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Carmen Villain ponders the significance of reflection in all its forms on 'Memoria', overdubbing flutes, strings and trumpet (supplied by Johanna Orellana, André Bratten, Ole Henrik Moe and Eivind Lønning) with vanishing, effervescent rhythms and spiritual dissonances. It's her weightiest transmission to date, a properly focused fusion of deep listening, dub techno and fourth world jazz that's essential listening FFO Actress, Pole, Jon Hassell, Laurel Halo. There's a scene in Apichatpong Weerasethakul's 'Memoria' where Tilda Swinton's character is sitting with a sound engineer, trying to describe a mysterious booming sound she heard during the night. He scrolls through samples - a meme-able moment that'll be familiar to even the most casual producer - until her memory is triggered and she can make a connection. Carmen Hillestad assumes that role on her fifth album, considering the cultural significance of memory but neatly avoiding nostalgia, something she discerningly refers to as solipsistic introspection. Hillestad posits that deep listening is a way for us to relate more profoundly with our surroundings, using sonic triggers to provoke a cosmic level of contemplation that should be familiar to anyone who stuck around long enough with Weerasethakul's film to catch the blink-and-you'll-miss-it finale. We get a brief taster of what that might mean with opener 'Labour of Imagination', when Orellana's flutes and Hillestad's own clarinet are reshaped into cloudy atmospherics, one part sublime ambiance, one part hallucinogenic free jazz. The album's aesthetic backbone is revealed on 'Entre Nosotros', a slithering, decelerated monster of a track that fogs its Andy Stott-style chug with circuitous piano improvisations that only become properly visible after a few plays. The crucial moment comes when the beat disappears completely and what's left isn't silence, but tape hiss, echo trails and dissonances from Hillestad's processes. As the track draws to a close, the piano dissolves completely; listen in the background and you won't catch it, zoom in a little and you'll be hypnotised, we promise. And on the title track, we're served with an expansion of the themes Hillestad introduced us to on that genius 'Holding a Shape' 12” a few weeks back. Referencing Pole, Torsten Pröfrock, Rhythm & Sound and Mille Plateaux's 'Clicks & Cuts' anthologies, she uses our associations with dub and the glitch aesthetic to guide us to a false conclusion. The beat never really comes, instead a loose rhythm forms from vibrating subs and vertiginous, whooshing echoes. Hillestad buries her concept in the details: the ghost rhythms that manifest and vanish like electrical interferences and the weightless drone that flickers unsteadily in the backdrop until the track's final, profound moments. In a way, it's the antithesis of the "power ambient" sound - just when you think it’ll all get steamrolled by distortion, Hillestad pulls back and reveals a different emotional layer instead. Honestly, we hear more jazz in this than what gets passed off as ambient these days. Like its predecessors, 'Memoria' is still shepherded by the influence of Jon Hassell's fourth world - just check the shimmering 'Hope Synapses', for example - but at this stage in her career, Hillestad has made it entirely her own. Her music isn't reducible to a single element or single inspiration, it's a deeply personal alloy of philosophies and ideas that she's considered and refined over the course of five albums and a handful of EPs and singles. And the more attention you give it, the more you’ll discover.
Excellent Traveler is Mercereau’s version of a solo guitar album following the release of his critically acclaimed records Joy Techniques and SUNDAYS. As penned in the album notes by Carlos Niño, this exquisite album of spontaneous solo composition, nuanced improvisation, and exploratory world creation features living legends Laraaji, Luis Pérez Ixoneztli, Idris Ackamoor, André 3000, and frequent collaborators Carlos Niño and Surya Botofasina. Mercereau’s (3 years young) daughter Juniper is also on the album. Kamasi Washington, Shabaka Hutchings, Cavana Lee, V.C.R, Anaiah Rasheed Muhammad, Dwight Trible, Andres Renteria, and Aaron Shaw all intersect in Mercereau's psychedelic quests and adventures as well. "I feel like I, and we, contain the vastness of all infinite potential, and in that potential, my imagination and feelings about it go beyond words, and it's all in the music!" Mercereau continues, "My greatest inspirations in life and music come from feeling a sense of infinite possibility, because I do believe that’s what is available in Life on Planet Earth and Beyond. I focus on opening myself up to this freedom as much as I can, and it’s something I maintain awareness of and cultivate in all aspects of my life and creativity. Freedom is very important, I offer it to myself and to others around me. I feel very alive and tuned in when experiencing, hearing, seeing and doing things that remind me that anything can happen.” Known for his writing and production credits on records by household names such as Jay-Z, John Legend, and Leon Bridges, Nate Mercereau is currently buzzing for his contributions to André 3000’s album, New Blue Sun. At the vanguard of electroacoustic compositions, he seized the opportunity of recording duets with the Golden Gate Bridge in 2021 after reading an article on San Francisco residents complaining about the landmark’s eerie hum–see NPR piece here. Produced, Mixed, Edited, and Arranged by Nate Mercereau
As the genre-defying masters of stoner metal, the latest iteration of Sleep finds founding member and lead songwriter Al Cisneros newly partnered with the generational talent of Dale Crover (Melvins, Redd Kross) on drums and the iconoclastic Bubba Dupree (Void) on guitar. While simpler minds may seek out the redundancy of a monotonous iterative exercise, the road map of new album Hempispheres is an exploratory vision, one replacing overload with nuance and subtlety yet maintaining the interplay that made the band so special from the outset. So while the discourse on messageboards and comment sections bemoan the amicable absence of long-time guitarist Matt Pike, real heads, visionaries and open-minded truth- seekers alike will be rewarded with not the Sleep album they anticipated or expected, rather with Hempispheres being the album that is needed.
