"Originally issued as a CDR on Matt's own Child of Microtones label, the stone madness of this session was so overwhelming we begged him to let us do it on vinyl. Luckily for one and all, he agreed. Recorded here and there, with a variety of different ensembles. Galactic Ooze is one of the most fully warped missives from Planet MV, and that is saying something. While there is a certain continuity between the layered threads of MV's deeply processed vocals and amazing stunned-noodle guitar figurines, the music here is always in flux. There's lots of electronic jiggering which brings to mind the squeedle elements of Blows Against the Empire (still the apex of the Planet Earth Rock and Roll Orchestra's discography), but there's none of the dogmatic claptrap that sometimes derails that album's liberationist thrust. The music on Galactic Ooze is a sweet sideways slip into deep space. Amidst tightly forested jams, there are many beams of sound that act like sun rays, illuminating the process from within, with skeletal frameworks outlined in pure scorch. You can catch whiffs of everything from the roll of Soon Over Babaluma-era Can to the thunder-echo of Yabby You's Beware It Dub at various points in the program, but the insanely sweet angularity of the guitar lines is trademark MV throughout, no matter how wildly the deck shifts at times. And for all their cosmic detailing, the songs are as abundantly human as always, addressing the eternal mysteries of life (whether lived in the woods of on the street). And asking the kinds of questions that require something more than a snappy answer. Galactic Ooze is a beautiful mutational meditation on where we exist inside our own personal cosmos. And its secrets unfold at their own pace, layer by layer by layer. As a great man once said, 'walking on water wasn't built in a day.' You can that that to the bank." --Byron Coley, 2021

Michael Ranta has collaborated with Takehisa Kosugi, Toshi Ichiyanagi, Jean-Claude Eloy, Conny Plank, Mike Lewis, and Hartmut Geerken, just to name a few. He was also assistant to Harry Partch and performer in the Gate 5 Ensemble in the 1960s. Additionally, Ranta performed in Stockhausen's ensemble during the 1970 World Expo in Osaka. Ranta's resume also includes recordings by Helmut Lachenmann, Herbert Brün, Toru Takemitsu, Josef Anton Riedl, Mauricio Kagel, among others. Throughout his extensive recordings and live performances, Ranta has furthered the trajectories of contemporary percussion composition alongside works for tape and electronics. His works are fully immersive which evoke vast spaces, ritual, and create an expansive presence for his accompanying multimedia commissions. For this CD release, two of Ranta's longform pieces are included: "The Great Wall" and "Chanta Khat". Originally scored for the HT Chen Dance Company as a theater production, "The Great Wall" premiered in 1984 at the La MaMa experimental theater in New York. This highly detailed composition for electronics, voice, percussion, and tape offers a massive drone-based accompaniment for Chen's stage presentation of the legend of Meng Jiangnu. Yet, Ranta's composition also creates a fully formed soundtrack that stands beautifully on its own. The atmosphere is very much in the spirit of Kosugi's multimedia masterwork Catch Wave and Jean Clade Eloy's large-scale production Yo-In which also features Ranta. "Chanta Khat" was completed in 1973. An early version of this piece originally premiered as part of a multimedia installation at the 1972 summer Olympics in Munich. This powerful work for tape and electronics includes Ranta's field recordings documenting his travel in Laos during a lunar eclipse earlier that same year. The piece is a haunting and equally frantic work where the local villagers are heard responding quite emotionally and viscerally to the celestial event of the day. "Chanta Khat" was later reworked and remixed in 1973 at the NHK electronic music studio in Tokyo. This version is featured here in its entirety. Packaged in a six-panel digipak with fully remastered and restored audio. Includes detailed notes by Michael Ranta and features new artwork by Timo van Luijk.

"The Wire Tapper 55. Every copy of the April issue will come with a CD of the 55th volume in our ongoing series of underground music anthologies, featuring 16 new or archival tracks by Muslimgauze, João Lobo, Mariel Roberts, Maxx Mann, Carlos Niño & Friends, Nun Gun featuring Sohail Daulatzai, Gentle Fire, Craig Scott's Lobotomy, and more. Don Cherry in Watts: As Don and Moki Cherry's work is the subject of a new book, Gabriel Bristow revisits the global music traveller's roots in the post-bop milieu of Watts, Los Angeles in the 1950s. Invisible Jukebox - Mike Paradinas x Lara Rix-Martin: μ-Ziq meets Meemo Comma and Planet Mu meets Objects Limited as the two UK electronica trailblazers sit down together with The Wire's mystery record collection."

Rich in musical associations yet utterly singular in its voice, joyous with an inner tranquility, the music of Natural Information Society is unlike any other being made today. Their sixth album in eleven years for eremite records, descension (Out of Our Constrictions) is the first to be recorded live, featuring a set from London's Cafe OTO with veteran English free-improv great Evan Parker, & the first to feature just one extended composition. The 75-minute performance, inspired by the galvanizing presence of Parker, is a sustained bacchanalia of collective ecstasy. You could call it their party album.

This was the second time Parker played with NIS. Joshua Abrams: "Both times we played compositions with Evan in mind. I don't tell Evan anything. He's a free agent."

The music is focused & malleable, energized & even-keeled, drawing on concepts of ensemble playing common to musics from many locations & eras without any one specific aesthetic realization completely defining it.

"The rhythms that Mikel plays are not an exact reference to Chicago house, but that's in there," Abrams says. "I like to take a cyclic view of music history, can we take that four-on-the-floor, & consider how it connects to swing-era music? Can we articulate a through line? I dee-jayed for years in Chicago & lessons I learned from playing records for dancing inform how I think about the group's music. The listener can make connections to aspects of soul music, electronic music, minimalism, traditional folk musics, & other musics of the diaspora as well. It's about these aspects coming together. I don't need to mimic something, I need to embody it to get to the spirit, to get to the living thing."

For jazz fans, the sound of Parker's soprano & Jason Stein's bass clarinet might evoke Coltrane & Dolphy, even though they didn't necessarily set out to do that & they play with complete individuality. Abrams sees a bridge to the historical precedent, too. "Since we first met in the 1990s, one of the things that Evan and I connected on was Coltrane's music," he says. "I hoped that we would tap into that sound world intuitively. In this case, I think that level of evocation adds another layer of depth, versus a layer of reference."

