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This is an official release from the prestigious [Mississippi Records] of a compiled compilation of material from the 70's by Abner Jay (1921 - 1993), an American multi-instrumentalist from Georgia and a lone one-man band and outsider bluesman. This is another solo band style, with one man playing drums, banjo, vocals and harmonica. The name of the song is "Cocaine," and it's a slow, country-style performance with a heavy dose of poison. His voice is very convincing, perhaps because of his checkered, haphazard, and reckless life. This is a bluesman!

Co-released by Cairo's HIZZ imprint and Heat Crimes, Upper Egypt’s “King of Trobby Music” detonates another singular vision on Raasny—a 9-track suite of bruised street rhythms, electro-shaabi fireworks, and raw emotional voltage, beamed direct from El Minya to the world.

Abosahar has spent the last decade carving out his own micro-genre—Trobby, short for “True Being.” Here it comes into sharpest focus yet: a sound that blurs electro-shaabi, house, techno, trap and pop into dazzling, rough-edged collages, powered by cracked software, busted machines, and the immediacy of lived experience.

Raasny loops wedding-party ecstasy into journeys from Minya’s dusty streets to Cairo’s neon clubs. Tracks like “Bs Ya Baba” and “Shaabi Alarab” fold shaabi’s serrated synth stabs into mutant pulses; “Moled w Samar Haz” and “Moled Altenee” lock into hypnotic folk-ritual cadences; while the title cut “Raasny” surges with an almost devotional intensity, all cracked voices and distorted beats tumbling into the red.

What sets Sahar apart is his refusal of polish: everything is left jagged, overdriven, improvised, alive. His music is inseparable from the weddings, streets, and daily life of Upper Egypt—rooted as much in the dust and electricity of Minya as in the people who move to it.

Raised with little more than a battery-powered radio and homemade instruments fashioned from grass and cardboard, Sahar’s DIY ethos is burned into every second of Raasny. His recordings double as ethnography and autobiography—part diary, part sound-system weapon, part spiritual exorcism.

Already hailed across Cairo’s underground and carried abroad to stages in France, Switzerland and Germany, Sahar’s music still belongs first and foremost to the streets and weddings of Upper Egypt. Raasny makes that clear: this is music of and for the people, loud, ecstatic, and uncontainable.

After more than 6 years of silence, Abschaum is finally back with a new album, and it was about time because this new opus is sublime!! ‘Shamanic’ Chris (Abschaum’s mastermind), made alone this magnificent piece of Folk, Ambient, Kraut music, that he carefully recorded in the mountains of Jura, experimenting with his guitar and a little electronic set-up, composing beautiful melodies and singing French lyrics with powerful voice to bring us to another level of harmonies, the all merged with special atmospheres that are not without remembering Eno or Froese sometimes. In our opinion, this record could easily been recognise as a timeless masterpiece in the future.

Led by Saxophonist Rob Mitchell, Abstract Orchestra have been a consistent presence on the u.k. music scene, touring constantly in promotion of their debut LP “Dilla” and follow up 45 “New Day feat. Illa J”, steadily building a loyal and supportive fanbase. Inspired by the legendary live performances of The Roots with Jay-Z and the 40 piece orchestral arrangements by Miguel-Atwood Ferguson of the work of J Dilla, classic arranging techniques underpin modern loop-based structures, breathing new life into familiar material.
The band itself is based on the classic jazz big band instrumentation of saxes, trumpets and trombones and features the cream of the north of England’s jazz scene who collectively have played with Jamiroquai, Corinne Bailey Rae, Mark Ronson, Martha Reeves, John Legend & the Roots, Roots Manuva and Amy Winehouse.

“Madvillain Vol. 1” takes the template of their debut LP “Dilla” and applies the same approach to the collaboration of MF Doom and Madlib, aka MADVILLAIN and their albums MADVILLAINY and MADVILLAIN 2. Sampling the likes of Sun Ra, Bill Evans, Freddie Hubbard, George Duke, Dr. Lonnie Smith, Quincy Jones and Stevie Wonder gave the albums a jazz oriented feel and ethos which in turn lend themselves perfectly to the deconstruction and re-imagining of Abstract Orchestra. As with their debut, all the tracks were recorded live in the studio with very few overdubs.

