in Freyerstown, a ghostly village in Victoria’s Goldfields in Southeast Australia, where you’re more likely to meet giant grey kangaroos bounding on its dusty main street than tottering prospectors these days. It unravels with claustrophobic glee as we traverse the structured climes of exemplary songwriting seasoned with the salt of improvisation. This from a band who previously released an album famously dubbed ‘Stoned Rehearsal’. It closes with the track ‘Jacob B’, a melancholy tale that’s a hybrid of Manson’s troubled tunes and the psychedelic folk songs of Quicksilver’s Dino Valente.

                                                                                        File under: outsider music for insiders.

                                                                                        TRACK LISTING

                                                                                        Side A
                                                                                        Eye Know Who You Are
                                                                                        Cinnamon Sea
                                                                                        Red Star
                                                                                        Side B
                                                                                        On The Radio
                                                                                        Jacob B

                                                                                        Hater

                                                                                        Sincere

                                                                                          A reawakening for the Swedish visionaries, Sincere solidifies their impressive trajectory in a fuzzed out haze of dark and arresting shoegaze pop. An expansive trip through noisier, bittersweet pop realms that recalls My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive and Deerhunter.

                                                                                          Underpinning everything there’s a continuing sense of drama throughout; richly textured crescendos, chiming guitars and delicate melodies are guided by Caroline Landahl’s tender yet sharpened vocals. Sincere is joyously effervescent, but with a dark underbelly where fury manifests in a swirl of entrancing and propulsive percussion.

                                                                                          A gorgeous and dazzling piece of aching romanticism, destined to feature on a thousand mixtapes.

                                                                                          Recorded last year in Malmö, Hater welcomed two new band members and those early day sparks saw them quickly turning demos into fully-formed new songs that appear on the record. Sincere was produced by long-time collaborator Joakim Lindberg and was mixed and mastered by John Cornfield, whose credits include Ride, The Stone Roses and Robert Plant.

                                                                                          TRACK LISTING

                                                                                          Side A
                                                                                          A1 Something
                                                                                          A2 I'm Yours Baby
                                                                                          A3 Bad Luck
                                                                                          A4 Proven Wrong
                                                                                          Side B
                                                                                          B1 Brave Blood
                                                                                          B2 Far From A Mind
                                                                                          B3 Summer Turns To Heartburn
                                                                                          B4 Renew, Reject
                                                                                          B5 Hopes High

                                                                                          50 Foot Wave

                                                                                          Power + Light (RSD22 EDITION)

                                                                                            THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2022 EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

                                                                                            1000 pressed. A much sought-after Kristin Hersh side project. Black Vinyl LP. Back on vinyl for this bracing, ever twitching opus made of seven fluid pieces that fold into one continuous mantra. An essential release from the Throwing Musesí offshoot helmed by Kristin Hersh and Bernard Georges, with Chalk Farmís Rob Ahlers on drums.

                                                                                            "Menacing, stalking, spirals of lean, hungry riffs." Drowned In Sound 9/10. 



                                                                                            TRACK LISTING

                                                                                            1 Medicine Rush
                                                                                            2 Honeysuckle
                                                                                            3 Power+Light
                                                                                            4 Skeleton Key
                                                                                            5 Broke
                                                                                            6 Wax, 7 Sun Dog Coma

                                                                                            50 Foot Wave

                                                                                            Bath White (RSD22 EDITION)

                                                                                              THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2022 EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

                                                                                              1000 pressed. Rare EP from this much sought-after Kristin Hersh side project. Black Vinyl LP. Back on vinyl for this Kristin Hersh fronted project, a super rare 2016 EP of enchanting and exhilarating sounds that shift from dreamy and emotional melancholy to jagged and almost Neu!-like rhythms that evolve behind her pointed prose and astute one-liners. A rush to the head thatís caustic yet comforting. 

                                                                                              TRACK LISTING

                                                                                              1 Bath White
                                                                                              2 God's Not A Dick
                                                                                              3 Human
                                                                                              4 Ratted Out
                                                                                              5 St.Christopher
                                                                                              6 Sun Salute

                                                                                              50 Foot Wave

                                                                                              Black Pearl

                                                                                                ‘Black Pearl’ is the brand new album from 50 Foot Wave: Kristin Hersh’s ‘other’ band - active since 2003, with fellow Throwing Muses’ member Bernard Georges on bass and drummer Rob Ahlers. A sonic trip from the heavy, echoey riff of ‘Staring Into The Sun’ with all of its grunge melancholy and dronecore menace to the perfectly baroque ‘Hog Child’ with its spidery guitar that dissolves into motorik bass and drums.

                                                                                                Hailed in various quarters as “an outlet for the material deemed too weird or wild for Throwing Muses”, their “menacing, stalking, spirals of lean, hungry riffs, set alight” as “feedback rips into the fragile melody.”

                                                                                                50 Foot Wave continue to traverse the rigid tension of their own sound. They remain detuned and discordant at will.

                                                                                                STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                Barry says: It's been quite the week for heavy new music, with Kristin Hersch's band putting out this absolutely stunning mix of grooving post-rock and angular hardcore on the ever reliable Fire records. Roaringly heavy but imbued with myriad moments of paddling, Isis-like downtuned post-metal business. Really, very good indeed.

                                                                                                TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                Side A
                                                                                                A1 Staring Into The Sun
                                                                                                A2 Hog Child
                                                                                                A3 Fly Down South
                                                                                                A4 Black Pearl
                                                                                                Side B
                                                                                                B1 Broken Sugar
                                                                                                B2 Blush
                                                                                                B3 Double Barrel

                                                                                                Pere Ubu

                                                                                                Nuke The Whales 2006-2014

                                                                                                  Rewriting the history of music, Pere Ubu continue to confound convention and shift personnel. The next box set in Fire Records’ reissue series, ‘Nuke The Whales’ houses 4 LPs originally released between 2006 and 2014 –
                                                                                                  'Why I LUV Women’, 'Carnival Of Souls’, ‘Lady Of Shanghai’ and Long Live Pere Ubu!’

                                                                                                  ‘Nuke The Whales,’ is a nod of respect to a couple in Cleveland who would daub such messages over the big news stations’ advertising boards. “Very few bands display such dedication to constant self-reinvention as Pere Ubu” The Quietus.

                                                                                                  All four albums have been remixed and remastered by original Pere Ubu member David Thomas. ‘Why I LUV Women’, originally released on Glitterhouse in 2006, gains its first vinyl release. "Spews 11 tunes of arcane lyrics and dense music” shrieked The Cleveland Gazaette.

                                                                                                  It’s joined by ‘Long Live Pere Ubu’ a soundtrack to a musical adaptation of the play. “Skronking, squalling rhythms and melodic snippets undulating round a pulsating soundscape." Record Collector

                                                                                                  And ‘Lady From Shanghai’, their Fire debut for Fire in 2013. Originally released on the 35th anniversary of the group's debut, ‘The Modern Dance’, a latter day re-evaluation of the unprompted dance genre.

                                                                                                  And its follow up ‘Carnival Of Souls’, a haunting “underscore’ to a tale of alienation, it “combines metallic percussion, spare guitars and David Thomas' muttered vocals into something rustic and rickety, yet threatening at a moment's notice.” AllMusic.

                                                                                                  TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                  Disc 1 - Why I LUV Women
                                                                                                  A1 Two Girls (One Bar)
                                                                                                  A2 Babylonian Warehouses
                                                                                                  A3 Blue Velvet
                                                                                                  A4 Caroleen
                                                                                                  A5 Flames Over Nebraska
                                                                                                  B1 Love Song
                                                                                                  B2 Stolen Cadillac
                                                                                                  B3 Mona
                                                                                                  B4 Synth Farm
                                                                                                  B5 Texas Overture

                                                                                                  Disc 2 - Lady From Shanghai
                                                                                                  C1 Thanks
                                                                                                  C2 Free White
                                                                                                  C3 Feuksly Ma'am, The Hearing
                                                                                                  C4 Mandy
                                                                                                  C5 Musicians Are Scum
                                                                                                  C6 Another One
                                                                                                  D1 And Then Nothing Happened
                                                                                                  D2 Road Trip Of Bipasha Ahmed
                                                                                                  D3 Lampshade Man
                                                                                                  D4 414 Seconds
                                                                                                  D5 The Carpenter Sun

                                                                                                  Disc 3 - Carnival Of Souls
                                                                                                  E1 Golden Surf II
                                                                                                  E2 Drag The River
                                                                                                  E3 Irene
                                                                                                  E4 Road To Utah
                                                                                                  E5 Throb Array
                                                                                                  F1 Visions Of The Moon
                                                                                                  F2 Dr Faustus
                                                                                                  F3 Bus Station
                                                                                                  F4 Carnival
                                                                                                  F5 Moonstruck

                                                                                                  Disc 4 - Long Live Pere Ubu!
                                                                                                  G1 Ubu Overture
                                                                                                  G2 Song Of The Grocery Police
                                                                                                  G3 Banquet Of The Butchers
                                                                                                  G4 Tear Your Eyes Out
                                                                                                  G5 March Of Greed
                                                                                                  G6 Big Sombrero
                                                                                                  G7 Bring Me The Head
                                                                                                  G8 Alienating The Audience
                                                                                                  H1 Road To Reason
                                                                                                  H2 Slowly I Turn
                                                                                                  H3 Watching The Pigeons
                                                                                                  H4 The Story So Far
                                                                                                  H5 Snowy Livonia, Pt 1
                                                                                                  H6 Elsinore & Beyond

                                                                                                  Pictish Trail

                                                                                                  Island Family

                                                                                                    Island Family is the fifth album from Isle-of-Eigg dwelling electro-acoustic psych-pop wonder Pictish Trail, AKA Johnny Lynch. A strange, unpredictable, sardonic and yet deeply personal record inspired by all from Fever Ray to The Flaming Lips, Liars, Mercury Rev and Beck, Island Family is Pictish Trail’s contrarian view of arcadia; a search for the euphoric in the bucolic, bound up in sometimes conflicting ideas and feelings around nature and environment, sincerity and artifice, escapism and belonging. It’s an album about how no man can remain an island, however hard he might try.

                                                                                                    Released by Fire Records, with support from Johnny’s own label Lost Map, and produced by long-term collaborator Rob Jones (The Voluntary Butler Scheme, The Gene Dudley Group), ‘Island Family’ opens with its title track, a song of death, ghosts and the ties that bind, fusing abrasive electronic beats with a tongue-in-cheek fireside folk refrain and the haunted ice cream van melody of a digitally reincarnated traditional Scottish jig. A purgative surrender to nature’s whim driven by a clattering machine drumbeat rolled in a puddle of filthy dirty fuzz, ‘Natural Successor’ is five-and-a-half-minutes of cathartic churning bass.

                                                                                                    ‘In The Land of The Dead’ is an eight-bit glitch-core reflection on island party excesses spasming into existential dread and regret, suitably accompanied by a funereal mariachi band. It’s followed by the epic ‘It Came Back’, the understated verses and arms-aloft falsetto chorus of which are accompanied by a tense, foreboding bass-driven electro hip hop instrumental with (spoiler) a brain-shattering industrial-metal meltdown. ’Melody Something’ is the album’s purest moment, a cautiously uplifting solar-powered-ballad about losing track of time in the cycle of the seasons, and the gap between memory and reality. Shapeshifting closer ‘Remote Control’ is a channel hopping cabin-fever-dream flipping from warped boyband ballad to deep-fried fuzz pop.

                                                                                                    STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                    Barry says: The latest outing in the Pictish Trail odyssey takes the blippy, 8-bit sounds of 202's 'Thumb World' and winds them around a core of wicker-folk psychedlia and oddball glitched electronics for stalwart label, Fire Records. It's both wonderfully odd and stunningly melodic in parts, but beautifully balanced with just the right amount of syncopated oddity and swimming lysergic folk.

                                                                                                    TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                    Side A
                                                                                                    A1 Island Family
                                                                                                    A2 Natural Successor
                                                                                                    A3 The River It Runs Inside Of Me
                                                                                                    A4 In The Land Of The Dead
                                                                                                    A5 It Came Back
                                                                                                    Side B
                                                                                                    B1 Thistle
                                                                                                    B2 Melody Something
                                                                                                    B3 Nuclear Sunflower Swamp
                                                                                                    B4 Green Mountain
                                                                                                    B5 Remote Control

                                                                                                    The Nightingales

                                                                                                    King Rocker (Soundtrack)

                                                                                                      Comedian Stewart Lee and director Michael Cumming (Brass Eye, Toast Of London) investigate a missing piece of punk history. Robert Lloyd, best known for fronting cult Birmingham bands The Prefects and The Nightingales, has survived under the radar for over four decades. But how, if at all, does Robert want to be remembered? The anti-rockumentary ‘King Rocker’ weaves the story of Birmingham’s undervalued underdog autodidact into that of the city’s forgotten public sculpture of King Kong, eschewing the celebrity interview and archive-raid approach for a free-associating bricolage of Indian food, bewildered chefs, vegetable gardening, prescription medicines, pop stardom and pop art. All of the highlights from the film are here, along with rarities which won’t appear on any of the deluxe reissues of the Nightingales’ catalogue, among them 7″ versions of “Use Your Loaf”, the Bob Luman hit “Let’s Think About Living” and “Black Country”, a glam remix of crowd favourite “Thick And Thin” and a version of Christy & Emily’s “Ghost” which rivals the Nightingales’ take on TLC’s “Unpretty” for sheer beauty. The only act with roots in the punk era that have gone on to make records more captivating, cutting and entertaining today than at any point in their past; 2022 will be a busy year for the Nightingales, with months of live dates planned, a limited edition remix 12″, deluxe reissues of both ‘Hysterics’ and ‘In The Good Old Country Way’, and a hardcover book collecting Robert’s lyrics.

                                                                                                      STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                      Barry says: A selection of brilliant Nightingales rarities and pieces from the film of the same name, written about Robert Lloyd of The Nightingales and The Prefects. A wonderful audio document in it's own right, and a perfect companion to a very funny film.

                                                                                                      TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                      A1 Use Your Loaf (7” Version)
                                                                                                      A2 Surplus And Scarcity (Live)
                                                                                                      A3 What A Carry On
                                                                                                      A4 Let's Think About Living (7” Version)
                                                                                                      A5 Black Country (7” Version)
                                                                                                      A6 Ghost
                                                                                                      B1 Born Again In Birmingham
                                                                                                      B2 Overreactor
                                                                                                      B3 Thick And Thin (Glam Version)
                                                                                                      B4 Chaff
                                                                                                      B5 The Desperate Quartet
                                                                                                      B6 Gales Doc

                                                                                                      The Lemonheads

                                                                                                      It’s A Shame About Ray - 30th Anniversary Edition

                                                                                                        Lemonheads’ seminal album ‘It’s A Shame About Ray’, lovingly reissued for it’s 30th Anniversary. The long overdue reissue includes a slew of extra material, including an unreleased ‘My Drug Buddy’ KCRW session track from 1992 featuring Juliana Hatfield, B-sides from singles ‘It’s A Shame About Ray’ and ‘Confetti’, a track from the ‘Mrs. Robinson/Being Round’ EP, alongside demos that are released for the first time on vinyl. 

