"The successor to 2022's Bajascillators glides easily into frame, but once there, Inland See is deceptively immediate. It's so dialed in, you hardly even feel how present the music (and you the listener) is. Time wharping's always been a resident magic for Bitchin Bajas, as is flow, which is translucent like water here. That's the Inland See vibe, unique unto itself. In turn, each of the four songs here are entirely within themselves, all together forming an essential whole. The coincision'll cause yer breath to shorten, like an exciting and non-fatal kind of exercise! New freedoms, yet more molecular structure in each one. With every successive Bitchin Bajas release, we see that the real key for them is a sense of discovery, that tingle that comes when you feel something breaking through. The sky opening up. The stuff that fills this Inland See holds you up powerfully, as if you're floating, saltwater or helium-wise -- effervescent, effortless, elemental. An increasing sense of the Bajas' physicality -- what's ephemeral, what's mercurial, and what sits inside us after it's all over. This music was mostly written on the road. It's an unusual happening for Bitchin Bajas! They were open for it, though -- the landmarked Bajascillators kept them out there for a while, and when inspiration struck, there they rolling. When it was time to render it to tape and find the record there, they did the whole thing at Electrical Audio. Recording all together in the room there lent a sense of space, which they dug and captured as natural as possible. No reverb at all added after the fact. Everything that's there was in system, directed through the interconnects with cool hands. And once Inland See is flowing toward you, through the hi-fi, you feel it all in the air."

LP version. "The shaman of the six-string is back. Waving his axe of choice, Sir Richard Bishop once again summons forth damnable truth and beauty on an all-new musical kamikaze run through histories both written and -- as of yet -- not commonly known. Since the dying days of the 20th century, the composer/player of spirited polytheistic guitar recitals including Salvador Kali, Improvika, The Freak of Araby, Tangier Sessions, and most recently, Oneiric Formulary has worked feverishly to wrench and wrangle all the music that has and can possibly fall out of the guitar from east to west. With Hillbilly Ragas, Sir Rick stretches his callused hands across the waters to draw diverse musics back to his shack with the gladiatorial bloodthirst and balance of gravitas and jocosity listeners can expect from him in every hot little moment of play. But there's more to be said than these merely glib rantings as to what happens when traditional music heads for the hillbillies:"

"There were a few different approaches I utilized for this release. First and foremost, I wanted to go back to basics, to strip away any excesses and keep it as simple as possible: one man, one acoustic guitar, no overdubs, no effects, no electricity. Taking several cues from the sounds most often associated with the so-called American Primitive guitar style, I wanted to avoid any traditional approaches and instead try something more-raw and aggressive, concentrating more on rhythm and movement as opposed to anything predictable or overly melodic, while also keeping my particular interpretive ideas about East Indian Raga in the mix. I've always felt that the majority of what is considered to be American Primitive music, while certainly based on historical American musical traditions, never really had any sounds that I personally thought of as being primitive -- it always seemed too orderly, too developed, and too safe? During the recording process I was envisioning an undiscovered mountain man or "hillbilly" who had remained hidden in his own private backwoods; one who never learned, or even heard about, any traditional musical canon that he was expected to work within. So what we have here with Hillbilly Ragas are nine pieces for solo acoustic guitar, each one representing a different excursion into the dark woods -- the untamed explorations of a musical loner, an outsider, maybe even an undesirable, embodying a peculiar folklore and turning it into sound -- creating his own folk music in the process. He's still out there, fueled by moonshine, his supernatural surroundings, and a fuck-all attitude!" --Richard Bishop, 2025

The Keith Tippett Group's Dedicated to You, But You Weren't Listening is a landmark in cutting edge fusion/avant-jazz. A vital and profoundly adventurous jazz-rock record that still swings hard, it was first released on Vertigo in 1971. Original copies are now very tricky to score and, as most of you really should know, it's aged ridiculously well. The stunning gatefold jacket fully restores Roger and Martyn Dean's original, arresting album artwork to complete this must-have reissue. Alive and bursting with a joyful energy that has to be heard to be believed, Dedicated to You, But You Weren't Listening flirts with perfection. It's truly magical and forever essential. A brilliant jazz pianist, composer, arranger and bandleader "who could make the outlands of modern music feel like the most hospitable of places" (The Guardian), Keith Tippett's second album is oft-regarded as his Canterbury album. Indeed, not only does he draw heavily on Soft Machine members past, present and future but the album title itself archly references a Soft Machine composition. Ray Babbington handles bass alongside Neville Whitehead and the drums are shared between Brian Spring, Robert Wyatt, and Phil Howard. Gary Boyle is on guitar whilst the great percussionist Tony Uter is enlisted for his conga and cow bell expertise. Elton Dean on alto saxello, cornetist Marc Charig and Nick Evans on trombone round out this quite stunning ensemble. Dedicated to You, But You Weren't Listening presents a collective of superhuman musicians enjoying themselves in the studio. The sheer exuberance of the performance is totally infectious. It's wild, energetic, atmospheric and, bluntly, bordering on chaotic at points. In a word, it's beautiful. This Be With edition of Dedicated to You, But You Weren't Listening has been re-mastered from the original Vertigo master tapes, Simon Francis' mastering working together with Cicely Balston's cut at Abbey Road Studios to weave their usual magic with these wonderful recordings.

LP version. Schnitzler's collaborations with Wolf Sequenza aka Wolfgang Seidel occupy a special place in his vast musical output. They brought him closer to pop music than ever before or since, with the possible exception of Berlin Express and Auf dem schwarzen Kanal. Following Consequenz and Con 3, Consequenz III is now the third album to be released from this phase of his work.

