Another week, more shipping debacles. But some long awaited stuff is finally showing up! That new Blue Train reissue(s) are gonna fly. Also the anniversary edition of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot… And a bunch of other stuff! A bit busy so…. come for a dig!
Current operations…..
– in-store shopping/pick ups – 11 – 6 pm Monday – Friday, 11 am – 5 pm Saturday
(if you don’t want to come into the store for a pick up, call and/or use the back door)
– We will be wearing masks, if you want to, great! If not, that’s also fine, but please be respectful of other people’s space and decisions.
– Sanitize your hands (we’ll have some)
…..picks of the week…..
Brick Road: III (Self Released) CS
Hot new album from our good pal Ethan! His releases get better and better, and this he claims is the best thing he’s ever done, and he’s a pretty modest dude. “BRICK ROAD III is one complete experience – however, you could divide it into two episodes: side A and side B of this tape. The first episode is more guitar-driven and composition-based. The second is more spatial and much slower. Every track on the album falls under the same musical philosophy (repetition, long tones, etc) with different parameters per track. Recording started around the same period Brick Road II was completed: summer 2021. Brick Road III was wrapped up the following summer, 2022. It’s only been one year; Almost every major aspect of my life changed during the recording of this album. The theme of this collection of tracks deals with the sacred natural world and a personal love and worship of it, in tandem with the complexity of existence on an infinite plane. Everything is connected. Love is all. ” – Brick Road
File Under: Psych, Drone, Tapes, Kris’s Picks, Ian’s Picks
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John Coltrane: Blue Train (Mono) (Blue Note) LP
On September 15, 1957, John Coltrane went into Rudy Van Gelder’s living room studio in Hackensack, New Jersey and recorded his first great masterpiece: Blue Train. It would be the legendary saxophonist’s sole album as a leader for Blue Note, a locomotive 5-track album fueled by the bluesy title track that featured a dynamic 6-piece band with Lee Morgan on trumpet, Curtis Fuller on trombone, Kenny Drew on piano, Paul Chambers on bass, and Philly Joe Jones on drums. To mark the 65th anniversary of the album’s recording, Blue Train will be released in two special editions as part of Blue Note’s acclaimed Tone Poet Audiophile Vinyl Reissue Series: a single LP mono pressing of the original album and a 2LP stereo pressing of Blue Train: The Complete Masters which includes a second disc of alternate and incomplete takes, four of which have never been released before, and none of which have been available previously on vinyl. The 2LP-set comes with a bound booklet featuring session photos by Francis Wolff and an essay by Coltrane expert Ashley Kahn. Both Tone Poet Vinyl Editions were produced by Joe Harley, mastered by Kevin Gray from the original analog master tapes, pressed on 180g vinyl at RTI, and packaged in deluxe gatefold tip-on jackets.
File Under: Jazz, Kris’s Picks
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…..new arrivals…..
Bjork: Fossora (One Little Indian) LP
Björk delivers her long-awaited follow-up to 2017’s Utopia with one of the most highly anticipated albums of 2022 entitled Fossora! Inspired by the death of her mother, her youngest son leaving home and the Covid pandemic quarantine, the enigmatic artist’s tenth album overall is introduced by lead single “Atopos.” “Each album always starts with a feeling that I try to shape into sound,” Björk shares. “This time around the feeling was landing (after my last album ‘Utopia’ which was all island in the clouds element air and no bass) on the earth and digging my feet into the ground. It was also woven into how I experienced the “now”. This time around 7 billion of us did it together nesting in our homes quarantining being long enough in one place that we shot down roots. My new album ‘Fossora’ is about that. It is a word I made up. It is the feminine of fossore (digger, delver, ditcher). So in short it means she who digs (into the ground). So sonically it is about bass, heavy bottom-end. We have 6 bass clarinets and punchy sub.”
