Search "nas+life+is+good" 235 Items

Swedish synth-pop phenomenon Kite's second 7 inch since signing with Dais in 2023 finds the duo of Nicklas Stenemo and Christian Hutchinson Berg swinging for new heights of romantic desolation and baroque grandeur. They describe the A Side, "Losing," as a "six-minute empty call for emotional response." Stately piano and anguished voice reverberate in a vaulted hall, before gradually building into a widescreen anthem of synths, drums, and soaring vocals decrying the steady deadening of life and love: "It's deadly quiet in your old heart / Are you there? / I see dark skies on the rise / And daylight shows no remorse / And I realize it is my life / But It's losing all meaning." Swedish dark music icons Anna von Hausswolff and Henric de la Cour join the chorus as the song cascades towards an ominous horizon. The B Side, "Glassy Eyes," showcases Kite's mastery of somber, sweeping balladry. Hushed church organ elevates and anchors Stenemo's devastated confessional, swaying between resilience and defeat. The band describes the song as a reckoning with "the privileged and existential anxiety of drifting through life dispassionately," contrasted with "the yearning to connect profoundly with others and a desire for experiences that stir the soul before facing one's final moments." Like a hymn, the emotion thickens as it deepens, approaching both darkness and divinity: "Deep as I go, nothing to find / Oh catatonia, I won't cry / Nothing can grow, everything dies / Behind my glassy eyes."

Cultured Swiss techno label Acquit has put together this cheeky little 7" from Trecci with one great tune on each side. 'Invisible Self' is the opener and it is a delightfully curious, inviting blend of soft focus synth loops and smeared pads that sounds like waking up on a distant planet. On the flip, 'Sit And Wonder' starts with pensive piano chords which are eventually carried away on a supple deep house grove with loopy bongos and a feel-good sense of late-night cruising. Tasteful stuff for sure.

With their Debut „Everything Went Down As Planned“ A Tale Of Golden Keys made it to numerous club and festival stages, into the good radios and Spotify playlists. Their sophomore album continued their way of releasing beautiful songs for the indie pop crowd. „Shrimp“ is a critically acclaimed record and was one of the most successful indie pop albums from Germany in 2018. In 2019 the band released the soundtrack for the adventure documentary "Tyry" called "Tyry (Music for the Film)".

When we first heard from recent Kompakt signing Emma Kollmorgen, with 2021’s “You Are The”, she was hymning the complexity of romance: “Love is scary as fuck!”, she said. On her debut EP, “1243”, she’s built on that intensity and offered up a five-track suite of night-vision electronic pop, bristling with a stealthy sensuality. It’s a cinematic collection, building from the brooding “Escape”, through the drifting, tactile pulses of “Taciturn”, the gritty, bustling noises that run underneath the smoke-signal torch-song of “All The Wild Animals”, and the closing, tear-stained melancholy of “Home”. “You Are The” reappears here as well, settling in perfectly amongst new friends.

It’s a completely assured first EP from an artist who’s been slowly and steadily building her own sonic world. From her early days, when she busied herself by learning guitar and joining bands, Kollmorgen always had a vision of doing something “more independent”, to allow her to find her own sound and write her own songs. A brief creative alliance with the Berlin DJ duo Dole & Kom led to some recordings and live performances. All the while, Kollmorgen was carefully shaping her production and sound designing skills with Ableton Live, and exploring distinctive musical terrain in collaboration with co-producer and multi-instrumentalist Paul Seidel (The Ocean Collective, Fern, Nightmarer). She joined the Kompakt family after a recommendation by Patrice Baumel, who also remixed her debut single with typical flair.

On “1243”, though, Kollmorgen fully inhabits her songs, gifting each of them with a sweet, subtle sway, her vocal and lyrical openheartedness balancing the bluer hues of her production. Each song is confident and poised, Kollmorgen relying on cross-thatched patterns of texture as a web to support her melodies: “I like patterns,” she says, “they give me something to hold onto, something stable in an unstable world.” The songs feel as though they’re grappling with moments of revelation and experience in Kollmorgen’s world, which makes sense, given her approach to music: “I never had a diary,” she reflects, “so writing songs is my way of expressing and dealing with life.” On 1243, you’ll catch some glimpses of life lived, made sonorous through songs beautifully sung.

Swedish synth-pop phenomenon Kite's second 7 inch since signing with Dais in 2023 finds the duo of Nicklas Stenemo and Christian Hutchinson Berg swinging for new heights of romantic desolation and baroque grandeur. They describe the A Side, "Losing," as a "six-minute empty call for emotional response." Stately piano and anguished voice reverberate in a vaulted hall, before gradually building into a widescreen anthem of synths, drums, and soaring vocals decrying the steady deadening of life and love: "It's deadly quiet in your old heart / Are you there? / I see dark skies on the rise / And daylight shows no remorse / And I realize it is my life / But It's losing all meaning." Swedish dark music icons Anna von Hausswolff and Henric de la Cour join the chorus as the song cascades towards an ominous horizon. The B Side, "Glassy Eyes," showcases Kite's mastery of somber, sweeping balladry. Hushed church organ elevates and anchors Stenemo's devastated confessional, swaying between resilience and defeat. The band describes the song as a reckoning with "the privileged and existential anxiety of drifting through life dispassionately," contrasted with "the yearning to connect profoundly with others and a desire for experiences that stir the soul before facing one's final moments." Like a hymn, the emotion thickens as it deepens, approaching both darkness and divinity: "Deep as I go, nothing to find / Oh catatonia, I won't cry / Nothing can grow, everything dies / Behind my glassy eyes."

The "Weimar EP" from singer/songwriter Albyrd is not only his first release under a new moniker; as his first self-produced record, it also marks one of many new beginnings. The end of the pandemic, the blossoming and withering of relationships - and of course, a tribute to his time in the city and how life's perspectives change.

In 8 songs, Albyrd shows not only the range of his magnificent voice, but also how well soul and RnB can be interwoven with electronic music. With a feature from Miles Bonny, Mr. Lumberjack Soul himself, this tape is definitely one for the shelf.