Abstract Orchestra’s MADVILLAIN Vol 1. explores the jazz, TV soundtrack and film score aspect of the original work, combining it with classic big band writing and a focus on improvisation. There is a strong influence of Quincy Jones, Lalo Schifrin and David Shire (Composer of the soundtrack to The Taking of Pelham 123) on the album, and the arranger Rob Mitchell crafts his own sound that inhabits the space between Madlib’s production and Quincy Jones’ writing. Bandleader and arranger Rob Mitchell says of the record: “‘MADVILLAINY’ is a jazz album as much as it is a hip-hop album and I wanted to explore this reciprocal territory there has always been between jazz and hip-hop. 70’s cop show soundtracks have always captured my interest and imagination, and I discovered so much amazing music through TV themes, Quincy Jones and Lalo Schifrin in particular. They explored sounds that were menacing, angular, dissonant, frantic and yet captivating. They were also able to write music that was the flip side of all that dark chaos, and write lush and beautiful music. Arranging and scoring up MADVILLAIN Vol 1. Has allowed me to explore these sounds that I’ve always loved, yet keeping a strong hip-hop identity as the core of its sound.” 

Originally released in 1998, South Central Thynk Taynk by Abstract Tribe Unique (Abstract Rude, Fat Jack, Zulu Butterfly Priest, Irie Lion King, and DJ Drez.) captured a pivotal moment in Los Angeles’ underground scene—when young Black artists were reimagining hip-hop from the ground up. Blending jazz-inflected beats, spiritual insight, and fiercely independent production, the album became an anthem for self-reliance and creative rebellion. Now reissued by Rhymesayers Entertainment as a deluxe 2xLP set with a lyric booklet and bonus track, this long-unavailable classic returns for a new generation.At the cultural core of the record is Project Blowed, a legendary L.A. crew founded by Abstract Rude and Aceyalone, which birthed a lineage of rap innovators whose fingerprints are still felt in global hip-hop. While mainstream rap embraced the West Coast’s G-funk boom, the Blowed crew forged an alternate path—steeped in jazz, radical politics, and Afrocentric futurism. Thynk Taynk stands as a richly layered time capsule from this revolutionary moment, pairing Ab Rude’s deep lyricism with Fat Jack’s genre-melding approach to production, creating a poetic reflection on family, struggle, and artistic purpose.This new edition includes the “L.A. Styles Back (Project Blowed Remix)” featuring a cross-generational lineup of heavyweights— Aceyalone, Myka 9, Medusa, Pigeon John, Blu, 2Mex, Ellay Khule, Riddlore, and NGAFSH—underscoring how L.A.’s underground has remained a creative epicenter for decades. South Central Thynk Taynk is more than a cult artifact; it’s a living document of transformation, community, and artistic power.

Abul Mogard and Rafael Anton Irisarri’s partnership unfolded serendipitously at the sold-out opening of the SoundSet Series at Madrid's Condeduque cultural center in 2023 - a program that featured performances by legends such as Autechre and younger artists like Caterina Barbieri and KMRU. The duo's encore that evening, recorded for Spain's Radio 3, resonated deeply with the audience, igniting a creative spark that propelled them to work remotely in their respective studios. At the heart of their effort lies a delicate balance of restraint and innovation, evident in the live concert track "Waking Up Dizzy on a Bastion." This piece, inspired by their musical sensibilities, serves as a testament to their shared vision and mutual respect. Utilizing a familiar parallel chord progression, the track builds from a simple melodic motif played live on synths that transforms into a call-and-response interplay between Mogard's synth lines and Irisarri's bowed guitar loops, creating a dialogue-like interaction between the musicians. As the piece moves forward, we are greeted by melting guitar patterns (recalling Kevin Shields most lysergic moments on Loveless), followed by an intense subsonic full body massage - the visceral physicality of the Ampeg bass amps and cabinets stacks on full display. Building upon the energy of that live performance, Mogard and Irisarri crafted "Place of Forever," a companion piece that combines Mogard's Farfisa organ and modular synthesizers with Irisarri's signature guitar tones and looping techniques at his Black Knoll studio in New York. Starting with a somber and minimal tone, the track gradually evolves, unfurling layers of deep bass tonalities draped in blissful gauze as it progresses during its 17-plus minute duration. The resulting album exudes a profound sense of alchemy, effortlessly weaving intricate soundscapes that feel simultaneously faraway and intimate. The cover artwork, by Marja de Sanctis, depicts a vase sculpture made of unfired clay. Created and photographed by herself, it reflects lights and shadows of fragility. The rawness of the material mirrors the purity and the delicate nature of the improvised duet’s performance. Daniel Castrejón’s design responds to the image transforming the shape of the vase into lines and empty spaces. His typography on the vinyl jacket features a spot varnish, creating a tactile reflection. Through these joint pieces, Mogard and Irisarri have created a work that encapsulates the dichotomy inherent in its title: impossibly distant, impossibly close.

