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A further volume of ryūkōka recordings, covering the end of the 1920s though to the late 1930s, supplementing the recent Longing for the Shadow collection...

Emerging during the early stages of the recording industry in Japan, the ryūkōka style adopted western classical, blues & jazz elements into traditional and classical Japanese music.

Is It Really Goodbye? further collects pre-war ryūkōka records which capture the hauntingly unique sound of a cultural merging that was starting to reflect itself via popular song, ahead of the widespread influence of western pop music during post-war US occupation.

NOW Music is delighted to introduce our new sub-brand ‘NOW Presents…’. This new series starts with ‘NOW Presents… The 1970s’, the first-ever NOW vinyl boxset featuring 5 LPs uniquely designed to reflect the era.

The boxset is a musical time capsule of the decade that saw so many different genres find chart success. Across its 74 tracks over 10 sides of vinyl, the massive hits sit alongside enduring classics from each year. The set not only includes 5 beautifully designed front covers on the individual albums (that slot into a rigid slip case), but also features track by track annotations with chart positions and facts about the artists and songs.

Each year, 1970-1979 is presented as 1 side of each LP… Kicking off with the iconic ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’ by Simon & Garfunkel from the biggest selling album of the year, and of the decade. 1970 also includes Motown classics from Stevie Wonder, Smokey Robinson & The Miracles, and the debut hit ‘I Want You Back’ from the Jackson 5.

1971 includes the seminal ‘What’s Going On’ from Marvin Gaye, alongside Elton John’s breakthrough – the timeless ‘Your Song’, Rod Stewart’s breakthrough ‘Maggie May’, and The Who’s defining rock anthem ‘Baba O’Riley’.

The charts in 1972 began to reflect the popularity of ‘Glam Rock’ – and ‘Virginia Plain’ by Roxy Music, and ‘Metal Guru’ by T. Rex are included, as is the David Bowie-produced ‘Perfect Day’ from Lou Reed.

‘Killing Me Softly With His Song’ – one of the most beautiful songs, and vocals ever from Roberta Flack opens 1973’s side – and is joined by, amongst others, Billy Joel’s signature song ‘Piano Man’ and Bob Dylan’s ‘Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door’.

1974 celebrates Queen having their first Top 5 single with ‘Killer Queen’, and title tracks from two of the decades’ biggest selling albums: Paul McCartney & Wings with ‘Band On The Run’, and ‘Tubular Bells’ from Mike Oldfield.

John Lennon released ‘Imagine’ in 1971 – but it became a UK hit in 1975, and so, starts this side… and finds space for some of the year’s perfect pop from Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel, David Essex, 10cc, and the biggest hit ‘Bye Bye Baby’ from Bay City Rollers, at the peak of their popularity.

ABBA enjoyed 7 UK Number 1’s in the 1970s, and their biggest was the enduringly popular ‘Dancing Queen’ which leads into 1976. Electric Light Orchestra had a huge hit with ‘Livin’ Thing’, as did Thin Lizzy with ‘The Boys Are Back In Town’ – plus Joan Armatrading emerged with ‘Love And Affection’.

1977 saw Fleetwood Mac release their mega-selling album ‘Rumours’, and from it ‘Don’t Stop’ is here, as is Donna Summer’s ‘I Feel Love’ – one of the most influential dance tracks of all time – and one of 1977’s favourite TV stars, David Soul, enjoyed a #1 single with ‘Don’t Give Up On Us’.

With ‘Wuthering Heights’, Kate Bush not only had 4 weeks at number 1 in 1978, but became the first female artist to achieve this with a self-written song. The Jam, The Boomtown Rats and Siouxsie And The Banshees all found consistent success as Punk & New Wave established new chart stars.

1979 concludes the set and opens with the iconic ‘London Calling’ from The Clash, and includes two of the biggest bands of the era, The Police and Blondie. A couple of years later the first video played on MTV would be ‘Video Killed The Radio Star’ from The Buggles – and it’s fitting that this is the final track on the collection, a #1 in late 1979 – it signposted the synth-pop wave that would define the early 80s…. (but that’s a different box set).

After the worldwide success of their first album Puzzle (1999), which sold over 200,000 copies and went gold in Japan, Xavier Boyer (vocals, guitars), Pedro Resende (bass), Médéric Gontier (guitars) & Sylvain Marchand (drums) reunited with producer Andy Chase to record the follow-up, Wallpaper for the Soul, in New York City. Starting in November 2001 at Stratosphere Sound, the prolific sessions gave birth to twenty tracks, twelve of which appeared on the original tracklist. The eight outtakes were compiled on the mini albums A Piece of Sunshine (2003) & Extra Pieces of Sunshine (2004). This new vinyl edition will be the first time all these songs appear together.

Almost 20 years on, WFTS is a tour de force of contemporary songwriting with obvious nods to the past somehow revisited in a timeless fashion. Tahiti 80’s second effort can also be seen as an alternative and more sophisticated snapshot of an era often associated with the rebirth of rock (The White Stripes, The Strokes…). This set of songs also established them as stalwarts of the Post French Touch cannon, showcasing both their ability to write catchy songs and their knack for mélanges & experimentation. 1,000 Times or The Train are unique examples of blue-eyed soul augmented with French flair (« Prefab Sprout as produced by Thomas Bangalter » suggested Uncut which listed WFTS in their Top Ten’s albums of 2003). Listen to Don’t Look Below today, and ask yourself who was mixing Destiny’s Child with My Bloody Valentine in 2001? Delicate numbers like Open Book or live favorite Better Days Will Come both demonstrate T80’s songwriting skills and their innate sense of melancholia.

Listening back to WFTS today, one cannot help but think of it as an album recorded in a state-of-the-art fashion. All four members would typically perform together in the same room. Basic takes were printed on a 24-track analog tape machine and then bounced onto a computer for editing. A fine example of this method is the title track itself. Originally written on acoustic guitar, Wallpaper … is the result of three eight minutes synthesizer jams pieced together. The Frenchmen were keen to try out multitude of ideas and had developed a taste for experimentation. The sessions also coincide with a rich outburst of creativity from a band on top of their game after several months of touring around the world.

Another typical WFTS characteristic is Richard Hewson’s orchestration. Veteran string arranger, famous for arranging The Beatles’ The Long And Winding Road or writing RAH Band’s ‘80s classic Clouds Across The Moon Hewson gave the songs a sweeping orchestral touch. Strings, Horns & woodwinds were all performed at the now defunct Olympic Studios in London. Urban Soul Orchestra, a 24-piece ensemble who played on Oasis’ or Spice Girls’ hits can be heard on five songs: the opening trilogy Wallpaper…, 1,000 Times and The Other Side, then on the Northern Soul revival Soul Deep and lastly on the album’s closer Memories Of The Past.

Rouen’s most famous four-piece, now relocated in a house on France’s North West Coast, in the quiet seaside town of Étretat, added more bells & whistles and resumed production on the songs. With one last transatlantic leap during the summer of 2002, the boys flew to Portland, Oregon to attend the mixing sessions held by sound wizard Tony Lash (Elliott Smith, The Dandy Warhols…). Suggested by Sub Pop’s craftsman Eric Matthews, also a guest on trumpet and keyboards, Lash would later become a major collaborator on Tahiti 80’s subsequent albums.

In the meantime, Laurent Fétis, the designer behind Puzzle’s iconic artwork, had started working with artist Elisabeth Arkhipoff on a set of nostalgic photographs transfigured with a soft air-bush technique. Those visuals, like their predecessors, have since become an inseparable companion to Tahiti 80’s music.

Many musical fashions and flavors of the month have come and gone, but twenty years after its release, WFTS still sounds fresh and relevant. And always forward-looking, Tahiti 80 is currently wrapping up the recording of their eighth album, to be released in early 2022.

