Paradigmatic yet forward-looking township jazz from 1975.
Braiding Wes Montgomery into marabi, the legendary guitarist leads a stellar line-up of musicians including Kippie Moeketsi, Barney Rachabane, Gilbert Matthews, Dennis Mpale, and Sipho Gumede.
The opener glances sideways at the commercial success of Abdullah Ibrahim’s recent Mannenberg — but the real magic follows on, when the players cut loose in their own, new directions.
This is the first vinyl reissue. Sleevenotes by Kwanele Sosibo feature interviews with key musicians, and previously unpublished photos.

Encouraged by the Art Ensemble of Chicago, the trumpeter Baikida Carroll upped sticks in 1972, moving from Missouri to Paris. He travelled with several colleagues from the Black Artists Group: saxophonist/flutist Oliver Lake, trombonist Joseph Bowie, drummer Charles ‘Bobo’ Shaw, and trumpeter Floyd LeFlore. Inevitably, they soon crossed paths with Jef Gilson, who invited Carroll to record for his young Palm label, in June 1974. Carroll brought along Lake, and the Franco-Chilean pianist Manuel Villaroel, from the group Matchi-Oul, which had already appeared on Futura in 1971. The lineup was completed by the great Brazilian percussionist Naná Vasconcelos, fresh from the triumph of his own debut LP as leader — the terrific Africadeus, for Saravah.
The first side is knockout: everybody plays a range of percussion and bells on the opener — its own iteration of space jungle love — embedding stately interventions by woodwind and brass; before the wildly funky free-jazz of Forest Scorpio, with raging saxophone and keyboard, and monster groove. The second half is thrillingly hybrid and one-of-a-kind: more reflective, intimate, and spaced-out — increasingly hallucinatory — with an improvisatory feel for dissonance and repetition which beckons Terry Riley and György Ligeti into the mix.
The original Palm artwork is scrupulously reproduced, and an eight-page booklet contains rare and previously unpublished photos. The more expensive LP is from an edition of just 175 copies, with see-through vinyl, and a silk-screened wraparound sleeve, numbered and signed by the artist Stefan Thanneur.
Hotly recommended.

An imperiously fuck-you, stoned, fuzzed-out garage stomper; first issued on the Dot label in 1965.
Produced by Dave Hassinger, guiding force behind the Electric Prunes; arranged by Jack Nitzsche; written by Donovan (for Dana Gillespie). Karen nails it.
This is the slightly longer of the two Dot issues. The instrumental on the flip adds freakbeat guitar.

‘This fifth LP in the series opens with a banger: Street Dance by Bonnie Jean, in the style of Shirley Ellis’ The Nitty Gritty, with Darlene Love & The Blossoms clearly audible on background vocals. The Hollywood-based Doré imprint is also the source of You Really Never Know Till It’s Over by The Vel-Vetts, One Way Street by The Swans, a soulful update of The Teddy Bears’ To Know Him Is To Love Him by the Darlings, and He’s Groovy — featuring lead vocals by Sheilah Page, formerly of groups such as the Bermudas, Becky & The Lollipops, The Majorettes, Joanne & the Triangles and Beverly & the Motor Scooters — by The Front Page & Her.
‘Other highlights include The Sweethearts’ Supremes-influenced No More Tears, the sophisticated slowie Lonely Girl by The Lovettes (that’s them on the front sleeve), My Heart Tells Me So by The Del-Phis (an early incarnation of Martha & The Vandellas), Brenda Holloway’s lovely pre-Motown Constant Love, and the Fran-Cettes’ terrific interpretation of Heart For Sale.’

