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Spotify|June2023

Best New Albums | June 2023 SunNeverSetsOnMusic

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Shadow Kingdom

by Bob Dylan

Released 2 June 2023

Columbia Records

*****

With the Never-Ending Tour grinding to a halt due to the COVID-19 lock-downs, Bob Dylan staged a startling original concert in Shadow Kingdom, a live-in-the-studio show captured in a noir-ish black & white film. Stripped of those striking visuals on this 2023 album -- released two years after the film aired for a brief time on the internet -- the music sounds remarkable, a genuine re-imagination of Dylan's warhorses. The key to Shadow Kingdom is that he's not performing any of these songs like he did at the time they were written. They're given inventive arrangements that are right in the vein of the pan-American roadhouse music he's been making since the dawn of the 21st century: they're blues and rockabilly, they're soul and country, they're standards meant to be crooned in a saloon. Dylan plays with his vocal phrasing, relying on all the tricks he learned cutting record after record of tunes associated with Frank Sinatra. The result is surprising and singular, revealing new twists in songs that seemed to be set in stone decades ago.

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Every Conversation In June

by Watchglass

Released 22 May 2023

Duchess Studios

*****

Watchglass began in 2017 as a Sydney based four piece band and has over time morphed into a recording duo of Gina Graham (vocals and lyrics) and Mark Vee (guitars, synths, arrangement and production), creating electro/guitar indie songs of the esoteric vibrational musing variety, delving into relationships with people and places, always with a positive spin no matter how desperate.

Gina Graham writes: "This album came about after I practically got down on my knees and begged Mark to send me some tracks to write to. We had been in period of being fallen out for over two years and I frankly wasn’t going to suffer needlessly any more. Mark was the reason I discovered I could not only sing well enough to lead a band but also write songs! We started our music journey five years ago after Mark answered my "singer available" ad in the local classifieds.
This is our 5th album in 5 years. Eight songs written and recorded between June 2022 and February 2023. We have begun again. The songs herein are primarily a reflection of the journey and the joy of returning home".

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The Unguitarist: Complete Works, 1969-2022

by Rick Deitrick

Released 16 June 2023

Tompkins Square

*****

Ohio-born Rick Deitrick took up the guitar at 16 and decided to approach his playing as if he was the only guy on an island and the instrument had just washed ashore one day. According to Rick, "I completely divorced my playing from any formal music knowledge, but it was very important to me to use original tuning. During those years, the ‘60s/70's, there was a lot of acoustic guitar playing, often using open tuning as a base. I wanted to create whole tones without de-tuning and keep access to the complex sounds stock tuning provided."
Rick pressed 500 LPs of his tranquil solo guitar record, Gentle Wilderness, in 1978. He gave copies to libraries and left a few in the middle of the wilderness, next to trails, "so people would find them." Rick sought inspiration in nature and in particular the various rivers scattered around the Western United States, often composing songs while seated beside them.
Now, Tompkins Square is proud to present a 5CD retrospective box set, Rick Deitrick - The Unguitarist : Complete Works, 1969 - 2022 , which makes a strong case for Rick as one of the most individual voices in acoustic guitar music over the past half century.

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when the poems do what they do

by Aja Monet

Released 9 March 2023

Night Dreamer

*****

aja monet’s poems are a work of gravity. A surrealist blues poet, storyteller, and organizer born and raised in Brooklyn, NY, aja won the legendary Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam poetry award title in 2007. In 2018, she was nominated for a NAACP Literary Award for Poetry and in 2019 was awarded the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Award for Poetry for her cultural organizing work in South Florida. Her work moves, constantly, between origin and outcome, allowing them to exist in converse. In her debut album when the poems do what they do, releasing June 9 via drink sum wtr, we glimpse her indefatigable commitment to speak. Those thematic origins of this album at times center around Black resistance, love and the inexhaustible quest for joy.

In when the poems do what they do, aja monet appears as a woman of letters and storm, her poems do not roar in pentameter - but rather in storm surge because, “Who’s got time for poems when the world is on fire?!.” And this work isn’t one to pull apart into one liners, these are poems of things felt. There is a fullness here that can’t be encapsulated in even the boundaries that language offers.
aja is joined in effort on this album by musicians Christian Scott (trumpet), Samora Pinderhughes (piano), Elena Pinderhughes (flute), Luques Curtis (bass), Weedie Braimah (djembe) and Marcus Gilmore (drums). Together, creating music that is insistent and unrelenting.
When you finally reach the end of this album, you are left with a similar feeling you get when heartbroken, the gravity of barrelling back down to earth, sopping wet with tears, out of breath, overcome with love, despair, hope, and all too aware that all of this, is over far too soon. When the poems do what they do, they do absolutely everything.

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Luke Una Presents E Soul Cultura Vol. 2

by Luke Una (Various Artists)

Released 9 June 2023

Golden Angel / Interscope

*****

Mr Bongo presents a much anticipated second volume of ‘É Soul Cultura’, curated by the charismatic Manchester based DJ Luke Una. In May 2022, ‘É Soul Cultura’ Vol.1 seemed to land at exactly the right moment. Post-lockdown, optimism was back on the rise and the dance floors swelled again. For many listeners, Luke Una’s intriguingly woven pattern of new, old, rare and under-discovered music from around the world became the soundtrack to rejuvenated positivity. Piccadilly Records made the release their top compilation of the year, with Rough Trade placing it as their number two. The enthusiasm from the industry was mirrored by record buyers and demonstrated that in the right hands, moving through genres, tempos and decades can make perfect musical sense.

