New Arrivals
Mama Too Tight
Originally released in 1967, Mama Too Tight stands as one of the most daring and structurally innovative albums from Archie Shepp, a pivotal figure in the free jazz movement and African-American cultural protest of the 1960s. Distinct from his more explosive works, this album showcases a refined compositional complexity, featuring avant-garde marching-band-style arrangements, masterful horn orchestrations, and a unique blend of humor and improvisational tension.
The title track, Mama Too Tight, …
Rumanikos, Kokin, Mixolydian, Kourd Atar, Pigmy, Slendro
In a sonic dialogue that balances delicacy and depth, Clinton Green and Barnaby Oliver explore the shifting textures of acoustics and resonance. Employing bowed aluminum bowls, strings, and a grand piano, their work unfolds in patient layers that probe the very essence of sound and its environment, evoking an atmosphere of quiet tension and subtle transformation.
Anxthelic Onghesont
Dervish-like guitar spirals by Ghent-based musician Benoît Monsieurs, following two excellent releases on Kraak under his Venediktos Tempelboom moniker. Ecstatic music that takes cue from psychedelism, modern and ancient - from Hildegard von Bingen to Vincent le Masne et Bertrand Porquet. Splendid stuff.
Unlike France, Belgian underground scenes never ceased to be consistent since the early 1970's and onwards, constituting vast, sprawling networks, that reaches present days via very active label…
Jacknife
Recorded at the legendary Van Gelder Studio in September 1965 and released on the prestigious Blue Note label, this remarkable album spotlights alto saxophone virtuoso Jackie McLean leading a powerhouse quintet through five original compositions. This recording captures a pivotal moment in post-bop jazz, highlighting McLean’s bold, expressive style and his commitment to pushing the boundaries of the genre.
Joining McLean are two celebrated trumpeters, Charles Tolliver and Lee Morgan, each bringi…
Wranglin'
First released in 1964 under the expert production of Blackwell for Island Records, this remarkable album captures the essence of Jamaican soulful jazz through the extraordinary talent of Ernest Ranglin. As a pioneering guitarist and composer, Ranglin delivers an impeccable performance that blends the rich traditions of jazz with the vibrant rhythms of Jamaica.
Accompanied by a highly swinging rhythm section, featuring Malcolm Cecil on bass and Alan Ganley on drums, the album explores a captivat…
Guitar In Ernest
Born in 1932, Ernest Ranglin stands as one of the most influential session guitarists in the history of Jamaican music. His iconic playing features on countless recordings by legends such as Alton Ellis, Jimmy Cliff, Bunny Wailer, Max Romeo, the Skatalites, the Heptones, and the Congos, among many others.
Produced by Chris Blackwell and originally released in 1961 on Island Records, "Guitar in Ernest" showcases the sophisticated jazz side of Ranglin’s artistry. This exceptional album highlights …
The Last Sacrifice
The Last Sacrifice by Mike Lindsay—co-founder of Tunng and the creative force behind Lump—offers a meticulously crafted folk-horror soundtrack that doubles as a standalone listening experience. Written as the audio companion to Rupert Russell's sinister true crime tale, Lindsay’s score winds through moods of spectral dread and rustic eeriness, shaped by analog warmth and otherworldly textures. The resulting album is immersive and haunting, deftly blending traditional English folk motifs with chi…
Early Works
Bill Fontana investigates the physics of perception itself. Side A: tape collages where sound becomes both material and force. Side B: Wave Spiral for 5 Rin Gongs - a sidelong, 21-minute centerpiece where pure sine waves create interference patterns, frequency made sculptural. Sound spiraling through space, dissolving boundaries between observer and phenomenon.
