Prolific digi-dub recording artist Tapes heads up the new year for Research, debuting with a two track 7” of slow and melodic synth cuts. At once playful and naïve yet masterfully constructed, the pieces unravel in unison to create the drowsy headspace associated with pitched down G-funk beats or vintage Italian library. Sharing a similarly visual immediacy to Amedeo Tomassi’s compositions for Biologia Marina, both ‘Sauna Research’ and ‘Aquarium Trousers’ conjure up subaquatic atmospheres of macrophytes and crill, wetsuits and snorkels. Tropical flora and fauna float by in the distance. Fittingly soundtracking the Australian summer, the new release follows on from recent daydream-like stoned outings for EM and Good Morning Tapes.

https://researchrecords.bandcamp.com/album/sauna-research-aquarium-trousers

Tapes – Sauna Research / Aquarium Trousers | snippets

Research Records indicate their inclination for cosmic instrumentation and kraut pervaded polyrhythms once again with an introduction to newcomer Glass Beams. Recorded at the beginning of 2020, Mirage is the first release from the artist, issuing four compositions that lend from a profusion of sounds and influences.

"I was looking for new energy & inspiration to write a bunch of new music. I recalled a childhood memory of my parents and I watching a DVD they had bought: ‘Concert For George’ (a tribute concert for George Harrison from the Beatles). George’s long time collaborator and friend Ravi Shanka put an Indian Orchestra together for that concert, and even though I hadn’t even started playing music at the time that I watched this, the sounds really stuck with me.

My father was born in India and moved here when he was 17, and after recalling this memory I decided to look up musicians from my father’s hometown and surrounding areas. I found a wealth of Indian classical, disco and pop music that formed the building blocks for this record. As soon as I had that vision of what I wanted to write and why I wanted to write it, the songs just flowed out really." – Glass Beams

The album's opener and title Mirage arrives with a coiling vocal mantra that conspires with a sliding bassline and transcendent synthwork, reminiscent of early 70’s prog jams yet inverted and futuristic. Taurus is a brisk arrangement, steeped with spaghetti-western elements and space-jazz to pave the way for the agile Kong. Rife with psych-fusion guitar phrases and instrumentation, Kong unfolds like a forecast lysergic voyage. The finale Rattlesnake nudges the serpent with intergalactic scales and spellbinding riffs. We may not know much about the enigmatic Glass Beams but Mirage is one epic inauguration, leaving the listener with more questions than answers.

Mirage

Glass Beams - Mirage EP | snippets

A morning puff up with Research Records founders Maryos Syawish and Alessandra Peach, direct from the couch at the Independent Music Exchange. Recorded at IME 6.11.2023

IME w/ Research Records on Skylab Radio

Genre-benders Big Yawn team up with Naarm based future rapper Teether for their latest high-octane single ‘2Stroke’. After a wild collaborative film score to Good Time, the formidable partnership kicked on to the studio to immortalise ‘2Stroke’.

The result is nothing short of perfection. Big Yawn’s notorious head nodding drum show and platter of dub-wise sound effects and synths sit in perfect harmony with Teether’s signature low slung and seemingly effortless rapping.

Album ‘NGBE’ out mid-July 2024.

NGBE

2Stroke

2Stroke (Ft. Teether) – Big Yawn

Our second release and the debut single from Melbourne four piece, Mildlife is finally here! 

Narrowing down the group's style into a genre is almost impossible, as they bond over the desire to push musical boundaries. No strangers to the Melbourne band scene, the four old friends have been drawing crowds through an epic journey at intimate venues and festivals for the best part of the past 4 years. Developing a tight live show bolstered by wild improvisation, the group have left punters itching for their first full length studio album that mines jazz, psych and disco for its irresistible groove.

"The Magnificent Moon" a 9 minute psychedelic disco journey is the opening track taken from Mildlife’s debut LP "Phase" due for release early 2018. Capturing the spirit of the band, this kaleidoscope jam is the interplanetary path between jazz, funk and disco with the perfect amalgamation of cosmic electronics and soulful acoustic instrumentation. 

