MUSIC

Irrepressible, off-the-wall and utterly unique - the late ‘70s/early ‘80s Latin jazz-funk and leftfield electronic boogie of Japanese composer and pianist Izumi ‘Mimi’ Kobayashi collected for the first time. (🇯🇵👇) A luminous soul with an indefatigable love for music, few artists have had careers as varied and successful as Izumi ‘Mimi’ Kobayashi. One of Japan’s leading jazz-funk pianists, she wrote and recorded cult albums with fusion legends at home and abroad. Obsessed with new electronic instruments, she penned some of the country’s most well-known TV themes and pioneered the use of drum machines in anime soundtracks. 💫 A star in Japan, she moved to Europe to record global hits with Depeche Mode and Swing Out Sister, toured the world with the Reggae Philharmonic Orchestra and made beats with Attica Blues’ Tony Nwachukwu. Now based in London, Mimi currently fronts Tokyo Riddim Band - the intergenerational live Japanese Reggae outfit born from Time Capsule’s acclaimed 2023 compilation of the same name - playing live shows and releasing a trio of recordings made at Prince Fatty’s studio. Choice Cuts 1978-1983 collects eight recordings from four of Mimi’s first five albums – Sea Flight (1978) recorded with her group Flying Mimi Band, and Coconuts High (1981), Nuts Nuts Nuts (1982) and Tropicana (1983) under her own name. The compilation opens with a syncopated electro-funk cover of Sergio Mendes’ iconic ‘Mas Que Nada’ (Tropicana) and the crisp and stripped back techno-pop of ‘Coffee Rumba’ (Nuts Nuts Nuts) with a keyboard bass line that would have made Stevie Wonder weep. Alongside the off-beat synth jam ‘Quiet Explosion’ (Nuts Nuts Nuts) and piano samba of ‘Espresso’ (Tropicana), there’s space for two low slung soul-jazz numbers, ‘Naze’ and ‘Angel Sky’, from Sea Flight (1978) that recall the collaborations between Herbie Hancock and Kimiko Kasai. But it is around the two tracks from Mimi’s 1981 album Coconuts High that this compilation revolves (and from whose cover shoot it borrows). Released on legendary guitarist Takanaka’s Kitty Records label, Coconuts High was recorded in LA with a backing band of jazz fusion icons, including Alex Acuña, Abraham Laborial, Harvey Mason and the Tower of Power horns. A riot of playful Latin-tinged jazz, funk and fusion with the off-beat spirit of Kid Creole & and the Coconuts, the album became a cult hit, attracting huge sums on the resale market. Here it’s the sultry, Minnie Riperton-esque ‘Crazy Love’, with its addictive groove and bittersweet melodies that makes the cut, alongside the steel drum-infused carnivalesque bounce of ‘Palm St’. Capturing a highly creative and prolific moment in Mimi’s career, Choice Cuts 1978-1983 will introduce the idiosyncratic energy and playful verve of this under-the-radar pioneer to a wider audience for the first time. Welcome to the world of Izumi ‘Mimi’ Kobayashi. Once you enter, you won’t want to leave.

After leading the Flying Mimi Band, Izumi Kobayashi, who gained attention for her keyboard work with the Masayoshi Takanaka Band and music for the anime “Urusei Yatsura,” reissued her funky, tropical solo debut released in 1981 on LP!

