Belgian artist Gratts wrote 'Sun Circles' as an empowerment anthem for his two sons and it dropped to plenty of acclaim last year. In its wake, Gratts DJed with Adelaide's multi-talented Alexander Flood on percussion and after some conversations he was enlisted to bring his jazz background to a remix of the original. He did so live as part of a quintet and the result is a super summery, airy rework with soulful vocals that linger long in the air. Detroit-based techno and ambient maestro John Beltran appears on the flip to bring a classy Balearic remix that will have you dreaming of longer, warmer nights and plenty of sun-kissed dancing fun.

TRACK LISTING

Sun Circles (Alexander Flood Live Rework)
Sun Circles (John Beltran Project Remix)

Over the years, Bonny Light Horseman has accumulated many miles on the collective odometer of life. The band’s core trio – Anaïs Mitchell, Eric D. Johnson, and Josh Kaufman – has amassed an incomparable collected resume. Mitchell is a celebrated solo artist as well as the playwright and songwriter behind the hit Broadway musical Hadestown, which notched eight Tony Awards and a Grammy for Best Musical Theater Album. Johnson is best known as the mind behind beloved indie mainstays Fruit Bats, as a longtime collaborator with The Shins, and as a film score composer. And Kaufman is a multi-hyphenate extraordinaire: songwriter, producer, and position player, having recorded and performed with artists ranging from Bob Weir to The War on Drugs to Taylor Swift, Hiss Golden Messenger and The Hold Steady. As a group, Bonny Light Horseman’s debut album received a Grammy nomination for Best Folk Album, and the track "Deep in Love" was nominated for Best American Roots Performance.



More important than any of this, though, they’ve also lived a big ol’ messy and tangled up pile of life, and all that living permeates their music with the wisdom, humor, and depth that underlies the accolades. Theirs is the stuff that defines folk music as a genre: love and loss, hope and sorrow, community and family, change and time. The Big Stuff, with the stakes sky high.



At the center of Bonny Light Horseman is, always, the singular combination of three powerful and tender artists, artists who expertly dodge superlatives but are quick to acknowledge that their bond makes each one better, braver and more vulnerable than they’d be on their own. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the force of their voices together, which work with complete trust in one another through the gentlest moments and the most ruthless wails.



Bonny Light Horseman’s new album, Keep Me on Your Mind/See You Free, is an ode to the blessed mess of our humanity. Confident and generous, it is an unvarnished offering that puts every feeling and supposed flaw out in the open. The themes are stacked high and staked even higher: love and loss, hope and sorrow, community and family, change and time all permeate Bonny Light Horseman’s most vulnerable and bounteous offering to date. Yet for all of its humanistic touchpoints, Keep Me on Your Mind/See You Free was forged from a kind of unexplainable magic.

TRACK LISTING

1. A Keep Me On Your Mind
2. Lover Take It Easy
3. I Know You Know
4. Grinch Funeral
5. Old Dutch
6. When I Was Younger
7. Waiting And Waiting
8. Hare And Hound
9. Rock The Cradle
10. Singing To The Mandolin
11. The Clover
12. Into The O
13. Don’t Know Why Youmove Me
14. Speak To Me Muse
15. Think Of The Royalties Lads
16. Tumblin Down
17. I Wanna Be Where Youare
18. Over The Pass
19. Your Arms (All The Time)
20. See You Free

BBE Music is thrilled to present J Jazz: Free and Modern Jazz From Japan 1954-1988, a remarkable large-format book covering some of the deepest, rarest, and most innovative jazz music released anywhere in the post-war era. Compiled by Tony Higgins and Mike Peden, co-curators of BBE Music's acclaimed J Jazz Masterclass Series, the book also features a foreword by Japanese jazz icon, Terumasa Hino.

This is the first time a book of this type has been published outside of Japan and the first anywhere of this size and scale. It is a unique collection of over 500 albums of free and modern jazz released in Japan during a period of radical transformation and constant reinvention. An era that saw Japan return from the ravages of World War Two to become a global economic power and emerge as both a technological leader and an international cultural force. Through a unique gallery of albums, J Jazz charts the development of jazz in Japan from the first stirrings of the modern jazz scene in the mid to late 1950s and on through the hard bop and modal jazz of the 1960s.

It steers the reader into the radical directions of the 1970s when free jazz, fusion, post-bop, and jazz-funk opened up a growing number of Japanese jazz artists to a new global audience before consolidating in the mid to late 1980s with a musical scene that laid the path for the contemporary jazz generation to follow. Over 500 full-colour sleeves from many of the leading names in Japanese jazz sit alongside rare and private pressings that tell a story of constant change and musical exploration. J Jazz includes profiles of several leading record labels such as East Wind, Frasco, King Records, and Nippon Columbia as well as critical independents such as Three Blind Mice, ALM, and Aketa’s Disk. J Jazz includes interviews with celebrated jazz photographer Tadayuki Naito, and pianist Tohru Aizawa, bandleader on the totemic spiritual jazz album, Tachibana Vol 1, as well as free-jazz record collector and jazz musician Mats Gustafsson.

The book also features a chapter on albums by non-Japanese artists that only received a Japanese release, with collectible, rare, and obscure releases by figures such as Herbie Hancock, Miles Davis, Mal Waldron, Steve Lacy, and Art Blakey. J Jazz includes Japanese jazz charts from some of the world's leading jazz DJs including Gilles Peterson, Toshio Matsuura, Paul Murphy, and Shuya and Yoshihiro Okino. Among the specialist content is a feature on obi strips by record dealer and Japanese jazz expert, Yusuke Ogawa, plus a special article on Japanese Blue Note albums.

Across its 300-plus pages, J Jazz includes a detailed introduction contextualising the music, tracing the story of Japan's fascination with jazz back before the war. It also features biographical information on many of the key artists involved in shaping the post-war Japanese jazz scene including Sadao Watanabe, Toshiko Akiyoshi, Masabumi Kikuchi, Masahiko Togashi, Terumasa Hino, Yosuke Yamashita, Fumio Itabashi, Masayuki Takayanagi, Takeo Moriyama, Isao Suzuki, and many more.

TRACK LISTING

1. Philosopher's Stone - Tohru Aizawa Quartet
2. Love Talken - Kohsuke Mine
3. Little B's Poem - Hideto Sasaki, Toshiyuki Sekine Quartet + 1
4. Take - Takeo Moriyama
5. Takeuma - Makoto Terashita Meets Harold Land
6. Dog's Dance - Miyasaka + 5
7. Future On You - Shintaro Quintet
8. Blue Road - Masaru Imada Trio + 1
9. Zekatsuma Selbst - Koichi Matsukaze Trio + Toshiyuki Daitoku
10. Rerev (Extended Version - Live) - Hideyasu Terakawa Quartet

Belgian DJ and producer Gratts have joined forces with London-based vocalist Mr. Beale to follow up on to success of their well-received 'Sun Circles' release last year. Here, on the sublime 'Submerge Me', they are in fine form once more with a brooding sound that features the uniquely mesmerising mantras of Beale and plenty of raw, compelling and percussive grooves that fully lock you in and get you going. Versatile Records' own Gilb'r then steps up on the flip and manages to take things even deeper with some fine liquid dub excursions to complete a top 7"

TRACK LISTING

Submerge Me (Original Version)
Submerge Me (Gilb'r Remix)

Be Strong Be Free debuts a new series here, Mellow Magic Worldwide, which will offer up a series of DJ weapons that have been produced by "worldwide studio buds." The first one opens with some superb tackle from Gold Suite whose brilliant 'Crush' is a slow-burning 80s jam and emotive rollercoaster that has made a real impact during road testing experiments. On the flipside is the mysterious Mancunian Visions Of Eden who debuts on vinyl with a lush deep house jam 'When It Has Past' that has a subtle Balearic charm. Lastly comes Murrin who heads up the Puca Sounds label and co-runs Berlin party Fandango. His 'Maybe Tonight' is a late-night cosmic delight.

TRACK LISTING

Gold Suite - "Crush"
Visions Of Eden - "When It Has Past"
Murrin - "Maybe Tonight"

Brainwave Research Center is back once again with another superb album, and once again Chase Smith and Christa Majoras embody a unique DIY sound crafted from analog synthesizer experimentations. This is another entry into the duo's initial four-part series and it encapsulates the essence of summer. The A-side commences with a dreamy narrative that transitions into the gritty urban landscape of Brooklyn in 'Interceptor iii,' and concludes with euphoric sunset vibes. On the B-side, the music delves into the sensation of falling in dreams, reminiscent of their second album Mosaic, again blending electronic and acoustic elements. Feel Free, then, invites listeners into the everyday musings of Brainwave Research Center and is a classic listen for fans of locked-in rhythms.

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
1. "Life Of A Earthworm"
2. "Interceptor III"
3. "Electric Twilight"
4. "Wow!"
5. "Big Moonlight"

Side 2
1. "Falling (Sensation)"
2. "Innerspace"
3. "Wild Air"
4. "(It's) Free To Dream"
5. "Endian Summer"

In celebration of 20th Anniversary of The Streets most iconic album: ' A Grand Don't Come For Free' - comes a limited edition coloured repress on double vinyl (dark red). Originally released in 2004, the record features legendary tracks such as 'Dry Your Eyes' + 'Fit But You Know it' and original artworks shot by counterculture photographer Ewen Spencer. A must-cop for any fan interested in relishing in the nostalgia of early 2000s Uk Garage, spoken word and hip-hop. 

Twin Cities duo Feel Free Hi Fi return to their in-house imprint Digital Sting with their first full length entitled “I was so far in I was out.” After two prior EP's and collaborations with Equiknoxx and Duppy Gun Feel Free Hi Fi deliver 8 new tracks of their distinct but eclectic digital dub. Amalgamating many of the sounds, sonics, and aesthetics of prior releases into these eight percussive instrumentals. The industrial dub and weirdo dancehall remain but the focus is further refined while also exploring environmental and cinematic sounds to create often dark and heavy versions that are as singular as they are collective, as introverted as they are expansive.

The records come in double sided silk-screened printed custom DJ Jackets, with Obi Strip style stickers and hand stamped white labels created and printed by Digital Sting.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Blood
A2. Gateless Barrier
A3. Spring Rain
A4. Triton
B1. Marauder
B2. Vexed
B3. Digital Tomb
B4. Computer Paul

Prophetic, spiritual and frenetic, ‘Amplifier’ is Delasi’s testimony in musical form. A manifestation of Delasi emerging triumphant after many years in limbo as he searched for a long-awaited breakthrough in the music industry.

Produced by Delasi himself alongside Morgan Greenstreet, ‘Amplifier’ is underpinned by the texture of coastal rhythms indigenous to Accra and tightly ornamented with bustling drum breaks, electronic synth lines and jazz sensibilities.

Veteran Ghanaian multi-instrumentalist and sound designer NiiNoiNortey appears on the track to deliver an explosive and rhythmically intense saxophone performance throughout as it tastefully builds to an emphatic crescendo.

Self-described as a prayer, the track’s maximalist and percussive instrumentation is cleverly juxtaposed with minimal lyrics where Delasi’s faint vocal repeats a series of repeated phrases like evoking the mood and semblance of a meditative chant and religious experience. Harkening to the work of afrofuturistic jazz musicians like Sun Ra and Pharaoh Sanders.

Speaking on the track’s meaning, Delasi said: “‘Amplifier’ is my prayer and like with other songs of mine it can scare me because I write things and then it’ll manifest in exact detail. The song is basically outlining how hard I’ve worked and how I need an amplifier to have my desires fulfilled. It's like a mantra and that’s why it's not so lyrical”.

‘Amplifier’ marks Delasi’s first release as a lead artist since his 2015 self-released project ‘#thoughtjourney’ which garnered support and praise from Rolling Stone, BBC6 Music, Worldwide FM, KCRW, Afropop Worldwide, Deutschlandfunk Kultur, NRK and legendary French DJ/Producer Laurent Garnier. Additionally parlaying into touring and festival gigs across Nairobi, Berlin, Morocco, Denmark and Sweden.

Delasi is an artist that has been quietly prolific for over a decade. Honing his musicianship exploring sonic possibilities with Ableton and Teenage Engineering. Eventually entrenching himself in the Ghanaian rap scene via collaborations with Hammer of The Last Two, Reggie Rockstone and Yaw P with whom he would release a joint project ‘Imperfections: The Break Up Vol 1’ in 2013.

He was musically raised on a diet heavily influenced by his father who exposed him to the sounds of Marvin Gaye, Bob Marley & The Wailers, Bobby McFerrin, Jim Reeves and Billy Ocean alongside the soundtracks for movies like Doctor Zhivago, The Sound of Music and La Bamba. Delasi’s own tastes would be heavily informed by linchpins of US Hip-Hop like Wu-Tang Clan, Nas, Onyx and M.O.P in addition to alternative R&B artists Frank Ocean and James Blake.

After many years of operating as a proudly independent and self-contained artist, Delasi has now partnered with Gilles Peterson’s Brownswood Recordings. One of the world’s leading indie labels, famed for their instrumental role in breaking the likes of KOKOROKO, YussefDayes, Swindle, Joe-Armon Jones, ShabakaAnd The Ancestors, Zara McFarlane and Ghostpoet.

With Delasi now being granted resources to give his music the grand and worthy footing, he is now on the cusp of the artistic breakthrough that was long out of reach. Speaking further on how the deal with Brownswood inspired the new single, Delasi said:

“The music I’ve created this go round is so strong that I can’t handle it all by myself. Though I had a lot of fun doing it all by myself with ‘#thoughtjourney’, this time around I needed it to be with a home who could properly amplify it.”

