This is the end — the final recording from arguably the greatest of genre-busting bands. A celebration, not only of Shakti‘s 50th anniversary tour in 2023 but of an entire career — one that began in 1973, when John McLaughlin and Ustad Zakir Hussain first jammed in New York’s Greenwich Village. By embracing Indian Carnatic and Hindustani traditions — fused with McLaughlin’s jazz DNA — Shakti broke down musical boundaries, and by extension, cultural and social boundaries as well.
Cherry-picked from multiple shows, these six tracks are also a tribute to tabla maestro Hussain, who passed away in December 2024. Shakti had survived loss before, when ‘Mandolin’ U. Shrinivas died prematurely in 2014, but Hussain and McLaughlin were the heart and soul…
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The debut album from Later Youth – the new solo project of The Travelling Band’s Jo Dudderidge – feels like paging through a diary written at 2 a.m. – those moments between collapse and clarity. Living History is a richly textured collection that brims with vulnerability, self-destruction and sonic wanderlust. It’s not an easy album to pin down stylistically, and that’s part of its charm.
Across eleven tracks, Dudderidge weaves an eclectic soundscape that ranges from the dreamy pulses of ‘Enabler’ – a highlight of the album – to the acoustic warmth of ‘The Lurker’, through to more traditionally rooted fare like ‘On the Missing’, which leans closest into Americana territory. There’s an openness here – emotional and musical – that gives the album its staying power.
This second album from the Belgian violinist and composer introduces haunted shreds of voice. Unlike her more cerebral debut Picture a Frame, Chronotopia threads soft wordless lullabies among the plucking, gliding, thumping improvised string tones. It plays with time, as the title suggests, but also with memory and perception.
This is subtle, unobtrusive music, coming at you out of dead quiet and forcing you to lean in to catch it. The cascading violin notes of “Off Day On” swirl vertiginously but lightly; you might imagine that a mad, frantic orchestra plays several rooms away.
Drones build up like storm clouds in these looming, brooding pieces. “Night Bites” emerges out of a sustained hum of overtones, a sound that vibrates with inchoate possibility.
Close your eyes. Imagine the dawning of the earth: the sun rising slowly through a soft mist, spreading warmth, light and hope across an undulating landscape of jagged mountains, lush foliage, free-flowing rivers… Then conjure a soundtrack. The morning ragas of Indian classical music, perhaps. Or indeed, Nilam, the second album by celebrated New York City-born, South India-raised singer, experimentalist and multi-instrumentalist ganavya, the owner of a voice so profound, so intimate and spiritual, that it seems double as a reminder of why we are here.
Technically speaking (although to do so is to detract from the beauty), ganavya’s melodic manoeuvres are to be marvelled at. The inclusion of the ancient, formerly extinct Tamil harp,…
The album was originally recorded in 1979 with sessions taking place for an intended follow up album by Bill’s recently formed group Red Noise. However, EMI Records, Bill’s then record label, declined to release the recordings and the material remained unreleased. Four recordings appeared as the ‘Do You Dream in Colour’ EP on his Cocteau label in 1980. The following year Bill licensed the original stereo mixes of the album to Mercury Records who issued the album in the Spring of 1981. A ground-breaking record, Quit Dreaming and Get On the Beam reached a peak of number seven on the UK charts and is to date Bill’s most commercially successful album.
This limited and expanded edition boxed set features a newly remastered version of…
You Got Me Hooked! is the latest instalment in Ace Records’ ongoing survey of British girl singers of the 1960s. Recent volumes in the series focused on the catalogues of Decca (Don’t Blow Your Cool!), Pye (She Wants You!) and Philips/ Fontana/ Mercury (Live It Up!). This new edition comprises a cherry-picked collection of cool she-pop from the EMI family of labels: Parlophone, Columbia and HMV. Most of the tracks were recorded at Abbey Road, a short tube ride from EMI HQ in Marylebone, hence the “Marylebone Beat Girls” subtitle.
