Jazz /
Bronca Buenos Aires
Essential jazz from Argentina, originally released in 1971. Bronca Buenos Aires is one of the highlights in the career of Jorge López Ruiz, alongside El Grito and the much-acclaimed Viejas Raíces project. The album is jazz poem by López Ruiz to the city he loved, not just for its virtues but also its faults, and the recording was an ambitious project that gathered many of the prominent jazz musicians of Buenos Aires.
However, due to the repressive political context of the time, Bronca Buenos Air…
Assagai
South-african jazz-rock worshippers alert ! Assagai was an Afro-rock band, active in the early 1970s in London, whose relatively short career produced two albums recorded in 1971. It has been described as "the second best-known African group of the late 60s/early 70s in Britain" after Osibisa. The original band consisted of five members, three from South Africa and two from Nigeria: drummer Louis Moholo, trumpeter/flautist Mongezi Feza, alto saxophonist Dudu Pukwana, tenor saxophonist Bizo Mngqi…
Soft Winds: The Swinging Harp of Dorothy Ashby
2025 Repress. Dorothy Ashby album from 1961 that also features female vibes player Terry Pollard. Comes with a version of The Skatalites 'Guns of Navarone' which is a pretty surreal listening experience. From the original liner notes: "Dorothy Ashby may not be the first jazz harpist (Caspar Reardon) or the first female jazz harpist (Adele Girard), but her good feeling for time and ability to construct melodic, guitar-like lines, mark her as the most accomplished modern jazz harpist (...) Accompa…
Waltz For Debby
The inventive jazz pianist and noted Miles Davis collaborator Bill Evans made lasting impact from the mid-1950s. After a New Jersey childhood disrupted by his father’s alcoholism, Evans obtained a scholarship to study composition in Louisiana. Arrivinging in New York in the '50s, he began working with composer and multi-instrumentalist George Russell, releasing his debut solo album, New Jazz Conceptions, in 1956. Evans' true breakthrough came through his membership of Miles Davis' sextet, where …
The Odysseus Suite
Those already familiar with the classic 1970 Lansdowne Recordings album Greek Variations & Other Aegean Exercises by Neil Ardley, Don Rendell and Ian Carr will immediately recognise the four compositions on this EP from the closing segment of that collection. The versions included here however, are taken from a separate session recorded around the same time and reveal that Rendell had a grander vision for them than simply to round off a collaborative album.
Not only are the tracks here nearly 20…
Idrissa's Dream
Strut continues their work from the archives of Idris Ackamoor and The Pyramids with a first ever vinyl release of Ackamoor’s debut avant-garde / Afro-jazz recordings from 1971 with The Collective, based out of Yellow Springs, Ohio. The group was formed after Ackamoor had returned to Antioch from a spell in L.A. under the wing of influential saxophonist Charles Tyler. Pianist Lester Knibbs had been appointed to the Antioch college music department as an assistant professor and had followed a sim…
Living Sky
Limited Edition Gatefold Double Vinyl (includes two artprints of Sun Ra and Marshall Allen by Damon Locks, on special gilded 300 gr paper by Black Monument Ensemble’s Damon Locks, 180 gr 2LP in black, obi strip, special cut vinyl sleeves, gatefold jacket, double sided insert sheet, gold foil stamped cover art.) For more than two decades, the disciple that has most visibly carried on Sun Ra Arkestra’s legacy and sound is their musical director, alto saxophonist Marshall Allen, the iconic fire br…
Aomawa: The 1970s Recordings (4LP Box)
4x CD Box set in printed fold-over CD case release from Strut Records. With a 32-page b&W info booklet featuring extended interviews with The Pyramids by Francis Gooding and a host of unseen photos. A brand new 4CD box set bringing together the incredible 1970s recordings of Afrofuturism pioneers The Pyramids, led by saxophonist Idris Ackamoor. The set features the remastered LPs Lalibela, King Of Kings and Birth / Speed / Merging alongside the first ever vinyl issue of their live session for K…
The Steps That Resonate
Uniquely orchestrated with all three members bringing a trove of objects & percussion, the trio of Martin Küchen on saxophones, Agustí Fernández on piano and Zlatko Kaučič on drums are heard in this two-part live concert at BUMF festival in Smartno, Slovenia, for a superb example of intent listening and use of space around confident, stunningly creative & virtuosic playing.
Live @ VisionFest. 20
Dedicated to the memory of reed & wind players Perry Robinson and Mark Whitecage, both of whom have passed since they took part in this tremendous 2015 live recording recorded at the 20th VisionFest in NYC, in a quartet with bassist Ken Filiano and drummer Lou Grassi for three collective free jazz, particularly the extended first improvisation dedicated to late trumpeter Roy Campbell.