Indeed, this is a performance in which the connections among the ensemble & the creative tension between improvisation and composition build into a complex mesh of associations & interactions. While the band confines itself to the territory mapped out by Abrams' composition, they are remarkably attentive & responsive, making adjustments to Parker's improvisations. When Parker's intricate patterns of notes interweave with the band, the parts reinforce one another & the music rockets upward. Sometimes, Parker's lines are cradled by the group's gentle pulse & an unearthly lyrical balance is struck.

Drummer Mikel Patrick Avery is locked-in, playing with hellacious long-form discipline, feel & responsiveness. Jason Stein's animated, vocalized bass clarinet weaves in & out with Lisa Alvarado's harmonium to state the piece's thematic material; the pulsing tremolo on the harmonium brings a Spacemen 3 vibe to the party. Abrams ties together melody & rhythm on guimbri, a presence that leads without seeming to. Like his bandmates, he shifts modes of playing frequently, improvising & then returning to the composed structure.

"As specific as the composition is, the goal is to internalize it & mix it up," Abrams says. "The idea is to get so comfortable that we can make spontaneous changes, find new routes of activity, stasis & byways every gig. It's like a web we're spinning. If someone makes a move, we all aim to be aware of it, make room for it. Experiencing & listening is what it's about, & Evan supercharges that."

& "supercharged" is the word for this album. With Parker further opening up their music, descension (Out of Our Constrictions) is the sound of Natural Information Society growing both more disciplined and freer, one of the great bands of its time on a deep run.

Mastered by Helge Sten, Audio Virus, Oslo. Lacquers by Kevin Gray, Cohearent Audio, So Cal. Liner Notes by Theaster Gates. LPs pressed on premium audiophile-quality vinyl at RTI.

Repress of this 1995 CD reissue of the all-time classic Jajouka LP, originally issued by Adelphi in 1974. Recorded by Joel Rubiner in Jajouka, Morocco during the summer of 1972, with liner notes by Robert Palmer. A conceptual 'sister' album to the Brian Jones presents the Pipes of Pan at Jajouka LP, which had attempted to initiate the Western world into this historic village music. Due to a generally perceived failure on Brian Jones' part for his insistence in adding post-production "fancy phazing and echo effects", that record was considered inadequate, but did get the word out on the potential psychedelic propulsion of this this indigenous music from a small village in the foot hills of the Rif Mountains of northern Morocco. On this self-titled album, Brian Jones isn't directly involved (his name, listed several times on the back of the CD, denotes that two pieces are in fact 'tributes', not participations), but the power and psychological intensity of their music (referenced so vividly by the likes of Brion Gysin, Ornette Coleman, William Burroughs, etc.) is finally realized to tape. "When this album was recorded, during the summer and fall of 1972, the Master Musicians were confronting the survival struggle head on. Brian Jones Presents the Pipes of Pan at Jajouka had been released the year before and had done little to improve the lot of the community. The musicians were determined to reach an audience in the West and it was decided at the outset that the extended ritual music which was captured by Jones, and which is so overwhelming under a full moon with bonfires blazing, lost much of its power and purpose when transferred to records. Accordingly, the musicians collapsed their long forms (which are rather like infinitely expandable telescopes) and set about putting concise statements of their heritage on tape...the tune 'Jajouka Black Eyes' is a particularly effective example of the spiritual and psychic powers of the rhaitas. Toward the end of the piece one player hits a continuous drone (maintained by circular breathing, in which the musician blows out and breathes in at the same time, storing air in his lungs as if they were bags of a bagpipe) while the other inserts graceful, semi-improvised punctuations. The horns naturally create many partials or overtones and when two or more play together, as here, these almost sub-audible harmonics build stacked celestial structures which seem to be related to ideas of mathematical perfection deriving from ancient Arabic numerology. In fact, one rhaita piece represents 'the perfection of the factors' and would probably tell us a great deal about the sciences of antiquity if we had a Rosetta Stone to help us decipher its meaning." -- Robert Palmer.

Only nine months after Hedvig Mollestad momentous debut solo album Ekhidna (RCD 2215CD/RLP 3215LP), the guitarist is back fronting her trio. With their previous album, Smells Funny (RCD 2203CD/RLP 3203LP, 2019), this explosive and expansive trio experienced a breakthrough of sorts, having gone from strength to strength through five albums since their 2011 debut Shoot! (RCD 2115CD/RLP 3115LP, 2011), gathering respect from both rock and jazz camps, sharing big stages with the likes of John McLaughlin and Black Sabbath, and being equally comfortable on jazz and rock stages. Hedvig enforced this breakthrough with Ekhidna, appearing on both jazz and rock best of 2020 lists, like coming in third in Prog's "Album of the Year" poll. With the hypnotic title track, the spacious ballad "Four Candles" and generally a more varied mood, Ding Dong. You're Dead. is the trio's most dynamic album to date. That said there's still enough solid and creative riffing here to satisfy the headbangers, as well as the jazzheads, as they further explore the free and open landscapes most notably started with their Black Stabat Mater album (RCD 2183CD/RLP 3183LP, 2016) and continued with Smells Funny. As Nate Chinen wrote about Black Stabat Mater in JazzTimes: "Her trio, which has Ellen Brekken on bass and Ivar Loe Bjørnstad on drums, caught my ear then with its audacious style references: the loose swagger of early Black Sabbath; the density and prowl of peak Led Zeppelin; the expeditionary urge of Jimi Hendrix; the incantatory fervor of John McLaughlin." This trio radiates confidence and have become a surefire hit on the Norwegian live scene. And while we rightly praise Hedvig's exceptional abilities, let's not forget how important the rhythm section is to make it all work so well. Ellen Brekken is an accomplished bassist, driving the band just as hard on the electric bass as on the acoustic. Then there's Ivar Loe Bjørnstad, not your regular rock drummer, not your regular jazz drummer, but in possession of the loose swagger mentioned above.

