Search results: Peacefrog

Review: Neil Landstrumm began his solo production in 1993, influenced by the Sheffield school of bleep as well as electro and Miami bass. His unique sound soon caught the ears of a wide variety of the world's finest electronic labels - going on to record for Tresor and Planet Mu among others and he remains one of the scene's innovators. Featured here are timeless classics such as "Takks" or "Sniff & Destroy" which nailed that similar kind of minimal funk that label mate Daniel Bell was creating at the time, through to the bang and clatter of frantic jams like "Swing/Jerk" and "Blam The Target" (Inhabit The Machines) which are still a true zeitgeist of early '90s UK techno.

Review: ***B-STOCK: Creasing to corner of outer sleeve but otherwise in excellent condition***


Moodymann's oeuvre continues to yield new gems on a yearly basis, but sometimes you've got to take it back to the classics. "Forevernevermore" was a landmark when it first landed in 2000, building on the promise of his earlier LPs to deliver an immaculate trip through the dreamiest corners of his idiosyncratic deep house vision. From the incantations of "Meanwhile Back At Home" to the early morning freak haze of "The Set Up", the quintessentially KDJ 'in-the-room' vibe of "The Thief That Stole My Sad Days" to the heavy edit funk of "Tribute" this is gold-standard Detroit house start to finish from one of the best to ever do it.

Review: ***B-STOCK: Sleeve damaged, but otherwise in excellent condition***

Review: ***B-STOCK: Creasing on outer sleeve, also the record has light surface marks/smudges, but otherwise in excellent working condition***


Finding and buying original vinyl copies of Moodymann's brilliant second album, 1998's "Mahogany Brown", can be a costly business, so all praise to Peacefrog for offering up this much-needed reissue. Packed to the rafters with classic Kenny Dixon Junior material - see the woozy warmth of "Sunshine", where a children's choir rides a locked-in groove and jazzy electric piano solos, the sample-laden up-tempo bump of "MEANDNJB" and the sublime gospel house workout "Black Sunday" for starters - it's arguably the album that established the Detroit legend's trademark sound once and for all. When it comes to jazz-flecked deep house shot through with references to the history of black American music, there are few - if any - better albums.

Review: For an artist whose practise is so entrenched in the history of black music (one of his most famous antics saw him deck out an Detroit home with purple drapes and decor, as a tribute to Prince) Moodymann is an unmatched force. This latest clear vinyl reissue of his 2003 classic 'Silence In The Secret Garden' hears the grilled house trickster's best album in its best light, showing off all its string-laden, sax-improvving and roller disco-house angles. Originally released to much critical acclaim for its intelligence and no-fuss vignette style, choice bits like 'Backagainforthefirsttime?' and 'Shine' nail Moodymann's advanced production style, sexy in its reluctance to reveal itself straight away.

Review: ***B-STOCK: Record ever so slightly warped, but otherwise in perfect working condition***


Second time around for Moodymann's sought after Telephone EP, which first appeared in stores way back in 2001. As with the original pressing, the A-side boasts a typically eccentric, percussively complex and attractive re-make of "Forevernevermore", where twinkling piano motifs and simmering easy listening string samples rise above a dense and bubby rhythm track. At a little over five minutes, it's notably shorter and punchier than the epic original version. Arguably even better is flipside "Telephone Blue", a wonderfully deep and jazzy outing that sees the legendary Detroiter get busy with a Fender Rhodes over a shuffling deep house beat.

