Jazz & Improvisation / All styles

Another energy jump from the iconic noise trio New Monuments. Featuring Borbetomagus's Don Dietrich on saxophone, violinist/vocalist C. Spencer Yeh, and Graveyards drummer Ben Hall. New Earth sounds like someone stepped on a copy of Mahavishnu Orchestra's "Birds of Fire", put it on the turntable, loved what they heard, and pressed it into a CD. Pure spontaneous music from three of the heaviest in contemporary music

**500 copies** This latest album is an exciting new statement from the duo, featuring long-form compositions for the first time, written specifically for the LP format and developed while touring in North America during 2017. Nate Wooley's piece, Deeply Discounted II, is inspired by John Cage's Cheap Imitation which, in turn, was inspired by Erik Satie's, Socrate. Ken Vandermark's composition, Sequences of Snow, is dedicated to the visual artist and musician, Michael Snow, and was influenced by …

**500 copies** This is a cool jazz album all the way around. From the black and white hand drawing to the fact that it came out of Fresno, California (not exactly a hotbed for jazz) to the handful of styles present (straight ahead, funky, free, and even a raga), this record’s got it going on.High quality musicianship and some far out stoner tracks make this album stand head and shoulders above most of its private peers. Original very limited issue (rumour has it that only 300 copies were release…

**1000 copies** We’re proud to introduce the new Superfly reissue of mind-blowing session of Spiritual Jazz recorded in NYC in 1984 led by Haitian genius Alix Pascal blending traditional Rara elements with modal / spiritual melodies. Fantastic listen all through, stand out for us is Tribilasyon. As usual, beautiful quality repress with paste on covers made in Japan, Obi and 180grs vinyl. "Mystical, otherworldly, Haitian Rrara and Vodun Funk from composer Alix Pascal. Under the group Ayizan, Alix…

**500 copies** Steve Lacy had plenty of fantastic moments on the European scene of the 70s – but this unique album may well stand as one of his best! The set's very different than any of Steve's recordings with his own group – partly because the core energy here comes from trumpeter Franz Koglmann – who sets things up in a really unusual way, by often embracing rhythm – but also setting it free in all these other erratic patterns too – which proves to be a perfect foil for Steve's soprano sax, a…

Pour Alto Seul is Johan Arrias’ first solo work. It came about as a result of a work period early 2018 and does not claim to provide a comprehensive picture of the artist, but is an exploration of more specific ideas. In eight tracks with strong musical identities Arrias explores the saxophone as a sole voice and sound source and, to some extent, his own identity.The recordings create an atmosphere of being alone among ruins; a desolate environment, a harsh but promising and exiting place full o…

**500 copies** A collection of duo recordings featuring Ken Vandermark in collaboration with internationally renowned, and critically acclaimed, musicians: Kris Davis, Hamid Drake, Paul Lytton, Ikue Mori, and William Parker. The material is documented on 5 CDs and was recorded during performances at Vandermark’s second Stone residency in New York City during January of 2018, and at Experimental Sound Studio in Chicago.The improvised music included is remarkably expansive, in terms of instrumenta…

"Eri Yamamoto transcended jazz, classical and folk forms in creating her new work for jazz trio and 50-member choir. She has seamlessly melded biography, group improvisation and far-ranging compositional vocabularies in a momentous seven-part suite, featuring her longstanding trio in collaboration with New York-based Choral Chameleon, directed by its award-winning founder, Vince Peterson. The suite is based off of the Goshu Ondo, a traditional circle dance song from Shiga, Japan, where it was su…

**Limited bundled edition, 100 copies made.** "Bubbha Thomas is a revolutionary, spiritual jazz bandleader, drummer, and activist from Houston. This is the definitive collection of his four classic albums with his Lightmen band, each mastered from the original tapes, expanded with bonus tracks and alternate mixes. Bubbha Thomas had toured America with R&B revues, served as a session musician for Peacock and Back Beat Records, and played straight ahead jazz with legends before the political and s…

The fifth release in the BBE Music J Jazz Masterclass Series has the perfect combination of rarity and exceptional musicality that inspires seasoned collectors to break out in a sweat. Animals Garden by Miyasaka + 5 was originally issued in 1979 on the cult private Japanese label ALM and is reissued for the first time in a 180Gram 2LP edition.Animals Garden was a one-off project led by master drummer Takashi ‘Bear’ Miyasaka and features a powerful and progressive jazz group including saxophonist…