                                                                                                        Described by music journalist and author Everett True as “A 30-minute insight into what it’s like to live hard and fast and loose and happy with like-minded buddies, fuelled by a shared love for similar bands and drugs and booze and freedom.”. ‘It's A Shame About Ray’ had a considerable impact back in those heady, carefree days of '92, the record perfectly captures Dando’s ability to effortlessly encapsulate teenage longing and lust over the course of a two-minute pop song.

                                                                                                        Singles such as 'My Drug Buddy' and the breezy perfect pop of the title track might stand out (plus the add-on of 'Mrs. Robinson' which later copies included), but the album's real strength lies in the tracks in-between; the truly fantastic 'Confetti' (written about Evan's parents' divorce), and the eye-wateringly casual acoustic cover of 'Frank Mills' (from the "hippie" musical Hair), a version that seems to resonate with every ounce of pathos and emotion felt for the lost 1960s generation. To hear Evan Dando sing lines like 'I love him/but it embarrasses me/To walk down the street with him/He lives in Brooklyn somewhere/And he wears his white crash helmet' is to truly appreciate how wonderful and tantalising pop music can be. Then, there's the rush of insurgency and brattishness on the wonderfully truncated 'Bit Part'; the topsy-turvy 'Ceiling Fan In My Spoon'... this was male teenage skinny-tie pop music on a level of brilliance with The Kinks, early Undertones, Wipers.

                                                                                                        TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                        It's A Shame About Ray
                                                                                                        1 Rockin' Stroll
                                                                                                        2 Confetti
                                                                                                        3 It's A Shame About Ray
                                                                                                        4 Rudderless
                                                                                                        5 My Drug Buddy
                                                                                                        6 The Turnpike Down
                                                                                                        7 Bit Part
                                                                                                        8 Alison's Starting To Happen
                                                                                                        9 Hannah & Gabi
                                                                                                        10 Kitchen
                                                                                                        11 Ceiling Fan In My Spoon
                                                                                                        12 Frank Mills

                                                                                                        Essential Extras
                                                                                                        1 Mrs Robinson
                                                                                                        2 Shakey Ground
                                                                                                        3 My Drug Buddy (KCRW Session, 1992)
                                                                                                        4 Knowing Me, Knowing You (Acoustic)
                                                                                                        5 Confetti (Acoustic)
                                                                                                        6 Alison's Starting To Happen (Acoustic)
                                                                                                        7 Divan

                                                                                                        Demo Recordings
                                                                                                        1 It's A Shame About Ray (Demo)
                                                                                                        2 Rockin' Stroll (Demo)
                                                                                                        3 My Drug Buddy (Demo)
                                                                                                        4 Hannah & Gabi (Demo)
                                                                                                        5 Kitchen (Demo)
                                                                                                        6 Bit Part (Demo)
                                                                                                        7 Rudderless (Demo)
                                                                                                        8 Ceiling Fan In My Spoon (Demo)
                                                                                                        9 Confetti (Demo)

                                                                                                        Stealing Sheep And The Radiophonic Workshop

                                                                                                        La Planète Sauvage

                                                                                                          René Laloux’s celebrated 1973 sci-fi animation ‘La Planète Sauvage (Fantastic Planet)’, is overhauled with a re-imagined soundtrack by electronic modernists Stealing Sheep and legendary sound innovators The Radiophonic Workshop. This exclusive release is part of Fire Records’ re-imagined score series, and is released on Delia Derbyshire Day 2021.

                                                                                                          It’s a real pre-Avatar conundrum that Stealing Sheep, with the help of Bob Earland, Dick Mills and Roger Limb from the Radiophonic Workshop, unravel. Creating an ethereal excursion that’s narrated by Roger Limb; like a futuristic Martin Denny, or Dr Who gone ambient techno, with a hint of Forbidden Planet 50 years on. It’s an analogue swirl set in an off-world paradise; a field recording from the future. This is a creative, generation-spanning, union brought together to score this unique cult film.

                                                                                                          A must for fans of psyche electronica and Stealing Sheep’s formidable ‘Big Wows’ album.

                                                                                                          ‘La Planète Sauvage’ is a thing of ambient beauty punctuated with electronic earworms that switches from intensely ominous to otherworldly dream like moments.

                                                                                                          “No institution has had a greater impact on the development of electronic music than the BBC Radiophonic Workshop.” The Vinyl Factory

                                                                                                          “Stealing Sheep devour a broad range of styles, incorporating everything from the dark dance-pop of Grace Jones to the experimentations of Radiophonic Workshop pioneer Delia Derbyshire and John Carpenter soundtracks.” The Guardian.


                                                                                                          TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                          Side A
                                                                                                          A1 Opening Credits
                                                                                                          A2 The Chase
                                                                                                          A3 Saved/Captured
                                                                                                          A4 The Bracelet
                                                                                                          A5 Council Of Draags Pt.I
                                                                                                          A6 Terr & Tiwa
                                                                                                          A7 The Knowledge Pt.I
                                                                                                          Side B
                                                                                                          B1 The Fight
                                                                                                          B2 The Knowledge Pt. II
                                                                                                          B3 The Initiation
                                                                                                          B4 Escape
                                                                                                          B5 The Big Tree
                                                                                                          B6 The Ritual
                                                                                                          B7 The Duel
                                                                                                          Side C
                                                                                                          C1 Theft/Zarek
                                                                                                          C2 The Bird
                                                                                                          C3 The Free Oms
                                                                                                          C4 The Purge
                                                                                                          C5 The Journey To Ygam
                                                                                                          Side D
                                                                                                          D1 The City Of Free Oms
                                                                                                          D2 Robot Attack
                                                                                                          D3 The Fantastic Planet
                                                                                                          D4 The Final Battle
                                                                                                          D5 Terr C6 Council Of Draags Pt.II
                                                                                                          D6 End Credits

                                                                                                          Modern Studies

                                                                                                          We Are There

                                                                                                            Through the hazy daze of a smoky folk opus, Modern Studies craft rich soundtracks, stuttering Super-8 sketches from a washed-out world of melancholy, hand-tinted and tantalising. Lullaby couplets blossom into gorgeous chamber pop melodies, the drama unfolding behind Emily Scott’s plaintive vocal; part Julie London, part Sandy Denny, a little bit Kate Bush, with a hushed sigh of Joni.

                                                                                                            Sweeping strings carry them into unchartered terrain on their new album ‘We Are Here’, flying high above their psych-folk roots, it’s an epic journey that’s exquisitely delivered, transcending categories, nodding to Brubeck, Low, Talk Talk, Jim O’Rourke and Pentangle, making music that is ready to cross over in these modern times with songs of substance.

                                                                                                            TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                            Side A
                                                                                                            A1 Sink Into
                                                                                                            A2 Light A Fire
                                                                                                            A3 Comfort Me
                                                                                                            A4 Two Swimmers
                                                                                                            A5 Wild Ocean
                                                                                                            Side B
                                                                                                            B1 Open Face
                                                                                                            B2 Won't Be Long
                                                                                                            B3 Mothlight
                                                                                                            B4 Do You Wanna
                                                                                                            B5 Winter Springs

                                                                                                            Josephine Foster

                                                                                                            Godmother

                                                                                                              A beautifully observed baroque masterpiece, part dream pop, part futuristic psych-folk with ambient synths and Josephine Foster’s plaintive guitar. Godmother is a slowly unfolding song cycle that marries a myriad of previous musical escapades with electronic experiments.

                                                                                                              Exploring new horizons on this record, it sees Foster at her most expressive and hypnotic. Now back home in the mountains of Colorado, Josephine’s 20-year journey to this new nirvana becomes enthralled further with a symphony of synths that sound like they are played in some neighbouring netherworld, through cotton gauze. It’s music that’s devotional, spiritual, a fitting soundtrack for any journey within or without, a means to experience places and vibrations beyond the boundary of time and space.

                                                                                                              Discussing the record, Josephine explains “You may notice me travelling a bit further sonically from our precious earth, aspiring to rise into broader astral perspective, to contemplate the light and origins of it all, as I do believe there is a grand source that is the sum of it all, us all. Performing all the parts on this recording, you may sense me focussing gestures of my singing into the instrumentation, which is a very great relief indeed, as the voice has such grand dreams to be set free.”

                                                                                                              TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                              1. Hum Menina
                                                                                                              2. Sparks Fly
                                                                                                              3. Guardian Angel
                                                                                                              4. Old Teardrop
                                                                                                              5. Flask Of Wine
                                                                                                              6. Gold Entwine
                                                                                                              7. Dali Rama
                                                                                                              8. Nun Of The Above
                                                                                                              9. The Sum Of Us All

                                                                                                              Lucy Gooch

                                                                                                              Rushing EP (Expanded Edition)

                                                                                                                Following Lucy Gooch’s acclaimed ‘Rain’s Break’, her first release on Fire Records earlier this year, the artist’s acclaimed debut EP ‘Rushing’ is revisited with new artwork and a brand new track, ‘Orthione’.

                                                                                                                “Lucy’s sound marries the etheral qualities of ambient music with buoyant, effortless pop” Crack

                                                                                                                ‘Rushing’ in its original shorter five-track incarnation was heralded as a touchstone beneath the cascading torrent of modern times and an oasis for turbulent times. An intimate collection of songs built around Lucy’s emotive vocals and unique ambient dream pop, the newly added stand-out track ‘Orthione’ trips into the esoteric world of Laurie Anderson and Philip Glass; here her voice is the grounding force that travels to a space that heals and grows.

                                                                                                                TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                Side A
                                                                                                                1. My Lights Kiss Your Thoughts Every Moment
                                                                                                                2. Rushing
                                                                                                                3. Stalagmites & Helicitites

                                                                                                                Side B
                                                                                                                4. Sun
                                                                                                                5. There Is A Space In Between
                                                                                                                6. Orthione

                                                                                                                The Dream Syndicate

                                                                                                                What Can I Say? No Regrets... Out Of The Grey + Live, Demos & Outtakes

                                                                                                                  The Dream Syndicate’s 1986 album is back on CD for the first time in 24 years. Hidden inside of ‘Out of the Grey’ are some of Steve Wynn’s strongest songs - “Slide Away” is delightful pop, “Now I Ride Alone” is moody and intense “like the hardboiled typewriting of novelists Jim Thompson, Ross MacDonald, and James Cain” that Wynn dug back in July ‘85. The epic “Boston” imagines the era in which Van Morrison was holed-up in that city circa 1967-68 writing the songs that comprised Astral Weeks while “50 in a 25 Zone” is a vehicle for a band-driven, slow burn groove.

                                                                                                                  Deliciously remastered with new liner notes from the band’s historian Pat Thomas, the package compiles 51 songs spread across 3 CDs, including a previously unreleased live album (from July 1985) and many unreleased demos and out-takes. The deluxe reissue also features interviews with Steve Wynn, Mark Walton, Paul Cutler, and Dennis Duck - plus plenty of rare photos.

                                                                                                                  Discs 2 and 3 reveal a wealth of unreleased material – including a never-before-heard July 1985 live album which has the ‘balls to the wall’ energy hard not captured in the studio. The songs were so fresh on that July night - they had not been recorded in the studio yet. On Disc 3, you’ll hear alternate versions of several Out of the Grey songs recorded as ‘demos’ before the album versions. These studio versions also have the raw energy of the live show, plus the band plays rare cover versions by Pink Floyd, Cream, Santana, Green on Red, Alice Cooper, Temptations, and Dolly Parton.

                                                                                                                  51 songs including 34 never-before heard Dream Syndicate recordings – released under the title of: What Can I Say? no regrets... Out of the Grey + live, demos & outtakes… in other words, you need this!

                                                                                                                  TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                  Disc 1 – Out Of The Grey
                                                                                                                  1 Out Of The Grey
                                                                                                                  2 Forest For The Trees
                                                                                                                  3 50 In A 25 Zone
                                                                                                                  4 Boston
                                                                                                                  5 Blood Money
                                                                                                                  6 Slide Away
                                                                                                                  7 Dying Embers
                                                                                                                  8 Now I Ride Alone
                                                                                                                  9 Drinking Problem
                                                                                                                  10 Dancing Blind
                                                                                                                  11 You Can't Forget
                                                                                                                  12 Let It Rain
                                                                                                                  13 Cinnamon Girl
                                                                                                                  14 Ballad Of Dwight Frye
                                                                                                                  15 Shake Your Hips
                                                                                                                  16 I Won't Forget
                                                                                                                  17 The Lonely Bull

                                                                                                                  Disc 2 - Live At Scorgies NY, 1985
                                                                                                                  1 Out Of The Grey (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  2 50 In A 25 Zone (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  3 That's What You Always Say (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  4 Slide Away (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  5 Dancing Blind (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  6 Blood Money (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  7 Dying Embers (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  8 It Hits You Again (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  9 Now I Ride Alone (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  10 John Coltrane Stereo Blues (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  11 Still Holding Onto You (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  12 When You Smile (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)
                                                                                                                  13 Days Of Wine And Roses (Live At Scorgies NY, 1985)

                                                                                                                  Disc 3 - Odds & Sods
                                                                                                                  1 Here On Earth As Well (Demo, 1985)
                                                                                                                  2 Dancing Blind (Demo, 1985)
                                                                                                                  3 Blood Money (Demo, 1985)
                                                                                                                  4 Dying Embers (Demo, 1985)
                                                                                                                  5 Slide Away (Demo, 1985)
                                                                                                                  6 It Hits You Again (Demo, 1985)
                                                                                                                  7 Now I Ride Alone (Demo, 1985)
                                                                                                                  8 Eighteen
                                                                                                                  9 Another Brick In The Wall
                                                                                                                  10 Brain Damage
                                                                                                                  11 Out Of The Grey Waltz
                                                                                                                  12 The Munster's Theme Song
                                                                                                                  13 Sixteen Ways
                                                                                                                  14 Papa Was A Rolling Stone
                                                                                                                  15 Low Rider
                                                                                                                  16 Papa Jam
                                                                                                                  17 I Ain't Got Nobody
                                                                                                                  18 Jeannie's Afraid Of The Dark
                                                                                                                  19 Badge
                                                                                                                  20 Dancing Blind (Live At The Stone SF, 1984)
                                                                                                                  21 Blood Money (Live At The Stone SF, 1984)

                                                                                                                  The Groundhogs

                                                                                                                  Roadhogs: Live From Richmond To Pocono

                                                                                                                    An essential rock artefact tracing The Groundhogs from their pre - ‘Thank Christ For The Bomb’ blues roots to the final live show for the classic line up of Tony McPhee (guitar and vocals), Pete Cruikshank (bass) and Ken Pustelnik (drums). Never before heard recordings from the Warner Brothers’ vaults including a vintage 1969 set from their show at the Richmond Athletic Ground (AKA The Crawdaddy Club) and their final explosive set at the Pocono Raceway track. Includes the live debut of what would become the anthemic ‘Cherry Red’ and McPhee’s seismic destruction of ‘Amazing Grace’. A career-spanning gem from the ultimate heavy rock power trio book-ending 976 days and 250-plus live shows. “In their stage act they concentrate on being as heavy and as hard-hitting as possible.” The Scene magazine. “Performing on stage we feel that the emphasis is on excitement so we play the numbers that involve the greatest amount of movement and dynamics,” Tony McPhee told Star Pop.

