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Nick Jonah Davis is a musician and sound engineer based in Derbyshire. His new album, 'When the Sun Came', is the fourth volume in a series of solo instrumental guitar recordings. It follows 'House of Dragons' (Thread Recordings, 2016), 'Of Time and Tides' (Tompkins Square, 2011), and 'Guitar Recordings Vol. 1' (2009).

The album was self-recorded at the village church in Atlow, and mixed and mastered by Nick at his home nearby. 'Whistle on Woolf' features Nathaniel Mann of Dead Rat Orchestra on pigeon whistles.

Nick has collaborated widely with many musicians, including C Joynes, with whom he released ‘Split Electric’ (Thread Recordings, 2016), a split LP of solo electric guitar recordings. He also features on Joynes’ latest album, ‘The Borametz Tree’, as a member of the Furlong Bray (alongside all three members of Dead Rat Orchestra), and on recent albums by Sharron Kraus, Jim Ghedi, and Neal Heppleston.

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In 2018 Far Out Recordings signed a record deal with Brooklyn born, nomadic producer Jneiro Jarel. Having just put the finishing touches to the recordings, Jarel suffered an ischemic stroke while living and working in Costa Rica and his wife Indigo was forced to set up a crowd fund to cover special medical transport back to the states to receive treatment. The release was put on hold, but thanks to the generosity of friends and fans around the world, Jarel was able to get the care he needed and is now on the long road to recovery. We’re overjoyed to finally announce that Jneiro Jarel’s After A Thousand Years is now set for a May 2020 release.

Throughout a career that has spanned over twenty years and seen collaborations with MF DOOM, Thom Yorke, Damon Albarn, BadBadNotGood, Portishead’s Beth Gibbons, Kimbra and Khujo Goodie (Dungeon Family), Jneiro Jarel’s consistently distinctive, forward thinking productions, as well as his love for the music of Brazil, made his partnership with Far Out a perfect fit.

Recorded between New York, New Orleans, Miami and Costa Rica, After A Thousand Years features legendary multi-instrumentalist Bill Summers, famed for his work with Herbie Hancock, Quincy Jones and Eddie Henderson. The album also features Malawian-American guitarist Masauko Chipembere who has worked with the likes of RZA from Wu-Tang Clan and Ladybug Mecca from Digable Planets.

For Jarel, After A Thousand Years is “a culmination of the longstanding musical contributions of the African diaspora.” Permeating the Brazilian music and Latin jazz Jarel has loved and drawn inspiration from, as well as the stateside jazz, soul and funk Jarel grew up around, the influence of Africa and it’s musical history, on both North and South America, is key to the album’s sound.

On lead single “Banana Peel”, Jarel’s outernational perspective makes for a track that is almost impossible to place geographically: you can hear the swing of Jarel’s native New Orleans jazz, the vibrance of Costa Rican rainforests as well as the influence of Jarel’s vast collection of Brazilian records. “Viberian Waves 1&2” is equally nonconformist, morphing from funky baroque-flavoured instrumental hip hop into a bossa inspired, percussive jam.

Taking its inspiration from the biblical prophecies found in the books of Isaiah, Daniel, and Revelation, foretelling the fully realized, physical and spiritual restoration of the earth and mankind after the thousand year reign of the Messianic Kingdom, After A Thousand Years contemplates and celebrates a world where everlasting love, peace, and harmony abound under a sovereign, divine rulership.

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“It's been a strange time for everyone, for obvious reasons. There's nothing in my music that hints at the global circumstances unfolding, nor should it be a requirement that all art created at the time of strife reflects that strife. On the contrary, the chance to sit down in the studio, with the time to create and the opportunity to relax as well has been (for me), hugely refreshing. Obviously with the circumstances around the creation of these tracks, there is always going to be an element of melancholy behind the otherwise upbeat instrumentation, but I think in general it reflects a gratitude for the well being of myself and my loved ones, and an optimistic leaning for our future.

This was originally two EP's called 'Home' and 'Sun', both self-released and both between March and July of 2020. I'd been listening to a lot of records I've loved for many years, some post-rock, some prog, some classic electronica and quite a bit of meditative ambience, as well as the usual soul-cleansers of computer games and films, and these tracks couldn't really have come out as anything except an amalgamation of those influences. My guitar got wired back in, and my love for that was rediscovered (the guitar really was my first foray into songwriting all those years ago, before all these beguiling synths got in the way), leading a lot of these pieces to begin from there and bloom outwards.

20 isn't only representative of this time, but a melting pot of all the influence leading up to it, and a shameless inclusion of every little riff or technique or idea I wanted to record. It is, as they say, what it is.”

Apta - Manchester, September 2020

About Apta:
Apta works in one of the world’s finest record shops, Piccadilly Records in Manchester. After work he makes music. When asleep he dreams about synthesizers and guitars.

Artwork
Harriet Richardson is a multidisciplinary visual artist based in Berlin whose work tends to revolve around nature abstracted, the psyche & the absurd.

About The Slow Music Movement
The Slow Music Movement is an evolving organism with an ambitious evolutionary plan. It was launched in 2017 as a radio show & daily music recommendation service with a focus on largely laid back, quality music, from independent artists & labels that we’ve dug a bit deeper to discover. We then share that music across the social media landscape.

