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Review: John Frusciante of Red Hot Chilli Peppers fame has always had a fine outlet to explore his passion for electronic music courtesy of the Los Angeles label and 303 lovers at Acid Test. He's turned out plenty of EPs and LPs now and 2023 kicks off with his latest offering I. It is a double album with the scones part II also forming his first new solo material since 2020. He has said of the rather sculptural album: "This music was made from sequences which never exceed a single note, many of these pieces being made on a single pattern."

Review: The Microcosm: Visionary Music Of Continental Europe, 1970-1986 presents works from 'cosmically-taped' artists; legends like Vangelis, Ash Ra Tempel, and Popol Vuh through to more obscure names in the form of Bernard Xolotl, Robert Julian Horky and Enno Velthuys. According to Washington State label Light In The Attic, the compilation aspires to present these these works of "ambient, new age, neuzeit, prog, krautrock, cosmic, holistic stuff, whatever one calls it - as a pulsating movement unto itself", and they've done a fine job of that when you hear how well curated this album really is. From major label recordings through to limited obscure cassette editions, it unearths some truly captivating and oddly inspiring gems from beatless electronic music's recent past.

Review: If postmodernity is what really rivets the minds and hearts of music listeners today, then longtime music-maker Eluvium (Matthew Robert Cooper) certainly has his finger firmly on the pulse. His latest album is a musical weigh-up of the concept of ontological relativism, a way of thinking that has seen an uptick in recent years thanks to the oncoming tide of new intelligence-mimicking (or, shall we say, cloning?) technologies such as AI and psyche-predictive algorithms. Through dour string movements, rattling soundscapes and neoclassical tropes, a sense of inevitability is put forth by the likes of 'Swift Automations' and 'Scatterbrains'. Whether the overarching conclusion of '(Whirring Marvels In) Consensus Reality' means we'll be overtaken by robots is really up to you.

Review: London's legendary Mute institution goes back to its roots and digs up some of the best work by one of the UK's finest Cabaret Voltaire. These guys don't really need an introduction give the fact that they're pretty much responsible for the rise of post-punk right through to the birth of techno. It was about time a new compilation of their stuff was released, especially one as brutally on-point as this one! All the classics such as "Nag Nag Nag", "Kneel To The Boss" and "On Every Other Street" are one here but the more obscure rarities that were previously only available on 7" are the real winners. "Just Fascination", for example, is one you'll certainly want on a longer, re-mastered cut! Downright essential!

Review: The Ibiza season is already in full flow, with the world's biggest DJs playing on the world's biggest dance-floras. This collection of tunes from Front Of House attempts to predict what will be the biggest tunes of the summer out there on the most famous party island of them all. And a fine mix it is too with a mix of originals and remixes from scene mainstays such as Claptone, Liam Cox, Idris Elba, Karmina Dei & Fabe and tens more. Wherever you hear these tunes the good times are sure to follow.

Review: The Music For Memory label has invented its own little scene over the course of the last decade. It's a mature and moving world where modern classical, ambient, downtempo, Balearic and plenty of in between sounds all come together in soothing harmony. To mark the occasion of its tenth release, the label has put together this superb double album overview of what it does - all the usual artists you would expect feature from Joan Biblioni to Jonny Nash to Gigi Masin and it all adds up to a perfectly escapist collection from this top draw label who sadly lost co-founder Jamie Tiller earlier in the year.

Review: You will probably know by now that Detroit's Filthiest is Julian Shamou, aka 313 Bass Mechanics amongst many other names. He is a music-making machine who deals mostly with electro on a wide range of labels. It is French crew Casa Voyager who tap him up here for an immersive full-length that finds him expanding his sound to take in moments away from the heart of a peak-time dancefloor amongst plenty of his usual weaponry. There are smooth electro vocal cuts, crunchy and sleazy ghetto cuts and soulful almost jungle rollers for deeper workouts making for his most complete work yet.