It was clear from the get-go that the concept warranted a series, there are many sides to É Soul Cultura and many musical stories to tell. This second volume gives another opportunity for Luke to share his journey of the past four decades of staying up late and getting transcendental whilst listening to holy grail music as the city slept. It follows on from where Vol.1 left off, at times venturing into the deeper, spiritual, soulful, downtempo, experimental aspects of his tastes

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Luke Una Presents E Soul Cultura Vol. 1

by Luke Una (Various Artists)

Released 6 May 2022

Golden Angel / Interscope

*****

With some of the best DJs and selectors there is a certain mysterious sound or underlying feeling which unites the music they play, regardless of genre, year or tempo. Luke Una is a master of telling a story through music and this compilation is a perfect example of his musical alchemy in action. Featuring tracks from Yusef Lateef, Airto Moreira, Crooked Man, Henri Texier and many more, it is a collection of new, old, rare and under-discovered music from around the world, all united by Luke under the banner of “E-Soul Cultura”.
It’s best described by Luke himself, who writes: “As the 5AM city sleeps and the strobe lights are slowly turned off, we gather on the wrong side of town in a transcendental journey alone together. We are the late night disenfranchised holding on in various after parties, flats, lofts, random kitchens and basements into the outer cosmos with É Soul Cultura. Music from exotic tear jerkers, Afro-spiritual jazz, cosmic Brazilian celestial grooves, machine street soul, dark horses, lost B-sides, £1 bargain-bin bombs, hidden gems, late night Italo dubbing, deep velvet N.Y.C garage, bass buggin sonic futurism, wrong speed 33BPM pitched up +8 new beat, majestic sunset strings, sweet vocals from heaven, no half steppin jazz dancing in outer-space and odd numbers. Yes… magical moments, together, holding on in witness protection suburban cul-de-sacs and Castle Court flats. Cosmic É high, 3000ft above the city getting evangelical to murky, wonky timeless beautiful music. This thing of ours dreaming of better days. Fail we may, sail we must, the sun will come up again.”

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Belongs On A Place Called Earth

by Secret Night Gang

Released 23 June 2023

Brownswood Recordings

*****

British jazz, funk and street soul masters, Secret Night Gang return with their highly anticipated second studio album ‘Belongs on a Place Called Earth’.

Led by Manchester natives and childhood friends Kemani Anderson and Callum Connell, Secret Night Gang spread their uplifting, transcendent, and genre blending street soul sound through, dynamic melodies, striking brass accents and jazz inflected soul prowess, renewing the musical frontiers of the genre.

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Friendship (EP)

by Surprise Chef

Released 2 June 2023

Crown Records

****-
Surprise Chef are Coburg’s cinematic soul journeymen, pushing moody shades of instrumental jazz-funk with a DIY mentality.
Surprise Chef’s output reflects a meticulous education of 1970’s soul, touching on the legacies of composer/producers David Axelrod & Isaac Hayes, with cues also taken from the catalogues of Daptone and Truth & Soul.

Friendship is a six song 12” EP that picks up where the last album left off and pushes their sound in new directions as they take on different energies and make them their own. The EP opens with “Rosemary Hemphill”, a gorgeous yet haunting tune that takes the listener through a myriad of musical changes and moods. “Friendship Theme” is a bouncy and energetic number with an infectious and driving topline that is sure to move dancefloors around the globe. “Over The Moon” is pure mood music that puts Surprise Chef’s restraint and tasteful use of space front and center while “Spiky Boi” is a frantic upbeat number drenched in percussion and keyboards.

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Different Eyes

by Uriel Herman

Released 30 June 2023

Ubuntu Music

*****

Uriel Herman, the young pianist and composer from Jerusalem, studied classical piano and composition with exalted Israeli conservatoire teachers during the 2000s, but has recently toured the world as a soloist and bandleader in pursuit of an increasingly personal and spontaneously-evolving music. When he released his 2014 debut album, Awake, it was evident how far the then 26 year-old Herman had moved from the orthodox roots of his training - songs by Nirvana and Radiohead joined originals framing words by revered Hebrew-language poets Yehuda Amichai and the gifted but short-lived Tirza Attar.

Different Eyes, Herman's third release, and a vivid collage of the sounds of his childhood on Jerusalem streets, mergers of rhythmic and melodic ideas spanning the Middle East, a little Chopin, and a closing lullaby dedicated to his young son – is the most powerful evidence so far of his formidable promise. T

If there are any racing certs for the 2023 poll winners' lists so far, Different Eyes sounds like one of the front-runners.

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Through and Through

by Baby Rose

Released 28 April 2023

Secretly Canadian

****-

D.C. bred, NC raised and Atlanta based newcomer Baby Rose (born Jasmine Rose Wilson) is a soulful singer, songwriter, and producer known for her deep expressive contralto vocals and eclectic mix of musical genres, including soul, rhythm and blues, and jazz. Born to a jazz connoisseur father and hiphop manager mother Baby Rose was in love with the music from a young age and has been writing, composing, and singing since.

The piercing honesty and vulnerability she brings to her lyrics in turn helps others process their feelings and find a place of healing. For Rose, it’s a journey that’s still ongoing. “If I’m going to leave anything behind, it’s going to be getting people back to themselves,” she says. “As I get back to myself, it’s a constant reset: Remember who you are, remember who you want to be.”

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The Age Of Pleasure

by Janelle Monae

Released 9 June 2023

Wonderland / Bad Boy Records

****-

Dedicated to those "around the diaspora and those seeking to join us," (The Age of Pleasure)'s delights are earthly in a way that echoes Monáe's listed track-by-track inspirations, which most pertinently acknowledge those finding communality and liberation in basement parties, ballroom culture, and (Atlanta) strip clubs. Objects such as "the weathered copy of Doggystyle (Snoop Dog's debut album) framed in my cousin Myron's clogged bathroom" are cited too. In addition to the Afrobeat element often brought in by (collaborators Sean Kuti and) Egypt 80, and appearances from a mix of legends and up-and-comers, The Age of Pleasure is threaded with interpolations and samples of numerous reggae classics. It still sounds just like a Wondaland production -- soulful, left-of-center pop that is ornate and tasteful, brimming with ideas from subtly dazzling vocal arrangements to crafty song transitions. There's joy in every moment. It's no coincidence that Monáe chose Pride Month and Black Music Month -- ten days before Juneteenth, to be precise -- to release a multicultural album of unrepressed (sometimes explicit) spirit, built for playing in the sunshine.

