More than 20 years in the making, this December finally sees the release of i/o, Peter Gabriel’s first album of new material since 2002’s Up.

During 2023, Peter has been releasing a new song from the album on the occasion of every full moon. Being revealed roughly every four weeks, each track has been allowed to find its own time and space, to enjoy its own orbit. “It’s a little like getting a Lego piece each month,” Peter explains. Now it’s time to stand back and admire the final, completed creation.

And what a creation – 12 tracks of grace, gravity and great beauty that provide welcome confirmation of not only Peter’s ongoing ability to write stop-you-in-your-tracks songs but also of that thrilling voice, still perfectly, delightfully intact. Throughout the album the intelligent and thoughtful – often thought-provoking – songs tackle life and the universe. Our connection to the world around us – ‘I’m just a part of everything’ Peter sings on title track i/o – is a recurring motif, but so too the passing of time, mortality and grief, alongside such themes as injustice, surveillance and the roots of terrorism. But this is not a solemn record. While reflective, the mood is never despondent; i/o is musically adventurous, often joyous and ultimately full of hope, topped off as it is, by the rousingly optimistic closing song, Live and Let Live.

Always looking to push the boundaries, i/o is not simply a collection of a dozen songs. All 12 tracks are subject to two stereo mixes: the Bright-Side Mix, handled by Mark ‘Spike’ Stent, and the Dark-Side Mix, as reshaped by Tchad Blake. “We have two of the greatest mixers in the world in Tchad and Spike and they definitely bring different characters to the songs. Tchad is very much a sculptor building a journey with sound and drama, Spike loves sound and assembling these pictures, so he’s more of a painter.” Both versions are included on the double-CD package, and are also available separately as double vinyl albums. And that’s not all. A third version – the In-Side Mix, in Dolby Atmos, comes courtesy of Hans-Martin Buff “doing a wonderful job generating these much more three-dimensional mixes” and is included in three-disc set, including Blu-ray.

Peter has kept his trusty inner circle of musicians close to hand, which means guitarist David Rhodes, bassist Tony Levin and drummer Manu Katché are sterling presences throughout. Several songs bear the fingerprints of long-time associate Brian Eno, whilst there are notable contributions from the likes of Richard Russell, pianist Tom Cawley, trumpeters Josh Shpak and Paolo Fresu, cellist Linnea Olsson and keyboard player Don E. Peter’s daughter Melanie contributes warm backing vocals, as does Ríoghnach Connolly of The Breath. Soweto Gospel Choir and Swedish all-male choir Oprhei Drängar lend their magnificent harmonies and the mass strings of the New Blood Orchestra, led by John Metcalfe, both soothe and soar.

Peter has also invited a range of visual artists to contribute a piece of art to accompany each track. The dozen artists make an exceedingly impressive team of collaborators: Ai Weiwei, Nick Cave, Olafur Eliasson, Henry Hudson, Annette Messager, Antony Micallef, David Moreno, Cornelia Parker, Megan Rooney, Tim Shaw, David Spriggs and Barthélémy Toguo. Having handpicked the artists, Peter recognises that “They have the same obsessive attention to their visual work that we musicians have in sound.”

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: I don't get why everyone is going on about it, it's only been 30 years and the result more than makes up for the *slightly* longer gestation time of I/O. It's a wonderfully rich, beautifully refined work that sings with influence from all of Gabriel's work since he started recording it, and coming together beautifully despite it's disparate elements.

