Following a series of meditative explorations in the form of the Singularity Zone series of releases, The Oscillation have returned with a new sense of vigour and purpose. Refreshed and re-energized, the result is ‘The Start Of The End’, an album that casts more light and shade than ever before to create a mood of hope and re-birth. Be it the celestial majesty of the title track, the melodic infusions that drive opening track ‘War On The Mind’ or the pulsing grooves underpinning ‘Faraway’ and ‘Body Electric’ or even hypnotic repetition at the heart of ‘Mantra’ and ‘The Eternal’, this music brimming with zeal and confidence. And to crown it all, closer ‘Sovereign’ is akin to communing with angels.

At once warm and welcoming, ‘The Start Of The End’ is an album quite unlike anything that The Oscillation have ever released before. Fuelled by optimism and taking stock of what’s good about life and what needs to be jettisoned, the record is a result of spiritual and physical re-charging and cleansing.

Leaving the claustrophobic environs of the big city for a more bucolic backdrop, the change in location has left a profound mark on Demian Castellanos, the creative force behind The Oscillation. Where the exorcism of dark emotions of previous album ‘Untold Futures’ left Castellanos wondering if he’d ever make music again, his new surroundings stirred something within him.

“When I made my new home, I allowed myself time to do nothing for a while,” says Castellanos, “and I then started some new songs without worrying about them being on an album. I just wrote with the mindset to put out something positive.”

He continues: “I did a lot of reflecting on the past and really wanted to change something in myself, but not knowing how and thinking that a lot of people must be feeling the same way.”

Recalling the creation of ‘The Start Of The End’, Castellanos says, “Writing and recording in an environment where I had little contact with people, no hanging out or partying or even having conversations was very interesting.”

The result is an album that’s recognisably the work of The Oscillation while pointing to a variety of new directions. ‘The Start Of The End’ is a line in the sand and one that points to a better tomorrow.

For fans of : Spectrum / Recurring Era Spacemen 3, Loop, AR Kane, MBV, bdrmm, Cocteau Twins , Telescopes and early 90s Creation records..

TRACK LISTING

Side A
War On The Mind
Far Away
The Start Of The End
The Eternal
Side B
Body Electric
Mantra
Sovereign

Bonus Dinked Edition CD Tracklisting:
Sovereign (Celestial Mix) 26.53
The Eternal (Unseen Mix) 09.17
Body Electric (Magnetic Mix) 08.26
The Start Of The End (Around And Around Mix) 07.38
Aftermath (Fade In) 04.03

Members of The Chats, EU pressing of their second LP in anticipation of their debut Euro Tour. FFO: Cosmic Psychos, The Saints, Stiff Richards, The Chats. Australia never misses.

European release of The Unknowns second LP, released on Bargain Bin Records in Australia. "There have already been some monster LPs released in 2023, and the sophomore album from The Unknowns just might be the best of the lot. The Brisbane-based then-trio released one of the greatest punk albums of the roaring twenties (so far) with Nothing Will Ever Stop back in late 2020. Now a foursome following the addition of The Chats' Eamon Sandwich on guitar, The Unknowns have returned with an even better follow-up. East Coast Low manages to take most of the musical genres I hold dear and mash them together in the most delightful way. Basically the sound is classic punk rock with a ton of energy and catchy tunes (what else would you expect from Australia?). Yet at the same time, this album aligns beautifully with modern-day garage punk, power pop, and straight-up rock n' roll. East Coast Low packs ten tracks of punchy sing-along punk rock into 23 and a half minutes of pure fun. Songs like "Dianne," "Rid of You," "Thinking About You," and "I Don't Know" prove once again that there's a certain kind of itch that only old school punk rock n' roll can scratch. These guys are doing nothing new. But man, they do it so freaking well! If we're talking about the cream of the contemporary Aussie punk crop, The Unknowns have earned a place in the conversation." - Josh / Faster and Louder blog.

TRACK LISTING

1. Shot Down
2. Dianne
3. Rid Of You
4. Crying
5. Beat Me
6. Thinking About You
7. Know It All
8. I Don’t Know
9. Deleted
10. Supersonic Love

Easy Eye Sound present this double sided 7" by Hermanos Gutirrez - a two-piece band formed of the brothers Alejandro and Estevan Gutirrez - of "Low Sun" and "Los Chicos Tristes (El Michels Affair Remix)", featuring Jensine Benitez

With its bold percussion - much more prominent than on previous Hermanos Gutierrez records - "Low Sun" captures a darker, more eerie tension between the brother's two guitars.

"Los Chicos Tristes" has been remixed by Leon Michels, better known as El Michels Affair, and introducing vocals from Jensine Benitez, the new take on the beloved ambient instrumental adds more prominent drum beats and a spoken word introduction by Benitez, giving the song an intense, cinematic twist. Subtle organ notes, vocalizing, and Hermanos' intertwining guitars lead the remix into a darker, more mysterious place while staying true to the duo's intimate sound that has won them millions of fans across the globe.

TRACK LISTING

1. Low Sun
2. Los Chicos Tristes (El Michels Affair Remix)

Here is the debut, self-titled album from a.s.o., singer/songwriter Alia Seror-O'Neill, and producer Lewie Day. 'a.s.o.' is a thematic consolidation of the previous three singles and an impressive artistic progression. Day and Seror-O'Neill show they've mastered the format of the radio-friendly pop song and found how to subvert it completely. Across eleven songs, they have built a rich and compelling body of work.

We know where we are now, emotionally complex, trip-hop torch songs for club freaks. But the palette has broadened to encompass ethereal dream pop à la Cocteau Twins, slow- burning AOR-soul, and dubwise stylings. As a result, 'a.s.o.' is a satisfyingly coherent listen but never a musical monoculture. Variously there are nods toward Julee Cruise, Fleetwood Mac, and the uneasy listening of Portishead. It's an album that wears its influences lightly, is never weighed down by them, and always sure of its own identity.

It's anchored by Alia's unique voice. Her words speak of restraint and release, taking us from the elegiac to the euphoric. This elegantly crafted, perfect pop music sounds like it has had enough of your shit. And Day's music is the perfect foil; deep, slightly menacing, restrained, and powerful. The album has a cinematic texture, as with David Lynch; the seemingly familiar becomes uncanny and strange the closer we look. a.s.o. take our emotions for a joyride before leaving us floating in space.

'a.s.o.' is a journey; by its end, we all are changed

STAFF COMMENTS

Liam says: One of 2023's best albums (me, Mine and Ryan loved it) is back in on a lovely repress! Proper rich and atmospheric downtbeat/trip-hop, there's also hints of dream-pop on here - like Mazzy Star soundtracking The Matrix. Absolutely boss stuff this!

TRACK LISTING

A1. Go On
A2. My Baby’s Got It Out For Me
A3. Rain Down
A4. LITD Pt. 1
A5. Love In The Darkness
A6. Cold Feeling
B1. True
B2. Falling Under
B3. Thinking
B4. Understand
B5. Somebody

Session Victim’s 5th studio album ‘Low Key, Low Pressure’ feels like an anathema to today’s fast paced, industry driven musical landscape – and for all the right reasons.

Having released two intense, dancefloor-focused 12“s on Rhythm Section and Delusions Of Grandeur over the past year, their return to Night Time Stories brings out their trippy, headsy side once again.

And despite the pandemic downtime being over, Hauke and Matthias remain holed up in the studio, jamming, head nodding to drum breaks and churning out records like the one in front of you.

Spanning 10 tunes – 12 if you count the limited bonus 7“ that comes with the first pressing – the LP is undiluted Session Victim, with their occasional trio partner Carsten “Erobique“ Meyer as the sole musical guest on the library-esque SOFT LANDING, a tune reminiscent of something the boys would try to hunt down on one of their compulsive record store rummages to feed it to their Akais.

You’ll also find the sequel to one of their cornerstone tracks from their 2020 album Needledrop, Jazzbeat 07. (It’s JAZZ- BEAT 08, in case you were wondering.)

Having acquired a taste for the occasional cover version over the years, the duo closes the album out with their rendition of Instra:mental’s Photograph. Tackling such a classic is a daunting task which they approach in a gentle way, not swaying too far from the original, subtly reimagining the rhythmical foundation and exchanging the distinctive playground sounds from the original with field recordings of the locals populating the gritty area around their Neukölln studio.

Being long time fans of Swedish organ player Bo Hansson, Hauke and Matthias tried to reach out to the people responsible for his cover artwork - who today are in their late 80ies and have not answered ever since. Things came together in the most fortu- nate way when the pair were introduced to French artist Xavier d’espinay Saint Luc and his enchanting pencil wizardry. The out- standing result is what you’re holding in your hands right now.

