Back catalogue: All genres

Review: After four years away from the label, Tomasz Guiddo returns to Compost Disco with a cut that defies easy categorization. It features lead vocals from Louie Austin, a classic, 'Rat Pack' style crooner who first collaborated with Guiddo back in 2016. 'Pain My Heart' combines squelchy, slow-motion grooves (complete with lo-fi, Latin-tinged drum machine beats), undeniably Balearic musical flourishes (including Spanish guitar solos and dreamy chords), and Austin's classy, emotive lead vocals. Quite where it sits is open to debate, but it's an immaculately executed and memorable song. Soundway sorts Meridian Brothers provide a suitably humid remix, adding Austin's weary vocals to loose-limbed Latin beats, deep bass and suitably tropical guitar licks. It's a revelatory revision and one of the strongest remixes we've heard so far this year.

Review: American music obsessive and archivist Jerome Derradji's Past Due Records label has got a fine compilation on its hands here. It gathers upside of the very best sounds that San Antonio-based funk band Horizon ever put out. They had a hardcore and devoted local following in the early 89s and secured a number of big radio hits. They were all released on 7"s that you will struggle to ever track down. Thankfully, each one gets assembled here across four fantastic sides of vinyl. What's more, no fewer than ten previously unreleased tracks also make the cut. These are authentic lo-fi funk gems with powerful rhythm sections and seductive vocal sounds.

Review: Lady Wray's Piece of Me is a second sizzling album of superb soul. It marked something of a homecoming for the artist as she debuted on this label back in 2016 and found her leaning towards her usual soul and r&b as well as more hip-hop influences than ever: classic boom-bap drums and chunky bass hist loud and proud and for that reason the originals are ripe for remixing as they are here. Two legends of the game in Pete Rock and Ghostface Killah step up and bring their own signature sound and dusty drum beats to make for a crucial little 7".

Review: Mr Bongo's brilliant Brazil 45 series is never more relevant than in the warmer summer months. The latest transmission from the South American country's golden period is again well mastered and cut nice and loud so that the super addictive vocal o the a-side really lodges deep in your brain. It also has a nice boogie bassline and plenty of funk in the drums. Flip it over for a more driving and hard hitting bit of samba rock with MPB grooves and a call and response male/female vocal that says over the high speed grooves.

Review: This is one of those disco holy grails that doesn't even need to convince you of its worth, and its no surprise original copies have been so coveted for so long. Chicago's Magic Touch label was a low key affair, but jams like this ensure its impact remains strong to this day as LaJohn and Sheela lay down the feeling in no uncertain terms. 'Too Far Gone' is a smouldering, bittersweet track which deserves to reach as many soulful heads as possible, so this tasty remaster courtesy of Numero couldn't come soon enough.

Review: LaJohn and Sheila's 'Too Far Gone' is an otherworldly disco cut from the Chicago label Magic Touch, which is benefitting from a reissue spotlight courtesy of Numero. The track was unearthed by Mr Peabody for a BBE compilation a long way back, but finally the tune is getting its own proper outing thanks to this tidy little 7", which comes in clear blue on this edition. Some tracks are holy grails for more than their scarcity, and this is truly one of those perfect records that everyone will want in their lives for all time once they clap ears on it.

Review: Tape Reworks Vol. 2 is the new 12" remix edition of the 2021 album Tape Works Vol. 1 (2021), by the UK's leading musique concrete ensemble Langham Research Centre. With the latter album following up the introductory Tape Works Vol. 1 (2017), which recollected the group's earliest experiments, the second album focused entirely on more recent, original splicings, cuttings and respoolings of the former modernist statement. Now, in turn, come two new remixes of the project by Kara Lis Coverdale and Beatriz Ferreyra, the former of 'Movable Fields' and the latter of 'Nachholbedurfnis'. Coverdale's version is an arresting, looming abstraction, capturing a sense of cosmic loneliness through exoplanetary whistles and deep subs gleaned from the original album's pickups of brutalist buildings; Ferreyra's is jerkier and stranger in palate, utilising glassy transitional sound effects and rapid, sped-up-slowed-down warbles.