Existential Moments
The 3rd album from the touring trio of Joe McPhee on trumpet & tenor sax, John Edwards on double bass and Klaus Kugel on drums, following their previous NotTwo releases A Night In Alchemia and Journey To Parazzar, here captured live at FreeJazzSaar 2019, in Saarbrucken, Germany for a boisterously exciting set of three collective improvisations, including a tip of the hat to Charles Gayle.
Renual
Not Two presents the latest recording by The Nu Band: Thomas Heberer - trumpet, Kenny Wessel - guitar, Joe Fonda - bass, Lou Grassi - drums & percussion. May 16, 2022, at Tedesco Studios, Paramus, NJ
Plays Standards
** 2LP exclusive 25th Anniversary release ** Finally this day has come - Not Two Records together with Wschodnie Triady and No Earplugs proudly present you special edition of Ground Zero Plays Standards 2-LPs exclusive 25th Anniversary release!
Legendary Ground Zero Plays Standards has been released in 1997 for Nani Records, then reissued for DIW (2000) and ReR (2002). So far it has only been released on CD, until this day. Vinyl edition is available now in limited copies. The vinyl master was …
Voices of Bishara
The title of Tom Skinner’s first release under his own name is a reference to cellist Abdul Wadud’s ultra-rare 1978 solo album ‘By Myself’, which Skinner listened to repeatedly during lockdown. Wadud’s album was privately pressed on his own label, Bisharra, and whilst Skinner’s title uses the more conventional spelling of this common Arabic name, they both have the same intention or meaning: it translates as ‘good news’, or ‘the bringer of good news’. This is a classic-sounding record that conne…
An Offering
Flowing water is an essential element of Earthly existence, a living force, a process of nature, a path-making which combines infinite sources mixing imperceptibly into a singular energy. It’s also a potent metaphor. A childlike wonder at flowing water’s presence and power, all the impressions it makes and creative neurons that it fires, happens to be a personality trait shared by Evan Shornstein (aka Photay) and Carlos Niño. The two producers/musical connectors may have grown up and reside a co…
Atalaya
*Limited edition of 555 copies.* Atalaya is new work by bassist Dezron Douglas, and it is alive. That is, ‘alive’ in all the ways that jazz is at its best – as a pure and personal expression of Black Music channeled through time-honored traditions by a group of musicians who practice sonic coherence through musical unity. As Dezron puts it in the opening statement of his liner notes for the album: “Mysticism, Magic, Faith, Love, Power, Discernment! These are words that embody the creative proces…
Next Time Could Be Your Last Time
Gondwana Records present ‘Next Time Could Be Your Last Time’ – the debut album by Forgiveness, AKA Jack Wyllie, JQ and Richard Pike. Described as “not really jazz, not really new age, not really ambient or electronica”, instead they welcome you into a synaesthesia-inducing technicolour fantasy, full of wondrous emotive beauty. This genesis began with the sharing of music, burgeoning friendships, and the mutually-inspirational benefit of the collective power of a group dynamic, with each spurring…
First Fire • At Dawn (Tape)
100 copies on Yellow cassette shell. John kolodij - guitar, banjo, etc, anna rg - fiddle, sarah hennies - percussion
Mastered by Stephan MathieuArtwork by Myste FrenchLayout by Tiny Little Hammers
The Little Bird (Tape)
First pressing of 200 on gold foil cassette shells. Tracks A1-B5 recorded July 5th & 6th, 2003 at The Black Eye by Jeff Ottenbacher, and mixed at Funsize Studio by Jeff Ottenbacher. Track B6 is a live improvisation by Vernacular & Black Ox Orkestar at the Grog Shop in Cleveland Heights, Ohio, in the Fall of 2004. J-card text: Thanks to Ed Sotelo, Jason Schafer, Cynthia Piper, Clinton Holley, and Jeff Ottenbacher. Extra special thanks to Amiri Baraka (rest in power), the members of Black Ox Orkes…
De Repente
In 1970, the Virgilio Armas Trio released De Repente on the tiny Discos A&B label, very likely a one-off, self-financed project. Virgilio Armas recalls: “The nightlife in Caracas of the 1950’s and 1960’s inspired me to record an album in 1970, with songs influenced by the Jazz, Bossa and Latin genres. De Repente was created with my beloved Piano, and my long-time musical partners Rodolfo Buenaño (bass) and Guillermo Tariba (drums).”
The style is very much influenced by the harder post-Bossa Nova…