Cordial Vinyl & CDs

Review: Still peddling pure and fast jazz-funk disco, and coming straight from the source, Afrodisia are an ingeniously named German band whose stated intent was to transcend colour and creed through the mode of music. The band barely squeezed by with four EPs and an LP to their name; these two new cuts were recorded for a second album, which never saw the light of day. The A cut is the highlight, being the dreamiest and creamiest of the two.

Review: Ruby & the Mudflaps were a funk group active throughout the seventies. Many of their best tunes have never before been pressed to vinyl and that is what motivates this new collection. Breezy. It is a superb collection of the band's best studio cuts alongside a number of live recordings, all made back in the seventies. These tunes are exclusive to the Cordial Recordings label and are new to vinyl aside from 'Is That Enough?' which the label put out on a 7" in 2018. The glorious title tune is a great one to kick off with and the funk levels do not dip from there.

Review: Cordial serve up some previously unreleased funky and soulful vibes from the much loved West Coast group Seaquence. These are high speed and hugely cosmic affairs with squealing synths reaching for the skies over driving rhythm sections. 'Visions Of My Love' opens up and is a short but potent bit of soul power with lung busting vocals and great horns. 'Life' on the flip side is more mellifluous, with acrobatic vocals rising and falling over more great horns and splashes of jazzy drum work.

Review: With Cordial Recordings, LoveVinyl's Roual Galloway is doing a terrific job in making rare, sought-after tracks available to a wider audience. In truth, you'll struggle to find a more rare and expensive gospel killer than The Tolbert Family Singers' "Ride The Gospel Train", a drum machine driven chunk of gospel-boogie with crunchy funk guitars that's been changing hands for hundreds of pounds online. Andrew Weatherall is a fan and it's easy to see why. Flipside "Give it Glory", a solo cut by Tolbert Family patriarch Brother OC Tolbert, is a sweeter and breezier slab of gospel-soul that has never before been released on vinyl. Two killer cuts for the price of one: nice one, Roual!

Review: UK based production team Weekend Sun is made up of Phil Smith and Chris Tarn. Here their loose and inviting 'Hoochie Coo Strut' tune gets presented on a limited edition 12" with a pair of killer mixes. The original is all deep cut, slow motion disco grooves, spangly guitar riffs and big horns. It is a cacophony of sound that gets dialled right back by Al Kent. His take is a low slung groover with jazzy chords given plenty fo room to breath and neat little riffs filing in the spaces beyond. Andy Smith Reach Up Disco Wonderland remix is a big one for full floors.