In May 1976 a record was released that would have an unforeseen and lasting impact on the music industry “Ten Percent” by Double Exposure was an early release on the New York independent label Salsoul Records. America was in the grip of a disco explosion with new clubs opening on a weekly basis; Salsoul saw what was happening and swiftly created a sound for their label, heavily influenced by the music then coming out of Philadelphia, aimed directly at New York’s dance-floors. Records like “Salsoul Hustle,” “Tangerine” and “You’re Just The Right Size” by The Salsoul Orchestra borrowed heavily from the beautifully orchestrated Philadelphia International records but added a more percussive, bass heavy depth that New York’s DJs loved. So what was so special about this particular single then? Double Exposure was, after all, just another band, “Ten Percent” just another song; one of many “disco” records released that week. First of all Salsoul became the first record label to make a twelve inch single available to Joe Public - the exotic format was previously only available to DJs as promotional items or bought under the counter at certain record stores. Not only that though, the extended version was created by Walter Gibbons, a DJ at New York’s Galaxy 21 who’d built his reputation making exclusive versions of tracks to play in his sets.

In 1976 it was unheard of for a DJ to set foot in a recording studio, being seen as little more than living jukeboxes by the serious music industry. Recording studios were strictly the domain of recording artists and producers so Walter found himself in a unique position, gaining access to a world no DJ had been granted before.

Or so we thought...
The Men In The Glass Booth tells the full story. Featuring ground breaking re-edits and remixes by some of the Disco era's most influential DJs including Walter Gibbons, Bobby DJ Guttadaro, Tom Savarese, Jellybean Benitez, Tee Scott and John Luongo, this opulent release also includes a 40 page book which features exclusive photos and insights from some of the story's key figures.

STAFF COMMENTS

Patrick says: BBE answer the prayers of all us non-millionaire disco fans, taking us on a journey through the alternative 12" history via this exhaustive collection of acetates and DJ edits. Mega!

'Mek Do & Mend', the debut album from self-taught producer, multi-instrumentalist, composer and artist Wonky Logic. Although his name may not yet be familiar to everyone, Wonky Logic (AKA Dwayne Kilvington) has spent the past two decades quietly becoming one of the UK's most respected musical collaborators. His career has moved comfortably between London's jazz, electronic and contemporary music scenes, performing and recording with artists including Nala Sinephro, Yussef Dayes, Nightmares On Wax, Shabaka Hutchings and Emma-Jean Thackray. Alongside his work as a producer and composer, he's been musical director for projects with Eddie Chacon, John Carroll Kirby and I.G Culture's LCSM, scored the feature documentary Zandra With A Zed, contributed music to A24's The Smashing Machine, and continues to lead music workshops with young people, refugees and people experiencing incarceration.

Far more than a collection of compositions, 'Mek Do & Mend' is a deeply personal reflection on the people, places and experiences that have shaped Kilvington throughout his life. It's the story of growing up on a Leeds council estate, where music became both a creative outlet and a way of understanding the world. Making music often meant working with whatever was available: a second-hand keyboard, a makeshift studio desk or ageing equipment that simply had to last a little longer. The title itself came from a conversation with his mother, capturing the resourcefulness that defined his upbringing and continued into the making of the album itself, which was written and produced to a tight deadline around touring, family life and Kilvington's work as a musician and educator.

TRACK LISTING

1. Strange Attractor
2. Underneath The Same Sky (feat. Vanessa Rani)
3. Mek Do & Mend
4. Alchemical
5. Yellow Red
6. Man (feat. Nubiya Imani)
7. Naiyima-Rani
8. L29
9. B.A.M.E (Beyond All Marginalised Expectations)
10. A Thousand Hands (feat. Brother Portrait)
11. Loan Sharks
12. Parris
13. Botanical Support
14. Made By Many (Outro)

Twenty years after forming in Tommy Brenneck’s Bushwick apartment, Menahan Street Band returns with 'Illusions', their fourth full-length album on Brenneck’s Diamond West Records. The band— Tommy Brenneck, Dave Guy, Nick Movshon, Leon Michels and Homer Steinweiss—have each pursued an array of projects in the years since. Brenneck has produced for Baby Rose, Rogê and Kirby, toured with The Budos Band and runs Diamond West Records and Studio. Guy plays trumpet with The Roots and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and has released his own solo album; Steinweiss has made his own solo record and, with Movshon, has worked across multiple platinum album projects; and Michels continues as El Michels Affair, runs Big Crown Records and has produced Grammy-winning and nominated albums for Clairo and Norah Jones.

Despite their many individual ventures, the group reunited with an energy Brenneck says felt like “the first time.” Recorded quickly and instinctively, 'Illusions' blends Menahan’s signature guitar, horns and drums with arrangements by Brazilian legend Arthur Verocai, taking listeners on an instrumental travelogue that lets the mind wander. Artist Ariana Papademetropoulos contributes original artwork to the album’s otherworldly collection of music.

TRACK LISTING

1. Palace of Illusions
2. Aurora Was Her Name
3. Gentleman’s Getaway
4. El-Onta’s Dance
5. Sound of Distant Thunder
6. The Emerald Courtyard
7. Crystal Crown
8. Another Magic Morning
9. There Before The Sun
10. City After City

Former RSD Ambassador and hip-hop legend Chuck D (Public Enemy) joins forces with The Doors’ iconic drummer John Densmore for do+pe = no country for old men. Recorded specifically for Record Store Day 2026, the album blends spoken word, rhythm, and raw social commentary, bridging generations of rebellion and reflection. It includes the RSD Song of the Year "every tick tick tick."

Previously an RSD exclusive, it is now available again.

The packaging features original illustrations from Chuck D himself.

TRACK LISTING

1. every tick tick tick
2. no country for old men
3. doomsay
4. the bones of my father by etheridge knight
5. i love that i don’t love
6. people are strangers
7. breakthru
8. ops3ssion
9. djali ii by kamau daáood
10. everybody dies
11. no country for old men (dub)
12. saydoom (dub)

A globe-spanning reimagining of bossa nova from legendary Brazilian composer Roberto Menescal and vocalist Muca.

Rooted in rhythmic subtlety and melodic intimacy, Beleza draws on MPB, soul, and folk to create what Muca describes as "a global choir built on a bossa nova foundation", honouring the tradition while reaching toward something genuinely new.

Highlights include a track featuring vocalist Sofia Grant, whose folk-jazz sensibility moves lightly across the keys before giving way to stirring strings. The lyrics were written by acclaimed British poet and songwriter L.A. Salami, bringing his signature literary depth to one of the album's most poignant moments.

In keeping with bossa nova's literal meaning, "new wave", Menescal set out to find fresh voices and ideas. The result is an album that bridges Brazilian culture past and present, as alive with discovery as the movement that inspired it.

TRACK LISTING

1. A Beleza De Ser
2. Versos Singelos 
3. Ladeira
4. Jureia 
5. Todo Samba 
6. Mulher Assim 
7. Midnight Lullaby 
8. Every Little Thing
9. Playing On The Loose Fields 
10. Blue Rain 
11. Dance With You 
12. Feeling When It Comes

'Everything I Ever Saw' finds The Menzingers entering a new era in what's already been a storied career.

The Philadelphia punk legends' eighth album chronicles moments of significant change-- the personal, the political, and the universal-- while returning to the core creative principles that first put them on the map with listeners the world over. Twenty years in, The Menzingers have discovered that the wisdom gained with time's passing is even stronger than the emotional armor they once wore in their youth, and 'Everything I Ever Saw' captures the quartet embracing the here and now while strengthening the bonds that have held them together.

The Menzingers have always created as a four- headed unit, with all members (vocalist/ guitarist Greg Barnett, vocalist/ guitarist Tom May, bassist Eric Keen, drummer Joe Godino) throwing in their respective talents as part of the craft--but for 'Everything I Ever Saw', the group worked in creative symbiosis more than ever before. "The way we made this record feels the most like how the band was in the very beginning: Me and Tom coming to the band with the most basic element of a song, and the four of us shaping that," Barnett says.

Instrumental in building that excitement was locally centered and nationally renowned production legend Will Yip, who threw in with the Menzingers on 2017's 'After the Party' and their sonically expansive 2019 record 'Hello Exile'. This time around, Yip once again became an unofficial Menzinger while the band crafted these 11 songs in their South Philly space. "Working with Will was like a homecoming," May beams while talking about Yip's contributions. "We've grown up together over these years, and we're still incredibly close friends. He's the best at gassing you up and making sure everybody's on the right page, but he's also so good at pointing out stuff that might not fit the vision without being a fucking prick. He's the hardest working person that we've come across in the music industry, and he's incredibly inspiring."

TRACK LISTING

1. Chance Encounters
2. Better Angels
3. Romanticism
4. Other People's Money
5. Gasoline & Matches 
6. The Fool 
7. Nobody's Heroes
8. Breathe With Me
9. When She Enters My Dreams
10. Parade Day
11. Everything I Ever Saw

Yum Yum Records launches its first vinyl release with label heads and duo Cal & Al, introducing "The Valley Mentality EP".

A friendship that started and grew into a project from many years of sharing moments shaped by digging, playing, listening and creating together.

A full Welsh affair, the EP features three original cuts alongside a remix from fellow Welshman Harrison BDP — four groove laden and drum driven tracks with an ambiguous tonal edge, built for open minded dance floors and introspective moments alike.

With this debut physical release, Yum Yum Records sets the tone for what’s to come…

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Techy and dubby, with a bit of rastaman vox thrown in for good measure, Cal & Al cement their sound in fine style for their label's vinyl debut. If you dug the Ark To Ashes and recent Mysticisms vibe, I know you're gonna dig this...

TRACK LISTING

A1.Jump and Twist
A2.Tell U (Deep Mix)
B1.Jump and Twist (Harrison BDP Remix)
B2.Tie Your Shoes Lace

Recorded live at The Hammersmith Palais in 1984 this unofficial live album captures excitement and energy of The Smiths early live gigs. Sound quality wise it might not be as pristine as an official release, but that adds to the, erm, charm and gives an authentic representation of them at their jangling best!

TRACK LISTING

Side 1
1. Miserable Lie
2. Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now
3. This Charming Man
4. Girl Afraid
5. Pretty Girls Make Graves
6. Still Ill

Side 2
1. Barbarism Begins At Home
2. What Difference Does It
3. Reel Around the Fountain
4. Hand in Glove
5. You've Got Everything
6. Handsome Devil

Birdman Records is proud to be reissuing 'Invisible Men', the early space explorations of electronic music pioneer F/i. In the mid-80s F/i was on the cutting edge of electronic bombast, producing cassette tapes of late-night interstellar sessions to be traded world over with the handful of heads that were plugged into similar perambulations. As a link between Throbbing Gristle and the Spacemen 3, this period of F/i has been woefully forgotten, until now. Later in the 80s, F/i would morph into Vocokesh continuing their space rock explorations.

The 2LP set features founding member Richard Franecki, Brian Wensing and Steve Zimmerman, and includes the ultra-rare recording 'Air' (produced around the same time as Invisible Men).

TRACK LISTING

1. Untitled I
2. Untitled II
3. Untitled III
4. Untitled IV
5. Untitled V
6. Untitled VI
7. Untitled VII
8. Untitled VIII
9. Untitled IV
10. Untitled X
11. Air

It is the late 1980s, the closing years of Thatcher’s Britain.

For the Trainspotting crew, a new era is about to begin – a time for hope, for love, for raving. Leaving heroin behind and separated after a drug deal gone wrong, Renton, Sick Boy, Spud and Begbie each want to feel alive. They fill their days with sex and romance and trying to get ahead; they follow the call of the dance floor, with its promise of joy and redemption.

Sick Boy starts an intense relationship with Amanda, his ‘princess’ – rich, connected, everything that he is not. When the pair set a date for their wedding, Sick Boy sees a chance for his generation to take control at last. But as the 1990s dawn, will finding love be the answer to the group’s dreams or just another doomed quest? 

Greg Mendez has always been an economical songwriter – he wields restraint and simplicity as tools, the core of his songs sharpened into simple, cutting truths. On 'Beauty Land', his new album and debut LP for Dead Oceans, we’re guided by a wry but forgiving narrator, an underdog who has learned to balance cynicism and faith. These songs are self-effacing without self-pity, carefully constructed altars of imperfection channeled through pop melodies, shimmering but urgent guitars, and a voice that reaches for choir boy innocence.

The bulk of 'Beauty Land' was recorded directly to tape, almost entirely alone in Mendez’s makeshift home studio in Philadelphia - a small room with no natural light. It’s his first full length since his unexpected self-titled breakthrough in 2023, which was a slow burn success following 15 years of writing and recording music in relative obscurity between Philly and New York. 'Beauty Land' picks up where we left off three years ago – plumbing the depths of grief, love, and addiction – but its intense, quiet clarity shows Mendez at his songwriting best.

Parts of 'Beauty Land' feel like a lucid dream, dented characters carve their way through a world that’s cartoonish and warped – the broken-clock march of 'I Wanna Feel Pretty', the chiming toy piano on 'Gentle Love'. 'Mary / Dreaming' begins as a sparse, finger-picked lament before cutting abruptly to a deflated, Beach-Boys-but-make-it-fucked-up resolution that brings both melancholy and joy; a sense that all things can be true at once. None of the 14 tracks here break three minutes, but they tell stories that span lifetimes.

Death floats through the record, whether it appears as a memory or a threat. Everything feels precarious. There’s a fragility to how these songs are built: the way the funeral organ hits alongside the morphine on 'Looking Out Your Window', the devastating simplicity of 'Frog', with its slowed-down keyboard and bare refrain: “Please forgive me for my faults.” 'Beauty Land' feels, at times, impossibly lonely. Which makes it really count when it doesn’t – like when Mendez sings in harmony with his wife and bandmate, Veronica near the end of 'So Mean' and it feels like a cherished reunion, a fleeting moment of redemption, a temporary parting of the seas.

TRACK LISTING

1. I Wanna Feel Pretty
2. Looking Out Your Window
3. Mary / Dreaming
4. Everybody Wants To Be Your Friend (Except Me)
5. Gentle Love
6. Frog
7. It Breaks My Heart
8. Sunsick
9. No Evil
10. Geranium
11. Interlude In D Minor
12. Serving Drinks
13. So Mean
14. Concussion

Men With Secrets is the Italian trio of Donato Dozzy, Lino Monaco and Nicola Buono. Now they're back with Sand Clock, a full-length that delves deeper into late-80s and early-90s darkwave and synth pop. The artists layer icy synth lines, shuddering bass and precise drum machine patterns around intimate baritone vocals to cook up a tension between momentum and deeply reflective moods that were all recorded across Rome and Pompeii. From the Gary Numan-esque 'Time For People' to the more Human League shininess of 'Around Three', each track reveals meticulous attention to texture and rhythm and shows this outfit to be skilled interpreters of minimal wave. An understated yet compelling exploration of shadowy electronic pop.

