New Grooves — CDs  

A sweet set of grooves from this cool Italian combo – served up with just the sort of retro style you'd guess from the cover! There's a strong influence here from older soundtrack modes – particularly Italian ones – no surprise, given that the album's on the film score reissue Cinedelic label, and really fits in with some of their classic work! The group take on a few older Italian soundtrack themes, and add in their own songs too – and they definitely have some of the Brazilian elements promised by their name, but in addition to bossa and samba, this also means some fuzzy psych as well – some of the heavier modes of the 70s generation, touched with a bit of cop/crime funk from the Italian scene of that era too. Vocals are in English and Italian – and titles include great remakes of "Metti Una Sera A Cena", "Femina Ridens", and "Goodby My Friend" – plus "Doping 2000", "La Donna Dei Miei Guai", "Gira Gira", "Clavinet Et Chase", "Drugs & Violence", and "Deep Throat".

Funky grooves, psychedelic sitar, and mod Hammond organ – a magnificent blend that's every bit as dynamic as the image on the cover – served up as the long-awaited debut album from this cool European combo! The album's got a feel that's somewhere between 60s spy soundtracks and Brit library work – but also carries a tighter, funkier groove overall – a contemporary ear for the best funky elements of the old days, served up with production styles that continue a very classic groove! The whole thing's a real unexpected delight – a set that grabs us with the same sort of energy as the older Blow Up scene during its best years – with no kitsch, no nonsense, and a brilliant sense of sound throughout. Titles include "Bengali Corporation", "Bumblebee", "Sitarmania", "Fuzz Party", "Per La Riviera Tolonesa", "La Panthere Pop", "Jerk A La Vague", and "Moog Traffic".

A cool compilation – and one that's much hipper than you'd guess from the Ibiza sticker on the cover! Instead of the usual sunny Spanish grooves, this one's filled with deeply spiritual tracks and hipper sounds from the left side of the club underground – some of our favorite artists from both sides of the Atlantic and Pacific, sifted out nicely by Daniel Pencoba with a really sensitive approach overall! The sound's laidback, but never in a chillout way – and titles include "Dawn" by Build An Ark, "Brown Sugar" by Dal Green, "Home" by Bing Ji Ling, "Once You're Near Me" by Kutiman, "Love Is To Blame" by Yukihiro Fukutomi with Isabelle Antena & Ernesto, "I'll Be Your Wings (M&D rmx)" by Invisible Session, "Reversed (Circle Research rmx demo)" by Elizabeth Shepherd, "Neil Diamond" by Bucky Johnson, "Life Angles" by Yesterdays New Quintet, and "Oasis" by Carlos Nino & Miguel Atwood-Ferguson.

Loads of great electro sounds here – bassy keyboards, splashy beats, and some cool moogy moments – all wrapped up in the kind of heavy funk we've always loved from Shawn Lee! This cool collaboration with AM furthers the pair's step into the best sounds of the 80s – modes that almost feel like digging up the most underground funk of the generation at points, but which also get some pretty tuneful songwriting at others – great vocals that themselves are pretty electronic, and often echo that great moment in the years past punk and disco – when genres broke down for a bit, and music got especially wonderful! The set isn't totally retro – leave it to the pair to bring in some of their own voice as well – and titles include "Good Blood", "Suffer Like Me", "Replay", "In The Aftermath", "Two Times", "Louna", "Iron Leaf", and "Special Disco".

A sweet little selection of grooves from the folks at Pulp Flavor Records! The label's best known to our customers for their great reissues of French groove obscurities from the 60s and 70s – but this selection features work by a number of newer artists involved with the label, interspersed by a few other older tunes pulled from sound library records. The overall feel is perfect – slightly Latin, slightly easy, slightly soundtracky – with a timeless quality that really blows away most American attempts at this sort of title. Tracks include "Dynamoog" by Jean Jacques Perry, "Vibra D'Electrique" by Apine, "Bagheera" by Nino Nardini & Roger Roger, "Freejazz Box" by Undress Code, "To The Bass" by Zimpala, "It's A Boy" by Ama D Us, "Epoch Making Sense" by Kan Takagi, and "Deja Mort" by Concorde Music Club.