LP+CD+7"

Tkay Maidza, the first female rapper signed to 4AD, announces details of her highly anticipated new album, Sweet Justice. The follow-up to her 2016 self-titled debut will be released on 3 November and includes the recent Flume-produced earth-shuddering single ‘Silent Assassin’. Today, Tkay shares a blistering new track, ‘Ring-A-Ling’ and official video directed by Jocelyn Anquetil.

“I’m never choosing compliance,” a defiant Maidza utters ‘Ring-A-Ling’; a warning from the Zimbabwean-born, Australian-raised, Los Angeles-based rapper, singer and producer and a mantra for Sweet Justice. Produced by Two Fresh, Tkay says of ‘Ring-A-Ling’, “I wanted to make an empowering song that tells others that my biggest focus are my goals.”

The result of a dark night of the soul—and ensuing epiphany—that led to a series of professional and personal reckonings, Sweet Justice isn’t a revenge album, but it does stem from a profound sense of karma. In a traditional sense, it’s a breakup record: about Tkay splitting off from her self-doubt and warped sense of self; the toxic figures that populated the last chapter of her life; and the idea that she should stick to any one lane.

After severing ties with old friends, she found some new ones on the same creative wavelength: Canadian producers Stint and Kaytranada, and fellow Australian Flume, all of whom contribute production. Sweet Justice is an album that embodies the beautiful contradictions of Tkay’s art: it’s a coming-of-age record by someone who’s mastered the game; an album about karmic justice and accountability that’s bright, breezy and incredibly fun. In Tkay’s mind, it’s a rebirth album, a record about harnessing the feminine power that was innate in her the whole time.

Tkay Maidza says, “Sweet Justice was a way for me to channel my emotions from what I’ve experienced in the last two years. It’s a diary of things and thoughts I’ve kept to myself. Making the record was a healing experience and I’m grateful to have worked with producers who have inspired me throughout my career.” Sweet Justice follows the 3-year-long, 24 song-strong genre-bending Last Year Was Weird trilogy exploring Maidza’s own African-Australian experience. The project earned her a 2021 ARIA Awards win for Best Soul/R&B Release and an NME Award for Best Solo Act From Australia in 2022. Following on from tours with Billie Eilish and Dua Lipa, Tkay is currently in the southern hemisphere for arena shows with Lizzo with her own headline shows to be announced soon.

"During lockdown we delved deep into the Crazy P vaults to see what might be lurking in there. Plenty of buried treasure to be found, but these 2 little beauties grabbed our attention and seemed to fit well together. The lead track, If Life Could Be This Way, was a jam we had between the 3 of us, the vocal's a bit of a one take wonder from Dani, and we didn't touch it! It featured in our set and was the title of our last tour Nov 2021".

My Back Was A Bridge For You To Cross, Anohni’s sixth studio album, expresses a world view by shape-shifting through a broad range of subject matter. Through a personal lens, Anohni addresses loss of loved ones, inequality, alienation, acceptance, cruelty, ecocide, devastation wrought by Abrahamic theologies, Future Feminism, and the possibility that we might yet transform our ways of thinking, our spiritual ideas, our societal structures, and our relationships with the rest of nature. On her first full album since 2016’s Hopelessness, she explains the creative process was painstaking, yet also inspired, joyful, and intimate, a renewal and a renaming of her response to the world as she sees it. “Some of these songs respond to global and environmental concerns first voiced in popular music over 50 years ago.” Anohni’s approach since her last record has shifted from someone tasked with challenging global denial, to an artist seeking to support others on the front lines. “I learned with Hopelessness that I can provide a soundtrack that might fortify people in their work, in their activism, in their dreaming and decision-making. I can sing of an awareness that makes others feel less alone, people for whom the frank articulation of these frightening times is not a source of discomfort but a cause for identification and relief. On “It Must Change,” Anohni soulfully describes systems in collapse with a note of compassion for humanity: “The truth is I always thought you were beautiful in your own way // That’s why this is so sad.” Anohni’s voice is sensual and smoothed, selectively reaching to the edges of what it can contain. “We’re not getting out of here // No one’s getting out of here // This is our world,” she murmurs. A portrait of legendary human rights activist Marsha P. Johnson taken by Alvin Baltrop features on the cover, reflecting a 25-year relationship with the memory of Johnson that Anohni has held space for in the presentation of her own work. Elsewhere, the album artwork states ”it’s Time TO Feel What’s Really Happening”. In some ways it feels as if she is reaching across her life’s expression, and has found a moment of unique composure, wearing her long exploration of disarming intensity, with the maturity of a painter carefully choosing her colors. “I want the work to be useful, to help others move through these conversations we are now facing, to move with dignity and resilience through this bitter dawning.”

Welcome to Roseville, the 7th studio album by Har Mar Superstar. Sean Tillmann’s latest collection of songs is career defining culmination of life and musical experiences that were heavily influenced by 70s AM gold artists including Todd Rundgren, Elton John, Carole King, David Bowie, Paul McCartney, Genesis, Hall and Oates, Meat Loaf, Dory Previn, and ELO. The album came together in the late months of 2020 and is the first true collaborative effort of the whole touring band. It was distance recorded by all of the members in their home studios and the band’s home base, Mid City Studio, in Minneapolis. It has been described as an “existential homecoming” that chronicles Tillmann’s return to life as a Minnesotan over the last 5 years.

It’s True What They Say is the debut EP from Edinburgh-based, husband-and-wife duo Sarah/Shaun (pronounced simply Sarah Shaun), aka Sarah and Shaun McLachlan (pronounced “McLochlin”).

