MUSIC

Satoshi (Satoshi & Makoto) releases his first solo album - A collection of archival works and new compositions. Like his previous releases with Makoto, this album is performed mainly on the much revered Casio CZ-5000 synthesiser. Features include: Benedek (PPU, L.I.E.S. Second Circle) on on guitar, Makoto and Kuniyuki Takahashi (Percussion & Mixes).

Since 2014, Brighter Days has been a part of the rich tapestry of Amsterdam nightlife – a semi-regular party promoting positivity and inclusiveness run by resident DJs Kamma and Masalo. On the back of the platform provided by the party, the duo has notched up a string of memorable club and festival appearances, a regular Brighter Days show on Gilles Peterson’s Worldwide FM, and a memorable Boiler Room set streamed live from Dekmantel Festival. Now Kamma and Masalo have taken the next step and curated a Brighter Days compilation for Rush Hour, a collection that does a terrific job in offering up slept-on and unreleased gems – including a clutch of their own tried-and-tested re-edits – while also accurately representing the sound, style and ethos of the event that inspired it. Like Kamma and Masalo’s event, which invariably takes place in intimate dancing spaces in Amsterdam, the Brighter Days compilation offers up an open-minded, club-friendly soundtrack that joins the dots between crate-digging obscurities from the recent and distant past, fresh cuts, ‘secret weapons’ and previously unreleased music from young, local producers who have become regular faces on Brighter Days dancefloors. Across nine tracks, Kamma and Masalo deliver an enticing blend of tactile and colourful house, disco, basement-ready throb-jobs, inspired dancefloor dubs and righteous boogie jams, some of which are appearing on vinyl for the very first time (see Haroumi Hosono and Yasuhiko’s ‘Turquois’, an exceedingly rare, CD-only chunk of deep, throbbing tribal house intoxication). There are highlights everywhere you look, from the piano-house rush of the ‘Subterranean Mix Edit’ of S’Xpress’s overlooked 1990 single ‘Nothing To Lose’ and the South African Kwaito-boogie brilliance of Cisco The Champ’s ‘Move On’, to the Italo-disco excellence of Hugh Bullen’s ‘Alisand’, and Mr Fingers’ jacking 1988 remix of ‘We’re Gonna Work It Out’ by fellow Chicagoan house producers North/Clybourn. Kamma and Masalo’s remixing and re-editing skills are put in the spotlight, too. There’s the edit of Discotheque’s 1982 Dutch-Belgian disco classic ‘For Your Love’ and a previously unreleased ‘dub’ edit of French-Cameroonian artist Anyzette’s 1984 gem ‘Baladoun’, a low-slung slice of drum machine-rich body music that blurs the boundaries between Italo-disco, Afro-boogie and proto-techno. Completing the package are two cuts that demonstrate the duo’s love of showcasing tracks by young and little-known Dutch producers. Peffa’s ‘Routine’, an immersive and emotive treat that blends elements of deep house and Detroit techno, is just one of numerous unreleased tracks by the producer that Kamma and Masalo has been showcasing in their sets in recent years, while Desmon – whose ‘Submerge’ is a woozy, off-beat deep house treat – has been a regular on Brighter Days dancefloors since the start. It’s a fitting nod to what makes Brighter days special: a close-knit community of dancers and inspired, lesser-known music old and new.

A 96 Minute Mix of all unreleased music by 21 contemporary artists. Featuring Molinaro, Carlos Niño & Friends, K15, Greg Beato, Legowelt, Afrikan Sciences, Hieroglyphic Being, Julion De’Angelo, 2000Black and many more. A journey through sounds, spheres, moods and dynamics dedicated to the unity and empowerment of the independent artists. Mixed, Cassette only, NO DIGITAL 'Love this sound' is where we find comfort in our favourite songs. Yet so much more can be enjoyed once one takes the journey of music exploration. This is something that does not come natural to most, but fortunately, Sassy J puts in the long hours to curate many musical trips. Expeditions in the boundless world sonically connected by years of music evolution, or the immediate arrival as though linked by sonic wormholes. A lust for musical growth fuels Sassy's quest for the identical but opposite, similar yet contrasting, energised and chilled sound that all fit perfectly together. Sassy J's eclectic selection taps into the sub conscience emotions music can reach. Is it meant to guide, provoke thought, bring happiness or ponder on misfortune whatever it does it all happens here at Patchwork. The popular echo chamber preaches to its own choir, whilst freedom of sound forces one to question if they will ever really know all what music can possibly be.

