Cerca:work of art

For the first time in more than a decade, Paul St. Hilaire (AKA Tikiman) presents a solo album – 100% Tiki.

Over his 30-plus year career, St. Hilaire has become one of dance music’s quietly legendary figures. Born and raised in Dominica, he moved to Berlin in 1994 and has lent both his voice and his musicianship to some of the most iconic electronic music from the German capital – and beyond. Renowned for his collaborations with Moritz von Oswald and Mark Ernestus (AKA Rhythm & Sound), he has also appeared on records with Deadbeat, Rhauder, Larry Heard aka Mr. Fingers and Stereotyp (G-Stone Recordings), amongst others.

However, few know the extent of St. Hilaire’s compositional and technical mastery. From his home studio in Kreuzberg, which includes an extensive collection of vintage hardware, self-built instruments and notebooks scribbled with endless lyrics, he has created a vast archive of material spanning ambient dub, avant-jazz, lush techno and lovers rock.

Tikiman Vol. 1 is a heady, downtempo tour de force of patois metaphors on education, displacement and personal vs. global histories, as is evident on slippy album opener “Bedroom in My Bag”: Mister, mister / Where are you going? / I’m heading for a faraway land / What are you having in the bag in your hand? / Help us to understand / He said, I’ve got my bedroom in my bag.

Overall, the album’s lyrics reflect on life between Berlin and Dominica, specifically St. Hilaire’s hometown of Grand Bay, where he has worked with various musicians famous for the island’s different genres of carnival music. St. Hilaire himself always favoured the island’s more “discrete” music, developing a sonic synergy between two different geographical strains of groove and minimalism, and combining them with foundational Caribbean mixing techniques, which provide the basis for his songwriting and distinct
baritone.

Tikiman Vol.1 offers a rare insight into St. Hilaire’s complex artistry, from the eyes-down grooves of “Little Way” and the guitar-heavy digi dancehall experiment “Keep Safe,” to the subtle hypnosis of “Ten to One” and the softly crashing synth waves of closer “Three And A Half”, evoking not only beaches but also coasts and borders. It’s a fitting expression of both the breadth of St. Hilaire’s work, as well as his history as one of the few black, Berlin-based artists who, despite remaining largely overlooked, has influenced the city’s electronic music culture since its beginnings.


Credits
Written & Produced by Paul St. Hilaire
Mastered by Stefan Betke
Artwork by Grant Gibson

Kynant Records was founded in 2015 by Richard Akingbehin, a British-Nigerian radio programmer (Refuge Worldwide), music writer and DJ. Originally specialising in deep techno and featuring artists such as Cio D’Or, Terrence Dixon and Donato Dozzy, Kynant has since launched a sub-label Kynant EX which focuses on ambient, dub and experimental electronics.

New album by SABA ALIZADEH, a groundbreaking voice in contemporary Iranian music who blends classical Persian traditions with avantgarde experimentation.

Born in Tehran in 1983 as son of the world renowned tar and setar virtuoso HOSSEIN ALIZADEH, SABA ALIZADEH established himself not only as a true master on the Iranian spike fiddle kamancheh but one of the groundbreaking voices in contemporary Iranian music, blending classical Persian traditions with avantgarde experimentation. His music, praised by THE WIRE as "a bridge between the ancient and the contemporary", turns sound and image into powerful narratives of memory and resistance. Over the past years, ALIZADEH (who relocated to the Netherlands a few years ago) has appeared at key festivals and venues such as Reeperbahn Festival, CTM, Flow Festival, Philharmonie Berlin, Kölner Philharmonie, solidifying his reputation as a singular live performer.
After the critically acclaimed releases "Scattered Memories" (his international debut, released on Karlrecords in 2019), "I May Never See You Again" (2021) and last year's "Temple of Hope", his new album fascinates again with a unique artistic voice, weaving together centuries-old sonic heritage and the urgency of the present through deeply immersive, meditative landscapes in two epic pieces. "Rituals Of The Last Dawn" may feel like a sad or resigned title (compared to the positively fierce "Temple Of Hope"), but at the same time the highly meditative music provides a good lot of contemplative strength. Appealing to an open-minded "world music" audience as well as fans of current streams of ambient or drone in its most subtle forms, ALIZADEH's latest work is a strongly needed soul food in bitter times. Created on the spot with his musical partners PIETRO CARAMELLI (guitar and electronics on "First Ritual") and LIEW NIYOMKARN (lap steel and electronics on "Last Ritual"), "Rituals Of The Last Dawn" is a pure, unfiltered emotional expression from one of contemporary Iranian music's leading artists.

2026 Repress

A landmark release for both the label and its founder as Kasra releases his debut solo EP. The Ski Mask EP features 4 tracks of rolling low end and marks the start of a new phase for him to make his mark as an artist as well as DJ.

Kasra says, "After 16 years of running the label I thought it was time I released a body of work of my own. It's quite daunting after all the incredible music the artists have given me to be doing this for the first time. I hope you enjoy it for what it is: raw, honest drum and bass."

No Drama, the label founded by Roy Rosenfeld, continues its vinyl and digital series with a new release from Eli Nissan, an artist whose work consistently rewards close listening.



The musical material unfolds over 15 minutes and 4 seconds, offering a concise yet layered statement.



While Hedonism opens with driving percussion and a flexible groove, layering textures and effects into a high-energy, immersive cut built for peak-time moments, Shout closes the release with a deeper, more introspective direction, blending vocal samples with a laid-back, psychedelic flow balancing repetition and variation to create a sense of elevation and continuity.



Concise, versatile, and DJ-ready, the fifth edition of the No Drama catalog continues the path with clarity and purpose.

Time To Get On Board A New Black Universal Express.

With each new recording Anthony Joseph presents an imaginative, personal vision of contemporary black culture, and The Ark is yet another compelling album by the award-winning Trinidadian poet and musician. This second part of a sequence of two albums launched with last year’s Rowing Up River To Get Our Names Back, finds Joseph giving full vent to his desire to explore many thought-provoking themes. However, there is a specific thread running through the glorious offering of sounds.

”I was especially interested in the idea of using Afrofuturism as a means of using the future in order to correct the wrongs of the past,” explains Joseph. “And so a lot of lyrics reimage or imagine an alternate black history. At the same time there are elements of autobiography.” The aforesaid cultural phenomenon, a view of the black experience through the prism of science fiction and ancient Egypt and Africa, as mapped out by visionaries from music and literature such as Sun Ra, Parliament-Funkadelic and Octavia E. Butler, has previously inspired Joseph. His 2006 novel The African Origins Of UFOs was a multi-hued work, and the new music shows how Joseph

has, much like all significant artists, gone on to broaden his conceptual palette, creating beguiling new stories and images set to startling rhythms and tones. Tracks such as ‘James’, with its taut, crisp bass and dubbed-up brass, and ‘Transposition Of Space (Glissant)’, a potent evocation of the influential Martiniquan theorist set in a haze of jazz guitar and ambient synthesizers, are marvels of text-sound painting.

As for ‘Baron Samedi’, shaped by a languid, almost wounded guitar line and slow rise of horns that frame Joseph’s journey to the ‘mountain of fire, almost touching the sky’ it is an epic blend of commanding vocal delivery and dramatic sonic tapestry.

Joseph led the Spasm band in the early 2000s and recorded well-received albums such as Bird Head Son and Time, in which songs were largely based on spirituals or chants enhanced by improvisation. But his musical curiosity has naturally led to collaborations, and the new work is produced by Dave Okumu, the prodigiously talented guitarist-vocalist-composer known as the leader of Mercury Music Prize-nominated The Invisible, and who was also a member of the seminal band Jade Fox.

Having first performed together at a show curated by influential saxophonist-flautist Shabaka Hutchings at the storied Total Refreshment Centre In London during lockdown, Joseph and Okumu struck up a rapport that further developed when the former guested on he latter’s album. With the connection made Joseph knew Okumu was the ideal producer for this latest project, which has a freewheeling, almost black psychedelic thing. After sifting through demos and loops the guitarist made on pro-tools the poet started to live with the music. Many months later words began to take shape. Joseph then went into the studio with Okumu’s band and set about creating a magnum opus. Boasting a stellar cast such as vocalist Eska Mtungwazi, trumpeter Byron Wallen and keyboardist Nick Ramm, The Ark is a highly intricate musical mosaic framed by simmering funk grooves, wily jazz improvisation and haunting dub effects. Through the use of many genres the music has simply become its own genre.

