Jazz /
Azimuth
Recorded in 1977 and now reissued in ECM’s audiophile Luminessence vinyl series, the debut album of the Azimuth trio was truly ahead of its time. Formed by adding Canadian-born trumpeter Kenny Wheeler to the British duo of pianist John Taylor and vocalist Norma Winstone, the group’s futuristic musical palette embraced hypnotic, minimalistic pulse patterns, otherworldly synthesizer sounds, songs, collective improvisation and solo flights. In recent seasons, the number of listeners under Azimuth’s…
![The Orchestra In The Sky [Tokyo + Kobe Recordings]](https://cdn.soundohm.com/data/products/2024-01/Hochzeits_OrchestraInTheSky_CD_01-jpg.jpg.500.jpg)
The Orchestra In The Sky [Tokyo + Kobe Recordings]
There’s a big clue to the pacific wisdom of The Orchestra in the Sky in the artist name – Hochzeitskapelle + Japanese Friends. For this is, indeed, music based in, and resonating with, friendship, camaraderie, collaboration, and creative exchange. Across two albums – one documenting recordings from Tokyo, the other an expansive double album of sessions from Kobe – Hochzeitskapelle gather around them some of the finest voices in Japanese independent and underground pop music, like Tenniscoats, Ed…
![The Orchestra In The Sky [Kobe Recordings]](https://cdn.soundohm.com/data/products/2023-12/1_2-jpeg.jpeg.500.jpg)
The Orchestra In The Sky [Kobe Recordings]
There’s a big clue to the pacific wisdom of The Orchestra in the Sky in the artist name – Hochzeitskapelle + Japanese Friends. For this is, indeed, music based in, and resonating with, friendship, camaraderie, collaboration, and creative exchange. Across two albums – one documenting recordings from Tokyo, the other an expansive double album of sessions from Kobe – Hochzeitskapelle gather around them some of the finest voices in Japanese independent and underground pop music, like Tenniscoats, Ed…
Everyone’s Children
Tip! *2023 stock* Everyone’s Children is the stunning debut album of spiritual avant-garde music from keyboardist, composer Surya Botofasina, out on Spiritmuse Records. The record combines deep jazz excursions with expansive synth passages and intimate piano turns to create a hypnotic, meditative and devotionally expressive suite that soothes, enriches and uplifts the soul. Botofasina’s upbringing at the Sai Anantam Ashram in the Southern Californian hills involved daily bhajans (traditional Hin…
Execution Ground
Tip! *Much needed repress!!* The seminal 1994 double album Execution Ground, by the original Painkiller with the line-up of Bill Laswell, John Zorn and Mick Harris on vinyl for the first time. When Painkiller started in 1991, their first two albums Guts Of A Virgin (1991) and Buried Secrets (1992) (both released on extreme metal label Earache) were heavy attacks blending grindcore and free jazz that brought together the musical backgrounds of the three protagonists: drummer Mick Harris had just …
(I'm just) Chillin', on Fire
"Over the past few years, concert patrons have stopped the musician Carlos Niño after gigs to ask two simple questions: “Are you a shaman?” “I hear the medicine in your music, can I come to your next ceremony?” The queries are fair enough: Looking at Niño, a tall man with a wild beard and kind eyes, one would think he’s from some faraway time and could maybe cast spells. Once you get to know him, you find that he’s just an incredibly sweet guy with a laid-back demeanor, and that he isn’t some gu…
Astral Plains
Peace Flag Ensemble are a free jazz collective from Saskatchewan. Their sophomore LP, Astral Plains, arrives July 18 via We Are Busy Bodies.
