Reissues
Warrior On the Edge of Time
"Hawkwind's fifth studio album found the band enjoying a rare oasis of stability after the multitudinous personnel shifts of the past five years. Only the recruitment of a second drummer, Alan Powell, disturbed the equanimity of the lineup that created the previous year's Hall of the Mountain Grill, although it would soon be time to change again. By the end of the year, bassist Lemmy had departed, vocalist Robert Calvert had rejoined, and the group's career-long relationship with United Artists …
Leading Stolen Horses
“One of the best shows I went to in San Francisco during 1984 was the Glorious Din & Trial gig. This show really changed my life & made realize that I had to follow my dreams. Both of these bands were local bands, but they had created this killer post-punk sound that could hold its own with any band from anywhere. Around this time, Glorious Din released their classic album Leading Stolen Horses. This album is a post-punk gem that many people have never heard – trust me, after one listen you will…
United Patchwork
One of the most mythical experimental groups of all time, Musica Elettronica Viva was formed in 1966 by a group of American composers in Rome, its nucleus comprised of pianist Frederic Rzewski, sound improviser Alvin Curran and the improvisatory keyboardist Richard Teitelbaum. Taking cues from John Cage and David Tudor, MEV employed open, limitless structures, using found instruments, toys, a homemade synthesizer and the first Moog to reach mainland Europe. Improv and critical listening practice…
Laboratorio Della Quercia
In the summer of 1978, an ambitious twelve-day experimental jazz project was undertaken at the ancient amphitheatre, Tasso della Quercia, on the slopes of Rome’s Gianicolo hill. The idea was to assemble the leading players from Italy’s avante-garde jazz scene, revolving around members of Grande Elenco Musicisti (or GEM), such as saxophonists Tommaso Vittorini, Eugenio Colombo and Maurizio Giammarco, trumpeter Alberto Corvini and trombonist/composer Danilo Terenzi, together with visiting American…
Anne Briggs
**Limited edition gold vinyl** This eponymous 1971 debut album by Anne Briggs, largely unavailable for 48 years, is widely regarded as a pillar of any folk collection. Re-issued here as part of the Topic Treasures series – the label’s classic and notable albums expanded in deluxe format with rare images, new liner notes (by esteemed journalist, Ken Hunt) – Anne Briggs heralds a huge resurgence of interest in this most reclusive of folk doyennes.This debut album contains some of Briggs’ most nota…
Sounds of Liberation
Fronted by alto maestro Byard Lancaster, this eponymous 1972 recording from the Philadelphian spiritual jazz / funk ensemble marks another wonderful release from Dogtown Records.Formed in the early 70s, the Sounds of Liberation was a group of Philadelphia musicians made up of Byard Lancaster, Khan Jamal, Monnette Sudler, Omar Hill, Dwight James, Rashid Salim and Billy Mills. The Sounds of Liberation mixed jazz, funk, free jazz and spiritual jazz into a harmonious celebration of sound. With thei…
Live In Sausalito, September 9, 1973
The finger-picking guitarist and blues enthusiast John Fahey enjoyed a long, influential and distinguished career. Born in Washington DC in 1939 and raised in Takoma Park, Maryland, he lauched his own Takoma label to issue self-produced work in the late 1950s and then delivered his master's theses on the blues of Charlie Patton at UCLA. Then, while based in the radical town of Berkeley, California in the San Francisco Bay area, began issuing filed recordings of forgotten blues legends such as Bu…
Moon Gas
Adventurous keyboardist and arranger Dick Hyman worked in radio, film and television before making a name for himself as a jazz pianist in the mid-1950s with a hugely popular harpsichord rendition of “Mack The Knife.” An early experimenter with electronic instruments, including the Moog, his 1963 rarity Moon Gas, produced by Creed Taylor and recorded with Sinatra sidekick and Broadway musical mainstay Mary Mayo, was conceived as “a glimpse of the possible sounds of the 22nd Century.” Blasting lo…
Nonzigo
Anma Ott is excited to announce the debut LP of Spemakh, a six-piece surprisemusic-group from across Germany (Saarbrücken, Nürnberg, Berlin, Bonn). Drawing from all corners of the compositional sphere, from free-jazz to serialism and concrète, and using a wide range of homemade and custombuilt wind and percussion instruments, as well as viola, doublebass, voice-noise, guitar, objects and miniature electronics, the band is aiming for a radical play with uncertainty, involving humour, gesture an…
'Africa' Live At The Carnegie Hall 1971
**Super limited** The musician and spiritual seeker Alice Coltrane was much more than just John Coltrane’s second wife. One of the few harpists to feature prominently in jazz, she was also a renowned pianist and composer and her interest in spiritual matters greatly helped steer her husband deeper into Krishna consciousness, which had significant bearing on his music, most notably evident on A Love Supreme. This mesmerizing performance, held at Carnegie Hall four years after John’s untimely pass…
Flare / Flame