The Ark can be perceived as a vessel or means of transport to new worlds, along the lines of Sun Ra’s Ark or Funkadelic’s Mothership, and the material it contains is a unique blend of who Anthony Joseph is and how he sees the world and society in these stimulating, challenging times. “It balances the personal with the universal in a much more vulnerable, accessible way than on previous albums,” Joseph explains.

“It has become less about a personal experience and more about a collective, communal experience in which the artist is conduit, messenger, urban griot.”

Irish drone-doom-folk act One Leg One Eye, the project of founding Lankum member Ian Lynch and veteran noise monger George Brennan, announce their new album, CRONE, out on 1 May on AD 93.

Today the group share the first track on the album, ‘Many are my Names Besides’, on which they are joined by the elemental force that is legendary actor, performer, writer and director Olwen Fouéré (Operating Theatre) contributing vocals.

Olwen Fouéré comments:

“When Ian and George first approached me to work with them, they were already creating the Crone album as a sonic invocation of the ‘sovereignty goddess’, who personifies the land and the legitimacy to rule it, in her darkest and most terrifying form. As we spoke, the triple goddess figure of the Morrigan entered my mind, reinforced by a marked presence of crows every time we met. The Morrigan is essentially a war goddess, frequently appearing as a crow in a battlefield, a death prophet, a guardian of sovereignty, and a very powerful figure in Irish Mythology.

So I invoked her energy as a starting point, using text extracts that Ian sent me from the Ulster Cycle and other sources. The voice recording was done in one day, improvising the source material while the already composed music occupied my psyche through headphones.

Listening back, at this time in our world, I can only wonder at how much blood and war the Crone/ Crow of sovereignty is preparing to unleash now. Watch out.”

CRONE is the second album from Lynch and Brennan, following on from 2022’s slowburn slab of ambient grit, …And Take The Black Worm With Me. Bewildering, psychedelic and ultimately transcendental, the four tracks of One Leg One Eye’s CRONE shapeshift and morph endlessly in a coarse miasma. Traditional song structures and vocal melody are eschewed, instead the trio directly channel energies from the rich seams of mythological significance submerged below the Irish psyche. The anger, rage and beauty of the sovereignty goddess burn a consistent and deliberate line through the album in the form of obscure incantations and dire pronouncements, the gnarled sinews that bind it all together.

Just as the subject matter of the tracks delve deeper into Irish myth and the remote past, the temporal reality of the album reaches back into the bands prehistory, with the majority of it the material being recorded by Lynch and Brennan in 2021 before One Leg One Eye was conceived of as an entity with Brennan working on the CRONE project while Lynch worked on …And Take The Black Worm With Me.

When they were there they saw a lone woman coming to the door of the Hostel, after sunset, and seeking to be let in. As long as a weaver’s beam was each of her two shins, and they were as dark as the back of a stag-beetle. A greyish, wooly mantle she wore. Her lower hair used to reach as far as her knee. Her lips were on one side of her head.

She came and put one of her shoulders against the door-post of the house, casting the evil eye on the king and the youths who surrounded him in the Hostel. He himself addressed her from within.

"Well, O woman," says Conaire, "if thou art a wizard, what seest thou for us?"

"Truly I see for thee," she answers, "that neither fell nor flesh of thine shall escape from the place into which thou hast come, save what birds will bear away in their claws."

"It was not an evil omen we foreboded, O woman," saith he: "it is not thou that always augurs for us. What is thy name, O woman?"

"Calib," she answers.

"That is not much of a name," says Conaire.

"Lo, many are my names besides."

"Which be they?" asks Conaire.

"Easy to say," quoth she. "Samon, Sinand, Seisclend, Sodb, Caill, Coll, Díchóem, Dichiúil, Díthím, Díchuimne, Dichruidne, Dairne, Dáríne, Déruaine, Egem, Agam, Ethamne, Gním, Cluiche, Cethardam, Níth, Némain, Nóennen, Badb, Blosc, Bloár, Huae, óe Aife la Sruth, Mache, Médé, Mod."

On one foot, and holding up one hand, and breathing one breath she sang all that to them from the door of the house.

Funny How? is Christophe Chassol’s fifth album.



While it builds directly on his work with the “Ultrascores,” it also marks a turning point: a more contemporary sound, broader songwriting, and more explicitly political and social themes make Funny How? his most accomplished album to date. It’s also his most accessible: inspired by American stand-up comedy, Funny How? sounds like a joyful mix of all the music that inspires the artist: soul, jazz, rap, musicals… Thus, throughout the album, major stand-up figures like Dave Chappelle, Marina Franklin, Dulcé Sloan, and Tiny Thickemz appear alongside emerging comedians filmed in more intimate comedy clubs, composing a moving portrait of the new American scene.

Drawing on archival footage and sequences shot for the project in New York and Chicago, and true to his principle of harmonizing reality, he reveals its hidden notes, replaying and developing them throughout a fascinating process. The result is a major work, a choral, political, and deeply musical narrative. In concert, the work unfolds majestically through a hybrid performance where music and images respond to and converse with one another.



The premiere of Funny How? on April 17 and 18, 2026, at the Cité de la Musique in Paris is already sold out. The album is scheduled for release on May 22, 2026.

'The Endless Dance' is the first collaborative album from Northern Irish producer and composer Hannah Peel and Chinese percussionist Beibei Wang. The record is grounded in the strength of ancient concepts, but comes alive with the joy and freedom of play as together, Peel and Wang travel through the 24 solar terms of the Chinese calendar with a cornucopia of sound in tow – synths and prepared piano alongside traditional and unconventional percussion.

The album is collaged together from recordings made over five days at legendary rural studio Real World, a setting which aligned with the duo’s inspiration from the natural world creating a permanent record of their shared musical landscape, informed by the flora and fauna that emerge and retreat through the seasons.

Both genre-defying, storied artists in their own right, Peel and Wang met while working on Manchester Collective’s 2023 album NEON and 'The Endless Dance' certainly represents a step-change from the duo’s shared classical backgrounds – but their knowledge and training is also the foundation of its freewheeling audacity, giving them the confidence to trust their instincts.

The album is produced by Mike Lindsay LUMP, Tunng, Guy Garvey, Jon Hopkins who, with free rein, brings added energy and creativity to the album, whilst Peel & Wang are also joined by Hyelim Kim on Daegeum, a Korean flute with “colourful overtones on every note”.

Track to track, 'The Endless Dance' is unpredictable and unexpected, which is in part due to the genuine curiosity and outside perspectives that each player brought to the sessions. “I am so familiar with Chinese heritage, but I don't see how it can present in electronics, for instance,” says Wang. “Hannah comes in with that direction, to imagine what the sounds could be together.” The characterful richness of the album stems from the commonalities they found in the sessions. “We both come from cultures where story is really important,” explains Peel. “The attention to detail comes from telling a story, and one note can set that off in a different direction.”

'The Endless Dance' is a major work from two accomplished, singular artists - but it’s also the sound of mutual curiosity and shared fun, or as Wang puts it: “Two women talking in totally different language that had a wonderful chat.”

Shaped from fragile, emotionally charged piano motifs that distort, disappear and transform into dense, cinematic textures, 'CANALS' is a debut that's finely matured, the result of years of friendship and growth. Italian artist Vanja Sturno and Montréal-based Belgian-Spanish composer Pablo Geeraert (aka Sanea Ima) have worked together extensively on various projects up until now, but 'CANALS' is their first official release as a duo. Having both studied music academically, the pair were eager to work more intuitively, so applied their well-honed set of skills to sound that, instead of fitting into a conceptual box, reflected more personal experiences.

Back in 2023, Geeraert travelled to Rome to support his friend at a difficult time and, during the trip, received some bad news of his own. The complicated feelings unconsciously surged through a series of delicate Ryuichi Sakamoto-inspired piano improvisations and a new project began to coalesce. They didn't realize it at the time, but once the record was finished, Sturno and Geeraert began to understand that the entire process had been a form a joint catharsis - a release of pressure. They were able to function so effortlessly and swiftly because they had already provided the space for each other to resonate emotionally and the music flowed from that point.