As the genre-defying masters of stoner metal, the latest iteration of Sleep finds founding member and lead songwriter Al Cisneros newly partnered with the generational talent of Dale Crover (Melvins, Redd Kross) on drums and the iconoclastic Bubba Dupree (Void) on guitar. While simpler minds may seek out the redundancy of a monotonous iterative exercise, the road map of new album Hempispheres is an exploratory vision, one replacing overload with nuance and subtlety yet maintaining the interplay that made the band so special from the outset. So while the discourse on messageboards and comment sections bemoan the amicable absence of long-time guitarist Matt Pike, real heads, visionaries and open-minded truth- seekers alike will be rewarded with not the Sleep album they anticipated or expected, rather with Hempispheres being the album that is needed.
Hanne Lippard and Renato Grieco bring language and composition into close conversation on Today’s Special. Lippard’s playful spoken-word pieces meet Grieco’s viola da gamba, piano and Wurlitzer, with the music mirroring the pitch, rhythm and inflections of her voice. Rather than improvisation, the duo use strict rules and compositional structures, drawing on wordplay, anecdotes, nursery rhymes, colour and borrowed language. Developed through residencies in Rome, Naples and Berlin, the result is sparse, witty and meticulously constructed, with every voice, note and pause serving a purpose.
Isik Kural’s Motorcycles and Cherry Wind is a sonic travelogue of stories waiting and wanting to be told, of seekers passing through a loop of time as they become witnesses to the glories of the ancient ruins. The album holds sounds of timeless quality—like inherited folklore, draped with secondhand nostalgia—taking the shape of whoever is eager enough to claim it as their own. Rich and full of character like the dusty mystery of an archeological site, Kural whispers to the living and the long gone alike in the poetic embrace of Motorcycles and Cherry Wind.
Yaphet is the new album from rapper Curly Castro- also known as one half of the dynamic duo Shrapknel- out September 18, 2026, on Backwoodz Studioz. On Yaphet, Castro draws inspiration from the Blaxploitation film genre of the 1970’s; using that era’s black heroes and antiheroes as a launching pad for his cinematic lyricism. Flows switch as effortlessly as camera angles; verses are saturated with references and entendres; it’s an endlessly rewind-worthy rap masterclass. But Yaphet is also Castro’s first solo album since 2021’s Little Robert Hutton, and beneath the fireworks, this album reflects the depth of his experiences in those intervening years. “I didn’t set out to be so honest about my life, but that’s what came out and the album is better for it,” Castro explains, “from facing the death of my infant daughter, to my father’s death, to facing my own impending mortality, these are my most vulnerable blades, on my deepest cuts.” Like Castro, this record marches to the beat of its drum, and make no mistake, there are drums a-plenty for the veteran MC to spar with, as only he can. Produced entirely by Milwaukee beat maker Locust, Yaphet is a bouncy, eclectic listen that nods to its influences, without ever looking backward. Castro is joined by a whirlwind of the genre’s finest: billy woods, PremRock, Fatboi Sharif, Brian Ennals, SKECH185, Blueprint, AJ Suede, shemar, ALASKA, Sunmundi, blackchai, & Margel the Sophant.
Yaphet is the new album from rapper Curly Castro- also known as one half of the dynamic duo Shrapknel- out September 18, 2026, on Backwoodz Studioz. On Yaphet, Castro draws inspiration from the Blaxploitation film genre of the 1970’s; using that era’s black heroes and antiheroes as a launching pad for his cinematic lyricism. Flows switch as effortlessly as camera angles; verses are saturated with references and entendres; it’s an endlessly rewind-worthy rap masterclass. But Yaphet is also Castro’s first solo album since 2021’s Little Robert Hutton, and beneath the fireworks, this album reflects the depth of his experiences in those intervening years. “I didn’t set out to be so honest about my life, but that’s what came out and the album is better for it,” Castro explains, “from facing the death of my infant daughter, to my father’s death, to facing my own impending mortality, these are my most vulnerable blades, on my deepest cuts.” Like Castro, this record marches to the beat of its drum, and make no mistake, there are drums a-plenty for the veteran MC to spar with, as only he can. Produced entirely by Milwaukee beat maker Locust, Yaphet is a bouncy, eclectic listen that nods to its influences, without ever looking backward. Castro is joined by a whirlwind of the genre’s finest: billy woods, PremRock, Fatboi Sharif, Brian Ennals, SKECH185, Blueprint, AJ Suede, shemar, ALASKA, Sunmundi, blackchai, & Margel the Sophant.
Sep 11, 2026 (EST) CD LL020cd 617308054637 $6.00 TOTAL Afro-Disco Makossa is the first Linear Labs album built for the dance floor, and Adrian Younge is uniquely qualified to make it. Having already recorded modern Afrobeat classics with Tony Allen and Ebo Taylor through Jazz Is Dead, Younge asks a new question: what would a Ghanaian producer in '76 have made if he set out to create an American disco record for his hometown? The result is a relentless, hypnotic patchwork of Afrobeat, funk, and disco recorded to tape, built for the DJ of any era.
Haruomi Hosono, the pioneering Japanese musician, producer, composer, and founding member of Yellow Magic Orchestra and Happy End, has “found his voice in a late career renaissance," writes The Wire. His five-decade legacy continues to grow and attract new fans, and has been cited by an acclaimed list of artists, including Mac DeMarco, Cameron Winter, Ginger Root, Vampire Weekend, and Harry Styles. Shaped by mid-century American music, Hosono's work now reverberates back through a new generation of Western artists—a remarkable circular exchange.
