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Following the creation of his own False Idols imprint and last year’s album of the same name, Tricky returns in the fall of 2014 with a new studio project that shares the name he was given at birth: Adrian Thaws. “Calling it Adrian Thaws is saying you don’t really know me,” says Tricky of his 11th album. “So many times people have tried to put a finger on me and every album I go to a different place.”

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Recorded in Tricky’s home studio in London, Adrian Thaws is a musically adventurous project and collaborators on the album include Francesca Belmonte, Nneka, Mykki Blanco, Bella Gotti, Tirzah, Blue Daisy and Oh Land. Adrian Thaws is out now on False Idols in association with !K7 Records. A 2LP Vinyl Gatefold and Deluxe Hard Case CD edition featuring a two bonus tracks and an exclusive booklet comprising never before seen photos from Tricky’s youth are available to buy now via the !K7 store, hand signed by the artist. – Tricky Website

Canadian ensemble BadBadNotGood made their name by crossing genre. This seamless movement between style hit hard when they took hip hop into jazz and vice versa. Their latest album – and first with XL recordings – demonstrates them going back to their instrumental beginnings. Instead of looking at the now, they reflected the history and innovation of those that influenced them. To paraphrase Lamont Dozier, this is an album about going back to their roots.

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BadBadNotGood formed in 2010, moving between three and four members before establishing its current line up in 2015. The band, aka Alexander Sowinski (drums), Chester Hansen (bass) and Leland Whitty (guitar and woodwinds), met on the Humber College jazz program in Toronto. At the time, instead of working with traditional jazz standards, the group sidestepped and drew from hip hop and other contemporary genres to create a unique sound rooted in Black American music, but 2021’s Talk Memory pays homage to the musicians, composers and influences that first informed their work.

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One of the central driving forces behind their latest album was to capture some of the focus, energy and improvisation which is at the heart of their live shows. As they noted, a song is a living breathing thing that naturally changes and evolves as it is played in different settings. This is an album that plays with that thinking. After years of touring, the band paused, refreshed and looked at their history and experiences before starting out on their current instrumental project. A sense of reflection and renewed communication is at the heart of their current approach to making music, and the spark that led to the album’s pensive title Talk Memory. Instead of recording and then developing the tracks on tour, the band decided to slow down and rethink their creative process. By the time they entered the studio and recorded the improvised performances, they had already clearly approached the process of writing and composition. The approach was more intentional, had a longer gestation period and was created over two years. The speed of their compositions, performance and sound has shifted in fresh ways. Instead of improvising and growing their tracks on tour, that process happened in the studio.

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The band demonstrates a sense of emotional and poetic progress, not just technique and virtuosity. They consider themselves constant students, always listening and striving for new directions. Those new paths range from moments of cinematic pacing to distorted improvisation. The album is a kind of aural odyssey, with all the sense of psychedelic narrative that entails. It is about drawing on the energy of collaboration as I happens. The band recorded their latest work in analog studios, as an intentional way to stay present and experience without drawing from the internet for research or references. – Bandcamp

The third instalment in the Future Bubblers compilation series is set for release on October 11th. The programme, started by Brownswood founder and 6 Music broadcaster Gilles Peterson has garnered a reputation of being at the forefront of cutting-edge music, having previously released tunes by artists such as Yazmin Lacey & Skinny Pelembe.

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Serving as both a new music discovery platform and a mentoring scheme - Future Bubblers aims to support left-field music by offering advice and practical support to the acts hand-picked from the multitude of applications received. Future Bubblers 3.0 continues the tradition of wonky electronica, soulful rhythms and jazz infused bops.

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From the Mancunian twang of Blind MIC to the free-flowing improvised hip-hop of NuTribe, the velvety vocals of Shunaji to the sultry r'n'b tinged Aaliyah Esprit - this new generation of creative and progressive musicians here showcase their individual skill - as well as the unifying and supportive 'extended family' ethos that comes from working as part of Future Bubblers.

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Future Bubblers has been running since 2014, artists are chosen through an open application process each year. They’re paired with a mentor from the music industry who, along with the Future Bubblers team, develop these artists. This album is focused on the ten artists from Year 3.

