We Are Busy Bodies HHV Records 78 Items

Hope, wonder, worry. Grief, love, fury. Joy, romance, time travel. Everything is possible. Peace Flag Ensemble return on their third LP with sharper focus and a wider lens. The record is their most canorous and most accessible.

The ambient free jazz collective’s early recordings were gauzy, percussion-less affairs where the piano was sparing and additional instrumentation was often textural, but on Everything Is Possible each member of the sextet finds space to shine while simultaneously lifting each other up.

The album centers around the improvisations of pianist Jon Neher. Following a short run of dates in Germany, Neher was struck by an observation that shaped the new record. His instrument had been receding to the background live in a way it didn’t have to – there was room to be more than just a vessel for the other players. As a result he steps forward on Everything Is Possible with more melodic and virtuosic moments.

Flugelhornist Dalton Lam and saxophonist Paul Gutheil’s lyrical playing sounds as though they’ve found comfort in each other’s company. They share exchanges like great conversationalist and at times prove that silence is peak communication.

Across the album, drummer Mike Thievin sits notably more present. His playing is restrained and subtle, but deceptively intricate as he anchors Travis Packer’s wayfaring electric bass.

The album was once again produced and mixed by ambient artist Michael Scott Dawson who contributes mazy guitars and electronics to the project. Dawson’s studio as an instrument approach lends a human touch to the affected and atmospheric elements. The result is as indebted to Tortoise in ‘99 as it is to Keith Jarrett in ‘75.

Everything Is Possible takes its name from a novelty tee shirt Dawson misread one bleary morning while racing through an airport.

Lionel Pillay’s broad list of associations is a testament to how widely respected he was in South Africa’s diverse jazz scene. In addition to his work with Mankunku, he played with Hugh Masekela in the early 1960s, produced the exquisite long-form recordings “Shrimp Boats” and “Cherry” with Basil Coetzee in the 1970s and collaborated with trumpeter Murray Campbell and saxophonist Bez Martin in the 1980s. However, is it with his 1980 album Deeper in Black, backed by core members of the jazz-fusion supergroup Spirits Rejoice, that his legacy was cemented.Deeper in Black was inspired by the 1969 Blue Note recording of American trumpeter Blue Mitchell entitled Collision in Black and took its name from Pillay’s cover of the album’s Peggy Grayson composition. Pillay’s album featured another two compositions from Collision in Black by way of the Monk Higgins track “Keep Your Soul,” with distinct arrangements straddling Side A and Side B, and Vee Pea’s “Jo Ju Ja” closing out the set. Although the source material was over a decade old when Pillay recorded his album, Collision in Black had struck a chord in South Africa with its first pressing in 1969 and even seen a local repressing in 1978. Blue Mitchell owed much of his popularity in South Africa to a six-week tour with saxophonist Harold Land in 1976. It was during this time that As-Shams/The Sun producer Rashid Vally seized the opportunity to record the Dollar Brand album Blues for a Hip King with Mitchell and Land backing Abdullah Ibrahim. Although the recording and release of Pillay’s Deeper in Black coincides with Blue Mitchell’s death in May 1979, the album was not explicitly promoted as a tribute but did certainly offer a respectful nod to the esteemed trumpeter who was among the few American jazz heavyweights who managed to connect with the South African scene during the Apartheid era.

Rich Aucoin is announcing his next album entitled Synthetic. The record is a rare Quadruple Album with its 4 seasons/LPs being staggered in 6 month intervals over the next 2 years. The album, which began at The National Music Centre in Calgary, Alberta in March 2020, houses one of the world’s most extensive collections of rare and historic synthesizers. There, Aucoin was doing the Artist In Residence program and recorded 51 synthesizers to begin the project. The project was paused with the start of the pandemic and Aucoin shifted back into film scoring and worked on the critically-acclaimed and short-listed New Yorker - Films of the Year documentary, No Ordinary Man, about the trans-masculine jazz musician Billy Tipton

This record is a good demonstration of Aucoin’s scoring potential as well as it’s a quadruple instrumental album; a huge contrast to United States, Aucoin’s previous, and most vocal-heavy album to date. “Lyrics just take me so long to write that I just want to take a couple years to make other kinds of albums before going back to lyrical music as I can write instrumental music much faster.”

