Back catalogue: All genres

Review: Shame On Dry Land (Syndabocken) is an award-winning Swedish movie that picked up the Guldbagge prize for best feature film soundtrack in 2024. That soundtrack has been written and produced by sometime Studio Barnhus associate and mythical young artist Baba Stiltz. It arrives on vinyl for the first time here and is a dense affair with plenty of esoteric stylings as you would expect of a man with a famously hard-to-pin-down sound. It goes from heavy and dark to airy and Mediterranean and needs to be heard nice and loud for the best effect.

Review: Stiroll's Sofia marks the Ukrainian artist's return to Greyscale Records with his first full-length album, painting a sonic portrait of a day in the life of a suburban area. The album invites listeners to experience the subtle intricacies and layered sounds of a community awakening, bustling, and finally resting as night falls. The journey begins with 'Intro - Dusk,' a brisk and atmospheric opener that evokes the early morning stillness before a city stirs to life. The full chord remnants and distant echoes set the stage for the day ahead, capturing the anticipation of the morning. 'Standbye' follows, offering a more airy and purposeful vibe, moving away from minimalism to suggest the first signs of activity, as if the world is slowly beginning to wake. 'Foundamental' continues this progression, riding along with gentle sounds punctuated by flares of static, hinting at the humidity and energy building in the air. The track flows effortlessly, mirroring the natural rhythm of a day gaining momentum. As the day matures, 'Sequence To None' introduces more serious, conflicting chords, perhaps reflecting the push and pull of daily routines and interactions. The crisp production and deep bassline ground the track, offering a sense of structure and direction. Midday arrives with 'Vidlunnia,' a sparse, downtempo piece that feels like basking in the warmth of the sun. The chords wash over the listener like rays, creating a relaxing, chill-out atmosphere with a broken rhythm that invites reflection. The pace slows with 'Interlude - Fall Moon,' where a churning, almost mechanical heartbeat drives the track forward, building tension as the day begins to wane. The ominous mood that emerges in the second half hints at the challenges that often accompany the close of a day. 'Nulle Part' shifts the mood with a more pronounced beat, offering a straightforward yet catchy rhythm that feels both harmonious and conflicted. The hypnotic quality draws you in as it moves toward a positive, yet complex resolution. 'Fall Control' then soothes with heavily processed sounds, offering a brief moment of respite before the album's closing tracks. 'Hope' stands out as the most original dub track on the album, blending strings with a lofty melody that soars before plunging into deeper, more uncertain territory. The track feels otherworldly, capturing the complexities and contradictions of hope itselfia fitting theme as the day begins to wind down. Finally, 'Outro - Dawn' signals the end of the day and the album, with ambient washes that gently alert like a clock, leaving the listener with a sense that it is time to close. Sofia is a meticulously crafted album that encapsulates the ebb and flow of daily life in a suburb, bringing together the sounds of different people and languages into a unified, sonic narrative.

Review: Keep Me Safe Keep Me Sane offers up a scholastic batch of rarities from Iggy Pop fronted proto-punk timebomb The Stooges, all captured in and around 1972 when the band had reformed from their first break up and were in the process of crafting their cult classic Raw Power. Boasting an array of studio outtakes, tour rehearsal cuts and unhinged live performances, this collection gets you as close to the madness as a fly on the wall of a dingy tour van or sweaty rehearsal studio, yet prevents from being caught in the chaotic drug-fuelled egotistical malaise that would eventually torpedo the group.

Review: The singular 2024 collaboration between rappers Kool Keith, 7L and Esoteric is a hidden wonderwork; Stress Eater served initially as a conceptual piece spinning off from the Czarface hip-hop / comic-book multiverse, which was in turn established by membership cross-sections of Wu-Tang Clan and God Complex. With Keith stepping in for Inspectah Deck on wisecracking and production duties here, Everybody Eats! hears the oddball rapper foil the evil antagonist Czarface’s world-corroding plans, by way of block-rocking beats and mind-bending lyricism. ‘Rocket Science’ blends boughing bass and dissonantly low piano plinks, while ‘Wilrow Hood’ and ‘Top Men Of Rap’ veer increasingly icy and gunslinging, the latter track especially proving 7L’s eerily humoured flows, as if to threaten to pop out of the comic and drag us into the Czar-verse.

Review: Originally formed in Birmingham in 1976, Suburban Studs were a classic case of right place, right time yet with no major mainstream success to buoy them for long. Opening for the likes of The Clash, Sex Pistols, Judas Priest, and even AC/DC during their tenure, while also recording a Peel Session, the Studs' live graft is what they're fondly most remembered for, yet their one and only full-length Slam is still packed to the brim with retrograde bangers. Releasing your punk debut in 1977, the year punk (apparently) died, may not have been the best move, but disregarding all pontifications of mysticism and fate, punks with working ears are still very glad the record exists, while those with turntables will be overjoyed to finally add this slept on gem to their collection.

Review: Ghost Riders is a live performance album by Suicide that was recorded in 1981 and originally released in 1985. It was recorded a part of the band's 10th anniversary concert in Minnesota and has stood the test of time as a real experimental and electro great. The snarled lyrics, the high intensity guitar-made fuzz, and the bleakness of it all are all things that still resonate with lovers of noise, DIY sounds and punk aesthetics. For that reason, it is an album very much worth revisiting.

Review: Suicide are generally referenced in terms of their earth-shattering late 70s debut, but of course Martin Rev and Alan Vega did work together after that. A Way Of Life was their third album, released in 1988 when the world around them had changed so much from when they started out, and yet their sound was still devastating and imposing amidst the culture of bands they'd influenced. Recorded with The Cars' frontman Rip Ocasek, the resulting nine industrial pop songs are as brilliant as anything from their fabled earlier works, and in this special expanded edition we're also treated to a fully remastered version including a clutch of additional tracks including their live cover of Bruce Springsteen's 'Born In The USA'.

Review: Berlin-based Dina Summer - a synth-loving trio fronted by the suitably sassy and no-holds barred singer Dina P - impressed with their Italo-disco and turn-of-the-millennium electroclash inspired debut album, Rimini. Three years in, they return with an arguably even stronger set - the notably darker, more stylish and more new wave-influenced Girl's Gang. Many of their trademark elements remain to the fore - Dina P's dead-eyed spoken word vocals, the use of vintage drum machine rhythms and sequenced basslines - but this time round come accompanied by black mascara-clad nods to post-punk, New Romantic, goth-rock and Depeche Mode style synth-pop sounds. As previously stated, it is genuinely stylish and impeccably observed stylistically, but what makes it stand out is the substance behind the sheen.

Review: The Wanderer has been in and out of print for many years since it first landed in 1980. The last time it was reissued was in 2014 but here it comes again on white, heavyweight vinyl. It does feature Summer's most famous track but it does reach plenty of brilliant synth-disco highs all the same. It is said that Summer was done with disco when she wrote this and that it was a more rock-inspired record co-written and produced by Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte, but drop these in the club and they will cause carnage. The album peaked at 13 on the Billboard Chart and the title cut was number 3 on the singles chart for a while, though none of the tracks cracked the UK charts.