To immerse oneself in the Knxwledge universe is to freefall through an unending reconfiguration of history, in short jolts of time. On this timeline, the sunshine’s Californian and the reefer comes standard-issue. The beat machine is blessed, his holy hand ensuring that no note, pitch, voice, or sound goes unturned. Some pieces ring familiar, many are uprooted for the greater good and released en masse. In this process, he mines for beauty wherever he can dig. (Sometimes, he doesn’t call the hotline to check the zoning.) Understanding this ensures one’s enjoyment of Hud Dreems: a gorgeous romp through many faraway lands, charging ceaselessly into the infinite. In a single breath, Knxwledge can elect to heal you, thrill you, or offer you an escape route. Tap into the way he steamrolls through time, and perhaps he’ll fulfill one of your dreams – Vinyl Me Please

Nobody thought that a band who appeared suddenly and unexpectedly on the jazz scene would develop so rapidly and in such an unforeseen direction. A year ago, critics and music journalists treated Błoto only as a one-off spin off of a larger band, EABS, when the debut album “Erozje” (eng,”Erosion”) was released. The band used their momentum and decided to release the second album “Inflorescence, all in 2020. Both albums resonated strongly enough to be at the top of many annual charts, and receive nominations for the most important music awards in Poland.

The reality around us continued to inspire the band to create. The Błoto quartet only needed a small spark to make another burst of creativity. The igniter turned out to be Polish Radio, which came up with the initiative to invite the band to a new project. This was the starting point for the creation of "Kwasy i zasady", Błoto’s third album within twelve months. – On Bandcamp

Damon Locks & Black Monument Ensemble’s new album "NOW" was created in the final throes of Summer 2020, following months of pandemic-induced fear & isolation, the explosion of social unrest, struggle & violence in the streets, and as the certain presence of a new reality had fully settled in. Set up safely in the garden behind Chicago’s Experimental Sound Studio, the music was recorded in only a few takes, capturing the first times members of BME had ever played or sang the tunes. For Locks, the impetus was more about getting together to commune and make art than it was about producing an album. In his words: “It was about offering a new thought. It was about resisting the darkness. It was about expressing possibility. It was about asking the question, ‘Since the future has unfolded and taken a new and dangerous shape... what happens NOW?’” - Bandcamp

Mash-ups of different tracks by MF Doom and Sade. Originally released as an exclusive digital mixtape for DatPiff in Feb 2016. DOOM’s love for Sade is the stuff of legend at this point – just listen to Operation: Doomsday standout ‘Doomsday’, which is built around a large sample of Sade’s ‘Kiss of Love’.

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Young Portsmouth-based producer Seanh2k11 has used this concept as the jump-off for SADEVILLAIN, an eight track EP that blends the best of DOOM with the best of Sade.

2011's cassette release 'NoMaps' gets a vinyl release, tracing a transitional period between two coasts, soundtracking Mndsgn’s transplant from New Jersey to Los Angeles. The 15 tracks take their own detours, in and out of soft-synth compositions, textured loops and hard bops.

In feudal Japan, the Bushido Code defined the way of the samurai. It was a blueprint to conduct warfare with honor: a system built upon the qualities of rectitude and courage, honor and loyalty. In the modern world, these historical tenets may seem antiquated, or sometimes even obsolete. But the power of tradition is resolute and unyielding. The art of the rugged drum and the razor tongued rap are timeless.

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After a decade in the music business, Mello Music Group has witnessed the dealings and promises of the record industry. Running counter-clockwise to the mainstream ethic, Mello has settled on its own code of conduct and value system. Their catalogue is a Hagakare of hip-hop -- a practical and spiritual guide to the essence. While the sounds are varied, an MMG release ensures that the art comes first, the artists are religiously devoted to the upholding of standards and values. The musicians swing fast blades and fly the Mello banner with speed and strength.

