Dissident is Richard Youngs's strong follow up to 2018's Belief and Endless Futures (REDUX 015LP, 2018). Youngs is also a member of Amor. Youngs on the recording: "Dissident is a hallucination of a legendary lost Samizdat-style recording of the legendary lost Richard Youngs Band. It's not clear to me that it is against anything in particular, and as such it is not literally dissident. In fact, I'm a little lost how or why it is dissident, save for being informed by the imagined provisional recordings of pre-Glasnost protest. Perhaps the wordless scratch vocals are voicing dissent, but I remember having fun. So much so, I couldn't stop myself from fleshing out the rough nylon guitar songs to a full band arrangement, recorded in multiple spaces." 180 gram vinyl.

LP version. Following her acclaimed trilogy of solo albums, electronic R&B innovator DAWN (formerly Dawn Richard) returns with new breed, a new album-length project that dates back to her upbringing in New Orleans, taking in the city's rich traditions and musical heritage. After releasing an initial taste of the album through the slow burning R&B of "jealousy", today sees DAWN drop the album's second single and title track. A self-produced return to the electronically-focused sonics of her previous solo work, new breed is an authoritative stamp on the genre in her own unique fashion. Set across ten tracks, the album provides the most intimate portrait of DAWN's life so far, harking back to her years growing up in New Orleans and paying tribute to the city's culture, sights and sounds. Presenting a duality between the more soulful sounds of the city's more traditional forms of R&B and DAWN's own innovative brand of electronic sonics, new breed sees DAWN at her most eclectic, drawing on a wide range of influences and, alongside contributions from the likes of Cole M.G.N (Christine & The Queens, Ariel Pink), Kaveh Rastegar (John Legend, Sia), and Hudson Mohawke, has been largely self-produced. Driven by innovations in tech as well as music, in 2016 DAWN became the first ever artist to perform live in 360 degrees on YouTube, partnered with Wired for the release of an award-nominated virtual reality version of her single "Not Above That", and joined Adult Swim as a curator and designer. Her last album Redemption (LOC 010CD/LP, 2017) went top 5 in the Billboard Dance Charts, and saw her subsequently collaborate with Dirty Projectors, Kimbra, and Mumdance on a series of singles. Live, Dawn has spent the Autumn of 2019 touring with her former Danity Kane band-mates as well as Kimbra, and performed at Adult Swim's festival. With new breed, DAWN has further set herself apart as one of R&B's true iconoclasts, merging styles and metamorphosing them to her own style to create one of the most important, culturally relevant projects of recent times. Increasingly carving her own lane in the landscape of contemporary music, DAWN is writing her own legend; one that those after her have no choice but to follow.

In 2019, Croatian Amor returns with a new album, Isa. Copenhagen's Loke Rahbek works in a wide variety of forms. His prolific rate of activity is best viewed through his and Christian Stadgaard's Posh Isolation label. Of Rahbek's many projects, his most eloquent and gentle is Croatian Amor. 2017's single "Finding People" bloomed from Croatian Amor's previous album, the widely acclaimed Love Means Taking Action (ALT 028CD/PI 180LP). These melancholic transmissions presented a kind of alien pop. For Isa, he has drawn on an impressive list of guests to realize a nauseating narrative of virtual communication and eschatological programming. The album's title invokes a messianic entity, and though it's hard to tell what's imagined or remembered anymore, the play that Croatian Amor is known for feels far more vivid today. "Enhance photo to reveal a picture of Bird caught mid-flight; enhance again, the bird has a human face screaming." Never pessimistic, Croatian Amor circles themes of tragedy and comfort to animate a sense of hope. His accomplices pluck details from his graphic scenes like a searchlight drifting over a starlit surface. Alto Aria, Soho Rezanejad, and Jonnine Standish of HTRK, each contribute vocals across the album, cloaked and kerned on Croatian Amor's inimitable stage. "Eden 1.1" and its accompaniment "Eden 1.2" feature the voices of Frederikke Hoffmeier (Puce Mary) and Yves Tumor, respectively. These are some of album's most delicate pieces, and where one may find respite from the helix of damaged rhythms that eddy across Isa. Familiar faces from Copenhagen are solicited throughout, and perhaps the album's most endearing quality is the space for volatility that all of the collaboration has invited. All the signals and timelines lead everywhere and back. Maybe it's only the myths that get us? The cover of Isa features work by artist Amitai Romm. "Tracing reflections that float in the pool: the water is lost in all images. Two skies hold glass billboards."

Restocked, last copies. "Maya Deren journeyed to Haiti to make a film of ritual dances, instead, she came to be accepted as a Voudoun initiate, whose devotees commune with the cosmic powers through invocation, offerings, song and dance of the Voudoun pantheon of deities, or Loa, whom are witnessed as being living gods and goddesses, actually taking possession of their devotees. Deren describes the relationship between magic, science and religion bringing a uniquely lyrical voice to her narrative. This paints a multi-textured, infinitely complex portrait of a spiritual tradition with roots stretching back to the very dawn of humanity. Joseph Campbell calls Divine Horsemen 'the most illuminating introduction that has yet been rendered to the whole marvel of the Haitian mysteries as 'facts of the mind.'' Included in this album are some of the first recordings ever made during religious ceremonies near Croix de Missions and Petionville featuring selections that serve as a soundtrack to the film she shot documenting Voodoo ceremonies and festivals conveying the incantatory power of the ritual drumming and singing. One can hear the sounds of nature while processions begin across the landscape further giving the effect of an audio memoir. For the first time in almost 40 years, this long out-of-print cult classic is now available in a limited edition featuring a beautiful screen printed cover by Grant Corum, risograph insert with liner notes by Cherel Ito, original cover art by Teiji Ito and mastered for the first time by Timothy Stollenwerk."