TRACK LISTING

1. AgbeDzidzi
2. Amplifier (feat. NiiNoiNortey)
3. Perception
4. Audacity Of Free Thought (feat. Noah Dreiblatt)
5. Learn From Adversity (feat. Lollise)

"She and Me Fall Together in Free Death" is probably the most approachable, largely "musical" album that NWW has released since Rock N' Roll Station . It's also one of his strangest concepts, a marriage of trance inducing Krautrock grooves with a traditional jazz standard and some jarringly atonal musique concrete. Side A is the 20- minute title track: a slow-motion jam reminiscent of of one of Can's sidelong tracks on Tago Mago or the more avant-garde grooves of Tony Conrad and Faust's Outside the Dream Syndicate. The propulsive Jaki Liebezeit drumbeat is the foundation for a long jam session with what sounds like a dijderidoo and layers of guitar feedback. It's a massive, heavy sound, the kind that Julian Cope would devote a whole chapter to in his "Kratrocksampler". Side B is one long piece with three distinct movements. Beginning with those familiar, World Serpent-trademark windchimes, the listener is quickly ushered into Staple- ton's singing debut (!) in a rendition of the oft- covered traditional jazz ballad " Black is the Color of My True Love's Hair " This was a favorite of the recently deceased Nina Simone, and also of the avant- jazz screamer Patty Waters. Nurse With Wound's version is backed by cello drones, repetitive guitar strums and tambourine, sounding very much like The Velvet Un- derground's " Venus in Furs ". It's such a treat to hear Steven Stapleton's multitracked vocals cover this classic song, and this eerie version rates as one of my favorites. This song and the title track prove to the naysayers that Nurse With Wound is equally adept at rock n' roll songcraft as he is at demented sound collages. The creepy jazz cover seques into "Chicken Con- cret (For Missy E)", a truly warped tape-edit job that juxtaposes chicken squawks and sythesized birdcalls with random bleeps, speaker hiccups and gongs.

Could this be Steven Stapleton 's tribute to Timbaland and Missy Elliott's incomparable use of musique concrete techniques on their major label hip- hop anthems? Hard to say, but I like to think so. Side B ends with the hyper-sexualized "Gusset Typing", in which a mutated woman's voice describes her masturbation and orgasm in in- timate, anatomical detail. Her monologue is set against an intense rhythmic throbbing that builds as she reaches her climax. At the end, she blows her load and the record ends. This certainly qualifies as an active listening experience, and it's also a great make-out rec

TRACK LISTING

1. She And Me Fall Together Like Free Death
2. Black Is The Color Of My True Loves Hair
3. Chicken Concret 
4. Gusset Typing
5.She And Me Fall Together Like Free Death (Phosphorous Mix) 
6. Chicken Korma
7. Fine Writin'
8. She And Me Fall Together In Free Death (Funereal Mix)
9. Yellowed
10. Seeting Red
11. Black

After four albums and a decade of hard work, including countless performances worldwide, the members — Cory Castro, Lawrence Warner, Justin Castro, Jake Hughes, and Kevin Garcia — have a fresh perspective on life. The band is through obsessing over what comes next and romanticizing the moments that have already passed. Instead, Free Throw is making music about the present and how seeking balance in our lives is far more meaningful work than the endless pursuit of whatever you deem to be 'enough.'

Those Days Are Gone was the band’s debut, and still most popular, album. Out of press for years, the title is now back in steady rotation.

TRACK LISTING

1. Such Luck
2. Two Beers In
3. Good Job, Champ
4. Tongue Tied
5. Pallet Town
6. An Hour Pissed
7. Kim Tastie
8. How I Got My Shrunken Head
9. Let’s Get Invisible
10. What Day Is It, October?
11. Hey Ken, Someone Methodically Mushed The Donuts

Keyboardist and composer Carl Moore originally wrote, recorded and pressed only 100 (!) copies of these tracks, grabbing a quick moment of studio time during a tour of Japan in the early 1980s. Moore’s purple patch saw him becoming peers with artists such as Phyllis Hyman, Jean Carn, Janet Jackson and ‘The King of Gospel’, James Cleveland.

Carter Lake is an energetic 2 minutes 30 second blast of pure dance floor joy, that looks back at carefree days, teenage love and love lost. Moore’s voice soars, and showcases his love for the powerful stylings of jazz and gospel. On the flip, Must Be The Beat sees him explore very different textures and could easily be a long lost Prince recording found in the vaults in Paisley Park. Sounding like something jammed late at night, this one is perfect for the afterhours when there are 30 sweaty dancers left on the floor at 5am that just don’t want to go home!

This is the first release on Sweet Free Association, a new label founded by Sam Don, the DJ and curator responsible for the recent lovers rock and UK soul comps For The Love of You and Just A Touch. Born out of the wish to find another way of sharing ‘the fruits’ from his Free Association radio show and parties, these impossibly rare disco tracks are now available to a wider audience for the first time, as the vast majority of the original copies have been long lost.

Mastered at The Carvery, the lo-fi recordings have been skilfully lifted by Frank Merritt to sound big in the club, while retaining the original charm in the sound that made the tracks stand out to Sam in the first instance.

TRACK LISTING

Carter Lake
Must Be The Beat

Tasty 12" featuring two of the greatest legends in electronica: Aphex Twin and Autechre. A side features AFX's remix of Curve's "Falling Free" - a cavernous, eerie trip into the dark recesses of mainframe funk - complete with the producer's sonar bleeps and morse code percussion.

Autechre's "444" originally appeared as the last track on 1993's "Incunabala". It's a brilliant example of the duo's expert handling of control voltage emotion and otherworldly rhythm sequences. Sounds like a spaceship slowly gliding forcefully through interstellar nebula.

Super limited copies. 

TRACK LISTING

Falling Free
444

DJ and producer Gratts returns to his own imprint with the third instalment of the "Balearic but bumpin'" trilogy. Here, the Belgian puts forward a captivating piece of organic, Body & Soul NY inspired deep house, assisted by Cata Mansikka-aho on vocals. As always, an instrumental is provided for maximum nightclub daydreaming. On the flipside, British duo Faze Action up the energy levels with an equally musical disco version that hits in all the right spots. Artwork once again by Mads Cooke.

TRACK LISTING

Rhythm Of Love
Rhythm Of Love (Daydreamin' Instrumental)
Rhythm Of Love (Faze Action Remix)

"Free, Dancing" is the first release by a new trio with percussionist and producer Carlos Niño, luminary multi-instrumentalist Idris Ackamoor (of The Pyramids), and wizard guitarist and producer Nate Mercereau. They have been playing concerts together in California since June 2022, sharing a unique, vibrant sound, whilst exploring their own musical findings and energies. It's a contemporary offering soaked in intimacy and spiritual nuances (as you'd expect from these two astral planers). 

Artwork by Nep Sidhu.

TRACK LISTING

We Love You So Much
Heaven Cruise Heaven Humming 2
Lightning Progression
Group Effervescence With Jesse Peterson
Wylde Life Thyme Decoration
Friends Now
Time On Earth

Wicked previously unreleased late '80s combination tune from Icho Candy & his brother Prince Junior, who are sometimes confused for each other. On the same rhythm as King Kong's "Agony and Pain" (also repressed this week). Lyrically about the struggle for freedom of the day, as resonant today as it was nearly 40 years ago.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Icho Candy muses on the struggle for the freedom over King Kong's "Agony And Pain" riddim. Its another winner from the selection of Jah Life Time reissues we've been luckily blessed with this week.

TRACK LISTING

A. Free Up
B. Free Up Dub

Kepler Is Free represent the new Athenian urban jazz scene in full. You may say that they actually started the whole scene with their debut album "Teegarden" by Veego Records. Voted by local music portals as one of the best albums of 2020 and probably one of the best debuts ever when it comes to the Greek jazz game. Kepler Is Free makes expansive music that straddles the line between '70s soul-jazz, alternative hip-hop, and experimental electronica. The name of the band is inspired by a retired space telescope launched by NASA to discover Earth-size planets orbiting other stars. Named after astronomer Johannes Kepler. Founded in November of 2018 by Sokratis Tsentoglou (drums) who gathered George Migdanis (electric guitar), Nikiforos Nugent (keys), Spyros Zardas (trumpet) and Vasilis Alexopoulos (bass guitar), they all came together from different musical backgrounds in order to create original and groundbreaking material.

Commuting over their shared love of jazz and hip-hop, they composed their debut album, “Kepler”, with five tracks that highlighted their love for the music of GoGo Penguin, Badbadnotgood and Alfa Mist.

The fact that all the members were young and had not played in other jazz bands before was something that shook the Greek jazz community. ''Second Light'' was recorded in difficult conditions and was delayed quite a while until it was finished due to the pandemic. The band played a handful of sold out shows in Athens over the last few months proving with their performance and  attendance that the band had gathered a hyped up audience spreading outside the immediate jazz circle. "Juno" track was a smash hit on the legendary En Lefko' Radio station over the last two years. Worth to mention that just a month before the release of their second album Kepler is Free collaborated with LEX, one of the most famous rappers in Greece with the "Spike Lee" track. 

TRACK LISTING

A1. Koi
A2. Blue Shift
A3. Proxima
A4. Betelgeuse
B1. Eris
B2. Item #4
B3. Sunsets On Cygnus
B4. Event Horizon

Incredibly, “Sadness Sets Me Free” is the 25th album Gruff Rhys has released in his 35 year career individually, collaboratively and as a member of various bands. “Sadness Sets Me Free” is also the follow up to 2021’s “Seeking new Gods”, his first solo top ten record.

Lead-off single “Celestial Candyfloss” is a telling four minute glimpse of the forthcoming album, revealing the heady wonders and classic pop sounds within. Soaring strings carry the sweet melodies along, anchored by just enough necessary melancholy to add emotional ballast. The eye-popping video was created by long-time collaborator Mark James and compliments the scope and style of the song on a galactic scale.

“Celestial Candyfloss” is, Gruff says, “an attempted pocket symphony about the cosmic lengths that people will travel in the pursuit of love and acceptance. Mark James has brought the Sadness Sets Me Free album cover to life & managed to place me watching TV interference in a shipping container that’s lost in space. For what is apparently the 25th album I’ve had a hand in writing I’ve reverted to a rich seam of inspiration relating to shedding some light on sadness and the general terror of cosmic loneliness.”

And so it was that Gruff and his band – Osian Gwynedd (piano), Huw V Williams (double bass) and former Flaming Lips drummer turned Super Furry Animals archivist Kliph Scurlock (drums) piled into a van driven by the late, legendary tour manager “Dr” Kiko Loiacono and raced from Dunkirk, where they had just played the final show of a tour of Spain and France, to the outskirts of Paris in the early hours of a March morning in 2022. There, in La Frette Studios, a recording facility installed in a 19th-century house, Gruff and his road-hardened group tracked “Sadness Sets Me Free” in just three days. Backing vocals were added along the way by Kate Stables from This Is The Kit along with additional strings and orchestration and it was mixed between Marseille and Cardiff. What finally emerged from these intense bouts of cross-continental activity was Gruff’s most accomplished and beautiful record to date.

In a career that has taken him from the slate-mining towns of north-west Wales, down to the expat communities of Patagonia, up to the Mandan tribe of the Great Plains of North America and across to the Tuareg rock groups of the Saharan Desert, Gruff Rhys, one of Britain’s most beloved and successful singer-songwriters, has always been willing to follow an opportunity, wherever it may lead him. “At this point I quite like working with serendipity,” he says. “Not in a cosmic way, [but] I try and leave things open to chance encounters and chance geography. As I'm around 25 albums in I’m always looking for ways to make a different-sounding record”.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Gruff is one of the masters of musical disguiuse, effortlessly turning his hand to any number of genre leanings, but it's in effortlessly melodic albums like 'Sadness Sets Me Free' that we get to hear the true genius and uplifting glee that only he can bring. There are moments of orchestral majesty and brittle, tentative sadness but every moment is a delight. A reminder of why Gruff is one of the greatest songwriters of our times.

TRACK LISTING

1. Sadness Sets Me Free
2. Bad Friend
3. Celestial Candyfloss
4. Silver Lining (Lead Balloons)
5. On The Far Side Of The Dollar
6. They Sold My Home To Build A Skyscraper
7. Peace Signs
8. Cover Up The Cover Up
9. I Tendered My Resignation
10. I’ll Keep Singing

Dinked Edition Bonus 7”:
A. Amser
B. (etching, No Audio)

Released in 1971, Gil Scott-Heron’s second album “Pieces Of A Man” is a stone-cold classic and rightly seen as one of the greatest albums of all time.

There is a reason why a full album of songs did not appear as a follow-up. Both Thiele and Scott-Heron’s writing partner Brian Jackson had been keen to move forward quickly with song-based material, but Scott-Heron saw himself first and foremost as a writer. A new novel, The Nigger Factory, would be published in 1972 and he also enrolled for writing seminars at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.

Once the decision was made to combine poetry and song, sessions were booked for the 2nd and 3rd March 1972. The first session with Bernard ‘Pretty’ Purdie (drums), Hubert Laws (flute/piccolo), David Spinozza (guitar), Jerry Jemmott (bass) and Brian Jackson (electric and acoustic piano) recorded the songs with Horace Ott taking care of the arrangements. The second was dedicated to poetry, recorded with Scott-Heron, Jackson, Eddie Knowles and Charlie Sanders from their college group Black & Blues. “Free Will” was released in 1972.

The song side included the heart-rending Vietnam war commentary of ‘Do You Hear What They Said?’, the propulsive title track and the beautiful ‘The Middle Of Your Day’. The poetry side immerses you in the radical politics of the day via ‘No Knock’ and ‘The King Alfred Plan’, and ends with his heartfelt tribute to John Coltrane ‘...and then he wrote Meditations’. Like “Pieces Of A Man” it is a classic and a cornerstone of any record collection.

When BGP inherited the honour of looking after the Flying Dutchman legacy we discovered that, as well as being almost unparalleled in his discovery of great talent, Bob Thiele also recorded it immaculately. The label’s master tapes sounded exceptional and when it has come to our reissue series have only ever required the most minimal of EQ before transferring them onto disc.

