Forced Exposure New Releases for the Week of 5/29/2023

 

PRICE: $25.00

CAT #: ACOLOUR 043LP

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

Over the past five years, Mark has forged a unique identity in underground drum'n'bass, alloying traditional junglist motifs and electroacoustic ambience through a series of singles on A Colourful Storm and Unterton. A Colourful Storm now presents the culmination of his work and debut album, a shapeshifting expression of luminescence and rhythmic complexity. Mark's ambitions with Integrier Dich Du Yuppie (ACOLOUR 009EP, 2017) and The Least Likely Event Will Occur In The Long Run (2018) reflected upon the relationships between -- and division of -- people, place, and power. Now he responds with two pieces featuring his signature skittering drums, seismic sub-bass, and atmospheric passages recalling Roland Kayn, Luigi Nono, and Bernard Parmegiani. Moonlight shines, choral voices appear from above. Arresting, unnerving tranquility. Recommended for fans of Eli Keszler, Hiro Kone, Torsten Pröfrock, and Kali Malone.

 

PRICE: $16.00

CAT #: ACT 9970CD

FILE UNDER: JAZZ

"Catching Ghosts by revered, iconoclastic 81-year-old reedist Peter Brötzmann with Moroccan Gnaoua adept Majid Bekkas playing two-stringed, camelskin-backed guembre and Chicago-bred drummer Hamid Drake, proves that 'free' spontaneous interactions deriving power from age-old traditions can transcend cultural lines. Improvising on incantations from Gnaoua liturgy, Brötzmann's horn cries as summons and statement; Drake's drums awaken inner impulses; Bekkas' strings, plucked and strummed, tie it all together, and his voice brings the song home. But this is no lucky success: The music is vital due to its players' career-long practice, their knowledge of heritage, and belief the past must always be reinterpreted, renewed. American jazz giants have jammed with Gnaouans, but for Brötzmann, Europe's exemplar of unfettered blowing, to grapple with such material is to hear a new synthesis. 'My approach is get in and disturb these themes, so other things happen,' he explains. 'I'm not thinking about scales or harmonies. I follow Bekkas, and when he changes, I do something against it to make the music interesting to me. The dialectic is a good way to make something new, out of tension. I need that in any sort of playing.' Bekkas aligns himself with Brötzmann, championing the revival of Gnaouan culture, which originates in the uneasy history of freed Black slaves integrating with Moroccan Islamic society. The music relates to American blues, as Bekkas knows. Drake orchestrates the open format, making drama from grooves so each track of Catching Ghosts tells its own story, signifying meaning though it be pre-linguistic. That suits Brötzmann's adjustment of his signature style. 'I don't have to play all high energy anymore,' says the German who shook up the jazz world in 1968 with his album Machine Gun. 'Now I'm more interest in dynamics and sound.' Those tangible qualities universalize the challenge of Catching Ghosts."

 

PRICE: $21.00

CAT #: ACTLP 9664LP

FILE UNDER: JAZZ

"100 Years of Ligeti: Improvisations inspired by György Ligeti's String Quartet No. 1 Métamorphoses nocturnes. French soprano saxophonist supreme, Emile Parisien and Italian pianist Roberto Negro -- widely considered to be one of the most exciting pianists in Europe, on account of his own projects and his collaboration with the Ceccaldi brothers -- now team up as a duo. Métanuits is a fascinating endeavour: a wonderful piece of craftsmanship in which everything seems to interlock. There is high-wire virtuosic playing, exploration of all the tonal possibilities of the instruments by both players. Tempi tend to be on the fast side: (with the indications on the sections 'allegro', 'presto' or 'prestissimo' setting the pace), but with a 'largo' to catch breath at the end. There is also a surprising lyrical warmth, as the pair follow each other through constantly changing re-framings of the the-me, which as is re-heard takes on an irresistible expressiveness." 'The overlaps between classical music and jazz are particularly close to my heart. The boundaries between these genres no longer have to exist' is Roberto Negro's view. And this is something he and Emile Parisien prove through the natural flow and the surprising approachability of Les Métanuits. In their homage to Ligeti, they don't even bother with the historicizing conventions and barriers of an old, abstract or arcane avant-garde. Instead, they let this beguilingly contemporary music resound -- and reveal its astonishing communicative strengths."

 

PRICE: $22.00

CAT #: BING 192LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

"Asher White's music is a complex and heartfelt reaction to the churn of the modern world. With tender intimacy and resounding anxiety, White takes a wide view through the lens of her own queer sexual politics and transgender identity; what does it mean to renew, to progress, to transform? What is lost, gained, or irreversibly altered? At 22 years old, White has developed a massive self-released discography: over a dozen albums since 2015, each one started the moment the last one was finished. New Excellent Woman is a distillation of these experiments and discoveries, a new achievement in songwriting that stands astride the cracks in the earth and lopsided ground. Songs jump between styles like a pubescent sex drive, all locked together by White's ability to pull melody out of chaos. New Excellent Woman wanders a meticulous cut-and-pasted path paved by forebears like The Books and Animal Collective. It sounds like a live band, bursting with kinetic energy, but the album was constructed alone in her Providence, RI studio, where she arranged, performed, recorded, and mixed the record herself. The ingenuity of Dirty Projectors is laced with the catchiness and warmth of The Kinks, and maybe a dash of Elephant 6. It's like an ADHD party and the listener is the first to arrive. New Excellent Woman is built from detritus, often quite literally: from the thrift store amplifiers and scavenged keyboards she uses to her penchant for discovering and sampling obscure YouTube videos into her songs. The thick fog of 'Bedsong' is made up of little more than a Hammond organ found on craigslist and a few muffled drums piled with rags; opener 'Ptolemy' uses a seemingly random video of teenage boredom as its textural and rhythmic backdrop. The ceaseless march of the modern world can feel both awe-inspiring and abysmal. New highways and condominiums are erected in a matter of weeks as historic burial grounds are demolished. Even short TikToks seem to expire in real time. Asher White won't change things, but New Excellent Woman gives one a fresh and poignant perspective of the shifting world around through her eyes -- and maybe a connection is the best one can hope for."

 

PRICE: $10.00

CAT #: BING 199CD

FILE UNDER: ROCK

"Tiny Ruins, the project of New Zealand musician Hollie Fullbrook, are back with their fourth album, Ceremony, out on Ba Da Bing Records. The follow-up to 2019's celebrated Olympic Girls, Ceremony goes deep into all the old and murky mysteries of what it means to be human -- and sometimes it nearly goes under. Yet these songs also show how one can find the strength to swim from the shipwreck, push through the silt, surface into another new morning -- another new chance. Ceremony washes in and takes one out like a strong tide, its songs 'chapters' of a saga set on the shores of T?maki Makaurau's (aka Auckland's) Manukau Harbour. Known to locals as 'Old Murky,' its western fringe of the Wait?kere Ranges is home to Fullbrook. And while the harbor itself is a treacherous and oft-polluted body of water, move to one of its many peaceful inlets and it's all tidal flats, shellfish and birdlife. 'It's beautiful but also muddy, dirty and neglected. It's a real meeting of nature and humanity' says Hollie. The album's songs took shape as she explored the turbulent landscape on foot with her two dogs. The things Fullbrook was struck by there are annotated across Ceremony (cover art by Christiane Shortal) as luminously as a naturalist's scrapbook. After touring Olympic Girls both solo and with her long-term band line-up of Cass Basil (bass), Alex Freer (drums), and Tom Healy (electric guitar, producer) for eighteen months, Fullbrook returned home to the banks of Little Muddy Creek, exhausted and with the global pandemic looming. The songs that would become Ceremony existed as note files, 'scrappy poems,' words written earlier during a profound period of personal loss, words from a 'difficult place' that she'd become adept at avoiding. When lockdown started to ease, Fullbrook went to stay in an old train carriage in the town of Raglan and spent several days forging these hard lyrics into songs. The intuitive rapport of her bandmates steered these early demos in another direction, with inventive, often joyful arrangements that land Fullbrook's hard songs into a blissfully warm bedrock of sound -- steadied in a kind of musical trust fall."

 

PRICE: $16.00

CAT #: BNG 001BK

FILE UNDER: Misc

2023 reprint. Originally published in 2014. "The story of Jackson C. Frank is tragic. The victim of a school fire in his youth, struggling with homelessness and mental illness throughout his life, half-blinded in old age before his death in 1999, Frank met continuous obstacles. And yet he enjoyed a shining moment with the release of Jackson C. Frank on Columbia Records in 1965. The album would go on to be seen as one of the greatest folk albums of the decade -- maybe of all time -- and its opening track 'Blues Run the Game' has become a standard covered by hundreds. Jim Abbott's book is the result of years of research piecing together evidence, relations and apocryphal stories from Frank's life. It is also part memoir, as Abbott cared for Frank through the final decade of his life. Their friendship was fraught with difficulties, which Abbott portrays with the honesty of a journalist. In doing so, he draws a portrait of a uniquely gifted songwriter, blessed with talent and besotted by demons. At 250 pages, Abbott's memoir shows a flawed and caring individual whose struggle was best depicted in his songs. Following the release of Jackson C. Frank: The Clear, Hard Light of Genius, Ba Da Bing will release three volumes of Jackson C. Frank: The Complete Recordings in early 2015, compiling work from throughout his life, including unreleased material." 250 pages; paperback.

 

PRICE: $31.50

CAT #: BEWITH 090LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

First reissue, originally released in 1973. Cleveland Eaton's Half And Half is a mutant bass-heavy monster that absolutely slays. Incredible jazz-funk -- super funky throughout, with lots of layers, jazz breaks for days, dripping with style and gritty class. Cleveland Eaton was a revered bassist who played an active role in the backing of Count Basie, the Donald Byrd Quintet, The Ramsey Lewis Trio, Terry Callier, and Minnie Riperton; amongst many, many others. Half And Half was the first album released under his own name, initially released as a private press record on his -- awkwardly named -- Cle An Thair Records. It was then picked up by Gamble & Huff for Gamble Records. Varied, string-adorned and with stupid funky grooves, it's just exceptionally good. Whilst Half And Half is treasured for its famously brilliant interpretations of gold funk-soul standards, Eaton proves an imaginative composer in his own right. Indeed, the album opens with a striking original; the earthy, laconic jazz-guitar-funk fusion of "Keep It Funky". Up next is a properly moving cover of Aretha Franklin's eternal "Day Dreaming". The flute and guitar combo truly achieve celestial greatness here. "Here Comes Funky Lou" rides a bassline a driving soul-jazz groove allows the track to go off in all sorts of directions. Serene guitar soul of the breezy variety one moment, crazy hectic violin-driven wig outs the next, courtesy of Ed Green who played with Dorothy Ashby and Alice Coltrane. "Betcha By Golly Wow", which uses a bed of acidy synths and harmonica, is melancholic, wistful, and beautiful. "People Make the World Go Round" is dripping in wonderful horns and ace percussive breaks. Opening side B, War's gigantic "Slipping Into Darkness" is tightly tailored to Eaton's funky flute fusion arrangement whilst the insistent "Missing You" is a swaggering horn-heavy version of Luther Ingram's track from the Dilla/Ghostface-linked LP, I've Been Here All The Time. The creeping, screeching guitar-drenched original "John's Groove" features more fantastic horn lines and neck-snapping percussion whilst "The Love Gangster", written by Bill Wyman and Stephen Stills for his seminal Manassas LP, contains a heavy break with slick drums high in the mix and fuzzy guitars. The album closes with two more Eaton originals. Written with Johnny Guitar Watson, "Lie" is one hell of a funky string and guitar-driven gem whilst the wild, celebratory "Ah Movin' On" cleverly quotes "Wade In The Water" folding it into his new free-jazz composition. Mastered for vinyl by Simon Francis. Cut by Pete Norman at Final Tweak.

