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SOURCED FROM THE ORIGINAL ANALOGUE MASTER TAPES
PRESSED AT RTI ON MOFI SUPERVINYL, AND STRICTLY LIMITED TO 5,000 NUMBERED COPIES
1/4” / 15 IPS / Dolby A analogue master to DSD 256 to analogue console to lathe


Ladies of the Canyon can be viewed as Joni Mitchell's coming-out party. Having recently moved to Lookout Mountain in Los Angeles' Laurel Canyon area — her house is depicted in a watercolour painting she made for the record's cover — the Canadian icon turned to her immediate surroundings for inspiration the while taking the pulse of national affairs, corporate enterprise, celebrity, and her relationship with Graham Nash. The 1970 album finds the singer-songwriter morphing into the groundbreaker who would shed folk music's constructs and wade into pop, jazz, soul, and poetry with a combination of depth, sophistication, self-examination, and acumen no one had ever heard.

Sourced from the original analogue master tapes, pressed on MoFi SuperVinyl at RTI on MoFi SuperVinyl, featuring new liner notes, and strictly limited to 5,000 numbered copies, Mobile Fidelity's UltraDisc One-Step 180g 45RPM 2LP box set delivers Ladies of the Canyon with bracing intimacy, detail, balance, and depth. Marking the first time the LP has received audiophile treatment, it's one of six iconic Mitchell records Mobile Fidelity is reissuing on definitive-sounding vinyl and SACD sets.

Playing with organic warmth, superb clarity, and ample spaciousness, this collectible UD1S edition benefits from the inherent properties of SuperVinyl — a virtually non-existent noise floor, reference-calibre groove definition, and ultra-silent surfaces among them. Primarily recorded solo, with spare accompaniment on select tracks, Mitchell practically takes up residence in your listening room. Her voice, piano, and guitar image with spot-on precision and three-dimensionality; the music is focused, emotional, natural. Auxiliary instrumentation — cello, clarinet, baritone saxophone, Milt Holland's deft percussion — is seamless, cohesive, steady. Notes bloom and decay as they do on a live stage; relatedly, the soundstage extends far and wide, with carbon-black backgrounds adding to the uncanny realism.

The deluxe packaging of the Ladies of the Canyon UD1S set complements its distinguished status. Housed in a deluxe slipcase, both LPs come in special foil-stamped jackets with faithful-to-the-original graphics that illuminate the splendour of the recording. This UD1S reissue is made for listeners who prize sound quality and production, and who desire to engage themselves in everything involved with the album, including Michell's illustrative painting that serves as the cover art.

Deemed "powerful and brilliant" upon release by The New York Times, Ladies of the Canyon followed Mitchell's first Grammy-winning effort (Clouds) and marked the first of six consecutive masterworks she made en route to becoming the most celebrated singer-songwriter of both her generation, and, arguably, all time. It's the first record on which the then-26-year-old featured the piano, a creative decision of immeasurable significance; first to attain platinum status, which transformed Mitchell into more than a folk figure; first to see her taking more chances with her singing; and the last on which she comes across upbeat, largely unencumbered by the complex themes and personal ache that would occupy her for the foreseeable future.

Mitchell radiates confidence and courage, producing Ladies of the Canyon herself after realizing she didn't need the services of an outsider when she already knew what she wanted. She just required a competent and collaborative engineer, who she landed in Henry Lewy. Fittingly, on the record's affectionate title track, she celebrates community and a trio of women — all real, all from her Laurel Canyon neighborhood — who, individually, as a visual artist, free-spirited mother, and circus-raised imagineer, respectively, were all reflected in Mitchell herself. Akin to Trina, Annie, and Estrella, Mitchell also had an affinity for wearing beautiful clothes, hosting friends, baking sweets, and weaving "a pattern all her own."

That pattern most famously materializes on the album's closing trio of songs — their unconventional placement on the record likely another sly acknowledgement of Mitchell's disdain for commercialism, or at the very least, catering to its demands — each, then and now, a classic. Within months of releasing Ladies of the Canyon Mitchell would find herself at the centre of the singer-songwriter movement — and preparing songs for another album whose impact is still felt today.