While no bust of Ned Doheny appears alongside those of his Laurel Canyon brethren in the pantheon of classic rock, it’s not for lack of songwriting abilities or recording chops. After Doheny and his buddy Jackson Browne were expelled from Elektra’s failed recording ranch, he and his Nudie-decked Canyon cohorts would go on to form the bedrock of Geffen’s Asylum label. But while his peers were looking east to Bakersfield for inspiration, Ned was applying skills foraged under the tutelage of classical guitar god Frederick Noad and west coast post-bop jazzer Charles Lloyd. Rolling Stone called his self-titled 1973 debut, "a sort of Southern California Astral Weeks," but that complimentary comparison brought few copies of the album to Tower on Sunset's cashiers and Doheny was dropped unceremoniously. Two of Ned's most enduring compositions were written during his free agency. The tongue-in-cheek "Get It Up For Love" began as a rollicking folk number, only to be stretched out by the likes of David Cassidy, the Fabulous Rhinestones, Johnny Rivers, Tata Vega, and Ned himself on his sophomore album Hard Candy. Also appearing on the Steve Cropper-produced album was "A Love Of Your Own," co-written with Average White Band's Hamish Stuart, and covered over the coming years by the Ebonys, Melissa Manchester, Millie Jackson, and AWB. Despite featuring a who's who of California heavyweights, including David Foster, JD Souther, Don Henley, Glenn Frey, Linda Ronstadt, HB Barnum, and the entire horn section for Tower of Power, the 1976 album was no match for Columbia's real blue eyed priority Boz Scaggs, whose "Lowdown" battleship blew Ned's cutter out of the water. His last taste of American chart success would come in 1981 via “What Cha’ Gonna Do For Me,” another cowrite with Stuart that Chaka Khan took to the top of the charts. Over the last three decades, Doheny’s albums have slid in and out of print on LP and CD, budget jobs without any involvement from the self-described “avatar for casual vulgarity.” Separate Oceans examines Ned Doheny’s first ten years adrift in song, pulling together choice album cuts and 11 previously unissued demos. An 8000 word essay is illustrated by images from the archives of noted rock photographers Henry Diltz, Moshe Brahka, Clive Arrowsmith, and Gary Heery, creating the first ever overview of this unheralded marina rocker.

Sade’s “The Best of Sade” album was released on 31st October 1994. It is a compilation of her greatest hits and includes “Jesebel”, “Like a Tattoo” and “Pearls”.

Hold on to your mind! Led by Belfast-born phenom David Lewis, Andwella made three LPs circa 1970 for London's Reflection label, redolent with Cream-y rock workouts, soaring post-Sgt. Pepper psych experimentation, and earthbound laments The Band might've dreamt up at Big Pink. Barely heard back then, they now conjure a popular rock fantasia to challenge the most expertly composed and orchestrated songs of the era. This deluxe set includes meticulous reproductions of the band’s 3-LP discography, plus an ephemera-packed booklet detailing Lewis's brief moment as a downbeat songwriting visionary at the height of his powers.

His name may not be instantly familiar, but Hideki Matsutake has had a huge influence over Electronic music. Starting his career as the assistant of Japanese Electronic Music master Isao Tomita in the early 70s, he went on to work with Ryuichi Sakamoto before joining Yellow Magic Orchestra as the group's keyboard programmer and unofficial fourth member. In 1981 he started his own Logic System project recording "Venus" that year in Los Angeles with Don Grusin, Nathan East and Michael Boddicker, brilliantly mixing Synth Funk, Ambient and Boogie with a touch of Smooth Jazz predating Vaporwave by 30 years. Wewantsounds is delighted to reissue this visionary album, which comes remastered from the original tapes and features Pater Sato stunning artwork.

Exclusive Mesh-Key release of Sakamoto's brilliant third solo album, with completely different art from the Japanese release. Comes with full-color inserts with lyric translations, and digital download cards.

After 20+ years with psych legends Yura Yura Teikoku, Shintaro Sakamoto’s third solo album is a bonafide masterpiece of warped steel guitar, ambient disco and AOR soul.

“Like a language of Sakamoto’s own…made with a ship-in-the-bottle-like focus.” Pitchfork (7.8)

“Love If Possible is the pay-attention-moment. Not enough know. More should know.” Under The Radar