Session Victim’s 5th studio album ‘low key, low pressure’ feels like an anathema to today’s fast-paced, industry-driven musical landscape – and for all the right reasons.

Having released two intense, dancefloor-focused 12“s on Rhythm Section and Delusions Of Grandeur over the past year, their return to NIGHT TIME STORIES brings out their trippy, headsy side once again.

And despite the pandemic downtime being over, Hauke and Matthias remain holed up in the studio, jamming, head nodding to drum breaks, and churning out records like the one in front of you.

Spanning 10 tunes – 12 if you count the limited bonus 7“ that comes with the first pressing – the LP is undiluted Session Victim, with their occasional trio partner Carsten “Erobique“ Meyer as the sole musical guest on the library-esque SOFT LANDING, a tune reminiscent of something the boys would try to hunt down on one of their compulsive record store rummages to feed it to their Akais.

You’ll also find the sequel to one of their cornerstone tracks from their 2020 album NEEDLEDROP, Jazzbeat 07. (It’s JAZZBEAT 08, in case you were wondering.)

Having acquired a taste for the occasional cover version over the years, the duo closes the album out with their rendition of Instra:mental’s PHOTOGRAPH. Tackling such a classic is a daunting task which they approach in a gentle way, not swaying too far from the original, subtly reimagining the rhythmical foundation and exchanging the distinctive playground sounds from the original with field recordings of the locals populating the gritty area around their Neukölln studio.

Being longtime fans of Swedish organ player Bo Hansson, Hauke and Matthias tried to reach out to the people responsible for his cover artwork - who today are in their late 80ies and have not answered ever since.

Things came together in the most fortunate way when the pair were introduced to French artist Xavier d’espinay Saint Luc and his enchanting pencil wizardry. The outstanding result is what you’re holding in your hands right now.

But what do you really need to know? This is ‘low key, low pressure’. It’s got pristine drum chops to zoom in, hazy melodies to zone out, and all the texture you need to lose yourself in the details. 

Nídia's third full-length is a future-facing suite of mutant Afro-Portuguese rhythms and wormy melodies rooted in Guinea-Bissau's anti-colonial history. Like everything we’ve heard from Nídia, it’s an effortless but deadly amalgamation of peak-time curveballs and gloriously catchy hooks - essential for anyone into DJ Danifox, Nazar, DJ Lycox, Matias Aguayo. '95 MINDJERES' ("95 women" in crioulo) is Nídia's most charged and unforgettable album yet, taking its cues from the women freedom fighters - like Titina Silá and Teodora Gomes - who helped bring Guinea-Bissau to independence from Portuguese colonial rule in the 1960s and '70s. Nídia braids lilting, West African rhythms into multicoloured electronic prangs, sharpened to a knifepoint that cuts straight thru the heart. She asks "it's like?" on opener 'É COMO?', goading us into a search for comparisons. The truth is she's completely out on her own, screwing with the form as she waltzes with familiar elements - hand drums, woodblocks, neon stabs, vibey hooks. On 'Caiomhe' she pushes resonant, clattering percussion into focus, before embracing a warehouse groove on 'To La', shattering its darkness with wafting guitar licks and zig-zagging shakers. She displays a deep knowledge of Euro-washed club forms and pierces them with conspicuous emotion: joy, melancholy and indignation. There are traces of Detroit's sci-fi-minded futurism left in the DNA of 'Sukuku', with its rolling synths and euphoric pads, but Nídia shuttles into a different zone, chopping the rhythm and never dragging things out for longer than needed. We can hear echoes of Innerzone Orchestra's epochal 'Bug in the Bass Bin', split with Afro-Portuguese rhythms instead of jazz, the result fully transcendent. We're treated to a rare DJ tool with 'cp', and Nídia's club skills are fully on show on ‘Pose’ too, where she refracts the House blueprints of Lil Louis into a martial, horny banger. On 'Mindjeres', she uses invigorating flute and mbira-like chimes to suggest a more downcast mood, before dialling serrated FM synths into tremulous thuds on 'abcd'. And to close, Nídia deploys her most widescreen cut to date - ‘Paradise' - a slow-paced epic that opens with a wash of Art of Noise-style pads and builds to a low warble with trapdoor kicks and pointillistic stabs. Tense but deliriously heady, it's the perfect finale to an album that's immensely uplifting, energising and unforgettable. Príncipe’s best in class.