LP version. White vinyl. Cheval Sombre releases his third album -- his first solo release for more than eight years, following 2018's critically acclaimed collaboration with Galaxie 500 and Luna frontman Dean Wareham, and the first of two new albums scheduled for 2021, both of which have been produced by Sonic Boom. Cheval Sombre is the nome d'arte of Chris Porpora, a poet from upstate New York whose otherworldly psychedelic lullabies on his self-titled album from 2009 and its follow-up, Mad Love (2012), won him a cult following. Time Waits for No One ushers in his most prolific period, and serendipitously the world has finally slowed down to his pace. This is no lockdown record, but Cheval Sombre's reclusive, reflective music is its perfect soundtrack. "I've always said that what I really want to do with music is to give people sanctuary," he explains. "Pandemic or not, the world has always felt as though it were spinning out of control to me, and so if folks have slowed down, I do see it all as an opportunity to discover vital realms which have always been there, but we've been too rushed and distracted to encounter." Time Waits for No One is also his finest and most fully realized body of work to date and, appropriately enough for a record that has taken so many years to come to fruition, across eight original songs, an instrumental and a closing cover of Townes Van Zandt's "No Place to Fall", its overarching theme is time itself; what it is and what role it inevitably plays in all of our lives. But the record is also timeless, contrasting the musical simplicity of Cheval Sombre's open-tuned acoustic guitar curlicues with the beautiful, sweeping and ornate arrangements of Sonic Boom's keyboards and Gillian Rivers' and Yuiko Kamakari's strings. The end result is something akin to Daniel Johnston backed by the Mercury Rev of Deserter's Songs. Elemental and earthbound, but simultaneously and very subtly shooting for the stratosphere.

2021 repress. "Niandra LaDes And Usually Just A T-Shirt is the first solo record by John Frusciante. Between 1990 and 1992 the guitarist made a series of 4-track recordings, which at the time were not intended for commercial release. After leaving the band Red Hot Chili Peppers in 1992, Frusciante was encouraged by friends to release the material that he wrote in his spare time during the Blood Sugar Sex Magik sessions. Originally released on Rick Rubin's American Recordings label in 1994, Niandra LaDes is a mystifying work of tortured beauty. Frusciante plays various acoustic and electric guitars, experimenting with layers of vocals, piano and reverse tape effects. Channeling the ghosts of Syd Barrett and Skip Spence, his lyrics are at once utterly personal and willfully opaque. Frusciante's rapidfire, angular playing shows how key he was in the Chili Peppers' evolution away from their funk-rock roots. His cover of 'Big Takeover' perfectly deconstructs the Bad Brains original with laid-back tempo, twelve-string guitar and a fierce handle on melody. The album's second part -- thirteen untitled tracks that Frusciante defines as one complete piece, 'Usually Just A T-Shirt' -- contains several instrumentals featuring his signature guitar style. Sparse phrasing, delicate counterpoint and ethereal textures recall Neu/Harmonia's Michael Rother or The Durutti Column's Vini Reilly. On the front cover, Frusciante appears in 1920s drag -- a nod to Marcel Duchamp's alter-ego Rrose Sélavy -- which comes from Toni Oswald's film Desert in the Shape. This first-time vinyl release has been carefully remastered and approved by the artist. The double LP set is packaged with old style tip-on gatefold jacket and printed inner sleeves."

2021 repress. "The Fall returned to Rough Trade in 1983 to release a pair of singles ('The Man Whose Head Expanded' and 'Kicker Conspiracy') and Perverted By Language, their sixth proper studio album. Perverted By Language hints at the band's shift towards a distinctly pop approach, one that they would perfect via their Beggars Banquet output that immediately followed. Yet again, the force and panic of their initial Rough Trade recordings remains the foundation for much of the album. A transitional recording in the absolute best sense, Perverted By Language is The Fall both as they were and as they would become. The emergence of Brix Smith is often cited as the impetus for The Fall's move toward outward pop, and she first makes her first appearance with the band on Perverted By Language. Nowhere is her presence felt more than on 'Hotel Blöedel,' where she handles lead vocal duties alongside Mark E. Smith whose mangled violin accompaniment roots the song's cold romanticism in his unmistakable brand of strange. 'Garden' provides a new take on The Fall's stretched-out tendencies -- using ringing, clean guitars to build a nearly 10-minute epic more subtly than ever before. The opener, 'Eat Y'self Fitter,' is wholly classic Fall: a playfully circular bass line drives the album's strongest vocal spout, complete with emphatic breaks where Mark E. Smith issues the song's spiteful decree with equal parts glee and scorn. Superior Viaduct's edition is the first time that Perverted By Language has been available on vinyl domestically."

Northern bred, South London based duo FYI Chris announce their debut album, Earth Scum. Following 2020 EP, Black Dragon Loop, "Scum of the Earth" is a nod to the duo's Northern roots and a signal to their friends and fam ethos, featuring Watson's uncle -- Mancunian poet Thick Richard. Blending swirling synths with punk energy, on "Scum of the Earth" Thick Richard's no-frills, spoken word -- "but just remember this planet is made out of dirt, when you call me the scum of the earth" -- is peppered with broken beats and distorted vox lines. Originally a track made from a live recording of Thick Richard taken in the wee hours of the morning in the smoking area of Corsica Studios about eight years ago, he managed to re-record during the UK lockdown in 2020, adding verses from another poem, "People in Crack Houses Shouldn't Throw Rocks". A duo with strong creative vision, follow Thick Richard cycling around the canals of Manchester, tinnies in hand, in the glitchy, wigged out visuals for "Scum of the Earth", directed and edited by Dilesh Patel. Traversing post-punk, jazz, techno, weirdo house, and beyond with a psychedelic spin, across twelve tracks Earth Scum promises insight into the multiverse of FYI Chris. The duo pay homage to their strong sense of community and life as they know it in South London and the North of England, nodding to friends and family along the way. Sonically, the pair showcase their varied palettes and musicality with a darker and more rugged multi-instrumental approach, while shining a light on their gallows sense of humor. Hailing from the North, FYI Chris (Chris Watson and Chris Coupe) met in South London -- fast becoming key players in that tight-knit local community as well as the global dance music scene. Regulars at Peckham's Rye Wax and often at the helm of the Rye Wax radio show; pre-pandemic, the duo could also be found playing gigs in esteemed underground venues across the globe. With their breakthrough release No Hurry / Juliette on esteemed local label Church in 2015, FYI Chris have since released on revered platforms including Rhythm Section, Toy Tonics, Banoffee Pies, remix work for Ninja Tune. Also features Pinty, Simeon Jones, Simeon Jones, and DJ Morris.

