‘A sonic snapshot of America’s steel capital, probing the fertile cavern between the departure of the Jackson 5 to Motown and the collapse of U.S. steel… a love letter to Gary, Indiana, salvaging twenty-plus lost songs from the southern-most tip of Lake Michigan. Housed in a deluxe tip-on gatefold jacket, with a 16-page booklet crammed with photos, ephemera, and an in-depth essay, Skyway Soul connects the dots between The Spaniels, Michael Jackson, and Freddie Gibbs.’

‘Operating in the farthest margins of L.A.’s cutthroat music business from 1961-1991, Mel Alexander’s Consolidated Productions was among the longest running Black-owned independent record conglomerates of the 20th century. Disentangling a web of imprints — including Ajax, Angel Town, Car-A-Mel, Emanuel, and Kris — this first volume gathers 28 smouldering R&B cuts by the likes of Lee Harvey, B .B. Carter, Marilyn Calloway, the Del Reys, the Deb Tones, the De Velles, Gene Russell ’s Trio, Jimmy ‘Preacher’ Ellis, and Ty Karim.’
Presented with customary class and attentiveness by Numero.

Twenty-six shots of late-night R&B out of Jim Kirchstein’s Cuca studio, in the late sixties.
Originally released via minuscule pressings into the Wisconsin wilderness, tracing the paths across the hinterlands of Highway 12 between the Chicago, Milwaukee and Rockford soul scenes.
The likes of Harvey Scales, Betty Moorer, The Twiliters, Birdlegs & Pauline, The Esquires, Artie & The Pharaohs… in another gem-studded chapter of the alternate history of soul music.

‘Coxsone Boy’ showed Mr. Dodd how to lick over Studio One’s vast armament of foundational rhythms for the dancehall era to come (and claim them back from Channel One). He knew them all backwards from singing over them on his sound.
Killer selection.