Robert Bergman
Robert Bergman

Raï is the music of a youth hungover from Algeria's recent independence. It became a space for a liberated, transgressive dialogue that told the social truths of its time -- an up-front yet poetic voice that covers the taboos and frustrations of daily life, expressing emotion without detour. This voice is heard at weddings, cabarets, in the nightclubs of the Oranese coast, and casually on the street... With the boom of the audio cassette, an avalanche of raï tapes were produced in Oran and diffused all over the world. Both women and men sang and listened to the new sound, as raï is intimately tied to parties, alcohol and the night. With the spontaneous improvisation of its singers as the main part of each song, raï keeps reinventing itself. In this style, Cheb Hasni, along with Cheb Nasro, incarnates a second generation of musicians. With the "love raï", or sentimental raï, Hasni sings about love, passion and its setbacks -- moving away from the bittersweet daily chronicles of the first chebs and chebates. Having recorded nearly 150 cassettes, Cheb Hasni remains one of the most prolific and talented raï singers of his generation. Almost thirty years after his death, this three-volume compilation of rare tracks from his cassette releases on the Oriental Music Production label is a tribute to the lasting legacy of Cheb Hasni -- ya raï! The second volume of three is presented here.CHEB HASNIVol 2Outre National

Reissue of Decadance "On And On (Fears Keep On)", one of the most iconic underground Italo-wave tracks ever."Permeated by dark a eerie synths, a perfectly programed Roland TR-808 and outstanding analog production, "On and On (Fears Keep On)" belongs to what we like to define "dark italo disco" or "italo wave". There's an extra touch of cosmic / interstellar feeling, sharing the same vibe (and the same synthetic hardware) of "Spacer Woman". Not a intergalactic travel this time, but the wait for somebody to come from the sky. "

Hell Yeah! Recordings has released all sorts of music over the years, but in recent times its' catalogue has becoming increasingly Balearic in tone. Here they further their nu-Balearic credentials via a four-track EP of tracks tailor-made for summer. If you're looking for well-known faces, Balearic legend Chris Coco joins forces with Micko Roche on the utterly gorgeous 'What is Love' (B2), while Max Essa predictably does a terrific job in turning The Vendetta Suite's 'Neon Secrets' into a saucer-eyed downtempo classic that draws much influence from late '80s New Order records. Elsewhere, Jaspar Robinson and Kayroy's 'Satellite' is a slow-motion affair where glistening guitars and hazy vocals tumble down across a slow-motion electro beat, while Feel Fly's 'Esperanto' would have sounded great on a Mediterranean beach in the mid 1980s.

2021 repress without the free MP3 download cardOut on his own, he produced a series of highly ambitious disco records aimed at positioning him as an international star, but weighed down by the excesses of the era, Gyan saw his meteoric rise matched by an equally swift fall back into obscurity. Soundway Records now collects the best of Gyan�s work as a frontman and solo artist, featuring an array of electrifying disco grooves that still sound contemporary (and in some cases futuristic) decades after their initial release. Tip!Hailed as Africa's answer to Stevie Wonder, Ghanaian multi-instrumentalist Kiki Gyan was a musical wunderkind who by 1975 had risen from the lowly status of high school dropout to being ranked eighth in a poll of the greatest keyboardists in the world (occupying the rarefied air of the top ten with heavyweights like Steve Winwood, Billy Preston, and Stevie Wonder) as well as becoming an in-demand session player in the top recording studios of London - all before his twenty-first birthday.

For the fifth anniversary of Buraka Som Sistema's 2016 farewell show in their hometown of Lisbon, Portugal - and the 15th anniversary of their debut EP - we're celebrating this important milestone by releasing 'Buraka 4 Ever', an album created from the recordings of this legendary concert where the band's most iconic songs were last performed in front of a roaring live audience.

There's plenty to set the pulse racing within this new set of remixes of tracks from Seb Wildblood's superb album "Sketches Of Transition", which dropped on All My Thoughts earlier in the year. Our pick of the bunch is the superb Suzanne Kraft remix of "Amelia", which wraps glistening '80s guitar sounds and fretless bass notes around a chugging, arpeggio-driven groove, though many may gravitate towards the tight but undeniably groovy and melodious Jenifa Mayanja deep house version of "Small Talk". Elsewhere, Ciel re-imagines "Bahn" as an intoxicating chunk of bleep-laden broken electronica/Balearic fusion, while object blue impressively chops up "Sketches" into a sludgy, mind-altering style.