The coastal town of Bristol Cove is known for its legend of once being home to mermaids. When the arrival of a mysterious girl proves this folklore all too true, the battle between man and sea takes a very vicious turn as these predatory beings return to reclaim their right to the ocean.

Double Image was the intermittent project of Davids Friedman and Samuels, whose vibes and marimbas found likeminded company in session musicians Harvie Swartz and Michael DiPasqua on Dawn, the second of only three albums for the group and their only for ECM. Having two jazz percussionists in the same space was something of a rarity in the late seventies, when the album was recorded, and perhaps contributed to its being swept under the carpet over time. What we have, however, is a smooth and airy set of four extended pieces more than worthy of a reissue.

One day Moomintroll wakes to notice that grey dust is covering everything in the Moominvalley. He runs to ask the philosophical Muskrat if he knows what is happening, who advises him that things tend to look like this before an awful fate coming from the sky hits the Earth. With the help of his father, Moominpappa, Moomintroll and his close friends Sniff and Snufkin build a raft and head out on a challenging journey to the observatory in the Lonely Mountains hoping to find out more from the wise professors there. The friends have to overcome several adversities in order to make it there. When they arrive, they find the professors deep in calculations. They reveal that a comet will reach the Earth in four days, four hours, four minutes and 44 seconds.

Along with Musik, the Contact Trio’s New Marks is another standout for ECM’s sister label, JAPO. Sharing with that later release frontmen Evert Brettschneider (acoustic and electric guitars) and Aloys Kott (fretless bass) but differing in the presence of Michael Jüllich (percussion, marimba, and vibes), this incarnation of the band charts vaster, even more palpable territory with a crystalline signature sound, for which we may also thank the late, great producer Thomas Stöwsand.

Vibraphonist-composer Tom van der Geld’s ECM initiation came by way of the JAPO sister label when, in 1976, the self-titled Children At Play introduced listeners to an album of uncompromising originality. Recorded in 1973, the same year of van der Geld’s permanent relocation to Germany (where the band’s reedman, Roger Jannotta, and drummer, Bill Elgart, would also find new homes), it’s a formative release not only for being Children At Play’s first, but also for sharing its uniquely sunlit sound with the world at large.