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Recent Best Sellers
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2LP
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BE 010LP
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Black Editions present a reissue of Musica Transonic's self-titled release, originally released in 1995. Musica Transonic was comprised of three of the most crucial artists to emerge from the 1990s Japanese underground: Nanjo Asahito of High Rise, Makoto Kawabata of Acid Mothers Temple and Tatsuya Yoshida of Ruins. The group's music was a supercharged combination of complex rhythms, blistering guitar attacks, and enormously deep bass momentum. Pushing the rock power trio to its miasmic, overdriven limits, Musica Transonic's sound retains the ability to shock even now, 25 years later. Remastered, Musica Transonic's self-titled debut is now available for the first time on LP and includes previously unheard material. Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI. Gatefold, heavy tip-on jackets; includes download.
"In 1986, Tokyo's PSF Records released the second album by High Rise, simply titled II, and it immediately became one of those legendary albums that hipsters worldwide whispered about, because hardly anyone had it to listen to . . . High Rise wasn't nearly enough to occupy the busiest guy in Tokyo's underground, though, and by the mid-90s Nanjo had enough bands going that nobody could really keep track anymore. PSF's legendary high-quality standards recognized a couple of them, however, with releases in 1995, including the enigmatic Musica Transonic. This was an unhinged band that on first hearing seemed to check many of the same boxes as High Rise, including the trademark redlined sonics. But those who cranked it up and really listened realized it was actually a very different beast, a sort of musical manticore assembled from a variety of monstrous parts . . . Guitarist Makoto Kawabata would achieve renown the following year as the leader of Acid Mothers Temple, also appearing as the guitarist in Mainliner, another High Rise-adjacent project with Nanjo. While by 1995 he and Nanjo had been playing together in other projects for several years, on this album Kawabata brought a chaotic, free-flowing guitar aptitude that painted a stranger spectrum than the laser-focused rock of High Rise. In concert with the brilliant drummer Tatsuya Yoshida -- well-known in the scene from his long-running duo Ruins -- the results are entirely unpredictable, and joyously so. After focusing for some time on repetition, Nanjo struck off down a new road with Musica Transonic. The better-known High Rise is a straight-ahead blast, minimalist in its approach as they drive right at your gut. With Musica Transonic, the combination of Yoshida's complex rhythms and Kawabata's ability to find unexpected angles for his guitar attack recalibrated the rock trio, with magnificent results that retain their ability to shock even now, 25 years later..." --Mason Jones, San Francisco, CA, 2020
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BE 012LP
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Black Editions present a reissue of Toho Sara's self-titled album, originally released in 1995. A mystifying work of Japanese avant-garde shamanism, Toho Sara's 1995 debut introduced a radical new sound from Asahito Nanjo (High Rise), Makoto Kawabata (Acid Mothers Temple), and Hisashi Yasuda -- playing an array of ancient instruments including tabla, piri, harmonium, biwa, shakujo, and hansho the group evokes an otherworldly ritual music, meditative and haunting. Originally released on CD by P.S.F. Japan, newly expanded, remastered and available for the first time ever on vinyl. Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI. Gatefold, tip-on jacket; Includes insert and download.
"In 1995, Tokyo's legendary label P.S.F. Records released two very different albums, connected by the shadowy personality behind them: Nanjo Asahito, well known by music fanatics acquainted with his band High Rise. The pair of 1995 releases, though, were quite different from the brain-scrambling, fuzz-driven, motor-psycho sounds of High Rise. One, by the mysterious Musica Transonic, refracted that distorted rock through a prism that broke it into abstract, free-form shapes. We're here, though, with regard to the other album, the self-titled debut by 東方沙羅, Toho Sara . . . From the first of the simply numbered songs (no titles here) it's clear that Nanjo, Kawabata Makoto, and Yasuda Hisashi have something special in mind: the delicate percussion and woodwinds are quickly joined by a much more ominous drone, and they combine brightness with murk throughout the album . . . Nanjo and Kawabata had played together for some time before this album, including a band called Johari, which brought together ethnic and contemporary music. They formed Toho Sara to revisit the idea, focusing on Asian spirituality while experimenting with acoustic instruments. Yasuda joined them after playing in Nanjo's avant-garde outfit Group Musica, and later played in the early Acid Mothers Temple with Kawabata. Toho Sara translates to Eastern Most, which follows the idea behind the group. Fascinated by shamanism, Nanjo wanted to create an avant-garde musical embodiment of ideas like kagura, ancient ritual theater, and bring it to album and stage . . .The fourth track, the album's eleven-minute centerpiece, bursts open in a chaotic clatter that barely disperses as mysterious scrapings and bowings come and go, a bewitching accretion of brain-scrambling sounds. It's a dramatic, eerie, and anarchic passage that would undeniably suit a summoning ritual for Moorcock's chaos-god Arioch. Some of the tracks are calmer, even peaceful if you don't mind a bit of ambient dread seeping into your peacetime. Slow drumbeats and gentle gongs are layered with not-quite-atonal woodwinds, intermittent clacks of wooden percussion accent some variety of buzzing woodwind, and droning harmonium underlies clarinet-like slow melodies..." --Mason Jones, San Francisco, CA, 2020
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WWSLP 035LP
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LP version. Wewantsounds reissue Logic System's Venus, originally released in 1981. Reissued outside of Japan for the first time in 40 years. Hideki Matsutake started his career as the assistant of Japanese electronic music master Isao Tomita in the early '70s, he went on to work with Ryuichi Sakamoto and then Yellow Magic Orchestra as their keyboard programmer and unofficial fourth member. In 1981 he started his own Logic System project recording Venus that year in Los Angeles with Don Grusin, Nathan East, and Michael Boddicker, brilliantly mixing synth funk, ambient, and boogie with a touch of fusion jazz predating vaporwave by a mere 30 years. While the first album, Logic had a harder techno feel, the second one, Venus, was different affair. Recorded in Los Angeles at the new state of the art Yamaha Studio, it was loosely themed on the Greek goddess Venus and had a funkier more organic sound. For the album, Matsutake had asked a handful of American musicians to provide songs he would then add his synth magic touch to. The updated sound was achieved by switching from the Moog III to the E-mu modular System (which Matsutake brought over to LA) and other synths like the Prophet 5, the Roland MC-8 and TR 808, and the Yamaha GS-1, a forerunner of the DX7. The result is an amazing futuristic mix of electronic music and early '80s funk, announcing many genres to come, from techno and house to French electro and vaporwave. From the breezy ambient synth of "I Love You" to the city pop edge of "Be Yourself" (originally written by Nathan East for Debra Laws) and the vocoder-led Daft Punk-ish "Take A Chance", Venus is a fascinating album that both pushes the boundaries of electronic music and is yet strangely accessible and beautiful. The other key elements of Venus is the artwork designed by legendary Japanese illustrator Pater Sato. Sato had started in Japan in the early '70s doing many album covers for Japanese artists, including Tatsuro Yamashita's cult Spacy LP (1977) before moving to New York in 1979 to pursue a career in fashion and advertising. His airbrush style became hugely influential over the years. The original album came with a beautiful eight-panel insert illustrated by Sato which Wewantsounds has reproduced. Also includes obi strip and a second insert featuring credits and line-up, plus liner notes by Hashim Kotaro Bharoocha with an exclusive interview of Hideki Matsutake. Remastered from the original tapes.
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FOX 046LP
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A legendary show from the Miles Davis Group recorded from SWR in Germany in 1971, and featuring a breath-taking line-up including no less than Keith Jarrett on electric piano and organ. Live at Berliner Jazztage in Berlin on November 6, 1971.
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BF 015LP
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LP version. Axis/Another Revolvable Thing 1 is released alongside Axis/Another Revolvable Thing 2 (BF 016LP). Axis/Another Revolvable Thing is the second installment of Blank Forms' archival reissues of the music of Japan's eternal revolutionary Masayuki Takayanagi, following April Is The Cruellest Month (BF 008CD/LP), a 1975 studio record by his New Direction Unit. Comprised of recordings of a September 5, 1975 concert by the New Direction Unit at Yasuda Seimei Hall in Tokyo's Shinjuku district, the two-part set showcases Takayanagi in deep pursuit of what he began calling "non-section music" after leaping beyond the confines of his prior descriptor "real jazz". The quartet of Takayanagi (guitar), Kenji Mori (reeds), Nobuyoshi Ino (bass, cello), and Hiroshi Yamazaki (percussion) deftly explores the twin poles of Takayanagi's spacious "gradually projection" and explosively virulent "mass projection" concepts across six pieces, titled "Fragments I-VI". Includes original liner notes by Japanese free jazz critic Teruto Soejima (newly translated for this edition). Originally issued in two individual LP volumes in rearranged order; the two separate LP reissues, Axis/Another Revolvable Thing 1 (BF 015LP) and Axis/Another Revolvable Thing 2 (BF 016LP), keep this rearranged order.
Masayuki "Jojo" Takayanagi (1932-1991) was a maverick Japanese guitarist, a revolutionary spirit whose oeuvre embodied the radical political movements of late '60s Japan. Having cut his teeth as an accomplished Lennie Tristano disciple playing cool jazz in the late '50s, Takayanagi had his mind blown by the Chicago Transit Authority's "Free Form Guitar" in 1969 and promptly turned his back on the jazz scene. Takayanagi had found a new direction, an annihilation of jazz and its associated idolatry of hegemonic American culture. Aiming his virtuoso chops towards the stratosphere, Takayanagi dedicated himself to the art of the freakout, laying waste to tradition left and right, most notably via the all-out assault of his aptly-named New Direction for the Arts (later New Direction Unit) and collaborations with like-minded outsider saxophonist Kaoru Abe. His innovations on the instrument parallel those of Sonny Sharrock and Derek Bailey and paved the way for the Japanese necromancy of Keiji Haino and Otomo Yoshihide.
