★We Are Busy Bodies
The Bull And The Lion
Bringing together Johannesburg’s two saxophone titans for a supergroup recording project was a visionary move by Jo’Burg Records in 1976. Following the success of Makhalemele’s debut The Peacemaker and Mankunku’s long-awaited sophomore release Alex E…
How To Unravel
How To Unravel is about how we might fall apart, and how we find the ways to come back together again. The first half follows all of the paths that lead in circles, the tangled yarn that never finds the end. But it holds on. It’s stronger than you th…
Universal Synthesizer Interface Volume Two
In 2019, Vancouver artist Kristen Roos came across a floppy disk for sale on eBay containing the Commodore Amiga version of Laurie Spiegel's 'Music Mouse'. This was one of the first intelligent instruments for personal computers, created by Spiegel i…
Synthetic - A Synth Odyssey: Season 2
On Synthetic: Season 2, Halifax pop artist and composer Rich Aucoin continues his journey through the history of synthesizers. The second entry in his quadruple LP series once again features an armada of the world’s most rare, historic, and highly so…
Astral Plains
Peace Flag Ensemble are a free jazz collective from Saskatchewan. Their sophomore LP, Astral Plains, arrives July 18 via We Are Busy Bodies.
Find Yourself Lost
Michael Scott Dawson is a Canadian producer and sound artist. Anchored by frayed melodies, tape loops, and pastoral field recordings he has crafted a body of tender and nostalgic ambient work.
Elegua
Latin music, with all its spirit, all its intensity, and all its magic, expresses itself in the decade of the seventies as a cultural revelation. Europe recognizes, listens, and dances to our music, the United States jumps to the sound of it. Latin A…
Plays Horace Silver
The music of Horace Silver is magically presented here by drummer Hideo Shiraki – grooving nicely in the same exotic approach to soul jazz you'd find on Silver's best Blue Note sides of the late 50s! Shiraki's always had a bit of a Jazz Messengers ap…
Deeper In Black
Deeper in Black was inspired by the 1969 Blue Note recording of American trumpeter Blue Mitchell entitled Collision in Black and took its name from Pillay’s cover of the album’s Peggy Grayson composition. Pillay’s album featured another two compositi…
Thrust Too
Thrust barely made a blip in the marketplace; it was mostly available around the Akron area. But Niles was undeterred. He returned the following year with the just-as-good Thrust Too, which is a touch more muscular, more precise — partly due to being…
Plum And Cherry
Following the April 2022 reissue of the album Shrimp Boats, We Are Busy Bodies presents companion titles Plum and Cherry and Deeper in Black to round out a Lionel Pillay and Basil Mannenberg Coetzee “trilogy” as part of the label’s As-Shams South Afr…
Synthetic - A Synth Odyssey: Season 1
Rich Aucoin is announcing his next album entitled Synthetic. The record is a rare Quadruple Album with its 4 seasons/LPs being staggered in 6 month intervals over the next 2 years. The album, which began at The National Music Centre in Calgary, Alber…
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 s…
Espejismo
We Are Busy Bodies announces the reissue of the rare and sought-after 1973 Venezuelan jazz album Espejismo ('Mirage') by Virgilio Armas Y Su Grupo, offering a fascinating snapshot of the thriving music scene in early 1970's Caracas, until now largely…
Like A Child
We Are Busy Bodies reissues Sadayasu Fujii Trio's 1977 album, Like A Child. Led by pianist, Sadayasu Fujii, the album includes jazz standards "A Sleepin' Bee" and "If I Should Lose You", along with original compositions.
Music For Listening
*In process of stocking* Music For Listening, the sophomore album by Michael Scott Dawson. The album is comprised of twelve ambient works for guitar. It follows his 2020 debut Nowhere, Middle Of which was built around generative synths. Not wanting t…
Ubok Aka Inua
*In process of stocking* Originally released in 1976, Ubok Aka Inua is the fifth album by legendary Nigerian saxophonist and band leader, Etubom Rex Williams. The album features Psychedelic Shoes and One Woman Is Enough Trouble, both heard on countle…
Funky Africa
*In process of stocking* We Are Busy Bodies is proud to present a reissue of composer, guitarist, and later producer, Almon Memela’s ultra rare 1975 album, Funky Africa. From the original liner notes: 'Africa has always been many things to many peopl…
Deeper Roots
*In process of stocking* Second, and long out of print album by South Africa's Roots. Remastered from original audio tapes. Artwork completely restored by Steve Lewin.
Shrimp Boats
Assembling unreleased recordings from 1979 and 1980, Shrimp Boats is a South African jazz archival compilation from 1987 built around its epic side-long title track featuring saxophonist Basil "Mannenberg" Coetzee. The recording was made during piani…