‘A wobbly loop of found sound. Almost inaudible speech from an unidentified documentary. Lapping waves of folk guitar created at the edges of the player’s ability. A haunted melodica. Mumbled vocals that reinvent the singer’s uncertainties as a deliciously glum pose. Layer these up in the recording software of your choice. Labour in a back bedroom overlooking the railway line to summon ghosts.
‘Spirits arrive from West Yorkshire, from Glasgow and Dunedin, from the suburban Midwest. Rising from squats and university accommodation past, from damp rooms filled with old paperbacks, stale hash smoke and abandoned mugs of tea.
‘Even as you listen to this collection of home recordings, made over the last few years by South London duo Jemima, these ghosts crowd around. Born in the Seventies to chase the tape experiments and gentle strumming of the Sixties they crane their necks and edge closer to the laptop. When something this perfect comes along, even the most tranquillised must stir their stumps.
‘It’s lonely music created around a wine bottle with a candle in it, made too late to appear via Xpressway or Cordelia. Don’t imagine though, that it has no home in the now. These spectres remain close because they know they are still wanted. We need them as much as they need us.
‘This spell-binding LP is a window onto a half-lit world on a deeper plane of consciousness.’

Spectral, nostalgic, highly evocative, sometimes-desolate reflections — alone on the piano, and together with saxophonist and flautist Finn Peters —  soaked in Satie, Ravel, and Mompou. Expressive and enchanting, but mournfully distracted, with a tentative, exploratory wonderment which reminds you of Paul Klee’s well-worn idea of a drawing as a line taking a walk. Easy to recommend to those of you who recently enjoyed Mashu Hayasaka’s Etudes LP, on All Night Flight. This is lovely stuff from Jesse, in an unexpected departure from his work with Elmore Judd, the Gorillaz, Nyege Nyege Tapes…

‘Marino uses the language of folk music traditions to witness and retell our current reality through a feminist lens, with traditional American Sacred Harp hymns and murder ballads at the core. Improvisation, experimentation and group-singing re-draw these traditional songs — populating them with new sonic languages which reflect on contemporary ravages of contempt, greed, jealousy, violence, and utter disregard.’
With the Norwegian percussion trio Pinquins, and bassist Inga Margrete Aas; plus guests
Emilia Dorr (voice), Weston Olencki (trombone), and Wendy Eisenberg (guitar).

‘Joanna Brouk’s most ambitious recording, Sounds of the Sea is a concept album full of mystery and eroticism. A conch shell bookends this journey into the deep, going down and down and down further, never reaching bottom. Drawing inspiration from various legends of mermaids and sailors, Brouk weaves circling flutes, vocals, drones and whale songs to describe a sense of unfathomable longing more clearly than words could ever express. Sounds of the Sea is a hypnotic and profound achievement by one of new age’s greatest composers.’

‘Recordings from early 2025, while Johnny was bed-bound in an assisted living facility with multiple sclerosis. He speaks into an iPhone laid gently on his chest, in remarkably tender and emotive form. Love in all its permutations. The tangled, but caring nature of familial love, to the anguish and euphoria of romantic connection. Johnny has a remarkable ability to pose questions, and answers, that reflect the truest of realities, without cliche.
‘Joel Nelson nimbly helms the nearly entirely electronic backdrop, with Buchla Music Easel bubbling up between Johnny’s stream of consciousness. At times, Broadcast’s fuzzed out ballads come to mind, while at others, early Oneohtrix Point Never’s gauzy, distant drones cast anchor beneath the slippery syntax.’

The beloved 1974 hit with Help Me, Free Man In Paris and co.
Folk-rock with jazzy flavours — Joe Sample and Wilton Felder alongside Graham Nash and David Crosby…
The LP is newly remastered by Bernie Grundman under the supervision of Joni Mitchell.