File Under: Pop, Experimental
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Blondie: Against the Odds 1974 – 1982 (Numero) 4LP
Against the Odds: 1974-1982 is the first authorized, in-depth anthology from Blondie in their 50-year history. This deluxe vinyl 4LP box set features the very best of the out-takes and rarities from the Super Deluxe Collectors’ Edition, remastered from the original analog tapes and cut at Abbey Road Studios. An accompanying 112 page book features an exhaustive look at Blondie’s international notoriety via picture sleeves and regional pressings. Most of this archive was stored for nearly two decades in guitarist Chris Stein’s barn, just outside Woodstock, New York. It included a hundred reel-to-reel tapes, half a dozen cassettes, storage tubs full of records, and promotional memorabilia. Says Debbie Harry: “It really is a treat to see how far we have come when I listen to these early attempts to capture our ideas on relatively primitive equipment. Fortunately the essence of being in a band in the early 70s held some of the anti-social, counter culture energies of the groups that were the influencers of the 60s. I am excited about this special collection. When I listen to these old tracks, it puts me there like I am a time traveler. As bad as it was sometimes, it was also equally as good. No regrets. More music.” Adds Chris Stein: “I am hopeful that this project will provide a glimpse into the ‘process’ and some of the journey that the songs took from idea to final form. Some of this stuff is like early sketches; the old tape machines are like primitive notebooks. The trickiest thing for me was always about getting the melodies out of my head into reality and the changes that would happen along the way.” Drummer Clem Burke notes: “It is amazing that after all this time, and against the odds, our Blondie archival box set will finally be released. It’s been a long time coming and we are all very happy and excited with the final results.” Producer Ken Shipley says: “From the moment I walked into Chris Stein’s barn and saw a wall of tapes I knew we were on the precipice of something extraordinary. Against The Odds is a treasure chest disguised as a box set.” Fellow producer Steve Rosenthal notes: ”Blondie is a group of extraordinary artists. Years of searching, months of mixing, mastering and restoration, days of decisions went into this box set to highlight the unique path they travelled – from CBGB’s to MSG.”
File Under: Rock
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Built to Spill: When the Wind Forgets Your Name (Sub Pop) LP
Built to Spill returns in 2022 with When the Wind Forgets Your Name, Doug Martsch’s unbelievably great new album (and also his eighth full-length)… with a fresh new label. “I’m psyched: I’ve wanted to be on Sub Pop since I was a teenager. And I think I’m the first fifty year-old they’ve ever signed.” When the Wind Forgets Your Name continues expanding the Built to Spill universe in new and exciting ways. In 2018 Martsch’s good fortune and keen intuition brought him together with Brazilian lo-fi punk artist and producer Le Almeida, and his long-time collaborator, João Casaes, both of the psychedelic jazz rock band, Oruã. On discovering their music Martsch fell in love with it right away. So when he needed a new backing band for shows in Brazil, he asked them to join. “We rehearsed at their studio in downtown Rio de Janeiro and I loved everything about it. They had old crappy gear. The walls were covered with xeroxed fliers. They smoked tons of weed,” Martsch says. The Brazil dates went so well Martsch, Almeida, and Casaes made the decision to continue playing together throughout 2019, touring the US and Europe. During soundchecks they learned new songs Martsch had written, and when the touring ended, they recorded the bass and drum tracks at his rehearsal space in Boise. After Almeida and Casaes flew home, Martsch began overdubbing guitars and vocals by himself. Martsch, Almeida, and Casaes had planned to mix the album together later in 2020 somewhere in Brazil or the US, but the pandemic kept them from reuniting in person. “We were able to send the tracks back and forth though, so we were still able to collaborate on the mixing process.” What emerged is When the Wind Forgets Your Name, a complex and cohesive blend of the artists’ distinct musical ideas. Alongside Built to Spill’s poetic lyrics and themes, the experimentation and attention to detail produces an album full of unique, vivid, and timeless sounds. The spare, power trio guitar riff in “Gonna Lose” is an anxiety-fueled joyride in song (“What could be more disorienting than being on acid in a dream?”). “Spiderweb” and “Never Alright” are classic-sounding, guitar-driven odes to REM and Dinosaur Jr (“No one can ever help no one not get their heart broken”). If there is such a thing as a Built to Spill sound, “Rocksteady” is maybe the band’s furthest departure from it yet with its reggae and dub-inspired instrumentation. The album also contains bittersweet songs like the lo-fi ‘60s-style anthem “Fool’s Gold,” with its mellotron strings, and bluesy, wailing guitars (“Fool’s gold made me rich for a little while”), and “Understood,” a song about misunderstanding, which also takes inspiration from Evel Knievel’s failed stunt in Martsch’s hometown when he was a child. (“The deaf hear, the blind see. Just different things than you and me.”) Martsch was also able to champion his love of comics by recruiting Alex Graham to illustrate the cover of When the Wind Forgets Your Name.