TRACK LISTING

CD Tracklisting:
CD1 – Bright-Side Mix
1 Panopticom
2 The Court
3 Playing For Time
4 I/o
5 Four Kinds Of Horses
6 Road To Joy
7 So Much
8 Olive Tree
9 Love Can Heal
10 This Is Home
11 And Still
12 Live And Let Live

CD2 – Dark-Side Mix
1 Panopticom
2 The Court
3 Playing For Time
4 I/o
5 Four Kinds Of Horses
6 Road To Joy
7 So Much
8 Olive Tree
9 Love Can Heal
10 This Is Home
11 And Still
12 Live And Let Live

Blu-Ray – In-Side Mix (Dolby Atmos)
1 Panopticom
2 The Court
3 Playing For Time
4 I/o
5 Four Kinds Of Horses
6 Road To Joy
7 So Much
8 Olive Tree
9 Love Can Heal
10 This Is Home
11 And Still
12 Live And Let Live

Vinyl Tracklisting:
Bright-Side Mix & Dark-Side Mix
Side A
1 Panopticom
2 Playing For Time
3 The Court
Side B
4 Four Kinds Of Horses
5 I/o
6 Love Can Heal
Side C
7 Road To Joy
8 So Much
9 Olive Tree
Side D
10 This Is Home
11 And Still
12 Live And Let Live

Les Amazones d’Afrique is a creative force that embraces international voices; sweet, strong harmonies that summon the rights of women and girls; and a meltdown of heritage and new gen talent. They were formed in Bamako, Mali, in 2014 by three renowned Malian music stars and social change activists, Mamani Keïta, Oumou Sangaré and Mariam Doumbia, and the collective has since expanded to involve many female artists from across Africa and the diaspora.

While their cause — campaigning for gender equality and eradicating ancestral violence — is worthy enough in itself, their musical creative expression is equally powerful. Richly melodic and far-ranging, it blends pan-African styles and collaborative harmonies with gritty, contemporary pop. Following two successful albums produced by Congotronix innovator Doctor L, the band have worked with renowned pop producer Jacknife Lee (U2, Taylor Swift, Modest Mouse) to present a totally fresh new sound on their third album Musow Danse, which draws inspiration from hip-hop, trap, and electronic music.

TRACK LISTING

1. Musow Danse (Women’s Danse)
2. Mother Murakoze (feat. Alvie Bitemo)
3. Flaws (feat. Mamani Keïta)
4. Kiss Me (feat. Dobet Ghanoré)
5. Kuma Fo (What They Say)
6. Espérance (feat. Mamani Keïta)
7. To Be Loved (feat. Kandy Guira)
8. Queen Kuruma (feat. Fafa Ruffino)
9. Bobo Me (interlude) [feat. Nneka]
10. Amahoro (Don’t Be Angry) [feat. Alvie Bitemo]
11. My Place (feat. Dobet Ghanoré)
12. Bobo Me (feat. Nneka & Mamani Keïta)

The Room is a collection of folkloric pieces from various regions around South America, as interpreted by Fabiano do Nascimento and Sam Gendel, on 7-string nylon guitar and soprano saxophone, respectively. Presented with purity and focus, soaring and lamenting, this album presents a unique journey through lesser-known musical landscapes and traditions stretching from Argentina to the Amazon.

Sam Gendal, the Californian saxophonist – perhaps best-known for his thoughtful collaborations with Moses Sumney and bassist Sam Wilkes – has long been honing slippery improvisations, pitch-bending his harmonies and sliding over rhythms. The ambient-jazz musician offers unpredictable, impressionistic takes on R&B hits from the '90s and early '00s, tackling songs by Beyoncé, Aaliyah, and Erykah Badu. Sam Gendel's ascension to beloved ambient-jazz savant has been fuelled, in part, by the inexhaustibility of his output.

Fabiano is a Rio de Janeiro-born, LA-based multi-string guitarist, composer and producer who has developed his own sound that is ever-expansive, sometimes called retro-futuristic brazilian music, borrowing from the traditions of samba and choro while echoing elements of modern jazz, experimental & electronic.

TRACK LISTING

1. Foi Boto
2. Capricho
3. Astral Flowers
4. Kewere
5. Cores
6. Txera
7. Até De Manhã
8. Poeira
9. Tupi
10. Daiana

Dub No Frontiers is inspired by and features female vocalists that Adrian Sherwood and the On-U Sound label knew from the UK or had met while travelling around the world. Many of the singers said they felt the dub and reggae arena was a bit of a male preserve and a little intimidating even, so Sherwood decided to invite artistes to perform a song of their choice, all in non-English on his rhythm tracks. Vocalists include Likkle Mai (singing in Japanese), Rita Morar (Hindi), Kerieva (Romani), Neyssatou (Arabic) & Yehaiyahan (Chinese).