This first full-length features Aucoin as the solo musician playing some 37 synthesizers including: Arp 2600s, the Supertramp owned Elka Rhapsody 610 String Machine, Formanta Polivoks, Novatron T550, Oxford Synthesizer Company Oscar, Selmer Clavioline CM 8 and the legendary TONTO which the first release off the record was made on.

Recording for the As-Shams/The Sun label in the 1970s, Pat Matshikiza released the collaborative album Tshona! with sax giant Kippie Moeketsi in 1975. The album was followed in 1976 by Sikiza Matshikza, Pat's solo debut with Moeketsi appearing as a featured artist. The personnel on the album were an early iteration of the group that would become Spirits Rejoice in 1977, with Duke Makasi on tenor sax, George Tyefumani on trumpet, Sipho Gumede on bass, Gilbert Mathews on drums and Sandile Shange (who appears alongside Matshikiza and Moeketsi on the album's cover photo) on guitar.Pat Matshikiza's mid-70s recordings mark a high point in his career and are essential documents in the history of South African jazz on vinyl. With these reissues, we hope to bring his artistic legacy to prominence and share his work with lovers of jazz around the world.

We Are Busy Bodies returns with a remastered reissue of The Best of Vis-A-Vis in Congo Style. The album finds the the young band in great form, with six new songs. The album was one of three released by the band in 1976. The band continued to be the backing band of choice of some of Ghana's biggest and most famous musicians all while recording their own albums.

We Are Busy Bodies exploration of Vis-A-Vis catalogue continues with a remastered reissue of their album Di Wo Ho Ni. The band continued to be the backing band of choice of some of Ghana's biggest and most famous musicians all while recording their own albums. The album has been remastered by Noah Mintz at Lacquer Channel, with art restoration completed by Steve Lewin.

Using only a scavenged MIDI keyboard and sounds plundered from a wide swath of archaic media (90’s sampler CDs, 80s VHS docs, 70s student films) musician Jonathan Orr creates startlingly accomplished slabs of thick, lo-fi electro that shimmer and pounce like nothing else on the Vancouver scene. As on his previous release (2023's 'Bulk Order') the spiritual template here is the early unreleased tapes of Scotland’s Boards of Canada, particularly the twin holy grails of 'A Few Old Tunes Vol 1 & II', but this time around things feel noticeably weirder and more destabilized, as if that template were cracking apart under the weight of older, less definable influences.

The title of the album is taken from the Gospel According to Thomas: “Give not that which is holy to dogs, in case they throw it onto the dunghill.” Reading the text on the verge of sleep, Orr had mistakenly understood it as pertaining not to ‘holy things,' but instead to things which were specifically ‘holy to dogs.’ What would such things be? Orr pictured a shrine of objects not valued by the world; garbage, refuse, decay, the discarded. Things forgotten or only half-remembered, like the rusted bones of ancient cities or the clips of dead media entombed on his hard drive.

'Holy to Dogs' charts a weaving course through this narcoleptic vision, from the bright epiphany of ‘Petroglyph Park’ to the blackened repetition of ‘Roman Concrete’, the eerie momentum of ‘Split Foot,’ and the rhythmic hypnosis of ‘Far Speak’; each track building on the last in a series of audio snapshots of lost worlds, forgotten rituals, and discarded histories. An absolutely essential release from one of Vancouver’s brightest (and darkest) lights.
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released May 15, 2024

'MIDI Janitor’s Holy To Dogs is the sound of technology wasting in the dustbin of memory. Broken machines composing one last great work before obsolescence. Jonathan Orr’s music is a nod to both the past and to the idea that making great art isn’t beholden to expensive toys. It’s all in the imagination of the creator, and Holy To Dogs is skies the limit for those discarded machines.'
-COMPLEX DISTRACTIONS

Pioneering Scottish-Canadian animator Norman McLaren (1914-1987) - creator of seminal short films Dots, Neighbours, Synchromy and many more - is remembered in first ever release of soundtrack works, self-composed from the 1940’s to 1970’s and forecasting the following half-century of electronic music.

