Suche:jagged

Spectral Bounce’s fifth instalment comes courtesy of L.A.’s rave archivist and dancefloor operative Dreams, A.K.A. Jesse Pimenta. Throughout his decade-long career the California native has inspected, dissected and concocted all manner of dance musics, leaving his mark with drops on Apron Records, Pinkman, BANK NYC and his own imprint Dance Data. On SPEC05 — Dangerous When Wet — he hijacks the synapses with 4 accomplished productions, plotting a high BPM course through manifold styles using the raw aesthetic that characterises his output.

“Losing Control” is a frenetic dancefloor invitation, immediately locking into a pacing groove. Beneath wild hand drums, Dreams plays with an insistent 303 bassline alternating between rasping buzz and oily squelch, while stern vocals are layered on top of breaks that have been processed to a viscerally satisfying end.

Taking things from delirious dance circle to underwater biosphere, the EP’s eponymous track explores a submerged 1980s Miami. Weighty & enveloping, “Dangerous When Wet” is pure aquatic pop-n-lock — hydraulic electro for a drowned world. Ocean floor caustics are transmuted into auditory form: arpeggios bubble up; drones shimmer mystically; hi-hats hiss like air from an open valve. Amongst the sonar bleeps, a barrage of pummeling low-end is sure to give subwoofers a workout.

“XTC Messenger” delivers an infectious paranoid dispatch, astutely balancing the sensual with the deranged. A slow-mo dial tone unfolds languidly, running counter to nervously twitching high frequencies. Its punchy percussion is tuned for maximum dopamine release; the track’s abrupt vocal chops and mechanical kick-snare pulsation evoke the leather jackets and jagged edges of 1980s industrial discotheque.

“Pressure Points” closes the EP on a heady and mesmerising polymetric trip. The parting track is a lithe yet spacious number, propelled by a rattling break. Here Dreams follows from track 2, creating an immersive environment in which sounds tightly twist and twirl. Shifting oscillators call out like tiny creatures as the bass throbs and wriggles further into your brain, long after the needle hits the runout groove.

Growing up is painful, brutal, and sometimes beautiful _ something Brooklyn-based indie-rock band Bedridden knows all too well. The band's name is even a nod to that ineffable period between childhood and the jagged edges of the real world. "When I was 21, I kind of lost my home," says frontman/guitarist Jack Riley. "I was couch-surfing. I was having a hard time.The next iteration in the band's maturation, then, is their debut, LP Moths Strapped To Eachother's Backs, 10 fuzzed-out (and sometimes gnarly) ruminations on dating, drugs, and survival out April 11 on Julia's War. The title came from a mysterious missive Riley received on astrology app Co-Star. "Last year I was way too reliant on other people _ my partner at the time, my friends," he says. "I was strapped to them in a weird way _ and flying in circles. This album is about that time."The current incarnation of Bedridden encompasses a patchwork of styles, influences, and friends Riley accumulated over the years. A Chicago native who first started making music at age five on a thrift-store guitar emblazoned with Kurt Cobain's name, Riley moved to New Orleans for college where he dabbled in punk before falling in love with shoegaze. There, he launched the first version of Bedridden. Sebastian Duzian (bass) _ a jazz musician and Pasadena native _ linked up with Riley in NOLA along with his bandmate, drummer Nick Pedroza. Pedroza, from Claremont, grew up on rock, metal, and jazz, honing his style after joining the band. Wesley Wolffe _ a guitarist fed on a steady diet of New Wave and `90s alt _ rounded out the crew just a few months back. Bedridden's previous lineup released their first EP, Amateur Heartthrob, in 2023 _ a noise-washed blend of shoegaze, DIY, and indie that Riley says is a "coming-of-age EP _ these formative stories about not having a bed, dating, being kind of a jackass. I was making fun of myself a lot." That release caught the attention of Douglas Dulgarian from Philly Label Julia's War (and TAGABOW), who signed them for Moths."Some of these songs have been around for years," says Riley, adding that they were recorded last February at Studio G Brooklyn; the album was produced by Aron Kobayashi Ritch (Momma). "As opposed to Amateur Heartthrob, we attempted to blend more clean guitars into a driving sound to capture more clarity _ one that also sounds live_ and raw," Riley says. That rawness thrums through the record, which kicks off with the thrashed "Gummy," about an incident when Riley had to gently fend off a co-worker's unwanted advances while both drunk and high on an MDMA gummy. And then there's mournful rager "Etch," which sees Riley daydreaming about beating up a meddler in his personal life _ in the minor key.The annihilating "Chainsaw" revs in next, a lightning-fast Lemonheads-inspired track that recalls Riley moving in with new roommates who were unnaturally obsessed with purchasing a lamp. "For some reason that pissed me off," he laughs; that rage is evident in the album cover, which shows said power tool demolishing a lampshade. Heavy-shredding "Heaven's Leg" showcases the band's affinity for `90s mainstays like Smashing Pumpkins while telling the tale of a gig at a local church. "The lyrics are about a pastor I had met that had lost his leg," Riley says. "The church had signs about not cussing and I had a feeling that neither of us had anything to talk about without potentially offending the other."The band's not afraid to get confrontational, though, on the anger-fueled, drum-heavy "Philadelphia, Get Me Through," which deals with a dead-end relationship and the mistaken assumption that getting drunk in the titular city would be a balm against the pain. And the nasty, brutist, and short hardcore-adjacent "MainStage"? "It's about being disrespected at a show on New Year's and how I lashed out," Riley says. "I then began to take it out on other people, which was a quality that I despise."Things get contemplative and mournful from here on out _ the emo-edged "Snare" is about bringing flowers to a hospital room where you're not welcome, while the Smiths-inspired "Uno" wrestles with self-loathing. "I guess the big finale of that song was my response to dealing with this recurring experience of feeling like I wasn't good enough by getting really into whippets," Riley says. Nu-metal bop "Bonehead," then, recalls an embarrassing dinner that turned into an argument _ the name applies both to that incident and the delicious simplicity of the guitar parts.After all that turmoil and pain, the band caps everything off with their eyes to the future on the jangle-pop "Ring Size." "All my friends are getting married _ do I follow in their footsteps? Or is it all a waste of time?" Riley says of the song. "At the end, through it all, I guess that's what I've been trying to figure out _ how to grow up, how to move on. I'm trying to navigate things as an adult and I'm not very good at it. But this is just the first record. This is just the beginning."And, hey, at least now he has a bed.

Take Me Out To a Bar / What Am I, Gatsby? marks a deliberate pivot. The album’s open, introductory chords evoke seem fit to score a scene in a Michael Haneke movie in which some stern German woman stomps down a whitewashed hallway. By the time that Chadwick’s crackly soprano joins in, it figures almost as a kind of intrusion upon what had been, up until that point, a pure mood. “You don’t have to listen to all the lyrics,” she attests. Chadwick's calling card since her earliest releases — a jagged, one-take immediacy — has been dialed back, leaving room to inconspicuously crowbar as much poeticism into the songs as she possibly could.