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NA 5103LP
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2020 repress. "Our comprehensive overview of Zambia's premier garage-, psych-, prog-, funk-,Afro-rock ensemble Witch, We Intend To Cause Havoc!, is now sold out in its 6LP box set form. So we are making the first four Witch albums available in archival reissue form. As with our box set, the audio is nigh-perfect -- restored and remastered from the original master tapes. The entirety of Witch's first album, restored and remastered from master tapes, and presented as an archival reissue. Witch's musical arc is contained to a five year span and, in retrospect, is a logical one. The band's first two, self-produced albums - released in unison with the birth of the commercial Zambian recording industry -- are exuberant experiments in garage rock, and are as influenced by the Rolling Stones as they are James Brown. Thus Introduction, their first, is the perfect starting point for anyone interested in delving into the Witch band, or Zamrock in general."
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BF 016LP
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LP version. Axis/Another Revolvable Thing 2 is released alongside Axis/Another Revolvable Thing 1 (BF 015LP). Axis/Another Revolvable Thing is the second installment of Blank Forms' archival reissues of the music of Japan's eternal revolutionary Masayuki Takayanagi, following April Is The Cruellest Month (BF 008CD/LP), a 1975 studio record by his New Direction Unit. Comprised of recordings of a September 5, 1975 concert by the New Direction Unit at Yasuda Seimei Hall in Tokyo's Shinjuku district, the two-part set showcases Takayanagi in deep pursuit of what he began calling "non-section music" after leaping beyond the confines of his prior descriptor "real jazz". The quartet of Takayanagi (guitar), Kenji Mori (reeds), Nobuyoshi Ino (bass, cello), and Hiroshi Yamazaki (percussion) deftly explores the twin poles of Takayanagi's spacious "gradually projection" and explosively virulent "mass projection" concepts across six pieces, titled "Fragments I-VI". Includes original liner notes by Japanese free jazz critic Teruto Soejima (newly translated for this edition). Originally issued in two individual LP volumes in rearranged order; the two separate LP reissues, Axis/Another Revolvable Thing 1 (BF 015LP) and Axis/Another Revolvable Thing 2 (BF 016LP), keep this rearranged order.
Masayuki "Jojo" Takayanagi (1932-1991) was a maverick Japanese guitarist, a revolutionary spirit whose oeuvre embodied the radical political movements of late '60s Japan. Having cut his teeth as an accomplished Lennie Tristano disciple playing cool jazz in the late '50s, Takayanagi had his mind blown by the Chicago Transit Authority's "Free Form Guitar" in 1969 and promptly turned his back on the jazz scene. Takayanagi had found a new direction, an annihilation of jazz and its associated idolatry of hegemonic American culture. Aiming his virtuoso chops towards the stratosphere, Takayanagi dedicated himself to the art of the freakout, laying waste to tradition left and right, most notably via the all-out assault of his aptly-named New Direction for the Arts (later New Direction Unit) and collaborations with like-minded outsider saxophonist Kaoru Abe. His innovations on the instrument parallel those of Sonny Sharrock and Derek Bailey and paved the way for the Japanese necromancy of Keiji Haino and Otomo Yoshihide.
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BLUME 017LP
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"This is the fulfillment of a dream for a new kind of music. There is nothing like Vespers in the literature of music. It is a completely new way of defining what music is, and the definition is given to us in a purely realized form." --Robert Ashley
Alvin Lucier is among the most important, influential, and radical of the second generation of the post-war avant-garde composers. First released as Lucier's contribution to the Sonic Arts Union's lone LP, Electronic Sound (1972), Vespers is a work generated by two equal actors: the performers and the space that they occupy. Conceived following a chance encounter with hand-held echolocation technology "the Sondol", a pulse oscillator that emits short, sharp pulses at variable repetition speeds, producing echoes from the reflecting walls of a space to register relative location and orientation. Written as a poetic "prose score", for the realization of Vespers, each performer is equipped with a "Sondol" and asked to move blindfolded within a defined space, moving from one point to the next using only echolocation, taking what Lucier describes as "sound photographs" that reveal discrete details of the given area. Despite the radical leap it presented within the history of the sonic arts, Vespers was not the first of Lucier's works that began to specifically address the relation between sound, perception, and space. Chambers, composed the year before in 1968 and embedded with the wry humor which lingers below much of the composer's output, explored the theme on a brilliantly miniature scale. As a total work, Chambers contends with the relationship between the knowing and understanding of what we hear, our perception of the source of a sound, and its relation to space. When viewed in the immediate context of Vespers, it presents as an unexpected inversion of what was to come. While it plays on the relation of sight and the sonic actor, what is seen and unseen takes on a dynamically different role. For the realization of Chambers, battery-operated radios, tape recorders, and various kinds of electric toys are hidden in paper bags, shoes, kettles, a suitcase, and other small resonant spaces, which not only limit the perception of these object to their sounds alone, but take on the role of acoustic actors on the sounds within, each space becoming as individual and distinct as the object it contains. Newly designed obi-strip/insert with an introduction by Robert Ashley, liner notes by Bradford Bailey and Gaia Martino. 160 gram, dark blue vinyl; edition of 300.
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BE 011LP
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Black Editions present a reissue of Kazuo Imai's far and wee, originally released in 2004. Kazuo Imai is one of the few artists to traverse both Japan's early avant-garde and free jazz movements. Though he began performing in the 1970s, his 2004 P.S.F. album far and wee was only the second under his name. In a series of thrilling acoustic guitar improvisations -- Imai's playing crackles with dynamic tension and physicality as well as a subtlety and nuance that reveals him as one of the instrument's true masters and innovators. In 2004, Kazuo Imai (Marginal Consort, East Bionic Symphonia) recorded a series of nylon-string classical guitar improvisations at the request of P.S.F. founder Hideo Ikeezumi. far and wee, the resulting album, vibrates with the inherent duality of nylon: the strings stretch and snap back like rubber tautened and released, and paint the softest of caresses in silky washes. Imai was a student of two of the foundational artists of the Japanese avant-garde: Masayuki Takayanagi, the pioneering free-improvising guitarist and Takehisa Kosugi, the visionary Fluxus composer also known for his work with Group Ongaku and the Taj Mahal Travelers. A sense of inquisitiveness about how far he can push himself and every part of the guitar pervades these performances as Imai makes everything from the pegs to the bridge to the strap pin explode with resonate. For over 20 years, Imai has been a driving force behind Marginal Consort a collective of Japanese avant-garde musicians devoted to collective improvisation, known for their incredibly layered and varied annual performances that last for three continuous hours. Using a blend of homemade and traditional instruments, electronics, and sculptural and natural forms, they create auditory experiences of exceptionally unique color and vibration. The same dedication to vitality and variety is found in Imai's guitar music, and it is via the guitar that his vast studies in philosophy and music come together in extreme focus, allowing him to tease and extend the history of the instrument while interrogating the limits of its edge. far and wee continues the tradition of the Soloworks concerts that Imai has been giving for several decades, and allows the listener to breathe in the unique space of Imai's thought processes. He attacks the instrument: the nylon strings explode against the guitar. And he caresses it, soothing each centimeter of string with delicate force and concentration. Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI. Heavy tip-on jackets; includes download.
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LP
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DLS 003LP
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LP version. Cream and army green vinyl. Originally released in 2007. This was Thurston Moore's first solo outing since 1995's Psychic Hearts. Remastered.
From original 2007 press release: "Thurston recorded primarily on acoustic guitar and bass, laying down the core of the tunes with drummer compatriot Sonic Youth's Steve Shelley and violinist Samara Lubelski, a noted player from MV/EE and The Golden Road, Hall of Fame, and other awesome gatherings as well as solo artiste. Thurston grabbed John Agnello to record and mix the sucker after having a helluva good time with the bro from working on Sonic Youth's 2006 killer Rather Ripped. They decided to work in Dinosaur Jr.'s J Mascis's Bisquiteen studio (the top floor in J's Amherst house actually) where Dino did their Beyond album (2007). This worked out very nicely as it allowed Thurston to yell down the stairs every time he needed a shredding guitar solo and J would trundle up, plug in and BURN. Other guests on Trees Outside... are Christina Carter, she of Charalambides, and she of the most beatific, beautific voice on land, sea, and air. One track called 'Honest James' has Thurston and Christina singing duet against a single acoustic guitar and it is a naked groove. The otherworldly Canadian musician Andrew Macgregor aka "Gown" plays some spectacularly understated and incredible guitar and Sunburned Hand of The Man's John Moloney takes over the drum stool to absolutely flail on the pit snarling 'Wonderful Witches'. And then there's the 20 seconds or so of primal noise wave courtesy of American noise underground genius Leslie Keffer on Off Work. Most of the tunes are lyric driven but there are a couple of majestic instrumentals like Trees Outside The Academy, which brings the album to a musical and breathless close. There's also some weird cassette tape that Thurston found at his mom's of him at 13 years old in the early '70s making some kind of sound-theatre."