File Under: Indie Rock
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John Coltrane: Blue Train: Complete Masters (Stereo) (Blue Note) LP
All-Analog Stereo 180g Vinyl 2LP of John Coltrane’s Blue Train: The Complete Masters Mastered from the Original Master Tapes by Kevin Gray & Pressed at RTI: Reference-Caliber Blue Note Reissue Helmed by Joe Harley. On September 15, 1957, John Coltrane went into Rudy Van Gelder’s living room studio in Hackensack, New Jersey and recorded his first great masterpiece: Blue Train. It would be the legendary saxophonist’s sole album as a leader for Blue Note, a locomotive 5-track album fueled by the bluesy title track that featured a dynamic 6-piece band with Lee Morgan on trumpet, Curtis Fuller on trombone, Kenny Drew on piano, Paul Chambers on bass, and Philly Joe Jones on drums. To mark the 65th anniversary of the album’s recording, Blue Train will be released in two special editions as part of Blue Note’s acclaimed Tone Poet Audiophile Vinyl Reissue Series: a single LP mono pressing of the original album and a 2LP stereo pressing of Blue Train: The Complete Masters which includes a second disc of alternate and incomplete takes, four of which have never been released before, and none of which have been available previously on vinyl. The 2LP-set comes with a bound booklet featuring session photos by Francis Wolff and an essay by Coltrane expert Ashley Kahn. Both Tone Poet Vinyl Editions were produced by Joe Harley, mastered by Kevin Gray from the original analog master tapes, pressed on 180g vinyl at RTI, and packaged in deluxe gatefold tip-on jackets.
File Under: Jazz
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Dead Kennedys: Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables 2022 Mix (Manifesto) LP
40th Anniversary Edition vinyl reissue of punk-rock legends Dead Kennedys’ landmark 1980 debut album Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables remixed by Chris Lord-Alge. Home to the sneering standouts “I Kill Children,” “Holiday in Cambodia,” “California Uber Alles,” and “Let’s Lynch the Landlord.” Includes an 8-page booklet with rare archival photos and interviews plus a full size collectible poster.
File Under: Punk
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Ella Fitzgerald & Louis Armstrong: Ella & Louis Again (Verve) LP
Following the success of Ella And Louis, Norman Granz and Verve Records decided to repeat the winning formula of having Louis Armstrong and Ella Fitzgerald in the studio to record some more classics from The Great American Songbook – the result was Ella And Louis Again. They were once again joined by the Oscar Peterson Trio – Oscar on piano, with Herb Ellis (guitar) and Ray Brown (bass), but this time Louis Bellson replaced Buddy Rich on drums. The initial session took place on July 23, 1957 and was followed by three more sessions on July 31, and August 1st and 13th. Such was the productivity of these sessions that Verve had enough material for a double-album. Of the 19 tracks, seven feature either Ella or Louis solo, but it’s when they are together that some of the real magic happens. Besides the vocals, Louis Armstrong contributes some beautiful trumpet playing on six of the songs. Among the standout tracks are “Autumn In New York,” “Let’s Call The Whole Thing Off,” “Love Is Here To Stay” and “A Fine Romance,” all of which are duets. A wonderful freewheeling rehearsal take of ‘Stompin’ At The Savoy’ was so good that Norman Granz kept it on the final album. This all-analog 180g vinyl LP reissue was mastered from the original analog tapes by Ryan K. Smith at Sterling Sound, pressed at QRP, and comes housed in a Stoughton tip-on gatefold jacket.
File Under: Jazz
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Kuedo: Infinite Window (Brainfeeder) LP
Kuedo is an avant garde artist based in Berlin. Synergising Vangelis-esque futuristic melodies with thunderous drum programming, the sound is otherworldly in palette and explosive in dynamics. Setting the bar high with his new album “Infinite Window”, the album sonics owe as much to modern R&B icons like Frank Ocean and The Weeknd as they do to legendary composers such as David Axelrod and Tangerine Dream or contemporary breakbeat scientists such as Sully and Jlin. Collaborating with Flying Lotus on the “Blade Runner: Blackout” OST (directed by Shinichirō Watanabe) led to Kuedo being signed by FlyLo’s Grammy-winning label Brainfeeder. He is a genuine genius of an artist who effortlessly treads the tightrope between electronica, classical and pop, and accordingly finds himself in demand with luxury brands such as Fendi and Bvlgari in addition to trailblazing haute couture designers such as Iris Van Herpen. The limited edition yellow vinyl LP features artwork by fast rising visual artists Monja & Vincent and sleeve design by Raf Rennie (Acronym, Prada, Nike).
