WOW. Looks like a 1970 Prog LP. Sounds like an incredible 1973 library LP. Is actually a sublime 1977 British jazz / fusion LP.

Mythically rare British album from the late 1970s, only a handful of original copies have ever been found. This is because a 1977 British jazz album that looked like a 1970 prog album that was issued on a brand new label that didn’t know what it was really doing was never going to sell. And it didn’t. It will now though. This is a unique jazz / fusion album from the period, sounding like an incredibly hip 1973 library LP, all super funky, occasionally dark, atmospheric, and very hip indeed. Performed by a killer line up of top musicians, including the legendary Barbara Thompson. Buy this LP. You will NEVER find an original. 

Legendary privately pressed 1979 LP from Scotland. This illusive, super rare and sublimely wonderful percussion album is like no other. Hypnotic, celestial, even cosmic and ambient in parts and totally unique in all ways, it was played by a group of 11 girls with an average age of 14. The group included Evelyn Glennie, who was destined to become one of the world’s greatest percussionists. This is her first ever record.

The Cults Percussion Ensemble was a group formed by percussion teaching legend Ron Forbes in the mid 1970s. The ensemble must have one of the best group names of all time. To many it will immediately come across as something sinister, a touch spooky and possibly a bit dramatic too. They are certainly two of those but the use of the word “Cults” here is easily misinterpreted. Cults, in this case, is the suburb of Aberdeen.
The average age of the students was just 14. They came from a few of the schools in the area, including the Cults Academy, Ellon Academy, Aboyne Academy, Inverurie Academy and Powis.

My original copy of the album came from Spitalfields market in London. I loved the music the second it started, because it reminded me of Carl Orff and peculiar library. So I started to investigate it further, and eventually, thanks to the highly tuned world of percussion, was given the address of Ron Forbes. I got in touch with him and now we have this, a formal release of something quite lovely that was only previously available very briefly in 1979 at concerts when the young girls performed.

The music here is really quite unique, with a celestial swirling hypnotic quality. The blend of glockenspiels, xylophones, vibraphones, marimba and timpani drums is quite intoxicating and can recall the shimmering warmth of the desert sun one minute (“Baia”) or freezing glacial ice caps the next (“Circles”). The Ensemble perform with an effortless tightness and deftness of touch, building textured layers with recurring percussive motives which appear simultaneously dense and yet sparse, almost sounding like modern sampling. In fact, while struggling to find a musical comparison, during the pulsating introduction to "Percussion Suite" I found myself recalling "Gamma Player", a piece of soulful Detroit techno minimalism from Jeff Mills (Millsart - “Humana” EP 1995) with its rhythmic percussion layered with complex emotion. Weirdly enough, other tracks on that EP also prominently feature xylophone and tuned percussion, although obviously synthesised and programmed, a good 20 years after the CPE first recorded.
Sleevenotes also include a letter from Ron Forbes:

“I decided to form a percussion group to provide an outlet for my percussion pupils to play music specially written for them. The group soon became well known in the region and as a result of winning the outstanding award at the National Festival of Music for youth on three occasions, they were invited to play at other festivals within Europe, one being in Erlangen in Germany - hence the Erlangen Polka - and Autun in France - hence the Autun Carillon. During these visits we were often asked if we had any recordings and so it was decided to make an LP”.

Thanks to Ron Forbes and Trunk Records, more people can now enjoy the simple hypnotic musical charms of the Cults Percussion Ensemble 

TRACK LISTING

Autun Carillon
Baia
My Love She’s But A Lassie Yet
Circles
Percussion Suite (3rd Movement)
The Little Dancer
Two Jubilee Pieces
Erlangen Polka
Dream Angus
Surrey With The Fringe On Top
Irish Washerwoman
Polymers

Blood On Satan’s Claw – AKA Satan’s Skin in the USA, is a cult British horror movie from 1971. It’s a film from the golden age of British horror, and one that ticks most of the horror connoisseur’s boxes - it stars the Devil, Olde England, it has nudity, strange ritualism, a fair smattering of blood and of course, sublime music. Produced by cult masters Tigon, this film was the perfect companion piece to their earlier Witchfinder General (1968). Set in rural 17th century England, it tells the fine story of a small village that quickly falls under the devil’s spell. It’s brilliantly told and quite beautifully shot with a very fine cast of superb character actors.

Over many years the film has slowly gained a cultish reputation, and there are rumours that good old Tim Burton is a very big fan and used the movie as an influence for his “Sleepy Hollow” production.

The score was never released. Written by Marc Wilkinson, former director of music for the National Theatre, this cult soundtrack takes its lead from “The Devil’s Interval”, but more about that in the next paragraph. Musical appearances from the Ondes Martenot (the earliest electronic instrument) and Cimbalom add to the overall spookiness of this recording. And in 38 years the music has lost none of its depth or addictive, evil hooks. The first pressing sold out many years ago and commands high prices. A repress has been requested for many years.

Here’s Marc Wilkinson’s thoughts…
“The descending chromatic scale which features throughout the music omits the perfect fifth (the only true consonant in the chromatic scale) and therefore highlights the diminished fifth, which ever since the middle ages in Europe has been known as the Devil's Interval!!”

