A shockingly large amount of stuff in this week, and some pretty big deals too. Sticky Fingers, with the zipper, reissued! And you can never go wrong with new Arthur Russell stuff. Never.
Also, this Sunday, we will be one of the venue’s for the Make Music Edmonton festival. We will be hosting 5 local artists playing music live out front. There are a pile of people performing at various locations on 124th street on Sunday. Check out the Make Music Edmonton website for more details.
…..pick of the week…..
Arthur Russell: Corn (Audika) LP
It has been seven years since Audika last issued an album of Arthur Russell material. The wait ends this summer with Corn, nine tracks Russell recorded in 1982 and 1983. In collaboration with Russell’s partner Tom Lee, Audika’s Steve Knutson compiled Corn from Arthur’s original, completed 1/4” tape masters. Russell himself compiled this material on three separate test pressings—labeled El Dinosaur, Indian Ocean, and Untitled, respectively—in 1985. Russell fans know something of the Corn sound from Audika’s debut release, Calling Out of Context (2004), which included four songs from these sessions: “The Deer In The Forest Part 1″, “The Platform on the Ocean”, “Calling Out Of Context,” and “I Like You!”. This new collection includes rhythmic alternate versions of “Lucky Cloud,” “Keeping Up,” “See My Brother, He’s Jumping Out (Let’s Go Swimming #2)”, “This Is How We Walk on the Moon”, and “Hiding Your Present From You,” along with “Corn,” “Corn (Continued),” “They and Their Friends,” and the closing instrumental “Ocean Movie,” one of the most beautiful and curious Russell tracks ever to see the light of day. With Corn, Audika reveals yet another side of Russell’s staggeringly diverse artistry, following the avant-electro disco of Calling Out Of Context, and its companion EP, Springfield; the orchestral works “Instrumentals” and “Tower Of Meaning”, compiled and released as First Thought Best Thought; the “Buddhist Bubble Gum Pop” collected on Love Is Overtaking Me, and Russell’s definitive solo masterpiece, World Of Echo.
File Under: Pop, Cello, Experimental, 80s, Essential Grooves
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…..new arrivals…..
39 Clocks: Subnarcotic (Luxury Product) LP
Germany’s self-crowned “Psycho Beat” combo, 39 Clocks were a low-lit shadow unit inhabiting a cultural corner all their own. Subnarcotic may be their finest moment, distilling and stretching the art-primitivism of their debut to it’s logical breaking point. Oozing out shock waves of bad acid trips, decayed guitar, and the dull stomp of a tiny beatbox, Subnarcotic is American garage and proto-punk filtered through some shadow-filled masterpiece of German expressionism.
File Under: Post-Punk, New Wave, Garage
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Ryan Adams: 10 Songs from Live at Carnegie Hall (Blue Note) LP
Ten Songs From Live At Carnegie Hall is a condensed version of Ryan Adams’ 42-track, 6LP Live At Carnegie Hall box set which is comprised of two full sets the esteemed singer/songwriter performed and recorded over two nights at the historic New York venue near the tail end of 2014. The career-spanning 10-track offering includes takes on many of Adams’ classic songs as well as new songs from his most recent Grammy nominated eponymous release, which debuted in the Top 5 on the Billboard Top 200. Live At Carnegie Hall was recorded and mixed by Charlie Stavish at The Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage. “When you look up into the crowd at Carnegie Hall there is a feeling of reverence. I know what the seats feel like. I know the angle of the stage from the seats…so I sort of have an idea of what is happening…Strangely my only thought ever up there is to make the people feel relaxed and like there is no pressure. I love diffusing it. I cannot explain why but once diffused it can build to an even deeper place. Once you destroy the 4th wall you can rebuild. I like to rebuild the emotional space with the audience. It feels like the best thing. It feels real.” – Ryan Adams
File Under: Live, Folk, SSW
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Air: 10,000 Hz Legend (Parlophone) LP
2001’s 10000 Hz Legend is the second full-length album from French postmodern electro duo Air – acronym for “Amour, Imagination, Reve” (love, imagination, dream) – comprised of sound auteurs Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoit Dunckel. Much more idiosyncratic and less pop oriented than its predecessor Moon Safari, 10000 Hz Legend finds Air sounding as futuristic as ever and approaching prog and avant-garde territories with the help of guest artists like Beck, Jason Falkner and Buffalo Daughter.
File Under: Electronic, Downtempo
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Air: Pocket Symphony (Parlophone) LP
Pocket Symphony is the fifth full-length album from French postmodern electro duo Air – acronym for “Amour, Imagination, Reve” (love, imagination, dream) – comprised of sound auteurs Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoit Dunckel. Ever since the release of their classic debut Moon Safari Air has straddled the line between the experimental and the accessible. And not since that first album have they done it as well as they do on Pocket Symphony. Co-produced by Nigel Godrich, Pocket Symphony features vocals by Dunckel and Godin but also from Jarvis Cocker and Neil Hannon (Divine Comedy). Air once again achieves that rare supernova of artistic vision that dares to reconcile palpable, unapologetic ambience with unpretentious soulful simplicity. They create the alternate now, an environment that begs escapism without denying humanity. While conventional instruments continue to play a great role, Air fashioned several tracks with the addition of Far East classical instruments which Godin learnt to play from Shoko, a Japanese master – namely the Koto (usually referred to as a Japanese floor harp) and the Shamisen, a 3-stringed instrument which is one of Japan’s most popular classical instruments and resembles the banjo. Working their way throughout the album as musical ricochets, these unearthly sounds of an alien nature add another motif to Air’s sonic architecture.