Limited restock; LP version. "This landmark album, now being reissued in a definitive stereo edition, marks the debut of the new Cosmic Myth Records label. Cosmic Myth plans to reissue Sun Ra's Saturn Records catalog titles under official license from Sun Ra LLC, comprised of the heirs of Sun Ra. Sun Ra albums like The Magic City prove the categorical futility of 'File Under: Jazz.' When assessing the post-Chicago (1960-on) work of Ra, 'jazz' turns out to be less a genre than a journalistic and marketing convenience. Jazz has a glorious tradition. Sun Ra was schooled in it, emerged from it, and grew to transcend it (though he never abandoned it). Even the cheeky term 'Space Jazz' cannot frame the extremes to which Ra pushed his art in the mid-1960s. In this regard, The Magic City was a pinnacle. 1965 was a turbulent year for the Arkestra and its leader, and many consider The Magic City a flashpoint for that upheaval. Arkestra drummer Tommy Hunter, quoted in John Szwed's 1997 Ra bio Space is the Place, describes a typical performance of the period: 'It was like a fire storm coming off the bandstand.' On the original 1965 The Magic City LP, issued on Saturn, the monster 27-1/2 minute title track sprawled across side A. The 'Magic City' to which Ra refers was his birthplace -- Birmingham, Alabama. The term was the town's motto, emblazoned on a billboard by the train station near Sunny's childhood home, intended to reflect the city's explosive growth as a Southern industrial epicenter after the discovery of iron ore, coal, and limestone deposits. Birmingham was a place about which Sun Ra felt and expressed ambivalence: an outpost of racial segregation and grim smokestack-pocked landscapes, yet a city for which he felt twinges of nostalgia and affection. (His heirs still live in the area.) Ra customarily supervised the Arkestra's improvisational process via keyboard cues or hand signals. He was always in charge -- hence critic Simon Adams describing the title track as '27 minutes of controlled freedom.' 'The Magic City' was never performed in concert; saxophonist John Gilmore said it was 'unreproducible, a tapestry of sound.' Although shorter in scope than side A's magnum opus, the four works on The Magic City's flip side reflect the same improvisational approach, spatiality, and lack of structure. One session outtake, 'Other Worlds,' an alternate version of 'Shadow World,' is included as a bonus track on side B. For this definitive edition, historical and technical liner notes are provided by noted jazz historian Ben Young, who restored and remastered the album with his Triple Point Records partner Joe Lizzi. Both men have been recognized for their extensive work on the Grammy Nominated Albert Ayler boxset, released on John Fahey's Revenant records in 2005."

Frankie Armstrong is considered the "godmother" of the natural voice movement. She began singing professionally in 1964 and came to wide notice in 1972 with her cult classic record Lovely on the Water (Topic Records). She has gone on to work with historic and contemporary legends alike -- including Anne Briggs, Dave Van Ronk, Peggy Seeger, Leon Rosselson, Alistair Roberts, Stick in the Wheel, and Lankum. Frankie's long and impressive career was recently marked with the Gold Badge Award from the English Folk Dance and Song Society. Frankie is now releasing her twelfth record Cats of Coven Lawn to mark her 80th birthday. The album was recorded over a couple of weekends in Brighton with critically acclaimed producer Tom Pryor and consists of mainly live takes with minimal overdubs, creating a warm lo-fi, almost anti-folk aesthetic. This is a brave record sonically -- traditional on one track, then verging towards outsider art on the next. It's bare-boned with eerie harmonies, raw unapologetic vocals, minimal instrumentation, and at times startling a capella performances. The song selection is daring and incredibly varied -- traditional songs ("Lizzie Wan", "Willow Song"), songs written by her friends ("Dead Funny", "Marcy's Guest House"), and songs that demonstrate Frankie's longstanding commitment to social and political issues ("Where I Live on the Map", "Song of Strength", "We Are Women", "Bread and Roses"). This album strives to represent the many intriguing facets of one of the UK's most important folk singers. Frankie is joined by her friends throughout the record, lending vocals, writing and instrumentation. Guest performances come from Martin Simpson, Bird in the Belly, Brian Pearson, and Bread and Roses. The warm lo-fi aesthetic, combined with the group performances from Frankie's friends creates an intimate, charming album -- an album akin to sitting around the dinner table with Frankie and her friends and reliving her memories through song. An incredibly personal album -- at times, sad, funny, odd, eerie, joyful, but always authentic.

LP version. Edition of 300. Jac Berrocal and David Fenech have been recording music together for more than ten years now... After albums with Ghédalia Tazartès (RIP) and Vincent Epplay, they shared the stage with musicians such as Felix Kubin, Jean-Hervé Peron, Jean Noel Cognard, and Thierry Müller (Illitch)... Now they are now joined by the American improviser Jason Willett (Half Japanese) for their first album as a trio. Built around a recording session in Paris, the three musicians created Xmas In March, an album of seven new peppermint-striped favorites. The tracks are like smoldering embers, mixed with the excitement and anticipation of Santa's arrival. Jac Berrocal's sound has never been so smooth since the Hotel Hotel album -- his trumpet like a sleigh in a jet stream. Willett plays bass with a rubber band and creates an impossibly huge sound from such a tiny "instrument" (like Charlie Haden played from a matchbox). He also plays this rare wooden synthesizer called Cocoquantus. Fenech sings, plays electric guitar, turntables, and is responsible for the recording as well as mixing all the tracks. With special guest Vincent Epplay on the closing track. This is the album you will want under the tree... skirt. Joyeux Noël! Cut by Andreas "Lupo" Lubich.

LP version. "Fleetwood Mac, also known as Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac, is the debut studio album by British blues rock band Fleetwood Mac, released on 24 February 1968. The album is a mixture of blues covers and originals penned by guitarists Peter Green and Jeremy Spencer, who also share the vocal duties. It is the only album by the band without any involvement of keyboardist/vocalist Christine McVie. The release of the album brought the band overnight success; in the UK, the album reached No. 4 and stayed on the charts 37 weeks, despite the lack of a hit single."

