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Based in Ottawa, Ontario, the capital city of Canada, The Riptides have been cranking out high-energy blasts of melodic, poppy punk rock for over 25 years. With their new LP Burn After Listening, the band makes the move to Pirates Press Records, and are ready to bring their sound to an all new worldwide audience! Originally formed in 1998, the band wasted no time assembling their own studio and label, putting out their own records as well as their fellow Ottawa bands. Word spread quickly, and the band's notoriety grew, particularly in the US, and soon the band found that they enjoyed rising to the challenge of leaving home and recording at noted US studios, with Burn After Listening being no exception. This album was recorded at the legendary Blasting Room in Fort Collins, CO, with Andrew Berlin at the helm for tracking and Jason Livermore in charge of the final master. These studio sessions included a cavalcade of friends & guest musicians, including members of Teenage Bottlerocket, All American Rejects, Screeching Weasel, and The Queers. A number of songs on the record also bear co-writing credits from fellow Pirates Press Records artist Matt DeeCRACK. Blending attitude-driven downstroke riffs with irresistible hooks and harmonies, combined with an aesthetic informed by everything from nerdy pop culture and surfing, they've already amassed quite the following across the decades, but this record stands poised to introduce them to many new fans.

Joni Void, the artistic persona of Montréal-based French-British producer Jean Néant (he/them) returns to songcraft on their warmest and most welcoming record yet, where the acclaimed sampledelic sound collagist chills out with an emotionally resonant song cycle tinged by downtempo, lo-fi, avant-pop, and trip-hop. Guests include Haco, Ytamo, Sook-Yin Lee, Pink Navel and N NAO. Every Life Is A Light expands on Void's recent stylistic turn towards more languorous and mellow lo-fi production, foreshadowed by the drifting looseness and ambient bricolage of their preceding experimental sound-art record. This transitional sensibility now shapes more defined song structures and styles, with loops are given time and space to unspool, and rhythms shot through the softer-focus lens of trip-hop and dub. Every Life Is A Light swaps the twitchy insistence of Void's acclaimed early albums for a newfound lightness and suppleness, still imbued with all the restlessness, sonic detailing, and emotional resonance that made their name. The neurotic brokenmachine kinetics of earlier Void, summarized by Sasha Geffen as "drawing despair and wonder from within the vast unfeeling of digital communication" in an 8.0 Pitchfork review, may be chilling out, but Void is becoming an ever better conjurer of hauntological feeling. Every Life Is A Light summons this in a comparatively buoyant, benevolent, head-nodding journey more open to tenderness and modest joys. Perhaps it's the sound of Void at greater peace with themselves and the world, despite the bittersweet cost: even as it channels grief, memorializing comrades and companions recently deceased, this album wants light. Void's raw materials continue to draw heavily from samples (their own Walkman cassette fieldrecordings and songs by others) and from a wide community of musical guests. Vocalists Haco on "Time Zone" and Ytamo on "Cloud Level" help levitate what could be lost tracks from a mid-90s Too Pure Records compilation of skewed-lounge electronica. Canadian musician Sook-Yin Lee sings on lead single "Vertigo," a sinewy 80bpm tape-loop and bassline groove propelled by psychedelically-layered lyrics that eventually turn the song in on itself entirely, like Grace Jones' "Nightclubbing" covered by Animal Collective. One of Void's greatest hip-hop loves is the Ruby Yacht collective; charter member Pink Navel drops some brilliant verses on "Story Board." The album's two minimal tracks, an extended piano loop set to a slow beat and shimmering electronics on "Muffin-A Song For My Cat" and the languid sampled bass riff and breakbeat of "Event Flow," are perhaps most overtly `lofi chill.' Indeed the whole album could be said to sit adjacent to those viral (if not already AI-generated) genre trends, which maybe begs the question on a lot of our minds: can specificity and authenticity of musical materials still be heard, still meaningfully signify substance and difference, still matter? Perhaps a question that fades in comparison to the career break Void could catch by landing on generic streaming playlists. More likely, these tracks remain too off-kilter, too genuinely lo-fi and ineffable, and too disqualified by the status of its peasant rights-holders, to catch the algos. Context remains the poor cousin of content. Meanwhile Void marches on, as a tireless organizer of local music events, bouncing around and often living in DIY venue, depending on the latest apartment eviction. With an ubiquitous polaroid camera in tow, they also document each communal happening with a single shot (and often a blinding flash bulb): a memory and metaphor for lives illuminated preciously, singularly, `imperfectly' in the moment. Dozens of these polaroids adorn the album's back cover and inner sleeve art in grid-like montages, as a fitting analog for the careful construction, grainy intimate materiality, and ephemeral feeling of these songs. Every Life Is A Light is Joni Void's most coherent and congenial record while relinquishing none of their experimentalist acumen as a producer or emotional attunement as a composer. Instead these qualities flourish, on an album that lights a humble flame for the fragile promise of homespun creative collaboration as unalienated labour and therapeutic communion, making an enchantingly idiosyncratic contribution to downtempo sample music along the way. Thanks for listening.

Finnish-born producer and pianist Idealism (800K Spotify Monthly Listeners) and French transplant Lucid Green (175k SML) are no strangers to each other’s subtle, yet potent productions. Having worked together on „Untold“ their Sophomore, fully collaborative LP “Unsaid” is a natural journey into the beautiful ambient, downtempo, lo-fi worlds they’ve each created. Through visits to Lucid’s flat in Paris and ideas being exchanged remotely, the duo experimented with different sounds, instruments and aural environments, in the process crafting a natural partnership that sits in a comfortable, melancholic pocket.

With lulling guitar and poignant piano progressions that provide a pillow to rest your ears, and downtempo percussions that keeps you ebbing and flowing along on a subtle current, unsure where one wave ends and the next begins, only the albums progressions dictate the head-nod. The album soars, reminiscent of life’s simple, yet wholly memorable moments.

As with all 823 releases, the project is a visual one as much as it is a musical project. The first singles visualizers are a fusion of Hopes & Dreams Club & 823’s design aesthetics with personal super8 footage captured by Idealism & Lucid Green, beautifully expressed from Hopes & Dreams Club membersi. Each visualizer and single art will easily stand on its own, transporting you to worlds familiar, yet undeniably groovy and sonically comfortable.

823 is a multifaceted Perth-based record label, fashion brand, and artistic community, founded by Australian producer and all-around creative, Ta-ku (630 SML). With an astute attention to detail and an ethos that appreciates the everyday things in life, 823 doesn’t stick to any particular genre. Past 823 releases include “So Far To Go” EP via Cabu (500k SML), Ta-ku and matt mcwaters’s duo project “Black and White,” featuring Masego collaboration “Flight 99” (38mil streams on Spotify), the “All Things Considered” compilations, a curated, collaborative series featuring both budding and well-established artists around the world and have included Idealism, Wun Two, pastels, L.Dre, Flobama, SwuM, Jinsang, Tenderlonious, among a host of others, as well as multiple sold out clothing capsules.

In Mallrat’s (aka Grace Shaw’s) vision of the world, light is more than photons and electromagnetic radiation hitting the eye — it’s a moment of divine intervention. A bold swerve into the metaphysical, this is the premise of the prized Brisbane-born, LA-based pop songwriter and producer’s 2025 sophomore album: Light hit my face like a straight right. Set against a newly informed backdrop of expressive breakbeats and dance music, its 12 songs explore the intangible and mysterious allure of human connection, held together by curious investigations into light — “the closest thing to a concept this album has,” Mallrat says. She reunited with Butterfly Blue producers Styalz Fuego (Troye Sivan, Tate McRae) and Alice Ivy, while bringing into the mix indie electronic producers Chrome Sparks and Casey MQ. Mallrat serves up highs like “Hideaway,” a song where heart-racing garage clashes with her trademark candor: “I’ll be your lucky charm just let me hang around your neck,” she sings. Sleek and early standout “Pavement” gets a gritty underlayer with chopped up vocals from DJ Zirk’s “Born 2 Lose” and mid-album standout “Hocus Pocus” finds Mallrat singing about being pulled “under the spell” of someone new, borrowing a different part of the same DJ Zirk sample to build its shimmering, dancefloor-ready facade. It’s an endeavor that perhaps reaches a peak on “Horses,” the record’s gentle and organic closer which Shaw herself calls “objectively the best song.” Written after returning home to Brisbane and “feeling like an alien,” it gained new meaning in the wake of her late sister’s passing. For Shaw, it’s the convergence of the song’s minimalism, lyrics, space, and the way her voice cracks on the recording as she sings, “Hey, I’m right here, I look different now.” After years of solidifying herself as a master of well-crafted, timeless pop — fielding recognition from New York Times, NYLON, Teen Vogue, Billboard, The FADER, NPR, and more — Light hit my face like a straight right is a step into the art of world-building, bolstered by her intuitive songwriting and clever, studied production.

For our first release of 2025, Incienso is excited to present “GNOSIS”, the debut album from San Francisco-based musician Raven. Dripping in warped synthesizer tones and flickering drum patterns, “GNOSIS” is a bold and new exploration into Raven’s timeless and immersive world

The Tonarium is an idiosyncratic instrument comprising of two sets of modular synthesizers: Serge by Random Source, and another one by Bugbrand, both of which operate alongside a mixer constructed by Piotr Ceglarek and Jan Dybała. This intertwinement facilitates precise control over audio and CV signals and integrates technology with analog sound, offering the artists a distinctive sonic palette to delve into.

The present record unfolds in two parts, each exploring the fluctuating nature of sound. Both equally contribute to the work’s immersive imaging characterized by sound intensity, continuity and endless flow. Within its sonic tapestry lies a space for listeners to uncover subtle nuances, pulsations, and moments of harmony flickering through each chord’s firm surface.

In Part I, a formidable force consisting of chord progressions pierced by abrupt shifts and transitions unfolds. This deliberate disruption of harmonic continuity invites listeners to immerse themselves fully in each musical entity, uncovering the intricate details of the chords’ overtonal structure, drifting and steadily glimmering inside their glowing cores.

Part II, on the other hand, presents a more closed form—a recurring four-chord motif that evolves and transforms with each iteration until it finally fades out into whisper-like serenity. Here, the bass pulsates with greater intensity, like a wave enveloping the listener in a froth of feelings, which prevails and swells throughout the composition. In contrast to Part I, it exudes a sense of warmth and intimacy, inviting listeners to reflect over the dimensions of their own inner landscapes.

The Tonarium is to serve as a conduit for expression—a vessel through which the artist Aleksandra Slyz is enabled to channel her creativity and emotion into the music. Both Part I and II of the work have the capacity to drag listeners into a sonic odyssey that transcends time and space, therefore leaving an indelible impression on one’s trembling soul.