 

PRICE: $16.00

CAT #: BEC 5611387

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

German neo-classical techno trio Brandt Brauer Frick is back with Multi Faith Prayer Room their fifth album and probably their most ambitious to date. Recorded over the past two years, it includes collaborations with Mykki Blanco, Azekel, Marina Herlop, Kom_I, Sophie Hunger, and Duane Harden. Their new album is a great example of their modern and hybrid approach to electronic music. The band still combines acoustic drumming and drums machines, syncopated layered bass and hectic Steve Reich-inspired piano to create simultaneously analogic and synthetic techno tracks.

 

PRICE: $30.50

CAT #: BEC 5611388

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

LP version. German neo-classical techno trio Brandt Brauer Frick is back with Multi Faith Prayer Room their fifth album and probably their most ambitious to date. Recorded over the past two years, it includes collaborations with Mykki Blanco, Azekel, Marina Herlop, Kom_I, Sophie Hunger, and Duane Harden. Their new album is a great example of their modern and hybrid approach to electronic music. The band still combines acoustic drumming and drums machines, syncopated layered bass and hectic Steve Reich-inspired piano to create simultaneously analogic and synthetic techno tracks.

 

PRICE: $42.00

CAT #: BT 036LP

FILE UNDER: EXPERIMENTAL

Limited 2023 repress. Black Truffle make Oren Ambarchi's Grapes From The Estate available once more on vinyl. Originally released on CD on Touch in 2004 (TO 061CD) and reissued on Southern Lord as a limited double-LP in 2006 during Ambarchi's tenure as a member of Sunn O))), Grapes From The Estate was a landmark release for Ambarchi, seeing him expand his sonic palette beyond the clipped, bass-heavy electric guitar tones he was known for at that point. Incorporating subtle layers of strings, keyboards, percussion over a bedrock of his signature guitar tones, in retrospect this album can be seen as the beginning of a broadening and evolution in Ambarchi's work that would lead to his acclaimed, densely layered epics for Editions Mego, Quixotism (EMEGO 202CD/LP, 2014) and Hubris (EMEGO 227CD/LP, 2016). Beginning with the shuddering pure tones of opener "Corkscrew", which looks back to previous guitar-only releases such as Suspension (TO 033.18CD, 2001), the album's next two pieces show a progressive broadening of the instrumental palette and a corresponding move away from textural abstraction and sustained tones towards more traditional notions of musicality. This reached its high point on the album's third piece, the fifteen-minute long "Remedios The Beauty", where guitars, both acoustic and electric, strings, piano, and bells build from a murmur to an interlocking web of repeating melodic patterns over gently swinging brushed snare and cymbals. The epic closer, "Stars Aligned, Webs Spun", returns you to a space populated only by the electric guitar, but unlike everything Ambarchi had produced up until this point in his career, the piece has a liquid, psychedelic edge that looks forward to the shimmering harmonics of his more recent work. As Brendan Walls wrote at the time of the original release, this is "another outpouring of personal, intimate and enduring music from Oren Ambarchi". Original artwork and design by Jon Wozencroft. Redesigned by Stephen O'Malley. Remastered and cut by Rashad Becker at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. Gatefold sleeve.

 

PRICE: $32.00

CAT #: BT 087LP

FILE UNDER: EXPERIMENTAL

2023 restock; LP version. Tenth anniversary reissue of this rhythmically churning one-man-band monster of an album, recorded in a single inspired studio session and originally released in 2012 on Editions Mego.From the original Editions Mego press release: "For anyone who still associates Oren Ambarchi exclusively with the clipped, bass-heavy tones of solo electric guitar works such as 'Suspension', this rhythmically churning one-man-band monster of an album-length piece might seem to come out of nowhere. However, listeners who have followed the breadth of his work for the last few years (solo and in projects with collaborators from Jim O'Rourke to Stephen O'Malley and Keith Rowe to Keiji Haino) will have noted how Ambarchi has allowed increasingly clear traces of his enthusiasms as a music listener (for classic rock, minimal techno and '70s fusion, among other areas) to surface in his performances and recordings, all the time filtering them through his signature long-form structures and psychoacoustic sonics. Recorded in a single inspired studio session, Sagittarian Domain displaces Ambarchi's trademark guitar sound from the center of the mix, its presence felt only as an occasional ghostly reverberated shimmer. Endlessly pulsating guitar and bass lines sit alongside electronic percussion and thundering motorik drumming (familiar from his work with Keiji Haino) at the core of the piece, locking into a voodoo groove like Faust covering a '70s cop show theme. The work is founded on hypnotic almost-repetition, the accents of the drum hits and interlocking bass and guitar lines shifting almost imperceptibly back and forwards over the beat as they undergo gradual transformations of timbre. Cut-up and phase-shifted strings enter around the half-way mark like an abstracted memory of the eastern-tinged fusion of the Mahavishnu Orchestra's classic Visions of the Emerald Beyond (1975), before returning for an extended, stark yet affecting come-down coda, equal parts Gavin Bryars and Purple Rain. While Sagittarian Domain contains traces of a diversity of influences, it mines all of them to uncover something that is clearly an extension of Ambarchi's own investigations up to this point, exhibiting the same care for micro-detail and surrender to the physicality of sound that are present in all of his work, extending them in new ways to repetition, pulse and rhythm."

 

PRICE: $13.50

CAT #: BLUE 001CD

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

2023 restock. "Ferrari -- along with Pierre Schaeffer, Pierre Henry, François Bayle, and others -- is one of the pioneers of the particular style of tape music known as 'musique concrète'. More significantly, he must be counted as one of the most complexly, most idiosyncratically compelling of post-War composers. Ferrari has time and again ranged far afield of musique concrète, and Interrupteur/Tautologos 3 is one such foray into instrumental music. But what a setting-forth! Mon dieu! These particular realizations came about through Ferrari's directed improvisations of Konstantin Simonovitch's ensemble, and the recordings were originally released in 1970 by EMI in their 'Perspectives Musicales' series. 'Interrupteur' is largely static music, a music of long tones periodically interrupted by aleatoric events. If it references musical minimalism (particularly Terry Riley, Steve Reich, and Robert Ashley), this surely counts as an intuitive, very personal result. 'Tautologos 3' pursues the idea of the superposition of cycles of different lengths that, once set into motion, will continually result in new events. Conventionally understood, a tautology is a redundancy in which the same meaning is expressed in different works; the same things are 'said' repeatedly in 'Taulologos 3', but as the context shifts through the displacement of the various cycles, how could there be no gain, no furtherance of both logic and sensation? In a world: exhilarating.""Interrupteur" is from 1967 and features the following instrumentation: English horn, clarinet, bass clarinet, French horn, trumpet, violin, viola, cello, two percussions, two electric organs. It is one of the most outright powerful and devastating recordings within the avant garde realm. "Tautologos 3" is form 1970 and features: flute, oboe, clarinet, trumpet, trombone, viola, cello, double bass, electric guitar, electric organ & vibraphone.

 

PRICE: $26.00

CAT #: BB 049LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2023 restock; LP version. On their second album Material, originally released on Sky Records in 1981, Moebius & Plank ventured far, far away from the double coordinates of the Harmonia world and pop music cosmos. Amazingly, they did not find themselves floating in space, but made an exemplary landing, avoiding getting caught between a rock and a hard place. Material saw them generate a form of genre-busting electronic music, more radical than anything one might have expected to come out of Germany, not even from the likes of Cluster or Harmonia. Having said that, one should add that the album is in no way a copy of the new wave and industrial scenes that were enjoying such prominence at the time. Material is, in the best sense of the word, without style, that is to say, it cannot be aligned with any of the conventional styles available. On their two first albums, Moebius & Plank take up their place in a lengthy list of musicians and composers who, from roughly the end of the 1970s, gave up caring about which stylistic category their music might belong to, no longer looking upon experimentation as a strategy of reckless abandon, but as a perfectly normal course of action. 180 gram vinyl LP housed in a printed inner sleeve with full-color photos and notes by Asmus Tietchens.

 

PRICE: $24.00

CAT #: BSR 842LP

FILE UNDER: WORLD

"This album was issued in 1980 in a limited edition of 300 copies on a blank label in a plain sleeve with no credits. It has never been repressed since then and has become a seriously in-demand collectors' item with copies changing hands for between £100 and £200... Now available on LP and CD with bonus tracks Dub mixed at: TMC (Tooting Music Centre) Recording Studio, 118 Mitcham Road, Tooting, London by Chris Lane We probably did it in all in about two hours and ten minutes, despite not having a lot of time, or perhaps precisely because of not having a lot of time, the resulting album, God Sent Dub proved to be a masterclass in dub mixing aimed directly at the roots market... it went back to the roots of dub and echoed the stark style of some of the very first dub albums from the mid-seventies."

 

PRICE: $38.50

CAT #: CNLP 068LP

FILE UNDER: JAZZ

Reissue, originally released in 1975. Recorded in September 1975 at Columbia Studio, Story of Wind Behind Left is a symphonic poem in the shape of a suite. In the album, Masahiko Togashi uses music to communicate the same feelings evoked by nature. The drummer demonstrates unique composition and performance skills in the way he imitates the sounds of nature or takes inspiration from nature itself to make music. With Story of Wind Behind Left, Masahiko Togashi revolutionized the Japanese jazz scene. The record includes an insert with the original liner notes translated into English.

 

PRICE: $49.00

CAT #: MOVCL 059LP

FILE UNDER: CLASSICAL

"Hear the music of Philip Glass as you've never heard it before, as Donald Joyce performs Glass's haunting works on one of America's best tracker pipe organs. The intricate nuance and rich texture of Glass's music are given sonic splendor by this handcrafted instrument with 4861 pipes, four keyboards, and 70 stops. Glass Organ Works is available as a 2LP and includes an insert with liner notes."

