Andy Romano
Every Time Feel Allright

After his debut LP ‘Temmuz’, released at the beginning of last year, Houschyar is back on Macadam Mambo with his new album: a less danceable but more personal opus. Being locked up on the rooftops of Istanbul, Houschyar repurposed a satellite dish, making use of its perfectly round and concave shape to create strange metallic-sounding percussive loops which he painted with sonic atmospheres that contained diverse shades of blue. ‘Mavi’ is an introspective pallet of emotions condensed into 7 hybrid compositions highly improvised which divagate into a very jazzy modern state of mind, jamming with pianos, electronic organs and rhythm boxes to produce another type of spiritual music that sounds absolutely timeless. In a very prolific year - with his release with DJ Sofa and Okay Temiz on Music from Memory and the initial EP of Raphael Kosmos’ newborn label Späti Records -, Marius Houschyar leaves no doubt about the level of his talent and him being part of a new generation of artists to keep a close eye on. To discover as soon as possible!

NAQI Vol.1 by Mansur Brown

Bottin brings us this juicy Artifact 4-tracker in super-limited-quantities. Dulce De Luna is an acid disco weapon with some sabor latino. Volver Al Campo is a psychedelic cosmic ritual chant (sounds like Adriano Celentano maxi-dosing mushrooms in the Italian countryside). El Caballero Oscuro serves as the main theme from John Carpenter's space-horror flick shot in the extraterrestrial jungle (only he didn't make that movie, yet) - Finally, we get a slab of low-hip high-energy madness for hardcore Italo heads (those who want the hypnotic synth machinery, not the demented vocals).

In early 2023, Tresor Records will reissue the sole output from Shifted Phases entitled The Cosmic Memoirs Of The Late Great Rupert J. Rosinthrope. Initially released in 2002, soon after James Stinson passed away, this LP plays a mysterious and compelling role in the Drexciya journey. While other records of Drexciya and related projects have received numerous reprints and editions, The Cosmic Memoirs... has remained out of print since its release. This rarity leaves it more open to interpretation with its place in the Drexciyan storm series, as it became increasingly hard to find and underexplored.Track titles Solar Wind, White Dwarf, and Lonely Journey of the Comet Bopp reveal a focus on cosmic realms, suggesting a link with the Drexciya LP Grava 4 that moves from the underwater to the galactic. As it launches with mechanical blows on aprecise orbit, each repetition entrenches the gravitational pull in the galaxy of Shifted Phases. In many places, it sounds like the readout of frequencies harvested from outer space, pockmarked with packet loss from the millions of kilometres distancetravelled.The music is hard to contain, intuitively restless in motion through its unfolding universe and achingly resonant. It shapeshifts across aectedly melodic sequences such as in Lonely Journey..., to the sparse, hard-hitting timbres found in Alien Vessel Distress Call and the mangled reverse vocals in The Freak Show, somewhat reminiscent of another Drexciya side-project, Glass Domain. The mythology of Drexciya is evident in how keenly James Stinson and Gerald Donald created their imaginary worlds.In Crossing Of The Sun-Ra Nebula, there is an undisputable reference to another Afro-futurist who delved deep into a galaxy of their own making.This reissue does not merely close the loop on Tresor's reissue series of the Drexciya catalogue but brings Shifted Phases to fresh ears more than other records. Accompanied by newly commissioned artwork from Matthew Angelo Harrison, the 3xLP vinyl reissue also features the tracks Crossing Of The Sun-Ra Nebula and Alien Vessel Distress Call, which were previously only on the original CD release.