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THE EX

The Ex

Dignity Of Labour - Reissue

    Originally released as a 4x7" box in 1983.

    First time on vinyl LP.

    With all original artwork, A2 poster and 16- page photo-booklet.

    "This package continues the dance of the dispossessed, with a thick atmospheric reconstruction of a factory’s death... The ultimate urban blues, a soundtrack that sounds like a manic collision between Neubauten and the Gang Of Four.Hammer hard beats with an ever present human touch throb along mechanically. Man and machine in perfect harmony you might say..”

    Karl Hector And The Malcouns

    Non Ex Orbis

      Kraut-jazz-rock produced by JJ Whitefield (Poets of Rhythm/Whitefield Brothers). The long-standing band’s third album. Featuring Marja Burchard (Embryo). Download card for WAV files included. It’s been over ten years since Karl Hector and the Malcouns’ Sahara Swing saw release on Now-Again in 2008. The album swung with influences from across the African diaspora and set the stage for a cult, but influential following. Hermes designer Christophe Lemaire picked tracks from Karl Hector and The Malcouns as amongst his favorites in the Now-Again catalog, and included them on his Where Are You From anthology. Festival promoters intrigued by the possibility of resurrecting the careers of once forgotten African mavericks – from Ghana’s Ebo Taylor to the progenitors of Zambia’s Zamrock scene – brought Hector and crew across Europe playing festivals for ecstatic fans.

      Producer JJ Whitefield even founded an Afro-Rock band, Johnny!, with Taylor’s son Henry. Unstraight Ahead, their sophomore release from 2014, found the band exploring territories even outside of the expansive scope of Sahara Swing: West African sounds of Ghana and Mali met the East African sounds of Mulatu Astatke’s Ethiopian jazz, tied together with the groove heavy experimentalism of The Malcouns’ 70s Krautrock godfathers: Can, of course, but also more obscure and equally adventurous groups like Agitation Free, Ibliss and Tomorrow’s Gift. “We look to Middle Eastern funk and psychedelic fusions, and to various ethnic records for sound and phrasing,” Whitefield stated at the time of Unstraight Ahead’s release. “We’re trying to combine the global experimentalism of Krautrock with the backbeat of funk.” Non Ex Orbis, the band’s third studio album, digs deeper into the Krautrock history embedded deep in the soil of their native Munch - three of the most influential bands of the 1970s experimental German rock scene spurng from there: Amon Düül, Popol Vuh and Embryo.

      Influenced by these musical heroes, Whitefield shapes a sound that takes the experimental approach of the classic Krautrock era and slides between beat-heavy drone and spacey, prog-rock suites. Marja Burchard, daughter of Embryo mastermind Christian Burchard, fronts the group on keyboard, vibraphone and other-worldly vocals. Al Markovic joins longstanding Malcoun Zdenko Curilija to round out the ensemble. Non Ex Orbis, read by Whitefield and the band as Out Of This World, symbolizes an innocent way of composing and improvising music, free from the influences of our contemporary environment, preserving a childlike way of hearing sounds in their unfiltered purity. “Some will classify this as a retro, but for the band it simply is a form of creating, Whitefield states. “We’re drawing from an established musical vocabulary which was popular at a time in Germany, when underground musical culture had its creative peak”. 

      TRACK LISTING

      A1. Non Ex Orbis
      A2. Crawling Through Your Mind
      A3. Hymnin5 (Extended)
      A4. Stossgebet
      B1. Asteroid
      B2. Inhale / Exhale
      B3. Mother Seletta
      B4. Dekagon

