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Preorders

  • Collateral 'Should've Known Better' PRE-ORDER

    Big Shot

    Collateral 'Should've Known Better' PRE-ORDER

    £11.99

    Release Date: 24/05/2024

    British four-piece rock band Collateral are set to release their highly anticipated sophomore album Should’ve Known Better on May 24, 2024. The album is distributed worldwide by Cargo. The album will be released on CD, red vinyl, picture disc, limited edition cassette, and digital. Friday February 9th will see the release of the lead single “Glass Sky.”.

    The new single “Glass Sky” and the forthcoming album Should’ve Known Better is produced by Dan Weller (Those Damn Crows, Enter Shikari, Monster Truck, Kris Barras, Holding Absence, Bury Tomorrow).

    "I love massive riffs, massive hooks and feel-good guitar music,” says Weller.  “When Collateral sent me their demos, I jumped at chance to produce their new record. I’m proud of what we managed to create.  It’s Collateral mk2 - ambitious, daring and refined. I can’t wait for people to hear it."

    Since the band released their debut album (Top 5 UK Rock Album Chart) at the start of 2020 Collateral have spent no time standing still. Covid came only weeks after the debut album was released and forced the band to cancel their highly successful tour with Phil X (Bon Jovi) halfway through. This made the band hungry to keep the momentum. With innovative ways to produce top quality live streams, the band became special guests supporting the likes of Skid Row, H.E.A.T and Reckless Love.

    The exciting and flamboyant Kent-based rock and roll band are comprised of Angelo Tristan (lead vocals, guitar), Louis Malagodi (guitar), Jack Bentley-Smith (bass) and Ben Atkinson (drums).

    On October 21, 2022, Collateral independently released a re-mixed and re-mastered version of their debut album “Re-Wired” which featured Jeff Scott Soto, Phil X, Kee Marcello, Rudy Sarzo, Danny Vaughn, and Joel Hoekstra. The re-release saw the band in the Official UK Rock Charts at #12. 

    After the gruelling back-to-back tours with Skid Row, H.E.A.T and Reckless Love, the band ignited a spark and strengthened their already loyal fanbase leading them to win the opening slot at 2023s Stonedead Festival, leading the band to perform their biggest show.

    Collateral’s hotly tipped sophomore album looks like it will take them to the next level. A lot of people don’t know what to expect from the new album, as the band have been tight-lipped about the new songs. Collateral have created a state-of-the-art rock album that will immerse listeners in their rock music universe, enabling fans to feel the blood, sweat and glory that went into the recording of every song.

    “We felt that our debut album was lacking the production,” reflects Collateral’s frontman, Angelo Tristan. “For the sophomore album, I wanted to make sure that this time we left no room for error and so got one of the hottest producers in the music industry, Dan Weller, to help lift these songs into a new dimension. With Dan’s pioneering studio expertise, this album has massive production quality that enables you to get lost in each character-filled track. Dan really brought out the emotions we were trying to portray and has achieved it with his own unique style.”

    “We wanted this album to express where we were in our own lives since the release of our first. So much has happened since then, I mean the world shut down for what felt like a lifetime! And it was obvious that people were going to need some sort of optimism.  I hope ‘Glass Sky’ is one of those songs that gives people the belief to find themselves again.”

    “Whereas, the feel-good ‘Just One Of Those Days’ is trying to find the good side of a bad day. Me being me, couldn’t help but to write a big power ballad, ‘The Long Road’, that I wrote from a very hard and deep place, in hope that it could maybe bring some peace and comfort to people who need it. I think there’s all aspects of life running though this album and what it means to us will remain in our hearts forever.”

    “Should’ve Known Better” is an album that goes beyond specific music genres,” says Angelo. “It’s almost like a soundtrack to a beating heart.  It’s an album that will remain timeless in years to come.” 

    Tracklisting:
    1. Glass Sky
    2. Original Criminal
    3. One Of Those Days
    4. Teenage Dreams
    5. Elysium
    6. On The Long Road
    7. No Place For Love
    8. Game Changer
    9. Final Stand
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  • Cowtown 'Fear Of...' Vinyl LP - Teal & White Marble PRE-ORDER

    Gringo Records

    Cowtown 'Fear Of...' Vinyl LP - Teal & White Marble PRE-ORDER

    £20.49

    Release Date: 31/05/2024

    First album in 8 years from Leeds Devo-esque DIY punk trio, full of three minute pop blasts.

    Surviving five years as a band on the UK underground scene is difficult to do, lasting for 20 takes a near miracle. However, Cowtown – Leeds formed and raised trio of Hilary Knott (keys/vocals), Jonathan Nash (guitars/vocals) and David Shields (drums) – arrive blinking into 2024 not only intact and able to celebrate two decades together as bandmates and friends, but armed with Fear Of… their first new record in eight years, and a collection of songs that hand-on-heart, away from the sales speak, may be their best work to-date.

    Friendship can keep a band going for so long, but it’s more than that that’s seen this ostensibly DIY band enjoy European tours with heroes Deerhoof and Quasi, play festivals at home and abroad, and during several periods of time in their history become the most requested hometown support in their native Leeds for any touring band worth their salt – not to mention their own ability to continually sell out shows up and down the UK with little to no backing.

    Other projects have come and gone – Nash perhaps most notably as drummer in Hookworms which has since evolved into Holodrum; Knott stepping further into the experimental undergrowth as Basic Switches, among other collaborative efforts – yet the band have remained.