Norman McLaren was once described by composer, music theorist, and mathematician Milton Babbitt as “the first electronic musician.” In addition to his pioneering work in animation, the electronic soundtracks McLaren created for his own films employ astonishing foresight and a characteristically precise methodology. They also crystallise boundless creativity, wit and whimsy, and illuminative brilliance into a unique insight to his remarkable mind, with or without visual accompaniment.

Rythmetic: The Compositions of Norman McLaren marks the first time his soundtracks have been released on record, carefully curated from his most important film works, hours of archival tapes, and multiple versions of the same key compositions. It represents an essential overview of McLaren as a composer, in neat dovetail with McLaren the filmmaker. Both are crucial figures in the respective developments of their fields, opening doors to a future that might not have existed without McLaren.

As an animator, McLaren was renowned for utilising or inventing techniques at their very vanguard and shaping to his needs the rudimentary technology of the era. Many of these techniques and technological adaptations, developed at the National Film Board of Canada over the 1940’s and 50’s, would eventually become adopted into standard practice for animation. He also blazed new trails for soundtrack composition: having heard the glue of spliced film reel produce sound as it passed through his equipment, he began meticulously applying his own cuts and notches to the tape and measuring the frequency values of the tones these striations would emit. Over years of refinement, he created a series of cards to correspond to eight octaves of musical notes, frequency by frequency, and to recruit these cards to compose his soundtracks. It was a way to maintain total creative control and freedom over his own work - every single frame would be processed “the McLaren way”.

“He could have used a synthesiser,” writes long-term assistant, friend, and filmmaker of McLaren documentaries Don McWilliams, also at the National Film Board, “but he had his own method and he stuck with it.” John Cage was an ardent fan, inviting McLaren to his infamous downtown NYC socials and once even writing to McLaren to beg a recommendation for his recruitment at the National Film Board.

Unsurprisingly, McLaren was musically capable and aware throughout his career. He was an inquisitive listener, often drawn to rhythmic expression found outside western music, and he collected records for both reference and enjoyment. West African and Chinese music were particular pleasures, as well as the gypsy jigs that in his youth had informed his own practice as a violin player.

The opening piece to this compilation, “Now Is The Time”, is crafted from trilling, birdsong arpeggiations of dulcet high frequency tones that chatter and warble in scattered dialogue. Accompanying the clouds, multiple suns, and dancing figures of the film, the soundtrack is alive with joy and wonderment. Next, “Rythmetic”, soundtracking McLaren’s famed numeric sequence visualisation, pitters and patters with the types of glitching rhythms so coveted by contemporary electronic music almost a century later. Even from these first pieces alone, it is readily apparent that McLaren could not have achieved the effect he desired with scored instrumentation. The “McLaren way”, so crucial to his process, is as much foundational to his soundtracks as it is to the films themselves.

Despite his acclaim and recognition within the world of film and animation - he won an Oscar, a Palme d’Or, is a favourite of George Lucas’, and is recorded in UNESCO’s cultural heritage archives (none of which interested him) - Norman McLaren is not a Walt Disney, Tex Avery, Chuck Jones, or an Ub Iwerks. His work is unflinchingly outré. Seeking out experimental, innovative, and unconventional modes of storytelling, his creative expression went even deeper than pioneering methodology and a prolific output, becoming part of the man himself as his working hours in the studio became longer and longer as his career blossomed. Even his straightest films are decidedly odd at their core, revealing not only a playful and joyously childlike sense of humour, but also the perpetual pursuit of perfection that fuelled his filmmaking throughout his life.

A gay man, McLaren also resisted the normative social structures of the day in his personal life, acutely aware of the legal implications of his relationship with lifelong partner and fellow NFB director Guy Glover. He also remains revered as the most generous and trusting of teachers, bringing under his wing young or inexperienced filmmakers in whom he saw passion and promise. His second protegee George Dunning, who went on to produce Yellow Submarine for the Beatles, had only recently graduated when McLaren brought him to work in the NFB studios.