                                                                                                                    TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                    A1 Cherry Red (Richmond Athletic Ground, London - 1969)
                                                                                                                    A2 Mistreated (Richmond Athletic Ground, London - 1969)
                                                                                                                    A3 Natchez Burning (Richmond Athletic Ground, London - 1969)
                                                                                                                    B1 BDD (Richmond Athletic Ground, London - 1969)
                                                                                                                    B2 Times (Richmond Athletic Ground, London - 1969) 
                                                                                                                    C1 Still A Fool (Richmond Athletic Ground, London - 1969) Side 
                                                                                                                    D1 Group Intro (Richmond Athletic Ground, London - 1969)
                                                                                                                    D2 No More Doggin' (Richmond Athletic Ground, London - 1969) 
                                                                                                                    E1 Eccentric Man (Pocono Raceway, Pennsylvania - 8th July 1972)
                                                                                                                    E2 Music Is The Food Of Thought (Pocono Raceway, Pennsylvania - 1972)
                                                                                                                    E3 Cherry Red, Split Part 2 (Pocono Raceway, Pennsylvania - 1972) 
                                                                                                                    F1 Still A Fool, Amazing Grace (Pocono Raceway, Pennsylvania - 1972)

                                                                                                                    Marta Del Grandi

                                                                                                                    Until We Fossilize

                                                                                                                      ‘Until We Fossilize’ is the debut album from Marta Del Grandi, an eclectic singer songwriter from Italy. This is an award-winning jazz vocalist set in new territory, crossing borders of genre and style from West Coast ‘60s to ambient exotica, from plaintive Lynchian etherealism to dramatic Morricone scores. Marta gathers influences from near and far to create a unique genre-splicing style who’s now travelling her own unique and unchartered path.

                                                                                                                      Newly signed to Fire Records, this debut is an unravelling of time and distance; a breath taking journey from mainland Europe to the Far East and back again, delivered as an eerie, soundtrack by a captivating vocalist. A self-produced gem; filled with lush strings and electronic ambience and an eclectic vocal that transcends boundaries.

                                                                                                                      Lead single ‘Amethyst’ takes inspiration by the myth of Amethyst, filled with Greek mythology, touching the wildest manifestation of imagination, it’s the story of a woman who frees herself from the expectations imposed on her by patriarchy. Composed with Indian drummer Tarun Balani, Marta sounds like Sandy Denny backed by Eno on Gamelan with a nod to Sun Ra.

                                                                                                                      ‘Until We Fossilize’ is a lyrically aware set of dramas littered with life-affirming couplets over gorgeous, dramatic turns.

                                                                                                                      “It’s modern and ancestral at the same time.”

                                                                                                                      STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                      Patrick says: Del Grandi flirts with exotica, ambient, Mediterranean and West Coast moods on this LP, providing an accidental Balearic hit.

                                                                                                                      TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                      Side A
                                                                                                                      A1 Taller Than His Shadow
                                                                                                                      A2 Shy Heart
                                                                                                                      A3 Amethyst
                                                                                                                      A4 Swim To Me

                                                                                                                      Side B
                                                                                                                      B1 Somebody New
                                                                                                                      B2 Lullaby Firefly
                                                                                                                      B3 Birdsong
                                                                                                                      B4 Totally Fine

                                                                                                                      Arizona Amp & Alternator

                                                                                                                      Arizona Amp And Alternator

                                                                                                                        1000 copies pressed. Fist time on vinyl. Double debut from Howe Gelb’s one-off project that features members or Arcade Fire, Grandaddy, Scout Niblett and M Ward among others. Featuring extensive notes and interviews with the collaborators, exploring how the whole thing was put together.

                                                                                                                        TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                        Side A.

                                                                                                                        1 Velvet And Pearl
                                                                                                                        2 Where The Wind Turns The Skin To Leather
                                                                                                                        3 AAAA (1)
                                                                                                                        4 Low Spark Of High Heeled Boys.

                                                                                                                        Side B.

                                                                                                                        5 Man On A String
                                                                                                                        6 Bottom Of The Barrel
                                                                                                                        7 AAAA (2)
                                                                                                                        8 Can Do Girl.

                                                                                                                        Side C.

                                                                                                                        9 Blue Blue Marble Girl
                                                                                                                        10 Baby It's Cold Outside
                                                                                                                        11 Re-Entry
                                                                                                                        12 Loretta And The Insect World
                                                                                                                        13 AAAA (3)
                                                                                                                        14 Talula And The Last Straw.

                                                                                                                        Side D.

                                                                                                                        15 Vows
                                                                                                                        16 AAAA (4)
                                                                                                                        17 Recital
                                                                                                                        18 The Leaving You. 

                                                                                                                        Pictish Trail

                                                                                                                        Natural Successor - Inc Django Django Mix

                                                                                                                          A purgative surrender to nature’s whim driven by a clattering machine drumbeat and rolled in a puddle of filthy dirty fuzz, ‘Natural Successor’ is the riotous new single from isle of Eigg based Scottish psychedelic electronic-pop ogre Johnny Lynch AKA Pictish Trail.

                                                                                                                          Set for release on limited-edition 12” vinyl by Fire Records, with support from Johnny’s own label Lost Map Records, it’s the first taste of a set of brand-new Pictish recordings produced by longterm collaborater Rob Jones (The Voluntary Butler Scheme, The Gene Dudley Group).

                                                                                                                          The 12” single features exclusive remixes by Django Django and Makeness

                                                                                                                          STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                          Matt says: Always nice to hear from the driving force that is Johnny Lynch. "Natural Successor" is soaring psychedlic rock with stadium potential. Django Django jump on board with a baggy, ALFOS-friendly tweak too. Then Makeness twist things up with a frenzied jungle refix.

                                                                                                                          TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                          A1. Natural Successor
                                                                                                                          A2. Natural Successor (Instrumental)
                                                                                                                          B1. Natural Successor (Django Django’s Fazed And Confused Mix)
                                                                                                                          B2. Natural Successor (Makeness Remix)

                                                                                                                          Come

                                                                                                                          Don't Ask Don't Tell - Expanded Edition

                                                                                                                            In 1994 Come responded to the difficult-second-album stereotype with the hypnotic, intense and emotional masterpiece ‘Don’t Ask Don’t Tell’. Featuring the original line-up of Thalia Zedek, Chris Brokaw, Sean O’ Brien and Arthur Johnson, the Boston band broadened their sound by slowing down the tempos and creating a dense urban stream of consciousness that mixes noise, city blues and… catharsis. The album hits you immediately as one of the greatest dissident records ever made.

                                                                                                                            Lovingly remastered, this expanded edition includes 'Wrong Sides', an additional albums worth of b-sides and unreleased tracks, including the band's very first single 'Car' and their last recorded song, 'Cimarron', featuring this core line-up. These gems showcase the rawness and incredible growth of a band completely in command of their songwriting and at the same time paying homage to some of their punk roots with beautiful renditions of Swell Maps 'Loin Of The Surf' and X's 'Adult Books'. Also Includes new artwork with unearthed photos and fresh liner notes by the band.

                                                                                                                            Dissident from traditional rock this is a band playing music that thematically and structurally seems to pull from old Europa, from Eastern folk and modernist classical music as much as US and UK rock. Dissident from traditional ideas about singing and songwriting Thalia’s (ex of Live Skull) presence on songs like ‘Yr Reign’ and the astonishing closer ‘Arrive’ isn’t the pushy self-aggrandizement of a lead singer but the internal voice of the eternal migrant, someone who knows about survival, hiding, how living between multiple worlds can become its own refuge of distance, its own sanctuary of unbelonging Don’t Ask Don’t Tell emerged from a period of cohesion, a break from the tight and hectic touring schedule Come had been plunged into after the acclaim accorded 11:11, and you can hear that increased focus in every moment the layers of guitars and feedback are even more precise, the structuring of songs takes on a new openness and ambition, and the whole narrative arc of the record from ‘Finish Line’ to ‘Arrive’ is more exquisitely realised and sequenced.

                                                                                                                            TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                            Don't Ask Don't Tell - Disc 1
                                                                                                                            A1 Finish Line
                                                                                                                            A2 Mercury Falls
                                                                                                                            A3 Yr Reign
                                                                                                                            A4 Poison
                                                                                                                            A5 Let's Get Lost
                                                                                                                            B1 String
                                                                                                                            B2 German Song
                                                                                                                            B3 In/Out
                                                                                                                            B4 Wrong Side
                                                                                                                            B5 Arrive

                                                                                                                            Wrong Sides - Disc 2
                                                                                                                            A1 Car
                                                                                                                            A2 Last Mistake
                                                                                                                            A3 Submerge
                                                                                                                            A4 Loin Of The Surf
                                                                                                                            A5 SVK
                                                                                                                            B1 German Song (Demo)
                                                                                                                            B2 Adult Books
                                                                                                                            B3 Who Jumped In My Grave
                                                                                                                            B4 Angelhead
                                                                                                                            B5 Cimarron

                                                                                                                            Brigid Mae Power

                                                                                                                            Burning Your Light EP

                                                                                                                              ‘Burning Your Light’ is a new six-track EP of covers from the remarkable Brigid Mae Power, it follows ‘Head Above the Water’ (2020) which saw her unique vocal style and music heralded in all corners. Power’s ability to interpret songs is unquestionable, as is her love of the art of songwriting. She skilfully brings joy from pain which is perfectly illustrated on this new EP.

                                                                                                                              Ranging from the brittle collapse of ‘Didn’t It Rain’ (Songs: Ohia) through to the slings and blows of Aretha Franklin, Bob Dylan and Patsy Cline, she brings hope and reverence to these classic songs.

                                                                                                                              The EP features ‘I’ll Be Here In The Morning’ from the late great pioneer of alt-country Townes Van Zandt’s essential album ‘For The Sake Of The Song’ (1968), ‘One More Cup Of Coffee’ hails from Bob Dylan’s ‘Desire’, Aretha Franklin’s ‘It Ain’t Fair’ from her 1970 album ‘This Girl’s In Love With You’, Songs: Ohia’s ‘Didn’t It Rain’ to ‘Leavin’ On Your Mind’, a country standard by Patsy Cline from 1963, that’s now taken to new depths of despair.

                                                                                                                              Also reworked is ‘May Morning Dew’ an Irish ballad that allows Brigid’s voice to ululate in the best tradition of the genre; the traditional sound is brought into a new decade with its chilling ambience.

                                                                                                                              "A remarkable Irish singer emerges from filigree and shadow" Mojo.

                                                                                                                              “The magic is in the folk singer’s extraordinary voice” Sunday Times.

                                                                                                                              "A remarkable Irish singer emerges from filigree and shadow" Mojo.

                                                                                                                              STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                              Barry says: Well, it's certainly a week for the cover versions isn't it? First Angel Olsen and now the folk stylings of Brigid Mae Power with her wonderful collection of folky covers of classics. It's Powers' voice that really tie together the songs here, filled with unrivalled emotion and brittle folky charm.

                                                                                                                              TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                              A1. I’ll Be Here In The Morning
                                                                                                                              A2. One More Cup Of Coffee
                                                                                                                              A3. It Ain't Fair
                                                                                                                              B1. Didn't It Rain
                                                                                                                              B2. May Morning Dew
                                                                                                                              B3. Leavin' On Your Mind

                                                                                                                              Modern Studies

                                                                                                                              Life Flows In Endless Song / The Body Is A Tide (Double EP) - Love Record Stores 2021 Edition

                                                                                                                                Love Record Stores Edition available instore from 10am on Saturday September 4th, any remaining copies will be available on online from 9pm on the same day.
                                                                                                                                Limited to one per person.

                                                                                                                                ‘Life Flows In Endless Song / The Body Is A Tide’ EP is released on vinyl for this year’s Love Record Stores on 4th September 2021.
                                                                                                                                Following the release of ‘The Weight Of The Sun’ LP, Modern Studies shift from light to dark over two new EPs brought together as six track 12-inch ‘Life Flows In Endless Song / The Body Is A Tide’, a record that further cements their reputation for innovative craftsmanship. ‘Life Flows In Endless Song’ showcases the band’s increasingly expansive sound, swelling with orchestrated drama behind the rich vocal pairing of Emily Scott and Rob St John, before their otherworldly dreaminess is pin-pricked at its height by Emily’s beautiful alto on ‘The Failing Light’. ‘The Body Is A Tide’ hails from ominous darker terrains, scratching further into their own psyche; it’s heady and baroque, ornate and super-detailed, an opus that climaxes with ‘High Hymn Summers’ and its slowly-rolling drone, created by processing all the songs from ‘The Weight of the Sun’ played at once. "The EP nods at the idea of our collective bodies weathering rough times, played out with massed strings, prepared guitars, slow bass grooves, hypnotic drums, wobbling saw, xaphoon and mellotron. We shook off our usual song structures in favour of something repetitive, slow and heavy; life flows in endless song." 

                                                                                                                                Pere Ubu

                                                                                                                                Pennsylvania - Reissue

                                                                                                                                  From the turn of the millennium, ‘Pennsylvania’ was the eleventh studio album from this uncompromising and influential group, presenting their dark take on pop music. This edition is newly remixed by David Thomas in 2021 and reissued on Fire Records. “Everyone talked about our artiness and our unlikeableness, people completely ignored for decades me saying, ‘We’re a pop band’.” David Thomas. With ‘Pennsylvania,’ Pere Ubu welcome you to a barely recognisable secret country drawn out of its own spectral geography... This is much more than just music.