 

PRICE: $42.00

CAT #: CS 007LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

Originally released in 2000 exclusively on CD, the self-titled debut album by Boston-based instrumental math-rock band Lynx is now being reissued and available for the first time on vinyl. This visionary record, a precursor to the math music of the new millennium, skillfully blends stripped-down, repetitive guitars with angular, minimalist drum patterns. This deluxe edition is augmented by a second vinyl entitled Human Speech, an EP featuring three unreleased tracks recorded in 2021 but composed more than 20 years ago. The entire collection is released by Computer Students in their Expanded Reissues series. It includes a massive double-sided poster and is housed in a sleek, tactile aluminum packaging. Includes 12" EP with three unreleased tracks recorded in 2021; includes poster.

 

PRICE: $24.00

CAT #: CMR 001LP

FILE UNDER: JAZZ

2023 repress; 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."

 

PRICE: $24.00

CAT #: CMR 003LP

FILE UNDER: JAZZ

2023 repress; LP version. "God Is More Than Love Can Ever Be is something of a rarity in the Sun Ra catalog -- a cohesive album with none of the stylistic eclecticism and musical chair shifting many of the artist's self-released LPs were known for. Recorded at Variety Studios one day in 1979, the album's five tracks comprise a solid jazz trio set. God Is More Than Love... is the only complete piano-bass-drums studio session in the massive Sun Ra catalog. The album offers an intense set of cosmic vagabond moods, reflecting the telepathy that is the essence of small combo jazz. Other than an overdubbed second piano on 'Days Of Happiness' the five works were spontaneously generated and forever fixed: none of the titles recur in the encyclopedic Ra discography. Originally released on Saturn in several small press runs under the alternate title 'Days Of Happiness' between 1979 and 1981, fully realized artwork was never established and the album never got much circulation, thus it has remained a largely overlooked session in the Ra omniverse. Nearly 40 years later, the record is long overdue for acclaim on its second time around. Newly remastered edition on CD and LP (with tip-on style jackets/ RTI vinyl)"

 

PRICE: $35.00

CAT #: DW 3262CLR-LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

"Originally released in 1973, Black Pearl's overall sound is the epitome of cool, orchestral funk/dramatic styles of the 1970s (e.g. 'Next Stop LA', 'Collect', 'Oh! Militia', 'Choctaw', 'Black Pearl', and 'Blue Shadow'). Also featured are several more romantic, laid-back, emotive pieces such as 'Miraculous Dream', 'Tryst', 'Sunny Monday', 'Melody and Lace', 'Monochrome', 'No Return'. Not to mention a couple of surprise solo honky-tonk piano jaunts -- 'The Vamp' and 'Night of the Garter'. An eclectic mix that is sure to pique anyone's interest. The album was produced by Alan Parker and Alan Hawkshaw, who is perhaps best-known for composing 'The Champ', which has been widely sampled and emulated by hip hop artists." "Library records are a collection of little one-minute pieces for soundtracks recorded by session musicians for movies, TV, student films, whatever. I don't actually know the story behind when, why, or where they were made but... there were a bunch of different labels that made them [and still probably do], and I was on the hunt for any recorded between 1969 and 1976. They all have random song titles like 'Bouncy Strut' with descriptions like 'hard-driving beat with percussion.' So, imagine how much funky shit is on them. For me, De Wolfe Music was the best." --Adam "Ad-Rock" Horovitz of the Beastie Boys

 

PRICE: $19.00

CAT #: DC 593LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2014 release. "Matthew Young's genre-bending, acclaimed 1986 release Traveler's Advisory reappeared as a reissue on Drag City/Yoga in 2010 and quickly sold out. We now return to Young's first effort, Recurring Dreams, dating back to 1981 and the apex of the Eno/Berlin schools' influence over a myriad of American followers. Young created eight EMS/Rhodes pieces solo, subtly weaving in variable-speed Revox manipulation of traditional rock instrumentation with the lightest of touches. As anyone who has heard Traveler's Advisory already knows, Matthew Young could never be a mere imitator. What all too often amounted to predictable schtick in the field of early 80s home electronica, Young made personal, delicate, discreet, and discrete. Wordlessly illustrating its titles -- 'Version, Inversion,' 'The Forest Of Lilacs,' and 'Mistral' (a strong, cold, northwesterly wind), Young conjures vivid, progressive tones of the unknown. Recurring Dreams requires repeat listenings to fully reveal its Bonsai-like qualities. Fans of Erik Satie, JD Emmanuel, private-issue new age or the more placid side of minimal synth should take note of this one."

 

PRICE: $20.00

CAT #: DC 631LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2015 reissue. "Midnight is one of those 'shoulda/woulda/coulda' bands that might actually have made it -- had their utter youthfulness not got in the way. Hailing from the 'burbs of Olympia Fields, Country Club Hills, and Chicago Heights, Illinois, Dave Hill (keys), Scott Marquart (drums), Frank Anastos (guitar, vox), and John Falstrom (bass) were all record-obsessed teenagers taking music lessons at Homewood's Melody Mart in 1974. After meeting, they realized that Hill, Anastos and Falstrom went to Rich Central H.S. in Olympia Fields, while Marquart was just down the road at H-F High School in Flossmoor. That same year they formed Midnight, covering hot and heavy hard rock songs from the likes of Uriah Heep, James Gang and Sabbath (natch!) -- but they evolved quickly, playing house parties and high schools around the south suburbs in '75. By the following year, despite the teenaged years of their members, they were playing nightclubs and colleges in and around Chicago, while adding electrifying original songs to their repertoire. In the fall of 1977, still lacking either management or producer, the kids recorded their LP Into the Night at A-K Sound Recording Studio in Orland Park, IL -- privately releasing it in early 1978 in a small edition, making it a majorly sought-after hard rock rarity today (Falstrom regularly gets offers of $100 or more for a copy!). Distributed themselves (and barely promoted), the LP certainly covers all the heavy bases with a wickedly raw mix, at times sounding like proto-doomers Pentagram, with the odd, occasional boogie number and power-ballad as well. Following the release of Into the Night, the band continued to play out, including a show at the Aragon in late '79. Meanwhile, Midnight had recording sessions at multiple studios in and around the Chicagoland area -- but Falstrom reports with some considerable regret that they let the tapes 'slide though our fingers' over the years. He was recently able to locate and release the masters from a three-song EP recorded at Columbia College in 1979 and then lost for 30 years -- but Into the Night is the true legacy of Midnight. The end of Midnight came in 1980, when the band chose to stop playing live and focus on writing new material -- this insular existence led to irreplaceable powerhouse drummer Marquart quitting. And with that, the clock struck Midnight on this promising young rock group..."

 

PRICE: $19.00

CAT #: DC 636LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2016 release. "Husband and wife team Johnima and Kalassu Wintergate are Lightstorm: globetrotting musical collaborators retransmitting messages of love from their teacher and Avatar Sathya Sai Baba. Since 1973, the Lightstorm discography has been issued under a variety of aliases (Creation Earth, 33 1/3, Teeth) unknown to all but the most obsessed vinyl casualties. Insofar as the irrepressible J&K are known at all, it's for their twisted, ridiculously entertaining 1982 shot-on video horror-comedy classic Boardinghouse. (See this movie!) The ever-unpredictable Drag City/Yoga Records now present the first-ever Lightstorm collection. Creation fuses the best tracks from the spiritual concept double LP Who Am I: One (1977) and sensual glam rock killer 33 1/3 (1980, recently featured in the Enjoy The Experience private press book). Eleven pieces of riveting catchy, psych-glam-weirdness, Creation captures both sides of Lightstorm. Soar with 'Let Your Astral Body Fly', and rut with 'Missionary Is Impossible.' To say that there's nothing else like Lightstorm would be an understatement, but their natural clear underlying love energy is unmistakable. Experience Creation. In the band's own words: Though fame was often within close reach for Lightstorm, it never materialized on the world stage. The Divine Energy as Creation had a different plan. Their natural clear underlying love energy, which was mostly due to Johnima's and Kalassu's deep personal inner quest for absolute Spiritual Truth and unconditional Love, always vibrated thru all musical renditions and it made the executives unsure since they always worried about the bottom line, 'Lightstorm's DOLLAR value.' The Creation Earth album (which was just too far ahead of its time) got a lot of late night airplay but it seemed that its Spirituality Concept was not quite understood by the average record buying public. The 33 1/3 album became a turntable hit on various radio stations all over the world, but the actual record sales in the US were very slow; probably due to the sensual overtones, which strangely enough, the corporate, government and religious establishments could not control. Lightstorm continue to perform and travel the world sharing love and light to remind everyone that we are all-powerful Divine Beings and you too can share light and love wherever you are."

 

PRICE: $19.00

CAT #: DC 685LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2017 release. "Mark Fosson's been playing music for nearly 50 years now. Solo Guitar is the 5th album released under his name in all that time, which gives an insight into the nature of his music; when it is time for Mark to commit to something underneath his fingers, regardless of whether that is after two years, ten or twenty, that's what's right. Sure, it makes for a funny career arc, but as far as the music that falls out of a guitar over the span of a lifetime is concerned, any old curve will serve. Mark's picking career was destined to be weird anyway, based on how it started: in 1976, a demo sent to 'American Primitive' label Takoma Records received a personal response from founder (and its primary artist) John Fahey himself, who invited Mark out to the west coast to rerecord the material for forthcoming release. Mark showed up, they recorded, it sounded great . . . then Takoma went bankrupt, John Fahey sold the whole company and the release of Mark's record was abruptly cancelled. No new destination for the recordings immediately presented itself, so Mark moved on, eventually making music with a band called The Bum Steers and writing songs for motion pictures as well. Once the tapes from '77 came to the attention of his niece, Tiffany Anders (she noticed them sitting out in his garage), things started happening fast. We put The Lost Takoma Sessions out in 2006, after which Mark made a full-band album of rockin' Americana called Jesus On a Greyhound. In 2012, Tompkins Square released the original demos for the Lost Takoma record as Digging In the Dust. Then in 2015, Mark released a new album of solo picking called kY, drawing on memories from his childhood in Kentucky to create sweet impressionistic vignettes played on six- and twelve-string guitars, as well as banjo and mountain dulcimer. Two years later, and there's another collection to hear! Solo Guitar shares something with kY, as Mark continues to use his chops and enthusiasm to wander musically, drawing up pieces of sparkling, nimble fingerstyle with an eclectic vision. As the title implies, this time Mark is focused on the austerity of the guitar, plain and simple, to bring out the music. Whether on six- or twelve-string, his sure touch is transported by crystal-clear recordings that belie their down-home origins, as they catch the contours of every string as it is pressed, bent and struck -- a full-bodied sound projecting soulful dips down into bass strings and shimmering upper register runs with equal power. The air around these performances is colored with curving waves of steel-stringed beauty, and the pungency of free-wheeling wit and recollection..."