In spring 2025, Abul Mogard and Rafael Anton Irisarri created the source material for their second album, Where Light Pauses in the Silence of the Sun, during a three-day residency at Morphine Raum in Berlin. Functioning as both recording studio and performance venue, the space has no stage, with the audience gathered around the performers. Working within an open framework, the duo reshaped the music each evening while recording the performances live to multitrack. Rotary speakers, modular synthesizers and bowed guitar formed the core of their sonic language, captured through a 1970s mixing console and microphones placed around the room. Back in Mogard’s studio in Rome, the material was further crafted as motifs were stretched, fragments isolated, and tempos dissolved. Irisarri recorded additional guitar textures and treatments in New York, while passages recorded by Martina Bertoni and Andrea Burelli in Berlin reinforced the harmonic centres and brought breath, refinement and a new sensibility to their compositions. The process continued as Mogard’s layering and subtraction reassembled everyone’s parts into the final arrangement. The album opens with “In the Eastern Wild,” building from a sparse outline into a monumental formation of low-frequency weight, its internal motion shaped by the rotating Leslie speaker. “Over the Domes” widens into a broader acoustic field, where sustained modular tones meet waves of softly plucked guitar. The music then turns inward with “A Blue Descent,” centred on Bertoni’s cello, whose growling timbre introduces a melancholic depth. At the album’s centre, “In a Quiet Radiance” unfolds around a slow guitar ostinato, its luminous stillness opening into a more expansive and reflective state. Across its ten-minute span, Burelli’s violin lines and Bertoni’s lower cello phrases gradually surface, weaving through the harmonic field. Mogard brings Burelli’s processed voice to the fore, its emotive, operatic presence becoming one of the record’s pivotal moments. “Of Blessed Ages” suspends the sonic flow, shifting between parallel major and minor chords as lingering, slowly decaying melodies shape the music’s internal drift. The closing “Among Shadows” settles into a darker resonance as layered textures recede. Mogard and Irisarri’s shared language balances restraint and maximalism. UK magazine Crack describes the music as “a tidal wave held in suspension,” while Dutch newspaper de Volkskrant writes, “What a colossal sound, and how this music strikes at the emotions.” Reflecting on the residency sessions, Irisarri recalls: “At moments I genuinely couldn’t tell if a sound was coming from me or from Abul. It stopped feeling like two people making decisions and began to feel like we were inside a system moving on its own." Marja de Sanctis’ cover artwork revisits the vessel sculpture from the duo’s first album, Impossibly Distant, Impossibly Close. There it appeared as raw, unfired clay. Here it has been fired in the kiln and finished with a glaze. Light gathers on its polished surface and spills into the surrounding space. As she explains, “I wanted to convey the idea of continuity within the duo, and the vessel became a kind of container for that idea. However, their music felt different this time, and with the collaboration of Martina and Andrea, I felt it should have a sleeker, softer, more glamorous look, very distant from the first raw appearance.” The transformation of the vessel from raw clay to fired form suggests a passage from immediacy toward permanence, mirroring the music’s gradual expansion.

'Quiet Pieces' initiates Abul Mogard’s personal imprint Soft Echoes with a definitive self-portrait of calm, contemplative, and discreet inner landscapes made audible.

While sifting through archived material left idle from earlier projects, a chance encounter with a late uncle’s trove of beloved 78rpm classical and opera records prompted the reworking and completion of what would eventually become the album. Spinning dusty records at 33 and 45rpm, Abul Mogard recombined their enduring spectres with unfinished sketches from his archive. The resulting soundscape blurs distinctions between his memories and those of another, exquisitely short-circuiting the senses with its waking, dream-like lucidity.

“This was a process I hadn’t explored in my earlier works. I began sampling brief moments from these records, altering them with studio effects and playing them at slower speeds. In many cases, I wasn’t entirely sure how the original music sounded. These fragments, once further processed, became a source of inspiration for my new compositions. Over time, I realised that the old pieces from the archive and the new material derived from the samples naturally complemented each other.”