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RM 4123LP
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Harbors is a collaboration of composers Ellen Fullman (Long String Instrument) and Theresa Wong (cello), which draws inspiration from the soundscapes, stories, and atmospheres that manifest around bodies of water that propagate exchange. Structured around the extended harmonics of the open strings of the cello, Wong and Fullman utilize subsets of these tonal areas to create distinct sonic environments within the piece. Fullman's Long String Instrument, a stunning installation of over forty strings spanning seventy feet in length, places the performers and audience inside the actual resonating body, transforming the architecture itself into the musical instrument. Wong has developed techniques that take the cello beyond tradition into a vocabulary more closely rooted in the sounds of the natural world. She captures material electronically, layering textures amplified throughout the space which form an immersive field where figure and ground are in constant flux. The piece reveals an orchestration of shifting drones, aberrant melodies and glistening atmospheres. Harbors has reverberated many spaces around the world, including: Click Festival, Helsingør, Denmark; Transformer Station, Cleveland; MONA FOMA, Tasmania; Centennial Hall, Sydney Festival; The Lab, San Francisco; and Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit. An iconic American figure in experimental music, Ellen Fullman is the creator of the long string instrument, in which rosin-coated fingers brush across dozens of metallic strings, spanning fifty to over a hundred feet in length. Her work has encompassed the study of Just Intonation tuning theory, developing a tablature graphic notation system, experiments with various wire alloys and gauges, and wooden resonator design and fabrication. In 2020 she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. Theresa Wong is a composer, cellist and vocalist active at the intersection of music, experimentation, improvisation, and the synergy of multiple disciplines. Her works include The Unlearning (Tzadik, 2011), 21 songs for violin, cello and 2 voices inspired by Goya's Disasters of War etchings, O Sleep, an improvised opera for an eight-member ensemble exploring the conundrum of sleep and dream life and Venice Is A Fish (2014), a collection of solo songs. She currently works and resides in the San Francisco Bay Area.
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LP
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DO XYZ004LP
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LP version; 2020 repress. Dark, hypnotic, tripping nyabinghi from 1974. Led by Jamaican Rastafarian singing hand-drummer Ras Michael over four extended excursions, the music is organic, sublime and expansive, grounation drums and bass-heavy (with no rhythm guitar; rather, Willie Lindo brilliantly improvising a kind of dazed blues). Lloyd Charmers and Federal Studios engineer George Raymond stayed up all night after the session to mix the recording, opening out the enraptured mood into echoing space, adding sparse, startling effects to the keyboards. At no cost to its deep spirituality, this is the closest reggae comes to psychedelia. Previously squandered in an incongruous 2-for-1 reissue, now lovingly returned to its original, singular glory at Abbey Road. Pressed on super-fly vinyl and housed in new standard-printed sleeves.
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PIC. DISC
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CV 001EP
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Where have the alienated masses gone after vaporwave? Producer Ramona Andra Xavier, aka Vektroid, Macintosh Plus, Laserdisc Visions, New Dreams Ltd., and a few others, is a good resource, being a reliable through line from the genre's peak to the current moment. Since her most recent studio album Floral Shoppe in 2011, Xavier has traveled further and further away from slowed-down R&B samples, challenging and complicating her own production style. But "Sick & Panic (First Mix)" is her first return to the Macintosh Plus name since 2011, and it sounds almost entirely unlike the curious complacency of Floral Shoppe. This new twelve-minute track breaks apart a few key components of vaporwave, but more readily takes influences from glitch music and the freeform design of a DJ set. But by calling this a Macintosh Plus record, you're forced to see it with a strangely human face. Between the hundreds of interrupted thoughts and microscopic silences, something organic is growing. This is the sort of music nobody is really built for, but that one learns out of idle curiosity. While we may not be androids for a few more years, this compact, biting music speaks to some metaphysical data analysis we're hardwired to be fascinated by. In a twelve-minute span, it has more than exhausted every notion and idea. It's a tactical deployment of thoughts too scattered to fit into their own slots. Which is where it wraps around again to vaporwave, because nothing ever changes. All music and art by Macintosh Plus, aka Vektroid. Deluxe hi-fidelity vinyl picture disc; Limited edition; includes digital download.
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2LP
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AU 1001LP
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2020 repress. "The compilation that started the renaissance. In 2002 Audika Records entered into an exclusive licensing agreement with the estate of Arthur Russell to compile and issue previously unreleased and out of print material from Arthur's vast archive. This first album Calling Out of Context, features 12 previously unreleased tracks of Buddhist Bubblegum Alt Disco Pop recorded during Arthur's prime years 1985-90."
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2LP/BOOK
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OP 055-2LP
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$37.50
PREORDER
RELEASE DATE: 9/25/2020
Limited "Sound Edition" double-LP, includes 92-page book and O card. Nicolás Jaar is a Chilean sound maker born in 1990. He is known in the club world for his various dance 12" EPs and remixes he put out from 2008 to 2011. Since his first full length (Space Is Only Noise, 2011), he has embarked in multiple divergent path. For the last seven years, he has released a large volume of recordings through his label Other People. In 2015, Nicolás scored Dheepan by director Jacques Audiard (winner of the Palme d'Or at Cannes 2015). In 2016, Jaar launched The Network, a web of 111 fictional radio stations done in collaboration with artists Jena Myung and Maziyar Pahlevan. In 2017, The Network became a book, published by Printed Matter in NY. In the spring of 2019, Jaar was commissioned for a nine-hour improvisation in the Oude Kerk Church in Amsterdam which he performed alongside two organists and a dozen surround speakers pointed at the ceiling of the church. Nicolás is currently curating a residency for sound artists in the West Bank that takes place in a 130 year-old converted food storage shack in Bethlehem (within the Dar Yusuf Nasri Jacir For Art And Research دار يوسف نصري جاسر للفن و للبحث.) Residents so far include composer Sebastian Jatz Rawicz and researcher and artist Rolando Hernández. In the fall of 2019, he presented Incomprehensible Sun, a sound and light installation in a 200-meter-long ex-military shooting range in Zaandam (The Netherlands) and Retaining The Energy, But Losing The Image alongside artist Vincent De Belleval which consisted of ten large rotating parabolic reflectors that capture and emit hyper-focalized surround sound. For the first Sharjah Architecture Triennale (curated by Adrian Lahoud in 2019). Nicolás performed a piece for 16 buried speakers in the desert near the Mleiha Archaeological Centre. Nicolás has collaborated with artist Lydia Ourahmane, FKA Twigs, and Patrick Higgins under the name AEAEA.
"Given all the technical ground Cenizas covers, Jarr is an impressively meticulous guide. Every pluck, ping, buzz, scratch, and whistle is intentional, a bump in the tunnel as you slide down the rabbit hole" --Pitchfork (8.0)
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ACOLOUR 028LP
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Alastair Galbraith is considered nothing less than a genius around these parts. A New Zealand underground legend active since the '80s, his solo works have seen release on Siltbreeze, MIE, Emperor Jones, and Grapefruit Records while his own labels, Xpressway and Next Best Way, have released the likes of The Dead C and Damo Suzuki. His list of collaborators reads like a who's who of freeform musicianship: Peter Jefferies, Bruce Russell, Robert Scott (The Clean, Flying Nun), and Maxine Funke, to name but a few. Seconds Mark III is Galbraith's first solo album since Mass (2010) and is a collage of pensive, longing, and almost forgotten pieces stitched in his inimitable style. A thrilling addition to A Colourful Storm's ever-expansive catalog. 21-track LP with full-color printed sleeve.
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TDP 54033LP
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Trading Places present a reissue of Sir Lord Baltimore's Kingdom Come, originally released in 1970. Hard-rocking Brooklyn trio Sir Lord Baltimore's highly sought-after debut album is a legendary precursor of the heavy metal genre, a 1971 Creem review of the disc perhaps the first to ever use the term. The group benefited from the songwriting and production team of Mike Appel and Jim Cretecos, Appel the future manager of Bruce Springsteen and Cretecos already heady from success with The Partridge Family; recorded at Vantone Studios in New Jersey, it was mixed to fine effect by Eddie Kramer at Electric Ladyland, fresh from his work with Jimi Hendrix. Guitarist Louis Dambra co-arranged the material with Appel and Cretecos; he had earlier played in garage band The Koala as Louis Caine, and here his screeching guitar is a major draw, backed by plodding bass from Gary Justin, as front man John Garner shrieks his vocals while pounding furious drumbeats. Aside from a tough cover of Ray Charles's "I Got A Woman" and a track inspired by Yeats poem, "Lake Isle Of Innersfree," the album features heavily-stoned acid rock originals, delivered the Sir Lord Baltimore way. 180 gram vinyl; gatefold sleeve. Licensed by Cherry Red.
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REGRM 007LP
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2020 repress, originally released in 2013. Recollection GRM assembles Greek experimental composer Iannis Xenakis' works for Groupe de Recherches Musicales circa 1957-1962. "Concret PH" (1958) was assembled for the Brussels World Fair. The industrialist Philips commissioned Le Corbusier's famous "Philips Pavilion": "I'll create an electronic poem for you, he said. Everything will happen inside: sound, light, color, and rhythm." Iannis Xenakis designed the architectural blueprint and composed "Concret PH" meant to psychologically prepare the public for the show created inside, accompanied by a musical piece by Edgard Varèse. The 400 speakers that lined the inner shell were meant to fill the space through the sound sparkles of "Concret PH" and achieve a joint emanation of architecture and music, conceived as a whole: the roughness of the concrete and its internal friction coefficient found an echo in the timbre of the sparkles. "Orient-Occident" (1960) was originally composed for a film by Enrico Fulchignoni for UNESCO. The film describes a visit to the museum comparing artifacts produced by various cultures and highlighting their interaction, dating back to ancient times. From an abstract point of view, the composer regards this work as a solution to the problem of finding highly diversified means of transition, meant to link a type of material to another. One indeed witnesses a varied gradation of mutations, interplays, overlaps, cross-fading, sudden shifts, and hidden junction points. "Diamorphoses" (1957-1958) portrays continuity and discontinuity within evolution. Here are two aspects of being, whether in opposition or in communion. In "Diamorphoses" this antithesis was illustrated sections of sound strongly opposed to others, and particularly in organizations of continuous variations of average or "statistical" heights. "Bohor" (1962): Bohor (referring to Bors the Younger, Lancelot's cousin), is a character from the medieval cycle of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. "Bohor" is dedicated to Pierre Schaeffer. The author deliberately abstained from giving any descriptive information on his piece, letting the listener choose an imaginary route for himself. This release presents the 1968 version, revised by Iannis Xenakis himself and as yet not made available to the public. "Even though Iannis Xenakis never made 'musique concrète' in the sense given by Pierre Schaeffer, the GRM was a locus for experimenting with his ideas about sound and sound structures. These works, composed between 1958 and 1962, show a boldness as advanced as in his orchestral approach. The relationship between Xenakis and Schaeffer was often tense. It nevertheless entailed mutual recognition and respect towards each other's musical approach. Schaeffer found the piece disproportionate in terms of intensity but was indeed pleased by the dedication. The four pieces presented here, all produced at the GRM, undoubtedly demonstrate the experimental intent and the strictly 'physical' character of Xenakis' music, in that it provides the audience with a listening experience of a rare intensity." --François Bonnet & Christian Zanési; Cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin, January 2013. Layout by Stephen O'Malley. Executive Production by Peter Rehberg.