“Sarah and I both have a love for nostalgia,” explains Shaun. “We watched that amazing old 80’s Sci-Fi, (John) Carpenter movie, Starman, a few months back. Myself and my brother David used to watch it all the time. We must have been, roughly, 5-7 at the time. I remember loving the movie but the end, you know, with the beautiful, atmospheric, synth ending, I love that particular moment the most - best part of the movie, you know, when he goes home… It’s heartbreaking but stunning, all the same. It’s the music that moves you most… It did when I was 5 and it still does to this day. It must have had some form of a (much deeper) impact on me.”

The duo narrates stories across themes of love, hope, family, friends, dreams and sadness - the good that comes with the bad in everyday life, not just on a personal scale but within a community as well.

“Starbed is the first song I have ever written and just came out of the blue really, with Shaun playing a melody and me singing along,” says Sarah. “It’s simple and just about two people in love. Love songs are always the best songs, after all… Music has been a big part of my life from a young age. I was unwillingly dragged to piano and violin lessons, which I’m thankful for now! I’d say the first band I really became obsessed with growing up were the Beatles, and on the back of that a lot of 60s music and fashion. From then on, I had a love for music.”

“Shaun definitely opened my ears to a lot of sounds and got me thinking about soundtracks and all the noises that can be made,” she goes on. “We love just spending time experimenting in the house with instruments, pedals etc and Ali is a real magician to work with, too…”

The recordings took place over the summers of 2022 and 2023, with fellow Delta Mainline member Ali Chisholm (aka Jaguar Eyes) plus long-term friend and collaborator Gavin King. Further collaboration then came via the ‘net from the (international) likes of Chris Dixie Darley (Father John Misty), Darren Coghill (Neon Waltz) and Daniel Land (The Modern Painters), among others (see a full list of credits below).

Both Sarah and Shaun have a love for uber-soundtrack producers such as Hanz Zimmer, Max Richter, Cliff Martinez plus live acts such as Beach House, Spiritualized, M83, Suicide, Moby and OMD (to name a few). Shaun also credits the work of Kyle Dixon & Michael Stein (from Survive) on the Stranger Things score… “Even a moment in a movie, whether it be just 30 seconds during a particular scene, it grips you,” he says. But there’s something much deeper at play as well. “Music is a healer,” he goes on, “and I write from my own perspective but more so for others. Once I've done my bit, it doesn't belong to me any longer. It belongs to whoever wants it or needs it.”

The result is a cinematic, synth-wavey, dream poppy and downright beguilingly beautiful body of work. And they’re just getting started…

Avalon Emerson & the Charm is an evolution.

Created during an extended break from the hectic blur of her life as a touring DJ, the album is a personal statement of intent from an artist who’s long looked beyond the club for inspiration. It’s also the first time that Emerson has put herself, her emotions and, most notably, her voice fully into the spotlight.

Having spent her entire career working more or less alone, Emerson purposely sought out a small cast of like-minded artists to help bring the album to life. A Chief among them was UK avant-pop savant Bullion, who executive produced the record and, most importantly, shares both Emerson’s predilection for shimmering pop melodies and her boundary- less approach to music-making.

Working together, they cracked open her head and heart alike, creating a space where she could intimately reflect on the people and places she’s loved and left behind.

There is something magical about the synergy of the voices of a couple; they gel, they interweave, they lift each other. Remember classic duets sung by partners over the years; so much is said, more than just words. 'Warm You' is the collaboration between Mandaworld (aka Amanda Hicks) and partner Matthew Tavares (aka Matty of Badbadnotgood fame). It is a song about your lover getting out of bed in the middle of the night because they can't sleep and you telling them to come back to where it’s warm and safe and they’re loved. It was written in their Montreal apartment a few months after they moved in. Matty described the writing process "We just spontaneously decided to make music, and the idea came out pretty much immediately. I laid down some guitar and then Amanda played the synth line over it and I edited the guitar so the timing was more interesting. We worked on it for a few days getting the chorus and the verses to feel right and, for the most part, everything fell into place super intuitively. Amanda wrote the lyrics." This heartfelt, dream-pop song, with a mellow shoe-gaze sensibility, lets the pair trade verses whilst the instrumentation builds to a crescendo and the duo's voices finally combine. Lush, passionate and personal, a beautiful song, rich in evocative memories. On the ‘B-side’, Mandaworld takes centre stage. 'Spoonfeed' is a spacey synth bass-led ambient ballad with smokey hazy vocals, calming like a bubble bath. Produced with a timeless quality, the song leaves you with a sense of tranquility and a feeling of being submerged underwater. Like all the best music this 7" is deeply personal, yet these are universal themes that are relatable to any listener as they recognise their own experiences within the mood of the songs.

Waxwork Records is proud to present Barbie Score From The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack composed by Mark Ronson and Andrew Wyatt! The score is featured in the juggernaut film Barbie, directed by Greta Gerwig and starring Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling as Barbie and Ken.

On composing the score, Ronson says, “Greta’s Barbie overflows with emotion in a way that inspired us to no end, not just with harmony and melody but also textures, sonics and rhythms. Sometimes Greta wanted us to elicit tears, sometimes she wanted it to feel like a disco. Sometimes she loved the warmth of vintage analogue synthesizers, sometimes she wanted the richness of the orchestra. Often, she wanted both.

“The late nights and crazy hours we put into Barbie were all worth it to us, because we were so in love with this film. And we truly hope listening to our score from beginning to end will give others the same emotional, whimsical experience they had watching this magical film.”

The highly anticipated film score vividly brings Gerwig’s vision to life and adds the perfect layer to the film that immerses fans into the Barbie Universe.

Waxwork Records is thrilled to present Barbie Score From The Original Motion Picture Soundtrack on CD, housed in a jewel case, with a 16 page booklet.

Welcome to Roseville, the 7th studio album by Har Mar Superstar. Sean Tillmann’s latest collection of songs is career defining culmination of life and musical experiences that were heavily influenced by 70s AM gold artists including Todd Rundgren, Elton John, Carole King, David Bowie, Paul McCartney, Genesis, Hall and Oates, Meat Loaf, Dory Previn, and ELO. The album came together in the late months of 2020 and is the first true collaborative effort of the whole touring band. It was distance recorded by all of the members in their home studios and the band’s home base, Mid City Studio, in Minneapolis. It has been described as an “existential homecoming” that chronicles Tillmann’s return to life as a Minnesotan over the last 5 years.

