a big mess

From the liner notes of our 2-disc Ebo Taylor retrospective, Life Stories:

Ebo acknowledges the influence of US jazz rockers Blood Sweat & Tears and
– less obviously, perhaps – Deep Purple on this easy going mid-tempo
piece, written a few years before it was recorded, when Osibisa and
various ‘blaxploitation’ themes were hip. “I was trying to fuse rock and jazz together with highlife,” Ebo recalls. “This kind of music was ahead of its time – not very popular when we recorded it!”

Life Stories

Peace On Earth

Ebo Taylor- Peace On Earth

Seek & Destroy

NO THANK YOU

Gorilla

We've been fans and followers of The Mole for a very long time, so we are excited to share "New Family", a sublime slice of ambient grooves that bumps somewhere between hip hop and house. 

"New Family" is taken from the album, 'The River Widens' on Circus Company.  Originally a limited cassette-only release on Eddie C's Red Motorbike, now due for release on 20 January on double vinyl, full digital release and cassette once again.

Never one to shy away from synth deep dives, or raw sample flip collaging, this collection of 21 works checks all the boxes. Ambient trippers to straight up neck-snapping instrumental beats. Not forgetting tastes of the more uptempo, highly-assured and hypnotic dance floor feels the world has come to love The Mole for. 

Moments of casual chilling are interspersed with effortless, emotive angles, some evoking the charm of his Little Sunshine release for Circus Company in 2017.

The River Widens

Buy/Stream

Exclusive Premiere: The Mole "New Family" (Circus Company)

Torn Sail - Birds

Jimi Tenor & Kabu Kabu - Dede (Baumhaus Remix)

Richard Pike - Vanitas

Sadeo (feat. Feather)

Pick up a copy of Highlife On The Move direct from:
Soundway Store: smarturl.it/highlifedirect
iTunes: smarturl.it/highlifeonthemove
Amazon: smarturl.it/HOTMAmazon

Chris Ajilo & His Cubanos - Afro Mood

Featuring Tata Din Din Jobarteh, Ed "Preachermann" Holley and the Antibalas Horns

Written and Produced by Jon Fine
Ed "Preachermann" Holley: Vocals
Tata Din Din Jobarteh: Kora and Vocals
Jon Fine: Bass, Guitar, Keys
Stuart Bogie: Saxophone
Martin Perna: Saxophone
Jordan Mclean: Trumpet
Nathan Hank: Drums
Matt Hauser: Percussion

Mastered by Joe Lambert at Joe Lambert Mastering,  Brooklyn NY
Engineered by Jon Fine and Lee Weinberg at Feet First Studios
Additional Engineering by Mark Bengston
Recorded at Creature Studios NYC and Tata Din Din’s in Brikama, The Gambia

https://www.facebook.com/theholyforest
https://www.theholyforest.com


©2015 Mighty Fine Music

Africa Calling

Khun Narin - Lam Phu Thai #1

Sir Hiss - Tai Chi Riddim

The Homeless Wanderer by Tsegué-Maryam Guébrou. From the album “Éthiopiques, Vol. 21: Piano Solo”, performed by the composer.



The Homeless Wanderer, by Tsegué-Maryam Guébrou (Ethiopia)

https://alogteohoandhissoundsofjoy.bandcamp.com/album/mam-yinne-wa

Alogte Oho And His Sounds Of Joy - Mam Yinne Wa

An ethereal, unresolved presence fading into the stereo field, Hilja breathes into life with a haunted synth line and self-sampling vocal hook that instantly creates an enchanted space. Hilja is the debut album by Glasgow-based musician Maria Rossi aka Cucina Povera. Named after a style of southern Italian traditional cooking associated with precarity and making-do, a philosophy of simplicity and stoicism that applies perfectly to the spare but beautiful music Rossi experiments with. Hilja’s marriage of minimal synth, field recordings and the hymnal dexterity of Rossi’s vocal performances creates a new language, sometimes literally, to be spoken in some mythological Fourth World we’ve yet to create.
 
Originally from Finland, Rossi brings an acute sense of space, surroundings, and practicality to her working practice, with each composition often relying on a limited sound palette to create deeply affecting messages which transcend language. Cucina Povera’s power is to communicate purely, often down to the solo-choir nature of Rossi’s multi-layered voice, an achingly beautiful instrument which has seems to have an innate spirituality in its grain. The tension between the means and the end is at the heart of Cucina Povera, the invocation of a kind of secular spirituality at times using nothing but Rossi’s voice. Indeed there’s almost a Dogme-like purity to the arrangements: Elektra is a soothing song based around the lapping waves of Rossi’s wordless backing vocals and a simple field recording of stones knocked together. Kehoitus is completely a cappella, a haunted fairytale told in glossolalia, evoking a quasi-religious experience with very little.
 