***
To meet with confidence
the cynic years;
Battling in wars that
never can be won,
seeking the lost cause
and the brave defeat.
***

Originally released in 1971. "What's Going On is not only Marvin Gaye's masterpiece, it's the most important and passionate record to come out of soul music, delivered by one of its finest voices, a man finally free to speak his mind and so move from R&B sex symbol to true recording artist. With What's Going On, Gaye meditated on what had happened to the American dream of the past -- as it related to urban decay, environmental woes, military turbulence, police brutality, unemployment, and poverty. These feelings had been bubbling up between 1967 and 1970, during which he felt increasingly caged by Motown's behind-the-times hit machine and restrained from expressing himself seriously through his music. Finally, late in 1970, Gaye decided to record a song that the Four Tops' Obie Benson had brought him, 'What's Going On.' When Berry Gordy decided not to issue the single, deeming it uncommercial, Gaye refused to record any more material until he relented. Confirmed by its tremendous commercial success in January 1971, he recorded the rest of the album over ten days in March, and Motown released it in late May. Besides cementing Marvin Gaye as one of the most important artists in pop music, What's Going On was far and away the best full-length to issue from the singles-dominated Motown factory, and arguably the best soul album of all time." John Bush, AllMusic

“I want total freedom, total possibility, total acceptance. I want to fall in love with the rock.” That’s how Lillie West describes the theme of “DIVER,” the song she calls the thesis of Lala Lala’s third record, I Want The Door To Open. The rock in question is a reference to Sisyphus, the mythical figure doomed by the gods to forever push a boulder up from the depths of hell. To West, it is the perfect metaphor for, in her words, “the labor of living, of figuring out who you are, what's wrong with you, what's right with you.”

Coming off of 2018’s acclaimed The Lamb, an introspective indie rock album recorded live with a three-piece band, West knew she was ready to make something sonically bigger and thematically more outward-looking than anything she’d done before; a record that would be less a straightforward documentation of her own personal struggles and more like a poem or a puzzle box, with sonic and lyrical clues that would allow the listener to, as the title says, open the door to the greater meaning of those struggles.

The result is I Want The Door To Open, a bold exploration of persona and presence from an artist questioning how to be herself fully in a world where the self is in constant negotiation. From the moment West declares “I want to look right into the camera” over a cascade of dreamy vocal loops on opening track “Lava,” I Want The Door To Open distinguishes itself from anything she’s done before in scope and intensity. The ultra-magnified iteration of Lala Lala is fully encapsulated in the monumental “DIVER.” Inspired by a character from a Jennifer Egan novel, it’s a pop song of Kate Bush-esque proportions replete with layered synths and booming, wide open drumming by fellow Chicago musician Nnamdi Ogbonnaya, and West pushing her vocals to the ragged edge. I Want The Door To Open is a musical quest undertaken with the knowledge that the titular door may never open; but it is through falling in love with the quest itself that one may find the closest thing to total freedom, total possibility, and total acceptance available to us on this plane of existence.

“I want total freedom, total possibility, total acceptance. I want to fall in love with the rock.” That’s how Lillie West describes the theme of “DIVER,” the song she calls the thesis of Lala Lala’s third record, I Want The Door To Open. The rock in question is a reference to Sisyphus, the mythical figure doomed by the gods to forever push a boulder up from the depths of hell. To West, it is the perfect metaphor for, in her words, “the labor of living, of figuring out who you are, what's wrong with you, what's right with you.”

Coming off of 2018’s acclaimed The Lamb, an introspective indie rock album recorded live with a three-piece band, West knew she was ready to make something sonically bigger and thematically more outward-looking than anything she’d done before; a record that would be less a straightforward documentation of her own personal struggles and more like a poem or a puzzle box, with sonic and lyrical clues that would allow the listener to, as the title says, open the door to the greater meaning of those struggles.

The result is I Want The Door To Open, a bold exploration of persona and presence from an artist questioning how to be herself fully in a world where the self is in constant negotiation. From the moment West declares “I want to look right into the camera” over a cascade of dreamy vocal loops on opening track “Lava,” I Want The Door To Open distinguishes itself from anything she’s done before in scope and intensity. The ultra-magnified iteration of Lala Lala is fully encapsulated in the monumental “DIVER.” Inspired by a character from a Jennifer Egan novel, it’s a pop song of Kate Bush-esque proportions replete with layered synths and booming, wide open drumming by fellow Chicago musician Nnamdi Ogbonnaya, and West pushing her vocals to the ragged edge. I Want The Door To Open is a musical quest undertaken with the knowledge that the titular door may never open; but it is through falling in love with the quest itself that one may find the closest thing to total freedom, total possibility, and total acceptance available to us on this plane of existence.

This is the follow up to Kero Hero Bonito’s 7” ‘Flamingo’ release from November last year.


Kero Kero Bonito are a London-based experimental pop trio, comprised of bilingual Anglo-Japanese singer Sarah and producers Gus and Jamie. Having previously made college radio indie (Time 'n' Place, #1 NACC 2018) and viral Casio megahits ("Flamingo", "I'd Rather Sleep"), the six track Civilisation mini-album compiles the "lost world junk pop" of the band's Civilisation I and Civilisation II EPs.

Civilisation was inspired by the art pop lineage of artists like Kate Bush, David Sylvian and Peter Gabriel, with a sonic palette informed by Warp's Artificial Intelligence series, homemade New Age music and early digital synth experiments. It was created entirely with dusty old musical hardware and uses both ancient musical tropes (pentatonic scales, minimalist repetition) and contemporary songwriting techniques to summon an out-of-time atmosphere that spans the past, present and future simultaneously. The songs tackle widescreen themes like psychological warfare (on the mystical polyrhythmic funk of "Battle Lines"), ancient mythology (on the energetic, melancholy synth-pop of "The Princess and the Clock") and the resurrection of the dead (on "Well Rested", the record's 7-minute psychedelic house closer).

Beautiful Garbage is the third studio album from Garbage, initially released on October 1, 2001. Marking a departure from the sound the band had established on their first two releases, Garbage & Version 2.0, the album was written and recorded over the course of a year, when lead singer Shirley Manson chronicled their efforts weekly online, becoming one of the first high-profile musicians to keep an Internet blog. The album expanded on the band's musical variety, with stronger melodies, more direct lyrics, and sounds mixing rock with electronica, new wave, hip hop, and girl groups. This brand new edition featuring newly remastered audio by Billy Bush & Butch Vig across Deluxe, LP, CD and Digital formats. The Deluxe edition includes Beautiful Garbage on 2 x 180g Black Vinyl, as well as a 12” 180g of B-Sides and memorabilia. The two Double LP formats have been pressed on 180g Black and 180g white vinyl respectively. This reissue campaign also features a triple CD featuring, original album, b-sides, demos and remixes housed in a deluxe clamshell.

Alex Nemec (Mirabilis Label Boss / Tronic / Bush Records) & Nik Feral (Dynamic Reflection / Stahlplatten) gave us the labels best selling release of 2020 and so we follow up with a all star remix EP featuring Barem (Minus / Sci+Tec), Simon Baker (Get Physical / Cocoon / Rekids), Iain Taylor (Dirtybird / Balance / Rejekt Music Boss) alongside a previously unreleased rework of original track Ultra from last year’s release.

Early DJ support from Apollonia, Marco Carola, Davide Squillace, Butch, Cristian Varela, Tim Green, Michel De Hey, Tomasz Guiddo, Anderson Noise, Dave Angel with radio plays from Kiss FM, Ibiza Radio 1, Ibiza Global Radio, Ibiza Sonica Radio, Warm FM, Eldarado FM, Dance TV, Dancetrippin TV, Pioneer DJ Radio, Datatransmission Radio and Digitally Imported Radio Belgium.