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LR 111B-LP
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Hailing from late-'60s Detroit, Black Merda (pronounced "Murder") were both aesthetically and musically way ahead of their time. When most black groups (including Parliament/ Funkadelic) were still sporting suits, singing about love and using a horn section, Black Merda had already become a tight guitar-heavy freak-funk four-piece. By weaving guitar rock and psychedelia into soul and R&B they were the gods of the underground "black rock" movement which fell somewhere between Jimi Hendrix and Parliament and MC5. But it wasn't just about the music, the message was just as important. Clear beer vinyl.
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LP
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HAB 013LP
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LP version. "We're super happy to announce our 13th release by Sharhabil Ahmed, the actual King of Sudanese Jazz (he actually won that title in a competition in the early 1970s). Sonically it sounds very different from what Jazz is understood to sound like outside of Sudan. It's an incredible unique mix of rock'n'roll, funk, surf, traditional Sudanese music and influences from Congolese sounds. Original copies of Sharhabil recordings are often hard to find, so we're happy they will now be widely available. 'Argos Farfish' which was featured on our last comp amassed close to 400,000 plays already. Sharhabil was born in 1935 and he is the founding father of the Sudanese Jazz scene. His aim was to modernize Sudanese music by bringing it together with western influences and instrumentation like he summarized it himself in a 2004 interview for 'Al Ahram Weekly': '[...]Haqiba music, you know, was traditional vocal music with little accompaniment beyond a tambourine. When our generation came in the 1960s, we came with a new style. It was a time of worldwide revolution in music. In Europe, the rhythms of swing and tango were being replaced by jazz, samba, rock- and-roll. We were influenced by this rejuvenation in Sudan, too. I started out by learning to play the oud and traditional Sudanese music, and got a diploma from the music institute of Khartoum University. But my ambition was to develop something new. For this, the guitar seemed like the best instrument. Western instruments can approximate the scales of Sudanese music very well. After all, a lot of Western music is originally from Africa. I have absorbed different influences, from traditional Sudanese rhythms to calypso and jazz, and I hold them together in my music with no difficulty.' Referring to its sonic appearance, Sudanese jazz hasn't too much in common with the western idea of jazz. Sharhabil's sound feels more like a unique combination of surf, rock n roll, funk, Congolese music and East African harmonies a.o. So, it kind of made sense to me, while visiting him in Sudan, to see the records he kept over the years: 2 of his own and 2 by Mulatu Astatke signed to him, further proving the influence of Ethiopian and other neighboring countries. In fact, Sharhabil was not just one of many Sudanese Jazz artist. He is the king of Jazz, literally, since in he won a competition over other artists for that title."
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SR 499LP
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LP version. From Mille Plateaux to Leaf, Staubgold, and Raster-Noton, ~scape, among others, or on his own label Ripatti, the Finnish artist Sasu Ripatti, aka Vladislav Delay, has been exploring various iterations of the "dub culture vs. electronica", since 1997. His sonic crafts and unique signature sound have been sought after by an eclectic range of bands and artists, ranging from Massive Attack, Hauschka, Black Dice, Autopoieses, Animal Collective, or AGF. Vladislav Delay met Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare (the most prolific Jamaican rhythm section and production duo) thanks to a series of jam sessions. Trumpet player Nils-Petter Molvaer had been asked by the Jamaicans to join them and he invited Delay alongside guitar player Eivind Aarset to tag along, which eventually turned into the Nordub project. The result of these jam sessions turned into an album, mixed and mostly produced by Vladislav Delay, released on the label Okeh. It was also followed by an extensive series of live dates. This one-shot reunion was the beginning of another story: a trio composed by Delay, Dunbar, and Shakespeare. In January 2019, Vladislav Delay went to Kingston and spent some days at The Anchor studios, to record drums and bass with S&R, some voice takes and a series of atmospheric field recordings. Back to Finland, Delay started to experiment with this precious material, mixing, and overdubbing, in the comfort and quiet of his studio, based on the island of Hailuoto, Baltic Sea, Northern Finland, giving another feeling to the Jamaican trip. This became a tribute to the "dub spirit", but in a very personal way, far beyond any influence or "the obvious". 500-Push-Up is two worlds collapsing, merging, also showing some intriguing approach of the Jamaican groove, used as a filigree, like the echo or the ghost of reggae, converging and conversing with a post-industrial and experimental approach. To file beside experiments -- for instance -- such as Lee Perry's Scientist Rids The World Of The Evil Curse Of The Vampires (1981) or the On U-Sound productions. Somewhere between the old-school electronica culture, the soundscaping, the experimental paths of Lee Perry and Adrian Sherwood, ghostly clubbing anthems, minimalism, pop, jazz, without being influenced, Vladislav Delay is building a drifting and coherent sound enigma. Personnel: Vladislav Delay - electronics, sampling, percussion; Sly Dunbar - drums; Robbie Shakespeare - bass.
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ZORN 058LP
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Aguirre Records present a first time vinyl reissue of Morgan Fisher and Lol Coxhill's Slow Music, originally from 1981. Unique improv/ambient album by two creative minds. Cherry Red generously gave Morgan Fisher musical carte-blanche by offering to distribute a label of his own so, like his studio, he called his label Pipe. For the first album he decided to record an album of ambient music. Rather than using synths, Morgan decided to invite soprano sax supremo Lol Coxhill to supply some raw material which he then processed in various ways. The opening track is based on Lol's beautiful performance of Handel's Largo, recycled through tape delays, VCS3 filters, and octave shifts. The result (in Morgan's opinion) is somewhat like a Mexican funeral march. Other tracks transform the sound of the sax sound into bells(!) and lush orchestral soundscapes. The 20-minute title track is based on the melody of the short closing track (which Lol sang, accompanied by church bells). Morgan recorded phrases from the melody using piano, guitar, bass, and voice. He snipped off the beginning of each note (about 5mm of tape) making the sounds less recognizable, then looped each phrase and recorded long stretches of the loops onto individual tracks of his 8-track TEAC. Finally, he created this piece in real time by fading tracks in-and-out through long tape delays. This pioneering work took weeks of intense experimenting and has been cited as an influence by several top Japanese artists such as Haruomi Hosono of Yellow Magic Orchestra. Lol Coxhill passed away after a long illness, on July 10 2012, aged 79. RIP. Transparent green and black vinyl.
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MAR 026LP
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Mad About Records present the first official worldwide reissue of Luis Carlos Vinhas's O Som Psicodelico, originally released in 1968. O Som Psicodelico is an all-time classic and a landmark in Brazilian music. Psychedelic bossa jazz. Pianist from Rio de Janeiro, he started playing at night in the late 1950s, quickly participating in the bossa nova movement. He joined the legendary Bossa Três alongside drummer Edison Machado and bassist Tião Neto, with whom he recorded three albums in the United States in 1962. Back in Brazil, he continued to perform with Bossa Três alongside other works with Jorge Ben, Quarteto em Cy, Elis Regina, and many others. Vinhas was one of the great exponents of bossa nova. He worked as a pianist at Beco das Garrafas. He also formed one of the first musical groups of this period, Bossa Três, which, in 1966, with Leny Andrade and Pery Ribeiro on vocals, was renamed Gemini V. In 1963, he released the album The Bossa 3. In 1964, he participated in the fabulous album O Som by Meirelles e Os Copa 5. Also in 1964, he recorded the phenomenal Lp - Novas Estruturas. In 1968m he released O Som Psicodélico de Luiz Carlos Vinhas, a bold mix of jazz with the sounds that came from the tropicalist movement and psychedelia. This LP is a milestone in Brazilian music and very rare in its original edition. 180 gram vinyl in hardcover sleeve; Deluxe limited edition, numbered, with obi.
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CD
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CVSD 075CD
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For a performance at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, in spring of 1966, percussionist Milford Graves invited pianist Don Pullen to play duets. The two musicians had worked together in a band fronted by saxophonist and clarinetist Giusseppi Logan, with whom they had recorded two LPs in 1965 for ESP-Disk'. Graves was already a daunting presence in free music. One step at a time, he was busy transforming the role of drumming in jazz, introducing a new way of dealing with unmetered time and accomplishing this task with technique that was almost inconceivable. His experience playing timbales in Latin bands had been formative, suggesting that the snare could be used as accent rather than beat-keeper, but by the mid '60s he'd worked up a holistic approach to sound and energy that was the most radical of his improvising percussion contemporaries. And with a simpatico accomplice like Pullen, who would go on to have an illustrious career with Charles Mingus, co-fronting a band with George Adams, and as a soloist and bandleader. This early setting finds Pullen is at his most hard-hitting, and his piano concept as heard here lays to rest dubious claims of Cecil Taylorism. Inspired by their performance, Graves and Pullen issued an LP, In Concert at Yale University, Vol. 1 on their own Self-Reliance Program imprint (1966). The vinyl is impossibly rare, especially its first copies, which sported hand-painted covers by the musicians. A second volume titled Nommo (1967) was subsequently issued, and it too is a highly prized platter. None of this music has ever been available digitally. The tapes were lost, so in putting this production together -- in the works for ten years -- virgin copies of the LPs were used. One CD includes the two complete LPs together with original cover designs, a gallery of hand-painted LPs, and a photo of Graves and Pullen selling them at a Nation of Islam convention. An insert modeled after the original one presents an interview with Graves about the production of the records. This is beyond the holy grail of free music. It is as vital and challenging today as it was more than five decades ago. Corbett Vs. Dempsey is honored to have collaborated with Milford Graves on this historic reissue. Personnel: Milford Graves - drums and percussion; Don Pullen - piano.
