“This isn’t the record I intended to make.”
For Nathan Jenkins, it’s less a regret than a revelation. His latest album, Nearly, began with one simple idea: no more songs. It ended up elsewhere.
Nearly arrives two years after Jenkins’ previous album as Bullion, Affection, which continued the collaborative spirit that’s defined his work across the decade. His reputation for warm, intricate production has made him an in-demand producer to artists on the adventurous side of electronic alt-pop. This year’s Written into Changes by Avalon Emerson & The Charm, co-written and produced by Jenkins, adds to a run of credits that includes Nilüfer Yanya, Westerman, Ben Howard and Oliver Sim of The xx.
While Affection was characterised by appearances from Carly Rae Jepsen and Panda Bear, Nearly centres Jenkins’ vocals ever more deliberately. The album’s sole guest feature comes from Whitley Bay-hailing artist, L Devine, who performs on Francis Ford and The Arm of Cinderella. A cast of musicians, including Ethan P. Flynn, lend colour to the instrumentation.
Applying the lessons learned from his work with others, Jenkins reveals a more private side on Nearly. In its sonic framing is an impulse towards contemporary pop, bringing together the melodic sensibility, synth-craft and emotional directness that have informed his songwriting to date. “There’s a window of opportunity to record these songs and it’s closing”, Jenkins reflects on the eventuality of making an album as starry eyed as Nearly.
1.Very Few Inspirations
2.Roo
3.Francis Ford (ft. L Devine)
4.OK Parsley
5.Young Shiver
6.Forget Performer
7.The Arm of Cinderella (Ft. L Devine)
8.Applegene
9.I’m Not Hooligan
10.101 Damnations
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
For Nathan Jenkins, it’s less a regret than a revelation. His latest album, Nearly, began with one simple idea: no more songs. It ended up elsewhere.
Nearly arrives two years after Jenkins’ previous album as Bullion, Affection, which continued the collaborative spirit that’s defined his work across the decade. His reputation for warm, intricate production has made him an in-demand producer to artists on the adventurous side of electronic alt-pop. This year’s Written into Changes by Avalon Emerson & The Charm, co-written and produced by Jenkins, adds to a run of credits that includes Nilüfer Yanya, Westerman, Ben Howard and Oliver Sim of The xx.
While Affection was characterised by appearances from Carly Rae Jepsen and Panda Bear, Nearly centres Jenkins’ vocals ever more deliberately. The album’s sole guest feature comes from Whitley Bay-hailing artist, L Devine, who performs on Francis Ford and The Arm of Cinderella. A cast of musicians, including Ethan P. Flynn, lend colour to the instrumentation.
Applying the lessons learned from his work with others, Jenkins reveals a more private side on Nearly. In its sonic framing is an impulse towards contemporary pop, bringing together the melodic sensibility, synth-craft and emotional directness that have informed his songwriting to date. “There’s a window of opportunity to record these songs and it’s closing”, Jenkins reflects on the eventuality of making an album as starry eyed as Nearly.
1.Very Few Inspirations
2.Roo
3.Francis Ford (ft. L Devine)
4.OK Parsley
5.Young Shiver
6.Forget Performer
7.The Arm of Cinderella (Ft. L Devine)
8.Applegene
9.I’m Not Hooligan
10.101 Damnations
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
More records from Bullion
1
Bullion, - Say Arr Ee
2
Bullion, - What Does She Know
Bullion has come a long way since his 'Pet Sounds: In The Key Of Dee', became a viral sensation on the internet within days of its release back in 2008. He's since gone on to release 'Get Familiar' - a gritty, bass heavy dancefloor anthem, released on One-Handed Music. More releases followed on the same label to critical acclaim, the best known an EP of contemporary love songs called 'Young Heartache'. On his last for OHM, 'Say Goodbye To What', it seemed as though he was loosening the assemblage points of his music, transposing sampled voices into new contexts, and creating a kind of modern, psychedelic cut’n’paste. His most recent effort, 'You Drive Me To Plastic', released by Young Turks Records, is a beautifully sewn together 21 minute piece of music consisting of 9 tracks drawing from leftfield Disco, Krautrock, Exotica, Afro & inspired 70’s electronics that he preferred to call a non-LP.
Having already appeared on R&S with a remix of Model 500 and a track on the IOTDXI compilation named 'Ralph' which showcased his singing voice for the first time, this two track single seems like the natural stepping stone from his previous work. Replacing what would previously have been samples with his own vocals and instruments played by both himself and some friends, 'Say Arr Ee' and "What Does She Know' continue to show Bullion as a music lover of many styles who can identify and combine those elements with an air of sympathetic range and still have a sense of clarity and cohesion.
TRACKLISTING:
A – Say Arr Ee
B – What Does She Know
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Having already appeared on R&S with a remix of Model 500 and a track on the IOTDXI compilation named 'Ralph' which showcased his singing voice for the first time, this two track single seems like the natural stepping stone from his previous work. Replacing what would previously have been samples with his own vocals and instruments played by both himself and some friends, 'Say Arr Ee' and "What Does She Know' continue to show Bullion as a music lover of many styles who can identify and combine those elements with an air of sympathetic range and still have a sense of clarity and cohesion.
TRACKLISTING:
A – Say Arr Ee
B – What Does She Know
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
More records from Ghostly International
Tracklist:
1.5 Days
2.B re a t h e
3.Flood (feat. Bon Iver)
4.Cállate
5.Firestorm
6.I Do, I Do
7.Keep Away (feat. Bon Iver)
8.Glow (feat. Bon Iver)
9.Speed Up
10.Anemic (feat. Gaidaa)
11.ALL IS LOVE (feat. aja monet)
LA-based Sudanese-American artist Dua Saleh continues their ascent with Of Earth & Wires, a resolutely warm, spiritual, and frenetic follow-up exploring notions of home, humanity, and renewal. Executive produced by Billy Lemos (SZA, Paris Texas, Tinashe), the album features contributions from Bon Iver, aja monet, Gaidaa, and others. Saleh threads and deconstructs indie, R&B, and electronic pop with flashes of Sudanese folk, UK dance, and baile funk, sounds intrinsic to their story, all held together by ambitious, future-facing production and clear-eyed lyricism. Saleh’s soulful, gritty, shape-shifting style has found fans from The New York Times to NME, alongside their breakout role in the Netflix series Sex Education, making 2024's Ghostly International debut, I SHOULD CALL THEM, a proper arrival. The highly anticipated Of Earth & Wires responds to the moment as both a watershed in their career and an urgent dialogue with struggles faced on a universal level. Beyond mythological references and planetary narratives, with their strongest, most immediate material to date, Saleh makes the case for love above progress and greed, for divine beauty and the enduring flame of the human spirit.
"While pondering the demise of Earth, I reflected on the ways that people would operate if modern society completely collapsed. Earth runs wild, becoming overgrown with vegetation, reclaiming her power. People must deconstruct their understanding of the old way and use what's left to be present with the Earth. As a Sudanese-American, I often feel as though my world has already begun collapsing as a result of the ongoing conflict in the region. I imagine what it would be like after all have been lost to the war. Mourning is a constant as plains are burned, sacred wildlife is decimated, and indigenous Africans are lost. If my world were to disappear, I would bring it back to life with aspects of home. For me, this means bringing in elements of sound that feel like home."
Of Earth & Wires is the latest in a series of projects Saleh has visualized over the coming years — vast ambition drives their project, and at times presents its most practical challenge: how to rein in overflowing ideas. Enter the guidance of friends, most of whom have Midwest roots. Iowa-born Billy Lemos, whose playful production style brings the best out of Saleh. Justin Vernon, aka Bon Iver, the Grammy-winning indie star and pride of Eau Claire, has worked with Saleh on several projects, including Travis Scott’s UTOPIA. With their encouragement, joined by collaborator Ryan Olson and several other Minnesota-based producers and musicians, Saleh approached sessions without expectations; there were no outlined objectives or intentions that any recordings would all appear on an album by any artist involved.
“I think we got like six songs within the span of three hours,” says Saleh, who sat with the material while filming Sex Education in Wales. “The war in Sudan was taking place, AI was emerging, and it just felt like the world might be ending. I was just kind of ruminating on where I could find my place as an artist amongst the terrain of AI, and I was lonely and overwhelmed. I missed my mom and my siblings; I felt like I was losing my accent being there, just questioning the notion of home on many levels. I started weaving an album around the music that we had made together, that we had collaborated on with other producers from Minnesota, where I grew up.”
The image of land overcome by wires came to symbolize unchecked technological proliferation as Saleh gravitated towards a sonic duality: warm, melodic arrangements that felt natural and human, contrasted with moments of wild, manufactured effects. The most telling example opens the album, “5 Days,” where their bare vocals, delivered tenderly above strums, collide with a more aggressive and dissonant presence, a screamo song dipped in mercury.
The Midwest thread runs throughout; Saleh points to “Flood” — “I was leaning into my Minnesota bag real bad” — where they shape wordplay around Vernon’s falsetto hook and a synth-driven bounce. The duo’s chemistry heats up on “Keep Away” and “Glow;” the latter, co-produced by longtime collaborator Simon Christensen (aka Ghostly alum Psymun), finds the artists feeding each other top lines, leaning into the idea of becoming a fictional band (named after Christensen’s dog). Saleh explains: “We suddenly had this soulful R&B hip-hop camaraderie, like The Isley Brothers, as if we were walking around with fur coats or something, we just realized it was a special song.”
While a dream list of talent contributes to Of Earth & Wires, Saleh’s vision and story remain its central force. The rhythmic "Cállate" darts between shuffling beats and a baile-like groove as the elastic vocalist lands a mix of feathery coos and pointed blows. "I Do, I Do" is pure pop balladry with a higher purpose, with Saleh nodding to a Sudanese proverb (“He who mixes poison is bound to lick his fingers”), underscored by plucks from an oud (a Middle Eastern instrument vital to Sudanese folk music) played by Malek Vossough. “You make me feel faint,” Saleh whispers into “Anemic,” a sultry R&B cut featuring Sudanese singer Gaidaa. Standout “Firestorm” is a coastal love song imagined from a place of heartbreak after the Los Angeles fires. Backed by the Trans Chorus of Los Angeles and a beat from Vernon, Saleh reaches for their sweetest tones, suspended briefly in a bliss born from trauma.
The record is bookended by poetry, first on “5 Days” with Saleh’s Prometheus-referencing outro, and later across the stunning closer, “ALL IS LOVE” featuring aja monet, the Grammy-nominated poet who shares a wider label home with Saleh. With cloud-parting grace and wisdom, monet’s prose lends Of Earth & Wires a sense of resolution and hope that, despite humanity’s worst, Mother Nature may find a way, and love could conquer all.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1.5 Days
2.B re a t h e
3.Flood (feat. Bon Iver)
4.Cállate
5.Firestorm
6.I Do, I Do
7.Keep Away (feat. Bon Iver)
8.Glow (feat. Bon Iver)
9.Speed Up
10.Anemic (feat. Gaidaa)
11.ALL IS LOVE (feat. aja monet)
LA-based Sudanese-American artist Dua Saleh continues their ascent with Of Earth & Wires, a resolutely warm, spiritual, and frenetic follow-up exploring notions of home, humanity, and renewal. Executive produced by Billy Lemos (SZA, Paris Texas, Tinashe), the album features contributions from Bon Iver, aja monet, Gaidaa, and others. Saleh threads and deconstructs indie, R&B, and electronic pop with flashes of Sudanese folk, UK dance, and baile funk, sounds intrinsic to their story, all held together by ambitious, future-facing production and clear-eyed lyricism. Saleh’s soulful, gritty, shape-shifting style has found fans from The New York Times to NME, alongside their breakout role in the Netflix series Sex Education, making 2024's Ghostly International debut, I SHOULD CALL THEM, a proper arrival. The highly anticipated Of Earth & Wires responds to the moment as both a watershed in their career and an urgent dialogue with struggles faced on a universal level. Beyond mythological references and planetary narratives, with their strongest, most immediate material to date, Saleh makes the case for love above progress and greed, for divine beauty and the enduring flame of the human spirit.
"While pondering the demise of Earth, I reflected on the ways that people would operate if modern society completely collapsed. Earth runs wild, becoming overgrown with vegetation, reclaiming her power. People must deconstruct their understanding of the old way and use what's left to be present with the Earth. As a Sudanese-American, I often feel as though my world has already begun collapsing as a result of the ongoing conflict in the region. I imagine what it would be like after all have been lost to the war. Mourning is a constant as plains are burned, sacred wildlife is decimated, and indigenous Africans are lost. If my world were to disappear, I would bring it back to life with aspects of home. For me, this means bringing in elements of sound that feel like home."
Of Earth & Wires is the latest in a series of projects Saleh has visualized over the coming years — vast ambition drives their project, and at times presents its most practical challenge: how to rein in overflowing ideas. Enter the guidance of friends, most of whom have Midwest roots. Iowa-born Billy Lemos, whose playful production style brings the best out of Saleh. Justin Vernon, aka Bon Iver, the Grammy-winning indie star and pride of Eau Claire, has worked with Saleh on several projects, including Travis Scott’s UTOPIA. With their encouragement, joined by collaborator Ryan Olson and several other Minnesota-based producers and musicians, Saleh approached sessions without expectations; there were no outlined objectives or intentions that any recordings would all appear on an album by any artist involved.
“I think we got like six songs within the span of three hours,” says Saleh, who sat with the material while filming Sex Education in Wales. “The war in Sudan was taking place, AI was emerging, and it just felt like the world might be ending. I was just kind of ruminating on where I could find my place as an artist amongst the terrain of AI, and I was lonely and overwhelmed. I missed my mom and my siblings; I felt like I was losing my accent being there, just questioning the notion of home on many levels. I started weaving an album around the music that we had made together, that we had collaborated on with other producers from Minnesota, where I grew up.”
The image of land overcome by wires came to symbolize unchecked technological proliferation as Saleh gravitated towards a sonic duality: warm, melodic arrangements that felt natural and human, contrasted with moments of wild, manufactured effects. The most telling example opens the album, “5 Days,” where their bare vocals, delivered tenderly above strums, collide with a more aggressive and dissonant presence, a screamo song dipped in mercury.
The Midwest thread runs throughout; Saleh points to “Flood” — “I was leaning into my Minnesota bag real bad” — where they shape wordplay around Vernon’s falsetto hook and a synth-driven bounce. The duo’s chemistry heats up on “Keep Away” and “Glow;” the latter, co-produced by longtime collaborator Simon Christensen (aka Ghostly alum Psymun), finds the artists feeding each other top lines, leaning into the idea of becoming a fictional band (named after Christensen’s dog). Saleh explains: “We suddenly had this soulful R&B hip-hop camaraderie, like The Isley Brothers, as if we were walking around with fur coats or something, we just realized it was a special song.”
While a dream list of talent contributes to Of Earth & Wires, Saleh’s vision and story remain its central force. The rhythmic "Cállate" darts between shuffling beats and a baile-like groove as the elastic vocalist lands a mix of feathery coos and pointed blows. "I Do, I Do" is pure pop balladry with a higher purpose, with Saleh nodding to a Sudanese proverb (“He who mixes poison is bound to lick his fingers”), underscored by plucks from an oud (a Middle Eastern instrument vital to Sudanese folk music) played by Malek Vossough. “You make me feel faint,” Saleh whispers into “Anemic,” a sultry R&B cut featuring Sudanese singer Gaidaa. Standout “Firestorm” is a coastal love song imagined from a place of heartbreak after the Los Angeles fires. Backed by the Trans Chorus of Los Angeles and a beat from Vernon, Saleh reaches for their sweetest tones, suspended briefly in a bliss born from trauma.
The record is bookended by poetry, first on “5 Days” with Saleh’s Prometheus-referencing outro, and later across the stunning closer, “ALL IS LOVE” featuring aja monet, the Grammy-nominated poet who shares a wider label home with Saleh. With cloud-parting grace and wisdom, monet’s prose lends Of Earth & Wires a sense of resolution and hope that, despite humanity’s worst, Mother Nature may find a way, and love could conquer all.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1
Joviale - The Mountain (Intro)
2
Joviale - Snow
3
Joviale - Heavy
4
Joviale - Crush
5
Joviale - HARK!
6
Joviale - Foul Play
7
Joviale - Let Me Down
8
Joviale - Moonshine
9
Joviale - Both Ways
10
Joviale - MC (Intermission)
11
Joviale - Beam
12
Joviale - Blu
13
Joviale - Disappear
14
Joviale - Wishing
Preview:
https://youtu.be/1zsja6VD8Vw?si=jx6L06pAf3QANKyK
https://youtu.be/gaMUvu6pf90?si=kSbvbmpJdQb6Puzy
Joviale makes music that feels like a show; drama lies in the tension between pop impulse and something more cerebral and sensorial. A multidisciplinary artist from North London, they came up as a theater kid and now harness their prismatic creative expression across mediums, fusing components of visual art, performance, and recording into a singular world. In 2021, following their Hurricane Belle EP, which caught the attention of Pitchfork and Crack Magazine, they quietly receded from view in an effort to evolve and hone their skills as a writer and producer. In 2025, out from behind the curtains comes Mount Crystal, their full-length debut on Ghostly International, an ascendant conceptual album that reintroduces Joviale’s point of view. Songs are electric and soulful, dashed with jazzy experimentation, rhythmic rock, and vibrant sound design, all realized alongside co-producers John Carroll Kirby and Jkarri and a cast of collaborators, including Sam Wilkes, Carter Lang, and Will Miller, among others. Initially imagined as a play, Mount Crystal brims and bursts with life — peril, humor, and the buzz of the human spirit — conjuring a metaphysical climb that transcends the audio format. With plans to further manifest the vision as a live set and more, Joviale sets the course:
“Mount Crystal's lore is driven by the embodiment of desire, danger, and desperation. A mirrored dimension in a distant reality where nothing is left unsaid. These chapters crave to tear apart the illusion of pleasure by alchemising the unrelenting pain I’ve experienced in my efforts to love, deny, and embrace the sweetest melodies with the sweetest friends.”
Inspired by the comedic musical mastery of Prince’s 1986 film Under the Cherry Moon and the offbeat surrealism of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks, Joviale first saw Mount Crystal as a murder mystery, hypothetically casting each collaborator as a character in the story. Co-producer John Carroll Kirby (Steve Lacy, Frank Ocean, Solange, Kacey Musgraves) became the American cop investigator tracking a series of murders in a strange British hotel. Joviale and contributors Fabiana Palladino and Laura Groves are entertainers at the hotel; co-producer Joshua Gaskin-Brown, aka Jkarri (PinkPantheress, Nia Archives, Bel Cobain, Natanya), is the resident handyman always at work in the periphery, and so on. The loose framework immediately set a relaxed, anything-goes mentality to recording sessions spread over various makeshift studio set-ups, including Joviale’s living room during a month-long stay in Barcelona. “We all have one thing in common, which is that we love to jam as musicians and love to have a stupid time and we will work from each other's houses,” says Joviale. “In this trio with John and Joshua, I felt very much in the lead; they'd be like, ‘we get it,’ and that's because we were able to jam through it.”
Joviale’s personality reverberates across Mount Crystal’s densely detailed world. They speak with swagger and sing skyward, cutting through rubbery basslines and angular strums, synthesized horns and harps, unruly beats, and unusual sound bites. The antithesis of background music, these songs leap from headphones much like an engrossing movie makes itself known on screen. Joviale’s sonic references span Sade, Kate Bush, Janet Jackson, Todd Rundgren, ‘60s girls groups, Japanese composers, and “the freaky guys and girls and the divas of the ‘80s…glamorous rock’n’roll, Rick James, Prince, Quincy.” Artists who prioritized playful ambition and bravado.
While set up as fictional abstractions, songs also reflect Joviale’s lived-in experiences: broken-hearted letdowns, realizations, and the search for clarity and truth. Sequencing arcs upward and back down as if scaling its namesake. Lyrics detail dynamics between the self and others. On the lightly psychedelic intro “The Mountain,” Joviale cautions, “careful not to slip and fall you are not invincible.” “Snow” finds them surrounded by glistening synth, bass, and horn-like pulses, likening faded love to a cold winter’s day. Super-charged centerpiece “HARK!” crosses sinister funk with serene majesty. “Not even them mountains can stop you! Not even them angels can help you!” Joviale shouts into the horizon as records scratch, guitars solo, and voices shriek and laugh. The group leaned into an evil groove during its recording, where Michael Jackson’s Thriller was a studio playlist staple. Joviale says they’ve always expected collaborators to rein them back in, but here, “John was kind of egging it on.”
The album’s altitude shifts at “Foul Play,” which unravels into a couple’s fight as a party escalates downstairs; the melodrama heightens over samples of a revving chainsaw, among other absurdities. The siren-like bells carry over into the bounce of “Let Me Down,” where Joviale jokingly riffed off the idea of embodying an opera diva for a minute, allowing themself an uncharacteristic rush of jealousy, pride, and anger.
“Moonshine” came together over several jams; Joviale was challenged to channel the classic Prince muse a la Sheila E., Vanity, and Chaka Khan, a notion in contrast to their self-described “giving art teacher’” disposition. They surfaced several lines on the spot (like “I’m easy breezy / Sweeter than a kiwi” while eating an actual kiwi). The track builds to rhythmic bliss with James Mollison of Ezra Collective on saxophone. Late album comedown “Blu!” was their first experience “writing in communion with someone.” Jkarri’s sweet-toned signatures meld with Joviale’s heady cadence as Kirby holds down the keys.