TRACK LISTING

1. Enlightenment
2. Soft Landing
3. Jazzbeat 08
4. The Hidden Trail
5. Porchless
6. Mycelium Dub
7. Walk In The Park
8. Assembler
9. One Trick Ponies
10. Photograph 

After heavy-duty releases on self-administered imprints Low End Activism and Sneaker Social Club, as well as London’s beloved graffiti-laden mutant-bass stronghold Seagrave (RIP), the almighty Low End Activist makes a welcome debut with the ESP Institute. No stranger to mining distant regions the hardcore continuum and the residue of soundsystem culture at large, his relentless traversing and assembling of UK-specific rhythms demonstrates there is no end in sight when it comes to evolving the region’s musical gene pool. The 5-track 'Gossip Is The Devil’s Radio' strings together a smear of dystopian instrumentation - ghostly pads wrapped in melancholy, percussion that marries bleep with low resolution shrapnel, and vocal fragments that resemble a control tower’s two-way radio on the fritz - all imperfectly focused through a damaged lens of dancehall. We’re drawn to a dull moan that pervades throughout the record, reminiscent of the nihilistic moments in Abigail Meade’s score to 'Full Metal Jacket' where the sonics resemble a slow churn of molten steel occasionally punctuated and pierced by crystalline shards. The depth between the bone dry immediate foreground and distant wet background creates an exquisite sense of longing which isn’t inherently dark or menacing, but seductively bleak. As voyeurs, we may certainly appreciate the aesthetic LEA portrays, but we can’t fully comprehend the sense of escapism rooted within this music without having come of age in the damp and restless confines of England on the cusp of Thatcher’s abuse. Its a reminder that the light at the end of a tunnel, while it may be dim and grey, is still a light after-all, and the only way out is through.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Tectonic power that bangs and rumbles in all the right places. Summoning up ghosts of rave's past and present, and shaking warehouses to their very foundations.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Gossip Is The Devil's Radio 
A2. Good Question 
B1. Strings Of Sorrow 
B2. Perpetual Conflict 
B3. G.E.L. 

The third and final edition of the Pay It No Mind mixtape trilogy. A transatlantic link up where Sheffield meets LA, heavily inspired by Memphis rap classics; Three-6 Mafia, Gangsta Pat, DJ Paul and Lil Noid. Through a mutual love and respect for that era’s raw production values, Lean Low & DJ Dubplates set out to make a mixtape series with an affirmed nod to that style, whilst seasoning it with a contemporary twist.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A
1. Love It Mane
2. Ignorant
3. The Call
4. Night Terror
5. B.O.M.D
6. The Transition
7. Sunny Side Down
8. Creepin
9. The Ticket
SIDE B
1. Buzzin
2. Never Sure
3. Bussin
4. The Bliss
5. Real It In
6. Cloud Gawds
7. The Infinity

Follow up to widely acclaimed debut. First release sold out first pressing before street date. Builds on first release with more vocalists. RIYL: Jlin, DJ Rashad, DJ Maphorisa. There’s more than a hint of ambition on the double LP sophomore effort from Sam Austin Rabede, the producer known as DJ Black Low. Pretoria, South Africa-born and based, the young man makes amapiano with new ways of expressing this local turned-global style of dance music. In DJ Black Low’s musical imagination, the songs manage to smoothly vacillate between dreamy and firmly-grounded. Adorned with vocalists across most of the twelve tracks, there’s a new dimension to Black Low’s now-signature approach to abstract, angular deconstruction of the rhythmic developments in his songs.

The album references influences and ambitions in its song titles and lyrics while the music itself is anthemic in its sonic and structural aspirations. On many of the songs a slow-burning tension transforms into something unexpected until you’re somewhere else as the track concludes. There is an emotional and compositional maturity that builds on his earlier work. Vocals and lyrics are in focus. Production collaborators among Black Low’s Gauteng Province circle add to the constantly churning array of ideas that populate this consistently surprising release. Despite being a relative newcomer, DJ Black Low is onto something here. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Awesome Tapes shines a light on modern amapiano producer DJ Black Low. Thick with that South African haze, full of elevating vocal melodies, and peppered with gently intricate beats; this is a invigorating high watermark of the genre featuring a wealth of vocalists and talent.

TRACK LISTING

1. Thando (feat. Black R, K.Dalo And Lah Presh) (4:18)
2. Akulalwa (feat. Black R, K.Dalo & Frego) (4:55)
3. Bo Mbali Leboh Palesa (feat. Dea Rebbedy) (5:00)
4. Dlozi Lam (feat. Jay, Frego & Gentow) (4:23)
5. Lepiano (feat. Black R, K.Dalo & Frego) (4:57)
6. Lovey (feat. Black R, Frego & Keenly) (6:26)
7. Mekete (feat. Thapzin Statah & Preshy Dee) (4:57)
8. Mjolo (feat. Golden Krish & Black R) (5:45)
9. Oskido (feat. Sphiwe, Black R & K.Dalo) (6:17)
10. Qhude (feat. Black R, K.Dalo & Frego) (5:09)
11. Umshato (feat. Black R, K.Dalo & Frego) (6:08)
12. Drive Through (5:04) 

2022 repress on colour LP (West Ham colours, half transparent violet & half turquoise)

There's an ordeal that underpins Low Life's 'Dogging,' and looking back at it, perhaps this was inevitable given the album's exceptionally derogatory attitude to its own scattered sense of time and debris. It's an attitude that's been hosed down in bore water-stained stupor, with all the anguished but forgivable hope and charm of plain packaged cigarettes. 'Dogging' crawled into the world desperately and painfully. Originally slated for release on Brisbane's singular Negative Guest List Records in 2012, the label's owner sadly passed away before it got there. It eventually emerged two years later as a split between two labels from the band's home turf of Sydney, Disinfect Records and R.I.P. Society. It's fitting that the latter had reissued Venom P. Stinger's Dugald McKenzie-era material the year prior - arguably the only other Australian band that compares to the tough, shit-kicking intensity found on 'Dogging.' Comprised of Mitch Tolman, Cristian O'Sullivan, and Greg Alfaro at this point (the current 2017 line-up includes Dizzy from Oily Boys), the reckless ferocity and defeatist's humour is pointedly nihilistic. It's not kitsch nihilism either, it's the kind that enlivens. Indexing happiness, fear, lust, grief, and sorrow, the wry indulgences outlined in Tolman's coded and scheming lyrics amount to white-knuckle sincerity. It's disarming, but it's blunted by a weighty smirk. If all this weren't delivered through a sardonic curled lip, the violence at the edge of it all would perhaps come off a little less real.

There's a bitterly angry confrontation with the contemporary Australian psyche once you enter Low Life's estate. Thugged out and at pace, there's a genuine rush to 'Dogging.' The mindless logic of 'harder and faster' could never get you to where they were at this point. Even at the marginally calmer moments the guitars glance you like a headache revealing just how bad it is. There's no respite, but on the the whole it's a very functional arrangement between the three of them. Each song is belted out with a short, sharp fit, with some synthesisers occasionally glistening out at the edges. The restraint is all the more fierce as it amplifies everything that's fucked about them. Low Life pull you through it all on all their terms, and that impact feels as untimely and excessive now as it did then.

STAFF COMMENTS

Martin says: Total gobbing, dogging Punk Rock!

TRACK LISTING

Dogging
Hammertime
Speed Ball
Down At The Dogs
DNA
Dream Machine
Emmie
Friends

New Order are delighted to announce the release of the definitive edition of their 1985 studio album Low-Life. The collection includes an LP (180g), x2CDs, x2DVDs, a book and features unreleased rare material across the different formats and new sleeve designs.

CD 2 contains previously unreleased mixes and alternative versions, including Love Vigilantes and Sub-Culture instrumentals, Sooner Than You Think Full Length Unedited. The two DVDs include an unreleased performance from The Manhattan Club, Belgium and rarely seen footage from Rotterdam Arena (Netherlands), International Centre (Toronto, Canada) and a BBC filmed Whistle Test at The Hacienda, 1985.

The 180g vinyl LP will be wrapped in its original ‘heavyweight tracing paper’, designed by Peter Saville. In addition the CD will also be wrapped in the same way for the first time ever. Also included in the set is a beautifully presented hardback book featuring rare photos and a new interview with all band members. 

TRACK LISTING

LP 180g Vinyl
Side One
1. Love Vigilantes
2. The Perfect Kiss
3. This Time Of Night
4. Sunrise
Side Two
1. Elegia
2. Sooner Than You Think
3. Sub-Culture
4. Face Up CD1
1. Love Vigilantes
2. The Perfect Kiss
3. This Time Of Night
4. Sunrise
5. Elegia
6. Sooner Than You Think
7. Sub-Culture
8. Face Up

CD1
1. Love Vigilantes
2. The Perfect Kiss
3. This Time Of Night
4. Sunrise
5. Elegia
6. Sooner Than You Think
7. Sub-Culture
8. Face Up

CD2: Extras
1. Love Vigilantes - TV Pitch Instrumental Edit (mono)
2. The Perfect Kiss - Writing Session Recording
3. Untitled No. 1 - Writing Session Recording
4. Sunrise - Instrumental Rough Mix **
5. Elegia - Full Length Version *
6. Sooner Than You Think – Album Session Unedited Version
7. Sub-Culture - Album Session Early Instrumental Version
8. Face Up - Writing Session Recording
9. Let's Go – Album Session Instrumental
10. Untitled No. 2 - Writing Session Recording
11. Sunrise - Writing Session Recording
12. Love Vigilantes - Writing Session Recording
13. Sooner Than You Think - Writing Session Recording
14. Skullcrusher – Demo

All Tracks Previously Unreleased Except * And ** (previously Unreleased On CD And Digital)

DVD1
Live In Tokyo
The Koseinenkin Hall, Tokyo, Japan 1985
1. Confusion
2. Love Vigilantes
3. We All Stand
4. As It Is When It Was
5. Sub-Culture
6. Face Up
7. Sunrise
8. This Time Of Night
9. Blue Monday

Live In Rotterdam
The Rotterdam Arena, Netherlands 1985
10. As It Is When It Was
11. Everything's Gone Green*
12. Sub-Culture*
13. Ceremony*
14. Let's Go*
15. This Time Of Night*
16. The Village
17. The Perfect Kiss*
18. Age Of Consent*
19. Sunrise
20. Temptation*
21. Face Up*

Live In Manchester
Whistle Test, The Hacienda 1985
22. As It Is When It Was
23. Sunrise
24. Face Up - Restored Version Using Available Footage From The Hacienda Dec ‘85 And July ‘85.