Performed & recorded on December 18-19th 2023 while in residence at The New Media Laboratory in Katowice, Poland.

Organized by The Soundscape Foundation

Composed & produced by Aleksandra Słyż

Mastered by Rashad Becker

Photographies by Kacper Krzętowski

Design by Maks Posio

Executive production by Christian Di Vito

DJ Support: Carlita, Dar Disku, Disco Arabesquo & Moving Still

Melbourne-based producer Rami Imam unveils Safara, the latest release on his own label, Ponda Records, which he founded in 2020 as a platform for his cross-cultural sound explorations. Drawing from the rich traditions of the Middle East, North Africa, and the Mediterranean, Safara is a six-track odyssey of energetic and euphoric house and disco house, deeply rooted in both nostalgia and innovation. Safara is the culmination of Imam's immersion into the golden eras of global music, channelling the soulful rhythms and melodies of Afro-Funk, West African Highlife, Arab Disco, Bollywood, Afro-Cuban Jazz, Libyan Reggae, and Algerian Rai. By blending these timeless influences with a modern, dancefloor-oriented focus, Imam creates a sound that is both steeped in history and refreshingly new.

With a sonic palette that includes iconic synths such as the Juno 106, Super 6, SH 101, Moog Model D, and the 303, Imam weaves the analog warmth of these instruments into lush, modern productions. Piano and strings—his favourite classical instruments—add an organic layer of emotional depth, connecting the pulse of the dancefloor with the timeless elegance of traditional composition.

Safara is more than a collection of tracks; it is a journey across continents and eras, where the pulse of the past meets the driving force of the present. Recorded in Melbourne but influenced by sounds from around the world, Safara invites listeners to traverse vast musical landscapes—from the hypnotic grooves of North African rhythms to the sun-drenched melodies of Mediterranean shores—culminating in a transportive experience that lingers long after the final beat fades.

By balancing the ancient with the futuristic, Imam has crafted a record that feels both comfortingly familiar and daringly innovative. Safara is a testament to the endless possibilities of blending cultures, genres, and eras into something that is not just heard but felt—music for the soul as much as for the dancefloor.

First Word Records is extremely proud to welcome aboard Takuya Kuroda.

A highly-respected trumpeter born in Kobe, Japan, Takuya is a forward-thinking musician that has developed a unique hybrid sound, blending soulful jazz, funk, post-bop, fusion and hip hop music.

After following the footsteps of his trombonist brother playing in big bands, he relocated to New York to study jazz & contemporary music at The New School in Union Square; a course he graduated from in the mid-noughties. It was here that Takuya met vocalist José James, with whom he worked on the 'Blackmagic' and 'No Beginning No End' projects.

Following graduation, Takuya established himself further in the NYC jazz scene, performing with the likes of Akoya Afrobeat and in recent years with DJ Premier's BADDER band (also including acclaimed bass player, Brady Watt). Premier said "The BADDER Band project was put together by my manager, and an agent I've known since the beginning of my Gang Starr career. He said, 'What if you put a band together that revolved around a trumpet player from Japan named Takuya Kuroda? He's got a hip-hop perspective and respect in the jazz field…"

Takuya Kuroda is already incredibly prolific, releasing five albums in the past decade and fortifying a solid reputation in the global jazz scene. 2011 saw the release of Takuya's independently-produced debut album, 'Edge', followed by 'Bitter and High' the following year and 'Six Aces' on P-Vine in 2013. Takuya was signed to the legendary Blue Note Records in 2014 for his album 'Rising Son', as well as appearing on their 2019 cover versions project, 'Blue Note Voyage'. He released his 5th album 'Zigzagger' on Concord in 2016, which also featured Antibalas on a reimagining of the Donald Byrd classic 'Think Twice'.

Late Summer 2020, Takuya Kuroda returns with his sixth album 'Fly Moon Die Soon'.

In his words, "this album is about the irony between the greatness of nature and the beautiful obsceneness of humanity. Melodies and grooves fly back and forth from being spiritual to being vulgar."

It took two years to make this album. In 2018, I decided I just couldn't make albums the same way I had been in the past anymore. As a birthday treat to myself, I booked a studio in Brooklyn for two days, with only myself and an engineer, Todd Carder. I brought along some tracks I'd been building at home to see if we could complete them within that time. We began replacing sounds and adding texture, sampling noises from all over the studio; me sipping coffee, hitting a 26" kick drum, speeding up snares. At the end of the two days we were like "wow, I didn't know we could make tracks this good in this way". This is how the process of the full album started. Everything was based on my beats I made at home, inviting musicians in one by one, adding or replacing parts. I was very careful when developing these tracks; just note by note, part by part. I wanted to make the music effectively from a blend of two different recording methods; one very slickly produced part and one very organic part played by live musicians. I remember mixtapes from when I was kid, and wanted to make an album that wasn't just a bunch of flashy singles, trying to catch people's attention in the first 30 seconds, or full of guest features. Instead, I'm essentially just trying to let the grooves breath."

The album consists of nine tracks of excellence. The uptempo jazz-funk of 'ABC' and 'Moody' sit alongside soulful jazz cuts like 'Fade' and 'CHANGE', also featuring Corey King on vocals. The title track is a downtempo groove lead by a heavy Moog bassline, whilst 'Do No Why' contains an infectious piano riff throughout. Aside from Takuya's original compositions, he revisits two classics from Ohio Players ('Sweet Sticky Thing' featuring Alina Engibaryan on vocals) and Herbie Hancock ('Tell Me A Bedtime Story') whilst the album closes with the epic 'TKBK'.

Takuya adds "this special cover was inspired by the Golden Moon I saw during a photoshoot in Death Valley with my homie Hiroyuki Seo".

Takuya Kuroda is a truly unique talent, and this album is a realisation of the evolution of his sound.

'Fly Moon Die Soon' is released on Worldwide Award-winning UK label First Word Records on vinyl & digital in September 2020.

“My introduction to “noise” came from a record shop in Lake Worth, Florida ran by a musician named Kenny 5. Kenny had left Detroit sometime in the mid nineties and had begun selling used records and CD’s from the downtown strip of this tiny southern Florida city in a humble shop sandwiched between a deli and a dog grooming business. Kenny previously was on labels like Amphetamine Reptile and timeSTEREO, and the records and videotapes that would be on repeat at his shop were a vast sonic expanse that spoke to the eclecticism of his experience as a touring musician participating and adjacent to American noise culture through the early to late 90’s. In 1998, I was eleven years old and I would order a pizza with him and watch VHS tapes of Japanese noise and deathmatch bootlegs, as well as any other sonic and subcultural rarities that far outstripped my age to comprehend (notably the RRR “Journey Into Pain” compilation and various Vanilla Tapes videos). This widecast net of information formed an introduction to a reality that did not fall deaf on me, but it took many years later for me to reorient the specific freedoms of what this dense and cathartic sound culture had imparted on my life and would continue onward to.

What does this have to do with this selection of choice recordings from the Secret Boyfriend catalog for the enmossed label? For the uninitiated, Secret Boyfriend is the long running moniker of Ryan Martin, North Carolina musician and label proprietor of the Hot Releases imprint. For over a decade from this writing I have watched Secret Boyfriend, and Hot Releases by extension as a curatorial and archival effort, embodying the multiplanal capacity that noise loosely functions from as an umbrella ideology and formalist avenue for sound creation. For anecdotal purposes, from (before) 2006 until roughly 2023 the East Coast of the United States showcased a vibrant network of eclectic regional festivals that saw wide swaths of artists addressing and negotiating the notion of what qualified “noise” from a conceptual and ideological perspective. Some festivals honed in on particularities in aesthetics and tropes, and others had a kind of “catch-all” implementation that allowed for a salvation of the sort of alienated and singular artistry that was amassing throughout these territories. While clear guidelines had been set from regional predecessors as to how noise with a capital “N” should maneuver, Secret Boyfriend is emblematic in the spirit of fluidity that was either implicitly coupled to the notion of the genre, or grew to evolve towards or devolve from.

Within Secret Boyfriend performances, I have seen and admired a mirroring from a ravenous appreciator of this culture at large back towards itself. Typical of a Secret Boyfriend set is an interchangeable narrative arc wherein blistering feedback laden scrap metal improvisations are forayed into naive ambient or “pop” songs, or skipping CDs, or mixer feedback play, or delayed Roland 707 drum workouts all at once and in a unique hegemony. Secret Boyfriend's stylistic mastery of each endeavor is at once an homage to a history of loving listening and enacting, while a brave step into the realm of actualizing the unique fluidity of his own practice. In performance and the action of network engagement, Secret Boyfriend operates a survey of that which he sought to hear and that which he cultivates around his work. His operations are mirrors, and the project (alongside his other peers) is a reflection on the ethos of his time.

Conversely his recording practice narrows in on these moments and allows for a different kind of intimacy or alienation for the non live listener. This record of selected “pop songs” (let's call them that) is particularly poignant at a time when the culture Martin mirrors is at a strange crossroads with itself. The aforementioned festival networks necessarily change and shift. The onlookers become the artists, the artists find new horizons, and the spaces for these cycles fade into locales of a distant memory. It seems, from my perspective, that audiences currently yearn for a more bottlenecked experience, searching for some ontologically vetted manifestation of an idea, of a sound and less for an experience that functions in opposition to our collective banalities. This makes sense in the face of general global catastrophism that plagues us. We need certainty of what something is somewhere, don’t we? Noise as an idea has expanded and contracted to so many iterations of itself it is hard to tell what it even is, and it is particularly difficult to identify in the absence of solid network activations a moment to reflect on its own complexities and nuances. In the face of so much change, I argue that the language of noise culture at large has on one hand become increasingly didactic and predictable, and laughably inclusive and non linear on the other. Probably has always been this way, but now we are in the midst of a moment of extreme access and indexicality, which somehow cauterizes expansion and naivety and chance.

This record highlights the Secret Boyfriend that obscures didacticism by highlighting output that opens up for more challenging catharsis and emotive signal processing. It provides an entry to the materialism of a cultural field full of ecstatic complexity and beautiful inconsistency. In these muted moments Secret Boyfriend has given us over his career we have an argument for evolving languages that further challenge our notions of what is supposed to happen and how it is supposed to be presented. In his more song oriented expansiveness, we can punctuate the ability to think in new modalities. Listening to these recordings reminds me of the polarity of sitting in the record store as a kid and understanding that His Name Is Alive is on 4AD and (gasp!) timeSTEREO. This trite early impression that nothing is really as different as our imaginations might want them to be, and that we can do whatever we want mostly within the creative realms we work through is an important filter to look through Secret Boyfriend as a project and a vessel. If we can achieve abandon and vulnerability through our artistic endeavors, then we have a sound model for, maybe, new potentialities. If that’s too much projection, or just complete liberal bullshit, I am fine with that. Secret Boyfriend's oeuvre at best offers us moments of reprieve to ponder these complexities, or at least a moment to zone out on a drive through North Carolina Highway 54.