From Guy Skornik, the composer and arranger behind Popera Cosmic and Pour Pauwels (1971), comes the enigmatic instrumental cues that provided fellow existentialist and notorious auteur director Alejandro Jodorowsky (The Holy Mountain, 1973) with the soundtrack music to what is now considered his rarest and most overlooked feature film, Tusk (1980). As part as Finders Keepers' ongoing dedicated Jodorowsky soundtrack series, the label present the original film edits from the 1979 studio sessions featuring Steve Hillage (Gong) and members of Cossi Anatz. Following his mind-melting masterpieces Fando & Lis (1968), El Topo (1970), and The Holy Mountain, Jodorowsky's "disowned" attempt at a family film retains the director's ongoing demand for intense, experimental film music resulting in what is undeniably one the best kept sonic secrets from the darker corners of this coveted filmography. Cherry-picked from pre-recorded synthesizer-fueled, cosmic pop sessions by Skornik, these compositions provided Tusk with arabesque new age synthesis alongside full-blown ambitious electro rock, as well as classic French Fender Rhodes-driven romanticism during some of this lesser-spotted movie's most memorable moments. Presented here in isolation, Guy Skornik's multifarious futurist-pop evokes worthy comparisons to Ash Ra Tempel, Eno's Bowie and Suzanne Ciani, mapping an unlikely journey between Magma and 10cc in the process. Don't ignore Jodorowsky's "elephant in the room" -- you never know what is hidden in the trunk. Tusk not only unearths a lesser-known Jodorowsky gem, but forms another spiritual circle in the label's alternative pop universe, forming new twines in the Finders Keepers family tree.

Phill Niblock's Music For Cello collects three pieces from the '70s and early '80s, performed by cellist David Gibson. This CD includes a 16-page unpublished interview with Niblock. Since the late sixties Phill Niblock has been composing long-form acoustic drones with a focus on the rhythms and overtones that rise from closely tuned instruments. His highly original and influential music is an exploration of timbre, microtonality, stability, duration and psychoacoustic phenomenon.

"3 To 7 - 196' is very direct, aggressive, and gritty. The overtone patterns that are produced by the proximal pitches become more prominent with louder volume. So please, play this piece very loud. This was the first piece of mine in which the musician was precisely tuned, in which I chose exact pitches in hertz. We used a sine wave oscillator and frequency counter for the tuning. 'Descent Plus' has four cello tones descending one octave over twenty-two minutes, from 300 hertz to 150 hertz. David Gibson played these tones without lifting his bow from the strings, constantly retuning. I made four different scores, manually changing an oscillator to which he was tuning, for each track's recording. For the revision, we added six more tracks, with David playing long tones which were not descending. The second part of the recording was made nearly twenty years later. 'Summing II' (one of four parts) is mellow and sonorous. David plays two strings simultaneously, one of which is retuned for each successive recording of that pair of tones. This is a mix of an eight-track tape. It's better played loud also." --Phill Niblock, from the liner notes.

Zauberberg -- Wolfgang Voigt's most fundamental (and foreboding) release under his alias GAS and perhaps of all in his untold discography -- finally stands alone once again and is released in the way its original splendor. Originally released in 1997 on the iconic Frankfurt imprint Mille Plateaux, and then reissued in 2016 as a part of GAS Box (KOM 370LP, 2016), Zauberberg is now released on his own label, Kompakt. Though this narcotic symphony is not the first release under the GAS moniker, Zauberberg is the first to disclose the true nature of Wolfgang Voigt's unified sound and ideology as GAS. Layers of ominous intensity supported by muffled kick drums as classical music loops incessantly swirl with no direction, Zauberberg is the definitive GAS album and a perfect starting point for those not familiar with his music. 180 gram vinyl.

1990, Storrs, CT. Twisted Village heads Wayne and Kate are DJs at the local college station with Tom Leonard, guitarist in a local up-and-coming outfit called St Johnny. One day Tom slips Kate a cassette curiously titled Luxurious Bags Of Vomit, containing the first recordings of his basement one-man band. The tape turned out to be a glorious noise and scuzz rock racket falling somewhere between Chrome and early Pussy Galore. The TV heads flipped over it, and immediately offered to put out an LP. Tom thinks they are joking. Eventually he is convinced they are serious, and that cassette forms the basis of the 1991 debut LP from Luxurious Bags, From Heaven To My Head. This was followed by 1992's Voluntary Lifelong Quarantine as well as a CD combining both LPs. All sold briskly, as Tom's one-man act gained momentum. Also gaining momentum was his other outlet St Johnny. After a couple of singles and a UK album on Rough Trade, they were signed by Thurston Moore to DGC in the post-Nirvana rush. Tom stayed for the recording of their 1994 DGC debut Speed Is Dreaming, but soon found the band's new life as a major label act not to his liking. Tom was gone by the time the album hit the racks, and retreated to the basement to work full-time on Luxurious Bags' magnum opus. Recordings already started on 4-track cassette were transferred to 8-track reel-to-reel, and reworked endlessly. In early 1995, Tom declared the record finished, and delivered Frayed Knots as the third (and, as it turned out, final) album. While retaining much of the lo-fi noisiness of his earlier work, Frayed Knots had a wider range of influences shining through. Much of Frayed Knots had a strong melodic basis, showing echoes of Dinosaur Jr and My Bloody Valentine, while the final 10+ minute cut dissolves into Terry Riley-esque soundscapes. So satisfied was Tom with Frayed Knots that he called time on Luxurious Bags upon the album's release in 1995, becoming perhaps the only one-man band to ever break up with itself. He then joined Major Stars, where he remains to this day. Frayed Knots earned glowing reviews in the 'zines of the day, and legions of fans have long waited in vain for a follow-up. Many have also waited for a vinyl issue of the album (this being the mid-90s, Frayed Knots had come out only on CD). Twisted Village therefore present the first vinyl version of Frayed Knots, a mere 23 years after its first release. Housed in a full-size version of the original artwork is a glorious black vinyl slab, from which these timeless melodies will ooze out of your speakers with more mystery than ever. Right freaking on.