Beyond metaphorical mountains and murder mysteries, Joviale’s debut album is a statement of artistic identity and purpose. A work that speaks to patience and collaborative ethos, surrendering oneself to music-making, and letting the process lead you somewhere new. “Disappear” begins a warm closing scene, the resolution after a season of wild experimentation; Mount Crystal reveals itself as the pop record it’s been reaching for. “We have come a long way,” Joviale sings on the hand-clapped “Wishing” — a second voice responds, “I go where I need to go” — and in that moment, in accord with their crew, Joviale confirms acceptance and the lesson learned, that life keeps going.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
https://youtu.be/1zsja6VD8Vw?si=jx6L06pAf3QANKyK
https://youtu.be/gaMUvu6pf90?si=kSbvbmpJdQb6Puzy
Joviale makes music that feels like a show; drama lies in the tension between pop impulse and something more cerebral and sensorial. A multidisciplinary artist from North London, they came up as a theater kid and now harness their prismatic creative expression across mediums, fusing components of visual art, performance, and recording into a singular world. In 2021, following their Hurricane Belle EP, which caught the attention of Pitchfork and Crack Magazine, they quietly receded from view in an effort to evolve and hone their skills as a writer and producer. In 2025, out from behind the curtains comes Mount Crystal, their full-length debut on Ghostly International, an ascendant conceptual album that reintroduces Joviale’s point of view. Songs are electric and soulful, dashed with jazzy experimentation, rhythmic rock, and vibrant sound design, all realized alongside co-producers John Carroll Kirby and Jkarri and a cast of collaborators, including Sam Wilkes, Carter Lang, and Will Miller, among others. Initially imagined as a play, Mount Crystal brims and bursts with life — peril, humor, and the buzz of the human spirit — conjuring a metaphysical climb that transcends the audio format. With plans to further manifest the vision as a live set and more, Joviale sets the course:
“Mount Crystal's lore is driven by the embodiment of desire, danger, and desperation. A mirrored dimension in a distant reality where nothing is left unsaid. These chapters crave to tear apart the illusion of pleasure by alchemising the unrelenting pain I’ve experienced in my efforts to love, deny, and embrace the sweetest melodies with the sweetest friends.”
Inspired by the comedic musical mastery of Prince’s 1986 film Under the Cherry Moon and the offbeat surrealism of David Lynch’s Twin Peaks, Joviale first saw Mount Crystal as a murder mystery, hypothetically casting each collaborator as a character in the story. Co-producer John Carroll Kirby (Steve Lacy, Frank Ocean, Solange, Kacey Musgraves) became the American cop investigator tracking a series of murders in a strange British hotel. Joviale and contributors Fabiana Palladino and Laura Groves are entertainers at the hotel; co-producer Joshua Gaskin-Brown, aka Jkarri (PinkPantheress, Nia Archives, Bel Cobain, Natanya), is the resident handyman always at work in the periphery, and so on. The loose framework immediately set a relaxed, anything-goes mentality to recording sessions spread over various makeshift studio set-ups, including Joviale’s living room during a month-long stay in Barcelona. “We all have one thing in common, which is that we love to jam as musicians and love to have a stupid time and we will work from each other's houses,” says Joviale. “In this trio with John and Joshua, I felt very much in the lead; they'd be like, ‘we get it,’ and that's because we were able to jam through it.”
Joviale’s personality reverberates across Mount Crystal’s densely detailed world. They speak with swagger and sing skyward, cutting through rubbery basslines and angular strums, synthesized horns and harps, unruly beats, and unusual sound bites. The antithesis of background music, these songs leap from headphones much like an engrossing movie makes itself known on screen. Joviale’s sonic references span Sade, Kate Bush, Janet Jackson, Todd Rundgren, ‘60s girls groups, Japanese composers, and “the freaky guys and girls and the divas of the ‘80s…glamorous rock’n’roll, Rick James, Prince, Quincy.” Artists who prioritized playful ambition and bravado.
While set up as fictional abstractions, songs also reflect Joviale’s lived-in experiences: broken-hearted letdowns, realizations, and the search for clarity and truth. Sequencing arcs upward and back down as if scaling its namesake. Lyrics detail dynamics between the self and others. On the lightly psychedelic intro “The Mountain,” Joviale cautions, “careful not to slip and fall you are not invincible.” “Snow” finds them surrounded by glistening synth, bass, and horn-like pulses, likening faded love to a cold winter’s day. Super-charged centerpiece “HARK!” crosses sinister funk with serene majesty. “Not even them mountains can stop you! Not even them angels can help you!” Joviale shouts into the horizon as records scratch, guitars solo, and voices shriek and laugh. The group leaned into an evil groove during its recording, where Michael Jackson’s Thriller was a studio playlist staple. Joviale says they’ve always expected collaborators to rein them back in, but here, “John was kind of egging it on.”
The album’s altitude shifts at “Foul Play,” which unravels into a couple’s fight as a party escalates downstairs; the melodrama heightens over samples of a revving chainsaw, among other absurdities. The siren-like bells carry over into the bounce of “Let Me Down,” where Joviale jokingly riffed off the idea of embodying an opera diva for a minute, allowing themself an uncharacteristic rush of jealousy, pride, and anger.
“Moonshine” came together over several jams; Joviale was challenged to channel the classic Prince muse a la Sheila E., Vanity, and Chaka Khan, a notion in contrast to their self-described “giving art teacher’” disposition. They surfaced several lines on the spot (like “I’m easy breezy / Sweeter than a kiwi” while eating an actual kiwi). The track builds to rhythmic bliss with James Mollison of Ezra Collective on saxophone. Late album comedown “Blu!” was their first experience “writing in communion with someone.” Jkarri’s sweet-toned signatures meld with Joviale’s heady cadence as Kirby holds down the keys.
Beyond metaphorical mountains and murder mysteries, Joviale’s debut album is a statement of artistic identity and purpose. A work that speaks to patience and collaborative ethos, surrendering oneself to music-making, and letting the process lead you somewhere new. “Disappear” begins a warm closing scene, the resolution after a season of wild experimentation; Mount Crystal reveals itself as the pop record it’s been reaching for. “We have come a long way,” Joviale sings on the hand-clapped “Wishing” — a second voice responds, “I go where I need to go” — and in that moment, in accord with their crew, Joviale confirms acceptance and the lesson learned, that life keeps going.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC1453
Release-Date:18.04.2025
Genre:Indie Rock/Alternative
Configuration:LP
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC1453
Release-Date:18.04.2025
Genre:Indie Rock/Alternative
Configuration:LP
1
quickly, quickly - I Heard That Noise
2
quickly, quickly - Enything
3
quickly, quickly - Take It From Me
4
quickly, quickly - This House
5
quickly, quickly - This Room
6
quickly, quickly - Beginning Band Day One
7
quickly, quickly - I Punched Through The Wall
8
quickly, quickly - Hero
9
quickly, quickly - Raven
10
quickly, quickly - Drawn Away
11
quickly, quickly - You Are
Mint Green Vinyl. Graham Jonson is drawn to the comforts of melody and noise. How the two conspire in tension, tonally and atonally, stirring up memory and mood. This quality animates the technicolor world of quickly, quickly, the psych-pop project that emanates from Kenton Sound, his basement studio in Portland, Oregon. "Everywhere your eye lands, there's another curio to marvel over," noted Pitchfork's Philip Sherburne when he visited Jonson's recording space for a Rising feature just after the release of his "strikingly original" 2021 debut LP, The Long and Short of It. Since then, Jonson formed a live band, released his Easy Listening EP in 2023, and navigated the up-and-downs of a young musician, the sustainability of tours and relationships. While shaped by personal bouts and fallouts, his highly-anticipated full-length follow-up finds Jonson making music that's universal, open-ended, and rewarding, like great songwriters can do. He set out to make a folk album but couldn't help coloring it in with noise; a confluence of lush instrumentation and unexpected sounds. Ambitious yet intimate, hi-fi yet homespun, the idiosyncratic songs on I Heard That Noise curve around the contours of everyday life with warmth, wit, and dissonance.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6Z6Opd5jNw
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6Z6Opd5jNw
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC1439
Release-Date:21.03.2025
Genre:Dope Beat/Hip Hop
Configuration:LP
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC1439
Release-Date:21.03.2025
Genre:Dope Beat/Hip Hop
Configuration:LP
Tracklist:
1.Weejuns (intro) ft. Will Stowe
2.Beautiful BLACK
3.One Hand Washes The Other feat. lojii
4.Crossroad(s)
5.Negroni (Skit)
6.FireFly feat. Fatima
7.Nothin’ to Say
8.UPtown Mami (Skit)
9.Manuva(s) feat. Joe Armon-Jones
10.Driftin’ Interlude feat. Pearl De Luna
11.Chase The Sunrise feat. Yaya Bey, lojii, Fatima 05:01
12.First Dates
13.Quiz Interlude feat. Salimata
14.Lizards / Dancin' With The Devil feat. Jaydonclover & The Hotel
15.Mind, Body, Spirit feat. Seafood Sam
16.FOREVER POOH
Preview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rESM76i97BM
Goya Gumbani loves getting dressed, guided not by stylists or trends but by his own research and self-expression, an excitement for fabrics, fits, and fundamentals. The Brooklyn-born, South East London-based artist approaches Warlord of the Weejuns, his first LP on Ghostly International, after years of acclaimed self-releases with the same mentality. Rather than simply recruit beats to rap over, he's now embodied both the narrator and the conductor, developing a shared musicality with various changes in scenery, players, producers, and guests — including Fatima, lojii, Seafood Sam, Yaya Bey, and many others — outfitting his flow between London's new jazz generation and New York City's hip-hop storytelling legacy. Goya borrows the album title from a magazine headline once placed upon Mile Davis (given how well he wore the iconic Weejun loafers). Here, he channels not just that storied style from the king of cool but an artistic ingenuity and timeless sensibility, redefining his recording project with rich, full-band arrangements. Marked by unguarded ambition and introspection, Warlord of the Weejuns is a triumph of taste, heritage, and pride from one of rap music's most dexterous talents.
Before and during sessions spread across London, Philadelphia, New York, and Los Angeles, Goya leaned into his jazz collection with a heightened sense of awareness, reflecting on Davis' legacy in the context of intention and growth. "His appreciation and love for music but also clothes, taking pride in your image. Not feeling restricted in your music or your fashion. He kept redefining himself, moving the goalposts. It just opened my eyes to the ideology that there are no bounds; you can't get boxed in, there's no wrong turns. Every turn just leads you somewhere else."
Taking cues from the intuitive and often wordless expressions of jazz as well as the rhythmic meditations of reggae, Goya let the music lead. "I didn't want to fit 100 words in 16 bars; it was more about making the voice part of the instrumentation, to sit at ease in the mix, like laying in the water, letting the current wash over." Even when more reclined at the mic, he remains an evocative and boldly vulnerable lyricist, allowing the material to form around life's impressions — "slight changes to the input," he says. "The things that I would pour into myself, my views, my mornings waking up, breaking up with girls, meeting new people, it's all these things. When I listen back to it, I can hear where I was, and I can hear where I'm going."
Threads of affirmation and self-worth — unlearning past constructs, manifesting knowledge and power from within — run throughout Warlord of the Weejuns. After the swaggering, a capella intro ("All I do is write, rap, scribble, scat, wear long coats with pressed slacks…."), the horn-backed "Beautiful BLK" sets the celebratory tone. Produced by Franky Bones, the track radiates pride with lush keys, bass, and brass as Goya declares, "It's time to redefine" above emboldened excerpts from a speech by Yosef Ben-Jochannan. He wrote the song after visiting his mom's birthplace far outside of London, and his uncle's recording studio in Nottingham and hearing him talk about Bob Marley's influence, realizing the lineage of it all. "I was just looking at him and looking at myself, and I thought, this is generational." He further unpacks the track: "I wanted to make something that could speak to Black kids from anywhere in the world, just love yourself, know your worth. Like, you got it. What I would have told myself: you are beautiful."
Goya welcomes a wide range of artistry across the spacious collection, replete with vibe-shaping skits and interludes. "I feel honored to have everyone on this album and understand how all these elements, these ingredients, come together to make the greatest gumbo. These collaborations made me remember the importance music has not only to me but to all of us."
London-based Swedish soul singer Fatima appears in two singles: first, there's "Firefly," a cosmic R&B groove that captures the rawness of a recent breakup. "Fatima came and just laid the hook, and I was like, damn, you're embodying how I'm feeling," says Goya, who built it out with contributions from Swarvy, Omari Jazz, Les Lockheart, and his Ghostly labelmate quickly, quickly. Fatima returns for the crew jam, "Chase Tha Sunrise," joined by Yaya Bey and lojii (also in his second appearance). Hovering above guitar lines and beats, they take turns in a weave of gratitude. Goya explains, "Yaya recently lost her father, a hip-hop legend ??[Grand Daddy I.U.]. He influenced one of my favorite rappers, Roc Marciano, who made me really get into lyricism and rapping and speaking. Then to get lojii on there, and Roc also influenced him, so it felt like the fullest circle moment just to give that kind of ode to the parents, to our ancestors."
He recorded the hypnotic "Crossroads" with Maxwell Owin in his South London studio at 4am; "It was winter time, and a window was broke, and it was f*cking cold, but something in my head was like like these are the hard times in the dirt that you're gonna look back on and be like, bro, you made a diamond."
Goya wraps Weejuns on the gospel-tinged outro, "FOREVER POOH," produced with Omari Lyseight. Surrounded only by soulful hums and strums, his closing remarks cross the looseness of a freestyle with the poignance of something greater, a 21st-century artist deeply in the pocket of his pleated craft.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1.Weejuns (intro) ft. Will Stowe
2.Beautiful BLACK
3.One Hand Washes The Other feat. lojii
4.Crossroad(s)
5.Negroni (Skit)
6.FireFly feat. Fatima
7.Nothin’ to Say
8.UPtown Mami (Skit)
9.Manuva(s) feat. Joe Armon-Jones
10.Driftin’ Interlude feat. Pearl De Luna
11.Chase The Sunrise feat. Yaya Bey, lojii, Fatima 05:01
12.First Dates
13.Quiz Interlude feat. Salimata
14.Lizards / Dancin' With The Devil feat. Jaydonclover & The Hotel
15.Mind, Body, Spirit feat. Seafood Sam
16.FOREVER POOH
Preview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rESM76i97BM
Goya Gumbani loves getting dressed, guided not by stylists or trends but by his own research and self-expression, an excitement for fabrics, fits, and fundamentals. The Brooklyn-born, South East London-based artist approaches Warlord of the Weejuns, his first LP on Ghostly International, after years of acclaimed self-releases with the same mentality. Rather than simply recruit beats to rap over, he's now embodied both the narrator and the conductor, developing a shared musicality with various changes in scenery, players, producers, and guests — including Fatima, lojii, Seafood Sam, Yaya Bey, and many others — outfitting his flow between London's new jazz generation and New York City's hip-hop storytelling legacy. Goya borrows the album title from a magazine headline once placed upon Mile Davis (given how well he wore the iconic Weejun loafers). Here, he channels not just that storied style from the king of cool but an artistic ingenuity and timeless sensibility, redefining his recording project with rich, full-band arrangements. Marked by unguarded ambition and introspection, Warlord of the Weejuns is a triumph of taste, heritage, and pride from one of rap music's most dexterous talents.
Before and during sessions spread across London, Philadelphia, New York, and Los Angeles, Goya leaned into his jazz collection with a heightened sense of awareness, reflecting on Davis' legacy in the context of intention and growth. "His appreciation and love for music but also clothes, taking pride in your image. Not feeling restricted in your music or your fashion. He kept redefining himself, moving the goalposts. It just opened my eyes to the ideology that there are no bounds; you can't get boxed in, there's no wrong turns. Every turn just leads you somewhere else."
Taking cues from the intuitive and often wordless expressions of jazz as well as the rhythmic meditations of reggae, Goya let the music lead. "I didn't want to fit 100 words in 16 bars; it was more about making the voice part of the instrumentation, to sit at ease in the mix, like laying in the water, letting the current wash over." Even when more reclined at the mic, he remains an evocative and boldly vulnerable lyricist, allowing the material to form around life's impressions — "slight changes to the input," he says. "The things that I would pour into myself, my views, my mornings waking up, breaking up with girls, meeting new people, it's all these things. When I listen back to it, I can hear where I was, and I can hear where I'm going."
Threads of affirmation and self-worth — unlearning past constructs, manifesting knowledge and power from within — run throughout Warlord of the Weejuns. After the swaggering, a capella intro ("All I do is write, rap, scribble, scat, wear long coats with pressed slacks…."), the horn-backed "Beautiful BLK" sets the celebratory tone. Produced by Franky Bones, the track radiates pride with lush keys, bass, and brass as Goya declares, "It's time to redefine" above emboldened excerpts from a speech by Yosef Ben-Jochannan. He wrote the song after visiting his mom's birthplace far outside of London, and his uncle's recording studio in Nottingham and hearing him talk about Bob Marley's influence, realizing the lineage of it all. "I was just looking at him and looking at myself, and I thought, this is generational." He further unpacks the track: "I wanted to make something that could speak to Black kids from anywhere in the world, just love yourself, know your worth. Like, you got it. What I would have told myself: you are beautiful."
Goya welcomes a wide range of artistry across the spacious collection, replete with vibe-shaping skits and interludes. "I feel honored to have everyone on this album and understand how all these elements, these ingredients, come together to make the greatest gumbo. These collaborations made me remember the importance music has not only to me but to all of us."
London-based Swedish soul singer Fatima appears in two singles: first, there's "Firefly," a cosmic R&B groove that captures the rawness of a recent breakup. "Fatima came and just laid the hook, and I was like, damn, you're embodying how I'm feeling," says Goya, who built it out with contributions from Swarvy, Omari Jazz, Les Lockheart, and his Ghostly labelmate quickly, quickly. Fatima returns for the crew jam, "Chase Tha Sunrise," joined by Yaya Bey and lojii (also in his second appearance). Hovering above guitar lines and beats, they take turns in a weave of gratitude. Goya explains, "Yaya recently lost her father, a hip-hop legend ??[Grand Daddy I.U.]. He influenced one of my favorite rappers, Roc Marciano, who made me really get into lyricism and rapping and speaking. Then to get lojii on there, and Roc also influenced him, so it felt like the fullest circle moment just to give that kind of ode to the parents, to our ancestors."
He recorded the hypnotic "Crossroads" with Maxwell Owin in his South London studio at 4am; "It was winter time, and a window was broke, and it was f*cking cold, but something in my head was like like these are the hard times in the dirt that you're gonna look back on and be like, bro, you made a diamond."
Goya wraps Weejuns on the gospel-tinged outro, "FOREVER POOH," produced with Omari Lyseight. Surrounded only by soulful hums and strums, his closing remarks cross the looseness of a freestyle with the poignance of something greater, a 21st-century artist deeply in the pocket of his pleated craft.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1
Whatever The Weather - 1°C
2
Whatever The Weather - 3°C
3
Whatever The Weather - 18°C
4
Whatever The Weather - 20°C
5
Whatever The Weather - 23°C (Intermittent Sunshine)
6
Whatever The Weather - 5°C
7
Whatever The Weather - 8°C
8
Whatever The Weather - 26°C
9
Whatever The Weather - 11°C (Intermittent Rain)
10
Whatever The Weather - 9°C
11
Whatever The Weather - 15°C
12
Whatever The Weather - 12°C
Across a remarkable run of releases in barely half a decade, London’s Loraine James has established her identity through a blend of refined composition, gritty experimentation, and unpredictable, intricate electronic programming. While titles released under her given name on the esteemed label Hyperdub tend toward IDM-influenced, vocal-heavy collaborations, James reserves her alias, Whatever The Weather, for a more impressionistic, inward gaze. On Whatever The Weather II, rich worlds of layered textures flow seamlessly from hypnotic ambience, to mottled rhythms, to cut-up collages of diaristic field recordings. The result is a uniquely fractured beauty, born from a compelling union of organic and human elements, processed through a variety of digital and analogue methods.
James titled Whatever The Weather pieces based on an innate sense of their “emotional temperature” at the time of recording, but she notes that often, upon revisiting them, they will feel somewhere else entirely on the thermometer; such are the whims of the environment. Compared to the album’s predecessor and its Antarctic imagery, though, Whatever The Weather II is a warmer outing, as signaled by the desert clime of its cover photo which is once again shot by Collin Hughes, and the package designed by Justin Hunt Sloane. Also common to both albums is the mastering work of friend and collaborator Josh Eustis (aka Telefon Tel Aviv), who lends his keen ear to James’ complexities, to craft a strikingly three-dimensional sonic experience.