The resulting pieces hover over a threshold, a liminal space that harmonises the old and older material. Voluminous waves of quiet and loud undulate between consonance and dissonance, conjuring imagery of a decaying grandeur that humanity’s decadence has surrendered to the elements. Abul Mogard’s seemingly abandoned yet vast landscapes are nevertheless intimate with timbral frissons of red-lined distortion. Elusive, yet as tangible as sea spray or smog, they affect the olfactory senses with a rarified, synesthetic quality that modestly engages one’s emotional register – a hypnotic, distinguishing feature long hailed as one of the hallmarks of his work. A fidelity to memory and dream recall is sensitively probed in the journey from the stately symphonic stasis of 'Following a dream' to the almost industrial, untethered brutality evoked by a looming silhouette that’s never fully visible in 'Constantly slipping away', culminating in the foreboding coda of 'Like a bird'. Those pieces appear to shield the album’s sentimental core, where the tempestuous play of light and shadow of 'In a studded procession' escalates to breathtaking, panoramic climax, while 'Through whispers' evokes an out-of-body-like experience encountered with visceral poignancy.

Looking back, Mogard notes an unexpected influence: “I realise being inspired by Phill Niblock, whose work I had barely known at the time but explored after his passing in 2024. His album 'Boston Tenor Index' changed the way I approached dissonance. It encouraged me to push my sound further, to the edge of a space where I began to feel uncomfortable.”

The album artwork, created by longtime collaborator Marja de Sanctis, features a photograph taken at the Temple of Jupiter Anxur, an archaeological site overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. Captured with an iPhone, the image traces the residual presence of construction techniques and architectural forms of the Romans, where material history is transcribed through contemporary tools. The convergence of ancient and modern technology aims to reverberate the site’s lasting spiritual presence – an echo persisting in what is now perceived as a quiet, emptied space. The spiral gestures towards infinity and light. Past and present dissolve into one another, reflecting 'Quiet Pieces' meditation on sound, memory, and time.

A modern funk / downbeat sanctuary recommended by fans around , , and , and also known as popular acts such as Space Ghost and Nelson Of The East , The second album "Chrysalis" of multi-instrumentalist ABUNAI based in Oakland, California appears. Slow tempo, dreamy texture, shadowy mellow vocals, and superb dream pop with rich synthesizers, it's a must-listen for fans of Tame Impala, Khruangbin, Shintaro Sakamoto, and James Blake! Limited to 500 copies.

Invisible City continues to celebrate its 10th anniversary as a record label by reissuing the overlooked 1994 UK LP Accura - Five x Five! The best records make you want to grab the steering wheel and feel the sunny coastal drive. Frank Ed’s unique blend of genres on his LP “Five x Five” does exactly this by melting G-funk, smoothie Rnb and NYC Disco a la Larry Levan, a genre he coined “Street Jazz”. A Ghana expat inspired by the endearing levity of the sounds of Hilife along the Gold Coast, Frank Ed fuses downtempo keys and throbbing basslines on the opener “The Vibe”. Taking turn on the sunny coast, “Groove Control” is a euphoric minimal disco gem teasing the padlocked grooves of Gwen Guthrie and the West End setting sun into a fiery Loleatta sample that sparks into a fiery vocal “You got me burning up”. Dervish vibraphones, inspired by the Jazz-Funk renaissance, mesmerize the interlude “Ghetto Strings”. The punchy sampledelic psychedelia of conscious hip hop continue with the car sounds of “Jazz Maiden” opening with a screeching car halt, alongside MCs Cap D and Darkstorm rapping about a girl on the town, before being snapped and interjected by a female vocal chiming in“Excuse Me!” “Freestylin’” is a top down portamento G-funk glider, a nod to everything from the West Coast hip hop highway. “The Good Times'' - a CD-hidden only cut - is the real jewel here, emblematic of Frank Eds distinctive style. Expect low slung, nasal rapping and sine wave G funk grooves paired with lyrics about baggy jeans and Kangol kits that land with the chorus: “ I walk the walk I pay the price of this hip hop rhyme.” The pacific highway drive continues with “Summer Jazz” a breezy cruiser with the line, “Just move your body and slow…Summer Jazz.” You can feel the sun and wind in your hair as the keys trill along the reverb vocals of “I Feeeel It.” This pressing Includes two other CD-only releases featuring the NHB remixes of “Feelin Jazzy” and “Summer Jazz.” An essential LP, lovingly remastered and adjacent to the African diaspora genre UK Street Soul and the fervent UK RnB explosion of the early 90s. Glimmering with the disco ball of The Paradise Garage and the simmering smoothness of bumpin’ West Coast hip hop. Official Limited Pressing made in collaboration with Frank Ed and Toronto local selector Matt Stein. Not to be missed!

