Jazz & Improvisation / All styles

More unearthed tape from a jazz icon! This second volume of Jazz Mill recordings shows Barney firmly at the top of his game. Once again, Barney Kessel and the Jazz Millers (pianist Pete Jolly, drummer Art Kile, and bassist Gene Stoffell) interpret a variety of standards from The Great American Songbook and each arrangement serves to demonstrate the group’s superb chops and collective creativity. In “Mean to Me,” a vintage standard from 1929, a high velocity rendition of Harold Arlen’s “Let’s Fal…

Following on from the re-issue of Topography of the Lungs, Otoroku is proud to follow up with another legendary free-improvised document, this one from the duo of Derek Bailey and Evan Parker, originally released on the INCUS label in 1975. "The London Concert is one of those rare recordings that capture musicians at a special moment of confluence, a moment when procedures are proving fruitful and before practice has hardened into dogma, when different visions are not yet turned into position pa…

Cien Fuegos present a reissue of the Peter Brötzmann Octet's Machine Gun, originally released in 1968. One of the most important albums of European free jazz, finally in the Cien Fuegos series. Recorded May 1968 at "Lila Eule", Bremen. Recorded with a whiff of revolution in the air back in May '68, this landmark Brotzmann LP taps into the spirit of its time with a robust garage rock sensibility, lending a considerable urgency to the session, with the highest volume passages taking up far more ai…

s, never before released on vinyl from Peter Brötzmann Octet's Machine Gun (1968). As Brötzmann has said: 'It was the feeling, the very naive feeling that we could take a little part in changing the world.' Adopting its title from Don Cherry's nickname for Brötzmann, 'Machine Gun' drew on the huge horn section of Lionel Hampton's 'Flying Home' for inspiration, translating the hilarious saxophonic power of the jump blues and Illinois Jacquet's booting and hollering into an abstraction painted wit…

Recorded July 2nd and 3rd, 2017 by Øyvind Gundersen at Studio Paradiso, Oslo Mixed October 2017, by Andreas Werliin at Repeat Until Death, Stockholm Mastered by Lupo at Calyx mastering, Berlin Liner notes by Brian Morto. Mats Gustafsson (saxes), Ingebrigt Håker Flaten (b) and Paal Nilssen-Love (dr) have followed an interesting concept with The Thing. They take the power of blues and heavy rock and mix it with the freedom of improvised music using the riff as the foundation of their pieces.Mats G…

Live at Molde International Jazz Festival 2015. All music by James Blood Ulmer. Viking jazz band The Thing team up with one of the legendary men of jazz and blues. Guitarist and singer Ulmer combines (free) jazz, blues, funk, and rock -- always on the edge, melting it to some kind of free funk... In 1980, Ulmer recorded the genre milestone No Wave with John Zorn and Pharoah Sanders. Personnel: James Blood Ulmer - guitar; Mats Gustafsson - tenor and baritone saxophones; Ingebrigt Håker Flaten …

“Fetén” brings together a selection of recordings made in Spain between 1961 and 1974. The tracks selected were originally released on records that have become impossible to find, and which, in most cases, have never been reissued. These are unique recordings spanning modal jazz, hard bop and even avant-garde jazz by Spanish musicians such as Mantequilla, Juan Carlos Calderón, Ricard Roda and Vlady Bas, as well as by international jazzmen like Dusko Goykovich, Lou Bennett and Tino Contreras. Th…

In the early sixties, "Mantequilla" had the chance to lead his own combo, Mantequilla y su conjunto, with which he was to record the three splendid EPs that are compiled on the present album. All these 7" have become elusive collector pieces in the record market, with sellers demanding from 200 to as much as 950 euros per copy. In 1961 "Mantequilla" was at his best moment, his gigs at the Jamboree Jazz Cava had brought him back to the first line of Barcelona's jazzmen after he had been working a…

This splendid catalan Jazz LP was originally released on Edigsa in 1968 and sees its first ever vinyl reissue here. Barcelona has always had a boiling jazz scene, and since the 1960s a strong focal point of the city jazzmen has been the Jamboree Club, in the centric Plaça Reial. The Jamboree was a regular point for al American artists doing the European jazz circuit, as it was for all European acts and, of course for the local talent. Among these, a young quartet formed by alto sax & flute playe…

Annihaya present Rats Don't Eat Synthesizers, the long-awaited second album by The Dwarfs Of East Agouza. Hailing from the Agouza district of Cairo, Egypt, this brilliant trio consists of Alan Bishop (acoustic bass, alto sax), Maurice Louca (keyboards, drum machine), and Sam Shalabi (electric guitar). Following their acclaimed first album Bes (NAWA 005CD, 2016), this new full-length is composed of two hypnotic journeys: "Rats Don't Eat Synthesizers" and "Ringa Mask Koshary" which were recorded i…