Yours Sincerely, his 23rd studio album and first collection of new music in over seven years, finds Hosono ever-pushing his exploratory songcraft: “I am now 78 years old, but from here on, I feel a growing curiosity toward the unknown music that my new self will create, while also embracing the music of my former self—as if I now carry two musical worlds within me.” Across arrangements that span tender psych-folk and bubbling avant-pop, Hosono contemplates the concept of a maternal force that envelops the Earth, “humanity’s understanding of the unconditional love possessed by those who give us life,” he says. Songs tap into a collective current, engaging the “deeply buried instincts—maternal compassion and mercy, things we rarely engage with in our daily lives.”
The work represents an artistic and subconscious shift. Several tracks feature female vocalists, such as “Note of Mothership”, a group-chanted expression of childlike wonder, “To a Wild Rose”, which delights with oceanside hums and prose, and on the elegant, marching “Figlio Perdute.” “This was a completely new approach for me,” he adds.
The unofficial title track, “Sincerely”, frames the legend in his signature mode, strumming, singing, playfully pondering the answer to a simple question. How do you express the Japanese ideas of omoiyari (compassion), jihi (慈悲), or boseiai (母性愛) in English? Hosono explains, “I searched, but no word felt quite right. Each came close, yet carried a slightly different nuance…I turned to a more familiar word often used to close a letter: ‘Sincerely.’”
“It is in this spirit that I offer this album to you—sincerely, from the heart.”
Haruomi Hosono, the pioneering Japanese musician, producer, composer, and founding member of Yellow Magic Orchestra and Happy End, has “found his voice in a late career renaissance," writes The Wire. His five-decade legacy continues to grow and attract new fans, and has been cited by an acclaimed list of artists, including Mac DeMarco, Cameron Winter, Ginger Root, Vampire Weekend, and Harry Styles. Shaped by mid-century American music, Hosono's work now reverberates back through a new generation of Western artists—a remarkable circular exchange.
Yours Sincerely, his 23rd studio album and first collection of new music in over seven years, finds Hosono ever-pushing his exploratory songcraft: “I am now 78 years old, but from here on, I feel a growing curiosity toward the unknown music that my new self will create, while also embracing the music of my former self—as if I now carry two musical worlds within me.” Across arrangements that span tender psych-folk and bubbling avant-pop, Hosono contemplates the concept of a maternal force that envelops the Earth, “humanity’s understanding of the unconditional love possessed by those who give us life,” he says. Songs tap into a collective current, engaging the “deeply buried instincts—maternal compassion and mercy, things we rarely engage with in our daily lives.”
The work represents an artistic and subconscious shift. Several tracks feature female vocalists, such as “Note of Mothership”, a group-chanted expression of childlike wonder, “To a Wild Rose”, which delights with oceanside hums and prose, and on the elegant, marching “Figlio Perdute.” “This was a completely new approach for me,” he adds.
The unofficial title track, “Sincerely”, frames the legend in his signature mode, strumming, singing, playfully pondering the answer to a simple question. How do you express the Japanese ideas of omoiyari (compassion), jihi (慈悲), or boseiai (母性愛) in English? Hosono explains, “I searched, but no word felt quite right. Each came close, yet carried a slightly different nuance…I turned to a more familiar word often used to close a letter: ‘Sincerely.’”
“It is in this spirit that I offer this album to you—sincerely, from the heart.”
Spearheaded by songwriter Dylan Young, ‘Massive Shoe’ is Way Dynamic’s third foray into alt-folk pop coloured by his own creative fingerprint. In the past year, Way Dynamic have released their sophomore LP ‘Duck’ to excellent reviews, toured with Waxahatchee and MJ Lenderman & The Wind, and are now already returning with another full length release ‘Massive Shoe’, resuming Young’s exploration into minimalist folk-pop, baroque pop and art rock. Yellow Green Red in their album review for ‘Duck’ aptly describe Way Dynamic as; “Brian Wilson’s lust for pop perfection brought back to earth by Randy Newman’s silliness and Christopher Cross’s knack for an original melody that already feels familiar”. Adding a touch of Neil Young balladry, Massive Shoe continues this formula, as they lyrically dive into topics such as navigating relationships, struggling to communicate, mistakes and humanity, while maintaining a sense of ambiguity that washes over you rather than slaps you in the face. Although Way Dynamic can draw parallels to many of the artists above, the album never falls into songwriting tropes of that era, instead Young manages to bob and weave in the face of any typical motif, keeping the album engaging and lighthearted, and maintaining a sense of adventure in his music. ‘People Settle Down’ sets us off with a groove and backing vocal hooks, before we shift into more tender songs such as ‘Miffed It’ which floats above a guitar melody that may be the earworm of the year. Before you can settle into the tender songs, the album shifts again with absurd pop song ‘My Visit (To Hell)’, lyrically chronicling Dylan’s journey through hell over a bouncy beat and progression. The album title ‘Massive Shoe’, alludes to one always having bigger shoes to fill. Despite Way Dynamic’s brilliant past releases, and the “massive shoe” left to fill after each album, Young consistently manages to outdo himself as he patiently builds a distinctive and impressive discography.