Most of the album was produced by bandmates Aaron Baum and Ryan Mach. John Fields (Jonas Brothers, Andrew WK, Har Mar’s 2004 album “The Handler”) returned to Team Har Mar producing “Solid Ghost” and “Hearts Have Misspoken”, and Ryan Olson (Poliça, Gayngs, Swamp Dogg) dropped in to produce “Patchwork Prisms”. Texas musical legends in the making Kam Franklin (The Suffers) and Jackie Venson (one of the greatest guitarists alive) popped by to elevate “Another Century” into a soul duet masterpiece. Denver Dalley (Desaparecidos) and T. Macey Taylor (Bright Eyes, Jenny Lewis, Amanda Shires) appear on “Where We Began” which they helped write on the road while supporting Afghan Whigs a few years back. The band is Nelson Devereaux, Jake Baldwin, Adam Hurlburt, Ethan Elseth, Aaron Baum, and Ryan Mach, and everyone had a hand in co-writing to help make this album a united, genre hopping masterpiece.

The whole album is a cohesive journey designed to be listened to front to back, but each track is strong enough to stand on its own.

“You’re trouble” is an avant-garde electronic pop album about questioning and locating a sense of self in a disorienting, breaking environment of dissolving certainity which grows increasingly chaotic, about dysmorphic dissatisfaction, becoming disillusioned and alienated. It seeks to juxtapose beauty, serenity and vigour with instability, ugliness, chaos and crisis, expressing itself fluidly without genre or otherwise boundaries. A kind of sinister, anxious but still forward-pushing and at times positive and hot-blooded empowering energy can be felt that wants to urge the listener not to give up but to try and take courage and take control of the troubles and fears in their life. The tone is sometimes reflective, sometimes confronting. The album navigates fairly abstract musical territory, cathartic abrasiveness, heavy and unrelenting sounds of post-club music and noise fused with stretches of pop music, never settling down or resting for long, constantly breaking up and re-assembling itself. Between chaos and form, it’s finding relief in imperfection and the in-between. As such the music is ambivalent and is equal parts some kind of crisis club music as well as introspective reflection.

Dressed in a powder blue suit with the frilly shirt to match, DJ Yoda invites you to be his +1 for Prom Nite, his new album promising retro Americana full of daydreaming reverie, international megastar guests, trip hop acknowledging the likes of Morcheeba and Nightmares on Wax, and the turntable extraordinaire’s bread and butter of cuts, beats and rhymes.

Certainly no stranger to retro sounds having famously peppered his DJ and AV sets with the unexpected the world over, and his How to Cut n Paste mix series going all the way back to the 30s, Yoda’s harp-laden puppy love vibe spreads from the sweet and mellow sound of 2019’s Home Cooking, an album described as “boundary-breaking” by Mojo upon slotting nicely into the UK’s blooming jazz canon. Think deliciously harmonised doo-wop murmuring “Goodnight Sweetheart” with an eye for dreamboats en route to Makeout Point - on “My Energy”, Eva Lazarus takes the form of an earth angel, with Yoda on jukebox cut-ups, taking it back to starry-eyed, clean cut days of wonder (or more recently, Little Mix’s “Love Me Like You”).

Beginning enigmatically with the assistance of Hollywood A-lister (and former next-door neighbour) Lily James, “Breathe” demonstrate Yoda’s continued evolution as a musician (not to mention shrewd decision maker), with James’ vocal confidence - a little Lana del Rey to her breathiness - returning on the velvet-smooth “Airplane Mode.” It’s a smartly executed soundclash accentuated by LA rapper Choosey, the star of the album’s straightest hip-hop shooter “Harder I Rock”. Homeboy Sandman adds some kick to the prom punch with typical wordplay sent down “Coconut Grove”, and Liam Bailey is perfectly cast for the darkly cinematic sway of “Don’t Even Try It.”

On an album of many talking points, the LP’s crowning glory is opening single “Feel Like Home”: featuring the vocal comforts of the House Gospel Choir, it’s your go-to pick-me-up when the chips are down, targeting the hairs on the backs of necks like a softer focus version of Jamie xx’s “Loud Places.” Extended into an alternative, equally uplifting form by Beardyman’s “Don’t Mean Thing”, summer festival season already has its homecoming anthem. With tongues wagging, the twists and turns step away from Heartbreak Ridge when O Love tucks into the mouthwatering shopping list funk of “Way Home”; and “Lesson 1956”, featuring Jamie Cullum and DJ Woody, jauntily pays homage to classic Cut Chemist alchemy, Yoda’s celebrated turntable tomfoolery back in full effect and extending the flavours found in Home Cooking.

Magpie artwork supplied by London’s Endless, whose signature style has tagged Liberty and Lagerfeld as but two high profile clients, Yoda again maximises the experience and enjoyment gained from recording live instruments and prioritising songs over beats. His continued progress mixes risk-taking, elite musicianship, nostalgia brought bang up to date, and ultimately, good clean fun capable of stirring your soul, making Prom Nite a date to remember.

Limited to 100. Dead Astronauts are one of the leading acts in the Synthwave & Synthpop scenes, blending the lines of Darkwave, Goth and Post-Punk. Previously composed of two members, Jared Kyle and Hayley Stewart, Hayley left to focus on her solo work (Mecha Maiko) and Dead Astronauts was reformed. Florence Bullock then took on the female lead, replacing Hayley in 2019. As a silent member and Record Producer, Slade Templeton (of Crying Vessel, Influx Studios) stepped in to help bring their new sound to life in 2019 and 2020 and round out the band. Dead Astronauts have regrouped and reworked the style they were known for, to become something modern, edgy, new and improved. Dead Astronauts are back and ready to ignite that flame in their fanbase that has been waiting, asking for more!