"Consequenz III follows on directly from the two previous albums. Once again, the pieces sound almost like pop music, once again they are rhythmically and harmoniously structured, once again they are between three and four minutes long. And once again, they are not 100% pop music, but rather a balancing act between strict, abstract seriality and contemporary electronics: no melodies, no vocals, and it's up to each listener to decide whether the pieces are danceable. Rather, the eleven pieces are rhythmic études or finger exercises, especially for Seidel, who once again plays with incredible precision, as if he were a sequencer himself. It is not for nothing that Schnitzler gave him the pseudonym Wolf Sequenza for their joint productions. Musicians such as Wolfgang Seidel continue to lend Schnitzler's sonic universe additional radiance. The fact that the pieces on Consequenz III have already been released in 2006 by the Japanese label Captain Trip under the title Consequenz 2 + was probably only noticed by very few Schnitzler fans outside Japan. Only a small number of the limited edition ever reached Europe, and sold out in no time. Consequenz III therefore reissues material that was previously known only to a few. And there's no end to it: Schnitzler left behind music that was either only released in very small editions (e.g. on cassettes or CDRs) or has never been released at all. There is still plenty to discover in the various archives. Will we ever get to know the 'whole Schnitzler'? I don't think so." --Asmus Tietchens, 2025

Color vinyl version. A fascinating glimpse into the creative mind of Pink Floyd's enigmatic founder, Madcap Cries compiles rare demos and outtakes from Syd Barrett's solo sessions.

"Although it was the lead track on the Stones's eighth studio LP, Let it Bleed, the song 'Gimmie Shelter' was not released as a single. Indeed, the single 'from' that album was the countrified non-LP track, 'HonkyTonk Women' backed with the corny chorale sluice of 'You Can't Always Get What You Want.' It was as though the Stones, knowing they would soon be pilloried on the cross of Altamont, wanted to have a way to try and dodge those nails by being able to claim they weren't even a rock band. Well, fuck them. 55 long years after the Stones's shameful retreat from their true identity, Jackie O Motherfucker has decided to try them in the court of public opinion, both for their jaundiced world view as well as the sheer cowardice of their presentation of facts. The simplest way for JOMF to proceed would have been to illuminate the ridiculous musical and philosophical inconsistencies inside their trademark song of 1968/9, 'Sympathy for the Devil,' but they chose to leave child's play to children. Instead, they took the four minutes and thirty seconds of 'Shelter,' divided it into thirds and created a set of music that explores the mathematical relationships between those segments and the three parts of a song which it reportedly inspired, The Stooges's 'Gimme Danger.' I've had the Calculus of the equation explained to me a couple of times by Tom Greenwood, the founding member of JOMF, but I get sorta lost in most number stuff more evolved than Trigonometry. My sense is that three improvised pieces on this album are musical meditations about the possible existence of a tripartite equivalent of Aristotle's Golden Mean. And while I totally believe in his as a concept, it doesn't really help to explain what the music sounds like, y'know? The three tracks are drawn from two live shows and one studio session, using a line-up resembling that on 2023's Manual of the Bayonet, the music here is largely-instrumental, reed-laced, and filled with the same glowing sense of direction this listener gets when I'm several acid sheets to the wind. Some parts collect themselves and repeat like small bursts of energy trapped inside a pyramid. When vocals do pop up, they sound like out-takes from the soundtrack to Kenneth Anger's Invocation of My Demon Brother, and submerge themselves in a murk of Egyptian dust. Some might compare JOMF's sound to the more abstruse out-takes from the Dead's Gizan shows of '78. But its commentary on the nature of musical forms reaches back further than that. I mean, remember -- the Dead pulled out of playing Altamont. I'm not sure JOMF would have done the same, but I'm sure they would have done something if they found themselves in the same situation. And it might well have sounded like this. As Bear always said, 'A trip in time saves nine.' Good thought, and as diggable today as it was back then. Hop on. This shelter is rolling. --Byron Coley, 2025

LP version. History of Silence is the first full body of work by Icelandic collective múm since 2013's Smilewound (MORR 124CD) and their seventh studio album to date -- recorded, deconstructed, put back together again, refined and finished over the course of two years. Vibrantly oscillating around a carefully curated palette of electronic and analogue sounds, the eight new tracks reflect the group's continuous strive to explore sonic spaces through subtle yet gripping songwriting. For a long time now, múm have been exploring the idea of distance in their music. Founded in Iceland in the late 1990s, the members soon began embarking on journeys across the world. Settling in, moving on, catching up: The concept of distance soon became an integral part of the collective's process. History of Silence leans into this idea, with space and time becoming indispensable pillars of the arrangements. While being coherent and structured, they echo their origins from different seasons, cities, and spaces -- neatly stitched together with unparalleled craftsmanship. On History of Silence time manifests in unexpected, liberating, and mesmerizing ways. It does not move reliably forward; it drifts, takes twists and turns, even disappears completely. Electronic textures blur into acoustic sounds, voices flicker and dissolve, melodies stumble and repeat. The arrangements often feel like they're wandering, gently resisting direction. Work on History of Silence began at Sudestudio in southern Italy. Additional recordings were made in Reykjavík, Berlin, Athens, Helsinki, New York, and Prague. The strings were recorded by Sinfonia Nord at the Hof concert hall, Akureyri, arranged and conducted by Ingi Garðar Erlendsson, who has worked with the band for many years. The orchestral elements don't dominate the record -- instead, they surface gently, adding depth and resonance to the songs without disturbing the songs' fragility. Contrary to what the album title suggests, History of Silence is a collection of bold and colorful songs, no matter how muted they might sound at times. They tickle like a feather drifting through the wind, ending up in unexpected places, stimulating long-forgotten thoughts and feelings, intimate moments of introspection. The songs move through the echoes those moments leave behind: the emotional traces of things unsaid, the weight of stillness. Offering closeness by means of distance and much-needed support. Bless.

