Sun Ra Arkestra
Swirling

Calm aka Kiyotaka Fukagawa has never been to the White Isle, but he sure knows how to capture its musical essence. He has done so over a long and storied career that has taken in 17 albums and some 35 EPs on many labels including this one over the last 20-plus years. His unique blend of ambient, jazz and leftfield was last showcased on this label in 2018 with his By Your Side album, and now he does it again with another timeless and escapist offering.

Electronic-jazz pioneer Mark de Clive-Lowe returns with the second installment of his Midnight Snacks EP series. Vol.2 kicks off with two dedications: “Crush Velvet”, a break-heavy, broken beat jam full of twists and turns, dedicated to Phlash – Mark’s mentor and dear friend, the late great Phil Asher. “Sorceress” is dedicated to the legend Chick Corea, a reworking of his Return to Forever classic by the same name. Featuring Mark’s lithe rhodes and piano lines, it’s perfect for the jazz-minded dancefloor. Side B kicks off with the downtempo head-nod of “Float into ETHer” before taking things back up-tempo again with “Joyful Resistance Part II” – a latin jazz-flavored 3/4-time broken beat samba keeping our spirits high in these unpredictable times. An EP packed full of future classics from one of the masters of the game.

Come for the leopard, stay for the stone cold jams. Yet another thrilling, funky-prog jazzy-rock fusion beauty from Ian Carr’s Nucleus. Originally released on Vertigo in 1975, Alleycat was never re-pressed so those original copies are now very tricky to score. Like all the Nucleus records, it’s aged ridiculously well and this Be With re-issue, re-mastered from the original analogue tapes, shows off just why this deserves to be back in press.

Maston’s Darkland is a breezy collection of the material from the Tulips sessions that didn’t make it on to the original LP. Originally a digital-only release for those in the know in the autumn of 2018, after re-issuing Tulips in 2020 it made too much sense for Be With to give Darkland a vinyl release. Like Tulips, Darkland was recorded mostly in Hoorn, in the Netherlands, between 2015-2017 during downtime from Frank’s touring duties with Jacco Gardner’s band. Bits were also done in Los Angeles on some extended trips back home. The collection plays like an alternate view of Maston’s instant modern classic Tulips; a companion piece to the LP proper with similar mixture of shorter themes and more full length tracks. As Frank Maston explains: “I think Darkland is the shadow of Tulips in a way… what it might’ve been in a different universe. But the heart of Tulips beats in these songs as well and they evoke the same memories and feelings for me. I see my process playing out across these songs - lots of experimentation and trying out new techniques and sounds and just sort of going for it.”