With this is mind we have embarked on a series of all analogue re-mastering projects, to bring the listener as close to the sound captured on tape as possible. Our first release was Gil Scott-Heron’s “Pieces Of A Man” which was released early in 2023 and this second outing is “Free Will”. We took the original master tape to Frank Merritt at the Carvery who transferred the audio and mastered it before making this new cut himself. We then had it pressed on 180 gram vinyl and our only wish now is that you drop the needle, sit back and go back to 1972 to enjoy Gil Scott-Heron in his prime.

TRACK LISTING

Side One
1. Free Will
2. The Middle Of Your Day
3. The Get Out Of The Ghetto Blues
4. Speed Kills
5. Do You Hear What They Said?

Side Two
1. The King Alfred Plan
2. No Knock
3. Wiggy
4. Ain’t No New Thing
5. What Would Become Of Me
6. Billy Green Is Dead
7. Sex Education: Ghetto Style
8. … And Then He Wrote Meditations

For the very first time on yellow vinyl , and following demand from an active and enthusiastic fanbase, Demon Music are proud to present a career spanning collection featuring 25 of Kirsty MacColl's most popular recordings on a 2LP set.

Between her June 1979 debut single 'They Don't Know' and her tragic death in 2000, Kirsty released five studio albums and seventeen singles, a succinct but consistently high quality body of work, much of it self written or in partnership with notable collaborators like Graham Gouldman , or Johnny Marr. Whether she was exploring themes of love and loss, or applying her original and often witty world view, Kirsty's talent as a songwriter and singer is instantly apparent on this new compilation. She was equally adept at throwing new light on old favourites look no further than her (some might say better than the original) covers of The Kinks' 'Days', and Billy Bragg's 'A New England', both included here.

The respect for Kirsty's craft can be heard in the versions of her songs recorded by the likes of Tracey Ullman, ABBA's Anni Frid Lyngstad, and Bette Midler, while her rich, unique and in demand voice saw her back Simple Minds, the Rolling Stones, The Smiths, Talking Heads, Happy Mondays, The Wonder Stuff, Alison Moyet, and Robert Plant, among others.

Born in Croydon, England, Kirsty's roots as a performer began in the fertile late '70s Punk and New Wave scene, but with her style adapting as her influences broadened, her songwriting took in Pop, Folk, Country, Rock 'n' Roll, Dance, and Latin music, all of which can be heard on this celebration of a much loved and much missed talent.

TRACK LISTING

1. Kirsty MacColl - A New England (03:50)
2. Kirsty MacColl - Innocence (Single Remix) (04:02)
3. Kirsty MacColl - They Don't Know (03:01)
4. Kirsty MacColl - There's A Guy Works Down The Chip Shop Swears He's Elvis (03:08)
5. Kirsty MacColl - Don't Come The Cowboy With Me, Sonny Jim! (03:48)
6. Kirsty MacColl - Can't Stop Killing You (04:09)
7. Kirsty MacColl - England 2 Colombia 0 (03:45)
8. Kirsty MacColl - Walking Down Madison (7" Mix) (04:39)
9. Kirsty MacColl - Free World (Radio Edit) (02:37)
10. Kirsty MacColl - Terry (03:56)
11. Kirsty MacColl - You Just Haven't Earned It Yet, Baby (From "She's Having A Baby") (03:39)
12. Kirsty MacColl - Mother's Ruin (03:57)
13. Kirsty MacColl - Mambo De La Luna (Single Edit) (03:31)
14. Kirsty MacColl - Angel (Single Edit) (03:40)
15. Kirsty MacColl - In These Shoes? (03:39)
16. Kirsty MacColl - My Affair (Single Edit) (03:34)
17. Kirsty MacColl - Treachery (03:52)
18. Kirsty MacColl - Caroline (02:55)
19. Kirsty MacColl - Days (02:57)
20. Kirsty MacColl - He's On The Beach (Single Version) (03:31)
21. Kirsty MacColl - Soho Square (04:26)
22. Kirsty MacColl And Billy Bragg - Darling, Let's Have Another Baby (03:26)
23. Kirsty MacColl - All I Ever Wanted (Single Version) (03:31)
24. Kirsty MacColl And Evan Dando - Perfect Day (03:49)
25. The Pogues With Kirsty MacColl - Fairytale Of New York (04:37)

Expanded 2xLP 10th Anniversary Edition includes two studio outtakes from the original sessions, and a side-long live session recorded at WFMU by the then brand- new Solar Motel Band.

Over the last two decades Philadelphia-based guitarist Chris Forsyth has released over a dozen critically lauded albums that have established him as one of today's most unique and acclaimed guitar player /composers - a forward-thinking classicist synthesizing cinematic expansiveness with a pithy lyricism and rhythmic directness that makes even his 20-minute workouts feel as clear, direct, and memorable as a 4-minute song.

Named after a run-down lodge in New Jersey near where he grew up, Solar Motel was the first full-band project from Chris Forsyth. Originally released in 2013, it was considered his most ambitious and sublime work of Cosmic Americana to date, and the idea of the Motel also figured into a band where vacancies would open and close.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: One of the finest examples of psychedelic country music from the 2010's get a much needed and wonderfully accentuated reissue. Chris Fosyth's lysergic journey, 'Solar Motel' flows like a dreamy trip, swerving from heady distorted bliss into woozy, minimalist primitive. Brilliant.

TRACK LISTING

A1 - Solar Motel Part I (11:41)
A2 - Solar Motel Part II (10:05)
B1 - Solar Motel Part III (12:17)
B2 - Solar Motel Part IV (07:26)
C1 - Harmonious Dance (08:43)
C2 - Long Warm Afternoon (06:47)
D1 - Solar Motel Part I - Paranoid Cat - Live On WFMU (20:44)

“Incident At a Free Festival” is a tribute to the mid-afternoon slots at Deeply Vale, Bickershaw, Krumlin, Weeley, and Plumpton – early 70s festivals that don’t get the column inches afforded the Isle of Wight or Glastonbury Fayre, but which would have been rites of passage for thousands of kids. Bands lower down the bill would have been charged with waking up the gentle hippies and appealing to both the greasy bikers and the girls in knee-high boots who wanted to wiggle their hips. And the best way to do that was with volume, riffs and percussion.

Compiled by the venerated Bob Stanley and Pete Wiggs of Saint Etienne, this is the heavier side of the early 70s they summarised on the acclaimed “English Weather” collection. There’s an air of menace and illicit thrills among tracks by Andwella, Stack Waddy and Leaf Hound (whose “Growers of Mushroom” album is worth well over £1,000). Bigger names include the rabble-rousing Edgar Broughton Band and kings of the festival freakout, Hawkwind. They are represented by their rare version of ‘Ejection’

For every mystical Tyrannosaurus Rex performance there was something like Atomic Rooster’s Tomorrow Night or Curved Air’s Back Street Luv to capture the spirit of the day and stir the loins of festival goers; the tracks on “Incident At a Free Festival” were inspired by both Chicago’s percussive wig-outs and the Pink Fairies’ anarchic spirit. The sounds were heavy and frequently funky, with a definite scent of danger. Their message was clear and simple: clap your hands, stamp your feet, hold on to your mind. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Chasing Shadows - Deep Purple
2. One Way Glass - Manfred Mann Chapter Three
3. Hold Onto Your Mind - Andwella
4. Hot Pants - Alan Parker & Alan Hawkshaw
5. Do It - Pink Fairies
6. Tomorrow Night – Atomic Rooster
7. Taken All The Good Things - Stray
8. Out Demons Out - Edgar Broughton Band
9. For Mad Men Only - May Blitz
10. Back Street Luv - Curved Air
11. Ejection - Hawkwind
12. Meat Pies ’Ave Come But Band's Not ’Ere Yet - Stackwaddy
13. Lovely Lady Rock - James Hogg
14. Third World - Paladin
15. Taking Some Time On - Barclay James Harvest
16. Ricochet - Jonesy
17. Led Balloon - Steve Gray
18. Big Boobs Boogie - Slowload
19. Freelance Fiend - Leaf Hound
20. Confunktion - Dave Richmond 

Disco Bits are back with 2 slices of high class edits for your next barn dance.

KLA vs TSI - "Make Me Believe In Free"
The Patti Jo classic is reworked for the dancefloor. Brand new vocals cut together with a steppin' nu-disco beat and soulful strings. Uplifting orchestral disco jive with Loft-y vibe a plenty. 

The Chopper - People On Hold
On the flip "People Hold On" by Rochdale's finest Lisa Stansfield gets sliced n diced by The Chopper. An uptempo chugger that will work in nightclubs and weddings alike!

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Disco Bits can always be relied upon for some tastefully spliced sevens to spice up the dance. Nice to see Rochdale's finest pop songstress making an appearance on this edition.

TRACK LISTING

X. KLA Vs TSI - Make Me Believe In Free
Y. The Chopper - People On Hold

Irreversible Entanglements: With a new album in the can, the US quintet discuss freedom, community and dismantling the mechanisms of oppression. By Phil Freeman

The Primer: Jazz & Poetry: A user’s guide to the ongoing conversation between mighty music and vibrant verse. By David Grundy

Vanishing Twin: The London based art pop trio take a playful approach to retrofuturist psychedelia. By Claire Biddles

Invisible Jukebox: Matana Roberts: The Chicago born musician and multidisciplinary artist faces The Wire’s mystery record selection. Tested by Teju Adeleye.

Unlimited Editions: Gin&Platonic

Unofficial Channels: Chocolate Monk Top Tens

Carol Robinson: Clarinet results from the Paris based musician. By Louise Gray

Tom Mudd: Getting algorithmic with the Edinburgh experimentalist. By Stewart Smith

Hearsay: Chicago improvising trio turn the tables. By Bill Meyer

Marina Herlop: Exploring otherworlds with the Catalan composer. By Miloš Hroch

Global Ear: Oaxaca A mountain town’s brass ensembles celebrate Mexico’s Indigenous Mixe culture. By Juan San Cristóbal Lizama

The Inner Sleeve: Val Wilmer on Henry Grimes’s The Call

Another much-needed repress from Surfin In Kansas. This one hanged ten just under three years ago and has since become one bodacious and highly sought after slice of beach grooving joy.

"I Love You" samples The Gap Band's "Big Fun", extending the percussive breaks, doing away with all the smoochy vocal bits and upping the tempo jussst a tad before adding smatterings of extra piano goodness.

On side B, Johnny Bristol 's "Love No Longer Has A Hold On Me" is reduced to a dubbed out vox and hefty raregroove lick; the Strat part chiming away over a foundation shaking b-line and manly horns. A hefty slab of soul which is perfectly snipped and tucked by A Good Christian.

This repress won't hang around long - you have been warned! 

TRACK LISTING

A. I Love You
B. Free To Be Me

Blisteringly groovy collection of completely off-the-radar songs by Libyan composer / producer Najib Alhoush's group The Free Music, circa 1976. Releasing an astonishing 10 albums, all impressively strong and equally infused by soul, funk, disco and reggae, The Free Music created a distinctly infectious groove that unfortunately didn't make an impact outside of Libya due to the complex political situation at the time. There is a reason it says "Part 1" in the title.

Avid Habibi Funk listeners may be familiar with Libyan composer / producer Najib Alhoush, who's track "Ya Aen Daly" - the Bee Gee's "Stayin Alive" cover - was included in our second compilation. While the original track never excited us, Najib's version managed to strip it from its pop approach that had taken over disco during the genre's peak. At that time, disco tracks mostly were aiming to appeal to the widest audience possible. Najib had turned the original track into something different and very unique. Upon further research we found that Najib was actually the singer and founder of The Free Music band alongside Fakhreddin, Salim Jibreel, Abdulrazzak 'Kit-Kat', Mukhtar Wanis and Mohameed Al Rakibi.

Initially, we only licensed Najib Alhoush's "Ya Aen Daly" from Yousef Alhoush, Najib's son, who was pleased to hear that there was interest in his father's music form someone abroad. In the process of exchanging and learning about Najib's music and career, our understanding was that The Free Music only recorded the one album. This couldn't be further from the truth, in fact, there were ten albums produced by the group, all impressively coherent with a clear influence from disco, soul, funk and reggae.

The Free Music album was probably the longest it ever took us to gather information, photos and musical source material in a good enough quality to be reissued. This is largely due to the complicated political situation in Libya, compounded by the fact that Libya is still largely cut off from international payment systems, so getting an advance payment to the right person can be a process that takes weeks. The same goes for getting master tapes to a studio abroad and afterwards back to Libya.

When we look for music that works under the umbrella of Habibi Funk, we often come across albums where bands experimented with influences from Soul, Jazz, Funk, Disco and more, usually on a single track or two but then they often go down to a different path for the rest of the album. This was not the case for The Free Music. All their albums are fully dedicated to their unique blend of Disco, Reggae and Funk and it feels that when we made the selection for this album, we could have chosen a completely different number of tracks and the album would be been equally strong.

The lead-off single is the stupendously groovy "Ana Qalbi Ehtar" out February 3rd along with LP pre-order to capitalize on Bandcamp Friday. From the outset, the rhythmic strumming of the funkified guitars give way to the galloping drums and bass, opening up to anthemic vocals and rounding out with a blistering guitar solo, a certified disco-funk classic through-andthrough.
Second single, out February 17th is the disco slammer "Hawelt Nensa Ghalaak." Guitars, harmonized horns, synths and bouncing bass and drums collide w/ spaced out vox to make the track a dancefloor sureshot for any party.

Third single is "Mathasebnish," a pure disco-funk slammer if there ever was one – with stabbing horns, funky bass riffs, a riding rhythm guitar and anthemic vocals, rounded out with stunning flute and guitar solos – the track will surely be on repeat along with the arrival of warmer weather.
Album focus track "Men Awel Marra" is another standout disco-infused tune, showcasing the immense creativity out of Najib and The Free Music. This past summer we finally had the opportunity to get together with Yousef face-to-face at a coffee shop in Istanbul's central Istiklal road together with our friend Anas El Horani. Yousef told us the whole story of how his father got into music, the start of the band and his father's continued conflicts with the Gaddafi regime that probably kept his career from becoming even bigger. As always, both vinyl and CD come with an extensive booklet featuring background on The Free Music and Najib Alhoush, including words from Najib's son, Yousef, as well as unseen photos, cassettes and more.