Review: Galcher Lustwerk is one of those artists who has a completely diehard fan base. And for good reason, he is an idiosyncratic producer who collides myriad different sounds. Rap, funk, blues, beatboxing, techno, electro and bass are all fair game to him. His fist ever mixtape was a stream of sonic consciousness that has never before been released on vinyl. But now Ghostly International step up and press it to two 12"s, with both black and coloured green versions as well as a CD version available. It was a fine announcement of his arrival back then and still stands apart today.

Review: Mark Broom is a techno veteran, but just because he enjoys that sot of status doesn't mean he has lost his edge. He proves that here with a hefty new record on Radio Salve's mighty Rekids. It bangs from the off with his signature heavy drums defining each of the tracks across all four sides of vinyl. '100% Juice' is peak time tackle with incendiary hit hats and loopy synths, 'Slush' is a head melter with more warped lines and elsewhere 'Wonky Workout' does exactly what says on the tin. There is a brilliantly unsettling and eerie vibe to 'Boxed In' and straight up dance floor fire in 'Wiggle Me This.'

Review: Dylan Brady and Laura Les are 100 Gecs and 10000 is their much anticipated second album. It comes four years after their 2019 breakout debut includes previously released tunes 'mememe' which is a colourful mix of ska-inflected verses, thrash guitars and wonky synths and 'Doritos & Fritos', a more 90s styled alt rock anthem unlike anything else the band has done. A world tour is to follow the release of this album and is the natural next step for this artfully unhinged and impossible-to-predict collective who make some of the most outsider pop sounds around right now.

Review: Stroom's latest chunk of left-of-centre brilliance comes from Jan Van Der Broeke, an artist active since the 1980s who's arguably most famous for his work under the Absent Music, June 11 and The Misz aliases. 11,000 Dreams is his first career retrospective and draws on 30 years worth of self-released cassettes and CD-Rs. It's a sublime set, all told, pulling together dreamy, evocative, melodious and soft-touch tracks that blur the boundaries between ambient, skewed downtempo pop, blissful warmth, spoken word laden cheeriness (the odd but brilliant "My Lesbian Girlfriends") and spacey cuts laden with exotic instrumentation and whistling synthesizer melodies.

Review: Ryuichi Sakamoto is making a very welcome return here with his first solo album since 2017's async. Milan Records are releasing 12 in January to coincide with the venerated Japanese composer's 71st birthday, and the timing is poignant given the album draws from musical sketches created while Sakamoto battled for two and a half years with cancer. Sakamoto himself describes reaching for his synths as a kind of therapeutic response to a big operation, and so the music carries an added depth of personal experience from one of the most profound ordeals a person can go through.

Review: For their 12 year anniversary, Munich's Compost Disco serves up 15 previously unreleased tracks. The variety ranges across the floor from classic soul (Ed Lee's 'You Are The Star' feat Allison David - extended dub) to boogie (Dimitri From Paris & DJ Rocca's 'The Compass Point') to some Italo (Ron Deacon on 'Killersong' or Imperial Porcelain's 'Tulip Moon'), and even a bit of deep disco (as heard on Mark E's playful 'I'm Your Eversion'). 12 Compost Disco Years is what the label best described themselves as tasty, hypnotizing and emotional.

Review: Alberta Balsam's elevated strain of electro is finding a comfortable footing, building on the impact of her Higher Dreams EP for Dekmantel in 2021 to now land on another Dutch label, DUB. Weighing in with six tracks, this is more of a mini-album than a single, giving Aniek de Rooij plenty of space to stretch out and show what her sound is all about. There's a satisfying blend of braindance-minded studio trickery and electro immediacy at play here, with a pervasive dark shroud hanging over the musical composition. The influence of Rephlex alumni isn't far behind, but de Rooij runs ahead with her influences as fuel, creating her own signature in the intricate drum programming and spellbinding synthesis that shapes out these magnificent constructions.

Review: To single out a release in catalogue of the 70s famed 'tax scam' label TSG is a hard ask the level of quality remained both consistently and inexplicably high during its two years of operation. Thus calling 1619 Bad Ass Band's 1976 self-titled album a stand-out release doesn't honour the spirit of the catalogue, and yet, by all accounts, everything about this monolithic funk and soul unit is striking.