                                                                                                                                  “[Pere Ubu] were still creating great works of abstract art, pushing the limits of rock ‘n’ roll to twist into avant-garde explorations of the darkest recesses of the human mind” Classic Rock // “From the beginning they obviously understood the nuts and bolts of popular music, and then loosened them.” Mojo

                                                                                                                                  TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                  Side A
                                                                                                                                  A1 Woolie Bullie
                                                                                                                                  A2 Highwaterville
                                                                                                                                  A3 SAD.TXT
                                                                                                                                  A4 Urban Lifestyle
                                                                                                                                  A5 Silent Spring
                                                                                                                                  A6 Mr Wheeler
                                                                                                                                  A7 Muddy Waters

                                                                                                                                  Side B
                                                                                                                                  B1 Drive
                                                                                                                                  B2 Indiangiver
                                                                                                                                  B3 Monday Morning
                                                                                                                                  B4 Perfume
                                                                                                                                  B5 Fly's Eye
                                                                                                                                  B6 Wheelhouse

                                                                                                                                  Pere Ubu

                                                                                                                                  St. Arkansas - Reissue

                                                                                                                                    Pere Ubu's darkest and most dramatic statement, ‘St Arkansas’ remains a work of offhand brilliance by a band who often seem capable of miracles. This edition is newly remixed by David Thomas in 2021 and reissued on Fire Records. Following ‘Pennsylvania’, ‘St Arkansas’ (2002) was Pere Ubu’s next studio album featuring a travelogue of characters encountered on the Mighty Road from Conway Arkansas to Tupelo Mississippi, I-40 to US 49 to State 6. “I drove the route and wrote down what the Road was telling me.” David Thomas. Pere Ubu are the mainstream.

                                                                                                                                    “Immediate, energised and claustrophobic.. It's difficult to think of a more important band.” Mojo.

                                                                                                                                    “Straddling the extremes of pure, uncompromising modern art and pure, uncompromising loud rock.” The Sunday Times.

                                                                                                                                    TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                    Side A
                                                                                                                                    A1 The Feverered Dream Of Hernando DeSoto
                                                                                                                                    A2 Slow Walking Daddy
                                                                                                                                    A3 Michele
                                                                                                                                    A4 333
                                                                                                                                    A5 Hell

                                                                                                                                    Side B
                                                                                                                                    B1 Phone Home Jonah
                                                                                                                                    B2 Lisbon
                                                                                                                                    B3 Mr Steve
                                                                                                                                    B4 Where's The Truth
                                                                                                                                    B5 Dark

                                                                                                                                    Josephine Foster

                                                                                                                                    Blood Rushing

                                                                                                                                      Tenth anniversary reissue of Josephine Foster’s lauded ninth album ‘Blood Rushing’. The North American Colorado based singer-songwriter has lent her warbling mezzo-soprano and interpretive wit to nearly two decades of self-produced recordings. Foster’s songs are rooted in early American folk-blues as well as classical art song and Tin Pan Alley. A rock-ballet chanté, the music is set to a Pueblo drum's metapulsing Pan-American heartbeat. Recorded in Colorado by Andrija Tokic (Alabama Shakes) with the collaboration of her partner Spanish guitarist Victor Herrero, and musicians Paz Lenchantin (The Entrance Band), Heather Trost (A Hawk and a Hacksaw) and Ben Trimble (Fly Golden Eagle). A story within a story, ‘Blood Rushing’ is a glimpse into the world of Blushing, a heteronym of the artist Josephine Foster. “North American folk linage from Jean Ritchie and Hedy West through to the present, via the chugging, churning electronic (folk) rock of The Velvet Underground, all the time infused with a joyous communal warmth.”

                                                                                                                                      TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                      A1 Waterfall
                                                                                                                                      A2 Panorama Wide
                                                                                                                                      A3 Sacred Is The Star
                                                                                                                                      A4 Child Of God

                                                                                                                                      B1 Blood Rushing
                                                                                                                                      B2 The Wave Of Love
                                                                                                                                      B3 O Stars
                                                                                                                                      B4 Geyser
                                                                                                                                      B5 Underwater Daughter
                                                                                                                                      B6 Words Come Loose

                                                                                                                                      Lucy Gooch

                                                                                                                                      Rain's Break EP

                                                                                                                                        An exploration of repression, longing and ‘otherness’ amidst illusory landscapes, ‘Rain’s Break’ EP is inspired by the early technicolour films of Powell and Pressburger. Lucy Gooch uses synthesisers and vocal layering to concentrate elements of each film’s score and narrative into songs which move through different moods of yearning and renewal:
                                                                                                                                        “I first experienced their strange cinematic worlds in childhood, and they stayed with me, like waking dreams – their vibrancy seemed to capture the hidden emotional lives of everyday people. The films’ fantastical sets were often met with the complexities of the inner female experience, as portrayed by each heroine. People wrestling with post-war isolation, changing attitudes to women and sexual repression alongside their struggle to establish equality and autonomy of their own lives.”

                                                                                                                                        So, it is amidst 1940’s austerity that these films were an escape, an over-rich backdrop of possibilities. A snatched piece of dialogue, the film’s score, the crackle of uncertainty all succumbs to the layered ambience of Lucy’s music as she traces moods of yearning and renewal on ‘Rain’s Break’ EP.

                                                                                                                                        Originally from Norfolk, Lucy studied Fine Art and later moved to Bristol to join the emerging ambient scene there - gradually developing her writing and finally releasing her debut ‘Rushing’ EP in early 2020. Over the past year, she’s dipped into a wealth of long gone celluloid as the basis for a filmic journey, a five song EP that relives formative movies in her unique take on ecclesiastical pop.

                                                                                                                                        ‘Ash and Orange’ emerged after listening to old recordings of women’s choirs from the 1930’s, their stoic sopranos circling churches and halls. In two parts, it touches on an everyday person’s hidden life that leads to an emotional breaking-down. A change from Lucy’s trademarked looping style it takes its inspiration from choral composition.

                                                                                                                                        ‘Chained To A Woman’ by contrast, is more playful, nodding to ‘80s synth pop, a homage to some degree to Blue Nile, pop music tinged with melancholy.

                                                                                                                                        “I sought to stick to that tradition of talk-singing the verses, and it seemed to fit in with the feeling of the song, which is more ambiguous. I wanted the words to be about being devoted to something, like family, a person or religion and all the things that come with that kind of devotion.”

                                                                                                                                        Inspired by the monsoon scene at the end of Black Narcissus (1947), the title track ‘Rain’s Break’ takes its lead from the weather to reflect an emotional journey.

                                                                                                                                        “That amazing tradition in early film of using weather to reflect the character’s emotional journey - it seems cliched now but at the time it was revolutionary. This is my attempt at trying to recreate the feeling of total surrender to drama, of something totally sensual.”

                                                                                                                                        This is music that takes you places, shifts focus, paints large canvases.

                                                                                                                                        STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                                        Barry says: There are all sorts of musical touchstones flying out of the player for this one. It's essentially widescreen ambient music but with a focus on the walls of echo and reverb-effected synths more akin to shoegaze. Slowly building into crescentic waves of layered tones, brilliantly warm but undeniably massive.

                                                                                                                                        TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                        Side A
                                                                                                                                        1 Rain's Break
                                                                                                                                        2 It Brings Me Back To You
                                                                                                                                        3 Chained To A Woman

                                                                                                                                        Side B
                                                                                                                                        4 6AM
                                                                                                                                        5 Ash And Orange

                                                                                                                                        ESG

                                                                                                                                        Come Away With - Repress

                                                                                                                                          Come Away With ESG - 35-year anniversary release of the classic genre-busting debut album by the Bronx sisters ESG. The sample-friendly opus that’s the inspiration for hip-hop, house and post punk. Music that falls outside of the no wave, new wave and post punk library, it’s for the dance floor but it’s not funk, there’s no horns, no driving organ; it’s the opposite of Sly And The Family Stone but no less cool and no less groovy. “A lasting document of their unique brand of minimal funk that would influence subsequent post-punk, hip-hop, and dance music acts. Stripped down to the most basic of drumbeats and rudimentary bass lines, ‘Come Away’ confirms the notion that the real rhythm is what happens between the beats.

                                                                                                                                          TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                          1. Come Away
                                                                                                                                          2. Dance
                                                                                                                                          3. You Make No Sense
                                                                                                                                          4. Parking Lot Blues
                                                                                                                                          5. Chistelle
                                                                                                                                          6. About You
                                                                                                                                          7. It’s Alright
                                                                                                                                          8. Moody ( Spaced Out )
                                                                                                                                          9. Tiny Sticks
                                                                                                                                          10. The Beat
                                                                                                                                          11. My Love For You

                                                                                                                                          Television Personalities

                                                                                                                                          Some Kind Of Happening: Singles 1978-1989

                                                                                                                                            “Treacy is the outsider's outsider, committed to a raw honesty, constantly bearing witness to his own suffering, his own weakness and fallibility.” The Quietus // A comprehensive remastered collection of all of the Television Personalities’ ground-breaking single releases from the Peel-approved ‘14th Floor’ through to the effervescent ‘Salvador Dali’s Garden Party’ EP. Includes the super rare Creation flexi, the TVPs as The Gifted Children, and the even rarer Caff 45 where the band tackle Stock, Aitken And Waterman.Purists will also find two shelved 45s for the Dreamworld label plus their take on Syd Barrett’s ‘Apples And Oranges’ from the ‘Beyond The Wildwood’ tribute album. Features the seminal ‘Where’s Bill Grundy Now’ and the self-effacing ‘Part Time Punks’ alongside a host of pop culture-bating gems. A celebration of the songwriting of Dan Treacy

                                                                                                                                            TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                            Side One

                                                                                                                                            01 - 14th Floor
                                                                                                                                            02 - Oxford St., W.1
                                                                                                                                            03 - Part Time Punks
                                                                                                                                            04 - Where's Bill Grundy Now?
                                                                                                                                            05 - Happy Families
                                                                                                                                            06 - Posing At The Roundhouse
                                                                                                                                            07 - The Prettiest Girl In The World
                                                                                                                                            08 - If That's What Love Is

                                                                                                                                            Side Two

                                                                                                                                            01 - Smashing Time
                                                                                                                                            02 - King And Country
                                                                                                                                            03 - I Know Where Syd Barrett Lives
                                                                                                                                            04 - Arthur The Gardener
                                                                                                                                            05 - Three Wishes
                                                                                                                                            06 - Geoffrey Ingram
                                                                                                                                            07 - And Don't The Kids Just Love It!

                                                                                                                                            Side Three

                                                                                                                                            01 - A Sense Of Belonging
                                                                                                                                            02 - Paradise Estate
                                                                                                                                            03 - How I Learned To Love The Bomb
                                                                                                                                            04 - Then God Snaps His Fingers
                                                                                                                                            05 - Now You're Just Being Ridiculous

                                                                                                                                            Side Four

                                                                                                                                            01 - She's Only The Grocer's Daughter
                                                                                                                                            02 - A Girl Called Charity
                                                                                                                                            03 - Salvador Dali's Garden Party
                                                                                                                                            04 - The Room At The Top Of The Stairs
                                                                                                                                            05 - This Time There's No Happy Ending
                                                                                                                                            06 - Part One: Fulfilling The Contractual Obligations

                                                                                                                                            Howe Gelb

                                                                                                                                            Hisser (RSD21 EDITION)

                                                                                                                                              THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2021 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON SATURDAY JUNE 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 6PM ON THE SAME DAY (SATURDAY JUNE 12TH).


                                                                                                                                              1500 pressed on Creamy White vinyl & DL card. First time on vinyl since 1998 for this magnificent patchwork collage of the Giant Sand main manís eclectic muses; a cut and paste gem, meandering, melancholy and beautiful. Classic solo album from Giant Sand's main man Howe Gelb circa 1998, re-issued with new liner notes and remastered on cream vinyl. A catch-all collection from the much-travelled troubadour that brings together a wealth of personal recordings edited into an intriguing ponder wander through the manís thinking.

                                                                                                                                              A truly intoxicating set of songs buoyed by Howe Gelb's prosaic prose and effortless use of the mind-bending one-liner. ìíHisserí is the vision of a truly unique and engaging talent, and in its pure heart and soul lies a masterpiece.
                                                                                                                                              College Music Journal // Pure genius and usually chaotic, Howe Gelb is a cottage industry often labelled the Godfather of alternative country. BOMB magazine // There are wonderful glimpses of what Gelb is capable of when heís not rushing off to dabble with the next nugget in a seemingly inexhaustible flow of ideas. The Line Of Best Fit // One of those albums that could have a semi-permanent spot next to the hi-fi for late-night playing. The Independent 

                                                                                                                                              TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                              Side A. 1 Temptation Of Egg 2 4 Door Maverick 3 This Purple Child 4 Shy Of Bumfuck 5 Propulsion 6 Catapult 7 Creeper.
                                                                                                                                              Side B. 8 Tanks Rolling Into Town 9 Halifax In A Hurricane 10 Living On A Waterfall 11 Like A Store Front Display 12 Explore You 13 Nico's Lil Opera 14 Thereminender 15 Hisser 16 Intro Speck 17 Soldier Of Fortune 18 Lull 19 Short Way To End The Day

                                                                                                                                              Half Japanese

                                                                                                                                              I Guess I'm Living: The Charmed Life Tapes (RSD21 EDITION)

                                                                                                                                                THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2021 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON SATURDAY JUNE 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 6PM ON THE SAME DAY (SATURDAY JUNE 12TH).


                                                                                                                                                1000 copies pressed on Yellow vinyl & DL card. Fist time on vinyl. All-enveloping superbly alternative third take on 1988's Charmed Life album featuring previously unissued versions and a half dozen previously unreleased songs. Includes brand new liner notes and an interview with Jad and David Fair.

                                                                                                                                                TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                Side A. 1 Said And Done (Alternate Version) 2 Evidence (Alternate Version) 3 Vietnam (Alternate Version) 4 Love At First Sight (Alternate Version) 5 Snake Line (Alternate Version) 6 Fun For All 7 Face Rake (Alternate Version) 8 Later In A Magazine (Alternate Version) 9 Red Dress (Alternate Version) 10 Charmed Life (Alternate Version 1).
                                                                                                                                                Side B. 1 Day And Night With Angie 2 Madonna Nude (Alternate Version) 3 Ashes On The Ground 4 T For Texas 5 I'll Change My Style (Alternate Version) 6 Fortunate (Alternate Version) 7 Please Crawl Out Your Window 8 30 Seconds In Heaven 9 Charmed Life (Alternate Version 2)

                                                                                                                                                Marina Allen

                                                                                                                                                Candlepower

                                                                                                                                                  Marina Allen glides on angelic highs, surfing the husky deep; she is one of the great new voices of her generation. Writing songs that carry notes from other realms; these are kitchen table tales about love and fear, the capturing of the wild heart, sketching the breaking of dawn, bringing real life back to life. Every song on stunning debut album ‘Candlepower’ is a tick box of influences, asides, inspirations, quickfire theories, storylines and melodic progressions that galvanise a chemical reaction for each dramatic scene that unfolds on this genre-traversing seven song epic.

