MUSIC

Whipped up in the dust of Rene & Rene's Tejano tornado "Angelito," the Dynamic label was just one among San Antonio record and real estate mogul Abe Epstein's enterprises. Dynamic's flagship outfit, the Commands, marched "No Time For You" up to the middle of the charts in 1966 with performance chops honed jet-sharp by the demanding Air Force Base circuit. That takeoff paved a runway for 20 more soulful Dynamic singles over an impressive 30-month campaign. Epstein's open-door policy brought a diverse cross-section of Texas talent into convergence within his General McMullan Drive studio, as whites, blacks, and Latinos alike suited up for service in whichever new group the call of duty called for. Epstein’s Alamo City melting pot is ladled out here in 28 of Dynamic's most intriguing dishes by the Tonettes, Little Jr. Jesse & the Tear Drops, Don & the Doves, Willie Cooper & the Webs, Bobby Blackmon & His Soul Express, and Doc & Sal. Our deluxe 2LP edition gatefolds into Lone Star pic sleeves, full-color dancehall photography, and rich ephemera, planting a new flag for soul in soil that’s seen its share of hoisted banners.

Honey for the Ants completes an ‘alchemical trilogy’, after The Funnel and Syphon. These albums are informed by mystical and gnostic texts, celebrating the weird, unhinged and occasionally beautiful.

In this forthcoming album the tonalities have shifted from mediaeval and renaissance to modernist dissonances. New singers and instrumentalists contribute to an emotional and textural richness achieved in a collaborative process. Distant musical periods, real and fictitious, are nonchalantly interwoven to create a delirious mongrel that salutes the imagination.

Wojciech Rusin is a Polish-born audio visual artist based in London. He draws inspiration from alchemical and gnostic texts, early renaissance choral music and Eastern European mythologies. He released Syphon LP on AD 93 in 2022 and The Funnel LP on Akashic Records in April 2019. He designs and makes 3D-printed reed instruments, reworking ancient designs with contemporary 3D modelling technologies.

In 2020 he released Meat for the Guard Dogs on Cafe OTO’s Takuroku digital imprint, and the Rufus Orbis cassette for Boomkat Editions / Documenting Sound series. His music has been featured on BBC Four and he has worked for The National Theatre and The Southbank Centre.

Artist, composer and producer James William Blades’ score Pare De Sufrir will be released via AD 93 on the 4th of October.
Pare De Sufrir (translating to ‘End of Suffering’) is the official soundtrack to A.G Rojas’ film of the same title.

Spanish-born, Southern California-raised filmmaker AG Rojas is known for creating videos and working with the likes of Jamie xx, Gil Scott-Heron, Kamasi Washington, Spiritualized and Mitski. Rojas’ sensitive eye and subjectivity has brought him from the world of music videos to creating his first independent film: a 48-minute featurette following three people as they navigate the liminal space between life and the afterlife in an attempt to heal themselves and each other. Rojas’ film is a fragile, wordless meditation on grief and how it can transform and baptise the body and spirit.

The almost silent film is a testament to Rojas’ trust in Blades’ composition to express the director’s voice and emotions. Rojas reached out to Blades after coming across his score for Keeping Time (dir. Darol Olu Kae). An intimate and unusual process unfolded. Rojas explained to Blades the personal narrative of the film, the two sharing unfurling conversations on the nature of loss and the human spirit. But Blades did not watch the film and instead worked on instinct to build out a concept of how the score would unfold, shaping its operatic, textural and granular tone. Blades went on to record the score in full, with orchestra and choir, without going back to Rojas for feedback, aware that he was taking a complete risk. “It was definitely something I felt had a gravitational pull,” says Blades of the decision. The score’s pull is reflective of the process of grief itself, how its moods and memories oscillate up and down into the past and lost futures, Blades hitting all those spaces with diverse and stretching notes.

The piano holds the memories of Blades and Rojas’ grandmothers, who both had out-of-tune pianos sitting in an empty room. The Silogo-De-Oro choir sing throughout, reminiscent of the broken phonetics of grief, the build up and release of tension and the inability to articulate complete sound or words. The harmony stabilises and then becomes distant, taking the griever away from the lushness of life and into the realms of loss, death and dream-like realities, as mirrored in Rojas’ layered vignettes. As the score closes, the harmonies become richer and fuller, marking a return to life. Understanding the power of sound to both respond to and drive narrative, Blades’ score weaves together field recordings, half-remembered conversations, choral movements, string arrangements and electronic fragments into a nuanced and evocative whole.
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James William Blades is a British composer and producer based in New York, whose work dissolves the boundaries between scores, sound design and music. Rooted in a meticulous sensitivity to melody and structure, he creates sonic landscapes that have the potential to refract meaning and tell new stories in the process.

It is through his multidisciplinary experience working with visual artists, directors, musicians and fashion designers that Blades has developed the unique musical aesthetic he is now bringing to the world of cinema. Blades began by collaborating with fashion designer Grace Wales Bonner, artist Theaster Gates, and film-maker Kahlil Joseph. Exploring the expressive possibilities of composition, his atmospheric sound collages for Joseph’s 2017 film Fly Paper and short film Process for the British music artist Sampha, subsequently led Blades to work with Beyoncé on Black is King for Disney in 2020, and more recently Renaissance, Beyonce’s self-directed documentary concert film.