More About Mobile Fidelity UltraDisc One-Step and Why It Is Superior

Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab's UltraDisc One-Step (UD1S) technique bypasses generational losses inherent to the traditional three-step plating process by removing two steps: the production of father and mother plates, which are created to yield numerous stampers from each lacquer that is cut. For UD1S plating, stampers (also called "converts") are made directly from the lacquers. Since each lacquer yields only one stamper, multiple lacquers need to be cut. Mobile Fidelity's UD1S process produces a final LP with the lowest-possible noise floor. The removal of two steps of the plating process also reveals musical details and dynamics that would otherwise be lost due to the standard multi-step process. With UD1S, every aspect of vinyl production is optimized to produce the best-sounding vinyl album available today.

MoFi SuperVinyl

Developed by NEOTECH and RTI, MoFi SuperVinyl is the most exacting-to-specification vinyl compound ever devised. Analogue lovers have never seen (or heard) anything like it. Extraordinarily expensive and extremely painstaking to produce, the special proprietary compound addresses two specific areas of improvement: noise floor reduction and enhanced groove definition. The vinyl composition features a new carbonless dye (hold the disc up to the light and see) and produces the world's quietest surfaces. This high-definition formula also allows for the creation of cleaner grooves that are indistinguishable from the original lacquer. MoFi SuperVinyl provides the closest approximation of what the label's engineers hear in the mastering lab.

Bert At the BBC is a comprehensive collection of Jansch's appearances at the BBC, featuring over eight hours (CD box set & vinyl bonus download) of rare and unreleased recordings, including live-on-air spots, studio sessions and full concerts straight from the BBC vaults, delving further into this legendary performer's canon. Bert Jansch was the very essence of folk music, providing inspiration for everyone from Paul Simon and Neil Young to Led Zeppelin and countless folk revivalists. This unparalleled limited-edition compendium is available as a 4xLP and 8xCD set, housed in a coffee-table book set with a lavish 40-page book tracing the recordings from Bert's earliest moments at the BBC. It includes interviews and insights from Lauren Laverne, Jools Holland, Johnny Marr, Jacqui McShee, Bob Harris, Bernard Butler, Mark Radcliffe and many more. Twenty broadcasters, producers and collaborators contribute at length to the booklet, with great affection for this gentle, maverick genius. Bert's BBC legacy remains the most significant and exciting untapped reservoir of his music. The undeniable advantage of recordings made for broadcast is that they were, by their nature, created for public consumption and, barring live-on-air appearances - which might go well or go badly, but were going out either way - were explicitly signed-off by the artist as representations of his art that were good enough to be heard. The set is compiled by Colin Harper, author of Dazzling Stranger: Bert Jansch and the British folk and blues revival (Bloomsbury, 2000), who contributes detailed liner notes to the package. The release is mastered by IFTA award-winning engineer Cormac O'Kane. The vinyl release features 48 tracks on LP and is accompanied by a download card with over six hours of extras spanning 1966-2009, including BBC4's St Luke's concert (2003), and a complete Queen's Hall, Edinburgh concert (2004) for BBC Radio Scotland. It is also available as a special 8xCD set containing all 147 tracks and encased within a coffee-tab...

Following the release of the first volume of the Koto: Tapestry series, Cinedelic completes the series of 3 with the release of the remaining two valuable albums. 'Tapestry: Koto' is a 3-album series produced by Nippon Columbia in the mid-1970s dedicated to one of the main instruments of Japanese traditional music: Koto. The beauty of the trilogy curated by composer Kiyoshi Yamaya, whose chapters are respectively dedicated to Sea, Hillside and Country, lies in the fact that they are a modern translation of tradition using newer and more avant-garde sound idioms, integrating the koto with jazz musicians. An original mix, a 'crossover’ that allows for the awakening and the consequential spread of traditional music in larger contexts. The extreme accuracy of the marvellous recordings is also remarkable. The performers on this fabulous album are: Toshiko Yonekawa - learned to play the koto at an early age, performing in a public concert as early as 8 years old. For three years, from 1941 to 1944, she won prizes as the best performer in the Japanese Cultural Federation's competition for traditional trios. She also received an award from the Prime Minister. Many other important recognitions followed, until she became president of the Reichokai and executive director of the Sankyoku Association. In 1996, she was appointed Living National Treasure. As a koto player, her best-known characteristics are her extreme precision of intonation and rhythm and the unparalleled beauty of her sound. Kiyoshi Yamaya - born March 1932. He attended the Kunitachi College of Music. Between 1956 and 1960, he performed with 'Nobuo Hara and His Sharps & Flats' (clarinet, saxophone, etc.) and was responsible for composition and arrangement. In 1959, he formed the 'Modern Jazz Three Association' with Norio Maeda and Keitaro Miho, which contributed to the improvement of the level of composition and arrangement in Japanese jazz. In 1965, he became conductor of the 'Tokyo Union Orchestra' and received the Japan Record Award's Arrangement Award. His name appears on more than 100 albums. An unmissable session for those seeking new sounds. Original masters licensed by Nippon Columbia for the first ever reissue. Includes OBI and insert.

