New Arrivals
Speleocombo Speelt VU
**200 copies** Speleocombo was a casual collective of Dutch art students that convened in the Antwerp Academy in the late ’80s. The core of this group consisted of Hewald Jongenelis and Egbert Aerts, sporadically joined by Fons Debaedts and several others, all of whom are still active in the fields of painting and drawing. During their time in Antwerp they hosted a show on Radio Centraal, Het Universeel Programma, and released several scarcely distributed cassettes and one single. This single’s …
Wont to Wanton Eyebath / Synapse Fusion Refusal
**200 copies** This took forever but here it finally is: after a few failed pressings, a broken back, lost contact, etc.; we are truly sorry we made all you Noor fans wait! Noor, or Nour Mobarak is a Lebanese-American immigrant. Her body acts as a synecdoche for a modern geopolitical condition, one which has experienced compounded war, negotiation, treaties, trauma, and clashing cultural values, and which now must synthesise this experience to heal. Her hybrid cultural identity translates itself…
Fuzzy Hair Electronics Vol. 1
**250 copies** W. Ravenveer – Erwin Van Looveren – has been a friend for over 20 years. Erwin is a magnet and connoisseur of strange and obscure music, and prone to nervous sweating should you mention a band or weirdo he doesn’t know. His early guitar gigs (as Schidzoid) are the stuff of legend, a reputation largely based on altercations with members of the audience. Having thumped everyone in sight, Erwin’s focus shifted to buying and mastering synthesizers with his customary zeal. After self-p…
Pymp World
**250 copies** Frank Hurricane’s legend is such that many have heard his name years before hearing his music. Hurricane Frank, if you will, is the kind of character that can spin an audience into a psychedelic vortex that will have you yelping HOLY PYMP BREW repeatedly as you zigzag your way back home. His music possesses a nagging quality: a dizzying mix of scruffy rap, Casio tones and raw dictaphone poetry that sounds like it always existed in that quattro formaggi part of your mind. Originall…
Meeting of Waters
** 300 copies ** Back in 2017 the unassuming Los Angeles-based multi-instrumentalist and producer Josiah Steinbrick released his first collection of solo pieces and we’ve been listening to it compulsively since then. Given that its initial release was only in North America, both on cassette with Leaving Records and in an extremely limited vinyl self-release via Banana Editions, we felt that this meticulously crafted, essential work righteously deserved to get a proper spin in Europe too! "Meetin…
How Deep Is Our Love?
** 525 copies ** Paul Régimbeau, aka Mondkopf, joins the Hands in the Dark ranks with a new album, "How Deep Is Our Love?". For more than a decade now the prolific Parisian producer hasn’t ceased to surprise us with his compositions, constantly treading new ground with artistic bravery and curiosity. At times extreme, at other times méditative and always complex, his music is never easy-access. In recent years his work has taken a clear turn towards a more ambient, intimate, less abrasive style.…
Hikima: Creativity
**800 copies** Key System Recordings present a reissue of Yusef Lateef's "Hikima: Creativity", originally released in 1983. In the early 1980s, famed jazz saxophonist and musical luminary Yusef Lateef traveled to Nigeria as a Senior Research Fellow to study, write, and teach at Ahmadu Bello University. He cut this record while there; pressed locally in Nigeria, it remained virtually unknown by jazz fans and collectors for over 30 years. On Hikima, Lateef leads a nonet of African musicians in sev…
Antipodean Anomalies
For musicians inhabiting the Antipodean countries of Australia and New Zealand during the 70’s and 80’s, it was a geographically and culturally isolating environment. Boutique shops, community radio and mail order exchanges championed independent and contemporary music from across the globe. It was, however, this isolation that caused a number of small community-focused scenes to evolve, creating their own unique interpretation and reappropriation of outside influences. Through both these scenes…
Le Personnage Principal est un Peuple Isolé
Benjamin Lew was an enlightened amateur, in the noble and almost Renaissance-like sense of the word: he dabbled with equal grace in photography, writing, visual arts ... and worked part-time as a cocktail mixer in a tropical bar which was one of the favourite watering holes of Brussels’ thriving artistic community of the early ‘80s. Tuxedomoon had just moved to Brussels, and Steven Brown was among the many musicians, designers & artists who patronized the bar. Benjamin had a secret passion: he w…
Ata Tak - The Collection, Box 2: Experimental
** 400 copies** The second installment in the "Ata Tak - The Collection" series is a lavish 5CD box set designed by Moritz R. that also includes a bonus 7" in replica sleeve. What is nowadays classified as modern electronic music (Elektro, Techno..) has enjoyed a long tradition at Ata Tak (the label exsist since 1979) Those who have made their debut on the Ata Tak/Das Büro label include DAF, Der Plan, Pyrolator, Wirtschaftswunder, Holger Hiller, Andreas Dorau, Element Of Crime, Lost Gringos, Pic…
Cleopatra Jones (Soundtrack) LP