Prices on the second-hand market for the original LP and 1978 Graham International reissue have priced out virtually everyone for decades. P-Vive is thrilled to be reissuing the album on vinyl fitted with an iconic Japanese obi strip.

Review: The past is on the mind of Mike Paradinas aka Mu-Ziq here. 1977, as its name suggests, looks back, but not to punk but to the equally siesmic year zero of the 90s ambient revolution. Definitely showcasing the more mellow side to his productions, the album glides gracefully through clouds of sugar sweet melody, his grasp of which remains as distinctive and recognisable as anyone's in the game. 'Allegro' sounds like a Philip Glass track trapped in ice and sprinkled in snow, 'Houzz' is a low key groover like The Black Dog used to make... But ultimately all you need to know is that another 15 great new prodeuctions by Mike Paradinas are in existence - and on vinyl to boot - and that alone should be enough to send you scuttling off to buy it pronto.

Review: Dark Entries takes it back to New York City in around 1982 for this previously unreleased record from Ike Yard. This cult crew was made up of Stuart Argabright, Michael Diekmann, Kenneth Compton, and Fred Szymanski and they worked in their own realm somewhere between proto-body music and No Wave peers in New York. They disbanded just a year after forming having dropped an EP on Les Disques du Crepuscule in 1981 and then a self-titled album for Factory in 1982. Using the Korg MS-20 and the Roland TR-808 they cook up plenty of hybrid electro-acoustic sounds and ramshackle rhythms that are underpinned by moody baselines and perfect to get bodies moving in the club. Whether you're a post-punk fan or lover of weird electronics, this is well worth checking out.

Review: It's taken a while, but finally Knxwledge has delivered the follow-up to his "official" debut album, 2015's "Hud Dreems". A concept album of sorts - the tall tale behind it being that the beats were created in 1988 by an infant version of our musical hero after he climbed inside an SP-12 sampler and mastered the machine - the set sees Knxwledge sprint through a beat-tape style assortment of short, sweet and often sublime instrumentals that make use of a variety of period samples. Given his track record, it's an impressive album, regardless whether the beats were genuinely made when he was in "Nike diapers" (as the press release amusingly claims) or not.

Review: The DJ Spinna 1998 Beat Tape vinyl finally arrives having previously only been available on digital after initial release in 2000. It is the this in a series after the 1997 and 1996 beat tapes he dropped back in 2019 and 2017 and again finds Vincent Williams serving essential hip hop beats. They are often depend packed with soul, with jostling kick and raw his interlaced with well chosen samples, curious vocals and cute melodies. It is a perfect soundtrack to a lazy afternoon, or great source material for DJs looking to bring a cinematic sound.

Review: This is a black vinyl version of a reissue that we also have on gold vinyl of Soyuz's '2' album. Originally released in 2019, this album marks a significant phase in the band's evolution, offering a glimpse into the sound that would define their later work while retaining traces of avant-psychedelic-pop influences. Produced during bandleader Alex Chumak's transition from Minsk to Kyiv, the LP reflects the tension between exploration and homesickness. Drawing from influences like Mikita Arlou, Ethiopian jazz, and Italian library music, the album eloquently captures the melancholy of long-distance travel and transience, creating a sonic narrative of emotional flux.

Review: Few people can be said to be a true hip-hop head lest they've heard 2014 Forest Hills Drive by J. Cole. The heartfelt, orchestrally-tempered album was released way back in 2014 (duh) and hears the rapper sing and speak eloquently of his bittersweet coming-of-age - telling many stories of his first loves, his adolescent angst, and his intentional avoidance of the wrong paths. Now lovingly reissued just in time for its 10th Anniversary, we're glad to hear the LP that helped establish Cole's romantic, reminiscent side won't stay out of the limelight.

