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Lunar Tredd – Fimber Bravo’s first album on Moshi Moshi since the much acclaimed Con-Fusion – tells the tale. The highlife fusion of You Can’t Control Me resonates in the wake of the global Black Lives Matters protests. There is fire in these impactful clarion calls to resist oppression, recognise strength in resilience and fight against the corruption of power.

Bravo’s been a constant collaborative force - as his time as leader of 20th Century Steel Band, as musical director of Steel ‘n’ Skin, and appearances with everyone from Sun Ra Arkestra to Hot Chip, shows. Lunar Tredd reflects the influence of the music handed down to him by “ancestors” . Helped by an enviable cast of friends and collaborators, Fimber has shifted those touchstones to create something that sounds resolutely like the here and now.

Those friends that appear on Lunar Tredd, include Alexis Taylor of Hot Chip and The Horrors’ Tom Furse; The Invisible drummer Leo Taylor and Senegalese percussionist, Mamadou Sarr dropping in on rhythm duties, while there are also appearances from Susumu Mukai aka Zongamin, the brilliant Kora player Kadialy Kouyate, vocalist Cottie Williams, Vanishing Twin’s Catherine Lucas, and production from Lapo Frost and Ghostpoet producer Shuta Shinoda. Some, like Zongamin and Williams go way back with Fimber, other connections are newer, but all have quickly become part of the London-based musician’s musical family.

Indeed, Fimber never loses sight of where he’s come from on LUNAR TREDD - even as he looks to where he might go next. As a musician, he’s still finding new creative peaks nearly 50 years after he began.

Melbourne born-and-raised musician, Jordan Brando, lands on Shall Not Fade's Killer Cuts imprint for his debut on the label, seven tracks that show impressive variety in his
production and include two vocalist features. "Moment in Time" is a versatile release with fully-fledged radio playable songs and a host of dancefloor heaters.

After hitting big with "Rockin'" in 2019 and touring Australia supporting the likes of Fisher, Brando now demonstrates the depth and breadth of his musical style in this full-length EP, opening out with the title track - a unique song featuring fellow Melbourne local Vincent Sole. From the glitchy intro the song hits a house beat to get you tapping along but then contrasts this with Sole's silky smooth vocals and disco guitar trills. Following on from this are two more classic dance tracks - "Elsewhere" chops up rnb vocals across a swirling bassline - day party gear - while "Broken Dub" shows Brando's abilities to draw from a range of genres, a pacey breaksy number that tempts a reload.

The record's B-side also contrasts club tracks with vocal features; "Conflict" is the most headsy track on the record, a harder beat and snarling bass for sweaty clubs. Brando returns to his house roots with "Let Me Be The Reason", centering on an earworm diva vocal sample. Sandwiching the record with two vocal features, "You Might Be Surprised" ft. China takes her enticing wordless vocalisations and lays them over a driving electro bassline, an adventurous pairing that fits perfectly. Digital bonus track "Breaking You" is a pure adrenaline floorfiller of deep techy inflections.

“I made this record for young women to feel invincible.” - Izzy B. Phillips, Black Honey Having last week been pre-empted by the landing of their colossal new single ‘Run For Cover’, today Black Honey have announced their brand-new album – ‘Written & Directed’. ‘Written & Directed’ will be released on the 29 th of January 2021 on Foxfive Records. ‘Written & Directed’ is Black Honey’s second album. It follows their outstanding self-titled debut released back in 2018 when the world that surrounded the Brighton four piece looked and felt like a very different place. Black Honey however are still the bad-ass, truly original band they have always been, they’ve just graduated from the intriguingly anomalous newcomers to becoming one of UK indie’s most singular outfits. They've travelled the world and released a Top 40 album; graced the cover of the NME and become the faces and soundtrack of Roberto Cavalli's Milan Fashion Week show; smashed Glastonbury and supported Queens of the Stone Age, all without compromising a shred of the wild, wicked vision they first set out with. It's now time for the next instalment of their story – ‘Written & Directed” – which see’s Black Honey deliver one, very singular, message – a 10 track mission statement that aims to unashamedly plant a flag in the ground for strong, world-conquering women. For fierce frontwoman and album protagonist Izzy B. Phillips – it’s the most important message she could send to inspire her cult-like fanbase and fill the female-shaped gap that she felt so acutely when she was growing up and discovering rock music for the first time. Written throughout 2019 and recorded in fits and spurts between touring, ‘Written & Directed’ is drenched with a hedonistic, anything-goes attitude. It’s also the most full-throttle collection of music that Black Honey have ever-written – egged-on by their run of shows supporting long-term friends and collaborators Royal Blood. Exploring everything from womanhood, to identity and power, it’s an album that revels in the rich history of pop culture, throws a wink to its rock- and-roll heroes, but ultimately (and in true Black Honey fashion) it stands on its own two feet. With a typically hyper-visual world referencing grindhouse cinema, kitschy pulp films and a flip-reverse of female cinematic representation all primed to unfurl and explode around them, 'Written & Directed' is the sound of Black Honey strapping in and saddling up, of harnessing their quirks, and, as the Phillips has always hoped, riding them joyously into the sunset.

Hedvig Mollestad Thomassen - guitar/Ellen Brekken - bass/Ivar Loe Bjornstad - drums. Only nine months after her momentous debut solo album Ekhidna, the guitarist is back fronting her trio. With their previous album, Smells Funny, this explosive and expansive trio experienced a breakthrough of sorts, having gone from strength to strength through five albums since their 2011 debut Shoot!, gathering respect from both rock and jazz camps, sharing big stages with the likes of John McLaughlin and Black Sabbath, and being equally comfortable on jazz and rock stages. Hedvig enforced this breakthrough with Ekhidna, appearing on both jazz and rock best of 2020 lists, like coming in third in Prog's "Album of the Year" poll. She was included in Downbeat's "25 for the future" and received heaps of international attention and great reviews.With the hypnotic title track, the spacious ballad Four Candles and generally a more varied mood, Ding Dong. You're Dead. is the trio's most dynamic album to date. That said there's still enough solid and creative riffing here to satisfy the headbangers, as well as the jazzheads, as they further explore the free and open landscapes most notably started with their Black Stabat Mater album and continued with Smells Funny. As Nate Chinen wrote about "Black Stabat Mater" in JazzTimes: Her trio, which has Ellen Brekken on bass and Ivar Loe Bjornstad on drums, caught my ear then with its audacious style references: the loose swagger of early Black Sabbath; the density and prowl of peak Led Zeppelin; the expeditionary urge of Jimi Hendrix; the incantatory fervor of John McLaughlin. As recent performances have shown, online and in the flesh, this trio radiates confidence and have become a surefire hit on the Norwegian live scene. Hedvig first picked up her mother's acoustic guitar at ten, before discovering a whole new world through her father's jazz and rock record collection as a teenager. She was given her first electric guitar and amplifier as a confirmation present. Hedvig met Ellen and Ivar at the Music Academy in Oslo and asked them to join her after she received the Young Jazz Talent of the Year award at Molde International Jazzfestival in 2009. They have stayed together since, and all previous albums have been released on Rune Grammofon to wide international acclaim.