Meditationsでも本当に長い間に渡って愛され続ける驚異の大名盤『Romantic Piano』でお馴染みの Gia Margaret の新作『Singing』がリリース！病によって声を失った経験から2020年リリースの『Mia Gargaret』、前作『Romantic Piano』でアンビエント寄りの作風へ踏み出した彼女が本作では声を取り戻しつつあり、一方で、その静けさと優しさはさらに深まっている。数年間声を出せなかった彼女は、代わりに音で語る方法を磨き、響きの細部と感情の精度を研ぎ澄ませてきた。その感覚は今作にも受け継がれ、ピアノの小さなフレーズや静かなアレンジが驚くほど繊細に響く。楽器、機材、アレンジ、声、ひとつひとつに深い情緒を見出し、信じること。その積み重ねが、音と音のあいだの空気までも音楽として息づかせているよう。透明なピアノの響きと、ささやくような歌声、余白が大きく、全てが控えめでありながら、静けさの中に確かな生命が灯る。Gia Margaret が沈黙の先で見つけた新しい声のかたちが、静かにしかし力強く、聴く者の心に触れてくる。
Space Afrika, the Manchester/Berlin-based duo of Joshua Tarelle Reid and Joshua Inyang, make raw, intensely detailed, visceral music with shades of ambient, trip-hop, techno, and modern classical, drawing spacious urban dubscapes from the contours of their city. 'Quiet Storm', the duo's highly anticipated follow-up to their 2021 LP on Dais Records, expands on its predecessor’s sound and scale in every direction as a sprawling, collaborative vision shaped with profound patience and intention. The leap, both technical and emotional, outlines the duo’s development — two polymath producers, composers, performers, and visual artists who’ve met expectations with mastery, embedding their own coming-of-age story within a moving suite of cathartic abstraction. Songs allude to spirituality and the human condition, the tension between boldness and softness, ambition and the inner demons that persist. Contributors include Axelle Fanyo, Alto Aria, Deuén, Klein, RXKNephew, Tony Njoku, Kiala Ogawa, and Kelly Moran. "We challenged ourselves and our own notions of identity, around class and diaspora, and how that is represented across musical genres. We wanted to show the characteristics of our project through the people we chose to work with," says Reid. "We've stayed true to ourselves. It's music from the heart. It's music that has a particular rawness to it, but we've articulated that in a more modern classic structure, there’s a much more critical pronunciation of techniques," says Inyang. "It's a collaborative record because there is always strength and love in collaboration. But with that, we were able to focus more strongly on our personal identity." Five years feels immense following the release of 'Honest Labour', which was named Resident Advisor’s album of 2021, among other accolades from the likes of Bandcamp, Mixmag, and The Guardian, and cemented Space Afrika as a world-class live act. "These things take time," says Inyang, explaining that with the increased visibility came a certain weight. "It’s taken us down a winding road with extreme positives and also negatives, a kind of responsibility that we've held as artists from the Northwest, with our work expanding globally." Naturally, 'Quiet Storm' responds to the moment with deep consideration. He continues, "There’s no compromise in how we’ve made this album. The idea started as a celebration of Black artistry. Our collaborations have been very intentional, as we discovered the pillars of the story– our journey, which is mirrored in the film, where two young boys have taken a risk by following a belief in their talents." If 'Honest Labour' defined Space Afrika’s industrial-noir frameworks, 'Quiet Storm' takes the contrast up several levels with striking textures and sophisticated arrangements. The album is every bit a multidisciplinary effort, with the duo welcoming contributions from cellists, violinists, guitarists, drummers, and more, often writing and arranging lines to realize the vision in its totality. "We always think about the presentation of the music, and as we're writing, we're thinking about the stages that it's going to be on," says Inyang. Reid adds, "It's been a big nod to have these international collaborations, but there’s a British eccentricity coming through this record. We’re connecting the threads between these disciplines and genres, whether rap or classical. We took time away to revisit and rethink how these worlds have inspired us. We saw it as a cathartic practice, to unshackle oneself and step into the unknown, and there is no limit to the ways you can articulate a message and the vessels that they come through." Speaking to the multidisciplinary nature of the project is the involvement of celebrated artist Glenn Ligon, whose work deals with Black identity and queerness. A central inspiration at the onset of recording, Ligon offered his work 'Figure #30' (2009) for the LP's cover artwork, and following the completion of recording, he agreed to provide the project’s name – an unprecedented gesture from the pioneering artist. When provided with the final audio, Ligon immediately thought of "Quiet Storm," the 1970s radio format known for smooth, late-night programming with themes of life and love. 'Quiet Storm'’s sequence brings the listener through various scenes, interludes, and arcs, marked by a sense that its movement is fluid and its characters are fleeting. Into-the-mirror monologues grapple with the existential and the immediate: survival, autonomy, purpose. The album opens with the explosive, string-backed "Vanity" featuring 2025 Grammy-winning opera singer Axelle Fanyo. At first fixated on the crevices of a quiet room, "Vanity" unfurls under Fanyo’s expressive soprano, traversing a wide emotional spectrum from sublime contemplation to poignant, heart-piercing pain. "Vanity" was the first song from the sessions released to the public, as the song is the central piece to the album's film accompaniment, 'Opera Omnia', directed by Valentin Noujaim. Throughout the record, words spoken and sung are placed sparingly to powerful effect. Vanessa Bedoret's bright vocals on "Crying never had a voice ~" break through the swell of thunderstorms. Tender affirmations from Danish artist Alto Aria lift up "From The Heart of Knowing", as saxophone and cello interplay with Kelly Moran on piano. Rochester, NY rapper RXKNephew declares his deep state reality on the woozy "Ballad For A 'G'" as strings, breath and static are exhaled, with co-production by South London’s Klein. The voice of "Validation" delves into the notion of owning who they are, as disorienting strums and city sounds surround, in conversation with plucks from Greco-Canadian harpist Any. "MLN" gets to the beauty and catharsis at the core of Quiet Storm. It’s a true band effort, a collective slow march featuring British-Nigerian artist Tony Njoku, with guitar and lead bass by Gabriel Evans, London's PIKE on drums, and Copenhagen's GB (Gustav B) on keys and strings. "Someone come and save me from the devil / I’m left outside," sighs Njoku in his processed falsetto as the snare drum snaps. On "Pretty Gospel," the Paris-based Japanese-Congolese artist Kiala Ogawa sings, "In my arms," guiding the listener into a somnambulant trance. The lullabic warmth is a respite from the weather, and world outside– "Another day to dream." The final movement gives 'Quiet Storm' its culminating release. "If This Is Hell" is assembled in a single take as a stream-of-consciousness from NYC’s Kaiuna Odogba aka Deuén, whose relatable array of spiraling brain activity is matched by jazzy, frenetic percussion. The pressure valve opens, as the phased drums and sharp conversational observational dispatched phrases cut abruptly after the line, "I wonder if that’s what heaven’s like?" We are left suspended in the comfort of the album's closer "Regards." Rainfall meets organ, drone, strings, and keys with gun reloads juxtaposed over tranquil hums. Heavy yet hopeful, Joshua Tarelle Reid and Joshua Inyang remind you of their journey so far. An appropriately cryptic and transportive outro for their open-ended opus, 'Quiet Storm' is a landmark level-up, self-produced, self-funded, and manifested out of sheer drive and conviction. Through bent time and low-lit haze, undoubtedly, Space Afrika has arrived.
