Ruscigan is Guido Baggiani, neapolitan composer and trumpet player, ex Karlheinz Stockhausen’s student. Ruscigan is Piero Umiliani, one of the most important Masters in Italian music, author of dozens of soundtracks and library recordings. “Disagio Sociale” was always considered as Umiliani’s solo work, even though it’s not part of his detailed and official discography as, i.e., “Viaggio nel domani”. Despite all the mystery and the discomfort of not knowing, the re-release of “Disagio sociale” i…
First 200 on Yellow Vinyl. More than to reward the artistic ambitions of the artist, the majority of Library records were generally functional to sonorizations and conceived for a commercial use. So the main difficulty for the artist was to demonstrate his compositional versatility that allowed the use of his songs in different contests : documentaries, spaghetti western movies, television programs and dramas, news reports. “Clouds”, fourth chapter of this new and exciting Spettro series, is a c…
First 200 on Green Vinyl. Released by Octopus in 1973 and now available for the first time on vinyl on Spettro, “Bass Modulations” is a record included in many “hip hop breakbeats” charts and it pays specific attention on bass – as title – and percussions. Composers are Antonino Scuderi, who worked on 2 tracks, ‘Overtime’, with low frequencies and a primitive drum machine, and ‘Range in’, one of the most strange track of this compilation, Roberto Conrado, Roman composer, already member of Gli Ap…
First 200 on Pink Vinyl. Masterpiece!!! If we talk about ideas, we surely talk about “Idee 1”, one of the best collaborations between Massimo Catalano and Remigio Ducros – together with “La fatica”, that will be reprinted in a while – with contributions from the amazing Daniela Casa. Daniela is one of the few women in the “Italian libraries” scene, but she’s more talented than some of her better known male colleagues. If Daniela, and so her husband Ducros, are names linked to a tiny niche of sou…
First 200 on Purple Vinyl. Amongst the first bunch of this new label releases, we couldn’t miss a tribute to one of the greatest masters of libraries recordings, Alessandro Alessandroni, born in 1925. In his long career Alessandroni has published lots of soundtracks – and we mean lots of - and for this he’s considered a real star of Italian music. As a friend, and close collaborator of Ennio Morricone, he’s remembered as “the whistle man” for his fundamental contribution to the immortal scores …
Fellini 60’s experimental flick Toby Dammit is a great film by a legendary director. 'Liberally adapted' from Poe's 'Don't Wager Your Head to the Devil', Federico Fellini's Toby Dammit was shot in twenty-six days over the winter of 1967-68, at the experimental film centre near Cinecetta in Rome. It is an extraordinary piece of genuine film psychedelia, and rightly regarded to be amongst the director's finest work.
Dammit reveals that he haunted this personal apparition of the devil; a littl…
**CD version** “Codice d’amore orientale” had been often labelled as one of the lowest points reached by the b-movies from the ’70s. Essentially, it is just a genuine attempt to exploit the success of the erotic genre, very popular at the time: the movie tells the story of two young lovers, running away from their families that were against their union. The two are given shelter by a minister of love, who introduces them to the secrets of Kamasutra.Definitely not an art-house film, and surely di…
**CD version** Sante Palumbo was born in 1932 in Cerignola, a small village near the city of Foggia, in southern Italy. After studying at Foggia’s conservatory, he moved to Milan in 1954. Unlike other musicians who were rapidly recognised by the local jazz scene, Palumbo started to be noticed only at the end of the 60s. At the beginning of his career he was one of the most in-demand pianist for studio sessions. When in 1969 he became part of Giorgio Buratti’s trio, the critics praised him as one…
**CD version** The long and prolific career of Piero Umiliani, also consisting of dozens of collaborations for television and cinema, has given (and is still delivering, given the amount of material that is finally coming back to light) a long series of experimental albums and music libraries that showcase his songwriting skills, as well as a natural curiosity towards avant-garde and more ‘difficult’ sounds. We can attribute to the second category this “Percussioni ed effetti speciali”, a title …
**CD version** A journey into space with a wonderful sound – served up here as a set of cosmic instrumentals from Luciano Michelini, most of which have a pretty groovy vibe! The mix of 60s instrumentation, spacey touches, and light electric moments peppered with cool keyboards or woodwinds, and occasional wordless vocals – all in this way that provides a wonderful 60s fantasy of the moon, and one that's actually a lot more exciting than any of the real moon landing records out there. There is on…
**CD version** Among all the aliases used by the great Piero Umiliani, M. Zalla is perhaps his richest and surprising: mainly used to produce experimental records that had little commercial appeal, this ‘nom de plume’ (along with Moggi) is tied to memorable episodes of his career, releases such as “Problemi d’oggi” (literally “Today’s Problems”), “Mondo inquieto” (i.e. “An Unsettling World”), and also “Suspense”, now reissued by Schema Records.