You have one pocket of life that you must do whatever you want to inside of. Secret Boyfriend does it affectionately, in a variety of forms, and always with deep sentimentality. These recordings are a wonderful set of songs to begin further investigation from. Thank you Ryan for allowing as many avenues as possible to continue a broad cultural exchange and conversation that intersect and refract while being the kind of artist that is brave enough to not phone in the effort.”

- Nick Klein , May 2024

Alpha Beta Gamma Delta Plus' endlich auf Vinyl, als expanded Doppel-LP in Gatefold. Die 13 Original-Tracks von 'Alpha Beta Gamma Delta', plus 9 Bonus-Tracks, die zuvor auf Single und alternativen Akustik-Tracks veröffentlicht wurden, auf einem denkwürdigen Album von unfehlbarem Inhalt: zeitgenössischer, aufregender, dunkler und gefährlicher Rock & Roll. Alpha Beta Gamma Delta, von der Band im September 2022 selbst veröffentlicht, war das erste neue Material der legendären britischen Rock'n'Roll-Gruppe The Godfathers seit fünf Jahren. Das während der obligatorischen Pandemic-Pause aufgenommene Album wurde von den Fans in den höchsten Tönen gelobt und erhielt einige der besten Kritiken in der gesamten Karriere der Band. Peter Coyne, Leadsänger und Frontmann der Godfathers, nannte es ,eine klangliche Tour de Force". Alpha Beta Gamma Delta ist eine brillante, aktuelle Sammlung von Rock-'n'-Roll-Songs, die perfekt mit dem konkurriert, was The Godfathers in der Vergangenheit gemacht haben, und Spannung in eine Welt bringt, die nicht mehr die Welt ihrer Anfänge ist. Sie behalten ihre Identität bei, aber der Gesamtsound ist etwas anders. Zur Wut der Vergangenheit gesellen sich Gesangsharmonien ('Bring on the Sunshine'), Gitarrensoli, Melancholie und eine Reihe neuer Referenzen, die auch ihre eigenen sind. Dead in Los Angeles", ein Song über einen Spaziergang im Mondlicht, könnte von einigen mit The Doors verglichen werden, und ,Tonight` ist sehr Iggy Pop. Die Godfathers machen auch leisere Nummern, wenn es nötig ist, und so ist Peter Coynes Baritonstimme auf dem sensiblen, honigsüßen ,There Is No Time" zu Hause. You Gotta Wait" ist ein melodischer Punkrock-Klassiker, der das Montagsgefühl auspackt, bei dem das Wochenende eine Million Meilen entfernt scheint... Kurzum, dreizehn Tracks solider und abwechslungsreicher wütender Rock'n'Roll für eine neue Ära. Darüber hinaus enthält Alpha Beta Gamma Delta PLUS drei Tracks, die auf der Originalausgabe des Albums nicht enthalten waren: 'Wild and Free' (zuvor als Single zusammen mit 'I'm Not Your Slave' veröffentlicht) sowie 'When the Cowards Fall' und 'Fade Away' (enthalten auf ABGDs Vorab-EP 'Midnight Rider'). Außerdem sind sechs akustische Neuinterpretationen der Titel enthalten, die während der Studio-Sessions eingespielt wurden. Alpha Beta Gamma Delta Plus ist ein melodisches, reifes und abwechslungsreiches Album, auf dem The Godfathers weiterhin ihr wütendes Wesen in einer anderen Ära, in einer anderen Welt zeigen, in der sie sich immer noch weigern, Rock 'n' Roll als Routine zu akzeptieren.

Jabu return with ‘A Soft and Gatherable Star’, an LP that sees the Bristol-based trio evolve from a uniquely spectral take on trip hop to proffer a singular vision between cloudy, downered dream-pop, off-kilter ambient, and the warm, low-end throb of sound system culture. This development is aligned with contemporaries like HTRK, Dean Blunt, Tarquin Manek, YL Hooi and Rat Heart Ensemble, whilst also harkening back to the likes of AR Kane (with whom they are set to play shows and release a collaborative single), the languorous drift of 'Victorialand' era Cocteau Twins or The Cure circa ‘Disintegration’. Comprising Jasmine Butt (vocals, guitar), Alex Rendall (vocals, keys) and Amos Childs (production, bass guitar), the trio’s method may have shifted but the feel remains consistent - slow, spatial, sensuous and gently melancholic. With a career arc unlike almost any other current guitar outfit, Jabu sit within a strong lineage of off-centre Bristolian music, and a very British strain of home-spun DIY bands. Self-recorded between Jas and Amos’ home in South Bristol and Amos’ mum’s house in rural North Somerset, the album came together via a process of trial and error - learning to play on borrowed instruments, using the equipment “wrong”, staying up late recording and slipping into strange, semi-conscious sleep deprived/inebriated headspaces. Having captured over 50 tracks, they honed in on those they liked most, shaping them further, whilst carving out space to allow input from people they love and admire - Daniela Dyson’s voice and Will Memotone's clarinet on ‘Ashes Over Shute Shelve’, Birthmark's synth on ‘Gently Fade’ and ‘Sea Mills’, Rakhi Singh (Manchester Collective) and Sebastian Gainsborough (Vessel)’s strings and arrangements on ‘All Night’, Josh Horsley’s cello on ‘If I Asked You, You'd Tell Me’, and Lorenzo Prati’s sax, again on ‘Sea Mills’. The album was mastered by Amir Shoat (HTRK, ML Buch, Dean Blunt, Carla Dal Forno). Influence-wise, the guitar-based material recalls the bands Amos listened to when younger, and Jas’ more folk-leaning inspirations. Deep-lying dub, hip hop and soul influences are also evident in both the way the LP was mixed, and the space ingrained in their subconscious. Tinged with melancholy, the songs cohere as a set of soliloquies and ruminations on love and tenderness. The album’s title comes from a poem by Amos’ late father which hangs on his wall and seeped into the record. ‘Ashes Over Shute Shelve’ is formed of lines from another poem of his. Recited by longtime collaborator Daniela Dyson and with Will Yates (Memotone) playing his mother’s clarinet, the track was imagined as a conversation between his parents. Geography and location also play a big part in the record, with several significant places name-checked in songs. Shute Shelve itself is a hill near Amos’ mum’s house, who explains “There’s a tree at the top with a 360° view of the Mendips, where my dad’s ashes were scattered. We used to go up there when we could first buy booze from the petrol station down the road, get drunk, light a fire, listen to music from my little battery powered CD player and sleep out without tents.” Titled after a Bristol suburb near where Amos’ grandparents lived and where Jas would spend time as a teenager, ‘Sea Mills’ references her being abandoned by friends on the Downs while high on mushrooms, stranded and missing the bus back. ‘Kosiše Flower’ references the city in Slovakia where Amos and Jas holidayed shortly after getting together and a flower he gave her, which she pressed in a book after an argument. ‘Oceanside Spider House’ is a location in Nintendo 64 game The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, where someone seeks shelter from the falling moon. Genre: Electronic / Ambient / Dream-pop

Tape

On Repetitions, New York-based Swiss artist and composer Samuel Reinhard brings us close enough to a piece of music that its systematic nature begins to buckle and fade. Across four movements, three pianos pursue their own respective threadbare motifs, which overlap at the hands of a predetermined ratio of duration. What unfolds—at first glance slow, melancholic, deliberate, even plain—is a study of repetition’s in-betweens, populated by unexpected resonances and delicate traces of notes in the process of being played by human hands. The three pianos are not in sync, but are nevertheless in relation, the nature of which shifts with the listener’s orientation and attention. Each piece within Repetitions arrives as a constant whole, containing harmonies and silences that are in a never-ending process of unfurling.

Repetitions is a joint release from Hallow Ground and Präsens Editionen and follows offerings by Kali Malone, Lawrence English, and FUJI | | | | | | | | | | TA on Hallow Ground, and Robert Turman, Magda Drozd, and Anna Homler on Präsens Editionen.

* Edition of 100 professionally dubbed cassette tapes
* special artwork by artist Jeff Rossi, graphic desing by Coline Houot

First Word Records areproud to present a new double-AA sided collaboration from K S R and Konny Kon (Children of Zeus) - 'Part of the Plan / Faded from the Jump', available on 7" vinyl and digital.

Two of Manchester's finest r&b ambassadors, the duo team up for two tracks displaying very different styles of soul music.

'Part of the Plan' has a timeless classic feel, nodding back to the likes of Stax and Atlantic, akin to the contemporary sound of Daptone artists like Jalen Ngonda or Thee Sacred Souls. Waves crash on the dock of the bay, with [ K S R ]'s soulful tones and Konny's laidback production (accompanied by Son of Zeus, Tyler Daley on the backing vox).

'Faded from the Jump' is another three and a half minutes of bliss, taking on a sound that's more signature to the duo's previous work, individually and collectively, sitting somewhere between future r&b, neo-soul and classic Manny street soul. [ K S R ] again takes the lead on this smoothed-out cut, with Konny behind the boards on production.

[ K S R ] hails from Moss Side and has been steadily building a strong rep for himself over the past few years with a slew of releases, including an EP and several singles via First Word. He was named "R&B act to watch" by Complex, and hand-picked by Mahalia to perform an event she curated personally at London's Jazz Cafe. He's toured with artists including Pip Millet, Etta Bond, Mica Miller & The Mouse Outfit, and also collaborated with various d&b artists, such as Zero T, Lenzman, Searchlight and Makoto. Music aside, [ K S R ] has also been creative ambassador for New Balance, Foot Locker, Nike, Size? and Manchester United.

Konny Kon is best known for being one half of hip hop soul duo, Children of Zeus. With performances for Colors and Soulection, and support from peers Jazzy Jeff, Jazzie B, Loose Ends & countless others, Children of Zeus have released two highly-acclaimed albums and two EPs on Worldwide Award winning-label, First Word. Additionally to writing, performing and producing, Konny is a formidable DJ, hosting a popular monthly show on NTS Radio, and performing at numerous events; most recently supporting Mercury Award-winner's Ezra Collective at every date on their European tour, culminating in a show with Children of Zeus at Wembley Arena, London.

Both artists have had wide support across the board from numerous tastemakers, including 1Xtra, BBC Radio 1, BBC 6 Music, Rinse, Represent, Unity, Mixmag, Notion, Hypebeast and tons more. The duo have previously collaborated on 'All on You' (from the CoZ album 'Travel Light') and single 'CGWY' (from [ K S R ]'s EP 'Peace + Harmony').