Space Afrika, the Manchester/Berlin-based duo of Joshua Tarelle Reid and Joshua Inyang, make raw, intensely detailed, visceral music with shades of ambient, trip-hop, techno, and modern classical, drawing spacious urban dubscapes from the contours of their city. 'Quiet Storm', the duo's highly anticipated follow-up to their 2021 LP on Dais Records, expands on its predecessor’s sound and scale in every direction as a sprawling, collaborative vision shaped with profound patience and intention. The leap, both technical and emotional, outlines the duo’s development — two polymath producers, composers, performers, and visual artists who’ve met expectations with mastery, embedding their own coming-of-age story within a moving suite of cathartic abstraction. Songs allude to spirituality and the human condition, the tension between boldness and softness, ambition and the inner demons that persist. Contributors include Axelle Fanyo, Alto Aria, Deuén, Klein, RXKNephew, Tony Njoku, Kiala Ogawa, and Kelly Moran. "We challenged ourselves and our own notions of identity, around class and diaspora, and how that is represented across musical genres. We wanted to show the characteristics of our project through the people we chose to work with," says Reid. "We've stayed true to ourselves. It's music from the heart. It's music that has a particular rawness to it, but we've articulated that in a more modern classic structure, there’s a much more critical pronunciation of techniques," says Inyang. "It's a collaborative record because there is always strength and love in collaboration. But with that, we were able to focus more strongly on our personal identity." Five years feels immense following the release of 'Honest Labour', which was named Resident Advisor’s album of 2021, among other accolades from the likes of Bandcamp, Mixmag, and The Guardian, and cemented Space Afrika as a world-class live act. "These things take time," says Inyang, explaining that with the increased visibility came a certain weight. "It’s taken us down a winding road with extreme positives and also negatives, a kind of responsibility that we've held as artists from the Northwest, with our work expanding globally." Naturally, 'Quiet Storm' responds to the moment with deep consideration. He continues, "There’s no compromise in how we’ve made this album. The idea started as a celebration of Black artistry. Our collaborations have been very intentional, as we discovered the pillars of the story– our journey, which is mirrored in the film, where two young boys have taken a risk by following a belief in their talents." If 'Honest Labour' defined Space Afrika’s industrial-noir frameworks, 'Quiet Storm' takes the contrast up several levels with striking textures and sophisticated arrangements. The album is every bit a multidisciplinary effort, with the duo welcoming contributions from cellists, violinists, guitarists, drummers, and more, often writing and arranging lines to realize the vision in its totality. "We always think about the presentation of the music, and as we're writing, we're thinking about the stages that it's going to be on," says Inyang. Reid adds, "It's been a big nod to have these international collaborations, but there’s a British eccentricity coming through this record. We’re connecting the threads between these disciplines and genres, whether rap or classical. We took time away to revisit and rethink how these worlds have inspired us. We saw it as a cathartic practice, to unshackle oneself and step into the unknown, and there is no limit to the ways you can articulate a message and the vessels that they come through." Speaking to the multidisciplinary nature of the project is the involvement of celebrated artist Glenn Ligon, whose work deals with Black identity and queerness. A central inspiration at the onset of recording, Ligon offered his work 'Figure #30' (2009) for the LP's cover artwork, and following the completion of recording, he agreed to provide the project’s name – an unprecedented gesture from the pioneering artist. When provided with the final audio, Ligon immediately thought of "Quiet Storm," the 1970s radio format known for smooth, late-night programming with themes of life and love. 'Quiet Storm'’s sequence brings the listener through various scenes, interludes, and arcs, marked by a sense that its movement is fluid and its characters are fleeting. Into-the-mirror monologues grapple with the existential and the immediate: survival, autonomy, purpose. The album opens with the explosive, string-backed "Vanity" featuring 2025 Grammy-winning opera singer Axelle Fanyo. At first fixated on the crevices of a quiet room, "Vanity" unfurls under Fanyo’s expressive soprano, traversing a wide emotional spectrum from sublime contemplation to poignant, heart-piercing pain. "Vanity" was the first song from the sessions released to the public, as the song is the central piece to the album's film accompaniment, 'Opera Omnia', directed by Valentin Noujaim. Throughout the record, words spoken and sung are placed sparingly to powerful effect. Vanessa Bedoret's bright vocals on "Crying never had a voice ~" break through the swell of thunderstorms. Tender affirmations from Danish artist Alto Aria lift up "From The Heart of Knowing", as saxophone and cello interplay with Kelly Moran on piano. Rochester, NY rapper RXKNephew declares his deep state reality on the woozy "Ballad For A 'G'" as strings, breath and static are exhaled, with co-production by South London’s Klein. The voice of "Validation" delves into the notion of owning who they are, as disorienting strums and city sounds surround, in conversation with plucks from Greco-Canadian harpist Any. "MLN" gets to the beauty and catharsis at the core of Quiet Storm. It’s a true band effort, a collective slow march featuring British-Nigerian artist Tony Njoku, with guitar and lead bass by Gabriel Evans, London's