Folk /
Jesus Hits Like the Atom Bomb: Gospel Quartet Singing in Jefferson County, Alabama
"Jefferson County is the heartland of black American a cappella gospel quartet singing. For more than [a century] black quartets have thrived in Birmingham and Bessemer, and they have provided immeasurable spiritual uplift and musical enjoyment to a large portion of the local population. The tenacious survival of black quartet traditions in Birmingham and Bessemer preserves a cultural and historical continuity that informs and enriches many lives. The older singers share a sense of brotherhood, …
Blood Blood Song
"Blood Blood Song continues East of the Valley Blues’ streak of sublime, future-forward acoustic fantasias. For years, the Toronto-based duo, comprised of brothers Kevin and Patrick Cahill, has excelled at an earthy and pensive brand of instrumental music inspired by notions of folk music as a global, rather than regional, idiom.While the duo’s elegant and unassuming virtuosity easily distinguishes East of the Valley Blues from its contemporaries of would-be Bashos and fledgling Faheys, it is th…
Bury Me In A Corner Of The Yard
Death Is Not The End issue a 14-track tape of vintage and archival Cajun ft. tracks from Segura Brothers, Amede Ardoin, Blind Uncle Gaspard, Sydney Landry & more.
Curse You, Foreign Lands
A 14-track tape pulling together rural Greek demotika recordings from the late 1930s to the mid-1950s. Soaring pentatonic improvisations, odd-metered rhythms, and vocal performances oscillate between heartbreaking laments and ecstatic celebrations.
Yashlik
Maqom Soul, a newly founded Uzbek label dedicated to reviving rare and overlooked music from Central Asia, proudly announces its debut release: a vinyl reissue of the seminal album by the Uyghur vocal-instrumental ensemble Yashlik, originally recorded and released in 1978.
Founded in 1974 as part of the Uyghur Music and Drama Theater in Almaty, Yashlik (which translates from Uyghur as Youth) quickly emerged as a groundbreaking force in the regional music scene. Though born out of a theatrical s…
At the Earl of Old Town
On At the Earl of Old Town, Terry Callier steps out of legend into living presence: a 1967 Chicago club set where his folk‑soul‑jazz blend arrives fully formed, intimate, unadorned, and quietly epochal, just before the world catches up.ì
Gloaming
*250 copies limited edition* Yoal was formed through a long‑distance exchange between Scottish musician Euan Alexander Millar‑McMeeken and Japanese artist Satomimagae, who first connected through a mutual admiration for each other’s work. Their relationship began when Euan invited Satomi to remix a Glacis track for his album Interpretations—a small gesture that opened an unexpected line of communication. What started as a simple artistic request soon grew into an ongoing correspondence, shaped b…
Nexus
Mohammad Reza Mortazavi is known for his groundbreaking work with the tombak and daf, traditional Persian drums that he has radically redefined through new playing techniques and extended vocabulary. Following his acclaimed 2019 release Ritme Jaavdanegi, Nexus marks Mortazavi’s return to Latency with a full-length album recorded entirely in Berlin.
Baur Bentur
Dewa Alit, master of radical Balinese gamelan, returns to Black Truffle with Baur Bentur. Genetic (2020, BT063) introduced international listeners to the magical sound-world of Alit’s Gamelan Salukat, who perform on instruments tuned to a unique scale derived from modified versions of two traditional Balinese scales. The two pieces heard on Chasing the Phantom (2022, BT093) further demonstrated his radical fusion of tradition and experimentation, with passages where unorthodox techniques make th…
Lower / Kronborg Polska
*Handcut mono lathe vinyl, risoprint cover and insert + bag of silence* A reinterpretation of Scandinaviaʼs dark folkdance traditions. The 7” features two recordings of heavily downtuned solo viola only accompanied by the musicians footstomps.