Tom Shanahan explains its entrancing grip, “The Magnificent Moon feels like the veteran journeyman to the rest of the album. I’m not sure if that’s because it was written first or because it seems to know what it wants and has a more considered direction. It never really second guesses itself except for maybe just before the outro when he realises he may have journeyed too far and his space suit has a hole in it. But then he just jams some gum in the hole and gets on with it anyway.”

Single available here: https://mildlife.bandcamp.com/track/the-magnificent-moon

Mildlife - The Magnificent Moon

The debut LP by mildlife soundcloud is finally here!

Narrowing down Mildlife’s style into a genre is almost impossible, as they bond over the desire to push musical boundaries. No strangers to the Melbourne band scene, the four old friends have been drawing crowds through an epic journey at intimate venues and festivals for the best part of the past 4 years. Developing a tight live show bolstered by wild improvisation, the group have left punters itching for their first full length studio album “Phase” that mines jazz, psych and disco for its irresistible groove. 

Capturing the spirit of the band, the 6 track debut LP of kaleidoscope jams is the interplanetary path between jazz, funk and disco with the perfect amalgamation of cosmic electronics and soulful acoustic instrumentation.

Two Horizons

The Gloves Don't Bite

Phase

Zwango Zop

Im Blau

On a trip to Cuba in 1996, Barney McAll was invited to a ceremony in honour of the Yoruba goddess Yemaya. The experience drew McAll, one of Australia's leading jazz pianists who had moved to New York to join Gary Bartz' band, to delve deeper into Cuban music and culture. 

Originally released as a CD on the Jazzhead label in 2006, beside Hermeto Pascoal, Paul Grabowsky and many more, 'Mother of Dreams and Secrets' is a continuation of Barney's innovative exploration of sacred Afro-Cuban rhythms that has stood the test of time. Over the 9 track McAll shows many different shades of his Cuban schooling. The opening track 'Ellegua' captivates the listener with a hypnotic percussion, rhythmic vocals and McAlls astounding piano skills, backed by the use of his very own 'Chucky' a "homemade musical instrument for textural enterprise and underwater landscapes". Further into the LP we are treated to the almost ambient 'Yemaya Prayer' an alluring piece featuring Dreiser Durruthy's breathtaking vocals. 

This album was recorded at Ergrem Studios in Havana with some of Cuba's finest percussionists and musicians, alongside New York based American and Australian players including the likes of Kurt Rosenwinkel and Billy Harper. 

Available for the first time on vinyl, spread over a double LP for optimum sound quality.

D1. Barney McAll - Venus As A Boy (6:17)

B1. Barney McAll - Yemaya One (7:51)

A2. Barney McAll - Mysteries (8:15)

A1. Barney McAll - Ellegua (7:18)

Following the success of Mildlife's 'Phase', Research brings you an all-star cast delivering their take on their pick from Mildlife's debut album released early 2018 via Research Records. 

Melbourne-Berlin transplant, master producer Tornado Wallace kicks off the EP with his take on 'The Magnificent Moon'. Wallace delivers a stripped back, break infused cruiser, mutating Kevin McDowell's vocals into an unknown alien tongue whilst staying true to the originals infectious melodies. 

Joining Wallace on the A side is Melbourne's own, Butter Sessions label-bosses, beat makers and party starters, Sleep D.The duo takes you on uncharted odyssey through their version of 'Im Blau'. Psychedelic swells lurk under dubbed out chords, cosmic fragments of the original are revealed before a bounty of bongos and congas take over! 

On the flipside Swedish disco-house rockers Mount Liberation Unlimited turn 'The Gloves Don't Bite' on its head with an extended 12-minute take! A re-imagined bass line mixed with quirky Swedish vocals, and their signature drum freak-outs makes for a memorable ending to this diverse EP.

