$60.00
Light In The Attic
Various – Somewhere Between: Mutant Pop, Electronic Minimalism & Shadow Sounds Of Japan 1980-1988
$60.00
Somewhere Between: Mutant Pop, Electronic Minimalism & Shadow Sounds of Japan 1980–1988 hovers vibe–wise between two distinct poles within Light In The Attic’s acclaimed Japan Archival Series—Kankyō Ongaku: Japanese Ambient, Environmental & New Age Music 1980–1990 and Pacific Breeze: Japanese City Pop, AOR & Boogie 1976–1986. All three albums showcase recordings produced during Japan’s soaring bubble economy of the 1980s, an era in which aesthetic visions and consumerism merged. Music echoed the nation’s prosperity and with financial abundance came the luxury to dream.
Sonically, Somewhere Between mines the midpoint between Kankyō Ongaku’s sparkling atmospherics and Pacific Breeze’s metropolitan boogie. The compilation encompasses ambient pop, underground electronics, liminal minimalism and shadow sounds—all descriptors emphasizing the hazy nature of the nebula. Out–of–focus rhythms wear ethereal accoutrements, ballads are shrouded in static, and angular drums snake skyward on transcendent tones. From the Avant–minimalism of Mkwaju Ensemble and Yoshio Ojima, to the leftfield techno-pop of Mishio Ogawa and Noriko Miyamoto (featuring members of YMO), and highlights from the groundbreaking Osaka underground label Vanity Records, these are blurry constellations defying collective categorization.
These tracks also exist in a space of transition when the major label grip on the Japanese recording market began to give way to the escalation of independents. Thanks to the idyllic economic climate and innovations in domestically–manufactured music gear, creators on the edges were empowered to focus on satisfying their artistic visions in the open headspace of home studios. While labels like Warner Music and Nippon Columbia explored new sounds through traditional channels, it was possible for Vanity, Balcony and other indie labels, not to mention self–released artists like Ojima and Naoki Asai, to publish their work via affordable media such as cassettes, 7" vinyl, and flexi–discs.
Expertly curated by Yosuke Kitazawa and Mark “Frosty” McNeill (dublab), Somewhere Between is a collection of music, much of it released for the first time outside Japan, that is bound more by energetic vibration than shared history, genre or scene. They are the sounds of transition and searching—a celebration of the freedom found in floating. - Light In The Attic
Label: Light In The Attic – LITA 183 |
Format: 2 × Vinyl, LP, 45 RPM, Compilation |
Country: US |
Released: 22 Jan 2021 |
Genre: Electronic |
Style: Ambient, Minimal, Dark Ambient |
$40.00
Issued for the first time are the rhapsodic, intimate, melancholy tunes of Lynn Castle, the first lady barber of L.A. who recorded these demos with Lee Hazlewood and Jack Nitzsche in the late 1960s.- Pitchfork
Label: LHI Records – LITA 157 |
Series: Lee Hazlewood Archive Series – 14 |
Format: Vinyl, LP, Compilation, Remastered, Stereo, Gatefold |
Country: US |
Released: 2017 |
Genre: Folk, World, & Country |
Style: Country |
$48.00
The Real ShooBeeDoo (AKA Reggie Fields) has always been a consistent name on the Detroit jazz scene … Fields who played with Pharoah Sanders while he was living in Motor City, worked with Sun Ra in the late 1970s and early 80s and who was also a close associate of the Afro-centric TRIBE label and artist collective, leaving his marks on a few essential TRIBE sessions such as Phil Ranelin’s “The Time Is Now!” as well as Ranelin & Wendell Harrison’s masterpiece “A Message From The Tribe”.
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It was Wendell Harrison who gave Fields the chance to record a solo album as a leader on his own WENHA imprint where “Reminiscing” found release in 1981. Reggie chose to record under his moniker “The Real ShooBeeDoo” because he built a rock-solid reputation as an internationally acclaimed performer under that name. This can later be heard on his fantastic ‘‘Live at Montreux Jazz Festival, 1982” album.