The classic 1991 album remastered and expanded with rare and previously
unreleased tracks. Extensive liner notes by band biographer Keith Cameron.
A landmark of the grunge era.
By going back to basics with ‘Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge’, Mudhoney
flipped conventional wisdom. Not for the first time - or the last - they would be
vindicated. A month after release in July 1991, the album entered the UK
album chart at Number 34 (five weeks later, Nirvana’s ‘Nevermind’ entered
at 36) and went on to sell 75,000 copies worldwide. A more meaningful
measure of success, however, lay in its revitalisation of the band, casting a
touchstone for the future. The record is a major chapter in Mudhoney’s
ongoing story, the moral of which has to be: when in doubt, fudge it.
The album began at Music Source Studio, a large space equipped with a 24-
track mixing board - downright futuristic, compared to the 8-track setup that
birthed the band’s catalytic 1988 debut, ‘Touch Me I’m Sick’. The Music
Source session quickly turned into a false start when the results, in guitarist
Steve Turner’s words, “sounded a little too fancy, too clean.” Lesson learned,
the band went primitive and got to work at Conrad Uno’s 8-track setup at Egg
Studio. Named after the cartons pasted on the walls in an optimistic attempt
at sound-proofing, Egg boasted a 1960s vintage 8-track Spectra Sonics
recording console, originally built for Stax in Memphis.
So it was that, in the spring of 1991, Mudhoney made ‘Every Good Boy
Deserves Fudge’. The resulting album is a whirlwind of the band’s influences
at the time: the fierce ‘60s garage rock of their Pacific Northwest
predecessors The Sonics and The Lollipop Shoppe, the gnashing posthardcore of Drunks With Guns, the heavy guitar moods of Neil Young, the
lysergic workouts of Spacemen 3 and Hawkwind, the gloomy existentialism
of Zounds and the satirical ferocity of ‘80s hardcore punk. The quartet’s
special alchemy meant these fond homages never slid into pastiche.
Ultimately, ‘Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge’ epitomised the best of
Mudhoney: here was a band reconnecting with its purest instincts and, in the
process, reinventing itself.
This 30th Anniversary edition, remastered by Bob Weston at Chicago
Mastering Service, stands as testimony to the creative surge that drove them
in this period. The album sessions yielded a clutch of material that would
subsequently appear on B-sides, compilations, and split-singles. This edition
includes all those tracks and a slew of previously unreleased songs,
including the entire five-track Music Source session.

Hailing from Brownsville, Brooklyn Taphari got his start in the underground queer clubscenes of Bushwick. His live performances are explosive dance parties and an aggressivecall to action. Truly charismatic on stage, music is Taphari's most efficient means ofcommunication. He writes of his struggles as a young loner from the hood seeking asylum inlaughter, queer expression, hip-hop, and the internet. On 'Blind obedience' we find Taphari on a journey of self-actualization, transcending suffering through the power of self-love and authentic musical expression. this hard-hitting,confident debut centers the skilled rapper's syllable hopscotchover mutating beats. staying in a lane he's forged himself, therap alien's rage is explosive out the gate. on lead single "Table42" featuring seasoned rapper pink siifu, taphari sings of lostlove and the end of the world over drum 'N Bass beats. "Backsoon" featuring label mate Benét is a generous breath from thiskinetic collection of bangers.

Pleasure is a Sydney based music project that utilizes distorted synths, irregular drum beats and fluid song structures to create energetic and hypnotic pieces that straddle the line of bright and abrasive.The trio is comprised of Adam Connelly (synthesizers + vocals) Jonathan Boulet (bass guitar + fx pedals) and Hugh Deacon (drums). When playing live and on record, their music is improvised and unrehearsed with no laptops or backing tracks. “One of us will introduce an idea and the rest will follow.”

Their debut LP Saint Albans, was conceived and recorded in a small farm house in the town of Saint Albans, New South Wales, over 3 days from the 12th to the 14th of October 2019. The building has since burned down in the 2019 Australian Bushfires. “We came away from this session with close to 20 hours of material that we edited down into consumable pieces.” This is the case for all tracks except BRAIN WASTE 191013 which was left intact and unedited.

They launched the Australian release of the album by playing a 6 hour endurance set in a warehouse in Sydney’s Inner West. “Our sonic influences seem very obvious but we haven't been called out yet. Mainly Boards of Canada, Black Moth Super Rainbow, Aphex Twin, Fuck Buttons, Blanck Mass and Lightning Bolt.”

Acid Dad is an American alternative-rock band composed of singer-guitarists, Vaughn Hunt and Sean Fahey, and drummer, Trevor Mustoe. Vaughn first started recording the band in his Bushwick, NY basement releasing singles “Brain Body” and their first EP “Let’s Plan a Robbery.” Appearing live in the New York City rock scene in 2016, Acid Dad quickly moved to a world stage with their self-titled debut album, released by Greenway Records in 2018. During 2020, the band spent their time building a new studio space in Queens, NY, while continuing to independently produce all their own music, art and even building their own guitars. With a new space and vision, the band produced their second LP, “Take It From The Dead,” set to be co-released in June 2021 by Brooklyn’s Greenway Records and psych powerhouse LEVITATION’s label, The Reverberation Appreciation Society. “Take It From The Dead” features an array of different influences ranging from 90’s neo-psych, modern post-punk and 70’s rock-n-roll. Acid Dad has crafted a record that sounds new, yet feels nostalgic. In contrast to their earlier work, they make use of slower tempos and expand their sound to include songs that are both more intricate and more hypnotic. To accompany the new record, the band spent the last year collaborating with video artist Webb Hunt, producing psych and glitch art videos that form a visual counterpart to the dreamy distortions of their sound. Take It From The Dead is out June 11th via Greenway Records / The Reverberation Appreciation Society on Deluxe LP & CD.

Classic black LPs housed in gatefold w/ special canvas cardboard stock and silver hot foil! Nordic pop diva KARIN PARK of ÅRABROT adds her ethereal, mournful voice and keys to the primordial sound of legendary electronic pioneer LUSTMORD for this sublime and poignant collaboration. ALTER is a ritual of our times. On the pair's frst collaborative work, the nine tracks that make up ALTER are every bit as heart-wrenching as they are terrifying, mining new sonic territory, it is a fascinating study of light and shade that delves deep into vast uncharted darkness. Their ability to create atmosphere on the album opener "Hiraeth" is second to none, perfectly assembling a harrowing backdrop for Park's lilting sound of longing. From there, Park's vocals add all of the emotional depth and power found in names like Kate Bush, Maynard J Keenan and Elizabeth Frasier, perfectly playing against Lustmord's waves of dark drama and creating a wholly unique record that recalls Dead Can Dance, Massive Attack and Portishead at their greatest. Considering Park's credentials, it might be surprising that a collaboration with Lustmord would ft so seamlessly. Utilizing a sound comprised of elements of industrial, synth pop and more, the celebrated Swedish solo artist and member of Norwegian rock band Årabrot utilizes experimentation in her work, blazing trails and bringing to mind the work of her peers The Knife, Scott Walker, Robyn, Depeche Mode and Burial with her darkly-rich compositions. Multiple winner of Norway's Spellemann award, Park co-wrote the Norwegian entry for the 2013 Eurovision, fnishing fourth overall. But it is the sensibility of the sacred music of her youth that Park adds to ALTER, contributing a powerful vocal that guides the listener through the cavernous, mystical depth of their collaborative work. "Lustmord is the Gustave Doré of music", Karin Park ofers pensively. "Painting magical pictures with a sound that is so vast, it gives space for your own imagination." Brian Williams grew up in North Wales, beginning his musical career as Lustmord in 1980 and becoming a pivotal fgure and pioneer in the early industrial music scene in the UK. A former member of SPK during arguably their most crucial era, Williams went on to work with Throbbing Gristle members Chris & Cosey and appeared on early albums by Current 93 and Nurse With Wound amongst others. After relocating to Los Angeles in 1993, Williams worked on dozens of motion picture soundtracks including The Crow, Underworld and Paul Schrader's First Reformed, as well as on several video game, television scores and solo albums. Williams has also contributed to and collaborated with artists as varied as the Melvins, Clock DVA, Jarboe, John Balance of Coil, Clock DVA, Paul Haslinger (Tangerine Dream), Wes Borland (Limp Bizkit), Puscifer and more, including Grammy Award-winners Tool from their much acclaimed eforts 10,000 Days and Fear Inoculum. FOR FANS OF Lustmord, Årabrot, Dead Can Dance, Hans Zimmer, Sunn O))), Fever Ray, Chelsea Wolfe, Boards of Canada, Heilung, Zola Jesus, Swans.