    Their fizzed-up brand of Devo-esque punk full of pop smarts has never stood still, constantly being updated and tweaked to sound timeless and subsequently outlast whichever latest guitar sub-genre has cycled back into fashion once again. Always though, Cowtown have kept at their core a warm sense of humour, positivity and the cartoonishly abstract song writing sense that’s always felt like their own small corner of the musical world

    A 20-year habit is hard to kick though and the group came to the same conclusion as everyone else; which was to crack on and try not to fear the outcome – and so Fear Of… is here. Silly as it might be to say for a band whose members are living through middle age, there’s a newer maturity to Cowtown’s sound.

    That doesn’t mean a monotone faced dumbing down of the frenzied hooks and two-minute blasts that they’ve cornered the market in – heck, the 11 tracks here clock in at a combed 30 minutes or so – but there is the slightest of breathing spaces given here and there.

    Wonderboy II is a typically all-guns-blazing intro to the album but then they just as quickly change direction, with the angular march of Can’t Talk Now that purposefully strides into a big chorus rather than rushing breathlessly up to it as they might have done previously. As Close To Town As I Like It meanwhile glides along underneath Knott’s more measured turn on lead vocal; she takes centre stage on Sea Lions too which recollects Dolittle-era Pixies in its ascendant guitar riffs thudding percussion.

    There’s still plenty of moments where the trio take the clutch fully off, of course – Thru Being Zuul, Offend Kliph and Total Engagement are two tracks that are the kind of giddy, breathless slices of pop punk (not that kind) fun that the band have made their staple over the past 20 years.

    Currently Unavailable meanwhile is a suitable rousing finale that touches euphoric heights. Ultimately for Cowtown that search for positivity remains their guiding force; 20 years in and at times it can feel harder than ever for the trio to find it, but Fear Of… is the sound of a band who can still find celebration in the simple importance of being able to make music with your best mates.

    Tracklisting:
    1. Wonderboy II
    2. Can't Talk Now
    3. Thru Being Zuul
    4. Offend Kliph
    5. Total Engagement
    6. As Close To Town As I Like To Get
    7. Humble Practitioner
    8. No Excursions
    9. Sea Lions
    10. Peace In Our Time
    11. Currently Unavailable
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  • Crumbs 'You’re Just Jealous' PRE-ORDER

    Skep Wax Records

    Crumbs 'You’re Just Jealous' PRE-ORDER

    £11.99

    v

    Skep Wax Records

    Crumbs 'You’re Just Jealous' PRE-ORDER

    £21.99

    Release Date: 10/05/2024

    New Album From The Most Danceable Post-Punk Pop Band In The UK.

    It’s like something has exploded!

    CRUMBS have been incubating this, their second album, for a few years now.  Who knows how they kept all the energy in check.  It must have been like sitting on a volcano.  The songs burst out with pure pop fire, sending splinters of guitar, sharp lyrics and snatches of the catchiest backing vocals.

    The rhythm section (Jamie and Gem): it’s like Delta 5 meeting Le Tigre in a dark alley in Leeds, fusing blindly and completely, and then forcing its way into the back entrance of a venue, sending volts through the limbs of the unwitting punters, forcing them to dance. This is TIGHT.

    And as the lights come on and the indie kids throw themselves around, Ruth’s vocals sweetly assault their ears with anger, joy, political intelligence - and all around, Stuart’s guitar, sometimes twangly-melodic like the B52s, sometimes sweet and ringing like a memory of Scars, sometimes furious and feeding back, keeps you alert and thirsty for more.

    These songs do NOT outstay their welcome.  Starts and ends are cut hard: no pre-echo, no wistful, drawn-out regretful fade-outs. CRUMBS have imbibed the key lessons taught by The Gang Of Four and The Au Pairs: never let the energy dissipate.  But there is more than anger here. The band have smuggled a pop sweetness into the disciplined shapes of their angular songs. You’re Just Jealous has sharp edges, but it’s generous too.

    CRUMBS - a brief history.  They are based in Leeds, where they are active movers in the DIY scene that currently thrives in the North of England. They recorded a Marc Riley session in 2016, released their first album (on Everything Sucks) in 2017, toured extensively in 2018 and 2019, playing at the Brudenell Social Club with Swearin’ and Jeffrey Lewis, and at plenty of fests such as LaDIYfest and Specialist Subject’s birthday all dayer in Bristol, A Real Cool Fest in Bradford, Mousetival in Stockton and the Cambridge Indiepop Alldayer.

    They spent the pandemic creating these new, tightly-wound, irresistible pop songs.

    Tracklisting:
    1. You’re Just Jealous
    2. Stab Alley
    3. Dear Deirdre
    4. Diy Sos
    5. Rest In Pieces
    6. Let’s Not
    7. 4291
    8. Call Now
    9. What’s It Means
    10. Sad Snoopy
    11. Mambo No.6
    12. Too Many Creeps

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  • Curling 'No Guitar (Deluxe Edition)' CD PRE-ORDER

    Royal Oakie

    Curling 'No Guitar (Deluxe Edition)' CD PRE-ORDER

    £11.99

    Release Date: 24/05/2024

    No Guitar (Deluxe Edition) combines the original album with two instrumental bonus tracks from the sessions, “Cavalry” and “C2”, a lush and intricate collection that covers a ton of ground—from the bittersweet jangle of power-pop, to indie-folk, Midwestern emo, and much more.

    You can hear shades of shoegaze in “Hi-Elixir”, where a massive wall of fuzzy guitars recalls My Bloody Valentine; “Patience” has a sweet-and-sour bite that recalls acts like Archers of Loaf and Shudder to Think; while “URDoM” swings and sways with a tapestry of guitars reminiscent of American Football and Mineral.