“Perfectionist pop for the extraterrestrial bachelor pad.” Spin

Light in the Attic’s Pacific Breeze series has supplied the world’s growing legions of Japanese music fans with an expertly curated selection of the most sought-after City Pop recordings—the mesmerizing and nebulous genre of Japanese bubble-era music of the ‘70s-’80s that encompasses AOR, R&B, jazz fusion, funk, boogie and disco. These familiar sounds are spun through the unique lens of optimistic, cosmopolitan fantasy colored by Japan’s affluence at the time. Much of the music has previously been nearly impossible to acquire outside of Japan and continues to captivate listeners with its unique blend of groove-laden escapism, even birthing wholly new genres such as Vaporwave. Pacific Breeze 3: Japanese City Pop, AOR & Boogie 1975-1987 marks the latest chapter in the famed series and features holy grails plus under-the-radar rarities. The collection bursts at the seams to reveal some of the greatest Japanese tracks ever laid to tape, pushing towards the edge of City Pop to reveal glimmers of the next waves of styles to spring forth from the country’s creative minds. The appearance of Pizzicato Five hint at the emergence of Shibuya-kei while the influence of hip hop and electro as an emerging global trend are also evident here through the prevalence of heavier programmed drum beats on tracks such as “Heartbeat” by Miho Fujiwara. This volume of Pacific Breeze, like its predecessors, is a female-forward offering with many tracks being voiced by women who would become household names in Japan as actresses and pop idols. Their songs here subvert the norm and brim with an innovative spirit that shatters gender roles in favor of sonic transcendence. Techno-pop classics from Susan, Miharu Koshi and Chiemi Manabe sit alongside sublime funk from Atsuko Nina and Naomi Akimoto while Teresa Noda slides into the mix with a sultry reggae jam. The genre span is stretched wider with hypnotic jazz fusion by Parachute and Hiroyuki Namba, a synthesizer fantasy from Osamu Shoji, and magnetic pop by Makoto Matsushita and Chu Kosaka. Although not front and center, the visionary members of Yellow Magic Orchestra are still very present on Pacific Breeze 3, with Haruomi Hosono, Ryuichi Sakamoto, and Yukihiro Takahashi taking up producer and musician roles on many of these tracks. Pacific Breeze 3 serves up a captivating musical journey that adds an essential chapter to the iconic compilation series.

Light in the Attic’s Pacific Breeze series has supplied the world’s growing legions of Japanese music fans with an expertly curated selection of the most sought-after City Pop recordings—the mesmerizing and nebulous genre of Japanese bubble-era music of the ‘70s-’80s that encompasses AOR, R&B, jazz fusion, funk, boogie and disco. These familiar sounds are spun through the unique lens of optimistic, cosmopolitan fantasy colored by Japan’s affluence at the time. Much of the music has previously been nearly impossible to acquire outside of Japan and continues to captivate listeners with its unique blend of groove-laden escapism, even birthing wholly new genres such as Vaporwave. Pacific Breeze 3: Japanese City Pop, AOR & Boogie 1975-1987 marks the latest chapter in the famed series and features holy grails plus under-the-radar rarities. The collection bursts at the seams to reveal some of the greatest Japanese tracks ever laid to tape, pushing towards the edge of City Pop to reveal glimmers of the next waves of styles to spring forth from the country’s creative minds. The appearance of Pizzicato Five hint at the emergence of Shibuya-kei while the influence of hip hop and electro as an emerging global trend are also evident here through the prevalence of heavier programmed drum beats on tracks such as “Heartbeat” by Miho Fujiwara. This volume of Pacific Breeze, like its predecessors, is a female-forward offering with many tracks being voiced by women who would become household names in Japan as actresses and pop idols. Their songs here subvert the norm and brim with an innovative spirit that shatters gender roles in favor of sonic transcendence. Techno-pop classics from Susan, Miharu Koshi and Chiemi Manabe sit alongside sublime funk from Atsuko Nina and Naomi Akimoto while Teresa Noda slides into the mix with a sultry reggae jam. The genre span is stretched wider with hypnotic jazz fusion by Parachute and Hiroyuki Namba, a synthesizer fantasy from Osamu Shoji, and magnetic pop by Makoto Matsushita and Chu Kosaka. Although not front and center, the visionary members of Yellow Magic Orchestra are still very present on Pacific Breeze 3, with Haruomi Hosono, Ryuichi Sakamoto, and Yukihiro Takahashi taking up producer and musician roles on many of these tracks. Pacific Breeze 3 serves up a captivating musical journey that adds an essential chapter to the iconic compilation series.

This customarily smooth set from 1981 is perhaps most famous for featuring three unforgettable tracks made with Marcos Valle. Rio's pop-soul wunderkind was exploring soul textures at the same time as Leon was absorbing the rich flavour of Brazilian harmonics. Together, they crafted rhythmically sophisticated and melodically adventurous soul.