BRIEF ARTIST INFO: Marc Wilkinson was musical director of the National Theatre throughout the 1960s. He scored a number of films in the late 1960s and 1970s including “If” for Lindsay Anderson. Wilkinson currently lives in France.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE ONE
1) Fiend Discovered And Titles
2) Peter And Rosalind In Attic
3) Rosalind's Madness
4) Angel's Claw
5) Claw In Classroom
6) Judge By Fireside
7) Peter Fights Devil, Severs Hand
8) Judge Drives Off
9) Mark Alone
10) Death Of Marc
11) Angel Naked
12) Angel's First Curse
13) Angel's Second Curse
SIDE TWO
14) Return From The Graveyard
15) Return From The Graveyard
16) Kathy Crowned
17) Children Into Church
18) Kathy's Ceremony
19) Kathy's Rape And Death
20) Peter's Ride
21) Ralph Chops Tree
22) Ralph Saves Margaret
23) Margaret Escapes
24) Ralph's Wound
25) Ralph Bewitched
26) Finale And Credits
Total Running TIme: 48:28

The unreleased soundtrack from the 1970 film. Black vinyl with a random sprinkling of “office door” clear ones ie randomly packed.

OVERVIEW:
Oh my God. This is mindblowing. Like Wow. Incredible. Amazing. Breathtaking. Super wow. And wow again. And another wow. Jesus Christ wow. Like bloody hell wow. I really cannot believe it wow. 

THE MUSIC:
Unreleased until now and super duper wow. Like British pastoral jam with killer drums, bass and percussion. Just dying for some huge hip hop producer to come and piss all over it, in a good way. This record is the hidden monster, the one killer OST no one saw or heard.

TRACK LISTING

Side One:
Bartleby 1
Bartleby 2
Bartleby 3
Bartleby 4
Bartleby 5
Bartleby 6

Side Two:
Bartleby 7
Bartleby 8
Bartleby 9
Bartleby 10
Bartleby 11

Rare musical magic from the Bruton library catalogue – ambient, spacey, pastoral and electronic. Music by John Cameron, Alan Hawkshaw, Francis Monkman, Brian Bennett and more – all total masters of the scene. All very cool. All very now. All will sell very fast.

Over the last three decades Jonny Trunk has collected and written about library music. But he’s never had a great deal of luck with the Bruton catalogue. By this he means that he’s never stumbled across a massive stash, or lucked-out buying a huge run for practically nothing –that’s the kind of thing that used to happen in the 1990s and the early noughties if you were out there looking hard for library music. But he did manage to get about 25 in one hit about 20 years ago when the BBC shut down their “TV Training Department” near Lime Grove and also when a box of Brutons ended up being dumped at a hospital radio, and they didn’t want the records, so Jonny got a call.

There are lots of Bruton albums in existence – over 330 LPs in the vinyl catalogue, issued between 1978 and 1985. That’s a lot of music to wade through if you are looking for sublime modern day sounds. For many years now the “trophies” from the Bruton catalogue have been the beat or action driven LPs – the two Drama Montage albums (BRJ2 and BRJ8) have always been the big hitters, and others such as High Adventure (BRK2) too.

But Jonny has always found himself drawn to the lime green LPs, the pastoral, peaceful albums (The BRDs), which were full of the kind of gentle, lovely music that would turn up in Take Hart as Tony was painting a woodpecker or a badger or an Autumn tree. The other Brutons he likes are the orange ones (The BRIs) simply because they are full of experimental futuristic electronics and would remind him of 1980s ITV backgrounds. This LP series includes Brian Bennett’s cosmic classic Fantasia (BRI 10). Jonny has been knows to refer to this style of library music as “Krypton Factor library”, because it’s exactly what that strange but successful 1980s TV quiz show sounded like.

In recent years as interest in library music has expanded, we’ve watched
the price of a handful of Brutons really going through the roof - not the just the action and drama ones, but the more esoteric and experimental LPs too – like the BRDs and the BRIs. Jonny gets the vibe that people finally want to hear this other more interesting and experimental side of the Bruton catalogue. So what better time than now to put together a compilation of such sublime period sounds.

Not only does this album bring together a set of fabulous cues that would cost the average man in the street a month’s wages (if the originals were all wanted and if you could even track them all down), but it also chops out the need to listen to other tracks on library albums that are nowhere near as good.

The cues here all date from between 1978 and 1984. They come from the BRD, BRI, BRH, BRJ, BRM, BRR and BRs catalogues.

The composers are all legends within the genre, and here, were doing what great library composers do best – fulfilling a brief and utilising modern studio equipment to both commercial and beguiling effect. 

TRACK LISTING

SIDE ONE
Vibes - BRS 6 – Frank Ricotti 1981
Utopia Revisited - BRJ 18 – Johnny Scott 1980
Trek - BRM 9 – John Cameron 1981
Tropic 2 - BRM 9 – John Cameron 1981
Reflections - BRM 2 – Frank Reidy / Eric Allen 1978
Stargazing - BRI 2 – Francis Monkman 1978

SIDE TWO
Drifting - BRI 3 – John Cameron 1978
Dissolves - BRI 3 – Les Hurdle / Frank Ricotti 1978
Floatation - BRI 9 – John Cameron 1980
One Language - BRR 18 – Orlando Kimber / John Keliehor 1984
Saturn Rings - BRI 6 – Alan Hawkshaw 1979
Billowing Sails - BRD 20 – Steve Gray 1982
The Swan - BRD 19 – Brian Bennett 1982

Album Mastered By Jon Brooks.