In late 1996, after two years of persistent touring, Chisel was eager to document its quickly evolving sound. Decamping from their native D.C. to Brooklyn’s Rare Book Room, the power trio of Ted Leo, Chris Norborg, and John Dugan teamed with engineer Nicolas Vernhes and came away with Set You Free, a remarkable, but largely overlooked, classic of the era. Originally issued on the venerable Gern Blandsten imprint in April 1997, Set You Free presaged the turn of the century 60s rock revival, providing a counterpoint to second-wave emo. This deluxe 25th anniversary edition has remastered and expanded the original’s 17-song track list with five period alternates and rarities, plus a booklet of lyrics, photos, and an essay by Jes Skolnik. Get ready for the invasion.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A
1 On Warmer Music
2 All My Kin
3 It’s Alright, You’re O.K.
4 The Mutable Mercury
5 The Town Crusher
6 The Unthinkable Is True

SIDE B
7 River High
8 Every Is A Good Trip
9 Do Go On
10 Privileged & Impotent
11 Oh Dear Friends

SIDE C
12 An Amateur Thief
13 In Our Time
14 Morley Timmons
15 The O.T.S.
16 Rip Off The Gift
17 The Last Good Time

SIDE D
18 The Guns Of Meridian Hill
19 The Town Crusher (live)
20 Morley Timmons (early Version)
21 Every Is A Good Trip (extended)
22 The O.T.S. (early Version)

Free Love (FKA Happy Meals) and their music are a conscious study in duality: thumping live tracks and meditational mantras, pop songs and esoteric experiments, acoustic and electronic instrumentation, lyrics in French and English, the Masculine and the Feminine, all side-by-side. Paragons of the cross-pollinating Glasgow DIY scene, their rapturous psychedelic odysseys have been emanating from the city since 2013 via esteemed labels including Night School and Optimo Music. Free Love’s debut EP Luxury Hits was released in 2018 to much critical acclaim (“a groovy fever dream” – Line of Best Fit) and saw them shortlisted for the Scottish Album of the Year Award (Suzi and Lewis’s third SAY Award nomination in all, following two under the Happy Meals moniker). It was followed in 2019 by the mini-album Extreme Dance Anthems (“music to move both body and mind” – Clash). In 2018 Free Love released a limited-edition vinyl EP, written and recorded on the isle of Eigg as part of Lost Map’s V I S I T ▲ T I O N S residency programme – strengthening a long-standing kinship between the band and the label which has seen them perform live many times at Lost Map events on Eigg and elsewhere.

It leads to the release on Lost Map in 2023 of Free Love’s latest opus INSIDE. Written and recorded at the band’s Glasgow home studio during and after the lockdowns of 2020-2021, and completed just before the birth of Lewis and Suzi’s son Echo in the summer of 2022, its 10 tracks of house-quaking acid pop, celestial drones and yogic devotionals are a by-turns banging and blissed-out meditation on life and death, community and seclusion, worlds both outwith and within. A song about “coming back to the centre after spiralling too far and recognising you’re not the only person wondering what’s going on”, ‘Open The Door’ reaches for the fresh silicon sound of Yellow Magic Orchestra. ‘Stop’ and ‘Golden Goose’ channel the space age pop dreams of Broadcast, while ‘Le Mirage’ and ‘Dans Le Noir’ take influence from 1970s electronic dance music pioneer Patrick Cowley – the former his gay porn movie soundtracks, the latter Cowley’s game-changing hi-NRG productions such as ‘Menergy’ and ‘Megatron Man’. Transportational seven-minute album closer ‘I Become’ sees Free Love borrow lyrics from the first track Lewis and Suzi ever recorded together, ‘Crystal Salutation’. “In doing, we become.”

“The sounds and themes on INSIDE came from the experiments we started working on throughout lockdown in our home studio, FULL ASHRAM CELESTIAL GARDEN,” says Lewis. “Sometimes we’d leave a sound running on loop until little melodies would come in and then that would start to take the form of the track. It has been a weird time for anyone to be making anything creative – to make sense of any reason to it all, we had to position creating music as an essential ritualistic part of our daily existence. We used the studio as a portal and made INSIDE.”

Free Love’s euphoric live show has seen them tour Europe, USA, India and Russia with the likes of The Flaming Lips, Liars and James Holden and The Animal Spirits, with Suzi often tearing through the audience centring the energy in the middle of the room over the live hardware electronics operated by Lewis from the stage turning into a ritualistic communal catharsis. As well as performing their debut Boiler Room live set from their home studio during lockdown, the band remixed music for Django Django and Charlotte Gainsbourg.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Woozy electronic stabs and rich scattered bass weave around lysergic floating vocals. Free Love present a perfect mix between euphoric synth-pop and darkened basement dancefloor grooves.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
1. Le Mirage
2. Open The Door
3. Fight Or Flight
4. All The Same To Me
5. Golden Goose
Side B
1. Dans Le Noir
2. Don’t Stop
3. Stop
4. It’s A Feeling
5. I Become

Best known for being Anderson .Paak’s live band The Free Nationals have toured the world meeting countless artists who inspire them. While the amount of all the contemporary musicians who inspire them would take an anthology of box sets, they boiled it down to a handful to include on the album, all of whom lend their talents in spreading the funk. Free Nationals means The first people of America, Indigenous to the land before Columbus came. Staying Indigenous to the funk, The Free Nationals wanted to tribute their inspirations such as Stevie Wonder, B.B. King, Herbie Hancock, and Al Green by incorporating musicianship while pioneering musical euphoria for a new generation.

The album features friends they’ve met along their musical journey including the late Mac Miller, Syd, Anderson .Paak, Kali Uchis, T.I., JID, Westside Gunn, Conway, Chronixx, Daniel Caesar, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, Kadhja Bonet, MIKNNA, Benny Sings, Callum Connor, T. Nava and Joyce Wrice. This pressing sees the album pressed on 180g Black Vinyl for the first time.

TRACK LISTING

A1/1. Obituaries (feat. Shafiq Husayn)
A2/2. Beauty & Essex (w/ Daniel Caesar & Unknown Mortal Orchestra)
A3/3. On Sight (w/ JID, Kadhja Bonet, MIKNNA)
B1/4. Shibuya (w/ Syd)
B2/5. Apartment (feat. Benny Sings)
B3/6. Gidget (feat. Anderson .Paak)
C1/7. Rene (feat. Callum Connor)
C2/8. Time (w/ Kali Uchis & Mac Miller)
C3/9. Cut Me A Break (feat T.I.)
C4/10. Eternal Light (feat. Chronixx)
D1/11. Oslo (feat. Callum Connor & T. Nava)
D2/12. Lester Diamond
D3/13. The Rivington (feat. Conway, Westside Gunn, Joyce Wrice)

Initially released in 2012, I Will Set You Free amalgamated elements of Barry’s previous work, resulting in an album that is unmistakably Barry Adamson. Like many of Adamson’s records, the album is a genre odyssey that jumps from garage rock rock, to blues, to new-wave pop, with the adventurous brass section injecting an acid jazz touch. His overwhelming desire to examine cultural shifts and embrace them within the quest to improve oneself that often centres in Adamson’s art is clearly present in I Will Set You Free. This subsequently makes it a quintessential Barry Adamson record that fits right in with the back catalogue. 

TRACK LISTING

A1 Get Your Mind Right
A2 Black Holes In My Brain
A3 Turnaround
A4 The Power Of Suggestion
A5 Destination
B1 The Trigger City Blues
B2 Looking To Love Somebody
B3 The Sun And The Sea
B4 If You Love Her
B5 Stand In

An insane classic from one of the wildest funk bands ever! According to reports, George Clinton and the band cut this set in a marathon 48-hour stretch in the studio - working like mad all night and day long, after dropping a motherlode of some mighty fine acid! We don't know if that story's entirely true, but the music on the album certainly backs it up - as it's some of the band's freest, most open-ended, most heavy-jamming work ever recorded! Guitars dominate over funky bass and drums - and the whole thing's an amazing blend of music, swirled together into a non-stop psychedelic party that includes P-Funk gems like "Funky Dollar Bill", "Free Your Mind", "Eulogy and Light", and "I Wanna Know If It's Good To You".

TRACK LISTING

A1. Free Your Mind And Your Ass Will Follow
A2. Friday Night, August 14th
B1. Funky Dollar Bill
B2. I Wanna Know If It's Good To You
B3. Some More
B4. Eulogy And Light

OFF!, the punk braintrust formed in 2010 by Keith Morris (ex-Black Flag, Circle Jerks) and Dimitri Coats (ex-Burning Brides), will release their first new album in eight years, Free LSD on Fat Possum Records.

The band’s powerful new rhythm section: bassist Autry Fulbright II (...And You Will Know Us By The Trail of Dead) and drummer Justin Brown (Thundercat, Herbie Hancock) accompany the release. The injection of new energy into the band’s signature high-anxiety hardcore is palpable and volatile, adding a new swing to the music’s incendiary thrust.

Psyched out, feedback fried blues-punk reissue, originally released by fans but now remastered and released via Tax Free. Featuring Gerry Franke on guitar, recorded live in 1986!

Real raucous beer-soaked, leather n denim freakouts - the kinda shit your mum warned you against!

TRACK LISTING

Spiesser Und Dichter
Alkohol Ii

Free All Angels was the third smash hit album from Ash. The album again reached No.1 within the UK and has since become a platinum record. The punk rock pop album contains mega hits including the Ivor Novello winner ‘Shining Light’, the NME single of the year ‘Burn Baby Burn’, ‘Sometimes’, ‘There’s A Star’, ‘Candy’ and Walking Barefoot’.

Ash and BMG are proud to reissue Ash’s third LP ‘Free All Angels’ for the first time on vivid yellow and clear splatter vinyl. This album has not been re-issued since it’s 2001 release, so will be an exciting prospect within the Ash community. Free All Angels contains hit after hit and with its punk rock sound resonates strongly with a wide audience. Upon release Ash drew critical comparisons to works of China Drum, Compulsion and The Replacements, , whilst touring with allusive contemporaries Weezer and Smashing Pumpkins and many more.

This re-issue coincides with the release of Free All Angels on immersive Sony 360RA for the very first time. This unique mix will give fans insight into Tim Wheeler’s sonic spatial sphere bringing Ash’s incredible hits into the new age.

TRACK LISTING

Side A:
Walking Barefoot (2022 Remaster)
Shining Light (2022 Remaster)
Burn Baby Burn (2022 Remaster)
Candy (2022 Remaster)
Cherry Bomb (2022 Remaster)
Submission (2022 Remaster)
Side B:
Someday (2022 Remaster)
Pacific Palisades (2022 Remaster)
Shark (2022 Remaster)
Sometimes (2022 Remaster)
Nicole (2022 Remaster)
There’s A Star (2022 Remaster)
World Domination (2022 Remaster)

The fourth release in Fu Manchu’s 30th Anniversary vinyl reissue series, No One Rides For Free, is a new vinyl specific remaster of the band’s debut album. These songs are the only recordings of the band’s line-up of Scott Hill (vocals/guitar), Mark Abshire (bass), Eddie Glass (guitar) and Ruben Romano (drums). The 8 song collection was recorded on April 16 and 17, 1993 at Sandbox Studios in LA, produced by the band along with Brant Bjork. This reissue was remastered by Carl Saff for optimum fidelity. This limited edition 2,000 unit LP run is pressed on red vinyl with white splatter and the newly designed gatefold package includes never before seen photos of the band and flyers from the shows of the era. The limited edition 1,000 unit CD run also features the updated art and a digital specific remaster.

TRACK LISTING

1. “Time To Fly”
2. “Ojo Rojo”
3. “Show And Shine”
4. “Mega-Bumpers”
5. “Free And Easy (Summer Girls)”
6. “Superbird” “Shine It On”
7. “Snakebellies

The wonderful new full length from Swede, Daniel Brandt’s Free / Slope project. “Blissful Repetitions” features 5 extended kraut infused jams, inspired in equal measures, by the likes of Spacemen 3, “Lazer Guided Melodies” era Spiritualized, Manuel Gottsching, Alice Coltrane, Terry Riley, Cluster / Harmonia, Morricone, David Crosby and Bo Hansson.

…..”Through the haze of a warm summer night FREE / SLOPE emerges, painting in tones a lazy state of bliss and calm. By blending the enigmatic melancholia and pastoral tones of fellow countryman Bo Hansson, (with cues taken from many of the names above), Daniel improvises kosmische jams that evoke not only space but also the serene scenery of Swedish west coast nature, afternoon daydreams and otherworldly psychedelic landscapes.

With a truly unique and personal melodic sensibility the music shines bright with its own special colours, ensuring the listener an experience both familiar and excitingly new. “Blissful Repetitions" will appeal both to the seasoned krautrock aficionado looking for some fresh jams to the casual listener seeking everyday escapism. Experimental but accessible, crystal clear yet blurred, organic but electronic - a fully formed vision brought to reality in a small bedroom studio.

It’s a mellow yet adventurous trip, cut on gorgeous clear vinyl, a soothing remedy for anyone wanting to escape the anxiety-ridden current state of the world" - Daniel aka F R E E / S L O P E.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: You know it's a good week when two PY records land at the same time. First up is this beautiful selection of blipping oscillations and (ahem) blissful repetitions from Free / Slope aka Daniel Brandt. Whirring and cosmic, full of beautiful proggy guitar and snappy percussion. You always know you're in for a treat with PY, and this is one of my favourites so far.

Free Time is the new album by Jerry Paper – a synth-pop, weird-rock, bizarro-muzak masterpiece.

This playful and joyous album captures Jerry Paper’s unique persona and tells the story of their self-discovery as a nonbinary artist.

Jerry Paper has previously collaborated with Tyler, The Creator, Weyes Blood, Charlotte Day Wilson, Kari Faux and BadBadNotGood, and they recently supported Flying Lotus live.