File Under: Electronic
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Joe Lovano: I’m All For You (Blue Note) LP
Blue Note Records has announced the continuation of the Classic Vinyl Reissue Series which presents 180g vinyl LP reissues in standard packaging mastered by Kevin Gray and manufactured at Optimal. The pressings are all-analog whenever an analog source is available, with Gray mastering directly from the original master tapes. While the first 16 titles of the series focused on the best-known Blue Note classics from the 1950s and 60s, the new run of titles curated by Don Was and Cem Kurosman broadens its scope to span the many eras and styles of the legendary label’s eight-decade history presented by themes: Bebop, Hard Bop, Soul Jazz, Post-Bop, Avant-Garde, The 70s, The Rebirth, and Hidden Gems. Saxophonist Joe Lovano signed with Blue Note Records in 1990 and over the next 25 years became one of the most recorded artists in the label’s history, building a formidable catalog that explored the full breadth of his artistry. Lovano’s sublime 2003 album I’m All For You: Ballad Songbook stands as one of his finest efforts, a stunning collection that found the saxophonist wrapping his warm sound around nine timeless melodies including “Stella By Starlight,” “I Waited For You,” “Like Someone In Love,” “Monk’s Mood,” and the ravishing title track based on the changes for “Body and Soul.” This elegant and endlessly listenable set also introduced Lovano’s marvelous Classic Quartet with the legendary pianist Hank Jones, bassist George Mraz, and drummer Paul Motian, who would go on to record the equally enjoyable follow-up Joyous Encounter the next year.
File Under: Jazz
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Metric: Formentera (Metric) LP
Even real places become imaginary when they are so far out of reach. Named for an idyllic island near Ibiza off the coast of Spain, Formentera is a place that, for Metric, only existed on a page in a “dream destinations” travel book that lay open on a desk in the new recording studio that guitarist Jimmy Shaw built in 2020, in a rural hamlet north of Toronto. This is the setting where the band’s eighth album took shape. Metric’s sound is both genre-defying and genre-defining here. Formentera is the follow-up to 2018’s Art of Doubt.
File Under: Rock
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Monster Magnet: Monolitic Baby! (Napalm) LP
2004 saw the release of Monster Magnet’s sixth studio album Monolithic Baby!, the follow-up to 2000’s God Says No, which cemented the Red Bank, NJ rockers in the world of space rock and roll. This 14-track journey of masterful hard rock features 11 ripping originals and three cover songs recorded in true classic Magnet style, including takes on The Velvet Underground, David Gilmour and Robert Calvert. Don’t miss the album Ultimate Classic Rock calls “a revitalized, fire-breathing Monster Magnet” and All Music calls “another collection of undeniably Wyndorfian tunes.”
FIle Under: Metal
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Mythic Sunship: Light/Flux (Tee Pee) LP
Light / Flux sees the Scandinavian outfit Mythic Sunship take their self-proclaimed Anaconda Rock in a new direction. The band has previously incorporated elements from jazz, prog, psychedelic music as well as a ferocious punk feel both in production and playing on their penultimate record Wildfire (2021). Notorious for their usually improvised approach, Light / Flux is the result of a more composed, melodically and harmonically curious process, though still with the band’s signature penchant for unhinged improvisation at its core. The album was recorded in the legendary RMV Studios located in Stockholm over the course of four days, and you can almost feel the chilly December winds of Sweden drifting across the record. Imagine Talk Talk being joined by John Coltrane – here, Mythic Sunship further their unique sound and approach to create a record that evokes both melancholy and somber bleakness amidst the traditional fiery peaks the band is so well known for.