Learning from visual artists, themselves reframing the relationship between music, sound and image, Blades has created a singular sonic language he describes in terms of landscape painting. “I like conveying a non-linear sense of sonics, playing around with combinations, depths, tempos, and making it feel like you’re in a moment surrounded. It’s visceral,” he explains. In each case, his approach involves periods of contextual and multi- instrumental research, working closely with directors to understand how best to support the specific emotions, moods and textures of the project at hand. “Thinking about the painting of a score is something that I'm trying to translate over a longer scale.”
This capacity to work on a variety of long-form projects is evident, whether in the scores he has had exhibited in a gallery context (Venice Biennale, Serpentine Gallery, 180 The Strand, Palais De Tokyo), or in the debut solo productions he is readying for release.

Other composer credits include Tendaberry, Hayley Elizabeth Anderson’s critically lauded debut feature film which premiered at Sundance 2024, the Showtime documentary NYC Point Gods produced by Coodie and Chike and Kevin Durant and Kiin a three part companion film directed by Fenn O’Meally and written by Letitia Wright and Tamara Lawrance.
A storyteller in the broadest sense of the word, Blades’ extensive inter-disciplinary experience marks him out as an artist in his own right, bringing an exciting and fresh approach to feature film composition. 

Strut proudly reintroduces a classic from the Topomic catalogue, Ice’s ‘Each Man Makes His Destiny’, officially available on vinyl for the first time.

After relocating from the United States to Paris, Ice began performing regularly in the city’s Barbès district, a vibrant area with a large North African immigrant community.

The band’s heavy Afro-funk sound caught the attention of producer Pierre Jaubert, leading them to become the resident session musicians at his independent Parisound studio.

Immersed in the local influences, Ice began integrating African-inspired chants, textures, and rhythms into their distinct funk style. In 1973, the group recorded their debut album, ‘Each Man Makes His Destiny’, a psychedelic funk exploration that hinted at the evolving sound that would later define them as the Lafayette Afro-Rock Band and, eventually, Ice once more.

Produced by Jaubert, the album brings some powerful social commentary on claustrophobic tracks like ‘Too Little Room’ and ‘Suicide’, under-pinned by a determination to succeed despite the adversity.

Remastered by The Carvery.

An album of hypnagogic nocturnes that relentlessly searches for a sense of calm in the great unknown, 'Is Peace Wild?' is German producer, drummer and visual artist Ludwig Wandinger's upcoming release on light-years. He dreamt it up while unpacking the breakdown of a long relationship, working in hotel rooms during the downtime between a series of chaotic live shows. To help empty his mind, Wandinger developed a suite of soulful reflections that prioritize harmony over rhythm and clarity over trivial complexity - music that confronts the eternal duality of romance and tragedy. Almost beatless and consistently sublime, 'Is Peace Wild?' is punctuated by hypnotic lyrical contributions from multi-disciplinary artist, poet and activist Yves B. Golden and producer and vocalist Evita Manji, both of whom bless the album with indispensable friendship and familiarity. "It's almost as if they were telling me a good night story," says Wandinger.

With a series of albums and EPs under his belt already, Wandinger is a tireless solo artist and a prolific collaborator. He's released material for Orange Milk, Gin&Platonic, Creamcake, 3XL, and he worked alongside artists such as Evita Manji, Sara Persico, Grischa Lichtenberger and Brodinski. 'Is Peace Wild?' though emerges as Wandinger’s most personal work to date. The title track opens the album, and Golden's voice breathes softly over Wandinger's warm, lulling arpeggios. "Balloons and birds delight in the flow of air between rooms," she murmurs, floating her surreal phrases in a tranquil pool of pitch-skewed pads and chiming, music box synths. But this airiness doesn't last long: on the noisy, sombre 'Vien', Wandinger interrupts his elegiac, organ-like synths with metallic crashes and distorted, rasping bass, weaving twinkling, pensive notes into the spaces in-between. The oscillation between darkness and light is remarkably even-handed, capturing the aching sense of longing - or "Sehnsucht" - that's at the core of German Romanticism. And it's even more evident on 'Xhausted Form', one of the album's heaviest tracks. Unfolding initially with affecting, sacred chords, the serenity is challenged by eerie, dissonant crunches and unsettling feedback shrieks, yet the spark of romance, in all of its intricacy, never diminishes.

Meanwhile, the album's illusory qualities are fully dilated on 'Fire'. Manji's hypnotic freestyle was recorded in a single take as they were lying in bed on the verge of falling asleep, and provides a quiescent counterpoint to Wandinger's muted trance vibrations. "The world is on fire drowning in its own fluids," they slur into the abyss, vocalizing playfully while Wandinger freezes the sentiment in vanishing 4/4 thuds and dissociated processes. This makes the baroque 'Overlife' and the noisy 'Eternal Image' all the more dynamic. On the latter, Wandinger creates a noisy, apocalyptic atmosphere for Golden's sardonic words, cooling his euphoric synths with hissing white noise and burnished cybernetic textures. "They are afraid of loud noises," Golden mouthes. "Bodies like mine are made for turbulence."

Open-ended and tangled with emotional paradoxes, 'Is Peace Wild?' can be interpreted in many different ways. Wandinger's own serenity is personal, but laying himself bare, he provides listeners with a cracked mirror to consider their unique patchwork of conundrums. 

Dutch electronic no-wave outfit Baby Berserk is making a thrilling return to Bongo Joe Records this Fall with their highly anticipated album, "Slightly Hysterical Girls With Pearls." Following the release of two compelling 7'' singles—"What I Mean/Sleepless" and "Toxic Kisses/Wartime"—and a real world tour, the band is back with a full-length record that pushes the boundaries of their eclectic sound.