It took more than just some time and imagination to believe that Carte Blanche, this piece of astonishing contemporary music by some of the most talented and able musicians of the international avant-circuit, could be realized. Karkhana, a highly explosive mostly Middle Eastern/Mediterranean ensemble -- Sam Shalabi (Land Of Kush, Shalabi Effect, Dwarfs Of East Agouza), Sharif Sehnaoui ("A" Trio), Michael Zerang (Peter Brötzmann, Hamid Drake, Jaap Blonk, Vandermark, etc.), Mazen Kerbaj ("A" Trio), Maurice Louca (Dwarfs Of East Agouza), Tony Elieh, Umut Caglar (Konstrukt) -- is weaving a tapestry of sound for Egyptian songstress Nadah El Shazly's voice to slide deep into. On the other side, two grand seigneurs of underground, ex-Sun City Girls and Rangda guitar whirlwind Richard Bishop and W. David Oliphant (Maybe Mental) play it loud. Far Eastern post-industrial. Very heavy, sharp, and crystal clear. Ripe. Carte Blanche will be released as a one-time pressing. It is released as a part of Unrock's Saraswati Series. Vinyl cut by Peter Koerfer at Ivory Tower. Extra-heavy deluxe cover, printed cardboard insert. 140 gram vinyl.

Another side of Pom Pom. Includes download code.

Lowtec, the man behind Workshop and Out To Lunch, famously takes his time to make electronic productions that are, in turn, out of time. Over the course of his career he's released tracks that could have been made yesterday, years ago, or a decade into the future. With Avenue 66 he's found a leftfield home that celebrates pure creativity, that embraces the liminal, the weird, and the sublime. Light Surfing fits all of these descriptors. The double-LP rewards deep, repeated listening. There's plenty to unpack, but those who cherish the murky bangers that have been Lowtec's stock and trade will find plenty to love. "Boy With The Broken Glasses" weaves a subtle, dancehall-inflected riddim into hazy ambient house, while the closer, "Burnt Toast", is the latest example of Jens Kuhn's uncanny ability to perfectly fit a soulful vocal sample into an alien dance floor soundscape. Unexpected moments of sideways beauty also unfurl across the four sides. The two-part Light Surfing is one of Lowtec's most evocative suites to a date -- its mournful string soundtrack is the album's recurring, longing motif. Elsewhere, as on "Mynthenquai", Kuhn applies avant-garde strategies to his synth leads, taking you on head-spinning melodic journeys. Light Surfing is a masterful balancing act between dream states and machine-like efficiency, the experimental and functional, precision and spontaneity. Lowtec could have only gotten here by taking his time.

LP version. "Disguised as the meandering outpourings of vacant thought and activity dialed simultaneously from zero and ten. Formed in the cauldron of a fevered mistake resolute. Surrounded by ignorance, dis-interest, and the attention of the carefully self-selected. Recorded and burned through a thousand galaxies of dust and doubt and endless infinite wonder, transforming both time and space. Forever exiled to the very bottom of the world to reflect on the struggling desperate pile above. Recognizing any contribution as miniscule and insignificant when placed within the greatness of the other, the dominant insolent preening satisfied, continually shouting the pre-eminence of the first world order. The latest by The Dead C -- Rare Ravers: it's a long player."

The brand new album from artist and musician Dolphin Midwives (aka Sage Fisher), Liminal Garden is released by Beacon Sound. The album will be preceded by a single, Mirror, including a remix from Pye Corner Audio. Using harp, voice, and electronic processing, Liminal Garden features ten compositions, bringing to mind artists such as Mary Lattimore and Holly Herndon. It is a controlled and dynamic album that blends the organic with the digital, resulting in a body of work that fuses tranquility and rupture. The album was recorded in early 2018 by Jason Powers (The Decemberists, Chromatics, Matthew Dear) at Type Foundary, and mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri at Black Knoll Studio (Alva Noto, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Benoît Pioulard, Grouper, School of Seven Bells, Tycho). The artwork has been designed by Bijan Berahimi at FISK. Says Fisher, "This album changed as I made it. This album is about change, about finding beauty and acceptance in the fractured, broken and vulnerable places. It's about integration, of all of my selves, of the natural world and technology, of all of the brokenness and imperfection and insecurity and fragility of being femme in a patriarchal society." Cardboard sleeve, printed/manufactured in the USA. Edition of 500, includes download.

Black Truffle present the first-ever vinyl reissue of Ruedi Häusermann's Galerie Randolph, a masterpiece of solo multi-tracking originally released on CD by Unit Records in 1995. Born in 1948 and residing in the medieval Swiss town of Lenzburg, and virtually unknown outside of the German-speaking world, Häusermann is a multi-instrumentalist and enormously prolific composer who works primarily in the medium of absurdist music-theater. A virtuoso wind player and free improviser who also composes for traditional classical instrumentation, his work is characterized by subtly surreal humor and the unlikely combination of extended technique and simple, at times almost child-like, melodic ideas. Named after his rehearsal room in Lenzburg, Galerie Randolph uses an enormous array of instruments to craft a work of singular compositional vision. Each of the twelve pieces begins from the same two elements: a woozy, sliding scatter of tones played on a home-made contraption stretching two guitar strings between the top of Häusermann's alto saxophone and an amplified cup, and a series of uneasy block chords sounded on accordion and reeds. On each piece these two elements (whose pitch gradually raises throughout the record) are complemented by entirely different material, all of it played by Häusermann. Ranging from layered flutes to one-finger piano melodies to unintelligible vocals to musique concrete interjections to free jazz saxophone explosions, these additional layers combine with the endlessly returning idée fixe of the foundational elements to create a truly dream-like listening experience, a gently deranged realm in which you lose all sense of linear time. Calling up the most unlikely combinations of possible predecessors -- Erik Satie, Gerry Mulligan, and Helmut Lachenmann perhaps -- Galerie Randolph ultimately defies comparison. Almost unknown except to a select group of cognoscenti such as Jim O'Rourke, yet destined to become a cult classic, Galerie Randolph is an instance of that most rare thing: music the likes of which you have never heard before. Mastered and cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. Presented in a deluxe gatefold sleeve with gorgeous archival images by the composer; Design by Stephen O'Malley; Edition of 500.