Limited coloured LPs housed in gatefold w/ special canvas cardboard stock and silver hot foil! Nordic pop diva KARIN PARK of ÅRABROT adds her ethereal, mournful voice and keys to the primordial sound of legendary electronic pioneer LUSTMORD for this sublime and poignant collaboration. ALTER is a ritual of our times. On the pair's frst collaborative work, the nine tracks that make up ALTER are every bit as heart-wrenching as they are terrifying, mining new sonic territory, it is a fascinating study of light and shade that delves deep into vast uncharted darkness. Their ability to create atmosphere on the album opener "Hiraeth" is second to none, perfectly assembling a harrowing backdrop for Park's lilting sound of longing. From there, Park's vocals add all of the emotional depth and power found in names like Kate Bush, Maynard J Keenan and Elizabeth Frasier, perfectly playing against Lustmord's waves of dark drama and creating a wholly unique record that recalls Dead Can Dance, Massive Attack and Portishead at their greatest. Considering Park's credentials, it might be surprising that a collaboration with Lustmord would ft so seamlessly. Utilizing a sound comprised of elements of industrial, synth pop and more, the celebrated Swedish solo artist and member of Norwegian rock band Årabrot utilizes experimentation in her work, blazing trails and bringing to mind the work of her peers The Knife, Scott Walker, Robyn, Depeche Mode and Burial with her darkly-rich compositions. Multiple winner of Norway's Spellemann award, Park co-wrote the Norwegian entry for the 2013 Eurovision, fnishing fourth overall. But it is the sensibility of the sacred music of her youth that Park adds to ALTER, contributing a powerful vocal that guides the listener through the cavernous, mystical depth of their collaborative work. "Lustmord is the Gustave Doré of music", Karin Park ofers pensively. "Painting magical pictures with a sound that is so vast, it gives space for your own imagination." Brian Williams grew up in North Wales, beginning his musical career as Lustmord in 1980 and becoming a pivotal fgure and pioneer in the early industrial music scene in the UK. A former member of SPK during arguably their most crucial era, Williams went on to work with Throbbing Gristle members Chris & Cosey and appeared on early albums by Current 93 and Nurse With Wound amongst others. After relocating to Los Angeles in 1993, Williams worked on dozens of motion picture soundtracks including The Crow, Underworld and Paul Schrader's First Reformed, as well as on several video game, television scores and solo albums. Williams has also contributed to and collaborated with artists as varied as the Melvins, Clock DVA, Jarboe, John Balance of Coil, Clock DVA, Paul Haslinger (Tangerine Dream), Wes Borland (Limp Bizkit), Puscifer and more, including Grammy Award-winners Tool from their much acclaimed eforts 10,000 Days and Fear Inoculum.

Soul Jazz Records new 'Two Synths, A Guitar (and) A Drum Machine' is a new collection of current D-I-Y post-punk bands shaped by the mutant sounds of no wave, punk funk and New York Noise bands from the late 70s and early 80s that collided with the world of underground dance music found at the Paradise Garage, Mudd Club in New York City (ESG, Arthur Russell, Bush Tetras, Talking Heads, Suicide, Liquid Liquid). Other influences cited here include Manchester and Sheffield's industrial post-punk sounds of the 1980s (Joy Division, Cabaret Voltaire, Gang of Four) as well as the 1970s German electronic experimentalism of Cluster, Neu!, Harmonia and Can. Featured artists from around the globe include Los Angeles D-I-Y band Automatic, New Fries from Toronto, artist/music collaborators Toresch from Germany, Susumu Makai from Japan/UK, VexRuffin from the Philippines/California and Madmadmad, Gramme, Tom of England and other UK groups. That all the bands featured here manage to make distinctive contemporary music out of these 80s roots is testament to the wide range of other musics that are seamlessly absorbed into a modern melting pot of sound - hip-hop, the electronic European avant-garde, rave culture, and more.

Aufgewachsen in den sanften Hügeln von North Yorkshire mit Künstlern wie Nick Drake, Joni Mitchell, Joan Armatrading und Kate Bush, wurde Martens von der Kritik hochgelobtes Debütalbum ”Writing of Blues and Yellows” im Jahr 2016 veröffentlicht, als sie gerade mal 17 Jahre alt war, und auch der Nachfolger ”Feeding Seahorses By Hand” (2019) wurde ähnlich gelobt. Nun ist Billie Marten mit ihrem dritten Studioalbum ”Flora Fauna” zurück, das gemeinsam mit Rich Cooper in London aufgenommen wurde. Martens
neues Material verbindet die für sie charakteristische, gedämpfte und resonante Stimme mit einem schnellen Puls und einer reichhaltigen Instrumentierung, wobei ihre Inspirationen nun von den Krautrockern Can bis hin zu Broadcast, Arthur Russell und Fiona Apple reichen.
Basierend auf dem minimalistischen akustischen Folk-Fundament, mit dem sie sich einen Namen gemacht hat, ist ”Flora Fauna” ein reiferes, gefühlvolleres Album, das um ein starkes Rückgrat aus Bass und Rhythmus herum aufgebaut ist. Die Songs markieren eine Periode persönlicher Unabhängigkeit für Marten, in der sie gelernt hat, sich selbst zu nähren und sich von giftigen Beziehungen zu lösen - und ein großer Teil davon war die Rückkehr zur Natur: “The name Flora Fauna is like a green bath for my eyes. If the album was a painting, it would look like flora and fauna -it encompasses every organism, every corner of Earth, and a feeling of total abundance.”

Limited edition to 500 copies vinyl + 16 pages comic.

Record Kicks presents the reissue of the rare and in-demand Calibro 35 EP Dalla Bovisa a Brooklyn on vinyl. The EP includes an original Calibro 35's comic and is limited to 500 copies, which makes it an instant collector's item.

Originally recorded in 2012 in Brooklyn during the sessions for their third studio album Any Resemblance, Dalla Bovisa a Brooklyn (literally 'from Milan's district Bovisa to Brooklyn') came out in that same year as a limited edition 10". The EP contained an original comic by Italian gurus Gianfranco Enrietto and Marco Philopat that tells, between reality and fiction, the experience of Calibro 35 in the Big Apple. Rapidly gone out of stock, the original copies are rare to find and change hands for big money amongst record collectors and Calibro fans. Following the re-release of the first 3 Calibro 35 studio albums, now also Dalla Bovisa A Brooklyn sees the light again on the superior 12" format that includes a restored colored version of the original 16 pages comic. From the opening "Broccolino funk" to the last track, the 6 minutes of the afro-funk winner "Bushwick, Nigeria", on the six tracks on the EP the band sounds as groovy as ever, serving another funk-filled journey, full of fuzz guitars, distorted organs and brooding bass lines.

Active since 2008, Calibro 35 enjoy a worldwide reputation as one of the coolest independent bands around. During their thirteen-year career, they were sampled by Dr. Dre on his Compton album, Jay-Z, The Child of lov & Damon Albarn; they shared stages worldwide with the likes of Roy Ayers, Muse, Sun Ra Arkestra, Sharon Jones, Thundercat and Headhunters and as unique musicians they collaborated with, amongst others, PJ Harvey, Mike Patton, John Parish, Stewart Copeland and Nic Cester (The Jet). Described by Rolling Stone magazine as "the most fascinating, retro-maniac and genuine thing that happened to Italy in the last years", Calibro 35 now count on a number of aficionadosin every corner of the planet.

Pixey grew up in the sleepy but picturesque village Parbold, Lancashire before moving to Liverpool for school and remaining there to this day. Now signed to Chess Club - a label famed for breaking new talent, where recent exciting signings include AlfieTempleman and Phoebe Green, and past successes include Jungle, Wolf Alice and Easy Life - Pixey is making more waves than ever before. ‘Just Move’ drew attention from BBC Radio 1 DJs Jack Saunders (who made Pixey one of his Next Wave artists) and Huw Stephens amongst many other admirers like Radio X’s John Kennedy who added the band to the X-Posure playlist at the station in October. Pixey has also featured as the cover artist of Spotify’s Indie Brandneu (GER) and Peach editorial playlists, and wasamongst the artists named in major annual tips lists, the Dork HYPE List and the NME 100.



New single ‘Electric Dream’ - with its accompanying video by Thomas Davies - combines cavernous drum machines and dreamy pop melodies with a signature dance stomp. Speaking about new single, Pixey explains: “‘Electric Dream’ was originally written as a piano ballad but after finishing the lyrics I felt the song worked as a dance track. I wrote it to make sense ofbeing locked in with nothing to rely on but technology. The verses are all of my anxieties that come with that - like trying to simulate humanity digitally and what kind of a future that would be - but the choruses are about the imperfections of real life that technology and AI can’t give us.”