Between 1993 and 2001 the trio released two LPs and an EP on Vernon Yard—a Virgin subsidiary—and two LPs on Vapor, the L.A.-based label founded by Neil Young and manager Elliott Roberts. In that span, they were selected to tour with Oasis, Mazzy Star, The Verve, and Spiritualized. Against a rising tide of post-Nirvana grunge and slipshod indie rock, Acetone tapped into a timeless Southern California groove by fusing elements of psychedelia, surf, and country.

"Here, the chicken sings better than anyone" Miguel Tomasin We are extremely happy to present to you the second volume of the explosive collaboration between two legendary collectives of the ecstatic music underground. In 2017 Kawabata Makoto and his Acid Mothers Temple embarked on an extensive tour of South America. During the tour they carved out time to record and play shows with Argentine 'disembodied' music provocateurs Reynols and the results of these improvised sessions are a unique and exhilarating leap into the infinite...ecstatic, shamanic, truly free psychedelic music, beyond language and beyond all rational thought.

We are pleased to reissue the masterpiece cassette of the early Acid Mothers Temple, which is an exquisite mix of psychedelic and noise that creates an unidentifiable sound. The reason for the mysteriousness of the sound is the editing that forms the composition and development of the sound in a way that would normally be unthinkable, and will reaffirm the uniqueness of Acid Mothers Temple.

(advaita records)

‘BMB x OBI II’ sees the continuation of the much sought after collaboration between Minnesota’s afro-psych powerhouse, Black Market Brass, and the young, visionary talent that is Obi Original. Black Market Brass follows the initial release of this partnership, ‘Battle Ready,’ as hard-hitting as they’ve started it. Both sides highlight and deliver the raw, tenacious attitudes that the two artists are known for individually with a song selection that spans a wider spectrum than the first installment. Drawing a direct line between the godfather of soul and the father of afrobeat, Obi Original wields the raucous 10-piece ensemble in a way that evokes the stage of Zaire ‘74. These tracks hit hard, stay heavy, and make no apologies.

The A-side, ‘If I Do My Own,’ is funk. Heavy on the one, this track showcases Obi’s band leadership, à la James Brown; if only you could see him dancing in the vocal booth. Stacked horns, a leader barking orders, and a rhythm section that won’t quit leads listeners to the land of the get-down. The energy stays high as Obi calls forward soloists, even picking up the guitar himself to show us how “he does his own.” ‘If I Do My Own’ is a track slated to make the dance hall shake, with horn and vocal hooks that will live rent free in your head well after last-call.

The B-side, ‘I No Be (Colonizer)’, in no way lets its foot off the gas as dance music is concerned. This song, however, sees BMB returning to their polyrhythmic roots, creating a multi-varied weave of time feels, meter construction, and rhythmic emphasis. That challenge is met and answered by Obi’s Ebo infused lyrics and horn melodies that wind around the vocal rather than merely serving as background. Halfway through the song, BMB’s three-member percussion section rips into a soli. Powerful, unembellished, and raw, the trio doesn’t pull any punches when delivering this rhythm break which propels the song into an unrelenting four-on-the-floor vamp featuring a guitar solo turned up to 11 that will dance you right out of your shoes.

Welcome to ‘LXXXVIII’ – the ninth Actress album to be created by Actress (Darren Cunningham) and the very first presentation of Actress’ voyage into luxury sonics.
A lifetime in the making, ‘LXXXVIII’ is the culmination of 25 years’ honing mind-shorting, soul-igniting audio infusions for dance floors, rave dens, festivals, and concert halls. 
‘LXXXVIII’ pays dividends to meditate on an instrumental facet of its creation: game theory. Indeed, deep strategic thinking – more readily associated with economics and chess than artistic practice – was fundamental to Actress’ process as ‘LXXXVIII’ was channelled into existence. 
‘LXXXVIII’ includes the recent avant-garde-influenced single “Push Power ( a 1 )”, a track which laid the groundwork for the coming album, acting as the first move in an intricate chess game. With each thoughtful move the game grows and develops over time - something we can hear reflected in the textured and delicate layers of the track. "( a 1 ) - The first move" comments Cunningham. Today he shares “Game Over ( e 1 )”, a new single from the album which signals the final, closing move. 