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This is Bushido, the latest Mello Music compilation gathering the current roster and the label’s closest brethren. As always, the core shoguns are present: Apollo Brown, Oddisee, Quelle Chris, L'Orange, Joell Ortiz, Skyzoo, and Homeboy Sandman. The rated rookies brandish sharpened swords: Solemn Brigham, Namir Blade, and The Lasso. The legacy teammates with championship trophies are all present: Open Mike Eagle, Georgia Anne Muldrow, Elaquent, Kool Keith, and Mr. Lif. So are label affiliates, Murs, The Alchemist, RJ Payne, and B-Real. The veteran general rounds out the roster, Stalley, the newest member of the Mello family. This isn’t merely an anthology, it’s a fully formed vision of what hip-hop can be. A meticulously assembled arsenal of past, present, and future. – Bandcamp

Is it a multi-genre ‘hybrid’, or is the ‘Astral Love’ LP a compound in its own right? It is, most certainly, a composition of sound formed from a very rich heritage that we’re about to examine in abridged form. ‘Astral Love’ is an awesome, inspiring collection of skillfully performed pieces that draw heavily on hip hop, nu-disco, funk and, of course, soul.

Those of non-Antipodean persuasion won’t require, nor appreciate this overly-simplified initial commentary. But, ‘down under’ gifts us with some truly spellbinding interpretations of the arts; food of course, and certainly, very firmly, music. Initially cultivating his craft from Adelaide, to cherry-pick ‘just some’ of the ‘feathers’ in Jules Habib’s cap, might go something like this: 2011 releases on Amsterdam’s BOOGIE BASH; a plethora of remix work from there onwards; outstanding releases on Dopeness Galore; notable ‘tech’ releases on RUSH HOUR’s ‘Store Only’ series; Hot Shot Sounds which included a collab with REGGIE B; Outerspace Connection on the monumental BBE; Planetself on TOKYO DAWN. And now, ‘Astral Love’, on UK-based Atjazz Record Company. But, relax, this will all make perfect sense soon. Very soon.

‘Astral Love’ bears all of the aforementioned ingredients, crafted by Jules Habib under his Inkswel moniker. It’s a bold, accomplished collection of skilful tunes, featuring talent spanning a global alliance of like-minded performers, all of whom are now very much at home, together on Atjazz Record Company. - Bandcamp

There Is No End was produced by Tony Allen, Vincent Taeger, and Vincent Taurelle — Allen had produced and written all the album’s beats back in 2019 alongside Taeger. In thinking back on the process of finalizing There Is No End without Tony physically present to guide them, Taeger remarked that his friend and mentor “was a teacher without speaking… a drummer and a guardian, with a great artistic vision and that vision filled the songs even after he had left us.” Renowned Nigerian novelist and poet Ben Okri, like everyone else involved in this valedictory album, had a very similar experience, declaring in awe that “this man could have lived another 150 years and kept creating new worlds. He had become the master shaman of his art. He knew himself and his mind. He wanted the album to be open to the energies of a new generation… but like a great mathematician or scientist who found a code for a new world, with just a few beats, he created this extraordinary canvas.”

“Cosmosis” came together just as Tony, Damon Albarn and Nigerian-British rapper Skepta had finished tracking their collaboration, “How Far?” for the Gorillaz 2020 album Song Machine, Season One: Strange Timez. Ben Okri wrote his lyrics as a tribute to Tony, to ask “How do you absorb a cosmos or integrate a cosmos, enrich a world, infiltrate in the highest possible way and change the mentalverse, the spiritverse; it’s by cosmosis.”

Tony Allen’s singular talent didn’t end when the music stopped. For all those who knew him, he was a deeply spiritual man whose life’s mission was not just to create a new musical language, but to pass it on to subsequent generations. As he put it, “I’m just doing my best to please the universe. Life’s a boomerang, you know? You create bad or good [and] it comes back to you.” Right up to this, his last album, his thoughts were for the younger artists who continued to flock to him, especially in the fraught historical and political moment in which we live. “I want to take care of youngsters; they have messages and I want to bring them on my beat. The idea is to transmit to the young generation, to mix different universes – the hip hop world to the Afrobeat world.” – Blue Note

The American Negro is a mammoth project from producer and multi-instrumentalist Adrian Younge: a 26-track part-spoken word, part-orchestral examination of the structural racism underpinning the identity of modern America. It forms just one part of Younge’s current projects on the same theme, including a four-part podcast, Invisible Blackness, and a short film, T.A.N.