“1°C” opens the album with James speaking through thick static, idly pining, “Bit chilly, innit… Can’t wait for it to be summer,” as a bed of granular tones and scattered vocal samples emerges. This ineffable mood carries through “3°C”, where high-frequency oscillations flutter across the stereo field, a vigorous, minimal kick rattles through a broken speaker cone, and spacious synth harmonies burst and fade into mist. “20°C”, the longest entry in the collection, daydreams through a din of conversation and minor-key chords, before blossoming into a series of glitchy, staccato percussion patterns. “8°C” rides a sole, wandering keyboard line adorned with minimal counterpoint. In these moments, James effortlessly draws order from a diffusion of ideas, and an air of playful spontaneity creates the common thread.
In discussing this project, James notes that the first Whatever The Weather LP (Ghostly, 2022) was created concurrently with Reflection (Hyperdub, 2021), and that there was some degree of stylistic cross-pollination between her two musical frames of mind. At the time, she shared her feelings on genre with Pitchfork’s Philip Sherburne, noting, “Yeah, I might look different from most people who make IDM, and I’m from a different time period, but I don’t really care about the term being negative or positive. I feel my music is IDM and I do my own spin on it, being inspired by other stuff and fusing it all together.” This go around, she dedicated several months of focused energy to the alias, and to the development of its distinctions: no collaborators, fewer beats, and a process based primarily on instinct and improvisation.
The album’s singular sound arises from James’ favoring of hardware over software, as her battery of synths is modulated, transformed, and reassembled through an array of pedals with few or no overdubs, effectively anchoring each arrangement to its precise moment of creation. The greatest effort in post-production was given to sequencing, on which the artist places the utmost importance; taken as a whole, the suite ebbs and flows with a fitting sense of seasonal flux and naturalistic grace.
The final act of Whatever The Weather II offers some of its most affecting moments, beginning with “9°C”, where the haunting echoes of children on a Tokyo playground break through intermittent bursts of static, steeped in a bath of off-kilter, bubbling tones. Here, James displays one of her many strengths: a fearless approach to sonic collage, elevated by ambitious experimentation and pacing that manages plenty of surprises. Never content to remain in the same sonic space for too long, “15°C” follows with soft pads and glistening countermelodies, abruptly joined by a jarring, cyclical rhythm that mimics a loose part inside a whirring machine. Like much of James’ work, it bears an internal logic that only makes sense in her hands.
Closing track, “12°C”, drifts from bustling human spaces into a concrete groove, weaving melody and texture into a truly unusual, soul-stirring fullness. In its final moments we hear, for the first time, a languid acoustic guitar and gentle, finger-tapped beat over her pitch-shifted voice, a callback that ends the album with wry ambiguity, and a hint of more to be found beyond the horizon. Whatever The Weather II is full of such passages, where formal composition appears like a film in negative, and conventions are upturned with wit, intelligence, and skill.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
James titled Whatever The Weather pieces based on an innate sense of their “emotional temperature” at the time of recording, but she notes that often, upon revisiting them, they will feel somewhere else entirely on the thermometer; such are the whims of the environment. Compared to the album’s predecessor and its Antarctic imagery, though, Whatever The Weather II is a warmer outing, as signaled by the desert clime of its cover photo which is once again shot by Collin Hughes, and the package designed by Justin Hunt Sloane. Also common to both albums is the mastering work of friend and collaborator Josh Eustis (aka Telefon Tel Aviv), who lends his keen ear to James’ complexities, to craft a strikingly three-dimensional sonic experience.
“1°C” opens the album with James speaking through thick static, idly pining, “Bit chilly, innit… Can’t wait for it to be summer,” as a bed of granular tones and scattered vocal samples emerges. This ineffable mood carries through “3°C”, where high-frequency oscillations flutter across the stereo field, a vigorous, minimal kick rattles through a broken speaker cone, and spacious synth harmonies burst and fade into mist. “20°C”, the longest entry in the collection, daydreams through a din of conversation and minor-key chords, before blossoming into a series of glitchy, staccato percussion patterns. “8°C” rides a sole, wandering keyboard line adorned with minimal counterpoint. In these moments, James effortlessly draws order from a diffusion of ideas, and an air of playful spontaneity creates the common thread.
In discussing this project, James notes that the first Whatever The Weather LP (Ghostly, 2022) was created concurrently with Reflection (Hyperdub, 2021), and that there was some degree of stylistic cross-pollination between her two musical frames of mind. At the time, she shared her feelings on genre with Pitchfork’s Philip Sherburne, noting, “Yeah, I might look different from most people who make IDM, and I’m from a different time period, but I don’t really care about the term being negative or positive. I feel my music is IDM and I do my own spin on it, being inspired by other stuff and fusing it all together.” This go around, she dedicated several months of focused energy to the alias, and to the development of its distinctions: no collaborators, fewer beats, and a process based primarily on instinct and improvisation.
The album’s singular sound arises from James’ favoring of hardware over software, as her battery of synths is modulated, transformed, and reassembled through an array of pedals with few or no overdubs, effectively anchoring each arrangement to its precise moment of creation. The greatest effort in post-production was given to sequencing, on which the artist places the utmost importance; taken as a whole, the suite ebbs and flows with a fitting sense of seasonal flux and naturalistic grace.
The final act of Whatever The Weather II offers some of its most affecting moments, beginning with “9°C”, where the haunting echoes of children on a Tokyo playground break through intermittent bursts of static, steeped in a bath of off-kilter, bubbling tones. Here, James displays one of her many strengths: a fearless approach to sonic collage, elevated by ambitious experimentation and pacing that manages plenty of surprises. Never content to remain in the same sonic space for too long, “15°C” follows with soft pads and glistening countermelodies, abruptly joined by a jarring, cyclical rhythm that mimics a loose part inside a whirring machine. Like much of James’ work, it bears an internal logic that only makes sense in her hands.
Closing track, “12°C”, drifts from bustling human spaces into a concrete groove, weaving melody and texture into a truly unusual, soul-stirring fullness. In its final moments we hear, for the first time, a languid acoustic guitar and gentle, finger-tapped beat over her pitch-shifted voice, a callback that ends the album with wry ambiguity, and a hint of more to be found beyond the horizon. Whatever The Weather II is full of such passages, where formal composition appears like a film in negative, and conventions are upturned with wit, intelligence, and skill.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1
Studio - Out There
2
Studio - West Side
3
Studio - Origin
4
Studio - Life's A Beach!
5
Studio - Self Service
6
Studio - Indo
The mid-2000s underground stir surrounding Studio, the project of Swedish musicians Dan Lissvik and Rasmus Hägg, feels nearly lost to time. West Coast, their seminal 2006 debut, captured a faraway romanticism of Balearic brushed up against Krautrock, disco, dub, and afro-beat, with pop lyricism lifted from new wave, all made modern by two art school grads in Gothenburg. First pressed in a small vinyl-only run via their own Information label, the album has been notably absent from most streaming services, and the internet’s record of its initial impact is all but fossilized from a bygone blog era, while its sound is simply untraceable to any one moment in music.
Presented with a minimalist black circle LP design, the set possessed an uncanny escapist sensibility, underscored by track titles like “Life’s A Beach!” but otherwise entirely on the suggestion of that sound, imagined, displaced, and subconsciously amalgamated. Some called it “the missing link between The Cure and Lindstrøm,” Pitchfork heard Durutti Column and Can, as the duo’s story became swept up in a loosely developing scene — adjacent first to the label Service (Jens Lekman, The Whitest Boy Alive) and later Sincerely Yours (The Tough Alliance, jj) — and a precursor to the 2010s boom at the axis of electronic and psychedelic music guided by indie greats like Caribou, Four Tet, and Darkside. Featuring six free-flowed tracks that glide between hypnotic instrumental terrain and anthemic pop architecture, West Coast succeeded in its premise, a trance-inducing, deja vu-like destination instantly identifiable and endlessly replayable. By late 2007, following its expanded CD repackaging as Yearbook 1, the songs were staples of year-end lists, including best album write-ups by Pitchfork, FACT Magazine, and Rough Trade. While Lissvik and Hägg kept busy, Studio’s proper follow-up never came, thus adding to West Coast’s strange allure and legacy. In 2025, the record sees renewed appreciation, remastered and reissued by Ghostly International.
West Coast took shape throughout much of Studio's existence. The earliest recordings trace back to sessions held at Lissvik’s art school and Hägg’s rehearsal space between 2001 and 2004. During this period, Lissvik co-founded the Service label, creating a platform to release music, produce T-shirts, and host events. Service organized large parties, and the art school served as both a club venue and office, in a style reminiscent of Factory Records and Haçienda. Aside from their three initial 7-inch releases on Service, they kept most of their music to themselves for several years. Hägg remembers, "All these recordings were just piled up and we dusted them off and started to deconstruct and assemble them in a more drawn-out fashion." In 2005, they left Service, flirted with breaking up, and then revisited material and wrote two new songs at Hägg's Ferry Terminal Studio and Lissvik's N.47 studio, which he jokingly dubbed the "Beach Ball of Death sessions" due to the slow processing strain put on his Power Mac G4. Hägg continues, "I had started a disco club night with a friend and we went deep down the rabbit holes of Balearics, space rock, and strange leftfield dancefloor stuff. This probably seeped into Studio's output. Around the same time, with Dan slowing drums down to half tempo, finishing ‘No Comply’ and creating ‘Radio Edit’, the B-side of Studio's first 12", a West Coast blueprint was born.”
Soon songs were finalized and sequenced from countless sketches and layers, and the titles clicked into place after being kicked around for a while. The title for the pulsing, guitar-driven “Self Service” was inspired by Lissvik’s visit to the office of the Paris fashion magazine and chosen to mark their newfound independence. Thematically, a larger vision emerged. “Somehow, I knew I wanted to make a conceptual record that, although only imaginary at that point, could represent or define how our city sounded,” says Lissvik. “I was totally immersed in a word bubble and was really struggling with lyrics for one of our potential instrumentals. While walking back to the studio one day after a lunch break, ‘West Coast’ appeared in my mind. I ran back to the studio, wrote down the lyrics for ‘West Side,’ and suddenly ‘Life’s A Beach!,’ ‘Indo’ and the rest of the potential instrumentals all made sense.”
Sonically, the set represented years of developing taste as well. In the same breadth, they cite DJ Screw, J Dilla, and Joy Division, along with early ‘80s European live DJ sets from the likes of Beppe Loda, DJ Mozart, and Baldelli as reference points. “The anything-goes mentality was very encouraging and was a big cornerstone to the Studio sound,” says Hägg. “But there’s so much more to the picture, we were not that young then and had lots of musical baggage in our suitcases, the new thing was that we finally let it all come through, not bound by any borders that was often the case with music identity in Sweden during the ‘90s.”
West Coast is defined by its swing, an ability to lock into loops and beat-grids while still prioritizing looseness and genuine surprises across long passages with layers constantly appearing and fading from the mix. Songs can momentarily fall out of step or change course, like 10 minutes into the hazy opener “Out There” when the bass line suddenly dips back beat for 4 bars and then returns on the beat, giving way for a dubbed-out breakdown and ascendent finish. Or take the 13-minute “Life’s A Beach!” which eases into a soft, tide-changing crescendo just before the 9-minute mark, returning anew on an optimistic bass line as the guitar gets moody above the shimmering wash. Hägg says, “It always transcended very well live, like an implosion. It’s a very tricky song to play, due to strange rounds so it’s such a relief when one gets there, probably what you hear is a big sigh.”
In the afterglow of the record’s 2007 reception, as their oft-mentioned un-Google-able name and Myspace page made rounds and West Coast was cemented as “one of the finest pieces of electronic music you ´ll hear this year,” per The Guardian, Studio receded from view, clouded behind a mountain of remix requests (including belter for Kylie Minogue and Stockholm’s Shout Out Louds) and label bureaucracy. But both artists, now well into respective careers beyond Studio, have come to peace with West Coast as their most enduring effort together. Lissvik adds, “It serves as a good reminder for me to keep to that decision and promise and to continue exploring and growing.”
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Presented with a minimalist black circle LP design, the set possessed an uncanny escapist sensibility, underscored by track titles like “Life’s A Beach!” but otherwise entirely on the suggestion of that sound, imagined, displaced, and subconsciously amalgamated. Some called it “the missing link between The Cure and Lindstrøm,” Pitchfork heard Durutti Column and Can, as the duo’s story became swept up in a loosely developing scene — adjacent first to the label Service (Jens Lekman, The Whitest Boy Alive) and later Sincerely Yours (The Tough Alliance, jj) — and a precursor to the 2010s boom at the axis of electronic and psychedelic music guided by indie greats like Caribou, Four Tet, and Darkside. Featuring six free-flowed tracks that glide between hypnotic instrumental terrain and anthemic pop architecture, West Coast succeeded in its premise, a trance-inducing, deja vu-like destination instantly identifiable and endlessly replayable. By late 2007, following its expanded CD repackaging as Yearbook 1, the songs were staples of year-end lists, including best album write-ups by Pitchfork, FACT Magazine, and Rough Trade. While Lissvik and Hägg kept busy, Studio’s proper follow-up never came, thus adding to West Coast’s strange allure and legacy. In 2025, the record sees renewed appreciation, remastered and reissued by Ghostly International.
West Coast took shape throughout much of Studio's existence. The earliest recordings trace back to sessions held at Lissvik’s art school and Hägg’s rehearsal space between 2001 and 2004. During this period, Lissvik co-founded the Service label, creating a platform to release music, produce T-shirts, and host events. Service organized large parties, and the art school served as both a club venue and office, in a style reminiscent of Factory Records and Haçienda. Aside from their three initial 7-inch releases on Service, they kept most of their music to themselves for several years. Hägg remembers, "All these recordings were just piled up and we dusted them off and started to deconstruct and assemble them in a more drawn-out fashion." In 2005, they left Service, flirted with breaking up, and then revisited material and wrote two new songs at Hägg's Ferry Terminal Studio and Lissvik's N.47 studio, which he jokingly dubbed the "Beach Ball of Death sessions" due to the slow processing strain put on his Power Mac G4. Hägg continues, "I had started a disco club night with a friend and we went deep down the rabbit holes of Balearics, space rock, and strange leftfield dancefloor stuff. This probably seeped into Studio's output. Around the same time, with Dan slowing drums down to half tempo, finishing ‘No Comply’ and creating ‘Radio Edit’, the B-side of Studio's first 12", a West Coast blueprint was born.”
Soon songs were finalized and sequenced from countless sketches and layers, and the titles clicked into place after being kicked around for a while. The title for the pulsing, guitar-driven “Self Service” was inspired by Lissvik’s visit to the office of the Paris fashion magazine and chosen to mark their newfound independence. Thematically, a larger vision emerged. “Somehow, I knew I wanted to make a conceptual record that, although only imaginary at that point, could represent or define how our city sounded,” says Lissvik. “I was totally immersed in a word bubble and was really struggling with lyrics for one of our potential instrumentals. While walking back to the studio one day after a lunch break, ‘West Coast’ appeared in my mind. I ran back to the studio, wrote down the lyrics for ‘West Side,’ and suddenly ‘Life’s A Beach!,’ ‘Indo’ and the rest of the potential instrumentals all made sense.”
Sonically, the set represented years of developing taste as well. In the same breadth, they cite DJ Screw, J Dilla, and Joy Division, along with early ‘80s European live DJ sets from the likes of Beppe Loda, DJ Mozart, and Baldelli as reference points. “The anything-goes mentality was very encouraging and was a big cornerstone to the Studio sound,” says Hägg. “But there’s so much more to the picture, we were not that young then and had lots of musical baggage in our suitcases, the new thing was that we finally let it all come through, not bound by any borders that was often the case with music identity in Sweden during the ‘90s.”
West Coast is defined by its swing, an ability to lock into loops and beat-grids while still prioritizing looseness and genuine surprises across long passages with layers constantly appearing and fading from the mix. Songs can momentarily fall out of step or change course, like 10 minutes into the hazy opener “Out There” when the bass line suddenly dips back beat for 4 bars and then returns on the beat, giving way for a dubbed-out breakdown and ascendent finish. Or take the 13-minute “Life’s A Beach!” which eases into a soft, tide-changing crescendo just before the 9-minute mark, returning anew on an optimistic bass line as the guitar gets moody above the shimmering wash. Hägg says, “It always transcended very well live, like an implosion. It’s a very tricky song to play, due to strange rounds so it’s such a relief when one gets there, probably what you hear is a big sigh.”
In the afterglow of the record’s 2007 reception, as their oft-mentioned un-Google-able name and Myspace page made rounds and West Coast was cemented as “one of the finest pieces of electronic music you ´ll hear this year,” per The Guardian, Studio receded from view, clouded behind a mountain of remix requests (including belter for Kylie Minogue and Stockholm’s Shout Out Louds) and label bureaucracy. But both artists, now well into respective careers beyond Studio, have come to peace with West Coast as their most enduring effort together. Lissvik adds, “It serves as a good reminder for me to keep to that decision and promise and to continue exploring and growing.”
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILP420
Release-Date:25.10.2024
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:LP
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILP420
Release-Date:25.10.2024
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:LP
1
Shigeto - Dial In (Intro)
2
Shigeto - Ready. Set. Flex. (feat. Zelooperz and Ian Maciak)
3
Shigeto - Runnup On'm (feat. Cleveland Thrasher and Ahya Simone)
4
Shigeto - Nothing Simple (feat. Tammy Lakkis and Cleveland Thrasher)
5
Shigeto - The Punch! (feat. KESSWA)
6
Shigeto - Let’s Talk (feat. KESSWA and Ahya Simone)
7
Shigeto - Can’t Keep Up (feat. KESSWA)
8
Shigeto - BookaMagick (feat. Cleveland Thrasher)
9
Shigeto - Pressure (feat. KESSWA and The Josh Craig)
10
Shigeto - Honey High and Blue (feat. KESSWA)
Cherry Blossom Baby, Shigeto's first full-length statement since 2017, sprouts out from a collective thaw, ambitious, collaborative, and fully realized. The Detroit-based, Japanese-American musician, DJ, Portage Garage Sounds label co-founder, and longtime Ghostly International artist embraces the role of producer and composer. Bold and cultivated with intention, the band-built sound honors traditions in electronic, jazz, R&B, and hip-hop, a fusion that's become his signature, now more vibrant than ever. Zach Saginaw and a group of guests and players present a snapshot in time, a celebration of self-love and an expression of vitality distinctly rooted in Detroit and informed by his family’s cultural history. "I am a cherry blossom baby," he says. "We all are cherry blossom babies, we all are resilient, we all are growing, we all will continue to."
Heritage has been at the heart of Saginaw's recording project from the start; his middle name is Shigeto, a name passed down from his great grandfather, which means "to grow" — it was apt given his premature birth weight of less than a pound, and remains fitting for the evolution of his artistry, now nearly 15 years since he signed to Ghostly. On Lineage (GI-148, 2012), Saginaw grappled with an ancestral story; the artwork contrasted photos taken of his great-grandfather's home in Hiroshima in 1916 and later at the Amache Internment Camp in Grenada, Colorado, where he and his family were sent during the Second World War. The line continues through Cherry Blossom Baby, which finds Saginaw drawing inspiration from the cherry trees that bloom every spring at Hiroshima, an enduring image of hope, resilience, and renewal.
Saginaw's been searching, a simmering introspection that surfaced in recent years as nightlife paused and he began to question the idea of Shigeto, the performer and Michigan fixture. "My identity is always something I've struggled with, not being really considered Japanese, not being considered white. I think Shigeto was a way for me to have this identity, to create one for myself that I can latch onto, and it suddenly didn't exist anymore." The realization pushed him to work on himself, to come back to his craft and his community, laying the groundwork for a record that rises from the figurative ashes anew.
A reaffirmed sense of self, momentum, and maturation is apparent in where Saginaw situates here as a songwriter and producer arranging ideas alongside Detroit's finest, a physical manifestation of his WDET 101.9FM show highlighting “forward-thinking music from the Detroit Diaspora.” Every track is a collaboration, be it with a vocalist or multiple instrumentalists, a tradition forged in his Portage Garage studio sessions. "It's the first time I'm writing this stuff myself and getting these players to make it even better…it's impossible to have made it at this level without them." The production and mix favor a full, throwback quality, eschewing modern compression for more spacious dynamics, a nod to psych and jazz records of the '70s and '80s. "It was on purpose but also subconsciously, playing live with jazz bands and DJing b2b with mentors like Dez Andrés, playing older sounds over the last decade. Sonically I wanted to make this record feel like you could see multiple people in a studio."
The group puts egos aside to pursue the best possible outcomes, like Saginaw's choice to invite drummer Ian Maciak (Machinedrum) for the early standout "Ready. Set. Flex,” which takes off with drum & bass velocity. "Ian's sound is unmatched, I can't play jungle breaks like Ian and I thought, how cool would it be if I could get another drummer to play that track?" Above the breaks and a rolling piano loop, there's Zelooperz, the ascendant rapper and Bruiser Brigade member (as well as Shigeto's partner in 2017 project ZGTO), rattling off a series of cerebral lines, with upright bass from Josef Deas (a Portage Garage alum) and Saginaw's synth flourishes.
"The Punch" dips into an electro-boogie vibe; it's a crew jam featuring rising star vocalist and musician KESSWA, who has worked with Shigeto on previous releases and a 2022 MOCAD museum installation and lights up half of Cherry's ten tracks with her smooth, soulful delivery. Behind the kit, Saginaw provides the percussive punch (as well as synth and glockenspiel), surrounded by the personnel that has comprised his live band and Versions (GI-340, 2019) ensemble, including Ian Finkelstein, Dez Andrés, and later, Marcus Elliot.