PIKE on drums, and Copenhagen's GB (Gustav B) on keys and strings. "Someone come and save me from the devil / I’m left outside," sighs Njoku in his processed falsetto as the snare drum snaps. On "Pretty Gospel," the Paris-based Japanese-Congolese artist Kiala Ogawa sings, "In my arms," guiding the listener into a somnambulant trance. The lullabic warmth is a respite from the weather, and world outside– "Another day to dream." The final movement gives 'Quiet Storm' its culminating release. "If This Is Hell" is assembled in a single take as a stream-of-consciousness from NYC’s Kaiuna Odogba aka Deuén, whose relatable array of spiraling brain activity is matched by jazzy, frenetic percussion. The pressure valve opens, as the phased drums and sharp conversational observational dispatched phrases cut abruptly after the line, "I wonder if that’s what heaven’s like?" We are left suspended in the comfort of the album's closer "Regards." Rainfall meets organ, drone, strings, and keys with gun reloads juxtaposed over tranquil hums. Heavy yet hopeful, Joshua Tarelle Reid and Joshua Inyang remind you of their journey so far. An appropriately cryptic and transportive outro for their open-ended opus, 'Quiet Storm' is a landmark level-up, self-produced, self-funded, and manifested out of sheer drive and conviction. Through bent time and low-lit haze, undoubtedly, Space Afrika has arrived.
Catching up with Thee Sinseers ahead of their new Colemine Records release, Love Stories, one thing becomes abundantly clear: this is not an LP that explores a neat and tidy love story. The vision of love put forth on this record is full-spectrum. Think of the seminal 1993 East LA film Blood In Blood Out — three protagonists bound together through hardship, strife, and diverging roads, who ultimately circle back to reckon with why they remain. It's a similar story here. Love Stories isn't interested in the happy ending. It's interested in everything that comes before it, after it, and in spite of it. Of course, none of this is accidental. More than a new record, Love Stories is a portrait of a band that has finally grown into itself — one that knows exactly who it is and isn't shy about saying so. As Quiñones puts it: "It's a solidifying statement of where we are now. This is our style." Bassist Christopher Manjarrez described that confidence as something you can hear: "Everything was just that notch up." In contrast to Sinseerly Yours, which had developed organically from a four-piece into an eleven-member ensemble, Love Stories was built from the ground up as a collective effort — every role established before the band entered the studio. "We went in knowing these are the roles that are gonna be played by these people," Quiñones says. "Everybody was considered wholeheartedly in every arrangement aspect." That collective approach extended into the sonic choices themselves. Every member zoomed out — listening not just to their own parts but to the record as a whole, what Quiñones calls thinking like "a beautiful painting" rather than a collection of individual tracks. With that foundation in place, the band handed the final mix to engineer Kelly Finnigan. "We could get so far with our opinions," Quiñones admits, "but at the end of the day there's still 10 or 11 of us trying to figure out what's right." The band also leaned into earthier instrumentation — standup bass, guitars run through amplifiers for a warmer sixties-adjacent tone — pulling inspiration from wherever it presented itself, even the most unlikely of places. It's that cross-genre thinking that Quiñones sees as the record's defining quality. "It didn't feel like we were making soul music at any point," he says. "It felt like we were making our music." But the sonic ambition of Love Stories only tells half the story. The band sought to capture something more honest than a highlight reel — showcasing the highs and lows of romantic relationships while expanding the frame to include the familial, the complicated, and the unresolved. On "Let's Fall In Love (Again)," Quiñones's protagonist pleads for a second chance before stopping mid-song to acknowledge his own role in the heartbreak — trading wishful fantasy for something far more honest. It's that kind of emotional candor that runs throughout the record. The band's parents appear in the album art, their own love stories folded into the record's visual identity, some of those stories still standing, others not. As Manjarrez puts it: "Every single song title directs you down a different road of love — whether you win or lose." Quiñones wanted listeners to sit with that ambiguity. "Love is never-ending," he says. "It stretches beyond lifetimes. I want people to still be confused — I want it to be left like an open book." To achieve what they're reaching for, every member of Thee Sinseers has had to check their ego at the door — and mean it. "The sense of ego is, in a weird way, non-existent when it comes to recording and writing," Quiñones says. "We're all fans of each other at the end of the day." It's the kind of trust earned on the road, forged through years of shared miles and close quarters — and reflected in a lineup that welcomed new additions seamlessly, including expanded roles for familiar faces and string arrangements from newcomer Skip Heller that push the songs into new territory. That spirit of trust extends to their partnership with Colemine Records, built on patience and creative freedom. "Terry's like a homie," Quiñones says. "He gives us his input but we get a lot of freedom because he trusts us." For a band still actively defining itself on its own terms, that kind of label support isn't just appreciated — it's essential. Yet one thing remains constant throughout: Thee Sinseers' commitment to where they come from. That East LA identity doesn't announce itself — it simply exists, woven into the fabric of the music without being worn as a badge. As Francisco Flores puts it: "We're from here. You can hear it a thousand miles away. You can't deny it — but we don't try to. It just comes out that way." Nowhere is that more apparent than on "Minute by Minute," which Quiñones describes as the album's most neighborhood-feeling moment — a slow dance number that conjures the gymnasiums of Roosevelt and Garfield High, intimate and unhurried, like a memory you didn't know you were making. There's no performance of heartbreak here, just the real thing. Like an unsent love letter finally delivered, Love Stories carries the weight of everything that was felt but never quite said. The universality of that feeling is perhaps best captured in Quiñones's own words: "It's never too late to change. It's never too late to tell a person you love that you love them." After any song on this record, Eric Johnson says, there's really only one appropriate response. "Damn."