Delving into this work of immense depth, Younge harks back to the social consciousness soul of forebears such as Marvin Gaye and Donny Hathaway on the communal funk of the title track and the twinkling soul of Watch the Children. The propulsive protest rap of Revolutionize updates Gil Scott-Heron’s The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, and A Symphony for Sahara showcases Younge’s deft hand at producing a luscious, cinematic score following his work on films such as 2009’s Black Dynamite.

Much more than a pastiche of influences, though, it is Younge’s impassioned spoken-word interludes – dissecting everything from the Frantz Fanon-referencing double consciousness of racial awareness to the creation of racism to solidify class structures – that give this record its unique tone and profundity. It may be an intimidating undertaking, but one that is well worth the time. – The Guardian

Is It Electro? Hip Hop? Techno? House? Funk? Disco? Balearic? Obscure?

It’s all up to you. Ottagono Design Of Music is back introducing from its Italian headquarter the Japanese crossover Hoodoo Fushimi‘s Oto (sound) Imprint. Fushimi Sensei from his private studio in Yokosuka (the city where he is born ) during 1979 -1993 used to work on many projects, producing different music albums, working as a painter and illustrator, working also for a few Japanese magazines as a music writer and English translator. Nowadays for many people, he is considered one of the Electro Disco Tech Funk Japanese pioneers/ innovators. Tamaran released during 1989 was available only on CD format on Syntax ( ’89 was the boom of CD Japanese Market ) for the Japanese Local Market becoming a true hard to find during the years, finally thanks to Ottagono after 30 years it takes the first official vinyl release. The Japanese Fushimi sound trademark looks still beautiful, fresh, and powerful ( from the Japanese word utsukushii) with influences that remind early Afrika Bambata, Cybotron, Egyptian Lover, De La Soul. Tamaran is featured by the club Hit “ Kaette Ne ” where Fushimi joining with singer Harka made a love song where still today it seems a true manifesto to Chicago Warehouse, New York Paradise Garage, it is something like a true mix of early Joe Claussell Instant House/Jungle Sounds, Chicago Trax Records with some reminiscence of Nami Shimada and Soichi Terada. We are sure that Larry Levan and Frankie Knuckles would have liked to play at that time if only had a chance to have this pearl in their hands at that time. Claudio Mate from his musical vision after introducing Zen Oikawa Studio Ghibli director with the first Ottagono release remarks the Otaku Sound concept, where Artists, Producers, Musicians from the land of Rising Sun are responsible for Soundtracks for Anime, Video Games, Drama Live Action, Movies as at same time fathers also of a few pieces such as of Underground Music, indeed more recently Hoodoo Fushimi Ongaku (Music) got featuring over a few episodes of Giri/ Haji the cult Netflix Uk/ Japanese Drama series. Claudio and Fushimi Sensei together introduce one more time another Italian /Japanese connection impossible to lose !!  – Bandcamp

1.Killer and cult electro funk hip hop musical U.F.O. from 1987 Japan!

2.Highly sought-after record reissued for the first time since its original release

3.Sound restoration, mastering and lacquer cut by Timmion Cutting Lab

4.180g heavy vinyl pressing, reverse board print

5.Comes with a 4 pages insert including the original Japanese one, an interview with Hoodoo Fushimi (in English and Japanese), exclusive pictures and the album's lyrics translated in English.

1987, Kanagawa, not so far from Tokyo, Japan. Minoru Fushimi teaches his high-school classes during the day. Back from work, he transforms into "Hoodoo" Fushimi, turns on the drum machines, the synthesizers and the sequencers, blends them with his own shamisen playing and builds a cult album: Kenka Oyaji is born and becomes a milestone in Japan's early hip hop and electro-funk history, now reissued for the first time since its original release, in collaboration with Hoodoo Fushimi himself. Essential!-  Bandcamp

The Shape Of Jazz is the debut release by Zvi Belling aka ZEDSIX, producer, composer and bass player. The album is part of an ongoing experiment in re-shaping American and African jazz standards through hip-hop. An all star series of collaborations investigate the intersection of boom-bap and be-bop, it sounds like the future! – Bandcamp

This single LP edit of Piñata has been lacquered at half speed master by Metropolis Mastering in London for the highest fidelity and is housed in a Blaxploitation-themed cover exclusively for Record Store Day 2020.