The collaborative spirit that runs through Cherry Blossom Baby widens its range. Rapper Cleveland Thrasher brings raspy bars to the hypnotic "Runnup On'm" with harpist Ahya Simone, the trap/breakbeat-wielding "BookaMagick," and across the pop grooves of "Nothing Simple," where he bobs and weaves with producer/DJ Tammy Lakkis. Guitarist Sasha Kashperko riffs through several tracks, giving the material a loungier feel — "I've always wanted a great guitarist on my tracks," says Saginaw. Ahya Simone returns to elevate "Let's Talk" to the cosmos. Her harp parts represent a natural progression for the Shigeto sound; whereas in the past, he might have collaged string elements together, he leans back in the open space and lets it all flow organically.
Expanding on the title's metaphor, Shigeto is pushing forward with the people around him: "A cherry blossom is regrowing, but it's always different too, and I'm speaking to that with all the different musicians on this record, getting everyone involved and honoring their contributions is part of that cherry blossom philosophy.”
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Heritage has been at the heart of Saginaw's recording project from the start; his middle name is Shigeto, a name passed down from his great grandfather, which means "to grow" — it was apt given his premature birth weight of less than a pound, and remains fitting for the evolution of his artistry, now nearly 15 years since he signed to Ghostly. On Lineage (GI-148, 2012), Saginaw grappled with an ancestral story; the artwork contrasted photos taken of his great-grandfather's home in Hiroshima in 1916 and later at the Amache Internment Camp in Grenada, Colorado, where he and his family were sent during the Second World War. The line continues through Cherry Blossom Baby, which finds Saginaw drawing inspiration from the cherry trees that bloom every spring at Hiroshima, an enduring image of hope, resilience, and renewal.
Saginaw's been searching, a simmering introspection that surfaced in recent years as nightlife paused and he began to question the idea of Shigeto, the performer and Michigan fixture. "My identity is always something I've struggled with, not being really considered Japanese, not being considered white. I think Shigeto was a way for me to have this identity, to create one for myself that I can latch onto, and it suddenly didn't exist anymore." The realization pushed him to work on himself, to come back to his craft and his community, laying the groundwork for a record that rises from the figurative ashes anew.
A reaffirmed sense of self, momentum, and maturation is apparent in where Saginaw situates here as a songwriter and producer arranging ideas alongside Detroit's finest, a physical manifestation of his WDET 101.9FM show highlighting “forward-thinking music from the Detroit Diaspora.” Every track is a collaboration, be it with a vocalist or multiple instrumentalists, a tradition forged in his Portage Garage studio sessions. "It's the first time I'm writing this stuff myself and getting these players to make it even better…it's impossible to have made it at this level without them." The production and mix favor a full, throwback quality, eschewing modern compression for more spacious dynamics, a nod to psych and jazz records of the '70s and '80s. "It was on purpose but also subconsciously, playing live with jazz bands and DJing b2b with mentors like Dez Andrés, playing older sounds over the last decade. Sonically I wanted to make this record feel like you could see multiple people in a studio."
The group puts egos aside to pursue the best possible outcomes, like Saginaw's choice to invite drummer Ian Maciak (Machinedrum) for the early standout "Ready. Set. Flex,” which takes off with drum & bass velocity. "Ian's sound is unmatched, I can't play jungle breaks like Ian and I thought, how cool would it be if I could get another drummer to play that track?" Above the breaks and a rolling piano loop, there's Zelooperz, the ascendant rapper and Bruiser Brigade member (as well as Shigeto's partner in 2017 project ZGTO), rattling off a series of cerebral lines, with upright bass from Josef Deas (a Portage Garage alum) and Saginaw's synth flourishes.
"The Punch" dips into an electro-boogie vibe; it's a crew jam featuring rising star vocalist and musician KESSWA, who has worked with Shigeto on previous releases and a 2022 MOCAD museum installation and lights up half of Cherry's ten tracks with her smooth, soulful delivery. Behind the kit, Saginaw provides the percussive punch (as well as synth and glockenspiel), surrounded by the personnel that has comprised his live band and Versions (GI-340, 2019) ensemble, including Ian Finkelstein, Dez Andrés, and later, Marcus Elliot.
The collaborative spirit that runs through Cherry Blossom Baby widens its range. Rapper Cleveland Thrasher brings raspy bars to the hypnotic "Runnup On'm" with harpist Ahya Simone, the trap/breakbeat-wielding "BookaMagick," and across the pop grooves of "Nothing Simple," where he bobs and weaves with producer/DJ Tammy Lakkis. Guitarist Sasha Kashperko riffs through several tracks, giving the material a loungier feel — "I've always wanted a great guitarist on my tracks," says Saginaw. Ahya Simone returns to elevate "Let's Talk" to the cosmos. Her harp parts represent a natural progression for the Shigeto sound; whereas in the past, he might have collaged string elements together, he leans back in the open space and lets it all flow organically.
Expanding on the title's metaphor, Shigeto is pushing forward with the people around him: "A cherry blossom is regrowing, but it's always different too, and I'm speaking to that with all the different musicians on this record, getting everyone involved and honoring their contributions is part of that cherry blossom philosophy.”
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC1420
Release-Date:25.10.2024
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:LP
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC1420
Release-Date:25.10.2024
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:LP
1
Shigeto - Dial (Intro)
2
Shigeto - Ready. Set. Flex. (feat. Zelooperz and Ian Maciak)
3
Shigeto - Runnup On'm (feat. Cleveland Thrasher and Ahya Simone)
4
Shigeto - Nothing Simple (feat. Tammy Lakkis and Cleveland Thrasher)
5
Shigeto - The Punch! (feat. KESSWA)
6
Shigeto - Let’s Talk (feat. KESSWA and Ahya Simone)
7
Shigeto - Can’t Keep Up (feat. KESSWA)
8
Shigeto - BookaMagick (feat. Cleveland Thrasher)
9
Shigeto - Pressure (feat. KESSWA and The Josh Craig)
10
Shigeto - Honey High and Blue (feat. KESSWA)
Sakura Droplet Vinyl!
Cherry Blossom Baby, Shigeto's first full-length statement since 2017, sprouts out from a collective thaw, ambitious, collaborative, and fully realized. The Detroit-based, Japanese-American musician, DJ, Portage Garage Sounds label co-founder, and longtime Ghostly International artist embraces the role of producer and composer. Bold and cultivated with intention, the band-built sound honors traditions in electronic, jazz, R&B, and hip-hop, a fusion that's become his signature, now more vibrant than ever. Zach Saginaw and a group of guests and players present a snapshot in time, a celebration of self-love and an expression of vitality distinctly rooted in Detroit and informed by his family’s cultural history. "I am a cherry blossom baby," he says. "We all are cherry blossom babies, we all are resilient, we all are growing, we all will continue to."
Heritage has been at the heart of Saginaw's recording project from the start; his middle name is Shigeto, a name passed down from his great grandfather, which means "to grow" — it was apt given his premature birth weight of less than a pound, and remains fitting for the evolution of his artistry, now nearly 15 years since he signed to Ghostly. On Lineage (GI-148, 2012), Saginaw grappled with an ancestral story; the artwork contrasted photos taken of his great-grandfather's home in Hiroshima in 1916 and later at the Amache Internment Camp in Grenada, Colorado, where he and his family were sent during the Second World War. The line continues through Cherry Blossom Baby, which finds Saginaw drawing inspiration from the cherry trees that bloom every spring at Hiroshima, an enduring image of hope, resilience, and renewal.
Saginaw's been searching, a simmering introspection that surfaced in recent years as nightlife paused and he began to question the idea of Shigeto, the performer and Michigan fixture. "My identity is always something I've struggled with, not being really considered Japanese, not being considered white. I think Shigeto was a way for me to have this identity, to create one for myself that I can latch onto, and it suddenly didn't exist anymore." The realization pushed him to work on himself, to come back to his craft and his community, laying the groundwork for a record that rises from the figurative ashes anew.
A reaffirmed sense of self, momentum, and maturation is apparent in where Saginaw situates here as a songwriter and producer arranging ideas alongside Detroit's finest, a physical manifestation of his WDET 101.9FM show highlighting “forward-thinking music from the Detroit Diaspora.” Every track is a collaboration, be it with a vocalist or multiple instrumentalists, a tradition forged in his Portage Garage studio sessions. "It's the first time I'm writing this stuff myself and getting these players to make it even better…it's impossible to have made it at this level without them." The production and mix favor a full, throwback quality, eschewing modern compression for more spacious dynamics, a nod to psych and jazz records of the '70s and '80s. "It was on purpose but also subconsciously, playing live with jazz bands and DJing b2b with mentors like Dez Andrés, playing older sounds over the last decade. Sonically I wanted to make this record feel like you could see multiple people in a studio."
The group puts egos aside to pursue the best possible outcomes, like Saginaw's choice to invite drummer Ian Maciak (Machinedrum) for the early standout "Ready. Set. Flex,” which takes off with drum & bass velocity. "Ian's sound is unmatched, I can't play jungle breaks like Ian and I thought, how cool would it be if I could get another drummer to play that track?" Above the breaks and a rolling piano loop, there's Zelooperz, the ascendant rapper and Bruiser Brigade member (as well as Shigeto's partner in 2017 project ZGTO), rattling off a series of cerebral lines, with upright bass from Josef Deas (a Portage Garage alum) and Saginaw's synth flourishes.
"The Punch" dips into an electro-boogie vibe; it's a crew jam featuring rising star vocalist and musician KESSWA, who has worked with Shigeto on previous releases and a 2022 MOCAD museum installation and lights up half of Cherry's ten tracks with her smooth, soulful delivery. Behind the kit, Saginaw provides the percussive punch (as well as synth and glockenspiel), surrounded by the personnel that has comprised his live band and Versions (GI-340, 2019) ensemble, including Ian Finkelstein, Dez Andrés, and later, Marcus Elliot.
The collaborative spirit that runs through Cherry Blossom Baby widens its range. Rapper Cleveland Thrasher brings raspy bars to the hypnotic "Runnup On'm" with harpist Ahya Simone, the trap/breakbeat-wielding "BookaMagick," and across the pop grooves of "Nothing Simple," where he bobs and weaves with producer/DJ Tammy Lakkis. Guitarist Sasha Kashperko riffs through several tracks, giving the material a loungier feel — "I've always wanted a great guitarist on my tracks," says Saginaw. Ahya Simone returns to elevate "Let's Talk" to the cosmos. Her harp parts represent a natural progression for the Shigeto sound; whereas in the past, he might have collaged string elements together, he leans back in the open space and lets it all flow organically.
Expanding on the title's metaphor, Shigeto is pushing forward with the people around him: "A cherry blossom is regrowing, but it's always different too, and I'm speaking to that with all the different musicians on this record, getting everyone involved and honoring their contributions is part of that cherry blossom philosophy.”
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Cherry Blossom Baby, Shigeto's first full-length statement since 2017, sprouts out from a collective thaw, ambitious, collaborative, and fully realized. The Detroit-based, Japanese-American musician, DJ, Portage Garage Sounds label co-founder, and longtime Ghostly International artist embraces the role of producer and composer. Bold and cultivated with intention, the band-built sound honors traditions in electronic, jazz, R&B, and hip-hop, a fusion that's become his signature, now more vibrant than ever. Zach Saginaw and a group of guests and players present a snapshot in time, a celebration of self-love and an expression of vitality distinctly rooted in Detroit and informed by his family’s cultural history. "I am a cherry blossom baby," he says. "We all are cherry blossom babies, we all are resilient, we all are growing, we all will continue to."
Heritage has been at the heart of Saginaw's recording project from the start; his middle name is Shigeto, a name passed down from his great grandfather, which means "to grow" — it was apt given his premature birth weight of less than a pound, and remains fitting for the evolution of his artistry, now nearly 15 years since he signed to Ghostly. On Lineage (GI-148, 2012), Saginaw grappled with an ancestral story; the artwork contrasted photos taken of his great-grandfather's home in Hiroshima in 1916 and later at the Amache Internment Camp in Grenada, Colorado, where he and his family were sent during the Second World War. The line continues through Cherry Blossom Baby, which finds Saginaw drawing inspiration from the cherry trees that bloom every spring at Hiroshima, an enduring image of hope, resilience, and renewal.
Saginaw's been searching, a simmering introspection that surfaced in recent years as nightlife paused and he began to question the idea of Shigeto, the performer and Michigan fixture. "My identity is always something I've struggled with, not being really considered Japanese, not being considered white. I think Shigeto was a way for me to have this identity, to create one for myself that I can latch onto, and it suddenly didn't exist anymore." The realization pushed him to work on himself, to come back to his craft and his community, laying the groundwork for a record that rises from the figurative ashes anew.
A reaffirmed sense of self, momentum, and maturation is apparent in where Saginaw situates here as a songwriter and producer arranging ideas alongside Detroit's finest, a physical manifestation of his WDET 101.9FM show highlighting “forward-thinking music from the Detroit Diaspora.” Every track is a collaboration, be it with a vocalist or multiple instrumentalists, a tradition forged in his Portage Garage studio sessions. "It's the first time I'm writing this stuff myself and getting these players to make it even better…it's impossible to have made it at this level without them." The production and mix favor a full, throwback quality, eschewing modern compression for more spacious dynamics, a nod to psych and jazz records of the '70s and '80s. "It was on purpose but also subconsciously, playing live with jazz bands and DJing b2b with mentors like Dez Andrés, playing older sounds over the last decade. Sonically I wanted to make this record feel like you could see multiple people in a studio."
The group puts egos aside to pursue the best possible outcomes, like Saginaw's choice to invite drummer Ian Maciak (Machinedrum) for the early standout "Ready. Set. Flex,” which takes off with drum & bass velocity. "Ian's sound is unmatched, I can't play jungle breaks like Ian and I thought, how cool would it be if I could get another drummer to play that track?" Above the breaks and a rolling piano loop, there's Zelooperz, the ascendant rapper and Bruiser Brigade member (as well as Shigeto's partner in 2017 project ZGTO), rattling off a series of cerebral lines, with upright bass from Josef Deas (a Portage Garage alum) and Saginaw's synth flourishes.
"The Punch" dips into an electro-boogie vibe; it's a crew jam featuring rising star vocalist and musician KESSWA, who has worked with Shigeto on previous releases and a 2022 MOCAD museum installation and lights up half of Cherry's ten tracks with her smooth, soulful delivery. Behind the kit, Saginaw provides the percussive punch (as well as synth and glockenspiel), surrounded by the personnel that has comprised his live band and Versions (GI-340, 2019) ensemble, including Ian Finkelstein, Dez Andrés, and later, Marcus Elliot.
The collaborative spirit that runs through Cherry Blossom Baby widens its range. Rapper Cleveland Thrasher brings raspy bars to the hypnotic "Runnup On'm" with harpist Ahya Simone, the trap/breakbeat-wielding "BookaMagick," and across the pop grooves of "Nothing Simple," where he bobs and weaves with producer/DJ Tammy Lakkis. Guitarist Sasha Kashperko riffs through several tracks, giving the material a loungier feel — "I've always wanted a great guitarist on my tracks," says Saginaw. Ahya Simone returns to elevate "Let's Talk" to the cosmos. Her harp parts represent a natural progression for the Shigeto sound; whereas in the past, he might have collaged string elements together, he leans back in the open space and lets it all flow organically.
Expanding on the title's metaphor, Shigeto is pushing forward with the people around him: "A cherry blossom is regrowing, but it's always different too, and I'm speaking to that with all the different musicians on this record, getting everyone involved and honoring their contributions is part of that cherry blossom philosophy.”
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC2243
Release-Date:17.05.2024
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:LP
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC2243
Release-Date:17.05.2024
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:LP
1
C418 - Subwoofer Lullaby
2
C418 - Living Mice
3
C418 - Moog City
4
C418 - Haggstrom
5
C418 - Minecraft
6
C418 - Clark
7
C418 - Mice On Venus
8
C418 - Dry Hands
9
C418 - Wet Hands
10
C418 - Sweden
11
C418 - Cat
12
C418 - Danny
Repress!
Minecraft is a dreamscape, a limitless world where anything is possible. Minecraft is a tool, a means of bringing the imagination to life. Minecraft is a community, a platform on which inventive minds of all ages can share their creations and ideas. Minecraft, of course, is also a game, the most popular and best-selling video game of all time. Created in 2009 by Swedish programmer Markus "Notch" Persson, this cultural phenomenon speaks volumes of our current zeitgeist's love for virtual spaces, but its unprecedented success couldn't be pinned on one factor alone. Countless layers of thoughtful artistry flow through Minecraft's singular experience, not the least of which is its transportive soundtrack. And now for the first time since releasing digitally in 2011, the music of Minecraft will be issued on vinyl and CD by Ghostly International.
Minecraft Volume Alpha, the first installment of a two-part OST, is the work of German composer and musician Daniel Rosenfeld. Using C418 as his moniker, Rosenfeld crafted the sweeping soundtrack and vibrant sound design which helped breathe life into Minecraft's voxel-based universe. Fans and critics were universally enamored with his beatless, nuanced electronic pieces upon release. Popular gaming site Kotaku named it among The Best Game Music of 2011, calling the music "remarkably soothing," and The Guardian has compared Rosenfeld's delicate piano and sparse ambient motifs to legendary artists Erik Satie and Brian Eno. In an interview feature with C418, Polygon distilled Volume Alpha to its essence: "It's not bound by the retro aesthetic of Minecraft's graphics. It transcends them. The album is an attempt to uplift the combined game/music experience into the sublime."
But for all of the critical praise, C418's crowning achievement has to be his insatiable fan base, the seemingly endless swath of players and listeners who treat his music like gospel. They are exactly who this physical release of the Minecraft soundtrack was conceived for, though Ghostly hopes to bring Rosenfeld's music to a whole new audience as well. As any cursory listen of the touching sounds will reveal, this isn't a record meant solely for lifelong gamers and MineCon diehards; anyone in love with ambient, neo-classical, or minimal music needs to hear Volume Alpha.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Minecraft is a dreamscape, a limitless world where anything is possible. Minecraft is a tool, a means of bringing the imagination to life. Minecraft is a community, a platform on which inventive minds of all ages can share their creations and ideas. Minecraft, of course, is also a game, the most popular and best-selling video game of all time. Created in 2009 by Swedish programmer Markus "Notch" Persson, this cultural phenomenon speaks volumes of our current zeitgeist's love for virtual spaces, but its unprecedented success couldn't be pinned on one factor alone. Countless layers of thoughtful artistry flow through Minecraft's singular experience, not the least of which is its transportive soundtrack. And now for the first time since releasing digitally in 2011, the music of Minecraft will be issued on vinyl and CD by Ghostly International.
Minecraft Volume Alpha, the first installment of a two-part OST, is the work of German composer and musician Daniel Rosenfeld. Using C418 as his moniker, Rosenfeld crafted the sweeping soundtrack and vibrant sound design which helped breathe life into Minecraft's voxel-based universe. Fans and critics were universally enamored with his beatless, nuanced electronic pieces upon release. Popular gaming site Kotaku named it among The Best Game Music of 2011, calling the music "remarkably soothing," and The Guardian has compared Rosenfeld's delicate piano and sparse ambient motifs to legendary artists Erik Satie and Brian Eno. In an interview feature with C418, Polygon distilled Volume Alpha to its essence: "It's not bound by the retro aesthetic of Minecraft's graphics. It transcends them. The album is an attempt to uplift the combined game/music experience into the sublime."
But for all of the critical praise, C418's crowning achievement has to be his insatiable fan base, the seemingly endless swath of players and listeners who treat his music like gospel. They are exactly who this physical release of the Minecraft soundtrack was conceived for, though Ghostly hopes to bring Rosenfeld's music to a whole new audience as well. As any cursory listen of the touching sounds will reveal, this isn't a record meant solely for lifelong gamers and MineCon diehards; anyone in love with ambient, neo-classical, or minimal music needs to hear Volume Alpha.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC1360
Release-Date:17.05.2024
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:2LP
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC1360
Release-Date:17.05.2024
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:2LP
1
C418 - KI
2
C418 - Alpha
3
C418 - Blind Spots
4
C418 - Mutation
5
C418 - Biome Fest
6
C418 - Aria Math
7
C418 - Taswell
8
C418 - Beginning 2
9
C418 - Moog City 2
10
C418 - The End
11
C418 - Kyoto
12
C418 - Chirp
13
C418 - Mellohi
14
C418 - Stal
15
C418 - Eleven
16
C418 - Far
17
C418 - Intro
Repress!