"Once again Clocktower bring you the massive and powerful tracks, such as 'Cloak & Dagger' DJ style led by King Tubby and Lee Perry. And they've also included the slow style of 'Cloak & Dagger' which you will never stop listening for generations to come, young and old. Then the following tracks of 'Blackboard Jungle' with two incomparable versions that will open up your ears to the greatest musicians on bass and drums, etc. We from Clocktower say listen, enjoy, party, and dance to all the fine production. We have compiled this for all who loves reggae music production beyond compare. Music of life." --Alfred Newman Not a reissue, a new compilation of early Lee Scratch Perry material, not previously issued in this form. With tracks recorded from the early '70s with material from Clocktower 7" only releases, etc.

2019 repress. The Caretaker slips beyond recognition in the first "post awareness" stage of Everywhere At The End Of Time. The ability to recall singular memories gives way to confusions and horror. It's the beginning of an eventual process where all memories begin to become more fluid through entanglements, repetition, and rupture. Though the metaphoric device of worn-down ballroom 78s and Jack Nicholson's descent into madness in The Shining (1980), The Caretaker connotes the transitory cognitive breakdown of moderate into severe late stage dementia. Memories of the good times are recollected in glitching pyknoleptic flashes as the music struggles to follow consistent lines of thought, instead fluctuating between a fractured mosaic of ideas and elusive emotive gestures, but still occasionally able to gather coherent thoughts. In aesthetic, the sieve-like mind state of Stage 4 vacillates a serene sort of psychedelia with utterly paranoid and petrifying mental subsidence. Smudged traces of sublimated musical hall memories give way to shocking tracts of atonality and discord with runaway rhythmic logic, perpetually tumbling farther into states of mind perhaps best compared with K-Hole-like dimensions or the babble of after-hours psychonautic journeys. The concision of previous stages is here replaced with wandering, side-long tracts. Three of those are titled "Post Awareness Confusions" and correspondingly explore and reflect agitated, irritable mindsets as they navigate an ephemeral, confusing complexity of structures. The other piece is called "Temporary Bliss State" and starkly contrasts the other parts in a coherently lush traverse of ambient crackle and glittering melody... Artwork by Ivan Seal. Mastered and cut by Lupo. Double-LP comes in gatefold sleeve.

LP version. Calling all turkeynecks, dirt fiends and juiceheads! Often imitated, never equaled -- the legendary, the one-and-only, the unique Las Vegas Grind! hath finally returned! After many years scouring the greasy basement dives of the netherworld, Jazzman finally managed to locate the manic mastermind responsible for the original six volumes of deviant, demented, and depraved sleaze-ball bump and grind. Slumped at the end of a bar, we struck the deal at midnight as we drank a toast of cold rat piss, and with deep regret Jazzman can now unveil the latest in the whole sorry saga. Las Vegas Grind! Volume Seven. And so, dragged under the stripper's spotlight for the first time in 60 years, long-forgotten never-knowns by Alonzo And The Boppers and The Abstracts rock side-by-side with lurid low-life lurchers Louie And The Fat Men and The Escorts. Little Louie And The Finger Cymbals rattle their tiny pasties while Gay Poppa's Cha Cha flips us round and takes us to the other side. All in all, yet another set of crude and tasteless chud-locker choons bound to upset the whole square world all over again. 16 gruesome growlers guaranteed to torment and tease. Shameless and shocking; rotten to the core; welcome, welcome at last to Las Vegas Grind! Volume Seven. Also features: Savoys, Low Rocks, Frank Scott, B Bubba, UBs Group, Leo Valentine Trio, Los Virreyes, Bob Moore And The Temps, Little Louie And The Finger Cymbals, The Original Spacemen, and Y-Dells.

Following on from Dimensional Space on Echospace (CV313 001CD, 313 004CD), dub techno legend CV313, aka Stephen Hitchell, offers up his second album, Glass City Sessions on Minimood, featuring five profoundly immersive tracks that come as a double vinyl release only. CV313's signature dub techno sound has been a blueprint for the genre and is created on vintage hardware; all sounds, static, tones, and paranormal occurrences are left in to render it as atmospheric as it is. The five expansive recordings that make up the album are actually based on live recordings from a DEMF after-show night back in 2000 in Detroit. "The music is a bit creepy and so was the experience of this live show," says Stephen Hitchell. "It was an old dingy warehouse about ten miles out of downtown Detroit, right next to the now abandoned Eloise asylum, but there are many stories of it still being haunted." Indeed, that theme of haunted locations around Detroit echoes through the five tracks and makes them a truly cinematic experience. Opening things up on the first record is the brilliantly dark "Belle Isle Symphonics", twelve frosty minutes of hunched-over drums and rattling metal sounds that place you in the center of a large abandoned building. "Masonic Mystic" is much sparser and more eerie, with watery chords and warm static suspending you in an unsettling calm atmosphere, but one that always feel like something strange is around the corner. On the second record the superb "Stars Above Elmwood" lifts the shadowy mood somewhat with more airy dub techno drums and pensive chords rippling out in all directions. It's warm, expansive, and utterly absorbing for more than 13 minutes. "Two Way Inn" continues the trip in fine style with gentle chords and barely there drums, comforting white noise and distant pads all sinking you into a state of meditation before the masterful "Eloise's Theme" arrives, an ambient-ish masterpiece with horizontal chords gently moving up-and-down the scales to trap you in a soothing state, but always with an undercurrent of foreboding. This new album by CV313 is deep, storytelling dub techno of the highest order. Comes on splatter vinyl.

