Rob Tex
Rock The Kasbah

In the 1960s and ‘70s, unbeknownst to most, Saigon (today named “Ho Chi Minh City”) had become a fertile environment for a flourishing music industry which produced countless recordings of beautifully crafted songs.Ho Chi Minh City based band, Saigon Soul Revival has been bringing alternative pre 1975 music from Saigon back to the stage since 2016 with their live performances. Honoring the original composers, singers and the golden era from which this music (Nhạc Vàng) came, while applying new arrangements and interpretations of old Vietnamese songs. With tight grooves, psychedelic textures and a powerful unique sound, SSR has performed countless shows at a variety of venues across Vietnam, and accompanied live the two release tours to the Saigon Supersound Compilation releases.While spending the last three years studying and playing this music, Saigon Soul Revival teamed up with producer Jan Hagenkötter (Saigon Supersound / INFRACom!) and finally in January 2019, they started to create own compositions in the same vein for their debut album Họa Âm Xưa. The album was recorded in Vietnam with additional guests during one week in May this year.The album focuses on compositions that fuse Vietnamese lyrics and sounds with influences of western rock, soul, bolero, tango and other popular genres of this time period, most of which was banned after the war. This project strives to revive this beautiful musical heritage of Vietnam which represents an important cultural bridge between east and west.

En Avant La Zizique ! Records & Music Maker Relief Foundation present a brand new collaboration: Grotto Session. The Music Maker Relief Foundation, is non-governmental organization. It was founded to preserve the musical traditions of the South by directly supporting the musicians who make it, ensuring their voices will not be silenced by poverty and time. Music Maker will give future generations access to their heritage through documentation and performance programs that build knowledge and appreciation of America’s musical traditions.Original blues & gospel from Music Maker 's archives, Grotto Session illustrates the true sound of the deep south re-imaginated by three young musicians to celebrate the 25th birthday's foundation. Only released as digital files til now, EALZ! Records have been chosen by MMRF to produce an exclusive physical album. An inspired, electric & groovy transgenerational project featuring: Captain 'Luke, Cora Fluker, John Dee Holman, Essie Mae Brooks, Rufus McKenzie and more...Gatefold cover, 12inch vinyl, including a 16-pages booklet with complete liner notes, rare & exclusive Tim Duffy's photographs (Recorded in North Carolina, crafted in Paris, pressed in Normandy, limited edition)

No one had been through those doors in years. Unchanged, seemingly untouched, just a Guard watching over it, one wondered whether the place would ever see the light of day again. Built in the 70s by Scotch, there were only twenty such places in the entire world. Twenty studios, all identical. Most had undergone a digital makeover in the 80s, but not this one; situated in Lomé, this studio had stayed true to its original form. Silent and uninhabited but waiting for one thing, and one thing only: for the sacred fire to be lit once again. That of the Togolese Recording Office, is studio OTODI for those in the know. Through thick layers of dust, the console was vibrating still, impatient to be turned on and spurt out the sound so unique to analog. That sound is what Peter Solo and his band Vaudou Game came to seek out. The original vibrations of Lomé’s sound, resonating within the studio space, an undercurrent pulsing within the walls, the floor, and the entire atmosphere. A presence at once electrical and mystical sourced through the amps that had never really gone cold, despite the deep sleep that they had been forced into. In taking over the studio’s 3000 square feet, enough to house a full orchestra, Vaudou Game had the space necessary to conjure the spirits of voodoo, those very spirits who watch over men and nature, and with whom Peter converses every day. For the most authentic of frequencies to fully imbibe this third album, Peter Solo entrusted the rhythmic section to a Togolese bass and drum duo, putting the groove in the expert hands of those versed in feeling and a type of musicianship that you can’t learn in any school. This was also a way to put OTODI on the path of a more heavily hued funk sound, the backbone of which maintains flexibility and agility when moving over to highlife, straightens out when enhanced with frequent guest Roger Damawuzan’s James Brown type screams, and softens when making the way for strings. Snaking and undulating when a chorus of Togolese women takes over, guiding it towards a slow, hypnotic trance. Up until now, Vaudou Game had maintained their connection to Togo from their base in France. This time, recording the entire album in Lomé at OTODI with local musicians, Peter Solo drew the voodoo fluid directly from the source, once again using only Togolese scales to make his guitar sing, his strings acting as channels between listeners and deities…

Moar is hot on the floor with this double Hip-Hop/RnB single. Don't miss it, this is a new killer track for the party :-)Dancefloors were made for this, quality stuff.Hand stamped records & limited press!

In the 80s, a Nigerian DJ named Hycentto Junior was notorious for making Onitsha people dance on his grooves. Soon, influenced by U.S hip-hop artists, he began rapping on top of the music he played.His eccentric style drew the attention of the biggest name, and the famous Nkono Teles decided to work with him on his next LP, Mama Groove. Their project was released in 1991. Due to unfortunate circumstances, the number of copies available was really low, making it very hard to find.More than 25 years later, working for a motor company, Hycentto met online with French music passionate collective “Lorem Ipsum”, that had randomly found his Mama Groove LP.The result is a reissue auditioning all the 1991 Mama Groove’s tracks and two bonuses selected from his first 1984 album, At A Party Last Night. The unique variety of sounds and genres, covering Electro Hip-Hop, Digi Reggae and Disco-Funk, will carry you from poolside to late night dancefloors!

** Available exclusively at The Pusher **Naples 1982, the earthquake leaves rubble and dismay, unease and misery, smuggling and heroin.The reconstruction is a shadow that will last more than a decade, it is a shady deal between bureaucrats and criminals.Naples is an open construction site and the redemption was long coming. There was the "music-music" of the Neapolitan Power, which conquers the national limelight, and a dark and marginal enigma called "VESUWAVE" (especially for those who have not experienced it), that remains so, even after many years. Naples is not a country for young bands that are not familiar with tradition and "bel canto" while the record industry inhabits a platonic and incorruptible world beyond the vault of heaven. At that time five Lucanians and three Neapolitans founded Little Italy, probably a tribute to the homonymous district of New York and inspired by Talking Heads, Contorsions, Polyrock, B-52's, Konk and Liquid Liquid. They have the freedom to experiment and smash the stages of the Italian peninsula festivals more attentive to the new waves as well as participate in some television broadcasts. They basically don’t unnoticed but in spite of the apprenticeship and the kilometers covered in three years of activity (from 1983 to 1985) all they had the chance to record were a couple of songs.
Fragments is a compilation made with archived materials that Futuribile Records releases on vinyl after having discovered and restored old unreleased tapes from back in the day and made available by the band members themselves. Seven tracks that highlight a collective in continuous transformation and outline their drivers and abilities.Little Italy have a horn section that gives them that chromatic vivacity, a typically mutant funk guitar groove, two fatal and dazed female voices who speak many languages (English, French, Italian) reciting collages of cryptic texts evoking modernity through no-sense and cultured quotations; a funk thrill in the basslines and drums solutions that give a nod to the sly disco beat of a specific easy listening, elegant and refined Italo sound. A super-sophisticated sound with the right dose of fusion, proper New Wave, which in the more New-Yorker passages recalls the volcanic and sweaty sound of the contemporary and fellow citizens Bisca, another out-of-the-box band member. The warm Mediterranean wind blowing on some tracks certifies their origin and the exoticism leads Little Italy to drink from that oasis of escape.After all, the escape from a world that does not contemplate banality is the synthesis of the 1980s thought. (Words by Fabio Astore)