Folk 125 Items

Why you'll love it...
Much of Montevallo was deceptive in its simplicity, hiding era-defining songwriting talent and a whole new mode of country crossover behind a seemingly easy-to-replicate formula of marrying traditional country instruments with programmed beats and slick, dynamic melodies. Its velvet revolution won Hunt years of radio dominance and anticipated a tidal wave of what’s been termed “boyfriend country” — legions of imitators who took the singer’s gently flirtatious tack and R&B influences to their cloying extremes. Plenty in Nashville didn’t see Montevallo as a changing of the guard, and even after he’d become a country megastar wrote him off as either a novelty, insufficiently capital-C Country, or both. When confronted with resistance about his own mode of widening country music’s lens Hunt has tended to return to the root of the issue, which runs much deeper than a simple disdain for pop music in country or concern about preserving some of its imagined “authentic” past.

Acoustic duo, Sleeper Bill (singer/ guitarist of Sleepwalkerz) and Mr Tof (upright bass for Hudson Maker) blend folk, blues, rockabilly and country to create a magnetic live show of original music.The two friends came together in 2015 with a mutual love of Americana, influenced by heavyweights Johnny Cash, Hank III and Bob Wayne, which shines through their vintage sound.They recruited the beautiful Mylène in 2016 on the musical saw and washboard, adding to their twang and continuing to present their own catchy rhythms and melodies with tales of heartache and loneliness.

Discrepant proudly re-presents the Vinyl edition of Lebanese trio Malayeen. Malayeen is the project of Lebanese musicians Raed Yassin (Keyboards, Turntables & Electronics), Charbel Haber (Electric Guitar & Electronics) and Khaled Yassine (Darbouka, Percussion). Born from Yassin and Haber's love for the music of quintessential Egyptian guitarist Omar Khorshid, Malayeen disassembles and re-configures the work and style of the iconic guitarist innovative take on Arabic music. The final result makes for an original and unique update of Khorshid & belly dancing inspired songs from the past. Over the course of 7 compositions, appropriately named after Khorshid and famous belly dancers from the Arabic diaspora, the three musicians' varied backgrounds and techniques collide and coalesce in an experimental yet magical fashion, not actually playing Khorshid's music, but inspiring themselves from the cult guitarist's genius to create something completely new, modern and unexpected. A unique LP featuring the combined talents by key players of the Lebanese avant-garde.

Julie Byrne’s much loved second album Not Even Happiness (2017) added atmospheric instrumentation and electronic flourishes to her unusual guitar tunings and fingerpicked melodies, moving the songs from the front-porch into subtle anthemia. Whether witnessing the Pacific Northwest for the first time (‘Melting Grid’), the morning sky in Colorado after staying up through the night at a house party in the mountains of Boulder (‘Natural Blue’), recording the passage of freight trains on the outskirts of Buffalo, New York ('Interlude'), or a journey fragrant with rose water; reading Frank O’Hara aloud from the passengers seat during a drive through the desert of Utah into the rainforest of Washington State (‘All The Land Glimmered Beneath’), Not Even Happiness is Julie’s beguilingly ode to the fringes of life.

Unreleased early Algerian synth electronic by Ahmed Malek, compiled and co-produced by Flako

In the early 1980s, Ahmed Malek was already in his 50s , when he discovered synthesizers and electronic music for himself and started to experiment with sounds. The result was a mixture of ambient synth music, field recordings he made in Cuba and a wide variation of different sound experiments that he also presented as different avanguarde music festivals in Cuba and the US. None of it was ever released but we got a huge box of master tapes from his family and we're happy to present this different side of Ahmed Malek's music. It was compiled and co-produced by Flako, a fan of early electronic and synth music. This is not a remix album though, Flako's aim was to create an album out of 2 hours of material that sounds like it might have if Mr. Malek would have finished it himself before of his death. Fully approved and licensed from the artists family.

The album comes with an informative booklet with liner notes, an interview with Flako regarding his approach towards the production and unseen photos. We will also release a third album by Ahmed Malek which will be more in the vein again of the music he is known for and this album will also be previously unreleased.