TRACK LISTING

1. Kno Me
2. Just Say Play
3. Second Skin
4. Shaking Ass
5. Myopitopia
6. Duumb
7. Second Place
8. DREEMSCENES
9. Gracie III
10.Flower, A Square

A wonderfully weird and wacky one from Iris on Tax Free, "Speah" contains 21 cute little sonic sketches or vignettes. Slightly spellbound, with gamelon, Reichian minimalism and nods to Manhattan Research Project - it's like ⅓ downbeat, ⅓ library, ⅓ DIY electronix - all made to pleasure the ears and put a smile across one's heart.

If you've already a sucker for the wild world's inhabited by Max Graef, Glenn Astro, Funkycan, Employee etc - this one for you!A wonderfully weird and wacky one from Iris on Tax Free, "Speah" contains 21 cute little sonic sketches or vignettes. Slightly spellbound, with gamelon, Reichian minimalism and nods to Manhattan Research Project - it's like ⅓ downbeat, ⅓ library, ⅓ DIY electronix - all made to pleasure the ears and put a smile across one's heart.

If you've already a sucker for the wild world's inhabited by Max Graef, Glenn Astro, Funkycan, Employee etc - this one for you!
 

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
1. Rub Ix (1:25)
2. Steely Dreem (1:09)
3. Dreem Reprise (1:17)
4. T 7 Ret (1:31)
5. Down By The Rivrrrs (1:08)
6. Werld (1:20)
7. Deth (1:40)
8. Miragem (1:29)
9. Deadlocked (4:32)
10. Flesh (1:07)
11. I Speah (2:42)
Side 2
1. Leer Die Kasse (1:14)
2. Dezert (1:21)
3. Maga (2:33)
4. Bels (1:34)
5. Thee Sun (0:45)
6. JPT Acid (4:08)
7. Graveyard (1:54)
8. Resurec (2:58)
9. Wav (0:13)
10. Dezert (Other) (1:47)

‘Free World’ is the first full-length issue from an ongoing collaboration between Behavior (Bedros Yeretzian, Evan Burrows, Justin Tenney, Robbie Cody) and Mayako XO (Sara Gernsbacher). It was tracked between 2019 and 2020 and assembled over the course of the last year in Los Angeles.

The album reflects its creation under open-ended yet intent circumstances. What’s recorded is a tangled pas de deux between discredited and demonstrative characters, singing through shifting voices over a living, melancholic music rendered legible by surveillance.

Mastered by Sarah Register.

For fans of Sonic Youth, Velvet Underground, Dead C, Blonde Redhead.

TRACK LISTING

I Love Music
Keeling Curve
So I Know
Waiting Song
Loud As Hell
1997
Trouble
Open Claim
For A Mood
Turnkey Smile
One Time Goodbye

Is there a better pairing of kindred spirits than a split seven-inch single featuring Le Butcherettes and Death Valley Girls? We're hard pressed to think of one. Sure, the interaction is fleeting, but damn is it satisfying.

We've got Le Butcherettes on side A taking on one of Death Valley Girls' most cosmic numbers, the kaleidoscopic centerpiece off Under the Spell of Joy album, "The Universe." Le Butcherettes' fearless and charismatic mastermind Teri Gender Bender takes the tune into even trippier territories, replicating the original song's sonic tapestry of synth, sax, and guitars with layer upon layer of vocals. Only the sparse accompaniment of acoustic guitar and modest percussion keeps the song from being fully a capella. It's a perfect interpretation of Death Valley Girls' communal and choral aims.

On side B, Death Valley Girls offer up a new tune - the deliciously ecstatic "When I'm Free." Like every great Death Valley Girls song, it's a celebration of life bolstered by fiery rock n' roll riffage, spiritual organ, dizzying sax, and Bonnie Bloomgarden's defiant and triumphant vocals. Suicide Squeeze Records is proud to offer up this meeting of mystical minds on vinyl and digital platforms on February 11, 2022.

Max Graef's oddball eccentricity continues to yield stranger and quirkier offerings as Tax Free sign up the indecipherable, post-minimal-wave brilliance / madness of Running Out Of Time.

A mix of Detlef Weinrich & Madteo modern new wave EBM, Total Stasis' opiated haze and Tax Free's own recklessly playful experimentalism. It'll appeal to lovers of minimal wave and DIY electronics - Throbbing Gristle, Suzanne Ciani, Delia Derbyshire, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith etc. - but also modernist labels like Youth and Beat Bude.

Sequenced and arranged to be left in the shadows, the space and the silence resonate almost as much as the music itself. It's like you're lost in the vast catacombs of the BBC Radiophonic Sound Labs..... or perhaps stuck in Vendel's studio under Oklahoma circa 2006... Freakish, circuit bent found sounds rub up against playful mechanized rhythms and a tense, cinematic quality. It's bloody brilliant!

Limited copies, comes with a WINAMP-inspired sleeve (if you know you know!). Highly recommended! 

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
1. Business Trip (5:15)
2. Ice (1:59)
3. Dog Treat (2:10)
4. Jongles Ambiance (2:20)
5. Trader Jazz 1 (1:01)
6. Jongle & Woodencastle (3:58)
7. Lava (3:06)
8. Wasteland Waterlands (4:24)
9. Water Gost (1:30)
Side 2
1. Abandoned Watertanks (1:52)
2. There Is No Way Out (1:18)
3. Reprogrammed Prototypes (3:12)
4. Last Breath (0:58)
5. Lifeforms (1:39)
6. Helper Unit (1:57)
7. The Big City (4:29)
8. Rocker (2:24)
9. Trader Jazz 2 (1:58)
10. Sono (1:49)
11. Friendly Primates (2:03)

Tough Love have partnered with West Coast imprint Mt St Mtn for the release of Free Advice, the instant slowcore/dreampop classic by San Fran four piece, Cindy. The full album is available to stream/download now, while a highly limited transparent vinyl pressing will be released on 20th November. Limited to just 250 copies, this pressing follows the long sold-out edition of 100 released earlier in the year and which was previously only available in the US.

Free Advice offers a somber-yet-uplifting take on sobered dream pop. Imagine if Galaxie 500’s On Fire didn’t have a guitar solo or if The Trinity Session was stripped of its folk & blues roots; it’s just pure mood. Like sitting in a half-empty movie theater that’s playing Alphaville or Wild Strawberries and watching patron’s heads briefly illuminated from the screen; Free Advice (and all of the Cindy output) transfers you to these momentary worlds.

Cindy is Karina Gill on guitar/vocals, Aaron Diko on synth/keys, Simon Phillips on Drums/Percussion, and Jesse Jackson on Bass/Keys + Simon and Jesse on backing vocals. The songs on Free Advice are these moments in mood: Phillips & Jackson’s rhythms create the foundation, while Diko’s keys rise and fall. Gill’s guitar rattles, vocals brood, and lyrics create these narratives that depict observers, not necessarily wronged rather, cautious and investigative of the world around them. 

TRACK LISTING

1 Discount Lawyer
2. Falcon Heavy
3. Seeing Double
4. Wrong Answer
5. Song 23
6. Fixed Idea
7. A Song In French
8. CSI: Creeptown
9. April Magazine
10. Free Advice
11. Lost On Me

AVAILABLE ONLINE ON SATURDAY NOVEMBER 27TH FROM 8AM.

LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

Out Of Print On Vinyl For A Decade And A Half Mobb Deep’s “Free Agents” Hits For RSD Black Friday In A Never Seen, Never To Be Repeated Colored Vinyl Pressing. 5000 pressed worldwide.

First released in 2003 on CD and LP. Out of print on vinyl since the mid-2000s. Mobb Deep redefined East Coast hip hop in the early 90s with their release “Juvenile Hell” and the break-out follow up “The Infamous.” As the group moved into the 2000s and parted ways with their long-time label, Loud, they released “Free Agents” as a celebration of their moving on to … well, free agent status. With Havoc handling production on all but 3 cuts and only two guest appearances (one being from long-time Queensbridge associate Big Noyd) “Free Agents” is uncut, undiluted Mobb Deep all the way through. The reaction from fans was solid catapulting the record to peak at number 21 on the Top 200 with a top 5 position on the R&B/Hip Hop charts. Out of print for well over a decade, this chapter in Mobb Deep’s legacy is back in effect for RSD Black Friday. 

TRACK LISTING

This Is Not Supposed To Be Positive (intro)
Solidified
Survival Of The Fittest 2003
Paid In Full
Double Shots (feat. Big Noyd)
What Can I Do?
Favorite Rapper
Let's Pop (feat. Acd)
It's Over
The Illest
Just Got Out The Box... (skit)
Narcotic
Clap First
Watch That Nigga
Came Up
Don't Call Tasha

Tax Free keep us well furnished with weirdness thanks to this long player of  digital renaissance & romantic ambient by ccctyyy with contributions by isangyi. Tumbling out the stereo like a vaporwave fever dream after one too many xans, "Reappearance" offers misty digital ambience and whacked out drum machine jams reminding me of Visible Cloaks and Tala Drum Corps simultaneously - which is totally Tax Free if you think about it.

TRACK LISTING

A1. C_RA_001
A2. INA GRM_RA
A3. TW
A4. HORIZONplus
A5. S_((((
B1. I_COO)))
B2. MMMM (feat Isangyi)
B3. J_T((
B4. CGO
B5. OI_I_O_OI (feat Isangyi)

Very useful ringers for multiple purposes by J-R! As always accepting all payment methods.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Der Koenig
A2. Bockafen Veirhozen
A3. Jan Min-Soek
A4. Veirgehozt
B1. Stauferpark
B2. Gornalo Dortolan
B3. Enkeltrick

R.E.M.’s first and breakthrough single “Radio Free Europe” was initially released by a small Atlanta-based record label, Hib-Tone Records. Produced by Mitch Easter, the original recording of the single had different mixes by Easter and by label-owner Johnny Hibbert. Although the band preferred Easter’s mix, Hibbert chose his version for the 1981 limited pressing 45RPM single, which is now a coveted collector’s item, packaged in a black and white sleeve featuring original photography by Michael Stipe.

“Radio Free Europe” was later re-recorded for the band’s first album release on major record label I.R.S. Records and went on to land the band their chart debut, peaking at number 78 in the Billboard Pop Chart. That album, Murmur, went on to reach number 36 in the album charts, and set the band steadfastly on the path to college radio domination and critical acclaim. The band’s 1988 compilation album, Eponymous, included what was called the Original Hib-Tone single, but what was in fact Easter’s original mix, not Hibbert’s.

This limited edition 7” pressing represents the first-ever re-release of the original Hib-Tone recording of “Radio Free Europe,” and comes housed in a replica sleeve.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Radio Free Europe

Side B
Sitting Still

El Perro del Mar releases her new EP FREE LAND on 20 November 2020 on limited edition hand numbered 12” vinyl via Memphis Industries. “FREE LAND” is about deconstruction and construction. It’s about resisting giving in. It’s about freedom of creativity and freedom of thought. It’s also an appraisal of the free artist as a well as a reclaiming of creative integrity in an over-commercialized world. The EP includes a collaboration with Devonté Hynes of Blood Orange who lends his vocals to a cover of Black Sabbath’s song “Changes” (“Alone in halls”).

TRACK LISTING

1. Enter
2. Life Is Full Of Rewards
3. White On White
4. Free Land
5. Alone In Halls (feat. Blood Orange)
6. Dreamers Change The World
7. EXIT

'Leaders of the Free World', Elbow's third album, sees the band try to beat down their major league contemporaries with a more ambitious set of songs. The results are impressive and may form the band's best work yet. Beginning with the beautiful, slow-building "Station Approach", and ending with the short but touching "Puncture Repair", 'Leaders of the Free World' takes in an a host of minor classics along the way including the captivating title track. The album is the result of a collaborative projecy between the band and film-makers, the Soup Collective.

TRACK LISTING

1. Station Approach
2. Picky Bugger
3. Forget Myself
4. The Stops
5. Leaders Of The Free World
6. An Imagined Affair
7. Mexican Standoff
8. The Everthere
9. My Very Best
10. Great Expectations
11. Puncture Repair

The ideal of the residency was to mix things up with special guests, different band lineups, and varied set lists, keeping things fresh and new week-to-week, and this show was the wild card of the bunch.

That's because although Ryan and I have played together for years, and Dave and Spencer have played together for years, neither half of the band had ever met each other. I was tangentially aware of Dave and his music and was intrigued by what I'd heard, so I thought it was a cool idea when Chris Tart, the residency promoter, suggested a collaboration.

So, about 30 minutes after we'd all heard each others voices for the first time, we got up and played for a little over an hour, uninterrupted. The only thing discussed beforehand was that we shouldn't discuss anything beforehand - not a key or a riff to start with, nothing - so as to preserve maximum spontaneity.

I think this music demonstrates a real connection on stage. In other words, each player was completely present and actively listening on the bandstand. Listening back, there are moments I can hear Ryan saying - musically - "Hey, let's go over here! Check this out!," or Spencer being like "Wouldn't it be cool to go down this path?" And we followed. And it was cool.

In my mind, that listening thing is the number one most important factor in any collaboration or cooperative effort, but especially in improvised music.

And I think it's fair to say that a little more listening, a little more presence, would do the whole world some good right about now, don't you think?

-Chris Forsyth

What started out in LA with Jon Hill and was finished back in North Carolina at Sylvan Esso’s home studio, "Free Love" asks major questions about self-image, self-righteousness, friendship, romance, and environmental calamity with enough warmth, playfulness, and magnetism to make you consider an alternate reality. These are Sylvan Esso’s most nuanced and undeniable songs—bold enough to say how they feel, big enough to make you join in that feeling.

TRACK LISTING

1. What If
2. Ring
3. Ferris Wheel
4. Train
5. Numb
6. Free
7. Frequency
8. Runaway
9. Rooftop Dancing
10. Make It Easy

Hen Ogledd - the quartet consisting of Dawn Bothwell, Rhodri Davies, Richard Dawson and Sally Pilkington - take a deliberately organic and natural approach on their second album ‘Free Humans’, out on Weird World.