Towards the end of McLaren’s career, McWilliams asked him how he perceived his own legacy; how Norman McLaren would be remembered in a hundred years’ time. “A filmmaker who made some interesting films,” was his reply. Modest, funny, wise, and yet knowingly sly. An answer most McLaren.

William Norman McLaren was born 11th April 1914 in Stirling, Scotland. He died January 27th 1987 in Hudson, Canada.

Can machines sing? With his Synthetic album cycle, Rich Aucoin answers that question with a resounding, exuberant "yes." The four-part project sweeps listeners through a gallery tour of synthesis history, giving voice to a chorus of specimens from the past century of electronic sound. On Season 3, Aucoin deepens his dive into the variegated genealogy of dance music, charting a joyful course through the many flavors of rave euphoria.

From March 2020 through February 2024, Aucoin recorded Synthetic: Season 3 during a series of visits to the National Music Centre in Calgary and the Vintage Synthesizer Museum in Los Angeles. Among these collections, he found historic synthesizers ranging from the ubiquitous to the esoteric, each with its own voice just waiting to be jolted to life. During these sessions, Aucoin took the opportunity to air out some of synth history's most iconic instruments.

From the mass-produced to the bespoke, each synthesizer on Synthetic: Season 3 sends a transmission from its makers' own historical vision of the future. The instruments' tactile interfaces -- from fields of patch jacks to 50-year-old optical discs to rows and rows of voltage dials -- all lend embodied dimension to the practice of shaping sound from raw electricity. Each of them carries a story about what might have tumbled into being from the moment of their creation. In awakening these machines, Aucoin cross-pollinates a choir of futures into an ecstatic, reverential present.

Broken Shoes is the follow up to Almon Memela's 1975 album Funk Africa. Scarcer than its predecessor and under a different project name, Broken Shoes features two 15-minute tracks by the acclaimed guitarist backed up by Soweto's Pelican Club house band.

Electric Taal Band was a project that came out of the Covid pandemic, a necessity to work alone and some happenstance. I had stumbled on a box of Punjabi records for sale at Bollywood Music Center on Gerrard St. East in Little India -- a store where I had been buying hindi film records for years. I wasn't too familiar with Punjabi music beyond UK Bhangra, took a chance and loved the records; over some time I bought every Punjabi record in the store. I studied the records and bought a tumbi from Kala Kendar, a shop next to the music store that sold instruments. I learned the tumbi from Youtube videos and copying the sounds on the records.

Over time I acquired both a vintage Radel Talometer and electronic Tanpura locally via classifieds and experimented with integrating their sounds into the recordings as well. The basic idea was to take these machines designed for practice, which had their own incredible sound due to technological limitations and apply them to Indian music. Everything I had heard of these machines in recordings and videos only used them in an abstract electronic context. The main intent was and still is to use these sounds in collaboration with South Asian musicians and vocalists in the Toronto area, but this album came from both casual exploration and experimentation with the tools, as well as an inability to collaborate in-person due to pandemic restrictions at the time.

Peace Flag Ensemble are a free jazz collective from Saskatchewan, Canada. Their second LP, Astral Plains, arrives on July 14th via We Are Busy Bodies. While the group’s 2021 debut Noteland was described as “akin to getting stuck in a sensory deprivation tank with Keith Jarrett", in itself by no means a bad scenario, by contrast Astral Plains opens up, offering spacious and blue-sky arrangements and production. Perhaps it’s closer to laying in a prairie field looking for animals in the clouds with Mark Hollis.

"On Synthetic: Season 2, Halifax pop artist and composer Rich Aucoin continues his journey through the history of synthesizers. The second entry in his quadruple LP series once again features an armada of the world’s most rare, historic, and highly sought after electronic instruments. Gaining access to the collections of Calgary’s National Music Centre and LA’s Vintage Synthesizer Museum, Aucoin ran amok on machines to create four albums of thrilling, transporting instrumental music.

