Folk /
Traveler
"Welcome to the second album we've done with string maestro, Joseph Allred. Unlike O Meadowlark (FTR 451LP), this one features a smattering of Joseph's vocals, although his main thrust is still glistening instrumentals. The title song is a goddamn sad one, sung with reedy elegance, dealing with a kidnapped dog that serves as a stand-in for all earthly beings, full of both frailty and resilience. Another vocal track, 'The Crown' (which inspired the cover art), stems from a long conversation Josep…
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…
Voice of the Eagle: the Enigma of Robbie Basho
Voice of the Eagle: The Enigma of Robbie Basho is a feature-length documentary on the extraordinary life and visionary music of the American guitarist, singer and mystic Robbie Basho. Before his bizarre death at the hands of a chiropractor, Robbie Basho was sure that his compositions would not outlast him. Orphaned during infancy, diagnosed with synaesthesia (a union of the senses that caused him to interpret sound as color) and claiming to be the reincarnation of a 17th century poet -- the Balt…
Do You Hear What I Hear?
Mark McGuire takes us on a kaleidoscopic journey through a winter wonderland with his soulful take on holiday favorites. From timeless classics like Joy to the World to a gorgeous rendition of Vince Guaraldi's Christmas Time Is Here, McGuire thrillingly updates these arrangements with his signature psychedelic guitar work. Here, he employs a wide spectrum of sounds and instruments to bring new ideas to these beloved chestnuts. Brimming with joy and festive cheer, Do You Hear What I Hear? is a mo…
Magic and Warmth at Christmastime
Vin Du Select Qualitite's resident mystic Anthony Pasquarosa conjures up the holiday spirits with an alchemically enchanted collection of Christmas classics. Utilizing his unique 12-string acoustic guitar sensibilities, Pasquarosa's versions of all-time favorites such as Frosty the Snowman and White Christmas take on an added dimension and shine, a frosted winter glow that sets the mood for warmly introspective holiday moments. Throughout the record, crackling fireplace sounds run alongside the …
Oh Really!?
The guitarist and singer-songwriter Mike Cooper was a key figure in the British blues boom of the late 1960s. Born in Reading in 1942, Cooper began playing guitar as a teen in local skiffle groups. After seeing Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee perform in 1961, Cooper caught the blues bug and began to play the harmonica and formed The Blues Committee, supporting John Lee Hooker, Sonny Boy Williamson, Alexis Korner and Long John Baldry, while Cooper was also performing solo. Acquiring a lap steel gu…
O Meadowlark
**300 copies** "Currently based in the Boston area, Joseph Allred was one of the players we first encountered at 2018's Ten Thousand Incarnations of the Rose festival in Takoma Park MD. Allred's playing had some Basho-esque sequencing that was highly engaging, and the rest of the set was a killer, off-center swathe of string quiver we could not resist. O Meadowlark is Allred's third solo vinyl (there are cassettes as well), and will surely please many heads. Here're Joseph's words on how the alb…
Witness Tree
**400 copies** "Vinylization of a self-released cassette issued earlier this year by our favorite Virginia-based guitar player. Witness Tree is a brilliant follow-up to Perry's eponymous debut LP (2018), and expands upon the form-abstractions he first displayed there. Mr. Perry has a firm and solid touch to his string wrangling, but unlike many of his contemporaries, he doesn't seem to feel compelled to resolve all the melodic questions he raises. Perry often stops in a place he finds interestin…
But a Night That Ends as All Nights End When the Sun Rises
Tashi Dorji is a celebrated free-form / improvisational guitarist. Born and raised in Bhutan, but transplanted to Ashville, NC in the early 2000’s. He is a musical force that is in a caliber of his own. The amount of originality in his playing could have only been summoned when one is forced to confront limitations and raise a big middle finger to the ‘status quo’. He is known to focus his attention heavily on tonal qualities over melody. Mellow harmonics that integrate interference of seemingly…
For Octavio Paz
Ben Chasny's last ultra-indie label release before moving onto greener pastures with Drag City is finally available once more on vinyl thanks to Hermit Hut. Originally released in 2003 on the fabulous Time Lag label, we are now safe to bask in it's psych-folk sunlight again and let me assure you it's worth it. Ditching the voice almost altogether (save for a few wails), For Octavio Paz sees Chasny focussing on his primary skill - the guitar. This is a collection of some of his best solo guitar w…
Unpentangled - The Sixties Albums