Studio Mule present a reissue of Mitsuaki Katayama Trio's First Flight, originally issued in 1979 on Johnny's Disk Record. Johnny's Disk Record is an independent jazz label run by the owner of jazz cafe Kaiunbashi No Johnny, located in Rikuzentakata City in Iwate prefecture, Japan. The legendary label released a string of albums of high quality but down-to-earth music, spanning from modern jazz and avant-garde jazz to left-field pop. Albums such as Farewell My Johnny/Left Alone (1980) and Aya's Samba (1978) have reached cult status among fans as some of the best works to come out of the Japanese jazz scene. This debut album by drummer and actor Mitsuaki Katayama is a Japanese jazz masterpiece consisting of five original compositions. The no-filler album includes the tracks "Unknown Point", a danceable jazz samba with tight and powerful drumming and the melancholic "Arizona High Way", a tune that perfectly epitomizes what Japanese jazz is about. "It's Over" features beautiful piano work by Kichiro Sugino, a promising pianist who tragically succumbed to a chronic illness and couldn't fully realize his potential. Edition of 500.

Double LP version. Midnight In Tokyo is a compilation series that aims to be the perfect companion to nights in Tokyo, collecting tracks by Japanese artists that sound best at night. Vol. 2 (STUDIOMUL 006CD/LP, 2018) focused more on '80s jazz fusion, but the latest installment, Vol. 3, picks up where Vol. 1 (STUDIOMUL 001CD/LP, 2018) left off, bringing together forgotten soul, disco, and new wave gems. The compilation opens with Japanese rare groove classic "More Sexy," a provocative song by Yoko Hatanaka. "Kimi No Yume," from the album Yume No Yonbai (1984) by Masumi Hara, is one of the best Balearic acid folk songs to come from Japan. "Silhouette Call" is an electric bossanova track in the vein of Antena, from a rare album called Octopussy (1982) by Yuki Nakayamate, a singer-songwriter who worked with Motoharu Sano. "Theme Of High School Student" is a dubby cut featured in the Japanese film Kougen Ni Ressha Ga Hashitta (1984), written by Atsuo Fujimoto (Colored Music), one of the key artists in the recent wave of global interest in Japanese music. "Get To Paradise" is a stone-cold funk jam by Mari Kaneko, who was known as the Janis Joplin of Shimokitazawa. Following that is one of Japan's greatest new wave disco tracks, "Hannya", taken from Tomoko Aran's popular third album Fuyu-Kukan (1983) produced by Masatoshi Nishimura, who was part of Friends Of Earth with Haruomi Hosono. Masako Miyazaki, whose rendition of Seawind's "He Loves You" is a fan favorite, puts her own spin on Earth, Wind & Fire's "Fantasy," singing in her accent-heavy English, giving the song an undeniable character. "Watashi No Koukoku" is a certified disco-boogie classic by Junko Sakurada. The Brazilian-esque jazz fusion, "Sunshine Bright On Me" is by fusion group Kangaroo, who were often billed as "the japanese Shakatak". "Stranger's Night" is a synth-pop number by Maiko Okamoto, which bears a suspicious resemblance to Rah Band's "The Shadow Of Your Love". Electro-pop disco "Singing Lady", off the sole album by The Fad sounds like something Giorgio Moroder could've cooked up. "Magic Eyes" is a disco anthem recorded by Tetsuji Hayashi's disco project, The Eastern Gang. Following that is Japanese soul gem "Crazy Baby," found on a rare 7" entitled Minato No Soul by Rinda Yamamoto also composed and arranged by Tetsuji Hayashi. Closing out this collection of 14 Japanese rare groove goodies is "I'm In Love", a bittersweet mellow dance number by Tomoko Aran.

Johnny's Disk record is an independent jazz label, run by the owner of jazz cafe Kaiunbashi No Johnny located in Rikuzentakata City in Iwate Prefecture, Japan. The legendary label released a string of albums of high-quality, but down-to-earth music, spanning from modern jazz, avant-garde jazz to left-field pop. Albums such as Farewell My Johnny / Left Alone (1980) and Aya's Samba (1978) have reached cult status among fans as some of the best works to come out of the Japanese jazz scene. The Japanese jazz classic, Aya's Samba, was a debut effort by bassist Eiji Nakayama, who played as part of Elvin Jones' Jazz Machine and toured with Don Friedman. This album is an important release in the Johnny's Disk catalog, not only because it is the first ever release, but also because the owner hearing the band play was the reason why the label came to be. Aya's Samba is a mellow jazz samba in minor key that's considered a Japanese jazz classic. Slow ballad "Yellow Living" is drenched in melancholy with emotive keys and sax notes.