Shrouded in myth, Save Your Software is the long-lost album by Der Plan. Back in the mid-1980s, Moritz Reichelt, Kurt Dahlke (Pyrolator) and Frank Fenstermacher initiated the Fanuks project with the aim of making themselves immortal as Mensch-Maschinen or Man-Machines. "Fanuks" would produce music for all eternity, embarking on a never-ending world tour. By the end of the decade, the Fanuks, or their respective human alter egos, had crafted six pieces. These were only rediscovered in 2020 during a thorough inspection of the Ata Tak/Der Plan archives. Reichelt, Dahlke, and Fenstermacher augmented their six visionary masterpieces with three tracks based on compositions from the year 1989. In cooperation with the company "Second Life Inc", who had worked on similar ideas for George Lukas and Kraftwerk, they developed designs scratching the limits of technological possibilities. At the same time Japanese cutting-edge robot producer FANUK opened an office in Düsseldorf. The plans included not only the technical aspects of the hardware of the robot musicians, but also similarly sophisticated software. For this area of the project Der Plan asked a man with an excellent reputation of experience, the mysterious Nigelius Senada, a Bavarian philosopher and musician, who had developed a Theory of Obscurity, that fitted the ideas of Der Plan perfectly. Senada had a history of developing a non-existing band for a Californian supergroup. Senada's projections were based on the idea, that in the future man would transform into robots as much as robots would adapt characteristic human qualities. Under permanent supervision of Der Plan the first prototype under the internal name LP3 could be finished by 1988. For test purposes the robot was sold to a household in Italy, where he served as a house-keeper and loneliness companion. 12 months later conclusions could be drawn: despite great expectations and the use of expensive materials such as molybdane and carbon, LP3 turned out to be not reliable enough for the use on a stressful band tour. Meanwhile the production of robot music in the Düsseldorf studio of Der Plan continued. The ambitious goal was music made by robots -- and it was pretty successful, actually more successful than the processing of the hardware. A good half a dozen of songs were recorded, determined to be send on tour with the robots. The FANUK project was the last great concept of Der Plan before the band split up two years later. It is buried in history and memories and seemed to be bound for oblivion. This is the first time the public will hear six original tracks, plus three newly recorded ones, based on compositions from 1989.

"I've had the pleasure of being a [The] Fall fan since I was a teen. I was lucky enough to have some guidance from my local record shop stoner-lords. They turned me on to many of my heroes, but once I heard my first slanted and barky Fall song, I was part of the army for life. The word prolific gets tossed around a lot. It almost seems like a slag-off in the press, as if they wish the artist would produce less so they wouldn't have to do their self-imposed job of judging releases for the rabble. The Fall is subjected to this lazy word often. Yet I can honestly say that I am so thankful for any nugget of Fall that lands at my feet and in my brain. Live Fall performances are always a pleasure because they seem to take what already made the Fall great and push it even a bit more into the rough and bloody uncharted wasteland that is drug scorched proto-punk and heady political poetry. So, it is with great pleasure that we introduce this Fall bootleg soundboard recording to you. Recorded during one of the many strong points in the bands vast and mighty history. They really burn bright here and bring every ounce of what you expect from this formidable force. We have reached out to every surviving member of the band, the sound person, the bootlegger who recorded it and the photographer and received their blessings and help piecing it all together. Castle Face will be donating 50% of our profits to Centrepoint, which helps the homeless in the Manchester area get back on their feet, so the local and deserving Fall fans get a little, and give a little back, too. Nothing but the hits here folks and as raw as you dig it. This one really is exceptional in terms of live sound for The Fall. All the stars were aligned over St. Helens that eve. And it wouldn't be complete with a bit of Fall fan saltiness so, fuck you too, Jason." --John Dwyer

"The only time that Bradford, Carter, Newton and Tapscott have all played on stage together, along with Robert Miranda! Roberto Miranda's Home Music Ensemble Live at Bing Theatre: Los Angeles, 1985, personnel: Roberto Miranda (bass, congas), Bobby Bradford (cornet, tpt), John Carter (cl), James Newton (fl), Horace Tapscott (p), Thom D. Mason (a and t sax, b cl.), Louis R. Miranda Sr. (voc, perc), Louis R. Miranda, Jr. (drs), David Bottenbley (guitar, elec bass, perc, voc), Elias "Buddy" Toscano (drs), Cliff Brooks (perc)."

Blue vinyl. "Owen Maercks's Teenage Sex Therapist LP is one of the forgotten twisted pop masterpieces of the Twentieth Century. Owen had been in Monster Island with Henry Kaiser, who proposed he do a solo album or his songs. Henry had moved back west by this time, so Owen went out and recorded this album there. Henry produced, and added amazing horn parts by Jon Oswald, Larry Ochs, and John Gruntfest. In 1978, the album was mixed, pressed, and distributed exclusively to radio stations, record labels, and the like, in hopes of getting Owen signed. The music didn't fit any extant pigeonhole, however, so no deal was in the offing. About the only note of its passing was made by an A&R guy at Elektra, who swiped the arrangement (and lyric rearrangement) of 'Little Black Egg' (originally by The Nightcrawlers) for use by his protégées, The Cars. Well, fuck them. Teenage Sex Therapist is ripe with jaw-drop moves. Flashes of Eno, Beefheart, Lou Reed, The Bonzos, and various of Owen's other obsessions fight each other for air time. And everyone goes away a winner. If this one doesn't make your teeth wiggle, you need a new jaw." --Byron Coley, 2014

2021 rerelease; 2004 release. King Tubby, the "Dub Master" who's output was as prolific as it is sought after and whose presence is surely missed. Jamaican Recordings take you on another dub excursion. This time through some essential cuts made for the producer/DJ Tappa Zukie. King Tubby always added something a little special to the tracks he worked on. Producers would often bring their already recorded tracks to his home studio at 18 Drummlie Avenue in the Kingston district of Waterhouse. The backing tracks which were laid at various other studios around Kingston. Like Channel 1 and Randy's Studio 17, would then be voiced/re-voiced at King Tubby's. Tubby and his team which included Prince Jammy and Philip Smart would be left to create the version cut. Having listened to the track it would be striped back to the bone of bass and drums and rebuilt. Sprinkling his magic over the track by dropping the bass in and out, adding echo and emphasizing various elements of the song. In some cases, dubbing the cut into something unrecognizable from its original sound. The tracks would be aired on Tubby's Hometown hi-fi sound system. Which acted much like a pre-release for the record to gauge the crowd's reaction, before the tracks would be unleased on the public. Another fine collection of Tubby Cuts, comprising work with Mr Tappa Zukie. Lost cuts to some of his own tracks like "First Street Rock", alongside productions he undertook with the great Prince Allah, Junior Ross, and the Spears. Also, the much-overlooked vocal group Knowledge. Some great rhythms, some great tracks, worked over by the greatest dub mixer of them all.