For not only does chess reflect the precise physicality of the artist’s material interactions in his studio, it also illustrates the intricate and tactical, internal and aesthetic battles which brokered ‘LXXXVIII'’’s creation. Recently Darren challenged people to play a bullet round of chess against him online, which then led the opponent to a site that hosted a trailer of the forthcoming album. 

The release follows 2022’s mesmerising 'Dummy Corporation', which placed Actress firmly back in the centre of underground club culture. Prior to that his 2020 album ‘Karma & Desire’ — which saw guest collaborations from Mercury Prize winner Sampha, Zsela and Aura T-09 — was received to widespread acclaim, with The Guardian commenting the album “cements his place as one of the great poets of club culture”. 

Having first premiered ‘LXXXVIII’s lead single “Push Power ( a 1 )” on the iconic IICON stage at this year’s Glastonbury festival, where he played straight after Four Tet, the album release also arrives off the back of a recent live performance at Field Day in London, one of his largest live shows this year in which he showcased ‘Grey Interiors’ - an A/V project in collaboration with experimental creative studio Actual Objects who’ve worked with the likes of ShyGirl, Kali Uchis, LSDXOXO and have presented work at Coachella and 180 The Strand’s Futureshock exhibition. 

Additionally, Actress was just announced as the official support for James Blake’s upcoming UK/EU tour, which includes Alexandra Palace in London (on 28th Sept), L’Olympia in Paris, Fabrique in Milan, UFO Im Velodrom in Berlin, and Forest National Club in Brussels, and is playing alongside Autechre in Australia across selected dates later this year. 

“The idea of the black avant-garde exists, as it were, oxymoronically – as if black, on the one hand, and avant-garde, on the other hand, each depends for its coherence on the exclusion of the other. Now this is probably an overstatement of the case. Yet it’s all but justified by a vast interdisciplinary text representative not only of a problematically positivist conclusion that the avant-garde has been exclusively Euro-American, but of a deeper, perhaps unconscious, formulation of the avant-garde as necessarily not black. Part of what I’m after now is this: an assertion that the avant-garde is a black thing.”- Fred Moten

When we go searching for a Black avant-garde, we have to be prepared to look in unexpected places. The route to a Black avant-garde involves walking down – what some might consider – peculiar highways. Where they see strangeness, a road leading them nowhere, we see nothing but beauty. The paths Darren Cunningham went down, the highways he took to make Actress, are a chapter in the story of the Black avant-garde. Cunningham the footballer. Cunningham the Wulfrunian. Cunningham the ex-footballer. Cunningham the DJ. Cunningham the Londoner. Cunningham the producer. Cunningham the painter. Cunningham the writer. Cunningham the composer. This is where the Black avant-garde in Britain is made. This is where you have to go to find it.

Across an expansive discography of more than ten LPs, Actress has created his own arcane language of hermetic references and inter-dimensional electronic composition.

Radical Frame arrives 18 years since debut album Hazyville, and it feels like an apotheosis. The image realised. We get the full gamut of Actress signatures. Short bursts of broken down music. Tiny sketches of zoomed-in sound. Refracted dance floor heat. And we get more. We get appearances from CASISDEAD on ‘Live By You’ (another image, another mask) and Rainy Miller (another artist from the provinces, Preston).

Today, we get ‘Overchord’ - the centre of the album paired with its precursor ‘Live By You’. It arrives alongside a video by Anna van der Velde, featuring Cunningham trapped in a luxury prison of his own making, contained but not constrained.

Perhaps Radical Frame is a container for everything that Cunningham has built so far. A frame he is handing over to the next in line. The next artist to make their own way in the Black British avant-garde.