A2. Im Blau (Sleep D Remix)

A1. The Magnificent Moon (Tornado Wallace Remix)

Early in 2018, the world was introduced to Mildlife through their debut album Phase. Few first releases amass praise from Mojo, The Guardian, BBC 6 Music, The Express, and Shindig, then go on to be celebrated by DJ Mag, Resident Advisor, Worldwide FM, Dummy and Indie Shuffle. But it’s precisely this eclectic mix of genres, tastes, and influences that brought Mildlife together, and what they committed to reflecting in their sound. After a surreal start to 2018, the four-piece completed a sold-out national tour of Australia, and recently announced plans to cross the oceans for their debut Europe and UK tours.

With the release of their debut imminent, Mildlife took retreat at Research Records HQ in Melbourne, staying overnight after recording each morning and afternoon. It resulted in the evolution of the title track, newly imagined and re-contextualised at increased tempo with swathes of improvisation throughout. The studio recording was the culmination of the song’s growth in a live setting, evolving on club stages and at festivals throughout 2017.

Mildlife’s knack for locked-in grooves and celestial tones features heavily across ‘Phase II’, a more than 11-minute sonic journey. Kevin McDowell's synth soars while Adam Halliwell’s growing prowess as a flautist is peppered over James Donald’s shimmering percussion. Shortly after, Tom Shanahan's phased bass appears, and the four lock into a groove that gives a subtle nod to 1960s Krautrock band, Can. It’s not long before ‘Phase II’ erupts into a cosmic jazz-funk that urges you to move. It sucks you in, free of worry and consequence; utterly otherworldly. It’s no surprise that the band has been described as “kaleidoscopic”, “irresistible” and “enchanting”. With Mildlife, you’ll always leave wanting more.

Phase II

Mildlife - Phase II (RREP02)

Formed by the chief songwriters from Melbourne bands Crepes, Dreamin' Wild and Sagamore, Swazi Gold brings old friends together. Chris Jennings and Sam Cooper grew up in the Victorian coastal towns of Barwon Heads and Ocean Grove, while Tim Karmouche was an inland man, hailing from Ballarat in the state's north-west.

It's this togetherness that's at the heart of Swazi Gold's debut album, Jehovah's Whispers. There are six songs, two created by each member; through true collaboration and participation. Nothin' but a democracy here.

Jehovah's Whispers was recorded in a single weekend in 2017 at the Cooper's family home in Ocean Grove, and captures the deep friendship between the three members.

The first single from the album is "Disco", written by Jennings. He says the song is about, "moving to Melbourne and seeing how we've all changed. We've all come from these bands that were heavily influenced by the coast and were our hometowns. They've changed a lot. We've kind of stopped being from the coast," he says.

Driven by a sassy disco beat, the song name-checks towns dotted along Victoria's western coastline. These places, like Leopold, Port Arlington, Bell Brae and Torquay, are the former homes of Swazi Gold. The final places, and indeed the final words uttered in the song, are better known international hubs—like Barcelona, London and Berlin—suggesting the mainstreaming of worlds in moving to the big smoke.

On "Disco" and Jehovah's Whispers,Swazi Gold draw on their collective love of African music, American funk, and quirky, melody-driven pop music to explore the spaces between conventional genres.

Lyrically, the remaining five songs address a range of themes, from the realisation of personal limitations to seeing a thriving country town fade to nothingness. There's also a brooding one in there for anyone who's ever been ripped off.

Jehovah's Whispers proves the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. And in amidst the love and equality, Swazi Gold's debut album still packs a punch.

Swazi Gold - Disco (RESEARCHEP03)

A1. Tumbleweed (4:24)

B3. Reflections (8:27)

A1. By The Light Of The Pyramids
B1. Postcards From Gortupal

In an era of boundless self promotion, anonymity is a rare and precious thing. Listening to Trevor Jackson's NTS show one night we heard a glorious piece of music by something called Elite Beat. A quick search found 10 years worth of recorded material but not a single photo or youtube clip. They had made a record with Niger born guitarist Mdou Moctar but were based in Portland, Oregon. More questions than answers but we knew we had just heard one helluva cosmic link up! 