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Versions Of Us

by Lanterns on the Lake

Released 2 June 2023

Night Dreamer

****-

Tyneside's Lanterns On The Lake have been releasing music on Bella Union records since 2011. Their 2020 album Spook The Herd was nominated for the Mercury Music Prize.
The band were joined by Radiohead's Philip Selway on drums for their latest album Versions Of Us.

The (album's) nine songs ... are existential meditations examining life’s possibilities; facing the hand we’ve been dealt and the question of whether we can change our individual and collective destinies.

Singer and songwriter Hazel Wilde has no doubt that motherhood fundamentally shifted her perspective. “Writing songs requires a certain level of self-indulgence, and songwriters can be prone to dwelling on themselves,” she says. “Motherhood made me aware of having a different stake in the world. I’ve got to believe that there’s a better way and an alternative future to the one we’ve been hurtling towards. I’ve also got to believe that I could be better as a person, too.”
Mixed by the band’s guitarist Paul Gregory, in the bedroom of his home in North Shields, there is a sense of time and place that runs deep throughout this record.

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Songs 2013 - 2023

by Ane Brun

Released 12 May 2023

Balloon Ranger Recordings

****-

A decade ago, the Scandinavian artist Ane Brun released Songs 2003-2013 to celebrate her first ten years in the spotlight. Now, music producer and singer has shared plans for a follow-up compilation album: Songs 2013-2023.
Brun wanted to chronicle the past decade since it was one filled with so much change, loss, and immense growth for the singer/songwriter.
“These 10 years have been filled with so much, from loss and sorrow to love and security, both sides of life’s spectrum,” said Brun in a previous statement. “I think the passing of my father was one of those massive life changes that we go through, and of course there’s the two years of the pandemic, which ended up with me moving to Oslo after two decades in Sweden.”
She continued, “But I’ve gone through personal processes that have made me more confident, braver, healthier, calmer and also happier. My life has become a lot better in many ways.”
Also paying homage to some of the songs she’s covered throughout her career, Portrayals features Brun’s majestical renditions of Beyoncé‘s “Halo,” Cyndi Lauper‘s “True Colors,” “Into My Arms” by Nick Cave, and Alphaville’s “Big in Japan,” among others.

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Joy'All

by Jenny Lewis

Released 9 June 2023

Blue Note

****-
Largely written during a week-long workshop run by Beck, Jenny Lewis’ fifth album casts her as a hard-nosed Stevie Nicks. ‘Psychos’ and ‘Balcony’ have the wide-screen, soft-focus of ’70s Fleetwood Mac but there’s usually a bite in her lyrical specificity.
She may joke about being “a rock-and-roll disciple”, with songs referencing AM Radio standards such as ’64 Malibus and John Denver, but this is a picket-fence America that, under its Nashville pedal steel and bouncing soul, is full of danger for teenage girls and where the essence of life is suffering.
The edge is easy to ignore given Dave Cobb’s production quality, which gives it a vintage classic rock vibe and captures the intimacy of a live band. This works particularly well on the stomping country-rock of ‘Love Feel’ and ‘Apples and Oranges’, which draw a thread to her Rilo Kiley days and make it sound like classic rock was always her destination.
If there are moments that slip close to cliché, such as the break on ‘Love Feel’ and the ’60s girl-group spoken word introduction to ‘Chain of Tears’, then it’s done with knowing intention. This means that Joy’All is less about cynicism than the hardened will to survive.

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Free Myself

by Theo Parrish, Maurissa Rose

Released 2 June 2023

Sound Signature / Whobody Records

****-

Theo Parrish and Maurissa Rose are both veterans of the Detroit scene, having collaborated on a select few singles since 2019. Now they present a full album together of luscious, meditative loops and smooth vocal explorations. Free Myself is another of Parrish’s signature deep house productions with a lofi flair, seeing Rose release a soulful stream of consciousness over these extended cuts. The tone is woozy with her wispy sighs, shown best in ‘Purify Me’ with crisp, strutting rhythms, jazzy brass beeps, and synths twinkling like wind chimes.

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Rosy Lee

by (Twit One, Turt & C.Tappin)

Released 18 September 2020

Melting Pot Music

****-

Technically, Syrup are a hip-hop group with unmistakeable leanings towards soul and jazz. The group consists of an MC (Turt), a pianist/singer (C.Tappin) and a beatmaker (Twit One). Their music is rooted in the tradition of collectives like Native Tongues and Soulquarians, and they have come up with a pretty appropriate term to describe their sound, which is „cool bap“.
But if we put formailties aside and look at the bigger picture, Syrup are also a perfect example of how music can connect people beyond national borders, language and tradition. And furthermore how Afro-American culture has influenced not only the musical taste but the views and opinion-making of generations of young people worldwide.

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Chris Black Changed My Life

by Portugal. The Man

Released 23 June 2023

Atlantic

****-
There may not be a more difficult to pin down band in pop music than Portugal. The Man. Led by singer/songwriter John Gourley, the Alaska-born, Portland-based outfit has carved out a distinctive niche on the pop landscape since 2006, exploring a literate, cut-n-paste brand of indie rock that's artfully left of center while still consciously embracing many of the dance, R&B, and electronic traditions that one might expect in modern contemporary pop. It's an eclectic approach that helped make their 2017 album, the '60s psych-influenced Woodstock, and its Grammy-winning single, "Feel It Still," such a surprising breakthrough.