So the album's title, while remaining ambiguous, suggests its formation: a sequence of eight interconnected channels that feed a creative whole. On the first segment, Sturno and Geeraert's initial recordings can be perceived most nakedly, the melancholy, Satie-like phrases floating peacefully for a moment before the tranquility is agitated by stormy distortions and swelled into thick waves of harmony. The piano provides the record with its emotional anchor, offering focus and clarity as multi-dimensional noise wells up around it before inevitably dissipating, leaving gentle, unadorned sounds once again.

And the familiar instrument is reshaped into a wheezing artificial organ on the animated 'CANALS III', punctuated by percussive, tape-warped pitch fluctuations that seem to bite into its very essence. Gauzy acoustic granulations snowball into a powerful, bass-heavy crescendo on the fourth part, setting the tenor for the album's second half. But after the crushing 'CANALS VI', possibly Sturno and Geeraert's heaviest track, a brief tremolo-heavy vignette that ripples through experimental rock and ambient music's braided history, the duo clear the air with a jazzy diversion, introducing soft woodwind blasts as a palate cleanser before an epic, widescreen finale.

It's an album that's best absorbed as a whole, a vortex of ritualistic, rhythmic repetitions that Sturno and Geeraert appropriately refer to as "spiral listening".

Sunday in the Park with George presents the music from the original 1984 Broadway production of Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s acclaimed musical. Recorded shortly after the show’s premiere, the album features the original cast performing Sondheim’s layered score, inspired by Georges Seurat’s painting "A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte".

The cast of the musical is led by Mandy Patinkin and Bernadette Peters, whose performances tell a story about art, love, and artistic legacy across two time periods. The recording includes notable songs such as “Sunday,” “Finishing the Hat,” and “Move On.” Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, Sunday in the Park with George is widely regarded as one of Sondheim’s most distinctive works. Produced by Thomas Z. Shepard, the recording won the 1984 Grammy Award for Best Cast Show Album.

The soundtrack of Sunday in the Park with George is available as a limited edition on blue vinyl and includes a 4-page booklet. The 2LP is packaged in a deluxe sleeve with linen laminate finish.

Recorded between the iconic Abbey Road and Polish Radio studios, Hania Rani"s original music for Joachim Trier"s Cannes and Golden Globe winning, Oscar and Bafta nominated "Sentimental Value" is a deeply intuitive collaboration, composed before a single frame was edited. For Hania Rani composing for the most recent film by Joachim Trier was nothing less than a true joy and a real artistic adventure. As she explains: "It doesn"t happen often that I"m asked to work on a film by a director whose work I know so well and which resonates with me so naturally. What I understood while working with such an intriguing mind and intelligent artist as Joachim is that the role of a film composer is to wander along with the director, hand in hand, rather than follow one another. The collaboration should be a partnership - evenly balanced and able to invigorate people on both ends - otherwise it will always feel superficial, imposed, and timid".

‘Sings Again’ is the fifth album from British electronic musician Will Samson. After starting the decade with a pair of largely instrumental albums, Samson… sings again.

The familiar collection of old tape machines that have characterised much of Samson’s sound remain (with a 1971 Seinnheiser microphone for the vocals), firmly rooting ‘Sings Again’ in an organic sonic landscape of electronic and acoustic influences.

Taking inspiration from the early works of Bjork, Four Tet and Efterklang, much of the album was built upon recording and then sampling organic sounds such as twigs, rocks and paintbrushes to create percussion. An empty glass bottle was transformed into the otherworldly organ on raw opener ‘0333AM, and his own voice became the moody synth sound on the sparse electronica of ‘Darabuka.’ Elsewhere, the hypnotic, emotionally resonant ‘Time Used To Feel Like’ and grandiose album finale ‘Julian’s Rocks’ offer a raw and direct insight into the most vulnerable parts of himself – a long-established artist beginning again.

I first encountered Pascal Comelade’s music thirty years ago—and nothing has sounded quite the same since. I was immediately captivated: he is an artist like no other, whose sincere and selfless love of music is always evident, especially in his tender reworkings of other people’s songs.

Comelade seems to work like a watchmaker: meticulous, precise, and obsessive—yet always drifting into something dreamlike. His music opens hidden doors, telling strange and beguiling stories filled with obscurity, kindness, and reserved humour.

Back then, my fascination was instinctive. Today, with a few more words at my disposal, I look to this exceptional 70-year-old French musician and feel exactly the same pull.

Métaphysique Du Hit-Parade is the first vinyl compilation devoted to Pascal Comelade’s favourite cover versions. It spans a forty-year career and traces sixty years of rock and roll history along the way. “Sheena Is a Punk Rocker” becomes a soft, soothing lullaby that may well have made the Ramones weep. Then there are his idiosyncratic tributes to Jonathan Richman (“Egyptian Reggae”) and The Kinks (“Sunny Afternoon”), alongside nods to formative heroes such as The Gun Club, Captain Beefheart, and MC5.

Two exclusive recordings stand out particularly: Bob Dylan’s “Girl from the North Country” and Nirvana’s “Come As You Are”—a song that shaped my early youth. Both were recorded especially for this release.

Jan Lankisch, January 2026

Brussels-based Maloca presents Paradise Mountain, the new EP from Katatonic Silentio, DJ and production moniker of Italian sound artist Mariachiara Troianiello. Positioned in counterpoint to her darker,
more visceral work, the record delicately folds Detroit electro and techno drum structures into a softened New Age glow, generating environments that breathe, shimmer, and slowly coalesce.

Across the EP, tracks unfold gently, rife with wet modular tones, chromatic arpeggiations, and light-touch percussion which drifts in and out of focus, blurring the line between dancefloor function and inward-facing sound art. Paradise Mountain ultimately traces a slow ascent through luminous, carefully crafted terrain - quietly joyful and deeply hypnotic in its approach.

With Gregor Huebner (violin, electronics) and Veit Huebner (bass, electronics), a vibrant musical dialogue unfolds between two brothers. Using loop stations and live effects, the acclaimed jazz musicians create layered, almost orchestral soundscapes—both transparent and powerful, energetic yet deeply poetic. Their music thrives in the moment: lines are looped, transformed, and reshaped into virtuosic improvisations. Jazz blends with classical influences, grooves meet sonic experimentation, and delicate chamber-like passages erupt into dynamic outbursts. Original compositions, jazz standards, and newly interpreted classical works sound intimate yet powerful in the duo format. Known as two-thirds of the trio Berta Epple, the Huebner brothers now present themselves for the first time as a pure duo. The result is a distilled artistic essence of more than four decades of shared and individual stage experience, with electronics serving not as an effect but as a third musical voice.

Besides having one of the most original artist names out there, Qrusifix aka Hampus Karlsson, is a true record collector who has been putting in the work on his MPC 2000 for quite some time. With roots in Småland and now based in Stockholm he’s been spinning records, low-key producing tracks on his home turf and popping up whenever the time felt right to spread his vibes. In 2024, together with fellow producer and friend David, he released his first record on the Malmö label Hip Hop Weekend.

The Chasing Clouds EP, out in May 2026 on Västkransen Records, presents four tracks built for late nights that drift into dawn - calm, dreamy and slightly melancholic soundscapes, as if you're on your way somewhere but without rush.

"Over the past three decades, Philipp Lauer has produced an incredible body of work, deploying a myriad of aliases, both as a solo artist and as a part of collaborative projects. From his hardware-steeped Frankfurt studio Pyramide 2, he has built this catalogue through original material and remix commissions, taking on the full spectrum of electronic music while retaining an unmistakable signature. He combines a hands-on approach to rhythm and composition with a DIY MO and a love of big hooks. The level of expertise at hand seems to facilitate a playfulness that subtly permeates all layers of his work. He's a pop melody natural who just so happens to love fiddling with synthesizers, drum machines, and effects an equal amount. All of these qualities are exemplified on "Embalmed In Martino": Lauer's four-track ode to the Belgian Martino sauce, a spicy tomato-based condiment, and arguably the essential ingredient to top off the namesake raw meat sandwich. On "Embalmed", which makes use of instrumentation that would fit right in on an early eighties Manchester cut, and "Martino", where a sturdy, electroclash flavored arp bass provides the stamina, a slew of big and small riffs easily work their way in, thirsting for our ears. On the other side, "Transactional" combines Miami basslines and similarly electro-fundamental twinkling synth work with a flanger-laced 4/4 beat, while "Don't You Know" features soaring synthwave patterns and the only vocal samples on the EP. Both sport rich arrangements as well, right down to the cowbell overdubs. Lauer's often lauded for his "summery sound". In this light ALT026 lands right on time - yet we might disagree here, as it's suited for all seasons, and all terrains, both the shiny festival grounds and the dim-lit club floors."