We still don't know what they look like but we can tell you Elite Beat is a 6 piece ensemble now in their 12th year as a musical collective. Their sound is non prescribed rhythm music with an emphasis on live playing, free form expression and dubbing techniques. Players who have absorbed the plethora of global grooves from dub, Ethiopoques and Tuareg guitar music (probably the odd Dead bootleg too). They aren't retromaniacs or here to revive a genre. Just some cats from Oregon talking that universal language, fueled by laugher and a vision of the eternal. 

*To preserve audio quality, the vinyl versions have been carefully shortened*

Elite Beat - By The Light Of The Pyramids (RREP03)

A1. Skinrat
B1. Thomas

After just 6 months since first seeing Big Yawn perform, we are thrilled to welcome them to the Research family. A compelling prelude to their debut album "No!" due out in late 2019.

Over six years the Melbourne-based group has evolved, with members of the band running various releases through label and collective Fallopian Tunes. As of 2019, Big Yawn had become a four-member music group, motivated by a history of studio production, prolific collaboration and quality hangout time.

The groups freshest effort 'Skin Rat/Thomas' captures the band performing live in the studio, and it's typical Big Yawn: fat and punchy low-end bass; drums and live drum processing; delay fx samples; thick syrupy synths. 'Skin Rat' is a hyperbolically dubbed out, tongue in cheek, magnetic blend of UK garage, footwork and breaks. And 'Thomas' takes cues from a slightly damaged post-punk sound, amplifying a brittle and sinister type of atomic porn-funk.

Limited to 200 copies. Hand numbered and housed in a screen-printed sleeve, artwork by Julian Hocking.

Skin Rat / Thomas

Big Yawn - Thomas (RREP04)

Dreamin’ Wild’s second album Heaven in Thirty Eleven owes a lot to Footscray. The inner-western suburb of Melbourne features not only in the album title (its postcode is 3011) but goes deeper to form a central part of the record’s narrative and reflection. 

For all six members - Chris Jennings (Swazi Gold, Sagamore, Sledgehammer), Sam Cooper (Crepes, Swazi Gold, Sagamore, Sledgehammer), Tim Karmouche (Crepes, Swazi Gold, The Murlocs), Sarah Quirk, Monty Hartnett (Sleep Decade, Miris, Sagamore) and James Guida (Laguna, Environments) - Footscray buoyed periods of music exploration and discovery. After more than six year of writing, rehearsing and recording in the suburb, there’s no doubt that Footscray is home for the band. 

Jennings adds that the album is, “a bit of a recap of the last three years for Dreamin’ Wild,” drawing attention to the change and growth many of the eight songs have undergone since creation. 

“I Don’t Disagree” is an album highlight; an almost seven-minute track that struts along calmly, taking life as it is. Quirk’s soulful refrain soars atop Jennings’ laconic vocals, carrying the song to its end. “Dynon Life” is another album gem, reminiscent of summer in the city, and happy seeking excess. 

Heaven in Thirty Eleven is an ode to a Melbourne suburb brimming with culture and stories, made by artists who are proud to call it home.

I Don't Disagree

Big Yawn - Skinrat (RREP04)

The Australian duo of Jarrod Zlatic and Nisa Venerosa harness expansiveness through a sepia-tone collage of intangible digital textures and adapted vocal chamber music. Formed in the early 2000’s, previous albums for cult-labels like Chapter Music and Siltbreeze waded through dubby psych-rock territories but their latest for ALTER stands alone. Recorded in Melbourne by Sam Karmel (F ingers, CS + Kreme), the album occupies an eerie, pastoral kind of twilight zone. Venerosa’s stark singing style challenging the ambient textures weaving in and out of the stereo field. 

