★Modern Harmonic
1969
Masterful ‘60s pop by a jazz guitar guru! Not many jazz artists were interpreting popular songs in the late ‘60s, but Hungarian-born Gabor Szabo looked past the oft-covered standards to put his trademark jazz transformations on a set of fashionable tunes on 1969, including major hits for the Left Banke, the Beatles, and more songs that his contemporaries neglected. Guitar master Szabo’s 1969 platter of folk and pop music touchstones is highlighted by the rock’n bossa spin on Sealed With a Kiss! …
John Cage Meets Sun Ra: The Complete Film
* Restocked, reduced price * The never-before-seen in its entirety, visual documentation proving this avant-garde collaboration of mythic proportions did indeed occur. Recorded at Sideshows by the Seashore along the Coney Island boardwalk on June 8th, 1986 as documented on VHS by John Polizzi under the commission of event producers Rick Russo and Bronwyn Rucker. It was long believed that John Cage and Sun Ra never performed together but as you'll see,these two shared the stage the entire time. T…
Prophetic Spirit
Blazing sitar and crazed percussion, a 50 year old mystery! Known only in legend from their appearance in 33 1/3 Revolutions Per Monkee, the Moon Express album finally arrives 50 years after its recording! Paul Arnold (mastermind behind The Inner Sounds Of The Id) and Tsvia & the Followers weave peculiar music that ebbs and flows with unusual time signatures, sonic baths of wild, exotic percussion and other fascinating and hypnotic sounds, all under Arnold's booming narratives and Tsvia Abarbane…
AndOarAgain
AndOarAgain provides unparalleled access to what David Fricke calls “the most harrowing and compelling artifacts of rock & roll’s most euphoric era” across three dozen unheard tracks! In addition to the quintessential original album, AndOarAgain features nearly two hours of unheard music on the way to Oar–along with roads not taken–that both clarifies and muddies the enigma of how psychedelic legend Alexander “Skip” Spence determined the final state of his iconic masterpiece. The time: December,…
I Want A Rock & Roll Band / I Got A Lot To Say / Mary Jane
Skip Spence leaves his hotel. Its a cold day in Nashville, climbing to only 43 F in the afternoon. It may be Sunday, but on this day a 22-year-old musician is working at Columbia Recording Studios. Over the past few days, hes recorded a slew of new songs and today will be no different. On December 7, 1968, Skip Spence will record no less than 8 different songs. He has only 3 more days left to finish the album. It's been fast and furious and its also been tough, recording every instrument on ever…
Solar Heat
Sultry Tjader jazz! Vibraphone legend Cal Tjader’s fusion of different genres and styles was an acute influence on Carlos Santana (and Latin rock as a whole). On Solar Heat he stirs in tastes of Exotica, Funk, and of course Latin and Jazz elements on this 1968 set of jazzed-up pop chestnuts and original bossas like the delicious “Fried Bananas.” Pressed at RTI, on colored vinyl
Pathways To Unknown Worlds
**First ever CD reissue, containing three Pathways session recordings left off the original, one never before issued** Intrinsic energies of mythic worlds! Pathways was originally issued on LP in 1975 as part of Sun Ra’s ill-fated and short-lived ABC/Impulse! partnership. This Modern Harmonic edition has been exquisitely mastered from the four-track session reel. The Impulse! LP was formatted as “Quad Compatible”—short for “quadraphonic”—which you could enjoy if you had four speakers, a custom q…
Something Weird
Something weird, and something very cool too – a set that brings
together a whole host of strange and unusual tunes from the glory days
of exploitation cinema! These cuts are all from a time when the b-movie
underground was playing it fast and loose – trying to get more folks
into the theaters with some ultra-sleazy themes – which resulted in
wilder music than you might have heard in movies just a few short years
before! The package is presented by Something Weird – the video company
wh…
Astro Black
Astro-Black mythology, astro-timeless immortality! Astro Black has long been known as a cornerstone of the Sun Ra catalog. It is well recorded, features a superb Arkestral lineup, and successfully combines several of the styles in which Sun Ra orbited, from Saturnic jazz to astro-funk. And now it’s finally back in the earthly bins! Pressed on colored vinyl, and packaged with new cover art, with liner notes by Robert Campbell (author of The Earthly Recordings of Sun Ra), and includes a poster ins…
Bad Trips
Nobody went full-on electro-rock before Fifty Foot Hose. Before their brief-but-groundbreaking run in the late ‘60s, Bad Trips collects the demos, outtakes, and other rarities that complete the story of a band too far ahead of its time to last. Includes both versions of their multi-speed composition “Bad Trip.” From the pre-Hose tracks of boldly atonal, proto-psychedelic freakout music to early versions of songs that would land on their opus, Bad Trips brazenly displays how Fifty Foot Hose chang…
Cauldron