On the 2024 Altered Circuits release Tropicana Tracks Rotterdam-based artist Betonkust paid tribute to the former subtropical pool (now a circular entrepreneurship hub) Tropicana of his hometown. ALT025 is the follow-up: the fallen-from-grace swimming paradise again fuels a club-oriented selection, inspired by, in the artist's words, "the electronic music from 1988 up until now", more specifically "the Benelux-sound". Tropicana Tracks Two kicks off in full gear with the zero swing drums and lately bass rhythms of Don't Think I'll Be Here Too Long setting the stage for intense synth stabs. Its counterpart comes by way of Realxing, which nonetheless uses similar patches. If the A1 is the thrill of the slides, this one feels like blissfully floating in the geothermally heated waters afterwards. Will Support on the reverse side takes on Detroit techno. Minimal in its composition, it is carried by tough, loopy minor fifth synth sections and prominently mixed rides. TV For Lonely People features more big bass catchiness and melancholic, silky melodies, glued together by vintage flanger treatment and chlorine-damp reverb. The production revels in what feels like the quintessential Betonkust sound. Innershades then joins for the encore, and, characteristically, the mood turns a bit darker. Letting Go Of The Dream is an emotional New Beat update, fully equipped with thudding drum works, haunting lo-fi vocals and pivotal 303 programming - a fitting reaffirmation of the long-standing ties between two of Low Countries Electronics's finest ambassadors.

Rebecca Goldberg presents the release of her debut full-length album, Night City, a deeply personal and expansive body of work that reflects a decade of artistic growth, exploration, and connection. Produced and arranged by Goldberg, this album captures the evolution of her sound through years of practice, travel, collaboration and mentorship.

Including 12 tracks across a 2x LP, Night City draws from the rich lineage of Detroit electronic music. Goldberg cites influences from dystopian cityscapes and futurism to space exploration and the possibilities of technology. The result is a forward-thinking genre-spanning collection.

The album features two notable collaborations: “444,” created with Jnn Aprl and recorded in her studio in Seoul, South Korea, and “Tunnel,” featuring Detroit techno artist Tiptonaires. Each collaboration adds a distinct voice and texture to the record’s immersive sonic world.

Night City was mixed and mastered by Andy Toth, with album artwork illustrated by Mark Sarmel. A limited run of vinyl is available for preorder now, pressed at Archer Record Pressing Co. in Detroit. The album will be released on Detroit Underground.

At its core, Night City is an offering shaped by experience and guided by curiosity, marking a significant milestone in Rebecca Goldberg’s musical journey.

The second vinyl release on Platz fur Tanz continues the narrative of techno's past and future. Experienced artists reinterpret the shadowy vibe of dancefloors around the world, giving it new form and depth.
The record opens with a track by Swedish techno futurist Lakej, featuring his signature sound of machinery on a working factory floor. The music immediately transports you into the industrial atmosphere of a rave.
This time, the Italian-born, Berlin-based artist VSK takes us on a journey through the emotional waves of deep techno. A slightly jazzy groove makes this track perfect for peak time dancefloors.
Latvian producer Ksenia Kamikaza stays true to her style, transporting us into a world of visualized melodies and rhythms. The bassline sets the groove, while the unhurried rhythm allows you to fully surrender to the dance.
Liza Aikin brings an uncompromising Berlin vibrations to the release, reminding us how a true rave should sound. Her style is not heavy but persistent. Liza never stops experimenting, and this track will be a highlight of any DJ set.
Another Latvian electronic talent closes the release. Igors Vorobjovs blends the best of electro and techno in his track. Nervous rhythms and loud sounds stir the emotions, while the raw, untamed resonance will leave no true connoisseur of feral techno indifferent.

Spectral Bounce’s latest offering comes direct from Norway, courtesy of Anders Hajem — co-founder of Boring Crew Records. To date, the Oslo producer’s previous releases have been vessels for the exploration of myriad dance musics, seeing the artist fluently turn his hand to soulful house, dub techno and 2-step.

SPEC07 — the Myr EP — is a much more focused affair, finding Hajem in techno mode across 4 potent cuts typified by undulating drums and swelling echoes. Despite its emphasis on percussion, atmosphere has not been sacrificed for rhythm: vivid FX and meticulous attention to detail bring these tracks to life beyond the context of the dancefloor. This is music that can be stepped into and explored, productions that reward repeat listens.

Opening at full throttle, “Myr” is a jackin’ percussive workout, harnessing punchy drums for maximum effect. Its pulsating low-end runs in tandem with trembling synths that perpetually reflect and refract in the stereo field. Atop its rolling drums, hardgroove-inflected “Sprett” utilizes timestretched vocals, cavernous reverb and ecstatically quivering tones, elevating this 2000s-era framework to new heights. “Existence” brings things to a deeper and more hypnotic place: delays are turned up, siren calls reverberate and timbres ebb and flow. Hajem goes more chasmic still on “Concussion”, hitting the brakes for a much slower cadence and allowing space for a truly expansive listening experience. Heady and mystical, entrancing and otherworldly — listen close enough; beneath the dizzyingly shifting pulses and rattling drums you’ll hear incantations, while bass tones pulse in the depths.

SPEC07 — immerse yourself!

Credits:
Art by Susanne Janssen
Mastering & Cut by Marco Pellegrino @Analogcut
Words by Cameron Leaf

Daniele Baldelli
"A pleasant surprise to find in this release various atmospheres and sounds that have always been part of my DJing. It even made me rediscover M’Bamina, whom I used to play back in 1974 at the Tabù Club in Cattolica.
There are afro vibes as well, with Black Line – Myele, which is featured on one of my Cosmic tapes, and Nowhere by the Stratosferic Band recalls a track I used to play at the Baia degli Angeli…
Excellent work!"

Voom Voom Music was an independent Italian record label based in Turin, founded and managed by record producer Ivo Lunardi (Turin, December 6, 1940 – December 9, 2010). A pivotal figure in the Piedmont music scene, Lunardi was active both as a DJ and as the owner of several disco clubs.

The label operated for several years in the latter half of the 1970s, releasing mainly productions connected to the Italian dance and pop scene.
Since 2016, the original master tapes from the Voom Voom Music catalog have been owned by Gianluca Pandullo (I-Robots), a close friend of Ivo and Luca Lunardi. Through his labels Opilec Music and Turin Dancefloor Express, Pandullo oversees their preservation and historical enhancement.

The artistic direction of Voom Voom Music was marked by a distinct sonic identity — eclectic yet visionary. The Turin-based label founded by Ivo Lunardi embraced a sound that blended disco, pop, and rock influences, interwoven with African American grooves in a pioneering, international perspective.

Voom Voom Music was among the first Italian labels to introduce this kind of musical language in the country. A prime example is the Italian edition of the debut album by B.T. Express, Do It ('Til You're Satisfied), released in LP, 8-Track Cartridge, cassette, and 7" single formats.
The label’s productions clearly reflected the influence of black and funk music, as evidenced by the references and inspirations running through its catalogue. The track “Lady Pick-Up”, for instance, includes direct nods to “Do It Good” by KC & The Sunshine Band and Manu Dibango’s iconic “Soul Makossa”, revealing a musically refined and contemporary sensibility.

Among the label’s most representative works is Splash (1977) by the Stratosferic Band, a project conceived by Luigi Venegoni — producer, songwriter, and guitarist of Arti e Mestieri. Venegoni’s artistic journey spanned from progressive rock to space and Italo disco. The album artwork was designed by Piero D’Amore (1944 - 2022), a charismatic and multifaceted figure of Turin’s art scene (one of his works was even acquired by the MoMA in New York).
The record includes a disco reinterpretation of Van Morrison’s classic “Gloria”, and “Splashdown”, a track fusing the disco-rock energy of Rockets and Space. In contrast, “Nowhere” revisits the 1975 single by Hokis Pokis, a soul/disco band from Nassau County (New York), transforming it into a vibrant disco-funk number.