Polish label Not Two presents a new release by a classic trio comprised of Uwe Oberg, Joe Fonda and Lucía Martínez, recorded live at the Just Music Festival, Wiesboden, Germany on February 23, 2019.Featured tracks include:1. Their Cheeks Glowed 10:312. Lighter Than Before 09:403. Almost Two 05:214. The Sharp Side of It 15:345. Relight Years 05:266. Triple Relish 03:57Lineup:Uwe Oberg – pianoJoe Fonda – bassLucía Martínez – drums

Matthew Shipp – piano, Gordon Grdina – oboe, guitar, Mark Helias – bass. All three of these musicians are master craftsman of their instruments and have received critical accolades from far and wide. Matthew Shipp has been called to as “truly one of the leading lights of a new generation of jazz giants.” Mark Helias has been hailed as “one of the finest acoustic bass players in the contemporary jazz avant-garde” and Gord Grdina needs no introduction and has aptly been referred to as a “force of …

Five Spontaneous Ones was recorded by Albert Cirera (tenor and soprano saxophones), Rafal Mazur (acoustic bass guitar) and Nicolas Field (drums). The three improvisers are featured stars of the avant-garde jazz scene. Albert Cirera has an organic and expressive playing technique, impressive virtuosity, wide musical knownledge and unique sound. Rafal Mazur fuses together the tendencies of contemporary academical and experimental music, basics of avant-garde jazz and the newest tendencies of exper…

**Red vinyl, gatefold sleeve** Exotic jazz guitar mastery! Gabor Szabo’s singular style and authentic sound is on full display across a set of originals and choice covers highlighted by unusual instrumentation and ingenious arrangements. From the sitar-starring adaptation of Paint It Black to the Latin rhythms and bossa nova beats, Szabo’s savvy jazz guitar innovations shine throughout."Gabor Szabo was one of the most original guitarists to emerge in the 1960s; mixing his Hungarian folk music he…

Jazz drummer Greg Adams was active on the Los Angeles experimental jazz scene of the early 1980s. Based in the working class coastal town of Long Beach, California, and with longstanding ties to the industrial east coast city of Wilmington, Delaware, Adams sought to hearken back to the naturalistic form of be-bop, which is why he recorded the material on Koolin Out in a live session with no overdubs in April 1983. Privately pressed in minute quantities as the sole entity on his own hip city impr…

**1.000 copies** Soul Jazz Records release flautist Lloyd McNeill’s album Treasures (1976). Originally issued on the artists’ own private press Baobab label in New York, the album is a serious collectors’ piece, a heavyweight and fascinating fusion of deep and spiritual jazz sensibilities blended with Brazilian and Latin rhythms and melodies."Lloyd McNeill is a cultural polymath - a multi-disciplinarian flautist, painter, academic, poet, and photographer - who as a musician has worked with every…

**1.000 copies on coloured vinyl** Drummer and composer extraordinaire Steve Reid’s Rhythmatism is one of his deepest and most radical of albums of all time and features some of the heaviest jazz players - Arthur Blythe AKA 'Black Arthur', Charles Tyler, David Wertman and others – joining Reid. The album was originally released on Reid’s own Mustevic Sound label in 1976.As a radical jazz artist, Steve Reid played with an extraordinary group of artists – including Miles Davis, Sun Ra, Fela Kuti, …

**2019 stock** "This December 1976 recording features two of the most prominent AACM musicians, Roscoe Mitchell and Anthony Braxton. Mitchell’s compositions run the gamut, beginning with the darkly gorgeous opener that features Braxton’s contrabass clarinet nestling evocatively beneath the composer’s earthy flute… Mitchell’s other pieces investigate the sparer, more abstract realm, as the duo’s wide variety of reeds populate the sonic environment with scattered moans, squeaks and pops. Overall, …

Prepare yourself for the first ever vinyl pressing of legendary free jazz guitarist Sonny Sharrock's seminal final album Ask the Ages, in a strictly limited edition 45rpm double 12” edition. Sonny's classic final album swings between deep, lyrical melodicism and passages of pure fire music and features jazz legends Pharoah Sanders on tenor saxophone and Elvin Jones, member of the John Coltrane Quartet, on drums. The album was produced by Bill Laswell and originally released in 1991 on his Axiom …

"There is music that falls right into place, a perfectly articulated expression of a few distinct influences. Then, there is another kind of median music, something more mysterious, the result of time, place, technology, and alchemy. Zambian writer and musician Smokey Haangala’s Aunka Ma Kwacha (The Money is Gone) released in 1976 is an example of this more mystical metallurgy, falling somewhere between psychedelic Zamrock, US folk, Kalindula, and Sundown Beat (music played after dark) from Tong…