 

PRICE: $20.00

CAT #: FANG 009LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

"It's the 40th anniversary year of their inaugural, incendiary, nihilistic, and influential underground punk record Landshark! And this year, first wave West Coast hardcore punk scene and Berkeley punk alumni, released their ninth studio LP No Warning Shots Fired, consisting of 13 urgent and caustic hardcore punk, crossover thrash, metal, and crust tracks. Profiled in the 2017 documentary Turn It Around: The Story of East Bay Punk, Fang have influenced the sound of and have been covered by many bands through the years. Metallica recorded 'The Money Will Roll Right In' during the Master of Puppets sessions. Kurt Cobain named Landshark! his sixth favorite record of all time. Butthole Surfers, Green Day, Nirvana, Metallica, Mudhoney, and many others have included songs by Fang on studio albums or in live sets. Fang features Sammytown on vocals, Tommy and Obi on guitars, and Brandon Brown on bass, all of whom have been the core lineup for the last eight years, with headlining tours in Cuba, Hawaii, Japan, Mexico, and throughout the United States. Drummer Steven Gonzales joined the band this past year."

 

PRICE: $27.50

CAT #: FTR 648LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

"Moon Bros. is more or less the solo project of guitarist 'Fred' Schneider and was brought to our attention by the Queen of Colorado herself (aka Josephine Foster). Fred appears on Foster's No Harm Done album, and she returns the favor by singing on one of the tunes here. Many of Fred's earliest recording efforts were done with a variety of Chicago-based post-rock/jazz-flecked combos (The Exciting Trio, HIM, etc.) But for the past few years, he has used Moon Bros. to explore contours of more rurally-based sounds. Employing pedal steel, acoustic guitars, harmonica and vocals, Moon Bros. have produced five previous albums (two of them vinyl) on which Fred ponders the mysteries of Chet Atkins, and the other Nashville-based musicians he was drawn to before being sucked into the avant vortex of the Windy City. The music on The Wheel is brilliantly plain-spoken. The songs all possess a quality that feels more like a meditation on country music than country music per se, but this is not to infer they possess ironic distance or anything like it. Rather, they have open structural centers that avoid creating easy hooks, generating sweet atmospheric conditions rather than the tight pop formalism that is Nashville's commercial stock in trade. There is a looseness to their construction that reminds me a bit of Michael Hurley's rambling approach to sonic architecture. The tunes share Hurley's out-of-time quality as well. Listening to The Wheel you'll get no easy clues as to when it was recorded. Could be from any time in the last half a century really. There's no dipping into any trends, just beautifully crafted and deeply atmospheric music that will make you feel like you're sitting on the back porch, in the summer, with the stars blazing in the sky and a sweet snootful of bourbon handy. If that's not a feeling you'd dig, I suspect you're living on the wrong planet." --Byron Coley, 2023 45rpm.

 

PRICE: $25.50

CAT #: FTR 725LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

Over the years Sharron Kraus's musical career has pulled her in many directions and seen her collaborate with artists, poets, writers, and researchers, creating soundtracks, podcasts, musical accompaniments, and responses. She is an intuitive improviser, a compelling performer and a weaver of musical spells. The spine supporting this body of work is songwriting, though, and it is to this most natural combination of words and music that she always returns. If prose writing is a tool for analysis and working out what we think, because of the emotional dimension music introduces, songwriting is a tool for working out how we feel. KIN, her newest album, is a collection of songs written during and partly in response to the pandemic and the relative isolation it plunged everyone into. Kraus dives into deep explorations of themes of kinship with other humans as well as the natural world, and of what happens when those kinship bonds are severed or abused. Sonically, the album is on a continuum with her previous solo album, Joy's Reflection is Sorrow (2018), with its layered synths and recorders, and sits somewhere in the space between Jane Weaver's electronica and the psych/folk of bands like The Left Outsides or Modern Studies. "an album layered with memories of landscape and memories of sound. It is a completely immersive experience and a fine achievement." --The Quietus "a truly unique sound located somewhere between Cream's 'Pressed Rat & Warthog' and what The Left Outsides might sound like if they jammed with a gamelan. Floating freaky fun of the highest order." --The Wire

 

PRICE: $30.00

CAT #: GET 51297LP

FILE UNDER: HIPHOP

2023 repress. "In 1994, hip-hop was going through a painful growth spurt. Since N.W.A. and Ice-T's ascent in the late '80s, the rap game was no longer owned by the east coast. After the worldwide popularity of Dr. Dre's The Chronic in 1992, things were looking even worse for hip-hop's hometown. The east coast/west coast feud that would indirectly claim the lives of Biggie and Pac was still in its infancy, but New York needed a shot in the arm. And as soon as the first lines of 'N.Y. State of Mind' kick in, bolstered by perhaps DJ Premier's darkest beat of all time, the entire east coast breathed a collective sigh of relief. God's son had arrived. Backed by an absolute all-star cast of New York's top-shelf producers -- Premier, Pete Rock, Large Professor, Q-Tip, and a youngster named L.E.S. -- the album never lets up. Serious to a fault, and lyrically dense to an extent that has possibly never been matched, the 20-year old Nas stood on the shoulders of his predecessors and proudly proclaimed, 'Don't f*** with the east? we are back.' It was a dark, hard record, made for heads in New York, not teeny-boppers in Des Moines. There were no dance beats, no crossover love songs. Just boom-bap and rhymes, skills, and heart."

 

PRICE: $20.00

CAT #: GOO 020LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2023 repress; LP version. "One of Sonic Youth's most beloved albums, 1987's Sister incorporated the dissonance of their earlier releases into more traditional song structures. It's an innovative and thrilling work assuredly delivered by a band at the peak of their powers. Reissued on the band's Goofin' imprint, this 2016 pressing includes a digital download card with the vinyl edition."

 

PRICE: $20.00

CAT #: GOO 022LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2023 repress; LP version. "Originally slated to be a seven-inch single to follow up their self-titled debut, Sonic Youth's Confusion Is Sex blossomed into the band's first album: a brain-bludgeoning, completely fried endeavor of dissonance and disarray, a perfect soundtrack for running from a chain-wielding gang near the SIN Club. This was the sound of 1983 New York City: nothing like London where punks were starting to scrub their faces and sounds to get on Top of the Pops, and nothing like the jangly roots of college radio rock starting to formulate in Athens, Georgia. It sounded like no one else on Earth, for that matter. The raw, Wharton Tiers 8-track production is dark, the Kim Gordon-scrawled cover figure art of Thurston Moore is dark, Lee Renaldo 's back cover photo-collage and Catherine Ceresole's crumpled-xeroxed images that adorned the inside are dark. It's an album that moves Sonic Youth forward from their first EP almost by devolving backwards into true ugly, lo-fi primitivity."

 

PRICE: $49.00

CAT #: IR 022LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

"Intervention Records is thrilled to announce The Flying Burrito Bros. classic 1970 sophomore effort Burrito Deluxe on 180-gram vinyl. Burrito Deluxe is the second and final hot Burrito made while the band was still led by former Byrds member Gram Parsons. The Flying Burrito Bros. are widely viewed as the inventors of country rock and are one of the most influential bands of all time. Burrito Deluxe is another classic full of great tunes written and sung by Parsons and Hillman. The original LP art is restored by IR's Tom Vadakan and the old-style, 'tip-on, brown-in' LP jacket is printed by Stoughton. Burrito Deluxe is 100% Analog mastered by Kevin Gray at CoHEARent Audio from the best source available- a phenomenal sounding 1/2? safety copy of the original stereo master tape. Intervention's reissue preserves all the top-end energy and 'snap' of the original A&M LP, while the bass foundation is fully restored to make this new Intervention reissue the definitive listening experience for this classic LP!"

 

PRICE: $49.00

CAT #: IR 028LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

"Classic solo album from founding member of The Byrds! Gene Clark's 1971 classic White Light is a bittersweet and knowing statement from a singer/songwriter at the peak at his creative powers. Having fronted The Byrds, Clark on his own here is stripped down in guitarist Jesse Ed Davis's stark production. The lyrics, singing and guitar playing are so powerful that less production here is immeasurably more musically. White Light was 100% Analog Mastered by Kevin Gray at CoHEARent Audio from the best source available- phenomenal-sounding 1/2? safety copies of the original stereo master tapes. The results are amazing! The beautiful guitar playing is finally full and rich, and you can hear the full body of the instruments, not just the strings. Gene's aching vocals have never been so emotive and immediate." 180 gram vinyl; mastered from analog tapes; restored "old style" jacket. "... one of the greatest singer/songwriter albums ever made." --AllMusic

 

PRICE: $28.50

CAT #: KOM 301LP

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

2023 repress; LP version. Pressed on 180 gram vinyl. Includes a CD copy of the album. An obvious fan favorite, GusGus' last full-length offering Arabian Horse exceeded all expectations and ranks among Kompakt's biggest bestsellers in recent years. Now, the core crew of Birgir Thorarinsson, Daníel Ágúst, Högni Egilsson, and Stephan Stephensen returns with new masterpiece Mexico: a hugely satisfying follow-up to past exploits and another step into the future of anthemic pop music. GusGus are dead set on maintaining the towering might of their songwriting, infusing the new album with the same luster as their earlier work, but presenting the deed with the snappiness and intricate production values needed for contemporary debauchery. From opening anthem "Obnoxiously Sexual," to the Existentialist shuffle of closing ballad "This Is What You Get When You Mess With Love," this album leaves no stone unturned on its journey to sonic bliss, delving ever deeper into its timeless melodies with every subsequent track. It's hard to pinpoint highlights from an album like Mexico, as each of those cuts stands well on its own without sacrificing its role in the ensemble. In a way, that's a good metaphor for GusGus itself, as this project again and again manages to successfully pool the forces from a group of exceptionally gifted individuals. Take "Sustain," "Airwaves" or "God-Application": drawing from influences as diverse as '80s synth pop, UK garage or '90s trance, each of these tracks showcases a unique identity but still interlocks with the overarching aesthetics of the album and its omnipresent penchant for brilliant pop hooks. Frequency-shifting house-stomper "Another Life" and deep string groover "This Is Not the First Time" might come closest to the predecessor's voluptuous textures, engaging in the same kind of floor-friendly agility against the backdrop of monumental synth washes. Interestingly enough, title-track "Mexico" is the only instrumental on the new full-length, fittingly bringing a more linear flair to the proceedings. Sporting the nuanced narration of a coherent artist album as well as the eager excitement of a great track selection, GusGus' latest holds the potential to become a source for many a personal best-of mixtape. All killer, no filler!