Another significant expression of the label’s catalogue is the afro-rock sound of M’Bamina, an Italo-Congolese group whose rhythmic energy and dialogue between African percussion and Western funk evoke the style of international formations such as Osibisa — themselves linked to a rich artistic history in Italy.

Maybe it was inevitable that Vilhelm Bromander and Fredrik Rasten would find each other. A symbiotic musical alliance of suggestive combinatory magic that stretches back to the interstitial two day space that separates their dates of birth and manifests here as the movement between ‘perfect’ or ‘just’ intonation and the ragged, psychoactive energy of the slippages from and towards that togetherness that render otherwise simple patterns or generally understood repetitions as wildly other and alive.

Astral Twins shares ‘twin’ works by each composer. The patiently unfolding real time retuning of Fredrik Rasten’s guitars on the a-side’s Sojourns and Vilhelm Bromander’s quickened steps and spry looping melodies on the flip’s Partially Dancing.

Both artists have history of going deep into the aesthetic and acoustic impact of intonation (how you think about what is ‘in tune’). Where their first LP (...for some reason that escapes us, 2019, Differ Records) shared a gorgeous set of sustained tone colour fields, this time they lean more explicitly into the folk music traditions of Scandinavia and further afield, whilst echoing the zoned minimalist atmosphere of Arthur Russell’s classic Instrumentals.

Recorded up close and in real time at Fylkingen’s soon-to-be-abandoned temporary location in Stockholm’s southern suburb of Bredäng, Astral Twins sings with the possibility that one plus one can equal more than two.

Fredrik Rasten:
 Sojourns explores the live retuning of guitar and double bass in a sequence of just intonation harmonies. A guitar ostinato runs throughout the piece where the retuning becomes an integral part of the composition. The slow pace reveals every detail in the transition from one harmonic arpeggio to another — how interfering waves emerge and disappear as the tonal interactions settle in electric clarity. The double bass shadows the guitar's process and comments with occasional pizzicato tones and register jumps, at times providing a low foundation for the sound and sometimes soaring together with the guitar. This is music that is deeply listening; experimental and at the same time humbly inviting many kinds of being with sound.

Vilhelm Bromander: 
As the title suggests, this song has a partially dancing character. The title also has a double meaning with reference to the partials and harmonics that dance together. The basic idea was to write music in just intonation that instead of being drone-based is reminiscent of a lightly dancing folk music, where the joyous feeling of just being in the music — “musicking" — is allowed to lead the way.

The double bass plays repeated overtone double stops in an open harmonic progression with subtle modulations that is inspired in equal parts by Steve Lacy's persistent repetition of phrases as east-asian khaen music. The guitars and mandolin have a freer role, with plucked retuned strings that enhance the bass's modulations and provide forward movement. The music invites to both melodic and spectral listening, suddenly halting so that other focal points can reveal themselves. For example, a chord sequence suddenly transitions to a more spectral part where Fredrik is playing a bowed guitar with a chain, several plucking guitars, voices, and pitch pipes. I wanted to make something ‘orchestral’ with just two people and no overdubs: a dance of overtones and open resonant strings, where we seamlessly take turns standing in the foreground.

Take Me, I’m Yours is the first collaboration album between Alan Abrahams and Jan Jelinek. Released through the latter’s faitiche, it builds upon multi-layered vocal sketches by the former. The Paris-based artist, primarily known for his work as Portable and Bodycode, supplied Jelinek with multi-layered song sketches that the German artist subjected to a rigorous process of manipulation, excavating the ambiguities of the original material and transforming its rhythms into subtle pulses. Take Me, I’m Yours is neither a typical Abrahams record nor a classic Jelinek album—it is something third, mediating between the physicality of the voice and the abstraction of electronic sound design.

The two had crossed paths before really getting to know each other after Abrahams invited Jelinek to play at one of his Süd Electronic parties. The idea of a collaboration emerged slowly. “It started as an experiment, and over the past few years grew from a few tracks into this album,” says Abrahams. He describes recording the basic material as a “tantalizing” process, not knowing how Jelinek would transform his material, some of which was based on wordless chanting, while other tracks were working with lyrical content. However, their mutual trust allowed Jelinek to remove the harmonies, radically reduce the rhythms, and concentrate on Abrahams’ voice.

Jelinek heard something “fragile” in this voice, “moments of doubt and dark premonitions.” He points to Forever as an example. “Alan’s original song reminded me of classic vocal house, but his voice seemed to almost break,” he says. “This contradiction made the piece even bigger, because we hear a singer in the moment of an awakening.” He further accentuated such tensions through arrhythmic synth modulations and time-stretching algorithms, while also adding concrete sounds from a variety of sources. With its dedication to both transforming and amplifying the emotional qualities hidden within Abrahams’ pieces, Take Me, I’m Yours functions as a dialogue between those two singular artists.

Produced by Masters At Work (Kenny Dope and Louie Vega).

'Collaboration is stimulating, it's in my blood.' Thus speaks Brian Jackson and his philosophy for making music and it's indeed collaboration that runs through this amazing album of reimagined and revisited songs from his artistic past. Featuring artists such as Black Thought, Rahsaan Patterson, Josh Milan, Moodymann, Omar, J. Ivy and others and being produced by Masters At Work, Now More Than Ever takes the enduring classic tracks that Brian made with Gil Scott-Heron and places them in the now over nineteen tracks and across a triple vinyl LP or double CD.

Songs such as Lady Day & John Coltrane, The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, Home Is Where The Hatred Is, Winter In America, The Bottle and more soundtracked a generational movement of Black Consciousness in the 70s and 80s. As Brian says, 'This album is one way to connect to what we were about in the 70s; we were about change and this is part of the lineage of resistance. These tracks mark a period of time when resistance was essential and now a younger generation has picked them up.'

'As young men in their twenties we (Brian and Gil) just wrote about what we saw and were feeling and people interpreted these songs in ways we never thought about but as Sly stone said the song comes from me but it's for you.' This statement from Brian perfectly sums up the collaborative nature of Now More Than Ever and the relevance of these songs in a contemporary perspective can be perfectly summed up by the songs themselves. The formidable stable of artists contributing to each track and the excellent production from Louie Vega and Kenny 'Dope' Gonzalez make this album an event in itself. However, these songs are there to be enjoyed as a canon or as individual masterpieces, whether on the dancefloor or on a home system. ‘Now More Than Ever’ just has to be in everybody’s music collection.

2026 Repress
A notoriously jaw-dropping folk-funk classic, long treasured by the Balearic fraternity, the self-titled LP from the brothers Batteau nevertheless remains a criminally underheard gem. Appealing to fans stuck on Ned Doheny's scorching blue-eyed soul as well as Gene Clark's rich country-rock, it's an honour to present the first officially licensed vinyl reissue of this undoubted masterpiece of proto-Yacht-Rock.

Like a forgotten piece of baroque folk caught in 1973, Batteaux's eponymous album somehow sounds magically timeless. A full 45 years after the fact, it remains a mystery as to why they weren't better known. The lush production and virtuoso playing conforms with the ruling aesthetic of the time - well-crafted, melodic songs performed with precision and balance - whilst the shimmering AOR atmosphere and sun-dappled vocal washes align neatly with the best Crosby, Stills & Nash records.

Throughout, the beautifully penned tracks hold traces of Jimmie Spheeris, America and Seals & Crofts. The immaculately orchestrated percussion and additional instrumentation (electric piano and fiddle to name a few) are performed by perennially celebrated West-Coast cats including Tom Scott, John Guerin and Andy Newmark.

It's no surprise that the heavenly "High Tide" is such a Balearic touchstone. A free soul aqua-space groover, its sophisticated rhythms predict the swing of CSN's canonical "Dark Star" by a full four years. An alternative measure of its enduring magnificence can be gauged by MF Doom sampling Paul Horn's wonderful version, subsequently used by Ghostface Killah.

The highlights are many and memorable. Gorgeous opener "Tell Her She's Lovely" is the perfect example of the addictive, melody-driven songwriting which really should have earned them stardom. Moody ballad "Living's Worth Loving" is nothing short of heartbreaking whilst the chugging elegance of "Wake Me In The Morning" showcases their bewitching harmonies. The hypnotic yearning of "Lady Of The Lake" is an exquisitely string-drenched, piano-laced favourite that achieves a peculiar strutting-funk. It's that good.

