With 2020's The View from Halfway Down, Andy Bell finally stepped out as a solo artist after more than 30 years as an alt-rock visionary and one of shoegaze's key pathfinders. As one of the driving songwriting forces in Ride, Bell possessed a one-of-a-kind knack for dreamy harmonies and distorted, psychedelic guitars that could somehow convey a wide range of emotions. With his first work under his own name, Bell sounded revitalized and inspired, blending his talent for lush hooks, reverb-coated melodies, and ambient experiments with touches of the electronic sounds he explored as a DJ and with his Glok side project.

Roger Troutman (November 29, 1951 – April 25, 1999) also known as Roger, was an American singer, songwriter, record producer, multi-instrumentalist and the founder of the band Zapp who helped spearhead the funk movement and heavily influenced West Coast hip hop due to the scene's heavy sampling of his music over the years. Troutman was well known for his use of the talk box, a device that is connected to an instrument (frequently a keyboard, but most commonly a guitar) to create different vocal effects. Roger used a custom-made talkbox—the Electro Harmonix "Golden Throat"—through a Moog Minimoog and later in his career a Yamaha DX100 FM synthesizer. As both band leader of Zapp and in his subsequent solo releases, he scored a bevy of funk and R&B hits throughout the 1980s and regularly collaborated with hip hop artists in the 1990s.

Reissue of the beautiful solo-effort by Eyes Of Blue/Big Sleep guitarist. Originally released on Pegasus Records in 1971 before eventually dropping away from the music business.The album has been orchestrated by Wil Malone and even Jim Sullivan turned up to lay down some tasty guitar throughout…

(5CD) Five original albums spanning 1995-2004 packaged together for a great price; The Infamous (1995) Hell On Earth (1996) Murda Musik (1999) Infamy (2001) Amerikaz Nightmare (2004).

Digital premiere (in its complete version) of this underrated version of Carmen. It features a splendid vocal cast with Jennifer Larmore as the title character, an irresistible Samuel Ramey (who was a specialist of the role he sung dozens of times on stage all over the world) as Escamillo, and one of the most convincing Micaëlas of the discography by Angela Gheorghiu, in her first studio recording.

Saxon threads familiar territory on “Carpe Diem”, and cater to the long time fans on this new effort. At times drawing too much inspiration from their past, but never short of impressive, the band clearly know their strengths, and refuse to rely on past glories, making a point of releasing new material whenever possible…

On his PENTATONE debut album Hommage à Horowitz, pianist Maxim Bernard revives Vladimir Horowitz’s legendary 1986 Moscow concert with a programme containing gems by Scarlatti, Mozart, Schubert, Schumann, Chopin, Liszt, Moszkowski, Scriabin and Rachmaninoff. While Horowitz’s wife Wanda Toscanini called the Moscow concert the summit of her husband’s career, Maxim Bernard sees it as “a defining moment of his existence, in which charm, elegance, poetry and bravura are marvellously brought together.” Bernard compares Horowitz’s carefully curated musical programme to the way one prepares a gourmet meal, and aims to give it a second wind, presenting it from a new angle, in light of his own personality.

Johannes Brahms is an icon. Say Johannes, and you know you are talking about Brahms. The successor to Beethoven, the sober man who valued seriousness, the champion of classical traditions, a close friend of the Schumanns. But how well do we really know Brahms? How close does he let us get to him in his music? In his Requiem we go in search of the human Brahms and in the music of his mentor and good friend Robert Schumann.

Celebrating 10 years of concerts, Victoria Baroque has released a new CD of ravishing Baroque concertos for multiple instruments. The concerti on the recording represent innovative baroque works by both famous composers - Vivaldi and Telemann, and less known composers Dall'Abaco and Heinichen working during the same period. They are influenced by the operas and sacred cantatas of the period. The Victoria Baroque is a leading ensemble specializing in the concerti of the baroque era.

Van der Graaf Generator's fourth album, Pawn Hearts was also their second most popular; at one time this record was a major King Crimson cult item due to the presence of Robert Fripp on guitar, but Pawn Hearts has more to offer than that…

Immediately following his departure from metal legends Iron Maiden, singer and jack of all trades Bruce Dickinson signed a new deal stateside to Mercury Records and went to work on his second solo effort. Notwithstanding some dreadful artwork, his Polygram debut, Balls to Picasso, is somewhat of a disappointment and, for the most part, an ill-conceived project…

There are those who believe that organ trios only have so many moves, that their repertoire sounds the same after a while. While there's truth in that—dependent, of course, upon which organ trio—Delvon Lamarr has been smart enough to create variations on his stew of Motown, Booker T. & The MGs, and Jimmy Smith. While not breaking any musical barriers, the resulting funk jams are an immensely fun listen and have a certain retro, life-of-the-party kind of charm. The Seattle-based trio's secret sauce is the interplay between Lamarr, who tends to favor long lines rather than knuckle twisting speed, and guitarist Jimmy James, who has a bluesy single note style but can also break out effects pedals, get funky on rhythm guitar as in "Get Da Steppin'," and most of all, create tight inventive mildly psychedelic solos. Finding and sustaining a groove is the name of the game here and both the opening track "Pull Your Pants Up" and title track generate the funky rhythms with Smith setting a repeated guitar figure for Lamarr to place a simple, repeating descending melody over the top. Smith gets to stretch out extended solos on the measured "Big TT’s Blues."

Mystique has always been at the heart of Urge Overkill, the self-styled rock & roll jetsetters who had a fleeting moment of fame during the height of the 1990s alt-rock boom and then slid into years of inactivity. During their peak, the band's aura emanated from their deliberately outdated fashions, and their allegiance to thick, dirty hard rock made them outliers; they were renegades from the 1970s running wild among the flannel-clad grungesters. During middle age, the mystery of Nash Kato and Eddie "King" Roeser is why they take over a decade to complete a new studio album. Oui is only the second Urge Overkill album of the 21st century, arriving 11 years after Rock & Roll Submarine and sounding like it could've been released 11 months after that LP.

"Emergence" is the name that comes at the right time to designate the trajectory of pianist Benjamin Thiebault who began his classes at Montpelier, went up to Paris at the CNSM, to perfect his knowledge, then finished his study in Holland. This course allowed him to refine his compositions, his playing on the piano, by increasing the number of encounters, by “trying” different trios, by testing his compositions with many rhythmic pairs (double bassists and drummers), live, in front of many audiences. in France than in Europe.
"Emergence" is therefore the fruit of a long process of development and here is therefore a very elaborate work, sharp in its arrangements, successful in its development…

Maybe the most famous greek psychedelic folk rock band of the late 60's early 70's era. Poll enjoyed a number of nationwide hits, such as "Anthrope Agapa (Humankind Love One Another)", an anti-war song, composed by Tournas and "Ela Ilie Mou (Come, My Sun)", composed by Tournas, Williams), Tournas later pursued a solo career and in 1972 produced the progressive psychedelic hit solo album Aperanta Chorafia (Greek: Απέραντα Χωράφια, Infinite Fields). He wrote and arranged the album using an orchestra and a rock group ("Ruth") combination. Third member S Logarides formed "Akritas", an ambitous progressive rock band when Poll split.