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ISLE008.5 shows Parisian artist D.K.'s concern for the nostalgia-tinged 90s electronica and second room IDM that inform not just his compositional practice but also our own tastes here at the label. Recorded live at the intimate South Korean venue The Edge, this limited 12" births fleeting moments in a late night music bar into physical form. Propulsive rhythmic tension, heavy doses of reverb and glassy, cavernous sound design across six movements.

Jazz plays a big part in this weeks show with it's latest beat led mutations sitting comfortably next to more organic fusion endeavours and just for good measure there's some Welsh folk and percussive led, slow house beauties

Benoit B - Vestigia Flammae feat. Elen Huynh (Into The Light)
Knxwledge - Learn (Stones Throw)
On-Ly - Double Edge (La Sape)
Rejoicer - Pre Memory Circle (Stones Throw)
Tim Jackiw - Elara (Bandcamp Self Release)
Collocutor - Pause Reprise (On The Corner)
Majid Bekkas - Chahia Taiba (Act Music)
Web Web - The Upper, Part 1 & 2 (Compost)
Cynefin - Ffarwel I Aberystwyth (Self Release)
Linkwood & Foat - Es Vedra (Athens Of The North)
Koichi Sakai - Wono feat. Afla Sackey, Yoruba Soul Mix (Olindo Records)

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Dead Melodies and Zenjungle join forces on this dark noir ambient album

Far beneath the lofty empire of steel and brick, a perpetual blanket of darkness reigns harbouring mankind's darkest sins. And amidst this grotesque illusion of grandeur, in which the elitist grip ever tightens, the forsaken's demons awake from their slumber wreaking havoc in the eternal shadow. Man's greatest creation and ruin rolled into one in an endless labyrinth of forgotten secrets, unsolved mysteries and stories that are yet to be told.

Step into the haze of the low lying smog and lose yourself in these noir tales from the darkest corners of the city, courtesy of Dead Melodies and Zenjungle.

Recommended for fans of Dark Ambient Noir Jazz

Credits
Tom Moore/Dead Melodies:
Electric guitar, bass guitar, acoustic guitar (picked), ebow, synths, keys and field recordings
Phil Gardelis/Zenjungle: Tenor saxophone, alto clarinet, electric guitar, acoustic guitar with bow, synths, noises, field recordings
Written, produced, recorded: Tom Moore & Phil Gardelis
Artwork & Mastering: Simon Heath

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Six Organs of Admittance is back with a new record, new techniques in sound generation, and a new energy. Arriving three years after Burning the Threshold, Companion Rises has a driving force only hinted at previously. Due out on Drag City on February 21st 2020. 
 
Methodologically, Companion Rises sometimes recalls the early-mid lo-fi Six Organs records, with digital processes substituting for the analog techniques of yore and, instead of Ben Chasny’s hand percussion overdubs, algorithmic programs generating rhythms. Ben Chasny created all sounds and programs, all the recording and mixed the entire record, also like some earlier ones – but don’t mistake this for a simplistic return to an older sound. Just one listen makes it clear that this new Six Organs of Admittance release is entirely in the present. 
 
Sonically, the songs are bursting with ideas, harmonically rich, gorgeously arranged; utilising synthesizer and guitar distortion for unique colouring effects while crafting contrasting versions of the song within itself, overlaying electric and acoustic treatments that interlock like two shards to form a single key. The rush of excitement is palpable, track after track. 
 
Thematically, Companion Rises navigates a similar Stellar-Gnosticism as 2012’s Ascent, while exploring a completely different set of stories. Whereas Ascent was locked into a narrative concerning a sentient Jupiter, Companion Rises presents a handful of folk-tales whose topics span in scope from panspermia to specific constellations, all written in a way that eschews old new age presentation tropes and embraces the now. One thinks of Octavio Paz’s oft-used metaphor of the concentric circle, as Companion Rises returns to a similar place but much farther out from the center.
 
With Companion Rises, Ben Chasny has created a Sci-Folk record that feels very much right-place, right-time as we welcome in the new decade. Listen to the first single “Two Forms Moving” above and preorder the new album for February 21st.

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ISAN’s Robin Saville reveals an ambient album, which merges the Electronica aesthetics of his main project with field recordings, drones and acoustic instrumentation.