All songs recorded and mixed by Pat Lilley at Nexus Recording Studio in Waukesha
Wisconsin between 1998-1999. Songs 1,2, and 4 originally appeared on Parallel
Chlorophyll Regions (Highwater Records 005) 1998. Song 3 originally appeared on
Akarso/Seven Days of Samsara Split 7" (Ricky Schroeder Fan Club 001) 2000. Songs
5-8 originally appeared on Akarso/Faraquet Split CD (404 Records 002) 1999.
Milwaukee's underground scene of the late 1990s harbored many hidden gems, and
Akarso is certainly one of its finest. Blending elements of post-hardcore, math rock,
screamo, and noise rock, the trio quickly made a name for themselves during their
short yet intense existence. Their chaotic and intricate sound earned them a loyal
following within math and post-hardcore circles, and they toured extensively, leaving
behind a legacy that would influence the Midwest's underground music scene for
years to come. With Leave Quietly: 1997-1999, Akarso's complete recorded catalog has
been unearthed, giving listeners a chance to experience the raw energy and innovative
sound of a band that was well ahead of its time. Released through Expert Work
Records, this LP collects Akarso's recorded output from their brief but impactful run.
Featuring Nathan Lilley on vocals and guitar (who would later gain notoriety with Call
Me Lightning), Joe Wong on drums (now a prolific composer for TV and film and host
of The Trap Set ), and Greg Roteik on bass (of Key of Evil fame), the trio's musical
chemistry is undeniable. Their dynamic interplay and knack for combining dissonance
with technical precision is immediately apparent, and this collection serves as both a
time capsule and sheer example of their musical skills.
The songs feel unpolished in the best possible way, full of jagged guitar riffs, off-kilter
rhythms, and aggressive vocals. It's easy to hear why Akarso garnered attention
during their brief career: their music demanded attention. Tracks from the collection
highlight their ability to balance complex structures with visceral energy, reflecting
their post-hardcore roots while pushing into more experimental territory. At the heart
of Akarso's sound is their seamless blending of math rock's technical precision with
the ferocity of post-hardcore and noise rock. The intricate guitar work of Nathan Lilley,
coupled with the driving rhythms of Joe Wong and the powerful basslines of Greg
Roteik, creates a tense and unpredictable musical experience. Time signatures shift
without warning, dissonant riffs collide with frenetic drumming, and Lilley's vocals
pierce through the chaos with a cathartic and desperate intensity.
It's a challenging, chaotic, and emotionally charged album that captures the intensity
of Akarso's live performances and the raw energy of their songwriting. More than two
decades later, Akarso's music remains as vital and relevant as ever, and this collection
that their legacy will continue to inspire future generations of musici

It’s safe to assume no one in the audience at Carnegie Hall on March 30, 1974 anticipated what Miles Davis would play at the concert documented on Dark Magus: Live at Carnegie Hall. Recorded near the tail end of his electric period, the double album remains the darkest, most ferocious statement of Davis’ career — a visionary effort that foresaw developments in jungle, noise-rock, funk, and drum ‘n’ bass.

Initially issued in Japan in 1977, Dark Magus waited two decades for U.S. release. Now, more than 50 years after Davis and his ensemble blew minds at the famous New York venue, it gets its first-ever domestic issue on vinyl — and on a definitive-sounding pressing at that.

Mastered at Mobile Fidelity's California studio, housed in a Stoughton gatefold jacket, and pressed at Fidelity Record Pressing, this numbered-edition 180g 33RPM 2LP set of Dark Magus invites you to pull up a seat and wrap your head around an exhilarating performance that simultaneously functions as an audition, experiment, release, and magnificent explosion of jazz-rock fusion. We hope your turntable and speakers are up to the challenge.

This collectible reissue presents the improvisational magic that unfolded onstage — the skronking tonalities, wah-wah-pedal bluster, acid-washed effects, furious drumming, run-the-voodoo-down grooves, menacing riffs, crashing cymbals —with incredible detail, color, and pace. It also captures the band’s unbelievable energy, rendering both instruments and on-the-fly changes with revealing depth, definition, and dynamics. At its core, MoFi’s audiophile set takes you deep into the boundless mystery, promise, and uncertainty of Davis and company’s efforts like never before.

The story behind Dark Magus is nearly as unbelievable as the spur-of-the-moment compositions that resulted when Davis brought drummer Al Foster, bassist Michael Henderson, percussionist James Mtume, horn virtuoso Dave Liebman, and guitarists Pete Cosey and Reggie Lucas together, and, in a new twist for the concert’s second half, added guitarist Dominique Gaumont and tenor saxophonist Azar Lawrence to mix. That the latter two instrumentalists had never seen each other until that night adds to Davis’ legend — and penchant for bold, unorthodox moves.

Ditto Davis’ own actions that spring evening, which reportedly included showing up to the show an hour late and taking the stage with his back facing the crowd. The strategy worked. Davis inspired the group to play in a bold manner that few, if any, had heard before. Dark Magus is a rhythmic bonanza. Rooted in Afro-centrist techniques, avante-garde sensibilities, and exploratory moods, the songs eschew set arrangements and solos, and, for the most part, melodic devices.

For Davis, Dark Magus represented a personal triumph amid a period marked by health issues, addictions, and critical decline. The latter slight would be corrected, but not until decades later when Dark Magus saw Stateside release in 1997 via a CD reissue. Of course, the free-form patterns, unpredictable passages, dense structures, and distorted blues that course through the songs — titled after Swahili numerals — are not for everyone. And certainly not for the fainthearted. Though Dark Magus contains majestic moments marked by quiet restraint and something on the level of balladry, its rich and radical concoction of tormented thwacks, thumps, cracks, clatters, wails, bleeps, burbles, stomps, and enigmatic beats remains its adventurous heart and soul.

Primal and enigmatic, fierce and jagged, forceful and revolutionary, jolting and terrifying, Dark Magus seemingly attacks from any and all directions. Turn it up loud and let the prophetic brilliance of this inimitable and relentlessly funky album wash over you.

Crawling up from the cold underground in Toronto, Canada, Some Exercise delivers their debut record - Web Peril.
Uncompromising and unsettling, the project's inaugural full-length is a noisy yet rhythmic hybrid of classic New Wave tropes and forward-reaching experimentalism. It's a part-post punk, part-industrial analysis of our post-internet age.
Cybernetic beats pulsate beneath jagged and occasionally dissonant guitar licks - recalling the same abstract danceability as underground legends like SPK and Suburban Lawns. Evocative vocals are joined by EBM-style synthesizers, molasses-thick bass, and clanking drum machines.
In a contemporary music landscape where capitalist algorithms promise fame and fortune, Web Peril sinks its teeth the hand that feeds, offering this cautionary tale - the onus is yours. Online is offline. Consume what consumes you.

Sunfear is a project from Turkish multidisciplinary artist Eylul Deniz who now returns to Dark Entries with her sophomore album. Deniz has been making waves in sound since 2017 when she debuted her blend of ambient and experimental music using piano, guitar, voice and synths as tools for storytelling and self-expression. Inspired by Dante's Love That Moves the Sun and Other Stars, Pessoa's poems and Turkish poet Lale Muldur, this darker follow-up to Octopus channels some of her own personal loss and grief. Tracks like 'Above' pair sparse guitar riffs with swirling electronics, 'Bright and Wild' contrasts lush drones with jagged feedback and there are also hints of hope in the likes of 'Form Changed.' A great return.