Long acknowledged as one of the greatest and most influential acoustic guitarists to emerge from the British folk scene, the late John Renbourn is best known to the wider world for his membership of Pentangle, the genre-busting band that he was instrumental in bringing together in 1967. Pentangle’s recordings are widely available, most recently with Cherry Red’s 2017 highly-acclaimed box set Pentangle: The Albums. in 1966. Housed in a clamshell box that boasts replica album sleeves, some very ra…
End of the Night
End of the Night was conceived based around a simple, yet extremely emotionally resonant concept. Late one evening the musician and myself were listening to records at home. After many hours it got to the point where everything became completely still, the silence permeating the walls, reverberating. We agreed to listen to one more record, but what would it be? What music could answer that existential quandary of the perfect last record of the night at home? I instantly asked him to make me the …
You Are Tired
**300 copies** You Are Tired features amazing finger-pick style utilising both a calm and destructive mood, the tracks title producing imagery whilst you are listening and to a degree the sounds send you back to a time. similarly to other such guitar luminaries within the same genre such as John Fahey, Sandy Bull, Robbie Basho to name a few. Rob is an extension of their ideas, using his guitar to express meaning and emotion and he does it very elegantly on the opening track. Nightmare Study is a…
Offstrings: Inventions for guitar
"Around the turn of the century there seemed to be a wave of guitarists versed in experimental and electronic musics who sought out ways of drawing new sounds from their instrument of choice; the likes of Fennesz, Tim Hecker, Keith Fullerton Whitman (on his still-superb Playthroughs album), Sebastien Roux and Christopher Willits were among the most notable artists in this movement, and now, at the start of a new decade, this excellent album strives to highlight the work of five emerging guitaris…
Huge Fluid Freedom
Huge Fluid Freedom is a singular melding of American primitive & instrumental guitar rock by one of the most important young guitarists currently mining the underground. Sean Smith
conjures fire and sweat, dew and ash through the guitar. From his Bay
Area locale, Smith has been elevating the language of the acoustic steel
string & exploring volume shredding electric excursions
concurrently for the better part of the last decade, forging a tightrope
walking hybridization of 2 seemingly disp…
"Second Poem To Karmela" Or Gypsies Are Important
2014 Release. Light In The Attic and the legendary folk/blues/roots label Vanguard Records are proud to begin a series of collaborations under the umbrella Vanguard Vault. The series will explore the vaults of Vanguard and see the reissuing of obscure nuggets, psychedelic weirdness and just some good old-fashioned seminal music.Originally released in 1968 on Vanguard Records, Peter Walker’s album “Second Poem To Karmela” Or Gypsies Are Important was a ground breaking blend of folk, raga, psyche…
Niko Karlsson & Topias Tiheäsalo
After a long hibernation, Anoema Recordings is back with a fantastic
split LP of fresh Finnish music. This time we bring joy to the world via
six beautiful acoustic six string exercises by two Turku-based masters
of guitar: Niko Karlsson and Topias Tiheäsalo. Niko plays both guitar
and banjo and has a background in pop, folk and various types of
experimental music. He is probably best known for his 2017 solo album
Valosta valoon on American Feeding Tube Records. Topias has studied
classic…
A Scarlet Fail
Awash in color and texture, Arian Shafiee's debut album, A Scarlet Fail, brings to light a guitarist whose sound and mastery are in full bloom. Best known for his work in the East Coast dance/punk group Guerilla Toss, Shafiee has spent years warping the idea of what a guitar can sound like. In a group setting, Shafiee does what's best for the composition, often blending seamlessly into the electronics and rhythmic grooves of his peers. A Scarlet Fail gives him a revelatory solo spotlight in a se…
Venus in Cancer
Though frequently overshadowed by his contemporary and Takoma Records labelmate John Fahey, the compositions and performances of Daniel R. Robinson Jr., best known by the stage name Robbie Basho, were integral in the development of the American primitive guitar style. Along with Fahey, and songwriter/composers such as Max Ochs, Leo Kottke, and others, Basho helped bring to the masses the distinct form of guitar finger-picking, which blended folk and country-blues with neo-classical composition t…
The New Folk Sound Of Terry Callier
Deluxe edition of two180g LP's stored within a glossy gatefold sleeve. Terry Callier conveys the promise and power in The New Folk Sound of Terry Callier. This capturing a young man in his element, his voice and soul, jazz and folk-infused songs timeless. This new version includes five previously unreleased alternate takes(“900 Miles,” “Promenade In Green,” “It’s About Time” and “Be My Woman”) along with two tracks making their vinyl debut (“Jack O’Diamonds” and “Golden Apples of the Sun”), as…