      The Duke Spirit

      Sky Is Mine

        Following 2016's acclaimed album KIN and EP Serenade, The Duke Spirit march on with poignant new album Sky Is Mine. Produced by the band themselves, and mixed by Bruno Ellingham (Massive Attack), it also features guest vocals by long time friends Josh T Pearson (Lift to Experience) on the woozy How Could, How Come, and Duke Garwood on album closer Broken Dream. Each song approaches, revises, steps back and looks for humanity on a planetary scale. From the shimmering melodies and prodigious power of tracks like ‘Magenta’ and ‘See Power’ to the energy-fuelled psychedelic rock of ‘Houses’ and ‘Yoyo’, the album flows with a dark, beguiling grandeur with the majestic allure of Liela Moss’ crystal vocals. Sky Is Mine looks at Harm, Control and Lack of love but burns through it to find the essential human heart. Talking about the inspiration behind the album, front-woman Liela Moss explains: “With feet cold and wet from standing in the sludgy shit of rhetoric, illegitimacy and fear that is the world we tread upon, the album snapshots a palpitating love that bursts with, and values, Life. Half-finished sentences, which describe shards of arrogance, egomania and cruelty are dissolved by being pissed on from a great height with a stream of golden, glowing benevolence."

        STAFF COMMENTS

        Barry says: Haunting reverbed guitars and swooning synths are laid out into languid carpets of sound before being joined by the unearthly, mesmerising vocals of Liela Moss. Like the best instrumental affectations of stunning post-rock but joined by the soaring majesty of a good vocal line. Brilliant.

        “In the year of the snitch, there are forces beyond your control that keep you up at night. Ghost notions that swirl around your room while you sleep. Your own pillow laughing right in your face while you fight for an hour of rest. Voices whisper from the corner, telling you everything you never wanted to hear. Negative Growth, our third album, is dedicated to fear and deception. “This collection of songs was conceived in Memphis and finalized in Los Angeles, with the help of our family doctor Ty Segall. It was created in February 2016, when we traded Memphis misery for a week of California sunshine. Negative Growth is a nine-track nightmare, a death trip in the crystal ship. The institution known as In The Red Records will do the honors. The Hollywood Heat Seeker takes ten years off your life.” - Chris Shaw of Ex-Cult.

        TRACK LISTING

        1. Mr. Investigator
        2. Attention Ritual
        3. Let You In
        4. Government Birdcage
        5. Dogs Roll In
        6. Panic In Pig Park
        7. Hollywood Heatseeker
        8. Nightmare Zone
        9. New Face On

        The London 4-piece return with an album brimming with new sounds amid a vibrant energy, flecked with sublimely delicate, intimate spaces and recorded by Simon Raymonde (Bella Union / Cocteau Twins).

        At the core is a deep respect for the frailty of life and the nobility that can be observed in death. Sonar, a highly emotional Liela Moss vocal, delivers a poignant goodbye to a loved one, framed by a magnificent circular guitar hook around which organs, bass and drums carry prayer and eulogy. There are some maverick guest appearances throughout the record, Mark Lanegan, Raymonde himself, longterm TDS collaborator Terry Edwards (PJ Harvey/Gallon Drunk) and old friend Sam Windett from Archie Bronson Outfit is here also to duet with Liela on the wiry post-punk vibes of Side By Side.

        One of the many standouts on the album is Pacific, a hyper vigilant and introspective tale of travel and self-discovery, of the realisation that often silence is a better way to communicate than with words. Adding to the tension, a force that pulls you in deep throughout the album, is a beautiful melody at the start of the song played on the saw by Mara Carlyle who also lends her effortlessly fluid voice to this and Sonar.

        Despite these cameos, this is about The Duke Spirit, who in ten glorious songs, have resurfaced effortlessly and quietly, with one of the most exhilarating albums of this year.

        TRACK LISTING

        1. Blue And Yellow Light
        2. Sonar
        3. Wounded Wing
        4. Hands
        5. Here Comes The Vapour
        6. Pacific
        7. Anola
        8. Side By Side
        9. 100 Horses Run
        10. Follow

        The Ex

        Dizzy Spells

          Latest offering from Amsterdam's experimental anarcho-punk legends. This one is engineered by Steve Albini who stamps his authority and sound all over this release.


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