WOO レコード& CD

Review: Since returning to recording in 2013, the Ives brothers have successfully updated the sound that made their early recordings as Woo so essential. Famously, they began working together in their bedroom in the early '70s, becoming cult artists in the early-to-mid-1980s thanks to a string of self-released cassettes full of gorgeous, hard-to-pigeonhole lo-fi soundscapes. Paradise in Pimlico, their latest album, is a much more polished and - production-wise at least - high-tech affair, though their ability to craft immersive, musically detailed, atmospheric instrumentals is as sharp as ever. Musically, defining the album's sound is difficult - we can hear elements of Penguin Cafe, ambient, dub, new age, jazz-funk, jazz and Balearica, for starters - but in many ways it doesn't matter: Paradise in Pimlico is a stunning, sun-splashed set that requires your attention.

Review: REPRESS ALERT: Emotional Rescue and Woo once again come together, this time to reissue their masterpiece, the previously cassette-only album Into The Heart Of Love. A joyous, uplifting ode to love in all it's forms, the trials and tribulations and ultimately the triumphs are all encapsulated in Woo's unique soundscapes. Of all the myriad of released and unreleased Woo recordings, Into The Heart Of Love is without a doubt their most complete and cohesive body of work. Full of Woo's quirky analogue dub electronics, there is also a very English sense of folk. With more vocals then their other albums, the structure and softness of mood quintessentially comes from the Mother Isle.

Review: The tireless Emotional Rescue dig once more into the well of cultish music from days gone by with a fully remastered reissue of Whichever Way You Are Going You Are Going Wrong, the debut album from brotherly duo Woo. Originally released back in 1982, this thirteen track set finds Mark and Clive Ives delivering a hugely ahead of their time exposition of hard to categorise electro acoustic folk. This hugely prolific pair was once described as "sounding like the music the Durutti Column would have made with Penguin Cafe Orchestra if produced by Brian Eno" and whoever came up with that obviously had Whichever Way You Are Going You Are Going Wrong in mind.

Review: Awaawaa, a collection of previously unheard recordings from cult early '80s sibling combo Mark and Clive Ives, first dropped on vinyl earlier this year. Here, it appears on CD for the first time in expanded form. Famously, it was all recorded in the Ives' Wimbledon bedroom during their teenage years, and offers an impossible-to-pigeonhole romp through tracks that gleefully fuse fuzzy ambience, odd indie-rock, lo-fi jazz, atmospheric acoustic music and other decidedly out-there musical escapades. Much of the material is more thrillingly psychedelic and out-there than even their wildest early cassette releases, making it an adventurous hotchpotch of weird and wonderful interludes, doodles and straight-to-take experiments.