The first-ever compilation of "havagies", the nearly forgotten Hawaiian-influenced music of 1930s Greece, focused on the compositions of Kostas Bezos and his ensemble White Birds. A world-class slide guitarist, political cartoonist and sleepless Bohemian, Kostas Bezos created some of the most unique music of any era: surrealist guitar portraits blending Athens and Honolulu, haunting tropical serenades, wild acoustic orchestras, and heartbreaking steel guitar duets. Incredibly, this is the same musician responsible for the legendary "Kostis" rebetika recordings (see A. Kostis "The Jail's a Fine School" [OLV-002 / MRP-098]).

France is the trio of Jeremie Sauvage on electric bass, Mathieu Tilly on drums and Yann Gourdon on amplified hurdy-gurdy. They play one note / one rhythm producing energetic performances reminiscent of the early collaborations between Faust and Tony Conrad. Creativly recycled influences result in intense shows with pounding overtones and repetitive pulsing rhythms. Loud straight and trance-inducing.

The pertinency of the recordings only slowly appear On “Occitanie" in the mass of sound, the rhythmic repetition and the elongated drones. The hurdy-gurdy forces you deeper, highlighting points of microtonal flux, cracking open the single note, the nodding rhythm, to imply the presence of every note, every sound, inside it. The insensible evolution, lurks in a corner of noise and finally imposes itself slowly on careful listening.

The band members of France perform in various other projects: Tanz Mein Herz, Toad and Jérico, all are member of the collective La Novià, an organisation based in Haute-Loire which brings together professional musicians and is a place for reflection and experimentation around traditional and / or experimental music.

The seventh solo-album by the Norwegian vocalist of Midnight Choir fame. The selection of Townes van Zandt's songs that can be heard on 'Come Tomorrow' is drawn from the period 1968 to 1978, and bears witness to a profound understanding of the artist and a great deal of research. The songs are presented in arrangements that preserve their poetic and melodic power with acute sensitivity.

Emotional Rescue celebrates its 10th Anniversary with a repress of one of its most cherished reissues, in the first ever collection of works from Spanish song writer Javier Bergia. As a member of Finas Africae his name is finally coming to prominence, now with this selection of his music from 1985 to today, the depths of his acoustic, folk and balearic writing can be heard. Born in Madrid to a family steeped in both classical and Spanish traditional music, Javier 's mastery of guitar, percussion, voice, poetry and composition is drawn from both this grounding and upon his lifelong musical inquisitiveness'. Since 1980 he has been an integral part of the ancient music group 'Atrium Musicae', while in 1984 he founded, with Juan Alberto Arteche and Luis Delgado, the groundbreaking group 'Finis Africae' as a sonic investigation into a fusion of diverse ethnic musical forms incorporating both indigenous instruments and electronic elements. As a solo artist, his career blossomed when, in 1985, he recorded his first LP, the acclaimed 'Recoletos' and with Luis Delgado he recorded the now classic album 'La Fl or De Piedra' under the name Ishinohana Erc025). Today Javier is active, participating in the Sephardic music groups 'Halilem' and 'Alquibla', as well as diverse alternative chamber music groups, as well as working around as composer, arranger and producer and appears regularly with Manolo HH on Radio Nacional de Espana.

Uzelli Psychedelic Anadolu is a brand new product from Uzelli label, based in Turkey. Uzelli was established as a cassette label in Frankfurt in 1974 and since its beginnings was bringing Turkish music to Turkish people in their homeland and Germany. Produced more than thousand of albums of various artists from genres as arabesque, tavern, arabic music, psychedelic pop and rock, bellydance, Turkish classical music and folk.
Following a big international demand for original and obscure Turkish music from 70s and 80s, Uzelli selected tracks from their archive and brought them together as a compilation of psychedelic sounds of famous and unknown artists of Turkey. Compilation consists of highly popular names such as Erkin Koray or Ünol Büyükgönenç from legendary KardaÅ?lar band as well as undiscovered talents of vintage Turkish pop, rock and folk - Akbaba Akilisi, Zor Beyler, Kerem Güney, AÅ?ık Emrah, Elvan Sevil, NeÅ?e Alkan and Ali Ayhan. All tracks were recorded and produced by Uzelli between 1975 and 1984. Most of the tracks were never released on any other source than cassette. Uzelli brings them on vinyl, CD and digital. Compilation consists of 10 tracks plus 1 hidden track - all remastered by Emil Berliner Studio in Berlin. The design of the release was created to follow the original style of Uzelli's cassette covers' style from 70s and 80s.
Uzelli Psychedelic Anadolu is a first production that initiates a new project of Uzelli - creation of series of compilations and albums from its vast archive. Bringing original, undiscovered sounds from Turkey to worldwide music amatours is a main goal of the production. The project is created by international crew - curated by Polish music explorer and digger, esthetically redesigned by Polish artist, backed by Turkish researcher, American ethnomusicologist, Israeli and German DJs and producers. All production and management of the project takes place in Istanbul, in the headquaters of Uzelli company. All this make the production awaited by many music and culture networks all around the world.

