A great little album of mid 70s funk from Ramsey Lewis - very much in the mode of his Earth, Wind, & Fire related work - no surprise, since the album's dedicated to Charles Stepney, whose influence was such a key part of the sound of the group, and of some of Ramsey's other Kalimba-produced albums from a few years before! Ramsey plays Fender Rhodes, mini moog, and Arp - and he gets help on keyboards from Stevie Wonder and Derf Reklaw, who also plays saxes and percussion on the set.

After Piazzolla Reflections, (ALPHA664), Latvian accordionist Ksenija Sidorova devotes this new recording to Bach and compositions influenced by his music - starting with the famous Concerto BWV 1052, which has inspired so many adaptations for piano, violin and even heavy metal guitar, "so I don't think a version for an instrument with two keyboards will surprise anyone!" says Ksenija. The programme also includes Sergey Akhunov, a composer who featured on her previous album, with a work inspired by Bach's Chaconne BWV1004; Beyond Bach by Gabriela Montero, the Venezuelan pianist and composer famous for her improvisations; and Horizons by the Anglo-Bulgarian composer Dobrinka Tabakova. The programme is completed by Bach's Chorale Prelude Ich ruf zu dir, which has accompanied Ksenija since childhood: 'I think this organ piece works particularly well on the accordion. Both instruments use bellows, but the accordion offers a much more flexible dynamic range. You can really let the music breathe.'

Here is an excellent example of the US Progressive rock scene of the Seventies: having both technique and excellence, imagination & talent. They seemed to be influenced by a variety of styles. Their sound was a little folky at times, poppy at others, even a little jazzy at times, loosely in the shadow of Kansas, Yes, Genesis, early King Crimson and others, with lots of vocals everywhere.

Instead of settling down in front of the mixing board for another dance album (a lá Technique or Republic), New Order returned in 2001 with a sound and style they hadn't played with for over a decade. Unsurprisingly bored by the stale British club scene circa 2001, the band opened Get Ready with a statement of purpose, a trailer single ("Crystal") featuring a host of longtime New Order staples: a sublime melody, an inscrutable set of lyrics, a deft, ragged guitar line kicking in for the chorus, and Peter Hook's yearning bass guitar taking a near-solo role. Though there are several allowances for the electronic-dance form New Order helped develop, Get Ready is a very straight-ahead album, their first work in 15 years that's focused on songwriting and performance rather than grafted dance techniques…

Présent dans les hit-parades britanniques depuis six décennies, Cliff Richard est une institution du rock anglais. Né Harry Rodger Webb à Lucknow, en Inde, le 14 octobre 1940, il fait ses débuts dans le rock'n'roll seize ans plus tard avec son premier groupe The Drifters, qui devient The Shadows et collectionne les succès : « Move It », « Livin' Doll », « Bachelor Boy », entre autres. Après un passage en solo, l'idole des jeunes se convertit au christianisme en 1964 et poursuit une carrière multiple de chanteur, acteur et animateur de télévision extrêmement populaire au Royaume-Uni. Doyen du rock britannique en activité depuis 1958, Cliff Richard a logé quatorze chansons au sommet des classements de ventes, dont « We Don't Talk Anymore » (1979) et « Millenium Prayer » (1999). Il continue d'enregistrer des albums entre pop, rock et chansons de Noël. Anobli par la reine Elizabeth II en 2009, Sir Cliff Richard retrouve son groupe historique, The Shadows, pour l'album Reunited. Puis, après un album de blue-eyed soul, Soulicious (2011), le septuagénaire consacre deux volumes au rock'n'roll de sa jeunesse, The Fabulous Rock'N'Roll Songbook (2013) et Just…Fabulous Rock'N'Roll (2016). Ce dernier, son centième album, est suivi deux ans plus tard par Rise Up et en 2020 par Music… The Air That I Breathe, qui rassemble des duos avec Bonnie Tyler, Albert Hammond, The Bellamy Brothers, Sheila Walsh et The Piano Guys.

For the first time ever, Michael Schenker returns to his classic years with UFO, revisiting the era that catapulted both him and the British hard rock band to international stardom. Produced by Michael Schenker and Michael Voss, the new album marks the 50th anniversary of Schenker's tenure with UFO, spanning from 1972 to 1978. Touring the globe as a teenager, Schenker became a driving force behind some of UFO's most beloved tracks, such as “Doctor Doctor”, “Rock Bottom”, and “Only You Can Rock Me”. During these meteoric years, the UFO albums 'Phenomenon,' 'Force It,' 'No Heavy Petting,' 'Lights Out,' 'Obsession,' and the seminal live album 'Strangers in the Night' were released, each contributing significantly to the genre. Now, Michael Schenker is set to celebrate those glory days with his new album, 'My Years with UFO,' alongside today’s rock elite.

