Wewantsounds

Review: The latest on-point release from reissue specialists Wewantsounds is a much-needed new edition of Billy Brooks' hard-to-find 1974 set, Windows of the Mind. The album has long been sought after by record collectors, partly because one of its tracks (the superb 'Fourty Days') provided one of the stand-out samples on A Tribe Called Quest classic 'Luck of Lucien', but mostly because it's exceptionally good. For proof, check the bombastic fusion of Blaxploitation funk and big-band jazz that is opener 'Rockin' Julius', the effortlessly slick and fluid jazz guitar solos of 'Coolin' It', the swinging late night jazz-club tidiness of 'The Speechmaker', and the car-chase soundtrack craziness of 'Good News Blues'.

Review: Alice Clark's 1972 debut album - her sole full-length outing - has long been considered one of the great, unheralded soul albums, with collectors clamouring to source copies of the hard-to-find set. As this reissue proves, it remains a fantastic album. Clark's vocals are superb throughout, soaring above gospel-influenced backing tracks rich in Jimmy Smith style organs, hazy horns and a rhythm section that strikes a perfect balance between groovy looseness and low-down tightness. The set's plentiful highlights including soaring torch song "Don't Wonder Why", the jazzy wooziness of "Maybe This Time", the surprisingly funky (but still laidback and groovy) "Charms Of The Arms Of Love" and impressive opener "I Keep It Hid".

Review: Ammar El Sherei's intoxicating instrumental album Oriental Music was written in 1976 and has remained a cult classic for all the deep diggers, world music lovers and curio obsessives. For this record, the iconic Egyptian artist, composer and producer actually served up his own take on six classic compositions by another Egyptian legend, Mohamed Abdel Wahab. The results are utterly hypnotic and majestic melodic affairs with organic drums and percussion and North African melodies that worm their way deep into your brain and transport you to the hustle and bustle of a dusty open air market or street side coffee spot.

Review: Donna McGhee's "Make It Last Forever" has long been one of the most sought-after disco albums around, in part due to the quality of Greg Carmichael and Patrick Adams' production and the seductive nature of the superb title track. It's been reissued on vinyl a few times over the years; here it gets a rare outing on CD thanks to Wewantsounds. 41 years after it was released, the set still sparkles, with highlights including the dewy-eyed disco-soul bliss of "Do As I Do", the warm and super-sweet "Mr Blindman" and the total insanity of "I'm A Love Bug", which is a fantastic overhaul of Carmichael and Adams' earlier Bumble Bee Orchestra cut "Love Bug".

Review: Although widely celebrated as a pioneering and influential work, the original Japanese version of Ryuichi Sakamoto's third solo album, Hidari Ude No Yume, has long been hard-to-find. Helpfully We Want Sounds has secured the rights to reissue it in Europe, pairing the Yellow Magic Orchestra man's original set - complete with sung and spoken Japanese vocals - with a partner disc of entirely instrumental versions. Musically, it remains as vibrant and otherworldly as it did at the turn-of-the-80s, with the great Sakamoto combining elements of jazz, traditional Japanese music, new age, ambient and new-wave with rubbery synth-pop and proto-electro sounds. The fact that it still sounds like nothing else is not only proof of Sakamoto's genius, but also why you genuinely need it in your life.

Review: Wewantsounds continues to respond to that request with another benchmark reissue following Egyptian musician and composer Ammar El Sherei's Oriental Music. This time taking one of the definitive releases in Ryuichi Sakamoto's extensive oeuvre and making it shiny and new. Or at least giving it a dusting down, not that the contents were ever going to sound anything other than fresh.

Hidari... was such a groundbreaking album at the time because of the pop sensibilities Sakamoto actively looked to root the album in by way of enlisting British producer Robin Scott and American guitarist Adrian Belew in addition to members of his Yellow Magic Orchestra. The result sounds like intoxicating downtempo electronica, jerky elec-house, 1980s fantasy movie soundtracks and Far Eastern percussive exoticism. So apparently a marriage of styles and places that we consider striking today does sound even better 39 years later.