**250 copies on gold vinyl, full tone gatefold cover artwork, includes printed inner sleeves and download code** Erik K Skodvin is most known for his surreal darker compositions as Svarte Greiner or as half of the melancholic induced duo Deaf Center.This collection of the two albums Flare and Flame marks his first musical entries under his own name, experimenting with the soundtrack based sides of Americana and Blues. While his Svarte Greiner albums might dwell on minimal atmospheric darkness, F…
Lalique Gadaffi Handgrenade
**700 copies** Incredible late '90s dub-noise gear from Muslimgauze resurfaces along with previously unreleased, genius electro-dub goodies in the latest Staalplaat volley. Can a person ever have enough Muslimgauze records? The answer is a firm no, and Arab Jerusalem (1996), found on the A-side, is a sterling example of the Manchester-based outlier at his trippy, expressive best, swirling samples of Arabic voices in a thick mist of dubwise FX with sloshing tabla and drones that seem to fade in a…
Elettroencefalogramma
**300 copies** In the widening realms of uncovered European Outsider Art and maligned musical enigmas, the composer most commonly known as A.R. Luciani continues to exist on the extreme outer limits. Despite his unwaning commitment to the Italian avant garde and extensive production for the film industry, his work remains undocumented in almost all the excitable documentaries, books and retrospectives on the subject made in recent years. Trust Andy Votel, Sean Canty and Doug Shipton to put that …
Complete Uppsala Concert Vol. 1
Recorded Live in Sweden in September 1961, the Uppsala Concert is an important document from Eric Dolphy's first Swedish tour as leader of an obscure but talented local quartet featuring Rony Johansson (piano), Kurt Lindgren (bass), and Rune Carlsson (drums). Master Dolphy shines, as always, on all his instruments alto sax, bass clarinet, and flute, while the track list consists of a rare mix of standards such as Milt Jackson's Bags Groove, Monk's 52nd Street Theme, Cole Porter's What Is This Th…
Live Rarities 1960
The George Russell Sextet caught in a rare live recording from a concert held at Music Inn, in Lenox Massachusetts on September 1, 1960. George Russell's kaleidoscopic sound conception takes shape through the collective interplay of a brilliant tight band featuring George Russell himself on piano, Al Kiger (trumpet), Dave Baker (trombone), Dave Young (tenor sax), Chuck Israels (bass), and Joe Hunt (drums). A great example of challenging modern and yet swinging jazz, including highlights such as …
Jazz Jamboree 63
This is the legendary Krzystof Komeda Quintet caught live at the Jazz Jamboree Festival in Warsaw in 1963. A marvelous combo featuring some of the greatest Polish jazz musicians, such as Tomasz Stanko (trumpet), Michal Urbaniak (tenor sax), Maciej Suzin (bass), and Czeslaw Bartowski (drums). Komeda, Stanko, and Urbaniak were sort of pioneers who effectively opened up a way for jazz in Poland. Komeda's fluent modern jazz conception was a perfect synthesis between the American influence and a cert…
Milano Calibro 9
**2020 repress, green vinyl** During a 1972 full of progressive rock masterpieces, the Neapolitan group Osanna released a follow-up to their debut LP "L'uomo"; a very peculiar record, the result of a collaboration between the band and the Maestro and composer Luis Bacalov (who already worked with New Trolls on their "Concerto Grosso" the previous year), a work commissioned for Fernando Di Leo's movie "Milano Calibro 9".The 'real' title of the album is actually "Preludio, tema, variazioni, canzon…
Xavana, Uma Ilha do Amor
**Brazilian Collector's Item**Ultra rare Hareton Salvanini soundtrack reissued for the first time worldwide. Brazilian album of the obscure Xavana, Uma Ilha do Amor, a mixture of Psych, Jazz and Bossa Nova. For this movie Salvanini has created a soundtrack full of groovy guitars, refined strings and delicate orchestral sounds.Polish film maker Zygmunt Sulistrowski pioneered the format of shooting low-budget soft porn on exotic locations. Brazilian arranger and writer Hareton Salvanini was comiss…
Summertime Killer
The Summertime Killer, a crime movie and a love story, was directed in 1972 by Antonio Isasi-Isasmendi and starred Christopher Mitchum, Karl Malden, Olivia Hussey and Claudine Auger among others. Academy award winning composer Luis Bacalov wrote the score which perfectly reflects the core of the plot, with a strange mix of love and death. The composer alternates dramatically suspenseful score with ‘source music’ in the form of ballad, rock music and dance floor tunes, usually heard through a car…
Spirits Known and Unknown
Leon Thomas' debut solo recording after his tenure with Pharoah Sanders is a fine one. Teaming with a cast of musicians that includes bassist Cecil McBee, flutist James Spaulding, Roy Haynes, Lonnie Liston Smith, Richard Davis, and Sanders (listed here as "Little Rock"), etc. Thomas' patented yodel is in fine shape here, displayed alongside his singular lyric style and scat singing trademark. The set begins with a shorter, more lyrical version of Thomas' signature tune The Creator Has a Master P…