2016 Grammys Best Historical Album Nominee
34 tracks newly re-mastered
Deluxe 3xLP set includes 60-page book housed in a “Tip-On” slipcase with three “Tip-On” jackets
Both 2xCD and 3xLP editions include comprehensive liner notes, artist interviews, unseen archival photos, and lyrics (with translations)
Vinyl pressed at RTI
Liner notes by Kevin “Sipreano” Howes

Largely unheard, criminally undocumented, but at their core, utterly revolutionary, the recordings of the diverse North American Aboriginal community will finally take their rightful place in our collective history in the form of Native North America (Vol. 1): Aboriginal Folk, Rock, and Country 1966–1985. An anthology of music that was once near-extinct and off-the-grid is now available for all to hear, in what is, without a doubt, Light In The Attic’s most ambitious and historically significant project in the label’s 12-year journey.

Native North America (Vol. 1) features music from the Indigenous peoples of Canada and the northern United States, recorded in the turbulent decades between 1966 to 1985. It represents the fusion of shifting global popular culture and a reawakening of Aboriginal spirituality and expression. The majority of this material has been widely unavailable for decades, hindered by lack of distribution or industry support and by limited mass media coverage, until now. You’ll hear Arctic garage rock from the Nunavik region of northern Quebec, melancholy Yup’ik folk from Alaska, and hushed country blues from the Wagmatcook First Nation reserve in Nova Scotia. You’ll hear echoes of Neil Young, Velvet Underground, Leonard Cohen, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Johnny Cash, and more among the songs, but injected with Native consciousness, storytelling, poetry, history, and ceremony.

The stories behind the music presented on Native North America (Vol. 1) range from standard rock-and-roll dreams to transcendental epiphanies. They have been collected with love and respect by Vancouver-based record archaeologist and curator Kevin “Sipreano” Howes in a 15-year quest to unearth the history that falls between the notes of this unique music. Tirelessly, Howes scoured obscure, remote areas for the original vinyl recordings and the artists who made them, going so far as to send messages in Inuktitut over community radio airwaves in hopes that these lost cultural heroes would resurface.

With cooperation and guidance from the artists, producers, family members, and behind the scenes players, Native North America (Vol. 1) sheds real light on the painful struggles and deep traditions of the greater Indigenous community and the significance of its music. The songs speak of joy and spirituality, but also tell of real tragedy and strife, like that of Algonquin/Mohawk artist Willy Mitchell, whose music career was sparked by a bullet to the head from the gun of a trigger-happy police officer, or those of Inuk singer-songwriter Willie Thrasher, who was robbed of his family and traditional Inuit culture by the residential school system.

Considering the financially motivated destruction of our environment, the conservative political landscape, and corporate bottom-line dominance, it’s bittersweet to report that the revolutionary songs featured on Native North America hold as much meaning today as when they were originally recorded. Dedicated to legendary Métis singer-songwriter and poet Willie Dunn, featured on the anthology but who sadly passed away during its making, Native North America (Vol. 1) is only the beginning. A companion set featuring a crucial selection of folk, rock, and country from the United States’ Lower 48 and Mexico is currently in production.

Back IN Print!!! An almost mythical giant of African guitar, whose reinvention of acoustic fingerstyle quickly spread from western Kenya throughout East Africa, before his tragic death in 1963. Spellbinding guitar lines, sweet harmony vocals, every melody an instant classic, and a life story steeped in legend. Co-released by Raw Music International and Olvido Records. 12-song LP comes packaged in a deluxe spot-color jacket, with a 12-page full color booklet featuring an oral history by George MUKABI's family and peers, and lyrics in English and Swahili.