"Eric Random is a British pioneer of post punk electronica. Born in 1961 Eric soon joined the Buzzcocks' road crew. At the age of 17 he became a third of a group called The Tiller Boys, the other two being Pete Shelley and Francis Cookson. They played their live debut in 1978, supporting Joy Division at Manchester's Factory club. For Pete Shelley The Buzzcocks were his main concern, so The Tiller Boys soon fell apart. Eric founded Free Agents with Cookson and soon met Richard Kirk and Stephen Mallinder of Cabaret Voltaire. Thus, he got involved in the Sheffield scene as much as the Manchester one. Despite the two cities being only an hour's drive apart, their respective music scenes were very different. Manchester was the number one spot for postpunk with band like Joy Division/New Order, The Smiths, James, Magazine or A Certain Ratio. Sheffield went a very different way. It is birthplace for groups like The Cabs, The Human League, Clock DVA, ABC or Heaven 17, all influential European acts of electronic music. Eric Random felt home in both scenes. His first solo efforts were recorded and produced at Cabaret Voltaire's Western Works studio. A change in sound became obvious. Eric later merged his electro funk with ethnic influences. Playing with people like Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan sparked an interest in Sufi music. He travelled extensively, regularly to India where he once even spent eleven months in a row. Random also fronted Nico's band until her untimely death in 1988. They recorded and album together, Camera Obscura, produced by John Cale. Random then went on a long hiatus. In 2014 he made his comeback -- since then three purely electronic albums have been released, the fourth now being No-Go. On this new long player, Eric goes further into an electronic dance direction, leaving his ethnic influences further behind. Think Wrangler, think Kraftwerk and you get the idea."

Yuko Araki is one of a number of young female artists emerging from Japan that are redefining the outer boundaries of noise, post-industrial techno and experimental electronics. Raised as a pianist, Araki's teenage obsession with metal opened a gateway towards various types of intense sonics. Exploring a range of diverse music projects over the past decade, her solo work resolved in 2019 after she developed an approach to freeform analog noise. Working with a reductive set of tools, her methodology was to create work that created a sense of timbral density and complexity through a weaving together of competing elements. End Of Trilogy pushes this approach outward, taking in almost kosmiche sensibilities, creating a sound that glints with the unsteady radiation of a dissolving pulsar. The album is an offering of competing states of tension and release. It merges polychromatic pulses against waves of sheering noise and uneasy ruptures of sound. End Of Trilogy is a record of unpredictable momentum and tempered ferocity. Even at its most intense. Yuko Araki's work maintains a sense of playfulness, and a determination not to succumb to mere sonic nihilism. Drawing on techniques borrowed from 70s prog-rock and even free jazz, she dissolves expectation and, in the process, reveals an utterly personal approach to noise and experimental electronics. End Of Trilogy is not merely a conclusion, but rather an interrogation of what comes next.

Multi-instrumentalist/composer based in Tokyo, Yuko Araki started playing piano when she was a small child and in her teenage years was inspired by hardcore and metal music, but she soon became really eclectic and took on a diverse range of projects, including drummer of the oriental/tribal dream psych band Kuunatic and founding members of the neo classical noise duo Concierto de la Familia and her solo project: harsh noise drones layered by analog synthesizers, cymbals and samples of Japanese traditional instruments creating abstract rhythms and dissonant harmonies that sound like a noise orchestra. Her exceptional sensibility in processing extremely heavy and dense sounds makes the result sounding like nothing else you heard before: a thousand leaves oscillation sound at the same time rooted in Japanese noise but also totally different. Intergalactic noisescapes.

Steppas Records present Center of Gravity, the new album from Korean-German producer JahYu. This heavyweight instrumental dub album breaks all convention taking the listener deeper into the world of mystical and ethereal soundsystem music. Exploring and fusing the realms of dub, world, and electronic music. The enigmatic producer blends contemporary bass music with the sounds of his ancestral homeland, playing and recording traditional Korean instruments; kayagum, geomungo, haegum, daegum, hun, yanggum, and janggu via his own hand. Center of Gravity is another truly eclectic, profound and exciting album from Steppas Records not to be missed. "A perfect fusion of meditative Eastern instrumentation with 21st century sound-system vibration" --Mixmag. In partnership with onetreeplanted.org, there will be a tree planted for every record sold.

Trading Places present a reissue of Curtiss Maldoon's self-titled album, originally released in 1971. After playing in Bodcast with future Yes guitarist Steve Howe, Dave Curtiss, and Clive Maldoon formed blues-rock duo Curtiss Maldoon, their self-titled debut released on Deep Purple's label, Purple Records, in 1971. For the LP, the pair was backed by top session players including Mighty Baby's drummer, Roger Powell, as well as Howe on the final track; contemplative folk-rock track "Sepheryn" would later be immortalized in altered form by Madonna as techno classic "Ray Of Light," but is included here in all its original glory, along with four rare bonus tracks from the same sessions, left off the original release, making this expanded reissue the best way to experience the band at their finest. Features four bonus tracks. 180 gram vinyl. Licensed from Cherry Red.

LP version. Color vinyl. "With no touring in 2020, and possibly this year, Woods decided to take a deep dive into their archives and put together the first volume of their much-discussed archival series, Reflections. Featuring rare and unreleased recordings from 2009-2013, including a ghost town desert jam off the side of the highway, their first live performance in Big Sur, the first recorded version of 'Bend Beyond' and some shelved diamonds in the rough that were finished up during quarantine. Their hope is that it plays like a 'lost record' from an extremely strange and fruitful period in Woods history."

"This new Wackie's 12"s combines three of our favorite tracks from two different past Itopia releases into one killer three track EP. Showing the diversity of style in the Wackie's camp, two tracks have a more up-tempo dancefloor feel and the third in a more rootsy mode. These tracks have been some of the most requested for reissue in the last couple years, finally back on the road."

2021 repress. "David Axelrod delivered one of the great psychedelic albums with 1968's Song Of Innocence, based around the poetry of William Blake. It is considered by many his masterpiece. Song Of Innocence is this weird hybrid that no one, not even Axelrod himself, could ever really describe. The listener is pulled in by his melodies, simplistic at first blush, but colored by odd chord progressions and turn arounds, grounded by the drummer Earl Palmer and Carol Kaye's funk, torn between the juxtaposition of musical elements -- a jazz vibraphone solo here, a fuzz guitar tear here, a nod to the baroque in Don Randi's clavichord comps -- and put at ease, always, by Axe's arrangements, which utilize brass and strings in a way that no 1960s arranger did. It's worth noting that there are really count-on-your-hand examples of anything that might even be compared to Song Of Innocence. Perhaps Arthur Verocai's self-titled and only artist album, issued on the Brasilian Continental label in 1972, or the collaborations between Serge Gainsbourg and Jean Claude Vannier, which found their epitome in 1971's Histoire de Melody Nelson. But even these albums, superb, in any thinking music fan's canon of the best from this era, perhaps in their lives -- and perhaps in line with Song Of Innocence -- are one-offs. Axelrod's Song Of Innocence set in path a series of artist albums on Capitol and other labels and influenced the world countless times over, from The Verve to DJ Shadow to Madlib to J.Dilla. Remastered from the original tapes in a new transfer, with extensive liner notes and unpublished photos."

