Pop & Rock News

Actress and singer Julie London is best remembered in pop terms for her much-covered classic ‘Cry Me A River’, a Number 9 US hit in 1955 and a Number 22 UK success two years later. But as this compilation shows, there was much more to the girl than one impressive song

Strut present the first ever international reissue of one of the most sought-after albums from the Black Fire catalogue, Lon Moshe & Southern Freedom Arkestra's life-affirming 'Love Is Where The Spirit Lies' from 1977. This first international reissue of the album features new sleeve notes including interviews and commentary by Lon Moshe, Plunky Branch and band members with original illustrated artwork by Mary E. Greer. Audio was remastered from original tapes by The Carvery. "Lon was creating his own path in his music life at this time," remembers Black Fire's Plunky Branch. "We had met in San Francisco and he had become an original member of JuJu during the early '70s. He then wanted to pursue his own music, primarily in jazz; he was an avant-gardist and loved Tribe, Strata-East and Sun Ra." For his Love Is Where The Spirit Lies album, Moshe drew from musicians within the Black Fire stable. Oneness Of Juju's Jackie Eka-Ete sang and helped to write songs and members of Southern Energy Ensemble contributed, including their bandleader Marvin Daniels. "The band name, Southern Freedom Arkestra, was a proud declaration that this music was from the U.S. South," continues Branch.

Ndikho Xaba was born in 1934 in Pietermaritzburg, KZN, South Africa. For thirty-four years — 1964 -1998 — he lived in exile in the US, Canada and Tanzania. Originally issued by Trilyte Records out of Oakland, California, this 1970 recording is bracing, freewheeling Now Thing, suffused with SA idioms, and focussed by a political urgency wiring together US Black Power, Black Aesthetics and the anti-apartheid front-line like nothing else. You can hear Trane from the off — 'a spiritual offering to my ancestors' — and plenty of Sun Ra, with whom The Natives several times shared double-bills. (Xaba was to become close with Phil Cohran and the AACM.) Freedom is a gutbucket-soul rendition of the people's anthem; Nomusa is dedicated to Xaba's new wife, a poet and CORE activist from Chicago. The thunderous finale Makhosi features drummer Keita from the West Indies, and Baba Duru, who studied percussion in India, before winding up with Xaba blowing eerily through a horn made from a giant piece of tubular seaweed. Hats off to Matsuli for this outstanding reissue.

Sdban Records is delighted to announce the reissue of this genre-defying jazz album originally released on library label Selection Records in 1972.

Delving into the story of the American pianist and composer Phil Raphaël reveals more questions than answers. He was born in New York where he played with Charlie Parker, Jon Eardley and Howard McGhee, but a 1951 recording with Red Rodney for Prestige Records is the single remaining trace of his bebop days. Raphaël appeared under unknown circumstances in Belgium in the 1960s, playing among others at the 1966 Jazz Bilzen festival, and he eventually settled in Brussels. A multifaceted musician, he did not limit himself to jazz and also worked in pop groups, directed the music for the spectacle Hair, and even had a brief residency at Pol's Jazz Club where he played the music of Johann Sebastian Bach four nights per week.

His album 'Stop, Look, Listen', which was recorded with the rhythm section of Babs Robert's group, consists of four long genre-defying tracks colored by the dreamlike vocals of opera singer Rose Thompson. A surreal blend of genres, hard to pin down. It's highly imaginative jazz, that much is sure. Raphaël shifts from serene late night piano jazz to more free or even spiritual passages, magnificently paired with the otherworldly vocals of Rose Thompson. The LP was put out by Selection Records, a label that primarily issued library music at the time, and thus went largely unnoticed upon release. The recording makes clear that Phil Raphaël was a highly gifted artist whose talent will forever remain undervalued, since it was his only effort as a leader. Raphaël's passage through the Belgian nightlife was just as mysterious as his music, and few people seem to remember him. Drummer Bruno Castellucci describes him as remarkable, both as a musician and as a person: "He was a hippie before there were hippies. He wasn't part of the system but he had a system of his own."