FIle Under: Psych
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OFF!: Free LSD (Fat Possum) LP
Off!, the punk think tank helmed by Keith Morris (Black Flag, Circle Jerks) and Dimitri Coats (Burning Brides), return with their first new full-length in eight years! Free LSD effectively hits reset on the band, as the injection of new energy into their signature high-anxiety sound bonfires via new drummer Justin Brown (Thundercat, Flying Lotus, Herbie Hancock) and bassist Autry Fulbright II (…And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead) pushes the concept of punk into another frenetic dimension. The effect is palpable and volatile, adding a new swing to the music’s incendiary thrust; perhaps most evident on album cornerstone “War Above Los Angeles.” While the new lineup brings an experimental flair to the table, catapulting their subterranean howl into the orbit of Sun Ra and The Stooges by way of Coats imbibing a number of songs with layers of electronics amid explosions of percussive virtuosity from Brown and bursts of guest saxophone from Jon Wahl (Claw Hammer), Morris sounds timeless as ever, unleashing torrents of no-nonsense screeds across 90 second furnace blasts like “Kill To Be Heard.” Speaking on the album’s distinctly revitalized sound, Morris states: “After making music for as long as I have, it was time to use a palette that includes lime green, turquoise, and magenta instead of the typical colors and shades that were involved in all of the other breakneck and car chase scenarios. Miles Davis with Herbie Hancock and the Headhunters as opposed to Milo Goes to College.”
File Under: Punk
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Alhaji Waziri Oshomah: World Spirituality Classics 3: The Muslim Highlife of… (Luaka Bop) LP
Alhaji Waziri Oshomah — known to his fans in southern Nigeria as the Oyoyo King, the Godfather of Afemai Music, the Etsako Super Star — is the originator of a form of Muslim highlife that fuses local folk styles with pan-Nigerian highlife and Western pop. A devout Muslim and an exemplar of religious piety in his community, Waziri has recorded more than 100 albums over the course of his decades-long career. To this day, he continues to perform to adoring audiences who regard him as the greatest entertainer in Edo State. This September, Luaka Bop brings you the best of Waziri’s illustrious career as the third installment of their critically acclaimed World Spirituality series.
File Under: Nigeria, Highlife
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Pixies: Doggerel (Infectious) LP
The iconic Pixies forged an influential path for alt-rock during their first era, while their post 2004 reunion has seen them alchemize more sophisticated dark arts – a return which has them add another three UK Top 10 albums to the three they achieved on their first run. Now as fired up as ever before, Pixies deliver their eighth studio album Doggerel. It’s a mature yet visceral record of gruesome folk, ballroom pop and brutal rock, haunted by the ghosts of affairs and indulgences, driven wild by cosmic forces and envisioning digital afterlives where no God has provided one. And all the while, right there on the news, another distant storm approaches. Guitarist Joey Santiago says, “This time around we have grown. We no longer have under two-minute songs. We have little breaks, more conventional arrangements but still our twists in there.” Vocalist/guitarist Black Francis adds, “We’re trying to do things that are very big and bold and orchestrated. The punky stuff, I really like playing it but you just cannot artificially create that. There’s another way to do this, there’s other things we can do with this extra special energy that we’re encountering.” That energy shimmers in the album’s lead single “There’s A Moon On,” which fits into the space between prototype squalling Pixies guitars and heartland rock classicism. Thematically it plays somewhere between fact and legend, playing upon the adrenalizing effect of the lunar cycle on the human psyche, a phase during which the drunks in Francis’s brother’s bar become more aggressive. A congregation between darkness and beauty consistently emerges throughout the record. There’s “Haunted House,” a spirited concoction of ’50s-flavoured pop with ghosts both literal and metaphoric, as well as the brooding Morricone desert rock of “Vault of Heaven,” and a breezy folk-rock melody on “Pagan Man.” But Pixies still possesses a ferocious edge, one that feeds into the grinding intensity and surrealism of “Nomatterday” and The Who-like power of “Dregs of the Wine,” which will surely be the first and last Pixies song to namecheck Van Halen.
File Under: Indie Rock
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Polvo: Shapes (Touch & Go) LP
After a brief interruption, Polvo reconvened to record Shapes, their final album, released in September of 1997. The record continues in the vein of Exploded Drawing, weaving plaintive vibes, eastern passages and rip roarin’ freakouts in a pastiche eluding basic classification. The opening track “Enemy Insects” is a subterranean lurker; shimmering stabs of guitar competing with discordant chugs. “Downtown Dedication” is a dazed panoptic of old soul, farfisa leads, wahwah washes and a touch of Jimi. “El Rocio” serves as an epilogue of sorts for the band; a somber, chilling instrumental that wanders curiously as it showcases Polvo’s full palette, every ringing tone and chiming string.