“The idea of the black avant-garde exists, as it were, oxymoronically – as if black, on the one hand, and avant-garde, on the other hand, each depends for its coherence on the exclusion of the other. Now this is probably an overstatement of the case. Yet it’s all but justified by a vast interdisciplinary text representative not only of a problematically positivist conclusion that the avant-garde has been exclusively Euro-American, but of a deeper, perhaps unconscious, formulation of the avant-garde as necessarily not black. Part of what I’m after now is this: an assertion that the avant-garde is a black thing.”- Fred Moten

When we go searching for a Black avant-garde, we have to be prepared to look in unexpected places. The route to a Black avant-garde involves walking down – what some might consider – peculiar highways. Where they see strangeness, a road leading them nowhere, we see nothing but beauty. The paths Darren Cunningham went down, the highways he took to make Actress, are a chapter in the story of the Black avant-garde. Cunningham the footballer. Cunningham the Wulfrunian. Cunningham the ex-footballer. Cunningham the DJ. Cunningham the Londoner. Cunningham the producer. Cunningham the painter. Cunningham the writer. Cunningham the composer. This is where the Black avant-garde in Britain is made. This is where you have to go to find it.

Across an expansive discography of more than ten LPs, Actress has created his own arcane language of hermetic references and inter-dimensional electronic composition.

Radical Frame arrives 18 years since debut album Hazyville, and it feels like an apotheosis. The image realised. We get the full gamut of Actress signatures. Short bursts of broken down music. Tiny sketches of zoomed-in sound. Refracted dance floor heat. And we get more. We get appearances from CASISDEAD on ‘Live By You’ (another image, another mask) and Rainy Miller (another artist from the provinces, Preston).

Today, we get ‘Overchord’ - the centre of the album paired with its precursor ‘Live By You’. It arrives alongside a video by Anna van der Velde, featuring Cunningham trapped in a luxury prison of his own making, contained but not constrained.

Perhaps Radical Frame is a container for everything that Cunningham has built so far. A frame he is handing over to the next in line. The next artist to make their own way in the Black British avant-garde.

After crafting an all-timer with 2008's 'Hazyville', Actress set his sights on the unknown with a futureshock debut for Honest Jon's.

Wheras it's predecessor was composed over a staggered period of many years, Splazsh was fashioned in a fraction of that time, lending a tangible symmetry between shapeshifting tracks that defined and propelled the era. Of the 14 tracks, we'd previously encountered the first two, with the unstable space float of 'Hubble' appearing on a shady Thriller 12" and his remix of Various Production's 'Lost' reminding us that there are some deep cuts in the Cunningham discography.

From here in it's all about that longing, sealing the airlock and initiating pressure sequence with 'Futureproofing', before laying down 'Always Human' - can u even remember a time you didnt know this one? Showing resistance towards any categorisation, 'Get Ohn (Fairlight Mix)' swerves down a side street into a footwurkin' face-off by sliding to a mutilated mix of Jon E Cash and Chez Damier played underwater. Next we hit the erogenous interzone of 'Maze' and that incapacitatingly lush bassline designed to lock into your central nervous system and send shockwaves of piloerection to every fucking corner of your soul.

After that, we're cynically dumped into the Ferraro-esque Prince tribute 'Purple Splazsh', and on into the Detroit ghetto stalk of 'Let's Fly'. The dissonant robo-crunk of 'The Kettle Men' and closing entry 'Casanova' confirm that if anything, Actress only suffers from a surfeit of ideas. Proof, if it were needed, that there is a sprawling future beyond the stasis of so much contemporary electronic music.

Actress’ tenth studio album, the celestial and expansive Statik, is released June 7th via Smalltown Supersound. The collaboration between Darren Cunningham and the esteemed Oslo-based purveyors of elevated sonics evolved organically following Actress’ remix of a Carmen Villain cut for the 12” of her Only Love From Now On LP. In this vein, the entire Statik project, from conception through creation and release, has been blessed with an almost unnatural ease. For Actress, who wrote the majority of his subtly majestic new record in an extensive flow state, the project serves as a cohesive testament to artistic liberation. Resultantly, Cunningham’s new album is imbued with a sense of freedom. And of stillness. The kind of stillness within artistic motion that arises via the deepest states of flow. Once ‘inside’ the Statik experience, listeners may well find themselves newly calm and meditative. Of course, those well-versed in Actress’s works are well-travelled when it comes to fantastical flights of the mind. Transportive sonics that spark inner-voyages – whether through nocturnal cityscapes, or far above and beyond, through Saturn’s rings and past Pluto’s moons – are prime Cunningham terrain. Yet while Statik is unmistakably an Actress LP, it’s also distinctly aquatic and subtly primordial, and so offers his audience novel elemental atmospheres to flow through. Listening closely, influential visions of aqueous realms, such as the mythic Atlantis, and evocations of ancient ceremonies as well as flying birds (and, perhaps, humans) may reveal themselves. No matter if Statik inspires you to soar above or below the horizon, Actress and Smalltown Supersound promise you a safe and transcendent journey.

