Well folks, that’s a wrap! Well, more or less. That’s it for the year as far as new release updates anyway. We’ve had a lovely year here slinging wax and chatting about tunes with all the wonderful folks that come in and buy records from us and keep the doors open and the lights lit. We hope you have a wonderful holiday season filled with food, drink, family, friends and killer tunes.
Next week, our top picks of the year!
And speaking of top albums of the year… Looks like we’ll be HIRING someone again real soon! If you dream of hanging out and talking about records all day, then bring us a resume along with your top ten albums of 2019 and of all time!
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…..picks of the week…..
Gavilan Rayna Russom: The Envoy (Ecstatic) LP
Transdisciplinary NYC artist Gavilán Rayna Russom beautifully comes into her own with a distinguished solo debut album statement including the voice of Cosey Fanni Tutti and brass arrangements by downtown legend Peter Zummo. After decades exploring her sonic personality through here deep immersion in NYC’s club and avant-garde scenes, Rayna uses The Envoy as a vessel to firm up and convey her personal conclusions on intersections of gender and electronic music. Enriched with complex human experience and key influence from sci-fi writer Ursula K. Le Guin’s novel The Left Hand of Darkness (1969) — a book with descriptions of an alien race with multiple sexual characteristics — the album is intended to realign misconceptions of Russom’s prescient early work such as 2005’s The Days of Mars LP for DFA, which arguably foreshadowed a rise of beat-less and more ambiguous urges commonplace in contemporary dance music. With The Envoy, Russom returns to a 2019 music scene that’s better prepared with the politics of an emerging new world. Entwining Russom’s perspectives on gender, the occult, and spirituality, and how they relate to the body and music’s healing properties, The Envoy expresses the artist’s concerns in nine interrelated parts. Practically devoid of percussion, but full of body-moving polyrhythmic pattern, the pieces spill out of the lines of any typically imposed “grid”. Within this loose context, porous to the chaos of noise, Russom smudges a blend of analog and digital synths to connote an elusive sense of self. Employing the fluid potential of electronic music at its most fundamental in a way that loops right back to the gliding suspense of her prized early work, literally incorporating elements of solo recordings made in the late ’90s in the wake of Russom’s psych/noise band, Soma. Unanchored by kicks, yet pulsing in its own ways, the album flows with an underlying elegance from Cosey Fanni Tutti’s spellbinding recital of Russom’s text in “Kemmer”, set to an organic, orgiastic writhe of arps and stressed noise, and on thru the free-floating organ scape of “Envoy”, to acknowledge more industrial impulses with “Strength Out of the Dark” and a towering highlight of the album in “Discipline of Presence”, where Russom’s throbbing mass is hauntingly illuminated by plangent brass arrangement from Peter Zummo (key Arthur Russell collaborator). The ten-minute “Winter” then wraps it all up under a titular reference to Ursula K Le Guin’s novel, placing Russom as a filament of solo piano-playing light within the cold expanse of NYC. Cut at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin. Edition of 300.
File Under: Electronic, Industrial, Ambient
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Shasta Cults: s/t (Important) LP
Shasta Cults is the musical project of Canadian electronics technician Richard Smith. For almost two decades, Smith was the official Buchla & Associates go-to repair person for studios, collectors, and musicians around the world, having worked with artists such as Aphex Twin, Suzanne Ciani, Mort Subotnick, and institutions such as The Library of Congress and Mills College, Smith has had the unique experience of restoring and interacting with nearly every model of Buchla instrument constructed over the past 50 years. “Recording demonstrations of the rare equipment that found its way on to my work bench,” is how Smith describes the origins of Shasta Cults. Although sounds have been trickling out for decades, it wasn’t until 2017 that Smith recorded his first album using one of these rare instruments: the Buchla 700. Configurations, released in September 2019 by Important Records (IMPREC 432CD) and the catalyst for this latest release, features eight tracks of heavily-modulated, wave-shaped explorations drenched in effects. Recorded over the span of three months in the fall of 2018, this album was programmed using the only fully-functional Buchla Touché. Developed in the early 1980s with hardware by Don Buchla and software programmed by musician David Rosenboom, the Touché features waveforms generated internally by twenty-four digital oscillators and uses frequency modulation along with sophisticated digital and analog signal processing to produce complex timbres. This LP is a continuation of themes first heard on Configurations, with more consideration given to the generation and recording of the pieces. The album’s six tracks — a collection of sonic experiments and hypnotic drones — span almost forty minutes, showcasing not only the incredible fidelity of the Touché but also Smith’s evolution as an audio engineer. Put on some headphones, find a comfortable chair, and let this LP transport you to the mystifying southern cascades of Siskiyou County. Manufactured at RTI and cut by John Golden.
File Under: Electronic, Ambient
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…..new arrivals…..