The album is named after the group's close friend, filmmaker Chris Black, who toured with them in 2016 as a kind of unofficial DJ and hype man, and who died tragically in 2019 just as his career was taking shape. Black's death, as well as Gourley's own need to decompress and rethink the group's creative direction in the wake of Woodstock's success, found Portugal. The Man taking a long-needed break before reentering the studio. Thankfully, the time away finds them recharged.

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Fig (EP)

by Laura Jones

Released 16 June 2023

Laura Jones Music

****-

Lara Jones is a London-based experimental saxophonist but listen to this track before you pass judgement on what you think that might sound like. ‘Fig’ is an electronic powerhouse of giddy arpeggios, gritty electronic swells, pinched synths and blown-up drum sounds.

The title track from the EP takes as its source a field recording of a conversation between Jones and her wife in the shower and you hear the line “queer love, it’s just love you know.” Jones says “I wanted to be bolder with this EP in how I presented my message, I chose to use my voice audibly for the first time and ultimately aimed to start a conversation about queer love and identity from an intimate perspective.”
There is a lot going on in its three-minute running time. It’s a pulsating drama that seems to breathe in electricity and exhale pyroclastic clouds of dancefloor energy. It’s as anarchic as waves hitting rocks or meteors striking distant moons and the crackling power of it will give your fingers enough of a jolt to have them reaching for the repeat button.

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Over Tage

by Svaneborg Kardyb

Released 21 April 2023

Gondwana Records

****-

Svaneborg Kardyb are Nikolaj Svaneborg - Wurlitzer, Juno, piano and Jonas Kardyb - drums, percussion a multi award winning duo from Denmark, where they won two "grammys" at the Danish Music Awards Jazz 2019: New artist of the year and Composer of the year.  Drawing on Danish folk music and Scandinavian jazz influences, including Nils Frahm, Esbjörn Svennson and Jan Johansson's landmark recording Jazz På Svenska, their music is an exquisite and joyful melding of beautiful melodies, delicate minimalism, catchy grooves, subtle electronica vibes, Nordic atmospheres and organic interplay, all underwritten by the sheer joy of playing together. "We started in the earliest of mornings over the blackest of coffee, sometimes even without talking, just music. The vibe from these early sessions is still the backbone of our little band".Their music is intentionally simple at first glance, but evolves and unfolds through listening over time, with plenty of room for exploration, reflection and improvisation. Their aim is to create music that is as honest and intimate as possible "with melodies and rhythms so strong that we are left as only the messengers". And their fast-developing music chemistry allowed them to give little thought to what their musical influences were. Giving their music a captivating charm.

And it is that mixture of elevation and thoughtfulness, honesty and intimacy that makes the music of Svaneborg Kardyb so special and Over Tage such a joy to listen to. The world awaits.

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DNA

by Dorian Holley, Nayanna Holley

Released 9 March 2023

Night Dreamer

****-

Dorian Holley, backup singer for Michael Jackson (Dorian was singer and Vocal Director on the This Is It tour), Rod Stewart, James Taylor, etc. partners with his daughter Nayanna Holley, herself a veteran backup singer for Kelly Clarkson, P!nk, St. Vincent, Sheryl Crow, et al, fully realizing a cross-generational musical legacy.

This is the first album for the father-daughter singing tandem, a collection of favorite songs from the 70s and 80s, chosen at the height of the global pandemic to recall our ability to heal and to hope for better days ahead.

The album is produced by bassist Kaveh Rastegar (John Legend, Sia, Bruno Mars, Bruce Springsteen), and features legendary keyboardist Larry Goldings (John Mayer, James Taylor), guitarist Chris Bruce (Seal, Meshell Ndegecello), and drummer Abe Rounds (Ndegecello, Blake Mills, Sara Bareilles).

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Silberland - Kosmische Musik Vol 1 (1972-1986)

by Bureau B

Released 1 July 2022

Bureau B

****-

Bureau B is a Hamburg based label which releases past and future classics unearthed from genres including (but not limited to) electronica, avant-garde, post-rock, neoclassical and (kraut)rock - a colourful spectrum of diverse, yet contigiuous musical genre

Fellow humans, Bureau B invite you on an expedition to Silberland, a singular span of spacetime created by Germa - ny’s sonic futurists of the seventies and eighties. Embracing the early electronics and tape experiments of the six- ties’ avant-garde, these artists aimed to boldly go, eschewing small steps for giant leaps into a nebulous and novel sound.

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Silberland - Kosmische Musik Vol 2 (1974-1984)

by Bureau B

Released 16 June 2023

Bureau B

****-

Welcome to Silberland – where the streets are paved with strobes. Home to neon lights, straight lines and open roads, this futurist fantasy was ï¬rst founded in the mid-seventies, when Germany's creative class chose musical therapy in order to indulge their shared hallucination of a new Europe. Fuelled by the catalytic fusion of globalisation and new technology, the world was turning ever faster and the kosmische generation were ready to keep the pace. With synthesisers, rhythm computers and human metronomes turned to a gallop, these electronic innovators set modernity to a motorik beat, and Bureau B's second trip into Silberland cuts right to the thrust of the genre.

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I Thought I Was Better Than You

by Baxter Dury

Released 2 June 2023

Heavenly Recordings

****-

We’ve had two decades of Baxter Dury’s louche sardonic music, twenty years – twenty years! – of late-night London snapshots, shuffling basslines, comedown disco tunes, all run through with seedy bleakness and a sweet love for humanity.

Baxter Dury’s latest album, I Thought I Was Better Than You, is a new era for him, and with this new era comes a new character. “Faux-confrontational,” Baxter calls him. Here, not only is he recounting his childhood, but he’s also reckoning with it. Instead of just swinging at his past blindfolded with a baseball bat, he talks openly about the toxic cocktail of being born into unfortunately fortunate circumstances, with a persuasive surname but no structure or sense of responsibility with which reap the rewards of it. “Really, it’s about being trapped in an awkward place between something you’re actually quite good at, and somebody else’s success.” That ‘somebody else’ being his dad, Ian Dury. As one of the album centrepieces – Shadow – agonisingly puts it: “But no one will get over that you’re someone’s son/Even though you want to be like Frank Ocean/But you don’t sound like him, you sound just like Ian.”