This lovingly curated reissue enables a long overdue reappraisal of the hitherto buried genius of Batteaux. The serene aqua artwork which adorned the original jacket - their father worked on a dolphin-human communication project in Hawaii, hence the infamous design - and sumptuous inner sleeve have been faithfully restored. Whilst, with access to the original tapes, Simon Francis' sensitive mastering elevates the sound throughout and, as ever, it has been pressed at a reassuringly weighty 180g.

Kaiso Power is a collection of rare jazz, calypso and percussive gems from Trinidad and Tobago from the revolutionary generation of the 1970s, bringing radical new political vision and reclaiming ancient spiritual consciousness through music. At the dawn of the 70s a shift was taking place all around the world. The streets of Port of Spain thronged with Black Power marches, trade union demonstrations and Carnival protest bands - one epicentre in a growing global exchange of ideologies and strategies among Pan Africanist circles in Jamaica, Guyana, London, New York, Montreal, Lagos, Accra and beyond. And when the meetings were over, the revolution moved to the cramped secret dance halls, the Carnival fetes, the steelband yards. The music always had a sharp edge. Searing commentary has always been part of the various types of music in Trinidad, and in the absence of lyrics, the defiant use of the drum maintains the resistance, as well as the re-framing of the playing of European instruments to the needs of the message. Lancelot Layne, Delano Abdul Malik De Coteau, Andre Tanker, Clive Zanda, Mansa Musa were more than artists, they were teachers, community workers and advocates for justice. These recordings are as raw as an all-night Carnival jam, the horns loud, the percussion ringing out, the bass dripping with joy and rebellion. Under the modern influences is a solid rhythm, an unbroken connection to Africa, the songs and keys and cadences brought across the middle passage. These songs are a peep into the untapped treasures of a revolutionary generation, looking at the world with fresh eyes and believing that music was a central part of the mission to build consciousness and regain confidence.

Felipe Gordon is back on Shall Not Fade with his new album Tezeta and f*ck is it special.

Felipe Gordon is SNF label mainstay... (we released his triple repressed debut album "A Landscape Onomatopeya" in 2022 as well as 7 x 12" EPs on SNF over the years plus an extra 12" on Lost Palms)... so given his consistent and exceptional output on our record label you'd probably forgive some complacency with this write up, you might even afford us license to assume we're preaching to the choir and allow us to rest easy knowing that at this stage Felipe Gordon's records sell themselves.... Well none of those things are happening here because when an artist makes a record this complete, this good, you have to try to find the words. You use words like "timeless", "complete and "special". Words that can carry the weight. Because when you've listened to an album dozens of times, and not once, in any part, on any listen in any way has it fatigued you, you need to say. When a record felt so wonderfully familiar from the first listen and just kept on giving you the same feels ever since, you need to say. When a record makes you think about you how you feel about certain Air & St Germain albums (even when you know what it means to put that in a press release), you need to say. So here we are, saying these things.. Tezeta is a special record, one that exists in the rarefied air. A proper album. A record that every time you press play you will immediately remember why you own it and why you love it. A record that your subconscious will know so well that if shuffle is on you will know in an instant. An album that when it's in your collection and the first track starts you get a twinge of annoyance because you didn't listen again sooner and when the final track stops you stop too.

Given paint and a canvas we can most of us paint a picture, but only those that are gifted can paint something that makes us feel. Tezeta makes you feel. Feel familiarity when it's playing, yearning when its not, and absence when it ends. This alone would be enough to make the argument as to why this album is special and justify the gushing opening paragraph of this press release. But we're not done yet.

We don't really have a word in english for what Felipe Gordon has created with this album and how it makes you feel. "Tezeta" that word.

Tezeta is a one of four musical modes within the traditional Ethiopian modal music system known as Qiñit. Mulatu Astatke, the father of Ethio-jazz, frequently uses this mode, often translating it as "nostalgia" or "longing". Gordon says Mulatu's own tezeta recordings convey to him "feelings of melancholy and longing from a point of affection". This is exactly the feeling Gordon has captured. It is what he has woven through every recording on this album. Tezeta is the prime ingredient. It's the base note in recipe, it's sprinkled over the signature jazz-sampled house tracks. It powers the vast array of synthesizers Gordon deploys. It underpins the explorations into trip-hop. It's present in Gordon's varied vocal deliveries and it tunes his guitar. It's in the running order. It's the flow. Tezeta is tezeta in electronic music form, with 4/4, breakbeats, samples and synths.

Gordon says a big part of what differentiates this album from from his previous albums is that is was recorded in a period where he allowed himself to create music without the constraints of time or self-pressure which coincided with a moment of heavy personal growth which allowed him to reflect deeply on his work.

There is a word in Portuguese "Saudade" that Gordon says has a similar meaning to Tezeta - Saudade is defined as a deep, sometimes bittersweet, longing or nostalgia for someone or something that is absent or lost. But here at SNF we think that in Tezeta nothing has been lost. Quite the opposite. Through Felipe Gordon's artistic explorations we have all gained something very special indeed.

■ Human is a deeply “human” cover album by Gota Nishidera (NONA REEVES), focusing on the world of 80s–90s Japanese kayokyoku and new music.
Following his well received 2023 solo cover album Sunset Rain, this new release features an unprecedentedly wide ranging selection of songs spanning works
by Kyohei Tsutsumi, Reiko Yugawa, and Eiichi Ohtaki, all of whom Nishidera either learned from directly or profoundly respects for their devotion to the study and
practice of pop music.

■ After experiencing major success across Asia including two China tours with NONA REEVES and solo performances in Taiwan Gota Nishidera revisited the essence
of Japanese pop music from a renewed perspective. The result is a meticulously crafted collection of eight ultimate tracks, tightly packed with the charm of Japanese
pop. Born in 1973, Nishidera absorbed the new wave of Japanese music that began in 1980 in real time, and here he updates that experience for the present day.
With arrangements and vocals filled with deep affection for the originals, he offers a modern and fresh reinterpretation of these classics.

■ The album is produced by long time collaborators Yuzuru Tomita, Tomoya Yamagata, and rising talent Yudai Ohi. On the track “Woman (from W’s Tragedy)”,
Nishidera performs a duet with Megumi Mashiro of Hicksville, a vocalist he has worked with for many years on NONA REEVES recordings and live shows.

■ Mastering is handled by ambient/balearic maestro Calm, delivering a stunning final sound.

■ The jacket design is created by Keita Fukumi, producer of the YouTube channel Gota Nishidera Channel NGC. Shot at Nishidera’s local barbershop in Sangenjaya
during his usual haircut, the artwork vividly captures the “human” essence at the heart of this project."