Each song on Synthetic: Season 2 conjures a world of its own, combining Aucoin’s melodic sensibilities with textural, genre-agnostic experimentation. The album swerves into action with the wiggling synths and thunderous drum breaks of “Wav” – recorded on the Hammond Novachord from 1939 and considered the very first analog, fully polyphonic synthesizer – stacking hooks like a cinematic training montage as it climbs toward the first of many transcendent conclusions. “Shift” changes course into eerie, frostbitten industrial territory with rubbery beats that bounce like pogo sticks, switching tempos unexpectedly and dissolving into skittering arrays of sound.

The squelching groove of “Pure” brings a touch of ’90s French House, like Daft Punk jet-setting around the world. Six minutes pass in a flash during this playful brain-dance. “Space” is a thumping banger built upon chiming, subaquatic beats that slice through thick drones and filter disco drops. Its passages of extraterrestrial techno tranquility will make you feel like an astronaut floating in the inky void, making shapes in zero gravity.

- Jesse Locke"

NIGHT PLOW - A brand new international music project is here from complete strangers Gregory Macdonald and Tim Lefebvre.

They say “Never meet your heroes”. Well add to that “never meet your collaborator”.
Some would even say “Never meet the guy who wrote Heroes” but Tim already broke that rule.

Equal parts Tuscon and Toronto, the debut album from NIGHT PLOW consists of 21st Century sounds, themes, elements as well as lots of bass and drums… yet this is not your grandma’s EDM! “We’re kind of our own genre” says Tim “Bass Lord” Lefebvre.
Tim has worked with: David Bowie, The Black Crowes, Elvis Costello, Sting, Tedeschi Trucks Band, and many others.
Greg has worked with: Sloan, Twink, Butch Walker, New Age Doom, Limblifter, Hot Hot Heat, Lee “Scratch” Perry and many others.

Both Tim and Greg contributed parts to the 2021 album Lee “Scratch” Perry’s Guide To The Universe by New Age Doom (We Are Busy Bodies) and despite never being in the same room, decided they shared enough common musical ground between them to ‘step forward’ and start a brand new experimental duo. It’s kind of like the Aerosmith/Run DMC video for Walk This Way, except that Night Plow happily collaborate without smashing a wall.

Says Tim: “Expect to hear improvised beats finished by the genius Greg Macdonald of Sloan fame”
Says Greg: “Tim uses the word genius too much”

For fans of: Kraftwerk, Andy Stott, Vangelis, Photek, Hans Zimmer, Radiohead, Undo K From Hot, The Avalanches.

Reissue of Hideo Shiraki Quintet's 'Play Horace Silver' album. Led by Japanese jazz drummer and bandleader, Hideo Shiraki, known for his hard bop and jazz albums in the 1950s and 1960s.

Horace usually had a quintet on albums, whereas Hideo's group is a sextet with Hidehiko Matsumoto on tenor and flute, Akira Fukuhara on trombone, and Hisaya Omata on trumpet.

Following the April 2022 reissue of the album Shrimp Boats, We Are Busy Bodies presents companion titles Plum and Cherry and Deeper in Black to round out a Lionel Pillay and Basil Mannenberg Coetzee “trilogy” as part of the label’s As-Shams South African jazz archive series. The connection between these three albums is tight as the 1987 release Shrimp Boats compiled unreleased recordings from both the 1979 session for Plum and Cherry and the 1980 session for Deeper in Black. These two rare records have been carefully remastered from their original tapes and are back in print for the very first time in over 40 years.Shrimp Boats and Plum and Cherry capture the extraordinary musical chemistry that existed between pianist Lionel Pillay and tenor saxophonist Basil Coetzee in the late 1970s. The respective album showpieces “Shrimp Boats” and “Cherry” each occupy an entire side of vinyl with both exquisite musical journeys clocking in at an epic 25 minutes a piece. While “Shrimp Boats” was an instrumental reimagining of the popular 1951 song by American singer Jo Stafford, “Cherry” drew inspiration from Abdullah Ibrahim at the behest of producer Rashid Vally, who wanted to emulate the success of the famous track that had helped launch his independent As-Shams/The Sun record label in 1974. Ibrahim’s hit “Mannenberg” had also featured Basil Coetzee and it was this zeitgeist South African jazz recording that had given rise to his stage name.Capturing the grace and vitality of working-class township life on the city fringe, “Cherry” channels the type of laid-back Cape groove that Abdullah Ibrahim, recording as Dollar Brand, introduced to South African jazz in the 1970s. On the flip side, “Plum” appears to take its own simple chord change in the same direction before breaking into a chugging 20-minute romp that verges on proto-electronica and on which Pillay hangs all manner of savage keyboard riffing and experimentation. The two distinct flavours of Plum and Cherry make for a well-rounded platter with an iconic cover featuring the work of abstract expressionist painter and As-Shams/The Sun collaborator Hargreaves Ntukwana.