It's always a good day when a new Mr Fingers record lands!!!! A1. Around The Sun / A2. Drive / A3. Touch The Sky / B1. Coast Line Paradox / B2. Electrostatic Levitation / B3. Something's Going On / C1. Like The Dawn / C2. Pressureize / D1. Marrakesh / D2. Shimmer

Alleviated Records is proud to present a special re-issue of the Alien project. Larry Heard's productions always hinted at deepest outer space, but Alien was his first actual science-fiction record. It's almost as polished as the most mainstream dance production, but just as sublime as any Detroit producer. Heard's house roots often show themselves, while the chords and shimmering production make this an album almost on par with Heard's mid-'80s peak. The project was a recording & sound-development experiment that was mostly constructed around a Korg O1/W workstation keyboard.

We’re glad to be back with the second instalment of our new series of DJ and Artist curated 12” mini compilations: Melodies Record Club. Ben UFO is up next for volume two, following Four Tet’s selection a few months back. Available early October in loud 12” format and digitally. Here we have two tracks which have been staples in Ben’s DJ sets at different times, but neither were originally produced with a club setting in mind, which is why they’ve never been available in this format before. On one side, we have “Drums” from Laurie Spiegel’s 1980 experimental electronics album “The Expanding Universe”, a collection of tracks produced between 1974 and 1976 using a computer playing the actual sounds by controlling analog synthesis equipment under control of the GROOVE hybrid system developed by Max Matthews and F.R. Moore at Bell Labs. Drums is a percussive seven minute computer generated workout inspired by Laurie’s interest in African and Indian musics, and which brings to mind the most far out kosmiche music of the period to modern day techno. A connection Ben has tried to make explicit by including it in his first BBC essential mix back in 2013. On the flip we have a track by Olof Dreijer from the Swedish band the Knife who’s work you might also be familiar with under the moniker Oni Ayhun. Back in 2009 his artist friend Adnan Yildiz curated an exhibition called “THERE IS NO AUDIENCE” in Montethermoso, dedicated to public imagination. Adnan commissioned a single piece from Olof called “Echoes from Mamori”, that played on loop during the exhibition and was subsequently released only on CD. A contemporary piece more clearly indebted to house music, Olof built the track around arpeggios generated using sounds of frogs he recorded in the Amazon and birds around Berlin, fed into a sampler. Ben’s instalment is out early October in loud 12” format and digitally (stream & download), first press comes with a folded A2 insert with words from and about the Artists. Graphic design by Atelier ChoqueLeGoff, illustration and animation by Nevil Bernard and for the audiophiles out there, remastered and cut at half speed by Matt Colton at Metropolis Studios!

Tokyo based producer Keigo Okazaki, touches on a wide range of styles, from Trip Hop/Downtempo to Techno/Breaks/Minimal. His tracks are primarily composed of vintage synthesizers and drum machines, such as Electribe EM1, TB-303,606. Most inspired by moments of natural and synthetic beauty.

US-based, South Africa-born Brendon Moeller has been hugely prolific over the years under sever different aliases. Pathways is his newest album and is another signature blend of deep techno, dub, and ambient sounds that explore fresh ground. This one comes on cassette - a fitting medium for his always hazy, lo-fi sounds, and opens with a gorgeous stargazer loosely tethered to a dreamy groove. 'Movement' is just much of a cosmic floater, 'Accident' has static electricity fizzing about an underwater chamber and 'Through' is a slow-motion dubscape. 'Exodus' and 'Calm' close out this beautifully unhurried exploration of the deep.