Legendary Chicagoan General Juke aka Gant-Man returns with Distorted Sensory, his brand-new acid house adventure. A longtime veteran who's been behind the decks since before he was even a teen, he's been an essential part of Chicago dance music history since the Dance Mania days in the mid-90s, and a major pioneer in jumpstarting the juke movement that followed. This new single, and his debut solo release on the Teklife imprint explores the time-honored tradition of jacking, channeling the very essence of house music though a modern lens. Employing an enigmatic 303 bassline that mutates and breathes as if it were alive, Gant plays malicious melodies that run up and down octaves in a freaky, hallucinatory manner. Squelchy synth movements are met by eerie FM tones, reminiscent of Cajmere's classic Chicago staple the Percolator. A rugged 909 drum kit bangs the track along in true jacking fashion, making it the perfect tool for shaking the floors of dark, sweaty warehouses. In addition to the original, two of the UK's finest contribute remixes as well. Hyperdub boss Kode9 puts things into overdrive with his 160 BPM warped vision of Gant's acid, sliced up to appeal more to the footworkers and fans of psycho tempos. Dubstep pioneer Loefah strips back the original percussion and lets the 303s float over a cloud of deep sub bass, adorned with lovely splashes of rolling snares and micro percussion. With an array of stone-cold classics under his belt, from ghetto house anthem "Juke Dat Girl" to his brilliant collabs with the late DJ Rashad "Heaven Sent" and "Juke Dat Juke Dat", Gant-Man is a true renaissance man. For over 20 years, he's consistently shown the world the complexity that makes up his city's dance culture, never sticking to one area or tempo. Distorted Sensory is a beautiful celebration of Chicago house music, a return to its true raw design, and a reminder of just how timeless an art form it really is.

2021 repress. "After releasing their Warner Bros. debut, the Herbie Hancock Sextet underwent a major transformation in the early '70s. Over the course of a year, every member was replaced (except Herbie Hancock himself and bassist Buster Williams) and each adopted Swahili names. (Williams even led the group in occasional sessions of Buddhist chanting.) Hancock chose the moniker Mwandishi (meaning 'composer'), and the Sextet became unofficially known as the Mwandishi Band. The lineup's first album -- simply titled Mwandishi -- reflects Hancock's new aesthetic and spiritual directions. Stretching out from the R&B/jazz fusion of Fat Albert Rotunda, the pianist would draw inspiration from his time with Miles Davis (whose classic Bitches Brew came out in 1970) as well as through the creative relationship he had formed with producer David Rubinson (known for his work with Moby Grape and Santana). 'Ostinato (Suite for Angela),' dedicated to political activist Angela Davis, is an extended jam with stunning rhythmic complexity -- enhanced by studio effects, such as Echoplex delay. On the ballad 'You'll Know When You Get There,' Hancock's tight arrangements are saturated in reverb, which gives an ever-shifting dimensionality. Side-long closer 'Wandering Spirit Song,' written by trombonist Julian Priester (aka Pepo Mtoto), goes even further out: alternating between dynamic soloing and group improvisation, the Sextet fully manifests the radical potential of their collective identity/energy. Mwandishi remains a bold and expansive statement, even after nearly 50 years."

Long-time Astral Industries associate Wolfgang Voigt returns to the London label with his next album, Rückverzaberung Exhibition. The Exhibition reimagines the concept with renewed purpose, opening the gates to deliver an arresting 60-minute journey into the underworld. Dense soundscapes mutate with alchemic fluidity, unravelling with vast symphonic counterpoints and synesthetic textures. Intoxicating in its Mephistolean dissonances and ambitious sonic structure, the sprawling Rückverzauberung itself becomes a nebulous organism shrouded in the seeping mist of the unknown.

2021 restock; double LP version. "Over the past decade, the visionary musician Arthur Russell has entered something close to the mainstream. Sampled and referenced by contemporary musicians, his papers now open to visitors at the Performing Arts Library at Lincoln Center in New York, and his name synonymous with a certain strain of tenderness, Russell is as widely known as he's ever been. Thanks to Russell's partner Tom Lee and to Steve Knutson of Audika Records, who have forged several records from Russell's vast archive of unreleased material, the world now hears many versions of Arthur Russell. There's the Iowa boy, the disco mystic, the singer-songwriter and composer, and the fierce perfectionist deep in a world of echo. While all of these elements of Russell are individually true, none alone define him. Now, after ten years of work inside the Russell library, Lee and Knutson bring us Iowa Dream, yet another bright star in Russell's dazzling constellation. Blazing with trademark feeling, these nineteen songs are a staggering collection of Russell's utterly distinct songwriting. And although Russell could be inscrutably single-minded, he was never totally solitary. Collaborating here is a stacked roster of downtown New York musicians, including Ernie Brooks, Rhys Chatham, Henry Flynt, Jon Gibson, Peter Gordon, Steven Hall, Jackson Mac Low, Larry Saltzman, and David Van Tieghem. Musician Peter Broderick makes a contemporary addition to this list: more than forty years after Russell recorded several nearly finished songs, Broderick worked diligently with Audika to complete them, and performed audio restoration and additional mixing. Several tracks on Iowa Dream Russell originally recorded as demos, in two early examples of his repeated brushes with potential popular success -- first in 1974, with Paul Nelson of Mercury Records, and then in 1975, with the legendary John Hammond of Columbia Records. For different reasons, neither session amounted to a record deal. Russell kept working nearly up until his death in 1992 from complications of HIV-AIDS. At once kaleidoscopic and intimate, Iowa Dream bears some of Russell's most personal work, including several recently discovered folk songs he wrote during his time in Northern California in the early 1970s. For Russell, Iowa was never very far away. 'I see, I see it all,' sings Russell on the title track: red houses, fields, the town mayor (his father) streaming by as he dream-bicycles through his hometown. Russell's childhood home and family echo, too, through 'Just Regular People,' 'I Wish I Had a Brother,' 'Wonder Boy,' 'The Dogs Outside are Barking,' 'Sharper Eyes,' and 'I Felt.' Meanwhile, songs like 'I Kissed the Girl From Outer Space,' 'I Still Love You,' 'List of Boys,' and 'Barefoot in New York' fizz with pop and dance grooves, gesturing at Russell's devotion to New York's avant-garde and disco scenes. Finally, the long-awaited 'You Did it Yourself,' until now heard only in a brief heart-stopping black-and-white clip in Matt Wolf's documentary Wild Combination, awards us a new take with a driving funk rhythm and Russell's extraordinary voice soaring at the height of its powers. On Iowa Dream, you can hear a country kid meeting the rest of the world -- and with this record, the world continues to meet a totally singular artist."