The legendary lost album by Ghia! Street soul / downtempo magic, recorded 1988 to 1991. Distributed by wordandsound.net. Let’s get it straight: "This is" is THE album by Ghia. It catches the band at its peak and features 10 songs, including not only their impeccable hit, "What’s Your Voodoo?" but a full arsenal of yet unheard, timeless, and soulful music without equal. The songs on the album, which were recorded between 1988 and 1991, could be considered forerunners of the downtempo genre, with one foot in the late 1980s street soul direction but sparkling with touches of synth pop and contemporary jazz-funk. Genre limitations aside, all that Ghia ever wanted to do was create music—good music—and you will hear this in the depth of the compositions. When Ghia expanded from the dynamic duo of composers Lutz Boberg and Frank Simon to a trio with singer Lisa Ohm, it was meant to be something special. While Boberg and Simon had worked with different singers before, it was Lisa who set a new benchmark with her clear and powerful voice. Ohm had already been active as a professional musician since the 1970s and was connected with bands from the infamous Schneeball collective. While recording with Ghia at the Cottage studio, she could also be heard as the key background singer on many Georgie Red and George Kochbeck productions. The album starts with "Keep Your House In Disorder," which has yet again become another classic song from the band’s catalog since it was featured as the B-side of the "What’s Your Voodoo?" reissue. The song is about a relationship in which the woman has trouble adapting to her boyfriend's turn in life. He tells her to "keep your house in disorder," meaning don't take things too seriously, don't stand still, and you will do better to take the sideroads in life. "This Is" continues with the downtempo numbers "Crystal Silence" and "Close to You." Both are deep, one-of-a-kind, and previously unissued street soul ballads. On these two tracks, you can still hear the band’s roots in jazz-funk. Hence, as a follower of the band's output may have yet recognized, instrumentals of these two tracks can be found on their first LP, "Curaçao Blue." In fact, "Close to You" was one of the band’s first compositions. Earlier recordings of the song exist with different singers and different vocals, but it wasn’t perfect until Lisa laid down the final version and a choir was added. It’s difficult for us to recall any late-80s soul tune as beautiful and intriguing as this one. The final section, which begins with "so much baby we can say," sounds ahead of its time, reminiscent of mid-90s contemporary R&B. Next up is "Eskimo," an equally brilliant and soulful downtempo composition, but with more focus on synth sounds than the previous tracks. Once more, it showcases the creative lyricism of the song writers, Boberg and Simon, imagining a train ride during a rainy and cold night: "feeling like an Eskimo in an igloo in New York." Eskimo leads to the aforementioned classic, "What’s Your Voodoo?" Originally released in 1991 on the small Mikado label, it was reissued on our label in 2019. We already called this "one of the most wonderful and mystic slow motion synth pop tunes ever recorded"—and we still mean it! Let’s face it: this was done before British bands like Massive Attack, Tricky, and Portishead laid the foundation of trip-hop. Dare we call Ghia’s music "proto trip-hop"? As a special bonus, the digital version of the LP features a previously unreleased mix of the song, which includes added samples; this should clarify how close Ghia actually was to the sound of the mid-'90s. Here it should be mentioned that their unique tone didn’t come out of nowhere. At the time, composer and guitarist Simon was building his own effects processors to generate the sounds he had in mind. The keyboards and guitars on "What’s Your Voodoo?" were passed through a unique, privately built processor. Combined with a deep synth bassline and the exceptional haunting vocals by Lisa Ohm, it gives the track all the magic the title implies. But this isn’t yet where the story ends. "Angel On Your Shoulder" and "L O M E" are two more completely unissued and great tracks from the band's shelved works. Being a bit more uptempo than the rest of the album, they fall between contemporary soul/R&B and synthesized pop music. And of course, another downtempo hit needed to be featured on the album: "You Won’t Sleep on My Pillow." It was the original A-side of their single release in 1991, and since then it has been featured on various compilations. The album concludes with a really strong ballad entitled "I Haven’t Got The Power." Here we hear only pianist and keyboardist Lutz Boberg with Lisa Ohm, without further instrumentation. Basically recorded in a live session, this showcases once more the talent and ingenuity within the Ghia project. Whether you agree or not, "This is" may easily be considered one of the best German late 80s/early 90s soul pop and downtempo albums ever recorded. Cautiously, it may even be submitted as the missing link between mid/late 80s soul by bands such as Sade, and later trip-hop groups like Massive Attack. Let us celebrate Ghia and their music, which had been shelved for more than 30 years but has now finally been released on The Outer Edge.