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Nowhere Near The Sky

by The Jordan

Released 10 February 2023

Big Mouse / Cooking Vinyl

****-

Dutch singer and songwriter Caroline Van der Leeuw is back - with a new name, a new sound, a new mission. Emphasising the depth and breadth of her artistic transformation, Nowhere Near The Sky (produced By David Kosten - Bat For Lashes, Everything Everything) is The Jordan’s extraordinary, game-changing debut album, a new chapter that comprehensively rewrites Caroline’s story as former singer of Dutch pop group Caro Emerald. Gone is the jazz, the swing, the Latin rhythms, the rockabilly, the heavily stylised wardrobe. In their place: total candour and unvarnished truth, vocals purer and more powerful than anything she has recorded before, trip-hop and folktronic textures that wrap her voice in magic and mystery, and songwriting that, after years of doubt and repressed feelings, finally pulls back the veil.

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The Four Winds: East (EP)

by Clara Kent

Released 19 June 2023

Bounce House Studios and Productions

****-

The Four Winds: East is the first of a series of releases planned from this Afro-Indigenous multidisciplinary artist, entrepreneur and community liaison from Homewood (Pittsburg), Pensylvania. Wheter the medium is music, canvas, or creative direction, Kent uplifts the creative community, especially Black artists and youth. The self-proclaimed "Multidimensional Artistic Individual "was named Pittsburgh City Paper's "Person of the Year" for music in 2019 and has performed across many stages, opening for Wyclef Jean, Cautious Clay, Thundercat and others.In 2022 she bagan hosting a WYEP radio show "More Bounce with Clara Kent", managing alt-funk band "Mani Bahia & The Mob" and launched her production company Bounce House Studios and Productions. One of the first projects to launch is the "Four Winds" EP series, a collection of the artist's music from 2016 to the present.

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Dodecagon: Arturo Stalteri plays Philip Glass

by Arturo Stalteri

Released 26 May 2023

Orange Mountain Music

****-

In the late-1990s, Stalteri was a pioneer in interpretations and arrangements of Philip Glass's piano music. His album, Circles, became one of the early classics of the Glass piano repertoire. When approached by the label about an anniversary re-release of Circles, Stalteri responded with the idea to re-record, re-interpret, and re-imagine these Glass works. The title, Dodecagon, is drawn from the name of a shape with twelve sides - corresponding to the twelve tracks on the album.

Read more... ECM

Music By Henrik Odegaard

by Vox Clamantis, Jaan-Eik Tulve

Released 2 June 2023

ECM

****-

On this newest endeavour, the Vox Clamantis choir, under the direction of Jaan-Eik Tulve, turns its attention towards Norwegian composer Henrik Ødegaard with a fine-drawn programme of liturgical choral music. In a subtle sleight of hand, Ødegaard’s compositions interweave Gregorian chant with Norwegian folk song. The composer employs Gregorian and paschal hymns as source material, from which he then draws his own polyphonic layers and extensions. The main work here is the eight-part Meditations over St. Mary Magdalene’s Feast in Nidaros, based on antiphons found in a 13th-century manuscript from medieval Scandinavia. Ødegaard’s compositional process transfigures these antiphons, sensitively brought to light by Vox Clamantis. On past ECM recordings, the choir has addressed works of Arvo Pärt, Erkki-Sven Tüür and most recently Estonian composer Cyrillus Kreek – an acclaimed recording, which BBC described as “magic of another sphere”. The new album was recorded at the St. Nicholas Dome in Haapsalu, Estonia in March 2021.

Read more... ECM

A Time To Remember

by Elina Duni, Rob Luft, Matthieu Michel, Fred Thomas

Released 16 June 2023

ECM

****-

A Time To Remember is a continuation of the special synergy that inhabited Elina Duni’s acclaimed Lost Ships and finds her regrouping with that album’s quartet of guitarist Rob Luft, Matthieu Michel on flugelhorn and Fred Thomas on percussion and piano. As the title suggests, the notion of ‘time’ pulls through the programme like a theme, connecting music from different parts of the world – traditionals, popular songs and original compositions – in performances of deep lyricism but also fleet-footed folklore. The repertory spans Albanian and Kosovan traditionals, American songs like the Broadway classic “I’ll Be Seeing You” and Stephen Sondheim’s musical ballad “Send In The Clowns” as well as originals by Rob and Elina. Commenting on the group’s last effort, Jazzwise said that “the sum of Duni and Luft’s work together seems greater than their individual achievements, where concept and conceptualisation have combined to produce a classic.” A Time To Remember should confirm that proposition and further expands on the qualities explored previously.

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Glimmer

by Nils Økland, Sigbjørn Apeland

Released 16 June 2023

ECM

****-

Violinist Nils Økland and keyboardist Sigbjørn Apeland, musical partners for thirty years, have long explored the interface of Norwegian traditional music and improvisation. Glimmer, an exceptionally beautiful and touching album, takes as its starting point folk music from the Haugalandet region of Western Norway. Apeland’s collection of pieces from local singers who have helped to keep the traditions alive forms the basis of the repertoire here, along with original compositions. The latter range from pieces written for a film about Lars Hertevig, the great Norwegian landscape painter of the 19th century, to music inspired by modernist composer Fartein Valen. Throughout, the combination of Økland’s Hardanger fiddle and Apeland’s harmonium is marvellously evocative.