File Under: Electronic, Downtempo, Synthpop
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Air: Premier Symptomes (Parlophone) LP
1997’s Premiers Symptômes is the cult classic debut EP from French postmodern electro duo Air – acronym for “Amour, Imagination, Reve” (love, imagination, dream) – comprised of sound auteurs Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoit Dunckel. Featuring early instrumental singles released between 1995 and 1997, the dreamy downtempo 5-track affair stands up against anything the pair has released since and if ever there was an album designed for the turntable, it’s this one!
File Under: Electronic, Downtempo
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Air: Talkie Walkie (Parlophone) LP
Jean-Benoît Dunckel and Nicolas Godin have an uncanny ability to continually coax a magical range of tones from the wide array of instruments – analogue and digital – that they turn their hands to. Their third full-length, Talkie Walkie might not feature the stellar cast of collaborators that 10,000 Hz Legend gathered, but it certainly doesn’t relinquish their tight grip on unashamedly synthetic postmodern pop. Tracks like “Venus” and “Cherry Blossom Girl” recall the skewed pop of French pre-cursors Indochine. Dissonance, flipped melodies and synthetic held tones – that hold up to scrutiny against the high points of progressive rock – form the backbone of Air’s ensemble moments. “Alpha Beta Gaga” – it’s title forms an apt summary – encapsulates their talents precisely. Five minutes of collision-fun featuring: trickling analogue pulses, synthesized whistles and finger picking banjo in a context that amply demonstrates the (artificial) intelligence that forms the cornerstone of their prodigious output.
File Under: Electronic, Downtempo
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Air: Virgin Suicides (Parlophone) LP
Released in 2000, The Virgin Suicides was director Sofia Coppola’s first feature film, Kirsten Dunst’s first major screen role, and Air’s first foray into film scoring. 15 years after its initial release, Warner/Parlophone will issue The Virgin Suicides: Deluxe Edition box set and a remastered 180g vinyl version of the original soundtrack. On the same day, Warner/Parlophone will also release Air’s five album discography on 180-gram vinyl with original artwork, including their first EP Premiers Symptômes (1997), Moon Safari (1998), 10,000 Hz Legend (2001), Talkie Walkie (2004) and Pocket Symphony (2007). The Versailles duo – Jean-Benoît Dunckel and Nicolas Godin – started to record new music by watching VHS tapes of the film during the autumn of 1998. Eerie, synthetic and tempestuous, The Virgin Suicides soundtrack’s first single “Playground Love” featured Gordon Tracks (an alias of Thomas Mars, the lead singer for the band Phoenix). The recording process was finished when drummer and soundtrack supervisor Brian Retzell called the duo from Los Angeles. “The microphones and the amps were packed and we needed a song for the ending credits! It happened on a Saturday afternoon. We called Thomas Mars from Phoenix. He wrote the lyrics, played some drums and sang on ‘Playground Love,'” remembers Dunckel. The Virgin Suicides premiere took place at the Cannes Film Festival in May 1999. Much to the duo’s surprise, Air’s soundtrack had been heavily edited and 80% of the recorded tracks had been abandoned in the final cut of the film. Godin comments, “You can do everything with editing. That was the first big lesson. The film turned out lighter and more evanescent. I felt that we didn’t get what Sofia wanted.” Despite these regrets, The Virgin Suicides soon became a cult soundtrack and, most of all, one of the most celebrated albums in the electronic performers’ fascinating discography.
File Under: Electronic, Downtempo, OST
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Michael Angelo: s/t (Anthology) LP
The 1977 psychedelic rarity Michael Angelo (aka The Guinn Album), by Kansas City, MO based singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Michael Angelo Nigro, is a staggering, hookfilled, hi-fi snapshot of one man’s inner space via dreamy folk-rock, Anglophile-pop and light psychedelia. Filled with poetic, contemplative, imaginative and arresting lyrical imagery and a Beatle-esque vocal presence that etches lovely figures, there’s little to ally the album to its time. Michael Angelo taps into the forever, ruminating on timeless life concerns in an oblique and direct manner. Ethereal and mellifluous, the album isn’t just a collection of songs, but a cohesive album-length statement with strummy, jangly folk-rock guitar, incendiary lead lines, big, resonant piano chords and plaintive tinkling, aided by keyboard coloring, and stands as a heavy-hitter in the pantheon of “out-of-time” treasures. Coming to form in local professional studios where he worked as a mid-to-late ‘70s session man, Michael plays all instruments on the album (spare drums, handled by Frank Gautieri). Original copies of this obscurity have long traded for close to four figures. The more affordable versions previously available have been shoddy bootlegs with poor sound. While the original master tapes vanished decades ago, this edition has been treated to a new re-master from a sealed original mint copy – and with Michael’s full involvement and blessing – rendering it as near the sound of the original LP as possible. We can now all drift within a sea of dreams with Michael Angelo!