A contemporary take on the sounds of mid-Century – a very cool batch of tracks that leans heavily on 50s exotica, 60s electronica, and lots of other odd bits – all filtered together in cool production with a really playful feel! The set's somewhere between some of the older retro sounds on the Irma La Douce label, and some of the colder work in recent years by groups who've been inspired by Italian crime and horror soundtracks – although Akron's work is a bit warmer overall. Titles include "Rabbits In Orbit", "A Glimpse Of Hell", "Frog War Chant", "Robot Grind", "Memory Hole", and "Picabu".

Creative electronics from Uwe Schmidt – aka Atom (TM) and dozens of other pseudonyms! Atom (TM) And Friends make these great pop music pastiches laced with electronic textures – putting modern electronica, classic funk, pop, rock, bossa nova and more in a blender – and coming out with material that's easy to love, but hard to categorize! Includes his tropical clubby cover of "Smoke On The Water" as Senor Coconut, an icy Euro funk takes on James Brown's "Superbad" and Bowie's "Ashes To Ashes" as LB, straight up original soundscapes as Atom and other strange, yet accessible numbers recorded as Erik Satin, The Stereonerds, Los Sampler's, The Rogertubesound Ensemble and more. 17 in all: "Duck Cha Cha" and "Showgirl" as Lisa Carbon, "Mp3 (MoralPovertyThree)", "Suck My Groove", "Bowman Suite" and "Daddy's Song" as Atom, "Music (For The Library Of God)" as The Roger Tubesound Enemble, "Dropshadow Disease" as Dropshadow Disease, "La Vida Es Llena De Cables" as Los Sampler's and more.

Bebo Best is at it again – creating new grooves with plenty of retro twists – a bit like some of the older Italian work we loved on the Irma La Douce label – and its cool blend of 50s and 60s elements! There's lots of jazzy flourishes over the tip, played by live instrumentation – and mixed with a hip blend of beats and samples that draw plenty of inspiration from 60s soundtracks and other instrumental modes of the time. A few tracks have vocals, but most are instrumental – and titles include "Soul Bossa Nova", "Anytime Swingers", "Oh Jeje", "Amarcord Jazz", "Baise Moi", and "A 100 Lounge Lizard".

A sweet set of contemporary bossa gems – all older numbers made famous by Joao Gilberto in his early days – spun out with a very fresh finish here by the Brazilian Love Affair combo! The group work in a mostly live jazz mode, with just a bit of programming on the rhythms – and the album's especially heavy on Fender Rhodes, which updates an older bossa sound nicely – amidst older-styled instrumentation on acoustic guitar, Hammond, trombone, and flute. The vocals are great – with the same raspy charm of Joao's early recordings – that very human, very honest quality that made his singing so different from other vocalists of his generation – and titles include "Rosa Morena", "Desafinado", "Voce E Eu", "O Barquinho", "Saudade Fez Um Samba", "Ho Ba La La", and "Chega De Saudade".

One of the few albums ever from percussionist Francisco Mora Catlett – a player with a decades-long legacy of performances with jazz legends Max Roach and Sun Ra, as well as Detroit electro genius Carl Craig! The album's got a wonderful sound that links together these 2 sides of Catlett's career – righteous acoustic jazz at the core, but augmented with bits of electronics, some of which are played by Carl Craig on synth and "space programming"! Arkestra member Marshall Allen is also in the group – playing alto and flute – and other instrumentation features twin trumpets from John Douglass and Dwight Adams, keyboards from Craig Taborn, and lots of percussion from Francisco himself. The sound is outside at some points, but always swings back to a warmly spiritual vibe – and Catlett's compositions are as ambitious as the performances on the set. Titles include "Baba Lu Aye", "Suny", "La Luu Banche Barasuayo", "Space Chord Progression", "Voodoo Papa Legba Mapotelo", "Saints At Congo Square", "Pa'Los Mayores", and a Carl Craig/Craig Taborn mix of "Baba Lu Aye".