LP version. "Mr. Wonderful is the second studio album by British blues rock band Fleetwood Mac, released on 23 August 1968. This all-blues album was broadly similar to their debut album, albeit with some changes to personnel and recording method. The album was recorded live in the studio with miked amplifiers and PA system, rather than plugged into the board. A horn section was introduced; and Christine Perfect of Chicken Shack was featured on keyboards. In the US, the album was not issued under the name Mr. Wonderful, though around half of the tracks appeared on English Rose."

LP version. "The Pious Bird of Good Omen is a compilation album by the British blues rock band Fleetwood Mac, released in 1969. It consists of their first four non-album UK singles and their B-sides, two other tracks from their previous album Mr. Wonderful, and two tracks by the blues artist Eddie Boyd with backing by members of Fleetwood Mac. These two tracks came from Boyd's album 7936 South Rhodes."

Enter, Angst a series of musical "essays on the ephemeral being" by Portuguese pianist and composer Tiago Sousa. After 2015's Um Piano nas Barricadas (CREP 023LP, 2016) Sousa expands his compositional chops by writing and performing along with a trio made of clarinet, percussion and vibraphone adding a magical realism aura to the music. It was fate that the releasing of these compositions would arrive in one of the most troubled passages of recent memory, just as a new decade begins. If it was already established that anguish is one of the hallmarks haunting our modern era, these last few years expose this existential feeling with even greater urgency. The album that Tiago now presents, part angst part nostalgic escapism addresses this very modern concern as well as other themes dear to the so-called existentialist thinkers such as Heidegger, Camus or Kierkegaard, who among others, seek to directly challenge the Being with various concepts such as Repetition, Temporality, Interiority, Despair... Throughout the eight themes here presented, a delicate attempt is made to sketch a phenomenological cartography through its content and form, loosely describing the feeling of being launched into the wide world and the discovery of one self. In other words, the artist's aim here is to convey the growing pains that the whole question about the meaning of life throws at us. In an approach that is difficult to catalogue, the album tries to avoid genres and crystallizations in which music presents itself as a vehicle to express the ineffable and the incommunicable, expressing instead a magical world of wonder and enchantment.

OPTO S formed in early 2018 in Brooklyn, but the genesis was almost ten years in the making. Argelis Liriano (The Boonies, Last Ones, Ghost Beaters) and Diana K (Hamish Kilgour Band, Giggle The Ozone, Ghost Beaters) befriended each other at Brooklyn basement psych-punk shows and had already been jamming for eight years within the confines of various rehearsal spaces when Diana responded to a social media post by Charles Dodson (Pelvi$$, Ghost Beaters) putting out feelers for a synth-driven new band that would draw on influences such as Sun Ra, Suicide, Oneida, and Silver Apples, to name a few. Charles and Diana had met separately through shows, and all three later determined they had been to many of the same shows, whether they knew each other or not at the time. They found that they were all native New Yorkers. The chemistry was instantaneous and the first few shows were booked within months. Credits: Argelis Liriano - bass, vocals; Charles Dodson - synth, guitar, vocals; Diana K - drums, percussion; with Ben Jaffe - tenor saxophone on "Lucifer Crawl" and "Downlow". Recorded in concert at The Broadway on January 4, 2020 and The Footlight on February 12, 2020. Mastered by Scott Anthony at Storybook Sound in Maplewood, NJ Produced by OPTO S and Steve Holtje.

2021 restock. After years of mythology, misinterpretation, and procrastination Nurse With Wound's Steven Stapleton finally chooses Finders Keepers as the ideal collaborators to release "the right tracks" from his über-legendary psych/prog/punk peculiarity shopping list known as The Nurse With Wound List, commencing with a French specific Volume One of this authentically titled Strain Crack Break series. Featuring some Finders Keepers' regulars amongst galactic Gallic rarities, this double-vinyl dossier demystifies some of the essential French free jazz and Parisian prog inclusions from the alphabetical "dedication" inventory as printed the anti-bands 1979 industrial milestone debut. When Steven Stapleton, Heman Pathak, and John Fothergill's anti-band Nurse With Wound decided to include an alphabetical dedication to all their favorite bands on the back of their inaugural LP the notion of creating a future record dealers' trophy list couldn't have been further from their minds. By adding a list of untraveled European mythical musicians and noise makers to their own debut release of unchartered industrial art rock they were merely providing a suggestive support system of existing potential like-minded bands. Many of the rare, obscure and unpronounceable genre-free records on The Nurse With Wound List have slowly found their own feet and stumbled in to the homes of open-minded outer-national vinyl junkies, mostly without consultation of the enigmatic NWW map. Via vinyl vacations, on cheap flights and interrail tickets, buying bargain bin LPs on a shoestring while oblivious to the pending pension worthy price tags after their 40-year vintage, Stapleton and Fothergill, even if you've never heard of them, were at the bottom of the pit before "digging" became pay dirt. The List has been mythologized, misunderstood, and misconstrued. It's also been overlooked, overestimated, and under-appreciated in equal measures. Bolstered by the sub-title "Categories strain, crack and sometimes break, under their burden," all bands on the inventory (many chosen on the strength of just one track alone) were chosen for their genre-defying qualities. Forty years after Nurse With Wound's first record, Finders Keepers, in close collaboration with Steve Stapleton remind fans of this kind of "lost" music, that there once existed a feint path which was worn away decades before major label pop property developers built over this psychedelic underground. A collaborative attempt to officially, authentically, and legally compile the best tracks from the list, succeeding where many overzealous nerds have deferred. The first volume of the series focuses exclusively on individual tracks of French origin, the country that unsurprisingly hosted the highest content of bands on the list. Comprising of musique concrète, free jazz, Rock In Opposition, Zeuhl School space rock, macabre ballet music, lo-fi sci-fi, and classic horror literature inspired prog.

Features Jacques Thollot, Philippe Besombes, Igor Wakhévitch, Mahjun, Lard Free, Etron Fou Leloublan, Jean Cohen-Solal, Z. N. R., Red Noise, Pierre Henry, Horrific Child, Dashiell Hedayat, and Jean Guérin.