File Under: Psych, Folk
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Black Mountain: s/t 10th Anniversary Edition (Jagjaguwar) 2LP
It’s only a cliché because it’s true, but the greatest records are timeless. Black Mountain’s self-titled debut album is just such a record. It is a new classic rock, with reference points arcane and clear, its sound fresh, unfamiliar and irresistible. The work of a small collective of musicians operating from Vancouver, Canada, far from any industry buzz but firmly in the eye of their own storm of creativity, Black Mountain’s debut album was, of course, a beginning, but it also marked an ending. Begun as the fourth album for Jerk With A Bomb, the 4-track bedroom project turned non-rock band led by Stephen McBean that preceded Black Mountain, the songs grew from skeletal sessions cut by McBean and Josh Wells and honed on the road in empty North American clubs along with Amber Webber. “We’d lay down the bed tracks, the guitars and drums,” remembers McBean. “Matt [Camirand, bass] joined, and we changed the band name after a dream of how life could be different in the B section between Black Flag and Black Sabbath. Josh’s roommate Jeremy [Schmidt, keys] was lurking about. We asked him if he wanted to add some synth bleeps or whatever. He came back with all these orchestrated keyboard parts, and we said, ‘Oh, you should probably join the band now.’” They cut the album at the Hive and their jam space in Vancouver, recording in “a big cement room with a tall ceiling, nice boomy acoustics, lots of natural reverb, on an 8-track reel-to-reel tape recorder.” During the sessions, these elemental first tracks found their true shape: wry and giddy, hypnotic and gracefully heavy, the dark and powerful blues, and mysterious chugging murk. The album’s initial success saw the band take to the road, leaving their Vancouver enclave for stages across the world. “It felt like there was a real explosion of excitement at shows,” remembers McBean. “We wouldn’t write setlists, we’d just feel the energy in the room and call things out, jamming on songs like ‘No Hits’ and ‘Druganaut.’ It was a good time for live rock’n’roll: DJ booths were being transformed back to drum risers, people were digging 20 minute heady jams and there were bands like Comets On Fire and Oneida out there who we felt kinship with. I was into Faust and Amon Duul but had no idea of the scene of modern bands doing that stuff. And then we met those bands, and it was cool. And then we went on tour with Coldplay…and the adventures continued.” Their jaunt across the world as guests of perhaps the biggest band in the world is a tale for another time, perhaps: the start of Black Mountain’s next chapter, and all that followed. For now, savor the compact, spacey brilliance of that cosmic, heavy and subtle debut album, expanded now with a raft of delicious bonus tracks scavenged from the Black Mountain Army archives. “Once you’re done recording and touring a record, it’s hard to listen to it again for a long time,” says McBean. “But it’s fun when you hear your songs in strange contexts and don’t recognize them at first, like the other night I was watching some new Kevin Bacon show with a surreal orgy scene and Black Mountain playing in the background. Listening back to the first album again for the remaster, there were lots of things I dug about it, and it brought back a bunch of memories. When we made it, there were no expectations. We were hoping maybe twenty people would dig it. So everything that happened with it was really, really cool.”
File Under: Stoner Rock, Rock, CanCon
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Crosss: Lo (Telephone Explosion) LP
CROSSS are back with a dense, ominous and cerebral album that expands on the formula which made Obsidian Spectre such a critical success. Once again, the band straddles the line between metal and psych, with a noticeable shift toward the former. This is a record that hits hard on many levels.
File Under: Psych, Metal, Stoner
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FFS: s/t (Domino) LP
Collaborations don’t work, or that’s what FFS would have us believe on their debut album. When the seminal Los Angeles duo Sparks and Glasgow-based quartet Franz Ferdinand decided to record together, it was a flawed and potentially disastrous idea, right? Wrong, as FFS is one of the strongest albums of either bands’ distinguished career. Produced by Grammy-award winning John Congleton (St Vincent, David Byrne) at London’s RAK Studios, the album FFS took 15 days to complete. Kimono My House-era Sparks fans will recognize how FFS highlights their classic pop rock DNA, and Franz Ferdinand fans won’t be disappointed to hear the band at the peak of their powers as they bring their exhilaratingly unique and witty modern rock sound to the collaboration. Very much a new project, FFS doesn’t truly sound like either band, but a striking and fascinating mutation. “The real motivation was to make something new, not ‘Franz featuring Russell Mael’, or ‘Sparks with Franz Ferdinand backing them,” says Alex Kapranos (of Franz Ferdinand). “You can’t chart what is Sparks and what is Franz Ferdinand,” suggests Ron Mael (of Sparks). “I think each band unconsciously relinquished a little of who they were in order to enter new territory.” So in the right hands, collaborations do indeed work, and beautifully as FFS wholeheartedly attests. The strength of the two bands is bigger than the sum of the parts. 2LP-set pressed on heavyweight 180 gram vinyl with four bonus tracks and an MP3 download.
File Under: Pop, Rock, Sparks
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Bernard Fevre: Cosmos 2043 LP
In May 2015, Anthology Recordings commemorates the anniversaries of Bernard Fèvre’s 1975 LP Suspense and 1977 LP Cosmos 2043 with their first ever vinyl reissues. Suspense exemplifies Fevre’s cinematic skills in composing proto-electro vignettes and dramatic melodies befitting of the album’s title. Cosmos 2043 is it’s follow up, a wild, science fiction-themed library LP in which the enigmatic French synthesizer wizard conjures a far future populated by space-age electronics. Both albums have been remastered from the original tapes. “Cosmos 2043 and Suspense were made one after the other in 1975,” recalls Fèvre. “I chose to do everything myself, because I didn’t trust the other producers and musicians; I thought they were way behind the times.” Truly sui generis, Fèvre has since become a touchstone for countless generations of electronic musicians. This two album retrospective marks the first chapter in the Anthology Cinema Studies division, Anthology Recordings ongoing exploration of this diverse genre. “The idea to re-release these records, and for the first time in their original format, is very dear to me. I really like the word origin, because it’s very important to know where things and people come from. I hope that others can see that I have been an originator not an imitator, although I never considered myself futuristic or revolutionary at the time. The important thing with these reissues is the fun that they will bring to the fans that have demanded them for so long. I understood it was going to make people happy. I wanted to re-master my old tracks myself because I didn’t want to have a modern filter that would take away the charm of my old work, and new details would even appear in my work. “In the end, the 1970s need to be heard: it’s important for the magic of listening. Listeners will have the exact sound of the studio that I was using at the time, hardly utilized by me for the original Revox tapes. It will be a journey to my dimension in a universe that I was the only one to know until now. I had the chance to work from magnetic analogue master tapes, which have not traveled far from my 1975 studio / chambre de bonne and the Paris suburbs where they were archived, since the object ages less quickly than its creator…It’s still amazing to celebrate the 40-year anniversary of Suspense and 38-year anniversary of Cosmos 2043 (which came out in 1977).” – Bernard Fèvre