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THE NEW QUARTET (50th Anniversary)
Gary Burton

Original Release 15 September 1973

Re-released 23 June 2023

ECM

*****

FEATURED ARTISTS
Gary Burton - Vibraphone
Michael Goodrick - Guitar
Abraham Laboriel- Bass
Harry Blazer - Drums
RECORDED

March 1973, Aengus Studios Fayville

As well as being the great vibes innovator of the era, Gary Burton has been a most astute talent scout. In 1973, The New Quartet introduced Abraham Laboriel: this was the first recording of the bassist who would shortly become one of the most in-demand session players across all genres. “It must be emphasised that Laboriel sounds like a major artist in the making with his astonishing bass work,” wrote Melody Maker.

Guitarist Mick Goodrick also emerged as a player to watch with this album, shining in a well-conceived programme with compositions of Keith Jarrett, Chick Corea, Carla Bley, Mike Gibbs and bandleader Burton.

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Old and New Dreams

Don Cherry, Dewey Redman, Charlie Haden and Ed Blackwell

Original Release 1 November 1979

Re-released 23 June 2023

ECM

*****

FEATURED ARTISTS
Don Cherry - Trumpet, Piano
Dewey Redman - Tenor Saxophone, Musette
Charlie Haden - Bass
Ed Blackwell - Drums
RECORDED

August 1979, Talent Studio, Oslo

Don Cherry, Dewey Redman, Charlie Haden and Ed Blackwell came together to celebrate the work of mentor Ornette Coleman, but the repertoire of their Old and New Dreams quartet soon blossomed into a project of much wider scope, addressing also the musical experiences the players had made individually in their travels around the world. As well as superlative versions of Ornette’s “Lonely Woman“ and “Open or Close“ this highly influential album, now regard as a classic of new jazz, includes pieces by Cherry and Blackwell inspired by African music, Redman’s enigmatic “Orbit of La-Ba”, and Haden’s impressionistic “Song for the Whales”. Recorded in Oslo in August 1979 and produced by Manfred Eicher, this vinyl reissue includes new liner notes providing historical context and background information

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Carl Philipp Emanuele Bach

Keith Jarrett

Released 30 June 2023

ECM

****-

FEATURED ARTISTS
Keith Jarrett - Piano
RECORDED

Keith Jarrett’s Cavelight Studio, New Jersey, in May 1994

Keith Jarrett’s account of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach’s Württemberg Sonatas is a revelation. “I’d heard the sonatas played by harpsichordists, and felt there was room for a piano version,” says Jarrett today. This outstanding recording, made in 1994 and previously unreleased, finds the pianist attuned to the expressive implications of the sonatas in every moment. The younger Bach’s idiosyncrasies: the gentle playfulness of the music, the fondness for subtle and sudden tempo shifts, the extraordinary, rippling invention…all of this is wonderfully delivered. The fluidity of the whole performance has a quality that perhaps could be conveyed only by an artist of great improvisational skills. In Jarrett’s hands, CPE’s exploration of new compositional forms retains the freshness of discovery.

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Therapy

by Brendan Eder Ensemble

Released 3 March 2023

Brendan Eader Ensemble

****-

Brendan Eder is a Los Angeles composer and drummer best-known for his eponymous genre-bending ensemble of woodwinds, drumset, and bass; as well as his film scoring work, most notably on four short films for director Ari Aster.

His third album, Therapy is a collection of meditative woodwind arrangements recorded primarily at Church of the Good Shepherd in Arcadia, California.

Following 2021’s Cape Cod Cottage - Eder’s concept album under the guise of Edward Blankman, a retired dentist in the 1970s, which added elegant, understated jazz to the ensembles' repertoire - on Therapy, Eder drops the alter ego and the drumset (almost entirely) and begins with a new directive:

What would ambient mastermind Richard D. James do with a chamber ensemble and a church organ?

It was a question Eder had started to ask in 2020 with his cover of “#20 (Lichen).” Listeners responded with over one million streams. Appropriately, Therapy delivers two new Aphex Twin arrangements alongside eight original pieces. The result is a distinctive take on New Age and ambient music subtly interwoven with Eder’s affinity for 20th century classical and jazz.

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by Hannah Macklin

Released 2 June 2023

Hopestreet Recordings

****-

Hannah Macklin is a uniquely gifted vocalist, musician, songwriter and performer, with both contemporary and classical training and a jazz degree from the Queensland Conservatorium of Music.
An artist committed to evolution, she is presently focused on writing for and playing with her current band - a progressive ensemble based in Meanjin (Brisbane) which explores jazz, soul, punk, rock and theatrics.

What’s Mu about? Mu is about everything: Songs about heartbreak and parting share the album with songs marveling at the scale of the universe. Mu is a concept from Zen and Chan Buddhism that means: “nothingness” and also, “pure awareness.” The awareness at the source of all things. In Hannah’s words: “There is so much life in every moment. Endless patterns, algorithms and instances repeating and changing and adapting. Spiraling outwards from the source. What source? The source.” In search of the source, Hannah has composed and arranged an undefinable, cinematic album that leads the listener on a winding path through her imagination.

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Further Out Than The Edge

by Speakers Corner Quartet

Released 2 June 2023

OTIH

****-

FEATURED ARTISTS

Biscuit - flute

Kwake Bass - drums & percussion

Raven Bush - violin

Peter Bennie - bass.

The journey of South London collective Speakers Corner Quartet to where they are today has been a self-less, community driven calling. Starting as the house band at the legendary Brixton spoken word and hip hop night Speakers Corner in 2006, they spent the following decade backing up other artists and helping them shape their visions – both in live performances and in the studio. The list is extensive, but notable collaborations include Sampha, Kae Tempest, Tirzah, Dean Blunt, the late MF DOOM, and Lianne La Havas.

This period honed their craft and versatility as multi-instrumentalist producers, but also shaped their values, building profound long-term relationships in music that comes full circle on their debut album, Further Out Than The Edge.