File Under: Indie Rock
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Slipknot: The End, So Far (Roadrunner) LP
Over 25 years ago, nine guys from Des Moines, Iowa, shattered the scope of what was possible in metal. Slipknot’s music put blastbeats, massive breakdowns and brutal riffs alongside breakbeats and turntablism; punctuated hooky melodies with extreme vocals and percussive rap verses. On stage, bodies clad in numbered jumpsuits and horror film masks crashed into each other, eliciting mania from hungry crowds and drawing blood and breaking bones in the process. Everything Slipknot did was maximalist and monstrous, completely unhinged and meticulously thought out. The metal juggernaut follows-up 2019’s We Are No Your Kind (third consecutive Billboard 200 No. 1) with their Joe Barresi co-produced seventh album The End, So Far which will be their last with Roadrunner and comes introduced by lead tracks “The Chapeltown Rag” and “The Dying Song (Time to Sing).” “It’s really killer, man. It’s darker than ‘We Are Not Your Kind’, but there’s a ton of melody,” Corey Taylor told SiriusXM’s Trunk Nation With Eddie Trunk. “I’ve been telling everybody that it’s like a heavier version of ‘Vol. 3[: (The Subliminal Verses)]’. It’s got so many textures and layers. The heavy stuff has attack but the melodic stuff you can just sink your teeth in; there’s a lot of great melodies and hooks. I’m really, really excited for people to hear it.”
File Under: Metal
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Vertex: Yeah! Yeah! Yeah! (Busy Bee) LP
Sweden’s The Vertex were, along with The Moderns, one of the country’s first mod-revival bands. Smalltown teens with big time dreams, they spat out mod/punk/pop stompers in the early 80’s, before gradually digging themselves deeper into the psychedelic sounds of the 60’s and then closing business in 1987. But their legacy and legend has grown ever since. With singles like ”Tonight The Sky Will Be Ours” and ”John”, the band regularly appears on compilations and today their releases are highly sought after collectibles all around the globe. For the first time a retrospective with The Vertex is now being presented, including previously unreleased material.
File Under: Mod, Rock
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Wilco: Yankee Hotel Foxtrot (Nonesuch) LP
White vinyl! Wilco’slegendary fourth studio album,Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, was originally released in April 2002. It delivers ten songs that have since become favorites among fans and critics alike. It scored a perfect 10 on Pitchfork, which hailed the album as “complex and dangerously catchy, lyrically sophisticated and provocative, noisy and somehow serene … simply a masterpiece.” And as the New York Times put it, Jeff Tweedy’s songs “unfold in richly enigmatic arrangements.” Yankee Hotel Foxtrot is without question Wilco’s most storied and experimental release. Produced by the band and mixed by Jim O’Rourke, the album finds the Chicago-based band stretching their creative boundaries, imbuing their trademark sound with inventive textures and song structures. Tweedy’s stirring songwriting commingles with a unique and eclectic sonic approach here that is stirringly emotional and beautifully mysterious. From the poignant opener “I Am Trying To Break Your Heart” to the stark and powerful “Ashes of American Flags” to the giddy pop of “Heavy Metal Drummer,” Yankee Hotel Foxtrot is an ambitious original that no one should be without. This 20th anniversary vinyl 2LP reissue finds the original eleven songs remastered by Bob Ludwig and cut by Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman Mastering.
File Under: Rock
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Wilco: Yankee Hotel Foxtrot Deluxe (Nonesuch) 7LP BOX
This 7LP Deluxe Edition of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot features the original ten songs remastered; plus an alternate version of the album (titled The Unified Theory Of Everything). Additionally, the songs performed on the September 18, 2001 WXRT radio appearance are included as is the entire July 23, 2002 show from The Pageant in St. Louis, MO. The vinyl is mastered by Bob Ludwig and cut by Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman Mastering. The package (designed by Lawrence Azerrad) includes a new essay by music journalist Bob Mehr featuring recent interviews with Jeff Tweedy, John Stirratt and Glenn Kotche plus previously unseen live and studio photos.