Incredible follow up to the sold out Zwartjes Tapes 1, this vinyl continuation takes us deeper into the sublime world of the cult Dutch director Frans Zwartjes’ soundtrack tape archive; dream-like, disjointed, disturbing, peculiar, sexy, unexpected and totally unique.

Frans Zwartjes is famous for his art-house films (look him up on YouTube). A Dutch underground auteur, his prolific output dates from 1968. A unique talent, Zwartjes produced, directed and edited his own films (his last work was in 1991), but more importantly he created and improvised the soundtracks too. Zwartjes and his large body of work is only now being recognised by a wider, more international crowd, with screenings at the NFT and other important art-house cinemas across the world. The recordings on Tapes 2 were mixed directly from the Zwartjes soundtrack tape archive. They were assembled directly and in real time by Zwartjes archivist Stanley Schtinter and have never been issued before.

The music and sound have been put together as two long, seamless sequences; they are dreamlike, unsettling, peculiar, plugged-in, prescient and unlike any other soundtrack we have heard. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Yes you might be tricked into thinking you've bought the soundtrack to one of Mart's B/W, arthouse 'blue' movies; but post-watershed this is not! Instead it's some of the most eerily evocative, strangely compelling 'found sounds' I've heard for a while.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE ONE
The Teacher Part One

SIDE TWO
The Teacher Part Two

All Cues Mastered And Sequenced By Jon Brooks, AKA The Advisory Circle 

Originally written and released by Woody Guthrie in 1947, this cover version of “Pastures Of Plenty” by Pete Tevis – a Californian folk singer living in Rome in 1962 – was arranged by Ennio Morricone. A few years later, Sergio Leone wanted Morricone to score his up and coming western called A Fistful Of Dollars. Legend has it Morricone wrote some music, Leone hated it. Morricone then played him this old single. Leone wanted this music but with a new melody over the top. The rest is film music history.

This is the first ever repress of this hugely important single since 1962. Originals copies are mythical to say the least.

TRACK LISTING

Side One
Pastures Of Plenty

Side Two
Notte Infinita

Holy shit! If it isn’t three unheard 1960s and 1970s reels from the unreal and unreleased Basil Kirchin Tape Archive. Sublime pastoral jazz, autistic children screaming, spooky vocals, experimental tape manipulation and more from the master of such thing.

HISTORY:
The three parts of this new Basil Kirchin album come from three very different tapes from his archive. All parts were unreleased until now.

“Pat’s Pigs” actually sounds to me like a Basil bird recording, slowed and treated, mixed with simple improvisation. But it could well be pigs. Pat’s pigs. This whole tape recording may have been an early experiment towards what was to become Worlds Within Worlds Parts I and II. A lot of Basil’s work was headed in that direction.

“Electronic” – first of all this is not that electronic. There are elements of the classic Kirchin drone sound here, mixed with multiple and treated recordings of the autistic children of Schurmatt, along with Esther, his wife, singing. I remember speaking to Basil many years ago about his Schurmatt recordings. Esther worked as a nurse with the children, Basil got to know many of them, and became fascinated by the extreme musical noises they would make with their voices. This recording is not necessarily for the faint hearted, but makes for extraordinary listening, based on the fact this would have been made and mixed, simply as a classic and progressive Kirchin experiment, back in the late 1960s/ early 1970s. This also has untreated elements that would eventually contribute towards Quantum, his preferred version of the WWW concept.

“The Suspended Fourth” comes across like a soundtrack, so it could well be part of what Basil called his “imaginary film music period”. It has a very distinctive and pastoral Kirchin style leitmotif that repeats along its glorious and slightly disturbed 21 minutes. It’s very well produced, possibly built up and improvised over a few days, could well have been an experiment, a pitch or just something that had to come out in the groovy studio. The tape itself states that this is The Suspended Forth with a subtitle: “The Musical Study Of A Mind, Part 1 Schizophrenia”. It therefore could even be something to do with a soundtrack he was asked to make for a mental heath conference for psychiatrists at Earls Court in the late 1960s (see States Of Mind, JBH005LP – the British jazz musical line seems like it could well be the very same). But who knows for sure? I shall continue looking in the archive for other possible parts.

Before I go, the original title for this album and the artwork come from an empty tape box in the archive, which I think sums up all sorts of things about Basil, his awesome music and the tape archive all at the same time.

More reel discoveries will follow. Thanks for listening as always. 

TRACK LISTING

Pat’s Pigs
Electronic
The Suspended Fifth

Extraordinary unreleased homemade electronics from the late 1960s made by a pioneering ballet dancer and musician. With possibly the best name ever.

There are very few Ernest Berk recordings. As a pioneering ballet dancer, instructor and electronic music artist he was surprisingly prolific. He made music for all sorts of uses – he even made library music – and of course this very album of his music for two of his ballets.