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Archetype

by Joe Armon-Jones, Maxwell Owin

Released 9 June 2023

Aquarii

****-

Joe Armon-Jones is a keyboardist/producer from London who is part of Ezra Collective, but he’s also been building quite a career outside of the group as well, creating solo albums, collaborative albums, and just contributing to albums by other artists, such as Nubya Garcia, Moses Boyd, and Ego Ella May, just to name a few. Starting in 2017, he started working with producer/multi-instrumentalist Maxwell Owin, and they dropped their first album together, Idiom. They have continued to both work on multiple projects since that time, but the question became when they were finally going to follow that album up. Well, the wait is finally over, as the duo now delivers their new album, Archetype.

While other projects these two work on might sway more heavily to jazz, or maybe neo-soul and R&B, Archetype is a different type of project all together. Armon-Jones is a brilliant keyboardist in the traditional sense, but tradition is being thrown out the window on this album. There are a few moments here and there where you get a glimpse of his virtuosity, but this album is really about Armon-Jones and Owin taking all these different genres and subgenres of music and blending them together into something new and different, challenging listeners ears along the way.

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Utarhythm

by Oki Dub Ainu Band

Released 9 March 2016

Chikar Studio

****-

OKI DUB AINU BAND features Tonkori, the traditional stringed instrument of the Karafuto Ainu in a band setting with drums, bass, keyboard and heavy dub sound.

FEATURED MUSICIANS

OKI (tonkori/vo)

Futoshi Ikabe (tonkori/vo),
Takashi Numazawa (Dr)
Takashi Nakajo (ba),
HAKASE-SUN (key)
Naoyuki Uchida (dub mix).

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Amatssou

by Tinariwen

Released 19 May 2023

Wedge

****-

Some people have commented that Tinariwen have always been a country band, albeit a North African take on that most North American of genres. That idea is magnified on new album Amatssou, which finds the Tuareg band’s trademark snaking guitar lines and hypnotic rhythms blending seamlessly with pedal steel, piano and strings from guest musicians including Daniel Lanois, the embellished arrangements lending the songs an epic, universal application.

In the two decades since Tinariwen emerged from their base in the African desert to tour the globe, they have got to know many renowned country, folk, and rock musicians from the USA including Kurt Vile, Stephen O'Malley, Jack White, and Wilco. Tuareg nomads and cowboy drifters. Camel trains and mustang horses. The timeless horizon of the endless Sahara and the wild frontier of the Old West - several thousand miles of ocean may divide the desert blues of Tinariwen and the authentic country music of rural America but the links are as palpable as they are romantic.

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Heaven Is A Junkyard

by Youth Lagoon

Released 9 June 2023

Fat Possum

****-

In 2016, Trevor Powers shut the door on Youth Lagoon. “I felt like I was in a chokehold,” he says. “Even though it was my music, I lost my way. In a lot of ways, I lost myself.”

Stepping back from the alias, Powers found personal transformation at his home in Idaho and released experimental tapes under his own name (2018’s 'Mulberry Violence' and 2020’s 'Capricorn').

In October 2021, something changed the channel. After taking an over-the-counter medication, Powers had a drug reaction so severe it turned his stomach into a “non-stop geyser of acid,” coating his larynx and vocal cords for eight months. “I saw seven doctors and multiple specialists. I lost over thirty pounds. No one could help me,” says Powers. By Christmas, he could no longer speak, turning to text messages and a pen and paper as his only ways to communicate. “I wasn’t sure if I’d ever be able to speak again, yet alone sing,” he says.

“It all felt symbolic in a way,” he adds. “I’d been swallowing fear all my life and now here it was coming back up. I used to think God watches people suffer. Now I know She suffers with you. That changed everything.”

The growth that followed that nightmare narrowed Powers’ focus. Rather than writing about the world at large, he started writing about home.

With whispers of country, 'Heaven Is a Junkyard' is mutant Americana in a world of love, drugs, storytelling, and miracles—held together by Powers’ voice and an upright piano. “If a lyric wasn’t right, a song wasn’t right,” says Powers, who scrapped two-and-a-half albums worth of material because it “wasn’t honest.”

“'Heaven Is a Junkyard' is about all of us. It’s stories of brothers leaving for war, drunk fathers learning to hug, mothers falling in love, neighbors stealing mail, cowboys doing drugs, friends skipping school, me crying in the bathtub, dogs catching rabbits, and children playing in tall grass,” says Powers.

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Djawla

by Anouar Kaddour Cherif

Released 28 January 2022

Riverboat Records / World Music Network

****-

Armed with his beloved mandole, Anouar Kaddour Cherif draws on his Algerian musical roots within a contemporary jazz setting. From heartfelt pieces reflecting his life in exile to animal-inspired spiritual tales, this is a sublime collection of Arabic jazz-tinged compositions.

Read more... Bandcamp

Subhana (Habibi Funk 022)

by Ahmed Ben Ali

Released 16 Jube 2023

Habibi Funk Records

****-

Reggae in Libya has dominated the charts since its arrival in the 1970’s and flourished with some of the pioneers of Libyan reggae such as Ibrahim Hesnawi, Najib Alhoush and The White Birds Band. Composers like Ahmed Fakroun and Nasser Mizdawi also played around with the genre, although they did not dedicate their sound to it. When we started researching into more contemporary recordings, we quickly came upon Ahmed Ben Ali. Ben Ali is a Libyan singer and producer, whose YouTube channel at the time contained four songs (we later learned they had been uploaded more than ten years prior).

Contextualizing his own style, Ben Ali points out that, “The Libyan folkloric rhythm is very similar to the reggae rhythm. So, if Libyan people listen to reggae, it’s easy for them to relate because it sounds familiar. This is the main reason why reggae became so popular here. [...] We played the reggae Libyan style, it’s not the same as in Jamaica. We added our oriental notes to it and if you mix both it becomes something great.” With a bit of laughter, he adds that “...to me it’s still original reggae, it’s the Libyan style, not some bullshit.”

