Jazz /
Dark Is The Sun
* Special 10th anniversary edition comes in tip-on gatefold sleeve with cover art in bronze, including archive pics & new liners. 180 gram vinyl; includes download card. * Recorded in Sweden, Dark is the Sun is a concept album based on themes and variations by British pianist/composer/arranger Greg Foat, who has created an intriguing blend of non-contemporary jazz sounds with classic scoring techniques. An exotic array of unorthodox instrumentation was utilized, including harpsichord, tubular be…
Chris McGregor's Brotherhood Of Breath
** 2021 Stock ** Reissued by Fledg'ling in 2007, this is a classic title from 1971 by Chris McGregor's magnificent big band -- Brotherhood Of Breath. Arguably one of the most influential albums to emerge from the London jazz scene of the early 1970s, the Brotherhood of Breath was an exuberant big-band created by South African-born pianist and composer, Chris McGregor. In South Africa, McGregor had formed the racially mixed Blue Notes in the early 1960s. By 1964, finding it very difficult to work…
Gideon Plays
Long lost 1968 album from visionary South African jazz composer incorporating traditional African music sources and instruments. Officially licensed from the Nxumalo family and reissued with inner sleeve containing archival photographs and new liner notes by Francis Gooding. Gideon Nxumalo’s Gideon Plays might just be the most mythologised and sought-after LP in the whole South African canon. A sophisticated bop excursion with a distinctive African edge, it was only Nxumalo’s second LP as leader…
Live at Century City Playhouse 9/9/79
Finally available after long pressing delays, comes a never before issued recording of Horace Tapscott leading his legendary Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra, "Live at Century City Playhouse 9/9/79", documenting the entirety of a 2 hours performance that sprawls across glorious 3 LPs. Easily one of the most beautiful, striking, and historically important records of the year, it’s a joyous explosion of sound, seeded by social, political, and community-based action, at the juncture of spiritual and fr…
Kirtan: Turiya Sings
Impulse! is releasing a virtually unreleased work by the legendary and late jazz godmother Alice Coltrane, a 1981 recording titled Kirtan: Turiya Sings. The album, to be released on 16 July 2021 as part of the historic label's 60th anniversary celebrations, comprises nine devotional songs originally released in 1982 only on cassette for ashram students. In addition to Alice's voice and instrument, those recordings included parts for synthesizer, strings and effects. In 2004, Alice's son (and pro…
Raft
The Northwoods Improvisers return with a new album comprising their first release in 10 years. Raft is the latest effort with an augmented lineup that includes veterans Mike Johnston (bass, bass recorder, wood flutes, percussion) and Nick Ashton (drums, percussion) and unites them with a fierce front line of saxophones with Dominic Berenga (tenor/alto/soprano saxophones, flute, percussion) and Donovan Boxey (alto/soprano saxophone, clarinet, melodica, wood flutes, percussion). The music is all a…
Inscribe
** 2021 Stock ** Inscribe is the third release by this group. The self titled disc includes pieces and improvisations by all the members. The instrumentation includes guitar, cheng, violin, bass, tabla, percussion, bowed banjo and cello. With elements of indigenous music, jazz and the avant garde, natural reference points are Don Cherry, Ahmed Abdul-Malik, The Art Ensemble of Chicago and early ECM records. Includes member of the Northwoods Improvisers. The first release on the label in nearly 10…
Emerging Field
** 2021 Stock ** Emerging Field marks the sixth release of Faruq Z. Bey with the Northwoods Improvisers on the Entropy Stereo label. This release finds the group exploring rhythm and space in a broader sense than previous offerings. Faruq Z. Bey, Mike Carey, and Skeeter Shelton create thoughtful space and intricate conversations in their horn lines evoking a relaxed and passionate response with a solid blues focus. Mike Johnston and Nick Ashton root the group with their sound rhythmic foundation…
Midnight Pacific Airwaves
** 2021 Stock ** A rare recording from an under recorded period of Bobby Bradford's music. This date stems from a California radio broadcast. The line up is Bobby Bradford on trumpet, James Newton (flute), Richard Rehwald (bass) and John Goldsmith (drums). Includes a bonus track duet with Vinny Golia (clarinet) from a 2003 gig.