TOTAL Allison de Groot is a clawhammer banjo player from Winnipeg, Canada whose work spans old-time, bluegrass, and folk traditions. A recipient of the Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in Banjo and an Americana Music Association Instrumentalist of the Year nominee, she is perhaps best known for her duo with fiddler Tatiana Hargreaves, whose albums Hurricane Clarice and their self-titled debut earned recognition from the IBMA, the Canadian Folk Music Awards, and the JUNOs. Rich Ruth is a Nashville-based multi-instrumentalist (born Michael Ruth) who records for Third Man Records. His solo albums draw from ambient, spiritual jazz, minimalism, and synth-driven post-rock, compositions that begin with looping drones and synthesizers and expand outward through collaboration. He is also a third of Shrunken Elvis, a Nashville trio born from long European drives and winter jam sessions, uniting Ruth with pedal steel guitarist Spencer Cullum and guitarist Sean Thompson in a shared creative space that prizes intuition over ambition. Their well-received self-titled debut arrived in 2025. The two came together when Ruth was set to produce a solo record for de Groot. Over the course of about a year in Ruth's Nashville studio, the project quietly shifted: the two began composing together, and what emerged is shaped as much by space and process as by melody. De Groot's clawhammer banjo moves through looping and delay, set against Ruth's synthesizer arrangements in a way that balances the tactile immediacy of acoustic instruments with the enveloping qualities of electronics. Patrick M'Gonigle contributed violin and string arrangements throughout, while Shrunken Elvis bandmate Spencer Cullum brings his pedal steel to several tracks, adding another layer of atmospheric depth to the record's palette. Shortly after completing the album, the group debuted the material live at Big Ears Festival as one of the event's surprise performances, a stripped, minimalist set that reflected the spirit of the recordings. The album captures two distinct musical voices finding not so much a meeting point as a new, shared language.
1 TOTAL 2 Composer and multi-instrumentalist Koen Holtkamp has spent more than two decades shaping a body of work at the intersection of ambient, experimental, and electroacoustic music. Known for his role in the influential duo Mountains, as well as a solo catalog defined by texture and spatial awareness, Holtkamp has long explored how sound interacts with environment and perception. With Nightlife, he enters a new phase of that inquiry, one shaped as much by physical relocation as artistic evolution. After leaving Brooklyn for the relatively rural setting of New York’s Hudson Valley, Holtkamp found himself immersed in nature and embracing a slower way of life, a shift that directly informed the album’s creation. Rather than rushing into a new project, he allowed the space itself to guide him, focusing on experimentation and play instead of a fixed outcome. Over time, a new instrument emerged from his modular system, built around physical modeling techniques that emulate plucked string sounds. Drawing on a deep affinity for acoustic traditions, from guitar soli to the kora and other chordophones, he began translating those influences into an electronic language, creating music that feels tangible, effusive, and even intimate, despite its synthetic nature. As the pieces took shape, Holtkamp expanded the project into a kind of imagined ensemble. Composed with specific collaborators in mind, the album features extensive contributions from drummer Greg Fox and saxophonist and flutist Matt Bauder, whose performances subtly reshape the material and draw it toward more fluid, song-like forms, alongside a guest appearance from Ben Vida on synth bass. Yet even as Nightlife occasionally resembles a band in motion, its construction resists traditional cohesion. Acoustic and electronic sources coexist to create a hyper-dimensional sense of space, with each element deliberately placed in its own distinct environment, yielding a complex yet inviting setting that feels both otherworldly and completely natural. Much of the album was created during late-night sessions, which became a kind of personal ritual and ultimately inspired its title. Nightlife unfolds as a series of finely detailed environments, where stillness, texture, and subtle interplay take precedence over momentum. Each piece invites close listening while remaining open and unforced, reflecting both a change in pace and a deepening of focus. The result extends Holtkamp’s ongoing interest in how sound can shape, and be shaped by, the spaces we inhabit.