This is the 5th Limblifter record.

It was conceived bit by bit, when inspiration would sneak into a rehearsals for shows or in between recording sessions at my studio in East Vancouver. These little song starts or jams sprout up; incomplete, but with the potential to be full songs.

As these recordings amassed on hard drives, I would occasionally listen back, hunting for a glimmer or an angle of potential; some of which were buried inside long jams. These sessions happened over a five year period as I was also recording, mixing, writing and mastering for other artists in my studio called recRoom.

In 2020, my partner and bandmate in Limblifter, Megan Bradfield and I migrated to our cottage on a Southern Gulf Island in British Columbia.

At the start of the pandemic, recording, mixing and at my Vancouver studio wasn’t a wise idea, so I migrated my from East Van to the Southern Gulf Islands and opened Mayne Island Sound. My partner and bandmate, Meagan Bradfield and I have been coming to this island for years to take a break from our busy downtown Vancouver life and during COVID we found ourselves staying here, waiting for the madness to pass. Moving away from my busy Vancouver studio life and from touring gave me perspective.

Living in the middle of this spectacular forest on an island has put Megan and I back in touch with nature.

The combination of all these things gave me laser focus to write new material and finish the songs we’d started. - Ryan Dahle

We Are Busy Bodies explores the recordings of Venezuelan pianist Virgilio Armas with the reissue of his 1970 album De Repente and 1973's Espejismo. Espejismo finds Armas and his quartet improvising and experimenting with latin jazz rhythms and sounds.

We Are Busy Bodies explores the works of Venezuelan pianist, Virgilio Armas with the reissues of De Repente and Espejismo. De Repente is a more traditional jazz album with Armas own interpretation and improvisations leading the trio, which included Rodolfo Buenaño and Guillermo Tariba.

UWUW, is:

• Jay Anderson (Badge Epoque Ensemble, Biblical, Lammping) - drums
• Ian Blurton – (Ian Blurton’s Future Now / Change of Heart / C’mon) – guitar and production
• Jason Haberman - Bass (Yaehsun / Dan Mangan ) Bass

Guest Vocals by:
• Drew Smith and Marker Starling

After many years of playing in mutually respected bands, Jay Anderson and Ian Blurton came together through a run of shows, backing mutual friend and singer/songwriter, Kate Boothman as her drummer, and guitarist, respectively. Anderson’s and Blurton’s connection were instant, and a plan was set to start making music together. As ideas began to take shape, Anderson suggested bringing in Jason Haberman, a talented bassist, who Anderson had seen play with Toronto indie-folk band, The Wooden Sky.

The trio hunkered down for two days in Blurton’s Pro Gold Studios, jamming out ideas. With the intersection of the many different bands and genres each brought to the table, songs came together quickly, with Blurton editing and sculpting, as they went along. Realizing they didn’t want an instrumental record, they layered on bright horns and smooth vocals, lifting the songs from instrumental jams, to the undefinable yet distinctive sound that is, UWUW.

Saxophonist, Jay Hey, was brought in to provide horn arrangements, along with Tom Richardson on trombone and Patrick McGroarty on trumpet, all three contributing on every song.

Giving the songs a voice, literally, are two of Toronto’s most distinctive songwriters: Drew Smith (Bunny, The Bicycles), providing his trademark, 60s harmony pop and lyrical prowess to “Staircase” and “Landlord”; and Marker Starling; adding his distinct, easy-glide, story-telling charm to Box Office Poison, and Scattered Ashes.