Towards the end of his life Ernest Berk gifted his entire collection of works, tapes, documents and all to the Historical Archive Of The City Of Cologne. Tragically, in 2009, a large part of the archive collapsed (due to the construction of an underground railway) destroying 90% of the everything. Berk’s tapes have tragically never been recovered. They are assumed lost forever.

So these two recording – issued privately circa 1970 – remain precious to say the least. There were no masters, this new pressing was simply transferred from the original copy held by his family. We have done our best to restore the sound. I have also reproduced the original notes, and from what I can gather this album may well have been pressed and given away as promotion for the Dance Theatre Commune.

Ernest Berk was born in Cologne, Germany and cams to England just before the war. He started a dance company in London and wanted a sound especially suited to his experimental dance style. This he found in electronic music.

Berk feels that electronic music is able to express the feelings of contemporary society in a more potent and communicative way than conventional forms of music. This is not to say he disregards traditional forms of music, rather, he blends the best elements of both, creating a new and exciting sound.

Over the years he has gained an international reputation as a composer of electronic music. His works have been heard in Berlin, Cologne, Florence, Edinburgh, United States, to name a few. He has scored a number of films, plays and ballets. Ernest and his wife, Ailsa, opened a new studio at 52 Dorset St, W1, in April, 1970 where they give tuition in modern dance, electronic music and percussion. They also teach at the Guildhall School Of Music And Drama and at ILEA Institute (Stanhope). The studio is headquarters of the Dance Theatre Commune which the Berks created in order to combine their work in dance and music with those already working in similar spheres. 

TRACK LISTING

SIDE ONE
INITIATION
A Ballet Score: The Theme Of The Ballet Is Modern Youth And Its Ritualistsic Behavior. One Has To Be “initiated” In Order To Belong. The Subtitles Of The Eleven Scenes May Give A Helpful Guideline:
1) Arrival And Setting Of The Scene
2) The Girls Alone, Giggly And Immature
3) The Scare
4) Passionate Whip
5) Undercurrents
6) Tittilation
7) Phallic Symbol
8) Song Of The Adulated Star
9) Adoration Madness
10) The Body
11) The Sacrifice And Final Initiation

SIDE TWO
GEMINI
A Ballet Score: Identical Twins Are So Much Out Of One Mould That They Experience Transference Of Sense, Perception And Emotion. A Young Man Meets One Of The Girls And Falls In Love, Unaware Of The Twin Sister. The Great Love Duet Show The Young Man Dancing With One And Sometime The Other Without Knowing There Are Two. Later, He Surprises Them Together And Finds Himself In Love With Both. So They All Live Together In Great Bliss And Fun Until The Day Comes When One Of The Sisters Dies. Her Surviving Sister Feels Like The Dead. The Young Man Cannot Lopve One Without The Other. They Part Inconsolably

THIS IS A RECORD STORE DAY 2019 EXCLUSIVE, LIMITED TO ONE PER PERSON.

Worlds Within Worlds (Part I and II) is one of the most important improvised jazz-based recordings of all time. Released in 1971 it sold just a handful of copies, but has become a keystone in the development of experimental and ambient sounds - originals now fetch £1000+.A perfect released for RSD, this will be the first time this exceptional, unique and highly desirable record has been repressed. Built up using layers of treated and slowed field recordings with Derek Bailey and Evan Parker improvising, WWW offers listeners a mesmerizing sonic experience that remains years ahead of its time. This pressing features a new gatefold sleeve (Kirchin hated the original sleeve), with images of Kirchin, his original field recording tapes and notes by WWW fan Thurston Moore. There are just 1500 being pressed with 250 on gold vinyl, which will be mixed randomly in with the 1250 black versions. There will be no way of telling which colour is which as all LPs will be sealed. The LP will not be repressed. Tracklist:Side One - Part One - Integration (Non-Racial)Side Two - Part Two - The Human Element

Out of print since 2001, a classic trunk records release gets a rare repress. Naïve and pastoral space music at its very best!

As a TV obsessed child, the Clangers was my favourite programme on the box, so you can imagine how excited I was when this came in!

What an unbelievable recording. The entire unreleased score for the entire Clangers TV series - that's music for all 26 episodes. It grows organically (as does the series) from small and simple phrases to complex passages of pure pastoral space music. It all climaxes with the awesome "Harmony Of The Spheres". The running order is exactly as it ran with all 26 episodes and includes some SFX, Tiny Clanger and Oliver Postgate's timeless introduction. This CD also comes with the unique and sweet "Clangers Opera" compiled by Oliver Postgate, an adventure on the Clangers planet starring the Iron Chicken. The CD booklet includes rare photos, early Clangers Sketches and a Libretto for the Clangers Opera written by Oliver Postgate. 

Volume five of the killer Britxotica! series, looking this time at 16 super rare and briliantly bonkers latin and percussive pop cues from the wild British Isles!

Britxotica! (pronounced “Britzotica”) neatly describes an odd and yet undocumented pre-Beatles British musical scene where famed UK composers as well as unknown singers and bandleaders threw convention on holiday and went wild wild wild! Put together by Jonny Trunk with DJ / tastemaker and Smashing nighclub legend Martin Green, these groundbreaking new compilations shine new light on lost and forgotten corners of British culture and sound.