A rare example of a 'jazz opera' The Real Ambassadors was an innovative concept when first released in 1962. Heading
an all-star cast, Louis Armstrong was at the peak of his popularity and still playing magnificent trumpet, while Dave
Brubeck was hailed as one of the most creative and successful musicians of the age. Enjoy this incredible LP, including
"Cultural Exchange", "Summer Song" and "Since Love Had Its Way"

Fragments repräsentiert eine Einladung an elektronische Künstler, traditionelle und moderne Musik zu kombinieren. Regelmäßig wird Fragments von einem neuen Komponisten inspiriert werden. Hieraus entsteht eine Serie von Alben, welche eine Bandbreite elektronischer Künstler dazu einlädt, einen ganz neuen Blickwinkel auf die Werke eines renommierten Komponisten zu werfen.

Fragments ist ein Projekt, das zwischen Welten schwingt. Zwischen klassischer und elektronischer Musik - zwischen alt und neu.
Beginnen wird die Serie mit Erik Satie: dem französischen Pionier der ‚Minimal Music‘, ein spitzfindiger Künstler, beliebt im Pariser Nachtleben seiner Zeit, ein Ambient Komponist avant la lettre, wiederentdeckt von einer Generation 100 Jahre nach seiner Lebzeit.
Beim Suchen und Finden der kollaborierenden Künstler, wurde das Projekt Fragments mit einstimmigem

Enthusiasmus empfangen. Das Resultat ist eine Kollektion großartiger Remixe & Reworks, welche monatlich zwischen August 2021 und Mai 2022 erscheinen.

FIRST-EVER VINYL RELEASE OF LANDMARK ZIAD RAHBANI ALBUM RECORDED IN 1985 AND ONLY RELEASED ON CASSETTE AND CD IN 1991. MIXING FUNK, JAZZ, BOOGIE, IT IS RELEASED FOR THE FIRST TIME ON VINYL WITH REMASTERED AUDIO AND NEW LINER NOTES BY LEBANESE DJ AND CURATOR ERNESTO CHAHOUD

Wewantsounds is delighted to announce the release of Ziad Rahbani's cult classic "Houdou Nisbi," one of his most praised albums, released on the sought-after Lebanese label Relax-in. This release is an event as the album, recorded in 1984-85 at Rahbani's By-Pass studio, was only released in 1991 on cassette and CD and missed out on the vinyl format. Mixing arabic music with Funk, Jazz, Boogie and a touch of Brazilian music, it is considered a classic among Oriental groove fans, DJs and collectors around the world. Curated by Lebanese DJ and Journalist Ernesto Chahoud, the album is making its vinyl debut with original cassette artwork, audio remastered by Colorsound Studio in Paris and also a 2 page insert with a new introduction by Chahoud in English/French.
Ziad Rahbani is one of the giants of Arabic music and a cultural icon in the Middle East. The musician, pianist and producer is also a celebrated playwright and a political activist. Coming out of an illustrious artistic dynasty (his father, famous composer and musician Assi Rahbani, was in The Rahbani Brothers and his mother is the legendary Lebanese Diva, Fairuz), Ziad Rahbani released a string of key albums in the 70s that have since become cult among DJs and collectors.

Heavily influenced by Western music, Rahbani brought these influences to traditional Arabic music early one. 1978 saw the release of two key Rahbani albums, the Disco 12-inch ‘Abu Ali,’ one of the most sought-after Arabic albums on the international DJ scene and ‘Bennesbeh Labokra... Chou?’ also featured in many diggers' want-list.

Serving as musical director to his mother Fairuz, he produced some of her best albums including 'Maarifti Feek' recorded in 1984 at his Beirut studio, By Pass, bringing his blend of modern influences to her traditional sound. At the very same time, Rahbani started recording his own album at By Pass with the cream of Lebanese musicians including saxophonist Tewfic Farroukh, Guitarist Paul Dawani and percussionist Emile Boustani.