Hedvig Mollestad Thomassen - guitar/Ellen Brekken - bass/Ivar Loe Bjornstad - drums. Only nine months after her momentous debut solo album Ekhidna, the guitarist is back fronting her trio. With their previous album, Smells Funny, this explosive and expansive trio experienced a breakthrough of sorts, having gone from strength to strength through five albums since their 2011 debut Shoot!, gathering respect from both rock and jazz camps, sharing big stages with the likes of John McLaughlin and Black Sabbath, and being equally comfortable on jazz and rock stages. Hedvig enforced this breakthrough with Ekhidna, appearing on both jazz and rock best of 2020 lists, like coming in third in Prog's "Album of the Year" poll. She was included in Downbeat's "25 for the future" and received heaps of international attention and great reviews.With the hypnotic title track, the spacious ballad Four Candles and generally a more varied mood, Ding Dong. You're Dead. is the trio's most dynamic album to date. That said there's still enough solid and creative riffing here to satisfy the headbangers, as well as the jazzheads, as they further explore the free and open landscapes most notably started with their Black Stabat Mater album and continued with Smells Funny. As Nate Chinen wrote about "Black Stabat Mater" in JazzTimes: Her trio, which has Ellen Brekken on bass and Ivar Loe Bjornstad on drums, caught my ear then with its audacious style references: the loose swagger of early Black Sabbath; the density and prowl of peak Led Zeppelin; the expeditionary urge of Jimi Hendrix; the incantatory fervor of John McLaughlin. As recent performances have shown, online and in the flesh, this trio radiates confidence and have become a surefire hit on the Norwegian live scene. Hedvig first picked up her mother's acoustic guitar at ten, before discovering a whole new world through her father's jazz and rock record collection as a teenager. She was given her first electric guitar and amplifier as a confirmation present. Hedvig met Ellen and Ivar at the Music Academy in Oslo and asked them to join her after she received the Young Jazz Talent of the Year award at Molde International Jazzfestival in 2009. They have stayed together since, and all previous albums have been released on Rune Grammofon to wide international acclaim.

- The definitive overview of one of Canada's unsung musical heroes - Rare/previously unreleased recordings, photos, and interviews - Lyrics, discography, and filmography - Audio re-mastered by John Baldwin Mastering - Artwork by Christi Belcourt and Alanna Edwards - Liner notes by Kevin Howes (Voluntary In Nature) - Contributions from the Dunn family, Bob Robb, and Alanis Obomsawin (OC) // How did you first experience the poetry, music, and film of Willie Dunn? In a Montreal coffeehouse during the mid-1960s? On a CBC Indian Magazine broadcast with host Johnny Yesno? At a Toronto record store or Native Friendship Centre at the turn of the 1970s? Waiting outside of the Mohawk Nation Longhouse? Maybe in your parent's record collection on the Rez? A White Roots of Peace gathering? Pow wow? The Mariposa Folk Festival? Or was it that Save James Bay Benefit back in '73? On a good friend's stereo? Sitting around a crackling campfire? How about an old NFB film reel or VHS tape in high school? Or while attending Manitou College? A German concert hall in the 1980s? Maybe a direct action protest on the colonial streets of Canada? Busking in Ottawa during the 1990s? College radio? At Willie's celebration of life service in 2013 alongside Alanis Obomsawin and Willy Mitchell? LITA's Grammy-nominated Native North America (Vol. 1) compilation or the very anthology you hold in your hands? There should be no judgment for coming to things when you do. All that's important is remaining open to life-changing messages such as these_ Willie Dunn shared truth through song and celluloid. His original composition, "I Pity the Country," is an unparalleled statement on the greed and hate created by humankind, recorded in 1971 and still unfortunately needed today. "It's like the reason you're supposed to make music," said Kurt Vile about the song to MOJO Magazine in 2015. With "Charlie," Willie was the first to deliver the devastating story of Chanie Wenjack and the Canadian residential school system to the music community, nearly 50 years before the much-celebrated Secret Path, yet ignored outside of Indian Country and the folk festival circuit. Dunn's film technique, featured in 1968's The Ballad of Crowfoot (NFB), predates the "Ken Burns effect" to great effect. Are you catching the drift? Willie Dunn was not only a trailblazing leader in his time, but well ahead of the curve, simply without the PR push and big money backing of major label players. "He was our Leonard Cohen," said singer-songwriter Eric Landry about his musical hero. The only difference is that Willie refused to play the Hollywood showbiz game. In talent, he is Cohen, Dylan, and Cash rolled into one and along with Buffy Sainte-Marie, Floyd Red Crow Westerman, and A. Paul Ortega, brought a new set of perspectives and realities to the folk music tradition. Willie spoke directly to his people and Mother Earth through his creations, not only from experience but by examining his roots and connecting with the world in which he lived. We are humbled to help honor Willie Dunn. May he never be forgotten_ PEACE

Calgary songwriter Chad VanGaalen’s new album, ‘World’s Most Stressed Out
Gardener’, is a psychedelic bumper crop. A collection of tunes that does away with
obsessiveness, the anxiety of perfectionism, in favour of freshness and immediacy -
capturing the world as it was met while recording alone at home over a period of
years. “Don’t overthink it,” VanGaalen told himself again and again, despite the
push/pull love/hate of his relationship with songwriting. “I’m always trying to get
outside of the song - but then I realize I love the song.”
This is a record that gleams with VanGaalen’s musical signatures: found sound,
reverb, polychromatic folk music that is by turns cartoonish and hyperphysical - like
ultra-magnified footage of a virus or a leaf. Apparently, the album began life as a
“pretty minimal” flute record. (There’s only a vestige now, on ‘Flute Peace’, one of
three instrumentals.) Later it became an electronic record “for a while” and finally,
“right at the last second,” it “turned into a pile of garbage.” The good kind of
garbage: glinting, useful, free. Music as compost - leaves and branches ready to be
re-ingested by the earth, turned into a flower.
Throughout these 40 minutes, VanGaalen floats from mania to solace to oblivion,
searching for zen in all the wrong places. “Turn up the radio / I think we’re dead,”
he sings on ‘Nothing Is Strange’; or, on the inside-out rocker ‘Nightmare Scenario’:
“You’re stressed out when you should be feeling very well.” The singer’s mental
landscape is rotting and redemptive, beautiful in spite of itself - and his soundscapes
reflect this fertile decay.
He has been influenced by his instrumental work on TV scores (Dream Corp’s third
season began this fall) but still “nothing can really replace the human voice,” he
admits. Like Arthur Russell or Syd Barrett, it’s VanGaalen’s vocals that shine a path
through the swampland - from the cello-lashed ‘Water Brother’ to ‘Starlight’’s
krautrock pipe-dream.
These days, VanGaalen cherishes the privacy of the studio, the capacity to wander
around, get distracted, and “move at the speed of life.” Whereas once he would
obsess over mic techniques, now he puts the microphone in the same place every
time - trying to capture a song quickly, the idea at its heart. He’ll act on his
infatuations - for the flute, a squeaky clarinet, his basement’s copper plumbing
(remade into xylophones for ‘Samurai Sword’) - and then he’ll try to get out, “veering
away from responsibility,” before he overdoes his stay.
In the end, it’s like gardening. You have to live with your horrible decision-making;
the weather’s going to mess with you if it wants to; and if you plant a hundred
heads of broccoli, “now you gotta eat a hundred heads of broccoli - or watch them
go to seed.” But mostly VanGaalen just tries to be a deer: “I remember seeing some
deer come out in the Okanagan Valley once,” he says, “watching them wait for a
sunbeam to hit a perfect bunch of grapes - and then eating them right out of the
sunbeam. I’d recommend that.”
Initial LP copies pressed on clear with gold, red and blue high melt coloured vinyl.

Music For Soundtracks is an album of ten ambient, atmospheric pieces Richard Norris has recently created for film and TV.
They feature in BAFTA winning director Kieran Evans’ recent Sky Arts documentary ‘Cold War Steve Meets The Outside World’, as well as Marc Issacs’ latest film ‘The Filmmaker’s House’. The tracks range from widescreen electronic dance to immersive deep listening cuts, all with a marked sense of space and landscape. Dive in…

On a newly arisen Amsterdam – Berlin axis, Daniel Monaco and Sauvage World unite for their first collaboration EP on San Francisco based Roam Recordings.