Bamboo present the first ever reissue of Paul Bley's Improvisie, originally released in 1971. Recorded Live March 26th, 1971 at Club B14 in Rotterdam, Netherlands, Improvisie is a part of the 1971 trilogy of Paul Bley and Annette Peacock's combined experimental recorded work. Together with recent reissues of 1971's The Bley Synthesizer Show and 1972's Dual Unity, Improvisie is taken from a compelling period for two iconic figures of the free jazz movement, and their pioneering use of the first-e…

**175 copies** Dark and demanding improvisation, each side of this album is an extended foray into dark and dangerous explorations from the Los Angeles trio of Peter Kolovos on guitar, Patrick Shiroishi on saxophone, and Noel Meek on electronics and tapes. Shiroishi's sweeping tones matching the electronics and effected guitar in a glorious nightmare of darkly imaginative sound.

**500 copies** A few years ago I had this crazy idea... Why not ask Obnox aka Lamont "Bim" Thomas to make a free jazz record? After seeing him on tour playing drums with Cleveland out-rock legends X_X, I just had to try and make it happen. Bim, who is no stranger to making out-there genre defying records, surprised me a bit by happily agreeing. It seems a bit of a cliche to try and get rock people to make jazz records, or jazz folks to make rock records, but what the hell? Of all people, Obnox s…

Saxophone jazz deviant Sam Weinberg joins with refugees from thrash jazz agent Little Women — Andrew Smiley, guitar; Jason Nazary, drums — to form a new trio, Bloor. It’s wild, acerbic and even a bit mathematical... Similar to the electric guitar-based free jazz units like Many Arms and Matta Gawa. Their new album Drolleries comprise of ten performances that are concise and never overlong. In contrast to another Weinberg project, W-2, there’s at least a sense of premeditated composition (seven o…

**300 copies** "The modus operandi of more than a few of the recent New Wave of Jazz releases is sparse free improvisation using extended techniques. These albums, often disjointed with abrupt transitions and long minimalistic passages, exhibit a surprisingly consistent approach despite their aleatoric nature – a commitment to the unpredictable. Enter acoustic guitarist Daniel Thompson and saxophonist Colin Webster, both experienced improvisers who team up on the three tracks of Boskage. This pa…

**300 copies, 2019 stock** "The Serries-Verhoeven acoustic, chamber duo – Serries on the acoustic guitar and Verhoeven on the piano – is actually the last one to be recorded in the Tonus series but the duo distills the very essence of the series serves as a fitting introduction to this series. Cagean Morphology was recorded, mixed and mastered at the Sunny Side Studio at Anderlecht, Belgium on March 10th 2018. The minimalist layout of the Tonus series, was designed by Rutger Zuydervelt, aka Mach…

**300 copies, 2019 stock** "Minimal art is often presented as an act of simplification, a field in which nothing much happens and lesser (or even lazy) artists can have a field day. However, it is both in the visual arts and in music, perhaps one of the most misunderstood movements. Minimal artists not only sought out a certain core essence, but leading artists and theorists, such as Donald Judd, also offered a reaction against the extravagant focus on the subjective by the abstract expressionis…

**2019 stock** Fresh from releasing the solo triple-CD Piano Works, composer and pianist Lisa Ullén masterminds the rumbling new EP of Motståndsorkestern (The Resistance Orchestra), Sekvenser Och Lager. In four original compositions seething with restrained energy and melodic rage, the orchestra takes what is sometimes called contemporary music apart into an ensemble playing in which the collective will is resurrected through its total respect for individual contributions.

**2019 stock** Piano Works is Lisa Ullén’s most ambitious work so far – a triple CD of solo recordings capturing the breadth and depth of her singular musical vision. Ranging from 49 seconds to almost fifteen minutes, the 27 pieces collected share the distinction of sounding thoroughly composed and yet instantaneously sculpted (as they are) at the same time. There is a precision to her playing which brings out every note, fixes it and makes it sit there on the musical canvas, even as the figures…

**500 numbered copies, private edition** "Heather Leigh is originally from West Virginia but now lives in Scotland. She is a steel guitar player with an increasing reputation for furthering the unexplored reaches of pedal steel guitar. She combines a physical presence with a playing style which is as spontaneous as it is based on solid musicianship. She is known as a player who combines strength and sensitivity. She has received great reviews from The Wire Magazine, MOJO, Uncut, The Guardian, Th…