This is the first presentation of a lost jazz concert from the Helmut Brandt estate, recorded March 1963 at SFB Sendesaal/ Haus des Rundfunks in West Berlin. That evening the “Helmut Brandt Orchestra” consisted of eleven soloists from the Berlin radio orchestras of RIAS and SFB, including Benny Bailey, Herb Geller, Nat Peck and Ack van Rooyen. They played a one-off concert of mostly unknown compositions, taped by producer Hans Gertberg for inclusion in the huge archive of NDR Jazz Workshop recor…

Today it is well known that Austrian pianist and composer Friedrich Gulda was at home in two different worlds: classical music and jazz. He once mentioned “There are so many great musicians alive, but none of them was able to tear down the border that was created by the music industry, which is the border between classical music and popular music. Jazz is still considered to be something deserving less respect.” Gulda was one of the few who tried to cross that border, working in both realms, wit…

Referred to an as 'American Iconoclast' by the New York Times, Roscoe Mitchell is an internationally recognized saxophonist, composer, and founder of the Art Ensemble of Chicago. Discussions Orchestra is derived from several musical improvisations found on Roscoe Mitchell's Conversations with Kikanju Baku and Craig Taborn. The songs have been transcribed and performed by a twenty piece orchestra.

**small repress available** Honest Jon's Records present a reissue of Derek Bailey & Han Bennink, originally released in 1972. The third release in a series of collaborations between Honest Jon's Records and Incus: three double-LPs of the legendary free-improvising guitarist Derek Bailey, solo (HJR 200LP) and in duos with Anthony Braxton (HJR 201LP) and Han Bennink, augmenting the original releases with marvelous, previously unissued music. The tussling vegetables in Mal Dean's cover-sketch some…

When pianist and composer Moses Taiwa Molelekwa died in February 2001, fans and fellow musicians alike were swept away by grief. He was so young – not yet 30 – and had shown such musical promise.Genes and Spirits was his second album, released a year before his death. While the composer’s voice and pianist’s touch are instantly recognisable from his debut, Finding One’s Self, the ideas underlying the music mark a conscious step into the unknown: what he called “finding a range of rhythmic altern…

When glancing over the history of indigenous French free improvised music, there tends to be two observable categories of musicians - those who worked and collaborated with their counterparts from abroad, and those who worked independently. The former is generally more celebrated, and among those the drummer Jacques Thollot, who worked with Don Cherry, Steve Lacy, Sonny Sharrock, Sam Rivers, Joachim Kühn, and numerous others, as well as with French pioneers like Barney Wilen and Jef Gilson, rank…

Small repress available, in process of stocking. The mid 80s were a pivotal period for Don Cherry. Much of his energies had been devoted to co-op projects like Codona and Old and New Dreams and he also helped jumpstart the Leaders. The time being ripe to form his own ensemble, Cherry created Nu, a quintet with saxophonist/flutist Carlos Ward, bassist Mark Helias, percussionist Nana Vasconcelos and drummer Ed Blackwell. Live at the Bracknell Jazz Festival, 1986 confirms Nu to be an ensemble that …

Late great alto screamer Kaoru Abe is the lost wild legend of '70s Japanese free jazz. This was the very last recordings he has leftIn the short space of his tempestuous life, he burnt a path which has served as a map for a whole generation of Japanese artists to follow who would call themselves 'free' in any sense of the word whatsoever. Though he performed live frequently in his day, his releases were sporadic, many of them emerging after his untimely death in 1978, and on a string of Japanese…

**Very Last Copies - Original 1983 copies of this obscure classic, slightly warped** few copies available. Over the last decade we’ve begun to form an image of Italy’s long neglected musical avant-garde. This movement, with artifacts stretching from the mid-1960’s to today, remained landlocked for decades, almost entirely unheard beyond the country of its birth. With a small number of exceptions, despite the remarkable creative diversity reissue culture has managed to represent, the majorit…

“The debut record of Luft (the duo comprised of Mats Gustafsson and Erwan Keravec) - is a two volume album of exceptional explorations within the bagpipe and reed universe ——unknown music of poetic beauty and high energy cascades. Fast moving changes in texture and layers vs static repetitions and alternatives densities and melody treatments! Vol 1 - is focusing on the interaction between the two persons/ instruments - with a huge variety in extended techniques and various ways of treating the i…

Trost presents the first vinyl edition of How To Raise An Ox by Zu and Mats Gustafsson. Initially released on CD in 2005 by Atavistic. Features new cover artwork. Long-running intense jazz/noise-core band Zu from Italy teams up with Viking-saxophonist extraordinaire Gustafsson (The Thing, Fire!). Mastering by Andy Moor (The Ex) and Colin McLean.Personnel: Mats Gustafsson - baritone saxophone; Luca Tommaso Mai - baritone saxophone; Massimo Pupillo - bass; Jacopo Battaglia - drums.