Under: Electronic, Library
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Bernard Fevre: Suspense (Anthology) LP
In May 2015, Anthology Recordings commemorates the anniversaries of Bernard Fèvre’s 1975 LP Suspense and 1977 LP Cosmos 2043 with their first ever vinyl reissues. Suspense exemplifies Fevre’s cinematic skills in composing proto-electro vignettes and dramatic melodies befitting of the album’s title. Cosmos 2043 is it’s follow up, a wild, science fiction-themed library LP in which the enigmatic French synthesizer wizard conjures a far future populated by space-age electronics. Both albums have been remastered from the original tapes. “Cosmos 2043 and Suspense were made one after the other in 1975,” recalls Fèvre. “I chose to do everything myself, because I didn’t trust the other producers and musicians; I thought they were way behind the times.” Truly sui generis, Fèvre has since become a touchstone for countless generations of electronic musicians. This two album retrospective marks the first chapter in the Anthology Cinema Studies division, Anthology Recordings ongoing exploration of this diverse genre. “The idea to re-release these records, and for the first time in their original format, is very dear to me. I really like the word origin, because it’s very important to know where things and people come from. I hope that others can see that I have been an originator not an imitator, although I never considered myself futuristic or revolutionary at the time. The important thing with these reissues is the fun that they will bring to the fans that have demanded them for so long. I understood it was going to make people happy. I wanted to re-master my old tracks myself because I didn’t want to have a modern filter that would take away the charm of my old work, and new details would even appear in my work. “In the end, the 1970s need to be heard: it’s important for the magic of listening. Listeners will have the exact sound of the studio that I was using at the time, hardly utilized by me for the original Revox tapes. It will be a journey to my dimension in a universe that I was the only one to know until now. I had the chance to work from magnetic analogue master tapes, which have not traveled far from my 1975 studio / chambre de bonne and the Paris suburbs where they were archived, since the object ages less quickly than its creator…It’s still amazing to celebrate the 40-year anniversary of Suspense (and 38-year anniversary of Cosmos 2043, which came out in 1977).” – Bernard Fèvre
File Under: Electronic, Library
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Fucked Up: Year of the Hare (Deathwish) LP
Fucked Up is one of the most prolific hardcore punk bands of our generation. Since their 2001 inception, they’ve challenged listeners with thoughtful artful chaos and a seemingly limitless drive for musical experimentation. Because of this, they’ve also become a record collectors worst nightmare; releasing over 80 recordings and collaborations on countless labels that include Arts & Crafts, Matador, Jade Tree, and more. The Year of the Hare EP is the latest installment of their Zodiac themed releases. Over a two year period, it was recorded and constructed at Electrical Audio, Key Club Studios, and Candle Studios. Title track “Year of the Hare” is a 21 minute epic that frantically mixes traditional instrumentation, piano/synths, flutes and sax, experimental editing/soundscapes, and guest vocals from great Isla Craig into one dizzying experience. While B-Side “California Cold” slowly builds and deconstructs over an 8 and a half minute stretch. Organically shifting from jangly melodic-punk anthem into a fuzzed out psychedelic jam session. Eclectically blending musical styles and voices in the most, well, Fucked Up way possible.
File Under: Punk, Hardcore, CanCon
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Glass Family: Electric Band (Lion) LP
The origins of The Glass Family start in West Los Angeles. Jim Callon formed a band to play surf music and covers at frat parties to make some money. They went by a few different monikers at that point; the Carpet Baggers and the Soul Survivors amongst them. “Los Angeles at that time was a wonderful place to be,” Callon said. “There were these pockets of communities all over the place. Everything [was] about what was going on and [what] we were a part of really had a good intention. It was people expanding their minds with LSD and marijuana. People just wanted to try new things and change the way that they were expected to live their lives.” A few years later when the band members were at Cal State LA for grad school, they changed the band name to The Glass Family. They played all over Los Angeles, gigging at notable venues like The Troubadour, The Topanga Corral and The Whiskey A Go-Go, sharing bills with The Doors, Vanilla Fudge, and Love. By 1967, they’d secured a record deal with Warner Bros. Records, who released their record in 1968. Although it never became the hit that they’d hoped for, the more important result was that the Glass Family were a piece of the puzzle of the times: playing gigs with Gram Parsons and The Flying Burrito Bros, Canned Heat, Big Brother and The Holding Company with Janis Joplin, and The Grateful Dead. “The gigs we played with The Dead at The Fillmore were the most memorable. Owsley Stanley would walk around backstage and place little paper cups full of coke or punch dosed with the best Owsley acid. Then he’d walk through the audience handing out cups.” ‘House of Glass’ is the impressive opening track, full of tension and convincing vocals over some 13th Floor Elevators style grooves; ‘Once Again’ and ‘Sometimes You Wander’ are nice soft-psych tunes; ‘The Means’ is an excellent hallucinogenic flying into the Beatles territory; ‘Do You Remember’ is not far from Pearls Before Swine. ‘I Want To See My Baby’ has nice fuzz guitar, and reminds one of Country Joe & The Fish’s ‘Death Sound Blues’. We’ve always thought that this was one of the better underground psych albums, so we’re glad to see an official version hit the streets. Gatefold includes unique band photos and a biography of the band’s experiences in psychedelic 1960s Southern California. The first LP is a reissue of the band’s original Warner Bros. album. The second LP contains unreleased tracks—how the band intended the songs to sound. Initial recording sessions for the album took place in the summer of 1967 with Richie Podolor (producer for Steppenwolf and Three Dog Night) at the helm. Those recordings were rejected by Warner Bros. So the band went back into the studio late in 1967 and early 1968 with Podolor in hopes of creating something more palatable to the label folks. These later sessions are what eventually comprised the original Glass Family album, “Electric Band.” The first Glass Family sessions from 1967 are what you’ll find on the second LP of this release.