Winner of Best World Music Album in the 1994 Grammy Awards. The illustrated booklet [from the CD edition] contains four pages of notes describing the equipment used for the recording and background on Ry Cooder & V.M. Bhatt, Bhatt's mohan vina (an instrument he designed himself, featuring twelve sympathetic strings, three melody strings and five drone strings, played -like Cooder's guitar- with a slide), the recording and the circumstances that brought them together. The second drummer, Joachim Cooder, is Ry Cooder's son. NB: In the book that came with the 1993 [i]Trance Europe Express[/i] 2CD compilation, Alex Paterson of The Orb included this release among his top 12 ambient albums of all-time, adding "I only wish we [The Orb] could have produced some of this record. It would be a match made in heaven."

A very difficult-to-find LP, originally released on a small, independent label. Originally released on a very limited run of vinyl. The original LPs are demanding a nice price on the Asian market. A beautiful recording with absolutely fantastic sound. Includes a performance of her hit song "Diamonds and Rust" as well as the audiophile classic "Famous Blue Raincoat." This may be an under-the-radar title, but it's a can't miss for the discerning audiophile. The album chronicles a show performed by Baez in a bullring, naturally, in Bilbao, Spain, in 1988, and it demonstates what makes her such a draw overseas. Half of the collection, side two of the LP, consists of songs sung in Spanish. Now we've upped the ante even more for true audiophile bliss — the 45 RPM 2LP version reduces distortion and high frequency loss as the wider-spaced grooves let your stereo cartridge track more accurately. Natural tonalities, superb balances, pristine clarity and more are all revealed. »This record was made in a bullring in Bilbao, Spain, in 1988. It is dedicated to the Mayor and the people of Bilbao, who came out between thunderstorms to see me perform. The song in Catalan "Txoria Txori" is about a sweet little bird ... I want to thank Pasku who taught it to me, and thank the Bilbao public for singing it so beautifully.« — Joan Baez. Illustrations by Joan Baez; additional vocals Mercedes Sosa.

The original album, Remastered by Bernie Grundman, on CD & 180g 2LP
• CD of previously unheard bonus tracks taken from the original 1996 session tapes
• 40 page book featuring new liner notes, photos, song notes, lyrics, biographies and a history of the original club
• 2 x 12x12” Art Prints

‘Buena Vista Social Club’ is both the name given to this extraordinary group of musicians and the album, recorded in just seven days in 1996 in Havana’s 1950s vintage EGREM studios. It was clear from the atmosphere of the recording sessions that something very special was taking place. However, no one could have predicted that Buena Vista Social Club would become a worldwide phenomenon – awarded a Grammy in 1997 and, at 8 million copies, outselling any other record in the same genre. The acclaim of the original album has elevated the artists (including Ibrahim Ferrer, Rubén González & Omara Portuondo) to superstar status, inspired an award-winning film by Wim Wenders, and has contributed to popularising Cuba’s rich musical heritage. Produced by Ry Cooder for World Circuit, the timeless quality of the music and the sheer verve of the veteran performers have ensured that this will go down as one of the landmark recordings of the 20th century. To celebrate the 25th Anniversary of the album’s recording, World Circuit will release Special Edition Remaster formats of the album in September 2021, featuring previously unheard tracks, previously unseen photos and new liner notes. The releases will be supported by an international PR & marketing campaign, events and digital initiatives.

Light in the Attic Records proudly presents Even the Forest Hums: Ukrainian Sonic Archives 1971-1996—the first comprehensive collection of Ukrainian music recorded prior to, and immediately following, the Ussr’s collapse. From subtly dissenting Soviet-era singles to DIY recordings from Kyiv’s vibrant underground scene, the compilation chronicles the development of Ukraine’s rich musical landscape through rare folk, rock, jazz, and electronic recordings.