Bringing Funk, Boogie, Jazz Funk fusion and Brazilian music to the mix, Rahbani created a landmark album, 'Houdou Nisbi' now considered one of the best jazz funk albums from the Middle East. Featuring such cult tracks as 'Rouh Khabbir', a remake of the Crusaders' 'Soul Shadow' sung by Rahbani himself, the Modern Soul of 'Bisaraha' and the Brazilian flavoured 'For Sure', the album is both effortlessly groovy and steeped in Oriental music. Held as "one of Lebanon's best kept Musical treasures' by Ernesto Chahoud in his notes, the album is a certified Rahbani cult classic.

"Houdou Nisbi," which means "relatively calm", an expression used by news anchors on Lebanese TV to describe the mood during cease-fire in the civil war that went on between 1975 and 1990 - has been remastered for vinyl from the original masters by David Hachour at Coloursound Studio in Paris. The cassette artwork has faithfully been reproduced for vinyl release with an iconic woman supposedly going to party with her high-heel shoes during cease-fire in a war-battered beirut (an agit-prop cover in line with the political stances of Rahbani, a self proclaimed non-religious leftist). Wewantsounds is delighted to bring the first-ever vinyl release of this iconic album to the world, an event for all Middle Eastern music vinyl collectors and 80s funk & boogie lovers.

'AGAMA' is the music project and alter ego of singer, composer, producer and multi instrumentalist Cassandra Gurling. Born and raised in Birmingham and now based in London, Cassandra is a classically trained vocalist and choir director.

Her sound is classic yet contemporary, a dense mix of styles in which her operatic and earthy voice is simultaneously rooted and floating above - soulful, jazzy, slightly psychedelic with touches of electronics and a dramatic twist. Think a mix of Rotary Connection and Four Hero with a touch of musical theatre and you'll be approaching the range and depth of these 4 amazingly fully-formed, exploratory songs.

This rare fusion of musical and cultural influences within a socio-political context mirrors Cassandra’s mixed Anglo-Jamaican upbringing, where she learned to sing within the Church and Musical Theatre schools in multi-cultural Birmingham.

Following 16 albums and over twenty years of forward-thinking collaborations and experiments with some of electronic musics leading pioneers, Coppé (the "Godmother of Japanese Electronica") goes back to her roots for her 17th release entitled, 'Milk', paying homage to some of Jazz musics classics, greats and personal favourites.

As with anything Coppé applies herself to though, there is nothing standard about 'Milk'. Through brand new collaborations with the likes of Nikakoi, Atom™, Kettel, Modified Toy Orchestra's Brian Duffy, Christ. (ex Boards Of Canada), Terry D, Chris Mosdell and others, classics like 'I Fall In Love Too Easily', 'Candy' and 'My Funny Valentine' are taken into entirely new and unexpected realms.

However, through Coppé's clear, warm and sincere vocals, these interpretations never lose sight of honouring the originals, and form one of Coppé's most coherent and universal collections to date.

Coppé's own Mango + Sweetrice Records team up with UK label Bit-Phalanx Music to host 22rpm : An All-Day Electronic Music Festival on Saturday 7th October 2017, taking place at St. John on Bethnal Green church, Shoreditch, London.

Their third annual festival following two previous sold out events in Soho, this year's line-up includes exclusive live, AV and DJ sets from Valgeir Sigurðsson, Bola, Ash Koosha, Scanner, Ulrich Schnauss, Plaid, Gescom, B12, Digitonal, Derek Piotr and more, plus a unique second crypt space hosting a multi-channel 'Silent Disco', with hosting channel one.

Coppé will be performing in the main church hall with an all-new Jazz/Electronic quintet band, debuting Milk and other originals & classics.

Kansas Smitty's House Band are famous as London's hippest bar-owning band. In 2018, they sold out shows at Ronnie Scott's and Cheltenham Jazz Festival, debuted at North Sea Jazz Festival, toured Europe and won the British Jazz Award for 'Best Small Group'.