Robert Ashley: Automatic Writing (Lovely) LP
Lovely Music present a reissue of Robert Ashley’s Automatic Writing, originally released as an LP by Lovely Music in 1979. Over the course of Robert Ashley’s career his preoccupation with language and the voice took many forms. He became known in his librettos as a wonderful, funny, moving writer. But with Automatic Writing he examines language at a very “primitive” level — the human impulse make sounds to express his inner state, whether it be regret, embarrassment, fear, or happiness — even though there is no one else to listen. Talking to oneself. Personnel: Voices – Robert Ashley and Mimi Johnson; Electronics and Polymoog – Robert Ashley; Words: Robert Ashley; Translation: Monsa Norberg; Silhouette: William Farley. The switching circuit was designed and built by Paul DeMarinis. Recorded, produced, and mixed by Robert Ashley at the Center for Contemporary Music, Mills College (Oakland), the American Cultural Center (Paris), and Mastertone Recording Studios (New York). This reissue was remastered and cut, from the original reel-to-reel tape, by Scott Hull, Masterdisk (New York). Manufactured at Record Technology Inc/RTI (California). 180 gram vinyl; Stoughton Old Style sleeve. Includes an insert with a transcription of the words, and the Automatic Writing notes Ashley wrote for Lovely’s 1996 CD (that included “Purposeful Lady Slow Afternoon” and “She Was A Visitor”). “On Automatic Writing, Robert Ashley composes under the influence of his ‘involuntary speech.’ (In his liner notes, Ashley revealed that he suffered from ‘a mild form of Tourette’s.’) The piece starts quietly, with scraps of Ashley’s mild, tremulous voice arranged next to more fluid French translations and barely-there touches of Moog. After Ashley’s phrases lengthen enough to encompass sense-making phrases, a bass-register groove briefly appears, vanishes, then returns. Few pieces so quiet have proven as captivating; many that intend to be equally startling can’t capture Ashley’s range of surprises.” –Seth Colter Walls, from Pitchfork’s “Fifty Best Ambient Albums of All Time”
File Under: Ambient, Electronic
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Brotzmann/Schlippbach/Bennink: Fifty Years After… Live at the Lile Eule 2018 (Trost) LP
For the celebration of the 50th anniversary of the legendary Machine Gun recordings at the Lila Eule in Bremen, Peter Brötzmann put together a trio with the Berlin pianist, composer Alexander von Schlippenbach and the percussionist Han Bennink, who already sat on the drums 50 years ago. They were so pleased with the music that they decided to release it and continue to play gigs as the trio. Machine Gun was originally recorded in May 1968 by an octet consisting of influential musicians of new jazz and improvised music. The LP was repressed on Cien Fuegos in 2018 (CF 020LP). Personnel: Peter Brötzmann – tenor saxophone, b-flat clarinet, tarogato; Alexander von Schlippenbach – piano; Han Bennink – drums.
File Under: Free Jazz
Chen Yi: The 1978-1983 (90% Wasser) LP
Originally released in 2006, Chen Yi’s The 1978-1983 aims for a collective approach of art. As an isolated group of humans/numbers operating directly from a secret place in Chelmsford (UK), they developed a personal and bizarre utilization of guitars, machines, voices, and distortion, giving as a result an unconventional group of compositions from among a lot of lost/unreleased recordings. This is likely what got John Peel interested, which lead to an inexplicable CBS contract. The results couldn’t be finalized, because CBS suddenly pulled out of the contract. Due to their raw and alternative “self-made” musical approach, they’ve been compared to the likes of Throbbing Gristle, Borghesia, and Severed Heads or more underground names such as Het Zweet and Biting Tongues.
File Under: Industrial, Electronic
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Alice Coltrane: Carnegie Hall ’71 (Hi Hat) 10″
Alice Coltrane, live at Carnegie Hall, New York on February 21st, 1971. On Sunday, February 21st, 1971, a benefit was held in New York’s Carnegie Hall for Swami Satchidanda’s Integral Yoga Institute, featuring Laura Nyro, the New Rascals, and Alice Coltrane’s All-Stars. The latter band was a remarkable coming-together of talent, with Lady Trane joined by legends such as Pharoah Sanders, Archie Shepp, and Jimmy Garrison on stupendous form (with a little assistance from members of the Yoga Institute). The astounding performance of John Coltrane’s “Africa” on this set, finds them improvising thrillingly. Includes the entire WQXR-FM broadcast, digitally remastered and accompanied by background notes and images. Also features: Kumar Kramer (harmonium), Jimmy Garrison (bass), Cecil McBee (bass), Clifford Jarvis (drums), and Ed Blackwell (drums). 10″ record with insert.
File Under: Jazz
Company: Trios (Honest Jon’s) LP
For the 1983 edition of Company Week held at London’s I.C.A. in May of that year, guitarist Derek Bailey once more invited a typically eclectic collection of guests. Cellist Ernst Reijseger is a mainstay of Dutch new jazz (ICP Orchestra, Clusone Trio…), American wind virtuoso J.D.Parran a veteran of the Black Artists’ Group and Anthony Davis and Anthony Braxton ensembles, while saxophonists Evan Parker and Peter Brötzmann, as titans of European free improvisation, need no introduction. French bassist/vocalist Joëlle Léandre is equally at home playing free or performing works by Cage and Scelsi, while Vinko Globokar is an acclaimed composer as well as a trombonist of monstrous virtuosity. He and British electronics pioneer Hugh Davies served time with Karlheinz Stockhausen, and before a brief stint with Robert Fripp’s King Crimson, percussionist Jamie Muir was, with Davies, on the very first (Music Improvisation) Company outing in 1970. Bailey once described playing solo as a “second-rate activity”; while at the other end of the spectrum, large improvising ensembles can, if they’re not careful, descend into the musical equivalent of a rugby scrum: dangerous, but thrilling — listen to what happens when Brötzmann comes barreling into the final track here. Sometimes one instrument takes center stage, as Parker’s circular-breathing soprano does at the beginning of “Trio Five”, but knowing when to lie low, as he does in the brief austere “Trio Three”, is just as crucial to the success of the whole. Muir makes sure he doesn’t get in the way of Globokar and Parran’s leisurely exchanges on “Trio Four”, but the trombonist is all over the place on “Trio One” — transcribe what Globokar does here and it might be the most difficult trombone music ever written — with Léandre racing up and down her bass and Davies all spikes, squeaks and squiggles, after which “Trio Two” is a lighter affair, Parran’s flute and Léandre’s vocals twittering together while Derek’s acoustic twangs merrily along. With a touch of dry Bailey humor, two of the seven tracks aren’t trios at all: “Trio Minus One” is his duo with Reijseger, running the gamut from crazed polyrhythmic strumming (imagine Reinhardt and Grappelli playing Schoenberg and Nancarrow simultaneously) to what must be the fastest cello pizzicati ever recorded. And on the closing ecstatic nonet, Brötzmann and trumpeter John Corbett prove that too many cooks don’t necessarily spoil the broth but sure as hell spice it up.