Review: The evolution of Justin Vernon from the broken-hearted, falsetto-voiced troubadour who emerged from his cabin to deliver his debut eight years ago to the here and now may seem downright implausible, yet the facts of the matter are this - '22, A Million' is proof positive that he is one of the most multi-faceted and enigmatic and inscrutable artists we have at our disposal, still capable of delivering heart-rending beauty in song form yet also of marrying it to wilful abstraction in a way that not only offers emotional resonance yet reflects and refracts its surrounding era to offer succour and salvation. Sing it from the rooftops, this is little short of a complicated modern masterpiece.

Review: On their hotly anticipated debut album, Passive Refraction invites us up to the "27th Floor" of an imaginary hotel in the heart of Tokyo, a place where you can gaze in wonder at the neon-lit cityscape. Musically, it's an immersive experience, where dreamy, slowly unfurling ambient chords and vivid synthesizer sounds reminiscent of Vangelis' "Blade Runner" soundtrack intertwine with sampled voices, hazy aural textures and quietly loved-up melodies. It's the kind of album that you can imagine being classed as a 21st century ambient classic 20 or 30 years from now, which we think you'll agree is high praise indeed.

Review: Chief among the multiple formats of De La Soul's debut album is this 2xLP edition - especially as the original one album pressing was famed as being one of the least DJ-friendly long players in existence. Often regarded as the inception of late 80s/early 90s 'alternative rap', the trio incited said era thanks to their declaration of the 'D.A.I.S.Y. Age' (da inner sound, y'all), consciously choosing a flowery, positive hip-hop sound, accessible to everyone. Trugoy, Maseo and Posdunos offer distinct personalities across the project, suggesting alternative ways in which to stay true to one's roots while keeping on the right path.

Review: The debut album from De La Soul (Trugoy, Maseo and Posdunos) gets another reissue here, pretty much ensuring this longstanding Long Island hip-hop trio never stay out of the limelight. Renowned for its uniquely positive spin on hip-hop amid a harsher world of dark, hardball gangster rap, classics such as 'Me, Myself And I' are known the world over, and you'll be hard-pressed to find a soul who doesn't have so much as an inkling as to how it sounds. While they were labelled as 'hippies' at the time, they've since gone on to influence many hip-hop artists internationally.

Review: De LA Soul's debut album gets a reissue in multiple formats this year. Among them, the most likely curiosity is this limited edition magenta LP, celebrating the trio's colourful aesthetic - a courageous move to take back in the 1990s, in a surrounding world of hip-hop darkness. Featuring such hits as 'Me, Myself and I', 'The Magic Number' and 'Eye Know', these are playful songs from hip-hop's veritable straight-and-narrow trifecta.

Review: Fluxus drone pioneers La Monte Young and Marian Zazeela present the latest reissue of 31 VII 69 10:26-10:49 PM/23 VIII 64 2:50:45-3:11 AM The Volga Delta, a historic and mesmerizing soundworld which captures the '60s pioneers' twin paths through the worlds of performance art, sculpture-based acousmatic music, and an overall real alternative beatnik lifestyle . Made between 1964 and 1969, the album has gone down in history as a captivating fusion of dreamy electronic sounds and Eastern-influenced vocalization, with techniques such as microtonal tuning and extended repetition laying its experimental groundwork.

Review: Efficient Space's latest essential release sees Andras and Instant Peterson take a trawl through the darker, lesser-visited corners of Australian electronic music. According to the label, the pair lifted material from "local 12" singles, CD-Rs and the archives of community radio station 3RRR FM". Highlights come thick and fast throughout, from the acid-flecked, "Nude Photo" style Detroit fun of FSOM's "Resist The Beat" and chiming, trumpet-laden bliss of Ian Eccles-Smith's "The Slaughtering Eye", to the jaunty, mid-90s New York style bounce of Blimp's "Yellowgold" and the ultra-deep ambient techno pulse of Tetrphnm's "Track 11". Check, too, the enveloping dreaminess of Screensaver's drifting ambient closer, and the jazzy dancefloor depth of Inner Harmomy's "Da Lub Club".