Actress marks an auspicious 20th year releasing music with a vinyl edition of his RA mix; a near hour-long collage or braque of some 100 unreleased cuts trawling his HD and traversing its depths of brisk 313 techno, silver haze synth noise and flashes of neo-classical beauty. Trailing ’Statik’ back in spring ’24, 'Дарен Дж. Каннінгем' is practically on par with the album for levels of engrossing and gritty noirish atmospheres, scattering a breadcrumb trail of puckered keys and teasing rave signals that go deep into the forest of his mind/sound at a strident pace that buckles into offbeats and practically stumbles, groggy and spangled to the close. As with all his work, an underlying, artful narrative thread ties it all together in an abstract storytelling style that has served him incredibly well thus far and continues to pique the imagination of listeners across the fields of hazed electronics and dance music who may not necessarily listen to one or the other style, yet can’t help but be snagged by his restless equilibrium of those vibes.

Actress marks an auspicious 20th year releasing music with a vinyl edition of his RA mix; a near hour-long collage or braque of some 100 unreleased cuts trawling his HD and traversing its depths of brisk 313 techno, silver haze synth noise and flashes of neo-classical beauty. Trailing ’Statik’ back in spring ’24, 'Дарен Дж. Каннінгем' is practically on par with the album for levels of engrossing and gritty noirish atmospheres, scattering a breadcrumb trail of puckered keys and teasing rave signals that go deep into the forest of his mind/sound at a strident pace that buckles into offbeats and practically stumbles, groggy and spangled to the close. As with all his work, an underlying, artful narrative thread ties it all together in an abstract storytelling style that has served him incredibly well thus far and continues to pique the imagination of listeners across the fields of hazed electronics and dance music who may not necessarily listen to one or the other style, yet can’t help but be snagged by his restless equilibrium of those vibes.

Actress marks an auspicious 20th year releasing music with a vinyl edition of his RA mix; a near hour-long collage or braque of some 100 unreleased cuts trawling his HD and traversing its depths of brisk 313 techno, silver haze synth noise and flashes of neo-classical beauty. Trailing ’Statik’ back in spring ’24, 'Дарен Дж. Каннінгем' is practically on par with the album for levels of engrossing and gritty noirish atmospheres, scattering a breadcrumb trail of puckered keys and teasing rave signals that go deep into the forest of his mind/sound at a strident pace that buckles into offbeats and practically stumbles, groggy and spangled to the close. As with all his work, an underlying, artful narrative thread ties it all together in an abstract storytelling style that has served him incredibly well thus far and continues to pique the imagination of listeners across the fields of hazed electronics and dance music who may not necessarily listen to one or the other style, yet can’t help but be snagged by his restless equilibrium of those vibes.

For the first time ever, Vampisoul, the sister label of Munster Records, is reissuing this Argentinean Balearic Jazz/Fusion masterpiece. The album was released on Vampisoul, a sister label of Munster Records. This is a fantastic album by one of the top Argentinean musicians who left his work for "Melopea Discos" under the direction of Litto Nebbia. This is an ethno-fusion/jungle ambience masterpiece with rich sonic nourishment and Brazilian flavors. Includes an insert with unpublished photos and notes. Highly recommended for fans of obscure South American music such as "Outro Tempo" (Music From Memory) and "América Invertida" (Vampisoul) as well as Azymuth, Mono Fontana and Motohiko Hamase!

For the first time ever, Vampisoul, the sister label of Munster Records, is reissuing this Argentinean Balearic Jazz/Fusion masterpiece. The album was released on Vampisoul, a sister label of Munster Records. This is a fantastic album by one of the top Argentinean musicians who left his work for "Melopea Discos" under the direction of Litto Nebbia. This is an ethno-fusion/jungle ambience masterpiece with rich sonic nourishment and Brazilian flavors. Includes an insert with unpublished photos and notes. Highly recommended for fans of obscure South American music such as "Outro Tempo" (Music From Memory) and "América Invertida" (Vampisoul) as well as Azymuth, Mono Fontana and Motohiko Hamase!

LTD stock from The Trilogy Tapes !! Adam Badí Donoval is the founder & curator of Warm Winters Ltd.