File Under: Jazz, Free Improv
Dila: s/t (Far Out) LP
Far Out Recordings presents a reissue of the first and only album from the mysterious Brazilian vocal sensation Dila (pronounced “Jee-la”). Having reportedly died in a car crash shortly after the album’s release in 1971, there is very little known about the woman behind the voice. But the joyous music Dila left behind gives us a picture as good as any, of a powerful feminine soul at the top of her game. The liner notes on the elusive original LP, written by composer Arnoldo Medeiros attest: “Friend, look out! Because when this girl starts to sing, you’re in trouble. Hold the railing so you don’t fall down the stairs, because she’s coming this way and shaking up everything.” Arranged and produced by Durval Ferreira, alongside his studio band affectionately known as Os Grillos (The Crickets), Dila is a rare glimpse into the authentic soulful samba sound of Rio’s favelas in the late sixties and early seventies. A blast of funky, percussive Brazilian breaks, scorching hot brass, and swing-laden piano, the music is as iconic as the album’s stark cover, as is clear on opener “Inez,” composed by The Crickets bassist Romildo. There’s a fantastic interpretation of the Ivan Lins classic “Madalena” (made famous by Elis Regina), a moving version of the Tom Jobim and Vinicius De Moraes classic “O Morro Não Tem Vez,” and a number of sunny original compositions by Madeiros, whose other writing credits include music for Marcos Valle, Wanderlea, Evinha, and Dom Salvador. With original LPs extremely hard to come by, this rare treasure of Brazilian soul, which fans of Gal Costa, Celia, Evinha and Elis Regina will love, gets a much-deserved official reissue. Personnel: Durval Ferreira – guitar; Sidney Marzullo – piano; Romildo – bass; Fernando – dr
File Under: Brazil
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Dome: Dome 4: Will You Speak This Word (Editions Mego) LP
With the demise of the group Wire in 1980, founder members Bruce Gilbert and Graham Lewis joined forces to create Dome. With the assistance of engineer Eric Radcliffe and his Blackwing Studio Dome took the ethic of “using the studio as a compositional tool” and recorded and released three Dome albums on their own label in the space of 12 months: Dome (July, 1980), Dome 2 (October, 1980), and Dome 3 (October 1981). A final fourth album, Will You Speak This Word: Dome 4 was released on the Norwegian Uniton label in May 1983. These albums represent some of the most beautifully stark and above all timeless exercises in studio experimentation from early 1980s alternative music scene. Personnel: G. Lewis and B.C. Gilbert – instruments, voices, production; Vincent Clarke – voice, Fairlight computer synthesizer, track 1; Deborah Danahay – voice, track 1; David Drinkwater – violin, track 1; Terrence Leach – saxophones tracks 1, 3, 4, and 6; Eric Radcliffe – engineer. Previously issued in the out-of-print Dome 1-4+5 box set in 2011. Floating-point re-master by Russell Haswell, August 2011. Cut at Dubplates & Mastering by Rashad Becker, August 2011. New artwork by Dave Coppenhall. Includes download card.
File Under: Experimental, Punk, Wire
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Ben Frost: Catastrophic Deliquescence (Mute) LP
Long-awaited vinyl edition of Ben Frost’s impendingly gloomy soundtrack to Fortitude. The Icelandic-based Australian composer is clearly the right man for this job, offering up a swell of emotive string arrangements shrouded in cold, wide electronic tones that convey the feel of the TV series thru a combination of incidental dialogue, cues and themes. Fans of contemporary sci-fi soundtracks and the expansive electro-acoustic designs of the Subtext label, Jóhann Jóhannsson or indeed Ben Frost will be totally in their element here. “From 2015 to 2018 electronic musician and composer Ben Frost sound tracked Sky Atlantic’s ‘Fortitude’. Over three seasons, his glacial compositions accompanied the drama that takes place on the Arctic Circle and features Christopher Eccleston, Stanley Tucci, Michael Gambon, and Sofie Gråbøl. The Icelandic-based Australian composer is clearly the right man for this job, offering up a swell of emotive string arrangements shrouded in cold, wide electronic tones that convey the feel of the TV series thru a combination of incidental dialogue, cues and themes. Fans of contemporary sci-fi soundtracks and the expansive electro-acoustic designs of the Subtext label, Jóhann Jóhannsson or indeed Ben Frost will be totally in their element here.”