This single showcases the vocals of [ K S R ] and the production of Konny Kon to a degree that exudes pure quality and class, exemplifying the power of modern British soul music.

'Part of the Plan / Faded from the Jump' is released on 7" vinyl and digital, 22nd November 2024.

On his latest full-length, Low End Activist swerves towards weightless grime and suspended hardcore miniatures to tell a very personal story. The UK-rooted producer continues his habit of zeroing in on a distinct approach for each release, leaving a logical breadcrumb trail of soundsystem science in his wake as he channels decades of bass absorption into 14 atmospheric cuts that prize patience and precision over obvious club functionality.

Municipal Dreams plays out as a semi-autobiographical tour through the Blackbird Leys estate that the Activist grew up on. It’s a lived reflection on inequality and the ripple effect it has in working class communities, using the sonic palette to set the mood and scattering pointed samples throughout to spell out the story.

In sampling the exhaust of a stolen Subaru Impreza, ‘TWOC’ looks back to the recreational car theft which was standard entertainment for the kids in his community. There’s an underlying idea that this ‘council estate sport’ wouldn’t have been so prevalent if there were public services and opportunities presented to the scores of disaffected youth looking for somewhere to direct their energy and frustration.

In ‘Just A Number (Institutionalised)’ LEA alludes to the shattered juvenile detention system, growing up seeing friends and family members locked up at ease with little to no support on being released back into society, just meant that the same cycles of behaviour would play out over and over.

‘Violence’ samples from a short film shot by the drama division of the Blackbird Leys Youth Club to evoke the physical threat which formed a background hum to life on the estate. The industrial mechanics of the local car factory, which served an integral role as a workplace for many in the community, gets sampled in ‘They Only Come Out At Night’ while the ‘Everyone I look up to are either junkies or criminals’ sample in ‘Broke’ looks to a lack of positive role models.

Municipal Dreams isn’t a one-note indictment of life on the estate, ‘Innocence’ captures the simplicity of a child at birth before their environment has time to shape them. The Hope interludes cut through the grim honesty of the longer tracks while a subtle thread of wry humour finds its way into some of the talking heads cutting through the signature LEA murk.

But honesty is the operative word here, and the message feels all the more meaningful at a time when the UK’s social divisions are laid bare in the wake of a devastating stretch of austerity. Returning to Blackbird Leys to shoot images for the photo-zine and album cover, the Activist found the local community centre being demolished. The local pub stands derelict, its faded Welcome sign a grimly ironic portent of the options facing children of the estate in the wider world.

Funnelling his memories, hopes and fears into a singular twist on the bass weight tradition, LEA captures evocative scenes that land somewhere between kitchen sink realism and rave futurism.

US Heavy Music Act CANE HILL melden sich endlich mit ihrer neuen, lang ersehnten LP “a piece of n ihrer nunmehr 13-jährigen Karriere haben Cane Hill immer wieder gezeigt, wie musikalisch divers sie sein können. Von Metalcore, über Nu-Metal, Industrial Metal und Alt-Rock ist alles dabei und nun beschenkt das Alt-Metal Quartett um Frontmann Elijah Witt uns mit ihrem neuen Longplayer aus 11 neuen Tracks, darunter die neuesten Singles “The Midnight Sun” und “Fade”.

“Ich habe diesen Song geschrieben, als ich wahnsinnig verliebt in jemanden war. Mittlerweile sind wir uns Fremde, aber ich glaube, hätten wir uns nie getroffen, wäre dieser Song nicht das geworden, was er nun ist. Musik kann so schön ironisch sein”. — Elijah Barnett über “Fade”

NOW Music is proud to present the newest addition to the ‘Yearbook’ series: NOW – Yearbook 1981. NOW – Yearbook 1981; a celebration of the eclectic and creative brilliance of the year in pop. 4 CDs of 85 tracks that defined the charts in 1981. Available on a 4CD special edition which is housed in ‘hard-back book’ packaging, including a 28-page booklet with a summary of the year, a track-by-track guide, a quiz, and original singles artwork, and as a standard 4-CD package. A limited edition 3LP set pressed in translucent red vinyl, limited to 3,000 units and a 4CD set

“A huge thing for this record was to make it feel as close to our live show as possible,” says Tom Sharkett of W.H. Lung’s latest album. “We didn’t want it to sound live but we wanted to capture the excitement of the live performances.”

This is something that has become paramount to the group in recent years as they have undeniably blossomed into one of the most joyous and arresting live bands in the country. “The reason I’m in a band is to play live music,” says singer Joe Evans. “For me, music is live music. That’s what it’s for, to be played with people.”

The five-piece band, also featuring Chris Mulligan, Hannah Peace, and Alex Mercer-Main, decided to try something new on their third album after two incredibly successful collaborations with previous producer Matt Peel. In order to capture the energy, spirit and dynamism of their live shows, they relocated to Sheffield to work with Ross Orton (MIA, Arctic Monkeys, Working Men’s Club) who was able to harness this side of the band to remarkable effect. “Ross is the Sheffield Steve Albini,” says Evans. “He’s the king of not overthinking it and trusting the process of the art of recording songs. He was always there to stop us fucking around with cerebral stuff and get it down.” Sharkett echoes this too: “He was the exact producer we needed without us even realising. His productions and mixes are bombastic, lively and in your face and that’s exactly what we wanted.”

However, while this album is rooted in a sense of capturing a moment and a sparky liveness, that’s not to say it’s a raw or ragged record. It is still a meticulously composed, delicately layered and pristinely produced piece of work that, in true W.H. Lung style, runs the gauntlet from dance to pop to indie while still capturing that distinctly unique quality that is unquestionably their own. “It was a really big thing for me to realise what made us sound like us on this record,” says Sharkett. “I think the album sounds a lot more confident and self assured because of it. Some songs sound just so much like Lung and I’m really proud of that. I’m not sure we’ve done that as consistently across the other records.”

While the band have drilled deeper into finding their own singular identity, it’s not a record resting on its laurels. It’s a significant leap forward, expanding on their solid foundations while also breaking new ground. “The big difference with this record is its directness in every sense,” says Sharkett. “The songwriting is more upfront. Previously we’d focused a lot on vibe and production as opposed to just writing songs. The overall mission here was to revert to a classic songwriting structure and for the production to come afterwards.” And so what you have on this record are deeply considered and well-crafted songs, then recorded with blistering intensity in the moment, and then given a touch of experimentation afterwards. Then throw in Orton’s contributions to the band and it’s proven to be a real winning formula. “He brought a real dose of magic to the songs we’d written,” says Sharkett. “And brought an extra bit of wonk and quirkiness each time.”

The band’s ability to write more traditional and conventional songs is clearly a skill they’ve taken to with ease, at times there’s an almost Springsteen-like quality – but if he'd ever had an ecstasy period – to tracks such as ‘Thinner Wine’ and ‘Bloom and Fade’. While ‘How to Walk’ was constructed with one thing only in mind: that it would absolutely slay on stage. “I can’t wait to play this live,” says Evans. “We wanted a song to represent our live set, a new big one, and this is it.” Once again it leans towards the anthemic, with its driving, propulsive charge complete with incandescent synths and vocal melodies so irresistible you can already hear them being sung in unison by a crowd.

It’s an incredibly difficult feat to pull off a record that is more rooted in traditional songcraft while also capturing the power of a live performance, as well as pushing sonics into experimental new directions while working with a brand new collaborator. But here the band has managed to do just that. And the album’s closing song ‘I Will Set Fire To The House’ is a perfect example of such a thing. It’s a song that feels immaculately constructed but also very much alive and of the moment as its radiating synths engulf from the off, and Evans’ vocal is silky but powerful and in perfect symbiosis with Peace’s. It’s a song that captures the endless joys of music playing long into the night. “It may be a bit of a bloody bombastic way to end an album saying ‘and we’ll dance into the sunrise’,” says Evans. “But fuck it.”

MORE PRESS ON ‘VANITIES’ (MELO131)

"Vanities artily refines an exhilarating brand of up-front electro-dance" MOJO ⅘

'Idiosyncratic yet euphoric electronic pop on triumphant second LP' 9/10 Uncut

''One of the most effective alternative pop albums of the year'' 4/5 Record Collector
'Dance music for the modern age' - The Times (4*)

Caroline Says' haunting new album, The Lucky One, is a poignant exploration of how the ghosts of past relationships linger, sometimes holding more sway over our hearts and minds than our current connections. We revisit these ghosts through evocative landscapes of our memories - hometown bars, road trips, and late-night swims. Through a series of fractured and persistent memories these songs capture the bittersweet realization that the past, though imperfect, can sometimes be a more comforting and meaningful companion than the present. Opening track, "The Lucky One," confronts death's role in shaping our memories head-on, as it ponders the way death freezes a person in time, forcing us to confront the complexities of grief and its lasting impact on our relationship with the one we lost. Other tracks delve into the complexities of relationships that naturally grow apart as life takes us in different directions. For example, "Faded and Golden" reflects on the bittersweet nature of reunions with old friends, where the idealized memories of youth can clash with the realities of the present. Then, "Actors" takes this a step further, acknowledging the influence of perception and desire in friendships, and the idea that in many ways "all friendships are imaginary friendships," as it confronts the disappointment of inauthentic connections, and the facades we sometimes put on in relationships. "Roses" began when Caroline was looking through her grandma's collection of commemorative Kentucky Derby glasses, each one etched with the name of a winner. The song delves into the story of "Sunday Silence," the horse that won the year Caroline was born. Researching the horse's journey from near-Triple Crown glory to retirement in Japan sparked a metaphor - a pressured being (the horse) desperately trying to please but ultimately disappointing. The owners eventually selling the horse becomes a relatable symbol of unmet expectations, and the sting of falling short despite our best efforts. Album closer, "Something Good," revisits Caroline's Alabama childhood. Lost on a recent trip to Birmingham, unable to find the familiar path to a riverside hangout, the experience becomes a powerful metaphor; we can't always retrace the paths in our memories, but those memories, however unreliable, continue to shape us. In the end, The Lucky One celebrates this enduring power, acknowledging how past relationships and experiences, even those lost to the haze of time, continue to inform the stories we tell ourselves, and the way we navigate the present.

Longtime enthusiasts of ambient music have much to celebrate as Rafael Anton Irisarri's cherished out-of-print cassette, "Midnight Colours," returns in a meticulously remastered edition and makes its inaugural debut on vinyl. The significance of this album's announcement is accentuated by its historical resonance, coinciding with the same day in 1952 when the world bore witness to the first-ever test of the hydrogen bomb.

"Midnight Colours" is far more than a mere album; it's an exploration of the enigmatic relationship between humanity and time. Conceived as a sonic interpretation of the Doomsday Clock, which symbolizes the world's existential vulnerabilities, Irisarri's work beckons listeners to contemplate the gravity of our existence and the delicate balance that envelops it.