Color vinyl. Milton Nascimento's 1969 Courage blends Brazilian music with jazz, marking his international debut. Featuring Herbie Hancock and arranged by Eumir Deodato, the album highlights Nascimento's emotive vocals and lush arrangements. A timeless introduction to one of Brazil's most unique voices.

Color vinyl. Groundbreaking Tropicália album that fuses Brazilian rhythms with psychedelic rock. Backed by the experimental band Os Mutantes, Gil blends tradition and rebellion in a bold, genre-defying sound. A vibrant snapshot of Brazil's musical revolution.

A note from Lawrence English: "If I'm not mistaken, Ben Frost and I first talked about the ideas of what would become Steel Wound sometime in mid-2002. In the early '00s, Ben had been working on cut-up electronics, spilling over with floating rhythms, humming string samples and piano splices. It was a sound realized in part through the subversion of fruity loops and also owes a debt to Ableton Live which arrived in late 2001. His works to that point, gently saturated and bristling with a fizzy distortion at times, hinted at another sound world which would become his focused in the summer of 2002 and into 2003. Locking himself away at Johanna's Beach, a remote southern vantage along the Great Ocean Road in Victoria, he was able to record for the first time without a sense of constraint. This opening up of the sound palette brought with it an entirely new harmonic language that had been hinted at, but not realized, on previous recordings. With a simple restriction of instrumentation, the guitar as the palette, Frost unlocked a certain verticality to his working methods that holds light to this day. Steel Wound is, by design, a singular record in Ben Frost's discography. It's a recording born of particular conditions, but also of particular interests. It was the first time Ben had set himself up with a situation where saturation, volume and density were all something that could be realized in a space and a time, not as a process of post-production. To have sound operating in space is a thing of true beauty and moreover it allows for a certain unpredictability that is central to new discoveries. Working with a Fender Twin, often with the reverb dialed in at maximum, he found a language of shimmer and saturation, of compression and collision, that set the stage for a prolonged interest in how sound performs and is perceived at volume. It also is the first time that many of the tonal and melodic inflections that have come to be recognized as his compositional language are on display. Steel Wound, in my opinion, is a map to the future for Ben. It is a portal, a chance for new understandings to emerge and also to take hold and it's these learnings that have guided Ben's work in the subsequent years. Steel Wound remains a pulsing beacon in an ocean of noise that has been flickering for two decades now."

Live at Kōkumeikan, Tokyo 1987 captures the raw, immersive power of Les Rallizes Dénudés at their peak. Blending droning psychedelia, ear-shattering noise, and hypnotic melodies, this recording is a testament to the band's uncompromising approach to sound.

LP version. Acclaimed Welsh composer, singer and multi-instrumentalist Cerys Hafana's third album, Angel, is a deep exploration of minimalism, traditional and avant-folk music and Hafana's primary instrument the Welsh triple harp. The album alternates between vocal songs (all sung in the Welsh language) and instrumentals, often buoyed by a deft trio of sympathetic and exploratory musicians (drums, double bass, alto sax). The uncommon breadth and innovation of Angel soundly confirms Hafana as one of the UK's most exciting young contemporary folk artists. Their spellbinding music is rich with atmosphere and heart and stubbornly resistant to genre boxes and easy classification. Hafana has been self-releasing their music for a few years, with 2022's Edyf making the Guardian newspaper's Top Ten Folk Album Of The Year list. They also recently had an album of piano pieces called Difrisg released on Instant Karma Classics. Although Hafana is an accomplished multi-instrumentalist and considers the piano to be their "main instrument, technically," it's for their work using the Welsh triple harp that they've gained a reputation as an innovative, exploratory, singularly powerful musician. Hafana's harp has a distinct sound, in part because they had the idea of damping the harp's strings using blu-tac to produce a woody, muted sound, after hearing about other harpists threading strips of paper and other material to create a 'buzzy' effect. It's this kind of experimentation that sees them both reach back to artists in the Welsh triple harp tradition like Llio Rhydderch and forward to fellow contemporary artists and sonic adventurers like Rhodri Davies. Hafana's music manages to be immersed in and informed by Welsh harp traditions but also embraces minimalism, jazz, the avant-garde and, particularly on the track "Angel," contemporary Breton folk styles. Hafana says: "on this album I wanted to try to push the musical limits more than I have previously, and to swing between the extremes of dynamics and texture as much as is possible on the instruments at my disposal. Lots of the writing also draws from contemporary Breton folk music with its driving and repetitive dance rhythms, more sparse, contemporary styles of composing and improvising, and some brief moments of very Welsh and traditional harp playing and unaccompanied singing."

Double LP version. The Slovenian avant-folk trio Sirom are back with a sonically and thematically expansive fifth album; a thrilling follow-up to their widely praised 2022 release The Liquified Throne of Simplicity (GB 120CD/LP). Navigating almost two dozen instruments (some of which they've handcrafted), and hypnotic compositions that often exceed ten minutes in length, Ana Kravanja, Iztok Koren, and Samo Kutin court patient, deep-dive listeners via intricately woven atmospheres, rhythms and sonics. In the Wind of Night, Hard-Fallen Incantations Whisper is arguably the sharpest evocation yet of the group's highly collective music process, enveloping rustic melodic folklore, outernational textures, non-linear song structures and dissonance, and a buzzing ambiance that can at times feel like an ecstatic ritual. Few experimental ensembles from the last decade have created an ouevre as singular and unmistakable as that of this far-sighted trio from the disparate landscapes of Slovenia. Sirom truly sounds like no one else. The band are more melodic and accessible here than they have ever been. The insistent grooves and trademark texture are still present, but there's a new-found sense of linearity that largely replaces the stacks of sound and detailed collages that have characterized their work to date. There is suddenly more air, allowing a string of sublime melodies, in "Curls Upon the Neck, Ribs Upon the Mountain" and "Hope in an All-Sufficient Space of Calm" in particular, to flourish. Everyone's still speaking, just not at the same time, but the drama level remains high. The resulting sense of space, of emergence and arrival, is certainly something a Tim Hecker or indeed Park Jiha fan would instantly recognize. This is as close as Sirom have ever got to a state-of-the-world, state-of-their-lives record. "We don't want to play something that sounds like it already exists," said Samo, and they still don't. File this under contemporary classical, imaginary folk or rural underground, file it under Slovenian, file it under anything you want. People will find this wonderful album regardless. Or perhaps, more probably, it will find them.