TRACK LISTING

Drowned World
Around Three
The Call
Meaning Of Words
The Tower
Time For People
Sky Is A White Noise
Dancing Universe

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2026 EXCLUSIVE LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

This Ball and Glove is unique and limited to this release in this configuration. LMFP plans to release a gatefold of the combined two soundtracks on one disc the prior month (Biovinyl 12" LP).

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

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

Limited Red Vinyl pressing for RSD 2026. Remastered for vinyl. The Men They Couldn’t Hang release their classic album ‘Devil On The Wind’ on vinyl. Recorded in 2009 at Perry Vale Studios, London, SE23, with legendary British producer Pat Collier and originally released to coincide with 25th anniversary of The Men They Couldn't Hang’s debut gig at the ‘Alternative Country Festival’ in Camden Town’s Electric Ballroom. Previously, the album was only available on CD through Robb Johnson's Irregular Records label. Now, for the first time, it is being released as a limited-edition vinyl by VINYL STAR RECORDS, featuring a distinctive red pressing. ‘Devil on the Wind’ combines the bands famed live ferocity and undiminished lyricism to create an essential rock folk hybrid very much relevant in these volatile modern times. This essential release highlights the heart and soul of The Men They Couldn’t Hang - as someone once said, The Clash jamming with The Byrds!

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A. 1 Devil On The Wind 2 The Ragged Shoreline 3 Beast Of Brechfa 4 Mrs. Avery 5 Reservoir.

SIDE B. 6 Overseas 7 Heartbreak Park 8 Aquamarine 9 A Real Rain Coming 10 Lost World 11 Hard To Find

Atmospheric post-rock from turn of the century Chicago. 90 Day Men’s debut for Southern Records surfs no wave’s spiky shorelines for eight hypnotizing tracks.

This expanded 25th anniversary edition includes an unreleased album tracked at Steve Albini’s Electrical Audio, with notes from engineer Greg Norman and a fresh Heba Kadry master. Let’s meet at Jinx.

TRACK LISTING

LP1 - (It (Is) It) Critical Band:
1. Dialed In
2. Missouri Kids Cuss
3. From One Primadonna To Another
4. Super Illuminary
5. Hans Lucas
6. Exploration Vs. Solution, Baby
7. Sort Of Is A Country In Love
8. Jupiter And Io
LP2 - Unreleased ‘98 LP:
1. Intro
2. Methodist
3. I’ll Be The DJ You Shithead
4. Super Illuminary
5. Missouri Kids Cuss
6. She’s A Salt Shaker
7. Activate ThThe Borders
8. Fight In ThThe Family Room
9. Beta Waves
10. Jupiter And Io

THIS IS A BLACK FRIDAY 2025 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON FRIDAY NOVEMBER 28th FROM 10AM ON A FIRST COME FIRST SERVED BASIS, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

IF THERE ARE ANY REMAINING COPIES THEY WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE ONLINE AT 8AM ON SATURDAY NOVEMBER 29th).

Released for the first time on double LP alongside a brand new dub mix of the album from the band on the second disc, pressed on special effect ‘white line on black’ vinyl and housed in a gatefold sleeve with brand new alternative artwork including a taped hidden message.

TRACK LISTING

1. Still Running
2. Shame
3. Feasting
4. 27
5. Rain Or Shine
6. Sirens
7. Old Rock N Roll
8. Nest
9. Liberated
10. John Doe
11. Dare Me
12. Get Started
13. 37 Dub
14. Various Big Cats Dub
15. Jesus Demon Dub
16. I Heard You Call Dub
17. Congo Square Dub
18. Real Milk Not Nestlé Formula Dub
19. Jane Dub
20. How Can We Be Free Dub
21. Devil Boots Dub
22. Shameless Dub
23. Spin The Bottle Dub
24. It’s All Over Dub

In the annals of Bristol music history Glaxo Babies could have a book and a zone of greatness all of their own. Singles and EP's such as 'Christine Keeler' and 'This Is Your Life', along with the seminal 'Avon Calling' compilation John Peel recorded session version of 'It's Irrational', stormed the zeitgeist of late 70's, early 80's UK post punk.

Four decades on, in 2025, another great leap forward brings the story to a stunning new destination with the vinyl and digital release on Bristol Archive Records in conjunction with their own imprint Liberated Sound Development of 'Men of Stone', the band's first new album in some forty years.It's a major chapter telling of reinvention, restructuring and in no way taking stock. For this missive the Glaxo's use not one, but two new vocalists adding their own voice to a collection of songs mainly written by long-time Glaxonian and original guitarist, Dan Catsis. Dan was also a massive part of nationally recognised Bristol luminaries, The Pop Group and Maximum Joy.

Other Bristol notables come into the new material's mix with Steve Bush, main-man of former NME faves Essential Bop, contributing lyrics to the darkness descends vibe of second side opener 'I Don't Want to be Loved', while Massive Attack producer and collaborator Neil Davidge adds a sonic sound-bed sheen to the track. Two of the new band members have an important Bristol back story. Bassist Steve Street was a centre-piece of studio recording at his SAM set-up in the city, and drummer Jamie Hill played with early Nellee Hooper/later Roni Size drummer linked percussion powerhouse outfit Mouth and later with ex Pop Group/Cortinas/Clash driven Virgin 80's act Head.

'Men of Stone' is a record that nestles right in there with Glaxo's earlier classics. It distils their past and present with plenty of other new goodies and angles to appreciate. You know it's going to play a blinder from the full on, visceral thrill guitar attack of opening track 'Living the Dream'. This is side-bar alt-rock heaven, a heady blend of classic LA howling blackout in a red room street love and hate meeting grunge in a dark alleyway. This album is so relevant that the pleasure of it almost hurts. Let it bleed into you.

TRACK LISTING

1. Living The Dream
2. Waiting For Something
3. Give Me
4. Anymore
5. Drifting
6. I Don't Want To Be Loved (Remix)
7. Stop Me Now
8. Men Of Stone
9. Change Is Forever

Following 2018's critically acclaimed self titled album - which received plaudits from Uncut, Mojo, The Quietus, The Guardian, The Times, NME and BBC 6 Music (playlist and live session) - and teaming up with producer Raf Rundell, recorded at the famous Konk Studios in North London, 'A Man For All Seasons' sees Saul's sound maturing into singer songwriter territory but still retains his dark and sharp observational British humour. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Syncopated guitars and percussion, soaring vocals and beautifully organic wisps of orchestration. The slower pieces here tend to lean towards smokey lounge-bar jazz and dramatic surfy guitar (Morricone + heroin), and contrast the more upbeat groovers beautifully. A wonderfully mellow, woozy collection and a great time all round.

TRACK LISTING

1. Love Again
2. Cleaning Bricks
3. Krab
4. Time Is A Healer
5. Tulse Hill Station
6. Alien
7. Butter
8. Graveyard (Of Our Love)
9. Weak

'All Is Love and Pain in the Mouse Parade'. It may sound a little strange, but the title and beating heart of Icelandic indie-folk collective Of Monsters and Men’s fourth album hits a lot closer to home than you’d expect. A tapestry of stories, moments, and conversations, the album explores how love and pain intertwine. Feelings that might seem at odds with each other, but co-exist simultaneously and need one another. Tales both big and small — from the loneliness and longing of living in a block surrounded by strangers, to missed connections in a grocery store, to the lives and losses of a community of mice in a vacant house during winter.

Of Monsters and Men went from Reykjavík to the global stage with their breakout 2011 debut 'My Head Is An Animal', which propelled them from Icelandic indie darlings to international chart-toppers. The album’s breakout single 'Little Talks', a defining song for a generation, now boasts over 1 billion Spotify streams.

Amid their meteoric rise, the band released their sophomore album 'Beneath The Skin' in 2015, which debuted in the Top 3 of the Billboard 200 and was accompanied by a surprise cameo on HBO’s huge hit series Game of Thrones. Their cinematic sound has popped up everywhere from The Hunger Games to The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, while their festival appearances — Coachella, Glastonbury, Lollapalooza, and more.

Over a decade in, the band have gone from folk-tinged newcomers to digital-era mainstays, with 9 million monthly listeners on Spotify and a new generation discovering that Iceland’s beauty extends beyond fjords and thermal baths. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Television Love
2. Dream Team
3. The Actor
4. Tuna In A Can
5. Barefoot In Snow
6. Fruit Bat
7. Kamikaze
8. The Towering Skyscraper At The End Of The Road
9. Ordinary Creature
10. Styrofoam Cathedral
11. The Block
12. Mouse Parade
13. The End

The debut album from London 2 piece Good Neighbours includes the band’s breakout single 'Home' alongside singles 'Suburbs', 'Ripple' & 'Starry Eyed'. The album was written and recorded on the road through 2024 and 2025.

“'Blue Sky Mentality' has been our motto since day one. Our band began as a kind of light relief - a creative outlet to break from jobs that we couldn’t stand and some tough personal times. Over the last year, we ran with that feeling, writing our debut album on the road - in the back of tour buses, hotel rooms, and scattered corners of the world. That’s what ‘blue sky mentality’ means to us—finding light, friendship and a sense of escapism wherever you are.”

TRACK LISTING

1. Keep It Up
2. Skipping Stones
3. Ripple
4. Walk Walk Walk
5. Kids Can't Sleep
6. Somebody
7. Home
8. Small Town
9. Starry Eyed
10. People Need People
11. Left Hand Man
12. Suburbs
13. Wonderful Life
14. The Buzz

'Regional Music' is a vinyl compilation of the band's first two EPs, 'The Country' and 'This Land'. With the announcement of the Compilation and This Land EP comes the release of the new single 'Not Ideal', produced by Carlos O'Connell of Fontaines DC - a chiming epic and live favourite.

The single follows the band playing two shows at this year’s Glastonbury Festival, supporting Miles Kane at his London Moth Club show and playing with The Libertines at the Eden Project in Cornwall. They also recently played The Great Escape, supported Yannis & The Yaw, and completed a three-date residency at The Dublin Castle. Upcoming dates include various European Festivals, followed by a UK tour with Cardinals.

Mên An Tol first emerged last year with their brilliant debut ‘NW1’, a track that picked up BBC 6 Music and Radio 1 support. They have been tipped by So Young, The New Cue, DIY, Still Listening, Notion and more.

TRACK LISTING

1. NW1
2. Set In Stone
3. The Country
4. I Get The Message
5. Lucky
6. Not Ideal
7. Alive
8. This Land

Back in 2005, Seattle quintet Minus the Bear were riding the wave of a swift upward trajectory with their blend of ‘90s mathrock fretboard savvy, early ‘00s electro-indie textural depth, and the wistful melodicism of the more mature strain of Midwest emo. So it was an interesting time for the band to undergo a stylistic sea change. Looking beyond their fellow guitar slingers, Minus the Bear instead found inspiration in the more adventurous pop producers of the era and went full steam ahead with a revamped sound of glitchy guitar loops, modern R&B rhythms, and swirling electronic tapestries on their 2005 sophomore album 'Menos el Oso'. The stylistic shift was a gamble in the waning years of indie rock orthodoxy, but the risk paid off and Minus the Bear’s popularity exploded. Twenty years later, 'Menos el Oso' still sounds fresh and vibrant while simultaneously capturing the essence of a specific era where the rules and formulas of guitar-forward music were breaking down. To celebrate the album’s anniversary, Suicide Squeeze Records and Minus the Bear are offering up 'Menos el Oso - 20th Anniversary Edition'.

'Menos el Oso - 20th Anniversary Edition' expands the original LP into a double album featuring five demos mastered by Ed Brooks at Resonant Mastering on side C and an etching by Cory Murchy on side D. These early incarnations of four 'Menos el Oso' tracks and 'I’m Totally Not Down With Rob’s Alien' from the 'They Make Beer Commercials Like This' EP showcase how razor-sharp and sonically satisfying Minus the Bear were even when their songs were still being workshopped. As companion pieces to the album, these alternate takes shine a light on the creative process of a band undergoing a sonic evolution while also just being solid standalone tracks.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Game Needed Me
2. Memphis & 53rd
3. Drilling
4. The Fix
5. El Torrente
6. Pachuca Sunrise
7. Michio's Death Drive
8. Hooray
9. Fulfill The Dream
10. The Pig War
11. This Ain't A Surfin' Movie
12. Hooray (Demo)
13. Drilling (Demo)
14. The Pig War (Demo)
15. Michio's Death Drive (Demo)
16. I'm Totally Not Down With Rob's Alien (Demo)

'Men in Love' is a collaborative concept album by Irvine Welsh and The Sci-Fi Soul Orchestra, exploring the complexities of love, relationships, and the human condition. The album blends classic Motown and disco influences with contemporary electronic dance production, creating a unique and powerful sound that is both nostalgic and fresh.

From soaring anthems to intimate ballads, 'Men in Love' takes the listener on a journey through the highs and lows of romance, celebrating the power of connection, vulnerability, and the enduring search for love in a chaotic world.

The album will be released concurrently with Welsh's new novel, also titled 'Men in Love'. The book is a sequel to Welsh's seminal work, Trainspotting, and continues the story of Renton, Sick Boy, Spud, Begbie, and other beloved characters. The album serves as a sonic companion to the novel, with its themes, lyrics, and musical atmosphere reflecting the experience and inner turmoil of its characters. The album also introduces The Sci-Fi Soul Orchestra, a unique musical entity with their own unique music releases in the pipeline”

BUT, WHY DISCO?

“In uncertain times, dominated by the ascendancy of soul dead oligarchs, their corrosive technology and looting economics, the great positive constant for humanity remains our infinite capacity for love.

Music is still the medium by which we bypass their reductive, low frequency world, and if we can sing and dance and express our collective love in joy and rapture, we render their pathetic schemes the irrelevant sideshows they deserve to be.

One of the greatest musical forms in delivering that ecstasy has been discotheque music. No matter how confused our men (and women) have been in the quest for love, as we are forced to earn a living to pay for our fun, our real predilections are to party like it’s 2099. So don’t diss the disco, let’s dance away the heartache or die trying, because nothing else makes any sense.”

Irvine Welsh

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Absolute sweat-dripping, glitteRball spinning, tight-trouser wearing, arm waving disco from... :checks notes: Irvine Welsh & The Sci-Fi Soul Orchestra. Why not eh? Brilliant it is too.

TRACK LISTING

1. A Man In Love With Love
2. You Gotta Be Strong
3. Damn Straight
4. Saviour
5. Love At Last
6. Supply Lines Of Love
7. A Whole New Side Of Me
8. Dreams
9. Men In Love

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2025 EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

New Original Soundtrack done by The Liminanas with David Menke. 100% new original song. This RSD Vinyl to be the only physical release.