Yetsuby lands on Third Place with her 'Water Flash' EP this July with four bubbly tracks :) Seoul-based artist Yetsuby is best known as one half of electronic super-duo Salamanda, who have won hearts and minds with their light and floaty new-age electronica via releases on Good Morning Tapes, Human Pitch, and Métron Records. As a solo act, she has released her own music on the Taipei-based 禁 JIN, Extra Noir, as well as through the Seoul store The Internatiiional amongst self-released delights on her Bandcamp. On the A-side, the title cut 'Water Flash' leads with airy synths and textured percussion, while 'Electro Union' ups the energy with choppy vocal samples, punchy drums, and twinkling arps. On the flip, subtle synths wriggle alongside low-key percussion on 'Commercial Noisy Day', making for a heads-down affair, before the gorgeous finalé '물먹는하마' rounds out the B-side with delicate keys and detailed yet muted drums.

Ricardo Villalobos lands on Dana Ruh’s BQD TRAX for the label’s second ever release with two fresh sides of marathon-length minimal and broken beat entitled I’m Broken. Offering two different looks at a similar palette of sounds, Villalobos favours a mid-tempo break-y chug here, drawing deep emotion and ennui out of a vocal chop uttering the title and some stormy, high frequency synth lines. The B side’s Mix 2 clears away a bit of the clattering noise, but stutters the vocal line to give it an alien or computer malfunctioning feel. It’s a neat trick from a master at work.

Pacific Rhythm is elated to present a grounding offering from Oakland's Space Ghost entitled Private Paradise as our first release of 2022. The LP is an ode to Space Ghost's time spent at Sea Ranch on the Northern California coast, a place he and his partner visit to refresh their spirit and regain optimism and enthusiasm for the outside world. Private Paradise possesses a rare ability to restore, rejuvenate, and inspire through each listen and is something we've only grown more and more fond of during the unforeseen complications we encountered during its release over the past two years. It's a piece of music that feels like a perfect nod to where we've been musically for the past 8 years and where we see ourselves heading in the future. Deep, contemplative, and uplifting audio that compels its listeners to focus on the positive forces in the world and the power of being present in a moment.

Top drawer mini LP of nostalgic essentialness from a shadiest of corners.. very very killer. L.A. Club coming with it. New heat on LA Club Resource beat out by Duke & Cliff! Unearthed Essentials pays honourable homage to classics over six tracks....names like Boyd Jarvis, Marcus Mixx, Gherkin, and Nick Nonstop all popping up on this one. Continuing to move forward bringing essential, formative dance music back to the forefront over these six tracks.

'Italian house music maestro Fabio Monesi delivers a smoking 8 tracks double LP of old school bombs for @L.I.E.S. Records You'd be forgiven for thinking these were produced in the '80s as all the classic and authentic elements are intact; catchy Yamaha DX basslines, crunchy TR-707 and Juno strings. Eight cuts all primed for the disco tech and nights of pure hedonism. These tracks go right back to the essence, hitting the full spectrum with stripped back classic New York and Chicago House cuts that wouldn't seem out of place in a BMX or WBLS mix from back in the day. Catchy dx basslines, slammin reverb drenched drum programming, and deep strings are on order for this one. All guaranteed to more the party all night long, drop the needle and let these do the talking....Huge huge party cuts, check the Moonriver vocal and you'll hear it immediately For fans of Delroy Edwards, Legowelt etc.'

The charismatic DJ Terre Thaemlitz (=DJ Sprinkles), who was active in New York's transsexual clubs in the 1990s and is currently based in Japan, travels the world and continues to develop his artistic musical style with a focus on house music, This is the project of glitch rave techno evangelist Mark Fell and Mat Steel, a cutting-edge duo from Sheffield, and SND, who have produced outstanding work for Mille Plateaux and Raster-Noton. This dead stock 12" of timeless deep house music is now in stock. Mastered by Terre Thaemlitz and cut by Matt Coltonm.