Debut EP Free To Live In Colour was written, recorded and produced in Pixey’s bedroom in Liverpool - with additional production added by frequent Gorillaz and Jamie T collaborator James Dring - and draws inspiration from genres like hardcore breakbeat and





dream pop. Pixey says: “I wanted a collection of tracks which gave a quick snapshot into me and my brain - where I’m from, where I want to be and what I’m thinking about. I hope people can take something meaningful from it or simply have a dance.”



Pixey first discovered music as a toddler - she remembers not even being able to walk yet but desperate to sing and dance to Queen - before discovering the likes of Kate Bush, Björk, and George Harrison, whose classic songwriting struck a chord with her in her youth. The catalyst for Pixey’s musical coming of age however, was a near fatal viral illness suffered in early 2016 which hospitalised her, she says: “When I thought I was going to die I thought of all the things I wish I’d done and music was the first thing I thought of. As soon as I started recovering I started learning to record and produce.” She taught herself Ableton production software before mastering guitar and eventually drums and bass after her previous (and current) boyfriend(s) left their instruments lying around to prove she could learn it quicker and play it better.



Once able to carve out her own sound, Pixey turned to The Verve, The Prodigy and De La Soul for sonic inspiration, adding: “I particularly like the idea of using samples/making my own riffs sound like samples which was heavily inspired by the De La Soul album 3 Feet High and Rising. Starting out initially though Grimes was a huge catalyst when I realized she wrote, recorded &produced herself.” Her prolific and unusual songwriting style stems from an original riff or beat, with further layers added as she records and produces, and lyrics being added last - the process taking only a day or two.



With Free To Live In Colour and a whole arsenal of further material being readied on her new label home, Chess Club, Pixey is primed for big things in 2021 and beyond.

The term "Guitar Hero" is bandied about loosely these days. Seems like all you have to do is look good holding the thing and you qualify. But if you ask the actual guitar heroes---like Brian May, Jeff Beck, and Eric Clapton---who THEIR Guitar Heroes are, Steve Cropper is definitely on the shortlist. If all he had done were the records with Otis Redding that would be enough, but shortly thereafter he was leaving his fingerprints on records by Wilson Pickett, Sam & Dave, Johnny Taylor, Albert King, and virtually anybody worthy who came within earshot of Memphis. He was a Guitarist's Guitarist, and a Songwriter's Songwriter.

Fire It Up is Steve Cropper's first album of new Soul/R&B material in 10 years. The album was produced by Steve and Jon Tiven, and will be released worldwide on April 23, 2021 via Mascot Label Group/Provogue.

Les Disques du Crepuscule presents Subway, a collection of singles by cult NYC duo Thick Pigeon, originally released on Crepuscule, Factory and Factory Benelux between 1981 and 1991.
Comprised of vocalist Stanton Miranda and instrumentalist Carter Burwell, Thick Pigeon emerged from the downtown New York artrock scene which also spawned Glenn Branca, Bush Tetras, DNA, Arthur Russell and Sonic Youth. Like their chosen name, the duo were typically atypical: Miranda was previously a dancer with the Marthe Graham ballet company, and Carter a film animator and Harvard fine arts/architecture graduate. Very much a studio project, the ‘group’ hardly ever performed live.
Poised and subtle debut single Subway appeared on Crepuscule in January 1981, a connection forged by Miranda’s partner Michael Shamberg. Dog followed a year later, along with wry Christmas single Jingle Bell Rock, before the duo switched to Factory Records, recording debut album Too Crazy Cowboys in Manchester with Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert of New Order producing. Released simultaneously on Factory and Factory US in 1984, the album was billed as “a walk through the civilisation of you soul”.
Having now embarked on a career scoring movies (becoming the Coen brothers’ composer of choice), Carter was absent from the next TP project, 1986 dance single Wheels Over Indian Trails, although Morris and Gilbert remained on board as guest musicians. However Miranda and Carter would reunite for a second (and final) leftfield pop album, Miranda Dali, issued by Crepuscule in 1991.
As well as singles Subway, Dog, Jingle Bell Rock, Jess + Bart and Wheels Over Indian Trails, TWI 351 also includes b-sides (Sudan, Tracy + Pansy), album highlights (Crime, Riding) and a second festive track, Blue Christmas, previously issued only on cassette as part of a Factory Christmas card in 1986.
Alongside Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert, the stellar cast of guests include Fred Szymanski (of Ike Yard), Ikue Mori (DNA), remixer John Robie, and even artist and event designer Jean-Paul Goude on backing vocals.
Limited to just 500 copies, Subway (Singles) is newly remastered and pressed on transparent violet vinyl, reflecting the original 1981 sleeve artwork by legendary Crepuscule designer Benoit Hennebert. The album includes a free digital copy (MP3).

Veronica Swift flips the script on This Bitter Earth, the captivating follow-up to her 2019 Mack Avenue Records debut, Confessions. Whereas Confessions played out like pages from her personal diary, on the new album, the 27-year-old singer and master song interpreter looks outward while addressing social ills that plague the world today.
This Bitter Earth takes on the song-cycle characteristics of such classic LPs as Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On, Kate Bush’s Hounds of Love, and Mary J. Blige’s My Life. For her album, Swift tackles sexism “How Lovely to Be a Woman”, domestic abuse [“He Hit Me (And It Felt Like a Kiss)”], racism/ xenophobia [“You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught”] and the dangers of fake news [“The Sports Page”].
Accompanied by a team of kindred spirts that includes pianist Emmet Cohen, guitarist Armand Hirsch and flutist Aaron Johnson, bassist Yasushi Nakamura, and drummer Bryan Carter, Swift curates material that covers multiple genres, including jazz, American musicals, vintage R&B and contemporary rock.

Lydmor's new album 'Capacity' is a musical maze full of alluring mysteries. At the same time, it is part of a process of liberation, which is about opening oneself up and discovering one's capacity. For her previous album, Lydmor travelled to Shanghai. But on her new album, Lydmor has mostly travelled deep into herself. 'Capacity' is a contrasting musical work where fiction and reality merge into a multifaceted sound universe. It is the electronic pop artist's most personal, complex and conceptual album to date. There is almost a David Lynch'ish cut about 'Capacity'. The album is like a winding maze where it is difficult to decipher what is real and what is an illusion. Like a book with countless narratives. Without conclusions. Ambiguous. Full of alluring mysteries, dreams, reflections and messages about gender, identity, love, guilt and liberation. Rich in contrasts: Black/white. Silence/noise. Weakness/strength. Fiction/reality. Labyrinth/compass.
Multiple media has compared the quirky voice to the likes of Grimes, Kate Bush or Björk but inevitably the comparisons fall short. (Kaltblut Magazine) - With brutal honesty, unbelievable vulnerability and yet dreamy, she sings the soul out in her pulsating electronic pop songs. The soft, bright voice is deceptive. Denmark's "hidden gem" is a must-listen. (Flux FM) - She is every bit as innovative as Madonna ever was when she started out. Lydmor ticks all the boxes; the girl has everything. For my money she’s the most ground-breaking, inventive artist in Europe right now, possibly in the world. (God Is In The TV, UK) - A unique artist who somehow manages to combine sophisticated and subtle balladry with strident electronic pop, I’ve declared previously that I believe she is only one step away from becoming a big name. Perhaps the feelings are supposed to be mutually inclusive, as the song swings musically from simply cold to complexly hot. It is one that does try to combine both sides of her song writing persona, the introverted balladry and the more elaborate, extrovert electro-pop. (Nordic Music Review) - Revolting pop pathos, primed with pumped up beats. (Negative White, Switzerland)

In early 2018, Nathan Jenkins returned from the coast of Arrábida to his new home studio in a cottage tucked behind the grand hotel setting of Wim Wenders’ Lisbon Story. Breaking for lunches under a Datura tree in the garden and a far cry from the Finsbury Park basement flat he rented the previous year, a set of recordings followed that galvanised into an EP - ‘We Had A Good Time’. Music informed by out-of-town trips in a 1987 Renault 9 Super, Pitchfork attributed “remarkable healing powers” to lead song ‘Hula’.