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Book
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SPECTRES 002BK
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To resonate: re-sonare. To sound again -- with the immediate implication of a doubling. Sound and its double: sent back to us, reflected by surfaces, diffracted by edges and corners. Sound amplified, swathed in an acoustics that transforms it. Sound enhanced by its passing through a certain site, a certain milieu. Sound propagated, reaching out into the distance. But to resonate is also to vibrate with sound, in unison, in synchronous oscillation. To marry with its shape, amplifying a common destiny. To join forces with it. And then again, to resonate is to remember, to evoke the past and to bring it back. Or to plunge into the spectrum of sound, to shape it around a certain frequency, to bring out sonic or electric peaks from the becoming of signals. Resonance embraces a multitude of different meanings. Or rather, remaining always identical, it is actualized in a wide range of different phenomena and circumstances. Such is the multitude of resonances evoked in the pages below: a multitude of occurrences, events, sensations, and feelings that intertwine and welcome one other. Everyone may have their own history, everyone may resonate in their own way, and yet we must all, in order to experience resonance at a given moment, be ready to welcome it. The welcoming of what is other, whether an abstract outside or on the contrary an incarnate otherness ready to resonate in turn, is a condition of resonance. This idea of the welcome is found throughout the texts that follow, opening up the human dimension of resonance, a dimension essential to all creativity and to any exchange, any community of mind. Which means that resonance here is also understood as being, already, an act of paying attention, i.e. a listening, an exchange. Addressing one or other of the forms that this idea of resonating can take on (extending -- evoking -- reverberating -- revealing -- transmitting), each of the contributions brought together in this volume reveals to us a personal aspect, a fragment of the enthralling territory of sonic and musical experimentation, a territory upon which resonance may unfold. The book has been designed as a prism and as a manual. May it in turn find a unique and profound resonance in each and every reader. Features writings by: Jean-Luc Nancy, Tomoko Sauvage, Christian Zanési, Maryanne Amacher, Christina Kubisch, Okkyung Lee, David Toop, Pali Meursault, David Rosenboom, Chris Corsano, Ellen Fullman, and The Caretaker. Editors: François J. Bonnet, Bartolomé Sanson. Binding: thread-sewn metallic softcover; Size: 135 x 200 cm; Page count: 196 pp.; First edition: 2500 copies; Language(s): French/English. Published by Shelter Press with the support of INA GRM.
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2LP
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NA 5123LP
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2020 repress. "Issued in 1975, this is the articulation of Zambia's Zamrock ethos. While other albums -- Rikki Ililonga's Zambia, Witch's Lazy Bones!! -- are competitors, it's hard to best this album as it covers each major quadrant of the Zamrock whole: it came from the mines; its musicians were anti-colonial freedom fighters, it envelops Zambian folk music traditions, and it rocks -- hard. Amanaz were serious, and they made a serious stab at an album. They titled their album Africa, according to original band member Keith Kabwe, 'because of how it was shared and how its inhabitants were butchered and enslaved, its resources stolen... all the atrocities slave drivers committed. ' Thus, their 'Kale,' a blues sung in Nyanja, that traced the continent's arc from slavery to Zambia's independence closes the album. Kabwe and rhythm guitarist John Kanyepa have a winsome softness to their vocals, which sit politely aside the feral growl of drummer Watson Baldwin Lungu, bassist Jerry Mausala and bandleader/lead guitarist Isaac Mpofu. Africa's vibe ranges from anxious ('Amanaz') to escapist ('Easy Street') to straight-up pissed-off. On the 'History of Man,' his voice whiskey-burned, his distorted guitar buzzing like swarming hornets, Mpofu indicts his species. There's a darkness to Africa not found on any other Zamrock records, and a melancholy drifts throughout, specifically on Mpofu's more restrained 'Khala My Friend,' which stands as an effective, bleak situation for the Zambian everyman, the average citizen of a struggling, new nation, who might have had relatives in conflict-torn countries on the horizon, who might have been struggling to find his next meal, who might have seen a bleaker future than his president promised. Then there's the clear Velvet Underground-influence on the nostalgic 'Sunday Morning,' which, as Kabwe recalls, was the first song written for the album, back in 1968, when Velvet Undergound and Nico was a new release -- and the underground funk of 'Making the Scene.' The album also tackles traditional Zambian music and early-'60s rock -- punctuated, of course by Kanyepa's wah-wah and Mpofu's fuzz guitars. But every time Amanaz get too deep, too violent, they come back with an accessible song and woo their listener back to the groove. 'Green Apple' is a civil song, featuring Kanyepa's sighing guitar. It is a perfectly arranged album, from the dichotomy of Mpofu's and Kanyepa's lead and rhythm guitars, to the vocal harmonies, to the rhythm section's sense of space and time, which allows Africa's funk to build. Inexplicably, Africa was given two separate mixes and two separate presses: one version is dry, with the vocals and drums mixed loud, the other slathered in reverb, with the vocals and drums disappearing into the mix, and with the guitar solos mixed much louder. We've presented them both here as they each have their appeal: it's up to the listener to pick the one he or she prefers. This is a highpoint of the Zamrock scene and we hope that this can be seen as its definitive reissue."
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LP
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NA 5191LP
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LP version. "Ayalew Mesfin stands aside the likes of Mulatu Astake, Mahmoud Ahmed, Hailu Mergia and Alemayehu Eshete as a legend of 1970s Ethiopia. Mesfin's music is some of the funkiest to arise from this unconquerable East African nation. Mesfin's recording career, captured in nearly two dozen 7" singles and numerous reel-to-reel tapes, shows the strata of the most fertile decade in Ethiopia's 20th century recording industry, when records were pressed constantly by both independent upstarts and corporate behemoths, even if they were only distributed within the confines of this East African nation. Though Mesfin was forced underground by the Derg regime that took control of Ethiopia in 1974, he has returned almost 50 years later with this triumphant set albums -- the first time that his music has been presented in this form. These albums give us a chance to discover a rare and beautiful moment in music history, in anthologies built from Mesfin's uber-rare 7" single releases and from previously unreleased recordings taken from master tapes. Good Aderegechegn gives us a chance to discover a rare & beautiful moment in music history, in an anthology built from his uber-rare 7" single releases."
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LP
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MMS 039LP
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LP version. "The Heliocentrics' albums are all confounding pieces of work. Drawing equally from the funk universe of James Brown, the disorienting asymmetry of Sun Ra, the cinematic scope of Ennio Morricone, the sublime fusion of David Axelrod, Pierre Henry's turned-on musique concrète, and Can's beat-heavy Krautrock, they have -- regardless of the label on which they've released their music -- pointed the way towards a brand new kind of psychedelia, one that could only come from a band of accomplished musicians who were also obsessive music fans. Drummer Malcolm Catto and bassist Jake Ferguson are the Heliocentrics' masterminds and producers, and they are obsessive weirdos in today's musical climate, searching, progressive humans who are often out-of-time with current trends. They have been playing together for nearly two decades and their collective drive is to find an individual voice. The Heliocentrics search for it in an alternate galaxy where the orbits of funk, jazz, psychedelic, electronic, avant-garde and 'ethnic' music all revolve around 'The One.' With Madilb's label Madlib Invazion for Telemetric Sounds, the Heliocentrics have returned to develop their epic vision of psychedelic funk, while exploring the possibilities created by their myriad influences -- Latin, African, and more."
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LP
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PAL 059LP
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Limited repress! LP reissue of Land And Sea's limited 2016 tape documenting a performance by guitarists Michael Morley and Bill Orcutt at the L&S gallery in Oakland.
"... Once regrettable antics were permanently affixed to the rearview mirror, the pair chauffeured across the bay to Land And Sea, the cozy gallery on San Pablo Avenue in Oakland and sobered up on vegan cocktail wieners and gummie vitamins. You may doubt, you may scoff -- have fun with it, champion, seriously -- but on July 6, 2016, they rendered a landscape where miniature squalls grind in between seamlessly intersecting improv, and they did it sharp as the slap of a palmful of plum-colored hazelmyer elixir following a good, close shave. The distinctive sound of the Fender Telecaster as played without effects by Orcutt ('one of music's premier abstractionists,' according to Osmo Montesanto) remains unblunted throughout the album, an aggressively serrated presence within Mr. Morley's contrapuntal flanking. This freely improvised performance is imbued with discipline and deliberate restraint, the better to connect the players more to the sound than to the instruments . . . The duo's number-one fan worldwide Cye Husain, pictured on the back cover, would surely attest that the singular structure-building of Orcutt and Morley defies and transcends most any 'well, actually' bloviature that the usual bore-splainers will need to hurl into the troposhere. For instance, that a third guitar is clearly audible at certain parts in the mix -- beautifully recorded by Gabie Strong, by the way -- can be accounted for most sensibly by Aotearoan metaphysics. Mr. Morley's ax of choice was 'Patu Tutae Opoko Nui, a 2006 Squire Telecaster made in Indonesia that I had modified over the years. It died and was ushered up to Valhöll in Gothenburg, Sweden in 2018.' Readers opting to take a moment to refer to Morley's Instagram post dated 6 June 2018 and view the last rites of this extraordinary combination of wood and metal should do so now. He cried. You should expect to do the same . . . Electric Guitar Duets is that otherworldly modulation we all crave and rarely find, hovering halfway between a deeply satisfying lattice of blurred sky roars and the soundtrack from a Stefan Jarworzyn biopic scored by Sergio Leone left on the floor out of its sleeve. Morley and Orcutt hold everything sideways at least as well as the centrifugal force required for slow-motion footage of mannequins riding tiny motorcyles around the inside of a chrome replica of Lee Van Cleef's skull. For other examples of fluid-splattered shards glistening inside crimson murk pulsations, only murder rolling through cold, cold blood comes to mind as superior to this 44-minute live recording." --S. Glass
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LP
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PFM 102LP
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Pleasure For Music present a reissue of the fourth studio album by the American solo artist Scott Walker, originally released in June 1969. The album does not include original compositions by Walker and consists of performances of ballads and big band standards. The record is an accompaniment to his BBC TV series, the simply named Scott, aired during Walker's self-described "wilderness years." Released between Scott III (1969) and IV (1969), TV Series was a collection of songs Walker performed on the show re-recorded in studio.