LP version. Color vinyl. Few debut albums arrive with the kind of self-contained logic and radical spirit found on the self-titled Faust. Released in 1971, it marked the beginning of a project that would sidestep genre and expectation, offering a fractured, exploratory take on rock music, blending tape experiments, improvised structures, and surreal collage. This Bureau B reissue offers a fresh opportunity to engage with one of the most curious and uncompromising records of its time. The story of Faust begins in 1969, when cultural journalist Uwe Nettelbeck met with Horst Schmolzi, an A&R man at Polydor in Hamburg. Schmolzi was looking for a German answer to The Beatles, but Nettelbeck had other ideas. With a generous advance in hand, he set out to assemble something far more radical. Nettlebeck headed into the Hamburg underground and fused members of the bands Nukleus and Campylognatus Citelli into a new six-piece lineup. From Nukleus came bassist Jean-Hervé Péron, guitarist Rudolf Sosna, and saxophonist Gunther Wüsthoff. From Campylognatus Citelli, he brought in keyboardist Hans-Joachim Irmler and drummers Werner "Zappi" Diermaier and Arnulf Meifert. Their debut album Faust feels deliberate in its unpredictability: a meticulously chaotic document of six musicians discovering a new musical language in real time. At its heart lies a groove so deep and syncopated it borders on funk, only to collapse into chaos once more. Drums stutter toward cohesion and then back away in terror. Guitars unravel into smoke. And in the final moments, the music recedes, leaving behind a broken narrative, fragmented speech, laughter, coughs, like a bedtime story told by ghosts of a Europe still recovering from war. Despite the experimental nature, surrealist lyrics and a complete rejection of conventional music form, this isn't an over intellectual exercise, or a display of willful antagonism. Instead, Faust packed these three sprawling, sputtering pieces with the breadth of human emotion, capturing the chaos and complexity of existence in an audio analogue to Jackson Pollock's abstract expressionism. More than 50 years on, it remains a thrilling reminder of what can happen when artists abandon the map and follow instinct instead.

2025 repress. Originally released in 1968, Caetano Veloso's debut album did for Brazilian music what the Beatles' Sgt. Peppers did for rock & roll, giving birth to the soon-to-be Tropicalia movement, which fused Brazilian music with pop, psychedelia and social awareness (and Veloso's leftist politics actually earned him a stint in jail in 1968 for 'anti-government activity'). Veloso, nonetheless went on to become one of the most popular and influential Brazilian musicians of all time. Includes the genre-defining classics "Clarice" and "Soy Loco Por Tì, América", "Superbacana", "Tropicalia" and "Alegria, Alegria". Now with bonus CD of the album and OBI "bookmark" Japanese style.

Color vinyl. Legendary Egyptian vocalist and cultural icon, Umm Kulthum was known as "the voice of Egypt" and "Egypt's fourth pyramid." Released in 1961 on Parlophone, this is a stunning showcase of her unmatched vocal power and a cornerstone of 20th-century Arabic music. A national treasure with fans ranging from Bob Dylan to Youssou N'Dour -- essential listening.

WRWTFWW Records presents the self-titled debut from Throwing Shapes, a new collaborative project featuring harpist Méabh McKenna, percussionist Ross Chaney, and label mainstay composer/producer Gareth Quinn Redmond. The immersive electronic meets traditional album is available on limited-edition LP housed in a heavyweight sleeve and including a beautiful mini-poster designed by artwork creator Stina Sandström. A hypnotic, texturally rich exploration in sound led by the striking timbre of the Irish wire strung harp, Throwing Shapes weaves intricate instrumental tapestries with ambitious electronic synthesis and arrangements. The result is an immersive soundscape that feels rooted yet experiential and through which a unique vocabulary emerges -- cinematic harp driven avant-electronic conjuring lush sonic worlds that evoke both heritage and futurism.

2025 repress. Be With Records present a reissue of Jay Richford and Gary Stevan's Feelings, originally released in 1974. Since its original release on Italian label Carosello in 1974, Richford and Stevan's Feelings has been described as the greatest library record ever released more than once. It's a tough funk, street jazz masterpiece coveted for many years by collectors of all musical genres. As the story goes, these were the pseudonyms adopted by Stefano Torossi and Giancarlo Gazzani who wrote the album but couldn't use their real names on the original release for legal reasons. But Torossi himself later both clarified and confused the tale further by explaining that fellow composers and musicians Sandro Brugnolini and Puccio Roelens also worked on Feelings. Infectiously funky, deliciously melodic and with impeccable, elegant production, Feelings record is the showcase for a stunning set of compositions and arrangements and with performances that are nothing short of virtuoso. The record's first side lifts off with "Flying High", soaring brilliant and shimmering with funk licks, menacing strings, and swaggering horns. The string-drenched cop-funk of "Going Home" raises the tempo with quick-fire bass lines and killer electric guitar. "Walking In The Dark" positively drips in blaxploitation-funk drama strings and horn struts, all laced with delicate drums, velvet piano, and more filthy wah-wah. "Fighting For Life" is another funk-fueled workout built around an effortlessly relentless drum track. The loping, open drum break that guides the much-loved "Feeling Tense" is filled out by heavy bass gloss, swirling strings, and ominous horns. "Running Fast" is a fine rollicking chase theme underpinned by frenetic (yet funky) Fender Rhodes and skipping bass and drums. "Loving Tenderly" envelops you in warm, velvety night-time vibes with easy listening horns and slinky strings. The pace picks up on the electrifying "Fearing Much" where strings dart around deep bass, buzzing guitars, and another funky drum break. The lush, melancholic "Being Friendly" is another easy beauty, all warm Rhodes and strings. The climactic "Having Fun" rides a pulsating, bass-heavy drum break with snatches of a funky guitar refrain, some luxurious keys, sweeping strings, and triumphant horns. Groove-laden bass, irrepressible horns, sweet flute lines, warm Rhodes, lush string arrangements, blaxploitation-styled wah-wah guitars and more make Feelings one of the finest instrumental soul LPs of the '70s, if not of all time. Remastered for vinyl by Simon Francis and cut by Pete Norman. Remastered from the original tapes.