Enough Light is songwriter Bradley Davis’s debut solo release as Affiliate Links. After more than a decade immersed in instrumental post-rock as a member of Fresh Snow, Enough Light is as bold an about-face as anyone familiar with Davis’ previous band could expect.

We Are Busy Bodies is proud to reissue two albums by Ian Carr's Nucleus, including 1974's Under The Sun. Originally released on Vertigo and not reissued since. The album has been remastered by Noah Mintz at Lacquer Channel Recording.

The album artwork is melancholy and reflects the overall feel of the album, which is more downtempo in nature than previous releases.

We Are Busy Bodies is proud to announce the first official reissue of ‘Playtime’ by popular and prolific Italian composer, Piero Umiliani. Incorporating styles like jazz, easy listening/lounge, rock, funk, and bossa nova to a genre largely dominated by orchestral scores, he penned some of the most outstanding film music from the '60s and '70s with over 150 titles under his belt. Originally released on Umiliani‘s own Omicron label in 1968, the album has been remastered from the original recordings by Noah Mintz.

We Are Busy Bodies is proud to announce the first official reissue of ‘Beat Gregoriano’ by Italian guitarist and composer, Mario Molino. Incorporating styles like surf, rock and folk, Beat Gregoriano is a unique album within the library music genre. Originally released on Dishi Monticarlo in 1971, the album has been remastered from the original recordings by Noah Mintz and art restored by Michael Dawson.

We Are Busy Bodies is proud to announce the first official reissue of 'Zodiac' by brilliant French tenor saxophonist, Barney Wilen. Originally released on the Disques Vogue label in 1966, the album has been restored and remastered from Barney Wilen's personal copy of the album. The album was recorded a few years after performing on albums and European tours with Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers and Miles Davis. The album is an exploration of free jazz, dedicated to the signs of the zodiac. Wilen and his friend, photographer Jean Larivière worked together to create the photos and artwork for his album, Zodiac. The intention at the time was to also create a film with a storyline and characters developed by Jean. Unfortunately, the concept was never fully realized at the time,. Sketches, photos and further context are included in the accompanying album insert.

We Are Busy Bodies returns with a reissue of composter, guitarist, and later producer, Almon Memela's ultra rare 1975 album, Funky Africa. From the original liner notes: Africa has always been many things to many people. To some, Africa is the Dark Continent, a mysterious, romantic and vast expanse of unexplored territory. To others, again, Africa is the ultimate symbol of man's triumph over his environment: a wakening giant destined to play a significant role in world affairs. But to Almon Memela, Africa is Home . . . and his music tells it like it really is. "Funky Africa" is the sound of Africa today. And as you listen, you will find that Africa is indeed many things. For in the music of Almon Memela lies everything that is Africa: the call of the wild and the scream of the Jumbo; the throb of the bush and the roar of Commissioner Street. So here it is . . . "Funky Africa". The sound of Africa, by an African, for the world.

The 20th anniversary vinyl reissue of Bellaclava, complete with 2 previously-unreleased tracks, will be the next chapter of Limblifter's continuing story. It's a story that began back in 1996 with a lauded debut LP --a story with Dahle as both its author and protagonist --joined by a who's who of Canadian musicians as supporting characters. It's full of awards and nominations and a handful of top 10 radio hits. And it's a story that becomes more engaging with each new entry.
Since the self-titled album that spawned singles like "Tinfoil" and "Screwed It Up," Limblifter has resurfaced somewhat sporadically over the years. 2000's Bellaclava produced rock radio staples like "Ariel vs. Lotus" and "Wake Up to the Sun," while singles like "Perfect Day to Disappear" and "Jumbo Jet Headache" gained 2004's I/O a JUNO nomination for engineering. Enter 2015's Pacific Milk, with lead single "Dopamine," where Dahle pushed forward with new bandmates as well as long-time collaborators." I want a cohesiveness to the whole story of the band," Dahle says. "Limblifter --that name means something to me. I can't articulate exactly what it is, but there's a casualness to it. It's not super serious; it has to be fun and exciting, so I am always open to great players and concepts." Ryan Dahle keeps good company and remains eclectic: He is one-third of CanCon super-trio Mounties with Hawksley Workman and Hot Hot Heat's Steve Bays. In April of 2019, Heavy Meta, their sophomore album, was released. Dahle's latest collaboration is as songwriter and vocalist with jazz artist, Donny McCaslin and his band--the same band that backed-up David Bowie on his final Blackstar album.