File Under: Ambient, Electronic
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Gas: Pop (Kompakt) LP
Pop — the album that has become widely recognized as the defining moment in which Wolfgang Voigt brought his listeners into a clearing of his deep, psychedelic forest. A landmark release in the GAS odyssey that drew international attention, Pop was originally released in 2000 on the iconic Frankfurt imprint, Mille Plateux. Pop was heralded by Pitchfork at the time of release as being “an exercise in sonic texture… pure sonic velvet, the layered drone radiating a palpable warmth.” Pop was reissued by Kompakt in 2016 as a part of GAS Box (now out of print) and by itself here. First time on 180 gram, triple-LP vinyl; includes original artwork.
File Under: Electronic, Techno, Ambient
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Jacky Giordano: IM 24 (Organ) (Le Tres Groove Club) LP
Le Tres Groove Club present a reissue of Jacky Giordano’s IM 24, also known as Organ, originally released in 1977. An aura of mystery hangs over Jacky Giordano, a studio musician who has mostly worked for library music. He is the one behind the amazing label Freesound — Schifters (1974), Philopsis (1975) , Challenger (1974) — but as well on Montparnasse 2000 with Pop In Devil’s Train (reissued on Le Très Groove Club, LTGC 001LP), on Timing (with Timing N°1 and Timing N°5, under the nickname Jacky Nodaro), on Musax with Boucles Rythmiques (under the nickname Joachim Sherylee, and reissued as well on Le Très Groove Club, LTGC 002LP), or Black Devil’s Disco Club (1978) whose paternity is still disputed between him and Bernard Fêvre. Jacky Giordano wasn’t an altar boy, far from it, and will have sadly been more known for his troubles with his troubles with justice than for his music. This is his work for the label l’Illustration Musicale (IM) which can now be re-discovered thanks to this new reissue on Le Très Groove Club. Organ (IM 24), as its name suggests, is a tribute to this instrument and all the genius of Giordano, mixing the instrument with bass synthesizers and Rhodes to create grooves tinged with melancholy. A club in the suburbs half empty on a Sunday evening, a grey sky on the esplanade of La Defense, the soundtrack of a B-grade crime movie –this is where Jacky Giordano takes you with Organ and his already cult tracks (“Interrogation Point”, “Project Problematic”, “Owls Night”) for those who had the chance to get their paws on an original pressing of this record.
File Under: Library
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Grauzone: Raum (WRWTFWW) LP
WRWTFWW Records is beyond thrilled to announce the first ever vinyl maxi-single release for Raum, Grauzone’s best-kept secret and underground mega-gem from 1980. The four-track affair includes the full title track sourced from the original reels. The 12-inch vinyl is cut at 45rpm and comes with a never-seen cover art by band member Stephan Eicher and a handmade Xerox hype sticker. Initially released almost 40 years ago on the beloved compilation Swiss Wave The Album (Off Course Records, 1980) alongside the band’s massive hit “Eisbär”, “Raum” is the biggest Grauzone track people have yet to discover. An über-infectious New York style bassline played by Christian “GT” Trüssel and frantic drumming by Marco Repetto’s blend with Martin Eicher’s hauntingly hopeless lyrics and Claudine Chirac’s saxophone escapades to personify post-punk heaven and all its wonderful anomalies. It’s disco with an edge, pop filled with fear, it’s The Cure infused with proto techno and Swiss art chic. Or maybe, it’s simply one hell of a song that will make you dance and shout. Further on the A-side, Naum Gabo’s rework takes Grauzone to modern dancefloors with a thumping track and bounce-inducing groove on which Liquid Liquid’s very own Dennis Young adds magic in the form of marimba, Roto Toms, and EBowed guitar. The energy is electric, the sound is huge, a club banger with extra heart, ready for sound systems of all kinds. The B-side features Ata Macias’s fabled extended version of “Raum” (first released in 2010 via Live at Robert Johnson) that Stephan Eicher described as “the perfect Grauzone edit” (and it is!), plus a straight to the point radio edit of Naum Gabo’s rework. This release follows WRWTFWW’s reissue of Grauzone’s Eisbär maxi-single (WRWTFWW 041EP) as part of the 40 years anniversary of the band.
File Under: Electronic, Cold Wave, Minimal
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Issam Hajali: Mouasalat Ila Jacad El Ard (Habibi Funk) LP
“Issam Hajali is most known as the singer and composer of the Lebanese band Ferkat Al Ard. While they recorded 3 albums only their classic ‘Oghneya’ saw a vinyl release and is highly sought after in the Lebanese record collector scene (A copy changed hands in Beirut this year for 5000 USD). Before the band came together, he recorded this debut album in Paris in 1977. This rare album fuses jazz and folk with Arabic and Iranian influences into unique beauty. It was only released in a limited run of 75 cassette tapes and is now officially licensed and reissued by Berlin based Habibi Funk Records.”