2025 repress. French indie-rock band La Femme is a conundrum -- an episodic band with various faces. La Femme was born during the X years in Biarritz, France, when Sasha and Marlon started composing music on their guitars and recording it onto Garage Band. Together they ride surfboards, pianos and synthesizers as they explore various styles from '60s yé-yé French pop to California surf music. Marlon moved to Paris, and there he met Sam, who played bass. Together, they formed SOS Mademoiselle along with Olivier Peynot, and played vintage French rock, as Sasha was practicing his scales in reverb surf band Les Redoutables. Sasha then joined his friends in Paris, where they discovered French cold wave and synth pop, Marie et les Garçons being one of their favorites. They polished a style that could be described as one of the following: surf-wave, bizarre-wave, strange-wave, weird-witch-wave, silly mental-wave or psycho-tropical Berlin. Joined in 2010 by drummer Noé and female singer Clémence. La Femme formed its first live roster in a few days and took shape that same year with its first anthem, "Sur la planche," a song that was made to be hummed and whistled while riding a surfboard. Later on, La Femme released their second EP, Paris 2012. Soon joined by fancy rhythm drummer Nunez Ritter von Merguez aka La Sauterelle and singer Clara Luciani, as well as a whole roster of female singers, they now present their debut album Psycho Tropical Berlin where rock, pop, rococo Bauhaus, as well as influences from Kraftwerk and Elli & Jacno conjoin just to please you. Printed innersleeves.

To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the release of this indisputable classic of French coldwave and synthwave, including hits such as "Polaroid Roman photo" and "Mots," Born Bad presents a limited-edition reissue, including a bonus 7" with two previously unreleased tracks and a 12-page vinyl booklet. Thierry Müller, who initiated the RUTH project, was not a newcomer when the album Polaroid Roman Photo was released in 1985. As early as 1982, an early version of the track "Polaroïd/Roman/Photo" was released under the project RUTH. "I wanted to write a piece to make the girls dance and make fun of the boys. I plugged a small handmade clock on my Farfisa organ as a sequencer. I had a small Roland synth-guitar, I put the organ in it and that's how it started." Thierry worked on other tracks for the future LP and asked some friends to write other texts. Later, Thierry settled down in the Anagramme recording studio to carry out acoustic sound recordings. But when the sessions were over, he was not too happy with the results of "Polaroïd/Roman/Photo": according to them, they lacked "flamboyance". They decided then to record a new female voice with a professional singer and the sound engineer Patrick Chevalot offered to mix the track in the Synthesis studio "so that it blows out." With his tape ready and the help of Jacques Pasquier (S.C.O.P.A./ Invisible Records) he started to contact record companies. "I visited almost all the major record companies and was thrown out every time. Only at RCA's I found someone interested in my music." The album barely sold 50 copies in 1985, despite the eponymous title being a potential success. In 2004, two DJs (Marc Colin and Ivan Smagghe) discovered the track "Polaroïd/Roman/Photoand," and decided to exhume it from oblivion. They released it on a compilation called So Young But So Cold (Tigersushi) and then with Born Bad records on the BIPPP compilation in 2008. Thanks to them, the track and the album began a new life. Alongside his activity as graphic designer, Thierry Müller carries on producing music under his name, those of ILITCH and RUTH, and with various collaborators.

Rafael Anton Irisarri's landmark work reimagined. Marking the tenth anniversary of the American composer's critically acclaimed album A Fragile Geography, this new edition arrives renewed, both sonically and visually. First released in 2015 during a period of personal upheaval and creative reinvention, it endures as a testament to resilience, transformation, and the connection we hold with the places that shape us. Written in the aftermath of a devastating theft, A Fragile Geography was born out of loss. Just days before a cross-country move to New York, Irisarri's entire Seattle-based studio was wiped out. Instruments. Recordings. Archives. Gone without a trace. He arrived on the East Coast to an empty room and the daunting task of starting over. Composed and recorded in the rural woods of the Hudson Valley, the album took shape in seclusion, surrounded by nature, and through a process guided by improvisation. Embracing limitations, Irisarri wove textural layers of field recordings with half-remembered melodies from his Seattle years, piecing them together like fragments of memory. Among its defining sounds is "Empire Systems," a monumental centerpiece built around a simple four-chord progression, organ textures, and guitar drones. Gradually, the track expands into layers of immersive loops and thick, enveloping distortion that wash over the listener like a rolling wave. More than a career highlight, A Fragile Geography has laid the foundation for Black Knoll studio, which Irisarri rebuilt from the ground up. The studio has since grown into a creative hub for countless projects, with Irisarri engineering records for iconic music figures like Terry Riley, Ryuichi Sakamoto, William Basinski, MONO, Devendra Banhart, Grouper, Emeralds, Steve Hauschildt, Julianna Barwick, and many others. Mastered by Stephan Mathieu with exceptional attention to detail, this anniversary edition uncovers every nuance in the sound design, enhancing clarity and presence. With each listen, new elements emerge, inviting discovery and reconnection.