File Under: Psych
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Hudson Mohawke: Lantern (Warp) LP
Lantern is the first solo full length in nearly six years from Hudson Mohawke. The producer has been on a meteoric rise, working with some of the biggest names in hip hop, pop and dance music. From age 15 he was an award winning scratch DJ producing happy hardcore on cracked software – he came to define a generation of electronic fusion producers but unlike many of his peers, Hudson has matured into a fully fledged contemporary hitmaker continually working to break the mold. Born of the underground club scene in the UK, ‘Hud Mo’ has been cultivating a formidable presence in the community, right from the earliest days producing on Fruityloops from his bedroom. His US break-out came in 2012 with TNGHT, the collaborative project with fellow producer Lunice, which saw their production influence the A-list in rap (being jumped on by the likes of Nicki Minaj and Lil Wayne) and help reintroduce the US dance/EDM scene to Hip Hop as club music. In the two years following, Hudson has worked on releases from Drake, Kanye West, John Legend, Young Thug, Pusha-T, and Antony Hegarty. Despite becoming one of pops go-to producers, to his avid fans he’s never been tied to one genre – and with Lantern we hear the realization of everything he has been working on since that Glasgow bedroom.
File Under: Electronic, Hip Hop, IDM
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In Camera: ERA (4AD) LP
By 1982 the quartet had fallen apart. The Fin EP was their 4AD epitaph: a Peel session from December 1980 which Ivo licensed from the BBC. Easily the band’s strongest release, it featured the 12-minute monolith ‘Fatal Day’. Gray remained affiliated with the label, co-founding The Wolfgang Press in 1983, while In Camera briefly reformed in 1991 to record some new material for the compilation CD 13 (Lucky For Some). Throughout the 1980s, 4AD was both a record label and a mood. That number combined with those two letters signified music that was dark, dreamy, and decorous, its roomy reverb conjuring quiet drama of introversion. While the sound of Cocteau Twins, This Mortal Coil, and Dead Can Dance more or less defined the label, 4AD also made room for the combustible punk of the Birthday Party, the fractured rhythms of Rema Rema, In Camera and eventually the gritty American indie of Throwing Muses and the Pixies. Nevertheless, the imprint quickly became identified with a very specific emotional bleakness. Ringleader among them was Ivo Watts-Russell, scion of faded aristocracy who co-founded the label in 1979 (its original name was Axis, after Jimi Hendrix) and steered it through the 80s and into the 90s. No businessman, he signed and funded acts regardless of their commercial viability. Some, like Cocteau Twins and the Pixies, became highly successful and proved incredibly influential. Others, such as Ultra Vivid Scene and His Name Is Alive, can be generously described as cult acts. Never forsaking their past, 4AD continue to look forward, re-defining the present.
File Under: Post Punk
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Rudiger Lorenz: Invisible Voices (Anthology) LP
When he wasn’t dispensing prescriptions in his day job as a pharmacist, the late German synth wizard Rüdiger Lorenz followed a truer passion, casting his own unique presence on the world of New Age music, and self releasing a significant body of work on his own Syncord label. His vinyl debut, 1983’s Invisible Voices, highlights when Lorenz’s busy, sprawling compositions and untraditional tone banks came into their own. More restless and spirited than many of his musical colleagues, Invisible Voices presents a vision of aural wanderlust, built for the journey and one’s reflection on it afterwards.
File Under: Electronic, New Age
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OST: ’71 (Touch Sensitive) LP
Inspired by a number of conversations between director Yann Demange and music producer David Holmes, the majority of ’71’s score was created before the film was shot. Yann likes to shoot with music already written – an idea that resonates with the collaborative work of Sergio Leone and Ennio Morricone. With reference to CAN’s soundtrack work, in which only Irmin Schmidt would have seen the film, David would describe the emotion, tone and atmosphere of the scene with the other band members before recording and then editing to picture after. He says “It frees your imagination to try and capture a world that only you can see and feel but in total relation to the directors overall vision. Living in Belfast for most of my life was also a big inspiration.” Musically influenced by John Carpenter’s ‘Assault On Precinct 13’ and ‘Escape From New York’, John Paul Jones’ ‘Four Minute Warning’ and Tony Conrad’s ‘The Pyre of Angus Was In Kathmandu’, the music pulses with the tension and potential terror of war-torn Belfast streets n 1971.
File Under: OST
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OST: Absurd (Death Waltz) LP
Death Waltz Recording Company is proud to unleash another cult classic from the video nasty era (and their first in an ongoing series with the legendary CAM Records from Italy). Carlo Maria Cordio’s musical score to Joe D’Amato’s notorious ABSURD (aka ROSSO SANGUE) is a pseudo-sequel to ANTHROPOPHAGUS, the film reunited D’Amato with George Eastman, star of the previous film, and brought the action from Greece to America where the near-invincible Mikos escapes from a hospital to go on a typically gory killing spree. Using drills, band saws, axes, scissors, and an oven, Mikos terrorises the kids of an American (Italian) family until he gets his inevitable comeuppance courtesy of a drawing compass. Carlo Maria Cordio’s score is centred around a versatile seven-note piano riff that gets an amazing amount of use without ever feeling too stale or repetitive. Cordio augments the riff in interesting and varied ways, sometimes going down the Goblin route with the big and impactful percussion and the funk beats, with a healthy dose of synth, or going for a bit of a chilled out proto-LETHAL WEAPON tune, with noodling electric guitar. Tension is the order of the day much of the time, with synths, an electric keyboard, and a snare drum being Cordio’s weapons. If you love your prog-rock horror music, ABSURD will be right up your alley. Just leave the axe at home, no?
