BBE 黑胶唱片和CD

Review: Having re-released Rim Kwaku's long lost Rim Arrives album, BBE follow it up with more dusty disco treasures from the Ghanaian hit maker's repertoire. From the blistering horns and thundering drum rolls of the near-nine-minute romp "Shine The Ladies" right the way through the looser, more Afrobeat-focussed "Peace Of Mind" by way of the emphatic Stevie Wonder-style showmanship of "I'm A Songwriter" it's a collection that still sparkles with soul 30 years after they were recorded. If you're unaware of Rim's story, you'd be wise to check it; from Quincy Jones endorsements to homelessness in the space of 24 hours, Rim's tales are as serious as his music is funky.

Notes: BBE Music is thrilled to present J Jazz: Free and Modern Jazz From Japan 1954-1988, a remarkable large-format book covering some of the deepest, rarest, and most innovative jazz music released anywhere in the post-war era. Compiled by Tony Higgins and Mike Peden, co-curators of BBE Music’s acclaimed J Jazz Masterclass Series, the book also features a foreword by Japanese jazz icon, Terumasa Hino.

This is the first time a book of this type has been has been published outside of Japan and the first anywhere of this size and scale. It is a unique collection of over 500 albums of free and modern jazz recorded and released in Japan during a period of radical transformation and constant reinvention. An era that saw Japan return from the ravages of World War Two to become a global economic power and emerge as both a technological leader and an international cultural force.

Through a unique gallery of albums, J Jazz charts the development of jazz in Japan from the first stirrings of the modern jazz scene in the mid to late 1950s and on through the hard bop and modal jazz of the 1960s. It steers the reader into the radical directions of the 1970s when free jazz, fusion, post-bop, and jazz-funk opened up a growing number of Japanese jazz artists to a new global audience before consolidating in the mid to late 1980s with a musical scene that laid the path for the contemporary jazz generation to follow.

Over 500 full-colour sleeves from many of the leading names in Japanese jazz sit alongside rare and private pressings that tell a story of constant change and musical exploration. J Jazz includes profiles of several leading record labels such as East Wind, Frasco, King Records, and Nippon Columbia as well as critical independents such as Three Blind Mice, ALM, and Aketa’s Disk. J Jazz includes interviews with celebrated jazz photographer Tadayuki Naito, and pianist Tohru Aizawa, bandleader on the totemic spiritual jazz album, Tachibana Vol 1, as well as free-jazz record collector and jazz musician Mats Gustafsson.

The book also features a chapter on albums by non-Japanese artists that only received a Japanese release, with collectible, rare, and obscure releases by figures such as Herbie Hancock, Miles Davis, Mal Waldron, Steve Lacy, and Art Blakey. J Jazz includes Japanese jazz charts from some of the world’s leading jazz DJs including Gilles Peterson, Toshio Matsuura, Paul Murphy, and Shuya and Yoshihiro Okino. Among the specialist content is a feature on obi strips by record dealer and Japanese jazz expert, Yusuke Ogawa, plus a special article on Japanese Blue Note albums.

Across its 300-plus pages, J Jazz includes a detailed introduction contextualising the music, tracing the story of Japan’s fascination with jazz back before the war. It also features biographical information on many of the key artists involved in shaping the post- war Japanese jazz scene including Sadao Watanabe, Toshiko Akiyoshi, Masabumi Kikuchi, Masahiko Togashi, Terumasa Hino, Yosuke Yamashita, Fumio Itabashi, Masayuki Takayanagi, Takeo Moriyama, Isao Suzuki, and many more.

Review: Jasper The Vinyl Junkie is back on BBE just 20 years after his last compilation as part of the label's 25th-anniversary celebrations. Vinyl Junkie Thangs is another first-class, full flavour collection of good-time jams, cool grooves and plenty in between. Most fo the tunes here are funk-filled, jazzy cuts and edits that you will have a hard time finding anywhere else, especially for affordable prices. Some of the tunes such as those from Mr Scruff and OPOLOP have never before been on wax, while firm favs like Fred Wesley, The Fatback Band and DTrain's Hubert Eaves cannot fiat to win you over.