"I wanted to capture the essence of humanity's relationship with time, both the anxiety and the serene beauty that coexists within the shadows of the night," explains Irisarri. "The vinyl format adds a tactile dimension to the experience, inviting listeners to physically engage with the music."

Known for his contributions to the ambient and electronic music genres, Irisarri often explores themes of introspection, nostalgia, and the interplay between sound and emotion.

Recorded in 2017, when the Clock was at 2½ minutes-to-midnight (and at the time, the second-closest to midnight since the Clock's inception in 1947), "Midnight Colours" permeates with the melancholy of memories resurfacing as one approaches the end of life: the regrets, the closure, the uncertainties, the anxieties.

Originally released as a limited tape on the beloved Atlanta-based label Geographic North, "Midnight Colours" swiftly garnered praise and acclaim within the ambient music sphere. Now, with this newly remastered edition on his own Black Knoll imprint, fans, both longstanding and newfound, can rediscover the album's captivating beauty in unprecedented clarity and depth.

"I've wanted to release 'Midnight Colours' on vinyl since it first came out, and I'm thrilled to finally be able to. The remastering process, brilliantly done by Stephan Mathieu, has breathed new life into the work, and I'm eager for listeners to experience it in this format."

The reissue of "Midnight Colours" features band-new artwork and design by the renowned Mexican visual artist Daniel Castrejón. A frequent collaborator and friend of Irisarri, Castrejón's imagery impeccably complements the album's mood and themes, extending a compelling invitation for listeners to explore its aural world visually.

This landmark release serves as a testament not only to Irisarri's enduring impact on the ambient music genre but also as a long-awaited gift to those who have patiently anticipated the album's vinyl debut.

Bringing a dance floor sensibility to the deeper end of the electronic spectrum, the Dutch duo Jordi van Achthoven and Micha Heyboer a.k.a. Tinlicker have courted the attention of global labels and tastemakers since breaking out in 2013. Prolific musicians with backgrounds in dubstep and pop production, their journey so far has seen them release on the likes of Mau5trap, Armada, Sotto Voce and Anjunadeep - with an a eclectic array of DJ support from Above & Beyond to Oliver Heldens, Tiësto to Yotto. Able to turn their hand to deep house, techno and electro, the pair have reworked the likes of Lane 8 and Deadmau5; their stunning update of Reflekt ‘Need To Feel Loved’ becoming a sought after mix among fellow DJs over the last 12 months. A showcase for their dynamic songwriting and forward thinking sound design, Tinlicker’s debut artist album ‘This Is Not Our Universe’ will be released on Anjunabeats this September.

Schwarzes 140g Bio-Doppel-Vinyl mit bedruckten Innenhüllen ohne Beilagen



Einstürzende Neubauten präsentieren ihr neues Album. Sie suchen nach neuen Formen. Nach dem unentdeckten Ton und dem noch unausgesprochenen Wort. Seit ihrer Gründung am 1. April 1980 verschieben die Einstürzenden Neubauten die Parameter von Mainstream und Subkultur, um das Unhörbare hörbar zu machen. Und vielleicht auch das Unerhörte. Ein sich über vier Dekaden erstreckender Feldforschungsversuch, der nun ins nächste Stadium tritt. In ihrem 44. Bestehensjahr geht die Formation weit zurück zu ihren Wurzeln, um sich gleichzeitig neu zu definieren. Ein verändertes Selbstverständnis, für das das Berliner Quintett plus eins 2024 sein eigenes Genre kreiert hat: apm - alien pop music. Ständige Weiterentwicklung - so könnte man das Schaffen der Einstürzenden Neubauten kurz und knapp zusammenfassen. Eine musikalische Evolution, die beim 1981 veröffentlichten Albumdebüt "Kollaps" beginnt und sich nun auf dem im April 24 erscheinenden Album "Rampen - apm: alien pop music" manifestiert, auf diesem präsentieren sich Blixa Bargeld, N.U. Unruh, Alexander Hacke, Jochen Arbeit, Rudolph Moser und Felix Gebhard nun von ihrer unberechenbarsten und eigenwilligsten Seite. Auf ihrem neuen Album setzen die Neubauten nun allen Sound-Spekulationen ein - wenn auch spätes - Ende. Schon seit Mitte der 1980er-Jahre experimentieren die Einstürzenden Neubauten auf der Bühne mit sogenannten Rampen: Öffentliche Improvisationen mit offener Entwicklung und Ausgang; Abschussrampen ins noch Unerforschte, die die Band im Jahr 2022 auf ihrer letzten "Alles in Allem"-Tournee im Zugabenteil performte und deren Mitschnitte als Basis für das neue Album dienen. "Rampen - apm: alien pop music" ist Popmusik für Paralleluniversen und Zwischenwelten. Für Hyperräume und Interzonen. Mikrokosmisch und intergalaktisch zugleich. Eine demimondäne Behauptung außerhalb aller physikalischen Gesetze, mit der die Einstürzenden Neubauten ein stilistisches Niemandsland zwischen Vergangenheit und Zukunft betreten. Rückkehr zu den Wurzeln einerseits, andererseits entsteht aus lärmgewaltigen Kracheruptionen, auf kryptische, oftmals fragmentarische Lyrics treffend, eine neue Kunstform: Populäre Musik für Aliens und Außenseiter. Aus Anti-Pop ist Alien Pop geworden. Fremdartig. Kokonhaft versponnen. Ungehört. Sonus inauditus. Nicht ganz unabsichtlich erinnert das reduzierte Coverartwork an das ikonische Layout des "Weißen Albums" von den Beatles. "Ausgehend von der Idee, dass die Einstürzenden Neubauten in einem anderen Sonnensystem ebenso berühmt sind wie die Beatles in unserer Welt", so Blixa Bargeld über die Gratwanderung zwischen Avantgarde und Augenzwinkern, Provokation und popkultureller Diskontinuität. Womit auch direkt das zentrale Thema vorgegeben wäre, das sich wie ein roter Faden durch alle Songs zieht: Veränderung, utopische Gedankenspiele und Vergänglichkeit. "Ich habe auf der Platte ein paar Lösungen gefunden und Dinge formuliert, wie ich sie vorher noch nicht formuliert habe, weil sie mir noch nicht so klar waren. Ich bin jemand, der denkt, durch Musik Erkenntnisse zu gewinnen. Das war schon immer so. Die Überzeugung, in der Musik etwas zu finden, was ich vorher nicht wusste. Und etwas zu singen, was ich vorher nicht wusste. Etwas, was sich dann als Wahrheit herausstellt. Oder zumindest als sinnvoll, wenn man es ein wenig kleiner halten will." Dieses Album repräsentiert die nächste Stufe der Evolution, auf der man die bekannte Sprache schließlich hinter sich gelassen hat. Und die Eröffnung weiterer, unendlicher Möglichkeiten: alien pop music.

Kompakt is proud to announce, finally, a reissue of the first, self-titled GAS album. Originally released on electronica imprint Mille Plateaux back in 1996, it’s been unavailable in its original form ever since – the version of GAS included in 2008’s Nah Und Fern box featured several different tracks. Here, however, GAS is restored in all its glory, the debut full-length from Wolfgang Voigt’s most enigmatic, quixotic project.

There had, of course, been signs of what was to come. Back in 1995, Voigt essayed the first GAS release, a slender, yet remarkable four-track EP, Modern. Its centre label featured a reduced symbol – an overhead or lamp light, switched on, its glow radiating outwards in four bold black lines – a perfect representation of the tight, stylised ambient electronic pop contained on that 12”. A few curious compilation tracks were floating around, too, for Mille Plateaux’s Modulation & Transformation and Electric Ladyland series. If you were attentive enough, you could tell something was up.

But nothing quite prepared us for the languorous, effervescing loops and regular-like-clockwork beats that Voigt folded together on GAS. Its six long tracks, all untitled, neither begin nor end but hazily fade into earshot, vibrate majestically in your cochlea for fifteen-or-so minutes – some a bit shorter, some longer – and then meander away, reading the mise-en-scène for the next example of Voigt’s drift and dream logic to unfold. The material is referential in the most distant way, and you can sense only the most evanescent of ghostly presences, haunting these six compositions.

GAS feels, also, like a more pliable hint at what’s to come, as the GAS concept really solidified on its successor, 1997’s Zauberberg, and reach its apotheosis on Königsforst and Pop. Those three albums share a very similar palette – blurred, hazy samples, often of classical music, stacked and cross-thatched across a muted 4/4 thud. GAS, then, is an outlier of sorts: it’s more expansive in its remit, lighter in its mood, perhaps more fleet of foot. This, of course, is part of its charm.

In clearing space for Voigt, by preparing the terrain, GAS sits both at the edge of the forest, and at the verge of an expansive, wide-eyed future; one where GAS would become truly eternal.

Text by Jonathan Dale

Kompakt ist stolz, endlich eine Neuauflage des ersten, selbstbetitelten GAS-Albums ankündigen zu können. Ursprünglich im Jahr 1996 auf dem Electronica-Label Mille Plateaux veröffentlicht, ist es seitdem nicht mehr in seiner ursprünglichen Form erhältlich – die gleichnamige Version von GAS, die 2008 in der Nah Und Fern Box enthalten war, enthielt verschiedene andere Titel. Nun liegt das 3er Album in seinem naturbelassenen Originalzustand wieder vor.

Bereits 1995 zeichnete sich mit der Maxi GAS - Modern auf Profan, sowie einigen Kompilation-Beiträgen auf Modulation & Transformation und Electric Ladyland auf Mille Plateaux dieser frühe, weltentrückte, rätselhafte GAS Sound ab, der sich erst in den sechs scheinbar endlosen, majestätisch-sprudelnden Tracks des Albums voll entfaltete. Die Musik ist von ätherischer Leichtigkeit, in der wie aus einer anderen Sphäre abstrakte Referenzen aus weiter Ferne nur andeutungsweise herüberzuwehen scheinen.

Dieser frühe, eher sphärisch-leichte, gleich einer sonnendurchfluteten (Wald-)Lichtung anmutende GAS Sound, stellt gewissermaßen den Ausgangspunkt der audiovisuellen „Welt“-Reise in den düster-romantischen Acid-Wald dar, in den sich GAS ab 1997 mit den Alben Zauberberg, Königsforst, Oktember und ab 2000 mit Pop an anderer Stelle wieder hinaus und in seine ganz eigene Ewigkeit begeben hat.