 

PRICE: $36.00

CAT #: KRANK 046LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2023 repress; double vinyl version in a gatefold sleeve. All analog production (AAA). Two extra tracks on the vinyl version. "The trio have succeeded in topping Secret Name -- Things We Lost In The Fire has songs that are lush ('In Metal') and songs that are naked ('Whitetail') and adds a layer of fuzz and distortion ('Dinosaur Act'). Alan Sparhawk and Mimi Parker's voices remain at the center of Low's music, Zak Sally's bass anchors the whole with carefully-placed pauses, making every second count. After five albums, Low have moved beyond tags like 'slowcore,' pace is not nearly as important now as placement."

 

PRICE: $36.00

CAT #: KRANK 052LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2023 repress, originally released 2002. Double LP version, gatefold sleeve, all analog production. "Trust was recorded with Tom Herbert at 3rd Ear Studios in Minneapolis, and mixed in London by Tchad Blake (Latin Playboys, Lisa Germano, Pearl Jam). Guest vocals are contributed by Gerry Beckley of 70s soft-rock giants America on 'It's In The Drugs' and 'La La La Song'. Marc Gartman plays banjo on 'It's In The Drugs.' Blake's presence is immediately apparent with the bells, whistling and echoing drums on '(That's How You Sing) Amazing Grace.' Trust is the most assertive and expansive Low album yet, and loaded with meaningful sonic details. This record grazes you with a brick then knocks you over with a feather."

 

PRICE: $16.00

CAT #: INT5

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

"Klaus Wiese (1942-2009) was a veteran e-musician, minimalist, and multi-instrumentalist. A master of the Tibetan singing bowl, he created an extensive series of album releases using them. Wiese also used the human voice, the zither, Persian stringed instruments, chimes, and other exotic instruments in his music. Wiese is considered by some as one of the great ambient or space music artists alongside Robert Rich, Steve Roach, Michael Stearns, Constance Demby, and Jonn Serrie. His musical style is much more appropriately compared to the organic soundscapes of drone and dark ambient music, such as Oöphoi, Alio Die, Mathias Grassow, and Tau Ceti. In the 1990s he founded the Nono Orchestra to play the giant sheetmetal instruments of Robert Rutman. Wiese is known also for his collaborations with Al Gromer Khan, Mathias Grassow, Oöphoi, Tau Ceti, Saam Schlamminger, and Ted de Jong. He collaborated with Deuter on his Silence is the Answer album in 1980 and East of the Full Moon in 2005."

 

PRICE: $31.50

CAT #: LTJC 003LP

FILE UNDER: JAZZ

2023 repress. Reissue, originally released in 1975. Fuzati (Klub des Loosers) producer and die-hard crate digger has teamed up with Modulor to launch Le Très Jazz Club, a label exclusively dedicated to vinyl reissue and jazz. With this reissue of Orang-Utan by legendary bassist and cello player Isao Suzuki, Le Tres Jazz Club offers a remarkable and highly sought-after free jazz album. The eponymous track is a sublime mix of free jazz and jazz fusion, led by sax player Kenji Mori and Kazumi Watanabe on guitar. Essential!

 

PRICE: $31.50

CAT #: LTJC 014LP

FILE UNDER: JAZZ

Reissue, originally released in 1969. An iconic French free jazz record recorded at Pathé Marconi Studios. On June 27th, 1969, Michel Portal pushed the door of the Pathé Marconi studios. With him were drummers Jacques Thollot and Aldo Romano, bassist Jean-François Jenny-Clark, and pianist Joachim Kühn. They hadn't rehearsed anything, as if entering the studio to record an album without any plan was something normal. The musicians were obviously very used to playing with each other, as the five tracks on Our Meanings And Our Feelings seem to flow perfectly without any hint of improvisation. The zokra, an oriental clarinet that Michel Portal plays on "Walking Through The Land" and "Dear Old Morocco" brings a singular touch to this album. This singularity is transcended by Joachim Kühn's ability to easily go from the piano to the saxophone alto, from supporting to soloing, before playing the bells, then the tambourine, opening the soundscape. Our Meanings And Our Feelings may not be the first French free jazz record -- as it was preceded by the fantastic Free Jazz by François Tusques, released in 1965 and on which Michel Portal plays as well -- but it remains one of the most important. Its incredible outburst of sounds and melodies is completely free yet never turns into cacophony. 44 years after its release, it is still urgent to listen to Our Meanings And Our Feelings and what these five talented musicians had to say.

 

PRICE: $40.00

CAT #: MMA 001LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

Karlowy Vary, formerly known as Korowa Bar (taken from the cult novel and the Kubrick film A Clockwork Orange) was an underground alternative/new wave band formed in 1981. They were based in Zagreb, Croatia and toured extensively all over the former Yugoslavia. The band initial plan was to release three albums. A demo session was planned in 1982 together with new-wave bands Sexa and Dorian Gray for a compilation release. Unfortunately, Dorian Gray cancelled and the whole project was scrapped. The first album called Haotika (1984) was actually recorded, but it was not released due to various reasons. It was at around that time that Tomo in der Mühlen befriended keyboard player Margita Stefanovi? (aka Magi), key member of one of the best ever Yugoslavian new wave bands: Ekatarina Velika (later known as EKV), during recording of their second album in Zagreb. The two bands cooperated closely and Magi co-wrote two songs on La Femme, played the Oberheim OB8 synth on all tracks and designed the cover. After two failed attempts the band recorded La Femme with the help of Dragan Simonovski (drums) and Rista Ibri? (violin). The album was originally released by label PGP RTB (part of Serbian National TV). It consists of eight songs including a rendition of T-Rex's '70s hit "Get It On". Although the band officially released only one album, La Femme is without a doubt one of the best Yugoslavian underground rock albums of the '80s. It still sounds fresh almost 40 years later. Professionally remastered from original masters. For fans of: Magazine, The Chameleons, Martin Dupont, Modern English, Videosex. Sky blue, 180 gram vinyl.

 

PRICE: $40.00

CAT #: MMA 002LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

A true gem from the Yugoslavian underground EBM scene of the '80s. Lubljana-based band EBM archive finally repressed. When theater students were fighting in music against repression and taboos. Borghesia is a Slovenian multimedia/electronic/rock group, created in 1982. The band was formed by members of underground theater group called FV-112/15. Borghesia created its aesthetics using the imagery of what was prohibited, tabooed, and repressed. Their sound is often compared to that of other groups in the period such as Nitzer Ebb and Front 242, the chief instigators of Electronic Body Music. Ogolelo Mesto, originally released only in Yugoslavia in 1988 is surely one of the underestimated nugget from the boiling EBM scene of that era, with underground hits such as "Naked Uniformed Dead" and "No Hope No Fear". This compilation of songs, initially recorded for the Belgian independent label Play It Again Sam, that they wrongly never released, and is finally available again on vinyl 35 years after its original release. Clear, 180 gram vinyl.

 

PRICE: $30.00

CAT #: MGART 603LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

Restocked. "In 1976 Michael Hoenig had a brief collaboration with Ash Ra Tempel's Manuel Göttsching in Berlin; A 48-minute recording of one of the sessions, which was released in 1995 under the title Early Water on Bernd Kistenmacher's Musique Intemporelle label. The album was deleted and unavailable for a long time. Now, finally, a re-issue of Early Water will be available again. Michael Hoenig still remembers: 'While I had been working on the Departure From The Northern Wasteland album, Manuel Göttsching had asked me if I would team up with him for some concerts in France, since his group had just gone through one of its hibernation periods. We rehearsed in my place for three or four weeks. One evening we got a call regarding some missing guarantee, which ultimately led to the decision to cancel the tour. Just for fun, we played one of the planned sets for a last time. Even though I do not recall pressing a record button, somebody recently dug up a Revox tape of that very set. After performing some digital sonic archaeology on it, it was just released under the very appropriate title Early Water.' And Manuel Göttsching adds: 'Unfortunately, some of the concert dates were not confirmed in time and we had to cancel the complete tour just on the day before we wanted to leave for France. On that evening, nevertheless, we recorded our last rehearsal 'just in case'. It turned out as a flowing harmonic piece, reflecting much of the optimistic air of 1976. Michael made his 'departure' to Los Angeles in the early 1980ies. When we met again in November 1994, I proposed to release this old track of ours. Michael took the original tape to Los Angeles, lovingly restored it and -- well, here is it again!'"

 

PRICE: $36.00

CAT #: MOV 3132COL-LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

"The Motions were a Dutch beat explosion group and were founded by Rudy Bennett and Robbie van Leeuwen. Van Leeuwen was also known for his part in Shocking Blue. The Motions were the first Nederbeat band to achieve chart success and released seven albums in their eight-year career. The 1969 album Electric Baby was the follow-up to the 1967 album Impressions Of Wonderful. This 13-track set includes 'Freedom', 'Wedding Of The Hundred Brides', 'Eliza', and 'It's Alright' a.o. Electric Baby is available as a limited edition of 500 individually numbered copies on silver colored vinyl and includes an insert."

 

PRICE: $39.00

CAT #: MOV 3433COL-LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

"Welcome Home is a under the radar classic album by Carole King, one of the greatest singer-songwriters of all time. Release in 1978, the album delivers a powerful blend of pop, rock, and soul where Carole King's incredible songwriting prowess. The album contains fan favorites such as 'Everybody's Got the Spirit' and 'Morning Sun'. The album's timeless songs and King's unmatched talent make it a classic that stands the test of time. Welcome Home is available as a limited edition of 1500 individually numbered copies on flaming colored vinyl, housed in a gatefold sleeve and includes a 4-page booklet with lyrics."