Review: Tresor is celebrating 30 years in the game with a series of special reissue projects. This one really goes way back to almost the start, when Juan Atkins was already defining the early techno sound. For this one he linked up with Moritz von Oswald and Thomas Fehlmann in 1992 for a second iteration of the 3 Men in Berlin project. The monumental results join the dots between Detroit and Berlin across a collection of timeless cuts that meld bassline funk, hypnotic minimalism and soulful machine sounds into propulsive, emotive dance floor joy. The unbridled energy and cosmic elegance of 'Jazz Is The Teacher' might just be the highlight.

Review: Cappadonna and Stu Bangas come together for a new album on the latter's Brutal Music that is potent both lyrically and rhythmically. Both artists have dropped plenty of heat in the last year or so and now they get tight and cohesive on the emcee's first full-length collaboration with a single producer. It comes nine years after they first worked together on a tune and shows how far they have come with timeless bars and dope beats. Stu has said the album is "a life goal of mine that I have checked off, while Donna added Stu's catalog may be as great, if not greater, than any producer I can name." Wise words.

Review: Shoegaze legends Ride's reissuing roll reaches their first four EPs; the first here, simply titled 'Ride', was emblematic of the band's sound and, outside of that sphere, paved the way for an entire genre. After that, and before 'Nowhere', came the subsequent EP's 'Play', 'Fall' and 'Today Forever', which make up this sprawling blue vinyl boxset. Once again, you can now bask in the shimmering waves that lap at this jolly band's feet, and ours.

Review: "45:33" was originally recorded by James Murphy (aka LCD Soundsystem) as a continuous album-length disco symphony. It is the result of Murphy's desire to create a piece of music outside the typical commercial constraints. Don't miss this DFA release.

Review: Don't get it confused; this isn't just a simple reissue of Neu!'s first album, but rather a tributary collection box of the krautrock pioneers' first four albums. And that's not to mention all the new reworks of the debut LP's tracks from various bands whose members double up as megafans - including Mogwai, The National, and Idles. A stonking, lead double-time EBM remix of 'Hallogallo' comes from Stephen Morris and Gabe Guernsey, and sets an impressive-progressive tone for the album to follow.

Review: A double album of sumptuous, expansive downbeat luxury written by Pete Woosh - one half of the celebrated duo Digs & Woosh and Nottingham's DIY collective - with Andy Riley (Toka Project, Inland Knights) during the illness which would eventually claim Pete's life. Given the background of its creation, it's a blissfully peaceful and optimistic sounding collection.

The chilled disco/house hypnotism of 'Keep Yr Shape' and 'For Your Love', all slinky, hazy vocals and headnodding back room hedonism, are obvious highlights, but more reflective moments like 'Piano Fades' make this into a varied and enduring 'proper album' listen rather a mere collection of tracks.

All profits will go to the Spirit Wrestlers foundation, founded in honour of Pete's memory and devoted to good causes in his hometown of Nottingham.

Review: Brooklyn-based band 79.5 make music right now, rather than being some long-lost acts from the 80s as you might expect from the cover. The group consists of singer, songwriter and composer Kate Mattison, singer and rapper Lola Adanna, drummer Caito Sanchez, bassist Andrew Raposo and sax player and flautist Izaak Mills. Their self-titled album comes on Razor-N-Tape and captures the sound of New York City perfectly with soul and psychedelic melodies that are hard to match. From 70s underground disco to acid jazz to and sweet pop sounds, they draw on it all for this fine concoction of dancefloor gems, which also serves as a protest at the often all too male dominated world of dance music.

Review: Since debuting on Bromance in 2013, Kaytranada has become one of the leading lights on the future R&B scene. Given his track record, it's understandable that there's plenty of hype surrounding 99.9%, his long await debut album. The 15-track sees him showcasing the depth and variety of his beat making, production and compositional skills. Thus, the string-drenched jazziness of "Bus Ride" is followed by the off-kilter R&B pop of "Got It Good", and the Onra-ish synth-hop soul of "One Too Many" sits side by side with the double bass, Rhodes and Latin-influenced beats of "Despite The Weather". It's pretty expansive, clocking in at 15 tracks deep, but the quality never dips throughout. Recommended.