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

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

Cross Record's new album, 'Crush Me', is steeped in the pressures and wonders of existence—a profound statement, especially coming from artist and death doula Emily Cross. A two-and-a-half-year gestation period offered challenges, disappointments, and joys reflected in the cramped space of the album, which explores how we handle the weights we carry.

TRACK LISTING

1. I Can Lie
2. Rolling Backwards
3. Charred Grass
4. Right Thing By Me
5. God Fax
6. Cutting A Cake
7. Led Through Life
8. Dorset Area Of Natural Beauty
9. Pearl Through A Funnel
10. Designed In Hell
11. Crush Me
12. Twisted Up Fence

‘Buyer Beware’ marks The Men’s fifth collaboration with recording engineer Travis Harrison (Guided by Voices, Built to Spill) who, at this point, is finely attuned to the nuances of the group’s dynamics - Nick Chiericozzi (guitar/vocals), Kevin Faulkner (bass), Mark Perro (guitar/vocals), and Rich Samis (drums). Recording direct to tape, Harrison captures the raw, confrontational fever of their stage shows without sacrificing their introspective undercurrents. The result is undoubtedly their most aggressive album since ‘Leave Home’ (2011), and their most psychedelic since ‘Immaculada’ (2010). But 'Buyer Beware' is no mere return to their roots - The Men have always moved forward while remaining true to themselves. A clarion call for troubled times signaled by its title, ‘Buyer Beware’ finds The Men tackling questions both personal and political, their sound and vision never more primal or apocalyptic.

TRACK LISTING

1. Pony
2. At The Movies
3. Buyer Beware
4. Fire Sermon
5. PO Box 96
6. Charm
7. Black Heart Blue
8. Nothing Wrong
9. Control
10. Dry Cycle
11. The Path
12. Tombstone
13. Get My Soul

For Greg Mendez, reflection doesn’t mean a static image in a mirror, or even a face he recognizes. It’s more a kaleidoscopic mirage, where paths taken shapeshift with the prospect of paths untread, and the subconscious merges with the intentional. On his self-titled new album, the Philadelphia-based songwriter and multi-instrumentalist investigates the shaky camera of memory, striving to carve out a collage that points to a truth. But there isn’t a regimented actuality here; instead, Mendez highlights the merit in many truths, and many lives, and how even the hardest truths can still contain some humor.

While this is technically Mendez’s third full-length album, his back catalog boasts an extensive range of EPs and live recordings. He’s a prolific and thoughtful songwriter, understanding the joy in impulse, and shying away from the clinical sheen of overproduction. 2017’s  ̄\ _(ツ)_ / ̄' and 2020’s 'Cherry Hell' garnered acclaim for their quiet, lo-fi urgency, exploring themes of addiction and heartbreak with an intentional, authentic haze, and it’s this approach that has solidified Mendez as a staple in the DIY community for years.

Greg Mendez was written in fragments, some stretching across more than a decade, with Mendez reworking old ideas and arrangements, and others blossoming much more recently. The weight of time––and perhaps the
anxiety in running out of it––clouds the album, as Mendez prods at some painful experiences from his childhood and early adulthood. The common thread connecting the characters is their evident imperfections, and the various degrees of damage they cause, both knowingly and unknowingly. But where do we draw the line between a good person and a bad person? For Mendez, it’s never been that easy.

Greg Mendez is an intimate dialogue between the chapters we’ve experienced, and how they can inform the reality we perceive. It’s a reminder that we are constantly shifting, ever-changing selves and that if we ruminate too long, we may find ourselves stuck in the seriousness of it all. Here, Mendez allows us to take the time to notice what happens outside of the framework we may have built for ourselves, and the beauty that can occur when we finally do.

TRACK LISTING

1. Rev. John / Friend
2. Shark's Mouth
3. Cop Caller
4. Maria
5. Goodbye / Trouble
6. Sweetie
7. Clearer Picture (Of You)
8. Best Behavior
9. Hoping You're Doing Okay

NJ White - aka WHITEY - explodes out of the shadows with the announcement of his highly anticipated double LP MENTAL RADIO, out on 3rd October 2024.

Pulling in influences from across decades of sound and putting it through the Whitey blender to create something musically fresh, MENTAL RADIO is an album that in turn is furious, raw, amused, politically razor sharp and poignant... a satirical take on 21st Century life, a musical pop art collage.

As an individual, Whitey prefers to speak via his work, and has eluded all interviews for well over a decade - leading one journalist to describe him as 'the musical equivalent of Bigfoot’. Despite this elusive stance, his music continues to rack up many millions of plays and draw fans from all ages across the globe. Across a string of acclaimed albums, Whitey's music has made its mark, from rock'n'roll clubs to electronic dance floors, fashion catwalks to movie soundtracks, television to computer games, from Breaking Bad and the Sopranos to Grand Theft Auto.

TRACK LISTING

1. WHEN DID I LAY DOWN AND DIE
2. CHERRYADE
3. LITTLE PIGGIES
4. LET IT BURN
5. THIS IS FOREVER
6. DON’T BE A CAN’T (ALL YOUR LIFE)
7. A SIMPLE SONG
8. IT’S A SCREAM
9. BAD ENERGY
10. BOXES SQUARES ETC
11. DEAR UNIVERSE
12. I’M ALRIGHT (DEAR UNIVERSE REPRISE)
13. BAD SCENES AT THE EYELID CINEMA
14. REMEDY
15. INACTION MAN
16. MAN YOU’VE GOT TO HELP YOURSELF

Although Cannonball Adderley experimented with assorted styles and formats during his career, Cannonball's Bossa Nova [aka Cannonball Adderley and the Bossa Rio Sextet] continues to be an unusual work in his discography. This was not only true because of the Brazilian style to which the LP is devoted, but also because he isn't featured in the company of his usual collaborators, nor any other American jazz musicians. Instead, he's backed by a combo of Brazilian musicians led by the great pianist Sergio Mendes and drummer Dom Um Romao, who later became a member of Weather Report.

"Cannonball Adderley, who had to do some agile dodging to avoid being contaminated by the 'soul jazz' flood, has moved into bossa nova with equally perceptive discrimination. His set with the Bossa Rio Sextet is one of the most distinguished collections he has turned out and he produces some of the most commanding and gorgeously stated solos he has ever recorded."- John S. Wilson, ****1/2 DownBeat

TRACK LISTING

Clouds
Minha Saudade
Corcovado
Batida Diferente
Clouds [single Version]
Joyce's Samba
Groovy Samba
O Amor Em Paz (Once I Loved)
Sambop
Corcovado [alt Tk]

'Vomitorium' is the new album from ever-evolving Eindhoven band Radar Men From The Moon. Due out August 16th on Fuzz Club, it's an eight-track collection of abrasive experimental punk that unleashes their latest line-up and musical incarnation in typically confrontational form. Revelling in cathartic excess and a bludgeoning intensity, they power through 90s industrial electronics, discordant noise-rock and the darkest post-punk extremes. "The album features eight mental landscapes, all with an entrance and an exit, just like a vomitorium of a Roman theatre", Radar Men From The Moon write: "Power structures that are constantly aroused and working against each other." On this recording, the band is made up of founding members Glenn Peeters (guitar) and Tony Lathouwers (drums), alongside second drummer Joep Schmitz, Bram Van Zuijlen (guitar/synths), Niek Manders (bass) and new vocalist Niels Koster. 'Vomitorium' is the band's eighth full-length in an extensive, shape-shifting discography that has also seen collaborations with the likes of Gnod (as Temple ov BBV), The Cosmic Dead and 10 000 Russos.

TRACK LISTING

1. Speech Of The Hammer
2. Psychic Warfare Now!
3. Vomitorium
4. Liberation
5. Altered States
6. My Body Is An Event
7. Confusion
8. Open Door To Vices

TMTCH stumbled into existence onstage at the Alternative Country Festival, Electric Ballroom, Camden on Easter Sunday in 1984; after a long afternoon busking and drinking in a Hammersmith subway. They knew three chords and a hundred songs all of which sounded a bit the same, a frenzied skiffle that was exciting to jump around and drink snakebite to. If they thought about longevity at all, a lifespan of 40 days seemed most likely. It’s forty years later and they are still running. Since those early days, and without much of a game plan other than always stepping onward, TMTCH have released around 20 albums plus many side projects, bootlegs, curios and an unknown number of T shirts. They’ve toured constantly, whether in dingy pub backrooms or Grand Ballrooms and Festival Stages. From Cairo to Reykjavik and all points in between, the TMTCH roadshow has shambled and thrilled through the decades, always passionate, always literate, occasionally dishevelled.

Forty years of recording has spawned a vast back catalogue, well represented here by songs from each album, style and era; a tapestry of human stories and vibrant characters. So there are the fast sprints like early folk hoedown ‘Ironmasters’, the frantic shanty ‘Raising Hell’ and the amphetamine punk blues of ‘Going Back to Coventry’. Then there are the waltzing folk ballads, from their impassioned version of the anti war standard ‘Green Fields Of France’ to the bitter regret of ‘The Bells’ and the righteous testimony of ‘Our Day’. Elsewhere there are anthems galore; ‘The Crest’ a swirling gaelic chant, ‘Rosettes’, a fast marching assault of drums, fiddles and mandolins; historical epics such as ‘Ghosts Of Cable Street’, ‘Shirt of Blue’ and ‘The Colours’; romantic ballads like the wistful ‘Parted From You’ and ‘Island in The Rain’.

All the eras are here; from the wiry lo fi of the first album, through the eighties into full blown MTV ready multi trackers with vast charging drums; the initial simplicity of their recipe deepening and darkening. And then on through the nineties, noughties and tens; always the double pronged vocals drifting between harmony and unison, always the celtic, folk and country tones vying for attention, the emotive fiddle, the top end mandolin above the thundering rhythm section. On through bouffant hair, spiky hair, dyed hair, thin hair and hats; on through Grunge, Baggy, Madchester, Rave, Britpop. On through the Miner’s Strike, Poll Tax, New Labour, Iraq and Brexit. On through marriage, children, loss and revival. Forty years at the working end of rock and roll is a feat achieved by very few bands. It requires tremendous chemistry, a deep catalogue; both panoramic and miniature, a vital and irrepressible energy, all of which is on resplendent display in this sprawling 3 disc compilation. But most of all it requires an intense resilience, something that TMTCH possess in spades. Forty years on the run; was ever a band so aptly named? 

TRACK LISTING

Ghosts Of Cable Street
The Eye
Wishing Well
Raising Hell
Bounty Hunter
Going Back To Coventry
Sirens
Nightbird
Shirt Of Blue
A Place In The Sun
Island In The Rain
Singing Elvis
The Lion And The Unicorn
Smugglers
Gold Rush
Night Ferry
The Crest
Rain, Steam And Speed
Our Day
King Street Serenade
Beast Of Brechfa
Kingdom Of The Blind
Rivertown
Great Expectations
Company Town
Devil On The Wind
Red Rocks Of Spain
Scavengers
Overseas
Rosettes
The Bells
Billy Morgan
A Map Of Morocco
The Colours
Parted From You
Green Fields Of France
Ironmasters
Walkin’ Talkin’
A Night To Remember
Red Kite Rising

'Lost on Land & Sea' is Jon Langford's Men of Gwent third album for Country Mile Records - The band spent time locked away in a rural mid Wales studio recording every track 'live' with minimal overdubs

Taking local stories and individuals from their hometown, Newport. The 12 songs weave in and out of a mostly true but partly imagined landscape where all the characters are set adrift at the mercy of the tides of time. The cover art by Jon Langford returns the infamous Newport Cherub (the town emblem on the old bridge) from Manchester back to Newport after the Stone Roses borrowed it for the cover of their 'Love Spreads' single in 1994!

TRACK LISTING

1. Commercial Street
2. The Last Murenger
3. How Bright Are The Stars? 
4. Ruby
5. Mrs Hammer's Dream
6. Tenby Boatman
7. Honest Ken
8. Encounted With A Selkie Off Llangranog
9. River Daughter
10. Ghost Light
11. Lost In The Wentwood 
12. Black Gold At Six Bells

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2024 EXCLUSIVE AND WILL BE AVAILABLE INSTORE ON SATURDAY APRIL 20TH ON A FIRST COME FIRST SERVED BASIS, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

IF THERE ARE ANY REMAINING COPIES THEY WILL BE MADE AVAILABLE ONLINE AT 8PM ON MONDAY APRIL 22ND.

Australian 9-piece Spiritual Jazz group Menagerie announce their highly anticipated fourth album 'The Shores Of Infinity' - representing the 3rd LP to be released by Freestyle Records from the Melbourne-based Jazz ensemble, founded by producer, songwriter, guitarist, DJ and recording artist Lance Ferguson (The Bamboos, Lanu, Rare Groove Spectrum, Machines Always Win).

Menagerie released their debut album They Shall Inherit in 2012 via Tru Thoughts, before releasing The Arrow Of Time on Freestyle in 2018 followed by the critically acclaimed 'Many Worlds in 2021. Inspired by both the post-Coltrane generation of the 70's and the current "New Wave Of Jazz", Menagerie have made serious waves internationally, being championed on Worldwide FM, Jazz FM and Jazzwise. They were nominated in the Best Jazz Act category of the 2021 Music Victoria Awards, and in 2022 performed as part of the esteemed Melbourne International Jazz Festival. Now, two years on from their last full length album, Menagerie are back with The Shores Of Infinity, further expanding their sound out into the music universe - a forward-looking, rhythm-heavy expression of contemporary Jazz that is steeped in the tradition but somehow also defies genre pigeonholing.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Shores Of Infinity
2. Kingdom
3. Earthrise
4. Arrival
5. Of
6. Danieda's Dance

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

‘Live at RBC Echo Beach’ features performances by Men I Trust and Khruangbin.

STAFF COMMENTS

Liam says: Next up in the Khruangbin 'Live At' series and it's a banger. Side A is a lovely slice a dreamy indie pop from shop faves Men I Trust, whilst the flip side has Khruangbin heading for the stratosphere in a funk fueled dub rocket - mega stuff!!

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A:
1. Men I Trust: Sugar
2. Men I Trust: All Night
3. Men I Trust: Seven
4. Men I Trust: Show Me How
5. Men I Trust: Say Can You Hear

SIDE B:
1. Khruangbin: Dern Kala
2. Khruangbin: Lady And Man
3. Khruangbin: Evan Finds The Third Room
4. Khruangbin: White Gloves

Recorded to mark the 30th Anniversary of their debut ‘Dad Man Cat’ and the follow-up ‘High Havoc’, Corduroy return with an new mini-album: ‘Men of the Cloth.’

Sitting perfectly at the corded fringe between acid jazz and rising Britpop, Corduroy emerged in 1991 out of the ashes of cult band Boys Wonder, and made three increasingly brilliant albums on Acid Jazz. They also became one of the top live acts of their generation. After an 18-year hiatus, they returned with ‘Return of the Fabric Four in 2018, and remain a draw on the live circuit.