File Under: Funk, Soul, Arabic
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Kink Gong & Li Daiguo: Dali China (Akuphone) LP
The prolific Kink Gong (aka Laurent Jeanneau) returns in a unique duet with one of the most prominent artists of the Chinese avant-gardist scene, Li Daiguo. Kink Gong and Li Daiguo first met in Chengdu (capital of Sichuan Province, China) while playing the same night at the Jahbar music venue. A few months later, as they become neighbors in Cai Cun, a village near the old town of Dali (Yunnan), Kink Gong begins recording Daiguo playing pipa, cello, and zheng. He then proceeded to deconstruct these recordings while adding voices that he mainly recorded in Yunnan Province. This fantastic combination of field recordings, experimental folk melodies, and electronic treatment leads its listeners to a fourth underground universe reminiscent of Jon Hassell’s finest hours. Includes download.
File Under: Asia, Experimental
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Willie Lane: A Pine Tree Shilling’s Worth (Feeding Tube) LP
“Proud we are to reissue the final piece of Willie Lane’s original Cord-Art LP trilogy. It was recorded in various spots throughout Western Mass, in the years following the release of Guitar Army of One. Initially issued in 2016, in an edition of 350, this lovely session disappeared into the fog of the forest before most folks were able to catch its scent. Now it has re-emerged with re-interpreted cover art by Max Milgram, and sonics we think will please even the most finicky listener. A Pine Tree Shilling’s Worth is my personal fave of Willie’s first three Cord-Art LPs. It has a hazily unstoppable flow, incorporating elements of American Primitive and Bay Area Ballroom-era string greats in equal measure. Mostly played on electric (although there are some acoustic overdubs), the music manages to be abstract and melodic at the same time, with individual lines splanging off in oddball directions, then reasserting their formal qualities inside a single musical breath. The specific quotes that exist inside the playing are crafty, episodic and display a strange syncretic streak. A nice example of this is the sprawling track, ‘New Arrivals,’ on the first side. Lane manages to obliquely reference both John Fahey’s improvisations for the soundtrack of Michelangelo Antonioni’s film, Zabriskie Point (1970), as well as Jerry Garcia’s work that was used in place of the bulk of Fahey’s music after he and the director had a savage falling out. Willie reconciles their differing approaches to blues architecture with mighty slide playing and sheer dint of will. Rumors are currently swirling that Willie’s next Cord-Art release will have vocals, so this three pack of instrumental genius may well be the primary documentation of one phase of this maestro’s aesthetic trajectory. Hope you’ve got them all.” –Byron Coley, 2019
File Under: Folk, Blues, Psych
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Los Siquicos Litoralenos: Medianos Exitos Subtropicales Vol. 2: Del Tiempo (Hive Mind) LP
The unique and magical sound of Los Siquicos Litoraleños (The Psychics of El Litoral), fermented in the rural north of Argentina, land of gauchos (Argentine cowboys), mate tea, chamamé folk music, and Psilocybe Cubensis. In this remote region, cut off from the fashions of the city, Los Siquicos were able to nurture their obsessions, hone their craft, and develop a singular style that takes the traditional chamamé folk music of rural Argentina, then throws it in a blender with Latin-American cumbia and chicha, the tropicalia of Os Mutantes and Tom Zé, the free music of Sun Ra, Captain Beefheart, The Residents, UFO conspiracies, radical philosophy, and a strong dose of the absurd. Out in the hinterlands, they fully embraced the spirit and ethic of DIY punk, gaining a reputation for wild, open air shows on the backs of flatbed trucks, or from makeshift set-ups in village squares and at local fêtes and fairs, where confused locals half recognize the twisted sound of a chamamé beamed in from another planet. Hive Mind Records are delighted to help bring Medianos Éxitos Subtropicales Vol. 2: El Relincho Del Tiempo (Medium Subtropical Hits Vol. 2: The Neigh of Time) out into the world. The album features a number of brand-new songs alongside tracks chosen from Los Siquicos’ extensive archive of home recordings. El Relincho Del Tiempo contains the soupy dub-cumbia of “Para Ser Un Gran Hombre”, the fantasy radio-hit “La Danza Del Brontosaurio”, and the shamanic ecstasy of “Los Ninos Del Brasil” or “Dostoyevski En El Minimercado”. Los Siquicos Litoraleños invite you to take a leap into their world in which the sounds of the future and the past blur into one, where the music of the whole planet is digested and spat out in new shapes, where the noise is joyful.
File Under: Latin America, Psych
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Madteo: Dropped Out Sunshine (Demdike Stare) LP
Dropped Out Sunshine is NYC mutant Madteo’s incredible new album of trigger-happy club graffiti on Demdike Stare’s DDS, weighing in a keenly anticipated follow-up to 2012’s cult-classic Noi No LP for Sähkö. Splitting at the seams with deviant funk and irrepressible attitude, Madteo’s first LP in sevem years forms a fractal, mixtape-like mosaic of asymmetric techno informed by skewed traces of rap, house, R&B, and dancehall. Its 12 tracks are delivered in an enviably nonchalant, freehand style that’s become the Italian-American artist’s ear-snagging signature since 2012’s Noi No and Mad Dip Revue albums, and also a dozen 12″s and mixtapes over the interim; all of which exerted heavy inspiration for everyone from Andy Stott and Joy O to Demdike Stare over the past decade, making this new LP a perfectly unusual fit for the anything-goes DDS aesthetic shared by label alumni including Mica Levi, Equiknoxx, Iueke, and Shinichi Atobe. Without beating around the bush, Dropped Out Sunshine is a straight-up masterpiece of cut-up sampledelia bound to make the club dance differently. Crammed with sawn-off edits that never lose the thread, its wild and effortlessly inventive turns of phrase are anathema to linear club music convention, generating fizzing alchemy from mutually exclusive bedfellows such as dancehall and techno, or R&B and noise that could really only be executed by a producer of Madteo’s caliber. Yet for all its singular nature, the album is also patently symptomatic of the times, sub-consciously parsing a gripping intimacy, personality and urgent yet elusive psychedelia from ubiquitous media overload. Kicking off with another *****-sampling zinger “1 4 U” (following his infamous use of “Marvin’s Room” on Noi No), and ending up mired in the melancholy gauze of “The Lies That Bind”, at each step the album effortlessly resists a struggle to square the nature of artistic expression. Fragments of gospel blues noise intersect gauntlets of filtered house fuckery, while restless Autechrian electro rubs up against uncoiled trap and needle-worrying levels of textured bass turbulence, leading to an outrageous turn of stuttering ragga-tekno in “Resident Alien (Broke-‘n-Steppers Reluctant Club Mix)” and a final side of collapsed, post-club styles that will leave listeners wondering wtf just happened, and ready to do it all again. RIYL: Andy Stott, Joy O, Mica Levi, Demdike Stare, Moodymann. Mastered and cut at Dubplates & Mastering, Berlin.