                                                                                                                                                  One listen to opening track ‘Oh, Louise’ underlines the range of Marina’s talent, it’s a filmic play on words, with an arrangement that’s like a Kate Bush dream sequence. It’s the perfect foil for the plaintive strum of ‘Sleeper Train’, a haunting, folky paean fit for Judee Sill brought up to date with some echoey electric guitar; or the conversational ‘Believer’; with a nod to Joni Mitchell in the lyrics it sounds every bit like Simon And Garfunkel at their Big Apple best listening to the ‘7 O’Clock News’ re-imagined on Sunset. The stuff of legend for a voice that surfs many musical tangents, hovers, and persists, that stings with honesty; morphing from Karen Carpenter’s gentle reverence to Laura Nyro’s soulful grit, moving through the phases like some possessed Dada performance artist before throwing in a melody from Joni at her jazziest or from the close harmonies of the lamented Roches when they flipped out with Robert Fripp. ‘Candlepower’ is a juxtaposition of melodies, an achingly beautiful set of songs set against the clank of the mundane world, a beguiling commentary on the everyday and everywhere. It’s all here, in under 20 minutes… every second counts.

                                                                                                                                                  TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                  A1 Oh, Louise
                                                                                                                                                  A2 Original Goodness
                                                                                                                                                  A3 Belong Here
                                                                                                                                                  A4 Sleeper Tran
                                                                                                                                                  B1 Believer
                                                                                                                                                  B2 Ophelia
                                                                                                                                                  B3 Reunion

                                                                                                                                                  The Chills

                                                                                                                                                  Scatterbrain

                                                                                                                                                    New studio album from the Dunedin (NZ) songsmiths helmed by the enigmatic Martin Phillipps with artwork by Trees’ David Costa. Dunedin’s finest, The Chills release their seventh studio album ‘Scatterbrain’, a glorious self-examination of Martin Phillipps’ songwriting hot (ish) on the heels of the hugely successful ‘Snowbound’ (2018) and the critically-acclaimed movie ‘The Chills: The Triumph And Tragedy Of Martin Phillipps’ a year later. “It’s about artistic integrity, self-realisation, self-acceptance and a reflection on mortality.” The Guardian Now in 2021, Phillipps is now taking stock of things – everything. Yes, everything.

                                                                                                                                                    The result is this triumphant new Chills’ album ‘Scatterbrain’, a thought-provoking and evocative take from a man who has lived through good times and bad. A mature and honest reflection on life, destiny and the fate of our times delivered in beautiful melodies with Phillipps’ trademarked incisive turn of phrase. Viewed from the perspective of a man understanding his age and indeed his own mortality, the new album takes a mature look at matters arising with a side order of perspective. ‘Scatterbrain’ is a life passing before your ears as uncertainty increases and fake news rumbles on; during which aliens invade, Phillipps scales the walls beyond abandon as he probes the minutiae of worlds within worlds and the hourglass fills. A landmark album from one of the great modern song writers, it’s pure pop music for the new normal and we can’t wait to see how it ends…

                                                                                                                                                    TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                    Side A

                                                                                                                                                    A1 Monolith
                                                                                                                                                    A2 Hourglass
                                                                                                                                                    A3 Destiny
                                                                                                                                                    A4 Caught In My Eye
                                                                                                                                                    A5 You're Immortal

                                                                                                                                                    Side B

                                                                                                                                                    B1 Little Alien
                                                                                                                                                    B2 Safe And Sound
                                                                                                                                                    B3 Worlds Within Worlds
                                                                                                                                                    B4 Scatterbrain
                                                                                                                                                    B5 The Walls Beyond Abandon

                                                                                                                                                    One of the North-West’s finest exponents of otherworldly pop has landed back on earth with an album of shimmering space age bliss. Elements of disco, new wave and krautrock are undoubtedly present in Flock, but Jane never relies on genre tropes to carry her work. Instead, she harnesses familiar rhythmic devices and choices of instrumentation in her own distinctive way. And while comparisons could be drawn between Jane and contemporaries like Vanishing Twin and Gwenno, she has undeniably staked out her own domain within the realm of off-kilter synth pop.

                                                                                                                                                    Throughout Flock Jane demonstrates her delicate vocal agility over a series of hypnotic loops and clever synthesis. The lazy disco strut of “The Revolution Of Super Visions” sets up a jangling interplay between Jane’s sweetly sung declamations, new wave style guitar interjections and Cowley-esque synth squelch. While “Modern Reputation” is propelled forwards by a Broadcast style motorik rhythm with electronics whirring in the background and mantra-like vocal loops swirling in a strange ecstasy.

                                                                                                                                                    In the title track Jane’s gauzy vocals reverberate over the ebb and flow of a loose knit groove, while in “Sunset Dreams” ornate guitar riffs weave in amongst a haze of twinkling chimes and fizzing sawtooth synthesis. The album culminates in a moment of escapist pop euphoria with final track “Solarised”, laden with cascading arps and irresistible vocal hooks. Once again Jane has succeeded in creating something playful, fresh and unpretentious which is in equal parts a fun and intelligent listen. All hail the cosmic synth queen! 


                                                                                                                                                    STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                                                    Barry says: This new outing from Jane Weaver sees Jane and co skirting the outer reaches of Disco, Synth-pop and ambient to stunning effect, rich with hooks but unmeasurably deep, it's one that will reveal more and more with each listen. Unsurprisingly superb.

                                                                                                                                                    TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                    Side A
                                                                                                                                                    A1 Heartlow
                                                                                                                                                    A2 The Revolution Of Super Visions
                                                                                                                                                    A3 Stages Of Phases
                                                                                                                                                    A4 Lux
                                                                                                                                                    A5 Modern Reputation
                                                                                                                                                    Side B
                                                                                                                                                    B1 Flock
                                                                                                                                                    B2 Sunset Dreams
                                                                                                                                                    B3 All The Things You Do
                                                                                                                                                    B4 Pyramid Schemes
                                                                                                                                                    B5 Solarised

                                                                                                                                                    Virginia Wing

                                                                                                                                                    Private LIFE

                                                                                                                                                      One of the year's most daring and true pop records, private LIFE comes as the result of Virginia Wing living through, and with, huge personal emotional and mental traumas. It is a document of how the very process of music creation in a group can be of huge therapeutic benefit to people. The three members of Virginia Wing have explored the depths of their creative and artistic inspirations within performance, production and composition, and have made a candid and brash pop record that speaks clearly about hope, desperation, impulse, addiction, urge and shame.

                                                                                                                                                      More tumultuous than its predecessor, private LIFE knocks hard. The evolution of Virginia Wing’s sound continues to build on the broad creative flow of the last album whilst being another audacious contribution to contemporary pop. The drums are huge and playfully unquantized. Edits are both assured and heavy handed, the instrumentation lightly mediates the two and finds itself on the edge of collapse alongside them. The icy facade of Merida Richards’ words are still front and centre, but are contrasted by dense, multilayered improvisations, vying for attention throughout the record. Over ‘I’m Holding Out For Something’s relentless juggernaut of 90’s R’n’B beats, Richards examines the relentless hope and desperation glued to modern consciousness, and speaks of how we often find the answer, or the route through, right at the breaking point. Subsequently, ‘St Francis Fountain’ compounds the issue, observing that often our own coping mechanisms can grow into full blown traumas of their own. Virginia Wing’s last record opened its arms into euphoric light, private LIFE invites you through a door and closes it. It examines what we’re doing at night, on our own, after work. What we do to enjoy ourselves, to cope, to be together, to be alone. It shines a dim blue light on what might be happening, causing us anxiety, stress and desire.

                                                                                                                                                      STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                                                      Barry says: Virginia wing bring another nuanced slab of moody synth-indie, with 'Private Life' displaying all of the superb songwriting prowess which made 2018's 'Ecstatic Arrow' such a heavy hitter, but with a more world-weary experience and depth of feeling. Superb stuff.

                                                                                                                                                      TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                      Side A
                                                                                                                                                      A1 I’m Holding Out For Something
                                                                                                                                                      A2 Moon Turn Tides
                                                                                                                                                      A3 Soft Fruit
                                                                                                                                                      A4 Michael Returns To The Garden
                                                                                                                                                      A5 99 North
                                                                                                                                                      A6 Return To View

                                                                                                                                                      Side B
                                                                                                                                                      B1 St. Francis Fountain
                                                                                                                                                      B2 Private Life
                                                                                                                                                      B3 Half Mourning
                                                                                                                                                      B4 Lucky Coin
                                                                                                                                                      B5 OBW Saints
                                                                                                                                                      B6 I Know About These Things

                                                                                                                                                      Rats On Rafts

                                                                                                                                                      Excerpts From Chapter 3: The Mind Runs A Net Of Rabbit Paths

                                                                                                                                                        The third album from Dutch punk-laced noiseniks adds new maturity and a conceptual feel that pulls the extremes of their sound together. A psychefuelled journey into the id punctuated with rhythmic kabuki modal mood swings, thunderstorms, digital beeps, traffic noise, and just plain old beautiful cacophonous reverb-drenched sound when needed.

                                                                                                                                                        The ‘third chapter’ refers to the last five years that the Dutch band have spent creating their “difficult” third album. Each song spins a yarn; there are plagues, dreams, wind and fire, ‘mythical’ characters, and the search for the secret government warehouse. Lead single, Tokyo Music Experience, resonates with a conveyor belt-propelled modal guitar, reflecting the halcyon days of Japanese super-productivity; a mesmerising mantra, infected with news bulletin on-thehour bleeps underlining its time-sensitive nature; a pristine super-commercial anthem to drive loyalty and reinforce solidarity with the party!

                                                                                                                                                        Having been described as creating “underground noise with a bracing, warped pop appeal” (Mojo), their new album is a coming-of-age post-classic with a unique worldview - inspired by Van Dyke Parks (Song Cycle) Scott Walker (3 & 4), Moondog (Elpmas), White Noise (An Electric Storm) and Beach Boys (Smile).

                                                                                                                                                        If their previous effort (Tape Hiss) was their very own sketch of a sketch for an incomplete concept album, a noisy reaction to their previous life, then ‘Excerpts From Chapter 3..’, with all its interlaced intricacies, is the realisation of their transition from punk-spiked-pop to psyche-pop protagonists. Evolving, testing, infectious...

                                                                                                                                                        STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                                                        Barry says: This wild and superb outing from Rats On Rafts shows that the bands playful spirit and whimsical melodies don't have to give way when things get serious. A brilliantly deep and eminently enjoyable third outing.

                                                                                                                                                        TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                        Side A
                                                                                                                                                        1 Prologue: Rain
                                                                                                                                                        2 A Trail Of Wind And Fire
                                                                                                                                                        3 Second Born Child
                                                                                                                                                        4 Tokyo Music Experience
                                                                                                                                                        5 The Rise And Fall Of The Plague
                                                                                                                                                        6 Another Year

                                                                                                                                                        Side B
                                                                                                                                                        7 Fragments
                                                                                                                                                        8 The Disappearance Of Dr. Duplicate
                                                                                                                                                        9 Excerpt Taken From Chapter 3
                                                                                                                                                        10 Where Is My Dream?
                                                                                                                                                        11 Part One: The Long Drought
                                                                                                                                                        12 Part Two: Crossing The Desert
                                                                                                                                                        13 Epilogue: Big Poisonous Shadows

                                                                                                                                                        Bonus Dinked Edition 7":
                                                                                                                                                        1. Tokyo Music Experience (Single Edit)
                                                                                                                                                        2. Osaka

                                                                                                                                                        Half Japanese

                                                                                                                                                        Crazy Hearts

                                                                                                                                                          Half Japanese return with another thrilling ride into unknown charters encountering beasts, celebrities, and menaces.

                                                                                                                                                          Purveyors of noise and indie rock for over four decades, Half Japanese have inspired generations of fans from musicians and critics alike.

                                                                                                                                                          Now set to release their 19th studio album ‘Crazy Hearts’ continues with their detuned, outsider pop capturing you in the way that only Jad Fair ever can.

                                                                                                                                                          A philosophical psych-tinged journey, these whip-smart observations are uplifting with life-affirming sentiments (‘Wondrous Wonder’) that we are familiar with. They meld melodic classic rock riffs with heavier bass lines and darker, more twisted tones on ‘My Celebrity’ and ‘A Phantom Menace’.
                                                                                                                                                          Their last excursion saw Uncut praising them for their “unchanged, more ecstatic musings on love and science fiction” that continues to resonate here.

                                                                                                                                                          Half Japanese deliver another well-wrought album with their usual DIY ethos and art punk spirit at its core (‘Undisputed Champions’), all whilst wearing Jad’s heart firmly on its sleeve (‘Crazy Hearts’).
                                                                                                                                                          Recorded across various studios in Spain, France and the US, Jad Fair is accompanied by his longstanding band members John Sluggett, Giles Vincent Rieder, Mick Hobbs and Jason Willett. Mastered by Brian Pyle and mixed by Jason Willett of the band. Album includes artwork from American illustrator and cartoonist, Gary Panter and David Fair.

                                                                                                                                                          TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                          1. The Beast Master
                                                                                                                                                          2. Wondrous Wonder
                                                                                                                                                          3. Dark World
                                                                                                                                                          4. And It Is
                                                                                                                                                          5. My Celebrity
                                                                                                                                                          6. Late At Night
                                                                                                                                                          7. Undisputed Champions
                                                                                                                                                          8. Crazy Hearts
                                                                                                                                                          9. As Best You Can
                                                                                                                                                          10. A Phantom Menace
                                                                                                                                                          11. A Job Well Done
                                                                                                                                                          12. Let It Show

                                                                                                                                                          Josephine Foster

                                                                                                                                                          No Harm Done

                                                                                                                                                            Brand new album from Colorado’s freewheelin’ melodist Josephine Foster.

                                                                                                                                                            Revolving between her adopted Spain and her native American West, Josephine was stationed this spring in Nashville with maverick guitarist and comrade-in-arms Matthew Schneider. The result: ‘No Harm Done’, a spacious and enveloping love letter of an album.