For this, Part Five of our planned Britxotica! series we head to lively latin tinged dancefloors where Brits could cha cha cha to the KIrchin band, “Jump In The Line” with Frank Holder and Mambo with Ido or Don. This killer collection of British dance obscurities brings us lively sounds from the rarest UK record bins, including this time an amazing cover version of the legendary loungecore hit “House Of Bamboo” plus the stunning “Jonny One Note” by Ted Heath, the track that originally introduced John Craven’s Newsround. To sum up, this is another exciting, wild and occasionally bonkers compilation by Jonny Trunk and Martin Green, two of the UKs most wild record collectors. Also, there are men in underpants on the sleeve, What’s not to like?

TRACK LISTING

SIDE ONE
1 The High Life – Marion Ryan
2 Vamos – A – Baila - Chico Arnez
3 Jonny One Note – Ted Heath
4 Wimoweh – Eve Boswell
5 House Of Bamboo – Neville Taylor
6 Baia – Tony Scott
7 Jump In The Line – Frank Holder
8 Mambo For Latin Lovers – Ido Martin

SIDE TWO
9 Fanagalo – Frank Chacksfield Ft Frank Holder
10 Taboo – Charles Blackwell
11 Voom-va- Voom – Eve Boswell
12 Crazy Latin – Don Carlos
13 Vaba -Ba - Boom – Edmundo Ros
14 Boliviana – Victor Silvester
15 Don's Mambo – Don Carlos
16 The High Life – Basil And Ivor Kirchin Ft Toni Sharpe

All Cues Mastered And Sequenced By Jon Brooks, AKA The Advisory Circle

Another superb adventure in the Britxotica! series, looking into rare and amazing exotic British recordings. For this exciting installment we waltz to the British ballrooms for charismatic Cha Cha Chas, magical mambos and a whole set of floor filling fun!

Britxotica! (pronounced “Britzotica”) neatly describes an odd and yet undocumented pre-Beatles British musical scene where famed UK composers as well as unknown singers and bandleaders threw convention on holiday and went wild wild wild! Put together by Jonny Trunk with DJ / tastemaker and Smashing nighclub legend Martin Green, these groundbreaking new compilations shine new light on lost and forgotten corners of British culture and sound.

For this, Part Four of our planned Britxotica! series we head to the now defunct British ballrooms for a set of dynamic and often extraordinary dance numbers - charming cha cha chas (including “Cha Cha Pop Pop”), lively latin and some fabulously freaky footappers including a classic version of “Cerveza”. Composers and artists include ballroom band legends such as Edmundo Ros, Ted heath and Stanley Black, but also we have found work by lost geniuses such as John Graven and John Warren who are very much worthy or reappraisal.

In short, this is another crazy and charismatic compilation of British music so obscure and rare that only Trunk Records could find and package it so superbly and with such effortless and comedic style.

This is the first time his extraordinary music has been released. CD in jewel case with large 16 page booklet, full colour rare photos, essay by Will Fowler. Compiles tracks from the ' Volume One' and' Volume 2' LPs.

Bruce Lacey is the quintessential British eccentric. Bruce Lacey is an artist, a musician, a filmmaker, a shaman, a genius and visionary. Since the 1950s he’s made film, music, art and performances, and collaborated with everyone from the Beatles to Throbbing Gristle.

He was part of the groundbreaking Cybernetic Serendipity exhibition in 1968. He even built a robot that won the Alternative Miss World.

Made and recorded using household objects as well as a modified synthesizer (made by a schoolboy in the early 1970s), it ranges from abstract tribal concrete to droning electronic trance. The music will be released across two separate LPs and one CD. Included will be a fine essay about the history of this inspiring figure by BFI / Flipside archivist Will Fowler.

Bruce Lacey has been a busy man. Since the 1950s he’s been making film, making music, making art, sculpture, rituals, performances and more besides. Many of his films have explored the basics of life and sex all with a sprinkle of irony, realism and ritualism. Many of his films have required music, music which Lacey made himself, improvising with bottles, rattles, typewriters and a tape machine.

By the early 1970s Lacey was exploring stone circles and ancient rights; he’d also bought a home-made synthesiser from a schoolboy who’d advertised it in Exchange & Mart. He’d made it as a home project. A week later Lacey bought a keyboard from another schoolboy in Exchange & Mart. Lacey set about slowly modifying this synth and improvising music influenced by his stone circle visits over the next few years.

This music is made only when “The Muse” descends. It is impossible for Bruce to perform this improvised music live. The music he made was occasionally available on cassette at his exhibitions in the 1970s. The late Poly Styrene (who had a copy) compared Lacey’s music to Tangerine Dream. Lacey had not heard of Tangerine Dream. This is the first time this raw and extraordinary music, by one of the UKs most extraordinary men, has been made available.

Jonny Trunk presents “Funny Old Shit”, a 17 track compilation of funny old shit from the Trunk archive. From calypsos sung by Bernard Cribbins and Robert Mitchum to avant-garde French concrete, with stops at post punk, killer vocal jazz, BBC Radiophonics, music from 'Les Vacances de M. Hulot', early African fusion, Argentinian film music and even some twitchy classical from Glenn Gould, this groundbreaking compilation flies in the face of the current trend for issuing records that to be honest are actually quite average and really very expensive indeed for what they are. This is a total bargain, an education and a right bloody laugh. Although some people will actually think it’s shit - but not us here at Piccadilly. We love ecclectic and we love oddball.