 

PRICE: $28.00

CAT #: NP 043LP

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

Paris Noise chiefs, Sister Iodine, return with Hollozone. Their seventh album and second on Nashazphone following the 2018's double album, Venom (NP 028LP, 2018). Erik Minkkinen, Lionel Fernandez, and Nicolas Mazet have represented the cutting edge and vanguard of French noise since the nineties and yet remain as radical and uncompromising as ever. With Hollozone, the group manages to confirm the sound and spirit intensity which perfectly embodies their unique world of controlled chaos. It is with the advent of the 21st century -- more than ever -- that the decisive path of Sister Iodine has taken a fascinating route. From their debut album, ADN115, released in 1994 which was strongly influenced by the original New York no wave scene (Mars, DNA, Red Transistor) to their more recent works which have been augmented by "newer poisons" such as black metal, or the most abrasive end of industrial music and power electronics, or experimental electronics (Editions Mego reissued an extended version of Flame Desastre (DEMEGO 009CD) on CD), the band has managed to survive through the decades, from the inhospitable French squats of the nineties to nowadays' established venues and proper tours. Today, the band's music has changed recipients and has attracted younger generations with their organized radioactive chaos while never conceding anything from their initial intensity. Over the years, Sister Iodine would have also created their own idiosyncratic language, for which sound exploration matters and pure beauty seem to count as much as pure explosive ferocity, while intense violence and energy gets deployed in live shows. The last few years witnessed an increasing number of collaborations such as the recent sessions with Meyhna'ch (Mütiilation) or the ones with Masaya Nakahara (Violent Onsen Geisha, Hair Stylistics). Hollozone offers a track featuring the vocal contribution of Stephen Bessac, the deviant front man of the cult French hardcore band Kickback. Sister Iodine produces today a music that is actually unique and unheard anywhere else. One of eternal youth and audacity. Edition of 200.

 

PRICE: $28.00

CAT #: NP 044LP

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

A central iconic figure in the ever-thickening Cairo underground electronic scene, ZULI has crossed borders years ago with a relentless international touring schedule and releases on Lee Gamble's UIQ as well as Haunter Records, now considered as flagship works. His meticulously crafted sound, located at the crossroads of IDM, hip-hop, jungle, and more has never stopped developing. It is characterized by power, precision, and very elaborate arrangements. Digla Dive - Live is an additional step further in his extended quest where studio compositions are constructed in a live setup spirit. "Alteration Jump" features Elvin Brandhi and Karim El Ghazoly. Edition of 300.

 

PRICE: $28.00

CAT #: NP 045LP

FILE UNDER: EXPERIMENTAL

A compilation of contemporary Italian tape electroacoustic and musique concrete artists featuring Valerio Tricoli, Mercury Hall, Ezio Piermattei, SEC_, Giovanni Lami, Giulio Nocera, kNN. Edition of 200.

 

PRICE: $28.00

CAT #: OTCR 018LP

FILE UNDER: WORLD

LP version. A stone's throw from the church where Desmond Tutu organized the escape of the most wanted anti-Apartheid activists of Soweto, BCUC rehearses in a shipping container-turned-community restaurant, where their indomitable outspokenness echoes in a whole new way. Like its elders, Bantu Continua Uhuru Consciousness sees its music as a hedonistic trance, but also as a weapon of political and spiritual liberation. Bantu means people, Uhuru means freedom -- the seven-piece band led by vocalist Jovi Nkosi rekindle the freedom of awareness, giving contemporary voice to the ancestral traditions of indigenous peoples. Jazz sounds of 1970s and '80s productions replaced by hip-hop influences and punk-rock energy, taking the listener on an intriguing epic journey. With only a few releases under their belt, BCUC took the world by storm with their mesmerizing performances, winning crowds at festivals such as Glastonbury (West Holts), Roskilde, Dour, Worldwide, Womad, Fusion, and Sziget to name a few, while collaborating with legends like Femi Kuti and Saul Williams. Millions Of Us is their first full-length album and most ambitious work to date -- distilling their magic on record, summoning mainstage festival-energy and stewing down, casting spells for the intimate audience. Recorded in Soweto, post dubbed and mixed in London the album is the coming together of this unique band and London's On The Corner Records, a label that has been traversing underground sounds worldwide.

 

PRICE: $23.00

CAT #: PALTO 007LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2023 repress; LP version. "Originally released in 1982, Kakashi is another high water mark in the 80s Japanese underground. This album, which has gathered cult status in recent years, is the project of musical visionary Yasuaki Shimizu, and considered to be a highlight of his solo career. Shimizu was the bandleader of Mariah, who also saw their album Utakata No Hibi reissued by Palto Flats in 2015. Kakashi offers a similar blend of saxophone experimentations, jazz fusion and ambient dub excursions."

 

PRICE: $40.00

CAT #: PXC 033GD-LP

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

Reissue, originally released in 2004. Eight years after his first record, Super Discount, a milestone for the French Touch scene, Etienne de Crécy, accompanied by his old accomplices (Zdar, Boombass...) revived the project with Super Discount 2 (2004), a second part exalting the festive spirit of sleepless nights through warm and colorful house music. Étienne de Crécy is a vital player on the international electronic music scene. In twenty years of a constantly evolving career, the French producer has delivered some of the world's major electronic albums: Pansoul (with Philippe Zdar under the name Motorbass), Super Discount, Tempovision, Super Discount 2 and 3. He also fathered thirty EPs and has produced some forty remixes for artists such as Kraftwerk, Air, Moby, and Lil' Louis. Renowned for his eclectic and efficient productions, Etienne de Crécy is also a passionate DJ. Features Philippe Zdar, Julien Delfaud, Alex Gopher, Boom Bass, DJ Mehdi, and Mr. Learn.

 

PRICE: $40.00

CAT #: PXC 034GD-LP

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

Reissue, originally released in 2015. In 2014, while EDM is wreaking havoc in the United States and around the world, Etienne De Crécy decided to return to Super Discount. Super Discount 3, the third part of the series, brings together the first two. If the synthesizers remain in the forefront, faithful to Super Discount 2's techno energy, samples and production give the record a house and funky sound that was the trademark of the first release. This time around Etienne de Crécy collaborated with singers rather than producers. Dave & Pos (De La Soul), Baxter Dury, Tom Burke (Citizens!), Madeline Follin (Cults) and Kilo Kish, but also Alex Gopher and Julien Delfaud all appear on the album. Also features Asher Roth.

 

PRICE: $26.00

CAT #: RUSLP 8245LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2023 restock. "Recorded across two nights in 1981 at New York's legendary Performing Garage and originally released in 1983 on cassette, Symphony No. 1 has been remastered for vinyl and reissued for the first time as a heavyweight 180 gram 2LP set in a deluxe gatefold jacket. The limited edition pressing features additional liner notes written by Lee Ranaldo (Sonic Youth) alongside the original notes by Jon Pareles (The New York Times) and now includes photos by Paula Court (New York Noise). The ensemble of performers on this recording are: Glenn Branca, Craig Bromberg, Dave Buk, Ann DeMarinis, Barbara Ess, Robert Harrison, Thurston Moore, Lee Ranaldo, David Rosenbloom, Richard Edson, Ned Sublette, Wharton Tiers, Gail Vachon, Fritz Van Orden, Stephen Wischerth and Margot Zvaleko."

 

PRICE: $24.50

CAT #: RM 4175LP

FILE UNDER: EXPERIMENTAL

In late 2019 a volcanic system in southern Iceland, dormant since the 12th century, began to show signs of awakening. As swarms of earthquakes rattled through their home in Reykjavík Ben Frost and Francesco Fabris resolved to capture the sonic terrains of this part of the earth and document this moment of transformation. Fagradalsfjall volcano erupted on March 19, 2021 and the pair descended on the site within hours. Vakning is the condensation of their recordings, and charts an intensive and dynamic sound field that celebrates the profundity of field recording and its ability to explode the ways you think about sound existing in our immediate environments.A note from Lawrence English on Vakning: "Nothing is fixed, nothing is permanent, nothing holds for anyone, any time or anything. As stable as we might choose to think it is, this planet is anything but that. A paper-thin crust, the zone in which we find ourselves, and mostly concern ourselves with, exists as a modest veil cloaking a dynamic seismic turbulence that is as powerful as it is unknowable. There are moments though where ruptures occur. The pressure from within carves its way to, and through, the surface of the planet simultaneously delivering destruction and virgin landscapes, as primordial as any we might care to imagine. It is here, in these places, where we can literally see the living planet, that geologic time is condensed and world building is made visible, and audible to us, in an unrestrained and provocative detail. These volcanic ruptures, such as those captured on Vakning by Francesco Fabris and Ben Frost, speak to the very living geology of Earth. These recordings, captured at close range, exist at a nexus where liquid rock becomes solid. They capture moments of transformation, of obliteration and of creation, often all at once. These are recordings of a living, material planet, dynamic and unrestrained."

 

PRICE: $17.50

CAT #: RM 4209CD

FILE UNDER: ROCK

A note from Mike Cooper: "Collaboration, improvisation, innovation. The remit for Black Flamingo. During the Covid lockdown period I started long distance collaborations with a team of friends and made Oceans Of Milk And Treacle for Room40 (RM 4176CD). A family of long-time associates plus some more recent and one that I have never met in person. All of them with a unique ability to respond creatively, in any genre or context, in a creative, spontaneous and improvised manner . . . Featuring Geoff Hawkins on tenor sax. Our 60 year friendship goes back to the 1960s and my first band The Blues Committee then on through the 1970s to Trout Steel and The Machine Gun Company on the Dawn label meeting up again in the mid-1990s on my Island Songs CD . . .Elliott Sharp, guitarist, composer, improviser from the Downtown New York music scene. We first played together in Rome many years ago. We have a duo digital collection on my Bandcamp site and here on Black Flamingo, Elliott plays bass clarinet. Jon Raskin, a founder member of The Rova Saxophone Quartet based in California surprised me one night in London by appearing in the audience at a folk club concert I gave . . . Scot Ray, slidationist; lap steel and pedal steel guitar visionary. We have never met in the real(?) world, only online. I am always seeking audacious players of both those instruments and Scot is a true star . . . Michael Thieke, a fellow parttime Roman parttime Berliner member of the International Nothing brings peace on the clarinet with breathy playing on this most beautiful of wind instruments. Viv Corringham has shared her voice on many past musical roads with me from Greek Rembetronika to an improvising trio with Lol Coxhill and Soundwalks in hills around Hong Kong. Tim Hill on baritone sax. We go back to my 1980s in Reading in the UK. Together we had Beating Time with Paul Burwell on drums and Gary Jones on bass, both sadly gone now and Mayhem Quartet with Pat Thomas on keys and Neil Palmer our improvising DJ both happily still with us. Then we started Trystero System which became a floating membership duo spanning several years and has included both Viv Corringham and Pat Thomas with myself and continues from time to time. Lastly, The Migrant School of Bodies Choir was the result of a workshop in Milan for a performance/dance piece organized by choreographer/dancer Ariella Vidach. The text is each member counting from one to 26 in their own language each one starting to count after the neighbor had reached the number eight. Most of the members were from Africa and shared no common African language..."