Talk about a talented family: Willie Nelson and his Sister Bobbie Nelson each achieved massive success in country music. Even in their late 80’s, the Nelsons continue to make music and their influence can be heard through many artists in the genre. December Day, Willie’s Stash Vol. 1 is a collaboration album between the two, and upon release in 2014 it was met with positive reviews from music critics. The album spawned three singles: “Who’ll Buy My Memories”, “Laws of Nature” and “Summer of Roses / December Day”. The liner notes were written by Willie’s frequent collaborator Mickey Raphael. This record comes as a limited edition on snowy white vinyl.

Puzzling collage of Tibetan Buddhist rites

Cody Jinks' credible grit and meaningful tattoos are no fad. They define exactly who he really is: someone who was raised on the sounds of country music and metal. Ultimately, Jinks found himself back to where it all began. His father loved the outlaw country icons: Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings and The Hag. That never ending consistency of incredible music growing up laid some very deep seeds and those early influences shine through his music. Jinks' beloved 2015 album Adobe Sessions, his fourth overall, is available on vinyl for the first time with bonus track "Fast Lane" and Side-D etching. "In 2015 a great crop of fresh faces in country and Americana arose on many people's radars," writes Country Perspective. "Hands down one of the best artists to emerge amongst this group was Cody Jinks...[His] 2015 album Adobe Sessions felt like the awaited breaking out of the next big star in the independent country scene. The album is full of traditional country, plenty of steel guitar and ballads on life and love."

A new Mount Eerie album unlike anything else in the Mount Eerie or Microphones back catalog. Eleven stark songs about basic deep grief, loss, real death, love, significance and non-significance, reality. Nothing wise or learned, just the described experience of living through unimaginable domestic obliteration, with names and dates.

contains: 11 songs, 42 minutes, very nice sounding vinyl, foil stamped front and back covers, heavy old style gatefold tip-on jacket with special Neenah “Slide” paper as the inner liner, silver on black, all the lyrics, double sided art poster, free download card

Limited edition for Record Store Day 2017!

Jozef van Wissem's 2017 album is inspired by a Vanitas painting by the Belgian artist Cindy Wright, which also graces the cover of the album. This inspiration is beautifully reflected in the music of the album as Jozef's lute arrangements sound fragile and his sparse vocals delicate. as if the vanity, the temporality and senselessness of everything has been rendered audible. Each song title refers to the painting, making each track a memento mori on its own. This is counterbalanced by the strong and deep sound of the album.

Niandra LaDes And Usually Just A T-Shirt is the first solo record by John Frusciante. Between 1990 and 1992 the guitarist made a series of 4-track recordings, which at the time were not intended for commercial release. After leaving the band Red Hot Chili Peppers in 1992, Frusciante was encouraged by friends to release the material that he wrote in his spare time during the Blood Sugar Sex Magik sessions.

Originally released on Rick Rubin’s American Recordings label in 1994, Niandra LaDes is a mystifying work of tortured beauty. Frusciante plays various acoustic and electric guitars, experimenting with layers of vocals, piano and reverse tape effects. Channeling the ghosts of Syd Barrett and Skip Spence, his lyrics are at once utterly personal and willfully opaque.

Frusciante’s rapidfire, angular playing shows how key he was in the Chili Peppers’ evolution away from their funk-rock roots. His cover of “Big Takeover” perfectly deconstructs the Bad Brains original with laid-back tempo, twelve-string guitar and a fierce handle on melody.

The album’s second part—thirteen untitled tracks that Frusciante defines as one complete piece, “Usually Just A T-Shirt”—contains several instrumentals featuring his signature guitar style. Sparse phrasing, delicate counterpoint and ethereal textures recall Neu/Harmonia’s Michael Rother or The Durutti Column’s Vini Reilly.

On the front cover, Frusciante appears in 1920s drag—a nod to Marcel Duchamp’s alter-ego Rrose Sélavy—which comes from Toni Oswald’s film Desert in the Shape.

This first-time vinyl release has been carefully remastered and approved by the artist. The double LP set is packaged with old style tip-on gatefold jacket and printed inner sleeves.