Pedro The Lion Covers “B” By Lync. Lync “B” Original Version On The Flip Side. One-Time Retail Pressing Limited To 450 Copies. Pressed On Opaque Purple Vinyl, Includes Download Coupon. The early ‘90s Olympia trio Lync harnessed the same raw energy and passionate discord of the era’s San Diego and DC chapters of post-hardcore while building their songs on the foundation of the Pacific Northwest indie rock scene’s clever hooks and sophisticated melodies. In celebration of the recent reissue of Lync’s sole LP, These Are Not Fall Colors, singer-songwriter David Bazan has re-envisioned the album opener “B” under his Pedro the Lion moniker, stripping away the celebratory distortion and riotous clamor of the original for a hushed acoustic rendition in line with Bazan’s most austere slow-core moments. Paired together as a 7” single on Suicide Squeeze Records, these two versions of “B” highlight the multifaceted power of the original song, with Pedro the Lion’s version elevating its fundamental melodic weight, idiosyncratic chord structure, and poetic power, and the original Lync version reminding us how their distinctive brand of expressive dissonance and adrenalized execution transformed their cerebral pop songs into jagged masterpieces of the post-Nevermind punk underground

Recorded quickly between John Cale producing Patti Smith's Horses and his going out on an Italian tour, Helen of Troy became Cale's third and final studio album for Island Records - This re-issue faithfully replicates the original 1975 Island Records UK release and is pressed onto high quality 180g vinyl. Helen Of Troy is a raw, fascinating listen. The title track with its horns and spoken word is one of Cale's best: after the sweet bubblegum of "China Sea", the album gets increasingly stripped down the acoustic guitar and piano of "Cable Hogue" and the punkish cover of The Modern Lovers' "Pablo Picasso" have long been favourites on the album. "Leaving It All Up To You" in which Cale becomes increasingly disturbed garnered controversy at the time and was actually removed from later pressings of the album because of its references to the Manson murders. Cale never lost his ability to shock. Taking its title from the opening line of Johnny Cash's "I Walk The Line", "I Keep A Close Watch", a track Cale would record again several years later, with its Robert Kirby-arranged strings and horns, is the closest Cale has veered toward a power ballad. It is a work of great beauty among all the jagged edges of Helen Of Troy.

elbow return with their seventh studio album on 3rd February 2017. 'Little Fictions' was recorded in Scotland and Manchester and sees the band collaborate with the string players of The Hallé Orchestra, the Hallé Ancoats Community Choir, members of London Contemporary Voices and session drummer Alex Reeves. As with the previous three elbow albums it was produced by Craig Potter.
'Little Fictions' is emphatically a band album. Having written individually for its chart-topping predecessor, 'The Take Off and Landing of Everything', sessions this time were collective affairs, with all four members gathered initially in a house in Scotland before moving to Guy's attic in Prestwich and finalising recordings in the familiar setting of Blueprint studios, Salford.
'Little Fictions' is an upbeat album. All the band talk of the sessions being 'joyful', Mark summarises it as 'the sound of four people who love what they do and each other', of an album that came into being naturally and, at times even unconsciously. Lead single 'Magnificent (She Says)' was embraced for the joyous, thrilling piece of music it is, positive and outward looking. Mark never even considered his audible switch towards electric guitars, most notable on the psychedelic lushness of 'All Disco', until the very end of the process.
The departure of drummer Richard Jupp prior to commencing the writing and recording process in earnest saw early sessions characterised by new approaches to rhythm, with the band utilising percussive noises, sampling and loops to build tracks. The grooves that run through much of the album, from the go-go beats of 'Gentle Storm' through the jagged trip hop of 'Kindling' to the soulful 'Firebrand & Angel' represent both the band's widest musical palette and a newfound sense of experimentation borne from both necessity and desire. That desire fuelled the title track, an eight minute piece that is epic without at any point feeling excessive. As a shorthand for the album it is perfect, crossing musical genres and experimenting with sound in ways that demonstrate the confidence and enthusiasm of the band throughout the recording process.
'Little Fictions' is, therefore, more than just yet another brilliant elbow album. In many ways it marks the start of a new chapter for the band, characterised by a rediscovery of shared purpose in doing the thing that has always brought them together, the place that Mark describes as 'the creative space where we all meet'.

Two years ago, after Covid sent the industry into a tailspin I made the sad decision to stop pressing Holding Hands records to vinyl. This was gutting as the label had been putting records out from the first release and it had always felt like an integral part of the label’s identity.

It sucked but I always hoped that in the future I would be able to feel confident in pressing records again and I am so happy to say that the time has finally come again!


Earth Trax popped into my inbox with some demos and I instantly knew there was something special here. The tracks are absolutely timeless and will do the business on any dancefloor from now until the end of time.

The A sides have more of loopy club quality that you could listen to all night. The sort of thing that you just lose yourself to when it comes on in the club. You aren’t sure exactly when it came on but you suddenly realise that you’ve been gurning with your eyes closed for some indeterminate amount of time. Basically, they’re very chewy loops (note to self: potential cereal idea).

The B sides have more of a...for lack of a better word, B side quality to them. They’re both broken and they make me want to move my body from side to side in a sort of jagged cool 80’s way. Ones to make you move and think at the same time.

OK enough of my blather. Go and listen to the damn things yourself and decide if you like them, rather than trying to work it out from reading a bloody press release you weirdos.

All four tracks are produced and sculpted for the club. They want big sound systems and dark rooms.

Close your eyes, hold hands and experience transcendental space flight...

In 2006, Danger Mouse is King Midas of the music world. He has an uncanny knack for creating jagged, dense, frenzied beats and odd, eerie, vivid soundscapes that never compromise the music's natural flow. Meanwhile, rapper and singer Cee-Lo, a veteran of Atlanta's Dirty South scene, has never been one to be constrained by hip-hop conventions, and is a willing partner in adventure. The result is an intrepid psychedelic blend of pop, hip-hop, soul, and rock that consistently challenges and delights. It's no wonder that "Crazy," with its modest riff, irresistible hook, and disarming opening line ("I remember when, I remember, I remember when I lost my mind") became a worldwide Internet sensation a full six months before the official release of St. Elsewhere. But that relatively simple soul-pop gem is the tamest track on this wide-ranging, often dark and introspective collaboration. (In fact, the duo considers Gnarls Barkley to be a wholly new creation, as opposed to a collaboration of existing artists.) "Everybody is somebody, but nobody wants to be themselves," Cee-Lo croons on "Who Cares?" He and Danger Mouse try very hard not to be their old selves as they creatively and confidently break down boundaries, but the brilliant cores of their musical personae--Cee-Lo's eccentric spiritual soul man and Danger's bold sonic explorer--remain. --Marc Greilsamer

Since its original release in 1980 to generally indifferent reviews, Bauhaus" debut album has grown in stature and is now appreciated as an innovative foundation stone of "Gothic" music. Peaking at number one and remaining on the UK "Indie" chart for over two years, this dynamic collection defies categorisation, offering an incendiary tinderbox of driving jagged rhythms, screeching guitars, brooding atmospherics, provocative lyrics and wildly animated vocals.