File Under: OST, Horror
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OST: Broadchurch OST (Mercury) LP
A vital element in the success of the critically acclaimed 2013 British drama Broadchurch was the hauntingly beautiful, BAFTA Award-winning score by the young Icelandic composer Ólafur Arnalds. To coincide with the arrival of the highly anticipated second season of Broadchurch, Mercury Classics is releasing a full soundtrack album of musical highlights from the first season as well as newly composed music for the second season, all appearing on one full length album for the first time. The first season of Broadchurch, about a hunt for the killer of a young boy in a small coastal community, was hailed as ”a bona fide national obsession,” by Entertainment Weekly. Produced by Kudos for ITV, it gained an audience of 10 million viewers, making it the highest-rated drama on the UK’s main commercial channel. The show has enjoyed similar international success in 135 countries. The critical response was equally impressive, and particular emphasis was placed on the score. In addition to scooping three BAFTA Awards (including Best Drama Series), it won another BAFTA Craft Award for Arnalds’ emotionally powerful and austere soundscape. In the Radio Times, Alison Graham wrote, “The terrific music is important in building Broadchurch’s chilly atmosphere and dark mood. Like the best music, it’s unobtrusive and doesn’t tell you what you should be feeling.” In the New York Times, Mike Hale called the score “a tasty icing of gloom and foreboding,” and Televisual commented, “The soundtrack was as big as the Broadchurch landscape…and as melancholic as its tragedy and hidden secrets.” It is fitting that the score should be praised as highly as Broadchurch as a whole. Author Chris Chibnall was a long-term fan of Ólafur Arnalds’ albums – which combine contemporary classical influences, avant-garde electronics, and evocative ambient sounds – and listened to them when writing the script. The mysterious and melancholy atmosphere of the show had Arnalds’ music in its creative DNA from the very beginning. After getting a green light for his project, Chibnall then approached Arnalds (via his website) to compose the score. The Icelander was just 26 when he was commissioned, but was already a hugely successful composer and performer both in his homeland and internationally. “Ólafur’s music just broke my heart. I instinctively felt if we could get him, it would be amazing,” said Chibnall. In a remarkably short space of time, Arnalds created an atmospheric and hypnotic score that captured both the mood and direction of the plot and the imaginations of millions of viewers. He assigned evocative themes to the most important characters and elements of the story, including the bleak and dominating Broadchurch cliffs. “The music is a narrative all of its own,” commented Chibnall. Composed for string quartet, piano and synthesizer, the music was recorded in an empty church in Reykjavik. The soundtrack also includes two vocal tracks – “So Close,” sung by Arnór Dan and featured in Season 1, and a new song recorded for Season 2, “So Far” also featuring vocals by Dan which will play at the closing of each episode.
File Under: OST, TV
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OST: Deadgirl (VCR) LP
Joseph Bauer’s original score to one of the most brutal independent horror movies of the last five years, Deadgirl, is now available for the first time on vinyl. With music sourced from the master recordings as provided by the composer, the 12″ LP will be released in a limited edition of 500 copies on 180 gram, two tone vinyl.
File Under: OST, Horror
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OST: Far Cry 4 (Invada) LP
UK’s Invada Records are delighted to announce the release of the soundtrack to the upcoming Ubisoft video game Far Cry 4 on limited edition, multicoloured triple vinyl, with music from acclaimed Hollywood composer Cliff Martinez, limited to 1500 units. The album will be released with 45 minutes of bonus material not included on the digital release, and will be issued on tripled vinyl, housed in a gatefold sleeve along with a download card. The colours are as follows: Solid Orange / Solid Blue / Solid Green vinyl. Despite not exclusively being a soundtrack label, Invada Records have proved to be a major force in the market for film and video game music. Their previous releases include the soundtracks to Ubisoft’s video game’s Watch_Dogs and Far Cry 3: ‘Blood Dragon’. Invada have also been involved in several Cliff Martinez projects, with their own release of the popular soundtracks to crime thriller Drive and science fiction film Solaris. Cliff Martinez has recently finished scoring the critically-acclaimed Showtime TV show The Knick, with his anachronistic music being recognised as one of the key elements of the show’s success. Far Cry 4 is Cliff’s first foray into the world of video game music. Label Manager Redg Weeks states “Ubisoft are not only a huge company in the video game world, they put huge emphasis on the soundtrack to their games – the fact they’ve brought in Cliff to score FC4 shows the lengths they go to to deliver a real top-notch overall product. We’re pleased to further develop our relationship with Cliff Martinez, whose work continues to astound us at every turn.”
File Under: OST, Videogames, Drive
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OST: Hannibal (Mondo) LP
Featuring 20 cues from the first two seasons of the hit television show, (10 from each) curated by the composer himself. This compilation is essential for Hannibal fans, Just in time for the Season 3 premiere. Featuring an informative interview with the composer, and original artwork by Phantom City Creative.
File Under: OST, TV
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OST: Maniac Cop 2 (Mondo) LP
Mondo is thrilled to present Jay Chattaway’s chilling, pulsing score to ‘Maniac Cop 2’ on Vinyl for the first time ever. Years after our release of Chattaway’s soundtrack to ‘Maniac’, we are honored to add another of his scores to our growing discography. This superior sequel is one of our favorite horror films of all time, and we are excited to pay tribute this film nearly 25 years later. This limited edition, one time pressing also features the infamous Maniac Cop Rap.