And if titles such as those mentioned above may som…
Modern Silence present a reissue of Oeil Vision, originally released in 1964. One of the best albums by legendary French pianist Jef Gilson, recorded in 1963 with Jean-Luc Ponty on violin,Daniel Humair on drums, Jean-Louis Chautemps andPierre Caron on tenor sax, Guy Pedersen and Henri Texieron bass. A superb line up for this beautiful album including two splendid versions of "Chant-Inca" (a hidden cover of Pharoah Sanders "Creator Has A Masterplan"). Essential French spirit/avant jazz. Gilson wa…
Sunergy brings together synthesists Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith and Suzanne Ciani for the thirteenth installment of FRKWYS, RVNG Intl.’s intergenerational collaboration series. For this edition, a panorama of the Pacific Coast provides the place and head space for a musical appreciation and consideration of a life-giving form vast and volatile with change.
Fortuitously (as is the freaky way), Smith and Ciani were discovered to be neighbors in the small coastal community of Bolinas, California. T…
Available for the first time ever on vinyl is the 1974 soundtrack by Alessandro Alessandroni for the Giuliano Carmineo (as Anthony Ascott) directed Di Tresette ce n'è uno, tutti gli altri son nessuno, known in English as The Crazy Bunch. The sequel to Lo chiamavano Tresette... giocava sempre col morto (Man Called Invincible), the film is a goofy, slapstick comedy spaghetti-western, but the Maestro’s soundtrack is anything but goofy. Haunting, sparse, and riveting, the soundtrack is easily t…
The long awaited second volume of soundtrack works by German pop and avant-garde futurist, Felix Kubin, following 2008's Music For Theatre And Radio Play. Some of Kubin's most adventurous and far-reaching music stems from his commissioned works for films, theatre and radio plays. Freed from conventional song formats and genre stereotypes he effortlessly combines musique concrète noises, splashes of haunted virtual orchestras, Gameboy music minuets and voice collage, interspersed with tons of sus…
Released on Gary Mundy's Broken Flag label in 1984, the first Controlled Bleeding album was Distress Signals, an almost impossible to find cassette-only album of power-noise and distorted vocals. Distress Signals I and II will be released by Artoffact Records in this combined double-CD featuring the original artwork of Distress Signals, as well as a copy of the liner notes from the tape insert.
"Cosmos" is a hard-to-find, alternately chaotic and tightly organized mid-'70s session that was issued on the Cobra, and then Inner City labels. Sun Ra provided some stunning moments on the Rocksichord, while leading The Arkestra through stomping full-band cuts of atmospheric or alternately hard bop compositions, peeling off various saxophonists for skittering, screaming, at times spacey dialogues. (AMG)
An endearingly effervescent introduction to the synth-pop democracy of Polytechnic Youth, They Make No Say: 45s on 33 collects 13 songs from hard-to-find 7” gems issued by the North London label over the last 3 years. As a subsidiary of The Great Pop Supplement, Polytechnic Youth was established in order to circumvent the pressing plant lag created by RSD; using a vinyl cutting lathe bought in Germany, 2014 to quickly, efficiently, and crucially, affordably manufacture short runs of clear 5” sin…
From the same vibrant cinematic landscape of '70s studio supergroups as Goblin, The Pawnshop, The Feedback, and The Braen's Machine comes the Magnetic System, the Italian incognito dream-team composed of Milano prog keyboardist Vince Tempera, Cinevox sibling Franco Bixio, and video nasty maestro Fabio Frizzi (whose career it launched). Bridging giallo jazz-bass-driven prog and the arrival of home studios and synthesizers, the film music of the Magnetic System marked a sea change in Italian gen…
With a life spent record digging across the world and a near encyclopedic knowledge of Brazilian music, its rare for David 'Mr Bongo' to come across an incredible record from that rich period that he doesn’t already know, but that's what happened with this one. This one began with a tip off from Floating Points, followed by frenzied digging and researching... and the joyful receipt of a mysterious package from Brazil! Printed in black and three special fluorescent inks on high quality white card…
Brazilian arranger and composer Hareton Salvanini was born in Bauru and grew up in Campinas. S.P 73 is his first LP – he worked tirelessly with his right man and brother, Ayrton, was a theatre director. The 'Hareton + Meta' EP was written and recorded for one of Ayrton’s productions – Hareton wrote the music, Ayrton the lyrics – which was given out at performances. S.P 73 was recorded with the full Campinas Teatro Municipal Orchestra, the same orchestra that that featured on ‘Hareton + Meta’ EP.…
Flavio Lira (aka Flaviola) only recorded one album, which was released on Lula Côrtes' 'Solar' (Rozenblit) imprint. Even now the album sounds astonishingly fresh; full of native acoustic Brazilian instruments, folk guitars… he even crinkled cellophane into the microphone to get a uniquely trippy effect. It is a contemporary sounding album that features the likes of Zé De Flauta, Lula Côrtes and Robertinho de Recife.