Transcendental poetry meets Southern Nightmare Jazz on the third album by Alabama-based artist Johnny Coley Mister Sweet Whisper is the meeting of poet & artist Johnny Coley and the band Worst Spills, led by guitarist & arranger Joel Nelson. (Imagine "King Tubbys Meets Rockers Uptown," but more like "William Burroughs Meets Lounge Lizards in Ghost Swamp"). Joined by vibraphone player and recordist of the group, Jasper Lee, Mister Sweet Whisper centers Coley as a gifted writer and unique elder voice, supported by an eclectic cast of friends & collaborators. Tapping into French surrealism and transgressive American poets such as John Ashbery, the songs in Mister Sweet Whisper evolve, cinema-like, with Coley as an uninhibited, almost mystical, narrator. Textural, jazz-like playing complements Coley's decadent landscapes, which glide by like cigarette-inspired invocations. Echoing, and at times, dissonant notes of saxophone, crystalline tones of vibraphone, and jagged guitar arrangements punctuate Coley's dreamlike visions, populated by ballet dancers, haunting nightclubs, and ghostly car drivers. Wistful and expansive, the songs in Mister Sweet Whisper speak of Coley's talent and natural ability to channel his poetic world into songs. A remarkable follow-up to Coley's first two albums_Antique Sadness, from 2021, and Landscape Man, from 2022_which were praised as "exquisitely haunting, sublime, hilarious" and falling "somewhere between Robert Ashley, David Wojnarowicz, and Intersystems," Mister Sweet Whisper arrives in full form: unpredictable and brilliant. LP comes with a 4-page booklet featuring artwork and writing by Johnny. Pressed in black vinyl.

Gi Gi returns to Quiet Time with a new album, Dreamliner. His last full-length for Quiet Time, Lumino Pleco, was built on familiar samples, melted into a skunky sludge. It evoked a heat-warped meditation cassette unearthed from a Goodwill located in a black hole. The Texas producer’s latest, Dreamliner, is comparably immediate and propulsive. Here, Gi Gi explores spacey, kosmische-laced trip-hop. At first, these eight tracks come across placid and twinkly — calling to mind glitter stars twinkling atop a navy canvas, or tropical sun beams cutting through crystal water. But a jaggedness becomes apparent when lended a focused ear. Beneath slow motion arpeggiations and lullaby melodies, dubby percussion and sound effects gnash and quiver.

Red Vinyl. Listening to Fashion Club's self-produced second album A Love You Cannot Shake feels like being caught in the crossfire of a profound beam of light. You can't help but feel both enlivened and exposed as its aberrant synth lines, artful strings and disfigured guitars swell into larger-than-life crescendos, which evoke a divine yet probing spotlight. Pascal Stevenson, the Los Angeles-based musician behind Fashion Club, likens the experience of hearing A Love You Cannot Shake to staring into the sun, and though the record wasn't written with religion in mind, its heavenly sonics and emotional sagacity also make it feel like a prophetic encounter. The album was shaped by Stevenson's gender transition and sobriety journey and parses her fluid emotions surrounding these events and other personal trials and tribulations. But as much as it's a dialogue between Stevenson's current and former selves, it's also an invitation for listeners to join her in the work of discarding bitterness and re-centering hope, especially when such efforts feel futile. Musically, A Love You Cannot Shake is an unshackling of expectations, as Stevenson's previous stint as bassist in the L.A. post-punk outfit Moaning and her first record as Fashion Club, 2022's Scrutiny, didn't necessarily reflect the full range of her taste, which includes ambient, pop, classical and dance music, or embody her sensitive tenderness and femininity. A Love You Cannot Shake also thrives on a fluid sonic palette. The album's magnetic immersiveness hinges on its strange dynamic shifts, jagged production and ambitious song structures with parts that don't repeat_choices influenced by her love of left-field electro-pop and her classical music background. While Stevenson handled most of the instrumentals on Scrutiny, this LP is much more collaborative, featuring an array of contributors who lent strings, piano, pedal steel and more. Plus, this album boasts country harmonies from Perfume Genius ("Forget"), high-pitched coos from Jay Som ("Ghost") and gauzy whispers from Julie Byrne ("Rotten Mind"). Stevenson's vocal evolution is also on display with this record, embracing a softer delivery that's more reflective of her personality and identity.

Pearson Sound returns to his Hessle Audio label with Which Way Is Up, a 4 track EP showcasing a range of textures and tempos with soundsystem pressure as the anchor. The 808-laced 'Hornet' kicks things off with a sound palette inspired as much by '80s Miami as '10s London. 'Twister' dials up the energy with a jagged lead and scattered breakbeats pulling in opposing directions, while the steppers pulse of 'Slingshot' evokes formative experiences at Subdub in Leeds. The EP is brought to a close with the blissed out title track 'Which Way Is Up', whose arpeggios dance around each other until they fizzle to breaking point. Support from Mala, Mary Anne Hobbs, Joy Orbison and more.

Twenty years ago, mclusky released their third album, The Difference Between Me and You Is That I"m Not On Fire via Too Pure. In the years since, their legend has only grown, proved by their recent sold-out tour dates. Alternative Press described them as "a smash up between the scabrous rock noise of the Jesus Lizard and the jagged rhythms and open spaces of Gang Of Four". Originally produced by the late, great Steve Albini, this reissue has been remastered by his close friend and Shellac bandmate, Bob Weston and is pressed on 180gram black vinyl.

2024 Repress

Hart & Tief returns. Pampa's dark bastard. The Proverbial black sheep. For the second statement from the label, we have the twin voices of DJ Koze and Robag Wruhme. Both are masters at remaining simultaneously identifiable yet surprising, and the freedom afforded by this fledgling label sees them push their respective milieus. Driven see's Koze return to previously mined percussive tropes and plumb a new minimalist clarity of emotion through maximal means. The track thuds, clicks and pumps in a singular trajectory that belies its complexity and compliments its title. Not to be outdone, Robag Wruhme provides X-mop 198, a slice of linear horror-techno that deftly re-contextualises its simplistic components in to a jagged and constantly surprising listen, creating a form of body music for the mind.

"Here is what 2014 felt like: The cold, rushed walk from the Montrose Avenue L to the downstairs entrance of 20 Meadow Street, an address you could never quite remember. The careful steep climb to the top of the nondescript building, where Titus Andronicus’s Patrick Stickles was waiting to take your balled-up cash and stamp the inside of your wrist. Standing beneath that jagged cardboard punk bunting, draped with tangled twinkle lights, while Joe Galarraga, frontman of Big Ups, slowly, menacingly, wound a microphone cable around his fist. Then a barbed F-sharp sprang forward from Amar Lal’s guitar, shaking the entirety of Shea Stadium to life.

For much of that time period, ten years now behind us, it would be easy to say, man, you just had to be there. You had to be there when Death By Audio closed. You had to be there when the Apple store opened on Bedford Ave. If you weren’t there when a small, specific subculture of New York City took over its abandoned lofts and grimy basements and squatted itself into community, that’s okay — it might be too clunky and myopic to explain now. Released in January 2014 to Dead Labour in the US and Tough Love Records in the UK, Eighteen Hours of Static stands even now as a triumphant representation of what Big Ups did so well over the course of their nine-year run as a band. Now, with the re-release of Big Ups’ killer debut full-length, those who didn’t get to experience all this the first time around will get a shot at living as if it’s the glory days again."

Spectres have been stirring in the shadows for years now. Dark eyes watching from pallid faces. Siren songs calling to lost souls. In the blackest corners of the UK underground, a name whispered relentlessly amongst the faithful, first with curiosity, then soul-shuddering awe: Zetra.

Zetra is also the title of their striking debut LP. Ten tracks whose indefinable blend of shimmering shoegaze and pulsating goth-metal work deep beneath the skin, it is a masterclass in intimate dark romanticism and sweeping elemental beauty. It could be seen as a reaction to the geography of a strange new world, but also to the jagged topography of the human psyche itself. Is it a manifesto? A roadmap? A riddle waiting to be solved? Profound pleasure lies in peeling back its many layers.