    The album marks the latest evolution for cross-continental duo Bernie Gelman and Joseph Brandel, who first met in high school and have been fusing their own unique musical sensibilities ever since, with Gelman operating out of the San Francisco Bay Area while Brandel currently resides in Japan.

    “…this is the sound of the days before smartphones and the Internet got in the way of seeking adventure, of not knowing what the band sounded like before going to watch them, of taking a punt on an album that you actually had to buy to hear.” - Monolith Cocktail

    “No Guitar squares all the previous works, making the songs much more impressionistic and imposing, at the same time moving away from the lo-fi trace that is common in their last two works, making the story really unpredictable and exciting” - Northern Transmissions

    “...a remarkable sonic pastiche of many genres and eras.” - American Pancake

    “...drives a sound that is effortless, cloaking the heavy thematic undertones such as isolation, romantic heartbreak, and the loss of a loved one. The lush and intricate songs cover a myriad of stylistic grounds, from power-pop’s punchy bittersweetness and rustling indie folk to the openhearted intricacy of Midwestern emo.” – Ghettoblaster

    Tracklisting:
    1. Shamble
    2. Pastoral
    3. Pop Song
    4. URDoM
    5. Reflector Mage
    6. Dysfunction
    7. Majesty
    8. Hi-Elixir
    9. Patience
    10. Husk
    11. Hotel
    12. No Guitar
    13. Cavalry (Bonus Track)
    14. C2 (Bonus Track)
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  • David Kuhnlein 'Bloodletter' Book + 4 Art Cards PRE-ORDER

    Amphetamine Sulphate

    David Kuhnlein 'Bloodletter' Book + 4 Art Cards PRE-ORDER

    £21.49

    Release Date: 24/05/2024

    I WILL FILL MY BELOVED MEXICO WITH BETTER DISFIGURED GHOSTS

    David Kuhnlein writes like he’s casting a spell. Bloodletter is entrancingly evil, every sentence a revelation and a curse: “How much can you care for someone if you can’t afford to dress them in a body bag? ”

    A grotesque world unfurls from his searing prose: “Ghosts reveal their measurements in smoke, different shades, more rings in the middle if they died long ago. Satan can’t keep up.” Blood sacrifices have never been so beautiful. -- Danielle Chelosky

    "Half our clothes are on the floor. The other half hang from the ceiling. Labyrinthine flesh-piles make a staircase. Polishing the soot off a breast with my sleeve, I dance horizontally. The band regurgitates into their instruments to slow the tempo, blowing catchy bubbles of sick. Sweat snows upward, stagnant when we see ourselves pooled within it, mosquitoes in a tin can. Vestigial, amoebic replications, abominable degenerations of the ape, totems fucked through stained glass. I toast the trash.
    Out of mounds, shaved together into a consciousness, a golden star excretes, floating toward me in a mist, apples singed in her teenaged hair, waist the width of a cigarette. I’m going to bugger her so hard they’ll have to put a serial number on the headstone. “If I’m to your taste, mister, this might spell the end for you.” What more could I ask of a woman?
    A heart condition of a child, torqued to breed too soon. I offer dialectic fugues, 77 press her forehead, cast a sigil tuned to the cacophony around us. Swaying, she enters a canyon trance, plummeting under magma.
    Beautiful funerals for all my friends. Remember me as an itch."

    With cover design, illustrations and Art Cards by Steven Purtill (Human Rights, Coyote, Small Talk at the Clinic etc.)
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  • Fm3 'Buddha Machine SE 2024' PRE-ORDER

    CVMK

    Fm3 'Buddha Machine SE 2024' PRE-ORDER

    £27.99

    Release Date: 10/05/2024

    FM3 proudly presents the Buddha Machine SE. This special edition, will be available beginning May 2024 in two sleek metallic colors — Silver and Graphite.
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  • Fu Manchu 'The Return Of Tomorrow' PRE-ORDER

    At the Dojo

    Fu Manchu 'The Return Of Tomorrow' PRE-ORDER

    £12.99

    Release Date: 14/06/2024

    The Return Of Tomorrow is Fu Manchu’s first new album in 6 years, and they made sure that it was worth the wait. Their 14th album is their 1st double LP of new material and it was conceived of as a vinyl listening experience.

    The first LP features 7 songs in their iconic heavy fuzz sound including the first single, “Hands Of The Zodiac” and the relentlessly catchy “Loch Ness Wrecking Machine.” The second LP sees the band mellowing out with 6 slower tempo jams including the synth inflected “Solar Baptized” and the title track.

    Both LPs are 45RPM for the thickest possible sound.

    CD listeners need not worry, as this version of the album was mastered specifically for the format.

    Like the band’s most recent album, Clone Of The Universe, and the band’s 3 part Fu30 EP series, The Return Of Tomorrow was recorded at The Racket Room in Santa Ana, California by Jim Monroe (Adolescents, Ignite) and co-produced with Fu Manchu.

    This limited edition release of 4,000 units is packaged in a glossy gatefold jacket with printed sleeves featuring live photos of the band and includes one “Space” colored LP and one “Sky” colored LP.

    Tracklisting:
    1. Dehumanize
    2. Loch Ness Wrecking Machine
    3. Hands Of The Zodiac
    4. Haze The Hides
    5. Roads Of The Lowly
    6. (Time Is) Pulling You Under
    7. Destroyin’ Light
    8. Lifetime Waiting
    9. Solar Baptized
    10. What I Need
    11. The Return Of Tomorrow
    12. Liquify
    13. High Tide


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  • Girls In Synthesis 'Sublimation' PRE-ORDER

    Own It

    Girls In Synthesis 'Sublimation' PRE-ORDER

    £7.99

    Release Date: 03/05/2024

    After two critically acclaimed albums (2020’s ‘Now Here’s An Echo From Your Future’ and 2022’s ‘The Rest Is Distraction’), and numerous mini-album, EP and single releases, London-based trio Girls In Synthesis return in May ’24 with their new statement; their third album ‘Sublimation’.