File Under: Electronic, Techno
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Maggot Brain #1 Mag
“Maggot Brain is brought to you by Third Man Records, under the eye of the ‘zine wizard Mike McGonigal. Maggot Brain, a full-color quarterly with heavy cover stock.” Features pieces on Alice Coltrane, Swell Maps, Malls Across America, Mia Zapata, Dilla’s Donuts, vibrant Detroit sign painting, Index, Big Joanie, how to resist ICE, Daniel Johnston, Les Filles Des Illeghidad, Swampfest, The KLF’s greatest pranks, and more! Also features pieces by Luc Sante and Mayakovsky.
Lloyd Miller: Oriental Jazz (Now Again) LP
“Born in 1938, and raised in Glendale, California, Lloyd Miller has had one of the most unusual careers in all of jazz. By age 12 he had declared an intent to make his living as a jazz musician, and by high school he had already begun to experiment, shunning swing music’s mechanical perfection, and chafing at his parents’ desire for him to nurture his talents with formal training. This tumultous relationship with his parents would eventually lead to a stint in a psychatric hospital, before reuniting with them in moving to Iran, his father having accepted a job working for the Shah. Stops in Hong Kong, Japan and Pakistan on the way to Iran deepened Miller’s connection to other cultures he’d first felt while listening to old world music compilations. He felt a definite calm and peace, an immense respect from everyone towards everyone else, and immersed himself in other cultures and languages immediately. Miller spent a year in Iran with his family, picking up Farsi after a few short months, and steadily gaining more and more of an appreciation for how deep the roots of Persian art run. However, still committed to his decision forge a career in jazz, Lloyd left Tehran in 1958 to head to Europe to see if he could make a living from jazz music. Miller kicked around the continent, first in Germany, then in Switzerland, Sweden and Brussels. He collaborated and performed alongside 60s jazz legend Jef Gilson, and experimented with exotic instrumentation before returning to America to resume his studies at Brigham Young University in Utah. In the years following his stint with Gilson, Miller had become more and more disillusioned with both modern music and modern society, which had ashewed jazz for rock music, which he detested. In Miller’s conception, for a music to have value it had to have a deep connection to a tradition, specifically connecting jazz to African lore. To Miller, something like ‘Tuareg African music is blues, just with no chord changes.’ Oriental Jazz was recorded, compiled and self-released in 1968 while Miller was studying at Brigham Young. The record, originally pressed in a quantity of 300 copies, sought to combine a cool, modal style with the exotic arrays of instruments and styles that Miller had picked up during his travels. Miller included songs he’d cut with Gilson in his Parisian studio years before, and a solo piano piece that he recorded in one of the school’s practice rooms. Despite Lloyd’s professed aversion to modernity, there nevertheless is something strikingly new sounding about this music, which fits together in startling juxtapositions. Traces of Bill Evans, Stan Getz and Jimmy Giuffre rub shoulders with Persian santur, Arab oud and Turkish saz music. Copies of Oriental Jazz languished in Miller’s home for years after numerous failed bids for record contracts, before finally ending up in the hands of record collectors decades later. After its release however, he would find a second life after returning to Iran, doing field recordings, and eventually hosting a weekly television show that programmed both American jazz and the best traditional Persian musicians he could find. It was not to last however, as he abruptly abandoned the country to return to the US in the late 1970s, predicting the arrival of the Islamic Revolution.”
File Under: Jazz
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Regis: Delivered Into the Hands of Indifference (Downwards) LP
Karl O’Connor’s banging Regis 1998 blueprint is back in circulation for the techno ultras. The track list has been reshuffled from all previous versions. The A-side now runs through “Hands Of A Stranger” and the cold pipes of “Disease Through Affection”, and is backed with the chewy grind of “Body Unknown” and the tonkin’ hustle of “Barriers”, while the C-side revolves “Concentrate” along with three hefty locked grooves and the D-side includes “Escape From Yourself” and the panic-inducing trample of “Indifference”. It hardly needs to be reiterated but this set includes some of the meanest examples of late ’90s UK techno, and more specifically, the Birmingham sound that Regis forged so definitively with this album, alongside efforts by his peers, Surgeon, Female, and Mick Harris. If you weren’t party to the original pressing, this one stands out thanks to the remastering, which really highlights the pebbledash grain and clangorous industrial atmospheres of the original recordings, which surely set this record and sound apart from the crowd. Entirely remastered at Dubplates & Mastering and cut with three bonus locked grooves not found on the 1998, 2003, or 2012 editions. Includes new artwork. Edition of 500.