After leaving London for a spell in Portugal, Nathan lost his taste for the night life and drew a line under a long-running NTS radio show. Much of the time spent abroad was dedicated to a longstanding collaboration with Westerman, whose album they recorded in a remote part of the Algarve countryside in 2019. Nathan’s own discography opened in 2007 with ‘Pet Sounds: In The Key Of Dee’, before pivoting in a more electronic direction via ‘Get Familiar’ and ‘Young Heartache’. From the sampledelia of 2011’s ‘Too Right’, the new wave and rave of ‘Say Arr Ee’ to the Robert Wyatt-influenced ‘Love Me Oh Please Love Me’, he’s mapped a deliberately peculiar path. 2015’s ‘Rooster’ was Eno & Byrne’s ‘Bush Of Ghosts’ given a shangaan-electro lick and clip. While Nathan’s partnership with fellow out-there pop auteur Jesse Hackett, as Blludd Relations, staggered like a half-cut Prince.

Collaged, rhythmic alternatives. Syncopated avant-garde sambas. Off kilter Sci-Fi jazz. Think Asha Putli in the spot at the Star Wars cantina. Arty, angular. Rich, but uncluttered. Frenetic, electric, blurring the boundaries between what is sampled, what is played. Nathan’s is a wilfully weird Pop, showcased in 2016 on his album ‘Loop The Loop’. Wayward but woven with hooks that come out of nowhere. Lyrical, often beautiful, solos on violin, oboe and desiccated guitars. Songs that demonstrate a nose-thumbing playfulness, a refusal to sit still. Where there’s always the urge to interrupt a carnival beat with a burst of galloping horse hooves. Or juxtapose ambient chords with a kazoo.

A roll call of Nathan’s broader musical adventures encompasses work with Paul Epworth, Sampha, Westerman and Nilüfer Yanya. Commissioned remixes reach from Dita Von Teese to Model 500, Tricky, Todd Terje and Lee “Scratch” Perry. Solo efforts gracing labels Honest Jon’s, R&S, Young Turks, Whities and The Trilogy Tapes. ‘Blue Pedro’, on the latter, making it into Crack Mag’s Top 100 Tracks Of The Decade.

In 2012 Nathan started his own label, DEEK Recordings, assuming the role of inhouse producer to collaborators. The imprint’s tagline and aesthetic - Pop, not slop! - is illustrated by an ongoing playlist of the same name and further explored in a series of compilations where Nathan and friends cover and reinterpret unsung ‘unclassics’ from alt. country to obscure 80s European arthouse scores, bouncing between Captain Beefheart, The Pixies, Sade and Mazzy Starr. DEEK’s roster is equally eccentric, non-linear and pop-literate. Laura Groves and Nautic - the realization and crystallization of a shared love for the Cocteau Twins.

12” pressed on crystal clear vinyl.

Bobby Would LP#2. Wistful waltztime psychobeat for warding off / wallowing in the 2020-21 Weltschmerz. Swelling and smearing the vision of 2018’s skeletal rock’n’roll heartbreaker Baby, most of the songs here are ballads – minimalist, ultra-hypnotic but lavishly melodic space-punk lullabies and bright, bruised expressions of jingle-jangle mourning. Highs, lows and heavenly blows. BW’s guitar is, more than ever, a thing of fearsome and filigree beauty, moving effortlessly from misty, mellifluous DIY pop-dreams to wailing vertiginous whiplash leads and dazed, epiphanic, angels-wept metha-drone, ringing in infinity - and tethered to this earth only by his beloved monotone, numbed-out, serial-killer croon. Spinning in its own orbit, but with recognisable dabs - perhaps - of Phantom Payn / JG39, Les Rallizes Denudes, Gary War, Peter Gutteridge’s Pure...and of course Bobby’s own work in Heavy Metal and Itchy Bugger.

Raleigh Ritchie releases his highly anticipated second album, ANDY. A twelve track project, Andy sees Bristol born and London-hailing Raleigh holding a colossal magnifying glass to himself. Over the production, for the most part, from long-term collaborator Chris Loco but also, the incredibly talented GRADES on “Time In A Tree” and “27 Club”, Raleigh leaves no stone unturned. The album is a creation of heartbreakingly honest songs that seamlessly fuses sweeping soul and mellow R&B with forward-thinking electronica and gutsy orchestral moments. (Raleigh has become well known for working with the sensational Rosie Danvers and Wired Strings.) This is a truly powerful record, a long-awaited return that packs a poignant punch.

It has been four years since Raleigh aka Jacob Anderson, released his inaugural debut album You’re A Man Now Boy but fans have not been left wanting. When he wasn’t releasing music, performing at his sold out show at Shepherds Bush Empire, or alongside Stormzy in his iconic Glastonbury headline, featuring on Gang Signs & Prayer, Stormzy’s critically acclaimed debut, or acting as Grey Worm in the hit HBO series Game Of Thrones, he was and is “Andy”.

For Blood and Empire is the fifth studio album by American punk band Anti-Flag, released in 2006. In the same year, the song “The Press Corpse” entered the Hot Modern Rock Tracks Chart. Anti- Flag are known for their politically charged songs, often criticising right wing policies and conservative ideologies. For Blood and Empire was released during the reign of George W. Bush, so naturally the album boils over with vehement anti-Bush attacks and confrontational lyrics that overwhelmingly target the war in Iraq. Featuring classic Anti-Flag songs “The Press Corpse”, “This is the End (For You My Friend)” & “Depleted Uranium Is A War Crime (feat. Tom Morello)” and “1 Trillion Dollar$”. The LP set includes an 8-page booklet, which contains short essays for all but two songs, providing more in-depth perspective on the inspirations for the song subjects.

Hunter And The Dog Star is the band’s fifth studio album and their first since 2018’s Rocket—a record that marked a major return for the group following a twelve-year hiatus and was released to widespread critical acclaim. Of the album, Associated Press declared, “a triumphant return…their joy in recording together again is clear on Rocket, a record that touches on a variety of musical styles with ease,” while NPR’s World Café proclaimed, “explosively joyful” and the Austin American Statesman praised, “a beautiful, inspiring, sensational album.” Since forming in Dallas in the mid-1980s, the band has toured extensively across the country and had their music featured in several hit shows including Miami Vice, Girls, Cold Case, Ugly Betty, Wet Hot American Summer: Ten Years Later, American Dad! and more. Since the release of their 1988 debut, the 2x platinum-certified, Shooting Rubberbands at the Stars, the band has continued to earn their reputation as an unclassifiable, genre-blending force. Returning to Arlyn Studios in Austin, TX to record with producer Kyle Crusham, Brickell and the New Bohemians—Brandon Aly (drums), John Bush (drums, percussion), Brad Houser (bass, synthesizer) and Kenny Withrow (bass, guitars, synthesizer)—once again put forth a collection of diverse musical ideas and styles on Hunter And The Dog Star, as they have continuously done for the past three decades. Reflecting on the album, Brickell shares, “Hunter And The Dog Star is a collection of songs reflecting the mystery of self-expression, loyalty, companionship and love in the darkest sky just before dawn.” In addition to Brickell (vocals, guitars), Crusham (background vocals, mellotron, piano, Rhodes, synthesizer) and the New Bohemians, the album also features Matt Hubbard (background vocals, organ, piano, synthesizer, wurlitzer), Burton Lee (pedal steel) and background vocals from Kelly Micwee and Alice Spencer.

‘Push’ is Maral’s debut full-length album due on Leaving Records. The album’s sonic palette includes a collage of Iranian classical and folk
samples and explores the genres of experimental electronic production, touching upon noise, punk / post-punk and dub.

Maral is an active and acclaimed musician in the electronic underground. Her debut mixtape was widely praised and she has contributed to several compilations and Richard Russell’s Crass remix project.

‘Push’ features dub legend Lee “Scratch” Perry and Penny Rimbaud of Crass.

‘Push’ is a confident step forward from Maral’s club and mixtape work into a powerful collection of original songs. The album bursts with an urgent psychedelic energy but its songs also grapple with a sombre undercurrent.

Maral says her album is intended to reflect tense US-Iranian relations: “The history of Iranian music has a lot of melancholy in it. So much of Iranian history is sad. Since ancient times, Iranians were always fighting off invasions.”