RAMZi is returning home with these eight sonic quests, reanimating the dormant FATi Records, Phoebé’s own label. Feu Follets (Fire Sprites) are fireflies, flickering balls of light dancing in the dark shadows, found in fields, forests, chaparral, and scrublands, the many different landscapes of RAMZi’s whimsical adventures.

This was it. This IS it. A true Big Bang for the scene as we know it today, materia prima out of which Príncipe came to be. "Vol. 1" was originally dropped in September of 2006 (first day of school) by Marfox, N.K., Jesse, Pausas, Fofuxo and Nervoso, then collectively known as DJs Di Guetto. With maximum respect for Nervoso's previous (and fiery) path, this was the next level, introducing a new generation capable of improving upon standards and in turn inspiring a still younger generation famously represented by Piquenos DJs Do Guetto: Firmeza, Lilocox and Maboku. The original compilation included 37 tracks, but we feel this selection of 13 perfectly captures spirit, sound and fierceness, a leap forward from straight kuduro and other crystallized styles that fed neighbourhood parties. Testing ground as well as tested ground, sureshot killers. Direct transport to the outskirts of Lisbon and the afro-portuguese experience with a sense of purpose, a mission if you will, the certainty of being part of a highly regarded heritage, the vision of fresh forms and details to continue carrying the torch, a futuristic and real transcendence of life conditions and limitations. Raw, uncompromising, respectful, true positive expression that branched out in all the beautiful ways we were blessed to be exposed to and later helped develop. Africa redesigned, repurposed in the bedroom and for the street, seeking to impress peers and make people happy in the dance. Not always understood and even marginalised within the more conservative-minded strands of the African music scene, this "guetto" style quickly became associated with trouble, even causing Nervoso (a few years older than the bunch) to suspend his DJ activities. There was a sense of danger in these grooves but maybe also of a type of freedom that was not merely artistic, a representation of the less glamorous aspects of the community. With the crew's permission we reissued "Vol. 1" 10 years ago as a free download package. Now presented in its compact version, it reappears with its power of expression intact, a beacon indicating the future, never a museum piece, prefiguring all the forthcoming new music and new artists to be undisclosed as our catalogue expands. A quick but fundamental touch-base.

Swedish producer HNNY (real name Johan Cederberg) releases his debut album 'Sunday' on Omena Records, a label set up by Tobias 'Tooli' Lidstrom. The ten track debut album continues an ongoing partnership between HNNY and Omena Records that started in April 2014 when the 12" 'Always' was released which also marked the starting point of the label. Sunday is released as a 180 g vinyl edition in gatefold sleeve.

Music From Memory are excited to present 'hyphea', a new album by Montreal based artist Phoebé Guillemot aka RAMZi. Featuring ten mind-melting tracks ‘hyphae’ is RAMZi’s latest sonic quest and is based around sketches she originally made as a score for a documentary about mushrooms called 'Fun Fungi' (directed by Frederic Lavoie). Recorded between November 2021 and May 2022, writing 'hyphea' began as an attempt to transcend boredom and frustrations imposed by severe restrictions during the pandemic. For Phoebé the album was a way to reconnect with her alter ego RAMZi; who's energy brought her back to uniquely mystical feelings and hope for future magical adventures. RAMZi is a wild spirit from the forest and refers to a parallel autonomous world that keeps evolving. In Phoebé’s own words: “The music remains as a doorway to that world. It has never been about me, I always see that entity bigger than myself. The process of writing 'hyphea' was rather intuitive. I don’t think about styles of music before producing tracks. Those are more like an adventure in itself, each one set in a different ecosystem.”

Detroit house DJ/producer Theo Parrish along with Moodyman, The 6-track LP "CORNBREAD & COWRIE SHELLS FOR BERTHA", which was released digitally only in 2022, will be released as a long-awaited 2-disc vinyl set!! !