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2LP
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FOX 047LP
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A great set from John McLaughlin and company, recorded live for German public radio in 1971. Double vinyl set; edition of 500.
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LP
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BT 064LP
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Black Truffle announce a new solo album by Eiko Ishibashi, her first for the label, following on from the duo recording Ichida alongside bassist Darin Gray (BT 039LP, 2018). Hyakki Yagyō (Night Parade of One Hundred Demons) was produced for the "Japan Supernatural" exhibition at The Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney focusing on ghost stories and folklore from the Edo period onwards. As with The Dream My Bones Dream (Drag City, 2018), the album is a response to troubling questions about Japanese history, and the influence of the past upon the present, but finds Ishibashi shifting further away from her earlier piano-led songwriting and showing a deepening interest in electronics and audio collaging. The two side-long parts of Hyakki Yagyō feature layered synthesizers, acoustic instrumentation, recited verse, and field recordings, at times densely mixed but always with a subtle interplay of changing elements. The influence of European and American forerunners as diverse as Alvin Curran, David Behrman, and Strafe Für Rebellion can be traced, yet at the same time Ishibashi evokes the flute and string sounds associated with Japanese storytelling, and draws directly on the subversive literary tradition of Kyoka ("mad poetry") with a verse by the 15th-century poet Ikkyū Sōjun repeated throughout the album. Revisiting what has gone before, re-thinking what is possible musically, as a way of articulating what else might be possible in the future. As Ishibashi's liner notes make clear, the album reflects an attention to persistent dangers, myths and evasions in Japanese culture -- as well as the lurking uncertainties that might threaten positive change. This would seem to be manifested in the emerging melodies soon met by dissonance, erratic collisions, and near silence, as well as the eerie manipulation of the double-tracked vocals. Ishibashi's underlying concerns ring true more widely of course. Hyakki Yagyō is a work of multiplicities, and mystery, a landscape where nothing is as it seems at first, and everything is vulnerable to sudden violent interruptions. The album was produced with regular collaborators Jim O'Rourke (double bass) and Joe Talia (percussion), and features dancer and choreographer Ryuichi Fujimura performing Ikkyū's satirical tanka. O'Rourke's immersive mix creates a three-dimensional effect, with Ishibashi's various sound sources enmeshing and interacting in captivating ways. White vinyl; inner sleeve featuring artist portrait and liner notes from Eiko Ishibashi. Cover and label design by Shuhei Abe. Back cover design by Lasse Marhaug. Mixed and mastered by Jim O'Rourke.
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2LP
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SR 551LP
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Limited restock, last copies... "Preserved on two reels in Rashied Ali's tape archive, this document may have been only the second time that Ali had led a band in public. The band membership is stellar and unprecedented, and the tunes they play predate all known segments of Ali's career as a composer or bandleader. Ali was still officially on the job as Coltrane's drummer when he assembled this cast for perhaps as little as two sets of music in the Spring of 1967. It appears to be the earliest documented activity for the late tenor saxophonist Ramon Morris, who had thoroughly absorbed the lessons of John Coltrane, post 1961. Trumpeter Dewey Johnson had his peak moment of fame two years prior, appearing with Coltrane on the orchestral Free Jazz masterpiece Ascension. Pianist Stanley Cowell was just emerging as a distinctive voice among the open-minded 'Young Lions' of the day, on his way from Marion Brown's quartet to groups led by Max Roach. Bassist Reggie Johnson was already familiar with Slugs; he had worked there, alongside Ali and Cowell, across the previous two years. This stereo recording gives us a front row seat -- with all the grit and mayhem from those heady times. Meticulous remastering from the original tapes has polished this bit of East Village verité into a riveting, glistening-but-raw pearl from the black underground of the Sixties. 2xLP gatefold tip-on jacket, pressed on RTI Vinyl."
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2LP
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SDGBJ 1303LP
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2020 repress; gatefold double LP version. This version is unmixed. Arguably one of the world's most important underground dance music producer/DJs Theo Parrish lends his hands to selecting and mixing a set of jazz and funk records licensed from and originally released on the Black Jazz label 1971-1976. World-renowned for his DJ sets and remixes/productions, this Chicago-raised artist is near impossible to pigeonhole. Revered by a wide spectrum of dedicated music fanatics, he is known for his otherworldly DJ sets, and his serious approach to DJing as an art form. Theo gives special attention to fellow Chicago musicians The Awakening (three consecutive tracks, four total on the mix), one of the best funk/fusion groups that the Black Jazz label released, and whose only output was on that label. The set itself is a masterful "two turntables all vinyl" execution, a format that Theo is dedicated to -- no mp3, no CD-R, just the vinyl palette for the true aural experience. Sit back and be drawn into his world -- hear things his way. Other artists include: Doug Carn, Gene Russell, Calvin Keys, Rudolph Johnson, and Walter Bishop Jr.
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2LP
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HE 69003LP
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Reissue for the 1969 masterpiece by Arthur Lee's Love, Out of Here, originally out on Blue Thumb. A true milestone in psychedelic rock, on double vinyl set.
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LP
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BEWITH 082LP
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Be With Records present a reissue of Fuzzy Duck's self-titled album, originally released in 1971. A memorable name with an outstanding cover, Fuzzy Duck is a classic slice of underground London art rock and melodic psychedelia. Originally released on MAM in 1971, it's truly a musical force of infectious riffs and fiery solos, sharp tempo changes, a tight rhythm section, and heavy, Hammond-drenched grooves. With echoes of Spencer Davis Group, early Grand Funk, and Vanilla Fudge, it comes on like a heavier Soft Machine or Caravan. No wonder Fuzzy Duck's cult appeal has endured. The album features Mick Hawksworth (Five Day Week Straw People, Andromeda) on bass, acoustic 12-string, electric cello, and some of the vocal duties, and also Roy "Daze" Sharland (Crazy World of Arthur Brown, Spice) on organ and electric piano. Accompanying those two were Paul Francis on drums and percussion, and Grahame White on guitars and the rest of the vocals. Originally released in an edition of 500, Fuzzy Duck became legendary all over the world through a holy trinity of scarcity, personnel, and its sheer brilliance. The album kicks off with a heavy, bass-fueled, Hammond rocker titled "Time Will Be Your Doctor". This is pure hard-edged blues rock, brilliantly played. Its drum break intro was sampled by DJ Premier for Gang Starr's "Mostly Tha Voice" on 1994's legendary Hard To Earn. At nearly seven minutes long, "Mrs. Prout" follows incorporating more psych-leaning guitar and drawn-out keyboards à la Ray Manzarek. "Just Look Around You" is propulsive folk-rock with a soaring, proto power-pop chorus, backed by frenetic organ and heavy bass. Back comes the heavy, strung-out psych to both close out side one with "Afternoon Out" and kick off side two with "More Than I Am". "Country Boy" quenches the thirst for rhythm and melody, only the lyrics and vibe are wonderfully creepy. The groove suddenly cuts and drops into a more sinister tempo before the band pick up speed and toss you back again into the opening jam, this time with organ. The final, fully fleshed out track is the majestic "In Our Time", which oscillates between endless organ-driven boogie and heavenly, genuinely moving vocals. Infamous instrumental cut "A Word from Big D" rounds out the album. Yes, that's the band jamming with duck quack sound effects accompanying the music. Mastered by Simon Francis; cut by Pete Norman. Remastered from the original analog tapes.
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LP
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EPR 059LP
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Martin Rude (Sun River) and Jakob Skøtt (Causa Sui) team up for a genre-defying record that was recorded during an exceptional session on March 3rd, 2020. Martin brought his double bass, acoustic and baritone guitar into the studio of Causa Sui, where Jakob's drums were already miked and prepped by soundwiz Jonas Munk, freshly tuned from the new Causa Sui recordings. The music they played ranges from sprawled out pre-fusion electric jazz to psychedelic folk ragas. After the sessions, the hours of free-floating music was edited and dubbed by Jakob Skøtt into shorter cohesive segments, but maintaining the improvised vibe of these first takes. It is a record that pays homage to the great innovators of jazz: Miles and Trane (or perhaps more fittingly their peak-drummers: Tony Williams, Jack DeJohnette, and Elvin Jones), as well as Mingus at his fiercest or Sun Ra at his most exotic. Not merely a tribute, the album doubles down with guitar pickings ala John Fahey and Sandy Bull, as well as sparse layers of oddly-tempered mallet percussion and synthesizers. But perhaps the closest reference isn't something of a certain place in time, but rather a free-flowing ethos of stoic proportions: letting happen what it may, turning the accidents and mistakes along the way into something vital. Includes download code.