Plain Songs slowly unfolds through a mesh of processed drones, flickering static and fragile yet propulsive bedding loops. G.B.H sees the pair utilising layers of spoken word and keyboard motifs atop spiralling background whirs and softly uttered harmonies. The late-night atmosphere pervades with On Temptation and Forever Turned where slow, dissonant passages work in tandem with Venerosa’s spectral vocal shifts. Zlatic’s trumpet howls into the ether on ‘Flowers and Fade’ accompanied by drum rattles, repetitive mantras and oscillating synthesisers to mark one of the LP’s most unique and isolated moments. There are hints of Nico’s Janitor of Lunacy and Meredith Monk’s Book of Days at play, where the icy screeches and distortions give way to the wax and wane poetry of ‘A Short Confession’. The overall power of Plain Songs hinges on the strength of the voice and the way it interacts with the sound world around it, Venerosa demonstrating an ability to flit between moods and assume control. It is ever present and in sync with the cosmos, fighting its way through the dark and igniting the beacon. 
credits

Australian pressing by Research Records. 

Releases September 20, 2019.

Plain Songs

Fabulous Diamonds - Plain Songs (album snippets)

Elite Beat is a musical collective from Portland, Oregon with a history spanning back to 2006.

'Selected Rhythms' captures the finest moments from all three of their ultra limited cassette series 'Casual Rhythms'.

Packed full of DIY dub mixing, cosmic orchestration and raw, percussion driven polyrhythms, the recordings have been remastered and put to vinyl for the first time with sections from Casual Rhythms Vol. 1 being re-shaped into previously unavailable single tracks.

Recording plays a big role in the Elite Beat creative process. The studio as an instrument. Much of the Elite Beat music is mixed in an all-hands-on-deck dub style approach - live with an analog mixer and loads of FX being thrown and dubbed in real time. The sound is genre-less rhythm music with an emphasis on live playing, free form expression and technique that borrows from soundsystem culture. Inspiration can be heard from all parts of time and place. Some Ethio Jazz, Black Ark psychedelia, Exotica, Malian blues, even Haight-Ashbury in the summer of love. Each member an accomplished musician in their own right, Elite Beat thrive on collaboration. 2018 saw the release of their astral-Saharan jams with celebrated Taureg guitarist Mdou Moctar.

The players get together every Wednesday evening, sometimes to chat, sometimes to play. The 'record' button gets pressed when they find what they are searching for. For this crew it's all about 'Casual Rhythms / Harmonious Lifestyles' - if things don't fall under that mantra, then it's got to go. 'Less is more' for Elite Beat and their cosmic sounds.

A SIDE:

Roggish & Unclean 
Go Back To Oly
Budget Dancehall
Mellow Fellows
B SIDE:

North Trini 
Powerdance
Sports Radio
RLC (Ambient Mix)

Selected Rhythms

Elite Beat - Selected Rhythms (RESEARCH07) snippets

Condemned Compilations, a collection of almost-pop songs and sketched experiments by Sydney’s darling duo, Jay (of Rangoons fame) and Yuta (of Orion and Low Life infame). The affection that the two share for UK DIY is immediately apparent in the ramshackle approach and offbeat wryness of humour employed throughout.

Immediately accessible synth-pop track ‘Swimming Pool’, shouldn’t work on paper. It's playful naivety could irk, but instead somehow remains on the right side of endearment. Another highlight, ’Access Card’, offers a Jay-driven thought experiment in self-betterment over a quickened, unchanging pulse where insidious undertones loom large. Another clear standout is ‘Mysterious Flaws In The House We Built Ourselves’, the interplay between vocal melodies and the askew beat as uneven as the titular living-space. Closer, ’Crucial Haze’, is Current 93 by way of Oasis. Ordinarily anything blurring these lines would be a clear anomaly, although bookending this eclectic collection it suits.