    If you thought you knew GIS, think again… they have moved on and created a dark and intense, yet melodic, collection of songs; their take on an angular pop record. Opening song ‘Lights Out’ is split into two distinct sections; the opening a Barrett-esque vocal and guitar lament to sleep deprived anxiety which morphs, via a ‘Faust Tapes’ influenced freeform noise section, into a stomping, high intensity closing blitz.

    Tracks such as ‘Deceit’, ‘We Are Here’ and ‘Picking Things Out Of The Air’ see the group at their most melodic to date, minimising some of the chaotic noise elements of their signature sound and bringing to the fore impassioned, soaring vocals and keys melodies.

    Their trademark, driving drums and bass foundation is particularly evident on songs ‘I Judge Myself’ and ‘Corrupting Memories’, but is counterbalanced by intense, early goth influenced keyboard lines, bringing influences from late 1970s/early 1980s into focus with the contemporary GIS intensity. Slow-burning tracks ‘I Was Never There’ and ‘The Prefix’ build up tension and atmosphere with sparse arrangements and circular, spiralling outros, while closer ‘A Damning Lesson’ sees the band return to their intense, bludgeoning wall of sound only to send it into a blur of echoing drum machine, reminiscent of the early work of Cabaret Voltaire.

    Lyrically, GIS prove themselves head and shoulders above their contemporaries, leaving the pastiche sloganeering and lecturing to those wishing to preach to the converted, and reach inside to bring forth poetic and challenging analysis of the anxiety and emotional turmoil of self-reflection and human relationships.

    Booked in for extensive UK/EU touring throughout May and June, the band will be adapting their white-heat live show to bring subtlety and clarity to the new songs from ‘Sublimation’, losing none of their unique and intense performance in the process. Be ready…

    Tracklisting:
    1. Lights Out
    2. Deceit
    3. Semblance of Choice
    4. We Are Here
    5. Corrupting Memories
    6. I Was Never There
    7. Picking Things Out Of The Air
    8. I Judge Myself
    9. Subtle Differences
    10. The Prefix
    11. A Damning Lesson
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  • Kevin Richard Martin 'Black' Vinyl 2XLP PRE-ORDER

    Intercranial Records

    Kevin Richard Martin 'Black' Vinyl 2XLP PRE-ORDER

    £26.99

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    Intercranial Records

    Kevin Richard Martin 'Black' Vinyl 2XLP PRE-ORDER

    £26.99

    Release Date: 17/05/2024

    'Black' is a musical eulogy to Amy Winehouse, a heartfelt memorial to a sorrowful demise. Its an album of predominantly beatless ambience possessed by the ghost of 'Back to Black'. Fragmented moods and hypnotic drones melt together as its circular beauty is set adrift, floating away into an endless void, where the original only remains in spirit alone.

    It doesn’t make particular sense why I was drawn to this idea and compelled to immerse myself in the original song, and her life in general, but sometimes you just have to roll with your muse. Having barely registered her whilst she was alive and not cared for Mark Ronson's poptastic productions, it was only when I heard of her tragic death that it struck an unexpected chord, recalling the same surreal emotional impact as when I had heard of Kurt Cobain's premature passing previously. Both figures were unarguably gifted, but both left this planet largely without essential support, whilst they were at the peak of their powers and on top of the musical world.

    Gone too soon and departed too young, a world-weary voice carried on a downward spiral, Amy Winehouse seemed trapped in her self-destructive descent. It was only years later, whilst randomly watching Asif Kapadia's moving bio doc 'Amy' on a long-distance flight, that I realised the scale of her greatness and the tragedy of the circumstances that led to her untimely death.

    This album is simultaneously a treatise on lovelessness, tragedy and loss, echoing the absence of a support network when it matters most during such a freefall. And just as myself and others I know shed tears watching that 'Amy' documentary, this album is as much a reaction to the universal emotional themes conveyed within that touching documentary as to the tragic life of Amy herself.

    I have been working on the idea of this sonic album for over a year, and the slo-mo dream rotations remain as blurred and impressionistic as they are repetitive and haunting. An eerie cocktail of spectral jazz, shoegaze drone and dubbed out ambient music, it continues the solo path I have been developing as KRM. I hope it strikes a chord. - Kevin Richard Martin.

    Double LP in a gatefold sleeve designed by Simon Fowler. Long-awaited vinyl release for this critically acclaimed album from October 2023. Featured in The Quietus (best albums of 2023), Mojo (4/5) and Louder Than War. 

    "As a cocktail of phantasmatic jazz, all spectral, shattered glass shoegaze drones and dubbed up, doped out ambient grooves like a cavernous spar turned into a swamp, it’s a wholly beatless affair that exists in the negative spaces and deeper recesses of the slo-mo, subzero subconscious fairgrounds littered around the inner emotional grids of the universe." Louder Than War

    Tracklisting:
    1. Loveless
    2. Black
    3. Cynthia's Passing
    4. Love You Much, Love Too Much
    5. On Top Of The World
    6. Camden Crawling
    7. Blake's Shadow
    8. One Hundred Deaths
    9. Belgrade Meltdown
    10. To Disappear
    11. Rest In Peace
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  • Laura J Martin 'Prepared' PRE-ORDER

    Summer Critics

    Laura J Martin 'Prepared' PRE-ORDER

    £12.99

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    Summer Critics

    Laura J Martin 'Prepared' PRE-ORDER

    £20.49

    Release Date: 17/05/2024

    Following the release of her 2016 album On The Never, Never, Martin knew that she wanted to take a break from writing and recording music. She moved back to Liverpool, from London, and began an apprenticeship with world renowned flute maker Willy Simmons.