The Tracks: Bernard Cribbins is a god, so Bernard was a great place to start, and can you name any other song apart from “Gossip Calypso” featured here that manages to squeeze in the words “Oxy Acetylene welder”? No, I can’t either. This is followed by modern classical music played on strange sculptures by the prolific team of Jacques Lasry and Bernard Baschet, Their sound is reminiscent of film music by Cliff Martinez, and that’s maybe because Cliff has a Crystal Baschet sculptural instrument too. If you look on-line you can see him play it. Next we travel to Argentina for some lovely film music and then to an early fusion of Africa and America with Guy Warren and Red Garland getting all hip and proto rap. This is followed by a classic chunk of minimal modern music from 1981 by The Jellies. I’ve put this on the sampler as the record I made of it sold out ages ago and it’s expensive now and loads of people who missed it need to hear just how good it is. Next up is the B side from the first ever BBC Radiophonic Workshop record, which, incidentally was produced by George Martin. After this we can absorb some high culture with Noel Coward reciting Ogden Nash’s words written in 1949 to accompany the romantic classic masterpiece The Carnival Of The Animals, composed way back in 1886. We then move to a high point in low culture and to the world’s best worst singer, Leoni Anderson. She starred with Laurel And Hardy in one of their many films, and her one and only album is a terrifying delight. “Rats in My Room” also featured on Desert Island Disks in August 2013 when award winning film production designer Eve Stewart chose it as one her fave eight tracks.

As a lover of very fine vocal jazz too I had to throw in “Naima”, a staggering version of Coltrane’s classic. During a talk by Robert Wyatt a few years ago he revealed that he though this was one of the best bits of music ever made, and I agree with him. A small piece of educational electronics by Terry Dwyer (more about him in a forthcoming Trunk LP) makes quite a good little plugged-in interlude, which leads us nicely to the main theme for the Jacques Tati classic, Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday. Eccentric pianist Glenn Gould then appears with the beginning of his legendary Goldberg Variations recording, and then I realized I seem to be nudging towards interesting classical recording a bit, which I think is no bad thing. And before you know it, we’re back enjoying some proper experimental concrete tape larks.

Never one to resist a film star singing, I found it almost impossible to not stick in Robert Mitchum singing, and then I realized when I was writing these notes that that this was the second calypso-based record on this very small sampler, and then I thought that very fact might enhance the idea of the whole thing really being a bit “shit”. After Bob we can all enjoy a super rare recording issued to accompany the 1962 kitchen sink drama A Taste Of Honey. It’s a song that repeats throughout the film, amplifying the fact that Jimmy, Jo’s lover, has buggered off to sea. We finish with Yusef Lateef’s version of Alex North’s sublime “Love Theme” from the film Spartacus. It’s a perfect musical spot where an incredible film melody has met one of the great experimental jazzmen of all time. The results are quite exceptional. It’s also a cue that I often use at end of a long set, so for me it was the obvious choice for the last cue here.

So chums, that’s Funny Old Shit. The idea is to put together more of these samplers with friends, guest and other groovy collectors and to draw you in further to the funny old shit musical world that is Trunk Records. Thanks for listening.

Jonny Trunk 2014

TRACK LISTING

1. Gossip Calypso - Bernard Cribbins
2. Rapsodie De Budapest - Lasry Baschet
3. Waltz In 16mm - Sergio Mihanovic
4. The High Life - Guy Warren Of Ghana With Red Garland
5. Jive Baby On A Saturday Night (Radio Edit) - The Jellies
6. Waltz In Orbit - Ray Cathode (Radiophonic Workshop)
7. Aquarium - Camille Saint-Saëns, Ogden Nash, Noel Coward
8. Rats In My Room - Leoni Anderson
9. Naima - The Double Six Of Paris
10. Material 1 Bubbles - Terry Dwyer
11. How Is The Weather In Paris - Alain Romans
12. Goldberg Variations BWV 988
I3. Aria - Glenn Gould
14. Classique: Bidule Et Un - Pierre Henry, Pierre Schaeffer
15. Tic Tic Tic - Robert Mitchum
16. Big Ship Sails On The Alley-Alley-O - John Addison, From The Film A Taste Of Honey
17. Love Theme From Spartacus - Yusef Lateef

An album of unrelased music made by Jeff Keen, one of the UK's great avant garde artists. This is music found on cassettes in his studio after his death, was made by Jeff (throughout the 1980s) using field recordings from his local amusement arcade, the radio, the TV, films, an Atari, a ZX Spectrum, a delay unit and a WASP Synth. This is the first Jeff Keen album ever issued.

Jeff Keen is one of the great undoscovered artist of out times. A missing link between the DADAists, Cocteau, Warhol, Picasso, Jack Kilby and just about anyone else you can think of, Jeff made art every day of his life. Art seemed to explode from him, and he worked across all mediums with boundless creativity and very much his own style. He developed his own graphic, visual and speoken art language. The BFI have issued a 4 DVD set of his films. His collages and paintings are currently being exhibited in Brighton, New York and Paris. The Tate have started buying his work. He’s now dead and his stock is quickly rising. The music on this relase was made in and around the 1980s, using methods unique to him; in his ramshakle studio he’d have a mic, a radio, an Atari, a ZX Spectrum, a WASP synth, effects units and his own very ususual mind. He mixes field recordings with his very own language (“Bltazwurds”) and takes on the characters he developed over his artistic life.