Pop music, at its best, has always succeeded in simplistic arrangements. Punk is obviously also grounded in the democracy of what little is needed equipment and skill-wise in order to make a song that burns. Much modern music churned out (punk or otherwise) seemingly values ease of reference and with it, a smooth digestion. When bedroom-pop sensibilities have become another branded hashtag, rather than an unintended by-product of necessity, it becomes increasingly difficult to discern what is a genuine trip. What to do with all of history at your fingertips?

A good deal of the early UK DIY and Australian art-rock bands Jay & Yuta can be viewed as a modern continuum of didn’t exist past a single or handful of 7”s. They were often young, without any musical education and didn’t remain congealed together long enough to better master their instruments. But they also didn’t lose their sense of humour or immediacy and, with that, lose the magic that makes those records still spin 40 years later.

Condemned Compilations

Jay & Yuta – Condemned Compilations | snippets

Research Records presents Melbourne electronic quartet Big Yawn’s second contribution to the label, South Preston Garage. A title to honour the bands beloved bandroom, S.P.G. compiles demos extracted from the studio for a digital release with a limited run of cassettes. Big Yawn reflects that completing the mini album “presented the challenge of creatively engineering the lo-fi recordings in a way that offered thrilling and creative insight for us and perhaps some replay value for the listener.”

S.P.G. embodies Big Yawn’s trademark pastiche, fusing together rich percussion and sweeping synthesizers that are recontextualised through an extensive shed jam. The band characterises the first two tracks British Teeth and Burno as “Big Yawn flavoured DnB,” with “refracted drum phrasing and unrelenting delays.” Cascading acid-tinged bass rules in the quivering 4 Dads; a venture into the band’s stockier temperament. The panoramic Burton Bell delivers raw and biting percussion, while remaining faithful to electronics with its layered sampling. The release then disperses into seaside rapture with its farewell Bad Boy. On Bad Boy, the band comment that the track “is perhaps our most melodic number to date, with heavily looping synths evoking a Hiroshi Sato/city-pop feel.”

What is perhaps most unique about Big Yawn is that they present familiar electronic sounds amplified as a live band. A timely release; S.P.G. translates the satisfaction of hearing a live band in a period when all we really want is to go to a gig.

South Preston Garage

Big Yawn – S.P.G. (snippets)

Research Records continue their voyage into Elite Beat’s extraordinary back catalogue with their second compilation Selected Rhythms Vol. 2. The chosen tracks are lifted from the Portland collective's three-part cassette series Casual Rhythms; a treasure chest of meditative and genre-defying instrumentals where percussion and dub accents prevail.

Elite Beat’s approach to producing music is their routine for respite. The band reflects when they come together weekly, it’s an opportunity to put down their other projects, ambitions, work and life stresses for a few hours and “just be.” This spirit flows into their free-form expression, absorbing both the band and the listener. Additionally, Elite Beat reveals the foundation of their output lies in the discipline of being able to sustain vibration through repetition. There’s a constant coiling mantra throughout each track, the band commenting “while many musicians can get totally bored playing the same thing over and over, we love it!”

The mixing process swings between embracing the warmth of live recordings and generating noise with analog manipulation. The band experiments with their recorded sound expressing “we are less concerned with sounding like 90% of recorded music out there and more concerned with trying shit out.” Elite Beat also cite dub music and it’s process of recording as an inspiration and how this approach lends itself to a “deep listening experience,” a notion the band channels artfully.

Remastered for the first time on vinyl, Selected Rhythms Vol. 2 adds to the immersive and interstellar tapestry of Elite Beat. The compilation delves deep into the healing and hypnosis that characterises the collective. For those who were inevitably left looking for more with Selected Rhythms Vol. 1, here’s a no-brainer.

Elite Beat – Selected Rhythms Volume 2 | snippets

Research is a Melbourne based, independent record label since 2017.

For any enquiries including Australian distribution get in touch at hello@researchrecords.com.au For distribution outside of Australia please contact luke@kudosrecords.co.uk

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