Welcome to Roseville, the 7th studio album by Har Mar Superstar. Sean Tillmann’s latest collection of songs is career defining culmination of life and musical experiences that were heavily influenced by 70s AM gold artists including Todd Rundgren, Elton John, Carole King, David Bowie, Paul McCartney, Genesis, Hall and Oates, Meat Loaf, Dory Previn, and ELO. The album came together in the late months of 2020 and is the first true collaborative effort of the whole touring band. It was distance recorded by all of the members in their home studios and the band’s home base, Mid City Studio, in Minneapolis. It has been described as an “existential homecoming” that chronicles Tillmann’s return to life as a Minnesotan over the last 5 years.

Most of the album was produced by bandmates Aaron Baum and Ryan Mach. John Fields (Jonas Brothers, Andrew WK, Har Mar’s 2004 album “The Handler”) returned to Team Har Mar producing “Solid Ghost” and “Hearts Have Misspoken”, and Ryan Olson (Poliça, Gayngs, Swamp Dogg) dropped in to produce “Patchwork Prisms”. Texas musical legends in the making Kam Franklin (The Suffers) and Jackie Venson (one of the greatest guitarists alive) popped by to elevate “Another Century” into a soul duet masterpiece. Denver Dalley (Desaparecidos) and T. Macey Taylor (Bright Eyes, Jenny Lewis, Amanda Shires) appear on “Where We Began” which they helped write on the road while supporting Afghan Whigs a few years back. The band is Nelson Devereaux, Jake Baldwin, Adam Hurlburt, Ethan Elseth, Aaron Baum, and Ryan Mach, and everyone had a hand in co-writing to help make this album a united, genre hopping masterpiece.

The whole album is a cohesive journey designed to be listened to front to back, but each track is strong enough to stand on its own.

A download code is included.

The second release of Michael Mayer’s IMARA imprint – the self-titled debut by Juliana Martínez, recording as Servicio al Cliente – is exactly the kind of unexpected and quixotic experience you’d want from a label run by a core member of the Kompakt family. In its six gorgeous songs, Martínez teases out both joy and melancholy, her sweet pop melodies set against a backdrop of intimate, gentle, yet beautifully brave arrangements for beats and electronics.

Now based in Berlin, Martínez grew up in Colombia, the daughter of a Colombian mother and Uruguayan father, both psychiatric doctors, from whom she learned a thing or two about the joys of creativity: “My mother especially believed music had no boundaries in what it can do for your brain and soul. Like sort of what sport does to your body.” Martínez attended an all-girl Catholic school, but she also took private music lessons, from which she was expelled “since I composed melodies instead of rehearsing.” In retrospect, this experience reads like a sign of things to come.

After studying law at university, including postgraduate studies in Spain, Martínez decided to change things up: she’d already been playing in a group called Las Palabras Correctas (The Right Words), and eventually found herself embedded in a community of friendship with other artists who “always made songs and art and shared with each other in what we called the ‘Ambassadors of Colombian Music,’ a name taken from a popular Colombian TV show. These friends kept me involved and interested in my keyboards and songs.”

The lovely songs on Servicio al Cliente came to Michael Mayer via an unsolicited demo – “there was no Soundcloud or Dropbox link,” he recalls, “but a beautifully designed website containing an mp3 player. The slightly surreal artwork in combination with Servicio al Cliente’s heartwarming, somehow naive music instantly broke my heart.” There is indeed something deeply moving about these songs, possessed as they are of an uncanny charm, full of ticking rhythm patterns, levitating organ drones and gentle, luscious keyboard patterns. Above it all, Martínez’s voice sails through the air, her delightful Sprechstimme filled with offhand confidence. “It sounds like something that I’ve always known,” Mayer marvels, “like an old forgotten friend or a childhood memory that pops up in a dream.”

Servicio al Cliente reaches us fully formed, the complexities of Colombian life etched deep within its DNA. Its surface sweetness, the sensual sashay and sway of melodies like “La mujer que bailó con el diablo” or the opening “Romántico”, betrays a deeper sense of longing that inhabits the songs’ folds, evidence of Martínez’s sharp, smart awareness of the work of memory, a kind of happy-sad splendor. “I feel my music is full of a South American nostalgia,” she agrees, “and is a try to recall a wider understanding of reality which Colombia forces you to have. A bittersweet irony where most things are simply possible. I try (for) my music to sound like this feeling.” And indeed, it was in a moment of great loss and sadness that Martínez decided to share her music: “It was only when my father passed away that I pushed myself to write to Michael with my songs.”

“And Michael replied back.