Das sechste Album von Still Corners heißt "Dream Talk". Wunderschön arrangiert, elegant und wehmütig, ist "Dream Talks" eine Sammlung von zehn sorgfältig gestalteten klassischen SC Songs. Vom herbstlichen Opener "Today is the Day" bis zum heißen Sommernachtsfinale von "Turquoise Moon" haben Still Corners einen Sound geschaffen, der fokussiert, stilvoll und verführerisch ist. Tessa Murray sagt: "Die Entstehung vieler dieser Songs geht auf Träume zurück. Jede Nacht habe ich die Träume, an die ich mich erinnern konnte, aufgeschrieben. Während der Aufnahmen holte ich mein Buch der Träume heraus und sang über verschiedene geloopte Phrasen, an denen Greg gearbeitet hatte. Die sich wiederholende Natur der Loops und des Gesangs fühlte sich fast wie eine Trance an. Viele der Songs sind aus diesem Prozess entstanden, es hat Spaß gemacht, und was ich für eine Art Geschwafel hielt, hat uns am Ende mit seinen verschiedenen Bedeutungen und Bildern überrascht." Schwarzes Vinyl kommt mit einem Download-Code, die CD ist ein Digipak.

Garden City Movement, the critically acclaimed Indie Pop/Rock duo who is celebrated for their

dynamic sound and experimental approach, is delighted to announce the release of three sets of

singles, paving the way for their highly anticipated sophomore album, "Never On Time",

scheduled for release on July 19 via Anova Music.

From their early days, Garden City Movement has captured hearts and minds across the globe,

earning acclaim from Pitchfork, FADER, and FACT, and gracing stages at Glastonbury, Primavera,

and Pukkelpop. Despite the challenges posed by cancer and the departure of a band member,

the duo has emerged stronger than ever, marking their territory in the music world with notable

achievements, including "Summer Night" being chosen by EA-Sports as the FIFA 22 official

soundtrack and a performance at the 2023 Formula 1 race in Singapore.


Garden City Movement, comprised of Roy Avital & Johnny Sharoni, is globally recognized for their

experimental soundscapes. They've drawn attention from prestigious platforms like Pitchfork and

FADER, and earned the title as the official soundtrack for EA Sports' FIFA 22, for "Summer Night".

Their resilience in the face of adversity, including a battle with cancer that put a temporary hold

on their music, only fueled their creative fire. In 2019, they made a triumphant return, further

solidifying their international presence with a successful tour in Japan, which earned them a spot

on the Top 100 "J-Wave" Japanese charts for "Miss You Under Shimokita Sky". A few years later in

2023, they were invited to perform at the renowned Formula 1 event in Singapore. Despite recent

changes, with Joe departing and the band transitioning to a duo, Garden City Movement

continues to evolve. Their upcoming album promises exciting collaborations across genres,

reflecting their diverse influences and the personal growth from their challenges. This next

chapter is not only a testament to their artistic innovation but also their enduring spirit.

Born out of revelry and resolution in a redwood cabin tucked into the California coast, endowed with a spirit simmering in wanderlust, and ornamented with the rich traditions of the Louisiana bayou, 'Lonesome Highway' marks the resilient return of Irena Eide, aka Rainy Eyes. These are eleven songs of triumph, punctuated with perseverance and perspective, here to sober up the soul and send it back stronger onto the blacktop. If Rainy's 2019 folk-infused debut, 'Moon in the Mirror', revealed the truth, 'Lonesome Highway' tells poignantly and poetically of the consequences.

'Lonesome Highway' was written as Rainy reflected on the juxtaposition of her circumstances. While she basked in the joy of her recent entry into motherhood, she was simultaneously confronting a troubled relationship that had turned toxic. "Songwriting was my therapy. It was basically how I dealt with the pain and the trauma. The music helped me heal," says Rainy. "This album is about how I had to help myself. To take that pain and use it. For it not to destroy me, but to make me who I am."

Sein drittes Studioalbum “The Learning Of Urgency“ erscheint Anfang Juni 2024 auf ODESZAs angesehenem Label, Foreign Family Collective.

Für Kasbo ist „The Learning Of Urgency“ ein extrem wichtiges Konzept. Das Songwriting kreist um das Thema Entschleunigung, da die letzten Jahre seines Lebens von einem Gefühl des akuten Drucks geprägt waren, der sich in einem unterbewussten Zwang manifestierte, ständig mehr zu erreichen und zu tun. Das Ergebnis hätte ihn fast seine Karriere gekostet, da er einen seltenen, stressbedingten Hörverlust entwickelte. Das Ende der Pandemie relativierte diese Stressfaktoren, und indem er sich mit ihnen auseinandersetzte, war er in der Lage, persönlich und beruflich wieder auf Kurs zu kommen und dieses neue Album zu schreiben. Vier Jahre lang nahm Kasbo „The Learning Of Urgency“ auf, während er hauptsächlich in Göteborg und Stockholm lebte. Er hatte die Gelegenheit, im geschichtsträchtigen Aufnahmestudio Riksmixningsverket (RMV) zu arbeiten, das auf der Insel Skeppsholmen in Stockholm liegt und dessen Besitzer:innen niemand geringeres als ABBA sind. Das Studio ist in einem 150 Jahre alten Lagerhaus untergebracht, das früher von der schwedischen Marine betrieben wurde. Kasbos Musik hat bis heute über 500 Millionen Streams erreicht. Er wurde mit dem schwedischen P3 Gold Award in der Kategorie „Dance Artist Of The Year“ ausgezeichnet und erhielt Lob von Billboard, The FADER, Stereogum und anderen. Mit seinen sich ständig erweiternden Fähigkeiten hat Kasbo als Live-Performer, DJ und Produzent die Dreifaltigkeit der modernen Tanzmusik erreicht.

Music From Memory is pleased to announce the upcoming release of ‘Salt And Sugar Look The Same’, a collaborative album from Tim Koh and Sun An.

Tim Koh is an American multi-instrumentalist and visual artist born and raised in Los Angeles. He has been touring, releasing music and showing art works internationally for nearly two decades. Sun An is a Southern California-based graphic designer, art director, and sound designer who has self-released music since 2012.

‘Salt And Sugar Look The Same’ plays somewhat like a dreamlike collage; across 18 short compositions, finger-picked guitars melt with electronics and warped samples to create a form of American Primitivism bent and refracted through Tim and Sun’s unique lens.

Their collaborative journey unfolded gradually, exchanging snippets via email over the span of a year or so, Sun in LA and Tim in Berlin. Amidst personal struggles and uncertainties, the act of recording and composing became a refuge, a safe space where they could navigate life's complexities together. Though they didn't converse much, mostly just sending music, their musical dialogue spoke volumes, shaping a narrative that evolved naturally over time. As they shared their musical ideas, they discovered a profound sense of connection and understanding with one another. The music became a conduit for healing, bridging the gaps between them and offering comfort in times of need.

Their musical influences and backgrounds anchored them. From reminiscing about past scenes to exploring cultural intricacies of being Korean American in Los Angeles, infused with a natural sense of shared identity, their collaboration reflected a mergence of old and new memories into a hallucinatory, dream-like experience. Across the 18 compositions that make up the album, incense emerges as a poignant motif, symbolizing the passage of time. Each incense stick becomes a vessel carrying the essence of moments gone by, while the holder becomes the custodian of these ephemeral memories.

‘Salt And Sugar Look The Same’ invites the listener on a boundary-transcending journey of introspection, joy, and pain, creating an experience that lingers long after the last note fades.

Sleeve art by Brian DeGraw, design by David McFarline.

This is not just a tribute album. It is an endeavour borne of love. Tim Smith composer, principal songwriter, lead singer and guitarist of Cardiacs passed away on the 21st July 2020. The artists on this record came together to celebrate Tim's unique music and further it's dominion Everyone involved in the making of this album generously gave their time and creativity freely, a testament to the love they all shared for Tim. After articles about Tim Smith and Leader Of The Starry Skies have been written in The Guardian and the Sun this is what some reviewers have had to say; A treat for fans and a primer for everyone else, this is extraordinary and timeless music that glows and trobs with love for the very brilliant man who created it. Dom Lawson ~ Prog Classic ...the music of Mr Smith, has the uncanny ability to transform minds, delve deep into whatever it is that makes us think and feel and push and pull at it in a way that is utterly unique and endlessly rewarding... Prog Archives ...the most diverse eclectic and excellent mix of music styles, artistic execution and musical diveristy that this reviewer has had the privelege - nay, the JOY to hear in ages. Andi James Chamberlain ~ Subba-Cultcha These aren’t just pop songs, there’s something far deeper going on. Many have the familiarity and spirituality of hymns... he’s our generation’s Elgar . Sam Shepherd ~ Line Of The Best Fit ...smart, talented people performing great, unique songs in support of a very worthy cause. Matt Evans ~ Rockarolla

Die US-Progressive-Metal-Pioniere und Innovatoren PSYCHOTIC WALTZ machen endlich ihren gesamten fesselnden und zeitlosen Backkatalog weltweit über InsideOutMusic wieder verfügbar. In zwei Wiederveröffentlichungs-Schritten (Mai & Juli 2024) werden die klassischen ersten vier Alben der Band - "A Social Grace" (1990), "Into The Everflow" (1992), "Mosquito" (1994) und "Bleeding" (1996) - neu gemastert von Patrick W. Engel / Temple Of Disharmony als 2CD Digipaks mit viel seltenem oder bisher unveröffentlichtem Bonusmaterial sowie erweiterten Layouts erhältlich sein, und die Hauptalben werden zusätzlich als Ltd. Gatefold-LP-Editionen auf 180g-Vinyl neu aufgelegt. Eine zusätzliche Demo-Raritäten-Zusammenstellung (mit einem Teil des Bonusmaterials) mit dem Titel "To Chase The Stars (Demos 1987 - 1989)" wird ebenfalls als Ltd. Gatefold 2LP Edition erhältlich sein, was diese Re-Issue-Kampagne zu einem aufregenden und unverzichtbaren Projekt sowohl für langjährige Kenner der Band als auch für neuere Mitglieder der ständig wachsenden progressiven Musikgemeinde macht.

2024 reissue of Thomas Bückers debut album as Bersarin Quartett, originally released in 2008 on Lidar.

With some albums, you realize within a few seconds that here you have come across something really special. It is music that touches you straight away. Music that is important, that has a story to tell – and that manages to do so without even a single line of lyrics.

Wonderful orchestral pieces full of longing and melancholy. It is that certain kind of melancholy that seizes you when you are moved while following the final credits of an emotionally touching movie, remembering special moments that have faded in the course of many years and linger hazily in your memory, when you are somewhat wistfully contemplating old, worn photographs from days passed by … not a feeling of failure or hopelessness, but a bittersweet reflection.