“Paninari On Acid” is a twisted tribute to the first golden age of Italian electronic music. Israeli talent Niv Ast turns the trip into a dance floor bomb, leaving no choice but to move with its chubby bass and synthetic lead lines.

“Teneré” was not only one of Milan’s paninari favourite motorbikes but – most importantly – means “desert” in the Touareg language. This is where Monaco and Sauvage World are taking you for a lysergic adventure filled with sand through a solitary land.

Fabrizio Mammarella brings it back to the age of the machines and delivers an hypnotizing electro version, brilliantly mixing the Arabic tinged nuance of the original with unstoppable killer rhythms and robotic vocals.

Multidimensional duo Divide and Dissolve release their third full length studio album ‘Gas Lit’ on Invada Records, produced by Ruban Neilson of Unknown Mortal Orchestra.
Divide and Dissolve members Takiaya Reed (saxophone, guitar, live effects) and Sylvie Nehill (drums, live effects) create instrumental music that is both heavy and beautiful, classically influenced yet thrillingly contemporary and powerfully expressive and communicative. Their music has the ability to speak without words and utilises frequencies to interact with the naturally occurring resonance.
The CD is presented as a digipack.
The vinyl is pressed on 180g Transparent Red vinyl and comes housed in a heavyweight spined sleeve with printed insert and digital download card.
‘We Are Really Worried About You’ presents a formidable saxophone sound giving way to a surge of crushing percussion and heavy guitar riffs. ‘Denial’ is a potent blend of Takiaya’s ominous and unsettling sax that blows wide open into riff city for almost eight glorious minutes. Both tracks encapsulate the message behind the music: to undermine and destroy the white supremacist colonial frameworks and to fight for indigenous sovereignty, black and indigenous liberation, water, earth and indigenous land given back.
For fans of James Baldwin, Osa Atoe, Adrienne Davies, the ocean and freshwater, breath/breathing, Toni Morrison, Octavia Butler, Afro futurism, indigenous futurism, indigenous sovereignty, slavery abolition, resistance, the forest, bodies of water, being submerged, the railroad and Ai Ogawa.

Cool Ghouls - a band fledged in San Francisco on house shows, minimum wage jobs, BBQ's in Golden Gate Park and the romance of a city’s psychedelic history turns 10 this year. What better a decennial celebration than the release of their fourth album, At George's Zoo!

How did San Francisco's fab four arrive at George's Zoo? The teenage friendship of complimentary spirits Pat McDonald (Guitar/Vox) and Pat Thomas (Bass/Vox) serves as square one. The Patricks were munching on Eggo-waffle-sandwiches and downing warm vokda in suburban Benicia (San Francisco bay) years before McDonald would hear George Clinton address his fans as "Cool Ghouls". The boys played their debut gig as Cool Ghouls at San Francisco's legendary The Stud in 2011, but there's no doubt the musical moment cementing the band's trajectory was much earlier at the 18th birthday party for boy-wonder Ryan Wong (Guitar/Vox) - at the Wong household.

You might remember the Ghouls' earliest days... McDonald’s hair hung luxuriously past his waist, Thomas dreamt of no longer having to crash on friends' couches to call SF home and Wong looked forward to turning 21. Cool Ghouls' Pete Best, Cody Voorhees, thrashed wildly – but briefly - on the drums and Alex Fleshman (Drums), who still claims he's not really "a drummer", turned out to be a really good drummer. Thomas would sleep pee on tour. Those were golden days!

Flash forward to today and everything is up in flames. No shows, parties or bars. Cool people are streaming out of SF. It's been 2 years since the last time Cool Ghouls have even played. The STUD is gone, The Eagle Tavern is for sale and The Hemlock has been demolished for condos. Your boss is an app. Fascism is no-knocking down the door. There's a pandemic.

Fortunately for us, the Ghouls got an album in before it all went to shit, and they made it count. At George's Zoo includes 15 of the 27 tunes they managed to eke out while simultaneously working through major life moves. It was a 5-month, all out, final sprint down the homestretch (to Ryan's moving day) with affable engineer Robby Joseph, at his makeshift garage studio in the Outer Sunset (pictured on the cover). Instead of recording the entire album over a few consecutive days - like they'd done with Tim Cohen, Sonny Smith and Kelley Stoltz for the first three LPs - the band took it slow by working through a few songs each weekend after rehearsing them the week before. Robby would cue up the tape, McDonald would throw some steaks on the grill and they'd get to work - much to the neighbor, George's, chagrin.

These guys have a real commitment to elevating as songwriters, musicians and ensemble players. It's always been for the music with Cool Ghouls and this long-awaited self-produced outing is a track by track display of the ground they've covered and heights they can achieve. Their vocals and trademark harmonies are front and center and out-of-control-good. Ryan's guitar solos are incredible. The horns by Danny Brown (sax) and Andrew Stephens (trumpet) hit in all the right places. Maestro, Henry Baker (Pat Thomas Band / Tino Drima), plays keys throughout. There's even a mesmerizing string section ("Land Song") by sonic polyglot, Dylan Edrich.

None of this growth is to the detriment of the fun, natural, feeling that fans have come to expect from the band. This is a fully realized Cool Ghouls album. It paints a remarkable portrait of SF's homegrown heroes and the many corners they've explored over the last decade. The songwriting, harmony and playing are nothing if not solid. The lyrics are keen. Robby's recording and mixing sound great start to finish and even better after mastering by Mikey Young. It's a triumphant addition to their catalogue. Recommended for Stooges and Beach Boys fans alike. Listen and see!

Yes, many things have changed since 2011. Who knows what the 20's will have in store for life on Earth, let alone the Cool Ghouls? We at least know that 2021 has At George's Zoo for us, a beautiful keepsake from the Before Times when we used to stand in living rooms together while bands played.

Mondo, in collaboration with Back Lot Music, is proud to present a vinyl pressing of James Newton Howard's Golden Globe Nominated score to Universal Pictures’ powerful new film from acclaimed filmmaker Paul Greengrass, News of The World.

Set five years after the end of the Civil War, News of the World follows Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd (Tom Hanks), a veteran of three wars, who now moves from town to town as a non-fiction storyteller, sharing the news of presidents and queens, glorious feuds, devastating catastrophes, and gripping adventures from the far reaches of the globe.

In the plains of Texas, Kidd crosses paths with Cicada, aka Johanna Leonberger (Helena Zengel, System Crasher), a 10-year-old taken in by the Kiowa people six years earlier and raised as one of their own. Johanna, hostile to a world she’s never experienced, is being returned to her biological aunt and uncle against her will. Kidd reluctantly agrees to deliver the child to where the law says she belongs. As they travel hundreds of miles into the unforgiving wilderness, the two will face tremendous challenges of both human and natural forces as they search for a place that either can call home.

The film is a moving exploration of our present through the lens of our past, and the music by eight-time Academy Award® nominee James Newton Howard (The Hunger Games, The Sixth Sense, Signs, The Fugitive) is innovative, emotional, and beautiful, as it follows Captain Kidd’s journey from regret to redemption. A haunted, and healing sound of vintage Americana floods from your speakers as the tender strings and piano guide you over gorgeous landscapes.