This is very much an art / music release. The sound is a little like the industrial albums made in the late 1970s and 1980s, intense, odd, otherworldy, unpredictable. As a result, the vinyl is being pressed in limited numbers, unusual colours and comes in hand made packaging. Notes by Jonny Trunk, there is also an important essay by David Toop and recollections by Will Fowler of the BFI who worked closely with Keen.

TRACK LISTING

01. Rayday
02. Atari Sounds 4 Track Mix
03. BlatzomFragzWhitenseWasp9
04. Song Of The Plasticator
05. Mix SynthAtariWar6
06. Artwar Noise Loop
07. BlatzomFragzWhitenseWasp6
08. Artwar Light And Dark Show
09. BlatzomFragzWhitenseWasp2
10. Omozap To Plasticator
11. Omozap Master
12. Rayday Readings
13. Plasticator Loop
14. MixSynthAtariWar8

Privately pressed in Scotland in 1979, this elusive and quite wonderful percussion / jazz album is like no other. Played by a group of 11 girls with an average age of 14, the group included Evelyn Glennie, who was destined to become one of the world’s greatest percussionist. This is her first ever record.

Johnny Trunk says:

The Cults Percussion Ensemble was a group formed by percussion teaching legend Ron Forbes in the mid 1970s. The ensemble must have one of the best group names of all time. To many it will immediately come across as something sinister, a touch spooky and possibly a bit dramatic too. They are certainly two of those but the use of the word “Cults” here is easily misinterpreted. Cults, in this case, is the suburb of Aberdeen.

The average age of the students was just 14. They came from a few of the schools in the area, including the Cults Academy, Ellon Academy, Aboyne Academy, Inverurie Academy and Powis.

My original copy of the album came from Spitalfields market in London. I loved the music the second it started, because it reminded me of Carl Orff and peculiar library. So I started to investigate it further, and eventually, thanks to the highly tuned world of percussion, was given the address of Ron Forbes. I got in touch with him and now we have this, a formal release of something quite lovely that was only previously available very briefly in 1979 at concerts when the young girls performed.

The music here is really quite unique, with a celestial swirling hypnotic quality. The blend of glockenspiels, xylophones, vibraphones, marimba and timpani drums is quite intoxicating and can recall the shimmering warmth of the desert sun one minute (“Baia”) or freezing glacial icecaps the next (“Circles”). The Ensemble perform with an effortless tightness and deftness of touch, building textured layers with recurring percussive motives which appear simultaneously dense and yet sparse, almost sounding like modern sampling. In fact, while struggling to find a musical comparison, during the pulsating introduction to "Percussion Suite" I found myself recalling "Gamma Player", a piece of soulful Detroit techno minimalism from Jeff Mills (Millsart - “Humana” EP 1995) with its rhythmic percussion layered with complex emotion. Weirdly enough, other tracks on that EP also prominently feature xylophone and tuned percussion, although obviously synthesised and programmed, a good 20 years after the CPE first recorded.

The LP comes with a new sleeve and the CD has a 6 page fold out booklet, which includes biographies and rare shots of the ensemble

STAFF COMMENTS

Philippa says: Not what you'd expect a privately pressed album by a group of 14 year old girls from late 70s Scotland to sound like. Forget preconceived ideas about scratchy, poorly recorded school bands, this is an impressive percussive jazz album with great sound.

At long last the rarest and most peculiar of all Radiophonic Workshop albums is available. Originally issued in 1969, "The Seasons" has become almost mythical over the last few years. With its mix of unexpected electronics, percussion, tape manipulation and austere poetry, it sounds like no other. "The Seasons" has also become a major influence on bands such as Broadcast and a key reference in the development of Ghost Box and the whole “Hauntology” soundscape. It is seen and heard very much now as an important and lost classic. And after over one year of detective work and rights investigation(which is a lot in this modern world of instant communication), this impressive, strange and wholly unique album is seeing the light of day once again.

Originally made as part of the BBC’s Drama Workshop broadcasts, this album was meant for educational purposes. Coming in the later period of what is commonly known and remembered as “Music and Movement” or “Movement and Mime Classes”, the album was issued briefly as a teaching aid for the modern thinking 1960s classroom. The idea was to play the album and get the school children to dance, improvise, think and create to the sounds and words. The music was originated by one of the early pioneering Radiophonic musicians, David Cain. Very little of his music has ever been made available (except on the classic BBC “pink” album) but to some followers of early British electronics he is the forgotten master.

And for this release he has been interviewed by Julian House (The Focus Group) with a fascinating Q & A, which will appear in the new sleevenotes. As for Ronald Duncan, he is now deceased, but had an interesting and inspired life. A born pacifist, he famously wrote the libretto for Britten’s opera The Rape Of Lucretia, wrote the script for Girl On A Motorcycle, and started the English Stage Company at the Royal Court Theatre. His poetry was published by Faber And Faber by T S Eliot who became a friend. Duncan’s 16 featured poems were specially written in 1969 just for this project.