Review: Joao Donato is one of the most well known and prolific stars of Brasil's MPB (which is short for "musica populera brasileira") scene. He has toped several highly sought of albums and is still turning them out today despite already having assured his legacy. A Bad Donato is something of a move away from his Brazilian bossa nova roots - instead the album, which was recorded in LA, is electric and eclectic with funk, psychedelic pop and groovy Fender Rhodes driven sounds. This reissue on Verve By Request comes on nice heavyweight 180g vinyl with classics like 'The Frog' and 'Lunar Tune' still sounding fresh.

Review: The blissful, heart wrenching, emotionally captivating Sufjan Stevens teams up with one of California's finest lo-fi indie artists, and a chap who has warmed up for him on a number of occasions; Angelo De Augustine. No doubt you can already picture in the mind's ear what this collaboration will sound like, and you'd be right. But it's far more difficult to figure out where they're coming from with this release.

Allow us to divulge, then. Beginner's Mind is a record at once inspired by some excellent movies, and then also some not-so-excellent ones. Each track on here owes something to the world's foremost visual culture (sorry, gamers), from 'Reach Out' referencing Wings of Desire to 'Lady Macbeth in Chains' nodding to All About Eve. In every case the link is nuanced, rather than direct, but this is only testament to the staggering songwriting at play.

Review: We are honored to release 'A Boy Alone', a double LP set from Manchester electronic music pioneer Eric Random. Best known for his early recordings for New Hormones and Les Disques du Crepuscule and collaborations with Pete Shelley (Buzzcocks), Cabaret Voltaire and Nico. As an original member of The Tiller Boys with Shelley, Random injected a healthy dose of Krautrock into the dour Manchester post-punk scene in 1978/79 before going solo the following year. Random's first 7" "Subliminal"/"23 Skidoo" was released in 1981 via Les Disques du Crepuscule and explored ominous sonic surrounds. That same year also saw the release of a second 7" single on New Hormones, "Dow Chemical Company"/ "Skin Deep". Both tracks offered bubbling, rhythmic sound patterns, and were the first to feature other musicians that would become know as The Bedlamites. Consisting of Lynn Walton on vocals, Ian Runacres and Andy Diagram of Dislocation Dance, and bassist Wayne Worm, aka Wayne Sedgeman. Their debut 12" single "Subliminal Seduction"/"Bedlam-a-Go-Go" was released in 1982 through Plurex, mixing arid funk textures and sparse melodies. That same year the group contributed proto chill-out track "6.55" to Plurex compilation 'Hours' and the highly filmic track "In Cassette Conference" to the Touch cassette package 'Feature Mist'. In 1983, Random spent several months in the Himalayas with a group of musicians from the Kulu Valley and studied non-Western instruments such as tabla. On returning to Manchester, Random convened a new group of Belamites including Walton, Sedgeman and drummer Graham Dowdall aka Dids of Ludus. They released the 12" single "Mad As Mankind"/"Dream Web Of Maya" in 1984 on Cabaret Voltaire's Doublevision, embracing electronic, industrial and dub styles. In 1985 they contributed the soothing "Pure Power" to Food Records' "Imminent Episode One" compilation. Our reissue also includes 4 unreleased bonus tracks from Eric's archives recorded between 1981-1984. The whole set adds up to 115 minutes of sinister, somnambulant Random music. All songs have been remastered by George Horn at Fantasy Studios. Each copy is housed in a gatefold jacket designed by Eloise Leigh featuring a spread of ephemera, photos with liner notes by James Nice of LTM.

Review: Originally released digitally in September 2022, Kreed's debut album A Brief History enjoys a much deserved vinyl boost. A veritable soundsystem odyssey featuring vocals and links with a remarkable cast of vocalists from Rider Shafique to Killa P, Jman, Gardna, Charli Brix, Catching Cairo, here the Bristol producer goes all-in with the dot-joining and genre fusing. The end result sits somewhere between dub, soul, bashment, hip-hop, garage and dubstep. Warm, hypnotic and loaded with twists and turns, highlights include the garage-style shuffles and flexes of 'Weeper's Lament' and the digi-dub bubbler 'Ashes'. Vibe overload. The rest is history.

