★The Roundtable
Black And White
Tip! Existing somewhere between the post-psychedelic period of Soft Machine and the electric funk of Herbie Hancock’s Headhunters, Black And White, the 1976 album from Norway’s Vanessa is without question a formidable beast of a jazz-rock record. A potent brew of sonic experimentation and pulsating off-kilter groove. Taking their name from the genus of Nymphalidae butterfly, Vanessa was founded in 1971 by saxophonist Svend Undseth and pianist Frode Holm, the founder of the Oslo record store turn…
Pyramid Pieces 2: Modern Jazz Australia 1969-1980 (LP)
Following the critical acclaim of the 2020 compilation Pyramid Pieces, The Roundtable return with a second offering of modernist jazz from Australia. Another vital document further examining the nation's jazz scene during the late 1960s and 70s. A fertile period that witnessed the birth of an independent movement and the development of a distinct Australian jazz sound. While continuing to focus on the modal forms explored in Volume 1, this second edition shifts direction slightly, this time also…
Fate Conspires With Destiny To Do Me Dirt
The Fevered Rantings of a Delusional Madman? Or… The Profound Musings of a Stand-Up Tragedian? You decide. Here, reissued for the very first time, are the seminal recordings of Brother Theodore. Theodore was a staple of late-night talk shows like the Late Night With David Letterman show, a denizen of dubious ‘70s exploitation films such as the ‘Jaws’ sex-parody GUMS and the disco-vampire flick Nocturna, onetime Chess Champion of New York City and alleged offspring of Albert Einstein. Whether rav…
Carlton Streets
Composer and saxophonist Brian Brown produced some of the most refined Australian jazz recordings during the 1970s. A versatile musician whose distinct impressionist music melded modern jazz with the outer limits of free experimentation. Considered to be his greatest work was the 1975 concept album Carlton Streets, an ambitious recording that romanticised the sights, sounds and the nostalgia of this once-bohemian Melbourne neighbourhood. Differing from his eco-jazz composition Wildflowers heard …
Invisible Roots
** First LP reissue of rare 1974 Canadian Free Jazz album ** Beyond the striking photography of the cover artwork, a cursory glance at this LP may appear misleading. One could be forgiven in thinking that what they had discovered was of a more obvious British provenance, but on closer inspection the truth is revealed… London in fact refers to London, Canada, an artistic hotbed that famously spawned the highly influential insurgent noise ensemble, ‘The Nihilist Spam Band’. Less celebrated yet equ…
Return To Monster Planet
A sequel to the cult 1975 Australian space rock album Monster Planet. In 2013 The Roundtable curated a dedicated program redocumenting the music of Australia’s legendary space rock band Cybotron. A new generation of electronic music enthusiasts and krautrock fans alike had been introduced or had perhaps been reconnected to the unlikely yet incredible sounds of Australia’s unique brand of ‘kosmische musik’. This archival series included Steve Maxwell Von Braund’s groundbreaking solo album Monster…
Pyramid Pieces : Modal & Eco-Jazz From Australia 1969 1979
Borrowing its title from an infamous Australian jazz composition, Pyramid Pieces is a long overdue compilation which documents a period of Australian modern jazz that flourished during the late 1960s and 70s. A brief yet vital survey which examines an isolated yet thriving vibrant scene that was largely unheard outside of its own country. Whilst many local musicians found success abroad in the UK or the USA, those that remained found limited support for jazz from the commercially-minded mainstre…
Psycorama
If conceivable, imagine a collaboration between Brian Eno and Aphex Twin, both in their ambient periods, recording stock music for an Italian Library music label. If so, then behold Psycorama!, a collection of experimental music used to soundtrack a series of films and documentaries produced by the Italian filmmaker Roberto Rossellini.Composed by Mario Nascimbene, a name synonymous with the golden age of Italian film music, a composer whose grandiose scores of the 1950s and 60s defined the very …
Sea of Fantasy
Scored by the legendary Italian film composer Armando Sciascia, Sea Fantasy is a conceptual suite of twelve exotic themes evoking the many moods and dramas of life under the sea. Recorded in 1972 for Sciascia’s own Vedette label, the album is a key recording within the micro-genre of Italian underwater library music. A mosaic of evocative modern classical, flamenco textures and a surge of raw analogue synthesizers.Mysterious aquatic music that sits comfortably alongside other Italian Soundtrack …
Next Of Kin
Praised by Quentin Tarantino as one of the greatest films from Australian New Wave cinema, Next Of Kin (1982) was a highly stylised psychological thriller in the bloody tradition of European art-Horror. Scored by none other than ex-Tangerine Dream/Ash Ra Tempel drummer and German electronic music pioneer Klaus Schulze, the music featured in the film was a unique hybrid of pulsing Giallo-moods and hypnotic Berlin-School electronica. Due to the limited availability of the film over the years, rumo…
Cutheart
**Incredible pioneering recording of extended synthesiser and percussion technique from the Australian experimental underground. Edition of 500** Welcome to the strange musical world of Tolley & Dara, an experimental duo whose incredible music held a marginal yet vital position on the fringe of the Australian music industry during the late 1970s and early 1980s. Consisting of jazz bassist and synthesist David Tolley and percussionist Dure Dara, their union was a relationship of romance and inten…
Planetarium
Post-Nuclear Mind Music? Lizard Strategies? Void Spirit...? These bizarre titles are just a few of the self-coined terms that Australian electronic musician Ian MacFarlane has conjured to represent his eccentric sonic world. An artist whose unique style of electronic experimentalism has balanced dangerously close to the edge of popular convention, existing outside the mainstream and extending well beyond the fringe of any sanctioned independent scene. A futurist outsider whose extraordina…
Tuscan Castle and Country Seat
Perhaps the most bizarre artefact to emerge from the phenomenal world of Italian Library music. Originally scored for a 1978 RAI television documentary, the album titled Tuscan castle and country seat conforms to nothing you know or understand about library music. Studying composition under maestro A.R Luciani, the young Teisco composed innovative home studio recordings that parallel the outsider technique of French soundtrack composer Francois De Roubaix. With little resemblance to the standard…
Electronic Dance (From The Walkabout Soundtrack)
Accompanying the premiere release of the lost soundtrack to the 1971 film Walkabout, The Roundtable offer a further lost piece of music associated with Nicolas Roeg’s seminal New Wave masterpiece. In addition to John Barry’s spellbinding original score, several pieces of popular music can be heard throughout the film transmitting from a portable radio, an obvious symbol of western civilization as the protagonists wander disorientated in the ancient tribal Australian wilderness. Here we have docu…
To Allen Ginsberg
Regarded as the link between Italian acid folk, Library music and Krautrock, Living Music was a collective of Italian Musicians, artists and poets active in the counterculture and student movement of Rome in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Taking their name and concept from the New York experimental theatre group ‘Living Theatre’ husband and wife duo Umberto Santucci (jazz critic, graphic designer (Brainticket) and photographer, library composer) and Gianfranca Montedoro (Jazz and rock singer, m…