Jazz /
The Ancients
Bomb! The debut recording by The Ancients, the intergenerational coalition of Isaiah Collier, William Hooker and William Parker formed by Parker to play concerts in conjunction with the Milford Graves' “A Mind-Body Deal” exhibition at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, and now a working group. Across 2LPs of side-length long-form improvised sets recorded at 2220 Arts & Archives in LA and The Chapel in San Francisco, The Ancients bring the free jazz trio languages first explored by t…
Believe That Was Me
Believe That Was Me: An Existential Experience Starring Avant-Garde Minds, Pianist Matthew Putman, Bassist Hill Greene, and Drummer Francisco Mela
Listen Ship
Listen Ship is the latest masterpiece in the ever-expanding sound world of Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Henry Threadgill, whom The New York Review of Books recently described as “one of American music’s great Romantics and a lifelong seeker of the sublime.” The new work is a suite for six acoustic guitars – including individual stylists such as Bill Frisell, Miles Okazaki and Brandon Ross – and two pianos that utilize Threadgill’s unique intervallic syntax to illuminate his idiosyncratic visi…
Magma
Esmeralda Sella is a young pianist from Ravenna, Italy. “Magma” is her debut album, and also a turning point. It’s the culmination of a journey that was «essential for understanding myself and the world around me» as she describes it. Sella recorded “Magma” with two key collaborators: Federico Giolito (double bass) and Giovanni Nardiello (drums), following years of mutual trust, shared musical experiences and extensive practice. «Our sound is the result of opinions, ideas, and doubts exchanged o…
Tokyo
Wolfgang Muthspiel and his trio with Scott Colley on bass and Brian Blade on drums (“Together they have something of the empathy of the Bill Evans trio” – Downbeat) goes into its third recording-venture swinging, setting the stage for what may be the group’s most adventurous trio recording with a delicate reading of Keith Jarrett’s “Lisbon Stomp”. Throughout the album however, the Austrian guitarist and his American cohorts turn the spotlight towards Wolfgang’s captivating originals, touching on…
Tramonto
Recorded live in Birmingham during a Contemporary Music Network tour in 2002, Tramonto finds UK pianist John Taylor (1942-2015) in celebratory, outgoing mood, fronting one of his most dynamic and quick-witted groups, with US musicians Marc Johnson and Joey Baron – the energetic team that would later collaborate on the critically-lauded ECM recording Rosslyn. Here the repertoire features the well-known Taylor tunes “Pure and Simple”, “Between Moons” and “Ambleside” (heard in an epic 15 minute…
Purposing the Air
"I grew up in a literary household with parents who paid close attention to the written word. My father was a Goethe scholar, and my mother often read to us, pointing out the beauty of the sound of words. I have always felt an affinity for poetry. I appreciate its emotional power to move us and to make us think less literally. Miles Davis stressed the importance of knowing the lyrics to standards, and I’ve always believed that understanding the meaning of the words provides an added dimension wh…
Feelings
Feelings marks Jake Henry’s long-awaited return as a leader, more than a decade after his debut with Sweet Talk Glitterbomb. This album is a deeply personal exploration of the intricate harmonic language and angular counterpoint Henry developed during his formative years as a guitarist. Drawing on the frenetic energy of math rock, raw intensity of metal, and chaotic textures of noise, Henry recontextualizes common song form into a bold, genre-defying soundscape.
The quartet—featuring Brian Krock…
Look Both Days
First meetings are always a risk, but if the vibrations are right and the doors are open, magic will be made. When the members of Look Both Days (brought together by Chicago pianist Erez Dessel) took the stage on the opening night of the 2023 Catalytic Sound Festival, nobody knew quite what to expect. With Marvin Tate on the mic, Mai Sugimoto and Fred Jackson Jr. both on alto saxophone, Erez Dessel on piano, and Ben Hall on drums, these stalwarts of the midwestern improvised music scene were poi…
Groppler Zorn
*2025 stock* Emerging from the fertile ground where language meets rhythm, Groppler Zorn proudly announces the release of their highly anticipated debut album. Conceived in the transition from spoken word to music, the project embodies the belief that the urge to speak and the impulse to dance spring from the same source. Far from being a singular vision, the album is the result of a series of creative dialogues — conversations between musicians and artists from diverse, and at times opposing, a…
The Dialogues
“The Dialogues” recalls the early jazz journeys of its creators, blending decades of musical growth into intimate conversations between violin and double bass. Drawing from jazz, classical, and contemporary influences, the album captures pure, wordless musical dialogue.