"'It's been nearly five decades since Joe McPhee assembled a group of musicians to perform the weekend concerts that would become Nation Time, his debut LP. It was December 1970, thirty-one-year-old McPhee was inspired by Amiri Baraka's poem 'It's Nation Time,' and the students at Vassar College didn't know what hit them. 'What time is it?' shouted the bandleader. 'C'mon, you can do better than that. What time is it?!' The music on Nation Time came out of the fertile, but little-known creative jazz scene in Poughkeepsie, New York, McPhee's home base. Two bands were deployed, one with a funky free foundation featuring guitar and organ, the other consisting of a more standard jazz formation with two drummers and the brilliant Mike Kull at the piano. Across the concert and the next afternoon's audience-less recording session, the band was ignited by McPhee's passion and his gorgeous post-Coltrane / post-Pharoah tenor. On 'Shakey Jake,' they hit a James Brown groove filtered through Archie Shepp, while the sidelong title track is as searching and poignant today as it was during its heyday. Originally released in 1971 on CjR, an imprint started expressly to document McPhee's music, Nation Time has a sense of urgency and inspiration. Additional material from those December days would later appear on Black Magic Man, Hat Hut's first release. In fact, the first four records on this seminal Swiss label all featured McPhee. Nation Time was largely unknown a quarter century or so later, when it was first issued on CD through Atavistic's Unheard Music Series. On Corbett vs. Dempsey, we reissued the album along with all known tapes leading up to and around it as a deluxe box set, but the standalone LP has long remained incredibly rare. Now is the time for a new generation of freaks to lose their shit when settling into the cushy beat of 'Shakey Jake' and answer McPhee's call with the only appropriate response: It's NATION TIME.' --John Corbett."

"Joe McPhee: Free music's most resourceful survivor tells Daniel Spicer about 50 years of blowing down the walls of sound, from saxophone solos to basement noise jams to the small underground music community he helps nurture in New York State. Meanwhile, inside the issue... The Primer: Tuareg guitars Francis Gooding surveys the nomadic rebel rock 'n' roll of North and West Africa, from desert rock originators Tinariwen through to contemporary stars including Group Inerane, Bombino, Filles De Illighadad and Mdou Moctar. Katalin Ladik: The Hungarian artist tells Lucia Udvardyova about a taboo-breaking career spanning vocal art, acting, performance art, erotic poetry, and whatever else she turned her hand to, including a spine-chilling outburst in Peter Strickland's 2012 film Berberian Sound Studio. Invisible Jukebox: Steve Gunn; Epiphanies: Brunhild Ferrari; The Inner Sleeve: Lovely Music's Mimi Johnson; Plus interviews with Stuart Chalmers, Orgue Agnès, Achim Zepezauer and more."

The second release on 4GN3S (pronounced "Agnes") is a five-track EP by The Golden Filter. "Talk Talk Talk" is like Siouxsie vs early Human League, but heavier. "All The Way In" is a jittery electro beat workout sounding as if Anne Clark were fronting Drexciya. Beatless and odd, "Dislocation" is part art-piece, part word association, and part no wave experimentalism. A mutating arpeggiated bass and an ominous tone drive "Cut My Hair" into an incongruously sci-fi dark dance netherworld. "Temple" is classic Golden Filter, with modular bass blurbs, soft vocals, and an 808 beat doused in analog reverb.

Limited repress; LP version. "Begun as a one-off collaboration in 2009, the trio of Keiji Haino, Jim O'Rourke and Oren Ambarchi has now become a solid working group, refining its craft through a series of annual concerts at Tokyo's legendary SuperDeluxe. Much of their recorded work has focused on their intense, ritualistic take on the rock power trio of electric guitar, bass and drums. Presenting the entire first set of the trio's March 2013 concert at SuperDeluxe (the second set will follow on Black Truffle later this year), Only Wanting to Melt Beautifully Away Is It a Lack of Contentment That Stirs Affection for Those Things Said to Be as of Yet Unseen is their fifth release and blows the instrumental palette wide open for a single continuous piece focused on acoustic strings, synth, flute and percussion. Featuring one of Haino's most delicate and moving recorded vocal performances, the opening section of the record takes the form of a spare duet between O'Rourke's 12-string acoustic guitar and Haino's kantele (a Finnish variant of the dulcimer), behind which Ambarchi provides a hovering backdrop of wine glass tones. While on previous releases the listener has often sensed that Haino was firmly in the driver's seat, here O'Rourke takes center stage with an acoustic guitar performance that takes the lyricism of John Abercrombie or Ralph Towner and refracts it through the free improvisation tradition of his mentors Derek Bailey and Henry Kaiser. The atmosphere of meditative, abstracted song is reminiscent of some of Haino's greatest recordings, such as the legendary Live in the First Year of the Heisei volumes recorded with Kan Mikami. After this stunningly beautiful opening sequence, the performance moves organically through a number of episodes, including a dramatic central passage in which Haino moves to synth and drum machine, crafting a current of raw electricity that unfurls slowly over the gently pulsing foundations of Ambarchi's cymbals and builds to heights of manic intensity. When Haino later turns to wooden flute, Ambarchi answers him with nimble hand-drummed percussion in a passage that calls to mind Don Cherry's liberated combination of free-jazz improvisation and non-Western musics. The trio's move away from the power trio dynamic bespeaks a risk-taking and questing spirit that refuses to be satisfied with repeating past glories, and yet the organic, immersive flow of this single improvisation attests to the intuitive bond that has formed between them over the last five years. Exuding the signature mystery and emotion of Haino's greatest works, this release is perhaps the strongest statement yet from this acclaimed trio, and holds out a tantalizing promise for everyone hooked on their continuing exploration of 'those things said to be as of yet unseen.' --Francis Plagne; Design by Stephen O'Malley with high quality live shots by Ujin Matsuo and stunning artwork by Norwegian noise legend Lasse Marhaug.

