Review: Let's face facts, the trilogy of releases that ACR:EPR completes have helped win over a new generation of fans for the band while reassuring established followers that A Certain Ratio can still do the business. They've been heartfelt and honest, truly innovative and - when all is said and done, at some point in the near future - destined to be considered collector's items.
The final chapter is certainly winding things up triumphantly. '$ouls In The City' seems to go straight for the mind's eye, an enrapturing track that chugs its way through layers of funk groove, with acid details just about audible on top. 'Night People' is a far more sticky, treacly affair, while 'Big Boy Pants' ushers in a kind of nocturnal seduction, brass and rolling breakbeats setting the scene perfectly for the ska-infused melodies of 'Downtime Vibes' that follow.
Review: A Certain Ratio have returned with their most tight and funky album, possibly ever, recently, and it is steeped in 40 years of ACR DNA. Now you can grab two of the standout singles on this fine, limited edition white 7" thanks to Daniel Miller's essential Mute. Opener 'Berlin' is the second single from that album, ACR Loco, and has breezy vocals and Trillin riffs over tight drum work. 'Dirty Boy' is riddled with squelchy synth funk, with popping drums and a great vocal performance that will get any party vibing.
Review: ACR have returned to post-punk-electronica megalabel Mute for a new 'partnership', ensuring that the entirety of their catalogue gets reissued. That being said, the unlike-anything-else-ever-heard-before band are also looking to the future, not shying away from releasing new LPs. Don't get confused; the LP '1982' was not made in 1982, it was made in the last few years, and will be released in 2023. Says it all really. Were the 80s simply better? We don't know, but perhaps a deep-dive into the album's themes can provide an implicit answer. Macuncian rapper Chunky appears throughout the moody industri-funk ensemble's new reverie, giving a present-day voice to a haunting spectre. Overall, though, you've got instrumental styles from Afrobeat, jazz, cosmic, disco, and of course, industrial post-punk, coalescing into a certain ration of wild, wild music - perfect for austere times ahead.
Review: A Certain Ratio's core trio of drummer Donald Johnson, bassist/vocalist Jez Kerr, and multi-instrumentalist Martin Moscrop make ACR Loco a perfectly fluid and funk album. In fact, on this, their first album in more than ten years, the Manchester post-punk outfit are as funky as they have ever been. Their tried and tested sound gets nicely updated with modern beat driven sounds and plenty of redefines to today's political strife in the lyrics. There are plenty of smooth and cool synth led grooves like 'Get A Grip' and messages of unity on 'Family' that we can all relate to.
Review: It All Comes Down to This is the album latest release from Manchester icons A Certain Ratio, and it's a record that is helmed by producer Dan Carey from Speedy Wunderground. Somewhat returning to their origins, the record presents ten concise tracks with a hint of the group's signature electronic flair. Notably, it's the first recording featuring the core trio of Jez Kerr, Martin Moscrop, and Donald Johnson, without any additional collaborators. From their celebrated 1982 album and right up to their dynamic last EP in 2023, this album shows the band's still evolving and still committed to new musical advancements. A testament to their enduring legacy, It All Comes Down to This solidifies A Certain Ratio's place among Manchester's finest.
Where Are You Coming From (Jane Weaver rework) (4:05)
Out From Under (Emperor Machine extended rework) (8:49)
We All Need (Jezebell Ghost Train mix) (5:47)
Review: Perhaps one of the most important bands to come out of Manchester ever. Up there with Joy Division, their funky post-punk is the very essence of that genre and possibly why a lot of bands like to call themselves post-punk. They're just wishing they sound as good as A Certain Ratio. For this latest release, the follow-up to their album It All Comes Down To This, they've reworked songs from said album - sensationally - and released a Christmas single. 'Now And Laughter' is described as an ode to "the unsung heroes that are on hand when the pressures of the festivities can become too much to bear." It's awash with sumptuous echoing guitar, a somber lead vocal which makes you want to raise your lighter and gently sway. There's a hint of David Bowie in there and the lyrics appear genuinely emotional and appreciative. This is a song of blissful poignance that can help remind us of what really matters in life as it captures a sense of vulnerability and awe in the magic of the moment.