Three young musicians team up to form this exciting trio. Personnel: Mette Rasmussen - alto saxophone; Tashi Dorji - guitar; Tyler Damon - drums.

London based saxophonist Colin Webster is quickly establishing himself on the European avant-garde scene. Working with a broad range of collaborators, Webster is known for working from extreme sonic palettes -- from minimal to maximal, constantly pushing boundaries. Webster first worked with Dirk Serries on the landmark Endless Voids performance led by Dead Neanderthals at the 2014 Incubate Festival. Since this initial meeting, the two have worked on different collaborations both live and i…

LP version. The new album combines again the trademarks of Made To Break: the soulful and grooving play of Ken Vandermark (one of the key musicians/composers in the current free jazz scene) on reeds with the filigran electronic distortions and loops of Christof Kurzmann, with a solid rhythm layer by the young Dutch bassist lloopp Jasper Stadhouders and drummer Tim Daisy. An unusual "jazz" record, fascinating so much the more. Personnel: Ken Vandermark - reeds; Christof Kurzmann - electronics; ll…

Boneshaker are Mars Williams (reeds, toy instruments), Paal Nilssen-Love (drums & percussion) and Kent Kessler (bass), three prolific powerhouse musicians, carrying among them a Grammy nomination and decades of experience with the top ensembles in the world. Thinking Out Loud is their third album. Personnel: Mars Williams - reeds; Paal Nilssen-Love - drums; Kent Kessler - bass.

Factory pressed double CD in printed triple panel Ekopack cardboard sleeve. Derek Bailey : guitar. Simon H. Fell : double bass. Will Gaines : tap dance. Mark Wastell : violoncello. Recorded live at The Klinker, London on Thursday 24th August 2000. Compèred by Matt Scott. Original DAT recording by Tim Fletcher.Mixed and mastered by Simon H. Fell. Produced by Mark Wastell. One of the special qualities of improvisation is the array of responses musicians and performers have to the environment …

Yet another 'out of time' band from the glorious golden season of Italian progressive rock, Il Baricentro - a name that does not coincidentally reveals the musicians' origins (Bari/center, Puglia) - were founded in the mid-'70s by brothers Francesco and Vanni Boccuzzi, out from the ashes of Festa Mobile.The debut "Sconcerto" saw the light in 1976: a beautiful instrumental jazz-rock LP, in which keyboards dominate over every other instrument. Despite the season of punk, new wave and disco music s…

Previously unreleased live and studio sessions from 1969/70. Transeuropean Jazz by Bruno Spoerri`s and Hans Kennel`s sextet and octet “Jazz Rock Experience” from Zurich. Deep brew of electrified Jazz-Funk, spiritual sounds, folk music from Eastern Europe and free improvisation. Original material plus vibrant versions of Leadbelly, James Brown and Eddie Harris, featuring a.o. Spoerri (el-ts and ss), Kennel (tp), Dave Lee (el-pi, clavinet and vibes), Raffael Waeber (g), Jonas Haefeli …

Mule Musiq present a reissue of Fumio Itabashi's Watarase, originally released in 1982. French-born English DJ, record label, owner, and music collector Gilles Peterson once called Watarase the best jazz record from Japan. Tokyo based Mule Music unearth Watabase, the second solo piano album of the Japanese jazz pianist Fumio Itabashi, remastered from the original recordings. While diving deep into the seven compositions on Watarese, any sensible listener finds out, that the instrumental piano pi…

Mule Musiq present the first vinyl reissue of Fumio Itabashi's Nature, originally released in 1979. The legendary Japanese jazz pianist's first solo record ever, Nature was recorded at Nippon Columbia's first studio in Tokyo from March 13-15 in the year of its release. It features Itabashi making feverish love with the piano and he shares the studio with the great bass players Hideaki Mochizuki and Koichi Yamazaki, drummers Kenichi Kameyama and Ryojiro Furusawa, soprano saxophonist Yoshio Oto…