1 TOTAL 2 Composer and multi-instrumentalist Koen Holtkamp has spent more than two decades shaping a body of work at the intersection of ambient, experimental, and electroacoustic music. Known for his role in the influential duo Mountains, as well as a solo catalog defined by texture and spatial awareness, Holtkamp has long explored how sound interacts with environment and perception. With Nightlife, he enters a new phase of that inquiry, one shaped as much by physical relocation as artistic evolution. After leaving Brooklyn for the relatively rural setting of New York’s Hudson Valley, Holtkamp found himself immersed in nature and embracing a slower way of life, a shift that directly informed the album’s creation. Rather than rushing into a new project, he allowed the space itself to guide him, focusing on experimentation and play instead of a fixed outcome. Over time, a new instrument emerged from his modular system, built around physical modeling techniques that emulate plucked string sounds. Drawing on a deep affinity for acoustic traditions, from guitar soli to the kora and other chordophones, he began translating those influences into an electronic language, creating music that feels tangible, effusive, and even intimate, despite its synthetic nature. As the pieces took shape, Holtkamp expanded the project into a kind of imagined ensemble. Composed with specific collaborators in mind, the album features extensive contributions from drummer Greg Fox and saxophonist and flutist Matt Bauder, whose performances subtly reshape the material and draw it toward more fluid, song-like forms, alongside a guest appearance from Ben Vida on synth bass. Yet even as Nightlife occasionally resembles a band in motion, its construction resists traditional cohesion. Acoustic and electronic sources coexist to create a hyper-dimensional sense of space, with each element deliberately placed in its own distinct environment, yielding a complex yet inviting setting that feels both otherworldly and completely natural. Much of the album was created during late-night sessions, which became a kind of personal ritual and ultimately inspired its title. Nightlife unfolds as a series of finely detailed environments, where stillness, texture, and subtle interplay take precedence over momentum. Each piece invites close listening while remaining open and unforced, reflecting both a change in pace and a deepening of focus. The result extends Holtkamp’s ongoing interest in how sound can shape, and be shaped by, the spaces we inhabit.
アルバムについて Kassel Jaeger (aka François J. Bonnet) returns to Shelter Press after Swamps / Things, Shifted in Dreams, and the recent reissue of the classic Zauberberg, co-composed with Akira Rabelais and Stephan Mathieu. With this major new album, entitled Sub Re, Bonnet continues his long exploration of the musical possibilities of sound, extending the concrete approach developed at the Groupe de Recherches Musicales, the historic and essential Parisian studio that Bonnet has been directing since 2018. Sub re, in Latin, can mean “under the thing, under the substance, under the matter.” It's precisely this direct approach to music, drawing on the extraction of raw sound material, that forms the basis of this album. Under the matter thus signals the concrete aspect of music, but not the concrete that is transfigured, becoming vapor and form, the substrate of an idea. Rather, it signals the concrete beneath the concrete, in the immanence of sounds, in their becoming, as a driving force, like a tide, like a vault of imperious and powerful matter. To achieve this, Bonnet draws on a multitude of sound sources (acoustic, electronic, natural or artificial, created on purpose or found by chance) and a multitude of contexts and occasions to give them form. The movement, a shell, a bell, a spell, for example, was heard for the first time during a concert organized in Venice in connection with Latifa Echakhch's contribution to the Swiss Pavilion at the 2022 Art Biennale, while the last movement on the record, signalmirror, concluded a piece presented at the first Sound Biennale in Sion (Switzerland) in 2023. These elements, formed and detached from their original context of appearance, of the places and people who made them possible and listened to them, contribute to a complex layering of climates and sonic worlds and help create a contrasting album, where density and tenuity coexist in a succession of moving waves, sometimes laden with memories, sometimes filled with regrets, always set in motion by their own morphology. Sub Re also refers to a chapter in Victor Hugo's Toilers of the Sea, a key passage in which the main character, faced with a colossal task, finds himself alone in the middle of the sea, beneath a gigantic shipwreck caught in the jaws of an isolated reef, surrounded by water, currents, and winds, alone to face the impossible. It is indeed beneath the surface that actions arise, decisions are made, and intuition guides us.
The Weather Channel is the new instrumental album from Bad Brains bassist Darryl Jenifer. It follows his 2010 solo debut, In Search of Black Judas. The record features a venerable lineup of heavy-hitters from the jazz world, including the likes of John Medeski, Ben Perowsky, Jack DeJohnette, and Karl Berger, among others. The tracklist includes nine new compositions, as well as new interpretations of two Bad Brains classics.
Released in 1971, Maggot Brain stands as the towering masterpiece in Funkadelic’s groundbreaking catalog. Initially misunderstood upon release, the album is now widely regarded as one of the most influential records of all time. Anchored by Eddie Hazel’s otherworldly guitar performance on the legendary title track and featuring enduring favorites like “Can You Get To That,” Maggot Brain redefined the possibilities of funk, rock, and psychedelic music. For this definitive 2026 reissue, the album was mastered directly from analog tape, preserving the raw power, depth, and atmosphere of the original recordings with extraordinary detail. A longtime holy grail for collectors, Maggot Brain receives the fully analog treatment it has long deserved.
Released in 1971, Maggot Brain stands as the towering masterpiece in Funkadelic’s groundbreaking catalog. Initially misunderstood upon release, the album is now widely regarded as one of the most influential records of all time. Anchored by Eddie Hazel’s otherworldly guitar performance on the legendary title track and featuring enduring favorites like “Can You Get To That,” Maggot Brain redefined the possibilities of funk, rock, and psychedelic music. For this definitive 2026 reissue, the album was mastered directly from analog tape, preserving the raw power, depth, and atmosphere of the original recordings with extraordinary detail. A longtime holy grail for collectors, Maggot Brain receives the fully analog treatment it has long deserved.