The 3rd album by The Dining Rooms (in case you couldn't guess by the title!) – and the best so far! These guys have really matured from earlier outings – moving into a sophisticated realm of downtempo soundscapes crafted with a great deal of care, and which are put together with a lot more than simple tricks and gimmicks. There's loads of really solid tunes in here – sly numbers that sneak up on you with a subtle approach to the craft, gently burrowing in and taking root – somehow making the album that much more compelling overall. A number of tracks have some wonderfully languid vocals, some male and some female – and these tunes fall nicely next to instrumental numbers with a very evocative approach. Titles include "Anima Per Amarti", "Tunnel", "La Citta Nuda", "Fluxus", "Flamenco Sketches", "Dreamy Smiles", "You", "African Loungesters", and a nice cover of Sun Ra's "Astro Black"!

A really great group with a strong influence from 70s Italian soundtracks – one that serves up some mighty spare instrumentation that just includes percussion and keyboards – the latter of which is heavy on organ and synthesizer! The music has a really sinister feel – like the kind of grooves, both funky and mellow, you'd find on some sort of spooky soundtrack from years back – almost like some of Goblin's best film scores of the 70s, but without as much jamming overall! The approach is really wonderful – lean, mean, and far from cliche – and titles include "Isolato", "Malabimba 1", "La Fortuna Alterna", "La Svolta", "Addormentato", "La Piaga Dell Umo", and "La Violenza".

As any reader of these pages will know, we're nuts about Ennio Morricone – the greatest Italian soundtrack composer ever, and quite possibly one of the greatest composers to have ever walked the face of this planet! Here, a similarly Morricone-mad bunch of folks pay tribute to the maestro, by remixing tracks from his classic soundtracks of the 60s and 70s! Titles include "The Man With The Harmonica" by Apollo Four Forty, "Chi Mai" by Nightmares On Wax, "Giocoso, Gioioso" by Groove Corporation, "La Bambola Come Maddalena" by Sofa Surfers, "La Lucertola" by De Phazz, "Clan Of The Sicilians" by DJ Dick of Rocker's Hi-Fi, "Il Grande Silencio" by Thievery Corporation, and "Belinda May" by Fantastic Plastic Machine. 13 tracks in all!

A warmly jazzy tribute to the music of Bruno Martino – the Italian songwriter who's best known for the famous "Estate" – but who also gave the world a host of other wonderful tunes over the years! The set's done in a sparkling Irma Records style – with backings from Papik that mix 60s retro modes with 21st Century production – often with instrumentation from a small jazzy combo that has great keyboards and horns. Most vocals are in Italian, although the set also features a few non-Martino numbers too – and singers vary from number to number, which adds a nice sense of variety to the set. Titles include "Estate", "Fai Male", "Che Peccato", "Al Di La", "Se Mai", "Cos'Hai Trovato In Lui", "Soli Tra La Gente", "Sabato Sera", and "Rimpiangerai".

The sun shines brightly on Mario Biondi – really making this record sparkle with a charm that goes way beyond Mario's previous albums – a quality that's less retro than before, and which shows Biondi as a growing soul star with really universal appeal! There's still some of the old school jazz in the mix that we love from Mario's Schema work – but the album's also got a fuller production style at times, one that really expands the palette of Biondi's colors, and which has him working here with help from key guests who include Omar, Leon Ware, Al Jarreau, Incognito, and Chaka Khan – and even a bit of organ from the James Taylor Quartet! Jean-Paul "Bluey" Maunick helped co-write a good number of tracks on the set – and titles include "Shine On", "Come To Me", "Woman Woman", "What Have You Done To Me", "Never Stop", "La Voglia La Pazzia L'Idea", "Girl Blue", "Light To The World", and "Catch The Sunrise".