Back catalogue: All genres

Review: It is always a joy to hear from the Music For Dreams label. Not only is it a musically interesting outlet but also one that digs deep into plenty of fascinating different scenes. And this is one such case as the project is centered around 99-year-old Iboja Wandall-Holm who sings about memories from her childhood growing up in Eastern Europe. The record plays out like a musical encounter where the songs are worked into magical forms by Danish musician Mikkel Hess and other members of his Hess Is More band with extra collaborative input from label head and producer Kenneth Bager.

Review: Famed for their thrilling, dancefloor-friendly fusions of West African funk and disco, American electrofunk and post-punk pop, Ibibio Sound Machine is one of the most exciting and essential bands of recent times. It's for this reason that "Doko Mien", the Eno Williams fronted band's first album for two years, is so hotly anticipated. Happily, we can confirm that it's another stunning set, with Williams and company charging through a set of sizzling songs that wrap kaleidoscopic synths, rubbery bass, fiery horns and off-kilter funk-rock guitars around grooves that variously doff a cap to '80s electro, Italo-disco, jazz-funk, Tony Allen and thrusting, mind-altering mutant disco. In other words, it's another must-have collection of cuts from the London-based band.

Review: If Electricity is anything to go by, Eno Williams and his Ibibio Sound Machine band were particularly productive during the various pandemic lockdowns of 2020 and '21. The resultant album, the rightly acclaimed group's fourth studio set to date, is predictably inspired, with hired-in producers Hot Chip wisely choosing to subtly tweak rather than totally overhaul the band's distinctive trademark fusion of kaleidoscopic synth-funk, West African disco and boogie, '80s electro and the more electronic end of the post-punk spectrum. Highlights include the throbbing, polyrhythmic Afro-electro of 'Electricity' and the acid-sporting nu-disco brilliance of 'All That I Want', but it's the set's overall feel - described by Williams as "Moroder meets Afro-futurism" - that really delights.

Review: Maverick Japanese producer Yasushi Ide's 2020 album Cosmic Suite was widely heralded and critically acclaimed. It now gets a welcome follow up with a second volume that features an a-list of international artists including Don Letts, Josh Milan, Japanese diva UA, Afrika Bambaataa and many more. As such all sorts of sounds from dub to house, broken beat to Afrobeat, freeform, jazz, post-punk and more feature. It is a future-facing collection of cuts all masterminded and conducted by Ide from his Grand Gallery HQ in Tokyo.

Review: Bristol's heavy post-punk groups Idles present their first full length album after a slew of records dating back to 2012. Brutalism collects the best of the bands antics, from vocals that shift from wailing snarls and smokey mob calls to punkish drawls, or the more spoken word and poetic emotional ballad that is album closer "Slow Savage". Guitars can thrash away or chill out melodically in the background, with the character of this album's songs striking up a familiar feeling of late-'90s punk to mid-2000s indie. Album highlights for us include "Mother", a song championing one woman's die hard working week, to the screeching, distorted anthem "Stendhal Syndrome".

Review: Now approaching a half-century of artistic life as the closest we have to a living personification of rock 'n' roll, Iggy Pop nonetheless also continues to carry himself with more class and style than most any lifer that springs to mind. Yet it has to be said that few were expecting the cadaverous king to make his greatest album for thirty of those years, and this is what 'Post Pop Depression' his collaboration with a dream team involving luminaries such as Josh Homme, Dean Fertita and The Arctic Monkeys' Matt Helders is exactly that - a wry, restrained and ice-cool meditation on carnality and mortality without cliche or rehash, this album is all primal satisfaction and righteous revelation.

Review: In The Nursery has always been a hard-to-pigeonhole proposition - a dark-wave, industrial and neo-classical outfit whose distinctive sound tends towards the cinematic but frequently blurs boundaries. Never was this more obvious than on the Sheffield-based outfit's 1990 album L'Esperit, which has now returned in expanded form, packaged in a rather natty metal tin. As with much of their work, it feels like a stirring, emotive soundtrack to a movie yet to be made, albeit one with some moody, heady and distinctive songs mixed in. This edition includes all 11 of the original tracks in remastered form, plus all four cuts from the 'Compulsion' EP, and six more gems recorded during the sessions for the album.

Review: 'PULSE 01' is the first release in PITP's new series, which is an ongoing exploration of ambient tech, while offering a more structured display of beat-driven ambient music. Pulse 01 features brand new tracks by SYNE and Influx.

SYNE is Dennis Huddleston from the UK, who is most recognized for his ambient work as 36. He returns to his SYNE alias for the first time in nearly 5 years, with only his second record since his 2017 self-titled debut LP.