Known for their seamless blend of music and fashion, Baby Berserk captures the essence of contemporary nightlife, balancing the raw energy of a live band with the infectious pulse of club music. Their latest work offers a refreshing and invigorating boost for the mind, body, and soul.

"Slightly Hysterical Girls With Pearls" isn’t just an album; it’s a statement. It’s about embracing who you are, kicking out the negativity, and finding power in the primal urge to live life on your own terms. With a sound that mixes slow, groovy beats with sharp, slithering synths and a relentless rhythm, Baby Berserk invites you to lose yourself in the music and emerge stronger, more vibrant, and unapologetically yourself.

Citron Citron is back! The ethereal sister-and-brother duo has worked hard over the past two years on their new album “Maréeternelle,” set to be released next autumn. Maintaining their majestic compositions, dual lead vocals, and home-made organic sound machinery, Citron Citron delves deeper into their sonic universe, singing about daily life, death, and love with the same poetic and personal vibe.

The first single, “Par un temps pareil,” showcases Augustin as the lead vocalist for the first time. With its heavy drum machine and groovy vibe, the track, built around a pun about idleness, is set to make your sunny summer days even shinier.

Multi-instrumentalist and composer Isaiah Collier connects with the divine ancestors on a transcendent Direct-To-Disc session, Parallel Universe Chicago-based innovator and educator Isaiah Collier is opening up new dimensions in the jazzwise continuum. A saxophonist by trade whose multi-instrumental talents and compositional prowess have stretched the limits of the form, Parallel Universe represents a new chapter in Collier’s musical journey. Having already performed with a diverse range of musicians such as Chance The Rapper, Waddada Leo Smith, Chicago jazz royalty Angel Bat Dawid and his own band The Chosen Few, Collier’s latest work as a bandleader explores the shared musical heritage of the African diaspora with a sense of grace and assurance that belies his years. Embracing the risk and vulnerability that comes with the live process, Collier and his band tapped into the frequencies of improvisation that fired up so many of the most timeless jazz recordings. “Recording direct-to-disc gave me a really fortunate opportunity to experience what our musical predecessors almost a hundred years ago were dealing with,” he explains. Name-checking Sun Ra, Ras G, J Dilla, Fela Kuti, Miles Davis, Gil Scott-Heron, Whitney Huston, Aaliyah and Frankie Knuckles, the opening of track of Parallel Universe imagines a genreless musical lineage that resonates with the polyphony of stories his band bring to the table, from Chicago and beyond. Featuring gospel soul singer Jimetta Rose, AACM and former Art Ensemble of Chicago trumpet player Corey Wilkes, blues-rooted guitarist Michael Damani, regular collaborators Julian Davis Reid, James Russell Sims and Micah Collier, the 8-track album bristles with a sense of love and understanding between players at the top of their game. Nowhere is this more evident than on the album’s 13-minute centrepiece, ‘Village Song’, in which Collier evokes the spiritual, psychological and emotional home of the African diaspora in song. “I want to speak to everybody of the African diaspora, truly in its entirety,” he explains, “from all the way of being back in the motherland, to the new lands we’ve come to.” Rooted in the percussion of Sonny Daze and the kalimba of Radius, ‘Village Song’ is a joyous and affirmative celebration of that unity. Picking up the flute, Collier explains, was also a part of that narrative: “The saxophone was not made in Africa so the concept of going back into the village we have to go back to our village instruments and dialect.” With vocals sung in Yoruba - inspired by a gift from legendary saxophonist Kenny Garrett - ‘Village Song’ soars between rhythms and references, from Afro-Cuban syncopation to the deep triplet swing of mid-‘60s Coltrane. Laying the foundations for the album as a whole, the result is truly exhilarating, “Give me that feeling that makes me feel like I’m alive,” Collier enthuses. “People can tell when you’re taking chances. I know that’s what everybody is looking for.”

Strut present the first international reissues of two classics of South African jazz by Malombo Jazz Makers, ‘Malompo Jazz’ (1966) and ‘Malombo Jazz Makers Vol. 2’ (1967). Formed in Mamelodi township near Pretoria, the group started out as Malombo Jazz Men with Julian Bahula on malombo drums, Abbey Cindi on flute and Philip Tabane on guitar. Fusing traditional and improvised rhythms with jazz, Malombo became renowned as one of the first South African bands to fully connect jazz with the African traditions. Despite his undoubted genius, Tabane became erratic on tour and Bahula brought in another Mamelodi-based talent, guitarist Lucas “Lucky” Ranku, renaming the band Malombo Jazz Makers. The group played stadiums and festivals and were soon signed to Gallo. Recording at a studio in Pretoria, the trio debuted with the album ‘Malompo Jazz’ in 1966, showcasing the simple, spacious beauty of the Malombo sound and Abbey Cindi’s compositions, with Mahotella Queens’ Hilda Tloubatla on guest vocals. The partner follow-up album ‘Malombo Jazz Makers Vol. 2’ was recorded a year later, continuing the earthy flow of Malombo’s music. The two albums have since been recognised as unique landmarks of South African jazz through popular tracks like ‘Sibathathu’, ‘Jikeleza’ and ‘Emakhaya’. Alongside full original artwork, the albums feature a new interview with Julian Bahula.

