Psych /
In Praise of Learning
*Comes in a CD-sized papersleeve album replica (gatefold), with obi-strip and insert of notes mostly in Japanese..2024 repress* This album was recorded at about the same time as Desperate Straights, the album that combined with Slap Happy and was recorded under a joint name. With the addition of Dubmar, there are more vocal numbers and the ensemble is as brilliant as on the previous album. The album is a good blend of the interest in improvisation shown on the previous album. Long-awaited encore…
Unrest
*Comes in a CD-sized papersleeve album replica (gatefold), with obi-strip and insert of notes mostly in Japanese..2024 repress* Second release from 1974. The three tracks on the analogue A-side are all meticulously arranged, even the improvisation-style passages, and show that the sound of early Henry Cow had reached its peak. The B-side is an improvisation-driven piece that hints at the possibilities of Cow's later work. Long-awaited encore pressing in paper jacket, 7 bonus tracks, remastered i…
Leg End
*Comes in a CD-sized papersleeve album replica (gatefold), with obi-strip and insert of notes mostly in Japanese..2024 repress* Debut album released in 1973 by Henry Cow, one of Canterbury's most important bands, formed around Fred Frith and Tim Hodgkinson, who were students at Cambridge University. It was signed to Virgin and recorded at Manor Studios. The songs had reached maturity in their earlier shows, and the studio work was highly accomplished, with intelligent, avant-garde songs produced…
Lovechild
*Comes in a CD-sized papersleeve album replica (gatefold), with obi-strip and insert of notes mostly in Japanese..2024 stock* Lovechild is a studio album credited to progressive rock band Curved Air, though only half the tracks are actually performed by the group. The album consists of previously unreleased demos overseen by Clifford Adams in the early 1970s: one by John O'Hara, two by Eddie Jobson, one by Kirby Gregory, and four by Curved Air. Vocalist Sonja Kristina explained the album's origi…
Hopes And Fears
*2024 reissue* Debut album released in ‘78 by Art Bears, a unit spawned from the fusion of Henry Cow and Slap Happy. With lyrics by Cutler + songs by Frith and songs by Dagmar, the image of the band is as if the extracts of the above two bands had been extracted and sharpened. A memorable album that could be seen as the starting point for the movement later known as ‘RecoMenkei’. Paper jacket, SHM-CD, remastered in 2015, with four bonus tracks, and even the poster included only on the first pres…
The World As It Is Today
*2024 reissue* Third and final album released in 1980. This album was released as a 45rpm 30 cm LP in analogue format. The entire album is filled with dark, high-tension performances, with a strong message that can be interpreted as an antithesis to the reality of the world, and a foreshadowing of the later activities of ReR and others. Paper jacket, SHM-CD, remastered in 2015, with three bonus tracks, as well as a reproduced 20-page booklet that came with the first pressing. Long-awaited encore…
Winter Songs
*2024 reissue* Brilliant second album by Art Bears, a band/project featuring Fred Frith, Chris Cutler and Dagmar Krause, formed in 1978 after disputes over the musical direction within Henry Cow. 'Winter Songs', originally released in 1979, placed Art Bears in the forefront of the Rock In Opposition Movement. Art Bears' intense and brutal avant-garde approach on the album comes across as primordial expression, which is nailed down by Krause's violently charismatic voice. As a piece of music reve…
Larks' Tongues In Aspic
Released in clear-tray jewel case with 12-page booklet. Larks' Tongues In Aspic is the fifth in a series of audiophile King Crimson vinyl reissues. Newly cut from masters approved by Robert Fripp, this super-heavyweight 200gm vinyl re-issue is housed in a reprint of the original sleeve. With its raw tone, inspired improvisations and hard hitting odd-metered rhythms, the album marked a radical departure for this most forward thinking of groups and was the first to include Bill Bruford and John We…
Lizard
Released in clear-tray jewel case with 12-page booklet. Originally released 1970. Tracks 9 and 10 are bonus tracks taken from the single King Crimson - Cat Food / Groon. Released in December 1970, King Crimson's third studio album, Lizard, is often viewed as an outlier in the pioneering British prog outfit's nearly half-century discography. It's not easily grouped with 1969's stunning In the Court of the Crimson King debut and 1970 follow-up In the Wake of Poseidon, and along with 1971's Islands…
Per... Un Mondo Di Cristallo
* 2024 stock * The Raccomandata Ricevuta Ritorno (also called RRR) were a Roman group dedicated to progressive rock in the years in which the genre, in Italy and in Europe, lived its best years with enthusiasm. Formed by Luciano Regoli (vocals, acoustic guitar), Francesco Froggio Francica (drums, percussion), Manlio Zacchia (bass), Damaso Grassi (flute, sax), Nanni Civitenga (guitar) and Stefano Piermarioli (keyboards) they released only one album in 1972 - "Per un mondo di Cristallo" - and then…
Vero