File Under: Electronic
Rizan Said: Saz U Dilan (Akuphone) LP
Akuphone presents Saz Û Dilan, the second solo album of Rizan Said. After King Of Keyboards, (CREP 034LP, 2016) this release brings the most exciting Kurdish-Syrian dance music to one’s ears. Surrounded by young local singers, Rizan offers his own interpretation of the modern dabke through eight original uptempo compositions full of energy. Rizan Said is a composer, musician and producer, responsible for hundreds of Syrian recording industry productions as well as compositions and themes for television and cinema. Hailing from Ras Al Ain, in northeastern Syria, Rizan was a musical prodigy from a young age — a gifted player of percussion and reed instruments before a wealth of synthesizers began flooding Syria in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Steadfast on the Syrian cassette album circuit at the time, Rizan was already sending his signals out from the Jazeera frontier, thanks to a partnership with local Syrian producer Zuhir Maksi. Later, he was the man behind Omar Souleyman’s music and has recorded and toured across the world with him. Nowadays, he performs as a solo artist and brings the original dabke dance sounds of Syria to European festivals and concerts. Includes download.
File Under: Syrian, Dabke, Electronic
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Various: Buzzsaw Joint: Dusty Stylus – Cut 6 (Stag O Lee) LP
Buzzsaw Joint was born of a club offering Londoners the chance to revel in the sounds of good ol’ trashy rock’n’roll in all its vintage vinyl forms. Club top-cat, Fritz, then took the primitive Buzzsaw sounds online with a series of savage Mixcloud mixes created by record fiends from all over the globe. Now, the high-octane energy of Buzzsaw Joint has manifested into the physical form with a run of compilations on Stag-O-Lee. Get your ears around the wild n’ weird sounds of the extraordinary and inimitable Buzzsaw Joint! Dusty Stylus is a music junkie who lives in the country, a hundred kilometers north of Melbourne, Australia. He spent the late ’80s drumming in ’60s garage bands and now mainly gets his buzz from collecting post war blues, R&B, and good old Aussie garage rock. He hosts a couple of nights, including the ever-greasy Bacon Fat, and is often on the DJ bill at the phenomenal Slow Grind Fever. For the sixth Buzzsaw Joint cut, Dusty has dusted off a purely top shelf selection of his rare 45 and 78 rpm records. Take the edge off with a hit of this gear here. Features Elmore James, Two Crows & The Diggers, Dennis Roberts, Jolly Jax, Tommy Williams & The Fingerpoppers, Ted Taylor, Margo, Pearl Woods, Grade Wicker, Piney Brown, Tabby Thomas, Billy Ray, Otis Blackwell, Leo Baxter, Big Jack Reynolds, and Moose John.
File Under: Rock n Roll, RnB, Exotica
Various: Hoochie Koo Volume 2 (Stag O Lee) LP
Here you are! A second batch with essential tunes from the hallowed nights of the Hoochie Koo. To some, this is dancefloor material. Some of these versions you won’t find anywhere else. The Hoochie Koo is a high-octane extravaganza inspired by the risqué rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle of the early days, delivering an explosive mix of rare ’50s/’60s tunes, a live — Soundsystem for the dancefloor, Gogo dancing — and the raunchiest Burlesque in town. Big thanks to all the queens and cowboys, frenetic musicians, sultry showgirls, and self-acclaimed dancing kings. A big shout to the collaborating venues for helping us set a benchmark. And the almighty Bassy Club, that will stay in our hearts forever… The music: “Crazy Lover” sets the mood. “Thunder” is tweaked a bit to kindle the floor, followed by the “Earthshaker” featuring the crazy honking of our sax-player, Florent. “Rock-a-Chika” is an homage to the leader of our go-go team, because her name is Chika! “Bassy Boogaloo” had been recorded years ago at one of our wild nights at the infamous Bassy Club (R.I.P). “Snacky De Odorou” is the soundtrack for the quirkiest burlesque performer at Hoochie Koo: Snacky The Drag King! Furthermore: a hiccup rock, the Nabout dance, atmospheric surf. Features Richard Berry, Bob Taylor & The Counts, The Lancasters, Warner Mack, Henry Cording, Hoochie Krew, Hajime Kaidou, Claude François, The Atmospheres, Dario Moreno.