As C418, composer and producer Daniel Rosenfeld designs sounds to resonate in both physical and pixelated realms. Best known for his original soundtracks to Minecraft, the single best-selling video game of all time, he’s developed a discography of instrumental music over the last decade that traverses electronic pop patterns, neo-classical dreamscapes, and sparse ambient motifs. The latter element has broken from the “8-bit” pigeonholing of game music and earned him accolades that reference artists like Erik Satie (The Guardian) and Brian Eno (VICE). In 2015, after quietly self-releasing Minecraft Volume Alpha and Minecraft Volume Beta, Rosenfeld partnered with Ghostly International to reissue Minecraft Volume Alpha on vinyl and CD. The release garnered attention from proper music critics and the gaming community alike, becoming one of the most sought after records in the Ghostly catalog. Now, following several restocks of Alpha to fervent fan response, it is time for the soundtrack’s second installment to shine. For the legion of listeners and players to, at long last, have Minecraft Volume Beta in tangible formats. The double LP arrives in August 2020 on standard black and fire splatter colored vinyl, available in regular sleeves as well an exclusive limited-edition jacket with a lenticular cover which gives depth and movement to its 3D-rendered image.
Originally self-released in 2013, Minecraft Volume Beta was C418’s longest batch of music to date at nearly 140 minutes. The collection features tracks that were "silently" added to Minecraft during its music updates and a few that never officially entered the game. The run time is now adapted to fit the double LP format, while digital downloads include the full set. Rosenfeld’s unmistakable abilities are on display; he creates a sweeping variety of musical ideas that mirror the limitless universe of Minecraft. Ghostly International is thrilled to give this unique collaboration its due treatment and hopes to see the creative inspiration which drives Minecraft and Rosenfeld continue to disperse by virtue of this unexpectedly universal music.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
As C418, composer and producer Daniel Rosenfeld designs sounds to resonate in both physical and pixelated realms. Best known for his original soundtracks to Minecraft, the single best-selling video game of all time, he’s developed a discography of instrumental music over the last decade that traverses electronic pop patterns, neo-classical dreamscapes, and sparse ambient motifs. The latter element has broken from the “8-bit” pigeonholing of game music and earned him accolades that reference artists like Erik Satie (The Guardian) and Brian Eno (VICE). In 2015, after quietly self-releasing Minecraft Volume Alpha and Minecraft Volume Beta, Rosenfeld partnered with Ghostly International to reissue Minecraft Volume Alpha on vinyl and CD. The release garnered attention from proper music critics and the gaming community alike, becoming one of the most sought after records in the Ghostly catalog. Now, following several restocks of Alpha to fervent fan response, it is time for the soundtrack’s second installment to shine. For the legion of listeners and players to, at long last, have Minecraft Volume Beta in tangible formats. The double LP arrives in August 2020 on standard black and fire splatter colored vinyl, available in regular sleeves as well an exclusive limited-edition jacket with a lenticular cover which gives depth and movement to its 3D-rendered image.
Originally self-released in 2013, Minecraft Volume Beta was C418’s longest batch of music to date at nearly 140 minutes. The collection features tracks that were "silently" added to Minecraft during its music updates and a few that never officially entered the game. The run time is now adapted to fit the double LP format, while digital downloads include the full set. Rosenfeld’s unmistakable abilities are on display; he creates a sweeping variety of musical ideas that mirror the limitless universe of Minecraft. Ghostly International is thrilled to give this unique collaboration its due treatment and hopes to see the creative inspiration which drives Minecraft and Rosenfeld continue to disperse by virtue of this unexpectedly universal music.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1
Hana Vu - Look Alive
2
Hana Vu - Hammer
3
Hana Vu - Alone2
4
Hana Vu - 22
5
Hana Vu - Care
6
Hana Vu - How It Goes
7
Hana Vu - Dreams
8
Hana Vu - Find Me Under Wilted Trees
9
Hana Vu - Airplane
10
Hana Vu - Play
11
Hana Vu - I Draw A Heart
12
Hana Vu - Love
Is there anything we like to be sung to about more than youth? A universal and yet elusive time that has a hold over all of us, it’s often evoked by the same platitudes. We’re told it’s a breathless stream of novelty and ecstasy, and we’re told even more often how quickly it ends. Yet we so rarely hear about its embedded grief. If youth’s ephemerality is part of its magic, doesn’t it make sense that an integral part of the experience might be mourning the days piling up behind you? “I was recently so close to childhood,” says Hana Vu, as she eats a piece of candy in her sun-striped Los Angeles apartment. “At the cusp of becoming a more capable and mature person, I feel grief for my naivete.”
This deep duality informs Romanticism, the newest album from Vu. She’s been making music since high school, with a full-length debut and several EPs behind her of glowy, brooding anthems of abstraction and emotion. On Romanticism, her guitar-driven synthy pop and plush contralto fill out the coming-of-age experience with slick and sorrowful precision. These songs pulse with meaning and jolt with playfulness, anchored by her powerful, sonorous voice. Her voice is a low and silky boom on songs like “22,” accompanied by dissonant guitar strums underlining the angst and dissolution of adolescence. It’s a muscular, soaring chant on songs like ‘Hammer,’ which layers clipped guitar and mandolin strums with an ascending, floor-coating bass. An artist aware of the contradictory compulsions of growth and human nature, she leans into that truth in juxtaposition. Romanticism can feel both reminiscent of guitar-heavy late-aughts indie rock, and expansively futuristic in its layered synth bass. Vu adds, “I’m just trying to convey my perspective as boldly as possible. To succinctly crystallize how it feels to be young, but also to be deeply sad.”
“Do you remember getting older / can you tell me what it's about?” Vu sings on “Airplane,” winking at the desire for tangibles in the unknown. With her previous work, Vu welcomed feedback as she went, but while crafting Romanticism, she shielded herself from outside opinion to preserve a singular vision. For over a year she holed up to work on her songs alone, waiting until she felt the album was fully-formed enough to show it as a whole. The result is a unified collection of songs aching with depth and intimacy. “Do you believe in starting over?” “Airplane” continues. “Can you tell me what it’s about?”
“Being young, there's so much that I experience for the first time, all the time. But as I experience more things, I become more desensitized to those things,” Vu explains. “You get wiser–– I feel quite wiser–– but less fervent, less hopeful.” She captures this liminal state poetically. Many of the songs invoke the contradictory feelings of youth directly–– “I'm just getting old / I'm just 22” on “22”; most of them wander into the existential–– “Forever seems like too much time / but I just got here, stay awhile” on “How It Goes”; and all of them are written concisely while providing windows of grand emotion. Most potently, this album somehow captures the luster of impermanence, in all its building wisdom, in all its funneling hope.
“Being a romantic is different from being a romanticist,” Vu clarifies, and Romanticism does have less in common with lovetorn ballads than it does with 1700s Europe, when artists called for heightened emotion over argued reason and sensory details over logical ones. These songs luxuriate in an intensified, distilled picture of the rush of feelings that follow adolescence. “The nexus of this album is indulging in these sad feelings, indulging in the senses,” Vu says as the sun begins to set through her windows. “It's just not commonplace in society that people really can value the beauty of being so sad, of feeling grief and heartbreak.”
And though it may not be stereotypically romantic, there is a powerful thread of sticky, hopeful devotion. “My hands fall off if they’re not holding on / I'll hold a love until it turns to dust,” she sings on “How It Goes.” “When the airplanes fly / over LA and say goodnight / I dream a window seat /across the world for only you and I,” goes the twinkling “Airplane.” And in the aptly-named “Dreams,” there are the ethereal lines, “love doesn't fade away / and everyone stays the same / and no it doesn't hurt to be alive.”
There’s a great sense of seeking that pervades Romanticism. “There is no answer / but I want one anyway,” she probes in “Hammer.” While Vu isn’t religious, she is spiritual, and music and songwriting are a place where she goes to connect with her spirituality. “I do plead with the world, or the universe, in writing,” Vu says of her writing process. “My writing of songs is where I feel inclined to ask questions and look for answers within myself.” But she also delights in the not-knowing, bathing in the process of asking. That’s where great artists linger, and our luck is getting to watch them turn over these questions in their mind. “What kind of person am I? / I don’t know, I don’t know. / What kind of lesson is life?” Vu sings hauntingly on the electric “Find Me Under Wilted Trees.” “I don’t know, I don’t know…” Romanticism is a lush example of how thrilling it can be to look directly at our feelings, to sing their sorrows and praise. Under Vu’s magnetic gaze, soaking up sadness has never felt so alive.
— Kyle Lucia Wu
Track preview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pM9nj3Pddrc
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
This deep duality informs Romanticism, the newest album from Vu. She’s been making music since high school, with a full-length debut and several EPs behind her of glowy, brooding anthems of abstraction and emotion. On Romanticism, her guitar-driven synthy pop and plush contralto fill out the coming-of-age experience with slick and sorrowful precision. These songs pulse with meaning and jolt with playfulness, anchored by her powerful, sonorous voice. Her voice is a low and silky boom on songs like “22,” accompanied by dissonant guitar strums underlining the angst and dissolution of adolescence. It’s a muscular, soaring chant on songs like ‘Hammer,’ which layers clipped guitar and mandolin strums with an ascending, floor-coating bass. An artist aware of the contradictory compulsions of growth and human nature, she leans into that truth in juxtaposition. Romanticism can feel both reminiscent of guitar-heavy late-aughts indie rock, and expansively futuristic in its layered synth bass. Vu adds, “I’m just trying to convey my perspective as boldly as possible. To succinctly crystallize how it feels to be young, but also to be deeply sad.”
“Do you remember getting older / can you tell me what it's about?” Vu sings on “Airplane,” winking at the desire for tangibles in the unknown. With her previous work, Vu welcomed feedback as she went, but while crafting Romanticism, she shielded herself from outside opinion to preserve a singular vision. For over a year she holed up to work on her songs alone, waiting until she felt the album was fully-formed enough to show it as a whole. The result is a unified collection of songs aching with depth and intimacy. “Do you believe in starting over?” “Airplane” continues. “Can you tell me what it’s about?”
“Being young, there's so much that I experience for the first time, all the time. But as I experience more things, I become more desensitized to those things,” Vu explains. “You get wiser–– I feel quite wiser–– but less fervent, less hopeful.” She captures this liminal state poetically. Many of the songs invoke the contradictory feelings of youth directly–– “I'm just getting old / I'm just 22” on “22”; most of them wander into the existential–– “Forever seems like too much time / but I just got here, stay awhile” on “How It Goes”; and all of them are written concisely while providing windows of grand emotion. Most potently, this album somehow captures the luster of impermanence, in all its building wisdom, in all its funneling hope.
“Being a romantic is different from being a romanticist,” Vu clarifies, and Romanticism does have less in common with lovetorn ballads than it does with 1700s Europe, when artists called for heightened emotion over argued reason and sensory details over logical ones. These songs luxuriate in an intensified, distilled picture of the rush of feelings that follow adolescence. “The nexus of this album is indulging in these sad feelings, indulging in the senses,” Vu says as the sun begins to set through her windows. “It's just not commonplace in society that people really can value the beauty of being so sad, of feeling grief and heartbreak.”
And though it may not be stereotypically romantic, there is a powerful thread of sticky, hopeful devotion. “My hands fall off if they’re not holding on / I'll hold a love until it turns to dust,” she sings on “How It Goes.” “When the airplanes fly / over LA and say goodnight / I dream a window seat /across the world for only you and I,” goes the twinkling “Airplane.” And in the aptly-named “Dreams,” there are the ethereal lines, “love doesn't fade away / and everyone stays the same / and no it doesn't hurt to be alive.”
There’s a great sense of seeking that pervades Romanticism. “There is no answer / but I want one anyway,” she probes in “Hammer.” While Vu isn’t religious, she is spiritual, and music and songwriting are a place where she goes to connect with her spirituality. “I do plead with the world, or the universe, in writing,” Vu says of her writing process. “My writing of songs is where I feel inclined to ask questions and look for answers within myself.” But she also delights in the not-knowing, bathing in the process of asking. That’s where great artists linger, and our luck is getting to watch them turn over these questions in their mind. “What kind of person am I? / I don’t know, I don’t know. / What kind of lesson is life?” Vu sings hauntingly on the electric “Find Me Under Wilted Trees.” “I don’t know, I don’t know…” Romanticism is a lush example of how thrilling it can be to look directly at our feelings, to sing their sorrows and praise. Under Vu’s magnetic gaze, soaking up sadness has never felt so alive.
— Kyle Lucia Wu
Track preview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pM9nj3Pddrc
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Tracklist:
1.And Then He Wrapped His Wings Around Me (feat. Meg Baird and Walt McClements)
2.Arrivederci (feat. Lol Tolhurst)
3.Blender in a Blender (feat. Roy Montgomery
4.Music for Applying Shimmering Eye Shadow
5.Horses, Glossy on the Hill 07:09
6.Yesterday's Parties (feat. Rachel Goswell and Samara Lubelski)
Through evocative, emotionally resonant music, Goodbye, Hotel Arkada, the new LP from American harpist and composer Mary Lattimore, speaks not just for its beloved namesake — a hotel in Croatia facing renovation — but for a universal loss that is shared. Six sprawling pieces shaped by change; nothing will ever be the same, and here, the artist, evolving in synthesis, celebrates and mourns the tragedy and beauty of the ephemeral, all that is lived and lost to time. Documented and edited in uncharacteristically measured sessions over the course of two years, the material remains rooted in improvisation while glistening as the most refined and robust in Lattimore’s decade-long catalog. It finds her communing with friends, contemporaries, and longtime influences, in full stride yet slowing down to nurture songs in new ways. The cast includes Lol Tolhurst (The Cure), Meg Baird, Rachel Goswell (Slowdive), Roy Montgomery, Samara Lubelski, and Walt McClements.
“When I think of these songs, I think about fading flowers in vases, melted candles, getting older, being on tour and having things change while you're away, not realizing how ephemeral experiences are until they don't happen anymore, fear for a planet we're losing because of greed, an ode to art and music that's really shaped your life that can transport you back in time, longing to maintain sensitivity and to not sink into hollow despondency.”
Memories, scenes, and split-second impressions have long filled Lattimore’s musical universe. As one of today’s preeminent instrumental storytellers, she has “the uncanny ability to pluck a string in a way that will instantly make someone remember the taste of their fifth birthday cake," writes Pitchfork's Jemima Skala. Lattimore's impulse to record life as it happens matches her drive to travel and perform, as profiled by Grayson Haver Currin for The New York Times: "Lattimore recognized that being in motion shook loose strands of inspiration, moods she wanted to express with melody. She needed, then, to remain on the go." That sense of fluidity has also made her a prolific collaborator outside of solo work. 2020's Silver Ladders, recorded with Slowdive's Neil Halstead, opened the door for Lattimore to widen the vision of her primary project as well, and its proper follow-up is the natural next scale. “All of these people I asked to contribute have deeply affected and inspired my life.”
For the title and inspiration, Lattimore’s mind returns to the island of Hvar in Croatia, where she first saw those silver ladders at the water’s edge. “There's a big old hotel there called the Hotel Arkada, and you could tell it had been hosting holiday-goers for decades in a great way. I walked around the lobby and the empty ballrooms and it looked like a well-worn, well-loved place. My friend Stacey who lives there told me to ‘say goodbye to Hotel Arkada, it might not be here when you get back’ and I heard soon after that it was actually going to be renovated in a very crisp, modern way.” Lattimore became fixated on the ingredients that make a place special — for Hotel Arkada, the patinaed chandeliers, the patterned bedspreads, the echoes of its intangible charm — and how when those leave this world, as they inevitably always will, it feels important to memorialize them, “to bottle it for a brief second.”
For the opening track, “And Then He Wrapped His Wings Around Me,” Lattimore looks to two of her closest friends — songwriter Meg Baird, her collaborator on 2018’s Ghost Forests, and accordionist composer Walt McClements, who she’s toured and performed alongside — to surface a core memory. As a kid, Lattimore won a drawing contest through a country radio station and got to see Sesame Street Live! in Asheville. She and her mom were invited backstage, and there the benevolent icon Big Bird “gave me an incredible hug with his scratchy yellow wings.” The trio channel the enveloping warmth of that portrait, the feeling of innocent escape, flying away towards a childhood dream that is just out of reach, surreal, and tinged with sadness. In a rare vocal passage in Lattimore’s library, Baird softly hums with the rolling washes of harp above McClements’ tranquil drone; just for a moment, we are held in a sublime canary yellow embrace.
“Arrivederci” features the synth work of Lol Tolhurst, an original member of The Cure and one of her musical heroes. Lattimore started the song after getting fired from a project because she hadn’t played the harp parts well enough. “So I came home and cried my eyes out and then wrote this song to try to recapture my love of playing the harp with nothing to mess up. I received Lol’s parts on New Year's Eve when I was hosting a party. I secretly went into my room and listened to the song and it felt just so magical to have such an influential musician connecting with a song that I made, especially a song I made when I was feeling like a total failure.”
On “Blender In A Blender,” Lattimore connects with guitarist Roy Montgomery, a pioneer of New Zealand’s underground. First drafted by Lattimore during an artist residency program in UCross Wyoming, the track later evolved over the duo’s pen pal correspondence. Montgomery adds chords that first feel distant, hazed behind a high-drama harp pattern, before thundering into the foreground in a thrilling outro. The title refers to the trend of teenagers blending their cell phones; Lattimore and a friend were joking about all stuff that could be blended, including another blender. Humor is an unsung key to Lattimore’s craft; titles and anecdotes provide unexpected, counterbalancing levity.
The subdued and striking “Music For Applying Shimmering Eye Shadow” is a tribute to the earthly rituals of preparation. “I wanted to make a song for the green rooms,” she says, recalling a moment in the mirror when a tourmate readied herself to go out into the unknown of performance. “It originally was made after googling ‘what does space smell like’ and getting an answer of ‘walnuts and brake pads’ and thinking about the wooziness of space, somehow smelling familiar earth smells in unfamiliar territory. Once I started adding more layers, I started thinking about what I hoped the song would soundtrack and what I wished a song would do.”
In the case of “Horses, Glossy on the Hill,” the narrative is nearly inextricable from the sonics. The percussive clacking resembles hooves in an anxious gate. There’s a storm cloud in the sky; from a car window, Lattimore captures the silvery sheen coming off the horses’ striated shapes as if photographing the scene through sound. Her shimmering strings accelerate and distort under twisting effects as the herd becomes one with the horizon.
There’s a crumbling elegance to the closing track, “Yesterday's Parties,” indebted to the reveries of Julee Cruise and the droning down-tuned strings of The Velvet Underground. We join Lattimore on a midnight stroll through the streets of Brussels; she looks through stained glass windows into quiet apartments and thinks of late nights with her friends who were out of town. Slowdive’s Rachel Goswell sings a wordless hymn as the harp, a special one Lattimore keeps in Brussels, glides with violin from Samara Lubelski. Leaving Lattimore in this place, itself a memory of yearning for connection, is an appropriate end to an album devoted to remembering and manifesting through shared expression.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1.And Then He Wrapped His Wings Around Me (feat. Meg Baird and Walt McClements)
2.Arrivederci (feat. Lol Tolhurst)
3.Blender in a Blender (feat. Roy Montgomery
4.Music for Applying Shimmering Eye Shadow
5.Horses, Glossy on the Hill 07:09
6.Yesterday's Parties (feat. Rachel Goswell and Samara Lubelski)
Through evocative, emotionally resonant music, Goodbye, Hotel Arkada, the new LP from American harpist and composer Mary Lattimore, speaks not just for its beloved namesake — a hotel in Croatia facing renovation — but for a universal loss that is shared. Six sprawling pieces shaped by change; nothing will ever be the same, and here, the artist, evolving in synthesis, celebrates and mourns the tragedy and beauty of the ephemeral, all that is lived and lost to time. Documented and edited in uncharacteristically measured sessions over the course of two years, the material remains rooted in improvisation while glistening as the most refined and robust in Lattimore’s decade-long catalog. It finds her communing with friends, contemporaries, and longtime influences, in full stride yet slowing down to nurture songs in new ways. The cast includes Lol Tolhurst (The Cure), Meg Baird, Rachel Goswell (Slowdive), Roy Montgomery, Samara Lubelski, and Walt McClements.
“When I think of these songs, I think about fading flowers in vases, melted candles, getting older, being on tour and having things change while you're away, not realizing how ephemeral experiences are until they don't happen anymore, fear for a planet we're losing because of greed, an ode to art and music that's really shaped your life that can transport you back in time, longing to maintain sensitivity and to not sink into hollow despondency.”
Memories, scenes, and split-second impressions have long filled Lattimore’s musical universe. As one of today’s preeminent instrumental storytellers, she has “the uncanny ability to pluck a string in a way that will instantly make someone remember the taste of their fifth birthday cake," writes Pitchfork's Jemima Skala. Lattimore's impulse to record life as it happens matches her drive to travel and perform, as profiled by Grayson Haver Currin for The New York Times: "Lattimore recognized that being in motion shook loose strands of inspiration, moods she wanted to express with melody. She needed, then, to remain on the go." That sense of fluidity has also made her a prolific collaborator outside of solo work. 2020's Silver Ladders, recorded with Slowdive's Neil Halstead, opened the door for Lattimore to widen the vision of her primary project as well, and its proper follow-up is the natural next scale. “All of these people I asked to contribute have deeply affected and inspired my life.”