Gong
Gong, newly reissued on CD with bonus tracks, finds Sissy Spacek at their inventive peak, transforming the noise duo format into a meticulous, sprawling environment. The album’s two extended pieces are collages of violently manipulated junk noise, shattered electronics, and warped musical fragments, merging chaos and structure. Through masterful tape edits and dense, eerie atmospherics—including glass, metal, piano, and field recordings—the band delivers an immersive, unpredictable journey into …
Raiser
Raiser captures a 2013 Bronson session of Sissy Spacek—Phil Blankenship, Charlie Mumma, and John Wiese—in Los Angeles, channeling an intense fusion of harsh noise and noisecore. The album is a relentless, cathartic experience: shriek-laced blasts, searing electronics, and disintegrating metal fragments, all reassembled into monstrous, meticulously pieced sound collages. The result is sonic destruction made compositional, a full-spectrum assault that melts into jittery static and transformed debr…
Porch Music
Porch Music documents No Hope Orchestra, an ambitious large ensemble led by Paul McCarthy and featuring core members of the Los Angeles Free Music Society. Recorded live at The Box gallery concert in Los Angeles, the project harnesses a vivid assembly of improvisers—Mitchell Brown, Elaine Carey, Dennis Duck, Ace Farren Ford, Juan Gomez, Mike Gonzalez, Joseph Hammer, Keith Lubow, Nathaniel Mellors, Joe Potts, Rick Potts, Trevor Rounseville, Alex Stevens, Molly Tierney, and John Wiese. This releas…
Music / Sangam
Paris, 1978. Don Cherry walks into a French studio with a suitcase full of instruments nobody expected and meets Ustad Ahmed Latif Khan for the first time. No rehearsal, no plan, just two musicians who recognize each other immediately as kindred spirits. What happens next is one of Cherry's best efforts - an album only hardcore fans know about, recorded in Paris, released only in France in 1981, disappeared, and now back again in a special edition that demands attention. This is what "world musi…
Star Dream FM
Dylan Henner’s album "Star Dream FM" is an experimental ambient suite woven from choral textures, marimba, processed voice, and impressionistic electronics. Presented as a fictional radio transmission of Henner’s adolescence, its 41 minutes blend memory and invention, immersing listeners in shimmering sonic vignettes that blur the boundaries between personal nostalgia and collective dream.
Terra Nova
Tempo Livre is a collaboration between Pedro Tavares (funcionário) and Luís Neto, where progressive rock, ambient folk, experimental electronics, and pop intertwine in compositions that explore themes of memory, fear, and transformation. The album Terra Nova is a sonic journey divided into nine tracks that drift between ethereal passages and rhythmic explosions, where the delicacy of traditional acoustic instruments like santur, nyckelharpa, and duduk contrasts with eclectic drums, elastic bassl…
Social Gathering
Mentioned on Julian Cope's essential guide Jap Rock Sampler, Food Brain released their debut album in 1970, gathering influences from prog, proto-hard and psychedelic music. By far a supergroup consisting of Shinki Chen (Speed, Glue and Shinki), Hiro Yanagida (Milk Time) and Hiro Tsunoda (Flied Egg), the band showed an incredible interplay on their nine instrumental pieces, generating a cult following aboard.
The Dissolute Society Comprised of All Sorts
Isabella Gellis’s The Dissolute Society Comprised of All Sorts is a formidable debut for solo piano, performed by Joseph Havlat. Drawing inspiration from Biber’s baroque suite and cannibalizing its gestures, Gellis interweaves the surreal, the silly, and the tactile, forming a musical tapestry that refracts historical tradition through a vividly modern, sometimes absurd lens.
Earth of the Slumbering and Liquid Trees
Benjamin Tassie’s Earth of the Slumbering and Liquid Trees is an immersive 70-minute composition featuring performances by Zubin Kanga on keyboards, blending sampled historic organs, analogue synthesizers, and real-time digital processing. The work, part of the ‘Cyborg Soloists’ research project, was recorded live in Amsterdam and surrounds listeners with a multi-layered soundscape exploring themes of ritual, memory, and environmental transformation.
Stable Processes with Slow Ornaments
Theo Alexander’s Stable Processes with Slow Ornaments, released by Flung Records in 2025, is a 36-minute single-movement work for viola, bass clarinet, and eight tape players. The composition fuses acoustic and electronic textures, unspooling as a patient meditation on resonance, memory, and the slow shifts of sound in space.
Clear and Stormy Horizons
Eden Lonsdale’s Clear and Stormy Horizons is a contemporary chamber mini-album released in 2025, featuring five compositions that drift between melancholy, tension, and delicate lyricism. Written and recorded during lockdown, these works showcase Lonsdale’s evocative use of varied instrumentation and emotional clarity, marking another intriguing chapter in UK-based new music.
Friends
H&F Recordings’ album Friends, sometimes known as Fragile, is a rediscovered gem of early 1970s British psych-folk. Crafted by Peter Howell and John Ferdinando, this collaborative project—originally issued as a private press—displays gentle harmonies, intricate acoustic textures, and a disarmingly intimate approach, now remastered for fresh ears after decades of semi-mythical obscurity.