    “I was now looking at an instrument I’d been playing all my life at a molecular level. The discipline and repetitiveness of learning a craft freed my mind from thinking about songs for a bit and made me focus instead on some of the toxic chemicals and blow torches used to make the flutes,” she says. “I’ve never been a particularly mindful person; I’m usually zipping from one thing to the next and this work had a pace of its own which I had to submit to. As well as making flutes, I was also repairing them, and this was the part I most enjoyed – the process of renewal. In a corny way, I experienced this renewal myself.”

    Following this period, Martin felt inspired to make music again and began setting up her own home studio. “Around this time, I’d started to listen to Joanna Brouk and the I am the Center compilation of early New Age music on Numero Group. This music was nothing like my own but seemed to extend from the Harmonia records I love and exist outside of the album, gig, tour regime. It was so inspiring and freeing, and I tentatively began to experiment in the studio, with the textures of Brouk’s song ‘Maggi’s Flute’ in mind.”

    Working closely with co-producer Iwan Morgan (Euros Childs, Cate Le Bon, Gruff Rhys, Georgia Ruth), the pair found themselves drawn to drum machines that wouldn’t stay in time, and a piano with a tuning mind of its own. “I rediscovered the sense of play which brought me into music in the first place,” says Martin. “The palette was infinite and without boundaries. Where my previous records had always operated within the instinct / lack of budget axis, I now had the possibility to sculpt sound, to remake, blend and remodel it for the first time.”

    Living next to the main 86 bus route into Liverpool City Centre prompted the idea behind ‘Outside at Night’, of parallel lives on different journeys. ’Three Days’ mines a similar theme but focuses on the hidden lives we share with others, the shift workers paradox. “It asks, do we really know what happens to our closest people when they leave the house?” explains Martin.

    Album opener ‘Prepared’ is a hymn to self-reliance but not to perfection, to working your own routes and abandoning the tape measure.  In part it’s about looking back at ways you judged yourself in past encounters and not recognising yourself: “I turned away again, was I even there?”.  Tied in counterpoint to this, closing track ‘Open Door’ works as a prism through which to view the album (copious drum machines, swelling synths).  It’s also as an answer of sorts to Martin’s search - new possibilities rage from cascading melodic and atmospheric structures, reaching some kind of midway between Harmonia’s ‘Deluxe’ and the polyrhythms of Francis Bebey’s Psychedelic Sanza.

    Across the record there are vocal and sonic contributions from co-producer Iwan Morgan. “Iwan maintains he’s not a musician but kept singing in the studio and eventually I managed to persuade him to put it on record,” says Martin.  ’Living on the Wall’ is the clearest example of this, exuberant monster truck beats, insistent pianos and vocals delivered without irony, think Wrong Way Up era John Cale and Brian Eno meets YMOs ‘Firecracker’.

    Collaborative sojourns to Marco Rea's The Barne studio in Clydebank and Mike Lindsay (Tunng, LUMP) in Margate allowed Martin to coax standout contributions from both, shaping the album as both artist and co-producer. The result is a unique fusion of folk, electronic, and experimental pop music that defies expectations and challenges the boundaries of contemporary music.

    “In a twisting but circuitous way, Prepared is my composted scrapbook of the last couple of years. I was prepared to follow where the sounds took me, the sonic train left the station and led me on its merry way,” she says. “It’s not an album about flute repairing but it wouldn’t have happened without learning the discipline of preparedness, the small movement, the tweak and the renewal from Willy Simmons.”

    About Laura J Martin

    Laura J Martin has so far released three solo albums. Her latest, On The Never Never, was recorded in Nashville with members of Lambchop, Silver Jews and Jesus Lizard. A mercurial and bewitching live performer who interweaves layers of vocals, flute, mandolin and electronics; Laura and her band have toured regularly across the UK and Europe and supported acts such as PJ Harvey, Teenage Fanclub, Cate Le Bon and performed and collaborated extensively with Euros Childs. Consistently played and supported by BBC Radio 6 Music DJs such as Marc Riley, Cerys Matthews, Lauren Laverne, Gideon Coe and Stuart Maconie; Laura's most recent release was a collaborative project 'Wyndow' written with Lavinia Blackwall of Trembling Bells and released in 2021.

    “An understated marvel” Uncut

    “Beautiful and intelligent stuff” The Quietus

    "An extremely unique sound, I love the combinations of textures she puts together"
    BBC Radio 6 Music, Lauren Laverne

    Tracklisting:

    1. Prepared
    2. Counting Time
    3. Living on the Wall (feat. Iwan Morgan)
    4. A Better Story
    5. Three Days
    6. Outside at Night
    7. The Dials
    8. Magic Mornings (feat. Iwan Morgan)
    9. Open Door
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  • Male Tears 'Paradísco' PRE-ORDER

    Avant! Records

    Male Tears 'Paradísco' PRE-ORDER

    £12.99

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    Avant! Records

    Male Tears 'Paradísco' PRE-ORDER

    £25.49

    Release Date: 12/07/2024

    One mere year after their previous pitch-black sounding album Krypt, LA outfit Male Tears is back with a new full-length and – oh boy – everything is changed.
    The used-to-be duo is now a four piece with James Edward as the sole founding member remaining and apparently this new line-up helped the original vocalist to shapeshift again.