Read more... Bandcamp

The Free Music Part 1 (Habibi Funk 021)

by The Free Music

Released 17 March 2023

Habibi Funk Records

****-

Avid Habibi Funk listeners may be familiar with Libyan composer / producer Najib Alhoush, who’s “Ya Aen Daly” - Bee Gee’s “Stayin Alive” cover - was included in our 2nd compilation.

Najib’s group, “The Free Music” produced an astonishing 10 albums, all impressively strong and equally infused by soul, funk, disco and reggae. Groovy synths, thumping bass and drums and Najib’s distinct flavor collide for something special. Self-financed, all their albums are fully dedicated to their unique musical blend, a distinctly infectious groove that unfortunately didn’t make an impact outside of Libya due to the complex political situation at the time.

When we made the selection for this album, we could have chosen a completely different number of tracks and the album would be been equally strong. There is a reason why it says “Part 1” in the title.

Vinyl and CD come with an extensive booklet featuring background on The Free Music and Najib Alhoush, including words from Najib’s son, Yousef, as well as unseen photos and more.

As always this release is fully licensed, all proceeds are split 50:50 between us and Najib Alhoush's family.

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Orkos (Habibi Funk 020)

by Maha

Released 10 October 2022

Habibi Funk Records

****-

Completely unknown album by Salah Ragab's Cairo Jazz Band vocalist Maha, recorded in Cairo in 1979. Features productions by Hany Shenoda of Al Massrieen. Maha’s “Orkos,” originally released on cassette, is one of these standout musical diamonds that combines Jazz and Egyptian vocal traditions with Funk, Latin and Soul.

The arrival of the cassette age was a turning point in the music industry all over the world. Manufacturing a vinyl record was a time-consuming process, as well logistically and financially a barrier of entry for many. This soon led to a proliferation of smaller acts and record labels dedicated to a particular sound without the barriers present in making vinyl.

At the same time, in Egypt in the 1970’s and early 1980’s, a new generation of musicians and composers made their way into the scene. Hany Shenoda, Mohamed Mounir, Magdy El Hossainy, Omar Korshid, Salah Ragab and Hamid El Shaeri are some names that come to mind. They all made very different music compared to one another but what connected them was their desire to add something fresh and new to what was perceived as the widely monophonic musical traditions of Egypt. Many built their sounds on a combination of their own musical upbringing with influences coming from the outside. The success of these projects varied but for each one of these artists there were numerous lesser-known bands and singers. A lot of these often-short-lived projects would release their music on cassette on tiny labels.

Maha’s “Orkos” album fits this category, and it’s fair to say that it was not a success when it was originally released in 1979 by Sout El Hob. While nobody remembers the exact numbers, sales must have been very limited and the project was quickly forgotten about and no follow up release was produced.

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Anomaly

by Jasdeep Singh Degan

Released 6 May 2023

Real World Records

****-

Submit to the beauty and sorrow, the poetry and power, of the sitar – that plucked string instrument with the long neck, pear-shaped gourd and origins in the courts of the Maharajahs of medieval India. Marvel at the astonishing prowess of Jasdeep Singh Degun, a sitarist who is steeped in the North Indian classical tradition — indeed, in the musical traditions of the Indian subcontinent — and proudly born, raised and based in Leeds, north of England.

His debut album Anomaly ... showcas(es) an almost preternatural musicality, a way with technique, improvisation, composition and collaboration that will dazzle purists and newcomers alike. Its twelve tracks range from inspired sitar solos and duelling sitar and guitar to all stops out cinematic journeying. Music rooted in the ancient repertoire of raags, the frameworks used in the improvised performances of Indian classical music, and delivered with contemporary flair.

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Awakening

by Yungchen Lhamo

Released 4 March 2023

Tibet Arts Managemant

****-

Tibetan vocalist Yungchen Lhamo often refers to music’s healing power, and indeed, at a very basic level, her music—soft, sensuous, flowing like a clear river—does offer a tonic for our times. Lhamo’s rich soprano boasts a natural vibrato that powers her hypnotic melismas, and on Awakenings, her sixth album, the Kingston-based singer-songwriter is accompanied by a versatile, mostly Spanish ensemble that conjures a singular fusion of Buddhist chant, Indian percussion, Tibetan folk, and smooth jazz. Lhamo sings mostly in Tibetan with occasional forays into English and Mandarin, but her lyrics need no translation: This is the best-possible mood music, which works equally well as atmospheric background or as a point of mental and emotional focus.

Standout tracks include “Monkey Mind,” whose jazzy chord progression, peppered by Julio Garcia’s reggae/Afrobeat-style electric guitar, recalls the Police, and “Compassion for All Beings,” which boasts Lhamo’s haunting, multi-tracked vocals atop a bed of throat singing. The title track could well be the Tibetan answer to Aerosmith’s “Dream On,” and “Auspicious Days” is a four-minute, raga-like melody featuring a time-suspending sopranino saxophone solo by Javier Paxarino.

Lhamo is a refugee from Chinese-occupied Tibet who in 1989 escaped on foot across the Himalayas, bound for the Indian border and, eventually, Dharamsala, the seat of the Tibetan government in exile. It was there that the Dalai Lama himself anointed Lhamo, whose name means “Goddess of Melody,” to go forth into the world to spread the gospel of Tibetan culture. He could not have wished for a better ambassador.

Read more... Bandcamp

sun|never|sets|on|music

THE WORLD'S BEST NEW ALBUMS MONTHLY

Spotify|June2023

Bob Dylan - Shadow Kingdom Trailer

Dudu Tassa & Jonny Greenwood - Ahibak (feat. Safae Essafi) (Official Video)

Meshell Ndegeocello - The Omnichord Real Book EPK

Julia Bullock - The Making of 'Walking in the Dark'

Best New Albums | June 2023 SunNeverSetsOnMusic