2018 is a landmark year with members of the House Band appearing at the Royal Albert Hall, Barbican, Friday Night is Music Night, Boileroom and The Rose Hall at Jazz at Lincoln Centre at the request of Wynton Marsalis. They've been nominated for Best UK Jazz Act by Jazz FM and have been playlisted extensively across Spotify. Now they're taking a look back over the high points of the last twelve months.

Originally released in 1967 by Ember Records
LIMITED TO 400 COPIES

* Legendary underground release from former member of The Sperm, Buddhas Of Golden Light, recorded in 1984 by the Nurse With Would listed Pekka Airaksinen.

* Buddhas Of Golden Light is a highly sought after crate digger's classic, originally self-released by Airaksinen in 1984. Airaksinen, a member of legendary Finnish improv group The Sperm, originally recorded the album to tape, using an 808 and DX7, with improvised saxophone, taken from an epic week-long solo session, with Antero Helander featured on one track. Buddhas Of Golden Light is a true underground record that sounds like very little else ever made before or since. Simultaneously alarming and disarming, Airaksinen has co-opted the sound of the 808 and manipulated his DX7 for a cosmic spiritual jam, Sun Ra style.

* Pekka Airaksinen has been actively making music for since the 1960s. Buddhas of Golden Light is from a series of albums he began making in the 1980s, each of which is dedicated to one of the thousand Buddhas, many of which are self-released. Currently, he is about a hundred Buddhas down. He is included in the infamous Nurse With Wound list.

* Airaksinen is mainly known for the controversial Finnish underground group The Sperm, formed in 1967. The collective's recordings resembled the noise and industrial music of the 70s and 80s, with a pro-drug, pro-sexual revolution rhetoric and a dadaist sense of humour, influenced by American free jazz, underground rock, and anarchism. After The Sperm disbanded in 1970, Airaksinen continued making experimental music in his own studio. His music is characterised by out-of-sync rhythms, intense dynamics, and feverish visions. His approach is consciously unpolished, spontaneous, and improvised, a cosmic electro-jazz sound developed in the 80s, fusing free jazz and the 808. In the 90s he began to incorporate techno influences, filtered through his Buddhist philosophy. He continues to make music into the present day.

Phall Fatale's line-up, for all its symmetry, is odd: two vocalists, two double bassists and a drummer. One of the singers is Joana Aderi, who also makes experimental electronica as Eiko, joining her is Joy Frempong, known for her work as one half of OY (Crammed Discs). One bassist is Daniel Sailer, previously known for performing both contemporary classical music and hardcore noise (O'Haldenramm, Krakatau, Pol, Frachter).

The other is John Edwards - quite a coup, given that he has worked with such avant-garde luminaries as Evan Parker, Peter Brötzmann and Wadada Leo Smith, as well as performing the songs of Robert Wyatt in Comicoperando. Completing the group is drummer and driving force Fredy Studer (Joe Henderson, Miroslav Vitous, Dave Holland, Jack DeJohnette, Paul Motian, John Abercrombie, John Zorn, Fred Frith).

Something about Studer's playing, which runs the gamut from full-blown rock-out to subtly textural, reflects that of the group as a whole, and he is both foundation and ornament to their unique sound.

Key to weaving together all these threads is producer Roli Mosimann, an early member of Swans who has also worked with JG Thirlwell, Young Gods, New Order, The The and Faith No More - and described by Studer as the sixth member of the band.

A new 6-track mini album from a musician with a long list of credits including South African trumpet legend Hugh Masekela, afrobeat co-creator Tony Allen and Ethiopian jazz originator Mulatu Astatke as well as many Brit-jazz and international roots artists. "It's Time" blends spiritual Afro-jazz groove with free improv, spoken poetry and other-worldly atmosphere, with lyrics and titles hinting at unorthodox takes on reality and the times we live in.

Phil Dawson is a top London guitarist who has worked and schooled himself extensively in many different African, Latin and Brazilian music traditions together with styles that more typically cross the radar of someone with a similar British background: roots reggae, punk rock, blues, soul, R'n'B, jazz and funk. As a sideman, he's played with a host of living legends of Afro-fusion music including South African jazz trumpet giant Hugh Masekela, Nigerian afrobeat co-creator Tony Allen, Ethiojazz pioneer Mulatu Astatke, the Algerian "king of rai" Khaled, and London based Ghanaian afro-rock dons Osibisa. Heavy company for sure.