During the latter half of the '80s a new breed of guitar-orientated bands began to emerge in the UK - armed with an overt pop song craft sensibility, and enamoured with a conflicting post-punk spirit and adoration of the '60s, many of these unlikely acts - all anoraks, Dr Martens and charity shop chic - would go on to become Top 40 regulars and set the tone for music beyond these shores, culminating in 'The Stone Roses', an album that defined a generation. 'Cut Me Deep' - named for a Jasmine Minks track which captured that spirit - presents a snapshot of that time and place, via essential independent labels such as Creation, Sarah Records and 4AD, and their major backed counterparts in Blanco Y Negro et al, alongside distribution via Rough Trade and other like-minded outlets. With an electric guitar in hand (no Stratocasters here please), and resplendent in clothes as immaculately and cheaply curated as their record collections, a new generation of British musicians kickstarted what would become the only credible challenge to the increasingly dominant synthesiser pop scene of the late 1980's.

In 2019, a year before the onset of the pandemic and three years before the full-scale war in Ukraine broke out, we released Illuminated Silence. This was the first album of a new trio consisting of the young Japanese-born, Irish-based pianist and composer Izumi Kimura and the greats of the improvised music world Barry Guy and Gerry Hemingway. The album was very much liked by listeners and I heard from many of them the question whether there is a chance that this formation will survive, because if the band debuts with such a great album, what will happen when it becomes a working band? Today, five years later we know well that the trio Kimura / Guy / Hemingway is working and bringing a new recording, this time a studio recording made in mid-December of 2023. It is with great pride that we place it in your hands - Six Hands Open As One.

14 tracks exclusively curated for Uncut by Kim Deal. “I DON’T know if it’s a driving compilation,” explains Kim Deal of the CD she’s curated exclusively for Uncut. “But that might be good, because if it’s a real CD then a lot of readers might listen to it in their cars…”

On his last couple of Warner Brothers albums, Gorilla and In the Pocket, James Taylor seemed to be converting himself from the shrinking violet, too-sensitive-to-live "rainy day man" of his early records into a mainstream, easy-listening crooner with a sunny outlook. JT, his debut album for Columbia Records, was something of a defense of this conversion. Returning to the autobiographical, Taylor declared his love for Carly Simon ("There We Are"), but expressed some surprise at his domestic bliss… "Isn't it amazing a man like me can feel this way?" he sang in the opening song, "Your Smiling Face" (a Top 40 hit). At the same time, domesticity could have its temporary depressions ("Another Grey Morning"). The key track was "Secret O' Life," which Taylor revealed as "enjoying the passage of time"…

Georg Muffat’s “Missa in labore requies” alongside church sonatas of his contemporaries make up audite’s latest offering in the series of polychoral baroque music recorded by renowned Early Music performers.
With its octagonal layout and four galleries, the Abbey Church at Muri provides an ideal acoustic for performing polychoral music. The galleries surround the main body of the church, placing the audience in the midst of the musical event. This sound experience is unique, both in concert and in recordings. The considerable distance between the galleries creates challenges in the musical interaction of the different groups.

In its original form, Crown's Howlin' Wolf Sings the Blues LP was a patchwork compilation of sides cut for the Modern label in 1951-1952, including three songs that had previously showed up on RPM singles, a bunch of outtakes not released on 45, and a couple instrumentals that weren't even the work of Howlin' Wolf himself. The material hails from that confusing junction in his discography where his first Memphis recordings were being leased to both Modern and Chess, which is why material from that era has tended to get released on different labels. Certainly the Wolf's Modern sessions could have been better represented than they were by this 1962 album, but it's still groundbreaking early electric blues, though not quite up to the peaks he'd scale with his best Chess sessions of the mid-'50s to the mid-'60s…

The title of this set by alto saxophonist Paul Desmond refers to his having placed first once again in the alto chair in the Downbeat poll. Released in 1960, First Place Again is the result of an unexpected gathering of the rhythm section of the Modern Jazz Quartet: Percy Heath and Connie Kay, and Jimmy Giuffre 3 guitarist Jim Hall. The four musicians were all unexpectedly at home in New York and took full advantage of cheap, after-hours recording studio time to play out this set of standards and a pair of newer tunes, John Lewis' great blues, "Two Degrees East, Three Degrees West," and "East of the Sun (and West Of The Moon)," from a Princeton University theater work…

"Alice In Wonderland" is a 40 minutes-long piece of work, obviously based on the famous book by Lewis Carroll. It confirms Neuschwanstein's significant importance in German rock history: the band succeeded, from the beginning, in creating a fluid and refined music, intense and suggestive, typical of the creative enthusiasm of the early Seventies. Usually structured around the keyboards parts, the music often underlines vivid and very refined piano pieces. With its strong melodies, its airy and dynamic flute soli, its dreamlike atmospheres, and the subtlety of the guitar effects, influenced by Steve Hackett's style, "Alice In Wonderland" easily takes its place among the best contemporary works of Camel or Focus.

The title Horse Rotorvator is explained in the liner notes as a device large enough to "plough up the waiting world," created from the bones of the horses of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. The Bay City Rollers this isn't. On the group's second full album, Coil continue the refinement of brute noise and creepily serene arrangements into a truly modern psychedelia, from tribal drumming and death march guitars to disturbing samples and marching band samples and back. Balance shares the same haggard, mystic vocal delivery common to fellow explorers of the edge like David Tibet and Edward Ka-Spel, but he has his own blasted and burnt touch to it all. His lyrical subjects range from emotional extremism of many kinds to blunt, often homoerotic imagery (matched at points in the artwork and packaging) and meditations on death…