Review: Vocalist Jinadu and producer Kirk Degiorgio first collaborated on the As One album "21st Century Soul" (Ubiquity Recordings) in 2001. Both have worked mainly in the electronic dance genre - recording for a wide range of labels from Mo' Wax to Bitches Brew. The Beauty Room came about through continued collaboration, with Degiorgio sending Jinadu sketches of songs with increasingly unusual progressions. Jinadu worked his magic and returned them enhanced with catchy melodies, hooks galore and layers of rich harmonies. The Beauty Room marks a notable stylistic shift for both Jinadu and Degiorgio. A debut single - a deft adaptation of Jan Hammer's classic "Don't You Know" - was recently released on Parlophone's New Religion offshoot and while it may have been a typically teasing Degiorgio hors d'oeuvre, it's in the shape of a self titled album that the Beauty Room present their full, lavish feast. Opener "Soul Horizon" sets the tone; its lulling acoustic guitar intro presaging a phalanx of Jinadu harmonies which usher in a melodic reverie of a song that could be a gently billowing outtake from the first Crosby Stills and Nash album. It's a languorous intoxication that continues as the album gathers its own mellow pace. Everywhere, Jinadu's harmonies weave, glide and plunge around the rippling guitars of (fellow Peacefrog artist) Ian O'Brien, marble smooth keyboards courtesy of Thomas O'Grady, Chris Whitten's crisp but discretely funky drums and Degiorgio's babbling electronic undercurrents. 'Holding On' is a deft, soulful Fender Rhodes ballad, with a chorus that sticks like superglue; "The Weight Of The World" nods to The Beach Boys at their most transcendent, while "Shades Of Yesterday", with Degiorgio adroitly taking care of vocal duties, is an intimate, hypnotic confessional, with a redemptive, string-caressed refrain. "Fortress", meanwhile, could very nearly be a Coldplay ballad - albeit it a spectacularly sensitive one. There's an undeniable sense of timeless urban sophistication at play here. Indeed, this album most readily brings to mind those high priests of the cerebral groove, Steely Dan. What The Beauty Room achieve here is a similar blend of sharp-creased strut and spiritual meditation, all of it laced with plenty of that most essential yet indefinable alchemical element, soul. Fans of singer/songwriters such as Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and the whole late sixties/early seventies West Coast scene, should also be hastily marshalled toward this beguiling distillation of downtempo eloquence, for while the overall mood is smooth and mellifluous, this is by no means lightweight music - far from it. There are lyrical stones tossed into the millpond tranquillity of a track like the string-propelled Burn My Bridges ("I retreat to your agenda/my resistance confounded") or the beguiling Visions of Joy ("Sometimes you'll try to tear off your disguise, revealing something new/The image you once loved, the lies you thought you knew."), proving that while this is undoubtedly music to chill to, it's certainly not aimed at those with either heart or brain in the deep freeze. Warm, human and - as you'll have guessed form Degiorgio and Jinadu's chosen band moniker - spaciously beautiful, The Beauty Room will take you on a journey past wonderfully familiar landmarks to a place you've never quite been before.

Review: The second single from Jose's new album "In Our Nature" is his unique interpretation of the Massive Attack song "Teardrop". The b-side features the instrumental "Four Forks Ache".

Review: Swedish legend Aril Brikha brings an exclusive track on Peacefrog - "For Mother". This will only be available on 12". "For Mother" is in the borderline between techno, deep soul, house and minimal.

Review: In 1998 Aril Brikha reacquainted the world with deep techno soul, as his record "Groove La Chord" crossed generic boundaries. Is it techno? Is it house? Is it deep house? It was everything and nothing. "Ex Machina", out on Peacefrog, is Aril's new album, and it is amazing.

Review: "Down The Line" is the new single from "In Our Nature", the sophomore album from Jose Gonzalez. The song has an overwhelming urgency with its unrelenting guitar strokes and foreboding yet universal lyrics. The video for "Down The Line" comes from long time collaborator of The Knife, Andreas Nilsson.

Review: "Down The Line" is the new single from "In Our Nature", the sophomore album from Jose Gonzalez. The song has an overwhelming urgency with its unrelenting guitar strokes and foreboding yet universal lyrics. The video for "Down The Line" comes from long time collaborator of The Knife, Andreas Nilsson.

Review: Findlay gives the singer-songwriter back the edge that made the likes of Bob Dylan and Paul Simon more than just bardy entertainers. His ambitious music may be intimate, bare, and dare-I-say-it sensitive. Vitally though it's also courageous, triumphant, challenging and otherworldly. Emotionally-driven, psychedelic, spiked with wit, blessed with a cidery traditionalism and foiled with subtle, yet noticeably modern, production from Simian's Simon Lord, Findlay's work is truly 'alternative folk'. But he says he's "more influenced by sixties music in turn influenced by folk". Crosby, Stills and Nash, The Band, and cult auteur Jackson C Frank (whose autonomous album was produced by Paul Simon) are his own points of reference.