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LP
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V 25AH426
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Restocked. Victory present a reissue of Pacific, originally released in 1978. Reuniting the best session musicians Japan had to offer to make an album that would evoke the atmospheres of the South Pacific islands, the kind of places Japanese people spend their vacations. Pacific is a treat to the ears; its theme of the southern Pacific ocean and its warm cerulean waters relax its listeners with a fusion of city pop, soft jazz, and that good old 1970s funk while remaining surprisingly fully instrumental throughout all contributions from artists Haruomi Hosono, Shigeru Suzuki, and Tatsuro Yamashita. A true cult LP and an inspiration for a lot of so called "vaporware" music. LP includes insert.
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LP
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FAITBACK 007LP
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Repressed. Faitiche presents Jan Jelinek's album Tierbeoachtungen on vinyl for the first time, originally released on Scape in 2006. The album's six tracks took their cues from Jelinek's live concerts of that period: dense, slowly unfolding loop improvisations made with a laptop, various effect pedals, and miniature synthesizers. It is music that floats in a semi-conscious state between dream and awakening, always slightly mysterious, leaving traces that lead directly to the psychedelic-cosmic music of the kraut era. Includes download code.
In his release notes for Tierbeobachtungen at the time, the late lamented Martin Büsser wrote (2006): "The animal is experiencing a renaissance in music. It provides a reflective surface for our notion of the unbridled and irrational, of that Other the philosophers Deleuze/Guattari -- as part of their 'Animalisation' -- called the embodiment of artistic deliverance. And yet, how much of a liberation can art actually tolerate? To what extent can music truly throw off its fetters without descending into chaos? Jan Jelinek's album title provides a first hint of this development: Tierbeobachtungen (animal observations) is his fourth album for ~scape, and it addresses the issue of release and liberation. Recorded almost in transit, while preparing his move to a new studio, the tracks reveal and relish in their improvisational character, and drifting, lost sound -- yet they never lose sight of their underlying structure. Tierbeobachtungen might be Jelinek's freest and most personal work, with simply arranged tracks based on four to five layered and modulated loops, while his own studio equipment provides the main sampling sources, from synthesizer and guitaret to vibraphonette. Jelinek takes on the role of observer on this record, with a level of reflection remaining audible throughout. However, this is by no means intellectual, distanced music -- Jelinek leads us straight into a thicket, an acoustic jungle where sumptuous splendour meets the uncanny. A long tradition of psychedelic music pervades the recordings -- Amon Düül, Cluster, My Bloody Valentine -- yet whatever musical memories might vie for our attention, these are no clear-cut references, just loose associations. . . Similar to the pioneers of industrial music, like Cabaret Voltaire or Zoviet France, who experimented with field recordings to challenge Western listening habits, Tierbeobachtungen takes us to new, unknown territories and brims with sounds that defy geographic or stylistic classification, not unlike the semi-conscious state between dream and awakening. (...)"
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LP
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EMEGO 287LP
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A new timely studio album from the duo of Peter Rehberg and Stephen O'Malley. Recorded and mixed during an unexpected extended stay in Berlin when the borders of the world suddenly closed. The claustrophobic urgency of this scenario is seared into the colossal vibrations set into this vinyl release. Unlike many of their releases this is a studio record made unto itself as opposed to the many soundtracks they have made for theater works and the like. It also stands as one of their most fully realized releases to date. Proceedings are launched with "The Director". Sitting somewhere between contemporary classical and doom this is a sliding and menacing mass of sound, more Masque of the Red Death than The Decameron. Silver lining is an alarming swooping buzzing track, looming and lowering only to rise and descend again. A delicate play with the Shepard-Risset glissando manifesting a delirious swarm of sound. Lee's garlic orbits into a short, fragmented zone with bursts of harsh feedback and crashing fx, all manner of audio enters and is discarded with an underlying sense of despair and frustration. Proceedings continue on Side B with "Tea With Kali" where a calmer plateau is embedded with oscillating guitar and fluttering electronics. Beating sine waves envelop the listener in a meditative thought piece of sound. Frostless concludes this epic dispatch as a subtle and gentle foray into twitching electronics as a light buzzsaw drone swirls as around your mind. The interplay of sources -- guitar, electronic equipment (hardware, software, speakers) -- is so entwined it's often difficult to discern who is doing what amongst the broad sound field. KTL's VII is instrumental music as visual narrative resulting in an exquisitely crafted release full of sophisticated and sublime illusory effects. Berlin, Spring 2020; Written and produced by KTL, Stephen O'Malley and Peter Rehberg; Recorded and mixed at MOM Paraverse Studios, Berlin, March and May 2020; Engineer: Andi Toma (mix), 2nd Engineer: Constantin Carstens (recording); Mastered at Zino Mikorey Mastering, Berlin, May 2020; Cut by Andreas Kauffelt at Schnitstelle, Berlin, June 2020.
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2LP
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BEC 5772110
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2020 repress. Justice's highly-acclaimed debut album from 2007. French-only vinyl version, in deluxe gatefold sleeve. Retreating to their underground post-nuclear shelter/studio, French duo Gaspard Augé and Xavier de Rosnay worked on their first album as if their lives depended on it. The result is a mind-fuck of an album that proves that Justice's unique talent is to be found where least expected. Take for example "Let There Be Light" and its strident, angry electro, driven by a jabbing bassline; "D.A.N.C.E," a pure piece of vicious house sung innocently by a choir of children; "Newjack," a funky parody of the opulent times of the French Touch; "Phantom," taking over where "Waters Of Nazareth" left off to drift towards "Phantom Pt. II" and its head-swirling disco violins; "Valentine," an erotic, melancholic nursery rhyme, like a tribute to Vladimir Cosma and "Tthhee Ppaarrttyy," a pure electro-funk track where the sexy Uffie plays more than ever the cheeky Lolita. Justice have thrown established rules out the window (the notion of good and bad taste, the thin line between underground and pop music, the pigeon hole labeling between rock and electro, etc.) with a fantastic talent for synthesizing and mixing their influences with total candor, be it the cosmic disco of Larry Levan or Vladimir Cosma's panty-wetting romantics, Camel's prog rock or the anxious theme of Goblin for Dario Argento, to the flashy funk of the Brothers Johnson or "ABC" by the Jackson 5. Cross isn't a collection of random dancefloor singles. Cross is for listening at home or in clubs. Cross is a link between pop at its purest and experimental music. Cross brings together hardcore elements and cheese. Cross makes the Goths link arms with the rave kids. A generational manifest, ideally positioned on the side of the dancefloor, Cross, insolent with youth, is a testimony that the French electro scene is healthier than ever.
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2LP
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MM 115LP
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"Dudu Pukwana and the Spears recorded in London, but were only ever released in South Africa. The story behind this extraordinary music and the famous names involved are documented in this extended edition of Dudu Pukwana's debut album. In 1964 the Blue Notes left South Africa to play at the Antibes Jazz Festival in France, and more or less stayed away forever after. In January 1969 alto saxophonist Dudu Pukwana went home briefly along with producer Joe Boyd who persuaded Johannesburg record company Trutone to license the recordings for release in South Africa. Matsuli Music's discovery of a second unpublished London recording session, following Dudu's South Africa visit, reveals hitherto unknown music, and history. In addition to Richard Thompson (Fairport Convention) and Joe Mogotsi (Manhattan Brothers) putting their own spin on mbaqanga hits like Sibuyile, the Blue Notes' fabled Church Mouse and an early version of Andromeda can also be heard. With Pukwana's explosive style and energy evident throughout, this album fills in an exciting and important lost piece of the Blue Notes' and South Africa's exile jazz story."
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LP
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RRS 107LP
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The Germs are one of the most legendary and venerated of all Los Angeles hardcore punk bands. The roots of the group stemmed from the meeting of two minds at an alternative school in the late 1970s, when future vocalist Jan Paul Beahm, AKA Darby Crash, met guitarist George Ruthenberg, AKA Pat Smear, the latter a reformed Jesus freak. Spearheading the west coast hardcore scene, the band burst into public consciousness with an explosive performance at The Whisky in 1977 (introduced by future Go Go Belinda Carlisle and KROQ disc jockey Rodney Bingenheimer), with Crash (then known as Bobby Pyn) and Smear joined by bassist Lorna Doom and drummer Donna Rhia, this line-up featuring on debut single, "Forming". Crash's rambling, sneering and often sarcastic vocals were the perfect foil to Smear's superfast thrash-guitar licks, and Smash was a dynamic frontman too, despite his volatile personality. After borrowing Weirdos drummer Nicky Beat for the "Lexicon Devil" single, debut album GI (1979), incongruously produced by Joan Jett of The Runaways, saw the introduction of Arizona-born drummer Nicky Bolles. The band's revered status and early innovation kept them on top of the LA punk scene heap, yet Crash ended up overdosing on heroin in December 1980, his death an apparent suicide. After releasing solo material in the late 1980s, in 1992 Smear was asked to replace John Frusciante in The Red Hot Chili Peppers but opted to join Nirvana instead, his presence there sparking the Germs revival that yielded the outtakes and live rarities set, Cats Clause, which includes rare live material from the Hong Kong Café, as well as material from Crash's final concert at the Starwood in 1980, and more rare material. Limited edition blue vinyl. Gatefold sleeve and printed inner sleeve with rare photos and other memorabilia. Also includes a 60x60cm poster. Edition of 200. Licensed from San Juan Music.