Featuring the popular sides from last years limited-edition 7” single ‘No More Me Me Me’ and ‘Hypnotoad’, ‘Men of the Cloth’ features four new cuts from the same Corduroy cloth - a heady mix of swinging sixties soundtracks, pop art imagery and Jazz-Funk in equal measure. A must-have addition to one of the founding acts of Acid Jazz.

‘Minsky Rock Megamix II’ takes its own fearless journey through the heart of the ‘Fear Fear’ album; on its way, it samples snatches from each of the album’s tracks and places them into glimmering new musical surroundings, all pinned to a constant metronomic beat that turns the whole thing inside out to create one streamlined, super-heavy whole.

Over twenty-three (cosmic) minutes, the track finds the pulse of ‘Fear Fear’ and follows it onto the dancefloor. Within this new mix, fragments of familiar tracks are twisted out of shape before being reborn with pounding Nu Beat basslines, Blackburn rave stabs and tweaking acid riffs that curl around minimal electro rhythms in a seamless mix.

Vocals are taken out of their original context and cut & pasted into a new stream of consciousness, forming their own manic hallucinations.

The result is an utterly mesmerising trip that feels like stumbling across a 21st century Detroit pirate radio station in full joyous flow.

‘Minsky Rock’ is the brainchild of Working Men’s Club frontman Syd Minsky-Sargeant and producer Ross Orton (Arctic Monkeys / M.I.A.). They previously remixed the band’s self-titled debut album.

12” vinyl with etching on Side B.

TRACK LISTING

Minsky Rock Megamix II

The latest darlings of the Manchester underground are DJ / producer Joey T and singer-songwriter Lady Lady, whose infectious blend of house, disco, sincerity and charm seem to be winning fans and turning heads the world over.

Released on Levi Love's labour of love, Mas O Menos; this is their first EP - four tracks announcing their arrival with a heartfelt resonance. Conceived after a long lockdown, Joey got in touch with Lady Lady (real name Sally) after seeing her post some songs online and the wheels were put in motion to recording a full EP; fast garnering the attention of the MOM head honcho who just happens to be one of the most charismatic players in the northwest music biz!

Possessing melancholy, yearning and contemplation in equal measure, Sally's vocals rub up against Joey's fizzy beats and squelchy b-line beautifully on EP opener "It's Just Me" - a ode to time spent alone and desiring the company of another.

"Like You" sees thicker house beats swung nicely and wrapped around a subby, woody b-line; whilst Sal turns her lyrical direction to deeper levels of intimacy and understanding between two possible lovers with differing levels of confidence and outlook. It really highlights the depth of skill of this burgeoning songwriter and Joey's symbiotic, sympathetic alignment via some tasteful production chops. Style and class by the bucketload.

Onto side B and "Maybe" sees the songstress rap about desiring someone as yet out of reach, but she's working on changing that! Again, Joey's instrumentals leave me feeling giddy; juxtaposing naivety and sophistication with each element he introduces - for his relative inexperience, here we have a producer in an effortless, confident stride. Something I pray he takes with him into further releases.

Finally, the title track - "Love Language" - a late night, red lit fishing net of deepness and togetherness. Drawing everyone into its warm bosom with a variety of tantalizing and sensual themes; with another arresting vocal performance by Sally who, by this point of the EP, I presume you've fallen as much in love with as the rest of us.

Did I mention that the two people involved (and, infact, everyone at Mas O Menao) are some of the nicest humans I've had the privilege of coming across recently?

This is the start of something very special. Don't sleep on this.

TRACK LISTING

1. It's Just Me
2. Like You
3. Maybe 
4. Love Language

The Waco Brothers was formed by Jon Langford of the Mekons. The group grew out of Langford's wish to play more country-influenced music as the Mekons concentrated more on a punk sound.

Shaking off the plague days like a snake sheds its skin the Waco Brothers stumble out of the empty, burning desert with a fierce thirst and an epic new album: The Men That God Forgot. It's the first collection of original Waco tunes since 2016's Going Down In History and comes to you via their own label Plenty Tuff Records.

Every night is still Friday night for the Waco Brothers but these new songs lace that reckless exuberance with a more sober awareness of the tsunami of cynical corruption & materialism that infects our everyday existence. "Best That Money Can Buy" rips its verses from what's left of honest journalism while "In The Dark" provides a requiem for functioning democracy AND boasts the best twin-lead guitar solo since Thin Lizzy. The album ends with "Nowhere To Run" a deceptively gentle dance number (inspired by a night on the Outlaw Country Cruise where the Wacos backed up their hero Lee "Scratch" Perry) that presents the struggle for social and economic justice as neverending. "George Walks With Jesus" is a song about George Jones walking with Jesus.

The Men That God Forgot is the 10th Waco Brothers full length album & was recorded with Mike Hagler at Kingsize Soundlabs in Chicago in 2022. The cinematic brass parts were arranged and performed by longtime collaborator Max Crawford with Dave Smith. Other Waco Cousins appearing are Barkley Mckay on piano and organ, Patty Vega on jingling tambourine and Andre Michot of the Lost Bayou Ramblers on accordion.

TRACK LISTING

1. The Men That God Forgot
2. This Town
3. In The Dark
4. Best That Money Can Buy
5. Blowin' My Top
6. Mud River Slide
7. Go Away
8. I Smile Through My Tears
9. If Your Heart Isn't In It
10. Teenage Kicks
11. End Of The Night
12. George Walked With Jesus
13. Backstage At The Boneyard
14. So Long General Mouton
15. Nowhere To Run

'3' is the third album by Men Of North Country and the first on Acid Jazz group label Well Suspect Records.  

Featuring wistful jangle-pop 'Out on the Hills', rollicking and celebratory 'Happy Birthday, Child', sweeping anthemic bravado 'There is Light', a romantic indie love ballad 'They Don't Know' (the Kirsty MacColl's classic) plus sexy rock'n'roll 'Since I found my Love'.  

Oh, and they haven't abandoned their Northern Soul roots – just sprinkle some talcum powder on the floor and soar away to the sound of 'Ravens', plus a brilliant down-and-dirty rendition of Sam Dees's dance-floor filler 'Lonely for You Baby'.  

Opening with the soulful soundscape of 'Titanic' and closing with their dark version of Californian 60s garage-rock gem 'Rari' by The Standells – this album is a ride through diverse musical territories, all the while retaining the melodic heart and soul of the band.

TRACK LISTING

Titanic
Lonely For You Baby
Since I Found My Love
Out Of The Hills
There Light
They Don’t Know
Happy Birthday, Child
Ravens
1000 Stations
Rari

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

100 % New original songs done by the psychedelic french garage duo The Liminanas & german-french music composer David Menke for the forthcoming Arte documentary "Thatcher's Not Dead" dedicated to Margaret Thatcher. The only physical edition done is the this Double LP for the Record Store day. 

TRACK LISTING

A1 - Snatcher – Feat. Oliver Howlett
A2 – Downfall – Part.1
A3 – Not Our War
A4 – Heritage
B1 – Bright Future
B2 – The Iron Lady
B3 – Master Plan – Feat. Oliver Howlett
B4 – Don’t Be A Traitor Feat. Oliver Howlett
B5 – Fuzzy Thatcher
B6 – She Had To Be Believed
B7 – War
C1 – Broken Dreams – Feat. Oliver Howlett
C2 – Num Confrontation
C3 – Chaos
C4 – Business As Usual
C5 – Revolting
D1 – Tears Don’t Lie
D2 – Way Of Her Cross
D3  - Ambiguous Memories
D4 – Downfall Part.B

Working Men’s Club present their Steel City EP, a 5-track release featuring remixes of tracks from their second album, Fear Fear by some of Sheffield’s most innovative producers: Toddla T, Charla Green, Ross Orton, Diessa and Warp originals, Forgemasters.

Fear Fear was released in July 2022 on Heavenly Recordings, reached #11 in the UK album chart upon release, and saw glowing reviews across Europe and the U.S.

The EP was previously only available on CD which came exclusively with purchases of the album via Bear Tree record shop in Sheffield. Before the end of 2022, these remixes were made available digitally as part of a deluxe edition of Fear Fear and now, this will be the first time the remixed tracks will be widely available on LP. 

TRACK LISTING

Side 1:
1. Money Is Mine (Toddla T Home Sick Remix)
2. Fear Fear (Charla Green Remix)
3. Ploys (Ross Orton Remix)
Side 2:
1. Rapture (Diessa Remix)
2. The Last One (Forgemasters Remix) 

The enticing and exotic samba 'Redondo Sambao' is pure Brazilian fire. With beautiful female vocal-group arrangements, floating flutes and vibrating rhythms, this song oozes charm. Its only downside being that it is over far too soon. Originally released in 1967 on a compact 7" on the Som Maior imprint, to our knowledge, the group sadly only had a couple of releases. 'Brasileiro' is taken from Jorginho Telles' self- titled 1971 album and also featured on a 7", both released on Copacabana Records. The track switches between a hoarse male vocal crooner and a rough and raw psych-guitar, RnB dancer: totally magic!

TRACK LISTING

1. As Meninas - Redondo Sambao
2. Jorginho Telles - Brasileiro

Produced by Alex Kapranos, the album is full of enduring anthems and is still considered by many as one of the defining indie rock albums of the noughties. In the USA, Rolling Stone made it one of their records of the year, calling it a “tour de force”.

TRACK LISTING

LP/CASSETTE TRACKLIST:
Side 1
1 Our Bovine Public
2 Girls Like Mystery
3 Men's Needs
4 Moving Pictures
5 I'm A Realist
6 Major's Titling Victory
Side 2
7 Women's Needs
8 I've Tried Everything
9 My Life Flashed Before My Eyes
10 Be Safe
11 Ancient History
12 Shoot The Poets

CD TRACKLIST:
Disc 1:
1 Our Bovine Public
2 Girls Like Mystery
3 Men's Needs
4 Moving Pictures
5 I'm A Realist
6 Major's Titling Victory
7 Women's Needs
8 I've Tried Everything
9 My Life Flashed Before My Eyes
10 Be Safe
11 Ancient History
12 Shoot The Poets
Disc 2:
1 It Happened So Fast (Vancouver Version)
2 To Jackson (Vancouver Version)
3 Don’t You Wanna Be Relevant?
4 Fairer Sex
5 Tonight
6 Get Yr Hands Out Of My Grave
7 Kind Words From The Broken Hearted
8 My Adolescent Dreams
9 Bastards Of Young
10 I’ve Tried Everything (Acoustic)
11 Men’s Needs (CSS Remix)
12 I’m A Realist (The Postal Service Remix)
13 Our Bovine Public (Demo)
14 Men’s Needs (Demo)
15 Moving Pictures (Demo)
16 I’m A Realist (Demo)
17 MTV (Demo)
18 My Life Flashed Before My Eyes (Demo)
19 Ancient History (Demo)
20 Tonight (Demo)
21 I’ve Tried Everything (Demo)
22 Shoot The Poets (Demo)
23 Be Safe (Rehearsal Tape For Lee)

'Of Gods And Men' is the first album from Welsh songwriter Lyndon Morgans to be released under his own name, having put out his previous eight albums under the 'Songdog' identity. Over the course of the record's 15 tracks, Lyndon continues his exploration of his favourite themes - the passing of time, lost love, sex, death, ageing and psychic overload.

In addition to fellow Songdog regular Karl 'Pod' Woodward, who provides the distinctive Mellotron sound that peppers the album - and also designed the cover art - Lyndon is joined by several guest musicians, including Mathew Conner on drums, backing vocalist Colleen McCarthy and producer Alex Franklinos on bass.

Following the critically acclaimed album "Moving Cities", recorded and produced with Makaya McCraven, Antoine Berjeaut - a stalmart of the European jazz scene - returns with "Chromesthesia". Crafted together with some of the most innovative musicians of the French jazz circuit, this exciting new album will be out June 3 through French-Japanese record label MENACE.

Chromesthesia (or sound-to-color synesthesia) is a type of synesthesia in which sound involuntarily evokes an experience of color, shape, and movement.

Antoine Berjeaut seeks synesthetic resonances between sound and colors, guided by the intuition that he can write music while using concepts and processes inherent to graphic art; playing with contrasts and nuances the way he plays with scales and keys, and tracing melodic lines in a constantly moving world, both graphic and sonic.

TRACK LISTING

1. PPDQ
2. Red Lines
3. Walk
4. Meeting Point
5. Mind's Eyes
6. Photism
7. Horns & Battle
8. Solar Hit
9. Life In Ocre
10. Chromatism

Songs created in the shadow of terror and loss, but that crackle and pop with defiance Fear Fear is a record made for agitating and dancing, for heart and soul, for here, now and tomorrow. It’s a record that explores juxtaposition; that of life and death, acceptance and isolation, environment and humanity, hope and despair, the real world and the digital world. That top to bottom rigour, the complete vision is what makes the second album from Working Men’s Club such a stunning and unique achievement.

Their critically acclaimed self-titled debut album, released in summer 2020, was the sound of singer and songwriter Syd Minsky-Sargeant processing a teenage life in Todmorden in the Upper Calder Valley. He was 16 when he wrote some of those songs, now 20, he had to get up and out of the Valley. “The first album was mostly a personal documentation lyrically, this is a blur between personal and a third-person perspective of what was going on.” Fear Fear documents the last two years. Yes, there is bleakness – but there is also hope and empathy. “I like the contrast of it being happy, uplifting music and really dark lyrics. It’s not a minimal record, certainly compared to the first one. That’s because there’s been a lot more going on that needed to be said.”

Making the busy feel finessed and the dreadful feel magical – Fear Fear manages those feats, and then some. Or, as Syd Minksy-Sargeant puts it: “We just set out to make the best-sounding album we could.”

Fear Fear was produced by Ross Orton (Arctic Monkeys, MIA, Tricky) and recorded at Orton’s studio in Sheffield.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Working Men's Club return for one of the most anticipated follow-up LP's around. This time sees them treading similar ground to the post-punk indebted debut debut, but imbued with a more dancefloor friendly groove. It's a heady mix, and one that stands as the perfect follow-up for a band at the peak of their game.

TRACK LISTING

1 19
2 Fear Fear
3 Widow
4 Ploys
5 Cut
6 Rapture
7 Circumference
8 Heart Attack
9 Money Is Mine
10 The Last One

The psychedelic French garage duo The Liminanas and german-french music composer & sound engineer David Menke wrote together 2 OST for documentaries . “The Ballad Of Linda L” for the Arte eponymous documentary about the life of Linda Lovelace. And “The Devil Inside me” for the Netflix serie “Monsters Inside : The 24 Faces Of Billy Milligan” . 100% new music, fuzz guitars & garage rock.