DVD2
Live In Leuven
The Manhattan Club, Leuven, Belgium 1985
1. Let's Go*
2. The Perfect Kiss*
3. Age Of Consent*
4. State Of The Nation*
5. As It Is When It Was*
6. The Village*
7. Sub-Culture*
8. Atmosphere*
9. Blue Monday*
Bonus Tracks
10. Thieves Like Us*
11. Temptation*
12. Confusion - Restored Version From Damaged Tape With Mixing Desk Audio.*

Live In Toronto
Filmed By Paul Boyd
The International Centre, Toronto, Canada 1985
13. Elegia*
14. Sub-Culture*
15. The Village*
16. Sunrise*
17. We All Stand
18. As It Is When It Was*
19. Love Vigilantes*
20. 586*
21. Age Of Consent
22. Temptation
23. Ceremony*
24. The Perfect Kiss*

The Perfect Film
Rehearsal Room, Cheetham Hill, Manchester 1985
25. The Perfect Kiss
*unreleased

With "Leave Me Alone", Detlef Weinrich presents his fifth album under the moniker Tolouse Low Trax. Weinrich, who has meanwhile turned his back on Düsseldorf and lives in Paris, has long since ceased to be an insider tip and is a guest in renowned clubs and festivals all over Europe. With his new album, he succeeds in an exciting, unforeseen new direction. The velvety heaviness and rawness of earlier records seems to have given way to a new playfulness. A playfulness perhaps in the sense of an electronica reminiscent of the late 1990s, which in its idea of deconstruction and reduction is currently enjoying a new appreciation in the clubs. But also in the sense of an urban vibe of hip hop and dub references, which are woven into a very unique mix in Weinrich's tracks.

Nervous mechanical murmurs, drifting comic-like through razor-sharp rhythm cliffs: welcome to "Leave Me Alone", a loop meta-level dreamland of styles and mental meteorology. A repetitive notion on the overwhelming speechlessness towards the world, its clocking, and all the despairs that come along with it. Wholly veiled in a sharp sonorous language, that brings a complete agreement of the expression with the idea, a sense of harmony, of a secret beauty, that often escapes the judgment of the crowd. It marks the latest longplayer by Tolouse Low Trax. After his stunning collaboration with French singer and hurdy gurdy player Emmanuelle Parrenin and myriad remixes for artists like Aksak Maboul, Ex Ponto, or Sebastian Tellier, he sharpened his artistic skills for a fresh musical treasure hunt. "Leave Me Alone" is a renunciation from the industrial slow drone zones, waving into spectacular decon- structed style collages.

13 veiled drum machine experiments, featuring dubby jazz districts, hip-hop flair, haunting little melodies, and the TLT signature funk. Again, he listened to the prose of his rhythms deeply, connecting the tones, placing rhythmic commas judiciously, like stops on a long road. All obscured into a new, ironic, yet totally serious sound layout, that is mirrored in the minimalistic shaped cover art- work full of suggestions to ramified cultural meanings. For a wonder, this time almost no pocketed vocal samples in the TLT creations. Instead, freshly recorded spoken words and singing by Brooklyn based producer Chris Hontos aka Beat Detectives, poet and multidisciplinary artist Fran from Paris and Italian synthesist and singer Andrea Noce aka Eva Geist, chanting introspective verses and Pier Paolo Pasolini poems over rugged grooves and suggestive sounds, opening his creative universe into a crisp manic eroticism. A cluster of genres, dancing in a rebellious, blistering swing, whirling styles upside down with an overall atmosphere that is flourishing on a positive spirit. An accessibility unusual for TLT and his non- conformist MPC driven music. So, let’s leave him alone and get lost in a wavering jaunt that chase away angst and depression with smoky musical spells and dramatic interlocking beat patterns.

TRACK LISTING

1. Albatros
2. How To Beat The Sea
3. Gates
4. Impure Nature
5. I Would Prefer Not To
6. My
7. Non Giudicare
8. Yellows
9. A Great, Strange And Moving Work
10. Ossia
11. White Flicker
12. Muddy Floors
13. Bianca From Rome

Not every two-year period measures out the same, noted Brendan Benson, the 51-year old Grammy- nominated singer-songwriter and co-founder of The Raconteurs. Benson had just finished his well- received seventh album, "Dear Life" in 2019 when his world came to a stop. "I was rehearsing for South-By-Southwest and gearing up for a tour and had a band ready and then, of course, the world shut down," he said in a recent interview. The lockdown then began to reroute lives, societies and ambitions worldwide. "Everything changed," Benson said. "I went to work on some songs so I'd have new material when things opened up." Over months with minimal interactions, those songs coal- esced and took on lives of their own, he said. Two years of semi-isolation, of fading relationships, of the natural inward turn that comes with less human contact unexpectedly pushed Benson's song- writing into new places.

Instead of being an afterthought, Benson's solitude evolved into, "Low Key" the eighth album by the idiosyncratic songwriter who has enjoyed both world-wide popularity with the Raconteurs and a devoted cult following for his numerous solo projects. Low Key, the Nashville-based artist said, was his chance to explore how lives and relationships changed during the lengthy isolation from the normal interactions of everyday life. Benson might not have written songs such as "People Grow Apart" and "Whole Lotta Nothing" prior to 2019, he said. "The lockdown afforded people the opportunity to cut ties - or maybe it caused people to do that," he said. "Whatever the case may be, a lot of people fell out. But then relationships ending is one of my favourite topics for song writing," he said with a laugh.

This isn't to say that the 8-track effort recorded in Benson's own Readymade Studio in Nashville is a grim look at the state of human condition. Just the opposite. The catchy, upbeat lead track "Ain't No Good," pokes fun at destructive self-absorption while the guitar-heavy "Whatever's On My Mind" skewers Benson's own hyperkinetic, stream-of-consciousness thinking. And then there's the most unlikely track of all: A cover of Gerry Rafferty's smooth 1978 hit, "Right Down the Line." The cover was suggested by a friend. "She's always been saying I should do that song. I don't normally pay attention when people say that stuff. But then I happened to hear it one day and I said, 'Dang. This is good.' "

Greg Calbi, the album's mastering engineer at Sterling Sound says: "Brendan combines the classic 80's style song-writing in the Squeeze, Crowded House vein with some incredible contemporary sonic magic, the kind of album which entices the listener to get tickets to a live show immediately."

The lockdown that left him mostly with himself, professionally speaking. Confined to his Nashville studio, Benson played every instrument on Low Key and handled all of the initial production. The end result was exactly what Benson had been searching for - even if he didn't know it at the time. Those years spent honing his craft as a songwriter, producer and touring musician, turned what could have been a liability of isolation into something far deeper, a body of work he described as the best of his career.

TRACK LISTING

Side A:
Aint' No Good
I Missed The Plane
People Grow Apart
Right Down The Line
Side B:
Whole Lotta Nothin
Whatever's On My Mind
All In
Something A Little Like Home

Vinyl only release from God Unknown featuring the mighty LOW b/w DØMES.Low offer 'All Night' from their massively acclaimed album 'So What' on Sub Pop. 'Opal' is the first release from the Anglo / American Dømes, their debut album will be released in 2023. This is also the last ever single from God Unknown Records infamous Singles Club. Eighty artists split over forty split 7”s and finishing with an almighty bang with LOW and DØMES.

Please note Low - 'All Night' is a vinyl only track - no digital will be available.

Glasgow’s Cloth announce their return with new music by way of a 4 track EP and their first release for their new label Rock Action Records. “Lucid” is resplendent yet brooding, offering airy dream-like, haunting vocals over dark guitar riffs and resonating percussion - a perfect moment of minimal alternative rock. Guitarist Paul Swinton says ”It was the first song we wrote for the EP and it felt like it set a tone for where we should go with the other songs - somewhere darker and bigger. The song is about being wrapped up in a situation you feel you have no control over then realising you do have the ability and agency to change things for the better.”

This physical EP is a limited pressing and is available on ice blue coloured 12" vinyl and includes download code.

It will appeal to fans of The XX, Cocteau Twins, Beachhouse and Warpaint.

TRACK LISTING

1. Old Stories
2. Lucid
3. Low Sun
4. Sidecar

First time on LP for 5 songs from last year’s acclaimed Uwami CD. Blazing a new trail in amapiano. First pressing of debut LP sold out before street date. Features new song “Gijima”. DJ Black Low burst on the international scene last year with Uwami, a collection of his early, downright avantgarde amapiano work. The young producer and DJ makes electronic music that sounds like nothing else: glitchy and fierce while smooth and soulful, all under the rubric of South Africa’s most-exported dance music movement to date. Now comes Uwami II, which features the rest of the tracks from the acclaimed debut plus a new song “Gijima.”

The Pretoria, South Africa-based artist has more work in the pipeline as we present these inimitable songs for the first time on vinyl. The song “Gijima” is a previously unreleased track Black Low chose to include in this collection as cremates more work at a furious pace. Quotes : “This is essential listening from a 20 year-old star.”—Resident Advisor Best Tracks of 2021 // “Uwami keeps an adventurous spirit at its core and pushes far beyond genre conventions in the process.”

TRACK LISTING

Side A 1.

1. Alone In A Dark (4:54) [+ Mr. Perfect Feat. DJ La Bengwa]
2. Sbono (Vocal Mix) (6:10) 
3. Down The Road (Original Mix) (4:53) [feat. DJ La Bengwa]

Side B

1. Vula Vala (5:24)
2. 60 Days No Sleep (5:43)
3. Gijima (Vocal Mix) (4:07) 

Jerry Teel - guitar, harmonica, vocals (The Chrome Cranks, Knoxville Girls, Big City Stompers, etc).
Jon Spencer - guitar (Blues Explosion, Pussy Galore, Five Dollar Priest, etc).
Russell Simins - drums (Blues Explosion, etc).
Lisa Wells - bass.