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2LP
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ZORN 070LP
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Low-key synth and keyboard studio album by Swedish all-rounder Gustaf Dicksson. From the early days of the found-sounds recordings -- like the downright scary Unga Röster album (2015) and the hilarious "Mandys Bil" 7" (2016) -- the homespun kitchen recordings/tape collages of the still-going Idiotmusik series to the more carefully elaborated and precise Leendet Från Helvetet (2017) and Knutna Nävar (2018) albums, the massive Livets Ord dropped like a bomb when it originally surfaced as a self-released cassette in 2018. Heavily based on synths and keyboards and clocking in on no less than close 70 minutes over four LP-sides, this is arguably the epic album from the cluster around the Förlag För Fri Musik empire. Gustaf Dickssons's fascination for Christianity/religious assemblies shines through once again, the title Livets Ord ("The word of life") derived from the Swedish free church/sect with the same name that was based in Uppsala between 1983-2013 and casting a pastoral shadow over the ambient music of the album. While dabbling with a long tradition of kosmische musik and private-pressed new age wonders, Blod's now-patented sound of a Björn Isfält-gone-sour still lingers throughout the entire recording. A cornerstone in contemporary Gothenburg underground music. Featuring guest appearances by Emelie Thulin and Jerker Jarold. Includes insert; edition of 300.
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LP
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LR 102LP
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Limited restock One of the brightest and most famous projects of the entire punk/new wave scene, No New York was released in 1978 on Island's sub-label Antilles. Featuring some of the most incredible rule breaking bands of the underground N.Y.C. art and music scene, the project - produced by Brian Eno - is a genuine snapshot of the massively creative N.Y.C. scene. Artists: Contortions, Teenage Jesus And The Jerks, Mars, D.N.A..
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12"
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MAIS 038LP
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Tokyo-based ten-piece and wild Japanese folk-song fusionists, Minyo Crusaders join forces with Colombian cumbia radicals Frente Cumbiero on the history-making Minyo Cumbiero, the first ever Japanese-Colombian collaborative release, and one that fuses ancient Japanese folk songs with heavyweight Colombian styles. Recorded across two days in Bogota in August 2019 Minyo Cumbiero includes versions of an ancient Japanese rap tune, modern cumbia standard and 1980s Chinese computer game theme-song and captures a thrilling exchange between two radical and triumphant groups. Japan and Colombia may be cultural opposites on different sides of the world, yet the countries are bursting at the seams musically and on this EP both groups stridently drive their respective music cultures and histories in exciting new directions with powerhouse horn sections, rippling dub basslines, and rampant Afro-Latin polyrhythms creating carnival grooves, released here via London-based label, Mais Um. For an uncompromisingly contemporary and inventive take on traditional Colombian cumbia, look no further than Frente Cumbiero. Headed by Colombian songwriter and producer Mario Galeano Toro (also a founding member of Ondatrópica and Los Pirañas), the Bogota-based crew have spearheaded Colombia's thriving new-look cumbia movement for well over a decade, fusing cumbia rhythms and bass weight electronics with releases featuring collaborations with the legendary London-based dub producer, Mad Professor and US-based Kronos Quartet. Following the release of their acclaimed debut album, Echoes of Japan in 2019 (MAIS 036CD/LP), Minyo Crusaders -- or MinCru as their Japanese fans know them as -- have won-over a global audience with their unique take on Japanese folk music. A debut European tour in 2019 saw main-stage performances at Le Guess Who and Transmusicales and was soon followed by shows at WOMADelaide and WOMAD New Zealand in early 2020 that saw audiences intoxicated by their mix of traditional Japanese folk songs (min'yō) and Afro-funk, Thai pop, Ethio-jazz and reggae. Fronted by singers "Freddy" Tsukamoto (his nickname comes from his hero, Freddie Mercury) and Megu, with guitarist and bandleader Katsumi Tanaka, the members of the ten-piece are drawn from Tokyo's vibrant and diverse jazz and Afro-Latin scenes.
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LP
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UNSEENRE 002LP
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First time vinyl issue of Keith Kenniff's debut under his Goldmund moniker, Corduroy Road. Originally only released on CD in 2005 via John Twells's Type Recordings, this album of rare and unusual minimalist beauty. Multi-instrumentalist Keith Kenniff is a busy man. He has appeared as Helios on a number of acclaimed releases, including Deaf Center's Neon City EP (2004), and released a debut album Unomia on Merck Records which has appeared on many "Best Of 2004" lists. All this while studying at the prestigious Berklee College of Music, and playing drums, guitar or contributing production to a host of amazing musicians. As Goldmund, Kenniff has disregarded the electronic elements of his music almost entirely in favor of just a piano, a microphone, and occasionally a guitar. Corduroy Road is thirteen tracks of pure recording, the sound of the piano being opened and the feet on the pedals, the sound of fingers pressing lovingly onto the keys. This is a record of rare and unusual beauty, so shocking and yet unpretentious in its simplicity. When the guitar does emerge from beside the delicately touched piano, it serves as a balancing point for the record. Weaving in-and-out of the melodies, it adds another layer to what is already incredibly moving music. Corduroy Road is rooted in Kenniff's love of folk music from the American Civil War. You hear this directly from his rendition of Civil War-era classic "Marching Through Georgia", but the influence carries throughout the record. There is an unheard voice which propels each track through history, maybe the ghosts of dying soldiers whispering in a long-forgotten bar. Every haunting note drifts deep into the psyche and is lost in the ether of nostalgia. In this way it is a concept recording of sorts, it certainly has a narrative and has to be listened to in sequence. The story has clear themes; loss, history, friendship, camaraderie, forgiveness, and hope, all clearly marked out by musical segments. It is no surprise that Kenniff's passion for cinema shines through so strongly. It would be hard to draw comparisons to music so rooted in folk traditions, but the music evokes traces of Ryuichi Sakamoto, Mark Hollis, Keith Jarret, or even Eno's more piano based compositions. Includes download code.
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CD
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SR 499CD
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From Mille Plateaux to Leaf, Staubgold, and Raster-Noton, ~scape, among others, or on his own label Ripatti, the Finnish artist Sasu Ripatti, aka Vladislav Delay, has been exploring various iterations of the "dub culture vs. electronica", since 1997. His sonic crafts and unique signature sound have been sought after by an eclectic range of bands and artists, ranging from Massive Attack, Hauschka, Black Dice, Autopoieses, Animal Collective, or AGF. Vladislav Delay met Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare (the most prolific Jamaican rhythm section and production duo) thanks to a series of jam sessions. Trumpet player Nils-Petter Molvaer had been asked by the Jamaicans to join them and he invited Delay alongside guitar player Eivind Aarset to tag along, which eventually turned into the Nordub project. The result of these jam sessions turned into an album, mixed and mostly produced by Vladislav Delay, released on the label Okeh. It was also followed by an extensive series of live dates. This one-shot reunion was the beginning of another story: a trio composed by Delay, Dunbar, and Shakespeare. In January 2019, Vladislav Delay went to Kingston and spent some days at The Anchor studios, to record drums and bass with S&R, some voice takes and a series of atmospheric field recordings. Back to Finland, Delay started to experiment with this precious material, mixing, and overdubbing, in the comfort and quiet of his studio, based on the island of Hailuoto, Baltic Sea, Northern Finland, giving another feeling to the Jamaican trip. This became a tribute to the "dub spirit", but in a very personal way, far beyond any influence or "the obvious". 500-Push-Up is two worlds collapsing, merging, also showing some intriguing approach of the Jamaican groove, used as a filigree, like the echo or the ghost of reggae, converging and conversing with a post-industrial and experimental approach. To file beside experiments -- for instance -- such as Lee Perry's Scientist Rids The World Of The Evil Curse Of The Vampires (1981) or the On U-Sound productions. Somewhere between the old-school electronica culture, the soundscaping, the experimental paths of Lee Perry and Adrian Sherwood, ghostly clubbing anthems, minimalism, pop, jazz, without being influenced, Vladislav Delay is building a drifting and coherent sound enigma. Personnel: Vladislav Delay - electronics, sampling, percussion; Sly Dunbar - drums; Robbie Shakespeare - bass. CD version includes two additional tracks.
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LP
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TDP 54034LP
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Trading Places present a reissue of Astrud Gilberto's That Girl From Ipanema, originally released in 1977. The daughter of a Brazilian mother and German father, Astrud Gilberto achieved international prominence with "The Girl From Ipanema," an inauspicious debut recorded for the landmark album her husband, Joao Gilberto, created with Stan Getz in 1963. Moving to the USA, where she was subsequently based, she continued her solo career and also toured with Getz, with whom she later began a relationship. Over-the-top classic That Girl From Ipanema allowed her to revisit the hit in the sweeping high-fidelity full-spectrum setting of a disco big-band, the album overseen by MFSB and Salsoul mainstay, Vince Montana. Along with individual takes of Cole Porter's "Love For Sale" and Harry Nilsson's "The Puppy Song," original "Far Away" benefits from the understated trumpet of Chet Baker, but the album ultimately revels in all things disco, the Brazilian element coming courtesy of percussionist Dom Um Romao on select tracks. Crank up the volume and tune in to the brass, piano, and percussion that percolates under Astrud's characteristically soft and sultry vocals to fully experience this underrated gem.
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12"
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LAPSUS 023EP
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Martin Jenkins, more commonly known as the artist Pye Corner Audio, epitomizes Lapsus Records' commitment to cutting edge sound experimentation. In 2017, he beguiled the electronic music community by releasing the Where Things Are Hollow EP (LAPSUS 016EP), on Lapsus Records. The Barcelona label announces the release of Where Things Are Hollow 2, consisting of three brand new original cuts and a remix from none other than John Talabot. Where Things Are Hollow 2 explores a spectral and hypnagogic terrain, establishing an electronic sound that at times invokes Jenkins' more dance friendly facet -- "Self Synchronise", "Weather The Storm" -- while also offering his familiar iridescent dreamlike ambient textures -- "Phase B" -- that featured prominently on his first EP. This second EP also includes a remix from John Talabot, unquestionably one of Spain's most internationally recognized names over the last decade, who exquisitely reimagines "Resist" -- a song from the first EP -- transforming it into a cross between EBM and hypnotic techno. From a graphic design perspective, renowned artists Alex Trochut and Basora have once again collaborated on this project, repeating the formula that made the artwork for Where Things Are Hollow such a collector's item.
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