Of the 26 tracks, a generous half are new to CD. These include ‘Too Late to Say You’re Sorry’ by the aptly named Soulmates featuring lead vocals by Liza Strike, which garnered a USA cover by Darlene Love, no less; Friday Browne’s fabulous…
Producer, multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and PC Music founder A.G. Cook shatters the boundaries between mainstream pop and experimental electronic music. In the process, he has shaped the look and sound of the 2010s and 2020s. With the PC Music label and collective, he embraced the growing role of technology in music-making, as well as the personalities of the people using that technology.
A. G. Cook’s 7D is a collection of seven demos from his 2018-2020 period, released via PC Music Bandcamp. These demos are specifically from the era of his debut album, “7G”, and were previously unreleased. The tracks were mixed and mastered using the same equipment as the original “7G” album. The artwork for “7D” was created…
Music collectors have the chance to rediscover a lost gem from the golden age of psychedelic rock. Released exclusively for Record Store Day 2025, this Half-Speed Mastered Edition offers the ultimate listening experience of the Texan band’s legendary 1967 debut—and only—album.
Originally pressed by the International Artists label, Power Plant has gained mythic status among fans of the genre, often fetching up to $2,000 for an original pressing. But this exclusive reissue surpasses even the most sought-after versions, delivering a superlative experience that uncovers astonishing stereo details never before heard. Recorded at the height of the Texas psych-rock explosion, Power Plant stands as the only album on the International Artists label…
This is FB’s second album after Old Codes, New Chaos and for me, it is one of the most beautifully crafted albums I have ever experienced. From the very start the sounds cocoon you in their warmth and take you on a journey. Jazzy cords reverberate and repeat creating a slow trance-like effect as soothing “dubby” basslines perfectly complemented by ingenius percussion drive the tunes along. The late great Bill Hicks’s tirade against the advertising world is used to great effect in the middle of the album just before Fila Brazilia kick in with a folk-trance barnstormer. Starsky and Hutch era pure funk pumps up in later tunes, bubbling beneath the surface of exotica. Don’t expect anything fast, hard or intricate-just look forward to the fact that their brilliance lies in an uncomplicated…
Of all the early Van Halen records, Fair Warning often gets overlooked — partially because it’s a dark, strange beast, partially because it lacks any song as purely fun as the hits from the first three records. Because of that, there were no hits from Fair Warning that turned into radio anthems; only “Unchained” and, to a lesser extent, the grinding opener, “Mean Street,” rank among the group’s best-known songs, and they’re not as monumental as “And the Cradle Will Rock,” from the preceding album, Women and Children First. There’s a reason for that: this album ain’t a whole lotta fun. Fair Warning is the first Van Halen album that doesn’t feel like a party. This may be a reflection of the band’s relentless work schedule, it may be a reflection of the increasing…
The American percussionist, composer, and songwriter David Van Tieghem (b. 1955) is something like a musical equivalent to astronomy’s “hypothetical astronomical object”: while evidence of an irresistible gravitational pull can be felt in deep reaches of the cosmos, its source is enshrouded in darkness, revealing glimpses of celestial power to astute observers.
For David Van Tieghem, these observers include a dizzyingly impressive cast of landmark musicians with whom he has composed and performed. David Byrne, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Arthur Russell, Laurie Anderson, Steve Reich, Robert Fripp, Brian Eno, Debbie Harry are just a few from an exhaustive (and ongoing) list. He has also composed music for Pulitzer and Tony-winning dance…
…remastered by Kevin Gray from original analog masters recorded by Rudy Van Gelder.
On View at the Five Spot Café: The Complete Masters collects the original 1960 album, recorded in New York City with a killer quintet line-up, along with nine additional tracks from the same club dates – six of which are being released for the first time. Burrell, a classically-trained guitarist who’d logged time with giants like Dizzy Gillespie (his first professional gig), Oscar Peterson, Billie Holiday and Tony Bennett, made his debut as a bandleader on Blue Note’s 1956 release Introducing Kenny Burrell. He’d cut two more LPs for the label by the start of the decade and several more for Prestige, but Blue Note was behind his first live recording as a bandleader. Working with hard bop…
…Samantha e Adrian is more than just an album — it is the story of a profound artistic connection between Brazilian actress/singer Samantha Schmütz and American composer Adrian Younge.