File Under: Rock
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Wilco: Yankee Hotel Foxtrot Super Deluxe (Nonesuch) 11LP BOX
This 11-LP + 1 CD Super Deluxe Edition of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, Wilcos 2002 Nonesuch debut, comprises the original album, remastered for its 20th anniversary in 2022, plus 82 previously unreleased tracks. Includes demos, drafts, and instrumentals, charting the making of the album; a live 2002 concert recording; and a September 2001 radio performance and interview. The box set also includes a new book featuring an interview with Jeff Tweedy, Glenn Kotche, and Jim ORourke; an in-depth essay by journalist/author Bob Mehr; and previously unseen photos of the band making the album in their Chicago studio. On Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, the band delivers a thrillingly experimental work that scored a perfect 10 on Pitchfork, which hailed the album as complex and dangerously catchy, lyrically sophisticated and provocative, noisy and somehow serene simply a masterpiece. Uncut called it a stone-cold classic.
FIle Under: Rock
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Yeah Yeah Yeahs: Cool It Down (Secretly Canadian) LP
It could only be called alchemy, the transformative magic that happens during the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ most tuned-in moments in the studio, when their unique chemistry sparks opens a portal, and out comes a song like “Maps” or “Zero” or the latest addition to their canon, “Spitting off the Edge of the World” – an epic shot-to-the-heart of pure YYYs beauty and power. A thunderstorm of a return is what the legendary trio has in store for us in 2022, with the release of Cool It Down, their first new music since 2013’s Mosquito. Their fifth studio album is an eight-track collection, and an expert distillation of their best gifts that impels you to move, and cry, and listen closely and is bound to be a landmark in their catalog. They never expected it to be so long between albums, and they certainly had stayed busy: There was a tour for their 2003 debut album, Fever to Tell that was re-issued in 2017; Karen released an album with Danger Mouse (Lux Prima, 2019) and co-composed the score for the animated film Where Is Anne Frank?; Nick made an album with his hardcore side-project Head Wound City, scored films, and collaborated with artists including Phoebe Bridgers, Amen Dunes and Songhoy Blues, Brian started his own label Chaiken Records. Karen and drummer Brian Chase both became parents in recent years. The band had even begun talking about new music back in early 2020, but then the world stopped. “I was having dreams, as I’m sure many people were during the early part of the pandemic and lockdown, of places I’d been,” Karen says. “Dreams of cities we’ve toured in the last twenty years together, whether it’s Byron Bay or Paris morphed with Mexico – my brain was taking me to all these places. And I felt, for the first time, ‘what if we don’t get to do it again?’ That thought had never crossed my mind before and I really felt it profoundly during the pandemic: I realized I’d taken for granted that we’ll always be able to go out on the road and play shows, that we’ll always be able to make more music when we want to. And having gone through the collective trauma of what we experienced, I really wanted to get in a room together and jam, and see what our subconscious was going to unleash after all that time.” She and Nick got together in spring of 2021 to give it a try. “We started playing music and it just came flooding out of us,” Karen remembers. Their longtime collaborator Dave Sitek (“basically a fourth member of the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, at this point”) had shared some tracks he’d set aside, including the framework for “Spitting Off The Edge of The World,” and Karen connected with it right away. “When I heard the opening line, it felt like a waterfall,” she says. “[David] Bowie came to mind immediately. Sitek was actually friends with Bowie, and it felt like he was tuning into that frequency of artistry. And so when I was writing the lyrics and the melody, that’s who I was trying to tune into, as well. Because I’ve never tried to evoke Bowie before. But he’s gone now, and there’s a big, gaping hole.” And when she imagined another voice joining hers on the tune, the idea to invite Perfume Genius’s Mike Hadreas felt obvious. “Mike really has a bit of Bowie in him,” she says. “He was literally the first and only person that came to mind for it.” Karen explains that the lyrics for “Spitting…” reflect on the state of the environment, and the need for honesty about the damage we’re doing to the Earth. “We’re all experiencing this climate crisis through a system which is broken and not really addressing it,” she says. On “Spitting…,” she reframes the topic as a personal conversation with her son about the world he’s inheriting. “I see the younger generations staring down this threat, and they’re standing on the edge of a precipice, confronting what’s coming with anger and defiance,” she says. “It’s galvanizing, and there’s hope there.”