An electronic rock band wasn’t even an idea when Fifty Foot Hose released their landmark debut album at the end of 1967. Their fusion of psychedelia and electronics resulted in a truly trailblazing sound. Cauldron stands as a signal achievement that laid the groundwork for genres that didn’t even exist when it was released. Pressed at Third Man Pressing on custom colored vinyl and featuring a zine-style insert with liners by FFH electronics mastermind Cork Marcheschi and the original sleeve rei…
I'm Sticking With You
Diminutive perpetual heartbeat of the Velvets! The unmistakable beat of the Velvet Underground was malleted out on the unconventional kit of Moe Tucker. Her (at times) childlike, fallen angelic voice also shines on some VU fan favorites. Here Moe reinterprets some Velvet gems, sometimes playing all instruments, other times accompanied by the likes of Jonathan Richman, Jad Fair, Kim Gordon and more. In addition to VU faves, we’re treated to rough and jubilant covers of her favorite early rock & r…
Reflections
Reflections is the very explicit beat-jazz birth of gangsta rap. A former pimp turned author, Iceberg Slim wrote Pimp: The Story of My Life, believed by some to be the highest selling book by a black author ever! On Reflections, the Red Holloway Quartet makes the bed, then Slim rhythmically speaks his prose like a bass note beat poet in what became the birth of the bad, dark, none-too-taboo tales of the street that inspired a subgenre of music. Justin Gifford, author of Street Poison – The Biogr…
One Man's Journey
One Man’s Journey is a compilation based on Alan Munson's real life happenings, a blend of singer-songwriter music and his experiences, accompanied by beautiful guitar and voice. It would be unfair to place Munson's music in a single genre — it’s a fusion of mellow psychedelic folk rock with the amazing atmosphere of the times.Originally released as private pressings, his recorded songs have a very intimate feel. Wonderful harmonies and meaningful lyrics will get deep under your skin, and the st…
Past The 20th Century
Seemingly unable to find an immediately-available niche in the outside world, Jerry Solomon spent the '60s & '70s carving his own niche and world into the grooves of records. Gone are the wobbly rock ‘n roll beats of Jerry’s earlier contributions, and in their place are droning minor-key melodies, irregular percussive jabs, toy piano strums, and impenetrable lyrics delivered by his self-overdubbed and echo-laden vocals. Original copies were sold on the streets by Jerry himself and trade for four…
Virginity For All
The rarity and bizarre content of Jerry Solomon’s releases have music connoisseurs clamoring for them, though he funded, wrote, recorded, and self-distributed his uniquely fascinating music for no reason other than to simply put it out there. Equal parts strange, entertaining, and foreboding, Jerry’s music is always engaging, and one can’t help but feel these recordings offer a glimpse through a murky portal into the unadulterated creative experience. Approximately fifty years after their initia…
The Saga Of Padani
The Oakland Elementary School Arkestra presents the odyssey of 4th, 5th & 6th grade students from novice musicians into an avant garde ensemble. An ensemble that engenders an array of sonic textures which never remain static or stagnant, but flow in a way that it's always surprising, often startling and astonishing.These schoolkids have traveled the spaceways of Modernism, Minimalism, Impressionism, Exotica, film soundtracks and more. They have ingested the lessons of Iconic artists like Sun Ra …
Crystal Spears
Recorded in ’73 and rejected by tin-eared major label execs in ’75, Crystal Spears (or “Crystal Clear” as it appears on the tape box) subsumes a cathartic brawl between Minimoog and Yamaha combo organ, with percussionists providing tonal textures, and plaintive oboe colliding with roaring electronic keyboards over waves of rollicking marimba, devilishly chattering below the fray. Crystal Spears is Sun Ra’s once lost aural cinematheque! Includes a quad-ra-color Sun Ra poster!Crystal Spears, inten…
John Cage Meets Sun Ra: The Complete Concert
If you were going to envision the ultimate avant-garde meeting-of-the-minds jam session, who would you pick? Even the most hopeful fan of strange and innovative music couldn't have seen this one coming: on one afternoon in 1986, at Coney Island's dilapidated freak show, space-age avant-jazz genius Sun Ra met avant-garde "serious music" composer John Cage in an unforgettable performance. You couldn't imagine two figures more opposite. Cage was known for his unusual approach to composition, using …
The Cymbals 1973
**Completely sold-out at source, few copies avaialble** Cymbals has finally landed… and brought a 2nd saucer with it! Originally recorded for the Impulse! jazz label in ’73, Cymbals makes its first legitimate release on vinyl, paired with a second LP of unheard material from the same sessions. Hear Sun Ra’s Baroque soundscapes, electrolytic clusters and dithering Moogs catalyze images of monoliths, space stations, computers malfunctioning and galaxies imploding on pristine red and green vinyl wi…