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A new remastered and expanded edition of the most popular of Manual records - the 2005 shoegaze classic Azure Vista. Jonas Munk aka Manual remastered the original six album tracks and added seven live tracks performed in Chicago and Los Angeles on Manual's 2007 US tour. Long time friend and partner in music Jakob Skott redesigned the artwork for this 2xCD edition, which comes in a six panel Eco-wallet.

 10 years after its release, Azure Vista still feels like a bold, and highly original work that's near-impossible to categorize. There's a definite dream-pop influence, occasionally recalling Robin Guthrie's most panoramic guitar work in Cocteau Twins, as well as Slowdive's oceanic euphoria. But this is far from being another shoegaze-homage. What really sets this set apart is the earnest and completely un-ironic incorporation of 1980s fm-radio sounds and John Hughes soundtracks, which Jonas Munk absorbed throughout his childhood and early teens - ghosts of Tears for Fears, New Order, Simple Minds and The Cure can all be heard throughout these six abundant, adventurous compositions, enveloping the ambience and electronics in a strange, nostalgic haze.

 The album was partly written and conceptualized during a three month trip to California, when Munk was 22, and comes off as a crazed, innocent celebration of youth, freedom, sun and sea  gradually unfolding over the course of 47 blissful minutes. If one senses a conceptual similarity to M83's indie hit record Sartudays = Youth (as well as one or two similar synth-riffs) , it's worth noting that Azure Vista was released three years earlier (!).

 The second disc features 7 live cuts performed with Jakob Skott (aka Syntaks) on synths and samplers. There's a previously unreleased track included (Untitled) as well as radically different versions of Marbella – a track Munk originally wrote with Robin Guthrie – and Rise (a Syntaks track), as well as Sal Paradise (from the collaborative Manual & Syntaks effort Golden Sun).

Manual: Azure Vista 2015 remaster

Manual: "Clear Skies Above The Coastline Cathedral"

Manual: "Summer Of Freedom"

Manual: "Twilight"

Manual: "Tourmaline"

Manual: "Neon Reverie"

Manual: "Azure Vista"

Azure Vista Records is an independently owned and operated label based in Odense, Denmark with a strong focus on blissed-out electronic sounds!