Review: For those interested in Japan's modern jazz wave of the 1960s and early '70s, BBE's J Jazz Masterclass series of rare album reissues always deliver the goods. For proof, check the latest volume: a first ever reissue of Kohsuke Mine's 1970 debut album, First. Full of energetic, hard-wired sax solos (provided, of course, by Kohsune himself), rubbery bass (courtesy of Larry Ridley), jazz-funk electric piano (Masabum Kiluchi on keys) and frenetic rhythms (laid down by Lenny McBrowne), the album is undoubtedly a landmark J-Jazz set and just gets better with each successive listen. It also includes a terrific interpretation of Thelonious Monk classic 'Straight No Chaser', which - in our considered opinion -is no bad thing.

Review: There are an awful lot of great records in the J Dilla's catalogue, but few can match the consistent quality and coherent construction of Welcome 2 Detroit, his 2001 breakthrough album. Designed as a love letter to his home city with a sample palette and blend of styles to match, it saw the late producer and a string of then largely unknown local MCs showcase their vocal talents over some of his best ever beats. This lusciously expansive 20th anniversary box set does a brilliant job in expanding on the original album, with the 12 included "45s" pairing vocal mixes with instrumentals, unreleased cuts and occasional remixes. The included hardback book is brilliant, too, and packed with first-hand accounts of the creation of a now iconic LP.

Review: Most people will recognize Brian Jackson as the most important collaborator with Gil Scott-Heron - between them the pair laid down a mesmerising new kind of soul which resonates in its influence and brilliance to this day. Jackson went on to work with scores of legends of Black American music, but this new album is something altogether his own. Working with Daniel Colias from Phenomenal Handclap Band, Jackson revived a long-dormant solo project from the 70s and brought it to fruition in a set of ascendant soul cuts which speak to Jackson's mighty legacy while offering something wholly contemporary. 'All Talk' bursts with jazz funk and boogie flourishes, while 'Path to Macondo / Those Kind of Blues' takes a more introspective trip into Jackson's illustrious musicality. Forget reissue culture for a minute - here's a bonafide legend still doing it in the here and now.

Review: Enja Records was founded in Munich in the early 70s by jazz devotees Matthias Winckelmann and Horst Weber. Given a co-sign by the always on-point BBE and IF Music founder Jean-Claude, the label is now enjoying a retrospective compilation which seeks to celebrate the best of their golden years. Featuring performances by John Stubblefield, Bobby Hutcherson, Harold Land, Don Cherry, Cecil McBee and Pharoah Sanders collaborator Marvin Hannibal Peterson to name but a few, this collection provides a great jumping-off point for Enja's rich and diverse back catalogue. It may only be an introduction to a vast pool of music, but it's curated with authority by a dedicated head, so you know you're getting a shortcut to the best the label has to offer.

Review: It would be fair to say that the latest edition in BBE's 'J-Jazz Masterclass' series of reissues is exceedingly rare. In fact, when it first appeared on Smile Records in 1976, only 100 copies of Hideto Saski-Toshiyuki Sekine Quartet's "Stop Over" were ever produced. The album's rarity is impressive, but it's the quality of the all-acoustic set of hard-bop workouts that makes it an essential purchase. As you might expect, there's plenty to set the pulse racing throughout, from the high-octane rush of opener "Carole's Garden", where dizzying piano solos catch the ear, to the similarly hectic and arguably even more rush-inducing "Stop Over" (a ten minute cut of epic proportions), via the sweet, sparse and contemplative "Soultrane".

Review: Capturing the essence and feels of the long-standing event he runs in his Swiss hometown of Lausanne, veteran digger and selector Attias presents a brand new compendium of sweet compositions that sum up he's at creatively and spiritually. Gems on gems on gems: highlights that we guarantee will appeal to your good tastes and dancefloor include the hypnotic vibraphone wash of Cro-Magnon's "Midnight Magic", the slept-on jittering funk of Tatham, Mensah, Lord & Ranks's "Cascade" and Material and Nona Hendrix's ludicrously funky, ultimately sleazy slinker "Over & Over". We suspect you'll be playing this record over and over, too...