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“Reminiscing” is a deep and rewarding spiritual jazz album with bass lines that can blow through walls as if they were made from paper. Foot stomping rhythmic beats and lyrics that are pure poetry, far-out (and less obvious) vocal duties … this all takes the avant-garde approach featured here on his album to new ‘cosmic’ heights. ‘Originality’, ‘unique’ and ‘standing out’ are the main key-words here.– Tidal Waves Music
Label: Tidal Waves Music – TWM29 |
Format: Vinyl, LP, Album, Reissue |
Country: US |
Released: 28 Jun 2019 |
Genre: Jazz |
$48.00
"Tony Newton’s first solo album ‘Mysticism & Romance’ (1978) has both elements of his impressive musical past and his vision for the future. The P-Funk-esque bass grooves and fusion jazz-rock vibes, combined with spacious synths, unusual instruments and an all-round cosmic approach make this a unique and VERY intriguing album." - Light in The Attic
Label: Tidal Waves Music – TWM26 |
Format: Vinyl, LP, Album, Limited Edition, Blue |
Country: US |
Released: 31 May 2019 |
Genre: Funk / Soul |
$39.00
Light In The Attic / Universal Music Special Markets / Island Records Inc.
Betty Davis – Nasty Gal | 2018 Reissue
$39.00
“When Betty Davis released Nasty Gal, her 1975 major-label debut for Island Records, the world wasn’t ready—not for her musical approach, which blended Black funk and “white” hard rock in an increasingly conservative, segregated recording industry; and certainly not for her hypersexual image, which managed to simultaneously run afoul of the moral majority and women’s lib, the NAACP’s respectability politics and Black Power’s prim militancy. By the end of 1976, Davis had dropped from Island’s roster, and out of the public eye altogether...
...From today’s perspective, Nasty Gal sounds at once of its time and radically ahead of it. Davis’ backing band, Funkhouse, certainly lives up to its name, but with a delivery that is almost punk in its aggression. Similarly, her vocals bear a resemblance to prime Tina Turner—albeit a Tina Turner who has been possessed by the spirit of a wildcat in heat. What really electrifies, however, is her raw, unapologetic carnality: a sexual self-determination that had some cultural precedent in the Blaxploitation roles of Pam Grier, but remarkably few peers in popular music. From the first notes of the opening title track, Davis prowls and seethes with unrestrained erotic menace; no wonder she had so much of her mid-‘70s audience quaking in their boots.” — Spectrum Culture
“This quartet distilled the Sly Stone funk-rock manifesto and propelled it with real force. Check the unbelievable twinning of guitar and bassline in "Feelins" that underscore, note for note, Davis' vocals. The drive is akin to hardcore punk rock, but so funky it brought Rick James himself to the altar to worship (as he later confessed in interviews). And in the instrumental break, the interplay between the rhythm section (bassist Larry Johnson and drummer Semmie "Nicky" Neal, Jr.) and guitarist Carlos Moralesis held to the ground only by Fred Mills' keyboards. In essence, the album is missing nothing: it's perfect, a classic of the genre in that it pushed every popular genre with young people toward a blurred center that got inside the backbone while smacking you in the face. Heard through headphones, its spaced out psychedelic effects, combined with the nastiest funk rock on the block, is simply shocking.” – All Music
Item description:
Artist: |
Betty Davis |
Title: |
Nasty Gal |
Label: |
Light In The Attic, Universal Music Special Markets, Island Records Inc. |
Format: |
Vinyl, LP, Album, Reissue, Remastered |
Pressing: |
US |
Release Date: |
This reissue: 05 Jan 2018 | Original: 1975 |
Genre: |
Funk / Soul |
Style: |
Soul, Funk |
Catalog No: |
LITA 046, ILPS-9329 |
Condition: |
New |