W.R.F. was formed in 2015 by Nina and late studio partner Andrew Weatherall to help wrangle the vast output recorded together beyond his solo releases.
Spotlighting nine tracks from the Apparently Solo series of EPs recorded between 2016- 2019 and released on Bandcamp in 2023, this lustrous time capsule marks the culmination of Walsh and Weatherall’s creative relationship born after they clicked at London’s earliest acid house clubs, becoming partners then managers of their Sabres Of Paradise/Sabrettes labels before taking different paths by the late '90s.
An accomplished musician, Nina had learned the art of studio technology by the time they reunited and started working together in 2012. Created at her Facility 4 Studio situated in the dangerous, gang-ridden no man’s land between Streatham and Mitcham, Anamchara captures the super-prolific creative stretch starting in 2015 that produced Weatherall’s Convenanza and Qualia solo sets, W.R.F.’s The Phoenix Suburb (And Other Stories) plus a whole lot more. According to Nina, Andrew envisioned the spectacular ‘Borderland’ as natural successor to ‘Smokebelch’, his most revered track. When it came to his remix, Nina enlisted renowned viola virtuoso Sarah Sarhandi and composed new harmonies with Pachelbel’s Canon in D Minor in mind.
The set also catches the breakthrough period when, through Nina’s careful coaxing, Andrew started using the computer system she’d set up to better express his musical visions by arranging the elements, grooves and melodies she sent him. Still considered the UK’s greatest DJ-producer, Andrew’s arrangements were inspired by his club-igniting sets. “This allowed me to mix the colours for his palette whilst he was painting the picture,” says Nina. Anamchara straddles the gamut of musical styles explored by W.R.F. at this time, from slower paced psychedelic “drug chug” outings ‘We Two’. ‘Heat To Meat Ratio’, ‘Hidden Watchers Part 1’ to banging acid house and techno sometimes inspired by the violence outside the studio door, including ‘SCHLAP’, ‘Crack-Ed’ and churning acid juggernaut ‘Yacidik’ (“After much dangling of the acid carrot, Andrew took a bite and, after one familiar raised eyebrow, never looked back,” says Nina).
Many tracks fly elements from the enormous sonic library Nina inherited from late partner Erick Legrand that she called The Akashic Library of Sound. Marking Andrew’s 2016 admission into the vault, ‘Rattly Old Puffin’ boasts Erick’s psychedelic guitar and tumbling drum loop Weatherall would run with, including on ‘Borderland’. “Erick was like our third member,” says Nina.
Bringing down the curtain, ‘Alma’’s exquisitely poignant melody that unfolds over thirteen time-stopping minutes was composed by Nina while navigating Erick’s birth and departure date anniversaries to accompany Andrew’s reading from Gordon Burn’s 1991 same-named novel at 2018’s Durham Literary Festival. Burn’s novel imagines early 60s popstrel Alma Cogan, who succumbed to cancer in 1966 surviving to reflect on fame. “Now it just makes me think of Erick. And every time I hear those well-placed cymbal crashes I can only think of the Captain himself.”
A beautiful grand finale for this astonishing selection of pure gold from the vaults.
Kris Needs / 2026

FELT wade deeper into the murky waters of contemporary Scandinavian electroacoustic music following the recent reissue of Johan Wieth’s Health & Safety project on sub-label LEFT and established gems from the likes of Civilistjävel!

Gintė Preisaitė, a Lithuanian artist and graduate of Copenhagen’s Rhythmic Music Conservatory, reveals her first solo release under her own name, following a collaborative effort with Toshimaru Nakamura in 2025 and a number of cassettes as “Baraboro”. The deliberately genre-blurring sound Preisaitė deploys works with composed pop vignettes, sustained drones, FX manipulations and guttural bursts of noise. Sparse piano movements, sample-laden psychedelia and moments of big beat/trip-hop rhythms gel with crowd noise, close mic’d intimacy and experimental percussion with a focus on instrumental timbres and extended techniques.

With a background in composing for large ensembles, Preisaitė's multi-instrumental approach is evident across the eight tracks, moments of dense concrète-style sound collages anchored by the human voice never being far away. She laments on fantasy, absurdity and relationships as a cast of players contribute string, brass, accordion, and guitar parts. Passages move from delicate acoustic folk motifs through to wide-eyed, cut-and-paste glitch electronics and spectral melodic riffs, making the album an unorthodox and welcome addition to Denmark's current world-class music scene.

Guided By Voices’ last album Thick Rich And Delicious (October 2025) was lauded by NPR’s All Things Considered and picked #1 on Magnet Magazine’s Best Albums Of 2025. The single “We Outlast Them All” from this latest, Crawlspace Of The Pantheon, is an anthemic victory lap on album #44 from the indie rock stalwarts. Robert Pollard told Rolling Stone: “ ‘We Outlast Them All’ could be our ‘We Are The Champions’ but it’s not necessarily about us.

It’s about anyone who perseveres over a long period of time.” On Crawlspace Of The Pantheon: “I worked much more diligently on this set of lyrics. I chiseled away at lines and sections and phrasings...I wanted them to have an overall emotionally conceptual feel. At times it feels somewhat autobiographical.” Guided By Voices will not be on tour in 2026. Pollard recently told Magnet: “Why would we stop playing live and make these kinds of records? I don’t know. We do what we wanna do.” “Pollard is the greatest rock lyricist of all time.” —Dennis Cooper

When funk music exploded onto the global pop scene in the late sixties, many of Jamaica's leading music-makers were inspired to incorporate elements of the exciting sound into their work. The result was the fascinating and compelling funky reggae style that proved immensely popular with record buyers on both sides of the Atlantic throughout the early ‘70s.

Pioneers of the sound included such celebrated producers as Lee ’Scratch’ Perry and Lloyd Charmers, whose recordings are heavily represented on both the CD and LP versions of this irresistible collection.

Collected here are some of the finest examples of the funky reggae, performed by some of reggae music’s most accomplished artists, from Ken Boothe and Lee Perry’s Upsetters to British-based acts, Greyhound and The Marvels.

Alva Noto - Wave Weave – Sono Obi is the original soundtrack by Alva Noto, composed for a film by Carsten Nicolai.

- The project emerged from a collaboration with an 12th-generation kimono textile manufacturer in Kyoto, Japan.

At its core, the work explores the translation of sound into textile form: sonograms of musical compositions serve as the basis for woven structures, connecting acoustic frequency patterns with traditional weaving techniques.

Alongside the original soundtrack, the release includes an alternative soundtrack version and a photographic documentation featuring sonograms, soundtrack visualizations, and film stills.




Tracklisting
---------------------------------------------------------
Medium: 1 // Side: A // Track: 1

Artist: Alva Noto
Title: Sono Obi Wave Weave
Playtime: 00:22:00
Explicit Lyrics: No
ISRC: DE1N62600001
(P): 2026 NOTON

Composer: Carsten Nicolai
---------------------------------------------------------
Medium: 2 // Side: B // Track: 1

Artist: Alva Noto
Title: Sono Obi Landscape
Playtime: 00:06:10
Explicit Lyrics: No
ISRC: DE1N62600002
(P): 2026 NOTON

Composer: Carsten Nicolai
---------------------------------------------------------

■ The latest installment in the popular ocean themed compilation series “SALT... meets ISLAND CAFE”, curated by the beach life magazine/media SALT...,
is DEEP BLUE the series’ first ever ambient music compilation. Centered around the title concept inspired by the deep, tranquil blue of the ocean, the album
presents soothing music tailored to modern lifestyles, spanning chillout, Balearic, meditation, and healing sounds.

■ Ten artists each highly trusted by discerning listeners across the ambient, chillout, Balearic, and surf‑music scenes have created brand‑new, original ambient
tracks inspired by the theme. From pioneers active since the ’90s to cutting‑edge trackmakers, this compilation brings together a stunning collection of
ocean‑themed ambient music.

■ Mastering is handled by ambient/Balearic maestro Calm, who is also featured as one of the contributing artists, delivering an exceptional sonic experience.
Enjoy all ten tracks, each expressing its own unique interpretation of DEEP BLUE.

■ The artwork features an artistic photograph by Pedro Gomes, a Brazil born, Japan based surf photographer, with design by Masato Maekawa (tAnkers inc.),
known for his work across apparel and outdoor brands. Under the supervision of SALT..., the visuals perfectly capture the compilation’s immersive world.


[b] a2. [.que] / deeply

Danish producer Kasper Bjørke returns with a new release on Tropical Animals, the “Veri/Gliss” EP a work that fully captures his signature blend of cinematic depth, refined production, and forward-thinking electronic aesthetics.

“Veri” opens the EP as a richly layered and immersive experience. Built around an evolving tapestry of textures, the track unfolds through pulsating synths, shifting sonic details, and a steady yet powerful rhythm. The result is a truly intergalactic journey, where each element seems to orbit around a constantly transforming emotional core. This is Bjørke at his most visionary-bridging club functionality with intricate sound design in a hypnotic and expansive narrative.

On remix duties, label head Ricardo Baez reinterprets “Veri” with a sharper, more direct approach. Stripping back the original’s layered atmospheres, he delivers a driving electro version that’s lean, tense, and fully focused on the dancefloor. With its tight groove and immediate impact, the remix is built for peak-time energy and club intensity.

On the flip side, “Gliss” reveals a more intimate and emotive dimension of Bjørke’s sound. A modern electronic ballad, the track blends sensual rhythms with delicate, suspended melodies. Its subtle yet captivating groove carries the listener to an unknown planet, where everything moves in sync, locked into the same pulse and flow. It’s a piece that radiates both mystery and warmth, showcasing Bjørke’s ability to craft deeply atmospheric yet rhythmically engaging compositions.