Willie “Junei” Lee spent the first half of the 1970s playing guitar with his older brother Robert Lee in the self-contained band Lost Weekend, recording a handful of singles and a still unreleased LP. The back half of the decade was spent touring with Albert King, Curtis Mayfield, and The Emotions, before returning home to Gary, Indiana, to focus on his own sound. In 1985, Junei’s girlfriend brought home a suite of Fostex home studio gear, including a 12 channel board, 8-track tape machine, and a halftrack for mix downs. He added a Yamaha drum machine and a Maestro echoplex and started his solo project. “The only artists I listened to was Hendrix and Santana,” Junei said. The emissions coming from his home studio were entirely different, however, as “Let’s Ride” channels the Euro sensibilities of Kraftwerk or Italo over virtuosic guitar. “I just didn’t want to sound like anyone else,” he continued. “Let’s Ride” achieved that differentiation, and managed to anticipate Chicago house by a few years. Pressed in minuscule numbers in 1987 on Pharaohs Records, the 45 never connected with the nearby scenes in Chicago and Detroit where it might have found purchase in fertile soils. Decades later “Let’s Ride” found new life as the bed for KAYTRANADA’s “Scared To Death,” and the track has slowly worked its way through the algorithm to a new generation of vapor huffers. “I am all for experimentation, trying new things, etc,” Junei said. “Kaytranada is a visionary and a talented producer. He has my respect.”

A masterpiece of the schooner rock variety, Black and White Raven is an album that emerged from Archie James Cavanaugh’s youthful dream of recording his own music while stuck in the Alaskan wilderness. “This dream was always elusive,” Cavanaugh said, “believing either that it was only meant for those famous artists who got picked up by major record labels, or that it was just too impossible to achieve because of cost and lack of know-how.” With a freewheeling cast culled from Archie’s travels around the Pacific Northwest, Black and White Raven was set down as the ’70s crested and self-released in the spring of 1980. Traces of disco, AM gold, gospel, and yacht mixed freely with his Tlingit heritage, creating a breezy and optimistic portrait of life in the 49th state.

Mindgames follows Strangelove Music's previous issue of Sjunne Ferger's early singles and soundtrack work on Childrens Mind (SL 106LP, 2021). Occupying its own hinterland within Scandinavia's early '80s electronic/progressive movements, Mindgames navigates a lifetime of musical and personal exploration by Sjunne Ferger. Child jazz drummer prodigy, arts venue operator, music teacher and Aikido practitioner, a bewildering array of personal and creative influences are distilled into the Örebro native's only long player. Written around a new wave context, his own jazz fusion roots and at times with an unintentionally Balearic outcome, Sjunne goes some way to conjuring up a singular sounding album of the time. Narratives of love and loss, calls to self-empowerment and mindfulness, the new age zeal throughout follows Sjunne's own awakening. Its music caught in meditative reflection one moment before propelling into ecstatic revelation the next, with Sjunne's collective Exit providing electric backing throughout. Propelled by the drummer's beat, it's hard not to be caught up with Sjunne's personal vision of a "Polymood Music" LP painstakingly transferred and fully remastered from the original tapes, with new liner notes and photography.

〈Record Store Day〉限定商品！オリジナルは五万円越えの高値もつける鬼レア盤につき絶対にお見逃しなく。1970年にイギリスのアーティスト、Christine Harwoodによって、同国のスモール・レーベル〈Birth〉からリリースされた唯一のアルバム『Nice To Meet Miss Christine』がアナログ・リイシュー。King Crimson OBのIan McDonald（サックスとフルート）に、天才ドラマーPete York、Roger Suttonを始めとした英国のプログレとサイケ・フォーク・シーンの銘酒をフィーチャーした傑作であり、ブルーアイド・ソウルからアシッド・フォーク、ヨット・ロック・マニアまでも必見の一枚！

To enter the world of Sally Townes and Roberta Vandervort is to be swept away into a dimension of unique sound. Embellishments of smoldering jazz funk, seductive soft rock, breezy AOR, and misty folk, all paint a picture of the worlds which they inhabited; from the endless flat expanse of Dallas, the hot and humid bustle of a Bourbon Street night club, to the late night buzz of a Los Angeles studio session. While Sally Townes and Roberta Vandervort never crossed paths in our reality, their supernatural union on this compilation feels like the meeting of old, yet familiar friends, set in a parallel dimension with lives intertwined. The songs feel like old friends, too — a comforting time capsule of the popular sounds of the era, yet offering something completely new. Bridged by the striking similarities in their musical confidence, vocal conviction, and boundless creativity, both women encapsulate an uncompromising passion for living, loving, and creating on their own terms.