File Under: OST, Horror
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OST: Once (Dual Planet) LP
From the bizarre Polish-cinema-inspired imagery of the album’s artwork to the private-press aesthetics of the original LP, the Once soundtrack has long been a mysterious artifact among rare film and electronic music collectors alike. Written and directed by ‘the father of virtual reality’, the obscure art film is an allegorical tale of ‘Creation’ and ‘Destruction’ and the battle for humanity. With no surviving prints of the film traced to date, all that remains is the remarkable soundtrack. Composed by Israeli-born classical composer, Aminadav Aloni, the score is a collection of other-worldly spatial analogue electronics, field recordings and strong overtones of haunting Jewish liturgical music whose synergy create a soundtrack as beguiling and enigmatic as the film itself. Liner notes by Wire/Uncut journalist, Jon Dale. One-time limited pressing of 500 copies for the world.
File Under: OST, Electronic
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OST: Starry Eyes (Waxwork) LP
Waxwork Records proudly presents the debut LP release of 2014’s Starry Eyes. Composed by Sub Pop recording artist Jonathan Snipes (clipping, Room 237), Starry Eyes has been hailed not only as one of the best horror movies of 2014, but one of the best horror films of the last decade. The LP features an incredible 100% analog synth score composed and performed by Snipes that has grabbed the attention of fans of the film worldwide. Starry Eyes and it’s score has received countless awards and accolades. Time has called the film one of the ten best films of South by Southwest.
File Under: OST, Horror
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Rolling Stones: Sticky Fingers (Universal) LP/2LP
Hear ‘em knocking from a moonlight mile away. Sticky Fingers, the Rolling Stones’ swaggering and swaying 1971 opus that ranks among the greatest rock records ever made, gets restored on this explosive reissue featuring an outer wallet, white bag, and 12×12 insert. The remastered analog sound makes Mick, Keith, ace lead guitarist Mick Taylor, and company come alive in vivid, raw, blues-soaked detail. Wild horses won’t even be able to drag you away. Sticky Fingers captures the band at the absolute peak of its powers on timeless tracks such as “Brown Sugar,” “Wild Horses,” “Bitch,” “Sister Morphine,” and “Dead Flowers.” The effort was was recorded in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, Stargroves, Mick’s country home, and Olympic Studios in London. Produced by Jimmy Miller, the set ranks #63 on Rolling Stone’s 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list and originally came out released shortly after the Stones became exiled in the south of France. The first sessions that led to Sticky Fingers took place as far back as December 1969, in the remote location of Muscle Shoals Sound Studios, Alabama. The band then reconvened, back home in the UK both at Olympic and with the Rolling Stones Mobile parked up at Jagger’s Stargroves home. Soon after the album hit, Sticky Fingers became the band’s sixth UK #1 LP. Its four-week reign was matched by its performance in the US, and it also raced to the top in Australia, Canada, and through much of Europe. Today, it’s rightly considered a near-peerless classic.
File Under: Rock
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Run The Jewels: s/t (Mass Appeal) LP
El-P and Killer Mike, two of the most distinctive and celebrated names in rap, might have seemed like an unlikely pairing on paper, but the duo subverted and pulverized all expectations with their critically lauded Run The Jewels collaborative LP in 2013. Tapping into the creative synergy they’d discovered in 2012 on Mike’s R.A.P. Music album (produced by El-P) and El’s Cancer 4 Cure album (featuring Mike ), plus subsequent tours together, Run The Jewels cemented their musical alliance with an album of uncompromisingly raw, forward thinking hip-hop. Ten tracks of speaker obliterating beats and razor sharp verses, laced with searingly honest emotion and pitch black humor not to mention guest appearances by Big Boi, Until the Ribbon Breaks and Prince Paul. Due to an overwhelming high demand, the group will be reissuing a physical version of their now-classic debut album for the first time since 2013. “Just when you thought Jay Z and Kanye West’s Watch The Throne was guaranteed to be the hip hop collaboration of the decade, along comes the equally thrilling co-production Run The Jewels.” – NME
File Under: Rap, Hip Hop
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Doug Snyder & Bob Thompson: Daily Dance (Cantor) LP
Finally managed to dig up more copies of this one! “After meeting at a Stooges/MC5 concert, drummer Bob Thompson and guitarist Doug Snyder met one fine day in October 1972 in Thompson’s kitchen and bashed out this set of fiery improvisations, seemingly influenced as much by Iggy’s proto-punk moves as John Coltrane’s whole sheets of sound ethos; the result is a mythical frenzy of distorted guitar and improvised drums, creating walls of psychedelic noise; its sound is unparalleled for its time, preceding its closest kin, New York’s no-wave explosion, by a solid five years. And because of its lack of pretensions (it was done almost innocently), the record comes off as something, dare we say, a little more ‘spiritual’ than is the norm for such excursions. It is a singular recording, one that mainlines the classic high energy pantheon of the Velvet Underground, Stooges, Pharaoh Sanders, Sonny Sharrock, etc. while anticipating the free jazz/noise/no wave synthesis of groups that would follow in their footsteps. Thompson and Snyder get into some abstruse territory, with Snyder tearing industrial gamelan shapes from his six strings while Thompson uses the guts of his kit as the basis for new tonal alphabets. But it’s all rendered with a strong savage ethos that effortlessly equates monochord rock obliteration with the celestial freedom of Cecil Taylor/John Coltrane, et al., while establishing new territory as advanced as that attained by the most far-reaching visionaries of the rock n roll blueprint… still hard to believe that this was recorded in 1972. A major historical unearthing, remastered from the original tapes, and beautifully packaged in a Stoughton paste-on mini-LP jacket, with an informative Obi/U-Card, and an extensive 20-page booklet of liner notes and photos. Produced in conjunction with Cantor Records, who recently made Daily Dance available on vinyl for the first time in 35 years. Includes one bonus track (not included on the LP reissue), which was intended for the original release, but left off at the last moment for time considerations.”