For the title and inspiration, Lattimore’s mind returns to the island of Hvar in Croatia, where she first saw those silver ladders at the water’s edge. “There's a big old hotel there called the Hotel Arkada, and you could tell it had been hosting holiday-goers for decades in a great way. I walked around the lobby and the empty ballrooms and it looked like a well-worn, well-loved place. My friend Stacey who lives there told me to ‘say goodbye to Hotel Arkada, it might not be here when you get back’ and I heard soon after that it was actually going to be renovated in a very crisp, modern way.” Lattimore became fixated on the ingredients that make a place special — for Hotel Arkada, the patinaed chandeliers, the patterned bedspreads, the echoes of its intangible charm — and how when those leave this world, as they inevitably always will, it feels important to memorialize them, “to bottle it for a brief second.”
For the opening track, “And Then He Wrapped His Wings Around Me,” Lattimore looks to two of her closest friends — songwriter Meg Baird, her collaborator on 2018’s Ghost Forests, and accordionist composer Walt McClements, who she’s toured and performed alongside — to surface a core memory. As a kid, Lattimore won a drawing contest through a country radio station and got to see Sesame Street Live! in Asheville. She and her mom were invited backstage, and there the benevolent icon Big Bird “gave me an incredible hug with his scratchy yellow wings.” The trio channel the enveloping warmth of that portrait, the feeling of innocent escape, flying away towards a childhood dream that is just out of reach, surreal, and tinged with sadness. In a rare vocal passage in Lattimore’s library, Baird softly hums with the rolling washes of harp above McClements’ tranquil drone; just for a moment, we are held in a sublime canary yellow embrace.
“Arrivederci” features the synth work of Lol Tolhurst, an original member of The Cure and one of her musical heroes. Lattimore started the song after getting fired from a project because she hadn’t played the harp parts well enough. “So I came home and cried my eyes out and then wrote this song to try to recapture my love of playing the harp with nothing to mess up. I received Lol’s parts on New Year's Eve when I was hosting a party. I secretly went into my room and listened to the song and it felt just so magical to have such an influential musician connecting with a song that I made, especially a song I made when I was feeling like a total failure.”
On “Blender In A Blender,” Lattimore connects with guitarist Roy Montgomery, a pioneer of New Zealand’s underground. First drafted by Lattimore during an artist residency program in UCross Wyoming, the track later evolved over the duo’s pen pal correspondence. Montgomery adds chords that first feel distant, hazed behind a high-drama harp pattern, before thundering into the foreground in a thrilling outro. The title refers to the trend of teenagers blending their cell phones; Lattimore and a friend were joking about all stuff that could be blended, including another blender. Humor is an unsung key to Lattimore’s craft; titles and anecdotes provide unexpected, counterbalancing levity.
The subdued and striking “Music For Applying Shimmering Eye Shadow” is a tribute to the earthly rituals of preparation. “I wanted to make a song for the green rooms,” she says, recalling a moment in the mirror when a tourmate readied herself to go out into the unknown of performance. “It originally was made after googling ‘what does space smell like’ and getting an answer of ‘walnuts and brake pads’ and thinking about the wooziness of space, somehow smelling familiar earth smells in unfamiliar territory. Once I started adding more layers, I started thinking about what I hoped the song would soundtrack and what I wished a song would do.”
In the case of “Horses, Glossy on the Hill,” the narrative is nearly inextricable from the sonics. The percussive clacking resembles hooves in an anxious gate. There’s a storm cloud in the sky; from a car window, Lattimore captures the silvery sheen coming off the horses’ striated shapes as if photographing the scene through sound. Her shimmering strings accelerate and distort under twisting effects as the herd becomes one with the horizon.
There’s a crumbling elegance to the closing track, “Yesterday's Parties,” indebted to the reveries of Julee Cruise and the droning down-tuned strings of The Velvet Underground. We join Lattimore on a midnight stroll through the streets of Brussels; she looks through stained glass windows into quiet apartments and thinks of late nights with her friends who were out of town. Slowdive’s Rachel Goswell sings a wordless hymn as the harp, a special one Lattimore keeps in Brussels, glides with violin from Samara Lubelski. Leaving Lattimore in this place, itself a memory of yearning for connection, is an appropriate end to an album devoted to remembering and manifesting through shared expression.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Tracklist:
1.Come and Go (feat. Vilja Larjosto)
2.Zero to Sixty (feat. Sarah Jaffe) 04:48
3.Faceless
4.Dreaming (feat. Asy Saavedra)
5.Transonic
6.Plateau
7.Long Light (feat. Benoît Pioulard)
8.Cut and Cover
9.Home
10.Rafters
11.Double Take
Seattle-based producer Jeff McIlwain, aka Lusine, returns with his 9th full-length record, Long Light, marking twenty years since he first joined the Ghostly International roster. A cited influence for myriad electronic artists including London’s Loraine James and others, Lusine is known for visceral, kinetically-curious music that fuses techno, pop, and experimental composition. In recent years, McIlwain has pushed his craft skyward with more collaborative, song-forward work. Long Light shines the throughline; his signature looping patterns and textures are dynamic yet minimalist as ever. Structurally straightforward, tight, and bright, the material radiates as the most direct in his catalog, featuring vocal contributions from Asy Saavedra, Sarah Jaffe, and Sensorimotor collaborators Vilja Larjosto and Benoît Pioulard. Lusine found his sound early on, but he’s never stopped pushing and pulling at its potential, patiently deconstructing the distractions and solving the puzzles. With Long Light, a laser-focused, process-driven artist reaches an exceptionally satisfying level of clarity and immediacy.
McIlwain sees the title, taken from the lyrical phrase "long light signaling the fall again,” written by Benoît Pioulard for what became the title track, as a guiding device that reflects several meanings. “There’s this sort of paranoia where you don't know what is real, it's an age of high anxiety and there are all these distractions,” McIlwain explains. “It's like a fun house mirror situation.” Following the long light is the only true way through, and he holds that metaphor to the album’s recording, which also carried a cyclical nature akin to seasons. Like the start of fall, the album completes a period of cultivation; “Music making is a struggle and you have to have a ton of patience.” Long Light is proof that what lies beyond the noise, at the end of the figurative tunnel, is worth all the work it’s taken to get there.
Across the collection, McIlwain identifies the core sonic element, a vocal cut or a simple beat sequence, from which to build everything else off. On the opener “Come And Go,” he multiplies a vocal take from longtime collaborator Vilja Larjosto into a celestial choir, evoking their Sensorimotor standout “Just A Cloud.” It’s the bass hook on the single “Zero to Sixty,” curving around the voice of Sarah Jaffe, whose pliable range and cool delivery provide the source for Lusine’s unmistakable mapping. The chorus is Jaffe’s (“cold-blooded”) line repeated in step with melodic synth pulses and the buzzing deep bass. For the verse, McIlwain unlocks the loop and she completes the thought, giving the track a sense of tension and relief.
“I feel like I am dreaming / You make me feel like I am walking on a cloud / I don’t ever want to feel the ground,” sings Asy Saavedra (of Chaos Chaos) on “Dreaming.” This time McIlwain keeps the phrase intact, making subtle tweaks to the timbre and texture as chimes, clinks, and snaps oscillate.
The album balances vocal pop motifs with some of Lusine’s strongest instrumental expressions, from ambient-minded foreshadowing (“Faceless,” “Plateau,” “Rafters”) to hypnotic head-nodders like “Cut and Cover” and “Transonic.” The latter jumps out as the rhythmic centerpiece; first McIlwain outlines the track’s silhouette before filling in its details one layer at a time. Stuttering synth hums join the kick, then proliferate a step higher, harmonizing at the peak with sparkled bell sounds and a burst of feedback.
“Long Light” has it all: Lusine’s percussive mood-building, rendered with samples from drummer Trent Moorman, and a contortion of tender poetry, courtesy of friend Thomas Meluch, aka Benoît Pioulard (Morr Music, Kranky). “This track has a sort of melody that I haven’t really messed with before,” says McIlwain. “It’s this very droney, mysterious thing, that I really liked, and focused on, and kind of counter balanced with a nasty wavetable patch. Tom just absolutely nailed the feel of the song.”
It is rare to arrive at a landmark work two decades into one’s craft, but through repetition, refinement, and patience, Lusine extends a defining moment, an essential piece to his discography.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1.Come and Go (feat. Vilja Larjosto)
2.Zero to Sixty (feat. Sarah Jaffe) 04:48
3.Faceless
4.Dreaming (feat. Asy Saavedra)
5.Transonic
6.Plateau
7.Long Light (feat. Benoît Pioulard)
8.Cut and Cover
9.Home
10.Rafters
11.Double Take
Seattle-based producer Jeff McIlwain, aka Lusine, returns with his 9th full-length record, Long Light, marking twenty years since he first joined the Ghostly International roster. A cited influence for myriad electronic artists including London’s Loraine James and others, Lusine is known for visceral, kinetically-curious music that fuses techno, pop, and experimental composition. In recent years, McIlwain has pushed his craft skyward with more collaborative, song-forward work. Long Light shines the throughline; his signature looping patterns and textures are dynamic yet minimalist as ever. Structurally straightforward, tight, and bright, the material radiates as the most direct in his catalog, featuring vocal contributions from Asy Saavedra, Sarah Jaffe, and Sensorimotor collaborators Vilja Larjosto and Benoît Pioulard. Lusine found his sound early on, but he’s never stopped pushing and pulling at its potential, patiently deconstructing the distractions and solving the puzzles. With Long Light, a laser-focused, process-driven artist reaches an exceptionally satisfying level of clarity and immediacy.
McIlwain sees the title, taken from the lyrical phrase "long light signaling the fall again,” written by Benoît Pioulard for what became the title track, as a guiding device that reflects several meanings. “There’s this sort of paranoia where you don't know what is real, it's an age of high anxiety and there are all these distractions,” McIlwain explains. “It's like a fun house mirror situation.” Following the long light is the only true way through, and he holds that metaphor to the album’s recording, which also carried a cyclical nature akin to seasons. Like the start of fall, the album completes a period of cultivation; “Music making is a struggle and you have to have a ton of patience.” Long Light is proof that what lies beyond the noise, at the end of the figurative tunnel, is worth all the work it’s taken to get there.
Across the collection, McIlwain identifies the core sonic element, a vocal cut or a simple beat sequence, from which to build everything else off. On the opener “Come And Go,” he multiplies a vocal take from longtime collaborator Vilja Larjosto into a celestial choir, evoking their Sensorimotor standout “Just A Cloud.” It’s the bass hook on the single “Zero to Sixty,” curving around the voice of Sarah Jaffe, whose pliable range and cool delivery provide the source for Lusine’s unmistakable mapping. The chorus is Jaffe’s (“cold-blooded”) line repeated in step with melodic synth pulses and the buzzing deep bass. For the verse, McIlwain unlocks the loop and she completes the thought, giving the track a sense of tension and relief.
“I feel like I am dreaming / You make me feel like I am walking on a cloud / I don’t ever want to feel the ground,” sings Asy Saavedra (of Chaos Chaos) on “Dreaming.” This time McIlwain keeps the phrase intact, making subtle tweaks to the timbre and texture as chimes, clinks, and snaps oscillate.
The album balances vocal pop motifs with some of Lusine’s strongest instrumental expressions, from ambient-minded foreshadowing (“Faceless,” “Plateau,” “Rafters”) to hypnotic head-nodders like “Cut and Cover” and “Transonic.” The latter jumps out as the rhythmic centerpiece; first McIlwain outlines the track’s silhouette before filling in its details one layer at a time. Stuttering synth hums join the kick, then proliferate a step higher, harmonizing at the peak with sparkled bell sounds and a burst of feedback.
“Long Light” has it all: Lusine’s percussive mood-building, rendered with samples from drummer Trent Moorman, and a contortion of tender poetry, courtesy of friend Thomas Meluch, aka Benoît Pioulard (Morr Music, Kranky). “This track has a sort of melody that I haven’t really messed with before,” says McIlwain. “It’s this very droney, mysterious thing, that I really liked, and focused on, and kind of counter balanced with a nasty wavetable patch. Tom just absolutely nailed the feel of the song.”
It is rare to arrive at a landmark work two decades into one’s craft, but through repetition, refinement, and patience, Lusine extends a defining moment, an essential piece to his discography.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
TRACKLIST
1.1 THE GREATER WINGS
1.2 PORTRAIT OF A CLEAR DAY
1.3 MOONLESS
1.4 SUMMER GLASS
1.5 SUMMER'S END
1.6 LIGHTNING COMES UP FROM THE GROUND
1.7 FLARE
1.8 CONVERSATION IS A FLOWSTATE
1.9 HOPE'S RETURN
1.10 DEATH IS THE DIAMOND
"My hope for The Greater Wings is that it lives as a love letter to my chosen family and as an expression of the depth of my commitment to our shared future. Being reshaped by grief also has me more aware of what death does not take from me. I commit that to heart, to words, to sound. Music is not bound to any kind of linear time, so in the capacity to record and speak to the future: this is what it felt like to me, when we were simultaneous, alive, occurring all at once. What it has felt like to go up against my edge and push, the love that has made it worth all this fight. These memories are my values, they belong with me."
The first album in over six years from American songwriter Julie Byrne is a testament to patience and determination, the willingness to transform through the desolation of loss, the vitality of renewal, and the courage to rise, forever changed. For nearly a decade, Byrne has moved through the world as a characteristically private artist largely outside the public eye. A self-taught musician that has committed her life to her work, she now emerges from a deeply trying and generative period with the most powerful, lustrous, and life-affirming music of her career, The Greater Wings. While they hold the plasticity of grief and trauma, the songs are universally resonant, unbridled in their devotion and joy, held up by the love and alliance of a chosen family. Byrne leans further into atmospheres both expansive and intimate; the lush, evocative songcraft flows between her signature fingerpicked guitar, synthesizer, and a newly adopted piano, made wider by flourishes of harp and strings. It is the transcendent sound of resource, of friendship that was never without romance, of loyalty that burns from within like a heart on fire, and the life force summoned in unrepeatable moments — raw, gorgeous, and wild.
Byrne has narrowly willed The Greater Wings into existence, honoring the legacy of Eric Littmann, her longtime creative partner, producer, and synth player who, halfway through the album's making, died suddenly at the age of 31. The material was written across several seasons, each its own lifetime: imagery from nights on tour, chord shapes found pre-pandemic. Writing continued through lockdown, the converging traumas of isolation, the long horizon of emergence, and the drives cross-country for the collaborations that would give shape to The Greater Wings. Recording began in Chicago in Eric Littmann's home studio space in the winter of 2020 and continued in New York with harpist Marilu Donovan (LEYA) in the spring of 2021; Littmann, true to form, brought a portable recording set up in his suitcase.
In the early summer, they brought the project to Los Angeles, where violinist Jake Falby composed and recorded the first of his integral string arrangements. Eric died a month later, in late June of 2021; in the cataclysm of his death, the record would not be opened again until January 2022. In the winter of that new year, in the fires of grief, Byrne and her closest collaborators reconvened to finish the record with producer Alex Somers (Sigur Rós, Julianna Barwick), immersing fully into sessions in the Catskills of New York, her first ever at a conventional recording studio. The challenge became a balance in both allowing the sound to expand and trusting her instincts amid irrevocable change, to uphold their original vision for the record. "We worked with intense effort, devotion, and deliberate exploration of how our collaboration with Eric continues, even through death."
Byrne will confess the success of her 2017 LP Not Even Happiness was unexpected; nine gracefully road-worn odes to the fringes of life she assembled without any expectation that they'd travel so far beyond their DIY origins. But its hushed closing track, "I Live Now As A Singer," did forecast an intention. She knew the open space — occupied by Littmann's signature palette of synth tones, Falby's strings, and Byrne's robust, drifting voice — presented something new and thrilling, something they'd develop as a live band touring the world, and what would later be understood as the catalyst for material to come. The Greater Wings builds on this revelatory space at every turn.
The title track presents the alchemy of the album with tender, arresting precision. Byrne outlines its namesake on guitar alongside celestial strings, recalling one of their earliest house shows ("There's music in the walls, you were with the moment with your life across the chord") and their first tours through Europe's underground. "Performing reminds me, time and time again that the stage can be a space to inhabit and feel free in." The intricacy of the guitar propels the "The Greater Wings" even further into its own mythology — the lyrics begin to conjure the stages of a quest: "I feel it, the tilt of the planet, panorama of the valley, measure me by what I've risked." The song travels through peaks and lowlands, pink noise, the surreal nostalgia of moonrise where light seems to come from a different age. Above all, the title track pays homage to what is unseen but deeply felt: "We hold the pact: Forever Underground, Name my grief to let it sing, To carry you up on the Greater Wings."
"Moonless" is an ode to the glistening darkness, partially written on an outlying island of southern Portugal where Byrne was completing an artist residency. "I remember walking through the dune systems on the ocean side of Culatra, the noises of the docks, the scent of tidal flats. The land itself, as a coastal formation, in a constant state of movement between erosion and growth." The hypnotic piano ballad is a portal into the lost, late night with beckoning sensorial detail: voices rising through the smoke, the tactility of names carved in the table, wind moving in off the ocean, across skin. Just as the scene begins to feel eternal, Byrne upends notions of the torch song. "Moonless" does not pine for the return of another but instead speaks to the alleviation of no longer waiting for someone's love. "Something I love about being a songwriter, especially as a queer woman, is being able to have the last word in my work, becoming myself line by line. This is a breakup song, and it's the first song I wrote on piano." Her new instrument fades into pools of eventide. A bare constellation of strings end the story like sparks rising in the darkness, then vanishing into ash.
"Hope's Return" reimagines "Love's Refrain," Byrne's 2020 collaboration with Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, adapted here on guitar in the distinct tuning found across most of the album. For the new arrangement, producer Alex Somers contributes bowed acoustic guitar to the bridge, one of many subtle ideas he helped facilitate. "He was the right person to finish the record with," Byrne says. "He's everything they say, there's almost like a divinity to his kindness, and he's also very silly and playful for all his depth and sophistication, he has such a tender heart. It's an intimate process, and I didn't have to conceal anything."
The statement at the heart of the record is "Summer Glass." A luminous, euphoric synth ballad, unbridled in its portraiture of intimacy, memorial, and deeply personal alliance. The song ignites all at once with Littmann's arpeggiated synth as they approach the zenith of their creative partnership; Byrne's voice casts the spell, "I can't say if it was devotion. I just wanted to feel the sun on my skin." The opening lyrics find her at the water's edge. Transfixing and radiant, Marilu Donovan's harp joins the pulse of the synthesizer in a tidal, interlocking cascade — a synergy that embodies years of collaboration. "Summer Glass" opens wide to encompass a universe of references, turning candid moments of laughter, desire, failure, perseverance, inertia, and emergence into legacy. Falby's strings offer a sweeping, incandescent bridge, a step more urgent at the album's apex, before Byrne returns with a final invocation:
"One day the skin that holds me will be dust
and I'll be ready to travel again
For now I want to go further in,
Into moment, into vision, into you
I swore I'd show myself so I could renew
That's not the same as being new forever
The shape of your hand left in the dust of Summer Glass
I want to be whole enough to risk again."
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1.1 THE GREATER WINGS
1.2 PORTRAIT OF A CLEAR DAY
1.3 MOONLESS
1.4 SUMMER GLASS
1.5 SUMMER'S END
1.6 LIGHTNING COMES UP FROM THE GROUND
1.7 FLARE
1.8 CONVERSATION IS A FLOWSTATE
1.9 HOPE'S RETURN
1.10 DEATH IS THE DIAMOND
"My hope for The Greater Wings is that it lives as a love letter to my chosen family and as an expression of the depth of my commitment to our shared future. Being reshaped by grief also has me more aware of what death does not take from me. I commit that to heart, to words, to sound. Music is not bound to any kind of linear time, so in the capacity to record and speak to the future: this is what it felt like to me, when we were simultaneous, alive, occurring all at once. What it has felt like to go up against my edge and push, the love that has made it worth all this fight. These memories are my values, they belong with me."
The first album in over six years from American songwriter Julie Byrne is a testament to patience and determination, the willingness to transform through the desolation of loss, the vitality of renewal, and the courage to rise, forever changed. For nearly a decade, Byrne has moved through the world as a characteristically private artist largely outside the public eye. A self-taught musician that has committed her life to her work, she now emerges from a deeply trying and generative period with the most powerful, lustrous, and life-affirming music of her career, The Greater Wings. While they hold the plasticity of grief and trauma, the songs are universally resonant, unbridled in their devotion and joy, held up by the love and alliance of a chosen family. Byrne leans further into atmospheres both expansive and intimate; the lush, evocative songcraft flows between her signature fingerpicked guitar, synthesizer, and a newly adopted piano, made wider by flourishes of harp and strings. It is the transcendent sound of resource, of friendship that was never without romance, of loyalty that burns from within like a heart on fire, and the life force summoned in unrepeatable moments — raw, gorgeous, and wild.
Byrne has narrowly willed The Greater Wings into existence, honoring the legacy of Eric Littmann, her longtime creative partner, producer, and synth player who, halfway through the album's making, died suddenly at the age of 31. The material was written across several seasons, each its own lifetime: imagery from nights on tour, chord shapes found pre-pandemic. Writing continued through lockdown, the converging traumas of isolation, the long horizon of emergence, and the drives cross-country for the collaborations that would give shape to The Greater Wings. Recording began in Chicago in Eric Littmann's home studio space in the winter of 2020 and continued in New York with harpist Marilu Donovan (LEYA) in the spring of 2021; Littmann, true to form, brought a portable recording set up in his suitcase.