Hung Far Low" is the fifth and final studio album by New York noise rock band The Honeymoon Killers, originally released in 1991 and is now remastered in order to achieve the extreme sound desired for this band.

The Honeymoon Killers recorded this album picking up 2/3 of the nascent Jon Spencer Blues Explosion.

Low Life are a rock band from Sydney, Australia.

THE RECORD: Low Life’s 3rd LP is called From Squats to Lots: The Agony and the XTC of Low Life.

NOTES ON HOW TO LISTEN TO AGONY AND XTC OF LOW LIFE:

1. Some records hit you with an instant impression of timeless brilliance, and Low Life’s Dogging is one of those records, what the wise call “an instant classic”.

2. From Squats to Lots: The Agony and the XTC of Low Life is more like their second album Downer Edn (read Edition), a little more withdrawn, a little more textured. Complex. Rich. Which is to say: you’re going to need some time with it.

3. Some show, some grow. Low Life have done both. This one is a grower. Spend some time with this one. It’s got that nuanced flavour. Don’t guzzle. Sip. Savour.

4. Sip it, and sense the recurring brilliance of Mitch Tolman’s lyrics, exploring the usual territory of gutter life, lad life, punk life, low life. The dirge. Disgust and shame in white Australia. Council housing, bills piled to the neck, substance abuse and rehabilitation, the fallen lads and lasses who stood too close to the flame, loss and loneliness, from squats to lots. Un-Australian gutter symphony.

5. There is a celebration of resilience and that’s a central theme of this record and a time like ours needs a record like Agony & XTC. Low times are coming through, but if you’re low they won’t get to you.

6. Iggy Pop’s Bowie produced studio rock masterpieces ‘The Idiot’ and ‘Lust For Life’ are important reference points to the 3rd album sounds of Low Life. Here comes success!

7. ‘The Agony and Ecstasy’ is a 1985 novel by Irving Stone about the life of Italian Renaissance painter Michelangelo. Stone wrote another novel about the single eared painter Vincent Van Gogh called ‘Lust For Life’. This synchronicity hit me.

8. Iggy and the Stooges are a pretty safe reference for Low Life (and all good rock music). Iggy and the Stooges are a low life’s Michelangelo, but solo Iggy like Lust for Life is a better reference for this particular incarnation of Low Life, which is to say they are studio rock albums.

9. Bowie later referred to this period of his life as profoundly nihilistic. But Iggy looked at it as the period of his life that saved him from an early grave. This confrontation is Low life lore.

10. Let’s stick to this, because there’s something about this era of Bowie that makes sense with Low Life’s new album, particularly Low. One should never miss the Low in our new album from Low Life. Producer and studio boss Mickey Grossman has the ear for the Low, and he has carved out a little statue of David right here.

11. Mickey’s ears are recording, mixing and producing the best of Sydney, most notably the Oily Boys Cro Memory Grin. A great companion record to this one. Use Agony & XTC AFTER Oily Boys. Not on an empty stomach, and don’t try to operate heavy machinery (bobcat, bulldozer etc).

12. The relationship between Low Life and Sydney hardcore should not be understated, but it also shouldn’t guide how to listen to Agony & XTC. This is not austere, disciplined music.

13. Think, like, if Poison Idea were given the kind of studio time and budget as Happy Mondays. You wouldn’t play it to a teenager. It’s not for children. This is a mature flavour, one for the adults who have had to contend with failure and hardship, medical bills and disappointed family members, betrayed lovers and worrisome growths, police brutality and tooth decay, humiliating bowels and collapsed septums, detoxing and drying out, for those who have seen themselves as corrupted and putrid and unloveable, for those who endure all of this and aren’t willing to lie down and cop it sweet: Low Life are still here and they ain’t going nowhere

TRACK LISTING

1. Agony Intro
2. Agony & XTC
3. Collect Calls
4. Real Man
5. Still Here
6. CZA
7. Conversations
8. Hammer And The Fist
9. Epitaphs
10. Harmony
11. Moments
12. Agony Outro

Geese are a band that begins and ends in Brooklyn, as a project between friends to build a home studio out of a basement.

Their debut album, ‘Projector’ (from which this single is taken), is born from the same ambition: make music by any means necessary. The songs were recorded with sneakers as mic stands and blankets draped over the amps, all within the afternoon following a school day, up until they ran the risk of noise complaints. 

TRACK LISTING

A - Low Era
B - Smoke In Japan

Low Hummer are a fast-rising six piece from Hull that write about their life in deepest darkest East Yorkshire and their place in a world of consumerism and bad news stories sold as gospel. Daniel, Aimee, Steph, Jack, John and Joe came together from the far corners of the city’s tight knit DIY community, established a regular rehearsal home in iconic DIY venue The New Adelphi Club and set about honing their righteous, danceable garage rock before announcing themselves in late 2019 and introducing the world to Low Hummer - this band of misfits from a town left behind.

“Scuzzed out indie with lashings of synths, their post-punk leaning songwriting has a surreal pop instinct running through it” – Clash.

“Brilliant new garage rock… classic garage rock sounds that join with post-punk fury.” – Gigwise.

“Its really charming. Great.” Laura Snapes (The Guardian / Pitchfork - For 6 Music Roundtable).

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Take Arms
Don’t You Ever Sleep
I Choose Live News
Never Enough
Sometimes I Wish (I Was A Different Person)

Side B
The Real Thing
Human Behaviour
I Tell You What
Commercials
The People, This Place

The Oscillation’s continuing journey into the centre of the mind and beyond shows absolutely no signs of slowing down. Indeed, new album "Untold Futures " is less a consolidation of all that we’ve come to love and expect from the cosmic explorers and more a leap forward into an upcoming reality. Redefining the possibilities of altered states through audio stimulation, “Untold Futures” finds The Oscillation at their most daring and breathtaking.

A multi-layered assault on the senses, this is an unexpurgated experience for the seasoned connoisseur and unspoiled novice alike. Its power is felt in the multi-layered dissonance and undying throb of “Dilated Mind”, the metaphysical possibilities that beat at the heart of metronomic pulses of “Forever Knowing” and the face-melting attack of “The Inner Void”. “Heart Of Nowhere” is a mantra for the profane, while the dissonant beauty of “Obscured” realises re-birth and resurrection.

Revelatory in its brilliance and an intersection between the individual self and the collective unconscious, this is music to fuel the inner technology of the mind. Veering between krautrock edginess, droning medicated tones and noise driven no wave fuzz, The Oscillation recalls the music of Neu! and Tangerine Dream and Loop interpreted with an eye on Pil’s dubbed out punk funk, Miles Davis’ experimentalism and Spacemen 3’s strung out blues rock.

Beginning in 2007, when DC Recordings released the debut “Out Of Phase”, The Oscillation have released many albums and EPS both self released and with labels (Fuzz Club and Hands In The Dark and Cardinal Fuzz). Recent releases include the mutant kosmiche techno of “U.E.F”, the pounding and otherworldly “Wasted Space” from 2018 and the epic exploration of the inner landscapes with “Droneweapon”. Now The Oscillation return with a new face-biting album questioning our strange relationship with reality as “Untold Futures”.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Wild, incendiary, chest-beating psych rock that shoots off the stage like a flamethrower. Roaring with wobbly feedback and howling like a banshee for its entire duration. Unmissable!

TRACK LISTING

Untold Futures
1 Dilated Mind
2 Forever Knowing
3 The Inner Void
4 Heart Of Nowhere
5 Obscured

Ambient Version LP (DInked Edition)
Obscured (ambient)
The Inner Void (ambient)
Dilated Mind (ambient)
Heart Of Nowhere (ambient)

To celebrate its ten-year anniversary, Fuzz Club Records are reissuing The Underground Youth’s 2011 ‘Low Slow Needle’ EP on 10” vinyl with remastered audio. ‘Low Slow Needle’s hauntingly minimal, neo-psychedelic melancholy provides a more lo-fi snapshot of the now-Berlin-based band’s earlier days – when The Underground Youth was more of a DIY solo endeavour for Blackpool-born musician Craig Dyer, as opposed to the much-adored, full-band, international touring force that it is now. Looking back on ‘Low Slow Needle’, Dyer said: “The EP was recorded in September 2011, I had just returned to the UK from St. Petersburg where Olya [now drummer in The Underground Youth] and I had just got married.

Olya had to stay in Russia to finalise her paperwork before we would move into our first home together in Manchester. It was a difficult time, being apart after just getting married, and so I distracted myself by working on these songs that would become the Low Slow Needle EP. It was sort of my love letter to that period, looking back and also looking to the future. I worked closely with mine and Olya's friend in St. Petersburg, Daria Xenofontova, who gave her beautiful voice to my words and featured on three of the most popular songs on the EP, 'Midnight Lust', 'Addiction' and 'Blue'. These three songs still remain popular with our fans, who still request we play them live to this day.” When compared with the cinematic folk-noir heard on the band’s tenth album, the newly-released ‘The Falling’ (2021), what we find here captures a more stark and stripped-back The Underground Youth as the project was about to come out of its embryonic phase: “All five tracks were recorded in my bedroom and I really wanted to strip back the sound, to give a romantic feel of that period for me. To consider it 10 years on, it feels like the beginning to the next step of the journey, my life in Manchester with Olya, making contact with Casper at Fuzz Club and signing up with the label (this came just after the release of Low Slow Needle) and us putting together the first incarnation of TUY's live band (again this followed the release of the EP). So, in a way, this record marked the end of the first era of The Underground Youth, and in doing so, paved the way for the next.”