Overview:
British hard-rock heroes, Thunder, release their 13th studio album ‘All The Right Noises’ on 12th March 2020. The album is a return to the full-throttle sound of Thunder that has seen them create a hugely successful 30+ year career at the forefront of British rock, all built around the lifelong friendship of vocalist extraordinaire Danny Bowes and songwriting genius and guitarist Luke Morley. ‘All The Right Noises’ is an intense confection of illicit charms that reasserts their authority as the number one band in the land. Recorded in the months leading up to the first Covid-19 lockdown, it was originally due for release in September 2020. Strange to reflect then on how much of the new material appears to address the challenging new world we now inhabit. On the album, Luke says “ All the songs were written and recorded pre-Covid. But it is interesting how if you look at some of the tracks through the prism of Covid they still make a
lot of sense.” The volcanic lead single from the album, ‘Last One Out Turn Off The Lights’ could easily be mistaken for world-ending lockdown rage. But, says Luke, “That was directly about Brexit, but you could apply it to everything else.” The track is indicative of both the ferocity and message of the album as a whole, with subjects tackled including depression, mental health, and diversity

‘All The Right Noises’ follows on from 2019’s stripped back and reimagined album, ‘Please Remain Seated’ which continued their consecutive Top 10 UK Album Chart run since their ecstatically received comeback six years ago. It is another chapter in the band’s incredibly successful history that has seen them create a succession of some of the most highly-regarded rock albums of the past 30 years. The key to their renown: brilliantly conceived top-drawer material. Thunder is the last of the true British rock giants.

Overview:
British hard-rock heroes, Thunder, release their 13th studio album ‘All The Right Noises’ on 12th March 2020. The album is a return to the full-throttle sound of Thunder that has seen them create a hugely successful 30+ year career at the forefront of British rock, all built around the lifelong friendship of vocalist extraordinaire Danny Bowes and songwriting genius and guitarist Luke Morley. ‘All The Right Noises’ is an intense confection of illicit charms that reasserts their authority as the number one band in the land. Recorded in the months leading up to the first Covid-19 lockdown, it was originally due for release in September 2020. Strange to reflect then on how much of the new material appears to address the challenging new world we now inhabit. On the album, Luke says “ All the songs were written and recorded pre-Covid. But it is interesting how if you look at some of the tracks through the prism of Covid they still make a
lot of sense.” The volcanic lead single from the album, ‘Last One Out Turn Off The Lights’ could easily be mistaken for world-ending lockdown rage. But, says Luke, “That was directly about Brexit, but you could apply it to everything else.” The track is indicative of both the ferocity and message of the album as a whole, with subjects tackled including depression, mental health, and diversity

‘All The Right Noises’ follows on from 2019’s stripped back and reimagined album, ‘Please Remain Seated’ which continued their consecutive Top 10 UK Album Chart run since their ecstatically received comeback six years ago. It is another chapter in the band’s incredibly successful history that has seen them create a succession of some of the most highly-regarded rock albums of the past 30 years. The key to their renown: brilliantly conceived top-drawer material. Thunder is the last of the true British rock giants.

Originally released in 1980, ‘Amanita’ is an early approach of Canadian artist Sherine Cisco, formerly known as Stu Cisco, to the limitless world of synthesizers in music, through ambient, progressive rock and drone noise.

A unique combination of ambient, progressive rock and even drone noises and space-age that converged in ‘Amanita’, her first full album and a piece of music history. This LP marks a milestone in the investigation, experimentation and evolution of musical instruments, where the Mini Moog demonstrated its versatility and creative potential, opening Sherine a path of limitless possibilities.

By the time ‘Amanita’ was first released in 1980 (only 300 copies were pressed at the time), Sherine had been playing synths for seven years. But far from acknowledging how traditional instruments were played, she tried to do things her own way, creating moving landscapes and a unique language of sound. This DIY approach to music was, as well how the album was made, in her own studio, with synthesizers that were originally meant for live performances such as the Elka Rhapsody or the Elektro Harmonix, channeled through a Dokorder 4 Tape Recorder.

However, what Sherine Cisco was living in her personal life, a gender transition, was as important to the record as the instruments she used to create it. “Beginning in the early 1980's, I began experimenting with taking the female hormone, estrogen. I felt like I was gradually being re-born. It affected my music, the mood of the music, and me, physically and mentally”.

A spacey vibe surrounds each of the 12 cuts that compose ‘Amanita’, waving from ambient to experimental music, introducing drone noises that add mystery to the whole piece and creating epic moments, with the Mini Moog accompanied by Randy Gray’s drums. To close things off, a synth pop infused track works as a masterpiece ending to this story.

In Zusammenarbeit mit dem britischen Entwickler-Studio Kaizen Game Works veröffentlicht das Kölner Soundtrack-Label Black Screen Records im Frühjahr 2021 Barry "Epoch" Toppings funkigen "City-Pop meets Vaporwave"-Soundtrack zu dem von der internationalen Gaming-Presse gefeierten Open World Adventure Game Paradise Killer auf Vinyl. Barrys Toppings Soundtrack erscheint auf limitiertem 180g Curacao & Pink Doppel-Vinyl und kommt in einem von 80er Animes & City Pop-Alben inspirierten Artwork der deutschen Designerin Mizucat. Zudem enthält das Vinyl ein gefaltetes A2 Poster und einen Download Code. Die Sounds des Paradieses. Die Musik eines kosmischen Traums. Tracks einer anderen Realität. Das Tempo eines Verbrechens, dass alle Verbrechen beendet. Der Beat von lange verlorenen außerirdischen Göttern. Die Playlist des "Investigation Freaks". Lass dich von der Musik ins Paradies führen. Fühle die glühend heiße Sonne auf deiner Haut. Rieche unerträglich heißen Beton. Genieße den süßen Geschmack von Verbrechen, begangen, auf einer tropischen Insel in einer alternativen Realität. Erinnerst du dich daran, wie wir am Strand getanzt haben? Neben den paradiesischen Straßen? Du hast mir dieses Mix-Tape auf dem Dach deines Apartments gemacht. Wir haben den Mond angestarrt. Du sagtest, du würdest den Mond töten. Ich glaubte dir nicht. Wie falsch ich doch lag.

British artist Robin Rimbaud (Scanner) traverses the experimental terrain between sound and space connecting a bewilderingly diverse array of genres. Since 1991 he has been intensely active in sonic art, producing concerts, installations and recordings, the albums Mass Observation (1994), Delivery (1997), and The Garden is Full of Metal (1998) hailed by critics innovative and inspirational works of contemporary electronic music. Committed to working with cutting edge practitioners he has collaborated with Bryan Ferry, Wayne McGregor, Mike Kelley, Carsten Nicolai, Michael Nyman, Steve McQueen, Laurie Anderson and Hussein Chalayan, amongst many others.

Rimbaud first met Belgian artist Hans Op de Beeck at Le Fresnoy Studio national des Arts Contemporains when they were both Visiting Professors in 2012. Op de Beeck lives and works in Brussels, Belgium and creates sculpture, installations, video, photography, animated films, drawing, painting, and writing. His various works show the viewer non-existent, but identifiable places, moments and characters that appear to have been taken from everyday life.

The artists found an immediate creative connection, and a year after meeting Staging Silence (2) was completed. In 2019, they returned to the theme and created Staging Silence (3).

Each of the films is realised through the same principles, as two pairs of anonymous hands construct and deconstruct fictional interiors and landscapes on a mini film set of just three-square metres in size. The films take the viewer on a visual journey through depopulated, enigmatic and often melancholic, but nonetheless playful, small-scaled places, which are built up and taken down before the eye of the camera.

Ranging from hyper-realistic fictional land and cityscapes to absurd, almost surreal, dreamscapes, the various locations are connected by the sense of mystery and melancholy that pervades them. And at every moment Rimbaud's score is amplifying and illustrating these moments, from tragedy to nostalgia, witty to optimistic.

Introspective and lyrical, Staging Silence offers us a world of mystery and intrigue, held together by nature and time. This is a very humane works experienced at a time when many of us feel disconnected from the world around us. The peculiar silence that permeates this hauntingly beautiful work is very much an illustration of our times, anticipating a future in the past. Staging Silence is an exquisite study in dreamlike abstract ambience, a kaleidoscope of sounds and tones that engage the head and the heart.