Review: This tasty 7" single brings together two stalwarts of the thriving Finnish jazz scene, namely saxophonist Timo Lassy and drummer Teppo Makynen. It's A-side "Calling James" that hits home hardest, as Lassy adds a snaking, alluring sax solo - all parping blasts and fluid fills - to a bustling, percussively rich Makynen drum track. Despite the fact that there's no other instrumentation, it's a genuinely heavy dancefloor workout. On the flip you'll find the looser and slightly more experimental "Yanki", where Lassy provides some free-jazz style soloing over a distinctively left-of-centre Makynen drum workout.

Review: Time for some Brazilian psychedelic boogie straight from 78. Erstwhile lead singer in Os Mutantes, with a personality thrice as big as the soaking wet bassline on "Agora E Moda", Rita Lee is no stranger to her motherland - even now. Flip for a huge soul injection courtesy of Pete Dunaway. Sounding English in every direction (from his name to his lyrics to the stunning, string-coated arrangement) he's actually Sao Paulo born and is a renowned multi-instrumentalist. Check this and you can tell in an instant. Stunning.

Review: Take a trip back into the underground of early 80s Chicago and the raw, brilliant sound of the Magic Touch label. Numero have taken on the task of picking up some of the label's most sought-after jams and giving them a fresh pressing, and this sure shot from the Light Touch Band is a fine place to start. This is a record which offers two very different vibes depending on what you're after, as the A side slips into a feel-good, funked up rap joint celebrating all things Windy City and the B side takes a surprise turn into wild-eyed P-funk territory. The diggers and sharks have been circling this one for a long time - let it reach the people so they can all get down to the unreal sounds.

Review: Los Sospechos first dropped 'Jano's Revenge' on Colemine back in 2010, and it's since gone on to become a stone-cold classic of heavy funk played by the most discerning DJs. Now it's finally getting a limited repress on green marbled vinyl, giving you a fresh opportunity to savour the sweet, soulful sound and share it with the world. There's a timeless quality to this instrumental and its spiritual cousin 'Mirror Door' on the flip, where the brass section takes the leads and hammers out hooks to sink your teeth into.

Review: Los Yesterdays made a big debut on Penrose with their first single and it is still getting heavy plays by soul DJs all over the place. Now they return with another perfect delivery of mid-tempo excellence that will appeal to fans of Eddie Holman and Billy Stewart. 'Nobody's Clown' pirouettes on splashy cymbals with natty chord riffs and twirling drums that dance their way into your heart. On the flip is the more forlorn and beautifully pained 'Give Me One More Chance.' It's about a love lost, like all the best tunes, and frankly, given the performance, it is a chance Mr Victor Benavides well deserves.

Review: The Lovely Eggs are teasing their new album Eggsistentialism which arrives on Egg Records at the end of April with this lovely 7" release, 'Nothing/Everything'. It is the third time they have worked with Grammy Award-winning producer Dave Fridmann and is another masterful mystic and psychedelic sound that shows a new sound f the band. Ban member Holly has said the singles reprint the yin and yang of life in that they capture "hope and despair, patience and frustration, birth and death, the mundane and the extraordinary." It's a great direction that has got us even more ready for the album later in the month.

Review: The 65th volume in Mr Bongo's admirable Brazil 45s series shines a light on Rio De Janeiro's turn-of-the-'80s boogie scene. On the A-side you'll find "E Novamente Mas Que Nada" by Ronaldo Resado, a five-minute chunk of samba-laced boogie sunshine that was originally featured on the artist's eponymous 1979 debut album. While wonderful, it's slightly overshadowed by flipside cut "Ginga", one of the highlights from Robson Jorge and Lincoln Olivetti's sought-after 1982 full-length (which, incidentally, was recently reissued by Mr Bongo and is well worth checking). Joining the dots between synth-heavy electrofunk, horn-toting disco-funk and languid jazz-funk, the instrumental track is arguably one of the best Brazilian boogie records ever made. Don't sleep.

Review: The Izipho Soul label continues to bring us hard to find nuggets from the many-layered history of US soul music. On this latest 7" we're treated to Ron Foster's 1985 version of 'Don't Let Him Get The Best Of You', which was recorded with the 21-strong Kindred Spirits Orchestra and has been revived with a new vocal take from the original lead singer of Whirlwind, Sandi Everett. On the flip, you can enjoy an extended mix of Lee McDonald's 'Let's Play Luck', a disco-fied stomper from his classic album Sweet Magic.