TRACK LISTING

1) Midnight Lust
2) On Your Screen
3) Addiction
4) Blue
5) Witchcraft

Something special for the pill goths and gloom crew as Low Standard Deviation deliver some maximally dark and manic minimal wave on Bunker. A fine example of the Dark Wired Sound, this eight track outing is times slightly reminiscent of Siouxsie and the Banshees or Joy Division, though sung through old and charming, slightly dissonant 'Samba' melody lines in keeping with the artist's Brazilian heritage. Detuned guitars, fuzzy drum machines, distorted vocals and bloodless synth sound abound on this bedsit masterpiece.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Transformation
A2. Um Dia
A3. Seguirei Adiante
A4. Tortura Electronica
B1. Stalker
B2. Ja Se Passou Foi Mais De Um Ano
B3. La Declaracion De Helsinki
B4. Em Algum Passado

Focusing on their craft, staying out of the fray, and holding fast their faith to find new ways to express the discord and delight of being alive, to turn the duality of existence into hymns we can share, Low present HEY WHAT. These ten pieces—each built around their own instantaneous, undeniable hook—are turbocharged by the vivid textures that surround them. The ineffable, familiar harmonies of Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker break through the chaos like a life raft. Layers of distorted sound accrete with each new verse - building, breaking, colossal then restrained, a solemn vow only whispered. There will be time to unravel and attribute meaning to the music and art of these times, but the creative moment looks FORWARD, with teeth.

HEY WHAT is Low's thirteenth full-length release in twenty-seven years, and their third with producer BJ Burton.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: 'Hey What' follows on nicely from 'Double Negative', continuing the dedication to avant-noise drone tempered with the majestic vocal accompaniment of Parker and Sparhawk. This time they move the sound forwards with a clever and unique mixture of that shadowy drone and the more pop-focused melodies of their early work. Stunning.

TRACK LISTING

White Horses
I Can Wait
All Night
Disappearing
Hey
Days Like These
There's A Comma After Still
Don't Walk Away
More
The Price You Pay (It Must Be Wearing Off)

Comes with digital download code.

These tracks were recorded by Kevin Low and Fiona Carlin in Kevin’s bedroom in Gayfield Square, Edinburgh, in 1986. Me and my dad, Kevin, dug out a huge bunch of his tapes over the lockdown (about 80 of the them at first). Some were…better than others, however, the Gayfield Square demos were the pick of the lot. Previously Kevin and Fiona were part of the Post Punk / indie band ‘Wild Indians’, whose first release “Stolen Courage” had come out in 1983 – released on Flexi Disc via the Edinburgh fanzine Deadbeat. Throughout the mid-1980s they performed across Edinburgh’s clubs, including at the Hoochie Coochie Club (name checked on track 7), where they played alongside bands and close friends Pop Wallpaper and Visitors. The band went on to release two 12” singles, “Love of My Life” in 1984 and “Penniless” in 1986.

After the band broke up Kevin sold his guitar amp and 7inch collection, Fiona her saxophone and they went out and got themselves a Yamaha RX-5 drum machine, Yamaha QX7 sequencer and a Yamaha DX-100. These bedroom tracks are the fruits of their first venture with this hardware, combining their experimentation with synthetic sounds (mostly the DX-100’s famous pre-sets) with a post-punk vocal style.

These eight tracks are also, in part, the fruit of the “Enterprise Allowance scheme” - a policy venture of Margaret Thatcher’s UK government that gave unemployment claimants access to an extra £40 to top up the basic dole money. Following Thatcher’s election victories in 1979 and 1983, the policy sought to reduce the figures of mass unemployment which hung over Britain well into the 1980s. This policy, according to Kevin, helped to keep up the credit payments. He notes that, “when Fiona and I turned up at the DHSS office with the sure-fire money-making plan of making a business as a ‘song-writing’ duo they signed us up. However, I still think they thought we said, sign writing as they were filling out the form.”

Kevin and Fiona stopped making music together shortly after these tracks were recorded so unfortunately, they never saw the light of day…until now!

Fiona went on to work in Film and Television sound. Kevin became a photographer, working mostly in theatre. He is now an artist/painter working in Glasgow.

TRACK LISTING

1. Change Of Heart
2. Nothing Else Will Ever Be The Same
3. Your Love
4. Kylie
5. Lonely When You Go
6. Miracle Town
7. Hoochie Coochie
8. Locked Out Of Love

In many ways, DJ Black Low’s debut album, Uwami, shows the signs of an artist’s first offering in any musical genre. Showcasing fluency in a broad range of styles and stuffing a number of ideas to the record’s brim is the 20 year-old producer’s attempt to both introduce himself to a wide listenership and stamp a recognizable sound in their minds. In other ways, somewhat out of the young South African producer’s control, Uwami goes against the grain. The album comes at a time when South African electronic music is being fundamentally disrupted. Amapiano, the electronic music movement which first gained popularity with a small, core group of followers, now dominates the mainstream. Well-known and pervasive, amapiano borrows from a diverse palette of musical styles which are popular in South Africa’s largely Black townshipsjazz, kwaito, dibacardi, deep and afro house among them.

Instead of pandering to the seemingly insatiable local appetite and growing global penchant for amapiano though, on Uwami DJ Black Low seeks out the limits of the sound du jour and tries to stretch them. On his solo productions, he uses the samples and compositional norms that make amapiano hits the bedrock on which to experiment and improvise. With collaborators, DJ Black Low improvises within the boundaries of listener-friendly grooves. The sound he creates has foundations of what could easily have progressed into captivating amapiano songs on their own. But he uses improvised but structured electronic percussion and distortion sounds to drive the tracks in a particular direction. What remains is something like a deconstructed amapiano.

For a young producer living in the townships of the greater Pitori area of South Africa’s Gauteng province, there were few avenues available for Radebe to pursue a career in music. His trajectory shows the vulnerability of this pursuit. “I had started producing in 2013 and it so happened that I lost my equipment in 2014. I couldn’t afford to buy equipment. In 2017, a friend of mine who had been making music found a job and decided to quit music. He gave me his equipment and I was able to start producing again. That’s when I started getting back to it. I tried to pick up where I had left off, with hip hop and commercial house but I found that amapiano was the popular music. I liked it, so I started producing it.”

TRACK LISTING

1. DJ Black Low & Hapas Music Feat. DJ KS & Patna “Jaiva Low”
2. DJ Black Low & Tap Soul Feat. Licy Jay & Eto “Emcimbinii”
3. DJ Black Low Feat. DJ Saxo Boy “9 Days”
4. DJ Black Low & Kapzela Feat. Licy Jay & MLG “Emonate Oe Bethela D Vosho”
5. DJ Black Low “Downfall Revisit”
6. DJ Black Low “Stiwawa Quitter”

CD Version Also Includes:

7. DJ Black Low & Mr Perfect Feat. DJ Labengwa “Alone In A Dark”
8. DJ Black Low Feat. DJ Labengwa Licy Jay & Menate Entertainment “Sbone (Vocal Mix)”
9. DJ Black Low Feat. DJ Labengwa “Down The Road (Original Mix)”
10. DJ Black Low “Vula Vala”
11. DJ Black Low “60 Days No Sleep”

Bobby Would LP#2. Wistful waltztime psychobeat for warding off / wallowing in the 2020-21 Weltschmerz. Swelling and smearing the vision of 2018’s skeletal rock’n’roll heartbreaker Baby, most of the songs here are ballads – minimalist, ultra-hypnotic but lavishly melodic space-punk lullabies and bright, bruised expressions of jingle-jangle mourning. Highs, lows and heavenly blows. BW’s guitar is, more than ever, a thing of fearsome and filigree beauty, moving effortlessly from misty, mellifluous DIY pop-dreams to wailing vertiginous whiplash leads and dazed, epiphanic, angels-wept metha-drone, ringing in infinity - and tethered to this earth only by his beloved monotone, numbed-out, serial-killer croon. Spinning in its own orbit, but with recognisable dabs - perhaps - of Phantom Payn / JG39, Les Rallizes Denudes, Gary War, Peter Gutteridge’s Pure...and of course Bobby’s own work in Heavy Metal and Itchy Bugger.