Now he's releasing a new mini 6 track album of original compositions under his own name and band - Phil Dawson ٤-tet - and he's joined by a stellar cast of London's finest players who include Rowland Sutherland (flutes - Airto Moreira, David Murray, Carla Bley), Khadijatou Doyneh (spoken word - The Heliocentrics, Danny Keane), Gaspar Sena (drums - Alfa Mist, Maria Chiara Argiro), Marius Rodrigues (drums - Oriole, Hermeto Hermeto Hermeto), Lekan Babalola (percussion - Cassandra Wilson, Ali Farka Toure) and Matheus Nova (bass - Antonio Forcione, Ed Motta, Jazzinho). Phil himself features on guitars, Fender Rhodes and piano.

'This is great' - Gilles Peterson, BBC Radio 6 (on 'It's Time)

'Beautiful' - Kassin (producer Caetano Veloso, Sonzeira etc) (on 'It's

Time')

'Rapid-fire guitar work with variety and energy' – The Guardian, UK

'A great guitarist' – Tony Allen

'An absolute killer - irresistible' - Snowboy (on 'Gnostic Hilife')

'Phil Dawson and his (quintet) are really smoking at the mo. No wonder the London jazz young guns are ripping it up with bands

like this leading the way. Miss them at your peril' – Russ Jones (Future World Funk)

Jazzwise Review

The British guitarist Phil Dawson is a fixture of a plethora of Brit-jazz bands and international roots outfits; his nuanced stylings have graced the work of A-listers from Ethio-jazz guru Mulatu Astatke to such late African greats as Tony Allen and Hugh Masekela. Like any an in-demand session player worth his chops Dawson also fronts his own trio/quartet/quintet, all of which allow him to stretch out and do his own thing, which – with his quintet - he does to pleasing effect here.

Buoyed by flute, bass and percussion, It's Time is a six-track brew combining free improv and spoken word with Afro-spiritual groove and a far-out esotericism befitting these strangest of times. Opener 'It's Time (Radio Edit)' is a psychedelic romp through a beneficent cosmos where ringing chords and woodwind trills underpin Khaditjatou Doyneh's pathos-laden musings on love and the universe and one of three variations on a theme. Over three minutes longer at 9:34, 'It's Time (aka Ougama)' is a freewheeling instrumental made dazzling by Dawson's silver-fingered guitar work; Doyneh resumes her pronouncing on the more dissonant but equally mind expanding 'It's Time (Fully Spoken)'. Then there's 'Gnostic Hilife', whose three interpretations each juxtapose the structures of this West African lingua franca in ways tight, spacious and inventive

‘Gentle Persuaders’ is the Love Love debut from London based neo-noise-jazz outfit Sly & The Family Drone. In the form of a four track long player, Sly vomit forth a smooth serving of curious and clattering noise not devoid of fun.

With the ingredients of shattering baritone saxophone, splurges of analogue noise, rolling drum derangements and snarling feedback it is immediately clear that these formidable noise-mongers have honed their methods of ear-attack adeptly. Textural spaces are peppered with bouts of densely packed controlled-chaos creating a tension that builds almost imperceptibly until the crushing pay-off that comes with the final track.

The politest of bludgeonings, ‘Gentle Persuaders’ has a real sense of cohesion and style, at times subtle and at others shudderingly direct.

With their unusual and interactive live shows, the group cut their teeth stunning the audiences of punk and noise scenes across the UK and Europe. Now, Sly & The Family Drone present their most complete recording to date; a rush of sheer ataxia ushering in a new age of noise.

Sophomore album from South London avant-groove collective Snorkel
Stop Machine
Dead Skin
Edgar's Hoover
Wet Tongue
Driller
Dark Star
Loophole
Jellyfish

Soccer96 is made up of two thirds of The Comet Is Coming, currently whipping up a cosmic storm on their Mercury Prize nominated album Channel The Spirits.