'Dystalgia' is a 12 minute opus, spread over 3 movements. Soaring pads and razor sharp percussion combine for a dynamic, emotionally charged journey in sound. Showing love to the Detroit greats, but recognising the distinct UK influence which made him fall in love with Techno in the early 90's, it's a surprising pivot in Dennis' sound and one which all lovers of beautiful, melodic ambient techno should enjoy.

Influx is the techno/acid/trance moniker of James Bernard. With his first release in 1993 (Braineater EP on Sapho Records), Influx is no stranger to techno and acid. This project had been in hibernation for nearly 14 years until his 2021 remixes for his collaborative album with 36 and awakened souls (The Other Side of Darkness). Revel Dub is a dub-techno excursion with sprinkles of ambient and psy-trance rounding out the frequencies. The Slow Version dials back the tempo to half-time and travels to more ambient dub territories.

Review: 'PULSE 01' is the first release in PITP's new series, which is an ongoing exploration of ambient tech, while offering a more structured display of beat-driven ambient music. Pulse 01 features brand new tracks by SYNE and Influx.

SYNE is Dennis Huddleston from the UK, who is most recognized for his ambient work as 36. He returns to his SYNE alias for the first time in nearly 5 years, with only his second record since his 2017 self-titled debut LP.

'Dystalgia' is a 12 minute opus, spread over 3 movements. Soaring pads and razor sharp percussion combine for a dynamic, emotionally charged journey in sound. Showing love to the Detroit greats, but recognising the distinct UK influence which made him fall in love with Techno in the early 90's, it's a surprising pivot in Dennis' sound and one which all lovers of beautiful, melodic ambient techno should enjoy.

Influx is the techno/acid/trance moniker of James Bernard. With his first release in 1993 (Braineater EP on Sapho Records), Influx is no stranger to techno and acid. This project had been in hibernation for nearly 14 years until his 2021 remixes for his collaborative album with 36 and awakened souls (The Other Side of Darkness). Revel Dub is a dub-techno excursion with sprinkles of ambient and psy-trance rounding out the frequencies. The Slow Version dials back the tempo to half-time and travels to more ambient dub territories.

Review: A year after his debut on Chloe's Lumiere Noire label, young Mexican DJ and producer Inigo Vontier is back causing more sonic trouble with his haunting grooves and twisted sound designs. There is a tribalism and mysticism with cosmic overtones to the man's music that makes it utterly immersive and cinematic: "El Hijo Del Maiz" is an aural trip stuffed with creepy details and weird effects that have you looking over your shoulder, as if you're wandering through a haunted jungle in the dead of night. Highlights like "Bo Ni Ke" draw on shamanistic leads, while "Awaken" is the most traditional track of the lot, opting for some trance inducing grooves and dreamy vocals. Whatever he does, it's fascinating.

Review: Inner Cop Avoidance is a cult supergroup that is already surrounded by plenty of discussion and conspiracy despite only having played their first gig in 2022. Made up of Krisitan Poulsen on guitar, Mathias Saedrup guitar, Sebastian von der Heide on drums and percussion, Max Stocklosa on synth, xylophone and vocals, this self-titled album from the group lands as the inaugural drop on their own label. It is a brilliantly cacophony of electronics and percussion with twisted rhythms, post-rock guitars and a fiercely experimental approach that results in brilliantly beguiling music that somehow combines the futuristic and avant garde with bird calls and ancient shamanic ritual.

Review: Produced with the help of Flaming Lips and Mercury Rev producer Dave Fridmann, Interpol's iconic sound returns, a whopping 16 years after their acclaimed debut, Turn on the Bright Lights, and four years since their last: El Pintor. Guitars still twang and sparkle with spine tingling reverberation and the melancholy of Paul Banks vocals remains everlasting. There are grungier elements where rock and electronics take over from the emotional response of the bands sound, as heard in "Number 10", and while the dazzling impact of songs like "Obstacle 1" may be something else, there's no denying this groups heartmelthing longevity.

Review: Interpol's seventh album sees the long-standing NYC indie rock giants teaming up with the legendary production team of Flood and Alan Moulder for a trip into sadness, darkness and introspection. For devoted fans of the band, those themes should ring true and spell out another record to be cherished for those downcast days. Daniel Kessler's serpentine guitar work cuts an imposing, but ultimately graceful figure on 'Into The Night', while Samuel Fograino's propulsive drumming continues to explore meters beyond linear motorik drive and Paul Bank once more speaks from the deepest reaches of his soul.