A lot of things have been written about what happens to the mind when the body starts moving. Instead of reciting poems of the inevitable self-help books, let’s get straight to the point: For many, taking walks on a regular basis is both liberating and empowering. It is not necessarily so much about the exercise, but rather finding one’s own rhythm in life. Robin Saville – of ISAN fame – is such an ambler His walks inspired him to base his third solo album – his first one for Morr Music – on the out of the way places he came to see and experience while being out and about.

Clocking in at just under 40 minutes in total, "Build A Diorama" is both a subtle culmination and a poignant antipode to what Saville has achieved together with Antony Ryan as ISAN. While the aesthetics might seem similar in places, Saville opts for a decisively different pace when it comes to writing and producing. Progress is steady, and change, however, is slow – like looking at a diorama for a long period of time in the ever so slightly changing light or as a flaneur focussing on one particular spot, a found object so-to-speak, waiting for the mind to orchestrate it appropriately, giving it sense and meaning.

Built around quiet field recordings, Saville’s six compositions transform this highly personal and, therefore, difficult-to-convey experience into a comprehensible exploration of beauty. Where ISAN almost exclusively uses electronics, Saville deliberately expands this well-established palette with acoustic instruments like bass guitar, chimes and glockenspiel, aiming for an even more suitable musical manifestation of what the walker sees and feels once he fully engages in his passion. Ranging from blissfully pulsing pads allowing for complete associative freedom ("The Deepdale Halophyte Economy") to the playful minimalism of an orchestra dominated by busy bells ("Bosky"), Saville’s "Build A Diorama" is not just a valuable addition to his musical output, but an essential audio guide for those striving to explore, learn and understand. 

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‘Continuation’ is a remarkable work in which the interplay of emotional experience and life motion experienced by band leader Tamar Osborn (also known as Tamar Collocutor) is channelled and explored by Collocutor.

The band’s third LP assuredly strides forward following the critical acclaim awarded to ‘The Search’ from 2016 (a work that gained the enthusiastic praise of Mulatu Astake and Gilles Peterson among others).
Whereas ‘The Search’ invoked a journey ending in hope and new beginnings, ‘Continuation’ looks at the aftermath of the unexpected. This is an album about coping with grief, loss and bereavement: The music charts the many (and sometimes surprising) emotional states encountered, moving from acknowledgement, trying to keep ‘normal’ life going, the need to sometimes put a pause button on and let the waves of feelings crash and roll, sudden anger and confusion, finally to moving (perhaps with uncertainty) forward.

Tamar Osborn has led Collocutor through a line-up shift from septet to quintet for ‘Continuation’. The modified line-up creates space for the musicians to express themselves through the shades of ‘Continuation’'s movement. The quintet brings in more group improvisation, based on just a few motifs and so giving the musicians more space to converse. 
Tracks like  ‘Lost & Found’ and in particular the album’s title track, ‘Continuation’ (the only piece with 3 horns) hark back to the intricate arrangements of ‘The Search’. 

It’s a deeply personal album, the writing of which acted as Tamar's way of processing and understanding experience and the need to channel her feelings. 

In listening truly ‘Continuation’ bares that rare and precious gift of a morsel of the human experience being illuminated by artistic genius. 

Tamar Osborn - Baritone Sax (1, 3, 4, 5), Bass Clarinet (2 & 6), Flute (5)
Josephine Davies - Tenor Sax (2, 5 & 6)
Mike Lesirge - Tenor Sax (1, 3 & 4), Alto Flute (3)
Suman Joshi - bass
Marco Piccioni - guitar
Maurizio Ravalico - percussion

All composed sections written by Tamar Osborn

Recorded & Mixed by Sam Jones

‘Deep Peace’ recorded at Heath Street Baptist Church, London (August 2018)
All other tracks recorded at Lightship 95, Soup Studio, London (January 2019)

Mixed at Secretsundaze Studios, London

Mastered by Frank Merritt at The Carvery

Co-produced by Tamar Osborn & Sam Jones

Thanks to Brixton Hill Studios for being our rehearsal home, and David and Ed at Soup Studio for all their help

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Tabansi Studio Band – Wakar Alhazai Kano & Mus’En Sofua: four incredible slices of almost- undiscovered late-70s/early 80s Afrobeat magic, but not Fela’s Yoruba/Pidgin Afrobeat.

This is Igbo and Hausa Afrobeat- two very different and rarely heard styles. For the first time anywhere, BBE is proud to reissue back to back two LPs that are so elusive that many Afro heads doubted their very existence until now.