File Under: Free Improv, Drone, Psych
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Umberto & Anton Maiovvi: Law Unit (Death Waltz Originals) LP
Death Waltz Recording Company are proud to bring you an all-new aural experience via the latest installment of the Death Waltz Originals imprint. Law Unit is a brand new creation by maestros Umberto (Prophecy of the Black Widow, Night Has A Thousand Screams) and Antoni Maiovvi (Yellow, Delta City), an original concept that in the composers’ own words “moves past the retro-futurist works of their individual solo releases to explore a world of early industrial and experimental music”. The resulting album is made up of ten dangerously cool and evocative cuts, the kind of tracks that put you in the mood for LA circa 2019, or the Detroit of 1987. Law Unit feels like exactly that; to paraphrase a certain TV show, “a lone crusader in a dangerous world”. Like a one-car journey into the night of Hades, dissonant synths and intent percussion surrounding you at every move. The cacophony at times is terrifying, the apocalyptic feeling echoing through distant electric guitars and sampled vocal chorus, following you, hunting you. Or are you hunting them? But what makes this record doubly worth your time are the snatches of beauty, of wonder, hidden within Reflective synth lines, guitar, sometimes ambient, other times in the foreground. Law Unit is a masterpiece of hard beats and harder synths that you’ll want on your stereo when you’re making that next trip into the dark unknown.
File Under: OSTish, Electronic
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…..Restocks…..
Tony Allen: Black Voices (Kindred Spirits) LP
Animal Collective: Prospect Hummer (Fat Cat) LP
Arcade Fire: Funeral (Merge) LP
Jorge Ben: Ben e Samba Bom (Polysom) LP
Bjork: Vulnicura (One Little Indian) LP
Black Angels: Passover (Light in the Attic) LP
Black Sabbath: s/t (Rhino) LP
Black Sabbath: Paranoid (Rhino) LP
Black Sabbath: Volume 4 (Rhino) LP
Black Sabbath: Sabbath Bloody Sabbath (Rhino) LP
Blue Phantom: Distortions (AMS) LP
Boards of Canada: Campfire Headphase (Warp) LP
Body/Head: Coming Apart (Matador) LP
Brothers & Sisters: Dylan’s Gospel (Light in the Attic) LP
Bunalim: s/t (Pharaway Sound) LP
Alex Calder: Mold Boy (Captured Tracks) LP
Can: Tago Mago (Spoon) LP
Caribou: Swim (Merge) LP
Caribou: Our Love (Merge) LP
Chrome: Box (Cleopatra) Box
Mikal Cronin: III (Merge) LP
Daphni: Jiaolong (Merge) LP
Earth: Hex (Southern Lord) LP
Donnie & Joe Emerson: Still Dreamin’ Wild (Light in the Attic) LP
Donnie & Joe Emerson: Dreamin’ Wild (Light in the Attic) LP
Lee Fields: Problems (Truth & Soul) LP
Serge Gainsbourg/Jane Birkin: J’Taime (Light in the Attic) LP
Goblin: Zombi (AMS) LP
Godspeed You Black Emperor: Lift Your Skinny Fists (Constellation) LP
Got A Girl: I Love You… (Bulk) LP
Honey Ltd.: LHI Years (Light in the Attic) LP
Etta James: Rock the House (Jackpot) LP
Jarvis Street Revue: Mr. Oil Man (Lion) LP
Daniel Johnston: HI, How Are You? (Eternal Yip) LP
Joy Division: Unknown Pleasures (Rhino) LP
Kinks: Kinda Kinks (Sanctuary) LP
Erkin Koray: Arap Saci (Pharaway Sound) LP
Kraftwerk: Autobahn (EMI) LP
Kraftwerk: Man-Machine (EMI) LP
Kraftwerk: Radio-Activity (EMI) LP
Kraftwerk: Trans-Europe Express (EMI) LP
J.D. McPherson: Signs & Signifiers (Universal) LP
Medusa: First Step Beyond (Numero) LP
Modest Mouse: Interstate 8 (Glacial Pace) LP
Monks: Black Monk Time (Light in the Attic) LP
Monolord: Vaenir (Riding Easy) LP
Ngozi Family: Day of Judgement (Now Again) LP
OST: It Follows (Milan) LP
Ought: More Than Any Other Day (Constellation) LP
Max Richter: Blue Notebooks (Deutsche Grammophon) LP
Ty Segall/White Fence: Hair (Drag City) LP
Sigur Ros: Agaetis Byrjum (XL) LP
Sigur Ros: Med Suo I… (XL) LP
Sigur Ros: Von (XL) LP
Sturgill Simpson: High Top Mountain (Red Ink) LP
Ray Stinnett: A Fire Somewhere (Light in the Attic) LP
Stone Roses: s/t (Modern Classics) LP
Stone Roses: Turns Into Stone (Modern Classics) LP
Sun Ra: On Jupiter (Kindred Spirits) LP
Unknown Mortal Orchestra: Multi-Love (Jagjaguwar) LP
Waxahatchee: Ivy Tripp (Merge) LP
Weezer: Pinkerton (Geffen) LP
Wet Secrets: Free Candy (Rawlco) LP
Wipers: Is This Real (Jackpot) LP
Neil Young: After the Gold Rush (Reprise) LP
Tom Ze: Estudando O Samba (Polysom) LP
Tom Ze: Todos Os Olhos (Polysom) LP
Tom Ze: Correio Da Estacao Do Bras (Polysom) LP
Various: Darkscorch Canticles (Numero) LP
Various: Our Lives Are.. Mowest Story (Light in the Attic) LP