Tosca, the Viennese masters of deluxe soundscapes and sensual rhythms, are back with their most magical and mesmerising album yet. Multi-instrumentalists Richard Dorfmeister and Rupert Huber have been friends since their Vienna schooldays. Richard later became half of the globally acclaimed DJ-producer duo Kruder and Dorfmeister, while Rupert worked in piano composition and sound-art installation. No Hassle is Tosca’s fifth studio album, and their most beautiful musical statement so far. A luxurious tapestry of analogue and digital sounds, submerged samples and live instruments, it evolves and expands into an hour-long ambient symphony. The title reflects not only the duo’s laidback approach to making music but their whole philosophy of life. No Hassle is all about contemplation and concentration. While recent Tosca releases like J.A.C. (2005) and the remix collection Souvenirs (2006) were a move towards classic song structures and club-friendly grooves, their latest is a much more introspective journey into inner space. It was conceived as a single seamless sea of sound, deeply layered with liquid rhythms and tidal melodies. Warm and enveloping, each leisurely track flows gently into the next, a musical ocean moving in slow motion. This is an album to plunge deeply into and get lost inside. Tosca, the Viennese masters of deluxe soundscapes and sensual rhythms, are back with their most magical and mesmerising album yet. Multi-instrumentalists Richard Dorfmeister and Rupert Huber have been friends since their Vienna schooldays. Richard later became half of the globally acclaimed DJ-producer duo Kruder and Dorfmeister, while Rupert worked in piano composition and sound-art installation. No Hassle is Tosca’s fifth studio album, and their most beautiful musical statement so far. A luxurious tapestry of analogue and digital sounds, submerged samples and live instruments, it evolves and expands into an hour-long ambient symphony. The title reflects not only the duo’s laidback approach to making music but their whole philosophy of life. No Hassle is all about contemplation and concentration. While recent Tosca releases like J.A.C. (2005) and the remix collection Souvenirs (2006) were a move towards classic song structures and club-friendly grooves, their latest is a much more introspective journey into inner space. It was conceived as a single seamless sea of sound, deeply layered with liquid rhythms and tidal melodies. Warm and enveloping, each leisurely track flows gently into the next, a musical ocean moving in slow motion. This is an album to plunge deeply into and get lost inside. Tosca, the Viennese masters of deluxe soundscapes and sensual rhythms, are back with their most magical and mesmerising album yet. Multi-instrumentalists Richard Dorfmeister and Rupert Huber have been friends since their Vienna schooldays. Richard later became half of the globally acclaimed DJ-producer duo Kruder and Dorfmeister, while Rupert worked in piano composition and sound-art installation. No Hassle is Tosca’s fifth studio album, and their most beautiful musical statement so far. A luxurious tapestry of analogue and digital sounds, submerged samples and live instruments, it evolves and expands into an hour-long ambient symphony. The title reflects not only the duo’s laidback approach to making music but their whole philosophy of life. No Hassle is all about contemplation and concentration. While recent Tosca releases like J.A.C. (2005) and the remix collection Souvenirs (2006) were a move towards classic song structures and club-friendly grooves, their latest is a much more introspective journey into inner space. It was conceived as a single seamless sea of sound, deeply layered with liquid rhythms and tidal melodies. Warm and enveloping, each leisurely track flows gently into the next, a musical ocean moving in slow motion. This is an album to plunge deeply into and get lost inside.

MESTIZX is Bolivian-born singer and multi-medium performer Ibelisse Guardia Ferragutti and renowned Chicago expat jazz drummer Frank Rosaly's debut album as co-composers, arrangers and musicians. Partners in both marriage and art, the Amsterdam-based Ferragutti and Rosaly dove into the sounds of their respective ancestral roots in Bolivia, Brazil, and Puerto Rico to create a deeply personal meditation on decolonization and the defiant power of ritual and protest. They chose the title MESTIZX – a non-gendered version of the sometimes slurred Spanish colonial word for a “mixed person” - as a means of both challenging and embracing the liminality of their identities and artistic practices. Rosaly says: “I grew up quite Puerto Rican in my home, but was taught to mask it outside my home. I wasn’t allowed to speak Spanish, so the drums eventually became my language, secretly tying together my own feeling of connection to mi tierra. This record is the first time I actively give voice to the nuance within myself, allowing me to take ownership of this in-between, which is what this album communicates for me… There is this unusual place that exists between these two cultures, of which I am both. There is a complex story in that sliver of in-betweenness, worthy of giving voice to all of us that live in-between.” Ferragutti adds: “My personal understanding is one that stems from being placed in between lineages that carry the colonizer and colonized, the oppressor and oppressed, the demon and the angel… thus by definition is tied to post-colonial social constructs which we as Bolivians have to step in, like a 500 year novel that goes on and on… We have access to many memories and traditions, but not really, because we don’t fully belong to any of those… This makes us feel we're in a constant state of being the “visitors” and “outsiders.” On one hand, we are never truly part of one lineage. On the other hand, it makes us a travelers of worlds, storytellers in between multiple languages, cultures, and worldviews. We chose MESTIZX for this work as an act of recognizing the mixed state of being as a difficult and yet powerful one.” The album was produced and recorded primarily at International Anthem Studios in Chicago, where Ferragutti and Rosaly were joined by a community of musicians and beloved friends including Matt Lux, Avreeayl Ra, Ben LaMar Gay, Daniel Villarreal, Bill MacKay, Rob Frye, and Mikel Patrick Avery, with addditional contributions from Chris Doyle, Guilherme Granado, Viktor Le Givens and Fredy Velásquez. The music creatively infuses Latin rhythmic patterns and oblong swing from pre-and post-colonial Latin America into a collision of avant jazz, art punk, Chicago post-rock, bomba, plena, cumbia, Andean, minimal, electronica, and folk. A wholly original but undeniably universal sound – both of-the-moment and alluringly futuristic - MESTIZX contains points of reference and resonance for fans of Juana Molina, Café Tacvba, Max Roach & Abbey Lincoln, Liquid Liquid, Arto Lindsay, As Mercenarias, The Ex, Tortoise, Tom Zé, Elza Soares, La Mecanica Popular... It’s a vast, vibrant and encompassing spectrum of sounds, but at its core MESTIZX is a lucidly conscious collection of auto-biographical statements from Ferragutti & Rosaly on the deeply personalized effects of colonialism on geography, history, and identity. Despite its heavy subject matter, however, MESTIZX finds a lifeline in communal, celebratory, soul-bearing and movement-inducing music.