Proton Pump is a milestone achievement in the winding career of alto saxophonist, gibberish shrieker and jazz legend Akira Sakata. It’s a lightning-fast, real-time cut-up of melody and bare-knuckle action that swings between the avant garde and hardcore be-bop. Sakata is backed by his famed rhythm crew Chikamorachi -- drummer Chris Corsano and acoustic bassist Darin Gray -- and joined by composer and pianist Masahiko Satoh. Sakata and Satoh emerged out of the late-1960s Tokyo jazz scene -- S…

As live albums go, Tashi Dorji and Tyler Damon nail it down. No matter the crowd -- head thrashers, Instagram zombies, shaken jazzniks -- the shadow lines of feedback and bombastic percussive bombs are always at peak intensity. Through telepathic engagement the Bhutanese-born guitarist Dorji and Midwestern drummer Damon act with one-mind destruction as Leave No Trace: Live In St. Louis perfectly captures.  It’s a pure sound for these disruptive, politically tumultuous times. Or Marc Master…

Last copies, sold out at source. Replica reissue of one of the rarest free jazz LP ever made: Masayuki Takayanagi & Kaoru Abe's earthshattering Kaitai Teki Kōkan. Supposedly released in a limited run of 100 copies in 1970, this incredibly rare record igot finally  its first vinyl reissue via Craftman Records. The album features a recording of the duo’s live performance at the Kōsei Nenkin Kaikan concert hall in Shinjuku on June 28th, 1970. The reissue is pressed on 180g vinyl and replicates …

All four Dharma Quintet, Dharma Trio & Dharma reissues at a special price. Long regarded as one of the best record stores in the world, offering a particular focus to avant-garde and experimental music, in 2014 Paris based SouffleContinu launched as bonafide record label. While France has played a crucial role in the history of avant-garde music - from its beginnings in Dada, to the developments of Musique concrète, experimental electronic and electroacoustic music, many of the country’s more ad…

ESP-Disk' present a vinyl reissue of Peter Lemer Quintet's Local Colour, originally released in 1968. British pianist Peter Lemer studied with Jaki Byard, Paul Bley, and Bill Dixon. His lengthy and distinguished career has found him in a wide variety of settings. As an avant-garde jazz pianist, he recorded with Spontaneous Music Ensemble; in the jazz fusion realm, he was a member of Gilgamesh and Paraphernalia; as a progressive rock keyboardist, he played with Gong, Baker Gurvitz Army, the Mike …

"FPE Records is thrilled to release Intergalactic Beings, Nicole Mitchell's second avant-jazz suite based on the Xenogenesis novels of Octavia Butler, recorded live on April 30, 2010, at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. Black Earth Ensemble features a cast of Chicago's most respected players and improvisers. This is their eighth album, and their first to see release on vinyl."

Brookland Suite is inspired by Micha Acher's travels to New Orleans and Johannes Enders's admiration for the soundscapes of Gil Evans. The unique instrumentation and the rough sound make Brookland a very special suite for lovers of deep sounds. Johannes Enders is a saxophone player with his own distinguished voice, and a rich international performing experience, covering gigs with artists as diverse as Donald Byrd, Jeff Watts, Roy Hargrove, Vincent Herring, George Cables, Lester Bowie, and Ja…

Reissue of Derek Bailey's 2nd Incus LP from 1974, fully remastered to bring Derek Bailey's uniquely personal improvisation style clearly into the 21st century. "In 1974, when Derek Bailey was planning his second solo LP on Incus, he decided to include a side-long solo using his stereo electro-acoustic set-up. Unfortunately, he never seemed to have a 20-minute stretch of time free of interruptions in his home, so he asked if he could record it at my place. After a fairly lengthy drive across Lond…

Continuing the series of collaborations between Honest Jon’s and Incus. As throughout the series, the recordings are newly transferred from tape at Abbey Road, and re-mastered by Rashad Becker. And here we have this incredible duo from underrated cellist Tristan Honsinger and Derek Bailey, originally released on Incus in 1976. There are parralels between this record and fellow sometime Parisian string pkayer Joelle Leandre's Taxi, but really, Honsinger's voice is like no other - there's less rev…

**small repress available**Honest Jon's Records present Solo Guitar Volume 1, a reissue of Derek Bailey's Solo Guitar release on Incus in 1971, with additional tracks included on previous reissues and a performance at York University in 1972. Kicking off a series of collaborations between Honest Jon's Records and Incus: three double-LPs of the legendary free-improvising guitarist Derek Bailey, solo and in duos with Anthony Braxton (HJR 201LP) and Han Bennink (HJR 202LP), augmenting the original …