Notable vinyl releases out this Friday - 8 March (2024)

Bolis Pupul Letter To Yu

  • Virgin Music Group
  • Electronic
Following acclaimed Topical Dancer album with Charlotte Adigéry, here comes Letter To Yu, Bolis Pupul's debut solo album, produced by fellow Belgians, Soulwax. It's no coincidence that Bolis Pupul's music sounds the way it does. Born in Belgium to a Chinese mother and Belgian father and raised in Ghent, Bolis' electronica is a joyous cross-cultural assemblage. The creation of the album is built around Bolis' trip to Hong Kong earlier this year, made to reconnect with his mother's roots.
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Bleachers Bleachers

  • Ingrooves
  • Rock, Pop, Alternative, Indie
Bleachers return with their self-titled new album, via Dirty Hit. The album is Jack Antonoff's distinctly New Jersey take on the bizarre sensory contradictions of modern life, on his position in culture, and the things he cares about. Sonically, it's sad, it's joyful, it's music for driving on the highway to, for crying to and for dancing to at weddings. There's something reassuringly touchable and concrete about it's sentiment: exist in crazy times but remember what counts.
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Judas Priest Invincible Shield

  • Epic Records
Invincible Shield is the nineteenth studio album by British heavy metal band Judas Priest. Announced onstage at Power Trip festival in California, the new record marks the band's first release in 6 years, having recently celebrated 50 years in music and 50 million records sold. Judas Priest is Rob Halford, Ian Hill, Glenn Tipton, Scott Travis and Richie Faulkner.
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Kahil El'Zabar's Ethnic Heritage Ensemble Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit

  • Spiritmuse Records
  • Jazz
Celebrating 50 years of Kahil El'Zabar's Ethnic Heritage Ensemble's legacy and unwavering contribution to Great Black Music. 'Open Me, A Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit' is a new Ethnic Heritage Ensemble sound, constantly shifting gears and tempos in a jazz-blues continuum, in perpetual spontaneity, combining their meaningful music history with an innovative approach to arrangements, performance and improvisation. This is Ancient / Future Music for the Now and Beyond. Open Me is a joyous honoring of portent new directions of the Ethnic Heritage Ensemble; it's a visionary journey into deep roots and future routes, channeling traditions old and new. It mixes El'Zabar's original compositions with timeless classics by Miles Davis, McCoy Tyner, and Eugene McDaniels. Thus, the Ethnic Heritage Ensemble continues affirming their indelible, half-century presence within the continuum of Great Black Music. For Open Me, El'Zabar has chosen to push the sound of the EHE in a new direction by adding string instruments —the addition of strings opens new textural resonances and timbral dimensions in the Ensemble's sound, linking the work to the tradition of improvising violin and cello from Ray Nance to Billy Bang, Leroy Jenkins, and Abdul Wadud. Open Me contains a mixture of originals, including some El'Zabar evergreens such as "Barundi," "Hang Tuff," "Ornette," and "Great Black Music" (often attributed to the Art Ensemble of Chicago but is, in fact, an El'Zabar composition). As a milestone anniversary celebration and a statement of future intent, Open Me effortlessly carries El'Zabar's healing vision of Higher Consciousness of Sound and Spirit. ETHNIC HERITAGE ENSEMBLE Kahil El'Zabar - multi-percussion, voice Corey Wilkes - trumpet, percussion Alex Harding - baritone sax Featuring: James Sanders - violin, viola and Ishmael Ali - cello Tapestry and Art Direction by Nep Sidhu Spiritmuse Records Music for the Spirit
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Kim Gordon The Collective

  • Matador
  • Alternative
Legendary musician and multi-disciplinary artist Kim Gordon returns with her second solo album, The Collective, which will be released March 8th on Matador. Recorded in her native Los Angeles, The Collective follows Gordon's 2019 full-length debut No Home Record and continues her collaboration with producer Justin Raisen (Lil Yachty, John Cale, Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Charli XCX, Yves Tumor), with additional production from Anthony Paul Lopez. The album advances their joint world building, with Raisin's damaged, blown out dub and trap constructions playing the foil to Gordon's intuitive word collages and hooky mantras, which conjure communication, commercial sublimation and sensory overload. "On this record, I wanted to express the absolute craziness I feel around me right now," says Gordon. "This is a moment when nobody really knows what truth is, when facts don't necessarily sway people, when everyone has their own side, creating a general sense of paranoia. To soothe, to dream, escape with drugs, TV shows, shopping, the internet, everything is easy, smooth, convenient, branded. It made me want to disrupt, to follow something unknown, maybe even to fail."
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Meatbodies Flora Ocean Tiger Bloom