    Remember their very first debut album from 2021 and those dark synthpop sounds?
    With their upcoming fourth album (in only three years), this American electronic-pop act from Southern California doubles the stakes once again and where Krypt was all about being goth and gloomy and disturbingly paroxysmal, Paradisco is somehow quite the opposite.

    Eight new tracks of pure italo disco, hi-NRG and freestyle bliss that pick up where the band left off three years ago to pursue much darker realms. Now that the quest for darkness is done, it is time to polish our nails and dress up for the night-out cause there's more in life than feeling sorry for yourself. Yes you will need to cut out the deadwood but there is no change in stillness.

    So join Male Tears and their new arsenal of bangers and floor fillers with assertive titles such as Out of my Life, Regret 4 Nothing and Leave it Alone.

    Get yourself wrapped up in one warm cover of delicate nostalgia and reborn romanticism, driven by sounds that  pay homage equally to Miko Mission and Ken Laszlo, Lisa Lisa and Exposé and, well yeah, even The Smiths because say what you wanna say but you simply cannot not love The Smiths.

    Embrace the vintage vibes that organically propagate from this new record's grooves and get in the mood for this new course in full-on 1980's Pop.

    Tracklisting:
    1. Talk to Me
    2. Leave it Alone (feat. Corlyx)
    3. Sex on Drugs
    4. Out of my Life
    5. Where Is It?
    6. He Wants Everything
    7. Regret 4 Nothing
    8. This Party Ends in Tears (feat. Digital Love)
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  • Marina Allen 'Eight Pointed Star' PRE-ORDER

    Fire Records

    Marina Allen 'Eight Pointed Star' PRE-ORDER

    £12.99

    Release Date: 07/06/2024

    The third album of powerfully vivid songwriting from Marina Allen. Beautifully orchestrated, highly melodic and delivered with unrivalled lyrical perspective. Across two acclaimed records, the Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter has ripened a rare harvest, but her third studio album is an arrival home.

    Taking fragments and stories from Marina’s past, Eight-Pointed Star deftly weaves together a new future, in what feels for all the world like a glittering, clear-eyed modern classic of alternative folk and Americana. For fans of Aldous Harding, Fiona Apple and Waxahatchee.

    Ineffable and timeless, this collection of songs holds a curiosity that’s as open to you as you are to them. Compared to the soaring and swelling compositions of Allen’s second album Centrifics or the innocent tranquillity of Candlepower, the world of Eight Pointed Star is more deeply addressing and open-armed.

    It favours a type of soul-searching that doesn’t dwell in complications, and is open to answers. Rolling guitars rise and fall with the canyons and dust is kicked-up from the red scarred earth. Allen’s vocals pure and crystalline whilst the instrumentation is rich and bursting with brightness. You can hear contentment radiating from the music, with Chris Cohen’s production offering a full-band affair.

    Allen’s affection runs deepest for singers who in her words can really sing, from The Roches to Karen Dalton, Joanna Newsom to Meredith Monk. But these influences vanish like ghosts in the attic when she starts to sing herself. Allen has a voice that stands up to the canon – inimitable – and it’s never sounded more resolute than it does here.

    Tracklisting:
    Side A
    1. I'm the Same
    2. Deep Fake
    3. Red Cloud
    4. Swinging Doors
    5. Bad Eye Opal

    Side B
    6. Easy
    7. Love Comes Back
    8. Landlocked
    9. Between Seasons
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  • Nikolas Schreck 'The Manson File: Myth and Reality of an Outlaw Shaman' Book PRE-ORDER

    Surrealist Research

    Nikolas Schreck 'The Manson File: Myth and Reality of an Outlaw Shaman' Book PRE-ORDER

    £29.99

    Release Date: 21/06/2024

    "A major work in elegant prose that will captivate and challenge anyone who thinks they know the story of Charles Manson." - Dr Stephen Harper, author of Madness, Power & The Media, University of Portsmouth

    Based on thirty years of research, the story of notorious outlaw, musician and folk devil Charles Manson is revealed to be one of the most twisted and depraved cover-ups in American history.

    A landmark in cultural reportage, Nikolas Schreck’s epic long-read shows with meticulous detail how a confluence of Hollywood, the music industry, organized crime and the judiciary colluded to conceal the real motives for the 1969 “Helter Skelter” killing spree.

    Structured like a proverbial helter skelter, this groundbreaking work cracks open the official story to reveal the interconnected aspects of Charles Manson as philosopher, musician, revolutionary and patsy.

    An essential textbook for scholars and a mighty “true crime” book for the general reader, The Manson File reveals a secret history of America in a narrative as artful as a great novel.


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  • Royal Trux 'Twin Infinitives' Vinyl 2xLP - Silver PRE-ORDER

    Fire Records

    Royal Trux 'Twin Infinitives' Vinyl 2xLP - Silver PRE-ORDER

    £28.99

    Release Date: 14/06/2024

    Originally released in 1990, Royal Trux’s ‘Twin Infinitives’ is being re-issued in all its (yet to be translated) alien glory, by Fire Records. A dismantled overture that sprawls out over two records, an avant-garde masterpiece that was the spark for Drag City Records and generations of new sound seeking musicians.

    Hailed in the same immortal breath as Beefheart’s ‘Trout Mask Replica’, the Velvets’ at their frenzied peak and Ornette Coleman at his most avant-garde, the duo of Pussy Galore’s Neil "Michael" Hagerty and Jennifer Herrema recorded ‘Twin Infinitives’ while imbibing all kinds of mind-altering substances to create an inadvertent blueprint for what the duo was building with moog’s, guitars and melodicas to name a few ingredients.