The beats are laid down by the seven legendary Martins Brothers – of ‘Money’ fame- whilst vocals are courtesy of a multi-lingual Igbo legend, Prof. Goddy Ezike, one of the most extraordinary voices out of Africa, up there with Youssou N’Dour and Salif Keita, whose half-century career has, like fine wine, simply improved his voice.

Wakar Alhazai Kano and Lokoci Azumi Ta Wuca (tracks 1 and 2) draw on Northern Hausa music, with its Islamic inflections and skipping 12/8 time signatures more typical of the string and wind-based instrumentation of Kano and the broader sub-Saharan musical palette.

Kama Sofos and Aka Ji Ego Ga Anu Nwam (tracks 3 and 4) are sung in Igbo, with all the percussive wonders that Igbo culture has to offer, filtered through a jazzy Afrobeat improvisational spectrum.
Never before. Never again. New Afrobeats, in old bottles.

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Our Place On The Wheel is a blues record. I’ve wanted to make a blues-based project with jazz instrumentation for a long time, and the idea of doing this as a trio with Oliver Lake and Mike Pride came up in a late-night chat with Pride last Spring.

Mike Pride is one of my favorite active drummers making music today. He’s a chameleon and an expressionist who sounds like himself no matter the setting he’s in. Mike is one of the deepest listeners I’ve ever played with and no matter where the music travels, he has an answer for it. Most importantly, he has a good head, takes care of his family and is a model for all full-time musicians. He’s a hustler and a beast.

What’s to say about Oliver Lake that hasn’t been said already? He’s a legend. He’s a Jedi that keeps his saber close. His music and approach is so deep and thought-provoking that I’m just happy to be in the same room with him. Oliver and I have known one another for about 10 years, and have played together many times, usually when he’s on the West Coast but also a few times in New York and casually at his home. When Mike and I were talking about making a blues record I immediately thought of Oliver and was lucky enough to have him agree to do it. I’m forever grateful for Oliver’s time and guidance and participation in this project. Oliver’s life of being a do-it-yourself musician and artist is a guidebook that every young player should study.

This record takes a lot of American blues themes from the likes of Charley Patton, John Lee Hooker, Blind Willie Johnson and Fred McDowell and reshapes them in an improvised context. In the studio we just hit record and started playing blues. Everything was in one take. There were no fixes or overdubs or false starts. We made the entire record in an hour and a half.

This record is pretty much how I hear music. A deep blues root, group interplay, blues expression and tonality and heart and blood. I hope you enjoy it.

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After Nu Guinea’s LP Nuova Napoli and Napoli Segreta first compilation, NG RECORDS follows up with an exploration into the unknown groovy side of Naples by releasing Napoli Segreta Vol.2.

Famiglia Discocristiana, DNApoli and Nu Guinea team up again selecting more tracks from their archives, for a new compilation containing nine mysterious Neapolitan tracks, found in the most hidden corners of remote flea markets around the Vesuvius.
But forget classical Neapolitan songs, "'O sole mio" or "Luna Rossa"...
Forget about what you expect to find once you land in town… oh and also forget about Google maps. Take a dodgy local guide, keep your eyes open, and follow it to enter the secret downtown, the underground, the routes that no satellite can detect, but beware there is no easy way out.

Napoli Segreta Vol.2 is a musical journey into the sonic landscapes of Naples that you have never heard of before. A variety of genres merging soul, disco, funk, blues, new wave, afro-beat and boogie, including lyrics in Neapolitan urban slang, instrumental tracks, and also some unexpected cover versions of famous songs!

Words - Gennaro Ascione
Artwork - Antonello Colaps / Dopolavoro

? Compiled by : Famiglia Discocristiana , DNApoli , Nu Guinea

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"Part of a long steady lineage of Portuguese romantics, Pedro Magina breaks a five-year hiatus after releases on Not Not Fun and Mental Groove.

When we first heard these songs, we were mesmerized by their mellowness. Inspired by many changes in his life over the last few years, “Olímpia” is a straight to the heart record, mixing lounge atmospheres, Balearic heat and the blissful “I don’t give a shit feeling” about what’s happening out there. This is not a 2020 record. This is a forever record.

We’re talking about a man from the North. He is busy enjoying life and making sure others do the same. Using synthesizers (Korg R3 and UNO synth), bass guitar, guitar and samples, Pedro created a meticulously crafted set of songs. From upbeat to chill in no-time, “Olímpia” reflects the years he’s been living in Barcelona: plenty of sun, joy and some of that eternal Portuguese romantic bliss infiltrating the beats. This is a love album. To you all."