2025 limited restock. April 30, 1967 recording of a Velvet Underground performance at The Gymnasium (424 E. 71st St) in New York City. It's Velvet's White Light/White Heat period in full gloom. In fact, it contains the first public performance of "Sister Ray" and the previously unreleased songs "I'm Not a Young Man Anymore," as well as the R&B number "Booker T." Mastered form recently sourced tapes not comparable with any previous versions.

"Drag City presents the reissue of hypnotic syncretic guitar duo Bill MacKay & Ryley Walker's recorded debut, Land of Plenty. And just in time for the 10th anniversary of the original release! Now, who remembers where they were in January 2015? Bill and Ryley don't need to, they've got Land of Plenty to remind 'em. That's when they made the record, but a scant year before, they barely knew each other! Once they met, though, they hit it off over mutual influences, like Albert King, Laura Nyro, Nick Drake, Bert Jansch, Ali Akbar Khan and Jimi Hendrix. They got to work. And play. A year later, they were loaded into The Whistler every single Friday night on the calendar in January 2015. A residency, so called, but these resident players had designed not simply to entertain each night, but also to record the pool of material they'd woodshedded together in the recent months. A record, of all new originals, recorded live. Then when they went back to review the tapes, they were reliving the dream! While the two of them are generally divided up by speakers, which is a groovy old-school way to have stereo sound, their shared headspace is a constant flow of ever-melding play, ranging across all sorts of genres and geographies from east to west and folding them immaculately into each other, whether in moments of transition or extended meditation. Listening out for each other as they're picking, these boys dance together and never land a foot wrong. Whether head-to-head with six-strings or with Bill picking up his Requinto, or Ryley picking up his 12-string, these performances sound rich. The live capture seems to enhance the sound in all sorts of unpredictable ways that activates with the chemistry in their playing, and ultimately serves to elevate Land of Plenty in its field!"

The bicoastal duo of Greg Hartunian (West) and Colby Nathan (East) have made music together for 15 years. For their third and most focused full length, Dimples displays that they are anything but spring chickies. Past injuries leave scars, old flames leave burns, and memories are little more mental syrup on a midnight sundae. Obscure Residue stays true to Dimples' bittersweet off-the-cuff pop sound while pushing the tempo up a bpm or two, honing in their codeine dream melodies with orchestral arrangements. The humor is subtle, but ever-present -- cherished, not precious. Nowhere is this more-clear than on "Passage of Time," the most elemental and stripped down track of the album. Nathan's voice accompanied by the guitar delivers a personal and resonant message, stating: "Open up/you may get burned/But keep shut/And never even get a turn/There's no easing the passage of time." Dimples' songs comment on the psychic clutter that people collect, filter, and then retain or abandon -- be it by choice, chance, or circumstance. This clutter can be physical, too -- as experienced during Dimples live performances. Nathan typically performs alone in an ever-mounting pile of nostalgic detritus. He uses elements of the recorded materials while mixing in real time cacophonous loops, projections of deeply layered video collage, mutating outfits, and interactive set designs. One can see him smirking as he folds himself into the canvas of light and freak accident. Hartunian prefers tending his desert garden over performing live. He chooses instead to paint a world of his own design. These paintings, utilized for Dimples' album artwork and incorporated into the live projections, display surreal worlds that act as shelter for these strange pop songs. For a band more familiar with questions than answers, Dimples share some glimpses of wisdom that time bestows. Cheeky lyrics reflect that wisdom lies in the acceptance of ignorance and how it sculpts perception. Obscure Residue feels lived in -- a lifelong friendship -- direct and obtuse, familiar yet abstract. Dimples proves that they understand that time proceeds without restraint, and what comes along and what is left behind is less a matter of choice and more a matter of fact. So they sing, "some currents cannot be resisted, they turn you right around."

2025 repress. Gatefold LP version. You don't need to be Freud to regard teeth as a delicate issue. They can make joy look joyous and pain look painful, and on the cover of the new múm album they do both at the same time. Smilewound is another example of the band's art of juxtaposing two conflicting meanings and taking advantage of the energy created through the tension between both. Sparser in sound than many of its predecessors, Smilewound is an airy, relaxed record. The múm core duo of Örvar and Gunni doesn't make you laugh out loud (except maybe for the quirky vintage arcade-sound-start of "When Girls Collide"), but it will make you smile often -- despite the heavenly voices singing about violence in one form or another in most songs. Musically, múm's capability to build playful electronic sound-ornaments around simple melodies is in full bloom. And these days they know that trimming the ornamentation can strengthen the melody. Take "The Colorful Stabwound": an aguish drum 'n' bass piece and Smilewound gets close to a straight pop-song. Even that isn't very close, but it combines its rhythmic strength with a simple yet effective piano-line and the soothing lushness of a female voice to something compelling that follows you like the smell of a delicate eau de toilette. Or "Candlestick," which started out as a little ditty strummed on an acoustic guitar many years ago and has grown into this bouncy piece of synth-pop that changes its musical colors every couple of beats until you feel comfortably dizzy. Perfect pop in very fancy clothes. No wonder that antipodean pop-princess Kylie Minogue wanted to collaborate with múm on "Whistle," the main song in 2012 movie Jack & Diane. Recorded in, among other places, the band's practice space, an old Baltic farmhouse and on the kitchen table after dinner, the album was produced by múm themselves. And being the revolving collective they are, it comes as no surprise that we see the return of former member Gyda. Defining satellites as part of the core fits nicely with the band's penchant for ambivalence -- in fact, that's part of the album's charm.