Gondwana Records announces ‘Goodbyes’, the debut album from Estonian-born, London-based sound artist and pianist Hanakiv. A deeply beautiful, meditative piano album featuring special guest Alabaster deplume. “This is an album about healing. It is about saying your goodbyes to everything that doesn’t serve you anymore. Each of these songs has a little goodbye in it. So, these are very beautiful and necessary goodbyes”. Hanakiv is a young composer and musician from Estonia (now based in London) who creates meditative piano-based ambient music with elements from classical and electronic music. ‘Goodbyes’ is her debut recording and draws on influences as diverse as Tim Hecker, Björk “Vespertine”, Kara-Lis Coverdale, Arvo Pärt, Erkki-Sven Tüür and Aphex Twin as well as her own cultural heritage. Music has an important part in Estonian culture, especially choir music and its traditions, but Hanakiv also draws on her love of nature – the beautiful Estonian seaside and forests - and on her time in Iceland. However, it was moving to London that gave her the freedom to make her own music: “London gave me the freedom and courage to really be who I am (as a person and musically)” and her heritage and her new home both offer inspiration to Goodbyes, as Hanakiv moves between these two opposite places, a bustling metropolis and a small country full of nature, drawing inspiration from both as she sculpts her own voice. Hanakiv had an unconventional music education – she started studying music at a school for handbells when she was nine and was part of a handbell ensemble for eight years. Starting on piano at the same time she went on to study composition at high school, and later at the Estonian Academy of Music. Eventually switching to electroacoustic composition, she studied in Reykjavik, and did internships in Malmö, and again Reykjavik before moving to London. She grew up in a musical family and her grandmother was a piano teacher and choir conductor. “I would always ask her to take me to her choir rehearsals. I remember sitting under the grand piano, listening to the choir and just being mesmerised by the sounds. She also teaches in a local music school in the south of Estonia with about ten pianos, and I’d spend a lot of time there as well. I believe this was the starting point for me to get to where I am now. The last two pieces on the album (Home II and Home I) are composed in this same music school, so it feels like a full circle. An early influence was Regina Spektor “the first artist who made me really want to play piano” alongside dream pop and Sigur Rós’ as well as Estonian contemporary composers such as Erkki-Sven Tüür and Arvo Pärt. Later her studies took her to Reykjavík: “There is this amazing record shop called 12 Tónar in Reykjavik where you can drink espressos and listen to all their vinyls. I spent quite a lot of time there. There is something about Icelandic music that really excited me (the mixture of contemporary electronic sounds with melancholy, emotionality). This is when I started getting more into electronic music, and experimenting outside of classical music”. Following a year long break from studying and inspired by making an electroacoustic soundtrack for a friend’s abstract video, she was inspired to complete a masters in electroacoustic composition, diving fully into the worlds of sound recording and mixing and focusing on surround sound and how to position and move sounds in space, eventually doing an internship with composer Kent Olofson in Malmö, who works with multi-speaker systems for theatre productions. “I learnt a lot from him and he introduced me to some of my favourite plugins I’ve used a lot on this album as well.” Hanakiv moved to London just as the pandemic hit and found herself trapped, in a big new city, without any network or family and so just concentrated on making music. “I stayed in my room with my basic equipment - keyboard, Korg minilogue, SM 58 and Rode nt1-a microphones, laptop and speakers. I was reading about mixing, and trying out different things and listening to a lot of music to get the sense of the mixes and production and finishing a commission piece for 5.1 multi speaker system at that time so I set up four speakers for quadrophonic surround sound in my room!”. She also found her way back to piano - my instrument – and started practicing again, playing the pieces she used to play, but also just improvising, and this was the beginning of what would become her debut album, ‘Goodbyes’. “I started appreciating everything about music again (even melody!), and everything just came together naturally, and I arrived to a point where I finally found my voice, and I had something that I wanted to say and share. I composed “Meditation I” first and started with “Goodbye”, and all the other pieces are derived from that. Without “Meditation I” there wouldn’t be this album. If you listen closely, “Meditation I” starts where “Goodbye” ends; “Meditation II” is born from “Meditation I”. But it was meeting Fi Roberts, a sound engineer based at the legendary Strongrom Studios in Shoreditch, London in December 2020 that really brought the album into focus. The pair bonded over an interest in prepared piano and a similar approach to production ideas (a balance of not overdoing it, and letting the songs speak for themselves, but being open to explore) and Fi became a friend but also a confidant and eventually co-producer “Fi has a big impact on this record but I don’t know how to really explain that properly. Of course, this album is sonically stunning thanks to her amazing mixes and recording skills, but she also believed in this music so much and it created something very special - that’s difficult to measure with words. She just works with heart, and I really appreciate that” This then is ‘Goodbyes’, the first offering from a major new voice, who offers us a meditative work full of space and tranquillity but also life and friendship and meaning. And we are very proud to welcome her to the Gondwana family.