Travelling alone, armed only with synths, guitar and drum-machine to compose, The Wanderers’ music could sound skeletal. Instead its early metallic bones have been fleshed-out with the electronic new-wave of Gary Numan and Pet Shop Boys and dreamy, droning guitars that hark to heroes like Slowdive and Sonic Youth as well as dark contemporaries Deafheaven and Alcest. As harsh as the truths with which they deal may be, these songs deliver beguiling brilliance.

Acolytes to spread the word of Zetra aren’t hard to find. British ‘contemporaries’ like Burner and Wallowing, Celestial Sanctuary and Employed To Serve have been dementedly singing their praises as far back as they can remember. Tours with the heavyweight likes of Creeper and Godflesh, VV and SKYND have taken their once-subterranean sounds into the spotlight. Unto Others’ Gabriel Franco (‘Moonfall’), Svalbard’s Serena Cherry (‘Starfall’) and Sólveig Matthildur Kristjánsdóttir from Iceland’s Kælan Mikla (‘Shatter The Mountain’) even crop up amongst these recordings, dissolving into the cult of Zetra themselves. But none are as important as the legions of fans Zetra are yet to reach with a dark gospel still unpicking all manner of psychological knots and existential truths.

Im Jahr 1998 standen Alanis Morissette und Co-Produzent Glen Ballard vor der herausfordernden Aufgabe, ein Album zu kreieren, das dem riesigen Erfolg von "Jagged Little Pill" gerecht werden konnte. Doch die beeindruckende und vielfältige Mischung auf "Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie" lässt "Jagged" fast zahm erscheinen. Das Album bietet eine bunte Palette an Stilen und Themen und erfüllte die Aufgabe, Alanis' Ruf nach dem großen Durchbruch ihres ebütalbums zu festigen, mit Bravour.


Anlässlich des 25. Jubiläums des Albums bringt die neue 'Thank U Edition' eine 2LP-Wiederveröffentlichung mit neu gestalteten Artworks sowie eine digitale Deluxe-Edition heraus, die seltene B-Seiten und Demos enthält. Zu den Hits zählen „Thank U“, „Unsent“ und „That I Would Be Good“.




[a] a1. FRONT ROW [4:12]
[b] a2. BABA [4:28]
[c] a3. THANK U [4:17]
[d] a4. ARE YOU STILL MAD [4:03]
[e] b1. SYMPATHETIC CHARACTER [5:11]
[f] b2.. THAT I WOULD BE GOOD [4:16]
[g] b3. THE COUCH [5:23]
[h] b4. CAN’T NOT [4:35]
[i] c1. UR [3:30]
[j] c2. I WAS HOPING [3:49]
[k] c3. ONE [4:39]
[l] c4. WOULD NOT COME [4:04]
[m] d1. UNSENT [4:09]
[n] d2. SO PURE [2:50]
[o] d3. JOINING YOU [4:24]
[p] d4. HEART OF THE HOUSE [3:45]
[q] d5. YOUR CONGRATULATIONS [3:54]

Im Jahr 1998 standen Alanis Morissette und Co-Produzent Glen Ballard vor der herausfordernden Aufgabe, ein Album zu kreieren, das dem riesigen Erfolg von "Jagged Little Pill" gerecht werden konnte. Doch die beeindruckende und vielfältige Mischung auf "Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie" lässt "Jagged" fast zahm erscheinen. Das Album bietet eine bunte Palette an Stilen und Themen und erfüllte die Aufgabe, Alanis' Ruf nach dem großen Durchbruch ihres ebütalbums zu festigen, mit Bravour.


Anlässlich des 25. Jubiläums des Albums bringt die neue 'Thank U Edition' eine 2LP-Wiederveröffentlichung mit neu gestalteten Artworks sowie eine digitale Deluxe-Edition heraus, die seltene B-Seiten und Demos enthält. Zu den Hits zählen „Thank U“, „Unsent“ und „That I Would Be Good“.




a a1. FRONT ROW [4:12]
[b] a2. BABA [4:28]
[c] a3. THANK U [4:17]
[d] a4. ARE YOU STILL MAD [4:03]
[e] b1. SYMPATHETIC CHARACTER [5:11]
[f] b2.. THAT I WOULD BE GOOD [4:16]
[g] b3. THE COUCH [5:23]
[h] b4. CAN’T NOT [4:35]
[i] c1. UR [3:30]
[j] c2. I WAS HOPING [3:49]
[k] c3. ONE [4:39]
[l] c4. WOULD NOT COME [4:04]
[m] d1. UNSENT [4:09]
[n] d2. SO PURE [2:50]
[o] d3. JOINING YOU [4:24]
[p] d4. HEART OF THE HOUSE [3:45]
[q] d5. YOUR CONGRATULATIONS [3:54]

[a] a1. FRONT ROW [4:12]
[b] a2. BABA [4:28]
[c] a3. THANK U [4:17]
[d] a4. ARE YOU STILL MAD [4:03]
[e] b1. SYMPATHETIC CHARACTER [5:11]
[f] b2.. THAT I WOULD BE GOOD [4:16]
[g] b3. THE COUCH [5:23]
[h] b4. CAN’T NOT [4:35]
[i] c1. UR [3:30]
[j] c2. I WAS HOPING [3:49]
[k] c3. ONE [4:39]
[l] c4. WOULD NOT COME [4:04]
[m] d1. UNSENT [4:09]
[n] d2. SO PURE [2:50]
[o] d3. JOINING YOU [4:24]
[p] d4. HEART OF THE HOUSE [3:45]
[q] d5. YOUR CONGRATULATIONS [3:54]

At once a spiritually-charged journey and a shit-kicking party record, American Cream Band comes to Quindi covering all the bases.
American Cream Band was formed by Twin-Cities musician Nathan Nelson around 10 years ago, taking the form of improvised live shows and albums Frankensteined from these sessions into exultant, fully-formed records you can sink your teeth into. The trick with improvised music is to start with intentions, however abstract they might be, and Nelson leads his rolling cast of collaborators into the creative fray with subtle guidance which drives the impulsive musical moment forward.
The band's previous records have manifested on labels like Moon Glyph and Medium Sound, and now Presents arrives in a freewheeling flash of snappy new wave, skronky sax, call and response sass and some krautrock-minded sonic cosmology. The album came together in December 2021, when Nelson took ten musicians to legendary studio Pachyderm in Cannon Falls, Minnesota. Living together, eating together, and with Nelson quietly setting up his low-key magick intentions around Jupiter's planetary frequency and the studio's abundance of elephant statues and carpets, they laid down some drum-heavy sessions that became the building blocks of the record.
'Taste What We Taste' is the perfect example of an exuberant groove pounded on skins as a vessel for a joyous get-down, with the singers and players free to freak out on top. Nelson remains at the centre of the melee, throwing half-sardonic, half-heartfelt calls out for connection. 'Banana' celebrates nonsense and holds down the most serious of beats - a disco-not-disco deadeye dripping in late night sleaze and lysergic potential. On 'Royal Tears', the jagged guitar chops call back to Gang Of Four, while the hot n' heavy sax from Cole Pulice baits James Chance and all the other angular New York un-jazz misfits.
Amongst his other implied intentions for the recordings, Nelson wanted to channel opposites, not least the distinct male-female energies in his vocal sparring with the girls on assistance duties. It wouldn't be right to call them backing singers as they shoot back at his punchy mantras, bringing a certain fierce femininity that tips its hat to The B-52's Cindy Wilson and Kate Pierson, not to mention iconic post-punk bands like Au Pairs, Delta 5 and Bush Tetras.
There's space for the dreamier kosmische which has crept into the American Cream oeuvre in the past, as 'Sirens' opens the album up in a swirling pond of rag tag percussion and molten synths. 'Words Would Handcuff Us' cools the whole riotous assembly down in unmoored perfection, a strung-out Bossa nova seance dusted with celestial drips from analogue spaceships.
Equally treading the line between light and dark, conscious and unconscious, the sacred and profane, Presents is a life-affirming, creep-under-the-skin listening experience - a joyously transient chapter in the evolution of American Cream Band.