Every Bit Helps
10% of all label /streaming revenue will go to Client Earth to help mitigate our environmental impact & try and make a difference. 

Credits:

Producer: Apta (apta.bandcamp.com)
Artwork: Harriet Clare (www.harrietclare.com)
Mastering: Ian Hawgood (www.homenormal.com)

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Mei eharaが、2ndアルバム『Ampersands』をリリース！
今作は彼女が集めたバンドメンバー、鳥居真道 ( ギター / トリプルファイヤー )、Coff( ベース /ex. どついたるねん )、浜公氣 ( ドラム / どついたるねん )、 沼澤成毅 (鍵盤/ODOLA)の4人と作り上げたセルフプロデュースアルバムです。

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Mei ehara releases 2nd album "Ampersands"!
This work is a band member that she collected, Masamichi Torii (guitar / triple fire), Coff (bass / ex. Dotsuitarunen), Koki Hama (drums / Dotsuitarunen), Shigeki Numazawa (keyboard / ODOLA) ) Is a self-produced album created with four people.

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Teno Afrika’s Amapiano Selections, a Reference Point for South Africa’s Youngest Electronic Music Movement

By: Setumo-Thebe Mohlomi

The past five years have seen amapiano, South Africa’s electronic music movement born in the townships of the country’s Gauteng province, evolve from an underground sound to a nationwide mainstream staple. Even with its commercial success though, amapiano’s DIY ethos has continued to disrupt music creation and distribution in the country. Most amapiano commercial successes today began their careers on cracked versions of production software like FL Studio, distributed their work through file sharing platforms like datafilehost and marketed it using social media pages they controlled and influenced.

Amapiano is partly a tasting menu of South Africa’s musical history, a lineage that has been as much a backdrop to the times as it has been a catalyst for change in the country. South African jazz has thrived pre and post-democracy, contributing international stalwarts of the genre, notably Miriam Makeba, Abdullah Ibrahim and Hugh Masekela. Kwaito music—which itself borrowed from other genres like marabi, kwela, mbaqanga, maskandi, bubblegum and others—was created and proliferated in the 90s partly because of the newly accessible House music imported into the country. In the early 2000s, Deep and Afro House dominated, to be followed by the rise of diBacardi, a percussion—heavy electronic music genre most popular in the city of Pretoria and its surrounding townships.

Amapiano Selections, the debut album by DJ and producer Teno Afrika, gives listeners outside the movement’s online release economy an insight into the high-burn nature of amapiano that has spawned a distinct typology under its larger umbrella. Nineteen-year-old Lutendo Raduvha has spent the bulk of his life moving between different townships on the outskirts of Johannesburg and Pretoria in the Gauteng province. The palette of amapiano styles on the album reflect these influences.
But at first, South Africa’s youngest electronic music movement lived underground with a small, loyal following. “Amapiano is a genre that I chose because I have a passion for it,” says Teno “I started following amapiano in 2016 because I wanted to explore how it’s produced. It was not taken seriously in our country.”

The record’s opening track, poignantly named “Ambassadors,” is the sound de jour in this current moment of amapiano’s evolution. Here organ solos riff over demure drums, bass and percussion for a sophisticated sound that is palatable to both seasoned and uninitiated ears. Teno Afrika does something similar on Conka, but this time referencing the Kwaito-influenced Amapiano popularised by DJ Sumbody and Cassper Nyovest’s collaborations and Focalistic’s lyrical dribbling which earned him the nickname Pitori Maradona (Maradona of Pretoria).

The next two tracks, “Storytellers” and “8 Ubers" as well as tracks 6 and 7 (“Lerato La Bass” and “Trip to Vlakas”) are Teno Afrika’s hat tip to the sound evolving in the townships on the outskirts of Pretoria (Pitori to the hip) known locally as gong gong amapiano. From the home of diBicardi, the percussion and groove of the latter two especially are distinct for their almost off-tempo stride, an identifying feature of diBacardi. The high-pitched keyboard builds to a delayed break; once there, the drum is almost turned inside out to create a bass-line that becomes the driving force behind the track.

As a counterpoint to the unrefined, chest rattling coarseness, fifth in the line-up “Smooth Criminal” is carried by the melody, given ample breathing space and balances the heavy bass on its back. Teno Afrika is referencing Harvard amapiano, named after the Ivy League US university for its supposedly more educated approach to production.

Interestingly, Teno Afrika only gives vocals prominence on the closing track “Chants of Africa.” As a way of making their music recognizable and relatable for broadcast, amapiano producers have sometimes overly relied on vocals in the form of singing, catch-phrases and party refrains for the purpose. “It was my decision not to use vocals on this project,” says Teno “The reason is I wanted people to feel my instrumentals and style because this is my first album.” On his closing track the young producer gives a glimpse of the considered approach to music which buoys anticipation for greater things from his future releases. 

Credits
Composed and Produced by Lutendo Raduvha in Pretoria and Rustenburg, South Africa
Mastering by Jessica Thompson
Big shout out to Silvadropz & Diego Don for making this album a success. Not forgetting my boys Stylo MusiQ from Bela-Bela in Limpopo.