Review: For the latest volume in their essential "Jazz Masterclass" series, BBE takes a trip back to 1979 and the sole album from Japanese combo Miyasaka + 5. There's not much info on the collective, other than that drummer and composer Takahashi Miyasaka was the band's leading light. Regardless, the set has long been talked about in hushed tones amongst jazz collectors and is well worth picking up. Musically, its four lengthy tracks - here stretched across two slabs of wax for the first time - are breezy, loose, spiritually and wonderfully detailed, with the fine production picking up each of the musicians' particular tricks and densely layered solos.

Review: Back in the late 90s and early 2000s, Rainer Trueby compiled (or helped to compile) a string of Brazilian-focused compilations for his friends at Compost Records. It's perhaps surprising, then, that it's taken this long for him to get a chance to showcase some gems from his record collection. "Soulgliding" is as smooth, warm and glassy-eyed as you'd expect, with the German DJ/producer serving up a range of mostly obscure jazz-funk, soul-jazz, boogie and slow jam gems. Highlights are plentiful throughout, from the sparse-but-rich synth-soul of Patrice Rushen's "To Each His Own" and the sun-kissed shuffle of Bridge's "Next To Me", to the saccharine sweetness of Crystal Winds' "Lovers Holiday" and the low-slung jazz-funk bounce of "Memories Of Moments" by Demo Cates.

Review: Some four months after he lost his battle with cancer, BBE is releasing Paul 'Trouble' Anderson's final production - a fittingly joyous, upbeat and life-affirming cover of gospel standard "Happy Day" featuring the impassioned vocals of soul singer John Redmond. On the A-side of this 12" edition you'll find the "Classic Main Mix", a bouncy and rubbery fusion of soaring gospel vocals, bumping house beats, mazy organ solos, rubbery disco bass and clipped guitar riffs. It's superb all told, and a fitting final hurrah from one of the UK's most significant DJs of the past 40 years. Over on the flip you'll find the slightly more stripped-back "Classic Dub", where impassioned vocal snippets ride Anderson's killer groove, bouncy pianos and spacey synths.

Review: London DJ Paul Murphy has been entertaining jazz dancers since the late 1970s and is rightly cited by Gilles Peterson (amongst others) as a major influence. Here he offers up a taste of the up-tempo dancefloor jazz he's been championing for the last four decades via a fine compilation named after his once regular club night, Jazz Room. There's plenty of Latin jazz and fusion present (see Art Pepper's "Mambo de la Pinta", Lucas Van Merwijk's "4Beat Cha Cha Cha" and Terje Terasmaa's "Yatra-Ta") as well as African-influenced workouts (see the cuts by Rhythmagic Orchestra and Mamelon), the odd classic (Art Ensemble of Chicago) and a handful of more recent cuts, including an inspired jazz cover of Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" by Blue Mode.

Review: BBE's second trawl through late 20th century deep Japanese jazz is every bit as eye opening and essential as its predecessor, which caused many hearts to flutter when it was released 18 months ago. From start to finish, we're treated to a righteous range of largely little-known tunes, from the spiraling, sun-kissed spirituality of Makoto Terashita Meets Harold Land's epic "Dragon Dance", and the funk-fuelled dancefloor jazz brilliance of Mabumi Yamaguchi Quartet's "Distant Thunder", to the smooth, snaking seductiveness of George Kawaguchi Big Four's "Vietnam" and the synthesizer jazz-funk insanity of Electro Keyboard Orchestra's "Mother Of The Future". A superb selection of genuinely off-kilter and life affirming Japanese gems that should be an essential purchase for both serious and casual jazz fans.

Review: BBE is the kind of label you can trust with any kind of reissue project, and when they call upon DJ Spinna and Kai Alce to look back over the foundations of house music, you know you're about to get a masterclass. This intermittent series has seen the two US DJ/producers picking through seminal house joints, editing the most crucial mixes to fit on a 7" as a neatly presented series for anyone wanting to point out exactly what house music really is. This time around they've turned to Sandee's 'Notice Me' - a Latin house joint from 1988 which rocked clubs like Tunnel and Palladium in NYC and Riviera in Chicago upon its original release.

