MUSIC

Eclectic ensemble of 18 instrumental arrangements evoking an epic and existential 
soundtrack determined by the power of momentary destiny and reflective sentiment. 

Originally released on LP in 2014

Terry Callier, famous for his spiritual soul trilogy for Cadet in the 70's, released his first album on Prestige in 1968, recorded at the age of 19. The album is a masterpiece of spiritual jazz-folk, with elements of traditional folk under the influence of Bob Dylan, and a jazzy, acoustic performance by two bass players influenced by Coltrane.

Debut album released in 1969 by Nick Drake, who is regarded as a genius singer/songwriter who died young. 180g Vinyl.

Alison Statton of Young Marble Giants, an avant-garde / indie pioneer in Wales, has established himself as a masterpiece released from the prestigious Rough Trade in 1982, a band formed with guitarists Simon Booth and Spike. The debut album "La Varieté" has been completely remastered from And is a happy reissue! !! This work is a bold work that breaks the flow of post-punk by incorporating various elements such as bossa nova, afrobeat, and truly original contemporary exotic pop based on jazz! A masterpiece of Neo-acoustic that was highly evaluated by critics at the time of its release and had a great influence on Saint Etienne and Belle and Sebastian, who later became active in the indie world! !! Clear vinyl specifications. Limited to 500 copies.

Songs 9, 11, 12, 13 by Myriam Gendron; 1 by John Jacob Niles; 8 by John Jacob Niles / Myriam Gendron. All other selections: traditional revived by Myriam Gendron. Recorded at home, early 2021. Mixed by Myriam Gendron & Tonio Morin-Vargas. Produced by Myriam Gendron, Eric Villeneuve & Tonio Morin-Vargas. Mastering by Harris Newman at Grey Market Mastering. Chansons 9, 11, 12, 13 par Myriam Gendron ; 1 par John Jacob Niles ; 8 par John Jacob Niles / Myriam Gendron. Toutes les autres pièces : traditionnelles ravivées par Myriam Gendron. Enregistré à la maison au début de 2021. Mixé par Myriam Gendron & Tonio Morin-Vargas. Réalisé par Myriam Gendron, Eric Villeneuve & Tonio Morin-Vargas. Matriçage par Harris Newman chez Grey Market Mastering.

Elodie is the first full-length album by Andrew Chalk, a solitary musician, and Timo van Luijk of Belgium, who also shows his talent in Af Ursin and In Camera. The sound is a mix of field recordings of birdsong and murmuring rivers, and performances of various instruments (bagpipes, guitar, koto, percussion, synths, etc.) and non-instrumentalists, resulting in a very varied sound, but still stateless. Like the works of both artists, it is a small and compact worldview, but all of the sounds, including quiet and beautiful drones, abstract playing with/without melody, and improvisation, are wonderful, reaching the realm of meditation. The sense of time, similar to that of Andrew Chalk's work, is clearly alive here as well, as one forgets the passage of time. This is an ideal type of music. I think you will experience a very fresh sensation. Daisuke Suzuki and Ian Middleton also participated. The artwork is as wonderful as ever and sounds just like this.

180-gram reissue of John Fahey's 1972 major-label debut. "In the liner notes for this wonderful disc, sideman Chris Darrow comments, 'I remember the first time I ever heard him, I thought they'd turned the record from 45 to 33 or something, 'cause I couldn't believe how slow he played.' One of the (many) great beauties in Fahey's approach is just that: he takes his time and savors every last resonance he can wring from his guitar. This 1972 release was his first for a major label (originally on Reprise) after more than a decade of issuing work privately or on small imprints, and also the first instance of Fahey having access to a large ensemble of musicians, including a brass and string section. Still, the extra players don't come close to swamping the session; Fahey is very much in the foreground and a number of the pieces read, essentially, as solo performances. It opens with 'Steamboat Gwine 'Round de Bend,' as gorgeous an example of Fahey's slide guitar work as he ever recorded, languid, soulful, and profound. Similarly, his medley of 'Deep River' and 'Ol' Man River' is steeped in Delta humidity, lazily floating downstream. The tracks with the brass band raise the ghosts of Dixieland, while some of the string accompaniment may recall Van Morrison. In any event, Fahey, major label or not, is simply himself, leisurely rolling along, sharply perceptive in his observations and sumptuously gorgeous in his evocations. A fine effort and certainly something that belongs on the shelves of any fan of the late, very great guitarist." --Brian Olewnick, AllMusic