Guedra Guedra presents Vexillology, an elevation of tribal consciousness and futurism from underground musical universes. The album offers listeners an immersive experience made from hypnotic and rhythmic arrangements, rooted in ancient culture. Referring as much to Sub-Saharan as to North African cultures, Guedra Guedra presents a synthesis of his pan-African appreciation and a full immersion into the traditional rhythms of these lands, especially within the Berber culture which is found in countries such as his home of Morocco, and across Tunisia, Algeria, Libya, Northern Mali, Northern Niger and beyond. The body of work is a complete celebration of cultural roots and future bass, bubbling in hotbeds of the global underground. Guedra Guedra is synonymously known for his ability to explore tribal rhythms and instruments of the past, as well as dancefloor innovations from contemporary underground scenes. For Vexillology and in true Guedra Guedra style, a myriad of immersive recording techniques were applied. The album is built upon a multitude of field recordings capturing live and 'in the moment' cultural happenings, encountered in everyday life, at tribal festivities and also on his travels. By also using video in his field recordings, Guedra Guedra enables himself to encapsulate the heat and entirety of the moment, applying this 'moment' and evolving it into his productions.

WRWTFWW Records is beaucoup happy to announce the official reissue of Pierre Barouh's hard-to-describe-but-easy-to-enjoy French flair meets Japanese avant-garde lost treasure of experimental-electronic-chanson-pop with a new-wave-minimal-bossa touch, Le Pollen. Originally recorded July 1982 at Nippon Columbia Studio in Tokyo and composed, arranged, and played by a who's who of Japan's most groundbreaking musicians of the 80s, the album comes as a LP with bonus 7inch, housed in a heavy sleeve displaying two immaculate photos of Barouh and holding a printed lyrics insert.

A free-spirited world traveler with an incredible ear for music, Paris-born singer and activist Pierre Barouh introduced the sounds of Brazil (and more) to Europe and pushed the envelope with his pio-neering label Saravah, home of adventurous innovators Brigitte Fontaine, Areski, Jacques Higelin, Naná Vasconcelos, and Roland Bocquet's Catharsis among many others. His bohemian border-free vision of modern chanson, blending musical tradition from various parts of the globe with forward-looking artistry, resonated particularly well in Japan, where the scene spearheaded by Yellow Magic Orchestra fell in love with everything Barouh.

And so one day in 1981, Pierre Barouh received an invitation from a Japanese label to come record an album in Tokyo. Not one to turn down an escapade around the world, the French visionary jumped on a plane and landed in a studio surrounded with a dream line-up of musicians: Yukihiro Takahashi (who had named his solo debut Saravah! after Barouh's imprint) and Ryuichi Sakamoto of YMO, Yasuaki Shimizu and his Mariah bandmates Masanori Sasaji and Hideo Yamaki, members of the Moonriders, Motohiko Hamase, Mitsuru Sawamura of Interior, Kazuhiko Katoh and the list goes on. Also participating in the making of the album were longtime collaborator Francis Laï and the mys-terious and beautiful David Sylvian.

The result is Le Pollen, a sincere and affectionate mix of nouveau chanson, techno-pop, post-punk, jazz, bossa, ambient, and minimalism. And probably something else entirely. Honestly impossible to classify in a particular genre, Pierre Barouh's fascinating cosmopolitan music melting pot is, above all, a reassuring ode to humanity, where friendship, exchange, and collaborative creativity breeze freely. Making music together. It's all love.

Pierre Barouh sadly passed away in December 2016, leaving behind a monumental legacy of music and art for us to cherish, and a life philosophy that's well worth considering:

La vie, qu'elle soit longue ou brève
Moi, tous mes rêves
Je les prends toujours au sérieux
Quand l'utopie brise les chaînes
C'est l'oxygène,
De ceux qui sont restés curieux

Life, be it long or brief
Me, all my dreams
I always take them seriously
When utopia breaks the chains
It's the oxygen,
Of those who've remained curious

From the song "L'Autre Rive" on Le Pollen.

Next up on MOM is another exploration of the link between art and music. This time it is dance performance. The musical artist is Okkre (Uge Pañeda) producer of the Spanish duo LCC, who have released two albums on the celebrated Austrian imprint, Editions Mego. Okkre is a composer of soundtracks, DJ and she is currently immersed in researching her "landscapes series" project, connecting countries and cultures that are seemingly unconnected to each other through field recordings... MOM 012 is the soundtrack to a very special performance named ÉPICA. Directed by Barcelona based choreographer Aimar Pérez Galí, it was premiered at Sonar 2017. EPICA brings clubbing culture inside the theatre, to deliver a highly energetic performance, joining bodies, sound and voices of historic and political dissidence. It is about communication between bodies (without language) and the liberty of being on the dancefloor. Freedom of movement, expression and happiness through music! Okkre has provided a startling soundtrack. This soundtrack complements the performance of the dancers beautifully but also deserves to be listened on its own. It is both powerful and dramatic, fitting the title. The music of the soundtrack has been adapted for its imminent release on vinyl. The piece begins with the rhythmic movement of beats, which provides a structured backdrop. They are complemented by a swirling bassline. Overlayed percussion of differing styles comes in and out. Harsh almost metallic synths enter after a few minutes, which also have the sensation of breathing. Later on, powerful synths battle sturdy cymbal assisted percussion. In the latter stages, everything gets even more intense techno feel and the A Side ends with dense dark synths. The music is alive! While the other side gently mixes a melodic bassline that moves like the wind with intertwined chorus and voices, which appeal to the spirit of the artistic work, evoking space for feeling and touching. At the same time, insistent beats offer a club feeling. Scary yet empowering strings create a hypnotic atmosphere alongside falling keys and vocal impressions. The final few minutes provides a strong climax to the record. This features hammering beats, a circling bass and powerful keys. A mighty performance! ÉPICA is indeed epic.

No other pairing in the history of Darkwave ever matched the unfettered creativity, resolve, and DIY attitude from the collaboration between the two creative minds that compromise Lebanon Hanover.

The meeting of the Swiss musician Larissa Georgiou, aka Larissa Iceglass and British artist William Maybelline a decade ago in the latter’s hometown of Sunderland in the UK, was a monumental occasion, reverberating throughout the European music scene and even across the Atlantic.

Lebanon Hanover would emerge from the peak of the world-wide minimal wave revival, with their 2011 split 7-inch record with La Fete Triste issued as the catalog debut of Europe’s most ubiquitous Techno-Industrial EBM labels, Aufnahme + Wiedergabe

With Berlin as their new physical home, William and Larissa would soon, however, join the Fabrika Records family. From here, they would go on to release two full-length albums through the Athens based label, starting in early 2012 with their winter debut LP The World Is Getting Colder, and it’s All Hallows Eve follow up Why Not Just Be Solo.

It was Lebanon Hanover’s 2013 third studio outing Tomb for Two that would go on to cement the duo’s legacy, with the album’s single “Gallow Dance” becoming a post-punk anthem for the times, with artwork became the band’s defacto logo. Not only that, the song “Sadness is Rebellion”, also featured on the album, became the band’s official Mantra.

Two years would pass before the release of 2015’s critically acclaimed fourth record, “Besides the Abyss”. In the intervening years, William and Larissa, initially a couple, would find other partners, and relocate to Athens.

Meanwhile, Lebanon Hanover as a live act would expand rapidly in popularity, exceeding capacity during their performances at Wave Gotik Treffen in Leipzig, and performing sold-out shows across Europe and the UK.

With the playful Babes of the 80s maxi-single released in the interim, three years would pass before the next record from Lebanon Hanover, with 2018’s Let Them Be Alien, the band’s fifth studio album.