The album sold in tiny quantities when it came out and was quickly deleted by the BBC. Even the BBC Archive doesn’t have a copy. In fact the album’s scarcity has only added to its mythical status. A handful of originals started appearing in bargain bins throughout the mid 1990s, and as interest in British electronics and the Radiophonic Workshop started to grow the album’s reputation began to gain a little momentum. The album rarely surfaces, but Jonny Trunk and fellow collector Martin Green found three copies at a village hall fayre back in about 1998, one of which was passed on to Jarvis Cocker. Jarvis has subsequently played a track at the start of each month (“January” in January etc) on his 6 Music radio show over the last year. The album also appeared on the Trunk Recommendations pages back in the Spring of 2003 and as a result requests to hear the album started slowly coming in. By about 2010 these requests became regular, and the album started popping up on wants list, on blogs, even on YouTube. Prices for original copies of the album then started to hit three figures. So, in 2010 Jonny Trunk started looking into a reissue. It has taken one and half years and has been a labour of love for all involved. Sleevenotes include contributions already mentioned, a piece by Jon Brooks (The Advisory Circle), and we have even traced two of the four mysterious slides mentioned on the original sleeve, that could be ordered back in 1969 via the BBC as a further aid to dance and projection.

STAFF COMMENTS

Philippa says: Ronald Duncan poetry line: 'When the gaunt elms shudder within the groin of grief'. How can you resist!

At last! The classic music from this important TV series is now available! Yes, to many people who grew up near a television in the 1970s and 1980s, Fingerbobs was a curious, formative and hugely inspiring series. Only 13 episode were made but were often repeated. It starred the audacious Fingermouse, a host of his paper friends (Scampi, Gulliver, Flash), and was fronted by folk musician, actor and former Play School presenter Rick Jones as “Yoffy”. Each episode involved simple craft, music and a story or fable based on that week’s theme (such as sound, wood, shapes and shadows). The whole series was conceived, created and modelled in a briliant home made style by the legendary husband and wife team Joanne and Michael Cole, the minds behind much of Playschool, the books and TV series Bod, and Ragtime.

The Fingerbobs album has been quite hard to put together; there are no masters and very little paper based archive to speak of, so no set stills, no paper puppets. All that really remains are a few scraps of paper in the Cole’s very small archive and the Fingerbobs annual, which contains nothing but pecualir drawings, none that really relate to the show. But, as the album was going to print Lo Cole found an exceptionally rare promotional flyer for the series in 1973 when it was first aired, and this wonderful little gem is what has been used to make the fabulous artwork.

In order to produce a musical album worthy of release, Jonny Trunk entrusted the ears and musical abilities of Jon Brooks (AKA The Advisory Circle) to pull together a musical collage of the whole series. So, we have all the themes, all the songs, all the instrumentals, a scattering of stories too. The music is a touch folky, a little whimsical, classically nostalgic, humble, hip, witty and occasionally camp (Gulliver’s song). Fingerbobs was possibly the last remaining unreleased score from TVs golden era, and finally, thanks to this first ever release, we can now enjoy it whenever or wherever we want. Like in the car with the kids. Which is a very good thing indeed.

Wow. 1964 was a pretty special year, especially for groovy jazz in Britain. Not only did it see the release of "Moonscape" by the Michael Garrick Trio but also the birth of these fine and exceptionally rare recordings. Modern, jazzy, exotic and progressive, early British jazz rarely sounded so good or beautiful.

In 1964 the Modern British jazz scene was growing, progressing and bursting out in creative musical rashes. Following the release of Moonscape (The UKs rarest British jazz LP), Michael Garrick teamed up with horn legend Shake Keane to cut an EP of modern ideas in a quartet setting called "A Case Of Jazz". It was issued the same year in a run of just 99 copies. At the same time, flugelhorn maestro Shake Keane was working with several arrangers and set ups, one of the results being a peculair (and possibly unreleased) acetate of four cues: two recorded with The Hastings Girls Choir, two in a small but lively and slightly latin combo.

Coming directly from Michael Garrick’s own archive, these exceptionally rare eight cues from 1964 have now been brought together for this unusual and exciting release. Opening with two cues with Keane and the Hastings Girls Choir, the music is etheral and strangely exotic. Moving then through a fine British bossa nova and into the quartet recordings we find the music pleasing, progressive (for 1964), creative and exciting. Also of note is the mighty fine Sun Maiden, which has the kind of classic piano riff and repetitive regal rhythm so sought after by many jazz collectors. These tracks and complete album are worthy additions to the growing archive of classic modern Brtitish period jazz, and feature two major artist flourishing early in their careers.

Originally privately pressed in 1964 as an edition of only 99 copies, "Moonscape" is possibly the rarest, most desirable and certainly most valuable modern British jazz record ever made. As one of the original 10" vinyl copies could set you back up to £2000, Trunk thought it was about time the album had a proper release. Recorded in London, "Moonscape" was pianist Michael Garrick's debut album, a beautiful lunar jazz set. Musically the album has a slightly floaty, drifting sound and represents an early British foray into The New Thing - the free jazz sound of America. Highlights includes include the blissful, melancholic "Sketches Of Israel" and complex 6/8 trip "Man Have You Ever Heard".