Inspired as much by ABBA as the work of 12th Century mystic-composer-naturalist-visionary Hildegard von Bingen, touched equally by the spirits of radical philosophical plumber Mary Midgley and PC Music star Hannah Diamond, as quiet as the paintings of Agnes Martin yet bombastic like a Werner Herzog documentary... it’s an album of seamless, glorious contradictions.

Tackling themes of love, friendship, Gaia theory, sewers, the nature of time, human stench and the thrills of wild swimming, it’s remarkable that, given the intense collision of influences and wide-ranging ideas at play, ‘Free Humans’ somehow coheres into a marvellous whole.

TRACK LISTING

Farewell
Trouble
Earworm
Crimson Star
Kebran Gospel Gossip
Remains
Paul Is 9ft Tall (Marsh Gas)
Space Golf
Time Party
The Loch Ness Monster’s Song
Flickering Lights
Bwganod
Feral
Skinny Dippers

Bcos U Will Never B Free is the debut album by singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Rex Orange County. Written and recorded in his bedroom at the age of 16, it caught a wave of interest when it was self released on 4th September 2015 on his bandcamp page. Its lo-fi textures and hi-def emotions led to a hook up with Tyler, The Creator who asked the teenager born Alex O’Connor to come to Los Angeles, where he wrote and sang on two tracks on the album that became Flower Boy. Rex has subsequently released 2 studio albums, 2017’s Apricot Princess and 2019’s Pony which charted top 5 in the UK, US and Australia.

TRACK LISTING

1. Rex (Intro)
2. Paradise
3. Belly (The Grass Stains)
4. Corduroy Dreams
5. Japan
6. Portrait Of Ned
7. Green Eyes, Pt II
8. A Song About Being Sad
9. Know Love
10. Curfew…

The first new Iggy Pop album since 2016’s Post Pop Depression.

While it follows the highest charting album of Iggy’s career, Free has virtually nothing in common sonically with its predecessor—or with any other Iggy Pop album. On the process that led Iggy and principal players Leron Thomas and Noveller to create this uniquely somber and contemplative entry in the Iggy Pop canon, Iggy says:
"This is an album in which other artists speak for me, but I lend my voice...By the end of the tours following Post Pop Depression, I felt sure that I had rid myself of the problem of chronic insecurity that had dogged my life and career for too long. But I also felt drained. And I felt like I wanted to put on shades, turn my back, and walk away. I wanted to be free. I know that’s an illusion, and that freedom is only something you feel, but I have lived my life thus far in the belief that that feeling is all that is worth pursuing; all that you need – not happiness or love necessarily, but the feeling of being free. So this album just kind of happened to me, and I let it happen."

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Iggy's back! One of the most recognisable figures in the punk community returns with his latest solo effort, shining with contemplative melodies and loungey percussive pieces, clearly showing a move towards a more freeform approach than his previous outings, with smooth jazzy horns and slow-burning developmental shifts. Lovely stuff, and perfectly illustrative of his mastery of a wide variety of disciplines.

TRACK LISTING

1. Free
2. Loves Missing
3. Sonali
4. James Bond
5. Dirty Sanchez
6. Glow In The Dark
7. Page
8. We Are The People
9. Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night
10. The Dawn

Mainly recorded and produced at Brooklyn’s Figure 8 Studios, with Ty Ueda later assisting on final tracking at his Mount Misery studio, Lina Tullgren’s Free Cell is masterfully confident. Some rock elements like nonlinear song structures and syncopated rhythms bleed over from the debut album Won era on tracks like “110717,” but the album offers a wider musical palette than its predecessor, with lush arrangements utilizing strings, brass and sculpted synths throughout.

“Golden Babyland” abounds in tension and claustrophobia, finding Tullgren alone and “in the kitchen melting Legos,” while the elegant and introspective ballad “Bad at Parties” scores a moment of quiet social paralysis. The strings (arranged by Simon Hanes) that carry through Free Cell echo back to Tullgren’s education as a classical violinist, and Lina moves deftly between these various soundscapes, resulting in their most dynamic music to date.

Throughout Free Cell , Tullgren looks back on their memories from the position of an analyst, often cool and cynical but always with an undercurrent of humor and deep feeling. In their poetry Lina Tullgren writes anthems for the alienated, for those alone on busses, at parties, at their parents’ house, for those who cannot help but feel lonely even if they are surrounded by others. Free Cell invites us to sit and listen, to reflect, but with no guarantee of any of those things being easy.

TRACK LISTING

1. Free Cell
2. 110717
3. Golden Babyland
4. Bad At Parties
5. Saiddone
6. Soft Glove 1
7. Glowing X 10000
8. Wow, Lucky
9. Soft Again
10. Nervous Yet
11. Soft Glove 2
12. Piano

Formed in recent years in San Francisco, though it may seem more likely that they hatched fresh out of a time travel portal from the mid-80s Bay Area thrash scene, Hell Fire have the classic look and sound of modern metal’s halcyon days. Hell Fire’s sonic assault warmly condenses elements of influences like Angel Witch, Iron Maiden, Rainbow, Exodus, Metallica, Riot, Virtue and Diamond Head into 8 tracks of headbanging MUYA anthems.

The free-wheelin’ creativity and infectious vitality of Bay Area thrash is a moment forever locked in time, but its spirit lives on in Hell Fire’s galloping guitar picks, soaring harmonies and blistering rhythms. The band’s perfect hybrid of NWOBHM theatrics and American thrash attitude delivers a rousing and genuine expansion on sounds long lost to pointless battles over who can be the most “extreme.”

Hell Fire began when bass player Herman Bandala moved to San Francisco from Tijuana, Mexico with the hopes of forming a heavy metal band. Herman posted an ad to Craigslist which caught the attention of guitarist Tony Campos. They bonded over a mutual love of 80s thrash and NWOBHM, which was a hard thing to find in the Bay Area scene at the time. Just before Hell Fire entered the studio to record their debut album Metal Masses, Jake Nunn joined on vocals. The lineup continued to develop over time, finally solidifying with Nunn also taking up second guitar duties and drummer Mike Smith joining prior to recording Free Again.

Hell Fire’s 2017 sophomore album, Free Again is being released for the first time on vinyl and remastered for CD and download in January 2019. it was recorded over 5 days in Grass Valley, California at engineer Tim Green’s Louder Studios (The Fucking Champs, Melvins.) Where Metal Masses showcased aesthetic nods to Metallica’s Kill ‘Em All album (as well as a cover photo brilliantly depicting a blurry hand speedily playing a Flying-V guitar), Free Again finds the band coming into their own with emphasis upon grooves, a beefier sound and tighter songs that expertly shift into new parts at the drop of a hat.

Opener “Free Again” kicks things right off with a galloping riff forming out of a haze of feedback as the tape machine comes up to speed. The anthemic chorus showcases Nunn’s powerful voice as twin guitar harmonies lead into a thundering double-time coda reminiscent of Iron Maiden’s “Aces High.” Elsewhere, a marching snare drum beat and totemic blasts set up dueling guitar leads of “City Ablaze” while dizzying, chugging 16th-note guitars drive the blistering “Live Forever” into oblivion. “Wheels of Fate” and “The Dealer” echo the groove based tunes and harmonies of Rainbow and Gary Moore era Thin Lizzy. Album closer “End of Days” is a chorus effect drenched ballad that builds into a crushing lament over the constant beckoning of depression and the struggle for freedom and clarity. It’s a touching and powerful closing to an album that traverses many moods and packs in more great parts into a single song than most thrash bands do on an entire album. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Free Again
2. City Ablaze
3. Live Forever
4. Wheels Of Fate
5. Beyond Nightmares
6. The Dealer
7. Destroyers
8. End Of Days

‘Finally Free’ marks Daniel Romano’s eighth long playing album in the last eight years. He has had what understatedly would be considered a prolific output of incredibly entrancing, poignant and creative records in this span of time. Recording, producing, designing and landing his records into the minds and hearts of scores of fans the world over. He has been called a shapeshifter, contrived, a chameleon, a charlatan, the best living songwriter, an asshole and a genius. His last record, ‘Modern Pressure’, received outstandingly high acclaim and praise from every notable publication out there and was acknowledged by a plethora of voguish year-end lists. Despite being the bronze placeholder in most of these dogfights, he is most often noted as a person of astounding influence on all of his musically economic successors.

“No matter what he does, everything he puts out is better than anything else being put out by anyone else.” - Unnamed Subjugate

Romano’s new effort, ‘Finally Free’, could stand alone as being pivotal if it were only its profound and breath-taking prose on paper. Writing now like an agnostic Whitman in his prime, Romano explores and uncovers new language and meaning for old sentiments grown tired, stating, “these poems are most certainly my finest and most principled efforts to date.”

‘Finally Free’ sings like a radical revelation, exploring the concepts of music as a celestial being, flora as a consequential ancestor and singing, no matter its quality or sound, as the endmost important output of our species. This record contains a vivid religious articulation despite its clear condemnation of a god as a singular ruling white male. New words have replaced old words for new meaning and the definitions have been left up to interpretation.

TRACK LISTING

Empty Husk
All The Reaching Trims
The Long Mirror Of Time
Celestial Manis
Between The Blades Of Grass
Rhythmic Blood
Have You Arrival
Gleaming Sects Of Aniram
There Is Beauty In The Vibrant Form

When, last year, Deep Distance released the Free / Slope debut full length “Daydream Melodies”, it came out seemingly from nowhere, with little fanfare. A first release from Swedish musician Daniel Fridlund Brandt with no previous, as they say.

However, the magnificent kosmische collision of Neu! and Harmonia grooves, with added guitar flourishes that tip a nod to Manuel Gottsching with an overall vibe straight outta’ “The Perfect Prescription” era Spacemen, meant it soon sold out it’s pressing in less than a week as word-of-mouth interest built.

So, to use the age old expression “long awaited follow up” more than rings true with LP number two, the equally fabulous “Abracadabra” LP.

As with last year’s record, the new one sees a split label release with Athens’ psych maestros “Sound Effect Records” (and is released with reverse board sleeves and on white wax.)

Musically, the new record once again draws heavily upon the kosmische sound of those revered key Sky, Brain, Ohr and co. releases. To these ears, it’s arguably less beaty, more ambient than motorik, more “Sowiesoso” / “Zuckerzeit” era Cluster than Neu! Beautifully organic electronics grow and swell, recalling moods akin to some of Popol Vuh and Ashra’s epic, unsurpassed highs, with more of that Gottsching inspired guitar genius sprinkled throughout….

Another truly lovely record. Beautiful, kraut inspired psychedelia, timeless, momentous and like it’s predecessor, sure to sell out super quick….

Sami Baha is a Turkish producer based in South East London. His music was introduced to the world via his 2016 EP 'Mavericks'. Sami got into producing through being a rapper himself, working with local rappers in Turkey and producing beats for them, before setting his sights outside the country. 'Free For All' features MCs from all corners of the globe: UK drill squad 67's Dimzy, Stockholm's Yung Lean and Chicago rapper and singer DJ Nate (aka Flexxbabii). The record also features Egyptian MCs Dawsha and Abanob. Sami's production is refined and elegant, familiar tropes are reassembled in original ways, the instrumentation reflecting his background and influences simultaneously. Everything Sami brings to the album sounds relaxed and minimal, but tough, built from thoughtful arrangements and instruments, shot through with emotion and a dreamy night-time feel. 

TRACK LISTING

LP A:

1/Cash Rain
2/Discreet (ft. Dimzy)
3/Aliens
4/Gambit
5/Thugs (ft. DJ Nate)
6/Free For All
7/NAH

B:

1/When The Sun's Gone (ft. Yung Lean)
2/Path Riot
3/Glory (ft. Kufura)
4/Ahl El M8na (ft. Dawsha & Abanob)
5/Limbo
6/Cold Pursuit

Features Simon Raymonde of Cocteau Twins on "Dawn of a Bright New Nothing". Crash City Saints are back with the long awaited follow up to Glow In The Dark Music, which inspired rave reviews back in 2010. The band says their music sounds like a sandblaster spraying sugar, Are You Free? might be the best shoegaze-influenced album released all year, and yet it's so much more than that.

At times, Crash City Saints sound like a powerpop band in shoegaze clothing. 'There's No School Tomorrow,' a song that prompts the equation GBV+MBV=CCS, might shower us in sparks, but it grooves like The Cars.

What do you say about a band that's been able to take the best parts of MBV, Smashing Pumpkins, Galaxie 500, cut out the worst parts and make an album of 12 great songs?

Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury return to score Ben Wheatley’s 1970s based epic shoot-out ‘Free Fire’, executively produced by Martin Scorsese.

Compiled by director Ben Wheatley himself, the soundtrack will be released on CD and double LP, featuring the full score by Geoff Barrow and Ben Salisbury, dialogue from the film and licensed tracks (The Real Kids, Creedence Clearwater Revival, John Denver).

‘Free Fire’ sees Barrow and Salisbury take a huge directional curve away from their intense, synth-based Ivor Novello award winning score for ‘Ex Machina’, with the composers curating a prog rock, free jazz, psychedelic journey influenced by bands such as King Crimson, Camel and Magma and tips its hat to the Lalo Schifrin thriller genre scores of that era.

Both the LP and CD will include a digital download card which features the full soundtrack as well as additional unheard bonus material not used in the score.