The recently composed "Ricochet Lady" (2016) is the only work for solo acoustic glockenspiel by the American experimental composer Alvin Lucier. Following in the manner of his pieces "I Am Sitting In A Room" and "Vespers", "Ricochet Lady" embodies Lucier's approach toward sound's individual function and mobility within space. This CD defines this approach through four realizations recorded in four dissimilar spaces, ranging from the standard to extraordinary: a university rehearsal hall with walls of drywall and glass, a chapel made of oak and stone, an empty forge and foundry warehouse for steel railway wheels, and a 36-meter tall dilapidated cement grain elevator. Never one to shy away from convention, Lucier intensifies each performance by instructing that the glockenspiel be placed against a wall or other reflective surface where the soloist systematically traverses the entire range of the instrument in rapid, repetitive patterns, actively disseminating the glockenspiel's sustain, clicks, and interferences throughout the space. In doing so, the glockenspiel maps the unique acoustical characters of each space as each space helps to compose the piece. Created in close collaboration with Trevor Saint, a rare (if not the only) specialist of experimental music for glockenspiel, Lucier has further enhanced the sophistication of this re-imagined instrument while maintaining his devotion to letting spaces speak. Presented in a stunning digipak with liner notes by Alvin Lucier and Trevor Saint. Design by Lasse Marhaug. Mixed and mastered by Matt Sargent at Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. (For an optimal listening experience it is recommended that these recordings be played at high volume).

Following a trio of sprawling, planet-gargling double-LPs, 2013's self-titled LP on Skrammel, and Second Launch (BLACKEST 033LP, 2015) and Eclipsed (BLACKEST 048LP, 2017) on Blackest Ever Black, Bremen -- Jonas Tiljander and Lanchy, previously best known for their contributions to Brainbombs' long rap sheet of genius-and-brutality, but latterly exponents of a rarefied cosmic melancholy -- return with Enter Silence, their most concise, and powerful, album to date. Once again, the Uppsala multi-instrumentalists combine elements of trogged-out psychedelic rock with a deadly serious Arctic minimalism and weeping modal improvisations that owe more to the outer limits of jazz and burnt-out free music from Japan. It's connoisseur's space music, grown-up and grievously honed; outwardly inclined towards the epic but studded with details that reward attention and introspection. There's always been a strong undercurrent of sadness animating Bremen's work, and that existential burden is present and correct on Enter Silence, culminating in the all-out cosmic anguish of "Palladium". Even "The Middle Section", whose ragged chords are nothing if not the sound of optimism and defiance, sounds like it's navigating some kind of unsayable trauma. But this band has always allowed plenty of room for bonehead slash-and-burn as well: see here especially the Stoogeian/39 Clocks-ish rock'n'roll of "Aimless Cruising", and the pulpy quasi-cinematic tension of "Sinister", or the brilliant "Too Cold For Your Eyes", a blast of voidal motorik that sounds like a cranked-up Clean. It's a cold, cold world out there.

Dead Memory LP, on United Dirter, by Steven Stapleton and David Tibet features two further out-takes from Musical Pumpkin Cottage (1996). Neither of these two tracks feature on The Threats Of Memories double-LP (DPROM 141LP, 2018) or The Threat Of Memory 5CD box-set. The cover features new paintings by Babs Santini and David Tibet, with handwriting by David Tibet. The LP was mastered by Andrew Liles, and the cover was designed by Ania Goszczyńska.

"Esoteric Recordings are pleased to announce the release of a new re-mastered and expanded edition of the classic 1972 soundtrack album to Roman Polanski's gritty film of Shakespeare's Macbeth. New re-mastered & expanded."

Restocked; 4LP version. Burial and Kode9 are each credited with fostering esoteric, hyperlocal sounds and steering them to global recognition. As such, these tracks reach into obscure corners and across a disorienting range of tempos. This set of four vinyl LPs -- produced to accompany the final FabricLive 100 compilation release, features 28 of the 37 tracks on the compilation in their unmixed format. Featuring artists from Africa, China, South America, and Japan as well as the Europe and US. Drawing from gqom, juke, and footwork to trance, jungle, and grime, as well as a wealth of material that defies categorization.

2019 repress. Faitiche presents a long-lost vinyl album. Since 2003, Jan Jelinek's Loop-Finding-Jazz-Records, originally released in 2001 on ~scape, existed only as a download. Now the album is available again on vinyl, as a double LP with two bonus tracks, "Moiré (Guitar & Horns)" and "Poren", B-sides from Tendency EP (2000).

"Don't be misled by the title, though for there isn't a finger-snapping rhythm bebop lead anywhere on the album. Instead, Jelinek chooses to explore the visual effect moiré - two shifting patterns creating an implied third dimension - in the audio realm." --Alternative Press

"The title acts as explanation for the studio technique that provided the basis for this album, snippets of other people's arrangements deconstructed through a sampler into loops and then splashed onto an audio canvas." --ATM

"Jelinek's sound evolved out of his dislike for (and inability to play) keyboards." --RPM

"Jelinek has abstracted his sources beyond recognition, looping his millisecond samples into flickering patterns of sonic moiré laid atop a dub techno framework. . . . Jelinek might as well have sampled a horn player's hissing intake of breath - it would have been 'jazz' enough for his purposes." --The Wire

"It's a perfect inversion of conventional music, a sonic negative. Everything that would typically be foreground is moved back or pushed off the screen altogether, and the flecks of sonic debris that would normally be covered by other sounds are left to carry the melody and rhythm." --Pitchfork

"All you need to know is that these onomatopoeic non-specific songs . . . are warm, paradisiacal creations." --NME

"Listen carefully and you'll hear textures slowly unfolding and mutating. Presuming you've not fallen asleep of course." --iDJ

"At times, it's all a bit dripping tap Japanese water torture; so sedentary it drowns in its own motionlessness" --DJ