TRACK LISTING

VINYL 1 - OST THE BALLAD OF LINDA L
FACE A
1. Prologue
2. Deep
3. Doin' It
4. The Ballad Of Linda L.
5. 80's Score Pt. A
6. 80's Score Pt. B
FACE B
1. Friends On Fire
2. Desolation
3. Romance
4. Punky Disco
5. Linda’s Lament
6. Get Up To Fight

VINYL 2 - OST THE DEVIL INSIDE ME
FACE A
1. Them
2. Waiting For You
3. Losing Control
4. A Shot Of Whiskey
5. Strange Girl
6. Meeting Morrison
7. Back To Amanda
8. Oh Lord
FACE B
1. Love Around Us
2. Illusion Song
3. USA Motorbike
4. Surfing
5. The Devil Inside Me
6. Savages
7. West Coast
8. Suicide Solution

As a DJ, producer and person, Mas O Menos founder Levi Love is larger than life. As anyone who’s been swept up in the raw energy of one of his many Manchester-wide bar or club residencies knows, the South African-born, northwest-based crate digger picks and makes music that celebrates the fulness of our existence.

What happens when that beaming light is confronted by death, though? It’s a question Levi found himself forced to answer on his new cassette "A Tribute To Magriza", made in response to the passing of the primary figure in his life: his mother.

Setting about creating a deeply personal LP of afro-tinged, spiritual-leaning deep house; Levi Love utilizes all the heavy emotion and successfully forges something positive and affirming out of the darkness. Beginning with a recording of his mother's vocal choir, we're then taken in by the reflective "A Thought For My Mother...." which somehow manages to be both simultaneously uplifting and melancholy. "Commonality of being human" sees Levi exploring tension through rhythm, intricate drum programming and suspense occupying much of the track's strung out duration. "Karma & Address" is a skillfully executed blend of bruk, deep house and broken beat; fluttering on a celestial plane. "Seething" utilizes shy, plaintive synth work and more detailed drum play for a moment of soulful introspection before "Benmore Avenue" concludes the piece with a lo-fi, clickity sample jam that sounds like it's been taken straight outta Theo Parrish's MPC library! 

TRACK LISTING

Ndiyakholwa 
A Thought For My Mother At Christmas (in Her Absence Mix) 
Commonality Of Being Human (Z-Arts Mix) 
Karma & Address
Seething 
Benmore Avenue 

Bristol's sike merchants the Heads have a 20 year anniversary to celebrate this week with their THIRD STUDIO album , "Under Sided", originally released in March 2002! . They've decided (!) to release a 4LP/plus boxset of that double album, with a double album of demos, their third peel session, and other such unreleased gems. Thats going to be released at the end of August /September. we'll send more details on that soon, once certain elements of that set are finished!

Whilst trawling through the cassettes, CDrs, and ephemera in order to create the forthcoming "Under Sided" 20th anniversary reissue boxset.. the Heads found their cover of May Blitz's "For Mad Men Only", originally released as part of a 70s tribute comp LP on SMALL STONE Records. Also unearthead was their version of Hawkwind's "Born To Go" ..a full on 13 minute unedited version.. (a version of which appeared on the ROCKET Records 10" Out Demons Out. )

How about doing a limited 7" single to announce the boxset's impending release... ideal, once Born To Go was edited down (full version in the boxset, of course!) Simon Price came up with a suitable wraparound sleeve idea.. and the 2 tracks were pressed to vinyl.. 900 (450 of two colours!) have been made.

This is a full on, pedals set to stun, grooves set to vibrate sike assault, with the Heads at this point in time revelling in the peak of their psychedelic rock powers, and pretty much obliterating all around, then, and now. This aint no gentle-whimsy-psych indie rock this is the real brown-acid-gobbling mind-melting beast you were warned about..get on board!

This sublime funky Samba joint has always ignited the dancefloor for us. It featured on the band’s 1978 album, ‘O Conjunto Que Faz Voce Vibrar’, which originally saw release on EMI. No crazy hype needed for this one, just a fantastic straight-up, no messing Samba Funk made for dancing. We only know of four albums by Os Devaneios and for the A-side of this 45, we have selected one of our more recent discoveries with a track entitled ‘A Beleza e Voce Menina’.

Taken from their 1979 album ‘Ra a Suor E Suingue’ (also originally released on EMI), it was recorded only a couple of years after ‘Embalo Diferente’. Whilst it remains in that Samba mold, it has also taken on some of the vibe and characteristics of Soul, Brazilian Boogie and AOR from that late 70s and early 80s period.

A feel-good and uplifting record, yet one which simultaneously has a hint of melancholy and is all the more beautiful for it. It’s always good to discover a new song by an old favourite, and we hope you grow to love it too.

TRACK LISTING

A Beleza E Voce Menina
Embalo Diferente

Following the recent release of 'X', the first new music from Working Men’s Club since their acclaimed self-titled debut was released in the autumn of 2020, the band share remixes from Paranoid London and Minsky Rock.

A side project of Syd from the band and producer Ross Orton, the Minsky Rock remix channels the energy of the primetime Detroit electro of Aux 88 or Cybertron while Paranoid London, the duo made up of Quinn Whalley and Gerardo Delgardo, turn in a bubbling 303 drenched acid workout.

TRACK LISTING

A1. X Paranoid London Remix
A2. X Minsky Rock Remix

B1. X Paranoid London Remix (Instrumental)
B2. X Minsky Rock Remix (Instrumental)

X is the first new music from Working Men’s Club since their acclaimed self-titled debut was released in the autumn of 2020, the album was the band’s perfect statement of intent, X is the delivery, the message, the action.

X rides on a sustained attack and gives way to a glorious synth heavy release of a chorus that’s just biding its time for a summer of discontent and dancing. This is the sound of your new favourite band hitting their stride. Count the days ’til you can see them in a field or in a club again.

Self-produced by Syd Minsky and once again mixed by Ross Orton, Y? is a synth heavy assault which picks up where X left off before venturing off into deeper acid-laced territory.

TRACK LISTING

A.X
B.Y

12th Isle quickly follow on from the double LP "Athenian Primitivism" by Christos Chondropoulos with two recordings from performance, voice and sound artist Lucy Duncombe. Cut to 10" vinyl and mastered by Morgan Buckley (Wah Wah Wino), "Brace / Mend" are collaborative works exploring an early musical fascination with theatrical vocal transposition and its duality with machinic interference and technologies. Lucy recently expanded upon this practice with a joint tape release with DJ Crud (Al White) entitled "THE RAPTURE OF CELLULAR ACCRETION". This limited run single continues 12th Isle's on-going relationship with musicians in their city of Glasgow.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says:

TRACK LISTING

A. Brace
B. Mend

Australian 9-piece Spiritual Jazz group Menagerie announce their highly anticipated third album 'Many Worlds'. Menagerie is the Melbourne-based Jazz ensemble founded by producer, songwriter, guitarist, DJ and recording artist Lance Ferguson, also the driving force behind The Bamboos, Lanu, Rare Groove Spectrum and Machines Always Win.

Recorded at Union Street Studio by award-winning engineer John Castle, 'Many Worlds' features some of Australia's finest musicians, including pianist Mark Fitzgibbon (a regular performer at Gilles Peterson and Patrick Forge's original Dingwalls sessions), drummer Daniel Farrugia and renowned saxophonist Phil Noy (The Bamboos).

Inspired by both the post-Coltrane generation of the 70's, labels like Strata-East, Impulse! and Tribe, along with the current 'New Wave Of Jazz', Menagerie aligns with the world of Kamasi Washington, Shabaka Hutchings and Nubya Garcia, whilst also bringing their own unique twist.

Lead single 'Free Thing' leans heavily into the spiritual side of the band's sound. The hypnotic spoken word-poem is evocative of The Last Poets, an earthy yet futuristic meditation on the universal theme of freedom itself, set to a backdrop of insistent percussion, double bass and brooding piano voicings.

'Hope' carries forward the sound of spiritual jazz into the 21st century, with its epic vocal harmonies and melodic fanfare, it is an uplifting anthem for this period of global worldwide upheaval and uncertainty.The title track 'Many Worlds' is a perfect example of how Menagerie incorporates their myriad influences, but manage to create a sound that feels uncannily fresh and contemporary. Book-ended by ambient, ethereal sections, the slow-burning groove builds over its 11-minute duration to create a standout crossover track.

TRACK LISTING

1. Hope
2. Many Worlds
3. Free Thing
4. Mountain Song
5. Hymn Of The Turning Stone
6. Quantum Blues

A rumble on the horizon. Gritted teeth, nuclear fizz and fissured rock. A dab of pill dust from a linty pocket before it hits: the atom split, pool table overturned, pint glass smashed — valley fever breaking with the clouds as the inertia of small town life is well and truly disrupted. Here to bust out of Doledrum, clad in a t-shirt that screams SOCIALISM and armed with drum machine, synth, pedal and icy stare are Working Men’s Club, and their self-titled debut album.

It’s hard to believe that the three fresh-faced music college kids who bounced out of nowhere and onto the 6 Music playlist with the sweet-but-potent, twangy guitar-led ‘Bad Blood’ (Melodic Records) in 2019 are the same band who clattered back there with maddening techno-cowbellpuncher ‘Teeth’ less than half a year later — and that’s because for the most part, they’re not. Having signed to Heavenly and with the hype around them building, underlying tensions came to a boil a mere five days before the band’s all-important first London headline show, and wunderkind frontman Syd Minsky-Sargeant was left high and dry; guitarist Giulia Bonometti had decided to focus on her blossoming solo career, and drummer Jake Bogacki was against the new electronic direction Minsky-Sargeant saw Working Men’s Club taking. (“I guess WMC started off as a bit more guitar-based, tryna copy stuff in our own way, like the Velvets and stuff like that, but I didn’t want it to be that anymore. It became dancier and dancier as I tried to experiment”, he explains.) All that remained of the outfit was Minsky-Sargeant himself, recently recruited bassist Liam Ogburn, and — given the band’s indebtment to wood panelled, community-run venues for an early leg-up — a rather pertinent name. But with staunch determination burning in his belly, Minsky-Sargeant quickly assembled a lineup consisting of himself, Ogburn, and Mairead O'Connor (The Moonlandingz) and Rob Graham (Drenge, Baba Naga) — both of whom he had met at the Sheffield studio of producer Ross Orton (The Fall, M.I.A., Arctic Monkeys) — replaced the live drums with a drum machine, and rush-rehearsed the new setup before going ahead with the show. “If it wasn’t for Sheffield then we probably wouldn’t have played that gig” he says. “I was shitting myself, because I didn’t know what would work or not.” Luckily, something stuck: “After about three gigs with that lineup it was already way better than what we’d had before.” Two original members lighter and three new ones the richer, Working Men’s Club took on a new hard-edge permutation, their shows becoming ever more sweaty, pulsating and rammed to the rafters; their energy raw; their vigour renewed; their interplay as musicians growing ever-more intuitive and elastic. Their eponymous collection of songs is equal parts Calder Valley restlessness and raw Sheffield steel; guitars locking horns with floor-filling beats, synths masquerading as drums and Minsky-Sargeant’s scratchy, electrifying bedroom demos brought to their full potential by Orton’s blade-sharp yet sensitive production.

It was at home in the town of Todmorden in the Calder Valley, West Yorkshire, feeling hemmed in, that 18-year-old Syd Minsky-Sargeant first began assembling these 10 songs. “There’s not much going on, not much stuff to do as a teenager” he says. “It’s quite isolated. And it can get quite depressing being in a town where in the winter it gets light at nine in the morning and dark at four”. It is this sense of cabin fever, of “thinking that you will never escape a small town in the middle of nowhere” on which the album opens, with the boredom-lamenting and rave-reminiscent ‘Valleys’. In a post-punk talk-sing over an old-skool beat, Minsky-Sargeant begins:

Trapped, inside a town, inside my mind

Stuck with no ideas, I’m running out of time

There’s no quick escape, so many mistakes, I’ll play the long game

This winter is a curse

And the valley is my hearse, when will it take me to the grave?

Fortunately for Syd and a thousand other bored-shitless, dark-dwelling teenagers, the Calder Valley boasts a burgeoning grassroots music scene, chiefly centred around The Golden Lion in Todmorden, and the Trades Club in Hebden Bridge — both of which were instrumental in the early life of the band. “Without those venues we probably wouldn’t have been able to get into playing live music”, Minsky-Sargeant reflects. Working Men’s Club’s first ever gig, at The Golden Lion, was self-booked and self-promoted, landlord Waka having allowed the band to use the 100-capacity room above the pub for free. Even before booking himself onto the stage though, Minsky-Sargeant regularly snuck into the venue to watch the internationally renowned DJs, like Justin Robertson and Luke Unabomber, who passed through its doors. This, combined with the discovery of 808 State, his stepdad’s extensive afrobeat record collection, YouTube videos of Jeff Mills making beats on a Roland TR-909, and a chance festival encounter with Soulwax, provided sustenance and inspiration for Working Men’s Club’s developing sound. Though it is songs almost entirely written and sung by Minsky-Sargeant that appear on the record, he is quick to point out the influence of the other members of his band on the record too; that “everyone that’s been involved in this band, from the old lineup to the new lineup, played on the record, contributed and shaped it in some way, through the phases”, wheedling in and around Minsky-Sargeant’s songs, embellishing them with their own bass, guitar, key or backing vocal parts. And without Orton, “it wouldn’t have been half as good a record.” Working with the producer radically changed MinskySargeant’s songwriting practice — “I tried to replicate what he was doing in his studio in my bedroom, and think more about drum sounds and making them more complicated and messing around with synths and stuff like that. It made me think about more components than just a guitar.”

The songs following ‘Valleys’ come fast and relentless — momentum ever increasing, mission well and truly stated as the frenetic, pew-pewing ‘A.A.A.A’ speeds through to nonchalant existential groove ‘John Cooper Clarke’ — centred around the realisation that yes, even the luckiest guy alive, the Bard of Salford himself, will someday die.

Hard holds hands with soft, and rough with smooth. On washily-vocalled, Orange Juicily-guitared ‘White Rooms and People’, there are simultaneously beautifully blooming flowers and ‘people talking shit about you’, and the hazy, ricocheting ‘Outside’, the gentlest track on the album, flips straight into the tough-as-shit, industrially-geared ‘Be My Guest’, which opens the second half of the record with markedly E. Smithian brio. The opening bars of ‘Cook A Coffee’ are momentarily reminiscent of ‘Bad Blood’, but spiral into direct and uncomfortable eye contact in song-form; a lost Joy Division number from an alternate universe, about taking a dump live on the telly. ‘Tomorrow’ glitches and glimmers, whilst outro track ‘Angel’ moves between psychedelic languidity and hardcore thrash, the album playing itself out on a 12-and-a-half-minute noodle.

