Suemori
Maebashi

Reconnected is compiled from Harold Lucious’ addictive 1990 release Connections, a visionary mix of soulful house, New Jack Swing and RnB, an American predecessor of street soul. Deeply connected to music from an early age, Harold started his music career in the early 70s at the age of 16. He sang in his first group, The Final Seconds, who pressed a 7” single in New York City in 1973. The group would go on to record a full album called Neo Cosmic Blues, but never had the chance to press it. They would continue to perform and write together throughout the 70’s and searched in vain for a label to work with. During that time, Harold landed a guest spot on the legendary Brother Ahh record Move Ever Onward, set up by his manager who was Brother Ahh’s sibling. Harold is listed as having played koto, but really he provided background vocals. Throughout the 80’s, Harold worked at WBI radio programming talk shows. On air, he would act out modified scripts to Richard Wright novels like “The Outsider”.Connections was his effort to finally release a record after years of recording and playing music. Experimenting with dance music he came up with an album that was inspired by his love of house music and RnB. He sold the record out of his backpack, ending up with boxes of copies that were eventually destroyed when he had to move from his long-time apartment in Brooklyn. Few of the original LP remain, and it has become almost impossible to find.Reconnected is a remastered redux with four songs taken from the original LP, and pressed onto a loud 45rpm 12” for maximum dance-floor potential. Mixed Signals is honoured to introduce Harold’s music to a contemporary audience around the world.

Yes, it is real!Anthems from the neighbourhood were begging for a proper press and here we have it. After a digital only release in 2020, 'Infinity' by Priori gets the 45rpm treatment on the A side with the Dust-e-1 on the flip with the remix.You can now hold it & play it for years to come.Are you a record shop in Canada/USA and would like some copies?Get in touch with us at distro@larama.ca

DE269 - US - 2019Patrick Cowley was one of the most revolutionary and influential figures in the canon of electronic dance music. Born in Buffalo, NY on October 19, 1950, Patrick moved to San Francisco in 1971 to study music at the City College of San Francisco. By the mid ’70s, Patrick’s synthesizer techniques landed him a job composing and producing songs for disco diva Sylvester, including hits like “You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)”, “Dance (Disco Heat)” and “I Need Somebody To Love Tonight.” This helped Patrick obtain more work as a remixer and producer. Cowley created his own brand of peak time party music known as Hi-NRG, also dubbed “The San Francisco Sound.” By 1981, Patrick had released a string of his own dance 12″ singles, like “Menergy” and “Megatron Man”. He also co-founded Megatone Records, the label upon which he released his debut album, Megatron Man. Around this time Patrick was hospitalized and diagnosed with an unknown illness: that which would later be called AIDS. Throughout 1982, he composed two more Hi-NRG hits, “Do You Wanna Funk” for Sylvester, and “Right On Target” for Paul Parker, as well as a second solo album Mind Warp. His life was cut short on November 12, 1982, when he passed away 24 days after his 32nd birthday from AIDS-related illness.Mechanical Fantasy Box is a new collection of 13 unreleased songs recorded between 1973-80 released in tandem with Cowley’s homoerotic journal of the same title. Featuring Patrick’s first electronic compositions in the Electronic Music Lab at CCSF when synthesizers were new technology to songs made at his semi-professional studio on Minna Street equipped with an Oberheim DS-2 digital sequencer. The sounds flows from funk to kraut to psychedelic ambient electronics inspired by Tomita and Krafterwerk. As Maurice Tani wrote in the liner notes that accompany this release, “What you hold in your hand is a collection of Cowley's work from the years preceding his meteoric rise as a pioneer of Hi-NRG dance music. This was before drum machines. Before programmable, polyphonic digital synthesis. This was before “cutting edge”. This was experimental music in every sense.”Some songs were mixed from 4-track stems by Joe Tarantino and all songs have been remastered by George Horn at Fantasy Studio in Berkeley, CA. The vinyl comes housed in a black and white gatefold jacket designed by Gwenaël Rattke featuring a photograph by Susan Middleton and include an essay from music partner Maurice Tani and an 8.5x11 insert with notes. Proceeds from Mechanical Fantasy Box will be donated to the San Francisco AIDS Foundation, who have been committed to ending the pandemic and human suffering caused by HIV since 1982.

With its 3rd release on the ERROR100 Series, System Error showcases Italian producer Otis, who delicately produced 5 club orientated tracks pulling influences from acid to trance, yet preserving a strong sBerlin based label System Error ignite their 2021 with further mind stretching material, this time they call on Otis to take on the role of master of operations. The “Cocoon Of Fantasies & Illusions” EP meanders across five tracks, touching on refined strains of techno, electro and breaks built for the rave. “Taking Control” is built to take command of a club space, all of the elements working in harmony, to make a well rounded intergalactic trip. Straight Electro flow in “Just A Game” laden with acid squelches, the title of the track rocking back and forth via a mysterious vocal sample, a sense of nostalgia with elements from the past. Opening the B side is “Inborn Archetype”, a chunky affair, jam packed with action. Huge drums ground the track as emphatic driving synths, and pads take the track to another level, ready to go to war. Riding an elastic sub heavy bass line is “Anima”, playful and curious. “Wreaks Havoc” is built around distinctive 90s breaks energy, with acid tones ricocheting from every surface. The shortest of the tracks but certainly packs a punch.

Turbulent synths ooze and oscillate, roaming like searchlight beacons across darkened shores. The experimental and idiosyncratic sound of duo Inkasso explores the feeling of being cast adrift in disorientating, mechanical worlds. In the studio, the pair jam with drills, string instruments, field recordings and everyday objects to create a hypnotic cacophony. Hear the penny drop on ‘Asso,’ chains rattle on ‘Träume aus Draht;’ the junglist murk of ‘Tag der Imker,’ and the sharp, crystalline beat of ‘Punkervirtel.’ Inkasso invites you to get lost in the uncanny spaces between dub, drone and techno; static introspection and the primal desire to dance.

Tagliabue’s cosmic music is a transcendental journey through introspection and imagination. The latter has no limits, when stimulated by sounds that slowly shade and snake deeply in the listener’s conscious.With “Ambiente Sonoro” the Milan based DJ and producer now introduces his debut mini-album. The concept is inspired by the Italian library music of the 70s from Daniela Casa, Egisto Macchi and Piero Umiliani, characterized by the extensive use of electronic, experimental and psychedelic sounds. It is arranged and produced in a contemporary way, alternating dark ambient, tribalistic sounds mixed with abstract electronic and IDM influences from artists such as Biosphere, Higher Intelligence Agency, Global Communication or Coil.His experience as a music selector and his previous works anticipate the character of this concept album. A record that cannot be placed in a specific genre.Ancestral rhythms, post-industrial waves, apocalyptic chants and drones, suggest a mental projection into a new planetary system consisting of six bodies with different landscapes kept in orbit by a cosmic sound perturbation. A dreamy state of emotional, protracted and reflective abandonment.