Orchestral cinemascope sounds provide the emotionally moving fundament, wrap the tracks up in a warm coating. Graceful strings pile up, creating big moments and repeatedly ending inmelodies that are simply heart-rending, cinematic and tragic. But the Bersarin Quartett does not merely rely on these ingredients. The songs are also repeatedly interspersed with suspenseful and surprising elements, be it frail electronica, hypnotic soundscapes, drums or reverbed guitars. Rarely has amelange sounded as convincing and natural as this, and rarely has it sounded so well produced.

Thomas himself calls his music “imaginary fictional filmscores“. And it is hardly possible to come up with a more apt term. 10 tracks for 10 movies that have yet to be shot. Music that radiates such an enormous and authentic passion in every single minute, that one can’t help but completely abandon oneself to it. And honestly: Can there be anything more wonderful that can be achieved through music?

The relatively short life of San Francisco's Aluminum has so far yielded a single (Spinning Backwards, 2020) and an EP (Windowpane, 2022), but their debut LP, Fully Beat, overflows with tenured confidence and a singular style that deftly comprises shoegaze, big beat, and jangle pop. With influences ranging from Orbital, to Wipers, to The Avalanches and Sly and the Family Stone, theirs is a multifaceted take on established forms, fed through fuzz and led by honeyed, male-female vocal harmonies from Bay Area post-punk veterans Marc Leyda (of Wild Moth) and Ryann Gonsalves (of Torrey). "Smile" begins with deceptive sparseness, adding neon swirls of stacked tremolo over a mesmerizing lyrical refrain, and hinting at the dynamism to come with understated grace and grit. "Always Here, Never There" is Fully Beat's first pure hit of melodic pop: its liquid bass groove winds beneath a melancholy-sweet synth hook and Leyda's plaintive vocals, while drummer Chris Natividad's deep, pillowy snare and propulsive style maintain a driving pace. Lead single, "Behind My Mouth", shifts gears into a big beat shuffle and howl of overdriven guitars, which relent to Gonsalves' rolling bassline and playful, snarky vocal. Composed across several weeks of experimentation, it is a prime iteration of Aluminum's meticulous world of sound, which nevertheless carries an air of wry nonchalance. Asking, "Do you ever see behind my mouth?", Gonsalves notes that the song "comes from a place of wanting to be understood authentically, and to communicate intentionally." This approach speaks to the album's broader theme of exhaustion amid the demands of the modern grind: working unfulfilling jobs to pay exorbitant rent, feeling society break at the seams, and trying to maintain a meaningful personal life with the remaining scraps of morale. The response, then, must be to find joy. These songs were crafted over a half-dozen months in basements and practice spaces, creating an abundance of authentic passion and catharsis that's as nostalgic and comforting as a cherished, tattered band t-shirt. The closer, "Upside Down", is a full-throttle blare of joyous release - "a straight-up love song," according to Leyda. The deliberate choice to end it with a gradual fade, rather than a dramatic climax, smartly suggests the ambivalence of acceptance - perhaps fitting, when considering the immensity of the album's subject matter. It also hints that there is much more to be said, and as such a rich and compelling debut, Fully Beat shows that Aluminum are only getting started.

Limited to 500 LPs and 500 CDs. New album from the most danceable post-punk pop band in the UK. It's like something has exploded! CRUMBS have been incubating this, their second album, for a few years now. Who knows how they kept all the energy in check. It must have been like sitting on a volcano. The songs burst out with pure pop fire, sending splinters of guitar, sharp lyrics and snatches of the catchiest backing vocals. The rhythm section (Jamie and Gem): it's like Delta 5 meeting Le Tigre in a dark alley in Leeds, fusing blindly and completely, and then forcing its way into the back entrance of a venue, sending volts through the limbs of the unwitting punters, forcing them to dance. This is TIGHT. And as the lights come on and the indie kids throw themselves around, Ruth's vocals sweetly assault their ears with anger, joy, political intelligence - and all around, Stuart's guitar, sometimes twangly-melodic like the B52s, sometimes sweet and ringing like a memory of Scars, sometimes furious and feeding back, keeps you alert and thirsty for more. These songs do NOT outstay their welcome. Starts and ends are cut hard: no pre-echo, no wistful, drawn-out regretful fade-outs. CRUMBS have imbibed the key lessons taught by The Gang Of Four and The Au Pairs: never let the energy dissipate. But there is more than anger here. The band have smuggled a pop sweetness into the disciplined shapes of their angular songs. You're Just Jealous has sharp edges, but it's generous too. The album will be available as a vinyl LP, CD, download and on streaming services. CRUMBS - a brief history. They are based in Leeds, where they are active movers in the DIY scene that currently thrives in the North of England. They recorded a Marc Riley session in 2016, released their first album (on Everything Sucks) in 2017, toured extensively in 2018 and 2019, playing at the Brudenell Social Club with Swearin' and Jeffrey Lewis, and at plenty of fests such as LaDIYfest and Specialist Subject's birthday all dayer in Bristol, A Real Cool Fest in Bradford, Mousetival in Stockton and the Cambridge Indie pop Alldayer. They spent the pandemic creating these new, tightly-wound, irresistible pop songs. These are the people in CRUMBS and these are their influences: Stuart (GUITAR) - Bauhaus, Gang of Four, Shop Assistants // Gem (DRUMS) - Beat Happening, The Raincoats, Antelope // Jamie (BASS, BACKING VOCALS) - Delta 5, ESG, Chic // Ruth (VOCALS) - The Go-Go's, Mika Miko, Paint It Black Collectively - 80s pop music

Longtime enthusiasts of ambient music have much to celebrate as Rafael Anton Irisarri's cherished out-of-print cassette, "Midnight Colours," returns in a meticulously remastered edition and makes its inaugural debut on vinyl. The significance of this album's announcement is accentuated by its historical resonance, coinciding with the same day in 1952 when the world bore witness to the first-ever test of the hydrogen bomb.

"Midnight Colours" is far more than a mere album; it's an exploration of the enigmatic relationship between humanity and time. Conceived as a sonic interpretation of the Doomsday Clock, which symbolizes the world's existential vulnerabilities, Irisarri's work beckons listeners to contemplate the gravity of our existence and the delicate balance that envelops it.

"I wanted to capture the essence of humanity's relationship with time, both the anxiety and the serene beauty that coexists within the shadows of the night," explains Irisarri. "The vinyl format adds a tactile dimension to the experience, inviting listeners to physically engage with the music."

Known for his contributions to the ambient and electronic music genres, Irisarri often explores themes of introspection, nostalgia, and the interplay between sound and emotion.

Recorded in 2017, when the Clock was at 2½ minutes-to-midnight (and at the time, the second-closest to midnight since the Clock's inception in 1947), "Midnight Colours" permeates with the melancholy of memories resurfacing as one approaches the end of life: the regrets, the closure, the uncertainties, the anxieties.

Originally released as a limited tape on the beloved Atlanta-based label Geographic North, "Midnight Colours" swiftly garnered praise and acclaim within the ambient music sphere. Now, with this newly remastered edition on his own Black Knoll imprint, fans, both longstanding and newfound, can rediscover the album's captivating beauty in unprecedented clarity and depth.

"I've wanted to release 'Midnight Colours' on vinyl since it first came out, and I'm thrilled to finally be able to. The remastering process, brilliantly done by Stephan Mathieu, has breathed new life into the work, and I'm eager for listeners to experience it in this format."

The reissue of "Midnight Colours" features band-new artwork and design by the renowned Mexican visual artist Daniel Castrejón. A frequent collaborator and friend of Irisarri, Castrejón's imagery impeccably complements the album's mood and themes, extending a compelling invitation for listeners to explore its aural world visually.

This landmark release serves as a testament not only to Irisarri's enduring impact on the ambient music genre but also as a long-awaited gift to those who have patiently anticipated the album's vinyl debut.

4 Jahre nach ihrem letzten Album Forgotten Days, das 2020 veröffentlicht wurde, meldet sich die US Doom Metal Band Pallbearer mit dem 6 Track Album Mind Burns Alive eindrucksvoll zurück.

It’s 1 year since JFB’s incredible ‘Jammy Fader Breaks’ sold out almost instantly! To celebrate we give you a super limited (200 copies Worldwide) Silver vinyl repress with alternative colourway sleeve! JFB needs no introduction, an absolute MONSTER on the turntables and 3 times DMC World Champion, he has nothing left to prove on the battle scene or club circuit. However Woodwurk are very proud to bring you a first from this legend in the game, JFB’s first ever battle break record - JAMMY FADER BREAKS
Side A contains a huge library of JFB’s personal scratch sample collection including original and hilarious vocals from beatbox innovator Beardyman. There are 9 skip-proof vocal phrases perfect for scratch jams, practice and battle sets plus a large selection skip-proof beats and drum phrases ideal for beat-juggle and drumming practice. The side ends with a never ending locked groove electro beat for scratch sessions. Side B contains another 2 huge sections of scratch samples from the JFB volts plus a selection of beats and sounds from some of JFB’s

World conquering routines, allowing you to try them out for yourself or create something new. This side again finishes with an electro beat lock groove to jam over. Buy 2 copies for twice the fun, this record is a must for beat jugglers and scratchers alike! Much like the man himself, Jammy Fader Breaks is a beast with something for everyone!

Artwork comes courtesy of Woodwurk Records head honcho DJ Woody, bringing to life some of the suggestions made by JFB fans as to what the letters of his name really stand for.


• Produced by 3x World DMC Champion turntablist JFB.
• Skip-proof scratch phrases, drumming phrases, 133.33bpm juggle beats, full sentences, instrumentals, routines and lock grooves.
• Unique battle samples from JFB’s own collection, including vocals by Beardyman.
• Perfect for battle routines, freestyle scratching and juggle practice.
• Artwork by DJ Woody

Nick Llobet (they/them) was ready to throw in the towel. Llobet, who grew up in South Florida, learned to play guitar at a very young age, dabbling in everything from classical, blues, classic rock, and flamenco. They'd spent much of their early 20s searching for their voice as an artist and as an individual, as well as for a musical community Llobet would eventually move to Brooklyn, but after three years of looking for a hopeful artistic breakthrough, they spent much of their time in seclusion, consumed by social anxiety and imposter syndrome-and they were considering abandoning songwriting completely. One day, while commuting through Penn Station en route to their partner's family home in Virginia (that would also lead to the crucial purchase of a secondhand Tascam cassette recorder), they noticed Patti Smith sitting alone, waiting for a train. The typically shy Llobet decided to approach the icon, who was, in turn, delighted to see that Llobet was carrying a guitar. At the end of their interaction, Smith offered some parting wisdom: "She wished me luck and said, 'Practice hard, Nick.'" Llobet took her advice to heart, and this chance encounter kicked off a personal and artistic rebirth. They started performing as youbet, a play on their last name, and began "changing their vision for what a song could be." youbet's debut, Compare & Despair, a delightful gem of a record that showcases Llobet's propensity for freewheeling whimsy and emotional intensity. In May 2019, inspired by a song-a-week writing group that produced Compare & Despair, Llobet started a second club in which contributors would upload that week's song to a private Bandcamp. Invigorated by this small musical collaboration, the feedback, and the accountability, Llobet wrote 18 songs throughout the duration of the club, twelve of which became Way To Be. After this songwriting marathon, Llobet spent 2020 focusing on instrumental guitar work and political engagement. By the summer of 2021, they were ready to revisit the Way To Be tracks. Over the next year-and-a-half, Llobet worked on the record relentlessly, refining the lyrics, recording, and arrangements from their apartment. Llobet self-produced Way To Be and describes the process as an enormous, labor-intensive undertaking that felt akin to "making a whole film." Along the way, Llobet was joined by collaborators, including Julian Fader (Ava Luna), Adam Brisbin (Buck Meek), and Daniel Siles. Across Way To Be's 12 delightfully off-kilter tunes, Llobet uses wordplay and tongue-in-cheek humor to obliquely explore dysfunctional relationships, regret, self-confidence or the lack thereof, queerness, and self-discovery. Fuzzy at the edges and filled with playful, kinetic arrangements, Way To Be is a bridge into the entrancing world of youbet. You won't want to leave.