For music often minimal and simple there’s a boldness that belies Hilja’s status as a debut. Rossi allows each word, each sound and rhythm to exist in its own space, finding its own relationship with its surroundings. Mesikämmenen Veisu is perhaps the most ecclesiastical sounding composition here; burbling water trickles below a virtuoso vocal, with incredible arrangements in several registers undulating above. A meditation to relieve hunger and restriction, it’s a perfect summing up of Hilja, a music ambient but completely earthed, finding enchantment in what you have to hand, the realism of magic, the magic of realism.

Cucina Povera: Totean

Alternate version of 'Without You' by Danny L Harle featuring vocals from Caroline Polachek. This was played on a Rinse FM podcast hosted by Danny on June 6th 2017

Without You (feat Caroline Polachek)

Danny L Harle - Without You (feat. Caroline Polachek)

Premiered by @resident-advisor 
https://www.residentadvisor.net/tracks/893826

"I made this track from samples of a piano board I recorded in EMS Stockholm with LAIR while we were working on our project. And some microphone hiss for the beats. I have been making purely percussive tracks recently for my upcoming album, so for this track I wanted to have an emotive melodic element as well. The title refers to the difficulty it seems as a human to live as you truly want, as opposed to how you think you should." - @eomac

Eomac - Don't Fear Your Own Heart

Order 2xLP: https://bit.ly/2KvvQBJ

Chandra Oppenheim was a child star like no other. As the daughter of famed conceptual artist Dennis Oppenheim. By age nine, Chandra was staying up late at her parents’ art-world parties, collaborating in her father’s projects, and performing her own plays at downtown hotspots such as The Kitchen and Franklin Furnace.

This set the stage for Chandra’s course-altering collaboration with members of The Dance, who were looking to form yet another project and found their muse/fuse in 10-year-old Chandra. Transportation EP, originally released in 1980 by The Dance’s own label, ON/GoGo. Balancing on razor- wire guitars, liquid bass lines, and dub-style melodica, the Chandra band unveiled their first four songs: “Opposite”, “Concentration”, “Subways”, and “Kate.”

At age 12, the post-punk pre-teen took the stage with her band for the first
time at New York’s legendary Mudd Club. A whirlwind of press coverage
ensued from glossy magazines like Vogue and Paris Match to the influential underground zine Non LP B Side and a Soho News cover story.

The infectious, propulsive “Get It Out Of Your System” opens Chandra’s second EP with one of her most commanding performances. “Stranger” slows the pace with stop-start rhythms, woozy synths, and the harmonized return of the melodica, while its lyrics find her being followed by a mysterious character revealed to be a woman. “Tish Le Dire” sounds like The B-52s in an eerie alternate universe with instructions on speaking up to your parents or authorities to the point of threatening suicide.

Chandra stepped away from the band at age 14 to focus on her education. Sadly, the second EP was shelved and would not see the light of day for decades.

Chandra’s trip continues with this new deluxe reissue from Telephone Explosion Records. Returning her debut EP to its original four- song, single-record release at a dancefloor-ready remastered 45 RPM, the expanded edition also adds to the second EP with a pair of never released songs from her 1983 four-track cassette demos. “Day Without Success” and “They’re All Alike” find Chandra’s dreamlike vocals driven by minimal wave synth zaps and pulsating drum machines. 

Words by Jesse Locke. 

“Transportation EPs" will be released on gatefold 2xLP / digital on December 7th, 2018.

Chandra - Day Without Success (Previously Unreleased)

Stream + Pre-order: https://ffm.to/losinglinda
Order Vinyl + CD: http://bit.ly/losinglinda-cascine

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"Perfect Place" is the first single from Losing, Linda, the new album by Sui Zhen for Cascine. 

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Sui Zhen
https://www.instagram.com/sui_zhen
https://www.facebook.com/suizhen/
https://twitter.com/beckysuizhen

Cascine
instagram.com/cascine_
facebook.com/cascinelabel/
twitter.com/cascine_

Losing, Linda

Perfect Place

Stream + Pre-order

Sui Zhen - Perfect Place

Available on Analog Africa No.13 - The Skeletal Essences of Afro Funk
Release date: April 30th

Min We Tun So

lori e allen
deborah wale
lottie poulet
katie spafford

a big mess

Tears|Ov