‘Sublime, ethereal minimalism: the first drawing together of Onogawa’s soundtrack compositions, plotting a decade of music for films by cult filmmaker Gakuryū Ishii.
‘Sequenced into an album by Onogawa himself, this retrospective spans a fertile period of collaboration with Ishii, through soundtracks for three remarkable films — August in the
Water (1995), Labyrinth of Dreams (1997), and Mirrored Mind (2005) — where the cinema is texturally and sensually imbued with the spiritual, ambient, dreamlike quality of Onogawa’s music.
‘The sound Onogawa conjures for these films is elegant and patient, often spare or essential in form, but saturated in a strange and otherworldly, poetic emotion and atmosphere. Boundaries are crossed between New Age and science fiction, passing through blissfulness, melancholy, and paranoia, towards enchantments of mood and colour.
‘It’s notable that the compositions on this album straddle the millennium, with a fitting mix of divine and uncertain themes. New listeners might hear links to Mark Snow’s work for the X-Files and Millennium, or the soundtracks of certain future-facing and future-fearing Japanese anime or cyberpunk.
‘Onogawa’s music adds great depth and tenor to the sensory experience of the films themselves, but it stands just as strongly as a listening experience on its own terms; a virtuosic example of Ambient that changes in hue when turned in the light. Remarkably, like Ishii’s films, Onogawa’s work has never been widely available outside of fervid underground fan posts, usually sourced from extremely limited and private CDs limited to Japan.
‘This retrospective seeks to remedy that, presenting Onogawa as one of the great composers of the last three decades.’

“This is killer,” says Ben UFO.

The oldest form of North Indian classical music still performed today — dhrupad — played by Madhuvanti on an instrument she built herself, recorded at home.
Two ragas; over ninety minutes.
Full-color gatefold, with extensive liner notes.

Four dazzling, extended engagements with mbalax master-drumming.
The contribution from Holy Tongue is chase-the-devil steppers — thumping, clangorous, reverberating — super-charged with energy and atmosphere. From the off, drummer Valentina Magaletti detonates a hard rain of small bombs, rounds of fire, ticking fuses. Musical co-ordinates are somewhere between classic On-U Sound crew like African Head Charge, The Mothmen, and Creation Rebel, and the experimental funk of the Pop Group and 23 Skidoo, at their funkiest. Thrillingly, the two dubs are increasingly deranged.
Adjusting the same wavelengths as her superb Workaround LP, Beatrice Dillon plays spaced-out, abstract synth-work against the bodily physicality of the ancient, shifting mbalax rhythms. The music is poised, mindful, tentative; but also limber, fleet, and magical.
Phantasmagorical and efflorescent, Lamin Fofana’s one-two is simply stunning. Both excursions are wide-open, beautiful, epic, and propulsive — the first mix is banging and headlong, the second more syncopated and serpentine — teeming with freshly sublime, funkdafied updates on Jon Hassell’s Fourth World possible musics.
The two parts of LABOUR’s Etu Keur Gui engage the same sequence of drum patterns (called bakks) from different perspectives. The duo performed portions of this piece at the opening ceremony of the Dakar Biennial in 2022, at the Grand National Theater, with thirty sabar players from the family of Doudou Ndiaye Rose. This Wolof phrase for the inside-yard of a home — a meeting-place, an architectural breather — doubles here as a metaphor for inner space on a metaphysical level; and Pan Sonic, Muslimgauze, Zoviet France, early Shackleton… all ghost across the threshold.

‘Eventually crowned Queen of the Norfolk Sound, Barbara Stant was just a teenager when she auditioned for Shiptown impresario Noah Biggs in 1970. A dozen sides were tracked throughout the decade, producing a body of work that stretched from deep soul to northern soul to sister funk. By 1978 disco was in overdrive, Noah Biggs was in the ground, and Stant’s career on hold. My Mind Holds Onto Yesterday is what remains.’

‘Teenage melancholy from the original Miami Sound Machine. Backed by the infamous FAMU Marching 100 Band and Frank Williams’ crack shot players The Rocketeers, I Am Controlled By Your Love compiles sides from Helene Smith’s ‘60s tenure with the Deep City, Lloyd, Reid, and Blue Star labels. A sweltering album of twelve deeply soulful, alternate universe hits from the First Lady of Miami Soul!’

A fourth LP of spiritual jazz by this feted nine-piece from Australia.
‘A stunning work, full of integrity and class… Essential’ (Echoes).
‘Wonderful record, full of some great Kamasi/Donald Byrd/even Art Blakey moments.’ (The Guardian).

Originally released in 1975. Featuring guest musicians Ken Boothe, Delroy Washington, Bob Davis, Gene Rondo, and former members of the Cimarons. .. and a sprinkling of Black Ark magic.

Aka the Clem Bushay All Stars, including Candy McKenzie, Dennis Bovell, Janet Kay, Jimmy Mack, Junior English, Moon Rocks and Zabandis…
From 1977.