TRACK LISTING

1. Earth In Heaven
2. Natural Killer
3. Bushfire Avalanche
4. Applause
5. Maybe You Should
6. Walk Away
7. Raft 8. So To Say
9. Diversion
10. Go

This is Tolouse Low Trax’s 4th solo album Jumping Dead Leafs.
A 38 minutes exorcism, dionysac sexyness fueled with romanticism, made of mechanical incantations mixed with spectral vocals of forgotten imaginary tribes, words from a physicist (Incomprehensible Image), and mystical breathings… To remind you that music is demanding your soul and body, fully. A master irritator, disclosing this talent all the way, down to every chosen title, for the album itself and all of its components (would you put Milk in Water ?). As repetitive or minimalist music may already make some of you feel nervous, it seems more accurate to talk here about primitive music - notwithstanding a non violent anarchism. But those are only words and vain attempts to attach TLT to a region or a family. Neither the burden of classical European music legacy, which eventually lead to pop music, seemed to interfere with his wild mind, and if it is no surprising to hear Bach in German electronic music, there is here a clear statement that you are out of this sirupy prison… For D.W. is a sorcerer. He’s been empirically learning the speaking of trance with years of touring and experimenting with all kinds of audience and venues, from clubs to museums, from Mongolia to Brazil, from his performances with his bands Kreidler or Toresch to solo ones, sustained by a steady limited set up, as the one used when he’s recording : one MPC, rudimentary synths, few effects and a mixer. No sound engineer on stage as only he knows his secret language… Raw dubmaking, leaning towards
hip hop, indubitably underlining here a significant distanciation from his previous industrial inspirations. The bewitchment of this record is operating with no warning from the very first seconds until the last epiphany of Sales Pitch. He is using his knowledge of techno, psychedelism (Inverted Sea), UK bass (Jumping Dead Leafs), only to bring you out of it. We all tend to be slaves, without even being conscious about it, and a balance must be existing between being a slave and showing off. Mr. Weinrich’s answer is unsettling because it is an utter call to this balance, in our world of black and white and political correctness. There is no morality in music… Don’t expect anything else than an unaccountable liberating immediate experience. Don’t expect any kind of music because you are already in the past or the future… From his recording technique mainly relying on one takes, his adoration of mistakes and jeopardy, to the core essence of repetitive music, it is all hereabout being in the present. No ears no glasses. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Patrick says: Dusseldorf's dance floor Derrida comes correct with his first solo album in six years, providing a little club deconstruction for the fringe DJ and haunted home listener! Frankly, no one sounds like Detlef, and as this LP blazes its hazy trail through warehouse smog, dislocated dubspace and an entirely crepuscular strand of psychedelia, it becomes increasingly clear how much we've missed him.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Inverted Sea
A2. Berrytone Souvenier
A3. The Incomprehensible Image
B1. Jumping Dead Leafs
B2. Milk In Water
B3. Dawn Is Temporal
B4. Pulse Skit
B5. Sales Pitch

Hailing from Ireland, Bobby (originally from Liverpool) and Billie (Bosnian born) from the ephemeral Low Sea compose music that flows like a serpentine river through the uncanny valley. Indeed, the owls are not what they seem—but even such blatant allusions can’t sketch an intuitive image of the sound-scapes woven by this intriguing dyad.

This is the duo’s third album having released a mini album on Lefse and a narcotic synth pop album on Dell’Orso and this album further extends their insular grey disco sound.

Low Sea’s woozy, gothic take on coldwave synthpop remains intact on Portals, but this time out moving from the shadows to the light of city nights. Intricately layered melodies shimmer and then pick up energy, as Billie’s unique beguiling voice sings of loss and triumph, loneliness and euphoria.

As with the last album there is a track mixed by the legendary Stephen Hague (Propaganda/ Pet Shop Boys), the final song All Living Creatures.

‘’There are just not enough superlatives in the English language for that matter to describe how good this band are’’
- Dan Hegarty, RTE2FM

‘’the most glorious dark – hewn pop songs – the perfect mix of heart and ice’’ NME.

TRACK LISTING

1) I Feel Uneasily Loved
2) Turn Away
3) Hunting For Your Shadow
4) Hanged Man
5) Sleeping
6) Mizar
7) All That Fall
8) Underground Disco Of Tehran
9) All Living Creatures

“From the ominous, post-punkish pulse and clang of opener ‘Monkey’, to the decidedly punky frustration of ‘Everybody’s Song’ and the unapologetic riffing of ‘California’, ‘The Great Destroyer’ pushes the band's sound on to thrilling new vistas” - The Guardian

Formed in 1993, Low are a trio from Duluth, Minnesota comprised of guitarist/vocalist Alan Sparhawk, percussionist/vocalist Mimi Parker and bassist Zak Sally.

Initially garnering attention as leaders of the ‘90s slowcore movement, Low went on to develop a sonic repertoire that incorporated pop, R&B and dissonant rock ‘n’ roll. With this kind of storied history, most people thought they had Low pegged. But then they turned in ‘The Great Destroyer’.

The band’s seventh full-length album, ‘The Great Destroyer’ is fascinating in that it blends the band’s austere melodies (‘On the Edge Of’, ‘Silver Rider’) with an aggressive guitar onslaught (‘Monkey’, ‘Everybody’s Song’) and even melds Low’s varied styles together into a single song (‘When I Go Deaf’).

Co-produced by Low and David Fridmann (Flaming Lips, Mercury Rev), ‘The Great Destroyer’ was a welcome surprise and, in the end, a rock ‘n’ roll revelation.

TRACK LISTING

Monkey
California
Everybody’s Song
Silver Rider
Just Stand Back
On The Edge Of
Cue The Strings
Step
When I Go Deaf
Broadway (So Many People)
Pissing
Death Of A Salesman
Walk Into The Sea

In 2018, Low will turn twenty-five. Since 1993, Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker—the married couple whose heaven-and-earth harmonies have always held the band’s center—have pioneered a subgenre, shrugged off its strictures, recorded a Christmas classic, become a magnetic onstage force, and emerged as one of music’s most steadfast and vital vehicles for pulling light from our darkest emotional recesses. But Low will not commemorate its first quarter-century with mawkish nostalgia or safe runs through songbook favorites. Instead, in faithfully defiant fashion, Low will release its most brazen, abrasive (and, paradoxically, most empowering) album ever: Double Negative, an unflinching eleven-song quest through snarling static and shattering beats that somehow culminates in the brightest pop song of Low’s career.

To make Double Negative, Low reenlisted B.J. Burton, the quietly energetic and adventurous producer who has made records with James Blake, Sylvan Esso, and The Tallest Man on Earth in recent years while working as one of the go-to figures at Bon Iver’s home studio, April Base. Burton recorded Low’s last album, 2015’s Ones and Sixes, at April Base, adding might to many of its beats and squelch and frisson beneath many of its melodies.

This time, though, Sparhawk, Parker, and bassist Steve Garrington knew they wanted to go further with Burton and his palette of sounds, to see what someone who is, as Sparhawk puts it, “a hip-hop guy” could truly do to their music. Rather than obsessively write and rehearse at home in Duluth, Minnesota, they would often head southeast to Eau Claire, Wisconsin, arriving with sketches and ideas that they would work on for days with Burton. Band and producer became collaborative cowriters, building the pieces up and breaking them down and building them again until their purpose and force felt clear. As the world outside seemed to slide deeper into instability, Low repeated this process for the better part of two years, pondering the results during tours and breaks at home. They considered not only how the fragments fit together but also how, in the United States of 2018, they functioned as statements and salves.

Double Negative is, indeed, a record perfectly and painfully suited for our time. Loud and contentious and commanding, Low fights for the world by fighting against it. It begins in pure bedlam, with a beat built from a loop of ruptured noise waging war against the paired voices of Sparhawk and Parker the moment they begin to sing during the massive “Quorum.” For forty minutes, they indulge the battle, trying to be heard amid the noisy grain, sometimes winning and sometimes being tossed toward oblivion. In spite of the mounting noise, Sparhawk and Parker still sing. Or maybe they sing because of the noise. For Low, has there ever really been a difference?

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Never one to shy away from a new direction, the ridiculously superb Low return with their most shadowy electronic affair yet. Bathed in distortion and rich, saturated ambience, it's a testament to their skill as songwriters and their overwhelmingly familiar 'Sound' that this still comes across as one of the best releases of their career. Mindblowing stuff.

TRACK LISTING

Quorum
Dancing And Blood
Fly
Tempest
Always Up
Always Trying To Work It Out
The Son, The Sun
Dancing And Fire
Poor Sucker
Rome (Always In The Dark)
Disarray

The four studio albums ‘Low’, ‘‘Heroes’’, ‘Lodger’ and ‘Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)’ have not been available as standalone vinyl LPs for over 25 years and this is the first time on vinyl for Stage (2017), which has 5 additional tracks to the original 1978 double LP release including The Jean Genie and Suffragette City.

The powerful reach of Bowie's masterpiece, the first part of the much feted 'Berlin Trilogy' created with the aid of Brian Eno, is still being felt strongly almost 30 years on. Air's wonderful four hour Essential Mix began with this album's opener "Speed of Life", Q Magazine rated the album #14 in it's Greatest British Albums Ever, and Pitchfork, the New Testament for the New Indie generation, recently decreed "Low" as the #1 album of the 1970's. Side A (or tracks 1-7 for those more familiar with the CD format) are classic Bowie ("Sound and Vision", "Be My Wife"), although dealing with the unfamiliar and slightly darker topics of lethargy, depression and estrangement, highlighting Bowie's overcoming of his cocaine addiction. Over on Side B the album's true colours really come through - four ambient tracks, originally rejected for the soundtrack to "The Man Who Fell To Earth" (the source of Low's iconic cover image), which see Bowie pay homage to Can, Neu! and Eno himself. The word 'timeless' was invented for such moments as these.

Low in High School is Morrissey’s first studio album since 2014 and was recorded at La Fabrique Studios in France and in Rome at Ennio Morricone’s Forum Studios. The record is produced by Joe Chiccarelli (who has worked with Frank Zappa, The Strokes, Beck and The White Stripes to name a few). Morrissey’s talent for combining political statements and beautiful melodies is more prevalent than ever on Low in High-School, capturing the zeitgeist of an ever-changing world.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Morrissey's new album is brimming with the sort of melancholy jangles and clever chord structures of yesteryear, but coupled with wry and ardent policism, a bit of conga and some flamenco stuff too. Lots of sounds, all worked into songs.