With the “Veri/Gliss” EP, Kasper Bjørke and Tropical Animals reinforce a shared artistic vision where sonic exploration meets club-ready precision, balancing introspection and dancefloor energy, cosmic textures and physical groove.

Shadow Child’s ‘Say It Now’ is an ode to the Portsmouth producer’s rave-heritage and how it has inspired him.

· Featuring a soaring vocal sample, ravey piano stabs and a dangerous bassline, this is a release that tells the story of Shadow Child’s music journey.

· London Records have pressed four mixes onto wax, including a thumping techno cut from Dusky, a floaty progressive house interpretation from Cinthie and asoundsystem-ready, jungle banger from S.P.Y, as well as Shadow Child’s original mix.

· This 12” features artwork from renowned print artist and designer Jimmy Turrell, who has worked with names such as Chanel, Adidas, Apple, Rolling Stones, Dazed and Chemical Brothers, just to name a few

RCR002 marks the second release from RAW CUTS Records, bringing together four established producers making waves across their respective scenes.

Leading the VA is 'Junior' from Argentinian artist Light Blue File whose been creating buzz with his cotemporary take on electro house built to set dancefloors alight. On A2, UK mainstay and Bizarre Trax founder Jhobei delivers 'Radionyx,' a hypnotic, progressive leaning takes on modern UK tech.

Flipping to the B-side, Christopher Ledger brings the acid-driven pressure of 'Acid Redux.' with a commanding bassline Rounding out the release is fellow Argentinian Guile, closing the VA with 'El Sonido Subterráneo,' an electro-infused funk workout that brings us home.

Very limited numbers, orders will need to be confirmed.

For his new album, Irreparable Parables, Andrew Wasylyk felt a strong desire to write a set of songs featuring an element hitherto rare in his work: the human voice. Equally strong was the conviction that he did not want to sing them himself.

The Scottish multi-instrumentalist and composer set about assembling a group of guest singers, sending out the songs to wherever they were in the world. The vocals were recorded remotely and then, like migrating birds, winged their way back to Scotland. The result is an album of great beauty which, perhaps preeminently in Wasylyk’s work, expresses the vulnerability and resilience of the human spirit.

Six singers appear on the record, represented by six songbirds illustrated on the sleeve by Clay Pipe Music’s Frances Castle. The cuckoo is a nod to Belle and Sebastian’s 2004 single ‘I’m A Cuckoo’, that band’s Stuart Murdoch being the first voice you hear on the new album. When the vocal for ‘Private Symphony #2’ arrived, says Wasylyk, “it was everything that I was looking for and more. But this is Stuart Murdoch. Of course he’s going to make something incredibly beautiful and thoughtful.”

The song lyrics were, for the most part, written by the singers. The music is Wasylyk’s creation. He navigates a sound world that lies somewhere beyond the borders of classical and jazz, ambient and abstract. It is difficult to describe, but easy to understand, which is to say to feel. That is the way Wasylyk’s work is experienced: as a feeling. It takes you back to childhood, perhaps, to feelings of comfort and safety, or to memories of walks at sunrise and sunset, or to the way a shadow falls on a particular field in a particular place at a particular time in your life. This is consoling music. That is why, though pretty, it is not merely pretty. These are songs to shore up the soul.

Wasylyk writes in a room, in his native Dundee, full of “half broken” instruments. He picks these up, plays a little, seeking an idea, a feeling, a door that lies ajar. The musical palette of Irreparable Parables includes brass and woodwind, a six-piece string section, guitar, bass, drums, vibraphone, Mellotron, Fender Rhodes, tape loops, synthesisers and percussion. The strings were arranged by the cellist Pete Harvey, a long-term collaborator.

Among the other guest vocalists are Gruff Rhys of the Super Furry Animals, Saya Ueno from Japan’s Tenniscoats and Peter Brewis from Field Music. Wasylyk himself takes the lead vocal on the title track, though a throat infection and touch of pitch-shifting have altered his singing in a way that even he, having fallen out of love with his own voice, finds acceptable.

The heart of the record can, arguably, be found in two tracks, ‘Love Is A Life That Lasts Forever’ and ‘Spectators In The Absence of God’, sung respectively by Molly Linen and Kathryn Joseph. The former, bright with trumpets, was inspired by the writing of Derek Jarman. “I was feeling deeply upset about the world and wanted to try and write some- thing that was obviously hopeful,” Wasylyk says.

‘Spectators …’ offers an emotional counterpoint. It is an “apocalyptic hymn” that seems to grapple with watching human suffering from afar, too distant to be at physical risk, but experiencing the psychological wounding, and feelings of helplessness, even complicity, that come with constant awareness of other people’s pain. “Kathryn’s a pal, I love her dearly, and she’s a brilliant artist who really feels what she writes,” Wasylyk says. “The cracked tenderness of her voice is spellbinding.”

The album closes with an instrumental piece, ‘Soul Enters The Ocean Sun Climbs Out Of The Sea’, all piano and strings, that offers a sense of resolution and ascension. A good moment, too, for Wasylyk to reflect upon the artistic companionship that he enjoyed while making this record – the songbirds that answered his call: “These humans are incredible at what they do. I’m deeply grateful and feel so lucky. It blows my mind.”

"I got to know visual artist, musician, and producer Guido Erfen and sound engineer, acoustic artist, and percussionist Michael Springer as part of a group of five by the name of SHM1. The members of the group organised concerts at Rhenania, a disused grain silo, where I performed with The Absurd in 1988 and 1989. The band was also featured on one of Erfen's tape releases. Erfen and Springer met when they were still at the same secondary school and soon became close friends and musical allies. With the other members of SHM they built an independent network for creating and distributing music beyond the mainstream in Cologne. Rent at Rhenania was incredibly low, allowing a recording studio to be established there.

The first traces of the Ukrainian Underground arrived at Erfen's door via a cassette tape with three bands from Kharkiv and Kyiv, the package including a long essay which detailed the rock scene in the two cities by Sergey Myasoyedow. In 1986, Myasoyedow, together with Sasha Panchenko, had founded the “Novaya Scena“ rock club in Kharkiv, presenting bands inspired by punk, the avant-garde, dadaism, and even medieval melodies. If Erfen hadn't been part of the independent mail-art scene, he wouldn't have had the chance to discover this unorthodox music. It was the summer of 1990, shortly before the Soviet Union collapsed and Ukraine became an independent state the following year.

In 1991, singer and keyboard player Soloveyka from Kharkiv arrived in Cologne and gave Erfen half a dozen cassettes with underground bands from Ukraine and a handful with bands from the Soviet Union. Intrigued by the original music of many of the acts, he visited Ukraine twice, made friends there, compiled a tape with his favourite tracks and finally succeeded in convincing Hamburg label boss Alfred Hilsberg to present underground music from Ukraine on the CD “Novaya Scena“ via his label What's So Funny About (the original home of Einstürzende Neubauten).
The album compiled 20 tracks recorded between 1986 and 1992 by 14 bands out of Kharkiv and Kyiv– music beyond the usual Perestroika records, often with jarring dissonances over grooves that fans of Captain Beefheart or The Fall would certainly enjoy.

On the other hand, there are tracks featuring flute and trumpet that seem inspired by folk, classical music, and punk. Ghostly chamber prog miniatures by Cukor Belaya Smert (lit. Sugar White Death) from Kyiv featuring, among others, the classically trained pianist and singer Svitlana Nianio (née Ochrimenko) and guitarist, visual artist, and spokesman Yewgeny "Yenia" Taran. Nianio sang in her native Ukrainian, as did two more of the bands. Today, this seems more relevant than ever, more culturally and historically significant from a Ukrainian point of view than it was even in 1993. Young Ukrainians were amazed at that time that rock music sung in their native tongue could work!

It is in the aftermath of the “Novaya Scena“ album that the music on this LP was created. About a year after the release of the CD in August 1993, Nianio and Taran came to Cologne to work on music for the dance production "Transilvania Smile" by the dance theatre ensemble Pentamonia2.
The seeds for the Traces of Ukrainian Underground in Cologne were sown. Starting in 1994, a series of informal recording sessions took place at Michael Springer’s Phanton Studio and at SHM studio in Rhenania. Together, these sessions formed the basis of the four different incarnations of the Ukraine-Cologne connection heard on STROOMS’s compilation.