At the dawn of the global pandemic, where dystopian nightmares that were only ever seen before within the pages of books and flashes of silver screen celluloid, has become a daily reality, a new kind of darkness envelops the world. It was at this Lebanon Hanover returned, sharing a glimmer of hope with the single “The Last Thing,” the duo’s first song from their forthcoming sixth studio album Sci-Fi Sky.

Spanning an epic journey across ten tracks that wander through industrial landscapes, and ascend beyond the atmospheric aether, Sci Fi Sky is Lebanon Hanover’s most cohesive artistic statement to date. With their icy hearts on their sleeves, this is the culmination of a decade’s worth of musical creativity radiating from the minds of both Iceglass and Maybelline, and altogether an otherworldly beacon of hope in a time of sheer darkness.

Guitarist and composer PAT METHENY has won 20 Grammy Awards in 12 different categories including Best Rock Instrumental, Best Contemporary Jazz Recording, Best Jazz Instrumental Solo, Best Instrumental Composition. The Pat Metheny Group won an unprecedented seven consecutive Grammies for seven consecutive albums.

Pat Metheny is one of the few artists in the world who can lay claim to such a description. On his latest album, Road To The Sun, Pat Metheny surprises us once again with his seemingly endless ability to harvest new vistas while retaining the instantly recognizable Metheny sound.

With two major new works, performed by five of the world´s leading guitarists, Metheny charts a new way of obliterating boundaries between genres while simultaneously unveiling new facets of an already expansive personal language.

Grammy-winner Jason Vieaux, described by NPR as “perhaps the most precise and soulful classical guitarist of his generation” was tapped by Metheny to perform his four-movement solo guitar suite Four Paths Of Light.

The centerpiece of this landmark recording is Road To The Sun, a six-movement piece for fellow Grammy-award winning Los Angeles Guitar Quartet LAGQ – Metheny describes them as “one of the best bands in the world”.

"Ultra Eczema rarely reissues records: firstly, because we believe it's hard to improve on a good original (and we would never want to republish anything that isn't); and secondly, it's called the Internet and you can find everything on it. Nonetheless, in 2015 we reissued Kraus' 'I could Destroy You With A Single Thought', a CDR from 2004, because it was camping in our all-time favourite records list for a decade and the data on this erratic medium tends to erase itself, much like a troubled past. 'A Golden Brain' was published in the first wave of the Covid pandemic via Kraus' bandcamp as a digital release. And once again we couldn't help ourselves. This is Kraus at his best: if a bedroom could be a stadium, he would play the main stage! Limited edition of 300 copies. Includes an insert, download code and a UE sticker."

It doesn't happen too often that you come across someone with Sam's composure and artistry at such a young age. 22 year old Sam De Nef has been in music for a while as lead singer of indie outfit 'Danny Blue and the Old Socks', but It wasn't until last year he started thinking of a solo career. Influenced by a generation of songwriters he listens to every day, Sam felt an urge to follow his own path and write genuine songs he could play all by himself and at any time, unadorned and without pretence.

He started recording demo's during the March lockdown, swiftly landed a record deal and started recording his debut with Nicolas Rombouts (Dez Mona, Ottla, Stef Kamil Carlens) and PJ Decraene (Rhinos are People too) - also his live band - in an old house in the French Vosges mountains.

The first tracks he released did not go unnoticed at national radio, press and streaming playlists alike. Sam is a prolific writer and lyricist, he recorded a 7 track debut mini album, expected in February. We are instantly struck by his stunning vocals, his versatility and maturity as a songwriter, embracing the classics but never without transcending their influence.

Sam De Nef's first solo project is a vehicle to tell his own stories and write songs that come to him in the most natural way. His debut mini album is an inspired collection of visceral folk and singer songwriter tunes, drenched in nostalgia. He's inspired by the likes of Dylan, Jack Kerouac, Leonard Cohen and Karen Dalton, but displays a unique voice and decidedly steers clear of platitudes.

"On my first trip to Serbia, visiting my girlfriends family, I discovered a whole new world in music. People played their songs around the diner table. What I saw was a family sharing food, alcohol and stories everyone could relate to. This experience opened up a new window, the wind blowing inspiration. I want to tell stories and touch people with simple songs and colorful language."

There is a directness and intimacy throughout each of the record's 23 minutes, which both sparks universal melancholy and makes Sam De Nef's debut very personal.

Andrew Kötting is one of the UK’s most highly regarded film makers, having worked on films such as ‘Gallivant’ (1996), ‘Swansdown’ (2012), ‘Edith Walks’ (2017) and many more. His new film, ‘The Whalebone Box’, was released in 2019. The soundtrack is composed by Andrew Kötting, Riz Maslen (Grand Theft Auto, Neotropic, Small Fish With Spine) and Oliver Cherer (Gilroy Mere, Dollboy).
For the soundtrack to ‘The Whalebone Box’, Kötting used various pieces of music by Dollboy,
The Assistant and musician Riz Maslen among others. Kötting chopped, processed and repurposed the songs for the film’s soundtrack, described as “a gentle, savage, unnerving warm bath of noise, music and references that is an integral part of the film and as much Andrew as it is the original tracks.”
The tracks were then remixed again by Cherer and Maslen for this 2LP release on Invada Records.
Pressed on ‘One Disc Green, One Disc Blue’ coloured vinyl and housed in a deluxe spinedsleeve with printed insert included.

‘Island’, the latest album from Oscar-nominated composer and
songwriter Owen Pallett, released on Domino / Secret City
Records (Canada).
Almost entirely acoustic, ‘Island’ begins with 13 darkened
chords and was recorded live at Abbey Road Studios with the
London Contemporary Orchestra. The introduction is the sound
of waking up alone and on the shore of a strange land. What
follows is a shimmering and luscious orchestral album that
draws across the full breadth of Pallett’s discography, from
‘Heartland’’s Technicolor to the glittering, fingerpicked guitar
that marked Pallett’s first records with their trio, Les Mouches.
In addition to Pallett’s Grammy Award-winning work with
Arcade Fire, Pallett’s commissions have included string, brass
and orchestral work for Last Shadow Puppets, The National,
The Mountain Goats, Christine and arrangements for Frank
Ocean, Caribou, R.E.M., Linkin Park, Sigur Rós, Taylor Swift and
the Pet Shop Boys.
Since the release of ‘In Conflict’ (2014), Pallett has earned an
Oscar nomination for their film scoring work on Spike Jonze’s
‘Her’ and an Emmy for Sølve Sundsbø’s ‘Fourteen Actors Acting’.
Their score for Matt Wolf’s ‘Spaceship Earth’, a documentary
about a crew who spent two years quarantined inside a replica
of Earth’s ecosystem called BIOSPHERE 2, is out now.

Thumbing Thru Foliage is a blunted journey through YUNGMORPHEUS’ mind where personal lyrics intertwine with socio-political themes and tongue in cheek humour. Produced entirely by ewonee. Lead single ‘Fistfulofgreens’ grooves on a g-funk-esque plain and is an assured mission statement - “original man who got the game plan, I aint switching my hands inside these strange lands” whilst also sharing some intimate insight “I don’t ever answer questions that the feds askin, they were cuffin’ my mama, you know I had to blast them”. Second single ‘Sovereignty’ takes a more soulful turn with ceremonial strings and r&b samples ringing under braggadocious bars. Third single ‘Middle Passage’ is a more introspective cut - sombre vocal and piano loops are juxtaposed with neck snappin’ energetic drums. Describing the project in his own words, YUNGMORPHEUS says, “Peace peace, I consider this album a call to action of sorts. The world is rife with distractions and oppressive tactics but niggas move through it nonetheless ! Respect to ewonee for providing a beautiful backdrop for me to get some much needed shit off my chest. Maneuver through the foliage yall... Power to all black people ! Salute to those who listen”. ewonee adds, “Growing up like we did in this corporation Neegas deal with a lot. Usually gotta go through the mud to get to the greens. Good comes with the bad and vice versa, learning how to adjust is a must. Hope y’all get that from this. Roll up count up and mount up. PEACE”. YUNGMORPHEUS is an American rapper and record producer, originally from Miami but now based in LA. He has released music on Leaving Records and Rap Vacation as well as collaborating with Pink Siifu, Fly Anakin, Koncept Jack$on and Ohbliv. Previously supported by Okayplayer, XLR8R, Bandcamp, DJ Booth, Tiny Mix Tapes, Earmilk, BBC6 Music, Dublab, NTS and Worldwide FM. ewonee is an American Multi-instrumentalist, Producer, Beat-maker & Audio engineer from New York. Part of the Mutant Academy crew and also involved with the Beat Haus Show, ewonee has previously produced & collaborated with the likes of Your Old Droog, Fly Anakin, Reginald Chapman and Koncept Jack$on.