2025 restock; Legendary shoegaze band Chapterhouse share their first ever recordings on a new EP, White House Demos. The four tracks were laid down at The White House studio in Weston-super-Mare on January 15, 1989, when the band were only four gigs old. The tracks weren't included on 2023's career-spanning Chronology boxset because they had been forgotten about -- until the intervention of Slowdive guitarist Christian Savill. He and Patman worked together in an office in Reading as their respective bands were starting out and he says the demo remains "their best record." Of the four tracks that make up the EP, "Ecstasy" has appeared in various versions and permutations on Chapterhouse compilations over the years, but never in its full eight-minute glory; a much later version of "Guilt" was included on the band's 1991 debut album and shoegaze classic Whirlpool; a version of "Die Die Die" was also included with that album on a bonus 12", and remained part of the band's live set for a while. The stunning "See That Girl," however, has never been released before. With 36 years of distance, it sounds like something of a lost classic, and the White House Demos as a whole feel like a brief moment in time captured forever.

Students of Decay presents The Dip, a new full-length recording by Berlin-based artist and composer Thomas Ankersmit, marking his debut with the label and sixth album to date. Comprised of two expansive, sidelong pieces composed entirely on the Serge Modular synthesizer, it signals a subtle yet significant shift in Ankersmit's trajectory, imbuing the hyper-physical, psychoacoustic intensities of his live performances with introspective, atmospheric, and even melodic elements. Primarily known for a site-responsive approach to sound, often realized in the moment of performance, Ankersmit's turn toward the studio in the last few years has opened up a new dimension within his practice. It is in this quiet rupture that The Dip emerged, a study in internality and suspended states, rich with cinematic undercurrents and ghostly spatial suggestion. Here, electricity itself feels transfigured -- becoming supple, even organic -- within an environment shaped entirely by analog signals. Over the past two decades, Ankersmit has established himself as one of the foremost practitioners of the Serge, the notoriously idiosyncratic and expressive instrument that has remained central to his work. On The Dip, he harnesses its potential not for brute force or disorientation, but for spaciousness, resonance, and lyrical abstraction. Without resorting to additional processing or effects, he draws out tones that feel simultaneously raw and refined, articulated and blurred -- intricate structures that seem to breathe and evolve of their own volition. The result is a kind of auditory hallucination, a "cinema for the ears," wherein impressions, emotional arcs, and imagined topographies unfold. Each side of The Dip plays like a single gesture unfolding in time -- a spatial narrative constructed through vibration, density, and the movement of air. The Dip follows acclaimed works on PAN, Touch, and Shelter Press, and reaffirms Thomas Ankersmit's position as one of the most focused and probing voices in contemporary experimental music. Quietly radical and meticulously constructed, it is less a departure than a deepening -- a descent into a more private sonic world, where the boundaries between perception, memory, and pure signal dissolve.

Double LP version. Clear color vinyl. "Nobukazu Takemura's music is singular in its ability to create a musical sense of childlike wonder and curiosity, with gracefully executed yet complex compositions. His pieces embody an innocence and the intricacies of self-discovery that every human is faced with as their worlds become more complex. An acclaimed producer and composer, Takemura is known for his idiosyncratic music and video artistry as well as his prolific collaborations including those with Tortoise, Yo La Tengo, DJ Spooky, and Steve Reich. knot of meanings, Takemura's first proper album in a decade, finds the Japanese artist wrestling with the rise of technological influence on art and culture in the modern era, in tandem with his own relationship to religion, and where those struggles meet. Like the colorful, irregularly shaped glasses on the cover, the album is a mosaic of technicolor elements that come together to form a complete picture, a dense portrait of interconnected struggles and triumphs. Throughout the album, Takemura exudes an unpredictability that builds surprise from unlikely combinations of instruments, tonalities and harmonic motions that embody bewildering knots to untangle, held together with a youthful sense of wonder. 'I attended a Catholic kindergarten as a child and cherished those early years, which laid the foundations for my future. This is in part why I have always used the keyword 'child' in my work as an adult,' notes Takemura. knot of meanings culminates his use of that child's perspective, or as Takemura has used extensively, that 'Child's View' to explore deeper life philosophies to ecstatic ends. The meanings and mysteries contained within make for an enchanting excavation for those attuned to deep listening, a journey that rewards the kind of inquiring open-mindedness of the listener."

"Japanese composer Nobukazu Takemura, who turned in a brilliant set of electronica...At points the music turned radiant, glowing with major harmonies, the pulse of the music driving. The music makes you concentrate, it promotes ecstasy." --NY Times

"Takemura has an uncanny understanding of [a child's] perspective, and even more amazing, realizes how to turn it into music." --Pitchfork

LP version. Clear color vinyl. "Sam Prekop's work over the last 30 years, whether created primarily on his guitar or on his modular synth, is consistent in its powerful melodicism, delicate arrangements and subtle evolution. Prekop's singular blend of melody, impressionistic lyricism and quietly intricate rhythms are the core of the singular sound of The Sea and Cake. Since 2010's Old Punch Card, Prekop's exploration of modular synthesis and electronic atmospheres, has come into its own. Highly skilled at manipulating the sonic interplay, Prekop has established a style all his own, his pieces are complex expressing real movement. Harmonies bloom with granular detail and contrary to their machine sources are able to convey emotion. Open Close is an album that captures the flow and energy of a live performance through the lens of a deft craftsman, an equilibrium of intuitive composition and the excitement of possibility. The music of Sam Prekop is defined by his signature curiosity and his ability to mold and refine that curiosity into a wholly unique sound. His process in naming album Open Close mirrors his creative practice and the worlds he builds across the album: 'I like simple words that become complicated if you think of them more than a second or two, beyond face value. And Open Close could be: close as in 'close to you' or close as in 'close the door.' If it gives everything away too quickly, then I'm not interested.' Each movement across Open Close is replete with simple gestures that suggest new complexities with Prekop's careful arrangements. Open Close unearths new, soulfully human sounds from synthetic textures precisely juxtaposed, its subtle contrasts in texture and rhythm are a free-flowing celebration of sonics as stunning as they are ephemeral."