                                                                                                                                                            Eight new slow-burning songs branch forth from idiosyncratic country folk blues, sung with sibylline wit and a hint of the absurd, awash in sensually anachronic lyricism.

                                                                                                                                                            “The Wheel of Fortune”, nearly a title track by virtue of its refrain: 'No harm will come/if there's no harm done', are words of a homebound wanderer finding refuge in healing stillness with her beloved, having 'time to kill' in the midst of 'hard times to feel at home'. All delivered with calm sagacity upon the pedestal of Mr. Schneider's pedal steel and underscored by a knowing trebled chorus in Foster's lower register. Going nowhere never felt like so righteous of a destination before.

                                                                                                                                                            Devotion in all its permutations, spiritual to carnal, are seamlessly explored.

                                                                                                                                                            In 'Conjugal Bliss', overtones of the 12-string and autoharp gently interplay, sounding like some unearthed Carter family wedding hymn (it bears the subversive subtitle '69' ) while 'How come, Honeycomb?' bounces low in the hips like a sultry old music hall number à la Harry Nilsson. The obliquely sapphic 'Leonine', it's unquiet harp scaling right out of ancient Lesbos, dreams of a kingless land; in 'Sure Am Devilish', a stargazer humbly confesses to a lowercase lord. 'Old Saw', the mesmeric album closer, is a medium's petition to cross the threshold and merge with the holy spirit.

                                                                                                                                                            Josephine's enigmatic voice captured once more by frequent co-producer Andrija Tokic in his analog Bomb Shelter studio, where layers of her guitar, piano, organ entwine with Schneider's 12-string, pedal steel and electric bass to rouse a spectral yet full blooded band. The ensuing cycle of songs pulse and glow within the ruins and deep fundamental roots of American song.

                                                                                                                                                            TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                            Side A
                                                                                                                                                            1 Freemason Drag
                                                                                                                                                            2 The Wheel Of Fortune
                                                                                                                                                            3 Conjugal Bliss
                                                                                                                                                            4 Love Letter

                                                                                                                                                            Side B
                                                                                                                                                            5 Sure Am Devilish
                                                                                                                                                            6 Leonine
                                                                                                                                                            7 How Come, Honeycomb?
                                                                                                                                                            8 Old Saw

                                                                                                                                                            Pulp

                                                                                                                                                            Separations - 2020 Reissue

                                                                                                                                                              Pulp’s 1992 album ‘Separations’ is part of the Fire Embers reissue series with unreleased bonus material. Their third and last album on Fire, Pulp had already transformed from their debut ‘It’ through the dark electronic phase of Freaks and were garnering significant momentum. Now critically acclaimed and with a live reputation matched by only a few, most of the songs on Separations sound fully-realised in that undeniably Pulp manner that was soon to be experienced everywhere. And, for the first time, there was an inescapable disco pulse. This is the transition album where Pulp, caught between a doomed romantic outsider past and an acid-bright future, made an album that brilliantly reflects both. Remastered and repackaged. Liner notes by Everett True. Featuring 4 bonus tracks ‘Death Goes To The Disco’ and ‘Is This House’, as well as an extended version of the single ‘Countdown’ and the previously unreleased ‘Death Comes To Town’. Separations spawned two of Pulps most successful singles to date in ‘Countdown and ‘My Legendary Girlfriend’ with the latter being placed on many top singles of 1991 lists by major music publications. Pulp’s ‘It’ and ‘Freaks’ will be reissued at the same time for the complete Pulp on Fire collection. 

                                                                                                                                                              TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                              1. Love Is Blind
                                                                                                                                                              2. Don't You Want Me Anymore?
                                                                                                                                                              3. She's Dead
                                                                                                                                                              4. Separations
                                                                                                                                                              5. Down By The River
                                                                                                                                                              6. Countdown
                                                                                                                                                              7. My Legendary Girlfriend
                                                                                                                                                              8. Death II
                                                                                                                                                              9. This House Is Condemned
                                                                                                                                                              10. Death Goes To The Disco (BONUS)
                                                                                                                                                              11. Is This House? (BONUS)
                                                                                                                                                              12. Countdown (BONUS Extended Version)
                                                                                                                                                              13. Death Comes To Town (Bonus)

                                                                                                                                                              The Bevis Frond

                                                                                                                                                              Valedictory Songs - RSD Edition

                                                                                                                                                                Recorded in Gold Dust Studios with a new sense of optimism and a fuller sound down to lots of extra energy (Nick believed it might be their last ever record) and the addition of piano and keyboards brings an instrumental direction.

                                                                                                                                                                Released on double LP with gate-fold sleeve for Record Store Day.

                                                                                                                                                                The Lemonheads

                                                                                                                                                                Lovey

                                                                                                                                                                  Ltd edition BOOKBACK CD companion to the Deluxe vinyl reissue of The Lemonheads ‘Lovey’ for Record Store Day 2020, housed in a bookback sleeve with expanded liner notes and unseen photos – this is the definitive document of Dando’s first steps towards the mainstream. The lovingly repackaged CD is accompanied by a second disc, ‘Triple J Live at the Wireless’, an unearthed radio session taken from their 1991 trip to Australia.

                                                                                                                                                                  The major label debut for Evan Dando’s Lemonheads from 1990, following three “ramshackle punk” (©Select magazine) albums for Taang! Pivoted on a more approachable set of sweet melodies still rife with punky spirit. A light and dark album, polished in the arrangements, nodding to the excess of American culture (Manson and Gummi Bears), hectoring Reagan’s drug laws (‘Lil’ Seed’), riffing on everyday life.

                                                                                                                                                                  Remastered with a freshly-dusted off second album featuring a full radio session recorded during their trip to Australia to promote the album and their gorgeous cover of Gram Parsons’ ‘Brass Buttons’.

                                                                                                                                                                  “Like Hüsker Dü when they were at their most ferocious or REM when they were at their most Byrdsian hypnotic.” NME

                                                                                                                                                                  TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                  Disc One
                                                                                                                                                                  The Lemonheads - Lovey
                                                                                                                                                                  1 Ballarat
                                                                                                                                                                  2 Half The Time
                                                                                                                                                                  3 Year Of The Cat
                                                                                                                                                                  4 Ride With Me
                                                                                                                                                                  5 Lil Seed
                                                                                                                                                                  6 Stove
                                                                                                                                                                  7 Come Downstairs
                                                                                                                                                                  8 Left For Dead
                                                                                                                                                                  9 Brass Buttons
                                                                                                                                                                  10 (The) Door
                                                                                                                                                                  11 Untitled

                                                                                                                                                                  Disc Two
                                                                                                                                                                  The Lemonheads - Live At The Wireless
                                                                                                                                                                  1 Come Back D.A.
                                                                                                                                                                  2 Stove
                                                                                                                                                                  3 A Song For You
                                                                                                                                                                  4 Come Downstairs
                                                                                                                                                                  5 Nighttime (Big Star Cover)
                                                                                                                                                                  6 Year Of The Cat
                                                                                                                                                                  7 Ride With Me
                                                                                                                                                                  8 Die Right Now

                                                                                                                                                                  Dead Famous People

                                                                                                                                                                  Harry

                                                                                                                                                                    Back in the 80s Dons Savage of Dead Famous People joined her first band Freudian Slips which soon ended so she along with fellow Freudian Slip refugee Biddy Leyland could pursue their own talents. A chance encounter with Flying Nun's spiritual guru, Chris Knox, led to a one-off deal with the label that resulted in a five-song EP, ‘Lost Persons Area’. Moving to London in 1986 the fabled "Flying Nun sound" began making an impact outside New Zealand. The release of near-perfect compilations by The Clean and The Chills except Dead Famous People were a little early for that buzz. Stumbling into a deal with Utility Records, Billy Bragg and legendary manager Pete Jenner. Dons later started singing with new combo, Saint Etienne, her vocals feature on the original version of their cover version hit, ‘Kiss And Make Up’, as well as a cover of Gil Scott-Heron's ‘Winter In America’. Around this same time, Martin Phillipps of The Chills asked Dons requested she sing on ‘Heavenly Pop Hit’. Dons soon returned home to Auckland without an outlet for her music, three decades later Fire tracked her down and the rest is history. Now set to release her new album ‘Harry’, it’s more philosophical than her earlier work. It feels like the right one for a world of apocalyptic pandemic, uncertainty and quarantine. Dons' power over melody and knack for profundity remains unchanged since Dead Famous People's original incarnation. A rare record in a time of musical factionalism and a world divided into camps of willful obscurity and grotesque mockeries of stardom and art, it’s a document of unadorned perfection.

                                                                                                                                                                    "Bob bought a DFP single which we both really liked, we were drawn to the mystery of the band's name and the melancholy tone of Dons' voice." Pete Wiggs - Saint Etienne.

                                                                                                                                                                    “There was a sense of excitement that something special was happening." Martin Phillipps – The Chills.

                                                                                                                                                                    TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                    Side A
                                                                                                                                                                    A1 Looking At Girls
                                                                                                                                                                    A2 Goddess Of Chill
                                                                                                                                                                    A3 Safe And Sound
                                                                                                                                                                    A4 Turn On The Light
                                                                                                                                                                    A5 Dead Birds Eye

                                                                                                                                                                    Side B
                                                                                                                                                                    B6 Groovy Girl
                                                                                                                                                                    B7 The Great Unknown
                                                                                                                                                                    B8 Dog
                                                                                                                                                                    B9 To Be Divine
                                                                                                                                                                    B10 Harry

                                                                                                                                                                    Graham Reynolds

                                                                                                                                                                    The Lodger

                                                                                                                                                                      Part of Fire’s ongoing series of re-imagined soundtracks. Following on from Fenella, Jane Weaver’s score for Marcell Jankovics’ ‘Feherlofia’, and Death and Vanilla’s reworking of ‘The Tenant’ and ‘Vampyr’. A specially recorded soundtrack for Alfred Hitchcock’s legendary Ripper-based drama by multi-award-winning composer Graham Reynolds (Where Do You Go, Bernadette/A Scanner Darkly). ‘The Lodger’ – based on Marie Belloc Lowndes’ 1913 novel with a nod to the infamous Jack The Ripper case – set many hearts racing when visiting the East End of London and an unexpected fog descended.

                                                                                                                                                                      The drama was afoot, and the tension has been further escalated with a re-imagined score by multi award-winning composer, bandleader, and innovative improvisor, Graham Reynolds. This tale of murder and suspense set on the streets of terrorised London is eerily completed as Reynolds’ sweeps from light to dark; it’s playful in places, haunting, a tease – like Hitchcock at his best. Nowhere is safe, even the seemingly innocuous ‘Police Station’ which is accompanied by a brooding piece of maniacal piano that underpins a gloriously evocative theme; a haunting and suggestive muse that stutters with tension. It’s another Reynolds’ master stroke on the heels of his score for Richard Linklater’s ‘Where Do You Go, Bernadette’, his work on Ballet Austin’s ‘Grimm Tales’ and his contribution to ‘The Sound Of Science’, a multimedia collaboration with Kronos Quartet’s former cellist Jeffery Zeigler.

                                                                                                                                                                      TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                      Side A

                                                                                                                                                                      A1 - The Lodger
                                                                                                                                                                      A2 - When He Sits At The Table
                                                                                                                                                                      A3 - Golden Curls
                                                                                                                                                                      A4 - Tempting Providence
                                                                                                                                                                      A5 - You Will Not Rest

                                                                                                                                                                      Side B

                                                                                                                                                                      B1 - The Satchel
                                                                                                                                                                      B2 - Keep Your Handcuffs Hidden
                                                                                                                                                                      B3 - Police Station
                                                                                                                                                                      B4 - A Kiss On The Hand
                                                                                                                                                                      B5 - The Chase

                                                                                                                                                                      Tobin Sprout

                                                                                                                                                                      Empty Horses

                                                                                                                                                                        Artist, illustrator, writer and lo-fi innovator, Tobin Sprout was the super-productive partner of Robert Pollard in the legendary Guided By Voices. The gifted songwriter returns with a pensive, expansive part autobiographical new album ‘Empty Horses’. Here he’s part Townes Van Zandt, part John Prine, part Robbie Robertson at his retrospective best.

                                                                                                                                                                        The album is a meticulously observed study of America and Americana (not the music, but the state of mind). An alternative American Songbook, if you will, a collection of laments to simpler times and the struggle for what’s right, peppered with an examination of faith and the search for a sense of justice. Close up and personal, ‘Empty Horses’ is a poignant carefully etched experience, a rolling journey in modern times, nodding back to tradition, a personal snapshot filled with honesty.

                                                                                                                                                                        ‘Empty Horses’ is released on vinyl LP and also a deluxe bookback CD, beautifully packed with 24 pages of paintings and lyrics by Tobin Sprout, a true collectors piece for fans of Tobin’s music and art.

                                                                                                                                                                        “The perfect aural encapsulation of melancholy: in turns somnambulant, romantic and all-consuming” Rolling Stone.



                                                                                                                                                                        “Raw, honest and often revelatory” Consequence Of Sound

                                                                                                                                                                        TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                        Side A
                                                                                                                                                                        1 Wings Prelude
                                                                                                                                                                        2 The Return
                                                                                                                                                                        3 Breaking Down
                                                                                                                                                                        4 On Golden Rivers
                                                                                                                                                                        5 The Man I Used To Know

                                                                                                                                                                        Side B
                                                                                                                                                                        6 Every Sweet Soul
                                                                                                                                                                        7 Empty Horses
                                                                                                                                                                        8 Antietam
                                                                                                                                                                        9 All In My Sleep
                                                                                                                                                                        10 No Shame

                                                                                                                                                                        Throwing Muses

                                                                                                                                                                        Sun Racket

                                                                                                                                                                          ‘Sun Racket’ is the brand new album from legendary Boston trio Throwing Muses, consisting of Kristin Hersh, David Narcizo and Bernard Georges. The follow up to 2013’s ‘Purgatory/Paradise’ is an outpouring of modal guitars, reverbed shapes, echoey drums and driving bass set behind Kristen Hersh’s well-thumbed notebook of storylines. A ten-song opus of suitably wrought tales set against a wall of sound that’s at once calm and ethereal before building into glorious cacophonous crescendos. When Throwing Muses wrote their last album, they were shattered. Pieces were coming and going, elements repeating and charging the whole. “It sounded beautiful jumping around like that”.