TRACK LISTING

1. My Love I’d Do Anything For You
2. I Wish You Lonely
3. Jacky’s Only Happy When She’s Up On The Stage
4. Home Is A Question Mark
5. Spent The Day In Bed
6. I Bury The Living
7. In Your Lap
8. The Girl From Tel-Aviv Who Wouldn’t Kneel
9. All The Young People Must Fall In Love
10. When You Open Your Legs
11. Who Will Protect Us From The Police?
12. Israel

* Restored and remastered audio
* Liner notes interviewing Tumbleweed principals Larry Ray and Bill Szymczyk, as well as surviving employees and artists
* Unseen archive photos, album artwork and label history
* Housed in a deluxe Stoughton “Tip-On” gatefold jacket

In February of 1971, Larry Ray and Bill Szymczyk fled an earthquake and a debauched L.A. music scene to claim their own slice of utopia in Denver, Colorado. After meeting and bonding at ABC-Dunhill, where Ray landed as general manager, and where Szymczyk had breezed in from New York — fresh off his first real hit as a burgeoning engineer/producer with BB King’s “The Thrill is Gone” — they’d often daydreamed about starting their own label.

In Denver, Ray and Szymczyk settled on the name Tumbleweed Records, and through industry connections they secured multi-million-dollar financing from Gulf + Western, whose head honchos believed they were bankrolling the hippie movement’s next big thing.

But instead of producing the next Janis Joplin or Jimi Hendrix, Ray and Szymczyk turned their sights on idiosyncratic wunderkinds like Pete McCabe, moody songwriters Robb Kunkel and Danny Holien, psych-folk rocker Arthur Gee, all the while providing a platform for more established musicians like Albert Collins and Dewey Terry (of Don & Dewey fame), while launching the career of Michael Stanley.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, and, per Szymczyk, it was a “bitchin’ disco time.” Drugs, parties, poetry, celebrities, money—Tumbleweed had it all, except airplay and distribution. Two years after its storied start, the label was finished.

Ray would go on to various opportunities, including producing five country albums alongside Bill Halverson, while Szymczyk would soon skyrocket to fame after producing The Eagles’ Hotel California. Yet most of Tumbleweed's artists have been relegated to thrift store bin obscurity—until now. This landmark release not only showcases Ray’s vision and Szymczyk’s early work, but begins a major reappraisal of Tumbleweed’s catalog by bringing these songs out of the shadow of the Rocky Mountains and back into the spotlight.

TRACK LISTING

1. “Colorado” - Danny Holien
2. "Sweet As Spring” - Dewey Terry
3. "Turn Of The Century” - Robb Kunkel
4. "Sunday Sherry” - Arthur Gee-Whizz Band
5. "Rosewood Bitters” - Michael Stanley
6. "Do On My Feet (What I Did In The Street)” - Dewey Terry
7. “Hick” - Danny Holien
8. "Plain Talk” - Arthur Gee
9. “Abyss” - Robb Kunkel
10. "Late Letter” - Pete McCabe

Les Graciés is a collaboration in the truest sense between Paris-based sound artist Gaël Segalen and Deepblak co-founder Afrikan Sciences. Segalen’s experiments in electroacoustic sound met the wider world this year via a debut LP for Erratum, an arresting work that showcases her ability to merge hypnotic murk ala Angus MacLise with the hard concréte of Parmegiani & Reibel. Segalen’s IHearU imprint / organization is a platform for her various doings, including psychogeographical audio works and multi-media collaborations, as well as servicing as a reference point for other contemporary female artists working across various mediums. Eric Douglas Porter aka African Sciences has been deconstructing and re-building forms of contemporary Black music since the mid-2000’s, through releases on Deepblak (the label he co-runs with Aybee) and PAN. His musical universe is one of warping cadences and celestial melody, referencing the bold work of percussionists like Milford Graves & Art Jenkins, the dissonant chords of Motor City Techno and stripped back essence of early Chicago House matched with broken Hard Bop sentiments: all tied together with an aesthetic that sits somewhere between Sun Ra’s omniverse, Jean Giraud Mœbius and Dogon cosmology. Together as Le Graciés, Segalen and Porter make a wholly unclassifiable strain of music that, while containing recognisable elements of each individual's work, also creates a third entity in the process, which can be heard to stunning effect on their forthcoming debut LP "Low Doses" for Firecracker Recordings.

• 2xGatefold LP from Les Graciés
• Strictly limited vinyl
• Silkscreened artwork by Al White & House Of Traps

TRACK LISTING

A1. Salubrious
A2. Symetric Relatives
B1. Pan
C1. Compoly
C2. The Entry Dance
D1. The Reign After
D2. Low Doses

Warehouse is a five piece band from Atlanta, GA. The band formed while many of its members were attending school for various useless degrees. Taking inspiration from the 1980's Athens, GA scene (Pylon, R.E.M., The B-52's) and having a mutual taste for bands like Stereolab and Abstract Expressionist visual art, they quickly took on a post-punk style characterized by the spidery and interlocking guitar riffs of Alex Bailey and Ben Jackson, filled by the effortless drums of Doug Bleichner and the agile racing bass riffs of Josh Hughes. The full and textural sound provides a unique body for vocals, added by Elaine Edenfield, whose lyrics can be described as sidewinding and oblique, oscillating quickly between melodicism and contrary roughness, using vocals as more of a physical tool of expression than as a glossy harmony to the sound. Warehouse can be described as breathlessly fast-paced, conveying a deep sense of desired intensity and emotionality. Warehouse's first album Tesseract was self-released in 2014 and later re-released under Bayonet Records. Their new album super low is more concise continuation of Tesseract, while still carrying the prior album's organic and wildly sprawling nature. Largely written in a notorious punk house that was torn down to build a parking garage, the album was finished in a new environment: across from a food mart called super low. The title connotes stark change, but it also hints at the additional psychological undertones of the album's meaning, to move down into more darkly subconscious and deeply endogenous areas of yourself in order to work through them and out. Also contrastingly literal, it denotes Warehouse's self-evident, uncontrived and rough-around-the-edges nature. 

TRACK LISTING

01 Oscillator
02. Exit Only
03. Simultaneous Contrasts
04. Arbitrarium V
05. Super Low
06 Reservoir
07. Long Exposure
08 Modifier Analog
09 Audrey Horne
10. Garden Walls

The Low Anthem return from an extraordinary five-year journey with Eyeland, an unprecedented collection of multi-dimensional future folk crafted with uncommon vision and emotional depth. The Providence, RI-based band’s fifth full-length recording, Eyeland began as a “vague and rather abstract” short story by co-founder/singer/guitarist Ben Knox Miller, based around the “sonic mythology of a moth’s dreams.”

The tall tale became real life as Low Anthem immersed themselves in the creation of their own Eyeland Studios, developing Providence’s once obsolete Columbus Theatre into an innovative and in-demand recording space and live concert venue. Eyeland proves a prism of the album’s inner themes, refracting Miller and co-founding drummer/multi-instrumentalist Jeff Prystowsky’s sonic escapades into a full-blown Möbius strip of music and meaning. Low Anthem’s lofty aspirations and creative capriciousness resonate throughout songs like “The Pepsi Moon” and “Behind The Airport Mirror,” their elegiac arrangements and lyrical frankness marked by shimmering ambience and a hauntingly defiant tension. Psychedelic in the truest sense of that overused word, Eyeland is a perspective-shifting musical experience at once elliptical and intangible yet still precise and powerfully personal.

TRACK LISTING

1. In Eyeland
2. Her Little Cosmos
3. The Pepsi Moon
4. Ozzie
5. Waved The Neon Seaweed
6. Behind The Airport Mirror
7. In The Air Hockey Fire
8. Wzgddrmtnwrdz
9. Am I The Dream Or Am I The Dreamer
10. Dream Killer
11. The Circular Ruins In Euphio

'Hey daddy-o, I don’t wanna go down to the basement,’ spat some lanky bespectacled dope once a long time ago. Trust Burnt Hills to wait until he was long enough dead to afford the opportunity to not have to. Holed-up at the Helderberg House in Albany, NY, these cuddly middle-aged monsters of tuff, levitational, psychedelic thug punk swirliness have made an avant-rock legend of their agoraphobia. They played out a few times over the years – Bard College, NY; Weirdo Records, MA; Ron Schneiderman’s Festival Of Endless Gratitude back during the heyday of that ‘New Weird America’ boom; the legendary Elevens show in Northampton, MA – but their collective heart has remained between four breeze-blocked walls, surrounded by the washing machine, some DIY tools, a wall of 4×12 cabs loud enough to be heard four streets away and an occasional Monday night party crowd, every member of which knows how utterly blessed s/he is to be there witnessing this glorious band take flight.

When the party’s not there, the band still is – pretty much every Monday for the past 10+ years now – doing it purely for its own reward. Real goose bump shit. Golden Lab feels no smugness in having witnessed this thing in action seven times now (and sat in on one unforgettable occasion). Rather a sense of longing that the rest of the right thinking world could be afforded the same opportunity. But then, isn’t it the inaccessibility that makes it so special?

Live At The Low Beat does much to disprove that theory. The show presented on this LP, recorded to digital handheld recorder and mastered in Manchester, UK by Dom Tanner, took place at a local eatery regularly frequented by the band (the restaurant boasts bottles of BH founder Jackson Wingate’s homemade ‘Flipped Out Records Habanero Death Sauce’ on its tables) on December 4th 2014. It was the first of what, it has been decided, will be an annual Burnt Hills performance outside the basement. Nine of the ten full-time members of the band were in attendance on this night (guitarist Panda was absent) and it’s safe to assume that they were all pretty well smoked, fed and oiled by the time they took to the stage as it doesn’t take long for shit to really fly. Close to 50 minutes in total, this is the most savage, raging, oblivion-bound Burnt Hills set yet committed to wax.