  • In The Red Records
  • Rock, Garage rock, Psychedelic rock, Shoegaze
Meatbodies' latest undertaking and borderline lost album, Flora Ocean Tiger Bloom, is their most varied and realized work to date. It's a melodic, hook-filled rock epic in which frontman and lead guitarist Chad Ubovich faces the trials of sobriety, redemption, reinvention while literally learning to walk and play again. Resurrection not only accompanies the record, but it's production as well, Flora Ocean Tiger Bloom examines themes surrounding love and loss, escapism, defeatism, hedonism, psychedelics and much more. By 2017, Ubovich had reached a crossroads. After years of increasingly insane shows playing to heaving crowds with an ever-evolving and rotating door of personnel, fatigue had taken it's toll and he realized another change was on the horizon. Retreating to the seedy Los Angeles underbelly-in search of meaning and a reset-he escaped into that world, ignoring his own well being, trying to forget his successes. It was at this point that Flora Ocean Tiger Bloom began to take shape-a project built by a man searching for new beginnings and his own sense of self. After sobering up, sessions began with longtime collaborator Dylan Fujioka. However, due to discrepancies with the studio, tensions were high and the plug was pulled. And as the world took a back seat, so did the idea of Flora Ocean Tiger Bloom. Not wanting to sit still at home, Ubovich began to comb through his previous demos, and, with that, 333 was born, the now de facto third Meatbodies album. Yet Flora was never far from Ubovich's mind.When restrictions started to lift, Ubovich headed to Gold Diggers Sound in Los Angeles, backed by engineer Ed McEntee and a team of colleagues and friends, and completed the final act to the album. It recalls the searing Blue Cheer-meets-Iggy Pop-with-psychedelia that permeated previous releases, but adds new elements of shoegaze, classic alternative, Britpop, drone, and hints of country. Simultaneously an ode to '80s LA punk and the rise of indie / alternative music in the U.K., it plays like a radio station broadcasting from the void.
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Moor Mother The Great Bailout

  • Anti
  • Experimental, Jazz
Moor Mother is an American musician, poet, and interdisciplinary artist known for her avant-garde and experimental work. The Great Bailout is an expansive meditation that acts as a non-linear word map about colonialism, slavery, and commerce in Great Britain. Featuring guest contributions from Lonnie Holley, Angel Bat Dawid & Sistas of the Nitty Gritty, Vijay Iyer, Mary Lattimore, and more, it's Moor Mother's most uncompromising vision to date.Moor Mother has gained recognition for her unique blend of spoken word, noise, and electronic music, addressing themes of race, gender, and socio-political issues. She hails from Philadelphia and has been an influential figure in the city's vibrant arts and music scene. She has received critical acclaim for her albums, with reviewers praising her fearless approach to sound and her thought-provoking lyrical content on albums like "Jazz Codes" and "Analog Fluids of Sonic Black Holes", showcasing her boundary-pushing sonic experiments.
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Norah Jones Visions

  • Capitol Music Group
Norah Jones' new album Visions is a vibrant and joyous 12-song set that finds Jones singing about feeling free, wanting to dance, making it right, and acceptance of what life brings. Visions is the yang to the yin that was Pick Me Up Off The Floor, Jones' last album of new original songs which was released early in the pandemic lockdown of 2020 and foreshadowed many of the dark emotions of that period.
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The Libertines All Quiet On The Eastern Esplanade

  • Republic Records
The quartet of unlikely lads have gathered from their newfound homes in France, Denmark, Margate and London to solder a strongest-ever internal bond and scale new creative heights. 'All Quiet On The Eastern Esplanade' began it's formation in September 2022 when Pete and Carl traveled to Port Antonio, Jamaica. Away from any distraction, the chemistry between the infamous songwriting duo began to bubble in earnest. The album was produced by Grammy-nominated producer Dimitri Tikovoï (The Horrors, Charlie XCX, Becky Hill) and recorded at the Albion Rooms in Margate over four weeks during February and March 2023. Mastered by industry legend Dan Grech (Lana Del Rey, Liam Gallagher, Paul McCartney).
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