Move Fast And Mend Things
For their second album Hi Res Heart expand from being a trio to a performing quintet with the addition of the two string players. In contrast to the first album - a very carefully conceived studio construct - Move Fast And Mend Things finds the group in live performance mode, recorded the day after their first gig as a five piece. As before, spaciousness and fire co-exist. Even when the music is at its most abstract, the spirit of the blues is never too far away. The music is direct and melodic …
Miniature Paintings And The Impossible Warehouse
*2025 stock* Founded in the Winter of 2017 Adam Shead’s Adiaphora Orchestra is a large mixed chamber orchestra performing the compositions and conductions of percussionist composer, and educator Adam Shead. The Adiaphora Orchestra, located in Chicago, IL, is comprised of the cities finest rising star improvisers from a variety of performance idioms and practices. Including a full string, brass, woodwind, auxillary, and rhythm section the ensemble performs what Shead calls “indifference music”. A…
All It Was
This music was written in a period of intense emotions, as the grief and pain of losing my father tangled and fused with horror and despair at the genocide in Palestine – but life is complicated, and the music also comes from joy and love “Listening intently to raptors” is dedicated to the great bassist John Lindberg, and the title comes from an email correspondence we had during covid lockdown. “After a break” appeared fully formed after quite a long period of composer’s block, while listening …
At The Deer Head Inn
Big Tip! ** One-time pressing, strictly limited edition ** After more than three decades of whispered reverence among jazz cognoscenti, the complete story of Keith Jarrett's transformative return to his musical birthplace can finally be told. At The Deer Head Inn: The Complete Recordings, a sumptuous 4LP box set to be released in August 2025, captures every note from what may be the most emotionally resonant performance in the pianist's extraordinary catalog. On September 16, 1992, something ext…
Mob 1
Cush is a raw, genre-blurring journey of drums, trumpet & baritone sax — where musique concrète meets groove-jazz. A sonic rebellion echoing Corto Maltese’s mythos. For fans of Pierre Henry & wild improvisation.
Stinger
Recorded live at Chicago’s renowned listening rooms, Constellation in February 2023, and Hungry Brain in July 2023, Stinger captures an exhilarating blend of precision and spontaneity. This album showcases a band that has fine-tuned its sound while embracing the thrill of unpredictability. At the forefront of this musical conversation is Keefe Jackson, a saxophonist whose deep and resonant tones on the tenor saxophone reflect his artistry as both composer and performer. Celebrated for his abilit…
Welcome Adventure! Vol. 1
2025 stock Are you ready for magic? The master musicians Daniel Carter, Matthew Shipp, William Parker and Gerald Cleaver will provide access with this album, the first they have released after playing together for decades.
Daniel Carter has been collaborating with William Parker since the early 70s and with Matthew Shipp starting in the mid 80s. This trio has played together on many recordings but by adding legendary drummer Gerald Cleaver to the mix they have created a masterpiece combination; …
Groet
2025 stock In the ever-evolving landscape of European improvised music, Groet stands as a testament to the restless creativity and sly wit of pianist Guus Janssen and drummer Han Bennink. Released on the Dutch label Data in 2005, this album captures two of the Netherlands’ most idiosyncratic voices in a dialogue that is as unpredictable as it is deeply musical.
Janssen and Bennink, both veterans of the Dutch avant-garde, approach the piano-drum duo format with a sense of play that borders on the…