There’s a whole bucketload of sensitive noodling amidst the chaos – along with the obligatory shred – but it’s, of course, the six-guitar pile-up that really takes this crescendo-obsessed troupe of suburban weirdos into the ‘Lord take me now!’ zone. As with the prior two Burnt Hills releases on Golden Lab, we feel blessed to be the label putting this out into the world. In an edition of just 250 copies with stunning psychedelic splurge art by Desmadrados Soldados De Ventura guitarist Dylan Hughes, this is gonna fly far and fast. Grip one while ya can.

Low’s Alan Sparhawk had this offer about the new album: “In our 20+ years of writing songs, I've learned that no matter how escapist, divergent, or even transcendent the creative process feels, the result is more beholden to what is going on at the moment. It's hard to admit that one is so influenced by what is in front of us. Doesn't it come from something magical and far away? No, it comes from here. It comes from now. I'm not going to tell you what this record is about because I have too much respect for that moment when you come to know it for yourself.

“I will, however, tell you about how we made it. BJ contacted us a few years ago and invited us out to the studio where he works with Justin, Lizzo, and other artists. The studio is close to our home in Duluth, so it seemed tempting. Months later, I worked with BJ, producing the recent record by Trampled by Turtles. We got along and seemed to have similar curiosity about the possibilities for Low, so time was booked and songs finished. We tracked under the soft glow of laser discs playing lost classics like Point Break and Speed. Glenn Kotche from Wilco was there one day working on another record, so we had him in to play hand-percussion on a couple songs. Working 2 or 3 days at a time, leaving it with BJ, then back again for more, we don't have the time or money to second-guess or pick from a pool of possibilities. This is the whole thought - the untamed truth. This is now. This is everything.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Andy says: A more rhythmical undercarriage brings a more dynamic sound to this exceptional band.

TRACK LISTING

1. Gentle
2. No Comprende
3. Spanish Translation
4. Congregation
5. No End
6. Into You
7. What Part Of Me
8. The Innocents
9. Kid In The Corner
10. Lies
11. Landslide
12. DJ

Legendary instrumental trio Dirty Three will boldly break cover in February 2012 with a remarkable new album, 'Toward The Low Sun', on Bella Union records.

'Toward The Low Sun' is the product of the most ceaselessly creative period in the band’s career, in which Jim White, Mick Turner and Warren Ellis have relentlessly made music in different permutations and locations around the globe. No other Australian band has ever impacted on international music in such a subversive fashion. This is a band that exists within itself and outside of itself, generating a massive (and massively influential) body of work.

Mick lives in Melbourne where he has built his own studio space, developed a fine reputation as a visual artist and released the Blue Trees album alongside the occasional Tren Brothers release. Jim is based out of Brooklyn but endlessly tours the world, recording and/or performing with the likes of Cat Power, Bonnie Prince Billy, Nina Nastasia and PJ Harvey. Warren resides in Paris, though is regularly to be found touring with the Bad Seeds and Grinderman or working with Nick Cave on soundtracks for such films as The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, The Proposition and The Road. He recently made his acting debut in the film Médée Miracle, alongside Isabelle Huppert.

Dirty Three’s live appearances over the past few years reflect the band’s standing on the international stage. All Tomorrow’s Parties invited them to curate a three day event in the UK, and the band has also played at ATP festivals in Japan, Australia and the USA.

However, all of this frantic creativity and activity is now merely an exotic backdrop to the release of the new album Toward the Low Sun. A return to the mothership was inevitable. There is a certain magic that can only be invoked when these three elements are brought together. Nothing else sounds like the Dirty Three. They are one-off phenomena. As Warren Ellis says: “There is a dialogue within the group that we are all still keen to explore”.

Toward The Low Sun is not a cosy, nice-to-be-back, return to the comfort zone. There is an energy and a raw excitement evident from the first electrifying opening moments through to the album’s finale. In Warren’s words, “Dirty Three has always been about the way we play together and feed off each other. We wanted this one to be a return to the more improvised and instinctive approach of the earlier recordings”. And indeed Toward The Low Sun sounds like a first ever recording, a punk avant-garde art-jazz record! And for all their incredible music of the past, the Dirty Three have never seemed more relevant.

Toward The Low Sun is produced by Casey Rice and Dirty Three and was recorded in Melbourne at Head Gap studios and mixed at Sing Sing.

STAFF COMMENTS

Darryl says: The return of the Australian instrumental trio, 'Toward The Low Sun' is a highly emotive avant-garde album - you can almost feel the baking hot Antipodean sun. Excellent as always!

Their attention to musical detail combined with the heavenly vocal harmonies of ALAN SPARHAWK and MIMI PARKER are perfectly attuned to both traditional carols like “Silent Night” and more contemporary tunes such as “Blue Christmas.”

Christmas contains a selection of seasonal songs, including four originals by the band, mostly recorded at Lowʼs 20º Below studio in Duluth, MN. “If You Were Born Today” and “Blue Christmas” were released as a 7-inch single in 1997 on the English Wurlitzer Jukebox label, while “Taking Down The Tree” is taken from a 1998 compilation of live recordings issue by the Dutch VPRO radio station.

STAFF COMMENTS

Laura says: "Just Like Christmas" is a sublime pop song with sleigh bells that give it a sprinkling of festive cheer without coming across all "Now That's What I Call Christmas"!

TRACK LISTING

Just Like Christmas
Long Way Around The Sea
Little Drummer Boy
If You Were Born Today
Blue Christmas
Silent Night
Taking Down The Tree
One Special Gift

Finn is German singer/songwriter, multi-instrumentalist and fashion designer, Patrick Zimmer who splits his time between Hamburg and London, where he recently found a new home with cinematic music label Erased Tapes – a conceptualist with the voice of Leonard Cohen on helium. Born in 1977, yet combining influences that span decades, Finn had to wander through a playground of electronica and low-fi recordings to get here. His third album "The Best Low-Priced Heartbreakers You Can Own" shows a surprisingly mature and cohesive collection of haunting and mesmerizing songs as a result from his consequential musical progression. Finn lived, recorded and produced the album over the course of seven months in the catacombs of an old 14th century church underneath the streets of St. Pauli. With this release, Patrick Zimmer prescribed himself a concept album.

Athens, Georgia trio The Low Lows return to Europe in February to promote their new single, "Elizabeth Pier". The title track is taken from their forthcoming album, "Little Tigers". Backed with B-side "Raining In Eva", and the video for "Dear Flies, Love Spider". Their debut album "Fire On The Bright Sky" was released in October. It's a radiant, desperate prom-night of a record, in which stark southern sweetness gives way unexpectedly to great storms of guitar noise. Sheets of dissonance and singer P.L. Noon's arcing wail conjure Galaxie 500 or "Electr-O-Pura" era Yo La Tengo, while bright walls of country narcosis à la My Morning Jacket crumble into climactic, stomping feedback and lush, sad balladry.

As you probably already know, Low formed in 1993, in Duluth, Minnesota, and features Alan Sparhawk on vocals and guitar, Mimi Parker on vocals and drums, and Matt Livingston on bass and vocals. "Drums And Guns" is the band's eighth full-length album and second for Sub Pop. It's also, after 2005's "The Great Destroyer", the second album they've recorded with producer Dave Fridmann. It features a number of songs that ardent Low fans will recognize from the band's recent live shows. These songs appear here in substantially altered forms, as though they've been taken apart and reassembled in striking new ways, or seen with new eyes. Or, given the lyrical emphasis on murder and death, a more insightful interpretation might see the band killing these songs and bringing them back to life anew. There's no contrivance here, however. While these songs feature new elements (looped vocals, drum machines, etc.) and are thoroughly, radiantly contemporary, they remain undeniably Low's. "Drums And Guns" possesses the unique, subtle beauty and power we've come to expect from Low, but the record is also profoundly exciting in ways that it's easy to forget music can be.

The Low Frequency In Stereo release their third album "The Last Temptation Of...", making music that sounds fresh, inspired and focused. Recorded on analogue equipment to get the classic room sound and mixed down on digital to keep the natural sounds on the mood and instruments. Some call it lo-fi post-rock, some call it The Low Frequency In Stereo sound. Some other critics mention bands like Can, Neu and Jesus and the Mary Chain when listening to the bands music.

From the ashes of Buried Alive and Carry On comes Terror. Holy shit!!! This lot have to be one of the best hardcore bands going into 2003 totally up yer arse mayhem.

Lovely majestic, piano-led songs on this debut album from Bolton band Mazeppa. The album tracks range from intense, emotive songs with sweeping strings to heavier tracks with percussive drumming and keyboard riffs.

Sixth album from Low, once again combining their beautiful vocal harmonies, alongside sparse guitar and bass, and simple drum rhythms. The album was recorded in their hometown church, which emphasises perfectly their minimal, emotive grandeur.

“...achingly slow, unabashedly sad, and beautifully spare; consistent enough that you know it'll bring you down, but diverse enough that you're not sure how." - Dusted.

“On first listen, it's quite difficult to square the two distinct facets of Trust; it's almost gothic morbidity, and it's candyfloss, campfire breeziness. And yet, it's this polarity that makes Trust the masterpiece that, on reflection, it quite obviously is." - Drowned in Sound [10/10].

“From the high plains of Duluth, Low continue to create music true to the universe they invented without standing still." - Popmatters.

If you like Small Brown Bike, Hot Water Music or The Get Up Kids then you'll love Hunter Gatherer. From Athens, Georgia this is a brand new set of songs from this fine emo-punk band. The twin guitar leads play sophisticated and subtly powerful riffs and the dual vocals are unusual but work well.