Following in the form of his last outing on Baroque Sunburst, the Italian percussive virtuoso delivers three wholly uncategorizable, tripped out drum workouts. Both frentic and hypnotic, these rhythms roll and snap into jagged grooves that leave dark basement dance-floor walls imprinted with the stains of psychic and somatic revelry.

Rising Sheffield five-piece Dearthworms are set to release their debut album Sapsucker; a ferocious yet considered blend of jagged noise, wonk-rock, and a touch of experimental post-punk, in the vein of the Pixies, The Fall, Shame, Gilla Band, Protomartyr, Uranium Club.

Infused with eerie, surreal lyrics, stepping into Sapsucker is to dive head first into a parallel universe populated by snivelling, pathetic men, tales of eroticism, ruminations on death, and even a giant worm rooted in North-East folklore.

The band, who all have a longstanding history of being in various other bands in Sheffield inc. Blood Sport, Amorous Dialogues, Knorke and Stray Bullet, are a by-product of the local DIY space Hatch; a place that has existed as a creative incubator and experimental breeding ground.

Lyndon Hobson’s production captures the tone of the album itself, which is one equally rooted in anxious introspection as much as it is noisy and cathartic outpourings. This is a debut album that is genuinely distinct and singular, filled with varying twists and turns and off-kilter movements.

Given The Fall's penchant for iconoclasm, it's no surprise that they decided to say goodbye to the '70s with a series of gigs at Northern England's gruffest halls. The band's formidable live show was met with even more derision and disorder than customary during these late '79 and early '80 performances, and they skillfully amplified such sentiments back at the crowd. Totale's Turns, The Fall's first live album, was released on Rough Trade just prior to their pivotal third album, 1980's Grotesque. "The difference between you and us is that we have brains," shouts Mark E. Smith to open Totale's Turns as the band breaks into the rollicking "Fiery Jack," their latest single at the time. Each player is at their jagged best: Marc Riley and Craig Scanlon's splintering guitars, Steve Hanley's thunderous bass and Smith's combative sneer reverberate over "Rowche Rumble," "Choc-Stock" and "Spectre Vs. Rector" more than any studio would ever allow. Totale's Turns never panders to live-record conventions, serving instead as a gripping exhibit of The Fall en masse and arguably the most accurate document of the group to date. Superior Viaduct's edition is the first time that Totale's Turns has been available on vinyl domestically. Liner notes by Brian Turner.

After turning in a wall-shaking remix of Essaie pas last year, Romanian production duo Khidja present their first EP for DFA. These four tracks are deep, spooky heaters - think John Carpenter in the club, with industrial basslines, frenetic melodies careening a bit out of control, and vocals echoing from the corners of the room. Their signature throb that runs along all four tracks, influenced by their time spent in underground scenes in Bucharest, London, and Berlin, as well as an emphasis on the jagged sounds of hardware.

Having established themselves with previous releases on labels like Hivern Discs and Malka Tuti, Khidja get darker, dubbier, and more twisted on In The Middle Of The Night. We find the record in the witching hour, and the tracks represent the cycle of nighttime mentalities, revealing the various directions the mind can wander in the place between consciousness and unconsciousness - mania, paranoia, even boredom. It all makes for a raucous dancefloor experience, with the duo bringing something new and heavy to the DFA roster.

The first thing that strikes you is the rhythm. The Gossip have been making punks dance since they debuted 5 years ago, long before dance punk existed. Soulful and jagged, you can hear everything from Dischord to Motown in Brace's playing. Now, with the addition of new drummer Hannah Blilie (Shoplifting, ex-Chromatics) they have a new thundering beat for the kids to dance to on the corners and in the clubs. The next thing that smacks you is Beth's voice, all the guttural blues of the South is in that inimitable instrument. It resonates with the confidence that is in her lyrics asking people to hold on just a little bit longer, re-assuring the youth that there are others out there, and spitting in the face of all who say otherwise! "Standing in the Way of Control", their third album, was recorded by Guy Picciotto (Fugazi) at Seattle's Bear Creek. From heartbreakers like "Coal to Diamonds" to the anthemic title track, released as a single with a Le Tigre remix, the band is unafraid to put it all out there and take their audience to new places. This is the sound of a band destroying and surpassing all expectations placed on them.

Obscure Formats is a sonic strike of moving body electronics. This modern metal machine music is directed, goaded and prodded into reaction by Robert Galbraith, Component Recordings founder and one half (with of the monster modular outfit that is Snowbeasts. Under the Obscure Formats moniker, he forges a tight, earthbound sound from synths, modular racks and drum machines to pound a path through your ears right into your mind. Tracks like pound and pulse with unrelenting beats, percussion and arpeggiating pulses. Within each Obscure Formats track is a harsh soundscape of angles, jagged edges and eerie drones. Obscure Formats - Agitations consists of 4 tracks of alluring body music with special remixes by AXKAN & Years of Denial.
Written + Produced by: Robert Galbraith Except Haunted & Blood Moon - Robert Galbraith & Elizabeth Virosa

