Back catalogue: Rock (All)

Review: American psychedelic soul band Monophonics, together with lead vocalist Kelly Finnigan, are back once more with the single version of their most recent album highlight, the vocal hooker-inner 'Love You Better'. The band's tight instrumentation are laid down rather effortlessly, and come as testament to their ability to shine through a strongly warm, lo-fi sound. Lyrically, the song is bittersweet, with both Finnigan's solos and choral backing vocals pining after what could've been, despite the song commanding a new-leafy, life-goes-on mood of confidence.

Review: The Tele Music catalogue follows a long tradition of library music mores; stock patterned album art and themed series included. Originally from 1973, Rhythmiques functions as one of the label's most iconic releases. Written entirely in collaboration between French composer and percussionist Pierre Dahan and synthesist Mat Camison, it features tense funk, blunted jazz and heavy breaks all the way. It is considered the rightful sequel to Continental Pop Sound, and despite the origin as library music intended for TV and film, has endured as a vital album for producers and DJs.

Review: Larry Manteca's Zombie Mandingo album arrived back in 2013 and in the danced plus has only ever been available digitally. Now it makes its debut on wax and remains a bold listen that was devised as a soundtrack to a non-existent exploitation film. It fuses funk, jazz, and Afrobeat influences with plenty of niche cinematic references such as the zombies in Lucio Fulci's horrors and Umberto Lenzi's cannibalistic adventures. The resulting mash up is beguiling to say the least with horror-tinged exotica next to Fela Kuti rhythms and elements of Italian Library music and colourful psychedelia. A boundary pushing work to say the least.

Review: Electric life-givers, MGMT, return for their fifth album Loss Of Life. Shockingly, it's been six years since 2018's Little Dark Age, in which the duo proved their capacity to evolve beyond the pale of their earliest electro-pop singles. Here, they adapt even further, enlisting the help of a well-selected cast of familiar faces - Christine & The Queens, Danger Mouse, Dave Fridmann, James Richardson, Oneohtrix Point Never, and Patrick Wimberly - all while declaring the project to be the yield of a calculated fusion: "20% adult contemporary" plus an unspecified amount of hero's journey subversion. From the standout single 'Dancing In Babylon' through to more esoteric twin sonic flames like 'Nothing To Declare' and 'Nothing Changes', this feels like an album dedicated to lost causes, overobsession with singular life trajectories, and moving through hard times.

Review: Over the course of his long and successful career, Ennio Morricone composed many dance songs in step with the fashions of the late 60s and early 70s. These were themes not necessarily directly connected with his films' synopses, but which were nonetheless played in disco clubs, on jukeboxes, turntables and on the radio. This collection contains a selection of pieces such as the brilliant main theme from Grand Slam (1967); the shake rock (opening credits) from Dario Argento's classic Four Flies On Grey Velvet (1971) the danceable from the noir film Violent City (1970); the beat version of the opening credits of 'Pioggia Sul Tuo Viso' by the Sorrows, from How I Learned to Love Women (1966); 'Per Vittorio (Bossa)', an elegant bossa nova with flute and percussions from The Success (1963); the tribal shake from I Cantori Moderni, which winks at the dies irae from Garden of Delights (1967); 'Scuola di Ballo al sole', a wild surf piece from the Hawks and the Sparrows (1966); the supreme bossa nova from One Night at Dinner (1969) with the super iconic voice of Edda Dell'orso; the shake music of "'Ostinazione al Limone from What Have you Done to Solange? (1972); and 'Donnabossa' from Full Hearts and Empty Pockets (1964), a delicate bossa nova piece with a prominent harpsichord.