In the early summer, they brought the project to Los Angeles, where violinist Jake Falby composed and recorded the first of his integral string arrangements. Eric died a month later, in late June of 2021; in the cataclysm of his death, the record would not be opened again until January 2022. In the winter of that new year, in the fires of grief, Byrne and her closest collaborators reconvened to finish the record with producer Alex Somers (Sigur Rós, Julianna Barwick), immersing fully into sessions in the Catskills of New York, her first ever at a conventional recording studio. The challenge became a balance in both allowing the sound to expand and trusting her instincts amid irrevocable change, to uphold their original vision for the record. "We worked with intense effort, devotion, and deliberate exploration of how our collaboration with Eric continues, even through death."
Byrne will confess the success of her 2017 LP Not Even Happiness was unexpected; nine gracefully road-worn odes to the fringes of life she assembled without any expectation that they'd travel so far beyond their DIY origins. But its hushed closing track, "I Live Now As A Singer," did forecast an intention. She knew the open space — occupied by Littmann's signature palette of synth tones, Falby's strings, and Byrne's robust, drifting voice — presented something new and thrilling, something they'd develop as a live band touring the world, and what would later be understood as the catalyst for material to come. The Greater Wings builds on this revelatory space at every turn.
The title track presents the alchemy of the album with tender, arresting precision. Byrne outlines its namesake on guitar alongside celestial strings, recalling one of their earliest house shows ("There's music in the walls, you were with the moment with your life across the chord") and their first tours through Europe's underground. "Performing reminds me, time and time again that the stage can be a space to inhabit and feel free in." The intricacy of the guitar propels the "The Greater Wings" even further into its own mythology — the lyrics begin to conjure the stages of a quest: "I feel it, the tilt of the planet, panorama of the valley, measure me by what I've risked." The song travels through peaks and lowlands, pink noise, the surreal nostalgia of moonrise where light seems to come from a different age. Above all, the title track pays homage to what is unseen but deeply felt: "We hold the pact: Forever Underground, Name my grief to let it sing, To carry you up on the Greater Wings."
"Moonless" is an ode to the glistening darkness, partially written on an outlying island of southern Portugal where Byrne was completing an artist residency. "I remember walking through the dune systems on the ocean side of Culatra, the noises of the docks, the scent of tidal flats. The land itself, as a coastal formation, in a constant state of movement between erosion and growth." The hypnotic piano ballad is a portal into the lost, late night with beckoning sensorial detail: voices rising through the smoke, the tactility of names carved in the table, wind moving in off the ocean, across skin. Just as the scene begins to feel eternal, Byrne upends notions of the torch song. "Moonless" does not pine for the return of another but instead speaks to the alleviation of no longer waiting for someone's love. "Something I love about being a songwriter, especially as a queer woman, is being able to have the last word in my work, becoming myself line by line. This is a breakup song, and it's the first song I wrote on piano." Her new instrument fades into pools of eventide. A bare constellation of strings end the story like sparks rising in the darkness, then vanishing into ash.
"Hope's Return" reimagines "Love's Refrain," Byrne's 2020 collaboration with Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, adapted here on guitar in the distinct tuning found across most of the album. For the new arrangement, producer Alex Somers contributes bowed acoustic guitar to the bridge, one of many subtle ideas he helped facilitate. "He was the right person to finish the record with," Byrne says. "He's everything they say, there's almost like a divinity to his kindness, and he's also very silly and playful for all his depth and sophistication, he has such a tender heart. It's an intimate process, and I didn't have to conceal anything."
The statement at the heart of the record is "Summer Glass." A luminous, euphoric synth ballad, unbridled in its portraiture of intimacy, memorial, and deeply personal alliance. The song ignites all at once with Littmann's arpeggiated synth as they approach the zenith of their creative partnership; Byrne's voice casts the spell, "I can't say if it was devotion. I just wanted to feel the sun on my skin." The opening lyrics find her at the water's edge. Transfixing and radiant, Marilu Donovan's harp joins the pulse of the synthesizer in a tidal, interlocking cascade — a synergy that embodies years of collaboration. "Summer Glass" opens wide to encompass a universe of references, turning candid moments of laughter, desire, failure, perseverance, inertia, and emergence into legacy. Falby's strings offer a sweeping, incandescent bridge, a step more urgent at the album's apex, before Byrne returns with a final invocation:
"One day the skin that holds me will be dust
and I'll be ready to travel again
For now I want to go further in,
Into moment, into vision, into you
I swore I'd show myself so I could renew
That's not the same as being new forever
The shape of your hand left in the dust of Summer Glass
I want to be whole enough to risk again."
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILP411
Release-Date:17.02.2023
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:LP
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILP411
Release-Date:17.02.2023
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:LP
Tracklist:
1.1HV ROAD
1.2LOVELY
1.3HOME WORLD 303
1.43 PZ
1.5COMPUTER BREAK (LATE MIX)
1.6FOUNTAIN, GROWTH (FT. TESS ROBY)
1.7LIFE MASK
1.8UNLIMITED <3
1.9TECHNO CREEP
1.10MY SAME SIZE
1.11SOUND GATHERING TRIP
Canadian producer Dylan Khotin-Foote has kept his Khotin alias going for the better part of a decade; the impressionistic electronic project shifts with the movements in his life. Sometimes it leads, like when the club-friendly grooves of 2014's Hello World immersed him in the heart of Vancouver's underground dance scene, and sometimes it follows, like 2018's Beautiful You, a downtempo salve for DJ fatigue. His melodic sensibility and playful ear for atmosphere remain the rippling core of the project's fingerprint; whether beat-driven or ambient, a foggy smear or a dusted and pristine print, a Khotin track has a distinct and instantly recognizable swirl. During and after the 2020 release of Finds You Well, his second LP on Ghostly International, Khotin-Foote settled back into a slower vibe in his hometown of Ed- monton. Even before the pandemic, his pivots to softer production, and away from DJing, left him with fewer opportunities in Vancouver and club bookings overall, and as a self-identifying introvert, he was fine with that. But the change of pace did open space for Khotin-Foote to grapple with concepts of adulthood and career. At his lowest, he almost walked off this musical path altogether; instead, he doubled down on the craft _ the tone, pacing, and dynamism of new material _ arriving at a definitive full-length. With Release Spirit, Khotin releases himself from the pressure of expectation, fusing and refining everything we know about his music. The warmth and familiarity of Khotin's dreamy, dulcet style meet new ideas and frameworks, a natural progression, a modest revelation; Khotin confirms it is okay to move slowly and he's never sounded better doing it. The album title borrows from the "release spirit" mechanic in the video game World of Warcraft. When players die, they are prompted to release their spirit and return as ghosts to find their corpses and come back to life. Khotin sees it as a worthy metaphor for the impending change his return home presented and the resulting process of purging artistic expectations to find his creative self again. On this go- around, he is freer, more playful, and more intentional within his palette of warped synth, breakbeats, and piano sounds _ including the classic Casio SK-1 presets he's used since the start _ mingling with wistful samples, field recordings, and other abstract snippets. For the first time, he enlisted Nik Kozub to do the mix and assist with sequencing. Khotin-Foote has long worked with the Edmonton-based musician and engineer in the mastering phase, as well as their days co-running the label Normals Welcome, and this time was able to involve his ears earlier given their newfound proximity. "I think it's my best sounding record to date." We begin on "HV Road" or Happy Valley Road, where Khotin-Foote spent time during a family vacation in British Columbia's Okanagan Lake. His plans to record crickets at night are quickly foiled by his younger siblings; the cute exchange orients the listener to a core memory of sorts, setting the tone of universally understood warmth and wonder that has defined some of Khotin's most transportive tracks. Hazy percussion takes hold, and we are swept further into the wisp of "Lovely," a grooving, melodic standout built on the interplay between the beat and human voice-like hums. Khotin knows this zone well; equally suited for a reverie or a club warm-up. The bubbling atmosphere and absurdity of "3 pz" offer a cosmic/comic interlude and also speak to reflections on his family's move to Canada two generations ago, and the audio tutorials they used to learn English. "I can only imagine my grandpar- ents repeating some of the bizarre phrases." "Fountain, Growth" finds Khotin in collaboration with Montreal's Tess Roby (Dawn to Dawn) for the project's first-ever vocal track. Roby's soft cadence echoes atop spiraling air pockets of rhythmic production, lending a breezy, almost shoegaze pop feel. Throughout the single and the album, wind gusts between the compositional layers, akin to the roaming spirits of its namesake, curving around the birdsong of "Life Mask" and seamlessly reaching "Unlimited <3." The latter bumps in slow motion; disembodied whirrs from his Casio collide with 808 drums and sub-bass for a vibe that teeters on trap and instrumental hip-hop. Release Spirit rests in a dream sequence. Oscillating synth lines dance around the heartbeat of "Techno Creep," a hyperactive REM state before the digitized ambient sprawl of "My Same Size." In the final pass, Khotin imagines transcontinental travel from the glow of his screen. He recorded "Sound Gathering Trip" to soundtrack a genre of YouTube videos he's taken to that follows train routes through Europe and Japan. The scene is serene and moving; piano keys warble as static-filled sound design shimmers off the rails, from cityscapes to the countryside, an introspective ride through a world beyond his bedroom. It doubles as an apt parting image for Khotin's project as a whole: dreaming big but happiest when riffing on the details, shaping environments from the inside out. Over the last decade, he has stretched from his core in Edmonton, leaving a trace in Vancouver and beyond; but when all signs point home, he loops back to see it all from a different vantage, revitalized, refined, and free.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1.1HV ROAD
1.2LOVELY
1.3HOME WORLD 303
1.43 PZ
1.5COMPUTER BREAK (LATE MIX)
1.6FOUNTAIN, GROWTH (FT. TESS ROBY)
1.7LIFE MASK
1.8UNLIMITED <3
1.9TECHNO CREEP
1.10MY SAME SIZE
1.11SOUND GATHERING TRIP
Canadian producer Dylan Khotin-Foote has kept his Khotin alias going for the better part of a decade; the impressionistic electronic project shifts with the movements in his life. Sometimes it leads, like when the club-friendly grooves of 2014's Hello World immersed him in the heart of Vancouver's underground dance scene, and sometimes it follows, like 2018's Beautiful You, a downtempo salve for DJ fatigue. His melodic sensibility and playful ear for atmosphere remain the rippling core of the project's fingerprint; whether beat-driven or ambient, a foggy smear or a dusted and pristine print, a Khotin track has a distinct and instantly recognizable swirl. During and after the 2020 release of Finds You Well, his second LP on Ghostly International, Khotin-Foote settled back into a slower vibe in his hometown of Ed- monton. Even before the pandemic, his pivots to softer production, and away from DJing, left him with fewer opportunities in Vancouver and club bookings overall, and as a self-identifying introvert, he was fine with that. But the change of pace did open space for Khotin-Foote to grapple with concepts of adulthood and career. At his lowest, he almost walked off this musical path altogether; instead, he doubled down on the craft _ the tone, pacing, and dynamism of new material _ arriving at a definitive full-length. With Release Spirit, Khotin releases himself from the pressure of expectation, fusing and refining everything we know about his music. The warmth and familiarity of Khotin's dreamy, dulcet style meet new ideas and frameworks, a natural progression, a modest revelation; Khotin confirms it is okay to move slowly and he's never sounded better doing it. The album title borrows from the "release spirit" mechanic in the video game World of Warcraft. When players die, they are prompted to release their spirit and return as ghosts to find their corpses and come back to life. Khotin sees it as a worthy metaphor for the impending change his return home presented and the resulting process of purging artistic expectations to find his creative self again. On this go- around, he is freer, more playful, and more intentional within his palette of warped synth, breakbeats, and piano sounds _ including the classic Casio SK-1 presets he's used since the start _ mingling with wistful samples, field recordings, and other abstract snippets. For the first time, he enlisted Nik Kozub to do the mix and assist with sequencing. Khotin-Foote has long worked with the Edmonton-based musician and engineer in the mastering phase, as well as their days co-running the label Normals Welcome, and this time was able to involve his ears earlier given their newfound proximity. "I think it's my best sounding record to date." We begin on "HV Road" or Happy Valley Road, where Khotin-Foote spent time during a family vacation in British Columbia's Okanagan Lake. His plans to record crickets at night are quickly foiled by his younger siblings; the cute exchange orients the listener to a core memory of sorts, setting the tone of universally understood warmth and wonder that has defined some of Khotin's most transportive tracks. Hazy percussion takes hold, and we are swept further into the wisp of "Lovely," a grooving, melodic standout built on the interplay between the beat and human voice-like hums. Khotin knows this zone well; equally suited for a reverie or a club warm-up. The bubbling atmosphere and absurdity of "3 pz" offer a cosmic/comic interlude and also speak to reflections on his family's move to Canada two generations ago, and the audio tutorials they used to learn English. "I can only imagine my grandpar- ents repeating some of the bizarre phrases." "Fountain, Growth" finds Khotin in collaboration with Montreal's Tess Roby (Dawn to Dawn) for the project's first-ever vocal track. Roby's soft cadence echoes atop spiraling air pockets of rhythmic production, lending a breezy, almost shoegaze pop feel. Throughout the single and the album, wind gusts between the compositional layers, akin to the roaming spirits of its namesake, curving around the birdsong of "Life Mask" and seamlessly reaching "Unlimited <3." The latter bumps in slow motion; disembodied whirrs from his Casio collide with 808 drums and sub-bass for a vibe that teeters on trap and instrumental hip-hop. Release Spirit rests in a dream sequence. Oscillating synth lines dance around the heartbeat of "Techno Creep," a hyperactive REM state before the digitized ambient sprawl of "My Same Size." In the final pass, Khotin imagines transcontinental travel from the glow of his screen. He recorded "Sound Gathering Trip" to soundtrack a genre of YouTube videos he's taken to that follows train routes through Europe and Japan. The scene is serene and moving; piano keys warble as static-filled sound design shimmers off the rails, from cityscapes to the countryside, an introspective ride through a world beyond his bedroom. It doubles as an apt parting image for Khotin's project as a whole: dreaming big but happiest when riffing on the details, shaping environments from the inside out. Over the last decade, he has stretched from his core in Edmonton, leaving a trace in Vancouver and beyond; but when all signs point home, he loops back to see it all from a different vantage, revitalized, refined, and free.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC1411
Release-Date:17.02.2023
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:LP
Label:Ghostly International
Cat-No:GILPC1411
Release-Date:17.02.2023
Genre:Electronic, Electronica
Configuration:LP
PINK VINYL!
Tracklist:
1.1HV ROAD
1.2LOVELY
1.3HOME WORLD 303
1.43 PZ
1.5COMPUTER BREAK (LATE MIX)
1.6FOUNTAIN, GROWTH (FT. TESS ROBY)
1.7LIFE MASK
1.8UNLIMITED <3
1.9TECHNO CREEP
1.10MY SAME SIZE
1.11SOUND GATHERING TRIP
Canadian producer Dylan Khotin-Foote has kept his Khotin alias going for the better part of a decade; the impressionistic electronic project shifts with the movements in his life. Sometimes it leads, like when the club-friendly grooves of 2014's Hello World immersed him in the heart of Vancouver's underground dance scene, and sometimes it follows, like 2018's Beautiful You, a downtempo salve for DJ fatigue. His melodic sensibility and playful ear for atmosphere remain the rippling core of the project's fingerprint; whether beat-driven or ambient, a foggy smear or a dusted and pristine print, a Khotin track has a distinct and instantly recognizable swirl. During and after the 2020 release of Finds You Well, his second LP on Ghostly International, Khotin-Foote settled back into a slower vibe in his hometown of Ed- monton. Even before the pandemic, his pivots to softer production, and away from DJing, left him with fewer opportunities in Vancouver and club bookings overall, and as a self-identifying introvert, he was fine with that. But the change of pace did open space for Khotin-Foote to grapple with concepts of adulthood and career. At his lowest, he almost walked off this musical path altogether; instead, he doubled down on the craft _ the tone, pacing, and dynamism of new material _ arriving at a definitive full-length. With Release Spirit, Khotin releases himself from the pressure of expectation, fusing and refining everything we know about his music. The warmth and familiarity of Khotin's dreamy, dulcet style meet new ideas and frameworks, a natural progression, a modest revelation; Khotin confirms it is okay to move slowly and he's never sounded better doing it. The album title borrows from the "release spirit" mechanic in the video game World of Warcraft. When players die, they are prompted to release their spirit and return as ghosts to find their corpses and come back to life. Khotin sees it as a worthy metaphor for the impending change his return home presented and the resulting process of purging artistic expectations to find his creative self again. On this go- around, he is freer, more playful, and more intentional within his palette of warped synth, breakbeats, and piano sounds _ including the classic Casio SK-1 presets he's used since the start _ mingling with wistful samples, field recordings, and other abstract snippets. For the first time, he enlisted Nik Kozub to do the mix and assist with sequencing. Khotin-Foote has long worked with the Edmonton-based musician and engineer in the mastering phase, as well as their days co-running the label Normals Welcome, and this time was able to involve his ears earlier given their newfound proximity. "I think it's my best sounding record to date." We begin on "HV Road" or Happy Valley Road, where Khotin-Foote spent time during a family vacation in British Columbia's Okanagan Lake. His plans to record crickets at night are quickly foiled by his younger siblings; the cute exchange orients the listener to a core memory of sorts, setting the tone of universally understood warmth and wonder that has defined some of Khotin's most transportive tracks. Hazy percussion takes hold, and we are swept further into the wisp of "Lovely," a grooving, melodic standout built on the interplay between the beat and human voice-like hums. Khotin knows this zone well; equally suited for a reverie or a club warm-up. The bubbling atmosphere and absurdity of "3 pz" offer a cosmic/comic interlude and also speak to reflections on his family's move to Canada two generations ago, and the audio tutorials they used to learn English. "I can only imagine my grandpar- ents repeating some of the bizarre phrases." "Fountain, Growth" finds Khotin in collaboration with Montreal's Tess Roby (Dawn to Dawn) for the project's first-ever vocal track. Roby's soft cadence echoes atop spiraling air pockets of rhythmic production, lending a breezy, almost shoegaze pop feel. Throughout the single and the album, wind gusts between the compositional layers, akin to the roaming spirits of its namesake, curving around the birdsong of "Life Mask" and seamlessly reaching "Unlimited <3." The latter bumps in slow motion; disembodied whirrs from his Casio collide with 808 drums and sub-bass for a vibe that teeters on trap and instrumental hip-hop. Release Spirit rests in a dream sequence. Oscillating synth lines dance around the heartbeat of "Techno Creep," a hyperactive REM state before the digitized ambient sprawl of "My Same Size." In the final pass, Khotin imagines transcontinental travel from the glow of his screen. He recorded "Sound Gathering Trip" to soundtrack a genre of YouTube videos he's taken to that follows train routes through Europe and Japan. The scene is serene and moving; piano keys warble as static-filled sound design shimmers off the rails, from cityscapes to the countryside, an introspective ride through a world beyond his bedroom. It doubles as an apt parting image for Khotin's project as a whole: dreaming big but happiest when riffing on the details, shaping environments from the inside out. Over the last decade, he has stretched from his core in Edmonton, leaving a trace in Vancouver and beyond; but when all signs point home, he loops back to see it all from a different vantage, revitalized, refined, and free.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Tracklist:
1.1HV ROAD
1.2LOVELY
1.3HOME WORLD 303
1.43 PZ
1.5COMPUTER BREAK (LATE MIX)
1.6FOUNTAIN, GROWTH (FT. TESS ROBY)
1.7LIFE MASK
1.8UNLIMITED <3
1.9TECHNO CREEP
1.10MY SAME SIZE
1.11SOUND GATHERING TRIP
Canadian producer Dylan Khotin-Foote has kept his Khotin alias going for the better part of a decade; the impressionistic electronic project shifts with the movements in his life. Sometimes it leads, like when the club-friendly grooves of 2014's Hello World immersed him in the heart of Vancouver's underground dance scene, and sometimes it follows, like 2018's Beautiful You, a downtempo salve for DJ fatigue. His melodic sensibility and playful ear for atmosphere remain the rippling core of the project's fingerprint; whether beat-driven or ambient, a foggy smear or a dusted and pristine print, a Khotin track has a distinct and instantly recognizable swirl. During and after the 2020 release of Finds You Well, his second LP on Ghostly International, Khotin-Foote settled back into a slower vibe in his hometown of Ed- monton. Even before the pandemic, his pivots to softer production, and away from DJing, left him with fewer opportunities in Vancouver and club bookings overall, and as a self-identifying introvert, he was fine with that. But the change of pace did open space for Khotin-Foote to grapple with concepts of adulthood and career. At his lowest, he almost walked off this musical path altogether; instead, he doubled down on the craft _ the tone, pacing, and dynamism of new material _ arriving at a definitive full-length. With Release Spirit, Khotin releases himself from the pressure of expectation, fusing and refining everything we know about his music. The warmth and familiarity of Khotin's dreamy, dulcet style meet new ideas and frameworks, a natural progression, a modest revelation; Khotin confirms it is okay to move slowly and he's never sounded better doing it. The album title borrows from the "release spirit" mechanic in the video game World of Warcraft. When players die, they are prompted to release their spirit and return as ghosts to find their corpses and come back to life. Khotin sees it as a worthy metaphor for the impending change his return home presented and the resulting process of purging artistic expectations to find his creative self again. On this go- around, he is freer, more playful, and more intentional within his palette of warped synth, breakbeats, and piano sounds _ including the classic Casio SK-1 presets he's used since the start _ mingling with wistful samples, field recordings, and other abstract snippets. For the first time, he enlisted Nik Kozub to do the mix and assist with sequencing. Khotin-Foote has long worked with the Edmonton-based musician and engineer in the mastering phase, as well as their days co-running the label Normals Welcome, and this time was able to involve his ears earlier given their newfound proximity. "I think it's my best sounding record to date." We begin on "HV Road" or Happy Valley Road, where Khotin-Foote spent time during a family vacation in British Columbia's Okanagan Lake. His plans to record crickets at night are quickly foiled by his younger siblings; the cute exchange orients the listener to a core memory of sorts, setting the tone of universally understood warmth and wonder that has defined some of Khotin's most transportive tracks. Hazy percussion takes hold, and we are swept further into the wisp of "Lovely," a grooving, melodic standout built on the interplay between the beat and human voice-like hums. Khotin knows this zone well; equally suited for a reverie or a club warm-up. The bubbling atmosphere and absurdity of "3 pz" offer a cosmic/comic interlude and also speak to reflections on his family's move to Canada two generations ago, and the audio tutorials they used to learn English. "I can only imagine my grandpar- ents repeating some of the bizarre phrases." "Fountain, Growth" finds Khotin in collaboration with Montreal's Tess Roby (Dawn to Dawn) for the project's first-ever vocal track. Roby's soft cadence echoes atop spiraling air pockets of rhythmic production, lending a breezy, almost shoegaze pop feel. Throughout the single and the album, wind gusts between the compositional layers, akin to the roaming spirits of its namesake, curving around the birdsong of "Life Mask" and seamlessly reaching "Unlimited <3." The latter bumps in slow motion; disembodied whirrs from his Casio collide with 808 drums and sub-bass for a vibe that teeters on trap and instrumental hip-hop. Release Spirit rests in a dream sequence. Oscillating synth lines dance around the heartbeat of "Techno Creep," a hyperactive REM state before the digitized ambient sprawl of "My Same Size." In the final pass, Khotin imagines transcontinental travel from the glow of his screen. He recorded "Sound Gathering Trip" to soundtrack a genre of YouTube videos he's taken to that follows train routes through Europe and Japan. The scene is serene and moving; piano keys warble as static-filled sound design shimmers off the rails, from cityscapes to the countryside, an introspective ride through a world beyond his bedroom. It doubles as an apt parting image for Khotin's project as a whole: dreaming big but happiest when riffing on the details, shaping environments from the inside out. Over the last decade, he has stretched from his core in Edmonton, leaving a trace in Vancouver and beyond; but when all signs point home, he loops back to see it all from a different vantage, revitalized, refined, and free.