how do we live in times when nothing seems safe, how do we listen to music when rockets and bullets make the air scream, how do we produce music when the building with our studio is simply no longer there? over the last 2 years, Amas and Konstantin Kost have been trying to produce a techno EP across the borders of the war in ukraine. Konstantin Kost was never able to leave ukraine for this, while we were able to move freely through europe. this ambivalence is part of this album, it is part of every note and every line of the poems that can be heard here. we all associate techno with bass-heavy and dancing through the night, but Odessa is more, it is a journey without being able to travel, an experience without being able to experience, an escape without being able to escape and a life without really being able to live ... neither Amas was able to travel to odessa during this time, nor Konstantin Kost to europe, neither was able to experience the other personally. however, the exchange of music and lyrics has built up a relationship to a country at war, as well as to its people, musicians, women and children. while we were dealing with our everyday problems in germany, the situation in Odessa became increasingly confusing. the constant fear of being drafted and producing videos and images for the album at the same time were extremely ambivalent moments. how do you deal with your counterpart in such moments and what do you say to someone in a situation that we can hardly imagine? we often talked about friends simply disappearing and corrupt officials and soldiers embezzling money and in the next sentence it was straight back to the vinyl production. these conversations were very rational and at the same time extremely surreal. this EP is not meant to be a political EP, it is meant to be a human album and to take away the feeling of powerlessness from the people who were and are involved. this production and its music is a triumph over the destructive and dark side of war, it is meant to show that art is boundless and that people are connected all over the world even in the darkest times. in the first track RED Glow our guest Tanya (musician and djane from Odessa) stoically repeats the words Love and Fear, followed by the words: ?i meet you with red glow, in your eyes i quickly dissolve!? the track is part of everyday life, everywhere you meet this red glow and yet everything has to flow on and yet people still live and dance ... in Nightcall we walk through the streets and follow the call of darkness. the words ?through the night? are used here repetitively like a percussion. but the highs and lows also give us hope and the belief that we will wake up again tomorrow and start a new day. in the dark there is always light, which must be preserved and found. OLD Kings is also the title of the poem we have written, based on the poem Ozymandias by percy bysshe shelley. OLD Kings determine our times and our political systems, seemingly unteachable old men hold the world in a stranglehold and it seems as if there are an infinite number of them. yet we continue to fight against these people, we cannot and do not want to do otherwise ... in Talk TO GOD, Konstantin Kost reads from the well-known ukrainian poem ?a cloud floating behind the sun? by Taras Shevchenko, a famous ukrainian poet and writer. he is considered the founder of modern ukrainian literature and, in part, of the ukrainian language. it is about red fields, the fog and its darkness, as well as the sea and the calmness of the heart in nature, the longing for peace and peace with god. in addition to poetry and music, all photographs and videos are original recordings by Konstantin Kost of his city Odessa. although we cannot visit each other, we still share strong visual impressions of a city that, in all its beauty and resilience, will hopefully soon be open to the world again. the cover is therefore also a picture of the port of odessa, a place where people and goods from all parts oft he world will soon be able to sail in and out again.

Patrice Bart Williams, also known as Patrice, is a singer,composer, producer and director from Germany and Sierra Leone. His career took off in 1999 with the release of the Lions EP. In 20 years, he has released a dozen albums. His music is a blend of reggae, soul, punk, folk and hip-hop. Over the years, he has established his own unique style. He settled in Jamaica in 2020 and decided to build a studio in the middle of the forest. This atypical location became a meeting place for artists and inspired Patrice to explore new territory. The "Super Sundays", live concerts held on the studio rooftop, were attended by artists such as Richie Spice and Jesse Royal. In 2022, Patrice unveiled the Super Album, an unplugged best of where he reinterpreted his greatest hits including 'Soulstorm', 'Hippies With Guns', and 'Burning Bridges'. Patrice returns in 2023 with a new album entitled '9', marked by rebirth and the symbolism of the colour blue. This album is the result of seven years' work, a veritable introspection into the depths of his emotions. "I was born on the 9th, the day my grandfather passed away. The notion of rebirth has always been present in my life, from my very first day. For my ninth studio album, I took the time to withdraw, to rebuild myself. The last seven years have been devoted to self-discovery, and it's this inner journey that has given life to this album." - Patrice

Two numbers referring to the year 1972. And in two numbers, everything is said. The project is simple and ambitious, it is the soundtrack of life passing by, of our lives, of theirs: those of two boys who became two men, both born the same year. 1972. And contrary to its commercial destination, the “tm” sometimes af fixed to these two letters appears here rather like a real mental tattoo, if not a purely aes thetic gesture, as if to tell us: these sounds, these feelings, these immaterial emotions, were deposited in the dark recesses of these two brains, these two minds, before passing through their bodies, passing through their fingers, then through the keyboards, the ins truments, to transform themselves, to turn into sounds, which, themselves, through the alchemy of creation, become music. And this music is the soundtrack to these two lives: Benjamin Cohen. Ulysse Genet. And these two lives which at one point crossed, met. And from this crossing was born 72. From these two experiences, from these memories, from the memories of the two artists, music is revealed. Four tracks for the moment, instrumental, mixing the reminiscences of hip hop, the echoes of the ‘ambient’ created by Brian Eno, the techno vo lutes of Detroit, and more particularly those of Carl Craig. Without forgetting the roots of what has been called the French Touch… this unique musical adventure revealing France abroad in a singular way, in which Benjamin Cohen has actively participated.

A download code is included. After having released their debut EP „Fading Pictures“ in 2019, we are proud to present Aksel & Aino’s first full length titled “Lullabies for Submarines”. The album is light & dark, mysterious & emotional and above all it is a grand tale of companionship. While celebrating the uncountable facets of human relationships with all the sadness that comes along naturally, the duet of Aksel’s instrumentations and Aino’s poetry always remains upbeat (positive) looking into a bright future, leaving us with the simplest, most sincere and best wish of them all: “I hope we grow old together somewhere inside this great adventure we use to call life.”

■Song selection and supervision = Toru Hashimoto x Artwork = Jiro Fujita, and the first volume of the new compilation series "Incense Music" mastered by Calm, a top Japanese artist of jazz ~ chill out ~ Balearic. "Incense Music for Bed Room" 7 inch single cut from!

■side-a, which contains the latest tracks recorded by Hiroto Uyama for the same compilation, is a wonderful cover of Pharoah Sanders' famous song "Moon Child." Side-aa includes the spiritual and mellow masterpiece "Bliss of Landing" from Yoshiharu Takeda's 2018 first album "Aspiration", an up-and-coming composer/keyboardist who has been praised by many artists!

■The first edition of the ultimate lifestyle compilation that proposes domestic and international ambient - jazz - chill out - Balearica - post-classical - jazzy & mellow beats as music for a comfortable life is the time spent in the Bed Room. A compilation of soothing music perfect for. Two 7-inch vinyl titles including the new recordings included in this album have been released, so please enjoy the wonderful music representing the album on vinyl.

■The 7-inch single (imwvr-1029) released at the same time combines haruka nakamura's newly recorded homage to Bill Evans' masterpiece and Nobuyuki NAKAJIMA's cover of Vinicius de Moraes' masterpiece!

