New Arrivals
Kevätjuhla
Finnish multimedia artist Jan Anderzén returns to Alter in characteristically singular style under his Tomutonttu guise. Kevätjuhla (translated as "Spring Celebration") is his second release for the label following a split 7" with Oneohtrix Point Never in 2010 (ALT02) and his first vinyl long player since 2011. Lately Jan has been busy within visual art, making mosaics, quilts and creating installation work for which the music of Kevätjuhla was initially composed. Inspired by the multitudes of…
Monuments
Sophomore album from minimalist improviser, Ben Vince. Monuments comes into an age of global uncertainty, demanding a response. From an axis of improvisation, Vince’s saxophone works embrace the contours of more dynamic, emotive landscapes where rich motifs coalesce and feel their way around each other. In a departure from the more rigid looping of his debut, The Purge, this album explores much more progressive minimalist structures that undulate in and out of phase whilst not being afraid…
Gente di Rispetto
"Gente Di Rispetto"is a dramatic 1975 film directed by Luigi Zampa and starring Franco Nero, Jennifer O'Neil, James Mason. Rotten atmosphere surrounding a young teacher who moves from Sondrio in Sicily. Here the young woman finds a home at the powerful lawyer Bellocampo’s house and she has a love affair with Professor Belcore. Her life is in constant danger after being finished in the gears of a very dangerous human society ...
Ennio Morricone has been able to perfectly represent in mus…
Astro Sounds - From Beyond The Year 2000
Swirling guitars and proto-ambient electronica sounds from many light years away! The Astro-Sound of Magnificence, from Beyond the Year 2000...a unique capsule of a funky, psychedelic rhythm section jamming, with snarling, stabbing and swooshing cranked-up-to-infinity electric guitar voyages piloted by Wrecking Crew veteran Jerry Cole, polished and primed for takeoff with a string section playing eerie, beckoning melodies in unison. These are the sounds of epiphanies concerning the future, …
Beat It Down
After the success of their debut EP, post-punk art rockers Y Pants performed regularly in NYC and other East Coast venues. In 1981 they toured Europe for six weeks and upon return went into the studio to record their only LP, Beat It Down, released in 1982 on Neutral Records (Sonic Youth, Glenn Branca et al). The album extends the band's signature pared down rollicking minimalism. The 10 songs are varied, using surprising and inventive instrumentation. The music is at once filled with a s…
Y Pants
"'In the late '70s and early '80s everyone had very fluid art identities. One day you were a filmmaker, the next day a musician, and Y Pants was very much a part of it... The lyrics are ironic without being callous, the voices are sultry, the music is repetitive and trance-like... [with] a sense of urgency - like something being driven out.' --Kiki Smith. Y PANTS were a three-woman New York band: Barbara Ess, Virginia (Verge) Piersol and Gail Vachon, all visual artists. They played in clu…
Sound of Speed
In the late 1950s, when Mexican-born Space Age Pop avatar Esquivel was in his prime, orchestra leader/composer/arranger Bob Thompson was his American stylistic counterpart. They recorded for the same label (RCA Victor), employed many of the same musicians and vocalists, and experimented with sound in the same Los Angeles studios.His RCA albums, Mmm, Nice!, Just for Kicks, and On the Rocks, embody 1950s orchestral pop: brimming with sparkle and sophistication, an appealing soundtrack for the…
Discordes
Aude Romary, cello. Jérôme Noetinger, electroacoustic devices. This duo started in 2014 with the idea to transform the acoustic instrument into a real electroacoustic one. Transducers, springs and microphones are attached to the cello which is then processed through electronic and tape. This CD comes from several hours of improvisations recorded in studio and reorganised to build six pieces of abstract electroacoustic music.