‘Empires into Sand’ is the first album of new material from Normil Hawaiians in 40 years. The group first refined their sound during the early 80s, hitting on a pastoral experimentalism that drew on ambient drone, motorik impulse and post-punk pep.
‘Empires into Sand’ came together in the familiar manner of their original three albums, with improvisation and nuance informing the blueprint of the tracks. It was with the official release of this last record ‘Return of the Ranters’ (originally recorded in 1984/85, but then unconsciously shelved) in 2015 by Upset The Rhythm that led to the group reconnecting with the intention of playing music together again. Normil Hawaiians played a launch show for that ‘lost album’ and followed that up with more concerts, including an appearance at Supernormal, a residency at the Edinburgh Festival, gigs at Cafe OTO. They were even chosen by Richard Dawson to perform with him in London.
Throughout this time, Normil Hawaiians revisited their original songs for live performance. However for a group always so interested in evolving their sound, it came as no surprise that they shirked at the idea of a faithful retread. The band pushed their songs into new inventive dimensions, still progressive at core, but now imbued with a cosmic uncanny. A cinematic approach that was always quietly present has come to the fore. The quaint weirdness of folk song, the humanity of communal practice and the group’s ecological mindedness have all found a place in Normil Hawaiians’ current sound world.
When Normil Hawaiians write and record music they prefer to gather in a remote location and live together for a while, such is their communal ethos. Being far-flung across the UK, the Family Hawaii (numbering seven key members) decided to encamp to Tayinloan, a small village on the west coast of the Kintyre peninsula in Scotland. They set up their own studio in an isolated, windswept house overlooking the sea and started the tape rolling. Noel Blanden from the band explains the process neatly: “we set up and began playing, slowly and patiently, allowing the music to take its own shape based on where we were staying and our ongoing friendship. We recorded for days, capturing everything. A lot of new and rich ideas began to emerge”.
Normil Hawaiians took their time to develop these threads at their own pace, allowing songs to mutate and settle over months. Simon Marchant deftly produced and recorded the album whilst also performing in the band, this marked the first time the band had total control of their own sound. The last few years has seen the band reconvene in Herne Bay, Faversham, London and Leith to record new parts, constantly responding to the changing form of these quietly spectral songs of defiance.
‘Empires into Sand’ incorporates samples from old rehearsals and live music into the new finished pieces, this is in continuum with their previous records. Snippets of sound from the static of short wave radio and satellite transmissions also embellish the work. In fact the whole album is stitched together with interludes, creating an acutely immersive 45 minutes. ‘Exiles’ opens the album amid swirling atmospheres, synth flights and recordings of Vilnis Egle (father of Zinta Egle from the band) retelling his experience of fleeing his home in Latvia during Soviet occupation in 1942. George Bikandy also features on this track talking about his flight from Syria in 2014. ‘Ghosts of Ballochroy’ is a winding river of a song featuring a lively discourse in Scots courtesy of Rodney Relax. There’s a commitment to truth telling present across this hopeful album populated with angels, incoming tides, long shadows and the rose-washed sun. “From our broken windscreen, we feel the breeze” soars Guy Smith triumphantly over the driving beat of ‘Waterfalls : Bedford 330’. ‘Big City Sky’ flutters and sparkles with rapid synth runs, tape-looped drums and Jimmy Miller’s commanding vocal. With ‘In The Stone’ Zinta’s melody is deliberately jagged and blunt, exaggerated by octave-layered vocals and interjections from Guy.
This is thought-provoking, boundary-bothering music. Honest in intent, a solidarity of vision. The album’s title is derived from a poem by band member Mark Tyler, who sadly passed away during the recording process and the transience of life is felt heavily throughout. Noel best coins the group’s wish for the album: “we wanted to create an album that acknowledges our history and also reflects who we are today. We remained true to ourselves and we wanted to make something beautiful without removing the edges.” ‘Empires into Sand’ certainly does that, it’s an echo from the past, an echo from the future.

Luxury Apartments have spent long enough pondering in the orb of creative frustration as art charged city dwellers and have alchemised a jagged piece of guitar work that calls on the past for a quick catch up before cracking on with their day as a witty, energised and wiry punk band. Formed before your favourite East London neighbourhood became full of high rises, cockapoos and pubs with Madri & Beavertown on Draft, there’s a whole swath of words you could use to describe Luxury Apartments, but doing so might draw too many parallels to estate agent listings wo we’re gonna let their track record and new LP do the talking… LA played with the likes of TOY, TELEGRAM, Deep Tan, Es, The Chisel and Rifle before even having an LP. Mixing dry humour with a belting live show served them well while the guys were woodshedding and earnt them early fans such as Graham Coxon and Jamie Reynolds, who I can only gather shed a single tear of seeing where they came from with all the chaotic guitar-busting, skin-splitting, bottle-smashing madness of an early LA show. But we’re here talking about NOW and NOW is the time to get your pre-order for their first LP, a half hour of power smashing the atoms of 80s c86 indie on lead track ‘Energy’, 77 punk on ‘Wire’ and new garage rock explosions on ‘Taliban’ which morph in to a piece of black wax that’s 100% guaranteed to get the disenfranchised wiggling, the fed-up hurling half bricks through foxtons windows and the punk lifers flipping off yet another boss before carving out another fork in their paths of resistance.

Honeymind is Ben Platt’s anticipated third album (and debut on Interscope & Polydor Records), named for the “honeylike” state of being in love (“like all the jagged thoughts and fears and anxieties in my brain are slowly smoothed out, until my mind is coated with warmth and sweetness,”). The album was Executive Produced by Dave Cobb (Chris Stapleton, Brandi Carlile), written with notable songwriters Hillary Lindsey, Natalie Hemby, and Alex Hope, and sees Ben exploring a more understated, folk leaning sound.

Craft Music's Good For Dance series continues with its second instalment and this one has been curated by none other than DJ Craft himself. Joining him are talented pals Schmoltz, Bogdan Ra, Romain FX, and Outra, also known as Joutro Mundo. These deep diggers are celebrated for their prowess in unearthing hidden gems and transforming them into dancefloor anthems and that's what they do here as each artist brings a unique flavour to the mix. Schmoltz's 'Luv The States' is a peak-time percussive disco jam, Bogdan Ra brings some slap-funk drums and glossy Italo synths and 'Tell Me Why' has crunchy drums and jagged synth stabs before a camp closer in 'Colosso'.

Spanning more than two decades, Mike Kinsella's widely influential songwriting has steadily sharpened and evolved with each new chapter. In his solo vehicle as Owen (in addition to his roles along the way with American Football, Cap'n Jazz, the more recent LIES, and other collaborative ventures), Kinsella’s ability to seamlessly stitch jagged emotional currents into crushingly beautiful songs has remained at the forefront of his art. The Falls of Sioux, Mike Kinsella’s newest Owen full-length, represent a type of reinvention; feeling like the natural next step in Kinsella’s growth, both artistic and personal. The album perforates an established sound to explore unlikely musical ideas, while the songs document a time of moving through life-altering turmoil into brighter days. Heavy themes are turned over with a gentle hand, and Kinsella inhabits the deeper perspectives that come with hard-earned life experience. This contrast has become more distinct as Owen expanded from unassuming acoustic beginnings into more ornate production, reaching new levels of complexity and clarity by the release of 2020’s The Avalanche.

Utilising a mammoth bank of saxophone samples, Shmuel Hatchwellpresents his new alias hoyah with an engrossing album captured in tape and digital form on Bruk.

The process leading to Set + Setting started out with a need for limitations to provide some focus for long-serving sound engineer and producer Hatchwell. He set out the following guidelines to accompany the overarching idea of 'set + setting':

No 'beats'
Saxophones are the voice
Stay away from the computer for as long as possible

Hatchwell took a deep dive in search of every saxophone sample he could find, threw them all into his MPC and then proceeded to weave together a variety of pieces. The focus on a particular instrument brings cohesion to the album, but equally the limited sound inspired freedom to experiment with other techniques and tools. At times one or two sax voices sound naked and undisturbed, while elsewhere you might only hear jagged shards or distant ghosts as they pass through aggravated processing.

Beyond the sound itself, the name hoyah was born with the flippancy of the 21st Century and ratified by ancient tradition. After the music had been made, After the music had been made, Hatchwell plucked the name out of thin air as a play on the TikTok meme 'can I get a hoya,' and subsequently discovered on a dive into his Jewish heritage that in old Hebrew hoyah means, 'to be, become, come to pass, exist, happen, fall out.' This distinction between Jewish concepts and modern political conflations is important to Hatchwell, who finds himself consistently having to separate Judaism from the situation in the Middle East and its ongoing genocide.