Svaneborg Kardyb are Nikolaj Svaneborg - Wurlitzer, Juno, piano and Jonas Kardyb - drums, percussion a multi award winning duo from Denmark, where they won two "grammys" at the Danish Music Awards Jazz 2019: New artist of the year and Composer of the year. 
Drawing on Danish folk music and Scandinavian jazz influences, including Nils Frahm, Esbjörn Svennson and Jan Johansson's landmark recording Jazz På Svenska, their music is an exquisite and joyful melding of beautiful melodies, delicate minimalism, catchy grooves, subtle electronica vibes, Nordic atmospheres and organic interplay, all underwritten by the sheer joy of playing together. "We started in the earliest of mornings over the blackest of coffee, sometimes even without talking, just music. Immediately we felt a connection between our personal style of playing and the compositions emerged like out of nowhere. The vibe from these early sessions is still the backbone of our little band". Svaneborg Kardyb hail from Aalborg, in Jutland, in the north of Denmark where they first met in 2013 and discussed the possibility of creating a duo over late night talks. Six years went by as they both explored other projects before they eventually realised the idea of making music together. Like their new label mates, Vega Trails, Svaneborg Kardyb are a duo, a format that gives them a lot of space to occupy - or leave blank. "We enjoy the simplicity and focus it gives to the interplay. We come from very different musical backgrounds; Nikolaj from Scandinavian jazz, and Jonas from Roots, blues and folk, so the music is a sum of our personal contributions and doesn't thrive to be anything else than that. It's quite unique for us to have this shared musical tongue and friendship". Their music is intentionally simple at first glance, but evolves and unfolds through listening over time, with plenty of room for exploration, reflection and improvisation. Their aim is to create music that is as honest and intimate as possible "with melodies and rhythms so strong that we are left as only the messengers". And their fast-developing music chemistry allowed them to give little thought to what their musical influences were. Giving their music a captivating charm. "We explored whatever sounds and musical structures our duality gave birth to and through long jam-sessions we found small seeds of ideas that turned into tunes. Danish traditional songs, community singing and hymns are a big inspiration too. Both the tonal language, the lyrical melodies and the way generations can gather around the music, is something that is close to our hearts". Over Tage (over roofs) is their third album, following Knob (2019) and Haven (2020) and marks their debut for Gondwana Records a label noted for working with artists such as Mammal Hands, Portico Quartet and GoGo Penguin whose music, like that of Svaneborg Kardyb delights in exploring the fertile spaces between genres. For the duo it is their most serious and thoughtful record to date. "It may be our strongest and most honest record so far. Doubts and uncertainty were kind of the foundation for the sounds of the album but there is also hope and lots of uplifting moments and we're very pleased with how it came out." And it is that mixture of elevation and thoughtfulness, honesty and intimacy that makes the music of Svaneborg Kardyb so special and Over Tage such a joy to listen to. The world awaits.

Captivating, ethereal and majestic, Mammal Hands unleash their third album, Shadow Work: drawing on spiritual jazz, north Indian, folk and classical music to create something inimitably their own. Recorded at 80 Hertz Studios in Manchester, it is the result of 18 months of intensive touring and mammoth writing sessions. The energy from their exhilarating live performances has fed into the writing process and yet there is a quiet reflective side to this album, giving it an expanded emotional range that draws the listener deep into Mammal Hand’s sound world.

Ooosh this is heavy: the lesser known but brilliant - mostly unreleased - work of King Tubby apprentice engineer-turned-prolific mixer “Prince” Philip Smart, for Bunny Lee, Yabby You, and Augustus Pablo, is spotlighted on a stack of half century old diamonds cut with signature, discrete, deft dynamic and 3D psychoacoustic nuance - check for the spangled peculiarities in ‘Official Sound’, the ruff but sweet crackle of ‘You Were Mine’, depth charge of ‘Man Free (Dub)’, cosmic Rasta skank of ‘Zion City Dub Wise’ and eerily bloozy strutter ‘Riding Rhythm’, and you’ll know the legendary steez

DKR put it best: “This compilation is dedicated to the memory of the late great “Prince” Philip Smart - the first apprentice of King Tubby and the first engineer at Tubby’s studio besides Tubby himself. Alongside Tubby, Philip was integral to the innovation that took place at Tubby’s studio in the mid 1970s, where the mixing of new roots reggae revolutionized the sound of Jamaican music and created styles and techniques that are still being echoed today, nearly 50 years later. 

Though rarely credited on records in comparison to Tubby, Philip also mixed a lot of the paramount music produced by those close associates of Tubby’s studio such as Bunny Lee, Yabby You, and Augustus Pablo. Philip was closely tied to Pablo due to their childhood friendship and was a partner in his stylistically significant early production works. In the early years of Tubby’s studio, both men were making and cutting custom dubs there for their sound systems before starting to produce their own tunes from scratch, and Philip becoming the second chair engineer.

Several of the songs on this compilation are a selection of the aforementioned work. All of the songs here are sourced from Philip’s personal tape archive, and basically all of these mixes and versions have been scarcely if ever heard, and never released before. This double album comprises a rare and genuine glimpse into the dubplate workings of the inner circle of Tubby’s studio in the mid 1970s, where the prime players and emerging giants of reggae music production and sound system versioned, remixed and voiced rhythms for custom and exclusive cuts. Some of the cuts heard here were formerly exclusive power plays on King Tubby’s own legendary sound system, and unlike some previous issues of such material, these are genuine mixes done at the time. Some other tracks clearly exude the youthful enthusiasm of the participants. In both cases we find this collection of tracks to be truly compelling, so please enjoy this glimpse into such rare air. Rest in power Prince Philip Smart.”