★Artists Profile ■Uyama Hiroto https://roph.net/ He became familiar with music from an early age due to the influence of his uncle, who was also a jazz guitarist. Since ``Letter From Yokosuka'' he has been involved in many nujabes works and has performed with them on numerous live shows. In 2008, he released his first album, ``A Son Of The Sun''. After Nujabes passed away in 2010, he became involved in the production of works such as the ``Luv (sic) series'' and ``spiritual state'', and also participated as an artist. After that, in 2013, he launched roph recordings in order to aim for even more pure music. In 2014, he released his second album ``Freedom of the Son'', which was his first in 6 years since his previous album. In addition to featuring Cise Star, Pase Rock, and Fat Jon, who he has been friends with since his days at hydeout productions, the song is a sequel to his first album. In addition, in 2016, they released their third album "Freeform Jazz", two years after their second album. The content strongly emphasizes the Japanese identity and stands out from previous works as a proposal for a new Japanese Free Jazz, and its originality has attracted not only Japanese but also overseas listeners, such as being featured on Hypebeast overseas. It also received many excellent reviews. He is currently working on music for his new album. (From the official website)

■Yoshiharu Takeda Fantastic music that expresses fluctuations, flows, and contours. Yoshiharu Takeda lives in Tokyo and is an up-and-coming composer/arranger/keyboard player and music selector. Around 2000, he studied music theory on his own and started producing music by composing and arranging on the piano and keyboard. His first album “Aspiration” released in 2018 received praise from Calm and Kaoru Inoue, and after listening to the album, Soichiro Suzuki (World Standard) fell in love with his talent and released his second album “Before The Blessing” in 2022 from the label . It beautifully expresses the wildness hidden within sophistication and the movement contained in stillness, further deepening the sound world that only Yoshiharu Takeda can create. It has been highly praised by many music lovers.

Produced by Jeff Kleinman (Beyoncé, Frank Ocean, FKA Twigs), Life on the Edge of You finds Lontalius aka Eddie Johnston elevating his intimate, confessional indie-folk songwriting across a new musical landscape. The pair had worked briefly in Los Angeles in 2017, then over the pandemic took to trading files from opposite ends of the word, building tracks in a surprisingly fruitful collaboration melding alt-indie with flavors of hip-hop and R&B.

Raised in Wellington, New Zealand, Lontalius embraced making music since getting his first guitar at the age of eight, and spent his preteen years honing his craft in his bedroom with all the resources of the internet at his disposal. After uploading intimate covers of pop songs from an eclectic range of artists, from Crowded House to Beyoncé to Yung Lean, to fanfare on YouTube and Soundcloud, Johnston released his debut LP, I’ll Forget 17, in 2016 on Partisan Records.

His subsequent albums, 2019’s All I Have and 2020’s Someone Will Be Here For You, have followed in its acclaimed footsteps, attracting over 110 million streams and over 650k monthly listeners on Spotify, alongside collaborations with Grammy Award winning producer Om’Mas Keith (Frank Ocean, Erykah Badu) and Jim Fairchild (Grandaddy, Modest Mouse).

Basque artist Elena Setién shapes the ethereal into immediate on the stunningly pristine songs of Unfamiliar Minds. Her command of melody and resolute voice are complemented by lush arrangements that surround the listener in a world of intimate beauty. Setién is an accomplished multiinstrumentalist, collaborator and improviser, having worked with artists like Mary Lattimore and Steve Gunn as well as composing for film and television. On Unfamiliar Minds, Setién reflects on isolation, confusion and harnesses uncertainty with optimism on ten ghostly wonders that capture ineffable feelings in radiant detail. After completing her Basque language album Mirande in collaboration with composer Xabier Erikizia (released on Forbidden Colors in October of 2020), Setién began composing Unfamiliar Minds during the height of lockdown, starting with songs she had begun in pre-pandemic times. As days turned to months Setién grew disconnected from the incomplete pieces made in a different reality. The paralyzing tension of those disorienting early months eventually gave way to new inspiration. Romantic poetry by Emily Dickinson served as a refuge and a springboard for Setién to ground herself in writing new songs in English. She drew inspiration from conversations with composers Gyan and Terry Riley as well as her collaboration with Xabier Erkizia for the Basque television series Altsasu. Erkizia and Setién extended their remote collaborations beyond the series as the two began focusing on their own reconfigured sense of mood and perspective after a year of so much pain and drastic change. Elena Setién's chameleonic songcraft effortlessly bends songs into immersive realms. Her music illuminates the fragilities and ephemeral nature of life with exceptional poise. Unfamiliar Minds is a palatial guide through trial and exaltation, a meditation on disquiet and hope for uncovering what lies ahead.

Hotly-tipped musician and singer Arlo Parks is hotly-tipped for a reason. Collapsed In Sunbeams is a pop album with an irreverent twinge; Parks’ lyricism is poignant as she recounts the mundanities of daily life — a slightly bungled kiss, an argument on a busy street, seeing your crush with somebody else — with a certain romantic awe, delivered in an irresistible mode recalling a youthful Macy Gray, backed by indie rock instrumentation which hinges on the simple and emotive. The soaring chorus hook of ‘Caroline’ is endlessly catchy, and while the LP is loaded with hit after hit, the whole thing demands repeated listens for all the tinier details.

After a first mini-album Dr Bolivard which took the form of a funky and electronic tragi-comic self-psychotherapy, a series of interviews with creators on YouTube (Jacques, Myd, L'impératrice...) where he played a zany psychiatrist character asking existential questions, Bolivard is back with a new mini-album which will be released on January 27th 2023: M. Bolivard.

Composed between 2020 and 2022, he gives his impressions of a turbulent period: pandemic, confinements, American and French elections, global warming, war in Ukraine, worsening mental health... Bolivard keeps his black humour and his taste for nonsense while adding a good dose of satire. On the agenda: social anxiety, radicalisation of opinions, narcissism, psychopathy...