An art form of SOUND SIGNATURE that embodies a unique theory of acoustic engineering and knits together the threads of dissonance and Chicago house.
"CORNBREAD & COWRIE SHELLS" with Afro rhythm and free jazz, "REAL DEAL" featuring Duminie DePorres on guitar from "DJ-KICKS", which became a hot topic for its almost album-level finish, THEO PARRISH, which continues to be loved as a Balearic classic From a different perspective to Tullio De Piscopo's "Stop Bajon", which was also covered by Pianists, "STOP LITE", a slow house with piano, and "DANCE ALONE", an epic over 18 minutes with a mechanical outfit, are rich THEO PARRISH style deep house!!!

Tropical boogie meets mellow house on Space Ghost’s new album Aquarium Nightclub: An homage to the natural world set against the richly-diverse backdrop of Oakland.. After Space Ghost’s first album Endless Light took to international airwaves and echoed out of cities from London to Los Angeles, his forthcoming release Aquarium Nightclub brings back his signature lo-fi aesthetics with a fresh hit of inspiration from the natural world. Melding irresistible vintage synths with a meditative groove, Aquarium Nightclub is a journey of sorts. Taking listeners on a tropical tour through 80s house drums, lush synth landscapes, and deep bass melodies, the thirteen-track LP is as adventurous as it is restrained. “I was watching nature documentaries while I was making the tracks, sampling some of the audio. I was imagining living in that world, diving underwater with fish, or swimming alongside a shark in shallow waters. It brought the tracks to life and pushed them further,” he says. Growing up in a small town a few hours from California’s East Bay area, Space Ghost (Sudi Wachspress) moved to Oakland ten years ago to study at the California College of the Arts. In a city known for its vibrant cultural fabric and its experimental music scene, Space Ghost represents a new generation of young artists. His DJ collective Late Feelings, launched in 2013, has allowed him to find his own groove amongst monthly all-vinyl dance parties, where he plucks influences from various corners of the world. “I became obsessed with the feeling I got from today’s Italian sound. Other styles like Burrell Brothers’ underground house or Larry Heard’s smooth pads mixed in with bubblegum pop and African boogie while making the record. Aquarium Nightclub is relatable but still different.” More complex than last year’s release, Aquarium Nightclub shows off Space Ghost’s artistic hunger and unique sonic signature. Kicking off with “Sea Snake Island,” a track that is best described as late 80s house melancholia is a beautiful dance of shimmering keys, drum machines, and sounds of the jungle. The single “Sim City” ft. Morgan is a classic Chicago house beast; dark but uplifting with heavy bass undertones, fuzzy drum pulse, and plenty of mysterious synth melodies. Other tracks like “Ocean Odyssey,” “Night Dive” and “Aquarium Nightclub” plunge into an ambient world of slow 80s funk, though always rooted in the Bay Area sound. “These are not your typical dance tracks,” Space Ghost says. “With the song ‘Aquarium Nightclub,’ I imagined what it would be like inside that club, with everyone dancing to a slow watery song in a mellow peaceful groove.” A product of record-collecting and dance party hosting, Aquarium Nightclub is a glittering postcard from Atlantis. Profound yet undeniably groovy, its mesmerizing tropical undertones promise a safe journey back to the endless days of summer. The album artwork is designed by Space Ghost himself and the LP comes as a limited edition version printed on a silver laminated sleeve. The first 100 LP copies further include an album poster designed and risograph printed by Space Ghost.