"Loop-Finding-Jazz-Records is a genuine modern classic whose re-release is anything but a cynical mortgage repayment exercise. Consider this a second chance, then pretend you had it all along." --Boomkat

Ustad Saami's God Is Not A Terrorist is hypnotic, unvarnished recordings by one of Pakistan's most revered and iconic classical singers. The roots of Saami's music go back to the 13th century, but its message is contemporary and universal: "to sing is to listen." Produced by Grammy Award winner Ian Brennan, God Is Not A Terrorist is volume five of Glitterbeat's acclaimed Hidden Musics series. "75-year-old Ustad Saami risks his life daily in Pakistan to keep alive his microtonal, pre-Islamic, multilingual (Farsi, Sanskrit, Hindi, the ancient language of Vedic, gibberish, Arabic, and Urdu) music. Handed down by his ancestors for over a thousand years, he is the only practitioner of Surti left in the world; when he passes, this music will die with him. Extremists resent his work as they do anything else pre-dating Muhammad. In the land where Osama Bin last hid, Master Ustad Naseeruddin Saami has spent his entire life mastering the nuances of every given note. It has been said that India always had a region where all of the greatest singers came from; that place is Pakistan. "To sing is to listen." These are the words of the master. The translation of his last name, Saami, even means "to hear." For him, everything centers on one note. From that, all else grows and music is seen as a sixth sense for people to better communicate with each other. With great precision, Saami utilizes 49 notes versus the West's mere seven. The scale was founded by a mix-raced royal whose lifelong endeavor was to make peace with duality through art. This predecessor of qawwali music is called khayál, the Arabic word for "imagination"; in it the melody carries the meaning. The lyrics are almost incidental during these call-and-responses. It is the uneven pitches that the master values as being the most searching; those with even numbers are too stable. The master shapes the notes with his hands as he sings like conducting a Theremin. Most masters now hide their knowledge, possessively passing their skills down through family only. Subsequently, traditions have died and withered. Master Saami's mission is to share his knowledge with the world, so that the music may live on freely." --Ian Brennan. LP version on 180 gram vinyl, includes download.

Hot Casa present a reissue of Katakata by Kings Aigbologa Bucknor, originally released in 1978. Amazing Afro-beat album from a disciple of Fela Anikulapo Kuti. A sublime spiritual and political session recorded at Phonogram studio (Lagos, Nigeria) in 1979, on a 16-track. After the critically acclaimed second album released in 1979 and reissued in 2017, African Woman (HC 050LP), Hot Casa present the first and really hard-to-find vinyl reissue of Kingsley Bucknor. Also known as "King Bucknor", the famous Nigerian producer, arranger, and singer delivered two brilliant, hypnotic and long traditional Afro-beat tracks. All the ingredients of the "Afro-beat" definition are here: killer drums, straight riff guitars, hypnotic bass, heavy horns chorus, strong political lyrics with beautiful melodies. Ultra-rare, unique, and essential.

There is a quiet confidence to I Met Her By The River, Dawda Jobarteh's third album for Sterns Africa. While the kora master's technique is prodigious, it's always subservient to the song. And although the songs contain beautiful moments of contemplation, they are never facile or saccharine. Their beauty and intricacy connote no loss of power or slackening of intent. The excellent support of his longtime friends and sidemen notwithstanding, this new album is definitely the work of a singular artist. Jobarteh's repertoire choices reflect both his birth and history in Gambia and his life and home in Denmark. In songs such as "Karang Folo" and "Sidi Yella", you hear the musician who is the grandson of the world-renowned kora player Alhaji Bai Konté; the youngest son of Amadou Bansang Jobarteh, the favorite musician of Gambia's first president; and the nephew of Dembo Konté and Malamini Jobarteh, the kora duo that Sterns first recorded in 1985. Elsewhere you hear other traditions and styles that Dawda has effortlessly absorbed into his own. "Jeg Gik Mig U Den Sommerdag" (which translates from Danish as "I Went Out On A Summer's Day") has a Scandinavian melody that dates back at least to the 17th century and words set in the 19th century, and has since become a perennial summertime favorite in Denmark. But Dawda Jobarteh has more than two sides to him. A world traveler, he appreciates the multifarious cultural influences beyond his personal West African-Northern European axis, and so it shouldn't be surprising, really, that he plays Mongo Santamaria's jazz classic "Afro Blue" on an electrified kora, or that he delivers an exquisite rendition of Adele's multi-million-selling pop hit, "Hello". And then of course there are his own highly original songs, such as the album's title track, a wistful kora solo, or "Begging Boys", a clear-eyed, heartfelt piece of social commentary. Dawda Jobarteh is, after all, a 21st-century citizen of the world -- as everyone is. I Met Her By The River, the third album by the Gambian composer, has been described as "absolutely beautiful", "a gorgeous synthesis of the old and the new", and "a joyful noise from a man right at home in very different musical and geographical places."

"Originally released in 1979, Iceland is Richard Pinhas' third solo album and his first following the breakup of Heldon. While moving away from the maximalism of his old band, paring down Heldon's hybrid of otherworldly sci-fi imagery and pummeling psych-prog riffs, the journey through Iceland is decidedly more inward. Consisting of longer, brooding synth-based pieces as well as short proto-industrial études and interstitial sketches, Iceland features Pinhas' delay-ridden electric guitar, pulsating machine rhythms and analog synthesizer washes -- all vivid in texture and timbre, notwithstanding an undeniably chilling ambience. This first-time vinyl reissue includes 'Wintermusic,' an immersive 25-minute bonus track recorded in 1983 and appearing here on vinyl for the first time. Pinhas' excursions channel the season's stillness and sublimity, its majesty and its threat. Without a doubt, one his finest moments. Recommended for fans of Cluster, Mica Levi, and Fripp & Eno."