 

PRICE: $34.00

CAT #: SAT 058LP

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

Black Light Smoke is the electronic music moniker of Jordan Lieb -- producer, songwriter, and award-winning film and TV composer. A Chicago native, Jordan transplanted to New York City in 2001, where his career as a multi-disciplined musician has taken flight in many forms. Currently residing in upstate New York, Black Light Smoke returns to Scissor & Thread for his first full-length debut-album: Ghosts. The 12 tracks span everything from '90s house, smooth, and deep soulful beats, dusty grooves, and thoughtful treaties on the state of creativity, capitalism, and identity. It's a collection that sits together as a listening experience perfectly, building peaks and sliding into serene troughs, all with a strong sense of radical thought and creative experimentation. Tracks bend and warp in unexpected directions, while gritty, distortion and overdrive counterpoint classic rave stabs and vocal samples. Taken as a whole, the album could be the soundtrack to a night drive through the city, as much as certain tracks will no doubt find themselves woven into the sets of the more leftfield and genre pushing DJs. Either way, it's an essential release from one of the most exciting and vital producers out there and the first artist signed to Scissor & Thread back in 2011. The album title, Ghosts, tells two stories. One is personal -- an artist embracing the shadows of his past in order to move forward and complete a body of work. The second story is a search for the original meaning of house music -- not just the usual sample, appropriation or casual nod to the originators of house -- but a meditation on the living story of Black America in which house music is an inseparable chapter. Both stories are a reflection on grief and the transformation of trauma into celebration. 100% of Jordan Lieb's personal proceeds from this record will go to Little Bit Foundation, empowering students living in poverty to achieve their academic goals. Features Léah Lazonick. Gatefold sleeve.

 

PRICE: $22.00

CAT #: SCTR 062LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

"Talk West is the project of Dylan Aycock. Aycock has forged a small series of intriguing and beautiful missives through the cassette underground with his explorations on guitar and pedal steel. On Black Coral Sprig, Aycock negotiates the terrain between stately and homely by stretching a ringing country tone into an all-encompassing atmosphere, much like the ambient realms of Stars of the Lid. His unhurried, gentle playing style comes to reveal understated textures that weave into a whole alternately spirited, warming and often haunting." --Preservation "Serene shades of Loren Connors and Bruce Langhorne's The Hired Hand in Dylan Aycock's (Talk West) Black Coral Sprig" --MOJO

 

PRICE: $10.00

CAT #: CY 994LP

FILE UNDER: EXPERIMENTAL

2023 restock; last copies/reduced price. Song Cycle Records present a reissue of Poesia Sonora, originally released in 1975. Sound poetry emerged in the early years of the post-war avant-garde and pioneered phonetic art forms that explored the relationship between human speech and sound, experimental music and structures of language. Affiliated to concrete poetry, fluxus, minimalism, conceptual and performance art, the first generation of sound poets questioned the meanings of "music" and "poetry" using interferences as source of new phonetic art patterns/compositions. Poesia Sonora represents one of the first international sound poetry compilations. The record came out in 1975 for CBS under the label "Recorthings & Zona Archives", curated and edited by Maurizio Nannucci. The anthology collects pieces by some of the most important pioneers of the sound poetry movement: Bob Cobbing, François Dufrêne, Henri Chopin, Ernst Jandl, Franz Mon, Arthur Pétronio, Arrigo Lora-Totino, Brion Gysin, Bernard Heidsieck, Sten Hanson, Maurizio Nannucci, Paul De Vree. Poesia Sonora is an indispensable reference anthology that sensitizes the ear for extraordinary pieces/compositions of sound and literary experiments. Released in collaboration with Maurizio Nannucci. Fluorescent artwork; Limited edition clear vinyl (hand-numbered).

 

PRICE: $12.00

CAT #: CY 999LP

FILE UNDER: ELECTRONIC

2023 restock; last copies & reduced price. Musician, visual artist, composer, writer, and sculptor Michael Snow is also one of the world's most highly acclaimed experimental filmmakers. In 1975 he released this album under the record company Chatham Square. The label was founded by the owner of Michael Snow's gallery, the Bykert Gallery, which also issued the first Philip Glass recordings. This reissue is released in collaboration with Michael Snow. 180-gram vinyl; gatefold sleeve.

 

PRICE: $31.50

CAT #: SPITTLE 067LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2023 restock. . Spittle Records present an expanded reissue of Massacre's Killing Time, originally released in 1981. Following the breakup of Cambridge's avant-rock legends, Henry Cow, guitarist Fred Frith moved to NYC in 1979, and soon found himself deep in the heart of the city's robust post-punk and free-jazz scenes. He performed with Bill Laswell and Fred Maher, from the group Material, as a power trio of sorts under the moniker of Massacre. The group quickly garnered a reputation around town, and around the world for that matter, as a heavy and heady band that experimented greatly with rhythm, time signatures, and tone. As Frith himself put it, "the group was a direct response to New York. It was a very aggressive group, kind of my reaction to the whole New York rock club scene." Massacre released one album, Killing Time, before disbanding for nearly 20 years. Their first wave as a group crashed fast and furiously and this one album, recorded in part live in Paris, and in part at Brooklyn's OAO Studio, is a perfect encapsulation of early '80s NYC. In addition to the original album, first released on Celluloid in 1981, this deluxe three-sided double LP includes eight bonus tracks recorded live between '80 and '81 at The Stone in San Francisco, and Inroads and CBGB in NYC. Avant-jazz-post-punk-noise of the highest order from several legends and one of the most important projects Frith and Laswell were ever involved in. The back cover states: "In contrast to previous CD and LP versions, the Killing Time LP cuts are heard here as originally intended, at the correct speed and pitch and without added reverb."

 

PRICE: $22.00

CAT #: SV 177EP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2023 repress. "These songs were recorded a few months after the Los Angeles punk scene began. These five statements of intent transcend Punk and project forward into the future: to the analog synth wave of the late '70s and beyond, to the present day, four decades later, when they finally receive an official release. Sourced from the original reel-to-reels, they are a revelation compared to the countless copies that have been circulating by multiple generations of tape-traders. Here, for the first time, is the Screamers' initial and legendary manifesto. The Screamers concept was simple, yet audacious: take the spirit and the look of punk -- the pseudo-psychotic aggression, the spiky hair, vacant stares and barely concealed sadomasochism -- and match it to a different configuration than the typical '60s rock template. As launched, the Screamers featured two keyboard players (Tommy Gear and David Brown), a drummer (KK Barrett) and an intensely charismatic singer (Tomata du Plenty). The idea was to be confrontational -- to evoke (as Tomata described in an early interview) a state of anxiety. Forty years later, this release builds on the groundswell of interest in the Screamers that has been occurring in the early 21st century. There are web sites with detailed histories of the group and several bootlegs of demos and live material from 1977-79. The video of '122 Hours of Fear' -- perhaps their peak moment, recorded at Target Video in August 1978 -- has now passed over 650,000 views online. This is the Screamers' time, and the time is now." --Jon Savage (excerpt from the liner notes). Cover featuring artwork by Gary Panter.

 

PRICE: $25.00

CAT #: SV 179LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

2023 repress. "If your brain has a shortlist of bands that instantly evoke New Wave, Suburban Lawns deserve a slot right next to the likes of Devo, Talking Heads and the B-52's. After putting out two singles on their own Suburban Industrial imprint, the Lawns signed to I.R.S. Records and released their debut LP in 1981. While the band gained cult status thanks in part to a Jonathan Demme-produced music video which aired on Saturday Night Live, their self-titled album would sadly be the five-piece's only full-length statement. Suburban Lawns' asymmetrical aesthetic is personified by co-vocalist Su Tissue, whose mesmerizing stage persona was at once childlike and terrifying. Her unique style embodies the awkward/arty female singer of the Reagan era, while the group's male vocals -- courtesy of Frankie Ennui, Vex Billingsgate and John McBurney -- maintain the satirical themes of Southern California's postwar mirage of limitless sprawl. Suburban Lawns' catchiness can be attributed to their drum-tight performance and taut songwriting. Listen to the vocal trade-offs on 'Anything,' which could have easily come out on any purely punk label from LA at the time, while Tissue's deadpan delivery on 'Janitor' glides into the best art-warble this side of Lene Lovich, broaching the possibility of nuclear annihilation with a murmured 'Boom, Boom, Boom, Boom.' From a West Coast scene dominated by 7-inch singles and EPs, the Suburban Lawns' lone LP remains in a class with precious few. It's not surprising that they found acceptance in the Hollywood punk scene, despite their Long Beach roots, and would influence other bands such as Minutemen. This is not a disc that will get parked in your collection hoping to get pulled once in a while; this is a record you will play."

 

PRICE: $47.00

CAT #: SR 501LP

FILE UNDER: JAZZ

2023 repress. "Duo Exchange was the flagship release of Survival Records. Percussionist Rashied Ali and saxophonist Frank Lowe were both in a hurry to ignite their careers as leaders, and this record lit the match. Survival Records was a joint venture between the duo, and the recording sessions done at Marzette Watts's studio were the maiden voyage of their partnership. They went in to capture the vehemence bursting forth nightly in the downtown lofts, and the results were furious, brutal, and poignant. With the release of this album in 1973, Ali and his family and Frank Lowe and his family all became executives and clerks helping to get the word out. And getting the records out -- at loft shows and Village record haunts. The message of untamed tenor saxophone and Ali's drums should sound familiar: That's the combination that made jazz history in Ali's 1967 duets with his then-employer, John Coltrane. What eventually came out as Interstellar Space is its own pinnacle of the genre, but its release was still a year off when Duo Exchange was issued to the public. Mixed and mastered from the original tapes, this expanded 2020 edition restores sections of the original record inexplicably excised from the CD release in the nineties, and expands on it with more than double the playing time of the original LP with fascinating outtake versions that rephrase the familiar tracks. 2xLP gatefold tip-on jacket, pressed on RTI Vinyl."