Subtly calling to mind the understated cosiness of real-life sax players like Sam Gendel as well as the fragmented sample manipulation of Matmos and Tim Hecker's approach to processed noise, hoyah's debut album absolutely manifests an idea and musical practice as something new and intentional

"As Bill Orcutt’s most mature and exhilarating LP to date, Music for Four Guitars was a slab of undeniable Apollonian beauty. Its approachability and obvious novelty landed it not only on the year- end lists of every key-pushing codger in the underground in 2022, but also on NPR in the form of the Bill Orcutt Guitar Quartet, an ensemble assembled to perform this music and featuring Wendy Eisenberg, Ava Mendoza, and Shane Parish in addition to Orcutt. But while their Tiny Desk Concert gave a whiff of the quartet’s easy intimacy, the sterile confines of the virtual recital medium still left a puzzle unsolved: how might these brutally mannered bricks of minimalist counterpoint sound on a stage in front of actual breathing bodies?" "This was the question foremost in my mind when I first saw the quartet in San Francisco a few months before this double live LP was recorded. I was already familiar with the prowess of Eisenberg and Mendoza, two of the most technically intimidating shredders to blast out of the noise/improv underground, and knew Parish as the mastermind behind the epic translation of Orcutt's quartet recordings into a fully notated score. I was ready to be 'blown away'—and I most assuredly was. The quartet navigated Orcutt's jaggedly spiraling right angles into the shining core of the compositions with joyous ease, faithful to the originals in nearly every way (though their tempos were slightly ramped up, Blakey style, to communicate their breathless rush). The renditions were flawless, stellar and inspiring. I had expected nothing less." "Which leads us to this album, Four Guitars Live, recorded in November of 2023 at Le Guess Who? festival during the quartet’s first European tour. The true essence of this set is not simply in its faithfulness to the source compositions, but in the group's easy familiarity (no doubt the result of weeks on the road) and the generosity of their improvisations, both collective and solo. Orcutt, clearly cognizant of both the caliber of his collaborators and the singularity of their voices, has given everyone room to stretch out, and all have delivered some of their most moving passages to date." "One of this record's great thrills for me is imagining a listener, perhaps unfamiliar with the outer limits of contemporary guitar improvisation (or the Tzadik catalog), slammed into catatonia by Mendoza's liquefying lines on Out of the corner of the eye, then revived and healed by the languid, breathy lines of Parish's unaccompanied, spaced-out breakdown of the track's main theme, finally only to be crushed by Eisenberg’s staggering extended solo on Only at dusk (somehow channeling both Eugene Chadbourne and Buck Dharma)." "There's another peak, which begins at the end of side B, in Orcutt's own languid solo, encapsulating the flowing focus of his recent solo LPs, and serving as an introduction to the next side's ensemble tour de force, the psychic heart of the album, On the horizon: its melodic core passing first to Orcutt, launching into a sublime solo turn by Eisenberg, a duo of Parish and Mendoza, before parachuting back into the ensemble for a smashup rendition of Barely visible and Glimpsed while driving (renamed Barely driving) knitted together with an softly bubbling ensemble improvisation. The transfer is orchestrated yet seamless, its tonal form undeniable even in the presence of obvious dissonance." "The breadth of Four Guitars Live gives lie to the false notion that agile, polytonal improv is necessarily without soul, is necessarily inaccessible. Rather, Four Guitars posits a human avant-garde music that the most conservative will recognize as virtuosic and revel in its classic intervals, boiling counterpoint, and precisely- layered facets. Even the rockers in your life might dig it, so why not pass it on?"—Tom Carter

Emerging out of Amsterdam's vibrant squat scene in 1979, The Ex – a name chosen for the ease and speed with which it could be spray-painted onto a wall – have for four decades been an entirely self-sustaining musical entity, charting a course through the global underground with a spirit of freedom and radical exploration.

Blueprints For A Blackout, The Ex's fifth album and first double LP, combines caustic studio experimentations and loose songs from their gripping live-set at the time. The band consisted of singer G.W. Sok, guitarist Terrie Ex, two new recruits on bass, Luc and Yoke, and drummer Sabien Witteman, along with a plethora of guests including Mekons' Jon Langford and long-serving sound engineer Dolf Planteijdt, among others.

Originally released in 1984 on the band's own Pig Brother Productions, Blueprints veers from jagged punk explosions to sharply focused improvisations featuring field recordings that would become a hallmark of their subsequent forays into free jazz and experimental music. The overall effect is not unlike the menace of a slowly building winter storm.

Tracks like "Rabble With A Cause," "U.S. Hole" and "Scrub That Scum" stand out as exemplars of this phase of The Ex. Comparisons can be made to contemporaries Einstürzende Neubauten, NoMeansNo and Svätsox as well as later Crass label bands.

Random Color Vinyl. Beach Fossils' sophomore album, Clash the Truth, is modern post-punk triumph that's left a lasting impression on the music scene it was born out of. After releasing their self titled debut and the beloved EP, What a Pleasure, songwriter and composer Dustin Payseur began recording dissonant and introspective demos reflecting on his southern upbringing and young adulthood in New York. The tracks that would eventually make up Clash the Truth involved Payseur taking his songwriting in a new direction, employing jagged instrumentals, existential lyrics, and socially conscious subject matter. The darker themes of Clash the Truth still come out vibrant through bright guitar tones, locomotive drumming, and Payseur's inventive home recording techniques. Referencing the sounds of Factory Records releases, New York's no wave scene, and 90's avant-pop, Beach Fossils expanded their sound past the perimeters of bedroom dream pop. The album is now being reissued for the first time on Payseur and his partner Katie Garcia's own label, Bayonet Records, including a limited edition clear pink vinyl pressing.

Punk pioneers Crass continue their vinyl reissue series, re-pressing their limited releases by adjacent artists through Crass Records, in association with One Little Independent. The series, including over twenty bands and solo artists recorded at the legendary Southern Studios and produced by Penny Rimbaud, continues with two more historic pieces from the Crass Records catalogue; ‘Barbed Wire Halo’ by Annie Anxiety and ‘Neu Smell’ by Flux of Pink Indians.

They follow records from the likes of Captain Sensible, Omega Tribe, Honey Bane, Jane Gregory, Lack of Knowledge, Sleeping Dogs, Rudimentary Peni and Zounds. First released on 7” vinyl, limiting the sound, the new series has been remastered for 12” by Alex Gordon at Abbey Road Studios, allowing them to be heard as never before. This, plus enlarged replicas of the original covers, brings new gusto to their already radical sound.

New York City musical maverick and performance artist Annie Anxiety, aka Little Annie aka Annie Bandez, began her illustrious career (including work with Adrian Sherwood, Coil, Current 93, and Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry) with Crass. They released her first solo single, 1981’s ‘Barbed Wire Halo’ alongside ‘Cyanide Tears’, an extraordinarily prescient piece of jagged electronics, samples, and skeletal rhythms, led by Annie’s nightmarish vocals.

She tells us; “When creating this single with Penny I hadn’t heard the word ‘avant-guard’ nor could I spell it – I only got explained ‘concretism’ via an interview I did in Berlin regarding some of my work three years ago – My father was a printer so I grew up with sound of printing press and subway train beats and always heard melodies and cross rhythms within those beats – I was just making dance music / disco tunes to my mind and Pen heard those same tunes I was hearing – my first recording, in retrospect I guess, was pretty ‘out there’ at its release, but to us it was dance floor for a club yet to be invented- one day”.

Penny Rimbaud expands; “Annie Anxiety is a total enigma, a passionate voice in the wilderness of consensual reason. Dada in instinct, Monroe in affection, Rambo in inflection, Annie rams it home with divine thunder. An instigator and innovator, she’s the bonkers angel of Yonkers, NYC. With no time to spare, Annie takes to the road with complete conviction, overtaking Kerouac halfway down 5th Avenue. Catch her if you can”.