Rooms With Walls and Windows is the first album by Seattle-by-way-of-Chicago-by-way-of-Buffalo singer, songwriter & guitarist Julie Byrne. Blending psychedelic & traditional folk elements, Julie Byrne creates a highly personal & quietly mystical world that echoes the early work of Leonard Cohen & Vashti Bunyan. Rooms With Walls and Windows' twelve tracks were collected from two limited edition cassette releases, recorded between 2011 & 2012 by Jake Acosta in Chicago, IL. Each song was recorded live, with Julie accompanying herself on fingerpicked acoustic guitar or keyboard. Rooms With Walls & Windows was lovingly remastered for vinyl by Owen Ashworth & Matthew Barnhart.

Mike Hanapi (1898-1958), a famous steel guitarist and vocalist from Honolulu, Hawaii, left behind one of the greatest collections of pre-war Hawaiian music in the 20th century with his Kalama's Quartet. This is the long awaited analog reissue of the original 78rpm disc with remastering! This is a miraculous reissue of a number of recordings that have never before been reissued in any format. Gorgeous falsetto voice with a bottomlessly beautiful clarity and presence, and harmonious voice with a backing band as rich as a lonely yodel. Purely acoustic instruments such as lap steel guitar, ukulele, and harp guitar are gently woven into the vocal melodies, creating fluid, harmonious layers and hauntingly beautiful blue notes. This is truly peaceful, serene, and unique music. Reverse board jacket, 8-page full-size booklet with biography, rare photos, and full lyrics in Hawaiian and English.

Kazuo Imai is one of the few artists to traverse both Japan's early avant-garde and free jazz movements. Though he began performing in the 1970's, his 2004 P.S.F. album "far and wee" was only the second under his name. In a series of thrilling acoustic guitar improvisations - Imai's playing crackles with dynamic tension and physicality as well as a subtlety and nuance that reveals him as one of the instrument's true masters and innovators. Newly mixed and remastered under Imai's supervision, available for the first time ever on LP. Pressed to high quality vinyl at RTI and housed in heavy Stoughton "tip-on" jacket with laminate gloss finish and additional insert. Originally released on CD in 2004 by P.S.F. Records, Japan.

Music From Memory are excited to present a special release with The Zenmenn in the shape of a limited 7” containing 2 tracks taken from the same recording sessions that resulted in their debut album 'Enter The Zenmenn' from 2021. About MFM057 The Zenmenn say: “Bella Fantasia and Topaz 2 are two uncut gems that we couldn't quite fit on the record. In the last couple of days before the deadline, we were tripping a little bit that Topaz was no good, so we tried to do it in a different way and came out with this more melancholy vocal version, looking back at the small moments from a past relationship that somehow slipped away. We kept both versions in the collection.” “For Bella Fantasia we were finding it funny to have this vocal using Ben's extremely limited Italian vocabulary, but after a while of it being a joke, it slowly settled into just being what it is. An angelic female voice seemed like it would fit in well, so we called up our dear friend Kari K and she flew in on gossamer wings to take care of the job like a real professional sent directly from beyond the pearly gates. In the final seconds of the song, much like Indiana Jones reaching back in the nick of time to snatch his hat from beneath the closing temple door, Magnus heroically managed to squeeze in a quick reference to the late great George Michael – R.I.P. Hopefully his estate never finds out about this.”

Curious, eccentric pop experiments, steeped in the melody of the Far Eastern tradition. Strange, hypnotic incantation and another winner on The Trilogy Tapes!

The goddess of British folk mythology, Vashti Bunyan's first self-produced and final album.
It's been 9 years since the previous work Lookaftering. When she was recording alone, which she liked, she produced most of the work herself, trying to return to the state before the release of the masterpiece "Just Another Diamond Day". Therefore, it seems that this production time was necessary, but Vashti Bunyan. All the sounds that come out are Vashti Bunyan. The warm singing voice and the world of poetry, the simplicity of the performance packed with it, is a crystal that no one else can create... The artwork is produced by her daughter Whyn Lewis following the previous work Lookaftering. It is said that it is paired with Lookaftering.