                                                                                                                                                                          Two-minute songs reappearing as twisted instrumentals or another song’s bridge. They mimicked the effect live which kept them on their toes. Whatever was happening was already over in other words. ‘Sun Racket’ is the opposite. It refused to do anything but sit still. It says, “sit here and deal”. “All it asked of us was to comingle two completely disparate sonic vocabularies: one heavy noise, the other delicate music box. Turns out we didn’t have to do much. Sun Racket knew what it was doing and pushed us aside, which is always best. After thirty years of playing together, we trust each other implicitly but we trust the music more” - Kristin Hersh And so, they continue. Business unusual.

                                                                                                                                                                          STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                                                                          Barry says: Throwing Muses bring us their newest selection of gritty, fuzzed-out rock and / or roll, classic rock tinged melodies and deep, bluesy grooves. It's an intoxicating and exciting mix, and one that hasn't tempered any over time.

                                                                                                                                                                          TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                          1 Dark Blue
                                                                                                                                                                          2 Bywater
                                                                                                                                                                          3 Maria Laguna
                                                                                                                                                                          4 Bo Diddley Bridge
                                                                                                                                                                          5 Milk At Mcdonald’s
                                                                                                                                                                          6 Upstairs Dan
                                                                                                                                                                          7 St Charles
                                                                                                                                                                          8 Frosting
                                                                                                                                                                          9 Kay Catherine
                                                                                                                                                                          10 Sue's

                                                                                                                                                                          Josephine Foster

                                                                                                                                                                          This Coming Gladness (RSD20 EDITION)

                                                                                                                                                                            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.


                                                                                                                                                                            Black Vinyl.Essential reissue of Josephine Foster's crucially revered classic 'This Coming Gladness' ñ for the first time on vinyl since 2008.Comes with brand new artwork and housed in a reverse board sleeve with a download card.

                                                                                                                                                                            Brigid Mae Power

                                                                                                                                                                            Head Above The Water

                                                                                                                                                                              Brigid Mae Power paints expansive songs that are effortless, hypnotic and folk-oriented like Judee Sill, Bill Callahan and Sharon Van Etten.

                                                                                                                                                                              The third album from the celebrated singer/songwriter, ‘Head Above The Water’ is a coming of age opus featuring a ground-breaking amalgamation of traditional folk and country - an engaging blend of strings, bouzouki, piano and Power’s distinctive vocal make this an achingly beautiful body of work.

                                                                                                                                                                              Recorded in analogue studio The Green Door in Glasgow with Alasdair Roberts co-producing alongside Brigid and Peter Broderick. It’s a continuing tale of everyday survival; more diverse, different, a bigger canvas, with broader brushstrokes…

                                                                                                                                                                              Country and traditional folk rub shoulders, making for a juxtaposition of threads, with added instrumentation from five musicians lured into the studio to provide larger dynamics.

                                                                                                                                                                              “Power meditates on the dichotomy that’s always existed in her work, melding atmospheric bliss and stark desperation.” Pitchfork.

                                                                                                                                                                              “Power invokes the elements, either in contrast to internal weather or in sympathy with it.” The Guardian.

                                                                                                                                                                              “Haunting and haunted” (The Line Of Best Fit), ‘Head Above The Water’ continues in that vein becoming more ethereal, more personal and even more alluring.

                                                                                                                                                                              TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                              Side A
                                                                                                                                                                              A1 On A City Night
                                                                                                                                                                              A2 Wearing Red That Eve
                                                                                                                                                                              A3 Wedding Of A Friend
                                                                                                                                                                              A4 Not Yours To Own
                                                                                                                                                                              A5 I Was Named After You

                                                                                                                                                                              Side B
                                                                                                                                                                              B6 We Weren't Sure
                                                                                                                                                                              B7 You Have A Quiet Power
                                                                                                                                                                              B8 I Had To Keep My Circle Small
                                                                                                                                                                              B9 The Blacksmith
                                                                                                                                                                              B10 Head Above The Water

                                                                                                                                                                              Giant Sand

                                                                                                                                                                              Ramp

                                                                                                                                                                                A Deluxe remastered edition of Giant Sand’s 1991 album ‘Ramp’ with a second disc featuring the Mad Dog sessions from earlier that same year. “Convertino's brush-work and Burns' upright bass provide the perfect foundation for Gelb's parched voice and chaotic guitar, and guests include Rainer, Victoria Williams and country veteran Pappy Allen. It’s one of Giant Sand's strongest and most complete albums.” The Quietus // Featuring piano lounge music for an off-world colony interrupted by an onslaught of guitar when needed, it’s light and dark and the better for it, a musical journey on a road less travelled. With Gelb’s lyrical invention to the fore: “His thoughts unfold in long, rolling sentences that don't always follow conventional rules of grammar or syntax.” The Quietus // The Tucson sound at it very best.

                                                                                                                                                                                TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                Disc 1

                                                                                                                                                                                1 Warm Storm
                                                                                                                                                                                2 Romance Of Falling
                                                                                                                                                                                3 Wonder
                                                                                                                                                                                4 Welcome To My World
                                                                                                                                                                                5 AntiShadow
                                                                                                                                                                                6 Neon Filler
                                                                                                                                                                                7 Jazzer Snipe
                                                                                                                                                                                8 Z.Z. Quicker Foot
                                                                                                                                                                                9 Seldom Matters
                                                                                                                                                                                10 Resolver
                                                                                                                                                                                11 Nowhere
                                                                                                                                                                                12 Always Horses Coming
                                                                                                                                                                                13 Patsy's Blues

                                                                                                                                                                                Disc 2 - Live At Mad Dog Studios – 30th January 1991:

                                                                                                                                                                                1 Back To The Black And Grey
                                                                                                                                                                                2 Trickle Down System
                                                                                                                                                                                3 Bible Black, Book II
                                                                                                                                                                                4 Still Too Far
                                                                                                                                                                                5 Romance Of Falling
                                                                                                                                                                                6 Can’t Find Love
                                                                                                                                                                                7 Shadow To You

                                                                                                                                                                                Modern Studies

                                                                                                                                                                                The Weight Of The Sun

                                                                                                                                                                                  New album from kosmiche folk-rock quartet Modern Studies. A glorious compendium of haunted disco hallelujahs, mercurial krautrock chorales, cosmic pop adagios and euphoric, resilient, anthems. ‘The Weight of the Sun’ sees principal songwriters Emily Scott and Rob St John further their warm, esoteric field studies with Pete Harvey and Joe Smillie, as previously reconnoitred on ‘Swell To Great’ (2016) and ‘Welcome Strangers’ (2018).

                                                                                                                                                                                  “The exact point where Fairport Convention meet Jim O’Rourke at a remote Scottish railway station.” Tim Burgess.

                                                                                                                                                                                  “Melancholic magic… recalls Johnny Marr’s hazier reveries and the febrile, electrified folk of Polly Harvey’s Let England Shake.” UNCUT

                                                                                                                                                                                  There is a strange familiarity, and a welcome strangeness, in the quiet alchemy of Modern Studies.

                                                                                                                                                                                  TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                  Side A
                                                                                                                                                                                  1. Photograph
                                                                                                                                                                                  2. Run For Cover
                                                                                                                                                                                  3. Heavy Water
                                                                                                                                                                                  4. She
                                                                                                                                                                                  5. Corridors
                                                                                                                                                                                  6. Signs Of Use

                                                                                                                                                                                  Side B
                                                                                                                                                                                  7. Brother
                                                                                                                                                                                  8. The Blue Of Distance
                                                                                                                                                                                  9. Back To The City
                                                                                                                                                                                  10. Jacqueline
                                                                                                                                                                                  11. Spaces
                                                                                                                                                                                  12. Shape Of Light

                                                                                                                                                                                  Josephine Foster

                                                                                                                                                                                  I'm A Dreamer

                                                                                                                                                                                    Popping up unassumingly in the second season of the popular series ‘End Of The F**cking World’ on Netflix and Amazon. This new release is sided with exclusive B-side ‘All Glow Now’. Taken from her 2013 album of the same name, ‘I’m A Dreamer’ beckons with a gentle hand, each note clear and crisp. ”Another stellar effort” (NME) the album “collects together a set of early country-esque songs” (The Quietus) and is produced by Andrija Tokic. The song sits comfortably at home in salon or saloon with its delicately arranged piano, woozy harmonica and soul-searching lyrics. “A masterclass in songwriting that perfectly invokes old Americana” Time Out // The North American Colorado based singersongwriter breathes new life into archaic forms, embodying the cultural archelogy of Harry Smith’s old weird America. She has lent her warbling mezzo-soprano and interpretive wit to nearly two decades of self-produced recordings. Her songs are rooted in American folkblues as well as classical art song and Tin Pan Alley. (E. Gades)

                                                                                                                                                                                    Las Kellies

                                                                                                                                                                                    Suck This Tangerine

                                                                                                                                                                                      Argentinian grrl group Las Kellies return with new album ‘Suck This Tangerine’ out 27th March on Fire Records and will be touring Europe in Spring 2020. Sucking you in, Las Kellies takes us straight back to the party reminding us of what we’ve been missing with their libidinous mix of garage, punk and dub. Thrashing it out on the dancefloor, ‘Suck This Tangerine’ deals with the difficulties of a society in never ending crisis (‘Funny Money’) to the highs and lows in relationships (‘He’s Who’, ‘Let You Go’) and there’s a guest appearance from ex-Kellie Julia Worley on ‘Close Talker’. Recorded at home in Buenos Aires, the chemistry of the duo’s formative years remains as does their febrile new wave post-punk sound soaked in fiery dance beats and dub-pop. Their first release since 2016’s ‘Friends & Lovers’ was “impressively varied” (The Vinyl District) whilst “seamlessly melding psych/fuzz pop, post-punk attitude and dance beats” (Louder Than War). Las Kellies are Cecilia Kelly (bass, guitars, vocals) and Silvina Costa (drums, percussion and vocals). "Absolutely love 'em" Lauren Laverne

                                                                                                                                                                                      TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                      1. Closer
                                                                                                                                                                                      2. Funny Money
                                                                                                                                                                                      3. Baby
                                                                                                                                                                                      4. He's Who's
                                                                                                                                                                                      5. Matrixland
                                                                                                                                                                                      6. Despite.
                                                                                                                                                                                      7. Charade
                                                                                                                                                                                      8. Rid Of You 
                                                                                                                                                                                      9. Weekdays
                                                                                                                                                                                      10. Let You Go 
                                                                                                                                                                                      11. White Paradise
                                                                                                                                                                                      12. Close Talker

                                                                                                                                                                                      Bardo Pond

                                                                                                                                                                                      Bardo Pond - Repress

                                                                                                                                                                                        Critical praise from Pitchfork, Clash, The Wire, Q Magazine and more upon release. New inverted LTD edition artwork. Fire re-issue Bardo Pond’s eponymous eighth studio album from 2010, their debut for Fire from way back when. A lysergic brain wrestler in which the Pennsylvanian drone outfit perfect their modal sound. Teasing the artistry of LaMonte Young and Terry Riley into a guitar shaped cauldron, the album’s compulsive reverbed guitar shapes slowly simmer behind Isobel Sollenberger’s esoteric vocals “Like hearing a tannoy at a station in the voice of Jesus.” The Quietus. A claustrophobic stuttering raga interlocks with their psychedelic leanings best exemplified on ‘Cracker Wrist’ which sounds like something that’s intentionally always just about to happen/and/or spin back in time. Featuring lengthy fully nurtured play offs between the quintet ‘Bardo Pond’ is a heady statement that’s like the most wholesome kind of vegan-friendly mushroom trips. Pitchfork reckons they’re “playing fuzzed out stoner dreams.” Vice’s musical brother Noisey likens them to “Fugazi On Acid.” Allmusic intervenes with: “These are epic, soaring psychedelic ambient power-drone rock noise melodies where partially buried, distant female vocals are laced throughout a roaring, murky/sludge guitar soundscape

                                                                                                                                                                                        TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                        1 Just Once
                                                                                                                                                                                        2 Don’t Know About You
                                                                                                                                                                                        3 Sleeping
                                                                                                                                                                                        4 Undone
                                                                                                                                                                                        5 Cracker Wrist
                                                                                                                                                                                        6 The Stars Behind
                                                                                                                                                                                        7 Wayne’s Tune

                                                                                                                                                                                        Islet

                                                                                                                                                                                        Eyelet

                                                                                                                                                                                          A Powys trio whose free-spirited invention and exuberant intensity flows through experimental pop: hypnotic, exhilarating and defiantly unique. The Welsh band Islet return with the release of their long-awaited new album.

                                                                                                                                                                                          Eyelet was recorded at home tucked away in the hills of rural Mid Wales. It took form the months following the birth of band members Emma and Mark Daman Thomas’ second child and the death of fellow band member Alex Williams’ mother. Alex came to live with Emma and Mark, and the band enlisted Rob Jones (Pictish Trail, Charles Watson) to produce.

                                                                                                                                                                                          ‘Caterpillar’ described by Emma as “a song for my unborn child”. It's followed by syncopated lullaby ‘Good Grief’ with its haunting keyboard hook and icy percussion thawed by Emma’s yearning vocals about the quiet strength of generations of women. With nods towards Arthur Russell and Jenny Hval, ‘Geese’ is a mini symphony of driven electronica inspired by Welsh cultural theorist Raymond Williams’ novel People Of The Black Mountains.

                                                                                                                                                                                          Young Fathers inflected rhythm can be heard on ‘Radel 10’ that accompanies the multi-tracked variations of Emma and defiant lyrics that were inspired in part by The Good Immigrant - the landmark anthology of essays on race and immigration by BAME writers.

                                                                                                                                                                                          STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                                                                                          Barry says: Islet were one of the first bands I saw play when I moved to Wales, and remained a mainstay on my shelves since that day. Whilst their groove has morphed, and the frenetic energy has both waxed and waned, the output has remained undeniably brilliant. 'Eyelet' is on the more relaxing side, but absolutely glimmers with astoundingly written pop songs and immersive, soaring heft. Their greatest work to date, in a catalogue of gold.

                                                                                                                                                                                          TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                          Side A
                                                                                                                                                                                          A1 Caterpillar
                                                                                                                                                                                          A2 Good Grief
                                                                                                                                                                                          A3 Treasure
                                                                                                                                                                                          A4 Geese
                                                                                                                                                                                          A5 Sgwylfa Rock

                                                                                                                                                                                          Side B
                                                                                                                                                                                          B1 Radel 10
                                                                                                                                                                                          B2 Clouds
                                                                                                                                                                                          B3 Florist
                                                                                                                                                                                          B4 Moon
                                                                                                                                                                                          B5 No Host
                                                                                                                                                                                          B6 Gyratory Circus

                                                                                                                                                                                          Bold, weird, wild, wired, sonically luxurious yet never losing touch with its DIY-‘til-I-die roots, Thumb World is a voyage to the outer rings of Pictish Trail’s mind at its darkest, funniest and most inventive – a plugged-in, fuzzed-out, fucked-up contemplation on, as he puts it, “life repeating and gradually degrading, the inevitable cyclical nature of things, and the sense of their ultimately being no escape.”