TRACK LISTING

Where We Going?
Do The Boob (The Real Kids)
I’m I.I.F.M
Sledgehammer Cracks Nut
This Is Ord
Docks Beat
Step Into My Office
Run Through The Jungle (Creedence Clearwater Revival)
Raw Onions
Vern
Come Out
Gorgeous As Ever
Money Count
Nice Teeth
Harlequins Reunion
Steven’s Been Reprimanded
Stevo Apologises
Suck On This
First Shot
Mostly The Suit
Martin Shot
Will Everybody Calm The Fuck Down
Snipers
Good To Go
Free Firing Gunshot Solo
The Phone Rings
Watch And Vern
Crawl Chase
So That’s What A Fucking Brain Looks Like
Lead Lobotomy
Poke Him In The Eye
We Can’t All Be Nice Girls
That’s Why I Appreciate The Arts
Leary
Aiming For The Nose
Oh Fuck
Where Do You Think You’re Going Little Harry
Annie’s Song (John Denver)
A John Denver Story
Justine’s Theme
This Old Guitar (John Denver)

As Finders Keepers’ disobedient little sister label reaches her 20th (release) anniversary, Cacophonic Records present a record that will not only leave rare record collectors salivating but will open ambitious ears to a truly pioneering album from the seldom celebrated and individualistic micro-genre that is French free jazz.

Comprising some of the earliest uninhibited performances from key musicians behind records by Serge Gainsbourg, Jef Gilson, Triangle, Don Cherry, Barbara and countless other groundbreaking European jazz records and freakish films, this album captures the birth of an exciting movement that would soon earn its Parisian birthplace as the go-to European spiritual home of improvised and avant-garde music.

Spearheaded by polymath pianist and composer François Tusques this 1965 French album coined the phrase ‘free jazz’ before the American genre of the same name had fully taken shape and packed its suitcase; laying the foundations (alongside Jef Gilson’s ‘Enfin!’) for a unique satellite brand of jazz that would later provide visiting afro American avant-gardeners with a vibrant Parisian platform. Having recorded a very rare single in celebration of the architect Le Corbusier in late 1964, Tusques was lucky enough to play live with Don Cherry (a key player on Ornette Coleman’s 1961 Free Jazz LP) thus planting a pedigreed seed for this vibrant cultivar.

With this record we not only hear the unique differences within the Gallic approach to the art form (combining masterful sombre cinematic changes with aerated freeform percussion and erratic reed and brass) but we also get to witness the early lesser savoured secret ingredients that would carry France’s mainstream pop culture into truly uncharted and unrivalled territories throughout the following decades.

Best known to faithful Finders Keepers fans as the soundtrack composer to the horrortica films of Jean Rollin, Tusques is joined here by sax and flute player Francois Jeanneau, whose electronic jazz album ‘Such A Weird Plane’ would later lead to his own band Triangle gaining recognition as France’s leading French language prog jazz rock act.

This glimpse into a seldom documented underground of a domestic, revolutionary, uncompromised spiritual art form successfully reveals the other side of abstracted French music which alongside musique concrète, protest pop, symphonic rock and Zeuhl-skool electronic prog created a homegrown, self-contained music industry that went on to influence a universe of Gallic magnetic inspiration.

Presented here on vinyl for the first time since its original, ultra rare micro press (original copies now fetching upwards of 1000 euros), this Cacophonic release is taken directly from François Tusques’ very own mastertape archive.

Features two rare original outtakes which did not appear on the original LP.

Presented in authentic packaging complete with external seams and a facsimile of the original Tusques-penned booklet, which, after 52 years, still evades the most fastidious collectors trying to unite mint copies with this oft estranged pictorial pamphlet.

Auckland-based guitarist Oscar Dowling embarks on his debut solo album, leaving his deepest emotions laid bare across the table. The former New Gum Sarn member has created a subdued guitar record in the great indie tradition of his homeland. One that leads into the abyss, tantalising with heartbreak and his unsettling bitterness towards life and death. Influenced heavily from the identity of his country and battling with "my own identity, falling in love, anxiety and mental illness, friends, family and enemies to name a few".

Free And Easy was recorded and mixed with Ben Lawson at The Red Bull Studios in Auckland. The album features local luminaries Steven Huf, Will Wood, Mason Fairey, and Sam Hamilton. Dowling recalls; "Ben heard me play at my neighbours wedding and later asked if I wanted some studio time at Red Bull. He gave me a week in between other projects and last minute I realised I didn't want to record solo and asked friends Steven Huf and Will Wood if they wanted to help me out. I'd seen both of them play with a lot of different people over the years and knew they could pull it off without much warning. I think we only practiced 3 times."

Recording in such swish surrounding felt alien to Oscar, as he states "it was different to the DIY style I'm used to, lots of fancy gear and a soundproofed, air conditioned live room. We had a reasonably strict time schedule so when we were there it was all go and no fucking around."

Whether soaked in Oscar's melancholy voice and warped out guitars, ('Sally Free and Easy'), or accompanied by a delicate piano ('Low Moon') or the jarringly raw ('Ease My Passing') each track paints a vivid picture of Oscar's life. Title track ('The Life') is best at transcending this portrait of the hardship of life with an entrancing melody line and ruthless lyrics, those lyrics severing as a medium for "understanding subjects such as death and love" and finding comfort in writing about his relationship with mental health, the outcome being "very therapeutic."

After spending the past year beekeeping with his brother, Oscar is still able to live out the perfect balance between city life and the countryside. Having grown up in the sticks, he tells us that the reason for moving to the capitol was that "people from all over come here to make music and find others making music, so it has a decent scene. I moved here for that reason and it has influenced me massively in terms of how I think about music and why I continue to make it."

The heavy use of dialogue is what will transcend Free and Easy to it's listeners - reconnecting us with our own identity and making us remember what really is important. "My family, my girlfriend and my friends. They are the people I look to for inspiration everyday."

TRACK LISTING

1. The Life
2. Ease My Passing
3. Sally Free And Easy
4. Human Connection
5. Fair Weather Friend
6. Cream And Peaches
7. Low Moon
8. The Circus
9. Rotten Apple
10. Motorway

Working for a Nuclear Free City have never been too concerned with genre. Since their debut release almost a decade ago they have danced around the constraints of genre, eschewing predictability and expectation in the process by creating a body of work dictated by invention and momentum.

Their latest release is no exception although, like much of their previous work, whilst it is difficult to pinpoint it is not lacking in stylistic coherence, “When putting the record together I was trying make something cohesive in some way.” Says one of the group’s founding members, Phil Kay.

The end result is an expansive, pop-tinged, experimental album that can be as propulsive as it can be restrained, bringing to mind artists as diverse and brilliant as Beck and Brian Eno to the Super Furry Animals.

The situations and inspiration around the record have been rather hodgepodge, “I listen to the radio most of the time, stations that play pretty diverse things, or I put things on shuffle a lot - mainly just trying to take the decision making process out of what I choose to listen too” Kay says, whilst also stating that the environments in which the record were created were just as all over the place, “I move around a lot so all the tracks are from different areas. Some from back in Manchester, a few from here in London, a couple I recorded in LA up in the Hollywood hills in Jennifer Anniston’s old apartment.” This geographically vast record was also done over a period of time too, making it a continent-spanning record that has had years’ worth of thoughts and ideas funnelled into it, “It was recorded over such a long period of time that each track has its own distinct memories for me.” Kay says of the process.

The title of the album What Do People Do All Day? Has a dual meaning, as Kay points out, “I was writing a kids book at the time so had loads of Richard Scarry books lying around. I think we hit on the title as it of course reminds you of Scarry and puts you in that playful territory but the second meaning of it is about the mundanity and futility of life, so there's that juxtaposition. It was supposed to be this loose concept album about peoples lives or various snapshots of people lives. The songs also all seem to relate to these imagined characters and their lives - perhaps a days in their lives”

As a result the songs vary enormously and when discussing what some of the individual tracks are about, Kay paints a picture of a little universe of strange tales and stories, one song is about “Media and politics and bullshit and living in a city and everyone wired up and concrete and adverts and too much noise” whilst others are about: “A girl who dreams of killing her boss, quitting her mundane job and living in a magazine”; “The heir to Blackpool Pleasure Beach who turns it into a Vegas-style resort, makes millions, moves to Venice beach and turns it into Blackpool” and “Teenagers getting stoned in a park in suburbia and discovering a secret portal”. As illustrated by these unique and vast narrative situations, it’s an album with huge scope and one that has set out to be as lyrically ambitious as it is sonically. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Bottlerocket
2. Ordinary People
3. Run
4. Euphone
5. Stop Everything
6. Cassetteboy's Theme
7. Going Nowhere
8. New Day
9. Good As Gold
10. Lindow
11. Turned To Tight
12. Blunderland
13. What Do People Do All Day
14. Leaving

U.S. Girls is Illinois-born, Toronto-based artist Meghan Remy. A captivating musical force, Meg has evolved from the raw, corrosive 4-track fidelity found on her early records to the more unabashed art-pop of recent works ‘U.S. Girls’ on KRAAK (2011) and ‘Gem’ (2012); the latter managing to “widen and universalise her music without losing a drop of what previously made it so special and personal” - Pitchfork.

‘Half Free’ is the next step in this impressive transformation, an honest and lyrically jarring exploration of emotions, drenched in a bath of raw beats and loops that have become the hallmark of her work with producer and frequent collaborator Onakabazien.

Other album guests include Slim Twig (DFA), Ben Cook (Fucked Up, Young Guv), Amanda Crist (Ice Cream) and Tony Price.

Featuring recent singles ‘Damn That Valley’ and ‘Woman’s Work’, ‘Half Free’ is Meg’s first album for 4AD. Again emerging as a vital voice among the noise, ‘Half Free’ is an enchanting document of life at the point when it feels most on its knife-edge.

“She’s the fast-rising exponent of luscious lo-fi DIY pop.” - The Guardian

“With each successive release, you’re never quite sure which Girl you’re going to get: the avant-pop deconstructionist, the 1960s traditionalist, the basement R&B diva.” - Pitchfork

Jason Isbell - award-winning artist is back with his fifth album Something More Than Free featuring Isbell’s Southern-inspired vignettes of working class men, women and traditions that permeate these 11 new songs. The pure honesty and authenticity of Isbell’s poetic lyrics and soulful vocals have connected deeply with so many, and they shine as brightly as ever on the new album.

It is Isbell’s most sonically diverse album to date. The opening track, “If It Takes A Lifetime” exudes a classic country tone, while “24 Frames” flows effortlessly with its easy, Laurel Canyon vibe. The wistful folk balladry of “Flagship”, along with the bluesy Southern rock timbre of “Palmetto Rose” and epic “Children Of Children” prove that Jason Isbell is an artist whose creative pinnacle has yet to be within sight.

Something More Than Free is the follow up to Isbell’s 2013 breakthrough album Southeastern, which received overwhelming support from the press and sold over 150,000 copies. Isbell was subject of stories in outlets ranging from The New York Times Magazine and Wall Street Journal to NPR’s All Things Considered and Fresh Air with Terry Gross. Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit made many television appearances, including The Late Show with David Letterman, Conan and Austin City Limits. Isbell won Artist of the Year, Song of the Year and Album of the Year at the 2014 Americana Music Awards.

The Free Fall Band are five very young timeless pop creators bursting with melody and sublime choruses, hailing from Mataró, a village north Barcelona.

‘Elephants Never Forget’ was the band’s debut album, produced by Miqui Puig and released on LAV Records. The record sums up The Free Fall Band perfectly: echoes of The Beatles, Jonathan Richman, The Shins, The Zombies… fun and emotion in equal measure, carefully assembled arrangements and a youthful image.

2013 put them at the forefront of Spanish pop, thanks to landmark moments such as their performance at the Primavera Sound Festival and supporting Rodriguez in Barcelona. They also released their first step on El Segell del Primavera, an EP with covers of The Strokes, Violent Femmes, New Order, Booker T. & The MGs and Jonathan Richman.

And now their second album arrives. It’s called ‘The Münster Sights’ and shows the band in another level: the songs reflect a band that have been playing and growing as musicians. The album was produced by Darren Hayman (he used to play in Hefner and has a long and amazing solo career) and engineered by Giles Barrett (from London popsters Tigercats), a perfect choice for The Free Fall Band as they’ve long been fans of both musicians. As a result ‘The Münster Sights’ sounds richer and fatter than their previous efforts and contains such great numbers as ‘Fontana’ and ‘I Want To Know’.

TRACK LISTING

I Want To Know
City Of Raleigh
Fontana
Look At Me Run, Dear
Lonesome Cowboy, Solitary Peggy Sue
Oh, What An Awkward Day
By Your Window
Every Man
The Barbershop
A Friend’s Homecoming
The Münster Sights

A short while removed from his acclaimed Brothers Fowl album, released in late 2012, Dam Mantle returns as part of the Free Association collective with a new three-track 12” on NOTOWN Recordings.

A loose collective of musicians from his Glasgow home, this EP showcases, according to Tom Marshallsay AKA Dam Mantle, ‘a small glimpse of what's been getting made in the studio recently. There's quite a few other folks who feature on some of these tracks, so it's a demonstration of the collective attitude behind all this’.

The EP is a glimpse of the moods being explored in his live sets, where his diverse productions converge in a fervent sonic assemblage. The A side gives two heads-down hip shakers which explore a diverse sound palette, while the flip-side adds urgency and steady syncopation with a streak of dark intent and an anticipatory glimmer.

Since the release of his Brothers Fowl album, Dam Mantle has been busy ‘mainly playing records and putting on parties, living life, working’. In addition, he’s spent a bit of time working on collaborative projects, mainly as General Ludd, releasing via the Mister Saturday Night banner, the NYC promoter and label.

TRACK LISTING

A1. The Free Association - Heavy Velvet Affair
A2. Dam Mantle Feat. Baker - Simultaneous Fall
B1. Dam Mantle - The Underlying Issue

The Free Fall Band are five very young timeless pop creators bursting with melody and sublime choruses. They appeared out of nowhere three years ago from the Maresme. They quickly gained recognition: finalists of the Demoscópicas de Mondo Sonoro or at the Villa de Bilbao (where they were the winners of the Pop Rock category in 2011) azzaldia de Donosti, Faraday, popArb… a series of achievements that led them to record their debut album, produced by Miqui Puig and released on LAV Records (co-released with Buenritmo).