It is with war, free-fall, and re-birth already behind them that Working Men’s Club emerge, resilient; inspiration from across breadth of eras, genres and tour-mates merely strata in their very own indie-cum-dance-cum-techno niche in the crag.

Diva Harris, February 2020

STAFF COMMENTS

Laura says: It's perhaps unsurprising that a band from the Calder Valley on the edge of the Pennines draws on influences from both sides of the hills. Todmorden’s WMC have done just that, splicing the synth led sounds of 80s Sheffield with doomy Mancunian post punk stylings to create a forward thinking monster of a debut album. The acidic synths and pulsing beat of album opener “Valleys” encapsulate the claustrophobia of growing up in a small town and the smothering intensity is maintained through the industrial clatter of “A.A.A.A.”. With its funk fuelled grooves, nonchalant vocals and bitter sweet chorus, “John Cooper Clarke” could easily be an undiscovered classic from early Factory days. As side one draws to a close, the mood is lifted with the choppy guitar groove of “White Rooms and People”, and on “Outside”, it feels like they’ve escaped the town for sun kissed wide open spaces. Side two reverts to pounding industrial grooves and distorted guitars on “Be My Guest”. “Tomorrow” marries monotone vocals with a super catchy chorus while “Cook a Coffee” takes a cheeky snipe at a certain TV presenter. “Teeth” is aimed squarely at the dancefloor with its relentless synth stabs interwoven with doomy guitar riffs and “Angel” brings the album to a triumphant close: Jangling guitars and crashing cymbals over a driving rhythm that morphs into a sprawling psychedelic wig-out.

They set out to make a dance record that wouldn’t be pigeonholed as a dance record. I think they’ve nailed it.

TRACK LISTING

1 Valleys
2 A.A.A.A.
3 John Cooper Clarke
4 White Rooms And People
5 Outside
6 Be My Guest
7 Tomorrow
8 Cook A Coffee
9 Teeth
10 Angel

Building on the success of 2018’s ‘Filoxiny’ (listed as one of Q Magazine’s ‘354 Albums to Blow Your Mind’) and this year’s ‘Umoja’ (“a pleasure to listen to from start to finish” – Songlines magazine) – both of whose singles have peppered the playlists of BBC 6 Music and have lead to his helming of a Bandcamp takeover - Skinshape returns with the witheringly, prophetically titled ‘Arrogance is the Death of Men’. Written and recorded between November 2019 and July 2020, Skinshape bids to recreate something akin to the ‘old style’ of ‘Oracolo’ (2015) and ‘Life & Love’ (2017). With ‘Arrogance…’, Will Dorey’s blueprint points to a simple formula, aligning a bank of fresh drum breaks recorded at the end of 2019 to whatever he had to hand, for a long player recorded in the majority at home due to the COVID-19 lockdown.

Forever balanced between sweetness and a sigh, as per his position ‘Behind the Sun’, the Skinshape essence, intricate yet always reachable, at times tailored in a single session and sourcing archive bric-a-brac when required, is all around on the sweetly strummed ‘Tomorrow’ and ‘The Eastern Connection’, featuring Ivan Kormanak on drums. Maintaining an incisive knowledge of global sounds that keeps him in the filmic company of Khruangbin and El Michels Affair, Dorey’s listening to vintage Vietnamese music and Asian film scores provides the basis of ‘Sound of Your Voice’ and ‘Flight of the Erhu’, starring Wan Pinchu on Erhu violin. Acutely aware of the world’s ongoing health crisis without preaching about the whys and wherefores, the title track and ‘Losing My Mind’ reflect enforced confinement as tranquil songs of both quiet consideration yet powerful release. Dorey’s guitar pieces and wraith-like soul continue to flicker with fascination as Indian Summers and fireside retreats beckon, with ‘Watching From The Shadows’ - about “standing up for yourself, and avoiding the limelight for your own good”– and ‘Outro’ gently bringing the album to rest

TRACK LISTING

A1. Tomorrow
A2. Sound Of Your Voice
A3. Arrogance Is The Death Of Men
A4. The Eastern Connection
A5. Behind The Sun..
B1. Another Day
B2. Losing My Mind
B3. Flight Of The Erhu
B4. Watching From The Shadows
B5. Outro

Pre-order the album to be in with a chance of winning a limited edition test pressing.

Freud’s process of therapy was famously labelled the ‘Talking Cure’ - through the act of conversation participants received cathartic relief. Positive Mental Health Music (PMHM), the debut album from South East London band Tiña, stems from this idea. Lead singer/songwriter Josh Loftin explains that he used the songs to “work through a mental breakdown”, and that for him “writing is like solving a mystery”.

The 11 track LP provides an honest and intimate portrait into this process of self-examination, covering themes of anxiety, depression, love, sex, isolation, fear and failure. Yet, PMHM is anything but a difficult listen: the tracks are catchy, lively - even danceable at times. Loftin’s cooing vocals, his lyrics poetic yet slightly self-mocking, sit atop a blend of psych-pop keys, drums and guitars, all guided by the shepherding hand of producer Dan Carey.

After singles ‘I Feel Fine’ and ‘Dip’, Positive Mental Health Music is the first ever LP to be released on Carey’s Speedy Wunderground label.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Tiña perfectly stands between solemn bedroom rock and intricate art-pop, at once beautiful and effecting but without ever being a struggle to listen to. Personal, frank but beautiful and wonderfully done.

TRACK LISTING

1Buddha
2 Rosalina
3 I Feel Fine
4 Rooster
5 Closest Shave
6 Growing In Age
7 New Boi
8 Golden Rope
9 It's No Use
10 Dip
11 People

VERY LIMITED GERMAN EDITION OF THE ALBUM.

The multi-media project Kraftwerk was started in Düsseldorf, Germany 1970 by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider. They set up their electronic Kling Klang Studio where they conceived and produced all Kraftwerk albums. 

Kraftwerk created the soundtrack for the digital age of the 21st century. AUTOBAHN 1974, RADIO-ACTIVITY 1975, TRANS EUROPE EXPRESS 1977, THE MAN-MACHINE 1978, COMPUTER WORLD 1981, TECHNO POP 1986, THE MIX 1991, TOUR DE FRANCE 2003. Their compositions, using innovative techniques, electronic sounds and synthetic voices combined with computerised rhythms, had a major musical influence on Electro, Hip Hop, Techno and Synth-Pop.

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

Working Menís Club hotly anticipated, self-titled debut album was due to drop this June, now, for reasons obvious to most of us, it is due October. Looking at the blank space left by the postponement, 18 year old wonderkid frontman Syd Minsky-Sargeant decided to utilise his free time, in lockdown, and capitalise on the creative momentum the band has garnered. The result is a 21-minute continuous ëMEGAMIXí that simultaneously acts as a taster and a condensed electronic reworking of parts of the album. ìOur album would have been released today but we had to push the release back due to Covid. It doesnít feel like a particularly apt time to be self promoting anything at all however we wanted to give something to the people who pre-ordered the album on what would of the original release date,î says Minsky-Sargeant. ìInitially it seemed a bit of a crazy idea to go and remix an album we've just made that isn't even out yet. But once we got into it we were like, ëlet's fucking go for ití. One could of course argue that crazy ideas are whatís needed in such crazy times but, in reality, what has been produced is less of a chaotic and scatterbrain idea and more a coherent artistic statement in line with the bandís perpetual forward momentum. Minsky-Sargeant teamed up with the bandís producer Ross Orton - under the moniker ëMinsky Rockí, a recently started project under which they recently completed a Jarvis Cocker remix - and the pair worked remotely to create the unique reimagining. ìRoss has a studio in Sheffield and I have a bit of one at home. So I would play a synth part and then send him the file over and he'd put it into his computer and then bring it up on a shared screen. I could see his interface and we'd mix it like that. It was like being in the same room.î The result is a ìreinterpretation rather than a remixî says Minsky-Sargeant. Over its seamlessly flowing duration, as it unfurls in hypnotic and infectious grooves - teasing snippets of songs as they weave in and out - the mix plays out like a classic 12î extended mix. Albeit one that takes on different forms and explores new terrain altogether. ìIt takes a number of parts of the album but different versions [and edits] of the songs,î he says. ìI've played new parts on more or less everything. Some tracks I've taken out the guitar parts and re-done them with synths or replaced bass lines with synths.î Thereís something of a northern lineage that can be traced here too, in that the 12î band remixes were something of a mainstay of Manchester bands like New Order and A Certain Ratio, and in a similar spirit, WMC are a new young band pushing, and crossing, the boundaries of where guitar and electronic music can interlink and overlap. ìIt's free flowing and electronic, rather than sounding like a band,î Minsky-Sargeant says of the mix. ìIt gives an insight into what the record is like, as well as the future of the band, but itís also something totally exclusive. It's very much its own thing.î

New York band The Men have always been genre-morphic and unpredictable, but on their eighth album Mercy they have truly done something new as a band. For the first time since forming, they have now created three straight records with the same lineup, and the result is a sound that feels developed and continuous despite running the gamut of mood, in true Men fashion. Having this lineup stability has allowed the band to deepen and finesse the sounds they were exploring on 2017’s Drift and produce tracks that have a unique and distinct voice.

Mercy was recorded live at Serious Business studio to 2” tape with Travis Harrison. The band did minimal overdubs, contributing to the urgent feel of the recording. The album is simply the sound of a band that has a deep and unjaded passion for songwriting and creation, working at the peak of their collaborative connection.

Mercy takes the listener on a cinematic journey throughout its seven tracks, beginning with the soothing but lonesome country rock opener “Cool Water.” This track, like many on the record, feels timeless, illustrating the band’s ability to write songs you are convinced you’ve heard before on the B-side of your favorite record from the ’70s. You are then pulled into its longest song, the 10-and-a-half minute psychedelic blues rock opus of “Wading in Dirty Water.” The band explore some new territory on Mercy, and they also revisit the Suicide-style sound they have been working on for a while through Drift and also with one of their side projects Dream Police, resulting in the highlight “Children All Over the World,” a song that could stand next to any classic rock hit but with The Men’s unique artistic savvy. It wouldn’t be a contemporary Men record without a total fuzzed-out stomper a la their Open Your Heart-era sound, and this record’s offering, “Breeze,” shows the band’s complete command of this urgent and pulverizing style. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: As stylistically varied a record we've ever heard from The Men, Mercy skilfully toes the line between pastiched 80's soft-focus synth work and grooving psychedelia, dipping toes into a wealth of genres along the way including gothic rock, blues and even veering towards the dancefloor. A fascinating and engrossing collection.

TRACK LISTING

1. Cool Water
2. Wading In Dirty Water
3. Fallin’ Thru
4. Children All Over The World
5. Call The Dr.
6. Breeze
7. Mercy

At the end of the 70s, The Monochrome Set were part of the first wave of 'post punk' bands. Right from the beginning, the band earned a solid reputation as purveyors of fine pop, gaining praise from 80s contemporaries such as Morrissey and Edwyn Collins. The Monochrome Set sound has often been described as 'timeless', and that alone explains why, over the years, the band has continued gaining admirers. As with all TMS albums, "Fabula Mendax" is at once accessible and arcane, upbeat and dark, lush and spare, and with lyrics that as ever remain tantalisingly opaque.

It’s 33 and a third years since the seminal Giant Sand and its country cousin The Band Of… Blacky Ranchette entered the studio to lay down their second albums. Yes. Both bands had recorded their second albums each. Two sides of the multi-faceted hyper-productive Howe Gelb. “I was turning 28,” he recalls, “and had been wanting to make and release albums since my early 20s, but only recently had figured out how. It was time to make up for lost time.”

Time was of the essence. That thin line between then and now has seen journeymen Giant Sand release 27-ish albums, their latest, ‘Recounting The Ballad Of The Thin Line Men’ turning the clock back to 1986’s ‘Ballad Of A Thin Line Man’, picking over the bones and making a whole new soup. All these years on, the latest incarnation of Giant Sand: Howe Gelb (guitars, piano) Tommy Larkins (drums) and Thøger Lund (bass), have dusted off the old vinyl and re-imagined those heady days – they’ve polished these buried gems, reignited some truculent tirades and rekindled an ageless angst. The revamp re-orders the tracks, drops a couple and adds ‘Reptillian’, a previously lost song hailing from their album’s 25th anniversary re-issue, a tune that opens proceedings and basks in all its crinkly glory. There’s also two takes of ‘Tantamount’. The unique thing about Giant Sand’ is they make it all their own, they sound like no-one else. The songs remain the same, but somehow completely different. Howe: “We were a fine storm. The greatest storm in terms of tumultuous velocity and pelting bluster. It proved unstoppable... for a minute”.

TRACK LISTING

1 Reptillian
2 Hard Man To Get To Know
3 Desperate Man
4 You Can’t Put Your Arms Around A Memory
5 Tantamount
6 Who Am I
7 Body Of Water
8 Graveyard
9 The Chill Outside
10 Thin Line Man
11 Tantamount Blast (Bonus Track)

Efrim Manuel Menuck, founding member of Godspeed You! Black Emperor and Thee Silver Mt. Zion and Kevin Doria from Growing and Total Life, are now officially a duo. Menuck recruited Doria to help him translate his acclaimed 2018 album Pissing Stars from the studio to the stage, and the pair have been touring under the Efrim Manuel Menuck moniker for the pastyear (often with Doria’s latest solo project KGD opening the proceedings). They’ve also been co-writing piles of new material, diving deeper into whirling maximalist electronics,still shot through with Menuck’s incantatory singing awash in plaintive distortion and hope. Efrim Manuel Menuck & Kevin Doria are SING SINCK, SING presents the first volume of songs forged from this febrile and fertile merger: an antifa poetics of sound that unspools across five crushing, keening tracks driven by thick sweeping drones and ostinatos, battered by inscrutably searching, ricocheting vocals. Anguish,yearning, and desperate conviction combine in these saturated survivalist electro-hymns, for as long as the power stays on to overload the amplifiers

TRACK LISTING

A1. Do The Police Embrace?
A2. Fight The Good Fight
B1. A Humming Void An Emptied Place
B2. Joy Is On Her Mount And Death Is At Her Side
B3. We Will

In case you don't know by now, Insecure Menare led by Saul Adamczewski (Fat White Family) and his schoolmate Ben Romans-Hopcraft. There debut album was a glorious mess of  exotica, easy listening, lounge and timeless pop music.They now return with this 10 track covers record, feat. takes on Bruce Springsteen, The Pogues, The Carpenters, Peter Andre et al.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: It's a completely bizarre but thoroughly brilliant re-working of some karaoke classics from Insecure Men here, including the Police, the Denny's and PETER BLOODY ANDRE. WTAF / This is brilliant. Special shout-out to the Pogues' 'A Rainy Night In Soho'.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A
1. Rainy Days And Mondays
2. Mysterious Girl
3. She Thinks I Still Care
4. A Rainy Night In Soho
5. Streets Of Philadelphia

SIDE B
1. Roxette
2. I'm So Depressed
3. Sail Away To The Sea
4. Picture Cards Can't Picture You
5. Madame George

NYC’s The Men have made a name for themselves as wayfaring musicians, constantly evolving and eluding their listeners. Before they were genre-hopping through country, post-punk, noise rock, and more, they were applying that experimental nature within the more confined space of punk. Within that genre they were wildly adventurous, playing noise shows, hardcore shows, rock shows, and switching up the instrumentation as they saw fit, while always operating within a general punk ethos. Their first demo was a hand-dubbed and spray-painted run of 32 copies, half of which worked, and their first shows were at New York dives like Tommy’s Tavern, Matchless, and Don Pedro (all of which have been shut down).