Musically, French pop and funk are always mixed with electronic music. Bolivard sings, raps, slams, speaks, above all to tell stories that are more or less crazy, often funny, sometimes disturbing, definitely creative

Although he has provided songs for DA Pump, m.c.A・T has actually released his own original songs "Gokigen daze！" and "Feelin' Good ~Koi wa Paradise~" on vinyl as a double-sided 7"!

Japanese folk trio Minmoa succeed where few others have. Inspired by laid back 60’s psych-folk, it’s clear that their sound is indebted to the likes of Fairport Convention and Virgin Insanity, but they stand out by updating that sound, breathing new life into a sound that’s become almost cliche.

Their first album, Kikyo no Hi (2021) was released to critical acclaim, with particular praise directed towards lead vocalist Saeko Kusaka’s expressive vocal performance, and the unique guitar playing of Takaaki Konno. The first analog 7-inch single from Minmoa contains “Shinya no Teikibin” from their first album, and “Madokana Yoru”, the title track from their upcoming second EP! Simultaneously laid-back and moving, this unique coupling of two of Minmoa’s best songs on limited edition 45rpm vinyl is one you must not miss! Get it in a flipback cover, available only from P-vine Records!

Limited to 200. Still Dark Sky is New Haunts‘ third full-length album. Still Dark Sky's title track was written just before the UK went into lockdown for the first time - news of the approaching pandemic felt surreal and disturbing, but at the time everyday life remained unchanged. Each song that followed relates to a feeling or issue that has always existed, but which was inevitably amplified by the strange times in which it was born. They wanted the songs to be cathartic - Still Dark Sky is their most upbeat and uncompromising album yet – an album for anyone who needs to process things via loud, heartfelt music.

The International Feel label is back from an extended meditation. Well-rested and with a cornucopia of new ideas and records, IFeel is happy to announce the debut album from Charlie Charlie as the starting shot. „Little Things“ is the brainchild of Gabriella Borbély alias Bella Boo and Jens Resch better known as Chords. Born on a beach in Southern California instead of their hometown Stockholm, it is exactly what you would hope for such a record to be: pop music that is informed by hippie or counter culture and by a Balearic ethos (hence the International Feel address) that is free of blinkered definitions. In equal parts, the duo’s ten songs take the listener through honey dripping r&b, while respelling that certain Californian recording studio sound aesthetic, revisit vintage yacht rock and pop tropes as well as they are reflecting dance music influences in a broken, yet gold framed mirror. Most of all, it’s like a day dream that you don’t want to end. To quote our Italian friends from Edizioni Mondo: good listening experience! Band info: Charlie is Gabriella Borbély – also known as Stockholm’s deep house virtuoso Bella Boo. Charlie is Jens Resch – also known as prodigious producer/musician Chords. The two Charlies met on a beach in Southern California and immediately decided to write a song together. That first track was built on the sampled sounds of a rusty drainpipe. Charlie fired up a dusty ARP Odyssey and played a woozy solo over the drainpipe beats, then the other Charlie did the same, using that same legendary 70’s analogue synth. When they realized the two separately recorded solos played together in perfect harmony, they knew they had to keep heading down their newly found, shared musical path.

Rolling through life, an open mind like an ocean, an infinite ride that comes furiously crashing to a halt. This is Whitney K’s ‘Two Years’, a deep dive into the Canadian songwriter’s journey through vulnerability, change and ultimately letting his guard down.

Whitney K is the wandering stalwart Konner Whitney, a Whitehorse Yukon resident who has spent time in Vancouver, Montreal, Burnaby and Los Angeles. We met the character in 2016 through his intoxicating 4-track recorded manifesto ‘Goodnight’, a head on collision into 24 hours of illusioned romance and modern day escapism. Fast forward to 2021, lift those curtains, aptly titled ‘Good Morning’ is the opening track on ‘Two Years’, a different cracker, a deliberate record about transformation, where to put it simply, Whitney K has arrived. Enlisting the aid of main collaborator and bandmate Josh Boguski and drummer Avalon Rossignol-Tassonyi, the focus has been shifted, folklore and realism becoming reckoning and truthfulness, what was outsider folk is now political poetry, life in motion delivered through a freeway ridden baritone voice that transforms the mundane into extraordinary. Written with a completely different mindset and a conscious effort to break with the traditions of a corrupt, hypocritical, and hateful society/lineage, Konner’s pen is precise and daring, uniting the earnestness of Willie Nelson and the comedy relief of Harry Nilsson on the beautiful ‘Me Or The Party #165’, or when painting Canada’s colonial past and heartland image on the primitive rock’n’roll anthem ‘Trans-Canada Oil Boom Blues’. There is no avoidance, no excuses, whether your self portrait in the mirror resembles a five dollar caricature sold on a boardwalk, the John Cale-esque opener ‘Good Morning’, or whether you learn you are worthy of love like on the poignant vignette ‘Maryland’, the beautifully arranged album closer that echoes Tin Pan Alley with Lou Reed’s grit. ‘Two Years’ also presents plenty of fun, the perfectly stumblin’ garage rocker ‘Last Night #2’, the honky tonk blues coming-of-age episode ‘Cowboy City Rocker’ and the cello/violin belter ‘Hit This Pipe’. One of Whitney K’s many gems is ‘The Weekend’ a minimalist spectral ode to hope where the band’s restriction brings out the pure force and vocal command of the ramblin’ troubadour. Time to open your arms, he’s coming out of no fun city and aiming straight for you.

Heady power pop trio Portable Radio announce the release of their debut eponymous LP on March 12th 2021 on Crimson Crow Records. Lead track and first single Hot Toddy, out in February, introduces the album with its ethereal brooding pop arrangement. Some years ago, the world started to go weird – and that’s when the then duo, Portable Radio, decided it was as good a time as any, to start making first steps. Phil … and Mof … shared some messages and a love of melodies, and as a gift to friends and those feeling the weight of everything, recorded a version of Brian Wilson’s gorgeous opus, ‘Love & Mercy’. The result was enough for them to start writing songs, and the blueprint for Portable Radio was born – hope, empathy, fun, love, and mercy.