The cult Canadian band lands on Mood Hut for an album of sunburnt It's difficult to imagine a more topical band name than Freak Heat Waves, though the Canadian duo have been using it for over a decade. A hard-to-pin-down staple of the country's eclectic DIY scene, Steven Lind and Thomas Di Ninno are as Montreal weirdo as they are Vancouver stoner. Their fifth album is their first for Mood Hut, which gives a hint as to where their heads are at these days. Cementing a gradual shift from wiry punk to vintage post-disco, Mondo Tempo finds the duo getting stuck into a style of humid machine funk that pairs samples and sequencers with live drums and distant vocals. It's a clever formula that should prove irresistible to any fan of the smoked-out sound Mood Has cultivated over the past decade, bringing the label's indie rock origins to the fore. If this is your first Freak Heat Waves release, on first listen, opener "The Time Has Come" could come off as Pender Street Steppers pastiche: dusty drums, flamboyant sax sample, semi-ironic disco guitar lick, muttered vocals. But it also sounds unusually lush and open. The reverb on Lind's ultra-baritone voice lends him a dollar-bin Barry White smoothness, and the drums fall into a funky pocket you can't get from a straight-up drum machine. Both of these elements are key to Freak Heat Waves' unusual appeal. On "Endless," Lind stretches out his vowels into hilariously exaggerated syllables—like "helpleeesss." His laconic drawl contrasts the precocious hi-hats and snares, which are panned left and right as if your head was inside the bass drum. The warmed-over quality of Mondo Tempo can might read lo-fi, but the duo create a rich and detailed word within their sepia-toned confines. Starting out sprightly and meandering from there, Mondo Tempo gets slower as it chugs along, with a particularly druggy back half. Highlights like "Off My Mind"—whose meditative beat and wailing diva samples sound like a synth funk band covering 808 State—and "Altered States" make a clear connection between Mood Hut and and the band's DIY punk past. After all, Mood Hut and the Vancouver scene built around it was started by members of rock bands who brought their instrumental chops and pop instincts to chilled-out house music. Freak Heat Waves reverse engineer that from the opposite perspective, making idiosyncratic dance jams out of off-kilter rock music. The title track is a great example, a stark climate change warning disguised as a chill-out room jam. With Lind warning about "One degree / Worldwide / Have we begun to reach the breaking," it would be painfully preachy if it weren't couched in such a seductively lazy beat—encapsulating the mix of paralyzing fear and resignation felt by so many of the world's young people. 
Lind's over-the-top baritone can make Freak Heat Waves feel like a stoner comedy sometimes. But any sense of irony falls away on album highlight "In A Moment Divine," which is the finest song ever released on Mood Hut. A collaboration with Cindy Lee, formerly of Calgary noise rock band Women, "In A Moment Divine" pulls together the band's lo-fi disco, synth pop and even progressive house into a unique torch song with a hint of breakbeat. Strings breathe in and out on the meek verses, while a sequencer somewhere between New Order and Sasha frames the more desperate choruses. When everything drops out to leave just those synths, the result is elegant and beautiful—heartbreak captured in the sputtering notes of a machine. Firing on all cylinders, here Freak Heat Waves reveal themselves as priests of a syncretic religion combining dance music and DIY punk, pointing to a future in both dance and straight-up pop. Which way, Canadian men? The beauty is that Freak Heat Waves don't have to choose, and they never have. Whether Mondo Tempo is a true fork or just a diversion, Lind and Di Ninno continue to go their own way, making a well-worn West Coast sound feel fresh all over again.

For their third release San Francisco based Indian duo Baalti bring the heat and delve into what they say is their most personally authentic release to date, disclosing the record reflects the various club sounds they’ve been enjoying and discovering over the past year. The five track EP which they’ve titled ‘Better Together’, stays true to their signature sampling of nostalgic South Asian flavours derived from classic Indian, Pakistani, and Bangaldeshi music but on this occasion fused with a backdrop of breaks and euphoric club music which perfectly aligns with Seb Wildblood’s All My Thoughts imprint to which the EP will be released on. The duo have kept a consistent emotive element to the music throughout the EP combined with the leftfield dance- floor sounds they’ve been vouching for more recently. About the release which will be their biggest yet, Baalti go on to explain: ‘With this record, we wanted to lean into clubbier energy that’s been inspiring, enriching and energizing us. We’re trying to connect where we come from to where we are right now, bringing sounds we grew up with to dance- floors and spaces we’re part of today. It’s our most sincere and complete expression yet, and we’ve tried to capture all of the feelings we had from a year of touring, living with our bffs, being in love, finding amazing communities through music, and getting more connected with each other as a duo.’ – Baalti