Review: The music Venezuelan artist Alejandro Ghersi makes as Arca first came to the fore via UNO, the New York label who issued a trio of compelling releases in 2012. Arca's brand of glossy, high grade beat experimentation has seen him go on to work with Kanye West and FKA Twigs as well as release on venerated US indie Hippos In Tanks. An album deal with Mute may seem unexpected yet the UK label have a long and proud tradition of challenging conventions. Entitled Xen, Mute have described the 15 track set as full of "mercurial forms, fluxing unpredictably from smooth to spiked to sweet" and you wont get much of an idea from the soundclips. If you were charmed by the FKA Twigs set this is an album that will get your serotonins bubbling.
Review: In 1979, Cabaret Voltaire - then consisting of all three founder members, Richard H. Kirk, Stephen Mallinder and Chris Watson - recorded a soundtrack for an experimental film "for two projectors" by Babeth Mondini. 40 years on, that soundtrack has finally been given a release. It's similar in tone to some of the Sheffield experimentalists' other soundtrack work from the period, offering discordant, unsettling and otherworldly sound collages that fuse heavily modified and processed instrumental parts (guitar, bass, drums, clarinet, saxophone) with tape loops, sampled dialogue and the band's ever-present electronic tones. Whether you're an obsessive Cabs fan or not, it's well worth a listen. This is, after all, a slice of previously hidden musical history.
Review: The arrival of a new Cabaret Voltaire album - the first since 1994 according to our records - should excite all those who hold the work of the pioneering Sheffield outfit dear. It's now a solo project from Richard H Kirk (he decided to keep the name after parting company with Stephen Mallinder in the late '90s), but the distinctive stylistic ticks remain (think paranoid sonic textures, metallic percussion hits, clear dub influences, plentiful spoken word samples, curious electronic noises and nods towards the industrial funk, EBM and post-punk). Naturally it's not as ground-breaking as Kirk and company's work in the '70s and '80s, but it is undeniably a Cabaret Voltaire album - and one that subtly updates the Cabs' particular brand of dense, dancefloor-ready paranoia for a new century.
Review: The arrival of a new Cabaret Voltaire album - the first since 1994 according to our records - should excite all those who hold the work of the pioneering Sheffield outfit dear. It's now a solo project from Richard H Kirk (he decided to keep the name after parting company with Stephen Mallinder in the late '90s), but the distinctive stylistic ticks remain (think paranoid sonic textures, metallic percussion hits, clear dub influences, plentiful spoken word samples, curious electronic noises and nods towards the industrial funk, EBM and post-punk). Naturally it's not as ground-breaking as Kirk and company's work in the '70s and '80s, but it is undeniably a Cabaret Voltaire album - and one that subtly updates the Cabs' particular brand of dense, dancefloor-ready paranoia for a new century.
Review: London's legendary Mute institution goes back to its roots and digs up some of the best work by one of the UK's finest Cabaret Voltaire. These guys don't really need an introduction give the fact that they're pretty much responsible for the rise of post-punk right through to the birth of techno. It was about time a new compilation of their stuff was released, especially one as brutally on-point as this one! All the classics such as "Nag Nag Nag", "Kneel To The Boss" and "On Every Other Street" are one here but the more obscure rarities that were previously only available on 7" are the real winners. "Just Fascination", for example, is one you'll certainly want on a longer, re-mastered cut! Downright essential!
Review: When Cabaret Voltaire returned to the release schedule in 2020 as the one-man Richard H Kirk show, fans were relieved to find that mind-bending meld of 1970s Kosmische, techno, dub, house and space-age experimental electro was as pure as it ever has been - the results being a typically fresh and forward-thinking record the man in question summed up as "no nostalgia... normal rules do not apply. Something for the 21st Century. No old material."