Review: Song of Island is a private press album that very few people knew about. It is the third long player from pianist Yasuhiro Kohno's trio (he started his career as a member of Japanese rocker Eikichi Yazawa's band) and was recorded live at the jazz club and live house 'Again' in August 1985. This is the first time the album has ever been reissued before and captures a special time in Japanese jazz when it was all about exemplary acoustics performed live by skilled musicians. There is one take on a classic jazz standard here as well as four original pieces.

Review: ***B-STOCK: Creasing to corner of outer sleeve, product unopened & in excellent condition***


BBE's J Jazz masterclass continues unabated with this holy grail issue from Hideyasu Terakawa and his quartet, including Hirosji Fuji in the line-up. This album of live recordings was originally released in 1978 as a private press affair in numbers as low as 100 copies, but now it's been given the ceremonial presentation it deserves. The music is actually a range of covers, as Terakawa and co reinterpret works from US composers such as Wayne Shorter, Frank Foster and Milt Jackson and Jimmy Heath. It's a superlative set loaded with feeling and all the more magic for knowing it was all laid down live, in the moment.

Review: Almost entirely ignored at the time of its original release, Nigerian drumming maestro Remi Kabaka's legendary original LP Son Of Africa has gone down in legend as the defining solo statement of an incendiary drummer, whose contributions to music across the jazz and rock spectrums is credited and felt strongly to this day. A founding member of Afro-jazz band Osibisa, Kabaka is credited for his work with many a Rolling Stone and Beatle, but it's his solo work on this Afro-funk rare gem that really gets the least easy to please among us going. An Afrofuturist statement to the core, its jubilant vocal chants and defiant trumpet lines are but mere pepperings over the boxy, banging body that is Kabaka's live Afrobeat quads.

Review: The Jazz Room is a hotly curated selectors' V/A compiled by jazz expert and BBE label owner Paul Murphy. Following the success of the original comp first released in 2019, this one comes up after a full four years' worth of curating and mulling, and aims to represent the full range of both classic and contemporary jazz sounds, from New Orleans to Latin jazz, in quick succession. Consisting of contemporary jazz versions of the likes of Fela Kuti, Raul Monsalve and, for some reason, The Human League, said contributions by the likes of Cruisic and Clare Fischer aim to trace the - yes, the - comprehensive throughline of jazz from past to present, all while refusing to abstain from BBE's trademark eclecticism. Highlights include 'Rebel No. 23' and Fast 3's Hammond-organ-injected 'Don't You Want Me'. Most importantly, no track goes without a driving, bright-bursting mood of energy.

Review: Techno veteran, DJ, composer, producer and notorious jazz lover Kirk Degiorgio explores both modal and seventies fusion sounds on this new full-length album project for BBE. Session drummer Chris Whitten brings some high-quality stick work to this album alongside Kirk's own signature vintage synth work, heavy percussive breaks and funk-fuelled future grooves. It's an album inspired by the great Library works of the 70s and 80s which, says Kirk, allows him to be "able to express ideas and thoughts in a maximum of two minutes at a time." It is creatively free and musically accomplished, as you would expect from this great British artist.

Review: BBE Music continues to delve into the exceptional back catalogue of Detroit's Strata label. Overall, there's not a huge amount there, with just ten albums released during the imprint's tenure. Nevertheless, what's there has plenty worth diving into, not least the stunning cover designs by iconic jazz poet John Sinclair - aesthetics to set the mood, make no mistake.
Sphere's Inside Ourselves was the third record put out on the platform. Recorded live at the Detroit Institute of Arts on 28th June 1970, and like much of the Strata stuff, this is about boundary-free jazz that captivates and compels the listener as much as it seems to entrance and possess those playing it. Indicative of the overall standard that came out of the camp itself, collective memories of Sphere themselves seem hazy, but John Dana, Jimmy Peluso, Keith Vreeland, Eddie Nuccilli and Larry Nozero made up the outfit, so props to them.