This record is the intersection where Rio and Los Angeles merge into a lush, cinematic, and deeply personal experience created by two musical soulmates.
Produced and recorded at Younge’s Linear Labs, an all-analog studio, Samantha & Adrian is a grand, orchestral, and soulful record. It’s a bridge between Brazil’s MPB tradition and the elegance of 1970s LA soul. With sweeping string arrangements, rich harmonies, and undeniable grooves, the album conjures the feeling of a lost classic—music that takes the listener back to a ’70s…
Double bassist Caimin Gilmore has featured on over forty recordings, but this is his debut release under his own name.
As a member of Crash Ensemble, he’s been an integral part of a series of splendid albums, and on this record he is joined by Crash Ensemble director and cellist Kate Ellis, whom we’ve covered in multiple projects, stretching all the way back to Fovea Hex. Gilmore also plays the Yamaha DX-7, the classic keyboard with a timeless sound.
…The phrase genre-fluid appears multiple times in the liner notes, and the reference is apt. While we’ve assigned an overall category, certain segments of Gilmore’s set could fit comfortably in three others. The Irish performer accumulates energy as he experiments, allowing…
Reliquary proposes the idea of an album as a “living archive,” both tomb and shrine: a sonic snapshot of the artist when the final masters are created. In the old days, months or even years might pass between recording and distribution; in the new era, both can occur the same day.
Reid Willis‘ advantage is that his music is genre fluid. As a pianist, he uses the form of modern composition to write electronic tracks, which lends them a certain gravitas. His work is a perfect match for Max Cooper’s Mesh imprint, which is always eager to experiment.
The album itself is friendly, beginning with its first word: “Welcome.” Drones establish a base pattern before receding to ambience, from which electronic patterns emerge. This all happens…
Sophia Djebel Rose first started singing in her early twenties while she was living in Lyon studying philosophy. A night of impromptu singing under a bridge with strangers coaxed the performer out of her, while a move to the bucolic pastures and volcanic mountains of Auvergne soon inspired the songwriter in her. Her second solo album Sécheresse, meaning ‘drought’ in French, is an accomplished and often moving avant-folk album that rummages in the soil of France in search of clues from lost generations.
Perhaps most extraordinary is her version of the traditional folk song ‘La blanche biche’ (‘the white doe’) a haunting and unsettling tale with its origins in medieval Brittany, with themes of transmutation, sibling abuse and cannibalism.
Chris Staples has always possessed a knack for finding profundity in the mundane, but his latest offering, Don’t Worry, elevates this skill to new heights. Settled into the stillness of Richmond, VA, Staples transmutes domestic tranquillity into a sprawling yet intimate landscape, a reflection born from a rare opportunity for deeper introspection.
The ten-track collection, recorded and produced in a small studio behind his house in Richmond. Bringing in friends from across state lines like Kyle Crane (on drums), Alan Parker (whose pedal steel holds us close across several of the record’s songs), Daniel Walker (providing piano, most notably for the record’s clearest moment of autobiography in “Talk About Your Day”), and Kylie Dailey (whose harmony on the title track reminds…
This is the second album from the Australian-based duo Minor Gold (Australian Dan Parsons and Canadian Tracy McNeil), the pair originally bonding in McNeil’s band, Tracy McNeil & The Good Life, before setting out on their new venture. Their first self-recorded album was well received. For Way to the Sun, the pair travelled to California and recruited drummer Austin Beede and, more importantly, the talents of Dan Horne, who produced the album and played bass and pedal steel. Horne has a fine pedigree, with acts such as Beechwood Sparks, Cass McCombs, and Mapache under his belt, and he lifts the album some degrees higher than on their debut.
The PR blurb mentions “sun-dappled folk rock”, and that’s not too far from the truth.