“This record is a labor of love and a long time coming,” says label owner Matt Sullivan. Over the course of the last five years, Sullivan, alongside producers David Mas ("dbgo”), Mark “Frosty” McNeill, and Ukrainian label Shukai Records worked tirelessly to compile a carefully curated, chronological playlist. But behind the scenes, ongoing war & politics would shape the evolution of the tracklist, which originally featured both Ukrainian and Russian artists. “We found ourselves in the midst of a larger political issue; what began as a broader overview of a sonically underrepresented region suddenly became quite the controversial project,” Sullivan continues, “so we decided to pivot and focus only on Ukrainian music. There were times when it felt impossible to bring this project to fruition, so to be sharing it with the world today is truly humbling and long overdue.”

Guiding listeners through the physical editions of the album are insightful liner notes and track-by-track details by Vitalii “Bard” Bardetskyi—a Kyiv-based filmmaker, DJ, and writer. The 2xLP is housed in a beautiful gatefold package showcasing Ukrainian artist Maria Prymachenko’s beloved and iconic folk paintings. The vinyl edition features a 20-page booklet with artist photos & liner notes in both English and Ukrainian, pressed on Clear Blue Sky & Sunflower Yellow wax; the CD edition features bonus content housed in a deluxe, 64-page hardbound book.

Light in the Attic will donate a portion of proceeds directly to Livyj Bereh, a Kyiv-based volunteer group working to rebuild in the regions affected by ongoing war in Ukraine.

“Music has always pulled Ukrainians out of the abyss,” writes Vitalii “Bard” Bardetskyi in his liner notes for Even the Forest Hums: Ukrainian Sonic Archives 1971-1996. “When there is no hope for the future, there is still music. At such moments, the whole nation resonates under a groove. Music, breaking through the concrete of various colonial systems, is an incredible, often illogical, way to preserve dignity.”

While the songs collected in Even the Forest Hums were recorded during periods of immense societal and political upheaval—and certainly reflect the resilience of the Ukrainian people—they are rooted in the universal spirit of exploration: from post-war teenagers seeking fresh rhythms and artists experimenting with DIY recording technologies to an entire nation being introduced to decades-worth of previously-embargoed albums. Yet, until now, it has been nearly impossible for anyone outside Ukraine to explore the country’s flourishing music scene for themselves.

Much of this can be attributed to Soviet-era restrictions. Music, much like any other commodity, was tightly controlled before the fall of communism. “Only state-authorized performers who had gone through hellish rounds of the permit system could record at the few monopolistic, state-run studios,” explains Bardetskyi. While many of these compositions were released and performed to mass audiences, however, they weren’t necessarily what they seemed. “Some of the artists managed, even under difficult ideological circumstances, to build a whole aesthetic platform which was essentially anti-Soviet.”

Bands could slide under the radar by changing the lyrics of rock songs to reflect Soviet ideals or by performing traditional folk music with subtle outside influences. “This resulted in a whole scene that combined central-eastern Ukrainian vocal polyphony, Carpathian rhythms, and overseas grooves,” writes Bardetskyi, who refers to this era of music as “Mustache Funk.”

Examples featured in Even the Forest Hums... include 1971’s “Bunny” by Kobza. While the folk-rock group was known for their polyphonic vocals, this particular composition is an instrumental waltz, which blends elements of traditional Ukrainian music with progressive rock, British beat, and jazz-rock. Another example of “Mustache Funk” comes from the latter half of the decade, with the Caribbean-influenced “Remembrance” by Vodohrai. While the group—which included some of the best jazz musicians in the country—had a multitude of traditional hits, inspired jams like this one could, for a lucky few, occasionally be heard live.

While the 70s proved to be a golden age for Ukrainian music (complete with pop stars, large-scale tours, and legions of adoring fans), the excitement was short-lived. “The Soviet system finally understood that funkified beats quite strongly contradict[ed] [its] principles,” notes Bardetskyi, who adds that by the 80s, “The once prolific scene was almost completely colonized, appropriated, and largely Russified; the state radio and TV waves were occupied by banal VIAs and cheezy schlager singers.”

With tighter restrictions, however, came the rise of the underground. While the decade leading up to Ukraine’s independence was marked by great turmoil—including the political reform of Perestroika in the Ussr and the Chernobyl disaster—it also marked a time of incredible creativity.