Nick Llobet (they/them) was ready to throw in the towel. Llobet, who grew up in South Florida, learned to play guitar at a very young age, dabbling in everything from classical, blues, classic rock, and flamenco. They’d spent much of their early 20s searching for their voice as an artist and as an individual, as well as for a musical community. Llobet would eventually move to Brooklyn, but after three years of looking for a hopeful artistic breakthrough, they spent much of their time in seclusion, consumed by social anxiety and imposter syndrome—and they were considering abandoning songwriting completely. One day, while commuting through Penn Station en route to their partner’s family home in Virginia (that would also lead to the crucial purchase of a secondhand Tascam cassette recorder), they noticed Patti Smith sitting alone, waiting for a train. The typically shy Llobet decided to approach the icon, who was, in turn, delighted to see that Llobet was carrying a guitar. At the end of their interaction, Smith offered some parting wisdom: “She wished me luck and said, ‘Practice hard, Nick.’” Llobet took her advice to heart, and this chance encounter kicked off a personal and artistic rebirth. They started performing as youbet, a play on their last name, and began “changing their vision for what a song could be.” youbet’s debut, Compare & Despair, a delightful gem of a record that showcases Llobet’s propensity for freewheeling whimsy and emotional intensity. In May 2019, inspired by a song-a-week writing group that produced Compare & Despair, Llobet started a second club in which contributors would upload that week’s song to a private Bandcamp. Invigorated by this small musical collaboration, the feedback, and the accountability, Llobet wrote 18 songs throughout the duration of the club, twelve of which became Way To Be. After this songwriting marathon, Llobet spent 2020 focusing on instrumental guitar work and political engagement. By the summer of 2021, they were ready to revisit the Way To Be tracks. Over the next year-and-a-half, Llobet worked on the record relentlessly, refining the lyrics, recording, and arrangements from their apartment. Llobet self-produced Way To Be and describes the process as an enormous, labor-intensive undertaking that felt akin to “making a whole film.” Along the way, Llobet was joined by collaborators, including Julian Fader (Ava Luna), Adam Brisbin (Buck Meek), and Daniel Siles. Across Way To Be’s 12 delightfully off-kilter tunes, Llobet uses wordplay and tongue-in-cheek humor to obliquely explore dysfunctional relationships, regret, self-confidence or the lack thereof, queerness, and self-discovery. Fuzzy at the edges and filled with playful, kinetic arrangements, Way To Be is a bridge into the entrancing world of youbet. You won’t want to leave.

Repress of the 2020 album on aqua blue vinyl. The power of a Winter song is hard to describe, like how the delicate world building of a good book can be more compelling than real life. There's a make-believe, fairy tale surrealism that sets Winter's blend of shoegaze and psychedelia apart while existing in the same universe as the ethereal dream pop of Cocteau Twins and Melody's Echo Chamber. Samira Winter grew up in Curitiba, Brazil, where her Brazilian mother filled their home with the gentle melodies of MPB (música popular brasileira), and her father introduced her to the distorted sounds of American punk. At 18, she moved to Boston where she first released music as Winter, eventually moving to LA's Echo Park. Winter has built a cult following with a stream of bilingual releases and national tours supporting Boogarins, Broncho and Cherry Glazerr, not to mention dates in Mexico, South America and Europe. Three videos to promote album. First digital single premiering on Fader 4/17. Features guest vocalist Dinho Almeida from South American psych legends Boogarins. “Winter’s breathy voice is pretty magical.” Brooklyn Vegan // “Winter makes cosmic dream-pop fit for stargazing. The languid motion of their soaring tunes are filtered through fuzzy sounds of slowly writhing guitar work

Cate Brooks is back with her seventh release for Clay Pipe Music. Never one to stand still, ‘Easel Studies’ finds her pushing the boundaries of sound synthesis and experimentation on the Buchla Music Easel while still sounding beautifully beguiling and hypnotically melodic.

"On this day in 2015, at exactly Midday, I took delivery of a wildly exotic musical instrument. To call it a synthesizer would be a misrepresentation; it’s really more of a tactile, living, breathing entity than anything else. It had originally supposed to have been delivered on the day before, but had somehow been mislaid in the labyrinths of the Royal Mail sorting office at Elephant and Castle.

I sat patiently and quietly all morning, waiting for its imminent arrival. I had already read through the ‘manual’, which is more of a concept / design for living, written by synthesis legend Allen Strange.

With Noon approaching, I became a little anxious- my local postie, Barrie, was usually here by about 10:30am and there was no sign of him.

At 11:58, Barrie walked past, completely ignoring my house. Obviously concerned, I stood at the door and waited for him to walk back toward his van. As he came back, he smiled and I called out, quizzically “Barrie?”. His reply was “Yes I have!” and walked back to his van, collecting a large box and bringing it to my door. I remember the weather was muggy and my neighbour was attending to her rose bushes, as the cheery and helpful postie deftly navigated around her busy secateurs.

I took the box inside, opened the top and just looked at the inner box for a while. I took a photo of it, which I still have. It felt like quite a momentous occasion, because I felt that this instrument would take me to different sonic spaces than I was used to. It wasn’t my first experience with Don Buchla’s instruments by any means, as I’d learned to use his 200e system. But this was quite a different beast.

My cat Brillo came to inspect the box and I set the Music Easel up on the floor and plugged it in. The result of that very first experiment became “Pendula”.

In the following days and weeks of that summer, I created many more experiments on the Easel, quite often with Brillo either sat on me as I played, or trying to climb up on the instrument itself, attempting to move the faders and switches himself.

By the end of August, I had amassed some thirty-something pieces, which I put aside for future reference. I had learned a lot about this instrument, its idiosyncrasies, subtleties and ways of working.

Sadly, Brillo died in September of 2015. I like to think that his last summer with me was a comforting experience, curling up and listening to the sonic experiments taking place, as he regularly did for the sixteen years he was with me. The first track on the album, “Con Brillo” is my little tribute to him.

Fast forward to 2021 and I rediscovered all of these experiments. Some were almost unlistenable, but some had a beguiling charm about them- perhaps the sound of someone not really knowing what they’re getting into. They needed mixing and balancing, so I set to work. I also wrote a new piece, with exactly the same recording chain, in the same way, in the same room. This became the suitably titled final track “Hindsight”.

The Music Easel has remained a constant source of sonic worlds for me to explore. It because the main instrument on the album Agri Montana, for example and has cropped up on many other records I’ve made since.

I would especially like to thank David at Postmodular for selling the Music Easel to me, after phoning him and disturbing his Sunday afternoon outing to Hyde Park (sorry about that David). I always promised I would send him a copy of something I had produced on it, so hopefully he will enjoy Easel Studies."

As I finish writing this, I notice that it is, once more, exactly Midday.

I hope you enjoy Easel Studies too.

Cate Brooks (21st of May, 2023).

tapetopia 006 In 1983, some more subdued sounds began to waft from the GDR punk underground into the second half of the ’80s. At five to the end of time, it was perpetually striking midnight and the occasional punk band would mix a little laudanum into their potential for aggression. Portents in this vein preceded a dark wave whose foamy crest would break on fog walls of dry ice. Especially in Leipzig and East Berlin, a chain-rattling zeitgeist produced bands that drew from a dark well. Many of these bands arose from the still hot or already cold ashes of punk. The two founding fathers of Neuntage Alt, René Glofke and Taymur Streng (nicknamed “Strangler”), knew each other from the East Berlin punk scene. The third man aboard, Mike Sauer, played drums in the early 1980s for Sendeschluß, a punk band that, lost in thought somewhere in the no-man’s land between punk and post-punk, faded away in 1984. Punk was no longer the order of the day, but it was a form of expression among many and easy to combine. Glofke and Streng found common ground in experimental set-ups with such otherworldly names as Medusa Brahma or Die zeitweilige Erscheinung.
From this far-flung point of departure, a short tunnel led straight into the black light of Neuntage Alt, the coldest star in the low-hanging sky above East Berlin. Neuntage Alt appeared at the end of 1986, during the last blackout phase of the GDR, on the threshold between the underground and the so-called “other bands” – a scene that used the non-socio-critical approach of German Wutwave (“anger wave”) in order to be allowed to perform publicly. In the context of this scene, Neuntage Alt did not belong to the inner circle. Moreover, the band’s subcultural base was initially in Mahlsdorf, on the south-eastern edge of East Berlin. This was where the DIY sound studio of amplitude apostle and great modulator Taymur Streng was situated. Strangler held the position of house electrician and keyboard god in various projects. One of them had the bland alias Mahlsdorfer Wohnstuben Orchester, behind which the avant-garde court chapel of the bungalow studio was concealed. There Taymur also conspired with the East Berlin underground band Ornament & Verbrechen (tapetopia #001). Ronald Lippok of Ornament & Verbrechen remembers how once, at the opening of a joint session, he and his brother Robert attended Taymur’s engaging slide show of his collection of test patterns. Afterwards, they created a piece with the psychedelic title “Das sentimentale UfO”, which sheds an iridescent light on the bizarre atmosphere in the studio. Taymur’s obsession with technology was legendary. The home studio was also his living space; a circuit, a machine park of screwed and soldered equipment, a single keyboard orgy. His own creations were also based on circuit diagrams found in the radio amateur magazine “Funkamateur”. Its somewhat clueless subtitle “Praktische Elektronik Für Alle” (Practical Electronics for All)