The record sums up The Free Fall Band perfectly: echoes of The Beatles, Jonathan Richman, The Shins, The Zombies…fun and emotion in equal measure, carefully assembled arrangements and a youthful image.

2013 has put them at the forefront of national pop, thanks to landmark moments such as their performance at the Primavera Sound Festival and supporting Rodriguez in Barcelona. Before the year is out they will play at BAM and will also take part in the Primavera Sound Touring Party that will take them all around Spain.

This next step is a mini album of covers (their first record on El Segell Del Primavera) that includes covers of The Strokes, Violent Femmes, New Order, Booker T & The MGs and Jonathan Richman.

Their second album is planned for the beginning of 2014.

TRACK LISTING

‘Love Vigilantes’ (New Order)
‘The Modern Age’ (The Strokes)
‘When We Refuse To Suffer’ (Jonathan Richman)
‘Green Onions’ (Booker T & The M.G.s)
Violent Femmes Medley

On the heels of last years critically acclaimed debut LP “Under the Pale Moon,” and “Earth Has Doors” EP comes the sophomore full length from Wymond Miles, guitarist of San Francisco garage-pop titans The Fresh & Onlys. “Cut Yourself Free” assembles another convergence of moon-lit romantic swagger and post-punk massacred urgency. Again self recorded and produced to tape, Miles’ song-craft has emerged more refined and poignant, benefitting from the avalanche of his frenzied live shows, but also adhering to a more minimalistic fashion with crooning mid-era Nick Cave or Bowie/Roxy Music strains of pop-modernism. But what stands at the forefront is Miles’ command of his textural guitar and vintage-synth sprawl that on his choosing can open dream-like vistas, or pierce with an engine’s snarl. Turning to the narrative, Miles weaves each song with its own vignette of story line, often with a vaguely obscured protagonist/antagonist dialog. Relationships in Miles’ sketches are always tangled, if not licentious affairs, but are presented more as lustrous gateways to mend and revitalize rather than squalor in.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Ascension (5:33)
2. Passion Plays (3:27)
3. Night Drives (4:06)
4. White Nights (2:12)
5. Bronze Patina (1:32)
6. Vacant Eyes (5:30)
7. Anniversary Song (4:43)
8. Why Are You Afraid? (3:17)
9. Love Will Rise (2:59)

Edward “Apple” Nelson is best known for the small clutch of 45s he released under the Apple And The Three Oranges name on local Los Angeles labels in the 1970s. He first found credit as “Apple” on a Marie Franklin single released the Stage Music imprint which led to the issue ‘Free And Easy’, the first record released as Apple And The Three Oranges. This rapid development from road hog to recording artist inspired him to found Sagittarius Records, named after his zodiac sign. His run with Sagittarius contains six unimpeachable soul and funk numbers released under the Apple And The Three Oranges banner and one issued under his own name, Ed Nelson. This material is ripe for a historical reappraisal. The low fidelity of every Apple And The Three Oranges single was never a problem for the low-riding Eastside Angelenos, who lionized tracks such as ‘True Love Will Never Die’, but their muddy quality cast Nelson outside of the canon in which troubled soul singers like Bobby Womack have held court for decades. Nelson’s master tapes - lost in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina - will never surface to right this wrong. And the records themselves are rare: the ‘Love Brings Out The Best Of You’, ‘Curse Upon The World’ and ‘I’ll Give You A Ring (When I Come, If I Come)’ singles are amongst the most sought after and expensive Los Angeles soul and funk records to ever list at auction. Nearly 40 years after he gave up on his recording career, we’re left with little more than Nelson’s explosive music and his straight-shooting stories of his life’s arc in this anthology of his complete works. Whether it’s his first hand experience with the great New Orleans drummers who laid the foundations of funk, or his relating the oft-told, and always sad, tale of lust supplanting love, Nelson offers confounding words to complement his all too beautiful soul and funk music.

TRACK LISTING

1. What Goes Around Comes Around
2. Free And Easy Pt. 1
3. Free And Easy Pt. 2
4. Down Home Publicity
5. True Love Will Never Die
6. My Baby
7. Curse Upon The World
8. Moon Light
9. Gotta Stand For Something Pt. 1
10. Gotta Stand For Something Pt .2
11. Love Brings Out The Best Of You
12. My Love Needs Your Love (And Everybody Needs Love)
13. I'll Give You A Ring (When I Come, If I Come)

After their ‘Ranting & Raving’ and ‘Unraveling After The Lottery’ EPs, Tirk are proud to announce the debut album from maximalist Balearic indie band Free School.

The album sparks into motion with the aptly named ‘Theme From Free School’, a slow burning intro of drawn out pads and strange sounds layered over an enigmatic, distorted passage of spoken word. ‘Meet When The Moon Is Full’ is a galactic cruise through silken star belts, complete with an epic instrumental chorus and that fuzzy feeling. Track four is the 2011 single ‘Ranting & Raving’, but not as we know it. The new full string arrangement transforms the track into a billowing, spine tingling opus.

‘I’m Not Nintendo’ follows, taken from their EP earlier this year. As momentous and eccentric as ever. ‘Spring Brings New Technology’ is a subtler record that lingers fluidly around the senses. Equally suited to the twilight hours or a lazy sunny afternoon. The duo’s enthralling nine minute sound-movie piece ‘Lemon’ comes next. It’s a profound offering that pushes all the right emotive buttons. ‘Time Breaks’ introduces the first sung vocal element to the album. The building, low-slung groove references early Moby as much as it does early Cosmic Disco from the likes of Daniele Baldelli et al.

Up next, from the second EP, ‘Unraveling After The Lottery’ pounds away with the vivacity of a marching drum gala, amidst android vocal cuts, pulsing strings phrases and synth loops. ‘Iberico’ initiates with arcs of synthetic organs and chirping electronic detritus before the hardest beat on the album drops, then reinvigorates the arps and synths for a full bodied middle. The album ends with ‘Theme From Free School (Repirse)’, a beautifully rich cinematic experience, full of Vangelis undertones and progressive string movements. A wonderful end.

‘You Are Free’ is the sixth album by American singer / songwriter Chan Marshall, a.k.a. Cat Power.

The album was released in 2003 on Matador Records. Dave Grohl of Nirvana and The Foo Fighters plays the drums, Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam provides backing vocals on two tracks, and Warren Ellis played violin on two songs.

Free School return to Tirk for their second EP, bringing the Balearic sounds of summer and the icy Kosmiche sounds of winter all in one sweeping hit. Free School are maximalist and minimalist all at once.

The band, hailing from Birmingham, like to compare themselves to Caribou, Orbital, Hot Chip, Fourtet, and Pet Shop Boys. ‘Unravelling After The Lottery’ is a dazzling example of Free School’s inclination towards smooth analogue tones, articulating the solid groove with lovely reverberated percussion. Mark E steps it up in his remix with deep, deep bass and some tasteful synth flourishes amidst the original's foundational elements to suburb effect.

’I’m Not Nintendo' is as pleasing as they come, with layer upon layer of loveliness and a hook that will stick with you for weeks. Nutaike's 'Magnavox Odyssey' remix takes things a little more visceral, working those harmonics and melodies for that warm fuzzy feeling.

These four lean, mean dance floor machines will warm the cockles of even the toughest crowds.

Incendiary debut album from Liverpudlian music legend Edgar Jones' new band Free Peace.

Earlier this year NME dedicated a whole page to Edgar 'Jones' Jones and his classic album from 2005, 'Soothing Music for Stray Cats (Viper).

Free Peace's line-up is completed with Nick Miniski on drums + Stuart Gimblett on Guitar. Their sound is loud and heavy with a touch of soul.
Since touring with Oasis, they have been working on their album making sure it is just right. Edgar in his time has worked with the best - Paul Weller, Johnny Marr and Lee Mavers amongst others.

Shake it loose!

Two years after the beloved "Ice Scream Spiritual" album, Ponytail return with "Do Whatever You Want All The Time".

Like "Ice Cream Spiritual", the energy of Ponytail is still alive and full throttle, but on ‘Do Whatever You Want All The Time’ there is a more sophisticated and experimental approach to the song.

This is complex intellectual pop - their most phenomenal album thus far.

We Are Free has already brought you one of the most exciting bands of recent years in Yeasayer – now prepare yourselves for the onslaught of Baltimore's craziest band, Ponytail. Their music is total spastic bliss, a complete sugar high freak out, smiles, dimples and grins beam from the crowd to the band, and from band to crowd.

First up on Rong's shiny, new DFA collaborating imprint RongDFA is Free Blood's "Never Hear Surf Music Again" 12". This two-piece Brooklyn band has more street cred than you can shake a stick at, and for good reason. Consisting of Madeline Davy (Octopi NYC) on the microphone and John Pugh (formally of !!!) also on microphone, Free Blood has got some serious, serious heat on the mic and mixing board. Hey, really, who needs other band members when you're rockin' a style this damn hard? "Never Hear Surf Music Again" is an unpredictable druggy number, a mangled hybrid of disco-not-disco rhythms fused angrily with a Butthole Surfers song and a hint of Beatles melodies later on. It's followed by the steaming mayhem of "Quick and Painful", a raucous affair that delivers a swift kick to the head in an indie-meets-R&B fashion. On the flip, the Barfly boys stretch things out a bit with a nine-minute Arthur Russell-style disco (not disco) remix of the title track. After tearing the roof off and burning down the place with their mind-crunching sound, this band is ready to clear out any venue at a moment's notice.

'A cream-whipped dream of Fleetwood Mac, Tears For Fears and Thomas Mapfumo, all soaring, vocal harmonies, cascading synth parts and muffled tribal drums, with highlife guitars and a children's choir' - Time Out. Yeasayer's smashing debut album is a mesmerizing journey.

Out originally on Bullwackies' Aires offshoot, in a plain, stencilled sleeve, this is a thrilling early-mid-70s dub album based around three cuts of the dreader than dread "Free For All" rhythm. The title track was recorded at Randy's, and was originally put out on The Heptones' Hepic label, featuring Family Man Barrrett on keyboards, complete with deejay cut "Meditation Dub" which sounds like Charlie Ace. There are dubs of Little Roy's "Tribal War" and "Black Bird". Stranger Cole's "My Application", later re-voiced by The Heptones, turns up as "Dis Ya Dub"; and if things weren't smoke-filled enough, "Roots" is the rhythm of KC White's "All For Free". Melvin 'Munchie' Jackson and Lloyd Barnes production work for the album began in Jamaica and finished at the Sounds Unlimited studio in New York.

Epic, intelligent, melodic, groove-based and atmospheric - this is the sound of Working For A Nuclear Free City. Descendents of "Fools Gold" era Roses, Spiritualized and The Beta Band, Working For A Nuclear Free City represent the best of Manchester's new experimental underground.

This album of classic 60s tinged pop, co-produced by Matthew Sweet, is now available in this expanded edition. Remastered and with new liner notes and photos, it also includes a bonus disc of demos.

This is the new band project from David Holmes and Steve Hilton, with Sean Reveron and Petra Jean Phillipson providing vocals. Imagine a fantastic mash up of psyche and avant rock, blues, funk, hip hop and general sleazy grooves.

Gil Scott-Heron’s second album, “Pieces Of A Man”, showed that his collaboration with musical partner Brian Jackson was very special. Although not a hit, it was a big enough success to warrant a follow-up, but when the time came Gil was unsure. With more books than albums to his name, he thought his future may have been as a writer, but Brian Jackson and producer Bob Thiele convinced him otherwise, and in March 1972 “Free Will” was recorded.

The record’s first side comprised a set of songs that confirmed how well he and Brian Jackson worked together. The album’s masterpiece is ‘Did You Hear What They Said?’, one of the most effective evocations of war’s ultimate price. It was aimed at the conflict in Vietnam, but is as relevant today as when it was written. Other numbers seem to focus on the apathy or self-centred attitudes Gil saw in people’s actions. He was seeing the 60s dream turning sour and people standing idly by and letting it happen. It made for compelling art.

Gil’s literary side was represented on the album’s second side, which saw him return to the spoken-word poetry found on “Small Talk At 125th And Lenox”, his first LP. The new material seemed to find him angrier and more incensed by the world. He railed against apathy in society and misuse of power by the Nixon administration. He took white musicians to task for ripping off black American music throughout the 20th century, questioning why Elvis was more successful than Chuck Berry. The only let-up occurs in the final track, ‘…And Then He Wrote Meditations’, a considered tribute to John Coltrane.

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
01. Free Will
02. The Middle Of Your Day
03. The Get Out Of The Ghetto Blues
04. Speed Kills
05. Did You Hear What They Said?
06. The King Alfred Plan

Side 2
01. The King Alfred Plan
02. No Knock
03. Wiggy
04. Ain't No New Thing
05. Billy Green Is Dead
06. Sex Education: Ghetto Style
07. ...And Then He Wrote Meditations

CD Bonus Tracks:
1. Free Will (Alt Take 1)
2. The Middle Of Your Day (Alt Take 1)
3. The Get Out Of The Ghetto Blues (Alt Ending)
4. Speed Kills (Alt Take 3)
5. Did You Hear What They Said? (Alt Take 1)
6. The King Alfred Plan (Alt)
7. No Knock(Alt)
8. Wiggy (Alt)
9. Ain't No New Thing (Breakdown Take)
10. Billy Green Is Dead (Alt)
11. ... And Then He Wrote Meditations (Breakdown Alt Take)

Almost a companion piece to last year's wonderful "Carthy Collecton" from the Free Reed label. This 3xCD set collects rare and classic tracks from this independent folk label's most respected artists and recordings. Some of the greatest names in British folk music have recorded for Free Reed over the years and this is a welcome reminder of the potency of traditional music in all its guises.

One of the greatest rock bands of all time with their classic debut. Now remastered with eight rare bonus tracks, full of youthful vitality and a sense of invulnerability, listen to Kossof on "Goin' Down Slow" to get a real idea of what blues-rock guitar is all about.

Epic organ led prog, strong vocals and more riffs and time changes then you can shake a stick at.