Less than six months later and the big CV has more next level business to offer us, coming in the form of Shadow of Funk, a new EP that offers something of a counterpoint or extension to last year's full-length, Shadow of Fear. Based on 'Billion Dollar' alone - an acid-driven big, dark room banger that closes this EP -this release looks set to make an equally heavy impact, but as with anything this man touches, the joy is in discovery. So, let's leave it at that.
Review: There have always been two distinct threads to Richard H Kirk's work as Cabaret Voltaire, with or without his former collaborators Chris Watson and Stephen Mallinder. There's the clanking, moody industrial funk that marked out the band's work in the 1980s - brilliantly resurrected on last year's Kirk-only set Shadow of Fear - and even more clandestine, beat-free releases that explore the more paranoid end of the ambient and experimental electronica spectrum. BN9Drone, Kirk's second Cabs LP of 2021, swims in these murky waters, with the veteran Sheffield producer layering up dark, foreboding chords, gravelly electronic textures, droning noise and Robin Rimbaud style snippets of overheard telephone conversations and police radio chatter. It's unsettling at times but also utterly captivating, as if you're listening to a distant disaster unfold in real time.
Review: RECOMMENDED
You always feel like you've pushed through the other side of the mirror when it comes to CAN. A mysterious, groove-laden, funk-infused yet utterly lucid place where guitar hooks seem to come out of the walls, rhythmic hypnosis draws listeners ever-deeper into a place that, while perhaps not entirely theirs, is one which they helped build in the outer limits of late-1960s surrealist rock.
Laying the foundations for early progressive and krautrock with an avant-garde approach to songwriting, by the time this Stuttgart gig took place they had almost a decade of work to go at, and yet as the tracklist suggests the band always had improvisation at their core in a live setting. Concerts that would transport crowds far beyond the venue, into thick layers of melody, hooks and strange effects, every single recording of every show is a genuine moment in history never to be repeated again.
Review: During the 11 years in which they were active, krautrock pioneers CAN delivered a string of acclaimed and influential albums. They Cologne quartet was in a constant state of evolution, creating art-rock epics which frequently defied easy categorization. 1973's Future Days, which Mute has decided to remaster and reissue on gold vinyl, is a fantastic example of this. While rich in krautrock grooves that sit somewhere between jazz-rock and progressive rock, each of its four tracks has a decidedly different feel, with the sun-kissed, semi-ambient and bossa-tinged title track being followed by the wonky and percussive 'Spray' and the low-slung, funk-fuelled madness of 'Moonshake'. The headline attraction though remains the near 20-minute closer, 'Bel Air', an ever-changing, shape-shifting krautrock soundscape whose psychedelic intentions come wrapped in a hazy ambient veneer.
Review: For fans, this album contains the very essence of what made CAN such an iconic group. The band's blend of progressive rhythms and morphing, tantilizing melodies are all here in Delay 1968, which was recored in that year but not initially put out until 1981 (it was initially meant to be their debut album). Each tune comes laden with thrilling effects, tape edits, loops that makes every tune brim with vitality and a harsh, coarse texture. There is a real rawness to the whole thing that makes it a definitive garage-rock classic with some calling it a proto-CAN sound because of how they evolved in subsequent years.
Review: Mute and Spoon Records continue in their CAN retrospective bout, following up the first two parts of the long-lost CAN live series ('Brighton' and 'Stuttgart' respectively) with further re-releases of their best known albums. Here, their sci-fi prog masterpiece 'Monster Movie' gets a blue vinyl rerub, doing best justice yet to the band's debut after Holger Czukay and Irmin Schmidt left their academic careers to start the band. The twenty minute peak state 'Yoo Doo Right' sounds particularly great here, thanks to the band members overseeing the album's most recent remaster in 2004. As ever with CAN, this album has an honest, intense and raw sound.