Flaviola’s music has been compared to Vashti Bunyan. He now resides in Rio de Ja…
Written, recorded and released just as Brazil’s military dictatorship reached the climax of its long black arc, the one and only album by Satwa is a divinely subtle protest, often cited as Brazil’s first independent record. Formed after the return of Lula Côrtes and Lailson from their respective foreign excursions – the ‘Satwa’ project lasted only a year, perhaps due to their differing stripes. Lailson was from the verdant former Dutch colony of Pernambuco, while Côrtes hailed from the wild b…
Re-issue of this monster rarity. Originally custom pressed in 1980, ‘Rosa de Sangue’ is the closing chapter of the amazing Recife psychedelic movement that flourished and centred around the work of Lula Côrtes, beginning in 1973 with the release of Satwa, and the creation of ‘abracadabra’, Lula’s loose art/music/design collective. “I want to close all of this with a golden key”… and a golden key it is.Entering a small local studio with a head full of songs and his freshly road tested ‘mountains …
**Lucky restock, few copies in, totally sold-out at source** Another incredibly original album from the Solar/Rozenblit catalogue, this features the fabulous trio of Lula Cortes, Marconi Notaro and Ramalho. With Lula Cortes at the controls, writing, playing and illustrating the album cover. Soon after recording the classic album ‘Satwa’ (MRBLP083), Lula was back in the same Recife studio with his friend, the cult poet and writer Marconi Notaro to lay down another equally magical album.This joyou…
2012 reissue, long out of print. A fluid, low-key effort, with less of the challenging, music box melodies of his earlier efforts. This is a record which eases its way past your ears (and I mean that in a good way!) It’s not sappy or unchallenging, but it is a lot smoother and less overtly avant than the stuff David Byrne loves so much.” – slipcue.com
Tom Zé began his career together with Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil, Gal Costa, and Maria Bethânia. As a composer, he influenced Caetano and …
This is one of Tom Ze's best albums ever – and it's monsterously hard to find. The record is a fantastic blend of post-Tropicalia styles – and it features some strange arrangements that perfectly illustrated Ze's insane approach to songwriting. As with much of Ze's music, the actual sound is incredibly hard to describe – and the album bristles with imagination and creative fire. Documenting Zé’s most fertile and creative period, this album documents his kaleidoscopic experiments in the be…
2014 Reissue. Long-awaited legit (and High Quality) Brazilian reissue of this collectible avant madness LP from 1973 from one of the most influential artist in the Tropicália movement of 1960s Brazil. The joke with this album is that the album art -- which looks like an eyeball -- is actually a photo of a marble shoved up someone's anus... a little jab at the Brazilian dictatorship's office of censorship, which apparently didn't recognize a mirror when they saw one. Tom Ze's nutty side comes dan…
Neumond is a 7 inch representing sound researches by Pavel Milyakov, also known as Buttechno. Composed and recorded by Pavel Milyakov. Mastered by Giuseppe Ielasi. Label artwork by Ed Emshwiller, from the movie Sunstone (1979).
The fist ever Brainticket box set featuring 4 discs of these krautrock genius’s critically adored early ‘70s albums plus rare singles and live recordings, some of which have never been available on the commercial market – until now! Packaged in a sleek box with full liner notes, a 50+ page color booklet, poster, button and more!
An over 4 hour mindtrip into electronic space-scapes: the first CD includes the first Joel Vandroogenbroeck's Brainticket album, Cottonwoodhill, and a second album b…
Belgium’s Yves De Mey strikes clean and sharp with four modular rave prongs for Entr’acte, leading a jagged dance after his recent 2nd album, 'Drawn With Shadow Pens' for Spectrum Spools.