Ilan Eshkeri and Shigeru Umebayashi score the music to the highly anticipated actionadventure game developed by Sucker Punch Productions and published by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Ilan Eshkeri is a critically acclaimed film, television and video game composer. Eshkeri has been nominated for a BAFTA, an Ivor Novello Award and a International Film Music Critics Association Award. Shigeru Umebayashi is an internationally acclaimed composer who has won numerous awards. He has scored the music for many notable films including ‘True Legend’, ‘Rise of the Legend’ and ‘The Wasted Times’. Triple black vinyl set with tri-gatefold sleeve and printed inner sleeves. Specialist marketing activity.

Gold Black Marble version....


Co-founder and label custodian Zanias makes her debut on Fleisch with a journey through climate catastrophe. Composed in Berlin and mixed in Queensland with the smell of bushfire smoke in the air, she addresses the primary anxiety of our time with four tracks designed to draw the body into movement and the mind into action. Body music elements are wrought with mournful melodies and studded with samples recorded from the fast-disappearing natural world, while her voice guides the way through the darkness.

The Tipping Scale is a gorgeously sung cycle of songs that mix deeply personal lyrics with universal themes; Kinlaw is a smart, conceptual writer, one not afraid to explore deep emotions like loss, regret, and confusion, alongside strength, identity, and change. She explains that The Tipping Scale is an ideal metaphor for the record, the idea of an ever-present slipping in and out of change, and an acceptance of this kind of change. On it, she unravels intimate memories and tries to learn from them. As you listen to her songs and decode her words, you realize she's not just building songs, she's also creating a home_where painful thoughts of the past can exist within the present_as well as an entirely new, unflinching universe. This universe she created is not metaphorical_it's, in fact, very real. Kinlaw, who often works with gesture and movement as a writing tool, found The Tipping Scale unifying her multidisciplinary practice. She found it by building a real world. As she wrote, with the goal of finding human entry points for storytelling that felt authentic and honest to her practice, she often saw the music relating to motion. "I would start with a gesture and let it build into something until a memory attached itself to it," She explains. "The memory would become a story and the story would reveal itself as something important that needed to be expressed in this album." This works, too, for the lyrical process, where harder and less smooth gestures would represent consonants, and smooth, flowing movements would become vowels. She found the same thing happening with melodic lines and key changes. This is a record that jolts between the corporeal and the psychological, drawn from a flailing body, anchored by inconvenient truths. RIYL: Choir Boy, Jenny Hval, Kate Bush, Boy Harsher, Caroline Polachek, Black marble, Julia Holter, Grouper

In a time where everyone from Whitney Houston to Frank Zappa have been re-created in hologram form, where Grimes recently suggested in an interview that “we were at the end of human art”; there could scarcely be a better time for genre-shifting Leeds-based six-piece Team Picture to bring forth the thrillingly expansive synth-pop opus of their debut album The Menace of Mechanical Music.

Inspired by an early 20th century essay under the same name by American marching band leader John Philip Sousa, Team Picture take a look at the automation of creativity on this, their first record with a fully settled line up. Themes centre around the value of creative identity in an automated age, the increasingly disposable nature of art and where that leaves its creators. At twelve songs split into a three-part suite; The Menace of Mechanical Music is emphatically maximalist.

Tracks like the breathy, twinkling Flowerpots, Electric Beds and Handsome Machines’ Icarus-like striving for the sun are an antidote to a music world awash with digital production manipulation and songs written to algorithm. In debating the loosening of the human grip on creativity, Team Picture have poured every last drop of emotion into the recording process.

The group’s now trademark three-way vocal delivery and blurring of textures takes on new structure and purpose. They’ve always had a self-awareness to themselves, too. Initially grouped in with the guitar psych crowd, thanks to their fledgling repeato-rock, they were quick to disassociate themselves from that on 2018's mini-album Recital. With The Menace of Mechanical Music, they expand their sound further still, pirouetting from the likes of Sleeptype Auction – which glimmers like a late 80’s 4AD artefact – through various FX-laden dreamscapes, to the squelchy post-punk of closer Quit Reading. Yet the group were as much influenced by the work of the Early Netherlandish painter Hieronymus Bosch, and his triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights, as they were music touchstones ranging from Kate Bush, Cass McCombs and The Cure.

It’s Sousa words that resonate most deeply within the record however: “The fears of Sousa echo the fears of today's musician,” says Lewis of the late band leader’s 1907 text. “The re-appropriation of funds and support that the artist needs to survive, the gradual erosion of musicianship and self-improvement, that art will become disposable, and that our cultural identity will disappear.”

Recorded with producer Matt Peel (W.H Lung, Eagulls), half the group were unemployed during the session and a daily routine would see them undertake universal credit meetings and job interviews in the morning, before heading to the studio to work into the night. “It was an anxious process but an enjoyable one” says the band’s guitarist Josh Lewis. Indeed, beyond the increasingly golden gated idea of ‘making it’ as an artist, this new album is simply about surviving as one.
Sousa’s vision of a society that had deferred to automation, where babies were rocked to sleep by wheels and pulleys, and people no longer played piano with their own hands. Well over 100 years later and on the precipice of a technological shift never seen before, The Menace of Mechanical Music is the most human response that Team Picture could have given.

Southern Lord announce Crush The Machine, the debut EP from West Coast hardcore punk collective D.E.A (Dead End America), formed by the late, great Steve "Thee Slayer Hippy" Hanford of Poison Idea, with current and former members of Queens Of The Stone Age, Eyehategod, The Accüsed A.D, World Of Lies, Ape Machine, and more.

Captured before Hanford’s passing earlier this year, D.E.A's debut shall be released on 7" and digital EP on 30th October (Non-Returnable) Recording details, liner notes from Mark Lanegan and more info below.

Crush The Machine sees the primary writers, drummer/vocalist Steve Hanford and guitarist Tony Avila (World of Lies, Why Won't You Die, Aborted Cop, Here's Your Warning) joined by lead guitarist Ian Watts (Ape Machine, Minmae) and bassist/vocalist Nick "Rex Everything" Oliveri (Mondo Generator, The Dwarves, ex-Kyuss, ex-Queens Of The Stone Age), with additional lyrics and vocals from Mike IX Williams (Eyehategod, Corrections House, Outlaw Order) and Blaine Cook (The Accüsed A.D, The Fartz, Toe Tag).

"A perfectly appropriate title for this 7 inch EP of jack-hammering, oldschool style hardcore tunes released by Southern Lord, written and played by a rogues gallery of real deal music lifers as a condemnation of the criminal Trump administration and republican party, in the same spirit of those by-gone days when Ronald Reagan or George Bush was the crooked, self-serving president of the crumbling United States empire. Never before has there been a more obvious target, as Donald Trump and his mafia family cabinet rape the country while Rome burns. D.E.A. is Tony Avila, Ian Watts, Nick Oliveri, Mike IX, Blaine Cook and the legendary and beloved, late producer and drummer of Poison Idea, Steve "Thee Slayer Hippy" Hanford. Dying shortly before the completion of this record, it stands as a final testament to his genius, one last hot-wired blast of his epic musical brilliance."

Mark Lanegan
Los Angeles
August, 2020

Spirit is the seventh studio album by Earth, Wind & Fire, released 45 years ago, in, 1976 by Columbia Records. The album rose to No. 2 on both the Billboard 200 and Top Soul Albums charts.

Two singles became huge hits; “Getaway” reached No. 1 on the Billboard Hot Soul Songs chart. The single also rose to No. 12 on the Billboard Hot 100. “Saturday Nite, peaked at No. 4 on the Billboard Hot Soul Songs chart and No. 21 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.

Spirit received critical acclaim. The New York Times wrote; “What is most interesting about Maurice White and his musicians, is their refusal to be locked into any stylistic format Mr. White’s record will be labeled ‘disco’ in some quarters, and indeed parts of if, would not sound out of place in a disco. But, generally, Earth, Wind and Fire is closer to
jazz, or to jazz‐rock, than to the thumping formulas of disco. And yet the group isn’t afraid
to slip in a ballad, either.”

