CDs + Vinyl:

The 2 Bears – The Night Is Young CD/2xLP (Kartel/Southern Fried Records)

Two years ago The 2 Bears dropped a debut album that re-invigorated a genre and gathered music fans in the open embrace of house music with Be Strong, an album rooted in their love for London. The Night Is Young takes on a more global vision. With a love for their home city still at its heart, the album pulls influences and experiences from across the world of dance music, drawing deeply from their trip to Africa last summer.

The Aislers Set – How I Learned to Write Backwards [Reissue/2002] CD/LP+MP3 (Slumberland/Suicide Squeeze)

The Aislers Set occupy an enviable place in the pop pantheon. Brimming with drunken romanticism, sharp pop sensibilities, and timeless melodies, The Aislers Set reveled in the history of great pop, spiking their classicist ‘60s-tinged tunes with post-punk energy and originality of bands like the Fire Engines and The June Brides. Every song is a meticulously constructed sound world, where the arrangement and instrumentation sublimely and uncannily bring each tune to completeness. Unfortunately they stopped playing and recording together by 2004 due to life commitments. (Vinyl version pressed on HQ-180gm green wax.)

Allo Darlin’ – We Come From The Same Place CD (Slumberland)

The third full-length recording from the much loved Anglo-Australian four-piece is made up of smart, beautiful pop music, with lyrics that resonate with experience and melodies that chime, echo and soar.

Elisa Ambrosio – The Immortalist CD/LP (Drag City)

“Elisa Ambrogio, lead singer of the art-rock heavyweight Magik Markers, usually isn’t one to get too sentimental. But her new solo album, The Immoralist, includes some heart-wrenching songs, including its arresting opening track, ‘Superstitious.’ — NPR

[Read more…] about New Releases for October 21, 2014

CDs + Vinyl:

Absolutely Free – Absolutely Free CD/LP (Lefse)

Absolutely Free is a trio based in Toronto. The group formulates musical experiments based on instrumentation, compositional structure and other formal qualities ubiquitous to popular rock music. Following years of touring and releasing albums with defunct art punk band DD/MM/YYYY, the members of Absolutely Free set out to create a more hypnotic, patient music that integrates analog electronics, African polyrhythms, psychedelia, Bollywood and Krautrock.

Acacia – Coma Witch 2xCD/LP (Rise)

The Acacia Strain are pioneers of the deathcore genre, and for the past 13 years they have been a staple in the metalcore community.

The Aislers Set – How I Learned to Write Backwards [Reissue/2002] CD/LP+MP3 (Slumberland/Suicide Squeeze)

The Aislers Set occupy an enviable place in the pop pantheon. Brimming with drunken romanticism, sharp pop sensibilities, and timeless melodies, The Aislers Set reveled in the history of great pop, spiking their classicist ‘60s-tinged tunes with post-punk energy and originality of bands like the Fire Engines and The June Brides. Every song is a meticulously constructed sound world, where the arrangement and instrumentation sublimely and uncannily bring each tune to completeness. Unfortunately they stopped playing and recording together by 2004 due to life commitments. (Vinyl version pressed on HQ-180gm green wax.)

Edip Akbayram & Dostlar – Nedir Ne Degildir [Reissue/1977] CD/LP (Pharaway Sounds)

As Turkey’s political factions turned more and more violent in the late 1970s, Buscemi-eyed Edip Akbayram was nearly beaten up by rioting audiences for daring to sing about rural points of view that were naturally critical of Istanbul’s political leaders. This second album of Anatolian psychedelia, originally released in 1977, showed defiance even in its gatefold art, with a drawing of the band members seeming to grow straight out the ground, covered in plant tendrils. Akbayram poached members of Mogollar and Bariş Manço’s Kurtalan Ekspres to get the best fuzz breaks and hammond slams and put ’em straight in your ears. Vinyl comes with exact reproduction of the original gatefold pop-up sleeve.

Tony Allen – Film Of Life CD (Jazz Village)

For his tenth album, Tony Allen, the co-creator of Afrobeat, has pulled out all the stops. At his side are French producers The Jazzbastards and fellow world-class musicians including Damon Albarn (Gorillaz, The Good The Bad & The Queen, Blur). With Film Of Life, Allen has produced an album that has the ring of a true self-portrait, offering an overview of his rich and exemplary career that brings together bebop, Afrobeat jazz and psychedelic pop. Vinyl version due October 27.

The Apartments – The Evening Visits… And Stays For Years CD/2xLP+MP3 (Captured Tracks)

Upon release earlier this year overseas, The Evening Visits received strong praise and drew comparisons to a wide range of acts such as Cocteau Twins, Nick Drake and Bob Dylan. This expanded domestic edition includes several bonus tracks and a collection of demos.

[Read more…] about New Releases for October 14, 2014