                                                                                                                                                                                          Expect alien abductions, thumping beats, Trump-haired pigs, paternal panic, astronaut sex, bad acid trips, worse hangovers, lashings of distortion and a lot of anthropomorphic thumbs. “Our opposable thumbs are the things that separate us from most other animals on Earth,” Pictish explains, of the fat digit symbolism, “they are also the things that we use to swipe on screens, to separate ourselves from our normal lives, but which in turn trap us within an artificial reality.”

                                                                                                                                                                                          Produced and mixed by Rob Jones, featuring string arrangements from Kim Moore and drumming from Alex Thomas (Squarepusher, Anna Calvi, Air), Thumb World is Pictish Trail’s most collaborative album to date.

                                                                                                                                                                                          An audio-visual dialogue with Swatpaz, AKA Scottish artist Davey Ferguson – the man behind the Turbo Fantasy series and an entire episode of cult TV phenomenon Adventure Time – furnished Johnny with not just a graphic aesthetic for the album, but even helped him to shape the sound of the finished record. “I sent Davey a work-in-progress mix of the album,” Johnny says, “he came back with sketches in which he had reimagined Thumb World as an 80’s arcade game. Some of the songs are centered around specific visual images, inspired by Davey’s sketches.”

                                                                                                                                                                                          Due for release on Fire Records on February 21, 2020. Four years in the making, Thumb World is the much-anticipated follow-up to his critically acclaimed Scottish Album of the Year Award public vote winner Future Echoes.

                                                                                                                                                                                          STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                                                                                          Barry says: This definitely falls solidly within my realm of interests,

                                                                                                                                                                                          videogame aesthetic [x]
                                                                                                                                                                                          superb production [x]
                                                                                                                                                                                          brilliantly written tunes [x]

                                                                                                                                                                                          It's got it all, and only goes to show how the super talented Johnny Lynch keeps smashing it out of the park. Ace stuff.

                                                                                                                                                                                          TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                          Side A
                                                                                                                                                                                          1 Repeat Neverending
                                                                                                                                                                                          2 Double Sided
                                                                                                                                                                                          3 Pig Nice
                                                                                                                                                                                          4 Lead Balloon
                                                                                                                                                                                          5 Fear Anchor

                                                                                                                                                                                          Side B
                                                                                                                                                                                          6 Slow Memories
                                                                                                                                                                                          7 Bad Algebra
                                                                                                                                                                                          8 Heart Eyes
                                                                                                                                                                                          9 Turning Back
                                                                                                                                                                                          10 Thumb World

                                                                                                                                                                                          “What Black Lips do so well is tease the horror out of wholesomeness and recast golden-age rock’n’roll in a strange, discomforting light” Pitchfork.

                                                                                                                                                                                          “Cosmic country that comes strutting off a dusty back porch with gritted teeth” Consequence Of Sound.

                                                                                                                                                                                          It’s country music but not as we know it which begs the question: Have these Bad Kids of 21st Century rock ’n’ roll finally grown up on their ninth studio album? Are they at peace with themselves? Have they made a record their parents could listen to? The Black Lips new album ‘Sing In A World That’s Falling Apart’ continues to flick the middle finger to one and all. This ain’t another gaggle of bearded southern sons fleeing their collective suburban upbringings and collegiate music education. There aren’t the usual clichés about drinking, honkytonks, and heartbreak. These are, after all, the same Black Lips who rescued the waning garage punk subgenre by not sounding or dressing their musical predecessors. They also dug contemporary hip-hop and punk and actualized themselves Like so many dramatic moments in the Black Lips career, ‘Sing In A World That’s Falling Apart’ was born out of crisis. The band’s stylistic evolution through decades of prolific touring and recording took them where no garage punk band had gone before - huge venues, network television shows, and major music festivals. Here Black Lips are at their grimiest, most dangerous and equipped with the best collection of songs since the aughts. Skidding onto the asphalt in a shower of sparks, they roll on with an unapologetic southern-fried twang, pacing the beast, every now and then dropping a psycho howl into the rubber room madness lurking underneath the truckstop fireworks. This ain’t your granny’s country album. And conversely this ain’t your mama’s Black Lips.

                                                                                                                                                                                          STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                                                                                          Barry says: Just as the thigh-slapping hoedown starts, it fades away into rich psychy rock and swinging blues riffage. Black lips have always been one of the most distinctive bands that start with 'Black___' (of which there are A LOT), and 'In A World That's Falling Apart' provides a feelgood alternative to that exact scenario. Turn it up and don't stress. Black Lips got this.

                                                                                                                                                                                          TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                          1. Hooker Jon
                                                                                                                                                                                          2. Chainsaw
                                                                                                                                                                                          3. Rumbler
                                                                                                                                                                                          4. Holding Me Holding You
                                                                                                                                                                                          5. Gentleman
                                                                                                                                                                                          6. Get It On Time
                                                                                                                                                                                          7. Angola Rodeo
                                                                                                                                                                                          8. Georgia
                                                                                                                                                                                          9. Odelia
                                                                                                                                                                                          10. Dishonest Man
                                                                                                                                                                                          11. Locust
                                                                                                                                                                                          12. Live Fast Die Slow

                                                                                                                                                                                          Josephine Foster And The Supposed

                                                                                                                                                                                          All The Leaves Are Gone

                                                                                                                                                                                            Could it be that the world is finally ready for the tempestuous folk-rock opera that is "All the Leaves are Gone?" In 2004, only the truly informed and forward-thinking heads "got" this mini masterpiece. Critics scratched their heads and usually resorted to comparisons of past artists, like ol Grace Slick and her Great Jefferson Society, Fairport Convention (but which era? SURELY Judy Dyble's early reign?), and at best, Shirley Collins. A few fans attempted to connect the record to even more obscure "freak folk/rock" like Mellow Candle, Fear Itself, or Trees. "All the Leaves are Gone" was made by unique personalities not concerned with influences or copying any bygone era. Surely, some things are in our DNA or even early childhood, as Josephine Foster's roots in opera manifest themselves as much as any other influence in this organic song cycle. Sure, guitarist Brian Goodman may have heard Richard Thompson before, but his alchemical and molten guitar spray is purely his own, in tunings and intervals still not meant for normal humans to understand, mostly because his 2004 guts were poured into every sublime note (I think even Brian himself never even understood how good he was). That fiery emotion is also in every nuance of Foster's songs--like life, there's disquieting, jagged moments of unease, and there's calm both before and after the storm. There are moments of utter gentleness along the journey---because yes, every concept album should be a voyage, and this is one everyone should take. - Steve Krakow

                                                                                                                                                                                            TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                            Well-Heeled Men
                                                                                                                                                                                            The Most Loved One
                                                                                                                                                                                            All The Leaves Are Gone
                                                                                                                                                                                            Nana, Deathknell
                                                                                                                                                                                            Silly Song
                                                                                                                                                                                            Jailbird (Hero Of The Sorrow)
                                                                                                                                                                                            Worried And Sorry
                                                                                                                                                                                            Who Will Feel Bitter At The Days End?
                                                                                                                                                                                            John Ave
                                                                                                                                                                                            Seen From The Gray Train
                                                                                                                                                                                            Don't Wait Mary Jane
                                                                                                                                                                                            (You Are Worth) A Million Dollars

                                                                                                                                                                                            Jane Weaver

                                                                                                                                                                                            Loops In The Secret Society - Deluxe Edition

                                                                                                                                                                                              This unique package successfully archives the key elements of Jane’s ‘Loops In The Secret Society’ tour. Housed in a concise limited-edition pocket-compendium the new CD version brings Jane’s fully realised ‘Loops Variations’ and sonic installations into your own environment with new illustrations based on the songs by Andy Votel and DVD featuring the experimental film installation featured on the tour by Nick Farrimond. When science fiction turns science fact the effect can be truly momentous. The state demands that no-one wants an unlicensed machine-hum from an outbuilding; no-one wants clever prose mapping the future, no-one wants “music” that is attention-seeking, soul-defining, beneficial, Biblical, baroque and beautiful.

                                                                                                                                                                                              No-one told Jane Weaver that. Jane Weaver’s multi-layered synthetics evolved into a welcoming slew with 2014’s ‘The Silver Globe’, continuing through to 2017’s ‘Modern Kosmology’. ‘Loops In The Secret Society’ is a re-imagined journey through parts of both albums, with new ambient pieces primed and polished; with new tangents explored in a lab-friendly blossoming of the Weaver vision that travels yet further into the psych of our future. A continuous experience with one-line observations set in glorious sense-stimulating sound. That source material was then united in an expansionist experiment in late 2018. The ‘Loops In The Secret Society’ tour fused unrelated sounds set off against sympathetic new textures, tones and drones; hot-housed into an idealistic soundscape that formed the conducive parts of the imminent album of the same name. Co-conspirators include Henry Broadhead, PJ Phillipson and Andy Votel. Renegades all, headed by the enigmatic Weaver all under surveillance. 

                                                                                                                                                                                              TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                              1 Element (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              2 Milk Loop
                                                                                                                                                                                              3 Arrows (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              4 Found Birds
                                                                                                                                                                                              5 H>A>K (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              6 Did You See Butterflies (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              7 Sun House
                                                                                                                                                                                              8 I Wish (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              9 Mission Desire (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              10 Battle Ropes
                                                                                                                                                                                              11 Found Birds
                                                                                                                                                                                              12 Slow Motion (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              13 Margins
                                                                                                                                                                                              14 Cells (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              15 Code (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              16 Signs Are Rising
                                                                                                                                                                                              17 Ravenspoint (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              18 Sous Le Même Soleil, Vie Disparu Dans Le Ciel (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              19 Majic Milk (Loops Variation)
                                                                                                                                                                                              20 Conduit
                                                                                                                                                                                              21 Ivana Vessel
                                                                                                                                                                                              22 Battle Ropes

                                                                                                                                                                                              Giant Sand

                                                                                                                                                                                              Glum

                                                                                                                                                                                                A conceptual masterpiece, complete with a second disc capturing a classic KCRW Morning Becomes Eclectic session just prior to the original album’s release in 1994, plus five bonus tracks available for digital download. An epic windswept desert dry encounter with one of America’s greatest bands that traverses genres and styles to create a complete masterpiece. “While the guitars still squall and roar, they're used more sparingly, erupting to devastating effect in gloomy, low-key songs.” The Quietus // Emotional and uplifting, and always thought provoking, the band’s line up of Howe Gelb, latter day Calexico’s Joey Burns and John Convertino are joined by Victoria Williams, Pete Holsapple, Chris Cacavas, Pappy Allen and Lisa Germano, the whole shebang produced by Daniel Lanois protégé Malcolm Burn. “Giant Sand move to the darker side of their emotional stew. Within is jazz, country, folk, blues even Glam, we’re led to believe the mainstay is downbeat but the result is monumental

                                                                                                                                                                                                TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                                A1 Glum
                                                                                                                                                                                                A2 Yer Ropes
                                                                                                                                                                                                A3 Happenstance
                                                                                                                                                                                                A4 Frontage Road
                                                                                                                                                                                                A5 Painted Bird

                                                                                                                                                                                                B1 1 Helvakowboy Song
                                                                                                                                                                                                B2 Spun
                                                                                                                                                                                                B3 Left
                                                                                                                                                                                                B4 Faithful
                                                                                                                                                                                                B5 Bird Song
                                                                                                                                                                                                B6 I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry

                                                                                                                                                                                                C1 World Stands Still – KCRW SESSION
                                                                                                                                                                                                C2 I Wish You Love - KCRW SESSION
                                                                                                                                                                                                C3 Interview - KCRW SESSION
                                                                                                                                                                                                C4 Lester Lampshade - KCRW SESSION

                                                                                                                                                                                                D1 Get To Leave - KCRW SESSION
                                                                                                                                                                                                D2 Left - KCRW SESSION
                                                                                                                                                                                                D3 I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry - KCRW SESSION
                                                                                                                                                                                                D4 Interview - KCRW SESSION
                                                                                                                                                                                                D5 Instrumental - KCRW SESSION

                                                                                                                                                                                                Fenella

                                                                                                                                                                                                Fenella

                                                                                                                                                                                                  ‘Fenella’ is the latest project from Jane Weaver - musical polymath and one of the most respected electronic composers of recent times - and her long-term bandmates Peter Philipson and Raz Ullah.

                                                                                                                                                                                                  Having already released three critically-acclaimed LP’s within the last five years Weaver’s creativity continues to expand ever further into the (modern) kosmos with this reimagined soundtrack to Marcell Jankovics’ cult animation Fehérlófia.

                                                                                                                                                                                                  Released in 1981, Fehérlófia is a remarkable animation based in ancient folklore with a narrative culled from mythical tales of the Scythans, Huns and Avars.

                                                                                                                                                                                                  Weaver’s richly emotional and psychedelic music offers a perfect contemporary dialogue with Jankovics’ astonishing visual aesthetic.

                                                                                                                                                                                                  A mixture of ambient textures, menacing drones and spine-tingling vocals combine to create a lavish soundscape saturated with hypnotic moods and cinematic atmosphere.

                                                                                                                                                                                                  Fenella’s self-titled LP is a continuation of Fire Records re-imagined score series.

                                                                                                                                                                                                  STAFF COMMENTS

                                                                                                                                                                                                  Barry says: F'in-ell-a, this is good. As you'd expect, a project from Raz, Jane and Peter being anything but wonderful would be a rare day indeed, but this woozy slab of arpy psychedelia is pushing the boundaries. Intricate but easily digested, this rich tapestry of fizzing oscillators and analogue saturation is a gift straight from the white mare's mouth. AT LEAST 250ug of pure joy.

                                                                                                                                                                                                  TRACK LISTING

                                                                                                                                                                                                  Side A
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Slow Swoop
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Three Heads Rising
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Bright Curse
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Occurring In Waves
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Triangular Journey
                                                                                                                                                                                                  The Seed
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Pendulum
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Shard Of Glass
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Truly Seduced

                                                                                                                                                                                                  Side B
                                                                                                                                                                                                  The Spectacle
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Battle
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Echo Chamber Of Your Heart
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Strength In Air
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Rotation Wells
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Gilded Griffin
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Transfiguration Into One


                                                                                                                                                                                                  next 100

                                                                                                                                                                                                  Latest Pre-Sales

                                                                                                                                                                                                  169 NEW ITEMS

                                                                                                                                                                                                  E-newsletter —
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Sign up
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Back to top