The album is dedicated to the memory of both Ariane ‘Ari Up’ Forster and Lincoln Valentine ‘Style’ Scott with whom the project started.

Peter Harris’s cover painting of Afeni Shakur Davis sets the visual tone of the record and both the LP and CD come with a 12-page booklet featuring more of his paintings of inspiring women from the world of literature, politics, law, civil rights and medicine, such as Claudia Jones, Flo Kennedy, Barbara Jordan, Claudette Colvin and Mary Seacole.

TRACK LISTING

1. Yehaiyahan — Love Hurts [3:11]
2. Likkle Mai — Haste Makes Waste [4:12]
3. Rita Morar — Meri Awaaz Suno (Hear My Voice) [3:15]
4. In Temi Oyedele — I Dupe (Thanks Giving) [4:21]
5. Neyssatou — War [4:15]
6. Maria Wenda — Okama Werek Halok [3:42]
7. Kerieva — Chavale [3:52]
8. JaGodDa — Krysztalowy Aniol (Crystal Angel) [3:57]
9. Saba Tewelde — Semarulay Daqey [2:36]
10. Nadya Ostroff DR.NO — Little Cosmonaut [4:31]

Portico Quartet have defied categorisation over the course of six studio albums. From their 2007 Mercury Music Prize nominated breakthrough ‘Knee-Deep in the North Sea’ through to the longform minimalist inspired ‘Terrain’ and recent electronic driven album ‘Monument’. The band’s precisely sculpted ideas combine human touch with electronic efficiency, delivering acclaimed widescreen minimalism. The third, self-titled, album from Portico Quartet was originally released on 30 January 2012 and saw the band embracing new sonic territories.

This 10th anniversary re-release sees the album newly remastered for vinyl and cut across three sides (the fourth is an etching) by John Davis at Metropolis, with silver foiled sleeve designs and a 12-page 12” booklet of black and white photography from the recording period. There’s a choice of either black or colour vinyl, both with silver foiled sleeve designs and a 12-page 12” booklet of black and white photography from the recording period.

Also included in the vinyl formats is a hi-res download code for the full album and additional contemporaneous EP tracks, currently unavailable elsewhere.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Window Seat 3:18
Ruins 5:34
Spinner 4:38
Side B
Rubidium 8:44
Export For Hot Climates 1:08
Laker Boo 7:51
Side C
Steepless 3:57
4096 Colours 4:35
City Of Glass 6:36
Trace 1:53
Side D
Etching

The album has been Half-Speed Remastered and cut to lacquers at 33RPM, on 1x heavyweight black LP, to deliver maximum dynamic range in the sound.

Vinyl cut by Matt Colton at Alchemy Mastering, mastered by Tony Cousins at Metropolis. The album is true to the original LP design, but all images are newly re-scanned.

The album comes with a download card with a choice of digital download (Hi-Res 24bit or 16bit)

Recorded in 1984, and originally released in March 1985, Birdy marks the first occasion that Peter worked with French-Canadian producer and multi-instrumentalist Daniel Lanois who went onto co-produce both Peter’s So and US albums. The soundtrack to the Alan Parker movie of the same name – the tale of a Vietnam vet who harbours Icarus-like ambitions to fly – it finds Peter flexing his creative muscles free of any commercial pressures and has a number of tracks build out of elements of existing tracks from Peter’s third and fourth solo albums.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A
A1 At Night
A2 Floating Dogs
A3 Quiet And Alone
A4 Close Up (from Family Snapshot)
A5 Slow Water
A6 Dressing The Wound
SIDE B
B1 Birdy's Flight (from Not One Of Us)
B2 Slow Marimbas
B3 The Heat (from The Rhythm Of The Heat)
B4 Sketchpad With Trumpet And Voice
B5 Under Lock And Key (from Wallflower)
B6 Powerhouse At The Foot Of The Mountain (from San Jacinto)

The album has been Half-Speed Remastered and cut to lacquers at 33RPM, across 2x heavyweight black vinyl LPs, to deliver maximum dynamic range in the sound.