One of the best of the blacksploitation scores of the early 70s – a masterpiece of music that we rate every bit as high as Shaft or Superfly – maybe even higher! The music here is incredible – a surprising funky turn for JJ Johnson, who most folks know for his straighter jazz work – and like Marvin Gaye, Barry White, and others who were surprising the world with their ability to score music for a full film during the early 70s, JJ really knocks it out of the park with this one – coming up with a…
Manifest Being
** 250 copies ** "A lot of people flipped out over how amazing Mako Sica's last album, "Ronda" (FTR 409LP, 2018), was. "Ronda" was a 2LP set whereupon the Chicago trio collaborated with legendary local percussionist Hamid Drake. This pairing seemed like a natural to us, but for some reason people have been woefully unaware of Mako Sica despite the fact they've been releasing killer records for a decade, and playing live shows that submerge your brain in a sonic soup that recalls the Sun City Gir…
Ata Tak - The Collection, Box 5: The Single Collection
** 400 copies** The fifth and final installment in the "Ata Tak - The Collection" series focuses on the early singles released by the label. Once again, this box set was designed by Moritz R. and it includes three 7" records in replica sleeves and 1 CD with many tracks finally entering the digital domain for the first time and two completely unreleased numbers. What is nowadays classified as modern electronic music (Elektro, Techno..) has enjoyed a long tradition at Ata Tak (the label exsist sin…
Stereo
**300 copies** "Stereo" is the latest studio recording by Berlin based duo of Tony Buck and Magda Mayas. Conceived as rendering of a live concept the two have been developing over the last year or so, featuring multi-speaker and multi-layered audio, the essence of "Stereo" sees Spill performing in the studio, improvising and reacting to previously recorded improvisations and pre-structured, pre-recorded elements. The result creates a music with a sense of space and depth and an internal logic no…
Roars Bangs Booms
**150 copies** This composition by Alessandra Eramo shows for the first time a vocal interpretation of eight onomatopoetic words from the Manifesto of Futurist Music “The Art of Noises” by Luigi Russolo (1913). Alessandra Eramo creates harmonious miniatures of rough beauty and embodies urban soundscapes using her voice. Her very original approach to onomatopoeia as well as the humorous, yet profound interpretation of the original material reflects her intense exploration of sounds of industriali…
Sensudestricto
Has there ever been a better time to fuck off to the stars? Is a prison breakout ‘escapism’? Crisis carve some wound-space to let the dreams back in. In nights we turn to fire, in flight we burst into stone, where are the exits in this theatre of the damned? Strict luggage allocations – guitar (David Knight), saxophone (Stephen Thrower) – and all the electronics your thoughts can carry. Headspin echoes, round and around, tilt wind-sails at a dark horizon, cut a stutter through the distance barri…
Conventional Wisdom
Rich, multi-layered vocal studies and shortwave electronics from avant-garde polymath John Duncan (LAFMS, collaborator with Pan Sonic, Chris & Cosey, Jim O’Rourke and countless others), bolstered by synths, drum machines and arrangements by Joachim Nordwall. Highly recommended if you’re into anything from Scott Walker and Pere Ubu to Jay Glass Dubs, Coil and Ilpo Väisänen’s classic Liima Versions. Venerable avant-garde composer John Duncan follows his prized cycle of cover versions ‘Bitter Ear…
Kuro
PAN inaugurate Entopia, their highly promising, soundtrack-focussed sister label, with the tremulous beauty and dreamy ambient detachment of Tujiko Noriko’s ‘Kuro (OST)’ Realised alongside musicians Sam Britton and Will Worsely, experimental J-popstar and composer Tujio Noriko conceived the ‘Kuro’ soundtrack for the eponymous 2017 film which she wrote and directed with Joji Koyama, and in which she also plays the lead role. The film follows the tale of Romi, a Japanese woman living in the subur…
The Drought
After some serious pressing plant problems and several rejected pressings, here it is...Building from a reputation of arresting live performances and critically-acclaimed releases, Puce Mary breaks new ground with The Drought, evolving from the tropes of industrial and power electronics to forge a complex story of adapting to new realities. Remnants of noise still exist, sustaining the visceral penetration offered on previous records, however The Drought demonstrates an intention to expand on th…
Esox Lucius
The tracks of the album Esox lucius were recorded on high end analogue technique at the Czech Radio Broadcasting Studio in Prague. Four exceptional instrumentalists are creating bubbling and zizzling chamber music, they are blurring the edges of their instruments, but contemporarily dialoguing with a precise and unique vocabulary. The record is based on minimal drones, refined with analogue trumpet glitches and extended vocal techniques. Brass is bubbling, feedbacks are shrieking, it sounds as i…