    It is the legendary second album from the masters of the genre mashup - long before “genre mashups” even existed. Arguably, the term “mashup” was coined to describe what Trux, as they subconsciously scrolled through the radio stations of their lives.

    The album’s chaotic sound and offbeat construction laid the foundations for a string of Royal Trux albums that spiralled between genres, tunings, and noise. Through the 90s they would re-invent the rock ‘n’ roll ethic, straddle alien surf music, re-align boogie rock, not to mention 80s hair metal, and confound critics by their wildly meandering and courageous rites of passage.

    Remastered as part of a career spanning catalogue deal with Fire Records. The infamous and influential duo of Jennifer Herrema and Neil Hagerty will be delving into the archive with a comprehensive reissue series, unearthing the vaults and revisiting what made them such a compelling benchmark for their contemporaries and imitators. Reawakening their prolific output within a new monochrome vinyl series covering 1988-1993, they begin with their seminal deconstructed rock masterpiece Twin Infinitives.

    “Sounding like a subway ride inside a television inside an earthquake inside the end of the world and a pounding death rhythm of apocalyptic now.”

    - Pitchfork

    Tracklisting:
    Disc One
    A1. Solid Gold Tooth
    A2. Ice Cream
    A3. Jet Pet
    A4. RTX-USA
    A5. Kool Down Wheels
    B1. Chances Are The Comets In Our Future
    B2. Yin Jim Versus The Vomit Creature
    B3. Osiris

    Disc Two
    C1. (Edge Of The) Ape Oven
    D1. Florida Avenue Theme
    D2. Lick My Boots
    D3. Glitterbust
    D4. Funky Son
    D5. Ratcreeps
    D6. New York Avenue Bridge
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  • Shellac 'To All Trains' PRE-ORDER

    Touch And Go Records

    Shellac 'To All Trains' PRE-ORDER

    £16.49

    v

    Touch And Go Records

    Shellac 'To All Trains' PRE-ORDER

    £30.49

    Release Date: 17/05/2024

    THE BAND

    It’s still: Steve Albini - Guitar. Todd Trainer - Drums. Bob Weston - Bass.

    DATA
    This is Shellac’s sixth studio LP. Recording & Mixing took place at Electrical Audio in Chicago over a bunch of long weekends in November, 2017; October, 2019; September, 2021; and March, 2022. The record was mas-tered by Bob & Steve at Chicago Mastering Service.

    PACKAGING
    LP and CD packaging and artwork are identical (the CD is just smaller). Bob took all the photos; some with a fancy camera and some with a telephone.

    QC
    Audio quality is paramount, as always, with Shellac. The LPs are being manufactured by Green Vinyl Records using an injection molding process. This new process uses 100% recyclable PET (like soda bottles) and is environmentally friendly, containing no PVC or Phthalates. The process also uses 79% less CO2 than conventional hydraulic PVC vinyl presses. The records weigh 180 grams.

    Tracklisting:
    Side A
    1. WSOD
    2. Girl From Outside
    3. Chick New Wave
    4. Tattoos
    5. Wednesday

    Side B
    1. Scrappers
    2. Days Are Dogs
    3. How I Wrote How I Wrote Elastic Man (cock & bull)
    4. Scabby the Rat
    5. I Don’t Fear Hell
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  • The Lovely Eggs 'Eggsistentialism' PRE-ORDER

    Egg Records

    The Lovely Eggs 'Eggsistentialism' PRE-ORDER

    £12.99

    Release Date: 17/05/2024

    The Lovely Eggs will release their seventh new album “Eggsistentialism” on Friday May 17th on Egg Records. Their third collaboration with Grammy Award winning producer Dave Fridmann, “Eggsistentialism” will be released on ltd edition “mind green” green 12” vinyl with more breath taking mind boggling art-work by illustrator Casey Raymond.

    “Eggsistentialism” sees The Lovely Eggs return after a 4 year break since their Number One Independent Selling Album “I am Moron”. During that time they have made their own TV show Eggs TV (featuring Ian McKaye, Stewart LeeKatie Puckrik, Maxine Peake, David Shrigley and more), dueted with Iggy Pop, played a load of sold-out gigs and festivals and fought a campaign to save Lancaster Music Co-op (a community rehearsal rooms and recording studio where they live).

    Recorded at home in Lancaster, with production advice from Dave Fridmann, the album was mixed at Tarbox Road Studios, NY with Dave Fridmann and the band.

    As the title suggests, “Eggsistentialism” explores a much more personal, introspective, and reflective side to The Lovely Eggs world and sees the Eggs explore new sounds and experiment in unventured musical territories.

    “The new album is really a reflection on what has been happening to us these last couple of years, stewing up in Eggland in our own juices,” explains Holly. “It’s about loss and strength. On this album you’ll hear us at our lowest and most vulnerable. Daily life is hard. Realising everything you grew up with and loved is never coming back, alongside the responsibilities of caring for others is sometimes hard to take. The album is about life and death. Eggsistentialism. It’s about dragging yourself through all the shit to get to the other side.”

    “It’s a bit of a ‘wilderness years’ album,” continues Holly. “We haven’t released a new record since 2020 and in the meantime, we’ve been here fighting shit and trying to defend a right to a lifestyle that we’ve enjoyed here in this town for the last 30+ years as working musicians who refuse to get a “normal” job and tow the line. It’s about believing in something and not letting go. But that unwillingness to give in ultimately takes its toll. It does start to destroy you and the album is kind of a documentation of that destruction and collapse as well as the strength we’ve got to get through it all. Ultimately, this is a hopeful record about survival.”