Serendeepity is delighted to announce a celebrative compilation for the tenth anniversary of the Milan-based record store.

This collection is entirely composed of previously unreleased music, exclusively produced for the occasion by many artists of great relevance in the worldwide music scene, who supported the store over the last ten years.

The artists who produced the music for this compilation are Egyptian Lover, Ellen Allien, Thomas Brinkmann, Neil Landstrumm, JD Twitch, Matias Aguayo, San Proper, Tolouse Low Trax, Jay Glass Dubs, Dj Marcelle, Jorge Velez, Tamburi Neri, Fabrizio Mammarella, Heith, Itinerant Dubs, Timeslip89, Kreggo and Intersezioni Ensemble.

The entire work is composed of 4 x 12”, which will be released monthly.

No other pairing in the history of Darkwave ever matched the unfettered creativity, resolve, and DIY attitude from the collaboration between the two creative minds that compromise Lebanon Hanover.

The meeting of the Swiss musician Larissa Georgiou, aka Larissa Iceglass and British artist William Maybelline a decade ago in the latter’s hometown of Sunderland in the UK, was a monumental occasion, reverberating throughout the European music scene and even across the Atlantic.

Lebanon Hanover would emerge from the peak of the world-wide minimal wave revival, with their 2011 split 7-inch record with La Fete Triste issued as the catalog debut of Europe’s most ubiquitous Techno-Industrial EBM labels, Aufnahme + Wiedergabe

With Berlin as their new physical home, William and Larissa would soon, however, join the Fabrika Records family. From here, they would go on to release two full-length albums through the Athens based label, starting in early 2012 with their winter debut LP The World Is Getting Colder, and it’s All Hallows Eve follow up Why Not Just Be Solo.

It was Lebanon Hanover’s 2013 third studio outing Tomb for Two that would go on to cement the duo’s legacy, with the album’s single “Gallow Dance” becoming a post-punk anthem for the times, with artwork became the band’s defacto logo. Not only that, the song “Sadness is Rebellion”, also featured on the album, became the band’s official Mantra.

Two years would pass before the release of 2015’s critically acclaimed fourth record, “Besides the Abyss”. In the intervening years, William and Larissa, initially a couple, would find other partners, and relocate to Athens.

Meanwhile, Lebanon Hanover as a live act would expand rapidly in popularity, exceeding capacity during their performances at Wave Gotik Treffen in Leipzig, and performing sold-out shows across Europe and the UK.

With the playful Babes of the 80s maxi-single released in the interim, three years would pass before the next record from Lebanon Hanover, with 2018’s Let Them Be Alien, the band’s fifth studio album.

At the dawn of the global pandemic, where dystopian nightmares that were only ever seen before within the pages of books and flashes of silver screen celluloid, has become a daily reality, a new kind of darkness envelops the world. It was at this Lebanon Hanover returned, sharing a glimmer of hope with the single “The Last Thing,” the duo’s first song from their forthcoming sixth studio album Sci-Fi Sky.

Spanning an epic journey across ten tracks that wander through industrial landscapes, and ascend beyond the atmospheric aether, Sci Fi Sky is Lebanon Hanover’s most cohesive artistic statement to date. With their icy hearts on their sleeves, this is the culmination of a decade’s worth of musical creativity radiating from the minds of both Iceglass and Maybelline, and altogether an otherworldly beacon of hope in a time of sheer darkness.

Country music has chased piety, poetry, and much else, but The Social World is unapologetic hardcore, beer-sodden country music reduced to its core values. No faking. No pretension.
Spare, unornamented, and straight from the heart, the songs on the “Social World” of Rodger Wilhoit are all that’s holy and true in beerhall country music. The instrumentation is only as full as it needs to be. The singing is careworn and deeply sincere. There’s nothing tentative or lukewarm in Wilhoit’s music. It isn’t going to meet you halfway.
It seems that there’s always more to discover. Most copies of Social World and Rodger’s singles were probably sold off the bandstand 40 or 50 years ago. They were among the thousands of records by local artists on local labels sold off local bandstands all across the country. Most ended up in garage sales, thrift shops, or landfill. But every so often, an artist will be resurrected, and find a new audience. Rodger Wilhoit is one such singer. At a time when most mainstream Nashville country music sounds so contrived and empty, it takes an artist like Rodger Wilhoit to remind us what it’s really all about.

Jon Hester returns to Radio Slave’s Rekids label with the second instalment of his ‘Converge’ LP, ‘Converge - Part II’.

The second part of 2020’s ‘Converge - Part I’, a body of music which saw enthusiastic responses from the likes of Surgeon, Lauren Flax, DJ Bone, Anthony Parasole and Jus-Ed to name just a few, sees the Berlin-based DJ/Producer and dancer generously expand on and refine his slick vision of techno on one of electronic music’s key labels.

By encompassing warm and soulful textures within club focussed grooves, Hester continues to explore the far reaches of both the musical cues picked up from his years as a dancer and formative time spent in the Midwest US, connecting influences from Chicago, Minneapolis, and Detroit.
Stretched across a double LP, the album opens with the spacious and icy ‘Stealth’ followed by the machine communications of ‘Artificial Intelligence’. The B-side sees a whirlwind of the synthetic in ‘Instant’ before ‘Contact’ swiftly picks up the pace with it’s warbling pads and slippery percussion.

On the second disc, ‘Circadian Slip’, custom-built for dancefloor pandemonium, continues with off-kilter leads and vocal snippets before ‘Shadows’ brings eerie syncopation to the proceedings. In the final stretch, ‘Silver’ maintains steady energy into the twilight hours, and the gorgeous ‘Wonder’ closes out the LP beautifully, providing a soft landing to an exceptional journey through Hester’s sound.

“Sex Miami”. Let those words melt into your soul like creamy, creamy pink ice cream in on your tongue. This album by Deux Control is a smooth genre crossover paradise of 808s, Yamaha keyboards and deep mesmerizing vocals side by side with more hardcore synth elements found in bands like DAF or Nitzer Ebb.

Deux control’s sound is a mix your favourite soundtracks of electronic music with a large portion of body synth. It is sexy, cool, and a bit frightening. The music on “Sex Miami” is familiar and goes out to all listeners of all ages but especially to those in the French/Italian disco fandom out there. This is the kind of music an eighties international business traveller would listen when kicking back and clubbing after landing a fat new contract.

Deux control is the act that got bumped from the Miami Vice soundtrack last minute because being a bit to edgy for mainstream USA. They are the group that Gorigio Moroder tried to copy when he wanted to update his sound. Deux Control are the new rulers of psychedelic electric body-disco!

The music of porn movies of the 70s became the fad of diggers and Brigitte Lahaie an absolute icon of these years marked by sexual liberation. In 2020, feminist filmmaker Olympe de G. is embarking on the production of an inclusive and ethical

post-porn feature. Brigitte Lahaie, 64, activist for the right to die with dignity, plays the main role, driven by her deep desire to free the bodies and sexualities of women of her age. This film is certainly one of the most beautiful porn movies of the icon Brigitte Lahaie.