Nykysuomalaista - Contemporary Finnish
It seems bizarre that this LP’s original copy was pressed in such low numbers in 1969 that it has become an unusually expensive and wanted collector’s item that hasn’t been repressed on vinyl (and never released on CD) until now. Soulset were, after all, in the late 1960s one of the most popular pop groups in Finland. Their recorded legacy is relatively short, and when this split LP was released, Soulset were already about to call it a day. Here Soulset perform five fine cuts of jazzy Fenno-soul…
Agrim Agadez: Musique Guitare de la Republique du Niger
Agrim Agadez is a compilation of contemporary field recordings of guitar music from the Sahelian empire of Niger. Focusing on guitar music throughout the country, from meditative starlight ballads, fuzzy Hendrix covers, rag tag wedding bands, to political minded folk guitarists. A beautiful encapsulation of the diversity of guitar as it exists today, recorded over years of travels. Like most of the Sahel, the guitar is found in every corner of Niger. Whether acoustic, electric, or built …
Il Gatto dagli Occhi di Giada
After 40 years since its theatrical release, presented here for the first time on vinyl is the phenomenal soundtrack for Il Gatto dagli Occhi di Giada (also known as ‘Watch Me When I Kill’) - directed by Antonio Bido (director of THE BLOODSTAINED SHADOW). This top-notch score is undeniably catchy, yet has its creepy moments.The film’s score was created by a supergroup specifically formed for this project and consisted of Adriano Monteduro (vocals and guitar; known for his 1974 record in which h…
Tempo Sospeso
Bruno Nicolai is a leading figure in the world of Italian soundtracks although he is primarily known for being the most important of Ennio Morricone’s collaborators and his orchestra conductor in the period of Morricone's greatest production (60‘ and 70’s). But Nicolai's solo works are certainly not of lesser artistic relevance. Tempo sospeso (Suspended Time) is one of the most representative albums in this sense that it was produced by Nicolai in 1975 without any filters or restrictions,…
Carrefour / Sistemo l'America e Torno
The Italian funk god Luis Enriquez Bacalov is celebrated here with this unmissable 7-inch record, featuring two of his grooviest tracks ever: on the A-side, the legendary Carrefour is maybe his funkiest soundtrack piece, here released for the first time in its entirety, with an unexpected introduction via a powerful horn section, which was cut from the original 1976 RCA 7’’. Behold an eternal jazz-funk masterpiece with solid drum breaks and hip hop heavy beats, funky congas, wah wah guitar…
Kriminal / Il Cobra
One of the rarest and most sought-after Italian holy grail soundtracks ever is finally back from the grave! Originally released in 1966 on Beat Records (45-BT 024), the Kriminal main theme was written by Romano Mussolini (Raymond Full in the opening credits) and Roberto Pregadio for this sleazy crime-pop movie directed by Umberto Lenzi, and based on the cult Italian comic hero. Actually, this could be considered one of the best swinging jazz-beat themes from the 60s, with its wonderful hor…
Tilt
Tilt" is the amazing debut album by a band whose members were not newbies at all. The six musicians' combined former experiences had led them to the roads of jazz and prog rock (even the very young, masterful drummer Furio Chirico had played in The Trip's last two albums) for some time, so their expertise was quite obvious and quite impressive as well by the time "Tilt" introduced Arti + Mestieri to the eyes of the world. The jazz-rock oriented sound delivered by the band serves as an appropriat…
At the Salt Museum
In December 2015, these three Melbourne musicians camped at Murray Sunset National Park in northern Victoria, Australia, sounding various sites and performing ritualistic actions. This album documents our interactions with rusted salt harvesting machinery discovered at the outdoor 'salt museum' on the shore of the Lake Crosbie saltpan.
Streichquartett in 4 Sätzen
Recording of the first performance of the original 60 minute version of this new composition for string quartet in 4 parts. Recorded at the Hermann Nitsch Foundation, Vienna, 2016. Fullcolour 6-panel digipak. Edition of 300 copies.
Omerta
Released 2017, co-produced with Florence Giroud. In 2014, artist Florence Giroud invited five musicians to work around texts for her Opera XXS' third chapter, taking form in a long play recording. The music and texts deal with the disappearance of onelself in the beautiful island of Corsica in the mediterranean sea. Featuring Romain Hervault (La Société Etrange, Pan Pan Pan), Romain de Ferron (Balladur, Vinci), Pierre Bujeau (Tanz Mein Herz), Mathieu Tilly (Tanz Mein Herz, France) and Jeremie Sa…
Is This Right?
Is This Right? is Seymour Wright's third full solo record and comes as a 2 discs set in a beautiful oblong sleeve. 5 tracks recorded between 2014 and 2017 in Bologna, London and Paris. Is This Right? continues where his last solo - Seymour Writes Back - finished, further developing a set of relationships between ideas, places, people and time, as Wright puts it, documenting 'learning about the saxophone - actual and potential - as rhthym, shadow and text'.
Jazz am Rhein 1967-1968
It was the summer of love in 1967, and more than 12 000 people found their way into the Rheinpark in Cologne – situated opposite the majestic cathedral and right at the bank of the Rhine river – for the first German open air jazz festival. Featured on those two sunny days in September were three big bands – including ace musicians like Jiggs Whigham, Dusko Gojkovic, Manfred Schoof and Volker Kriegel – and the Kenny Clarke - Francy Boland Sextet. When the festival was revived the following year, …