Raw, deep and spiritual Gnawa music from Morocco to carry you through the night...

Recorded in a single late night session in a house in Casablanca, using a Tascam field recorder and 2 microphones, Dead of Night is the incredible new solo album from Maalem Houssam Guinia, the son of Maalem Mahmoud Guinia, and one of Morocco's most exciting young Gnawa masters.

The album was recorded live on the night of 3rd January 2022 in a relaxed session that lasted into the early hours of the next morning, and it captures Houssam at his most natural, singing and playing the Gnawa songs that have been with him since his birth, completely solo and free without percussion or backing vocals. Houssam described the album as containing the songs he knows best as these were the pieces his father would play and sing late into the night in their home when he was an infant.

What you'll hear on Dead of Night is raw, deep Gnawa music in its purest form played by a young Maalem who has been immersed in the culture his whole life and is a master of his craft. The whole performance has been beautifully and sympathetically captured by bassist and producer Karl-Erik Enkelman.

Latency present Danish artists Cæcilie Trier (CTM), Jakob Littauer and Mads Kristian Frøslev with their first collaborative album as TLF Trio. Chamber music for cello, piano and guitar; moving between written composition, improvisation and de-construction; channeling free jazz and minimalism and playing with the stiltedness of Central-European Classical of the Late Renaissance and Early Baroque. Named after the 1991 hardcore rave classic by Liquid, this acoustic almost beat-less album contains music that is more sculptural than narrative and that fluidly shapeshifts from being an object in the room to being the room itself – just as Louise Lawler’s distorted image from the Stedelijk Museum that adorns its cover..

Gus McIntyre is an artist with notable presence in the ska and reggae scenes, often producing music that resonates with classic Jamaican music. With his a-side track 'Silly Ska' he puts out a ska instrumental track, characterized by upbeat rhythms and lively melodies. The b-side contains the Peckings All Stars, a group of musicians and producers linked to the UK-based Peckings label - known for its authentic Jamaican music, especially reggae, rocksteady, and ska, and for releasing high-quality reissues of classic tracks alongside new music inspired by the golden era of Jamaican sound. The collective works closely with the label to produce music that blends traditional reggae with modern production, helping to preserve and revitalize classic Jamaican music. The song pays hommage to Fela Kuti and a silly twist to a ska song on the flip-side.

Sam Wilkes answers a few questions from Leaving Records labelmate Carlos Niño, on his debut full-length WILKES Listening to WILKES numerous times, considering what I might write about it for a Press Release, (which I agreed to do because I'm a fan of his Music and his collaborations with Sam Gendel and Louis Cole / Knower,) I was growing in enthusiasm, looking forward to my next radio show or DJ set including the song "Today" so I could hear it bump in a nice system. I was hyped the more I took in this 6 song offering. I thought to ask Sam about his new record and use his answers as aid to illustrate some of my feelings, but when I read his reply I thought you should too. It's so descriptive and visual, perfect to pull from and quote.

Leaving Records presents Music For Living Spaces, the debut LP by non-binary Los Angeles-based artist Green-House. Olive Ardizoni helms the project, which made its debut with the charming 2019 EP Six Songs for Invisible Gardens. Music for Living Spaces represents an evolution of its predecessor’s minimalist compositions into songs that move with winsome melodies and emotional arcs. Though recorded during a pandemic, the transporting nature of Music For Livings Spaces offers a remedy for dreariness. Ardizoni states, “I’m trying to hit that part of the brain that’s affected by the emotional state that you’re in when you perceive something as cute.” 
 
Music For Living Spaces' first single “Sunflower Dance” sports a breezy, bucolic vibe. The track is intended to invoke the whimsical image of hamsters happily dancing in a field. Ardizoni brings an intentionality to these playful atmospheres. They state, “In our culture, we prioritize profound artistic expression through emotions like sadness or aggression, but cuteness, silliness or fun, are the things that we trivialize in our culture. We say that they’re childish and it gets invalidated.” The complex and radiant productions on Music for Living Spaces counter this view. Ardizoni continues, “Cuteness and joy are gateways to compassion. It’s the gateway to empathy and activating the network in your brain that boosts moral concern for other people in the world around you.” Despite its general sunniness, Music For Living Spaces does not solely rely on exuberant, colorful moods. “Royal Fern” is a sophisticated composition of voices calling and responding to each other in rippling waves, while towards the closing of the album we hear Ardizoni’s ethereal voice for the first time that carries a nuanced, contemplative aura that defies categorization. 
 
Music For Living Spaces is a step forward for Green-House. Ardizoni states, “The intention of this project is to facilitate the connection between humans and nature. Instead of perceiving nature as something that's separate from us, or outside of our homes, we can recognize nature as something that is within us and in everything we do in our daily lives. You don't need to have access to the great outdoors to feel connected to the environment.”

A must-have for fans of Japanese environmental music such as Hiroshi Yoshimura, Satoshi Ashikawa and Yutaka Hirose! Organic new age music that is swallowed by the beauty of nature that sways gracefully! Leaving Records is proud to present the debut EP by Green-House, a project by local artist Olive Ardizon. "The six tracks are based on the concept of "communication between plant life and the people who grow it. Based on field recordings that capture the sounds of water and the voices and movements of plants and animals in nature, this is a superb new age/ambient work that breathes an aesthetic synth sound that encompasses the beauty and serenity of the pull that is common in Japanese environmental music. Artwork by Michael Flanagan.