Vinyl cut by Matt Colton at Alchemy Mastering, mastered by Tony Cousins at Metropolis. The album is true to the original LP design with a wide-spine jacket and printed inner sleeves, but now utilises colour photographs from The Last Temptation of Christ film. All images are newly re-scanned.

The album comes with a download card with a choice of digital download (Hi-Res 24bit or 16bit).

Passion – Music for The Last Temptation of Christ was released a year after Martin Scorsese’s controversy-laden film first hit the big screen in 1988. Passion tends to be regarded as a work in its own right rather than just being a movie soundtrack. It features additional music to that which was included in the film; this extra material was the result of Peter continuing to record and to resolve “unfinished ideas”. Built on a foundation of Middle Eastern and North African rhythms and melodies, Passion is unsurprisingly Peter’s most spiritual work, no more so than when the alternately ascending voices of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Youssou N’Dour and Peter himself interweave on the title track. Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Youssou N’Dour are far from the only notable guests; the cross-continental gathering of musicians also includes Senegalese griot Baaba Maal, jazz drummer Bill Cobham and avant-garde trumpeter Jon Hassell among many others.

TRACK LISTING

LP 1
A1 The Feeling Begins
A2 Gethsemane
A3 Of These, Hope
A4 Lazarus Raised
A5 Of These, Hope - Reprise
A6 In Doubt
A7 A Different Drum
B1 Zaar
B2 Troubled
B3 Open
B4 Before Night Falls
B5 With This Love

LP 2
C1 Sandstorm
C2 Stigmata
C3 Passion
C4 With This Love – Choir
D1 Wall Of Breath
D2 The Promise Of Shadows
D3 Disturbed
D4 It Is Accomplished
D5 Bread And Wine

There are pieces of music that seek to tell us deeper stories. Others harness the talents of the players at their disposal in adventurous ways. Then there are the rare, generous works that make us think back to our roots as human beings and to our shared beginnings in the universe, that lift us in their melodies, rhythms and textures, that carry us with them.

The Unfolding is all of these things. An extraordinary eight-part collaboration between composer Hannah Peel (Mercury Prize and Emmy nominee) and Paraorchestra, it was made over three years in precious morsels of time around a global pandemic. These circumstances – unexpected when the collaboration began – add weight to its explorations in sound about who we are, where we came from, and who we could all be. The Unfolding also explores Paraorchestra’s progressive idea of what an orchestra should be, mixing analogue, digital and assistive instruments with a unique ensemble of disabled and non-disabled musicians to make magic happen, and accessible to all.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Surpassing the meditative shimmer and oscillating beauty of last years' 'Fir Wave' was never going to be easy, but this is the most strikingly beautiful piece of work I think she's ever done. Choral and otherworldly, but imbued with a levity and optimistic glimmer that Peel does so well. Mindblowing.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
A1. The Universe Before Matter [10:58]
A2. Wild Animal [3:55]
Side B
B1. Passage [5:22]
B2. The Unfolding [5:47]
Side C
C1. If After Weeks Of Early Sun [4:16]
C2. Perhaps It Made Us Happy For A Minute [4:17]
C3. We Are Part Mineral [6:06]
Side D
D1. Part Cloud [10:31]
D2. The Unfolding Credits Instrumental Version [02:19] *vinyl Exclusive Not On CD*
D3. The Unfolding Credits [02:19]

Loney dear is the singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Emil Svanängen’s idiosyncratic musical project where classic song-writing meets complex productions – both wide open and uplifting as well as sensitive and heart breaking…

Recorded by Svanángen with producer Emanuel Lundgren in a mythical studio on western Södermalm in Stockholm, ‘A Lantern and A Bell’ is Loney dear’s second album for Real World, following 2017’s self-titled release.