Mirroring global trends, the first half of the decade found many composers and producers experimenting with electronic music. Among them was Vadym Khrapachov, whose scores have appeared in over 100 films. His moody, Moroder-esque “Dance” (written for Roman Balaian’s iconic 1983 film, Flights in Dreams and Reality) is notable in that it was recorded on the Ussr’s only existing British EMS Synthi 100 synthesizer.

Producer Kyrylo Stetsenko, meanwhile, was reimagining traditional songs for the dancefloor. Among them is 1980’s “Play, the Violin, Play,” by Ukrainian pop star Tetiana Kocherhina. Stetsenko, who produced the album for Kocherhina, created a hypnotic remix of the folk tune that was fit for a disco. Stetsenko is also featured here with 1987’s “Oh, how, how?,” in which he transforms a melancholic ballad by Natalia Gura into a synth-forward, breakbeat jam.

As the fall of communism approached, the scene continued to diversify—particularly as music from around the world became increasingly available. Kyiv, in particular, became an epicenter of creativity. In the early days, bands like Krok offered a preview of what was to come. Described by Bardetskyi as “The first real Kyiv supergroup,” Krok was led by guitarist Volodymyr Khodzytskyi and featured musicians from local Beat bands. In addition to backing the biggest pop acts of the day, the versatile collective explored a spectrum of styles in their own recordings, including fusion and electro-funk. They are represented here with the mellow “Breath of Night Kyiv.”

By the late 80s, Kyiv “was buzzing like a beehive,” recalls Bardetskyi. “It was a period of very active socialization and exchange of musical information and ideas; local musicians evolved with supersonic speed, absorbing decades of the world's musical background and transforming it into their sound.” While rock bands comprised much of this era’s first wave, artists continued to expand their repertoire as new influences pervaded the scene. The global rise of DIY recording technology and electronic instrumentation, meanwhile, also contributed to the growing sonic landscape.

Highlights from this period include the avant-garde improvisations of violinist Valentina Goncharova. Recordings like 1989’s “Silence” were created by a series of layered tracks and custom pickups. Similarly, composer Iury Lech paints a warm ambient soundscape with 1990’s “Barreras.” On the other end of the spectrum is the industrial “90” by Radiodelo (the project of Ivan Moskalenko—aka DJ Derbastler), which combines frenetic drum machine beats and haunting, reverb-soaked instrumentation. Post-punk was also thriving, with acts like Yarn (a large, loosely based collective) dominating the scene. “The interests of [Yarn’s] members extended all the way to medieval chamber music, which would clearly be noticeable in ‘Viella,’” writes Bardetskyi. The track features two of Yarn’s co-founding members: multi-instrumentalist and graphic designer Oleksander Yurchenko (who became a significant figure in modern Ukrainian music) and Ivan Moskalenko. Yurchenko is also represented here as part of Omi, a parallel project by the chart-topping electronic group, Blemish. 1994’s dramatic “Transference” (which features contributions by legendary Japanese musician Ryuichi Sakamoto and American singer-songwriter Diamanda Galas) serves up horror-movie-soundtrack vibes, particularly with the addition of eerie vocalizations.

Cukor Bila Smert’ (which translates to “Sugar White Death”) were also major players in the Kyiv underground. Interestingly, Bardetskyi notes, “In the reality of the general dominance of post-punk, the aesthetic message of Cukor Bila Smert’ was countercultural to the countercultural process itself.” For their contribution to the compilation, the experimental quartet provides 1995’s “Cool, Shining.”

In the years following Ukraine’s independence, Kyiv’s underground scene continued to flourish, particularly as Western trends became more accessible and Ukrainians found themselves at the forefront of their own cultural output. While the country’s music would largely evolve in new directions throughout the 90s, the final entry on Even the Forest Hums... provides a glimpse at what the future held. The album closes with 1996’s “Lion,” by Belarusian transplant German Popov, whose project, Marble Sleeves, was “one of the few Kyiv formations that tried to master jungle/drum-n-bass,” per Bardetskyi.

Though this compilation only scratches the surface of Ukraine’s vast and diverse music scene, Even the Forest Hums offers an in-depth overview of a significant period in the country’s cultural history and unites a number of influential figures in the same collection for the first time. As Ukrainian artist Oleksandr Schegel writes in the foreword, “This is our Ukrainian treasure. It is impossible to lose and impossible to win.”