**500 copies** Audiographic Records proudly announces the release of Soigne Ta Droite, Ken Vandermark’s first large ensemble recording in more than four years. The band is called Entr’acte and is a veritable “who’s who” of the most interesting and important musicians currently working in the field of experimental music: Dieb13, Elisabeth Harnik, Steve Heather, Terrie Hessels, Didi Kern, Mette Rasmussen, Jasper Stadhouders, Joe Williamson, and Nate Wooley.The material was recorded in March of 201…

Threnody is the unmissable force from three prominent improvising musicians: Martin Küchen (saxophone), Johan Bertling (bass), and Steve Noble (drums). Previously established as a trio formation under their full names, the trio has released their first album Threnody, At The Gates on Trost in 2017 (TROST 156CD/LP) and now call themselves Threnody. Personnel: Johan Berthling - double bass; Martin Küchen - retardophone, sopranino-, alto-, and tenor saxophone; Steve Noble - drums. Recording by Dani…

CD Version. Limited, exclusive, extended reissue of Hot Lotta, one of the rarest items in Peter Brötzmann’s oeuvre. Hot Lotta was a special cultural event, the meeting of the brightest free jazz talent from Germany and Finland. Peter Brötzmann and Peter Kowald were joined by Edward Vesala and Juhani Aaltonen for the studio session that resulted in the album but also toured Finland and recorded a radio session. That radio session has now been unearthed and is presented as an added bonus in this o…

This is for sure no fake news! F4 Fake is the exciting new album by Made To Break, the gripping quartet of Ken Vandermark, mixing jazz, funky patterns, and electronics in groovy improvisations -- interrupted by abstract insertions. Recorded by Daniel Schatz, November 29 2017 at Primitive Studios, Vienna. Mastering by Alex Inglizian at Experimental Sound Studio, Chicago. Mixing by Alex Inglizian and Ken Vandermark. Artwork by Federico Peñalva. Personnel: Ken Vandermark - reeds; Christof Kurzmann …

“Stop here!” exclaimed Robert Oumaou as we passed a mango tree on the side of the road just outside of Point-a-Pitre, the balmy capital of Guadeloupe. He filled a plastic bag with ripe fruit, and we set off on our journey across the small Caribbean island in search of musicians he hadn’t seen in years. On the way, we shared stories in broken French and English, stopping at truck stops to eat delicious fried fish. Robert took me to his hometown, and placed a mango and a flower on the grave of his…

The Timeless Nowhere features 42 tracks never previously available on vinyl (most previously unavailable on any format at all) and now distributed across 4 individual albums, each with stunning artwork by Kim Hiorthøy and assembled in a sturdy Box.In a world where being loud seems to be the only ticket for attention, Arve Henriksen has somewhat quietly and without much ado established himself as an important, major player on the European jazz scene. In his 20 years with Rune Grammofon counting 1…

Black Truffle invite you to an evening of drunken revelry in the Batcave! After a chance meeting at a local supermarket in Poughkeepsie, New York, Joe McPhee and Graham Lambkin have performed together as a duo extensively in recent years, in addition to their joint work excavating some of the wildest tapes from McPhee's archive for Lambkin's now defunct Kye label. Live in the Batcave documents an evening the two friends spent together in the company of Joe's brother Charlie and Lambkin's son Oli…

First time on vinyl, unrelease before recordings taken from thei legendary 'New Horizons' Album released in 1983 Creative Arts Ensemble was the only large ensemble group that emerged directly from Horace Tapscott’s legendary Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra and community jazz group. Their debut, aptly named One Step Out, is a true gem of the Los Angeles jazz underground, and a crucial document of pianist and composer Kaeef Ruzadun Ali’s first recording as leader.A Los Angeles native, Kaeef was intro…

The music of Italian cellist Francesco Guerri obliterates the line between contemporary classical music and free improvisation, sculpting spontaneous invention into startling, unpredictable compositions.On his striking third album, Su Mimmi non si spara!, Guerri presents a dozen innovative pieces that span a wide range of stylistic approaches and technical challenges, invigorated by the physicality of his virtuosic playing and the deep emotional bond he maintains with his instrument. Su Mimmi no…

Upperground Orchestra is the hybrid Jazz band of Rabih Beaini and his fellow musicians Tommaso Cappellato (drums), Piero Bittolo Bon (woodwinds / electronics) and Alvise Seggi (Bass / Oud). The band returns with a new LP, years after The Eupen Tapes.Euganea is a 5 tracks LP recorded during the Musica Veneta residency, promoted by FAI (Fondo Ambiente Italiano) in the great context of Villa dei Vescovi. Working around Veneto music, the band developed pieces that merge deep roots of original fusion…