Maritime themes permeate across ‘A Lantern and A Bell’ - the album arrives bearing artwork depicting the international nautical flag for distress and Emil’s voice is frequently bolstered by diffused water sounds at dark low frequencies and the calls of sea birds. For those who know their Loney dear, the constant references to sea and ships are hardly something new. All that is an important part of my inner life, maybe a romantic dream of adventure, but also a phobia, a danger I cannot help but be drawn to, says Emil; Near where I live, freighters pass by every day and the sounds of their engines get into my head. And further into the music.

Speaking about Emil’s new record - on which he has consulted as a sounding board, label founder Peter Gabriel says; Sad soulful melodies that create space in your head that fill with memories dreams and tenderness. I am very proud that we are working with such a gifted songwriter. When you’re isolating, what better than to be wrapped up in these beautiful imaginative constructions - the work of a master. 

TRACK LISTING

1. Mute / All Things Pass
2. Habibi (A Clear Black Line)
3. Trifles
4. Go Easy On Me Now (Sirens + Emergencies)
5. Last Night / Centurial Procedures (the 1900s)
6. Oppenheimer
7. Darling
8. Interval / Repeat
9. A House And A Fire

Bokanté - founded by Michael League (Snarky Puppy) - is a truly global band, with players from five countries and four continents. Metropol Orkest is part jazz big band, part symphony orchestra, helmed by English conductor Jules Buckley. The message is laced throughout new album ‘What Heat’… and it is urgent. Injustice is raging all around.

For fans of Snarky Puppy, Oumou Sangaré, Buena Vista Social Club, Les Amazones d’Afrique, Anjelique Kidjo, Ghost-Note, Bill Laurence, Afro jazz.

TRACK LISTING

All The Way Home
Fanm
Lè An Gadé-w En Zyé
Réparasyons
Bòd Lanmè Pa Lwen
Don’t Do It
Chambre à Échos
La Maison En Feu

The Breath are Irish singer Rioghnach Connolly, Stuart McCallum (guitarist of The Cinematic Orchestra) and McCallum’s fellow Cinematic alumni, pianist John Ellis and drummer Luke Flowers.

Born out of Manchester’s fertile music scene they mix Irish folk influences with mesmerizing guitar riffs, anthemic themes and powerful hooks. Connolly’s soulful vocals are interwoven into the electronic fabric of McCallum’s distinctive soundworld.

In turns hypnotic, lush, powerfully raw and raucously punchy, their songs entrance, uplift and break your heart as The Breath conjure a kaleidoscope of sound that perfectly frames Connolly’s raw songs and soul cleansing vocals.

Recorded in Manchester and at Real World Studios and mixed by sound guru Tchad Blake.

Portico Quartet still sound like nothing you ever heard before. The Mercury nominated East London based outfit’s unique music has expanded to embrace new sonic territories. Drawing on the inspiration of electronica, ambient, classical and dance music as they take their strange, beautiful, cinematic, future music to exciting new vistas where the inspiration of Burial, Mount Kimbie and Flying Lotus rubs shoulders with the textures of Arve Henriksen and Bon Iver and echoes of Steve Reich and Max Richter. But all underpinned by a shared joy in collective music making as the band push their inimitable music into the future.

Produced by the band themselves and brilliantly engineered by Greg Freeman at the Fish Market studios and Real World, Portico Quartet’s eponymous third album is the sound of a band that refuses to stand still. But there are no shortcuts here, the music is played live, not pre-recorded, and the hard won collective empathy that is at the heart of their sound remains their primary touchstone. Full of mystery and drama Portico Quartet still take the listener on an unparalleled journey but where their previous album Isla was the sound of a band looking inwards, Portico Quartet find the band looking defiantly into the future.