Their bold approach to improvised composition, recording processes and experimentation is reminiscent of Flying Lotus, Can, Thundercat and Gaslamp Killer.

SW2 returns to GD4YA after his previous release with Moses Boyd, this time with Joe Armon-Jones & Badwithphones+

Remixes from SP:MC & Hodge

Slowfoot Records is proud to introduce The Grip and their debut album 'Celebrate'.

This playful, freewheeling and energetic trio is comprised of three of Europe's most in demand and respected jazz musicians. Joining Finn Peters on flutes and sax, we have the highly individual playing of Oren Marshall (Sons of Kemet) on tuba and Tom Skinner (Melt Yourself Down, Owiny Sigoma Band) on drums. Both musicians have previously released records on Slowfoot, Skinner most recently under his Hello Skinny moniker, and both have collaborated extensively with Finn over the years, most notably on his critically acclaimed 'Music Of The Mind' project.

In some respects The Grip is a reaction to the Music of the Mind project, that heavily featured live sampling, electronics and '...;covered the stage with wires'. Wanting to bring the music down to earth again, this completely acoustic trio was born. Inspired by stories fictional and true, their telepathic compositions encompass music from hard blues to free bop and deep funk.

The name "The Grip" is taken from the classic free jazz album by "Black" Arthur Blythe. Finn worked with the legendary drummer from the album, Steve Reid, shortly before he died in 2009. Oren has also collaborated with Bob Stewart, the tuba player from that record. Blythe is a big influence on the musicians, but more importantly, the idea of making events (artistic, musical, social) happen within communities is crucial to The Grip's vision.

After a string of successful dates the group convened in label boss Frank Byng's South London studio and, true to their philosophy, recorded the album in a day. The resulting recording is fresh and spontaneous and their dynamic interplay clearly the result of years of mutual collaboration. The album is being released as a limited edition vinyl.

"A welcome new excursion in the art of the piano-less trio with tuba holding down a sonorous bottom end. The Grip make jazz from its bare bones with a sound that is both primal and playful. Sometimes the music feels like it's mining an ancient seam, sometimes it explores more modern abstractions, though it's always intriguing and engaging." Patrick Forge

"Finn Peters...; possibly his best work to date" Gilles Peterson

"From the knotty free-bop of 'Compost Fly' to the Arabesque drones of 'Saladin', Celebrate adds further momentum to London's vibrant contemporary jazz scene." [The List]

"Intricate yet engaging, cerebral yet physical, thematic yet episodic, The Grip presents a new black music that looks as far forward as it does back." [Kevin Le Gendre - Jazzwise]

"...;one of the city's hottest propositions. Their debut album Celebrate, out now on Slowfoot Records, takes the group through knotty free-bop, deep blues and Middle Eastern drones in a deft mix of free playing and compositional ingenuity." [The Quietus]

"Across nine group compositions in a range of styles covering blues, free jazz, funk and beyond...; ...;Taken as a whole, the album bursts with personality, verve and energy-great music that is also great fun. We must hope this trio prospers and records again very soon." [All About Jazz]

"Recorded in just one day, Celebrate is immediately alluring and resonates the trio's wondrous and spontaneous creativity." [Cast The Dice]

"The Grip combine legacy with their own unique compositional skills, focused energy and intuitive 21st century funk." [Ancient To Future]

"Some forward thinking jazz loveliness for your Tuesday evening, best served in one sitting. Gilles Peterson has called Celebrate Finn Peters' best work to date, and he might just be right. The Grip may serve as shining examples of the London jazz revival, but they also serve as proof that the genre never really needed reviving anyway." [Mangroves]

The Grip will be performing alongside live Hip Hop duo Con+Kwake and Michachu (Dj set) at Cargo on the October 19th, as part of a Finn's Sonic Navigation project at Cargo. Sonic Navigation aims to explore the lineage of improvised music, referencing 60 and 70's Jazz recordings that influence live British hip hop, spoken word and contemporary jazz.