The Old Gods
*323 copies limited edition* "Joseph Allred makes music that manages to feel sacred and at the same time is filled with sweat and muscle that's fully rooted to this physical realm. Uplifting and dare I say, ass kicking. The man can put a stringed instrument through its paces." — John Schoen
"The impetus for this album came while I was sitting in a cave near my house, ruminating on very old things. The title has to do with my own interest in history and rootedness, but it also acknowledges a futi…
Brandstichters & Oplichters
May this raw and vivid poem by ‘Manfred Tragil’ sketch the absurd picture of our European tour with Liam Grant. As Liam went further down the road, we were invited for a two-day residency with Tashi Dorji at ‘Dropa House’ - the new project of Koen Vandenhoudt & Christel Kumpen. This record contains our opening duo-set for the first night of that residency and was recorded live by Koen Vandenhoudt & Yves Demey. All the sounds contained in this record are 100% improvised - with a little help from …
The Voice of the Eagle
“I don’t call a lot of my stuff far out,” Basho explained. “I just call it a different level of feeling. It’s far in, as far as I’m concerned...I spent years on the road singing folk songs that had no meaning. It dawned on me music is supposed to say something. Music is supposed to do something.” This is a Basho vocal album – his singing, which John Fahey described as “strangely compelling”, came straight from the heart and soul with no regard for restraint, phrasing or timing. Thankfully, he wa…
The Gods Laugh
"Cotton may expand folk’s raw emotions into more avant garde territories, but they still feel possessed by a blood-red muscle memory that goes back centuries." - The Quietus
Alison Cotton’s fifth solo album is a mesmerizing weave of haunted atmospherics and avant-folk songcraft. Built around her viola, harmonium, and transportive vocals, the album moves between stark drone passages and more layered arrangements with piano, percussion, and synths. The Gods Laugh is a work of quiet, sublime intens…
New Old Medicine
Tip! Hot on the heals of their spectacular self-titled debut album, The Handover is back with their second long form composition, New Old Medicine. Aly Eissa (oud), Ayman Asfour (violin), and Jonas Cambien (vintage organ/synth) have been cutting their teeth on the international touring circuit for the past two years, landing from town to town in their seductive spaceship to blow people's minds and then dematerialize into the void. An outline for a new piece began to emerge along the route and la…
Hillbilly Erotica
Sir Richard Bishop returns for a new spontaneous six-string meshing of people’s music, recollections and psychic intentions. Are y’all ready for some Hillbilly Erotica?
Himba Hymn - Ghosts Of Namibia's Skeleton Coast
For more than two decades, Sublime Frequencies has stood among the most singular voices in the documentation of music from communities and geographies underserved by the global record industry. Their latest, Himba Hymn: Ghosts Of Namibia's Skeleton Coast, presents recordings made on location with Himba musicians in the Namib desert of northwest Namibia, produced and recorded by Ian Brennan, with photography by Marilena Umuhoza Delli. Issued in a limited edition LP of 500 copies, it joins the imp…
Aman Aman (Greek-Anatolian Laments)
Intensely expressive free-verse vocal laments over sliding violins, hammered santouri, guitar, and oud - the hybrid sounds of the Mediterranean in the early 20th century. “Aman Aman” cry the singers on these recordings, their voices preserved on 78rpm discs cut between 1911-1935. The phrase roughly translates to “mercy,” a call of despair, but also one of joy and admiration. On many of these sides, that full range of emotion is transmitted at once. Some of these artists are legends, others lost …
Bulayo (Guitar Songs From Tanzania, Kenya, Zambia, And DR Congo)
African acoustic guitar masterpieces, expanding on Mississippi’s beloved “African Guitar Box.” In 1979 and 1980, a young British-Kenyan musician named John Low hit the road to learn finger-style guitar from his heroes. He traveled across Kenya, Tanzania, Congo, and Zambia, visiting, and sometimes staying in the homes of, stars like Jean-Bosco Mwenda, Losta Abelo, and Emmanuel Mulemena. He also documented brilliant but previously under-recorded artists like Tanzania’s Francis Kitime and Kenya’s M…
Inzovu Y'Imirindi
In the late 1980s, singer Bizimungu Dieudonne, his wife Agnes Uwimbabazi, and a backing band of family and friends self-released a visionary cassette, featuring stuttering electric guitars, loping bass lines, and call and response vocals. Their combo of 80s studio wizardry rooted in traditional Rwandan praise songs resulted in hypnotic, extended jams unlike anything else released in East Africa at the time. The lyrics praised the beauty of the countryside and the exploits of the ancient gods. On…