Leo Nero is the assumed name of Gianne Leone, the keyboardist and mastermind behind the legendary band Il Balletto Di Bronzo, whose 1972 album 'Ys' is considered one of the true classics of the serious Italian Prog aficionado. That band split shortly afterward and Nero/Leone left for the United States in the mid 1970s. He recorded this album in 1976 in New York City before moving to Los Angeles for a few years, eventually heading back to Italy. He played all of the instruments on 'Vero' making …
Miss Madona (EP)
First vinyl reissue. Two years after having recorded Aurora, which Gérard Terronès released on his Futura Records label in 1971, the Théâtre du Chêne Noir put on another show, Miss Madona, first at Avignon, and then at Ariane Mnouchkine's Théâtre du Soleil. From this play, Gérard Gelas's group took three sound extracts which they made, with no further ado, into a single. Miss Madona is thus the second recording by Théâtre du Chêne Noir. The two sides (and three tracks) offer up an unbelievable i…
Aurora
LP version. First vinyl reissue. Souffle Continu Records present a reissue Le Théâtre du Chêne Noir's Aurora, originally released in 1971. In 1972, Steve Lacy recorded Solo, one of the gems in his discography, in the Théâtre du Chêne Noir in Avignon. The previous year (which was also the year in which Aurora appeared), the eponymous group of actors led by Gérard Gelas, took up residence in what was a 12th century chapel. The Théâtre du Chêne Noir is therefore not just the name of a space open to…
With (Junk-Saucepan) When (Spoon-Trigger) - LP
Black vinyl edition. Second in a series of ten reissues of the cult French underground Futura label. Recorded in december 1970, “With (Junk-Saucepan) When (Spoon-Trigger)” is the first album by Mahogany Brain, led by street poet / underground film maker Michel Bulteau and Patrick Geoffrois. It shares the same raw aesthetics with the Velvet Underground and offers 12 savage and unhinged songs of distorted guitars with crude lyrics. Their story is quite short-lived: two albums in two years, highly…
Sea Fluorescent
** CD edition, digipack deluxe ** First ever reissue of highly sought after french jazz funk fusion nugget from Alain Bellaïche featuring, Jerry Goodman (Mahavishnu Orchestra), John Hicks (Strata-East) & Fabiano (Fabiano Orchestra). Remastered from the master tapes. Restored artwork + 12 page booklet & Obi Strip A Frenchman who is returning (but who we seem to discover!) from the USA is something unusual. Everything seemed to start out well for Alain Bellaïche: Born in Tunis, childhood in C…
Omaggio A Futi
**Original 1989 copies of this obscure classic, few copies back in stock** Organized around LAFMS associate James Grigsby, also founding member of the California Outside Music Association (abbreviated COMA) Motor Totemist Guild was formed in Los Angeles in 1980 together with poet/singer Christine Clements. Throughout the 1970’s Grigsby had been involved with the study and performance of electronic music, Renaissance polyphony, progressive rock, post-Webern serialism, Balinese gamelan and punk-j…
Flasket Brinner
** 1971 debut album reissue with bonus Lp with unreleased material. Limited edition 500 copies ** In the early 1970s, Sweden, similar to neighboring Germany, had a vibrant music culture that shunned American and British tendencies. Here, bands were allowed to experiment with a wide variety of musical styles without worrying about how they would fare commercially. Here, innovative rock acts like International Harvester, Algarnas Tradgard, Samla Mammas Manna, and Kebnekaise came together to create…
Matching Mole
** Expanded Edition. 180 gram audiophile vinyl. Deluxe sleeve with linen laminate finish. Limited edition of 1000 individually numbered copies on yellow & orange marbled vinyl. For the first time available as 2LP-set. Including 7 bonus tracks** Recorded in an abandoned CBS studio in the cold winter of 1972, this is the historical first album of Matching Mole, Robert Wyatt's immediate post Soft Machine grouping featuring himself on drums and vocals and three of the most creative musicians from th…
Elegy - The Recordings 1968-1971 (6CD Box)
6Cd box Discs in Vinyl replica sleeves with a 36-page booklet all held in a clam-shell box. Colosseum came together in 1968, the brainchild of virtuoso drummer Jon Hiseman and saxophonist Dick Heckstall-Smith (who had played together in the Graham Bond Organisation and John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers). Teaming with bass guitarist Tony Reeves and keyboard player Dave Greenslade, the line-up of the band was completed with the recruitment of guitarist and vocalist James Litherland. Their debut album, ‘…
Genealogia
180 Grams, Green Vinyl, numbered edition of 500. Perigeo were founded in Rome in 1971: five professional musicians, all of them already largely active in the jazz and rock circuits of those years, who gathered in the studio to wisely blend together the two aforementioned music genres: this is probably the first example of jazz-rock music in Italy, admittedly influenced by Miles Davis and that legendary “Bitches Brew” that just two years earlier had shocked the jazz scene worldwide.Purists among …