This single LP version of Piñata, the acclaimed rap album from 2014 that debuted at Number 39 on Billboard’s Top 200, is presented in a unique cover for RSD 2020. The cover is a collaboration between Jeff Jank and Pathetic Pixels with inspiration found in the unique graphics and content of 1970s Blaxploitation films. Piñata is “a gangster Blaxploitation film on wax,” says Gibbs, who came up on the streets of Gary, Indiana, the disregarded city previously best known for producing Michael Jackson. Here he is joined by Mac Miller, Earl Sweatshirt, Raekwon, Scarface, Domo Genesis, Ab-Soul and a host of others in setting his soliloquies of the streets alongside film snippets and dusted funk, soul and prog musical tapestries.

This version of Piñata comes on the heels of the 2019 release of the duo’s acclaimed album.

Bandana, named Album of the Year by Hypebeast, Rap Caviar, and many others, and is a welcome reminder of the undeniable musical chemistry that first catalyzed six years ago, elevating Freddie Gibbs and Madlib to the upper echelon of the genre’s teams, and placing a classic album alongside the others Madlib issued over the years, from Madvillain’s Madvillainy to Quasimoto’s The Unseen.

A Side

1. Supplier 2. Scarface 3. Deeper 4. High (ft. Danny Brown) 5. Harold’s 6. Bomb (ft. Raekwon) 7. Shitsville 8. Thuggin’ 9. Real 10. Uno

B Side

1. Robes (ft. Domo Genesis & Earl Sweatshirt) 2. Broken (ft. Scarface) 3. Lakers (ft. Ab-Soul & Polyester the Saint) 4. Knicks 5. Shame (ft. BJ The Chicago Kid) 6. Watts (ft. Big Time Watts) 7. Piñata (ft. Domo Genesis, G-Wiz, Casey Veggies, Sulaiman, Meechy Darko, & Mac Miller)

- Record Store Day

The creative process of the album revolved around two Sun Ra’s ideas - deconstruction and discipline. “He sent members of the Arkestra out to research individual players in Henderson group in the order to get the feeling right when playing their parts. Sun Ra told them they weren’t copying those pieces, they were re-creating them, and with the proper information they could know the spirit behind the original." That’s how Herman Sonny Blount treated the music of the swing legend, Fletcher Henderson. EABS approached the composition of Sun Ra in exactly the same way. An equally important element with recording was a regime associated with the discipline and precision that the pianist from Saturn fought for, using a series of exercises-compositions entitled ‘Discipline’ previously used by Arkestra. They were strictly designed for exercises with the minimum amount of material, the most common built on the brass section parts, with a cyclical melody unfolding from fragments so each person played their lines meticulously, without any deviation. This is what the title of the album ‘Discipline of Sun Ra’ refers to.

Sun Ra was aiming to record timeless music that could still be alive in a 1000 years, and with no hesitation, he managed to do it. The music from distant planets is infinite. “By infinity, Mr.Ra means creating jazz of the future, but also covering the past”- the same idea is carried by polish musicians. On the ‘Slavic Spirits’ album, EABS was inspired by the ancient past. As we now know, discovering Sun Ra’s concept wasn’t coincidental. He also believed and shared the philosophy of coming through the darkness to see the sun and enlightenment. In case there’s no hope for living on our planet, we need to look for metaphorical escapism. That’s where the idea of building a cosmic ship under ‘Polish Space Program’ was born. – Astigmatic Records

The Japanese trumpeter’s dense and cosmic sixth album blends jazz with Afrobeat, hip-hop, neo-soul, and funk.

akuya Kuroda hails from Kobe, Japan, a nation that to a dedicated strand of Western jazz obsessive serves as a sacred tomb of rare riches. You can place the trumpeter next to 20th-century Japanese virtuosos such as Toshiko Akiyoshi, Masabumi Kikuchi, Ryo Fukui, and Koichi Matsukaze, and he looks extremely comfortable in the lineage: All respected the core tenets of jazz while offering their own unique interpretations. Kuroda, after all, is a guy who has name-dropped Lee Morgan as an inspiration while playing in DJ Premier’s touring outfit, the Badder band.

