Denis Fournier Jeff Parker Ben Lamar Gay Joachim Florent
Escape Lane

The follow up to the highly acclaimed reissue of the first volume Ethiopian Hit Parade. This 2nd volume features 'Ethiopian Hits' from 1972 to 1975. The track layout is Identical reissue to the original vinyl"After releasing around fifty 45 rpm singles and his first 33 rpm album (Ethiopian Modern Instrumental Hits AELP 10, re-released by Heavenly Sweetness HS092VL), Amha Esthèté set about compiling his best 45s on a series of now legendary albums (the originals are impossible to find) in 1972. The first four volumes of Ethiopian Hit Parade were released in September and October 1972, with the fifth volume appearing in January 1973. You are the proud owner of Volume 2.It is worth reminding ourselves that when Amha Esthèté set up his Amha Records label in 1968-69, it was in defiance of a state monopoly designed to regulate the imports and production of records by an imperial decree of July 1948. This extravagant state privilege had produced only 78s of traditional music , which though thrilling, excluded anything at all modern. To the best of our knowledge, only sixty-seven of these prehistoric discs were pressed in Great Britain between 1955 and 1961 and released by His Master’s Voice. They were supposed to be part of celebrations of Emperor Haile Selassie’s silver jubilee . . . even though 33s and 45s had existed since 1948 and 1949 respectively! Such incompetence and servility, combined with a rejection of an effervescent contemporary music scene, were symptomatic of the decadence surrounding the end of an era.An audacious, funky outlaw, a music lover and an entrepreneur in tune with the baby-boomer generation, young Amha Esthèté (he was only twenty-four when he launched his label) will be remembered as the instigator of a peaceful revolution thick with soul and rock’n’roll.After the acclaimed reissue of the first volume Ethiopian Hit Parade. Here is the second volume that include all the greatest Ethiopian Hits from 1972 to 1975. Identical reissue to the original vinyl which is extremely rare and expensive.The opening track of the compilation is the song Tezeta Slow and Fast by GETACHEW KASSA were featured on the album Ethiopiques, Vol. 10: Ethiopian Blues & Ballads. and originally released on 1972. The other tracks on this second volume celebrate such pioneers of modern Ethiopian groove as Abayneh Degene, Tèshomè Meteku, Menelik Wossenachew Mulatu Astatqe and Muluken Melesse, alongside “tradi-modern” singers representing Amhara and Oromo culture, so rich and so long marginalized."s

Emerging from endless improvisation sessions and re-interpreting their heroes, Paris-based band Underground Canopy presents their first body of original work via MENACE : “Bluestaeb & S. Fidelity present Underground Canopy” drops on January 31st, 2020. 
The debut EP was produced, recorded and mixed by critically acclaimed Jakarta Records artists Bluestaeb and S. Fidelity in London. The five-piece band’s neo soul- and jazz-infused instrumental hip-hop is heavily influenced by like minded acts such as Yesterday’s New Quintet, BadBadNotGood and Butcher Brown.Underground Canopy officially formed in 2016 after jamming and playing covers of Flying Lotus, Madlib and J. Dilla for several years. Band members Jonathan Aréna (Keys), Warren Dongué (Bass), Necky Gomis (Trumpet/Flugelhorn), Alfredo Grooveton (Drums) and Jeremy Talon (Guitar) members met in the south of France during their 20s and immediately connected over their shared passion for hip-hop and instrumental music. The approach to compositions was always to transform the vibe of jazzy hip-hop into hand made live music. They’ve played dozen of shows throughout France, including support slots for Alan Mion’s legendary jazz funk outfit Cortex and rising Japanese jazz band WONK.Through MENACE label founder Midori (Menace) the band met Bluestaeb, who moved from his hometown Berlin to Paris in 2015, and his long time collaborator S. Fidelity, who is still based in the German capital. Both featured UC pianist Jonathan Aréna on their previous records and collaborated with guitarist Jeremy Talon. The two producers, who are signed to German tastemaker label Jakarta Records, recognized the raw creative potential of Underground Canopy and shaped their demos into six fully arranged and fully grown songs. Additionally, Bluestaeb and S. Fidelity recorded a ten-minute jam of the band, which they left un

Jeff Parker - best known as the longtime guitarist for the Chicago-based quintet Tortoise, and for being part of The New Breed - is one of the many jazz innovators in the International Anthem ranks, and as a result the Chicago based label has become one of the most innovative and essential out there in recent times. His own last album was in part responsible for that and now comes a follow up full player that is made up exclusively of his own solo guitar works. The composer and multi-instrumentalist draws on his love of Coltrane here as well as experimenting lots and pursuing ideas that took him outside of his comfort zone.

First ever vinyl reissue of this highly sought after French experimental jazz recording by the legendary Jef Gilson.In 1971, the day after the death of Igor Stravinsky, Jef Gilson and his Unit (Pierre Moret and Jean-Claude Pourtier) made this curious homage to classical music. It is jazz, contemporary and electroacoustic music that the trio interrogate through a wild ‘noise’ session evoking as much John Cage as Pierre Henry, John Coltrane as the Percussions de Strasbourg, the Art Ensemble of Chicago as the Tacet by Jean Guérin.Le Massacre du Printemps, (the Massacre of Spring) is a strange kind of homage to Igor Stravinsky, who had just died when, in 1971, Jef Gilson recorded this not-to-be-missed album of French experimental jazz. “Too many pieces of music finish too long after the end” the Russian composer was quoted as saying and here is Gilson offering us... six!A funny bird (of fire) was Jef Gilson. Clarinetist who came up playing in the basement clubs with Claude Luter and Boris Vian, he turned to piano and multiplied his experiences in jazz: bebop, choral, modal, free, fusion... As a free spirit, Gilson welcomed many ‘up and coming’ French musicians in his bands (Jean-Luc Ponty, Bernard Lubat, Michel Portal, Henri Texier...) as well as being associated with Woody Shaw, Nathan Davis or Byard Lancaster. Later he would go on to create, Europamerica, a transatlantic formation in which Butch Morris, Frank Lowe, and Joe McPhee would play...But for the time being it’s a massacre! With Pierre Moret on organ and Jean-Claude Pourtier on drums, Gilson improvises with style and gusto. On the eponymous title track of the album, he also plays tuba and invites Claude Jeanmaire to get involved on prepared piano. Spring, for the four musicians here, is windswept: billowing, rumbling, frantic, it sounds like Stravinsky played by the ‘Percussions de Strasbourg’ without a scoresheet!After which, behind his electric piano, Gilson with Moret and Pourtier offers us five more “unpremeditated spontaneous expressions”, as he wrote on the back of the album sleeve. Five wily and electric expressions which are like the soundtrack to a film which could also have been played by the Art Ensemble or Jean Guérin. So, when, in the same text, Gilson expresses the hope that we will get “from this album the same pleasure that we had making it”, we can but reply: how could it be otherwise?

w/ henri texier on acoustic bass ! french jazz rock