Review: Marissa's music is an amalgam of traditional folk, paisley underground , shoegaze, and dream pop. Almost all of the songs are very sad - about broken hearts, death, or simple burdens. Her voice is what most people immediately respond to, with the writing and playing yielding a slow burn subtlety. Excelling at a Fahey-esque finger-picking technique, she plays homage to some of the great early American blues players.

Review: A part-time bare-knuckle boxer in his Yorkshire youth, Findlay is no introspective wimp. Influenced by the likes of The Band, Love and all things Krautrock, Findlay's music is emotionally-driven, psychedelic, spiked with wit, blessed with a cidery traditionalism and foiled with subtle, yet noticeably modern, production from Simian's Simon Lord.

Review: A part-time bare-knuckle boxer in his Yorkshire youth, Findlay is no introspective wimp. Influenced by the likes of The Band, Love and all things Krautrock, Findlay's music is emotionally-driven, psychedelic, spiked with wit, blessed with a cidery traditionalism and foiled with subtle, yet noticeably modern, production from Simian's Simon Lord.

Review: Marissa Nadler grew up in a small town in Massachusetts, where perhaps the brutal winters bred into her a chilly disposition and an early propensity for the darker and more melancholy side of things. Her music is dreamy and spectral: an amalgam of traditional folk, paisley underground , shoegaze, and dream pop. Almost all of the songs are very sad - about broken hearts, death, or simple burdens. Her voice is what most people immediately respond to, with the writing and playing yielding a slow burn subtlety. Excelling at a Fahey-esque finger-picking technique, she plays homage to some of the great early American blues players.

Review: Klima is the nom-du-disc of French musician Angele David-Guillou who has already made a name for herself in two bands, namely Piano Magic and Ginger Ale. At 15 Angele swapped piano exercises for an ever more sophisticated avant-pop career. She has become a serial collaborator with the great and good of French culture and, latterly, a beguilingly original singer-songwriter and recording artist in her own right. Soon after the Piano Magic hook-up she began working with the French band Ginger Ale. The band's cover of Siouxsie & The Banshees' "Happy House" was a club hit in Paris and London (with popular remixes by Dexter and Antoine de Crecy). She began recording tracks for the debut "Klima" album in 2004. Composed and programmed by Angele at home on her 8-track machine and recorded with Piano Magic's Jerome Tcherneyan at the controls, Klima's full debut synthesises her miscellaneous musical experiences to date and represents the full flowering of her very obvious talent. Already a name to drop in the hippest circles on the other side of La Manche, it's as Klima that Angele seems set to make her biggest splash yet.

Review: It's now been nine years since Swedish troubadour Jose Gonzalez rose to worldwide ubiquity thanks to his cover of The Knife's 'Heartbeats', and this is only his third solo record in twelve years. True to form, 'Vestiges And Claws' is a notable development of Gonzalez' sound. Whilst there may be no shortage of the kind of delicately constructed and tastefully somnambulistic songcraft by which he made his name - somewhat akin to a 21st century Cat Stevens - there is both a depth of subject matter and a glorious breadth of instrumentation to these ditties that bear the hallmark of an restless artist disinclined to rest on his laurels.

Review: It's now been nine years since Swedish troubadour Jose Gonzalez rose to worldwide ubiquity thanks to his cover of The Knife's 'Heartbeats', and this is only his third solo record in twelve years. True to form, 'Vestiges And Claws' is a notable development of Gonzalez' sound. Whilst there may be no shortage of the kind of delicately constructed and tastefully somnambulistic songcraft by which he made his name - somewhat akin to a 21st century Cat Stevens - there is both a depth of subject matter and a glorious breadth of instrumentation to these ditties that bear the hallmark of an restless artist disinclined to rest on his laurels.