Issac Hayes called Spirit one of Earth, Wind & Fire’s five essential recordings. Spirit was also nominated for an American Music Award for Favorite Soul/R&B Album. A song from the album called “Earth, Wind and Fire” was also Grammy nominated in the category of Best Instrumental Composition.

In March of 2020 bassist Dezron Douglas & harpist Brandee Younger were nestled in their apartment in Harlem, New York, not long after every live concert in the world was cancelled and most folks in the United States were forced to shelter in place for the covid lockdown. With all their gigs cancelled and their incomes strapped.. the two came up with an idea. They would host a live-stream performance from their living room, where they would perform classic tunes for friends and family to watch online, and folks could send them donations. They called it “Force Majeure: Brunch in the Crib with Brandee & Dezron,” the first part in homage to the ubiquitous contract clause that never seems to have any use (except all of sudden, c/o a covid-induced live music industry collapse). The immense popularity of their first performance roped them into doing it again, and again, until it eventually became a weekly ritual for Douglas, Younger, and their many friends and family who tuned in every Friday morning (ourselves included). Knowing the beautiful, natural sound they made in their living room would be as enjoyable (or more) as a record as it was through a social media stream… we mailed them a microphone to record themselves. What’s heard on this album, Force Majeure, is a collection of highlights from Douglas & Younger’s legendary lockdown livestream brunch sessions. It includes gorgeous interpretations of songs by Alice & John Coltrane, The Stylistics, The Jackson 5, Pharoah Sanders, Kate Bush, Sting, and The Carpenters… plus some solid gold nuggets of their banter between tunes. It’s an uplifting suite of real, soulful comfort music – a spiritual salve, emanating warmth from the hearth of a Harlem sanctuary.

Dezron Douglas & Brandee Younger are long time companions in life and in music. The two East Coast natives met early in life and have accompanied each other, personally and professionally, through their equally prolific careers. Douglas, a bassist who has established himself as a musician’s musician, is known to many for his work with Pharoah Sanders, Ravi Coltrane, David Murray, and Keyon Harold. Younger, a harpist who has distinguished herself as one of the premiere voices in her field, is known for her work with Jack DeJohnette, Charlie Haden, Stevie Wonder, The Roots, Lauryn Hill, and Moses Sumney. To the day Douglas and Younger often accompany each other in many of the ensembles they lead, respectively. The two played together in sessions for Makaya McCraven’s 2018 release Universal Beings, on which they are both featured artists. Of Force Majeure, McCraven says: “It’s a testament to the power of music to uplift us through the most challenging times.

Back in stock!!

Active as a professional DJ in Japan since the late eighties, DJ Yoshizawa Dynamite is also a renowned remixer, compiler and producer. An avid record collector and an expert of the Wamono style, Yoshizawa published the Wamono A to Z records guide book in 2015 which instantly sold-out. The book unveiled a myriad of beautiful and rare records from a highly prolific, but still then unknown, Japanese groove scene.

After many years working as a record buyer for several stores, DJ Chintam opened his own Blow Up shop in 2018 in Tokyo's Shibuya district. A member of the Dayjam Crew and a specialist of soul, funk, rare groove and disco music, Chintam is also an expert of the home-brewed Wamono grooves. He supervised and wrote the Wamono A to Z records guide book together with Yoshizawa.

With this first volume of the Wamono series, our two DJs here guide you through some of the best and rarest jazz funk and rare groove tunes produced in Japan between 1968 and 1980. Put the needle on the record, turn up the volume and dig right now into the Wamono sound - the cream of the Japanese funk, soul, rare groove and disco music developed throughout the years since the end of the sixties in Japan!

180g black vinyl Star Birth and downloadcode for "Star Birth" and "Star Death". Gatefold.

'Star Birth' is a flung fisherman's net, mighty in scope, irrevocable as looking up from the stone floor of a cathedral – there is space, yet there is profound intimacy from the immediacy of the lyrics, our thoughts rattling around like panicky goldfish. Race has taken aspects of areas
previously explored, and made a quantum leap into the unknowable. With opening track Can't Make This Up, the gauntlet is flung down – 'what is need, what is greed / it's a new crush, the brain trust/ hive mind rewrite rewind/ falsehood streaming'

'Star Birth' is international maverick and music icon Hugo Race's 15th album with his band of True Spirits. It's a double album and the twin album's name is 'Star Death'. Star Birth was recorded during Australia's bushfire summer apocalypse of 2019 and mixed as the 2020 covid-19 pandemic hit. When the stars align it all makes sense, Hugo explains, adding that one oceanic evening while writing the album a bright star exploded right before his eyes, the sign of a sudden end and a new beginning...

Hugo's writes of trials, tribulations, hopes, fears, heartaches, loves, losses, highs and lows – 'everyday I die a little bit more, in a thousand ways I fight my little wars – and he sings with exquisite pathos and depth, like he's singing just for you about the times in which we live –
political disasters, our planet, the absence and the presence of spiritual values, broken promises, cracked hearts and if any of it really matters anyway. With hell raising lyrics like,Expendable, you'd have to wonder if anyone of us will make it through alive – 'hey sister, are
we all expendable? nobody wins, but so many of you think they do / don't try to fool yourself people, deep down you know the truth - everybody gets their one hot shot but no one's bullet proof'. But then The Rapture reminds us that there will always be stars dying in the glory of
new life – 'give us this day comfort and bread / implant in us the living word / empower us with divine love and deliver us from evil / for you are the one true light / the power and the glory / forever /amen'

Hugo's True Spirit deliver a lush, sonic love letter of rock, electronica and dramatic orchestration, based in blues, hypnotic repetition and sonic exhilaration. Michelangelo Russo is a huge part of this atmosphere; his approach to music is that of an artist with a palette of
mysterious implements and machinery, but the entire band and production is incredible from start to finish. Star Birth is 48 minutes of mind expanding, mind blowing, heel tapping tunes, with its sister album 'Star Death', a dub version of remixes that will send you searching for
your own exploding star somewhere in the sky…

Fragile X is an exciting new collaboration between vocalist Inga Schunn and producer Dylan Chase.

The group began in 2019 when Schunn posted an iPhone voice recording on Facebook in which she sang an acapella in her native German. Her friend Chase, who was recording and releasing at that time as Caffeine Worldwide, heard the 30-second clip and immediately asked Schunn, at that time only an acquaintance, if she might like to record something. Neither of them realised at the time that the first sessions would lead to a debut 4-track EP that capably references as many styles as most full-length albums from established artists, while also setting a blueprint for a project that could go anywhere from here.

The opening track alone, 'Lifetime', opens with a woozy blend of UKG rhythms and Royksopp synths, before giving way to Schunn's sedate rendition of Daniel Johnston's 'Some Things Last A Long Time'...basically the years 1990-2002 distilled into 5 furious minutes of 5am energy.

Across the whole release, Chase's productions show the same cinematic flair that made his previous releases on French Press Lounge, Third Try and Human Concrete Block must-haves for your late-night record bag.
A2 'Prix' with the kind of R&S attitude that would make forebears like LFO or Lone proud, could be the soundtrack for an illegal outback rave or a sunset drive over a Big Sur overpass.
The album closer, 'Fragile X Theme,” sounds something like if late 90's Bjork was commissioned to soundtrack the movie Hackers with Akai samplers on loan from the Hartnoll brothers.

The whole release may be overshadowed by the B1, 'Karaoke Girl', a track Schunn and Chase wrote in Mexico City in 2019 after a rough night at a Zona Rosa karaoke bar.
Opening with dripping synths as soft and inviting as the last drink before sunrise, Schunn tells a story of a woman who overstays her invite at an intimate birthday party between friends, taking the mic from the birthday girl and singing "Seal, Rush and Kate Bush" with a "death grip on the mic."
It's a bizarre, vivid song for such new artists to have come up with, and the lyrics are underpinned by Chase's equally adventurous combination of Nordic disco elements with heavily treated bursts of Japanese koto.
The Lifetime EP's title is a reference to the laborious process that it took to make the record, with multiple recording sessions across two countries followed by endless edits and a Covid 19 related vinyl slowdown bringing its release to a crawl.
The record itself is a fast-paced, dopamine rush debut that we are proud to share with you as both the culmination of a long process, and the beginning of a strange new story.