That hand-dubbed demo kicked off a furious run of creative output from 2008 to 2011, much of which is now collected on the new compilation, Hated. The songs on Hated are pulled from a variety of sources — the debut demo tape, a split with Nomos, a 7", a 12" EP, and a slew of unreleased demos, outtakes, and live recordings. These songs show the huge range and potential of a band still in its infancy, when they were just beginning to blaze the path they’re still on to this day.

The core value of the original incarnation of The Men was work ethic. The band became a lifestyle for original members Chris Hansell, Mark Perro, and Nick Chiericozzi, with Hansell even living off unemployment checks to dedicate his time to the project. The three of them would jam and obsess over music together over all else.

For those who were at those early NYC shows, Hated will be a welcome reminder of a glorious time in the underground. For those who weren’t, it’s a chance to experience The Men as the locals did, and to get a glimpse of a Brooklyn DIY scene that doesn’t really exist anymore, at least not in the same way. And for diehard fans of the band, it’s a reminder of how much they’ve evolved, and how much more evolution they still have to go.

TRACK LISTING

1. Twist The Knife
2. Hated
3. Free Sitar
4. Gates Of Steel
5. Ailment
6. Digital Age
7. Control Loop
8. Think (7" Version)
9. Impish
10. Walking Out On Love
11. Saucy
12. Somebody’s Watching Me
13. Love Revolution
14. Captain Ahab
15. Cowboy Song
16. California
17. Wasted

Leeds-based Menace Beach return with news of their third album 'Black Rainbow Sound', which is due out August 31st via Memphis Industries.
New album Black Rainbow Sound is the band's first new material since early 2017’s Lemon Memory, and after a self-imposed break from tour duties, the album exhibits a profound shift in their sound, whilst still mainlining the blasts of noise, visceral power, and timeless pop songsmithery of their previous releases.

Unlike the bands previous records, Black Rainbow Sound came to life in the bands studio, where Liza Violet and Ryan Needham built dense late-night orchestrations from drum machines, synthesizers, loops and guitar noise, before being ripped apart and reimagined by the full Menace Beach cast at The Nave studio in Leeds with co-producer Matt Peel (Eagulls).

Never ones to shy away from an intriguing collaboration, Black Rainbow Sound contains songs featuring Brix Smith of The Fall, and Brix and the Extricated. “The synchronicity of the universe just forced us and Brix together. The very day l finished reading her biography she played us on her BBC 6music show along with a wonderfully out-there monologue of how the song made her feel. I said thanks, we got chatting and it went from there. She’s a burning comet of positive energy”.

On Black Rainbow Sound, Menace Beach continue to explore their own unique aesthetic, venturing much further into a colourful world of bizzaro no-wave analogue synths and static drenched electronic euphoria, which they have been circling for some time.

Lustrous, dizzying, and bursting with cacophonous vintage electronics - the sounds on Black Rainbow Sound act as an otherworldly backdrop for the album's enigmatic lyrics to play out. Celestial conversations, night terrors, love, anti-love, good vs evil, light vs dark, friendly crows, death, depression, and teenage tongues and are all here to absorb; the more introspective topics often hidden in plain sight atop celebratory choruses, and melodic hooks.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Menace Beach go all cosmic on their latest, 'Black Rainbow Sound'. We get clicking CR-78's, throbbing distorted bass and blipping, sample & hold sine waves enriched with heavy guitars and woozy, shimmering vox. Properly lovely.

TRACK LISTING

1. Black Rainbow Sound
2. Satellite
3. Crawl In Love
4. Tongue
5. Mutator
6. 8000 Molecules
7. Hypnotiser Keeps The Ball Rolling
8. Holy Crow
9. Watermelon
10. (Like) Rainbow Juice

Led by Elle’s guitar playing and beautiful, nuanced voice, ‘Constant Unfailing Night’ peels away layer after layer of expectation. Rhythmically challenging and yet unassuming, it leads you down a rabbit hole of emotions, sonics and stories, reminiscent of bands from Smog to Sharon Van Etten.

Though firmly grounded in folk-noir, the album carefully carves out its own space. From “Falling”, a song that seemingly gets more complicated after each listen, to the crescendo at the centre of “Behave”, where the vocals open the door from folk to anger, Elle Mary & the Bad Men have crafted a journey. Elle Mary explains: “This album has been written over the course of three years, a project started in response to a break up, a shift, a necessity to carry on. As I wrote and filtered out songs, the focus started to change and became about tapping into some part of the subconscious, looking for the part of me that knows better, but that I seem to ignore. The Bad Men, Michael Dubec and Pete Sitch, have joined me on this journey and probably know me too well as a result of it. The weight they add to the songs is incredible and I really couldn’t ask for a better band.

“Space and a minimal approach has always been the most important part of the music to me; to do more with less. It’s this that draws me in the most about the artists I love (Low, Julie Doiron, Bill Callahan etc.). The space allows my voice to sit on top and the words seep in. I don’t really enjoy telling people what the lyrics mean; I prefer them to interpret for themselves: that perspective interests me; I like the freedom of taking what you want from a song.”

For fans of: Jenny Hval, Sharon Van Etten, Low

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Beautiful tender string plucks and Elle Mary's haunting vocals soaring over the top, Constant Unfailing Night is another winner from Manchester's own Sideways Saloon.

Drift is the seventh full-length by NYC rock polymaths The Men. The band’s last album, the self-released Devil Music, was the sound of a band who had been through hell hitting reset and looking to their roots to rediscover themselves. On Drift, The Men return to their longtime label Sacred Bones Records and explore the openness that Devil Music helped them find.

The immediately evident result of that exploration is the experimental quality of much of the material on Drift. Songwriters Mark Perro and Nick Chiericozzi chase their muses down a few dozen thrilling rabbit-holes over the course of the album’s nine tracks. The songs on Drift veer in a number of directions, but notably, almost none of them feature a prominent electric guitar. The lone exception, “Killed Someone,” is a rowdy riff-rocker, worthy of the finest moments of the band’s now-classic Leave Home and Open Your Heart albums. The rest of the album drives down stranger highways. “Secret Light” is an improvisation based on an old piano riff of Perro’s. “Maybe I’m Crazy” is a synth-driven dancefloor stomper for long after last call. “Rose on Top of the World” and “When I Held You in My Arms” are paisley-hued, psyched-out jams with big, beating hearts.

The album was recorded to 2" tape with Travis Harrison (Guided by Voices) at Serious Business Studios in Brooklyn. A whole pile of instruments was involved — synths, strings, sax, steel, harmonica, tape loops, on top of the usual guitar, bass, and drums. Unlike recent releases from The Men, there aren’t many overdubs on Drift — a reflection of the personalities of its makers becoming less frantic, Chiericozzi suggests. In fact, the band removed a lot of the additional parts they tried adding early on, giving the final product a bit of a ghostly feel. The songs on Drift took giant leaps and trips from their beginnings only to find the band returning to the first spark of creation.

TRACK LISTING

1. Maybe I’m Crazy (4:11)
2. When I Held You In My Arms (4:59)
3. Secret Light (4:16)
4. Rose On Top Of The World (4:28)
5. So High (3:26)
6. Killed Someone (2:30)
7. Sleep (2:45)
8. Final Prayer (5:46)
9. Come To Me (2:45)

At the risk of further belabouring a rather obvious point, with "Thank God For Mental Illness", their third collection of absolutely stunning music in 1996, the Brian Jonestown Massacre parallels the prolific and effortless brilliance of the Rolling Stones at their fevered late-1960s peak; the sheer scope of their achievements is stunning — rarely are bands quite so productive, or quite so consistently amazing. "Thank God" is the BJM's down-and-dirty country-blues outing, all 13-odd tracks supposedly recorded on a single July day at a cost of just $17.36.

In May 1976 a record was released that would have an unforeseen and lasting impact on the music industry “Ten Percent” by Double Exposure was an early release on the New York independent label Salsoul Records. America was in the grip of a disco explosion with new clubs opening on a weekly basis; Salsoul saw what was happening and swiftly created a sound for their label, heavily influenced by the music then coming out of Philadelphia, aimed directly at New York’s dance-floors. Records like “Salsoul Hustle,” “Tangerine” and “You’re Just The Right Size” by The Salsoul Orchestra borrowed heavily from the beautifully orchestrated Philadelphia International records but added a more percussive, bass heavy depth that New York’s DJs loved. So what was so special about this particular single then? Double Exposure was, after all, just another band, “Ten Percent” just another song; one of many “disco” records released that week. First of all Salsoul became the first record label to make a twelve inch single available to Joe Public - the exotic format was previously only available to DJs as promotional items or bought under the counter at certain record stores. Not only that though, the extended version was created by Walter Gibbons, a DJ at New York’s Galaxy 21 who’d built his reputation making exclusive versions of tracks to play in his sets.

In 1976 it was unheard of for a DJ to set foot in a recording studio, being seen as little more than living jukeboxes by the serious music industry. Recording studios were strictly the domain of recording artists and producers so Walter found himself in a unique position, gaining access to a world no DJ had been granted before.

Or so we thought...
The Men In The Glass Booth tells the full story. Featuring ground breaking re-edits and remixes by some of the Disco era's most influential DJs including Walter Gibbons, Bobby DJ Guttadaro, Tom Savarese, Jellybean Benitez, Tee Scott and John Luongo, this opulent release also includes a 40 page book which features exclusive photos and insights from some of the story's key figures.

STAFF COMMENTS

Patrick says: BBE answer the prayers of all us non-millionaire disco fans, taking us on a journey through the alternative 12" history via this exhaustive collection of acetates and DJ edits. Mega!

“Lemon Memory” is, for Menace Beach at least, an exercise in restraint, the fuzz and distortion turned down, a big last chorus avoided. Liza explains, “The one ‘rule’ thing we went into the album session with was to keep in mind that sometimes doing The Opposite is much more interesting”. Liza takes the lead vocal as she does on much of “Lemon Memory”. Indeed, if debut LP Ratworld was Ryan’s record, “Lemon Memory” is very much a Liza record. Ryan explains “Liza got that look in the eye and a head-down-blinkers-on thing, and only a moron would try and get in the way of that. It’s all about keeping those ideas in their purest form and diluting as little as possible.”

Written in Ibiza and recorded in Sheffield with Ross Orton (MIA, Arctic Monkeys, The Fall) “Lemon Memory” is in part an effort to lift a citrus based curse – trust us, it’s a real thing - Ryan and Liza believe was placed on their house, via the hexbreaking power of music. It’s also the sound of a band finding their own identity, edging closer to some sort of grimy truth.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Dynamic swooning rock, pulsing indie anthems and pummelling breakdowns, brilliantly textured choruses, and fantastic counterpoint male/female vocals. A clever and immensely listenable tour de force of emotion and drive.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Give Blood
Maybe We'll Drown
Sentimental
Lemon Memory
Can’t Get A Haircut

Side B
Darlatoid
Suck It Out
Owl
Watch Me Boil
Hexbreaker II

Join amiina for their latest adventure, Fantomas. Originally composed as a live score to a silent masterpiece from 1913, amiina's members decided right from the start that the music would also be able to stand on its own, independent of the visual narrative. Melancholic and ethereal, yet full of suspense, pounding rhythms and haunting melodies, amiina's fans won't be disappointed.

Soundworld full of contrasts, from darkness and utter terror to heavenly melodies. The music thoughtfully composed, reorrucing themes and leid-motives build up a delicate structure where the listener can experience the piece as one entity - and then again different tracks or songs can be enjoyed independently. Violin, cello, drums, percussion, metallophone, table harp, ukulele and electronics are the source material for the sound world of amiina here, with their intelligent and imaginative usage of the different instruments and their varied and endless textures.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Another classic outing from the infinitely talented Amiina. Plucked staccato strings, beautiful violin pulls and soothing ambient textures, alongside bright and hopeful melodic phrases. Brilliant.

TRACK LISTING

Side 1

1. "Fantomas" (3:06)
2. "Juve & Fandor" (5:26)
3. "Paris" (2:47)
4. "Cafe" (3:25)

Side 2

1. "Simplon Express" (3:27)
2. "Telegram" (3:03)
3. "Entrepots De Bercy" (3:04)

Side 3

1. "Crocodile" (5:40)
2. "Lady Beltham" (4:41)

Side 4
1. "Bourreau Silencieux" (4:27)
2. "L'Homme Noir" (6:42)

2015 saw the UK’s unsung heroes of experimental art rock London based Sweet Billy Pilgrim, join the Kscope roster and release their label debut & fourth album 'Motorcade Amnesiacs' to critical media acclaim.

Following on from the release of 'Motorcade Amnesiacs', Kscope began the re-release campaign for the band’s earlier albums with their 2005 debut 'We Just Did What Happened And No One Came', 23rd September sees the release of the band’s 2009 Mercury Prize Nominated album 'Twice Born Men'.

The trio - Tim Elsenburg (singing, guitar, producer, mixing), Anthony Bishop (banjo, bass) and Alistair Hamer (sequencing, drums) caused quite a stir with their, navigating the delicate path between self-referential art rock and melodic folk rock. Their follow up in 2009 'Twice Born Men', originally released on David Sylvian’s Samadhi Sound label, saw the SundayTimes awarding it 5 Stars and CD of the Week as well as an inclusion in their Top 100 Albums of 2009.

Twice Born Men' is at heart a melodic beast complimented by the exquisite swooning shiver of Elsenburg’s vocal, ultimately, a beautiful album, which will appeal to fans of alt country and art-pop and should also be appreciated by lovers of great music everywhere.

‘Three Men And A Baby’ is the new album by Mike (Kunka, bassist / vocalist of godheadSilo) and The Melvins.

In 1998, Mike and his friends The Melvins - who at that time were King Buzzo (guitar / bass / vocals), Dale Crover (drums / vocals) and Kevin Rutmanis (bass / vocals) - started making a record at Tim (The Champs) Green’s Louder Studios. Complications occurred and the incomplete recording sat until 2015, when everyone reconvened and finished the damn thing at Sound Of Sirens in LA with Toshi Kasai.