"Every track is awash in sumptuous, eminently hummable melodies; the album swells with a newfound sense of joy." --Pitchfork, Best New Music

"The best improvisation transforms music into a living thing." --NPR, Best Albums of 2022

2025 restock; 1998 release. Voted one of 1998's top 15 Records of the Year in Modern Composition by the writers and critics of The Wire, Trilogie de la Mort is a work in three parts for anolog Arp synthesizer. The first third of the work, Kyema, is inspired by The Tibetan Book of the Dead and invokes the six intermediate states that constitute the existential continuity of the being. Kailasha, the second chapter, is structured on an imaginary pilgrimage around Mt. Kailash, one of the most sacred mountains in the Himalayas. Koumé makes up the last part of the trilogy and emphasizes the transcendence of death.

The Danish label Arbitrary presents Framework/Zwischen Remixes -- a remix by German artist Jan Jelinek and one by musician and label founder Mads Emil Nielsen originally made for a digital compilation, now published on 7" vinyl. For the CRXSSINGS release, Jan Jelinek remixed Nielsen's "Framework 10," a track from the Framework book/CD based on sequences/recordings of sine waves and noise. Side B features a rework by Mads Emil Nielsen of Jelinek's voice collage and electronic sounds, from Zwischen -- Marcel Duchamp, would you like or expect people to spin the wheel on your kinetic object Roue de Bicyclette. Mastered and cut by Kassian Troyer at D&M, Berlin.

2025 restock. "In the mid-'60s, Albert Ayler found himself at the center of major transformations within jazz. On his albums for ESP-Disk', his delivery was radically aggressive and his tone blistering -- aiming for something beyond the New Thing. His music would be further energized when (at the behest of John Coltrane) Bob Thiele signed him to Impulse! As Ayler told The Plain Dealer at the time, 'It's not about notes anymore. It's a sound -- a feeling. The approach we're taking will discontinue the use of the word 'jazz.'' In Greenwich Village, Ayler's first LP on Impulse!, perfectly captures the Cleveland-born saxophonist's radiant intensity. Sourced from a pair of live engagements -- February '67 at the Village Theatre on New York's Lower East Side and December '66 at the Village Vanguard -- these recordings show an improved clarity in production and performance. Both sets feature two basses (including Alan Silva and Henry Grimes) which allowed the ensemble to go in different harmonic directions while maintaining an organic unity. Of particular interest are 'For John Coltrane,' a tribute to Ayler's mentor who would pass later that year, and 'Truth Is Marching In' where trumpeter Donald Ayler joins his brother to celebrate and ultimately deconstruct several jazz traditions to stunning effect. Vibrant in sound and vision, Albert Ayler's In Greenwich Village is a landmark statement in free jazz and a career high-point for this truly original artist. Superior Viaduct is honored to present this classic album on vinyl for the first time domestically in 30 years."

"Yard Man Posse -- produced by Jah Thomas with massive hits such as the "Posse Yard Style," "Landlord," "Natty Walking," "China Girls," and more. When you put it on the turntable it will get you in the mood listen and enjoy for hours." --Alfred Newman

Featuring Roots Radics, Errol (Flabber) Holt, Sky Juice, Bingy Bunny, Dwight Andsowell, Steely and Winston Wright, Glassy Anderson, D Bradley, Dean Fraser, and Mambo and Friends.

LP version. Here are fourteen tracks of untimely yet unprecedented cross-fertilization from the French West Indies: all types of music rooted in the Creole archipelago have found their way, whatsoever, to the tracklisting. Whether originating from the city or being more rural, they all go back to what Edouard Glissant, in an interview about the place of West Indian music in the Afro-American scope, called "the trace of singing, the one which got erased by slavery." The opening track features one of the emblematic orchestras of this aesthetic identity, criscrossing many music types from the archipelago. The 1974 Ray Barretto guajira is magnificently performed by Malavoi, a legendary Fayolais group. Additionally, the compilation ends on a piece by Los Martiniqueños de Francisco. Practicing the danmyé rounds (a kind of capoeiria) to the rhythm of the bèlè drum, it delivers a terrific Caterete, a kind of champeta of Afro- Colombian obedience which was originally composed by Colombian Fabián Ramón Veloz Fernández for the group Wgenda Kenya. The icing on the cake is Brazilian Marku Ribas, who found refuge in Martinique in the early 1970s, bringing his singing to the last trance-inducing track. The Los Caraïbes cover of "Dónde," a famous Cuban theme composed by producer Ernesto Duarte Brito, has a typical violin and features renowned Martinique singer Joby Valente and his piquant voice. The meaningful "Amor en chachachá" by L'Ensemble Tropicana, a band which included Haitian musicians among whom was composer and leader Michel Desgrotte, also recalls how Latin music was pervasive in the tropics in the mid-1960s. They were the ones keeping people dancing at Le Cocoteraie in Guadelupe and La Bananeraie in Martinique. Around the same time, another "foreign" band, Congolese Freddy Mars N'Kounkou's Ryco Jazz, achieved some success on both islands by covering Latin jazz classics. In a more typically salsa vein, the Super Combo, a famous Guadelupean orchestra from Pointe-Noire that was formed around the Desplan family and had Roger Plonquitte and Elie Bianay on board, adapt "Serana," a theme by Roberto Angleró Pepín. Léon Bertide's Martinican ensemble excelled at the boogaloo which had been composed by Puerto Rican saxophonist Hector Santos for the legendary El Gran Combo. Three years later, in 1972, Henri Guédon, with the help of Paul Rosine on the vibraphone, tackled the Bilongo made famous by Eddie Palmieri. On the high-value collectible single -- the first one released by Les Aiglons under the Duli Disc label -- there is a sticker classifying the track under the generic name "Afro." Digipack CD includes 20-page booklet, and liners notes in French, Spanish, English. LP version includes 6-page booklet.