Journey into the Valley
** 2021 Stock ** "Once a member of Detroit legends Griot Galaxy, Bey's take on jazz is informed by the spectral divinations of Sun Ra, and pieces like "Moors" and "sherrif Sam (Sound By Law)" remind you of prime era Arkestra, floating between beautifully extended melody heads and stretches of languid free blowing, all underpinned by a steady, rolling rhythm section." Jon Dale; Signal To Noise Fall 2008. "If this were merely an audio CD, it would garner excellent reviews. But this set with DVD an…
Ancestry
** 2021 Stock ** On Ancestry, Trevor Watts approaches improvisation in a more stripped down approach with percussionist Jamie Harris. Both Watts and Harris combine an incredible sense of rhythm with exploration and subtlety. The recordings were culled from live performances and more intimate settings at Trevor's home studio to give a balance of the high energy of performance and relaxed musical exploration between friends. The end result is a stunning document of duo interplay on various hand pe…
Ashirai Pattern
** 2021 Stock ** A diverse follow up to their 19 Moons release of 2002. The groups has added longtime Bey collaborator Mike Carey (flute/tenor saxophone) to the ensemble. Ashirai Pattern embodies a higher spiritual plane and elements of mysticism in an aural feast. Instrumentation includes vibes, marimba, voice, bass, drums, tenor saxophone, flute, bass clarinet, violin, and percussion.
"The Michigan-based Northwoods Improvisers collective meld the largely undefined sounds of world music with ja…
Oneness
Matthew Halsall to release Oneness. A triple vinyl set of archive recordings featuring three sessions of deep meditative spiritual-jazz in a deluxe edition, designed by Ian Anderson of The Designer's Republic. The recordings on Oneness date from Jan, March and September 2008 and were born from a period of experimentation as Halsall first began to explore the music that would provide the inspiration for his spiritual jazz recordings Fletcher Moss Park and When the World Was One. They also offer a…
Medasi
Life Goes On presents Medasi by Haki R. Madhubuti. Super-rare deep spiritual jazz from 1977! A little-known sought after obscurity of indy label afro-centric deep jazz recorded in 1976-7!
Pilgrimage
** 2021 Stock ** Legendary avant-garde jazz saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell is best known for his role as a founding member of the Art Ensemble of Chicago. This group is recognized for incorporating, and none-too-subtly ridiculing, the long-bearded tradition of Western art music. Mitchell, nonetheless, has something to say that is within the tradition himself, apart from, but related to his work in the field of jazz. Usually the sort of classical music piece produced by a "jazz cat" is formulated wi…
Bremen '66
** 2021 Stock ** The young Paul Bley earned his spurs playing with legends including Charles Mingus, Art Blakey, Chet Baker, Jimmy Giuffre, Ornette Coleman and Bill Evans. As the 1960s progressed, he increasingly embraced the avant-garde, with arguably his greatest successes coming in the piano trio format. Originally broadcast on Nordewestradio in the autumn of 1966, and featuring material by Bley and his wife Carla, this fiery set typifies his approach at the time, and is accompanied by backgr…
Spiritual Jazz 9: Blue Notes Part One & Two
** 2021 Stock ** The Blue Note record label needs little introduction. Musically, graphically and sonically iconic, the label created and defined the golden age of modern jazz on record. Founded in 1939 by German émigré Alfred Lion, the label's roster of artists is a litany of giants - Thelonious Monk, Sonny Rollins, Horace Silver, Lee Morgan, Art Blakey, Lee Morgan, Herbie Hancock, and many more. With peerless musicians in the grooves, the legendary Rudy Van Gelder behind the boards, and graphi…
World Spirituality Class.1: The Ecstatic Music of Alice Coltrane
** 2021 Stock ** Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda self-released four brilliant cassette albums. These contained music, inpired by the gospel music of the Deroit Churches she grew up in, and the Indian devotional music of her religious practice. Originally available only throughh her ashram, they are her most obscure body of work. Turiyasangitananda’s devotion to spirituality was the central purpose of the final four decades of her life, an often-overlooked awakening that largely took shape duri…
Malagasy at Newport
** Carefully remastered. 4 page booklet with rare and unpublished photos ** In May 1972, the wave of anger and the thirst for freedom that had swept the world in 1968 arrived in Madagascar. The Malagasy youth took the opportunity to exile in search of a brighter future. Several of them, all jazz musicians and often polyintrumentalists, came to Paris with their afro hair and bellbottoms. Their names were Sylvin Marc, his cousin Ange "Zizi" Japhet, Del Rabenja, Gérard Rakotoarivony and Frank Rahol…
Madagascar Now - Maintenant 'Zao
** Carefully remastered. 4 page booklet with rare and unpublished photos ** While he was working on the repertoire for the new version of his group Malagasy, with young Malagasy musicians he had met in Paris in 1972 (and who can be heard on the album "Malagasy At Newport-Paris"), Jef Gilson realised that two of his new discoveries, in addition to being established polyinstrumentalists (who both had sharpened their skills in the legendary seja-jazz band from La Réunion, Le Club Rythmique), were a…