Millions Brazilians formed in Portland, Oregon in 2006. Founding members Grant Corum and Suzanne Stone have been central to the band since it’s inception, while a rotating line-up backs them depending on the latest vision for the sound. TIP!
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The band carry out their own interpretation of a genre bending ethos that has evolved throughout the American underground. Drifting between boundless compositions, focused energetic improvisations and experimental collaborations that embrace a weird sort of transcendence.

Their next installment Red Rose and Obsidian was recorded in Maine and engineered by Big Blood’s Caleb Mulkerin. Both he and the band deliver a powerful yet fragile and personal release. The mythical and evocative recordings are inspired by Maine's rugged coastlines; mournful ripples of sound wash up on the shore, whilst a lonesome, at times harrowing saxophone drifts through the rolling mountains, providing unsettling melodic interludes. Electronic treatments veil organic sounds, a fleeting whistle meets spontaneously with spacey flutes, mutated rock rhythms are topped off with the soaring vocals of Suzanne Stone who leads the listeners into the magical world of the Million Brazilians.

You take a trio of the fnest traditonal griot musicians from Mali and put them in a studio with Western music's most revolutonary string quartet - and the resultng album is one of the most richly rewarding musical collaboratons you are likely to encounter. Together the Kronos Quartet and Trio Da Kali have created an album that is rich in texture, hauntngly melodic and strikingly inventve as violins, viola and cello combine with balafon, ngoni and the powerful female voice of Hawa 'Kassé Mady' Diabaté in transcendental style. David Harrington, who founded the Kronos Quartet in 1973, describes the album as one of the most beautful Kronos has done in forty years.' All three Da Kali members come from hereditary musical families, Balafon player and musical director Lassana Diabaté was a long-tme member of Toumani Diabaté's Symmetric Orchestra and has recorded with Salif Keita, Taj Mahal and many others. A musician of great subtlety and inventon he has honed a virtuoso two-balafon technique to perfecton. Bass ngoni player Mamadou Kouyaté is the eldest son of the instrument's greatest exponent, Bassekou Kouyaté and he holds down the groove in his father's band 'Ngoni Ba'. Singer Hawa 'Kassé Mady' Diabaté is the daughter of Mali's greatest traditonal singer, Kassé Mady Diabaté, and the power, range and phrasing of her voice led David Harrington to compare her to the late queen of American gospel, Mahalia Jackson.
Kronos Quartet have earned an enviable reputaton collaboratng with contemporary composers such as Steve Reich, Philip Glass, Terry Riley and Laurie Anderson and with world music icons from Argentnian tango hero Astor Piazzola to Bollywood singer Asha Bhosle.

Resurgam– meaning “I shall rise again” – is the hotly-anticipated sixth studio album from Fink: UK-born, Berlin-based founding singer-songwriter musician Fin Greenall, alongside long-time bandmates Tim Thornton (drums, guitar) and Guy Whittaker (bass). It continues an acclaimed and distinctly adventurous catalogue, from the sample-splicing debut Fresh Produce (2000), through to the beautifully heady expressions of their last album, Hard Believer (2014). Greenall has also earned global props as a film music composer, songwriting collaborator (including works with John Legend and Amy Winehouse) and solo innovator, with recent side-projects spanning the electronic Horizontalism (2015) to Fink’s Sunday Night Blues Club Vol.1 (2017). Fink have never been afraid to experiment; on Resurgam, they arguably sound more fearless than ever.

Resurgam derives its title from a Latin inscription in a 900-year-old church in Greenall’s native Cornwall. Its vital, insistent spirit pulses through the entire album, which was recorded with ground-breaking producer Flood (PJ Harvey, U2, Foals, Warpaint, The Killers) at his Assault & Battery studios in North London. Its ten new tracks were created over two months, a relatively luxurious stretch of time compared to previous Fink albums, resulting in a collection that is both assertive and richly immersive.

Produced by Jack White, includes a Bob Dylan cover.

The trails that Brooklyn's Big Thief take us down on Capacity, the band's highly anticipated second record, are overgrown with the wilderness of pumping souls.

After last year's stunning Masterpiece, Capacity was recorded in a snowy winter nest in upstate New York at Outlier Studio with producer Andrew Sarlo.

The highly anticipated full-length record is the first new music from Stapleton since 2015's breakthrough double Platinum solo debut Traveller and will be followed by From A Room: Volume 2 coming later this year.