File Under: Rock
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Various: Library Archive 2 (BBE) LP
Crate digging DJs Mr Thing and Chris Read return to BBE Music with a second volume of their compilation series ‘The Library Archive’, presenting more Funk, Jazz, Beats and Soundtracks from the archives of Cavendish Music. Founded back in 1937 and originally known as Boosey & Hawkes Recorded Music Library, Cavendish Music is the largest independent Library Music publisher in the UK and also represents a host of music catalogues across the globe. The influence of Library Music on British pop culture cannot be overstated, especially during the 1970s when companies KPM, De Wolfe and of course Boosey & Hawkes provided the soundtracks to iconic TV shows such as The Sweeney and The Professionals, as well as a host of feature films. The discs produced by Boosey & Hawkes for TV and radio production have, over the intervening years, gained a cult following among collectors and have found themselves sampled by successive generations of beatmakers. Renowned scratch DJ Mr Thing and WhoSampled’s Chris Read, both lifetime beat fanatics, first entered the Cavendish vaults in 2014, presenting their first compilation of rare Library Music cuts in 2017 on BBE Music. Both knew that Cavendish Music’s vast low-ceilinged London basement still held a host of hidden treasure just waiting to be rediscovered, so the pair returned in 2020, emerging with ‘The Library Archive 2 – More Funk, Jazz, Beats and Soundtracks from the Archives of Cavendish Music’. “This new collection leans toward the less obvious titles, not only the funky sides and tracks ripe for sampling but also some of the jazzier corners of the catalogue” says Chris Read. “As with Volume 1, this is more than merely a collection for sample heads – it’s a compilation of great funk, jazz, soundtracks and experimental themes to be enjoyed by DJs, producers and fans of good music alike.”
File Under: Library
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…..restocks…..
Alfa Mist: Antiophon (Black Acre) LP
Alfa Mist: Structuralism (Black Acre) LP
Badbadnotgood & Ghostface: Sour Soul (Lex) LP
Badge Epoque Ensemble: Clouds of Joy (Telephone Explosion) LP
Courtney Barnett & Kurt Vile: Lotta Sea Lice (Matador) LP
Beatles: Let It Be (Apple) LP
Black Angels: Wilderness of Mirrors (Partisan) LP
Black Sabbath: Master of Reality (BMG) LP
Clifford Brown & Max Roach: A Study in Brown (Verve) LP
Donald Byrd: Byrd in Paris Vol. 2 – Parisian Thoroughfare (Sam) LP
Nick Cave: Abattoir Blues (Mute) LP
Nathan Davis & George Arvanitas Trio: Live In Paris (Sam) LP
DJ Shadow: Endtroducing (Mo Wax) LP
Dope Lemon: Smooth Big Cat (BMG) LP
Duster: Together (Numero) LP
Billy Harper Quintet: Antibes ’75 (Sam) LP
Vijay Iyer: Uneasy (ECM) LP
Kendrick Lamar: Damn (Aftermath) LP
Mars Volta: s/t (Clouds Hill) LP
Massive Attack: Blue Lines (Virgin) LP
Massive Attack: Protection (Virgin) LP
Metallica: Ride the Lightning (Blackened) LP
Metallica: And Justice For All (Blackened) LP
Minutemen: Double Nickles on the Dime (SST) LP
Monophonics: In Your Brain (Ubiquity) LP
Monster Magnet: 4-Way Diablo (Napalm) LP
Ramon Morris: Sweet Sister Funk (Pure Pleasure) LP
National: Sad Songs for Dirty Lovers (4AD) LP
Psychic TV: Allegory & Self (Sacred Bones) LP
Queens of the Stone Age: Rated R (Universal) LP
Smiths: s/t (Rhino) LP
Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros: 002 – Mescaleros Years (BMG) LP
Sure Fire Soul Ensemble: Build Bridges (Colemine) LP
Taylor Swift: Reputation (Universal) LP
Tonstartssbandht: Petunia (Mexican Summer) LP
Velvet Underground: & Nico (Verve) LP
Weezer: s/t (Blue Album) (Universal) LP
Kanye West: College Dropout (Universal) LP
Various: Soul Slabs Vol. 1 (Numero) LP