File Under: Rock n Roll, RnB, Exotica
Various: Sin City Jukebox Volume 2 (Stag O Lee) LP
Message from Stag-O-Lee: “When I visited New Orleans in 2004 in struck a friendship with a cab driver named Herb H. Franklin. He showed me great record shops and restaurants and told me his interesting life story. Herb was born in 1930 in Wiggins, Mississippi, and he moved down to the coast town of Biloxi with his parents at the age of ten. He later trained to be an auto mechanic, but as he hated getting grease under his fingernails, he opted to do what he did best — hang out in bars. So in 1950 he took a bartending job at The Smithwick’s — a watering hole in Biloxi, just off Beach Boulevard. When his boss retired in 1955, Herb H. Franklin became the new owner of the bar. A month of renovation followed and the place reopened in Fall 1955 as Sin City, an unofficial name, as the sign outside the bar just said ‘Liquor’. Herb said it was a long, rectangular room with a bar on the left, chairs and tables to the right, and a stage for live music at the end. The pool tables were relocated to a side room to make ‘plenty of space for sinning,’ according to Herb. There were rockin’ bands on the weekends, sweaty dancers every night, and a jukebox that was wired to the house sound system so it could be heard over the general ruckus of the bar. And that jukebox did its work until the mid- 1960s, when Herb closed the place. Amazingly, however, every 45 that ever graced the Sin City jukebox remained in Herb’s possession. Whenever the jukebox operator came to bring in the new tunes, Herb gave him some small change to keep the replaced ones. As a result, 15 years of serious record collecting took place, without Herb even giving it a second thought. And here are some of his tunes…” Features Jackie Harris, Larry Bright, Lonnie Brooks, The Sotos Brothers, Cliffie Stone’s Orchestra w/ Bob Roubian, Otto Bash, Lelan Rogers and Friends, Jimmy McCracklin, Junior Wells, Eddie Burns, Elmer Parker and the Light Lighters, The Sounds, Bobby King, Connie Christmas, Eddie Bo, and Earl King.
File Under: Rock n Roll, RnB, Exotica
Various: Spiritual Jazz 10: Prestige (Jazzman) LP
Gatefold sleeve with comprehensive liner notes and pics. Subtitled: Esoteric, Modal and Deep Jazz from Prestige Records, 1961-73. The tenth edition of Jazzman Records Spiritual Jazz series takes a closer look at the music Prestige was recording at the start of the 1960s. This was the period when the modal jazz sound pioneered by Miles and Coltrane was starting to percolate through the jazz underground. In its heyday, Prestige was the only jazz label that could hold a candle to Blue Note. Prestige was always quick off the mark to record new artists, and in the years after Kind of Blue (1959) the label was quick to release some of the most innovative early explorers of the new style. Founded as New Jazz in 1949 by 20-year old jazz fan and entrepreneur Bob Weinstock, Prestige was the only other imprint besides Blue Note to capture the iconic jazz sounds of the 1950s, and like its rival it grew to be an icon itself. If Blue Note documented the sound of hard bop in its most carefully crafted and beautifully presented form, the low-key, jam-session approach that Weinstock preferred meant that the music captured by Prestige has a tough, unfiltered energy that was a lot closer to way it was being played live, night after night, by New York’s most prominent jazz musicians. Featuring Afro-Eastern visions from Yusef Lateef and Ahmed Abdul-Malik, deep modal excursions from Mal Waldron and Walt Dickerson, and essential spiritual jazz grooves from Gary Bartz and Idris Muhammed, Spiritual Jazz 10 documents the sound of modal jazz in full flight, unabashed and authentic from the pioneers! Also features Roy Haynes, Latin Jazz Quintet, and Moondog.
File Under: Jazz
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…..Restocks….
Beastie Boys: Ill Communication LP
Beck: Sea Change LP
Blakey, Art & The Jazz Messengers: Meet You at the Jazz Corner of the World – Vol.1 LP
Blakey, Art & The Jazz Messengers: Meet You at the Jazz Corner of the World – Vol.2 LP
Boards Of Canada: Geogaddi LP
Boards Of Canada: Music Has the Right to Children LP
Bon Iver: Bon Iver, Bon Iver LP
Byrd, Donald: Black Byrd LP
Byrd, Donald: Ethiopian Knights LP
Cherry, Don: Brown Rice LP
Childish Gambino: Awaken, My Love! LP
Childish Gambino: Camp LP
Dal Forno, Carla: Look Up Sharp LP
Drake, Nick: Pink Moon LP
Finnigan, Kelly: Heartbreak For Christmas 7″
Ghania, Maleem Mahmoud w/ Pharoah Sanders: Trance of Seven Colors LP
Harris/Marquez: Echoes LP
Highwomen: s/t LP
Hollis, Mark: Mark Hollis LP
Hood, Ernest: Neighborhoods LP
Ikebe Shakedown: Hard Steppin’ LP
Kraftwerk: Autobahn LP
Kraftwerk: The Man Machine LP
Lamarr, Delvon Organ Trio: Close But No Cigar LP
Led Zeppelin: s/t LP
Madlib & Freddie Gibbs: Pinata LP
Madlib: Shades Of Blue LP
Mangan, Dan: Nice, Nice, Very Nice (2LP/10th Anniversary deluxe) LP
Megira, Charlie: Tomorrow’s Gone LP
Merzbow: Pulse Demon LP
Metallica: s/t LP
Orgone: Beyond The Sun LP
Orgone: Undercover Mixtape LP
Orior: Still Strange LP
Pop, Iggy: Free LP
Portishead: Dummy LP
Ruins: Marea/Tide LP+7″
Silver Jews: American Water (half-speed mastered) LP
Silver Jews: Starlite Walker LP
Silver Jews: Tanglewood Numbers LP
Smog: Knock Knock (half-speed mastered) LP
Stereolab: Margerine Eclipse LP
Stereolab: Sound-Dust LP
Stevens, Sufjan & Timo Andres: The Decalogue LP
Taj Mahal Travellers: August ’74 LP
Talk Talk: Laughing Stock LP
Various: 2019RSD2 – Motown Rare & Unreleased LP