Review: Ryuichi Sakamoto was still in the early days of his career when second solo album, "Thousand Knives Of", appeared in 1978. It was recorded around the same time as the formation of the band that made him famous, Yellow Magic Orchestra, and contains a similar reliance on cutting-edge electronic instrumentation. Of course, there are still pieces that doff a cap to his classical roots - see the piano-heavy "Grasshoppers" - as well as workouts that join the dots between jazz-funk and German style "kosmiche" ("Das Neue Japanische Elektronische Volkslied"), but for the most part it's the entirely electronic tracks that hit home hardest. For proof, check the jaunty genius of "Plastic Bamboo", the prototype YMO electrofunk of "The End Of Asia" and the doom-laden weirdness of "Island Of Woods".

Review: It's probably quite important to watch the 1973 movie Serpico in order to fully understand the moods Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis was thinking of when he wrote this accompanying score. The story of a hard but fair cop, the eponymous hero who takes on the New York Police Department's legions of corrupt officers in order to clean things up, that ruthless backdrop isn't exactly the image conjured by arrangements like 'Shoe Shop', which sounds like you're strolling through Central Park falling in love with a jazz trumpet.

Simply put, this is the perfect example of how circumstance and context define our emotional response to music. Sure, quintessentially 1970s funk-disco pieces like 'On The Streets' were made to be a pimp's walk-in theme, and the slick strings and groove of 'Meeting In The Park' is ideal for covert cop sequences, but the standout moments here are where classical meets Hellenic, and they really do shine.

Review: Compilation specialists Wewantsounds return once again; this time their focus is squared on the Bossa Nova movement. Popularised in the 1960s, Bossa Nova's roots actually took place in the prior decade and this 20-track collection looks to chronicle the movement's emergence properly. Artists readily associated with Bossa Nova of course feature, but the Wewantsounds crew have dug a bit deeper to highlight some of the lesser known, cult practitioners too. Therefore you get a nice blend, from Joao Gilberto to Celso Murilo via Elza Soares and Orlann Divo. Featuring sleeve notes from French music journalist Jacques Denis, Bossa Nova is a fine introductory compilation for those who wish to discover more about the subtle differences between early bossa and the more relaxed samba Cancao.

Review: Having previously issued Akiko Yano's 1976 debut "Japanese Girl" - an eccentric set of East-West pop fusions marked out by the artist's distinctive vocals - Wewantsounds has returned to raid her vaults once more. "Iroha Ni Konpeitou" first appeared in 1977 and garnered great hype in Japan thanks to the success of its predecessor. It's a similarly eccentric but inspired set, with Yano confidently flitting between synthesizer-heavy instrumental soundscapes (see superb opener "Kawaji"), drowsy country-inspired songs ("A Long Wait"), seductive jazz-funk ("Hourou"), head-nodding reggae-boogie ("Hai Hai Gasa") and breathy, post-soul ballads ("On The Way Home", a song that boasts both pedal steel and synthesizers).

Review: Having previously issued Akiko Yano's 1976 debut "Japanese Girl" - an eccentric set of East-West pop fusions marked out by the artist's distinctive vocals - Wewantsounds has returned to raid her vaults once more. "Iroha Ni Konpeitou" first appeared in 1977 and garnered great hype in Japan thanks to the success of its predecessor. It's a similarly eccentric but inspired set, with Yano confidently flitting between synthesizer-heavy instrumental soundscapes (see superb opener "Kawaji"), drowsy country-inspired songs ("A Long Wait"), seductive jazz-funk ("Hourou"), head-nodding reggae-boogie ("Hai Hai Gasa") and breathy, post-soul ballads ("On The Way Home", a song that boasts both pedal steel and synthesizers).

Review: Wewantsounds continues its Akiko Yano reissue series with a celebrated gem: 1980's "Gohan Ga Dekitayo", a set whose title apparently translates as "Ready For Dinner". The double album is significant in part because the music underpinning her distinctive J-Pop vocals was provided by Yellow Magic Orchestra, with band member Ryuichi Sakamoto acting as co-producer. As a result, the set offers a distinctive blend of far-sighted synthesizer sounds, power-pop and American style AOR rock, with Yano's famed vocals and piano playing featuring prominently throughout. There are nods to multiple styles - early electrofunk, reggae and so on - and some genuinely surprising highlights, including a killer cover of YMO's "Tong Poo". Bonkers but brilliant!