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Tracklist:
1.1PARLAY
1.2PUT ON
1.3OUTSIDE THE CLUB
1.4I NEVA SEEN
1.5ENTERPRISE
1.6KAINT
1.7IN THE PLACE
1.8CRICKET'S THEME
1.9FIFTY
1.10DOCKSIDE
1.11LIL BIT O CHOCOLIT
100% GALCHER was by all accounts a game-changer when it landed in 2013 as an hour of original music from a relatively unknown producer ushered in by the beloved mix series Blowing Up The Workshop. Galcher Lustwerk's signature sound _ a smoky stream-of-consciousness baritone shadow-boxing with beats, informed by funk, rap, rhythm, and blues _ felt like an epiphany, impossibly hypnotic and complete. Resident Advisor writes, "100% GALCHER laid out a louche, lysergic and resolutely black take on deep house." Pitchfork remembers the music's immediate impact: "It's the sort of gem you felt inclined to pass around" _ and by year-end list time, word-of-mouth intensified. It was Resident Advisor and Juno's mix of the year, and earned a top-ten placement in FACT Magazine's albums list, as well as Philip Sherburne's personal rundown for Spin." Since then, select songs from 100% GALCHER have seen small-run pressings, while the album has lived primarily on SoundCloud and YouTube as a low-key cult legend. The gateway into Lustwerk's now well-established catalog, known for its reliability as a late-night listen and its prophetic vision for the near future of underground dance music. RA would later name it a mix of the decade, citing its influence and imagination: "Original in every sense _ unknown, unheard and unbelievably good." In late 2022, marking ten years since he first recorded the material, Lustwerk returns to Ghostly International to release 100% GALCHER as a remastered limited-edition double LP. Lustwerk is a product of the Midwest. Growing up in Cleveland, he'd tape over his parents' cassettes and spend hours at his family computer recording loops and designing artwork for the jewel cases of burned CDs. In high school, he turned to Ableton Live and absorbed every electronic music magazine he could find at the local Borders Books store. As a college student at RISD, he played in noise bands, plugged into Providence's DIY scene via Myspace, and started DJing weeknights at bars downtown. There he connected with Young Male and DJ Richard, who would go on to found White Material Records and offer their third release to Galcher Lustwerk, an alias realized via CAPTCHA test, a perfect artifact of its internet age. By 2012, Lustwerk had drifted to New York City and settled into a graphic design job, quickly growing disenfranchised by office culture. "Some days I felt like a token, other days I felt invisible." At night, he and his friends were carving out their own space, throwing parties in small basements, office buildings, and off-beat karaoke bars in Manhattan, influenced by series such as Mr. Sunday in Gowanus and The Bunker at Public Assembly. The lifestyle started to bleed into Lustwerk's musical vision. He remembers the night it clicked in Providence, partying and listening to tunes with Morgan Louis and Alvin Aronson. He went back to New York and pieced together his bedroom setup: a Dave Smith Tempest drum machine, a Waldorf Blofeld synthesizer, and a TEAC cassette recorder. Early snippets went straight to SoundCloud, where Lustwerk tested the crowd. Comments and messages offered instant feedback. One DM proved to be the greenlight: from Matthew Kent, an invitation to his burgeoning mix series Blowing Up The Workshop. 100% GALCHER traveled fast and far. A phenomenon he could only enjoy for a short period before discovering that nearly all the masters of the tracks got wiped by water damage to his computer. "The only copies were now on the 192kbs mp3 mix I sent Matt." Until now, after Lustwerk revived the lost tracks and handed them to Josh Bonati for remastering. "The original mix was never mastered so I hope older fans can find something new here." Hearing the enhanced set for the first time delineated by tracklist reveals this was a proper album all along. Sly synth interludes (all titled "Stem") clear the air for raspy house anthems like "Fifty" and "Parlay," the set's original breakout. Themes present across Lustwerk's catalog first materialize in this iconic run _ the link between the meditative state of Midwest driving and the solitary comedowns of nightlife. Lust- werk, the narrator, is an elusive character, a secret agent of the club, embodied by the hooks: "One minute I'm on / next minute I'm gone," he reminds us on cult-favor- ite "Put On." These narcotic, one-line refrains stick with you; look no further than the original YouTube upload of "Kaint" to know that fans can't let these phrases go. While recorded alone, 100% GALCHER was a collective moment. A decade later, Lustwerk sees the legacy as shared: "Making music can be an alienating experience, especially for DJs who travel a lot, it's all super isolating. It's easy to express lone- liness in the music itself, but when it comes down to getting things done, putting music out, you def should go on that journey w other people, friends, or maybe just a group of people online, build things with your friends then they can build to help you."
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1.1PARLAY
1.2PUT ON
1.3OUTSIDE THE CLUB
1.4I NEVA SEEN
1.5ENTERPRISE
1.6KAINT
1.7IN THE PLACE
1.8CRICKET'S THEME
1.9FIFTY
1.10DOCKSIDE
1.11LIL BIT O CHOCOLIT
100% GALCHER was by all accounts a game-changer when it landed in 2013 as an hour of original music from a relatively unknown producer ushered in by the beloved mix series Blowing Up The Workshop. Galcher Lustwerk's signature sound _ a smoky stream-of-consciousness baritone shadow-boxing with beats, informed by funk, rap, rhythm, and blues _ felt like an epiphany, impossibly hypnotic and complete. Resident Advisor writes, "100% GALCHER laid out a louche, lysergic and resolutely black take on deep house." Pitchfork remembers the music's immediate impact: "It's the sort of gem you felt inclined to pass around" _ and by year-end list time, word-of-mouth intensified. It was Resident Advisor and Juno's mix of the year, and earned a top-ten placement in FACT Magazine's albums list, as well as Philip Sherburne's personal rundown for Spin." Since then, select songs from 100% GALCHER have seen small-run pressings, while the album has lived primarily on SoundCloud and YouTube as a low-key cult legend. The gateway into Lustwerk's now well-established catalog, known for its reliability as a late-night listen and its prophetic vision for the near future of underground dance music. RA would later name it a mix of the decade, citing its influence and imagination: "Original in every sense _ unknown, unheard and unbelievably good." In late 2022, marking ten years since he first recorded the material, Lustwerk returns to Ghostly International to release 100% GALCHER as a remastered limited-edition double LP. Lustwerk is a product of the Midwest. Growing up in Cleveland, he'd tape over his parents' cassettes and spend hours at his family computer recording loops and designing artwork for the jewel cases of burned CDs. In high school, he turned to Ableton Live and absorbed every electronic music magazine he could find at the local Borders Books store. As a college student at RISD, he played in noise bands, plugged into Providence's DIY scene via Myspace, and started DJing weeknights at bars downtown. There he connected with Young Male and DJ Richard, who would go on to found White Material Records and offer their third release to Galcher Lustwerk, an alias realized via CAPTCHA test, a perfect artifact of its internet age. By 2012, Lustwerk had drifted to New York City and settled into a graphic design job, quickly growing disenfranchised by office culture. "Some days I felt like a token, other days I felt invisible." At night, he and his friends were carving out their own space, throwing parties in small basements, office buildings, and off-beat karaoke bars in Manhattan, influenced by series such as Mr. Sunday in Gowanus and The Bunker at Public Assembly. The lifestyle started to bleed into Lustwerk's musical vision. He remembers the night it clicked in Providence, partying and listening to tunes with Morgan Louis and Alvin Aronson. He went back to New York and pieced together his bedroom setup: a Dave Smith Tempest drum machine, a Waldorf Blofeld synthesizer, and a TEAC cassette recorder. Early snippets went straight to SoundCloud, where Lustwerk tested the crowd. Comments and messages offered instant feedback. One DM proved to be the greenlight: from Matthew Kent, an invitation to his burgeoning mix series Blowing Up The Workshop. 100% GALCHER traveled fast and far. A phenomenon he could only enjoy for a short period before discovering that nearly all the masters of the tracks got wiped by water damage to his computer. "The only copies were now on the 192kbs mp3 mix I sent Matt." Until now, after Lustwerk revived the lost tracks and handed them to Josh Bonati for remastering. "The original mix was never mastered so I hope older fans can find something new here." Hearing the enhanced set for the first time delineated by tracklist reveals this was a proper album all along. Sly synth interludes (all titled "Stem") clear the air for raspy house anthems like "Fifty" and "Parlay," the set's original breakout. Themes present across Lustwerk's catalog first materialize in this iconic run _ the link between the meditative state of Midwest driving and the solitary comedowns of nightlife. Lust- werk, the narrator, is an elusive character, a secret agent of the club, embodied by the hooks: "One minute I'm on / next minute I'm gone," he reminds us on cult-favor- ite "Put On." These narcotic, one-line refrains stick with you; look no further than the original YouTube upload of "Kaint" to know that fans can't let these phrases go. While recorded alone, 100% GALCHER was a collective moment. A decade later, Lustwerk sees the legacy as shared: "Making music can be an alienating experience, especially for DJs who travel a lot, it's all super isolating. It's easy to express lone- liness in the music itself, but when it comes down to getting things done, putting music out, you def should go on that journey w other people, friends, or maybe just a group of people online, build things with your friends then they can build to help you."
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
Tracklist:
1.1PARLAY
1.2PUT ON
1.3OUTSIDE THE CLUB
1.4I NEVA SEEN
1.5ENTERPRISE
1.6KAINT
1.7IN THE PLACE
1.8CRICKET'S THEME
1.9FIFTY
1.10DOCKSIDE
1.11LIL BIT O CHOCOLIT
100% GALCHER was by all accounts a game-changer when it landed in 2013 as an hour of original music from a relatively unknown producer ushered in by the beloved mix series Blowing Up The Workshop. Galcher Lustwerk's signature sound _ a smoky stream-of-consciousness baritone shadow-boxing with beats, informed by funk, rap, rhythm, and blues _ felt like an epiphany, impossibly hypnotic and complete. Resident Advisor writes, "100% GALCHER laid out a louche, lysergic and resolutely black take on deep house." Pitchfork remembers the music's immediate impact: "It's the sort of gem you felt inclined to pass around" _ and by year-end list time, word-of-mouth intensified. It was Resident Advisor and Juno's mix of the year, and earned a top-ten placement in FACT Magazine's albums list, as well as Philip Sherburne's personal rundown for Spin." Since then, select songs from 100% GALCHER have seen small-run pressings, while the album has lived primarily on SoundCloud and YouTube as a low-key cult legend. The gateway into Lustwerk's now well-established catalog, known for its reliability as a late-night listen and its prophetic vision for the near future of underground dance music. RA would later name it a mix of the decade, citing its influence and imagination: "Original in every sense _ unknown, unheard and unbelievably good." In late 2022, marking ten years since he first recorded the material, Lustwerk returns to Ghostly International to release 100% GALCHER as a remastered limited-edition double LP. Lustwerk is a product of the Midwest. Growing up in Cleveland, he'd tape over his parents' cassettes and spend hours at his family computer recording loops and designing artwork for the jewel cases of burned CDs. In high school, he turned to Ableton Live and absorbed every electronic music magazine he could find at the local Borders Books store. As a college student at RISD, he played in noise bands, plugged into Providence's DIY scene via Myspace, and started DJing weeknights at bars downtown. There he connected with Young Male and DJ Richard, who would go on to found White Material Records and offer their third release to Galcher Lustwerk, an alias realized via CAPTCHA test, a perfect artifact of its internet age. By 2012, Lustwerk had drifted to New York City and settled into a graphic design job, quickly growing disenfranchised by office culture. "Some days I felt like a token, other days I felt invisible." At night, he and his friends were carving out their own space, throwing parties in small basements, office buildings, and off-beat karaoke bars in Manhattan, influenced by series such as Mr. Sunday in Gowanus and The Bunker at Public Assembly. The lifestyle started to bleed into Lustwerk's musical vision. He remembers the night it clicked in Providence, partying and listening to tunes with Morgan Louis and Alvin Aronson. He went back to New York and pieced together his bedroom setup: a Dave Smith Tempest drum machine, a Waldorf Blofeld synthesizer, and a TEAC cassette recorder. Early snippets went straight to SoundCloud, where Lustwerk tested the crowd. Comments and messages offered instant feedback. One DM proved to be the greenlight: from Matthew Kent, an invitation to his burgeoning mix series Blowing Up The Workshop. 100% GALCHER traveled fast and far. A phenomenon he could only enjoy for a short period before discovering that nearly all the masters of the tracks got wiped by water damage to his computer. "The only copies were now on the 192kbs mp3 mix I sent Matt." Until now, after Lustwerk revived the lost tracks and handed them to Josh Bonati for remastering. "The original mix was never mastered so I hope older fans can find something new here." Hearing the enhanced set for the first time delineated by tracklist reveals this was a proper album all along. Sly synth interludes (all titled "Stem") clear the air for raspy house anthems like "Fifty" and "Parlay," the set's original breakout. Themes present across Lustwerk's catalog first materialize in this iconic run _ the link between the meditative state of Midwest driving and the solitary comedowns of nightlife. Lust- werk, the narrator, is an elusive character, a secret agent of the club, embodied by the hooks: "One minute I'm on / next minute I'm gone," he reminds us on cult-favor- ite "Put On." These narcotic, one-line refrains stick with you; look no further than the original YouTube upload of "Kaint" to know that fans can't let these phrases go. While recorded alone, 100% GALCHER was a collective moment. A decade later, Lustwerk sees the legacy as shared: "Making music can be an alienating experience, especially for DJs who travel a lot, it's all super isolating. It's easy to express lone- liness in the music itself, but when it comes down to getting things done, putting music out, you def should go on that journey w other people, friends, or maybe just a group of people online, build things with your friends then they can build to help you."
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More
1.1PARLAY
1.2PUT ON
1.3OUTSIDE THE CLUB
1.4I NEVA SEEN
1.5ENTERPRISE
1.6KAINT
1.7IN THE PLACE
1.8CRICKET'S THEME
1.9FIFTY
1.10DOCKSIDE
1.11LIL BIT O CHOCOLIT
100% GALCHER was by all accounts a game-changer when it landed in 2013 as an hour of original music from a relatively unknown producer ushered in by the beloved mix series Blowing Up The Workshop. Galcher Lustwerk's signature sound _ a smoky stream-of-consciousness baritone shadow-boxing with beats, informed by funk, rap, rhythm, and blues _ felt like an epiphany, impossibly hypnotic and complete. Resident Advisor writes, "100% GALCHER laid out a louche, lysergic and resolutely black take on deep house." Pitchfork remembers the music's immediate impact: "It's the sort of gem you felt inclined to pass around" _ and by year-end list time, word-of-mouth intensified. It was Resident Advisor and Juno's mix of the year, and earned a top-ten placement in FACT Magazine's albums list, as well as Philip Sherburne's personal rundown for Spin." Since then, select songs from 100% GALCHER have seen small-run pressings, while the album has lived primarily on SoundCloud and YouTube as a low-key cult legend. The gateway into Lustwerk's now well-established catalog, known for its reliability as a late-night listen and its prophetic vision for the near future of underground dance music. RA would later name it a mix of the decade, citing its influence and imagination: "Original in every sense _ unknown, unheard and unbelievably good." In late 2022, marking ten years since he first recorded the material, Lustwerk returns to Ghostly International to release 100% GALCHER as a remastered limited-edition double LP. Lustwerk is a product of the Midwest. Growing up in Cleveland, he'd tape over his parents' cassettes and spend hours at his family computer recording loops and designing artwork for the jewel cases of burned CDs. In high school, he turned to Ableton Live and absorbed every electronic music magazine he could find at the local Borders Books store. As a college student at RISD, he played in noise bands, plugged into Providence's DIY scene via Myspace, and started DJing weeknights at bars downtown. There he connected with Young Male and DJ Richard, who would go on to found White Material Records and offer their third release to Galcher Lustwerk, an alias realized via CAPTCHA test, a perfect artifact of its internet age. By 2012, Lustwerk had drifted to New York City and settled into a graphic design job, quickly growing disenfranchised by office culture. "Some days I felt like a token, other days I felt invisible." At night, he and his friends were carving out their own space, throwing parties in small basements, office buildings, and off-beat karaoke bars in Manhattan, influenced by series such as Mr. Sunday in Gowanus and The Bunker at Public Assembly. The lifestyle started to bleed into Lustwerk's musical vision. He remembers the night it clicked in Providence, partying and listening to tunes with Morgan Louis and Alvin Aronson. He went back to New York and pieced together his bedroom setup: a Dave Smith Tempest drum machine, a Waldorf Blofeld synthesizer, and a TEAC cassette recorder. Early snippets went straight to SoundCloud, where Lustwerk tested the crowd. Comments and messages offered instant feedback. One DM proved to be the greenlight: from Matthew Kent, an invitation to his burgeoning mix series Blowing Up The Workshop. 100% GALCHER traveled fast and far. A phenomenon he could only enjoy for a short period before discovering that nearly all the masters of the tracks got wiped by water damage to his computer. "The only copies were now on the 192kbs mp3 mix I sent Matt." Until now, after Lustwerk revived the lost tracks and handed them to Josh Bonati for remastering. "The original mix was never mastered so I hope older fans can find something new here." Hearing the enhanced set for the first time delineated by tracklist reveals this was a proper album all along. Sly synth interludes (all titled "Stem") clear the air for raspy house anthems like "Fifty" and "Parlay," the set's original breakout. Themes present across Lustwerk's catalog first materialize in this iconic run _ the link between the meditative state of Midwest driving and the solitary comedowns of nightlife. Lust- werk, the narrator, is an elusive character, a secret agent of the club, embodied by the hooks: "One minute I'm on / next minute I'm gone," he reminds us on cult-favor- ite "Put On." These narcotic, one-line refrains stick with you; look no further than the original YouTube upload of "Kaint" to know that fans can't let these phrases go. While recorded alone, 100% GALCHER was a collective moment. A decade later, Lustwerk sees the legacy as shared: "Making music can be an alienating experience, especially for DJs who travel a lot, it's all super isolating. It's easy to express lone- liness in the music itself, but when it comes down to getting things done, putting music out, you def should go on that journey w other people, friends, or maybe just a group of people online, build things with your friends then they can build to help you."
Sicherheits- und Herstellerinformationen / safety and manufacturer info (GPSR)
WAS - Word and Sound Medien GmbH
Liebigstrasse 2-20
DE - 22113 Hamburg
Germany
Contact: [email protected]More