The results are worth the wait. Mike’s signature bass crunch and vocals are all over it and The Melvins are in fine form. The album has everything from hefty noise rock churn to a Public Image Ltd. song to cough syrup blues to deconstructed black metal.

TRACK LISTING

Chicken ‘n’ Dump
Limited Teeth
Bummer Conversation
Annalisa
A Dead Pile Of Worthless Junk
Read The Label (It’s Chili)
Dead Canaries
Pound The Giants
A Friend In Need Is A Friend You Don’t Need
Lifestyle Hammer
Gravel
Art School Fight Song

When everything is post-post-post-post something older and better where do the exceptions go? When the sci-fi 20’s ‘Urban’ might as well be the atomic 50’s ‘Race’, when R&B has no blues and hiphop is a boom bip with a shorty, a hoe, it’s off to the street corner we go… where does a group like Young Fathers, who ‘pick'n'mix from the popular music sweety shop and fly no flags and swear allegiance to no country’ (© - 100 interviews with the group in 2014) - where do they go?

They have to go to the place where Beck makes a sandwich with The Beach Boys and Captain Beefheart, where Faust and The Fall tango. In Rock and Pop you are allowed to pretty much be yourself. If you are a blue and green eyed boy from Brixton with the sallowest of white skin you can become the epitome of crystalised soul, itself. It swings both ways. So… Young Fathers are breaking out of the ghetto. Fuck these constrictive selling boxes.

For the purposes of this mission, this album, this 'White Men Are Black Men Too', is rock and pop. And hip hop, too No, you don’t box in the R&B Hits 2003 generation that easily. This sticker is only for the business. The listeners can decide for themselves.

The sounds are closer on this album, closer to your ears. It sounds as if you are in the room during the recording, possibly experiencing a little existential trauma, but not enough that you don’t notice an earworm hook when you hear one. These hooks, they stay with you. ‘Is that what they mean by pop’? you ask yourself. Could be, Madonna, could be. There are less words than before. Why, for fuck’s sake? Where is the hip hop? It slides in, like a reverse version, a negative, of the hip hop blueprint of eight verses and a sweet, female wail of a hook (while comedy rapper number 6 mutters ‘uh huh, uh huh’, you know, keeping it real). But YFs lob raps into songs that morph into sung verses then back into the tune, with no respect, none! for the law.

These are grown men, battle fit and in their prime. There are no celebrations of dole queue theatre, no fake politics - there’s no need. YFs are right there in the middle of the question: what is your ID? Why claim to speak for a dispossessed white or black class or group or generation? When you can only ever speak for yourself.

When they chant ‘nigger nigger nigger’ the group are singing their enemy’s song (and you can all sing along) - it’s not a war cry, it’s the off switch, the left hand turn in the ignition, the pop-hiss of deflation. No more war, motherfucker. The tension is sexual, tuneful, it’s only fun about to kick off.

TRACK LISTING

Still Running
Shame
Feasting
27
Rain Or Shine
Sirens
Old Rock N Roll
Nest
Liberated
John Doe
Dare Me
Get Started

A1. Still Running
A2. Shame
A3. Feasting
A4. 27
A5. Rain Or Shine
A6. Sirens

B1. Old Rock N Roll
B2. Nest
B3. Liberated
B4. John Doe
B5. Dare Me
B6. Get Started

Back in the good old of days of 1990, Color Dream Games released Menace Beach for the then popular NES games console from Nintendo. Imagine skateboarding through a side-scrolling 8-bit world filled with balloons, clowns and disgruntled dockworkers in search of your cute pixilated girlfriend Bunny. It’s from this slightly surreal, esoteric world that this Leeds indie rock revolving cast of local luminaries, headed by Ryan Needham and Liza Violet, draw their name. It’s reference acts as the perfect backdrop to their 90’s American underground and pre-Brit Pop indie; melody heavy, supercharged pop that’s always surprising.

After the success of their EP ‘Lowtalker’ in early 2014, British indie label favourites Memphis Industries snapped Menace Beach up with the band’s debut album in mind. It comes in the shape of ‘Ratworld’, a twelve song assault, a journey through a psyche tinged wonderland, documenting moving away and waving goodbye to the fractured rubble of an unhappy lifestyle. On the title, Ryan says “We’ve created our own grubby little Ratworld to inhabit. Everything is better when it’s a bit grubby and broken”. It’s that dreamy sensation of taking comfort in chaos, looking around at the perfect mess you’ve created and feeling deeply content as it’s yours and no one else’s.

“Among this year's most anticipated British releases” NME
“Like the Shins back when they still had the spark of youth, but with Superchunk’s playful sass and unrestrained crunch” Stereogum

TRACK LISTING

Come On Give Up
Elastic
Drop Outs
Lowtalkin
Blue Eye
Dig It Up
Tennis Court
Ratworld
Tastes Like Medicine
Pick Out The Pieces
Infinite Donut
Fortune Teller

“The first time I heard Dan Melchior I felt betrayed that no one had turned my ear to his strange sounds before then. The LP was called Hello, I’m Dan Melchior and it starts with the line ‘I once did mushrooms with Björk…’ Goddamn, he had me at mushrooms.

“Since then, I’ve been blessed with unearthing several of his masterpieces from LP bins all around the world. Dan has made mighty and copious marks upon the world of wax. Every record is a wade through the primordial poem- brain that is Dan Melchior’s creative force.

“What we have here is a fabulous collection of classic Melchior und das Menace. We asked, he let us dig through the archive, and lo and behold: Hunger, a grip of unreleased Melchior gold. It will take less than ten seconds for the high to kick in after the rush of greasy guitars consume you at the get-go of ‘A Wizard Doesn’t Need a Computer.’ And yes, he’s taking the piss. “I’ve also been lucky enough to do some touring with him and his lovely wife and co-conspirator Letha. They may be the only white cats I know who don’t look weird in dashikis. I wish I was kidding…quite comely. Letha has been duking it out with a heavy illness, and although strong as ever, the bills are piling up and they could always use a hand. A portion of the proceeds from the sales of this record will go to aid them in this fight. Here’s a link to the website, should you feel the urge to donate otherwise: http://melchiorfund. blogspot.com/

“So please dig in with open ears and hearts. Let Dan melt your brains as he has ours at Castle Face.” - John Dwyer.

Fear Of Men was born when Jess Weiss (vocal/guitar) had been writing and home recording ambient songs as soundtracks to short films and Daniel Falvey (guitar) attended an exhibition of her work. The two began swapping mix-tapes and started a project based on a shared love of melody and an eclectic mix of artists such as Grouper, Pixies and Daniel Johnston. After several sold-out 7"s on small UK labels, the band have recently announced their debut album, 'Loom', to be released this April. The first single 'Luna' is set for release as a flexi-zine - a 20 page booklet curated by the band accompanied by a 5" flexidisc with exclusive b-side 'Outrun Me'

The Men's new LP for Sacred Bones is the tongue-in-cheek-but-still-auspiciously-titled Tomorrow's Hits. This is their first album recorded in a high-end studio and, appropriately, the result is their most high fidelity album to date. That being said, it is still an incredibly straightforward record. Tomorrow's Hits is a concise collection of songs that nonetheless expands the band's ever-evolving musical palette. It's an album full of genre-bending risks, but it reinforces the overarching theme that has come to define its makers: The Men are a great rock band. After spending much of 2011 and 2012 on the road, including a trip upstate to write and record New Moon, their fourth full-length in as many years, The Men needed a break. They decided to take the winter of 2012 off to work on new material in Brooklyn. The converted founding member Mark Perro’s bedroom in Bushwick into a practice space and rehearsed there nearly every day for three months, cutting more than 40 demos. By the end of that winter, the Men had pared that crop of songs down to 13. With their plans to take a break foiled by their own work ethic, they decided to record those songs before New Moon came out. They booked two days at Brooklyn’s Strange Weather studios, clocked in, and tracked all 13 songs entirely live, even including a horn section.

Eight songs from those sessions made the final cut for The Men’s new LP, Tomorrow’s Hits. This is their first album recorded in a high-end studio and, appropriately, the result is their most high fidelity album to date. That being said, it is still an incredibly straightforward record. Tomorrow’s Hits is a concise collection of songs that nonetheless expands the band’s ever-evolving musical palette. It’s full of genre-bending risks, but it reinforces the overarching theme that has come to define its makers: The Men are a great rock band.

TRACK LISTING

1. Dark Waltz (5:15)
2. Get What You Give (3:22)
3. Another Night (5:30)
4. Different Days (4:33)
5. Sleepless (3:13)
6. Pearly Gates (6:19)
7. Settle Me Down (4:59)
8. Going Down (3:43)

"These shows will astonish you. I had tears of joy in my eyes". This was the standout line from a Five Star review by The Guardian newspaper of the live shows by The Magic Band - a collection of extraordinary musicians drawn from the lineups that were brought together over the years by the legendary Captain Beefheart. Tribute bands and ghost bands are usually a decidedly poor relation to the real thing, but The Magic Band are different, as the tracks on this album prove. Recorded at the UK shows during 2004, the material bursts with new life, and the band achieve a near-impossible task - not just playing the notes as they are on the records (hard enough in itself in some cases) but playing them convincingly enough to send a sold-out London audience into ovation after ovation. These are the players who were inducted into the Captain's secret musical universe, and who transformed his unique ideas into works of unfathomable and inimitable beauty, and live in 2005 they did that same thing again.

Of Monsters and Men began as the solo project of Nanna Bryndís Hilmarsdóttir however it quickly grew with the additions of friends Ragnar “Raggi” Þórhallsson (co-singer/guitarist), Brynjar Leifsson (guitarist), Arnar Rósenkranz Hilmarsson (drummer), Árni Guðjónsson (piano/accordion player) and Kristján Páll Kristjánsson (bassist)

Crafting epic songs inspired by their amazing homeland, fairy tales and personal history, the band went from battle of the bands winners to the breakthrough act at this year’s Iceland Airwaves and SXSW festival. The bands self-released, first single ‘Little Talks’ to date has sold an impressive 400,000 copies and received 3 million views on YouTube.

Of Monsters and Men continue to make waves among fans and tastemakers alike. ‘My Head is an Animal’ has already enjoyed huge success in Iceland and Europe. Mirroring that feat in America ‘My Head is an Animal’ entered the iTunes alternative chart at #1 and album chart at #2 however went on to top the album charts one week later. And in Germany the album debuted at #4 on their official album chart.

Along with a penchant for crafting rising epic pop numbers ‘My Head is an Animal’ has beautifully delicate moments and signal a fully-fledged band destined to win the hearts of musical lovers worldwide.

STAFF COMMENTS

Ryan says: A stern bit of icelandic pop right here, it's a bit folky but they manage to turn humble folk into a collection of sing-out-loud anthems. It's brilliant!

TRACK LISTING

1. Dirty Paws
2. King And Lionheart
3.Mountain Sound
Slow And Steady
5.From Finner
6. Little Talks
7. Six Weeks
8. Love Love Love
9. Your Bones
10. Sloom
11. Lakehouse
12. Yellow Light

Having made a name for themselves over the last few years as avant-garde, forward thinking producers who set trends instead of following, Instra:mental lay down a full length album showcasing where their productions are at now rather than being a summary of where they’ve come from.

Tracks like "Aggro Acid" and "Talkin Mono" give us crude analogue acid modulation at its rawest that twists and gurgles across the sound spectrum with mesmeric manipulation, whilst others such as "Memory Implant", "Waterfall" and "Plok" take us deep into synth arrangements that have become synonymous with their name. Alex Green and Damon Kirkham have studied every avenue to seek out new and interesting possibilities for originality within a tempo range, with most of this album focused on the 120-140 bpm range. They take elements of eras gone by and revitalise them with the use of old skool equipment mixed with modern production techniques. As usual their impressive hoard of vintage hardware plays an integral part in their characteristic sound. Whether it be techno, acid house, dubstep, drum & bass or electro that they turn their hand to, the Instra:mental sound shines through and makes genre irrelevant.

TRACK LISTING

CD TRacklisting:
1. Sun Rec
2. User
3. 8
4. Waterfalls
5. Aggro Acid
6. Arc
7. Love Arp
8. Thomp
9. Talkin’ Mono
10. Rift Zone
11. Plok
12. Delta Zone (Advance)
13. Memory Implant

LP Tracklisting
A. 8
B. Talkin Mono
C. Rift Zone
D. Aggro Acid
E. Delta Zone (Advance)
F. User

Men, the Brooklyn-based band & art/performance collective, consists of core members JD Samson (Le Tigre), Michael O'Neil (Ladybug Transistor) & Ginger Brooks Takahashi (LTTR). This is their debut album release on IAMSOUND, via Columbia Records. The band focus on the raw energy of live performance & the radical potential of dance music. Musical styles merge between guitar-laden dance-floor funk & funky electronica, with a lyrical bite!

Originally released in 1987, "Sex Bomb Baby" is actually a collection of Flipper material dated no later than 1982, comprised of singles, B-sides, and compilation tracks. The single version of "Sex Bomb" is an all-out classic, a frenetic, yelping punk answer to "Louie, Louie" and the rest is no slouch either - outrageous, harsh, sludge-punk from San Francisco's finest.

Joanna's music has more of an affinity with the folk revival of the 60s, or the bluegrass movement at present, than with most contemporary 'folk' (or 'anti-folk') scenes. Her harp arrangements are at times ethereal and delicate, at others galloping and ornate, but never overwrought.

One of the great collaborations of our times, as legendary 60s garage pioneers The Downliners Sect meet with Thee Headcoats, Thee Headcoats Sect is the inevitable intersection of two generations of mad-hatted punk R&B misfits with musical and philosophical lineage that can be traced back over more than 30 years. They were among the country's foremost rhythm and blues groups, their most prolific period being the years from 1964 to 1966. As is often the case, they were denied the sort of success they deserved - they were outcasts, too young, too uncouth, and just a tad too eccentric to be accepted by their peers. As the Melody Maker said of their debut album in 1964 'Forget this one if you want a Happy Christmas, and don't want to drive all the guests away from your party'. Today, however, to fans of raw, vital punk R&B, Thee Downliners Sect are revered above and beyond any of their tamer, more famous UK beat contemporaries.

His third album released in 1969, this saw Buckley really spreading his wings and incorporating more jazzy elements into the sound. The album featured just six tracks, many of them lengthy and evolving opuses of passion and pain, but there was now more depth and space to his music which complemented his amazing vocal range to complete perfection.

This album consists of two new versions of "In Menstrual Night", remixed by Steve Stapleton at Colin Potter's IC Studios in March 2003. These pieces were used as the introductory music for Current 93's two performances at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco on May 9 and 10 2003.

Brooding guitar tracks, built around a darkly textured rhthym section, strangely beautiful piano and topped with sung / slurred harmonized vocals.