    Tracklisting:
    1. Death Grip Kids
    2. Nothing/Everything
    3. Meeting Friends at Night
    4. People TV
    5. My Mood Wave
    6. I Don't Fucking Know What I'm Gunna Do
    7. Memory Man
    8. Things
    9. Echo You
    10. I am Gaia

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  • Vanishing Twin 'The Age of Immunology' PRE-ORDER

    Fire Records

    Vanishing Twin 'The Age of Immunology' PRE-ORDER

    £25.49

    Release Date: 03/05/2024

    Vanishing Twin’s seminal LP, The Age Of Immunology, receives a LTD edition pressing on None ‘Pink’ and Sine ‘Teal’ vinyl, limited to 500 units each and paired with matching sleeve art. As essential take on psych-pop futurism and a must for fans of Broadcast, Sun Ra and Ennio Morricone.
     
    Establishing the band as innovators in their field, the record was declared “a masterpiece” by The Line Of Best Fit, while The Quietus asserted Vanishing Twin as “one of the most original and exciting acts of the moment”.
     
    This was the group’s first LP for Fire Records, at the time of recording the band’s evolving lineup consisted of songwriter, singer and multi-instrumentalist Cathy Lucas, drummer Valentina Magaletti, bassist Susumu Mukai, synth/guitar player Phil MFU and visual artist/film maker Elliott Arndt on flute and percussion.
     
    The album was produced by Lucas in a number of non-standard, non-studio settings. ‘KRK (At Home In Strange Places)’ summons up the spirit of Sun Ra’s Lanquidity and Broadcast And The Focus Group Investigate Witch Cults Of The Radio and was simply recorded on an iPhone during a live set which crackled with psychic connectivity on the Croatian island of Krk. The magical Morricone-esque lounge of ‘You Are Not an Island’, the blissed-out Jean-Claude Vannier style arrangement of ‘Invisible World’ and burbling sci fi funk ode to a 1972 cult French animation, ‘Planète Sauvage’, were all recorded in nighttime sessions in an abandoned mill in Sudbury.
     
    ★★★★★ The Line Of Best Fit
    ★★★★★ Pop Matters
    ★★★★ Pitchfork
    ★★★★ Loud and Quiet
    ★★★★ Uncut
    ★★★★ Q
    ★★★★ Record Collector
    ★★★★ Norman Records
    ★★★★ The 405
    ★★★★ Shindig
    ★★★★★ The Vinyl District
    ★★★★ Sydney Morning Herald

    Tracklisting:
    1. KRK (At Home In Strange Places)
    2. Wise Children
    3. Cryonic Suspension May Save Your Life
    4. You Are Not An Island
    5. The Age of Immunology
    6. Magician’s Success
    7. Planète Sauvage
    8. Backstroke
    9. Invisible World
    10. Language Is A City (Let Me Out!)

    BONUS TRACKS: Download ONLY
    1. The Age Of Immunology (Version)
    2. Magician’s Success (Live)
    3. Backstroke (Live)
    4. Language Is A City (Let Me Out!) (Live)
    5. You Are Not An Island (Version)
    6. Cryonic Suspension May Save Your Life (Extended Life Version)
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  • Yur Mum 'Duality' PRE-ORDER

    Tropical Fuzz Records

    Yur Mum 'Duality' PRE-ORDER

    £11.99

    v

    Tropical Fuzz Records

    Yur Mum 'Duality' PRE-ORDER

    £19.99

    Release Date: 26/04/2024

    London-based rock duo, Yur Mum, is set to release their highly anticipated album, "Duality," on April 30, 2024.

    "Duality" serves as the sequel to their 2021 LP, "Tropical Fuzz," and encapsulates the band's essence as a fusion of contrasts – Female meets male, Europe meets South America, and rock meets Brazilian music.

    Anelise, the bassist and vocalist, expresses, "It's a total yin and yang. We're embracing our differences and blending them together to create something unique." The album features recent singles 'Say Say' and 'New Beginnings,' which gained recognition on BBC's 6 Music and Radio 1, along with Spotify editorial playlists.

    The duo's Brazilian roots are exposed in tracks like 'Hands To The Sky', 'Anhangá', ‘Café’, and ‘Snakes Don’t Fly’, featuring Myura Amara from PollyPikPocketz. In a bold move, Yur Mum has opted for an independent release, expressing pride in creating the album they envisioned.

    Collaborating with producer Alex Gordon, known for his work with bands like Tigercub and CLT DRP. "Duality" promises a wild mix of beats and melodies, rocking out with fuzzed-up riffs. Yur Mum's iconic bass and drums have levelled up, bringing an even bigger sound. Beyond the high-energy tunes, the band explores themes like faith, guilt, existentialism, mental health, toxic people, classism, and immigrant catharsis.

    The album cover, designed by Fabio Couto, portrays a fusion of the duo in an androgynous and striking composition. Fabio says it was captured “DIY style” with an old smartphone camera.

    Yur Mum, consisting of Anelise Kunz and Fabio Couto, stands out in the two-piece band scene with their distinctive Fuzz Punk Rock sound and South American influences.

    Tracklisting:
    1. New Beginnings
    2. Say It
    3. Anhanga
    4. Hands To The Sky
    5. Snakes Don’t Fly
    6. Guilty
    7. Guilt
    8. Obnoxious
    9. Immigrant
    10. Same Igual
    11. Café
    12. Go Back
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