 

PRICE: $16.50

CAT #: TR 540CD

FILE UNDER: ROCK

Since 1992, the collective around David Christian has been stoically producing unique noise pop. Comet Gain are Comet Gain, a band in which the Swell Maps and the Undertones shake hands in the Wigan Casino. Admittedly, a skewed picture. But as with every outstanding band, one fails to describe the sound of Comet Gain. You just have to hear it. When the Corona shit hit the fan in 2020, David Christian, who now lives in the beautiful south of France, had the leisure to dig through the considerable Comet Gain archive and presented the astonished Comet Gain community with new compilations of outtakes, demos, live recordings, and simply forgotten and never released hits every Bandcamp Friday. The Misfit Jukebox is now a compilation of these compilations, the topper-most of the popper-most from a hitherto unseen or unheard part of the CG universe. First time on CD and LP."... So here I am with a new Comet Gain, old friends like Jon Slade Darren Smith making demos in a London living room for whatever comes next. 'Post USA' 'Skinny Wolves' both sung by Rachel Evans are more spiky elbowed little skeletons, sometime after the jagged rock opera of a third album pop over to Phil's Highgateish flat near the shadow of suicide bridge to do some gentler songs among covers of John Cale we do 'My Time Tunnel' promptly forget it exists... when the genial sound stack Woodie Taylor arrives we embark on an expedition of EPs, LPs, 45s in a non linear gibbering slow/rush of an almost career... 'Never Die' was a Réa listes LP outtake now home on Beautiful Despair 12" EP for Kevin Pedersen. 'No Spotlite On Sometimes', 'Herbert Huncke Part 3' we somehow did in an airless east end dungeon while visiting punk guitarists stole some of the band for local pup crawls. This Herbert H was the first we did, meant for the Germs Of Youth 45 but a typical CG error meant the muckering about jam version ended up for the disc. 'Fists In The Pocket' was a softer demo I lost before the band heard and 'Weekend Dreams' was on Kiko Amat's La Doble Vida split 45 with Hello Cuca. We did this in a feral one take before the neighbors got back from work. I like it that way. By the time we got to the almost professional 'Paperback Ghosts' and 'Howl Of The Lonely Crowd' we'd lost Jon Kay Ishikawa but found Ben Phillpson, James Hornsey, Anne Laure Guillain. "Your Just Lonely" are B Sides from the records featuring friends Alasdair MacLean, Lupe Nunez on vocals. This particular tale ends with the most recent song which is about the group I've just wrote of 'Even This Could Be Beautiful' because yes even this erratic, warped, mumbling, innocent things can be. It's been fun so far. Enjoy the LP." --David

 

PRICE: $43.50

CAT #: TSR 048LP

FILE UNDER: SOUNDTRACK

After Giorgio Moroder, Jeff Mills, or Dieter Moebius, it is Joakim's turn to compose a soundtrack for one of the greatest masterpieces of cinema -- actually the first movie to enter UNESCO's Memory of the World Register, Fritz Lang's Metropolis. Originally commissioned for the 2022 reissue of Metropolis, a restored version of the original director's cut, the music was removed from the commercial release of the movie after the Murnau Foundation suddenly realized there was going to be new music which according to them "altered the original piece". The Blu-ray discs were removed from the beautiful box set released by Potemkine and destroyed, replaced by a Blu-ray without Joakim's music. So, Tigersushi decided to release the music on its own, with the Dolby Atmos mix that was made for the Blu-ray edition together with a classic stereo mix. It's a dark journey into the depths of Metropolis, its industrial noises but also its moments of light through Maria's character and Freder. For fans of: Oneohtrix Point Never, Mica Levi, Philip Glass, Disasterpeace.

 

PRICE: $16.00

CAT #: TMK 011CD

FILE UNDER: ROCK

A declaration of love to the original country music for which Theo Lawrence is the representative of the new generation. After leaving BMG, Theo Lawrence returns to independence with the launch of his own label Tomika in 2020 and a busy year in 2022: opening acts for Robert Plant and Alison Krauss and Charley Crockett, Americana Fest (Nashville), SXSW and a European tour, Theo Lawrence unveils a new album entitled Chérie. A 12-track jewel recorded in Wyldwood, Texas and sailing between ultra-romantic and thrilling ballads, Louisiana Cajun sounds, silky string arrangements, and epic vocal flights taking you back to the pop music heyday of Roy Orbison and Frank Sinatra. Theo Lawrence is a young French-Canadian songwriter based in Bordeaux. His music is rooted in the country music of the '50s and '60s, while borrowing elements from soul, pop, and rock n' roll of the same era. A mixture of styles and sounds, with a deep love of tradition, while bearing the stamp of modern times. Theo brings a new sound to traditional American music, and with this new album confirms that he is part of the prolific new North American country scene.

 

PRICE: $17.50

CAT #: WWSCD 074CD

FILE UNDER: ROCK

Wewantsounds announce an extensive reissue program of Meiko Kaji's first five albums released in Japan between 1972 and 1974 on Teichiku Records. The program, in partnership with Teichiku and Meiko Kaji, will see her first five albums reissued on vinyl for the first time ever in their original Japanese artwork and remastered audio. Famous for her early '70s exploitation movies (Lady Snowblood, the Female Prisoner Scorpion and Stray Cat Rock series) revered by Quentin Tarantino, Meiko Kaji was also a singer releasing albums to tie in with her movie career. These albums are a fascinating mix of Japanese pop and groove with superb funky cinematic orchestrations as displayed in Hajiki Uta. A cult icon on the international film scene, Japanese actress Meiko Kaji, born in Tokyo, has been put into the spotlight internationally by Quentin Tarantino when he heavily based his Kill Bill film on the 1973 revenge genre film Lady Snowblood. By the time she appeared in it, she had already made almost fifty feature films (she began her career in 1965) and she was one of the most famous exploitation actresses in Japan doubling as a sex symbol. This gave the studios the idea of getting her to start a singing career and release music closely associated with the films she starred in often singing the theme songs. Thus, she began releasing records at the dawn of the '70s, recording several 7" singles and five albums for Teichiku which have become sought-after and almost as cult as her films. Drawing on her film roles, the music on these albums were an uber-cool mix of kayokyoku (Japanese pop), traditional enka music, acid folk, and funky beats arranged by the best producers of the time in a cinematic way that could sound like Ennio Morricone or Jean-Claude Vannier. The album featured two film songs, namely "Urami Bushi" used for Female Prisoner Scorpion, and "Onna No Jumon" featured in Female Prisoner Scorpion - Jailhouse 41, which have been composed by Shunsuke Kikuchi who also composed the score for these films. Reissued with original artwork. Features new liner notes by Hashim Kotaro Bharoocha who has interviewed Meiko for the occasion. LP version comes in gatefold sleeve; OBI strip and insert.

 

PRICE: $31.50

CAT #: WWSLP 074LP

FILE UNDER: ROCK

LP version. Wewantsounds announce an extensive reissue program of Meiko Kaji's first five albums released in Japan between 1972 and 1974 on Teichiku Records. The program, in partnership with Teichiku and Meiko Kaji, will see her first five albums reissued on vinyl for the first time ever in their original Japanese artwork and remastered audio. Famous for her early '70s exploitation movies (Lady Snowblood, the Female Prisoner Scorpion and Stray Cat Rock series) revered by Quentin Tarantino, Meiko Kaji was also a singer releasing albums to tie in with her movie career. These albums are a fascinating mix of Japanese pop and groove with superb funky cinematic orchestrations as displayed in Hajiki Uta. A cult icon on the international film scene, Japanese actress Meiko Kaji, born in Tokyo, has been put into the spotlight internationally by Quentin Tarantino when he heavily based his Kill Bill film on the 1973 revenge genre film Lady Snowblood. By the time she appeared in it, she had already made almost fifty feature films (she began her career in 1965) and she was one of the most famous exploitation actresses in Japan doubling as a sex symbol. This gave the studios the idea of getting her to start a singing career and release music closely associated with the films she starred in often singing the theme songs. Thus, she began releasing records at the dawn of the '70s, recording several 7" singles and five albums for Teichiku which have become sought-after and almost as cult as her films. Drawing on her film roles, the music on these albums were an uber-cool mix of kayokyoku (Japanese pop), traditional enka music, acid folk, and funky beats arranged by the best producers of the time in a cinematic way that could sound like Ennio Morricone or Jean-Claude Vannier. The album featured two film songs, namely "Urami Bushi" used for Female Prisoner Scorpion, and "Onna No Jumon" featured in Female Prisoner Scorpion - Jailhouse 41, which have been composed by Shunsuke Kikuchi who also composed the score for these films. Reissued with original artwork. Features new liner notes by Hashim Kotaro Bharoocha who has interviewed Meiko for the occasion. LP version comes in gatefold sleeve; OBI strip and insert.

 

PRICE: $31.50

CAT #: WWSLP 075LP

FILE UNDER: JAZZ

Wewantsounds reissue for the first time Harold Land's classic LP Damisi, recorded in Los Angeles for Bob Shad's Mainstream Records and released in 1972. Featuring Buster Williams (b), Ndugu (ds), Bill Henderson (keys), and Oscar Breashear (tp), the album was recorded at a crucial time when Land was shifting to a more spiritual sound. The session is a superb mix of funk and modal jazz and features monster grooves. Harold Land was born in Houston in 1928 and grew up in San Diego, California. in 1954, he joined the Max Roach/Clifford Brown Quintet recording one of the most important albums in the development of hard Bop, which was produced by Bob Shad, then the head of the Emarcy jazz label. Land quickly moved to Los Angeles and became a key saxophone player on the West Coast scene, recording as a leader for Contemporary and Pacific Jazz Records in the sixties. In 1968, he started a fruitful collaboration with vibe player Bobby Hutcherson forming the Harold Land/Bobby Hutcherson Quintet that would last until 1971. Together they produced several records for Blue Note, Cadet, and Mainstream Records. Shad decided to go back to his jazz roots and record young emerging talents plus a handful of seasoned musicians from his Emarcy days, including Harold Land. He primarily recorded out of New York City but went to Los Angeles in 1971 with his A&R Ernie Wilkins for a short trip to record a few sessions with the sax player. Shad brought back three albums: two with the Land/Hutcherson Quintet -- A New Shade of Blue reissued by Wewantsounds (WWSCD 008CD/WWSLP 008LP) and Choma both released in 1971 -- and Damisi recorded with Oscar Brashear on trumpet replacing Hutcherson, released in 1972. Damisi, comprised of five extended tracks, kicks off with the up-tempo post bop "Step Right Up to the Bottom" before switching to the slow burning funk of "In The Back In The Corner, In the Dark" showcasing Buster Williams's formidable bassline and Ndugu's funk chops. Side one ends with "Pakistan", a beautifully serene tribute to the country, full of Eastern influences and featuring Land on oboe in the reflective tone. Side two opens with "Chocolate Mess" penned by Ndugu Chancler, a muscular funk groove backing great solos by Land, Oscar Brashear (who would soon join Earth Wind & Fire's horn section) and Bill Henderson on Fender Rhodes. "Damisi" the title track follows up and intricately alternates slow sequences with funkier passages, closing the album on perfect note. Original gatefold sleeve with never-seen session photos; newly remastered audio; includes two-page insert including new liner notes by Kevin Le Gendre.

 

PRICE: $15.00

CAT #: WH 371CD

FILE UNDER: JAZZ

"Roscoe Mitchell Orchestra performs two masterpieces for the Fault Zone Festival April 21, 2022. Distant Radio Transmission Fault Zone and Sustain and Run Ii features Roscoe on Alto Sax, James Fei on synth, vocalist Thomas Buckner, and a stellar thirty-piece orchestra. Also from the festival is cards in 3D colors, a duet written by Mr Mitchell for piano and violin and two pieces from Space Trio."