Reviews/Previews - The List, Jazzwise [live review], All About Jazz, The Quietus, Cast The Dice, Ancient To Future, Mercury Recommends, Jazzwise, Mangroves.

Radio - Jazz on 3, Gilles Peterson [BBC6], Patrick Forge, Nick Luscombe [Late Junction], NTS, Max Reinhart [Late Junction], Hoxton Radio

Purple Marbled Vinyl

Limited edition in random coloured vinyl and small centerhole. Each one unique mix between grey, red, pink with possible splatters from other colours.

Donut chiefs The Mighty Mocambos return with triumphant funk workout "The Take Off" out on limited edition 45.

On the instrumental A-side, crunchy drums and percussion set off into a 7-minute breakbeat extravaganza where dramatic horns and psychedelic, fuzzed-out guitars build up to an epic finale.

On the flip, Nichola Richards chants soulfully before passing the baton to Brooklyn MC JSwiss, whose spoken word poetry takes the listener to another level, ready for take-off!

Another sure-shotwinner from the Mocambo camp, for all funk DJs and aficionados.

The Pharaohs only managed one release during their short lifetime, 1971's masterful Awakening. But when the San Francisco-based jazz-funk reissue label Luv N Haight reissued Awakening in 1996, they also came out with a brand-new CD of mostly previously unreleased material called In the Basement. Most of this album was recorded live in 1972, after the already enormous 11-piece band had grown to include four more players, including a sixth drummer. The live tracks are fascinating, because where Awakening sounds like an earthier and more Afrocentric version of Earth, Wind & Fire (which several members of the Pharaohs would go on to found in 1973), the much loopier and more jazz-oriented tracks here sound more like Sun Ra jamming with the P-Funk All Stars. The 11-minute take on the Stylistics' "People Make the World Go Round" is absolutely indescribable, a mix of otherworldly horns and psychedelic guitars over a non-stop African-style groove. Other highlights include the all-rhythm "Drum Suite," a hypnotic blend of organic polyrhythms and chanting. – AllMusic.

Repress !

Where We're Calling From
The Liminal Zone: Reflections on Duval Timothy’s Sen Am
Lamin Fofana

Sen Am is an enduring and tender album, rich and beguiling and generous in a quiet way. Over the last few years, I find myself returning to it, listening and absorbing, reflecting on the voices and working through the multiple layers of feelings and themes it announces with confidence and equanimity. Notions of care and contradiction, expressions of joy and desire and the underlying feeling of unease and turmoil; there is an urgent appeal to the listener for generosity, to strengthen our capacity to hear multiple voices simultaneously, to exist in multiple places at once.

Duval Timothy’s music was dropped into our world from another realm sometime in the spring of 2017. We received the call and we answered it. The rhythm and spirit was transmitted via London’s NTS Radio on the Do!! You!!! Breakfast Show with Charlie Bones and a short while later we were listening to the first vinyl edition of Sen Am in our living room in Berlin. The record got a lot of plays (at home and at some shows, before and after performances). It was like sunlight filtering through a cracked window and remaining there for a moment, dancing. Blue music emanating from a liminal zone, an in-between space, somewhere on the outskirts of Freetown, or rural Sierra Leone, or the outer edges of South London, or Bath, UK, or some undisclosed orbit, unfixed location. The music is soaked in diasporic experiences. It refuses to settle but still invites us to enter and stay awhile in that zone, where multiple forms exist (all) together with jazz, hip-hop, various strands of expressive electronics and experimental music all breathing together and moving around. It is a portal to a place of possibilities, a space for building and repairing possible and lost connections. But life in that liminal zone is precarious; it is life under duress; under pressure – not merely the pressure to produce a presentable, categorizable, and salable body of work, but the pressure that compels us to experiment and create new concepts and things that will help us imagine a different existence, a way out of the turbulence.