Having relocated to New York to study jazz and contemporary music at The New School in the mid-2000s, Kuroda has since traversed the city as a recording artist—he notably spent some time on Blue Note Records—and musician for hire. Sixth album Fly Moon Die Soon is the work of a man who has undertaken his own musical Gulliver’s Travels. The album’s nine cuts are united by Kuroda’s determination to branch out from jazz and into hip-hop, funk, Afrobeat, electronica, and neo soul. But Kuroda isn’t simply quoting corners of his own record collection; he skillfully synthesizes his influences, hitting sweet spots that feel purely of his own creation.

Most apparent is the music of 1970s West Africa (Kuroda has previously collaborated with a group of similar interest in New York’s Akoya Afrobeat). The horns, guitar stabs, and rattling percussion of “ABC” gesture heavily toward Fela Kuti, while the driving rhythms of “Moody” recalls 1970s Afro-funk bands like the Funkees and Monomono. The brass instruments throughout Fly Moon Die Soon are often used to deploy catchy riffs, Kuroda’s trumpet frequently amalgamating with Corey King’s trombone. The title track shows a more experimental side, with programmed beats and a Moog bassline that swirls like a Thundercat jam. It’s the kind of dense and cosmic jazz hybrid that would blow minds over at Brainfeeder. - Pitchfork

The record is entirely crafted from sampling rare Soviet jazz and funk records from his home country of Russia and other former Soviet countries. Turned into deep and heavy instrumental hip-hop, with analog synthesizers, dub techniques, and subtle knob turns on a delay pedal to morph the context of these samples. – Rucksack Records

Limited edition of 300 copies on black vinyl!

Originally released in 2015 on cassette via Urban Waves, this little stunner by Japanese beatmaker Tajima Hal finally gets a proper vinyl release on 2LP. 25 beats taking you around Tajima's imagination and inner world and includes 3 features by Lidly. – HHV

If history has taught us anything, it’s that music has played an integral part in the pursuit of social justice for a long time. James Brown’s ‘Say It Loud – I’m Black And I’m Proud’, U2’s ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’, Rage Against The Machine’s ‘Killing In The Name’ and – more recently – Kendrick Lamar’s ‘Alright’ are just a few of the songs that have soundtracked revolutionary action over the years. 

Over the past week, thousands of people have taken to the streets in the US and across the world to protest following the death of George Floyd, an African-American man who was killed on May 25 when a white police officer, who has now been charged with second-degree murder, knelt on Floyd’s neck for almost nine minute as he lay on the ground during an arrest (his alleged crime? Possession of a counterfeit $20). Floyd’s horrendous killing has reignited widespread Black Lives Matter protests, online and in the streets. 

‘Run The Jewels 4’, the much-anticipated new album from hip-hop duo Run The Jewels – comprised of rapper Killer Mike and producer/rapper El-P – couldn’t be more appropriate for the times we’re living in. “And you so numb you watch the cops choke out a man like me/ Until my voice goes from a shriek to whisper, ‘I can’t breathe’,” raps Killer Mike, RTJ’s beloved social activist, on the defiant ‘walking in the snow’. It’s a track that also sees them question the school system, biased news reporting and unruly religious mobs. 

Mike is no stranger to speaking out on social issues. Just last week the community leader delivered an impassioned speech during a press conference in Atlanta in which he pleaded with the protesting residents of his home city to not “burn your own house down for anger with an enemy”. Instead, he suggested it was time to “plot, plan, strategise, organise and mobilise.” - NME

“The Ghetto Walk” originated from a session that resulted in Davis’ innovative 1969 studio album, In a Silent Way. Glasper isolated one two-chord pattern from the nearly 27-minute piece (released as part of the 2001 box set The Complete In a Silent Way Sessions) and looped it into the foundation for a jazz/hip-hop track.

