Cosmic | Balearic Vinyl 476 Items

Leng Records has long had close ties with the underground music scene in San Francisco, with low-slung dub disco and psychedelic disco outfit 40 Thieves releasing their acclaimed album The Sky Is Yours on the imprint way back in 2014. Now Leng has turned to another stalwart of the Bay Area scene, Cole Odin, on a single that’s every bit as trippy and engrossing as you’d expect from one of San Francisco’s most frequently overlooked talents. Cole made his Leng debut earlier in the year, contributing the electro-influenced track ‘Numbers Game’ to the label’s 10th anniversary compilation. On ‘Little Boxes’, he’s joined by good friend Eddie C, a much-loved disco and house producer from Canada best known for his releases on Endless Flight and Red Motorbike. The pair recorded the track while Eddie was staying with Cole in San Francisco last year.



In keeping with the low-slung, hallucinatory sound that has always been a big feature of the San Franciscan scene, ‘Little Boxes’ is a trippy, mind-altering affair in which waves of sitar sounds, cosmic synths, effects-laden guitars and kaleidoscopic electronics rise above a weighty punk-funk bassline and crunchy, snare-heavy beats. It has serious dancefloor chops but is also atmospheric and immersive: perfect 5am music for Bay Area beach parties and mushrooms-fuelled forest raves.



Fittingly, it’s 40 Thieves who provide the accompanying remix, a 10-minute epic created with the assistance of Adonis and Rodney from the psych rock band ‘Guavatron’ for additional synths and the guitars. Beginning with tabla-style percussion, swirling chords, psychedelic guitar licks and mystical sitar sounds, the remix builds in waves, with looser drums and even weightier bass propelling the track forwards at a metronomic and hypnotic pace. By the time the eyes-closed guitar solos drop two thirds of the way through, you’ll be tripping hard and reaching for the lasers. It’s a genuinely stunning remix of a genuinely intoxicating, mind-mangling track.

Laidback summer vibes over a brazilian rhythm and a little brokenbeat anyone? The London based artist Toma got you covered with his debut NothingCanEverBe. RawMTs Interpretation of it is a 10 minute subaquatic trip taking you deeper and deeper for ultimate relaxation. Now for the dancers: JKs Oldschool Remix is a LoFi workout with an irresistible groove in classic LOVEiT House tradition whereas Jo Pariotas Remix preserves the brazilian vibes and the vocals from the original but spices everything up with a phat housey beat, warm chords and some funky piano sprinkles on top. - morri313

I Love It When A Band Comes Together…The one thing that has kept most artists sane during the pandemic is writing and creating. In an attempt to apply this logic Red Ant Records maestro Pete Bones decided to recruit the talents of a bunch of cool cats he had met whilst traveling the globe and put a band together. Having often wondered after 30 odd years as a DJ/Producer how the band would sound had he not been swept up by Acid House in the late 80s, six months later, plenty of file bouncing and numerous edits, and The Stones Of Convention are ready to wreak havoc; with Jeff Ward on electric guitar, Jeff Richey on saxophone, Pierre Davis on drums, Scott Anderson on slide guitar, Duncan Gray on bass and electric guitar, Sean Q6 on acoustic guitar, and featuring the effervescent vocals of Laura Clarke. Hailing from Galway, Orlando, Pittsburg, St Petersburg, Slough, San Francisco and Glastonbury respectively, band practice might be problematic. The album features 7 original tracks, 2 full vocal cuts, and a cover of the Talking Heads classic Pull Up The Roots

It’s testament to the man they call Medlar, that you never quite know what you might get with one of his releases. Wolf Music family since the early days, his latest mini-LP on the label is no exception. Seven cuts that prove this man can do anything, taking you on an otherworldly, island tour. First stop, ‘Aerial’, channelling that inner Wally Badarou for a cosmic, sand-stomping chuggathon, heavy on the juiced-up basslines, tripped out synth wizardry and space delay goodness. Your pace quickens, ‘Iguanadon’ rattles the world around you, shamanic echoes swirling through your skull as that acidic stab hypnotises you into a stupor. Out the other side, you stumble across an ‘Elephant Bingo’. Cup of tea, track three. Slap bass, bongos and synth stabs lifting the spirits. Back on the beach you drift off into a slice of sleazed up Balearic business, turning the funk dial all the way up to 11 via ‘elv’. Suddenly things take a trippier turn. Are you dreaming? ‘cr78-108’ booms in the background, pure jungle-tinged, digi dubwise movements. A few stiff drinks and you’re on your feet again. ‘Phoenix Lights’ New York house stylings pump you with life, even if your hazy brain is still hearing wild echoes all over the place. How did you end up here, 10 hours later? One too many ‘Sin Prisa’ homebrews no doubt, yet you’re still stompin through, granted it’s of the slow-mo, acid-laced variety though. What was in that welcome drink Medlar handed you at the start? Who knows, who cares when you get that kinda bang for your buck.