Review: Few jazz saxophonists were as majestic as Hank Mobley. He had a unique sound that sat in between the rawness of John Coltrane and the smoothness of Stan Getz and released a number of now-classic albums. Soul Station has already had the Tone Poet Series treatment and next up to get remastered and come on new audiophile vinyl is A Caddy For Daddy. He had already been a But Note artist for some 10 years when he recorded this one in 1965. It finds him alongside a first-class sextet with Lee Morgan on trumpet, Bob Cranshaw on bass, McCoy Tyner on piano, Billy Higgins on drums and Curtis Fuller on trombone.

Review: A Day of the Sun is a spiritual jazz masterpiece full of poetry by two geniuses of the Japanese musical scene. Masahiko Togashi and Isao Suzuki: pivotal figures in jazz, with a unique talent and sensitivity that transcends conventional jazz forms and styles. In addition to being skilled performers they demonstrate extraordinary compositional talent that transcends their sensibilities and wisdom of more conventional jazz. A Day Of The Sun is based on Togashi's drums and percussion and Suzuki's bass, with occasional changes to cello and piano/synths, and is skillfully performed by just the two of them, creating a unique worldview; a performance that far exceeds expectations. The mystical melodies of the East, earthy percussion and the sensibilities of the two intertwine to create a unique groove, resulting in a universal masterpiece that will never fade away and connects with today's sound makers and DJs. Top sound quality from original master tapes. Includes four-sided insert with a very interesting interview at the time with the two musicians regarding the record.

Review: This new record from Automatic Tasty finds him move away from his usual pastoral acid sound and into a more DIY, bedroom pop realm with him on the microphone. It's a melancholic work that draws obvious parallels to Hot Chip, but with an extra air of curiosity and naivety. There is a dreamy vibe to the opener then a gentle party feel to 'A Happy Town,' lovely laziness to the bendy synths of 'Wake Up Dead' and more urgent feel to 'These Days'. This is utterly charming music that could have been released 30 years ago, today, or 20 years hence and still sound fresh.

Review: Originally released in 1982, A Flock Of Seagulls' eponymous debut album heard them burst on to the new wave scene with advanced songwriting and catchy guitar laps and lyrics. With Phil Spector hailing the album as 'phenomenal', perhaps for somewhat conforming to his wally production technique, the band ended up being venerated near-timelessly for their quasi-electronic synth tunes like 'I Ran' (clock the use of early electronic drum pads in its breakdown). This is new wave at one its best pop-centric peaks.

Review: Don't be fooled by the title of this compilation; this isn't just birdsong pressed to wax. Rather, each artist invited to contribute to 'A Guide To The Birdsong of Western Africa' was challenged to make an original song both using and inspired by an endangered bird from their country. The album, in its ingenuity, was produced to help fund the Nigerian Bird Atlas Project (NIBAP), a public initiative to encourage young Nigerians get into bird conservation, watching and atlasing. Standouts include Lamine Cissokho's kora imitate the 'Yellow-casqued hornbill', and the lilting call of the 'Nimba flycatcher' included in a warming voice-and-guitar bossa nova piece by Ruth Tafebe.

Review: Julio Ernesto Estrada, simply known as Fruko, is a Colombian composer, multi-instrumentalist, and orchestra leader who pretty much gave salsa its name from the early 1970s. You go ask any serious DJ who is into South American music, and the name Fruko will no doubt get dropped on a regular basis. In fact, up until now, this man's records have made themselves scarce on the second-hand market, and there is a very particular sort of crowd whose willing to spend big money on them. A La Memoria Del Muerto is his second LP, from 1972, and what is perhaps the man's most definitive work. It's just one of those albums that runs fluidly from start to finish, showcasing all of its native beauty with effortless skill and furore. Rampant trumpets, seductive piano keys, kinetic percussion, and a sense of tropicality make this into a spectacular piece of work.