Originally released in 1976, Ubok Aka Inua is the fifth album by legendary Nigerian saxophonist and band leader, Etubom Rex Williams. The album features Psychedelic Shoes and One Woman Is Enough Trouble, both heard on countless funk and soul compilations. The album was restored from the original tapes by Noah Mintz and artwork restored and recreated by Steve Lewin. "Etubom Rex Williams occupies the genuine space of legend of Nigerian Highlife. His incredible professionalism, vast body of work and huge personality, established him as a veritable force of the genre quite early in his career. A case quite similar to another teenage prodigy of Highlife Music, Sir Victor Uwaifo. However any accolades he earned were well deserved and based on a platform of hard graft and genuine love for his art. He like Uwaifo, straddles the Inter-generational gap between the old masters of Highlife such as Bobby Benson, E.C.Arinze, Inyang Henshaw, Dr Victor Olaiya etc and the latter generation of Eddy Okweddy, Orlando Owoh, Tunji Oyelana, Eric Akaeze, Osayomore Joseph et al." - Ed Keazor, Music in Africa

Beach Body wrote their debut album Walking Holiday in spring 2020 while holed up in a cabin in the remote woods of Northern Saskatchewan. They spent the summer recording at funeral-home-turned-recording-studio SoulSound Studio back in Regina.

Blue Stompin' is a collaborative album between Kippie Moketsi and Hal Singer that was organized and produced by Rashid Vally, owner of The Sun record label. The album prominently features both influential saxophonists as well as other iconic South African players Barney Rachabane and Pat Matshikiza. It was originally released by The Sun in 1977 and is being reissued by We Are Busy Bodies in partnership with the original label. The album has been remastered by Noah Mintz at Lacquer Channel. ---- 'Kippie Morolong Moketsi will appear very prominently in any history of jazz in South Africa. He will span the period from the frantic years when the sounds of the Charlie Parker's and the Dizzy Gillespie's first hit our shores to the now. And into this story some will read a curve: from Kippie teaching himself music by imitation, to a climax of artistic achievement and renown in this country, and then the decline... Others will read a lifetime of involvement, in spite of personal problems. Count me among the latter. A life-time of involvement: Kippie was among the few who understood bebop while the rest of us were still doing the jitterbug to the sounds of swing. In his way he made us see what it was all about. He has seen a generation of colleagues go to join the Orchestra Up Yonder, or merely leave their horns to spiders and their webs while they got on the straight and narrow path of grandfather-hood and six to six jobs at factories. Kippie continues on the wide, wide ' often unappreciated - road, creating music.' Notes by JOE Thloloe (Jazz Critic Drum Magazine)

Live, bootlegger version of L.W. compiled from 2021 Australian performances. Mastered by Noah Mintz of Lacquer Channel Mastering. The album features a reverse groove and is on clear vinyl.

As its name suggests, Eboni Band was an ersatz supergroup. Pulled together by arranger and bassist Greg Middleton (The Checkmates Ltd, Marlena Shaw) at the suggestion of Marvin Gaye producer Art Stewart, the musicians comprised of the four musical groups signed to the Ivory Coast-based Eboni Records (Mamadou Doumbia, Gun Morgan, Amadou Doukoure & Abdoulaye Soumare and Lamine Konte & Fode Drame) alongside a handpicked collection of mint Motown session men, including James Brown’s bandleader Fred Wesley, Nolan Smith (Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder), Ernie Fields, Jr (Rick James, Marvin Gaye), and Quentin Dennard (Aretha Franklin, BB King).