Freetown is a marvellous and sometimes sad place. It is one of those unmistakable locations inscribed diasporic memory; a place that touches you, a place that holds you and demands you bear witness: witness to pain, poverty, joy and desire. You remember the voices and the eyes of people even in momentary encounters. In Sen Am, you hear not only Duval’s recollections and sounds of Freetown, you hear family and friendship, people coming together and forming bonds, creating surrogate families. Forging community wherever you go is a practice, and community is at the core of this music. It’s in all the voices, from Emmerson and 6pac to Aminata and Aruna. It opens up a space for Black voices, for Sierra Leonean voices, and those voices extend through the succeeding projects, the 2 Sim EP and the album Help, and all that radiates from Duval’s Carrying Colour imprint.

Thank you for the invitation to write about the album Sen Am, on the occasion of its re-release which also coincides with the release of the exquisite double 7” Smɔl Smɔl with cktrl — a wonderful piece which calls on the listener to play both records at the same time to hear the music or play them separately and hear different versions. Duval is strengthening us, encouraging us to feel comfortable with discomfort, with incompleteness, with the hard-to-understand. This is a beautiful thing.

Repress on white vinyl.

The album features the single ‘Lamani’ a hypnotically psychedelic hip-swiveler of a track.

It also features their latest single ‘Dimitro’ which is their superb re-work of a traditional Bulgarian wedding song using 808 drum machine & bass to work it into a slow-mo dance track whilst retaining the raw vocals and ritualistic feeling. Tolga found the original record whilst digging in a world music record store in Istanbul and immediately fell in love with the vocals. Other highlights on the record include sunset, chill fave ‘Khepre’, the dancefloor chugger ‘Shu’ & the superbly catchy trumpet banger ‘Sahara’ Pink Floyd vibes on the hippie synth based ‘Hold Your Breath’.

This special edition double vinyl release includes 5 tracks that are not on the digital album each with their own unique style and includes collaborations with Ibiza legend DJ Pippi on Sem Voce and the jazz journey of Lumiere, produced in Denmark with label mates The Swan & The Lake & Langkilde.

Altogether a wonderful new album by islandman who has taken another musical leap forward from his critically acclaimed debut album ‘Rest in Space’. An album which has just been re-issued on Limited Edition yellow vinyl!

Band members:

Tolga Böyük - songwriter, producer, vocalist, guitarist, synth
Eralp Güven – Percussion
Erdem Başer - guitar

In a nation said to have ‘never had it so good’, Britain’s jazzmen were certainly proving this to be so during 1958. Not yet drowned by rock and roll, jazz was the youth culture music of the cognoscenti, those who, digging both modern American records and Continental fashion, were laying the groundwork of the first phase of ‘Mod.’ But there was more to 1958 than aping the mannerisms of others. London had its own scene and its own style – a Soho kind of sound – centred around clubs like the Flamingo and bands like the Jazz Couriers and there was seemingly no shortage of visiting US jazz giants, from Dizzy Gillespie to Dave Brubeck, queing up to give their approval for music they thought world class. Soho Scene ‘58 tells the story of this heady time; a Year Zero for Modernism in which London began to swing its way towards the 1960s, jazz setting the pace as never before.

First time on vinyl for this album. Proto Jazz-Punk multi-genre splatter album, released on CD in 1993, My Wife Doesn’t Understand Me is available on vinyl for the first time as a double LP, playing at 45rpm for superior sound quality. The accompanying download includes radio edits of live favourite 6-8-1 (The Burn-Up) and Blue Funk, plus Ructions (60s Stereo Mix) and Qualm-Free Zone. A statement of intent from the off, this is an album first and foremost. No singles, a piece of work to be listened to as a whole - from short shards of humorous observation (Cover Versions), politics (Margaret Thatcher We Still Hate You), straight-as-a-die covers (A Taste Of Honey and Jean-Pierre) to the closing Musique Concrete of the title track, prisoners were never taken. Terry Edwards and The Scapegoats look forward to the vinyl edition of My Wife Doesn’t Understand Me to bemuse, baffle and delight once again as it did on it’s release when Acid House was on it’s way out and Britpop was on it’s way in.

LIMITED EDITION CLEAR VINYL

LIMITED EDITION CLEAR VINYL

LIMITED EDITION CLEAR VINYL