AD “‘Ghetto Walk’ was so dope,” he says. “I got the concept quick because the name was already there. It’s called ‘Ghetto Walk.’ Those chord changes we sampled lend themselves to hip-hop so well.” – Rolling Stone

After the success of their collaborations on Bentley Bass Music and Trad Vibe compilations, as well as several DJ gigs in Europe, longtime friends DJ Cam and Moar team up for Beats. It's a special instrumental album, influenced by the great J Dilla, Pete Rock, New York in the '90s . . . and looking also into the future of beats in 2016. Limited blue vinyl. Includes download code. – Forced Exposure

Fredfades and his ability to capture a tangible mood through his productions has touched a fair few of our favourite records over the past two years. Wether he’s working with Kristoffer Eikrem as part of the Jazz Cats project or assisting on production duties for a member of the Mutual Intentions crew, Fredfades’ productions are immediately recognisable for their dusty charm and soulful inclinations. Music with the personality of a rare 7″ found amongst cobwebs in old second hand stores are brought into the present through the contemporary voices of peers like Ivan Avenue and Yogisoul where Fred’s music flits between grey areas amongst Jazz, Hip Hop and Nuo-Soul.

Warmth, his first fully realised solo work perpetuates the Fredfades sonic aesthetic, calling on an infallible list of voices to bring that human dimension to staccato arrangements where Fender Rhodes chords and synth melodies bounce off lethargic break-beat rhythms. A healthy dose of surface noise and needles clipping against tiny scratches on vinyl bring a healthy dose of colour and personality to the record, where they bound with life. Was it John Peel that said: “Life has surface noise”? Well Warmth certainly has that idea of living life engraved in its grooves. - Jaegeroslo

Straight Cold Beats – perfect for hip hop lovers into that colder side of things.

A Beat At the Table is An Instrumental Project by Koreatown Oddity conceputalized from Solange's A seat at the table Album.

A deep dive into the Black sounds & messages reinterpreted into 19 mins of Raw beat Energy as heard through the Ear of KtownOdd. - Bandcamp

Jazzvolution' is our instrumental compilation series exploring the connection between beatmaking and jazz. The aim is to explore the boundaries of hip-hop beats, to showcase the idea that beatmaking is an evolution of jazz foundations.

And here we are, concluding the trilogy with the final chapter. In the words of Sonny Rollins: “Jazz never ends… it just continues.” And so does beatmaking. Let’s keep on looking for the perfect beat. – Bandcamp | Jazzvolution

Welcome to the weird and wonderful world of library music. For avid aficionados of the beatmaking and sampling scene, it’s no news that library records have always been a reliable source of obscure sample fodder.

Over the years, there’ve been compilations of library labels such as KPM and Bruton, but no one ever took on the extensive catalogue of German library company, Sonoton. DJ, producer and record collector DJ Friction (Freundeskreis / Four Music) got in touch with Sonoton to discuss a possible collaboration. Once they agreed, he asked Dexter (Jazz Files, The Trip) – one of the most in-demand hip-hop producers and beatmakers working right now – to join him on this journey into sound. The idea was to not only compile a number of standout tracks from the Sonoton catalogue, but to sample these old recordings and transform them into a brand new collection of beats. Luckily, Sonoton was game and allowed Frico & Dexter to dive deep into the basement of the company's HQ in Munich. Out of those 200+ LP releases from the early 80s the two producers picked their favourites and went back to the drawing board. The iconic artwork of Sonoton’s 80s releases also inspired the cover sleeve of their new collabo LP.

Dexter and DJ Friction each produced one half of Diggin’ Sonoton. The result is an eclectic, exciting, and well-rounded instrumental album that clearly displays their respective individual styles, while at the same time transferring the distinctive vibe of the original recordings into 2020. All these tracks are digitally distributed via Sonoton as well, making this ambitious beat album a new addition to the rich history of library music. - Bandcamp