Cross Island
East Of The Apple

The third release from Canopy features the title track from a tough to catch Afro funk 7” originally released on private press in Benin in the 1980s. While information on the mesmerizing Tomede Ehue remains elusive, she is backed by the Beninois powerhouse, the truly almighty, “TP Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou”.Electrifying cosmic voodoo disco grooves, heavy bass pulsing, blistering horns and spooky organ riffs set the tone on this transcendental dance floor afro funk cut. A modernized tropical disco remix from bosq & an Afro - acid version from Sam Redmore revitalize this mysterious dance floor incantation and launch it into the present day.These tracks strike a balance between moody afro psych-funk and more punchy electronic aesthetics, while maintaining the subtleties of the original composition and performance.

A superb Jazz Flavoured Latin Funk Soul album recorded in 1977 by Grammy Award Winning Carlos Franzetti when he was a struggling musician trying to get his first breaks in a tough New York Jazz scene. With a Top Notch grouping including Percussionist Ray Mantilla, Victor Venegas on Bass and Dick Meza from the Tito Puente Orchestra Carlos played all the Keyboards, wrote the numbers and was also responsible for all the arrangements.Released by Guiness Records (No relation to the Drink) and swiftly forgotten Stateside it was picked up by the DJ's in London's early Jazz Dance scene where "Cocoa Funk" became a must have cut, eventually appearing on Soul Jazz Records seminal re-issue series "London Jazz Classics". It also became a hit in Germany after being re-issued on a double vinyl by leading label Sonorama Records.Now available again in its original single album format and sounding as fresh as if recorded yesterday from the opening bars of the jazz inflected cut "Beatriz" via the Worldwide sounds of "Sweet And Low" to the Funky Latin Jazz of the title track "Graffiti".Still changing hands for eye watering sums on collectors sites and now available again for a reasonable sum courtesy of Jazz Room Records.

Farfalla Records presents its new compilation Amplitude - The Hidden Sounds of French Library. 12 tracks exclusively recorded for professional use between 1978 and 1984 in France.Dive into the universe of the early 1980s with colorful sounds and catchy rhythms from talented musicians from the French scene, composing and arranging both for library music and variety, and accompanying big names in French music.

A rather obscure and fantastical 45 byAmerican jazz clarinetist and tenor saxophonist Wendell Harrison. A moody dusty fingers style downtempo cover of Stevie Wonder's sleeper Rocket Love from the LP 'Hotter Than July'. This one seems to have passed by many collectors, including myself, I was only turned onto it recently despite loving Wendell's catalog.

South African production duo of Emil Zoghby and John Galanakis were responsible for a string of high-quality disco singles in the early 80s, typically cover versions of international hits — Klein & MBO’s ‘The Big Apple’, Sly & the Family Stone’s ‘Family Affair’ & David Joseph’s ‘You Can’t Hide (Your Love From Me)’ — backed with their own compositions. When Starlight hit the market with an album in 1983, it featured only one cover, the local hit ‘Picnic’, along with five of the duo’s original compositions, including their similarly styled response, ‘Picnicing’, which replaces the original’s sax with spaced-out synth stabs. Then there’s ‘Jah Jah Love’, an ecstatic disco sermon of dancefloor dynamite weighing in at over eight and a half minutes. Other tracks on this landmark album — ‘Let’s Go Dancing (Boogie Boogie)’, ‘Keep On Moving’ and an eponymous instrumental — offer a similar fusion of classic disco with newer Italo and proto-house influences: machine music with a human touch! Remastered from the original master tapes and reissued for the first time, Starlight will be available on vinyl and digital platforms from early 2023 (40 years after its initial release) via Afrosynth Records.