Second Circle return with a special one-off album of music by Belgian producer soFa, German musician Houschyar and the legendary Turkish drummer and percussionist Okay Temiz.

elale is the result of a string of sessions that began in Istanbul in 2018, when soFa spontaneously teamed up with friend Houschyar for a series of smoky jams in the young German producer’s 5th floor apartment. soFa returned a few months later, with a plan to finish the EP, and whilst having lunch, the two decided to pay a spontaneous visit to Okay Temiz, with whom soFa had worked previously.

Welcoming the pair in the percussion workshop (Atölye) where he spends most of his days, Temiz was excited by their demos and the three of them began to jam around the tracks, with Temiz utilizing a number of his own homebuilt instruments from the workshop. The duo had now become a trio, it seems, and back in their home studio the jams would be edited and reworked; with Okay adding further overdubbing and contributions to the tracks.

Probably best known as a member of The Don Cherry Trio, for his own band Oriental Wind and for numerous collaborations with some of the best Jazz musicians in the world since the early 70ties, Temiz is considered to be one of the most innovative and outstanding musical figures in Turkey and beyond. Since first becoming a drummer, after his mother’s dreams of him becoming a trumpeter were dashed after being told his arms were too short, this amazing Turkish musician has continually pushed musical boundaries.

In this latest collaboration, Okay Temiz weaves his percussive magic through six diverse psychedelic synthesizer and drum computer jams, alongside two exciting young producers. Şelale is mixed by Dusseldorf studio wizard Gordon Pohl.

For our fifth release, P&f Recordings is pleased to welcome Berlin-based musician, producer, and DJ, Alex Kassian. Over the past few years, Kassian has made a name for himself in Berlin and beyond as a solo act, as well as with his project Opal Sunn, via a clutch of well received, dancefloor-focused 12s. But on our first release of 2021, Kassian swaps the techy pulse of the German capital for a sound that’s altogether more melodic and atmospheric. Side A kicks off with 'Leave Your Life (Lonely Hearts Mix)' which began as a way for the producer to realize some of his early—and so far unrequited—dreams of playing in a rock band. Next up he delivers 'Leave Your Life (Dance Mix)', which ups the energy and echoes some of the production that made the musician’s 'Oolong Trance' (Love on the Rocks) one of 2020’s best club tunes. On the flip, the gorgeous 'Spirit of Eden' unfurls like a lost Lyle Mays classic, but with a mesmerizing loop that keeps the song’s feet placed firmly on the dancefloor. Concluding the EP is a bass-heavy remix from none other than U.S. dub legend Bill Laswell. 'Eden’s' melodic focus is underpinned by a propulsive groove and filtered through Laswell's trademark sonic dynamics. The EP, comes packaged in a full-color jacket from Parisian artist Alexis Jamet with OBI strip.

After the first two Earthly Tapes & a handful of EPs, Earthly Measures drops its first full-length album with Mente Organica’s El Espacio - a beautifully crafted album with glorious textures, steady grooves, calming vibes & a dancefloor filler or two. Born in Bogotá, Colombia – producer & multi-instrumentalist Mente Organica has slowly been making a name for himself within the folktronica/Latin scene. Following multiple album and EP releases over the past few years, El Espacio marks his first release on wax and the music stands out from anything he has done before. These 8 tracks surprise & reward the listener as individual harmonies at first, and finally, as a whole and immersive symphony. From 'Pablo Bebe’, a track he wrote which is inspired & dedicated to his best friend – to ‘Close the Door’, written in the depths of quarantine, reflecting isolation, loneliness & introspection, & ‘Yoga’ - a song written with his father that can be easily heard filling the dancefloor as well as easy bedroom sessions, this album truly does feel like his most personal work yet. Eagle’- an utterly unique track born in Pucon, Chile, after meeting opera singer Katy Prado - blends sensibilities of 60s psychedelic rock vocals with Mente’s signature electronica. ‘Dame Un Segundo’ is the lobby track of the album, with Balearic vibes: chilled, jazzy & floaty. Title track ‘El Espacio’ pays homage to Mente’s influences growing up - think Massive Attack, Thievery Corporation & Air - giving us that Trip Hop vibe. ‘Huanini’ is a real groover - a low-key dance track that evokes that ‘start of the night’ feeling of excitement, with heavy experimentation of granular synths. Finally, rounding the album off with melodies of hope, delight and positivity, ‘Partida’ reminds us that there is always light at the end of the tunnel.

Mori Ra with the fastest diggers trigger in all the land completes a set of dancefloor ready edits of Japanese electronic & city-pop songs culled from his well-known Japanese Breeze mix series that he does with the Rotating Souls record label. Some of the tunes are familiar and some rare and unknown but Mori puts his own touch that can only come from years of experience and an extreme relationship to the originals. This record is a joint release between both Rotating Souls & Forest Jams.

Greville translates the deft drum programming and atmospherics of their previous work on Mad Habitat into a dextrous downtempo odyssey. The tracks pair woody percussion with crystalline pads and figurative sounds that evoke their own biospheres; listen to the woodland motorik of “Marbles” or swingbeat syncopation and coruscating arps of “Time”. The depth of production here is best exemplified by “Night Light” where the “Ambient Mix” strips the track down the dreamy chords and the asynchronous twitter and chirrups of a synthesized bushland - and like the EP altogether, it's a curious sonification of Australia in the summer.