The soundtrack of the film is entrusted to Jb Hanak. A figure in the musical underground, this hyperactive has been multiplying projects for more than 20 years. With the group dDamage he formed with his brother Fred, he explored the frontiers of Hip Hop, IDM and electro. With Cobra, a punk rock group to be taken to the 14th degree, they crossed the lands of the absurd. At the end of 2020, he will release an album with actor Pierre Richard. At the same time, he exhibits his plastic works in art galleries ... hyperactive we have said.

Having inked a deal with Prosthetic Records,SUMMONING THE LICH are preparing to release their debut full length,United In Chaos. The St Louis, Missouri four piece has created a world where death metal reigns supreme and the realm of fantasy is thoroughly embraced. Taking inspiration from the best elements of Lord of the Rings, Magic The Gathering, Dungeons & Dragons, and Adventure Time, and wrapping it up in a fantastical death metal parcel, SUMMONING THE LICH has an attention to detail and commitment to storytelling that is second to none. United In Chaos tells the tale of the rise of the Lich and fall of the Kingdom Rodor - and the spread of his wicked influence across the land as his power grows.

"New York City’s layers of continuous noise have become the backdrop to a rising four-piece that NME already calls “one of New York’s most exciting new bands.” Just like the city, The Muckers’ sound is equal parts vital and timeless, resolute and vibrant.

As The New York Times tells the story, lead guitarist and vocalist “Emir Mohseni, was inspired by the Strokes to pursue a career in music — a passion that brought him to New York all the way from his native Iran.” The move, profiled across acclaimed publications, from Rolling Stone to Billboard, only marked the beginning of the band’s story. Upon landing in this new environment, Mohseni met the three guys that would become his closest friends, and build with him the vitalizing sound and enrapturing live show that The Muckers are garnering early praises for: Anthony Azarmgin at the bass, Chris Cawley on rhythm guitar, and John Zimmerman behind the drums.

Be No Rain, the moniker of South London’s Sam Frankl is a project that was born out of a studio decked out with disco balls, fairy lights and fake ivy; a perfect aesthetic to the sound that followed.“It felt like there needed to be a character that could be as flamboyant as I wanted to be and remove the constraints that being human leaves you with” Frankl explains “It was incredibly liberating”.It’s about being trapped into that infinity loop of emotions, like a cartoon character wandering through a world he never quite understood”.The debut album from Frankl comes on the back of a collaboration with Armin Van Buuren on single Hollow. All album’s come signed by Frankl.

In 2007 bassist Anneleen Boehme was one of the founders of LABtrio, which is considered as one of the most acclaimed Belgian jazz bands of the past decade. Just like her companions Lander Gyselinck and Bram De Looze, she quickly asserted herself in the most diverse contexts. Now Boehme is launching her "dream project": Grand Picture Palace. A jazz quintet and a string quartet that blend different worlds together. Boehme leads and plays bass and has been writing eight compositions that break through genre walls, music both powerful and elegant, showing how jazz and classical music can balance each other without cliches.

All recordings were made in the early summer of 2020 in the studio of mentor and fellow musician Nicolas Rombouts. The self-titled album 'Grand Picture Palace' will be released on February 19th 2021.

3 tunes of Pure industrial dark acid Techno... Bangerz kick, with strange grooves and progressive obsessing sounds entering in. Music is there and, as you close your eyes, you go with her, exploring strange landscapes, on the burning sun... Dark Hynotizing sounds.

Cumbia, the music and the dance synonymous with Colombia, has been around almost since the 17th century. Today, it’s a badge of identity for Colombians everywhere, but is now also enjoying a global renaissance; filling dance floors and captivating a new generation of music fans.

Originally released by World Circuit as two separate albums – ‘Cumbia Cumbia’ in 1989 and ‘Cumbia Cumbia 2’ in 1993 - this collection brings together some of the greatest recordings made by Colombia’s legendary record label, Discos Fuentes, between 1954 and 1988.

Discos Fuentes was founded in Cartagena in 1934 by the visionary musician, arranger and producer, Antonio Lopez Fuentes. It was the first important record label in the country and grew into a company of immense significance for Colombian music, responsible for thousands of hits and scores of legendary singers and musicians over six decades. Fuentes hand-picked his musicians and singers then meticulously arranged, produced and recorded their music in-house.

This collection presents thirty of these three-minute-masterpieces, showcasing the gamut of styles that make up the distinctive and irresistible cumbia sound; a sound typified by a loping 2/4 gait and a pulsing rocksteady bassline, overlaid with heavy rural percussion, brass, accordion, clarinet, electric guitar and vocals. Disc 1 features a broad range of cumbia styles with recordings from 1960 through to 1988, whilst disc 2 digs further into the classics of the past focusing almost exclusively on the 1950s and 1960s.

Featuring cumbia’s biggest hits from Rudolfo y su Tipica, Gabriel Romero, Sonoro Dinamita and Armando Hernandez, ‘Cumbia Cumbia 1 & 2’ is a flawless collection from the Golden Age of Cumbia.

Digging deep through old and new, Basso captures arcane woodland fusion, serene electronic suites and wide eyed Balearic bliss on this first Growing Bin compilation.

This collection celebrates those precious records which land in your life on their own terms. Even the most advanced digger will admit that chance is the secret ingredient in any successful haul. Sure, it helps if you know where to look, but if you arrive a day early at that secluded second hand shop, or an hour late at the convention, you might miss out on a rare sight of sound. But there are still ways to skew the odds in your favour. Even in the most crowded urban environment, a solitary tree soon becomes a nest, and Basso's fostered an abundant garden in his Hamburg hometown. A decade on and the Growing Bin is a safe haven for those exquisite sounds crowded out of the mainstream, the rare birds with the most striking song.

'Coffee' comes right after cocoa in the bin's headquarter, though start your morning with One Tongue and be prepared for a different kind of day. A witch's brew spiced with a hint of Durian and the early bird, this 1990 composition could be the blueprint for the Teutonic trance dancers beloved by the Salon set. A more meditative magic flows through the A2, a smooth blend of fusion guitar, softly syncopated drums and counterpoint keys from one time art-rockers Inandout. This Growing Bin favourite from their '93-95' LP sounds right at home beside the majestic melodies and spheric bass of Matthias Raue's 'Brücke am schwarzen Fluss 2'. Taken from the soundtrack to a TV drama filmed in Mali, this digital homage to African rhythm shimmies in step with New Age dancers from Mkwaju Ensemble and Louis Crelier. The A-side ends with the unbridled optimism of Kosmische maverick Hardy Kukuk. The synthesist hit the studio with friends Karsten Raecke and Andreas Schneider in 86, coalescing crystalline electronics and gentle guitar into tender chord progressions suited for sun bathing beside the Sea of Tranquility.

The second side slinks into motion with the deep beauty and sincere spoken word of Frank Suchland's 'Schnee', a subtle body in a cocoon of reverb which takes Sade's 'I Never Thought I'd See The Day' to another level of placidness. Melancholic Germans Die Fische met in Cairo for the first time, and 'Conversation Of Everyday Lovers' could be the theme for that great city. Underpinned by primal percussion and a restrained groove, the track twists and turns between a trio of ineffable motifs, eternal combinations to the catacombs of Abusir. From there we go sublime, soaring skywards with a ten minute triumph from Hugh Mane. Balancing concentric sequences and space age synth riffs atop an irresistible breakbeat and bubbling bassline, the British producer finds a sensuous sweet-spot between fellow Growing Bin affiliates Krakatau and Singu.

Lucky are we who hear the Bin's sounds.
Patrick Ryder