Forest Standards Vol. 3
What is a standard to a forest? What makes that different to what’s a standard, in that jazz classic compositional sense, to a desert? To a city? To a suburb? To a plain? A wetland? A grove? The only thing standard in a forest, like any other environment, is the search for balance. Nature seeks an equilibrium and, given enough time, it finds it. It’s the only way to ensure survival and growth. For three albums, David Lord has been exploring this idea, seeking out some sense of the ethereal, with…
III
Elijah McLaughlin Ensemble III is an album full of shimmering harmonic atmospheres. It’s emblematic of the Chicago-based ensemble, whose music explores the textures and resonances of their string instruments, namely six and 12-string guitar (Elijah McLaughlin), upright bass (Jason Toth), and hammered dulcimer (Joel Styzens). Throughout Elijah McLaughlin III, they expand their usual palette by including analog synths, field recordings, and melodies from guest musicians cellist Katinka Kleijn and …
Changing Earth
Matthew Halsall has already blessed us with one beautifully conceived EP this year, now with Changing Earth he has shared another perfectly crafted four track mini-album or EP. Where the music on The Temple Within came from the energy around the band's monthly sessions at Yes in Manchester, Changing Earth is a more meditative, spiritual offering:
"I was thinking about climate change and the profound implication of the human race's relationship with nature and the changes we have wrought on our e…
Tourmaline
*CD with 12-page booklet* Tourmaline is a semi-precious gemstone that appears in a multitude of color schemes and is found throughout the world. It is known as “the stone of reconciliation” and is believed to foster positive energy, healing, and connections with the Earth. Tourmaline also serves as a symbolic representation of the philosopher’s stone, of the alchemical tradition, believed to be capable of transforming base metals into gold, attaining divine wisdom, perfecting the human body and…
An Offering
Flowing water is an essential element of Earthly existence, a living force, a process of nature, a path-making which combines infinite sources mixing imperceptibly into a singular energy. It’s also a potent metaphor. A childlike wonder at flowing water’s presence and power, all the impressions it makes and creative neurons that it fires, happens to be a personality trait shared by Evan Shornstein (aka Photay) and Carlos Niño. The two producers/musical connectors may have grown up and reside a co…
Next Time Could Be Your Last Time
Gondwana Records present ‘Next Time Could Be Your Last Time’ – the debut album by Forgiveness, AKA Jack Wyllie, JQ and Richard Pike. Described as “not really jazz, not really new age, not really ambient or electronica”, instead they welcome you into a synaesthesia-inducing technicolour fantasy, full of wondrous emotive beauty. This genesis began with the sharing of music, burgeoning friendships, and the mutually-inspirational benefit of the collective power of a group dynamic, with each spurring…
Isophonic Boogie Woogie
In restock Reissue of the legendary Afro spiritual minimal electronic masterpiece 5-track first LP (plus 2 bonus tracks) from horn wizard and original underground FM radio DJ Roland P. Young, featuring soprano sax, clarinet, and electronically-processed bass clarinet. An enjoyable outing from a neglected musician. Cosmic Afro-minimal electronic winds recorded in 1970s San Francisco. Classic explorations from the dude who was responsible for the legendary Infinite Sound LP on Arch 1750.
Thankful…
Naktės
*2022 stock.* The 3th album by Merope (2018) with arrangements of Lithuanian folk songs and own compositions. A unique trio sound with a blend of acoustic instruments, voice, el. guitar and electronics. Naktes presents a world full of wonder, inspired by the atmosphere of the night. After the release of Merope 'Salos' (STRLP-051 / gran21) we decided to repress Merope's previous album Naktes too. A collaboration with Stroom & granvat.
I.I tired out my feettramping dew's golden ore.I leaned on a w…
Kroksjø
*In process of stocking. 2022 stock.* The new album by the partnership of guitarist Jo David Meyer Lysne (born 1994) and double bassist Mats Eilertsen (born 1975) is a remarkable document that functions simultaneously as both a calm and meditative series of chill-out soundscapes, and as a rigorously poetic evocation of mood and place that one might expect to hear more readily in an art gallery installation. It is also shockingly beautiful. The ecstatic shimmer of acoustic guitar and pedal steel …
Sequential Stream
Big Tip! *Limited edition of 500 copies.* Properly transcendent deep-dream jazz fantasy from prolific trumpet virtuoso Arve Henriksen (Supersilent) and Norwegian pianist Kjetil Husebø, together shaping an album that’s much, much more than the not so inconsiderable sum of its parts. Like a fever-dream comedown, it takes us from insanely rich sounding 4th world topographies to fizzing, electric ambience and fluttering prepared piano, perfectly soundtracking the humid un-reality we’re living throug…
Hunter on the Wing
Piano, handmade electronics, tenor sax, couple strings. I was after something tangible. Sounds you could roll around in your palm and consider different, complex, and flawed textures. Feel the weight, maybe even smell them. This desire is probably a reaction to the dissociative nausea from the constant simulacra of these early 2020s. Like deliberately going barefoot to feel yourself grounded in a real place, as I read Andrea Needham did when facing charges for disarming a warplane. Anyway, my me…
Det Försvunnas Namn
*In process of stocking* All compositions by Martin Küchen (STIM/ncb), except "Sheer Life Asleep" and "Hippopotami mit Mensch" by Martin Küchen with recordings made by Chris Watson – "19. Elephants" and "05. Hippopotami" – taken from the album "Outside the Circle of Fire” (TOUCH TO 37). Chris Watson is published by Touch Music/Fairwood Music UK Ltd. "The 5th of December 1931 02.00 AM" is based on the first part of the sarabande from Bach's Cello Suite II, BWV 1008.