In De Mey’s own words: “Late-Night Patching is the result of a short test phase with modular software, mimicking traditional synth modules. A very basic 8-step sequencer setup was patched and used to its full extent for all these tracks. There’s something nostalgic about this EP, and not only in its recre…
Restocked. In the late 1970s and through the 1980s there was a lot happening on the German "post Krautrock underground" that few people knew about, lots of independent artists doing their own thing, either via small labels or doing it themselves. Circles were one of these bands. Based on the Frankfurt suburbs, they consisted of the multi-instrumental duo of Dierk Leitert (synthesizer, sequencer, drums, bass, guitar, voice, saxophone, flute) and Mike Bohrmann (guitars, bass, synthesizer) plus a …
Highly inventive library kraut / psych album related to Eulenspygel. Originally released in 1975, “Sexphonie” offers a mix of acid-rock, hard-psych, polit-rock and progressive / folky sounds with some eastern influences. Great studio production and outstanding guitar playing courtesy of Teflon Fonfara (who once blew up Camel’s PA system with his tape and delay guitar effects!). Tyll was formed when Teflon was approached by Kerston Records with the intention of releasing a krautrock album. …
CD Edition. 10,001 Dreams” is a perfect distillation of Paul Marcano’s musical essence: thoughtful, psychedelic, pop-oriented music but with a deeply progressive ear for song structure and the intuitive glow of a well-crafted lyrical refrain.” (Jack D. Fleischer—10, 001 Dreams, Liner Notes)
A thematic sequel of sorts to the sci-fi psych odyssey exploring cosmic ideology that was the British Columbians debut—LightDreams’ Islands In Space—10,001 Dreams from 1982 finds its leader, Paul Marc…
CD Edition. “Cologne Curiosities” collects, for the first time on vinyl, all the otherwise unpublished/un-reissued material that firstly appeared on the three "Unknown Deutschland - The Krautrock Archive" CDs released on Virgin during 1996. These CD only releases were originally compiled by Trevor Manwaring (Paratactile, Impetus, Virgin, Harmonia Mundi) from tapes supplied to him by Toby Robinson. Toby - aka The Mad Twiddler, aka Genius P. Orridge - is well-known to Krautrock collectors as one…
Live Industrial action from S.P.K., showing the good people of Brixton a beautifully bleak and heavy vision of existence in the year 1983. London Brixton Ace is brimming with clanking metal percussion, tortured howling and unidentified textures, with an all-pervading sense of doom. Great stuff, reissued on Therapeutic / Adverse Recordings.
Arranged by Mike Theodore and prolific guitarist Dennis Coffey—who later worked together on Rodriguez's Cold Fact—1968's The Forest of My Mind is a dose of soul-soothing mellow filled with captivating pastoral odes which try on a variety of period styles in craftsman-like perfection. The album is a unique synthesis of pop, folk and psychedelic sounds flecked with a touch of Donovan Leitch-like whimsy which is steered into righteous and refined waters by future Motown staff producer Clay McMurra…
Back in 1971, Luke Gibson entered at the studio to record, for the first time a solo album. He had played before on garage blues group Luke and the Apostles and psych pop Kensington Market. He focused on his own songs and recorded them as he felt. The result was Another Perfect Day, one of the best singer songwriter albums to came out from Canada in the 70's and one of the most underated too.
The sessions were produced by Gene Martynec (Kensington Market) and captured all the emotions of …
UK psychedelia moved into prog rock with spices of hard rock in the late sixties, some even coined a new label to describe the strong textures resulting of the mixture of rockier blues sounds, jazz, revolutionized freakbeat and the hardest side of popsike - ‘heavy psych’. Amongst the best works of the era were the two splendid LPs recorded by Welsh band Eyes Of Blue.The Eyes Of Blue where formed in 1966 and soon won the Melody Maker Beat Contest, a fact that secured them a recording deal with De…
Telephone Explosion reissues for the first time on vinyl ever Bruce Haack's cult masterpiece Haackula. This legendary dark electronic work from 1978 partner to 'The Electric Lucifer' (1970) finally sees light of day on vinyl thanks to Canada's Telephone Explosion.Deemed to be too dark and offensive for release when it was recorded in 1978 and bootlegged ever since, this is the first official release of Haackula. Haack's anger with society is palpable as he hisses and cusses his way over elas…