‘A studio recording from 1979, previously unreleased. It is primarily structured around pairs of tunes by Charles Mingus, Thelonious Monk, and Duke Ellington (or Billy Strayhorn), adding Ornette Coleman’s Lonely Woman for good measure. The results are stunningly intimate and show the twosome’s capacity for creative interplay at a fairly early stage in its unfolding. Pithecanthropus Erectus gets pared down to its essential walking-bass-ness, while Monk’s Evidence is taken apart, and solo spots by both men are as riveting as one would expect.’

Overproof sufferers by Sweeney Williams, with the Wailers Band.

Peerless cover of the soul classic — recorded at Randy’s in 1974 with Fully Fullwood, Chinna Smith, Tony Chin, Santa Davis… and Errol T at the controls.
It’s no surprise that Carless is a soul boy, into Jerry Butler and The Dells back then; one half of the Little Roys, when they cut Bongo Nyah for Lloyd Daley.
Crucial bunny.

Eighteen freeform electronic miniatures by Lorenz Lindner — aka Mix Mup — after his love of experimental ambient and soundtrack idioms.

Outstanding, spiritualised jazz-funk; keenly focussed but free and warm; steeped in post-bop and wide-open to r&b; somewhere between Lonnie Liston Smith’s Cosmic Echoes and Roy Ayers’ Ubiquity. Plenty here for dancers, chin-strokers and dreamers all.
The personnel discloses generous musical co-ordinates… Marvin Blackman from the Rashied Ali Quartet is here, and Ryo Kawasaki. James Mason and Justo Almario were later collaborators. Just a couple of years before this, Tarika Blue leader Phil Clendeninn was playing in a New York funk outfit alongside Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards…

Ace, freaky deaky boogie — dense, extrovert and synthy — originally out on Oil Capital.

Off-the-wall James Brown runnings, coming apart at the seams in Antananarivo, Madagascar, in 1967.

‘Three adventurous, spacious displays of Smith’s unique and innovative trumpet — besides percussion, tuned percussion and flute — right at the crest of his induction into the pantheon of AACM greats. A candid snapshot of one of the most vital musicians to extend the jazz tradition, testing his craft and artistry with a bright, pure-toned sensibility and deeply soulful melodic imagination.’

The violinist’s first solo record, originally released on Hat Hut in 1980. A mixture of his own compositions, extrapolated at length in an intimate live concert, as well as traditional and improvised material. Remastered from original tapes and augmented by newly discovered recordings from the same concert. Great to hear Giuseppi Logan on here, briefly in from the cold.

‘CD Of The Week… the best soul album — in the real sense of the word — you’ll hear this year… classic, blistering afro-beat’, Daily Telegraph; ‘as tight as a pressure cooker… fierce and fun’, The Wire.