Review: Not to be confused with the rather divisive 2011 album, Original Sin, on which a host of guest artists - Rob Thomas, Ben Harper, Mylene Gamer, Pat Monahan among others - take on the difficult task of stepping in for Michael Hutchence, joining the surviving members of INXS, Original Sinners is the real deal of the band at a time when they couldn't have been riding higher or been filled with more promise.

Recorded in 1984, this was the year when things really started happening for the Aussie alt-rock new wavers, scoring their first homeland number one ('Original Sin' - hence the title of this and the aforementioned outing), setting things up nicely for more than half a decade that would see them hit international superstardom with successive chart topping albums and singles. Packed with a synth-laden, emotionally charged and stadium filling sound, this is a snapshot of what everyone saw in them back then.

Review: Capturing the monster metal merchants live in front a massive crowd in Mexico in 1992 during their 'Fear of the Dark' tour, this selection from the setlist takes in some of the band's best known tracks, including 'The Number of the Beast', ' 'Bring Your Daughter To The Slaughter', 'Run To The Hills' and '2 Minutes To Midnight'. They're interspersed with newer efforts - 'Fear of the Dark' itself makes an appearance - alongside vintage anthems like 'Iron Maiden' (from their eponymous debut album) and 'Wrathchild' (from its successor 'Killers') dusted off for the occasion.

Review: Although he first entered a recording studio in the late 1960s, it wasn't until 1973, and the release of the Alvin 'G.G' Ranglin-produced single 'Love Is Overdue' that Gregory Isaacs career started to take off. The success of that record persuaded Ranglin to record an entire album with Isaacs, In Person, which became the now legendary reggae singer's debut full-length. This expanded edition of the album presents the album on disc one, alongside alternative dub versions and other singles Isaacs recorded with Ranglin during the period. Disc two, meanwhile, offers a celebration of Ranglin's other works of 1973 and '74 - Jamaican hit singles (and their corresponding dubs) which are largely lesser-known outside the Caribbean.

Review: There's something uniquely Japanese and slightly off-kilter about the pop-making prowess of Eiko Ishibashi, a singer-songwriter, improvisational drummer, pianist and all-round experimentalist that counts Editions Mego and Oren Ambarchi's Black Truffle as labels she has released on. She returns to Drag City, an all time Chicago label famous for records by Pavement and Stereolab to more recently music from Ty Segall and the all-talented John Mulaney. Ishibashi's music here, however, sways from heavy industrial beats to future, funky and avant pop numbers like "Iron Veil". It's a record that will take some getting used to but there's no denying you will get used to it too; if you can keep up with its modernity that comes from way out leftfield.

Review: Experimental British outfit Ishmael Ensemble have been at the heart of the innovations within the world of jazz, broken beat and electronic music of the last few years. Visions Of Light on the Severn Songs label (can you see what they did there?) built on their debut album with more noble fusions of jazz styles old and new. As the collective blur the lines between jazz and electronic music, they take us on an expansive journey with many highs and lows, different moods and grooves that ebb and flow and mix up lush cinematic compositions with left-field dub sounds that leave you wanting more. Two years on from its first release it gets this special and welcome reissue.

Review: After dropping many crucial dub albums on the likes of Twinkle Records, Music House Family, Reggae On Top, King Earthquake, and Conscious Sounds, Barry Issac now brings his brilliant vocal tones to Room In The Sky. Issac is well established as a top roots reggae talent who has worked with some of the most notable sound systems out there - Jah Shaka and Channel One being two of them. Here 12 tough riddims featuring some top talents like reggae trombonist Vin Gordon from the Skatalites and Winston Reedy who fronted The Cimarons get finished in style by his work up top. A timeless album for sure.

Review: Croatian cold synth artist Iv/An is a master of the sonic retrofuture, with his sound spanning both contemporary production hallmarks and 80s tape-hued rawness - while still managing to do this in a fully authentic way. Self & Selfish is a shining example of this: eight tracks of dark, minimal and melancholic songs that deal with themes of identity, alienation and love. This is technically a reissue; one from Iv/An's own self-released efforts, after which it soon became a highly sought-after treasure among synthwave lovers. The reissue comes on a limited white vinyl pressing and includes an extended mix of the track 'Loopholes'.

Review: Before he passed in 2018, the late, great Icelandic composer Johann Johannsson made a series of field recordings at Iceland's Ellidaar power plant which were inspired by the writings of Henry Adams. Those pieces inspired this new suite of music from Daniel Bjarnason and the Iceland Symphony Orchestra which also includes some of Johannsson's scores to Sicario and The Theory of Everything. It is a sublime work that joins the dots between all of Johannsson's work with soft drones, brass tones and chiming harpsichord all coming and going to make for emotional and dramatic tension. A fine reminder of one of the greats who sadly left us too soon.