Habitat (what we might now properly refer to as Habitat I) arrived, fully-formed, in 2021—the product of a conscientious, exploratory, and decidedly Covid-era collaboration between two Berlin-based experimental musicians: the composer N. (Niklas) Kramer, and percussionist, J. (Joda) Foerster. Inspired by the Italian architect, Ettore Sottsass, Habitat’s simple, albeit beguiling conceit (following in the footsteps of canonical ambient releases like Music for Airports and Plantasia) was that each track ought to represent a room in an imagined building. Taken quite literally, tracks like “Curved Hallway” guided the listener through a kind of psychogeographic labyrinth, at once welcoming and slightly uncanny. Habitat II operates on a similar premise. But if Habitat I charted the perplexing intricacies of an imagined, self-contained structure, Habitat II expands the conceptual realm. Think now, not only of rooms in a hypothetical home, but of the winding hallways and grounds of a mid-century structure—perhaps slightly past its prime, but not at all an inappropriate venue for a late-night soiree. How might these features be imagined, mapped, and rendered enticing for a listener? We begin, appropriately, with “Seating (Welcome),” which, in its fluttering, aetherial suite of static, winds, and percussive depths, gently hypnotizes in the vein of Terry Riley, beckoning our entry. The clarity here, the directional flow of air, recalls the dignity and gestural simplicity of the Bauhaus school. Of significant note is the Wasserspiel (track seven)—”water fixture” (loosely translated), like the sculpture by Lily Clark, which graces the record’s cover. In an album grounded by analogies, Wasserspiel constitutes an especially mimetic highlight: a cascading, shimmering, font of radiance that does not (to its strength) rely upon a sample or found-sound reference to running water. Instead we are left with the distinct impression of the glimmer of flowing liquid, and of the attendant, refractory evening sunlight. Indeed, fountains (the most common and domesticated form of Wasserspiele)—their simultaneous kitsch and abundance—may very well epitomize the kind of cultivated, sixties home-shopping catalog aesthetic that undergirds the Habitat series. These habitats, wherever they are, however they appear to you (and there is indeed ample room for interpretation)—we can all certainly agree that they are vaguely utopian and achingly nostalgic. Of their compositional process, Kramer and Foerster reference their mutual interest in improvisation, and, furthermore, a kind of “first thought best thought” approach to recording and indexing ideas. Relying primarily on a sampler with a 15 second limit, their process emphasizes the organic layering of asynchronous (though, crucially, harmonious — perhaps even “hospitable”) loops. Suffice it to say, many rooms have been lost to the aether, casualties of a mercurial recording process. Those rooms that remain in Habitat II have been cultivated, furnished, and decorated. And they eagerly await your entry.

Los Angeles-based vocalist, composer, and producer Sharada Shashidhar has a deep awareness of the cosmos. There's a distinct tug-of-war in her music, an understanding that scanning the heavens to answer existential queries isn't quite enough; there are internal depths to plumb as well. Shashidhar's first album, 2020's Rahu, found her voice billowing out of smoky, post-beat-scene soundscapes, meditating on the collective unconscious and the energy exchange between all living things. Her newest work, Soft Echoes, is a bold step forward, echewing her work's hip-hop tilt for expansive compositions that blend jazz and Indian classical influences into a swirling, spiritual whole. Though she has an extensive resume as a collaborator in LA's previous experimental jazz scene, notching work with the likes of Carlos Niño, Zeroh, and the Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra, Soft Echoes marks Shashidhar's first outing as a bandleader. Gathering an ensemble that includes Anna Butters on bass, Julius Rodriguez on keys, Devin Daniels on saxophone, and Timothy Angulo on drums, Shashidhar sought to create a band that ostensibly functioned as an extension of herself. Her primary goals in writing these songs were to “let [her] body do what it wanted to do,” to trust her intuition, and “play without judgment.” Through that process, making Soft Echoes became a practice of presence and exploration, a chance to unlearn rigid structures and rediscover the joy of creating for oneself. Recording took place over three brief, distinct sessions at Altamira Sound in Alhambra, California. Though the full band wasn't ever present at the same time, Soft Echoes sounds like the work of a group in complete, mind-meld focus. Splashy drums nudge up against skronkingsaxophone on “Canyon Song,” while mushrooming synth tones stack up behind rippling Rhodes piano on “Luckiest.” Shashidhar's elegant voice is the anchor for each of these tracks, sometimes gracefully stretching between instruments like a lithe dancer's limbs, other times scattering through psychedelic delay. She describes the album as having “two poles, ” illustrated by the whimsical, buoyant opener “Soft Echoes” and the darker, more anxiety-ridden closer, “New Echoes.” The songs in between may come from different emotional spaces, but “it's all really reflective,” she explains. album can play like a loop, with Shashidhar entering a portal “into the endlessness” during “New Echoes,” only to be transported back to the beginning, full of gratitude and pondering “how strange it is to be alive.” On Soft Echoes , Shashidhar leads us on a journey through her mind, traversing its peaks and canyons in search of greater connection. “I want to take people places,” she says, pausing thoughtfully. “I can’t always guarantee that they’re good places, [but] hopefully you’ll feel something.”

Anthology: over 50 tracks taken from Knxwledge's 2009-2013 Bandcamp releases, curated and released by Leaving Records. This was originally a double cassette release – cassettes now sold out.