Satomimagae’s Hanazono is an invitation to revel in your immediate and imagined surroundings, to make time and space for guileless curiosity and garden variety enchantment. A tribute to everyday mysticism, Hanazono is an ecology of simple, cyclical refrains and elegiac entreaties cross-pollinating with ludic and layered folk vibrations.

Blind Joe Death is the first album by American fingerstyle guitarist and composer John Fahey. There are three different versions of the album, and the original self-released edition of fewer than 100 copies is extremely rare.

Guitarist RUSSELL POTTER's A Stone's Throw (1979) and Neither Here Nor There (1981) reissued via Tompkins Square - LP & Digital June 25th

The latest in a series of reissues spawned from Imaginational Anthem Volume 8 : The Private Press, following Tom Armstrong - The Sky Is An Empty Eye and Rick Deitrick - Gentle Wilderness/River Sun River Moon

Reflections on Russell Potter by IA8 co-producer and poet, Michael Klausman :

The two latest reissues to spin off from our acclaimed Imaginational Anthem Volume 8: The Private Press feature the solo guitar compositions of Russell Potter, recorded in the last waning days of the initial American Primitive explosion.

A then obsessed teenaged devotee of John Fahey, Robbie Basho, and Leo Kottke at a time when Punk and New Wave were ascendant, Potter harnessed a similar DIY ethos to his own ends by starting his own label & self-publishing his first record, 'A Stone’s Throw’, while a freshman enrolled at Goddard College in Vermont in 1979. Assembled at the legendary Boddie Records in Potter’s hometown of Cleveland, Ohio, and sprinkled liberally with references to his heroes, from the initial record label name of Fonytone (which more than a little recalls Fahey’s earliest record label, Fonotone), to the arcane song titles and references to obscure rags.

Even as he looks to his elders, Potter’s debut release nimbly evinces a complete mastery of his form and is all the more remarkable for one of such tender years, as only the chutzpah of youth can account for such moves as successfully grafting one of your own composition to one of John Fahey’s, as he does here. There’s a very immediate, lovely, and real homespun quality to Potter’s chiming twelve-string compositions that puts it in the realm of those classic records that seem to simply exist outside of time.

Shortly after ‘A Stones Throw’, Potter produced & released a 45rpm single by an Ohio bluegrass band featuring the cult singer songwriter Bob Frank performing a cover of Devo’s ‘Mongoloid’, before moving on to his second (and sadly final) album the following year, ‘Neither Here Nor There’. Following an independent study with a Goddard College ethnomusicologist, Potter’s compositions and performance only deepened on his second release — the recording quality steps up a little but loses none of the immediacy, the playing gets more exuberantly virtuosic —but then more reflective too, particularly on the tunes that are influenced by the gorgeous traditional Irish slow airs. He’s still tipping his hat to Fahey occasionally as well, this time with an audacious electric guitar setting of the classic “Dance of the Inhabitant of the Palace of King Philip XIV of Spain.”

Though these albums landed at a time when American Primitive guitar music’s 1960s & 1970s heyday was in the rear view mirror, they absolutely look ahead to the genre’s eventual 21st Century resurrection, anticipating both in form & content many of the same concerns you find in the great contemporary work of the last two decades by Jack Rose, Glenn Jones, Daniel Bachman, et al., and as such provide about as fine a stepping stone between these two eras as you’re likely to find.

Brazilian music at it's finest! 2x7" set of four beautiful Piry Reis recordings from the 70s and 80s. Disc one is a reissue of his 1975 single on Som Livre, 'Heroi Moderno', which features the highly sought after 7inch version of 'Cisplatina' on the flip. The second disc holds the rare cuts 'Reza Brava' (1970) & 'Céu De Manágua' (1984). The project came together with the blessing of Piry Reis himself, and is released on the sub-label of Rush Hour recordings, New Dawn. Artwork by Amsterdam's Sekan with a touch by Megin Hayden. New Dawn, set up for less electronic but equally adventurous releases by artists we love.