Review: Mute and Spoon Records continue in their CAN retrospective bout, following up the first two parts of the long-lost CAN live series ('Brighton' and 'Stuttgart' respectively) with further re-releases of their best known albums. 'Soundtracks' - their 1970 album in which every song was written with the intention of being included in various German films including Deadlock, Cream and Deep End - here gets a limited purple vinyl reissue. Functionally, though, the music could form a standalone conceptual CAN album in its own right. It's also full of the dramas that go hand in hand with your usual LP output; this album marks the point at which the original vocalist for the band, Malcolm Mooney, was replaced by Damo Suzuki.
Review: In the forty-two years since the release of Ege Bamyasi, no-one has done as much to blend the spheres of experimental rock music and the avant-garde than Can, whilst also maintaining a hip-shaking primal pulse and delivering a radiant wash of kaleidoscopic sound that defies classification. Ege Bamyasi still stands as one of their crowning achievements, and one whose spooky reverberations have made their presence felt throughout a mighty chunk of the rock and dance music of the decades that have followed. An otherworldly masterclass for the ages.
Review: After 1972's seminal Ege Bamyasi, the German Krautrock legends released what is one of our personal favourite Can LPs. Aside from being the last work of theirs to feature the vocals of Damo Suzuki, it's a seriously deep and full-bodied piece of work, as you'd expect from the band. The title track itself is a hypnotic, visceral journey through space and time, but all the tracks on this are pure classics. You even get their poppier of moments in the form of "Moonshake". Don't ask any questions, just cop it. Essential gear.
Review: Live in Cuxhaven 1976 is the third release in Can's special series of live album reissues. It follows Can Live in Brighton 1975, which came out in December 2021. As with a good chunk of Can's latest releases documenting the bulk of their live appearances (which were inarguably their best performances, often outmatching their recorded material), the album consists of four instrumental pieces Eins, Zwei, Drei and Vier.
B-STOCK: Sleeve damaged but otherwise in excellent condition
Keele 77 EINS
Keele 77 ZWEI
Keele 77 DREI
Keele 77 VIER
Keele 77 FUNF
Review: ***B-STOCK: Sleeve damaged but otherwise in excellent condition***
Can Live in Keele 1977 captures a key performance from one of the most innovative bands of all time. This long remoured album features Can's late-period lineup: Irmin Schmidt, Jaki Liebezeit, Michael Karoli, and Holger Czukay, joined by Rosko Gee on bass. Czukay's shift to "waveform radio and spec. sounds" adds an otherworldly layer to the band's hypnotic, avant-garde textures. Pieced together from archival and fan recordings, the album highlights the unpredictable and experimental nature of Can's live performances during their 1976-77 peak. The inclusion of tracks that fans have long considered the best of their live work brings a raw, dynamic energy. Fans of Can's legendary improvisations will appreciate the diversity of sound, from ambient passages to intense, chaotic jams. Live in Keele 1977 stands as a crucial document of the band's legacy as they explore "inner space rock" and live sonic exploration.
Review: Live in Aston 1977, the latest installment in Can's series of live album releases, offers a fresh perspective on the band's dynamic stage presence. Released via Mute and Future Days, this release provides a glimpse into a challenging period for Can, following the mixed reception their eighth studio album, Saw Delight, elicited. Despite any expectations of a decline in energy or creativity, the live performances captured on this album defy such notions. Instead, they showcase Can's enduring vitality and adaptability, reaffirming their reputation as a band capable of captivating audiences with their unpredictable live shows. Notably, Live in Aston 1977 marks the debut of bassist Rosko Gee (Traffic) within the Can Live series. His addition to the lineup injects a fresh energy into the band's sound, complementing the innovative contributions of Irmin Schmidt, Jaki Liebezeit, Michael Karoli and Holger Czukay. Accompanied by a booklet, this release offers fans a deeper insight into Can's live performances during this period. It serves as a reminder of the band's relentless pursuit of sonic exploration and improvisation, making it a valuable addition to the Can discography for both longtime fans and newcomers alike.
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