Rhythm & Sound is an alter ego for Mark Ernestus and Moritz Von Oswald aka Maurizio, the German musicians/producers behind the enigmatic Basic Channel, Chain Reaction, M, Main Street and Burial Mix labels. Notoriously, the duo (generally) refuse to b…

Microstoria is a side project of Ovals Markus Popp and Jan St Werner of Mouse on Mars Combining Ovals fetish for CD scarification with MoMs odd instrumentation and breezy subtlely inchoate arrangements the pairs combined efforts come off much as one …

b. 3 October 1936, New York City, USA. Reich studied philosophy at Cornell University and composition at Juilliard School of Music and, moving to California, at Mills College with avant garde composers Luciano Berio and Darius Milhaud. He supported h…

The Headhunters represented a major turning point for Herbie Hancock whose approach to fusion became slicker and more commercial though not without substance or integrity with the formation of this popular band in 1973 Before that the chameleonic pia…

b. Stefan Betke, 18 February 1967, Germany. Betke juxtaposes a love of avant garde and experimental electronic music (To Rococo Rot, Oval) with an affinity for the wayward studio experimentalism of low-end pioneers such as King Tubby and Augustus Pab…

b. Louis Thomas Hardin, 26 May 1916, Marysville, Kansas, USA, d. 8 September 1999, Münster, Germany. This idiosyncratic composer lost his sight at the age of 16 following an accident with a dynamite cap. He was introduced to classical music at the Io…

Paul McCartney's first post-Beatles music venture, Wings achieved eight Top 10 albums in both the UK and US and "Mull Of Kintyre' remains one of the biggest-selling singles of all time. The band was formed during the summer of 1971, Paul and wife Lin…

b. 31 January 1937, Chicago, Illinois, USA. Glass was educated at the University of Chicago and the Juilliard School of Music before going to Paris to study with Nadia Boulanger between 1963 and 1965. By this time he knew that "playing second fiddle …

Vienna-based guitarist Christian Fennesz is one of the citys many artists associated with the noted Mego label which releases mostly freeform ambient and experimental electronica Similar in some respects to the work of Seefeel or Experimental Audio R…

Under various monikers, cellist/producer Arthur Russell is responsible for some of the most groundbreaking post-disco dance records ever made. Though a relatively obscure figure, Russell was instrumental in bringing disco out of the Studio 54s and in…

Along with Freddie Hubbard, Lee Morgan was one of the leading trumpeter/composers of the 1960s hard-bop era. His composition "The Sidewinder" is perhaps THE signature piece of the genre, and is practically the textbook definition of the "boogaloo" gr…

b. Nicholas Currie, Paisley, Scotland. After living in Canada for a spell as a teenager, Currie returned to the UK and, during the mid-80s, began recording on the independent circuit. His primary influence was Jacques Brel, whose earthy sexuality soo…

Combining elements of punk gypsy music and Brecht-ian cabaret Gogol Bordello tells the story of New Yorks immigrant diaspora through debauchery humor and surreal costumes Leader and singer Eugene Htzs taste in music was spun out of black-market tapes…

Pianist and composer Horace Silver was, along with Art Blakey, one of the primary instigators of the hard-bop jazz movement of the 1950s. Silver turned a limited piano technique to his advantage, welding simple but memorable phrases to driving, muscu…

Starting his career in the late 1950s, John Fahey set the standard for instrumental acoustic guitar pieces, both in terms of composition and improvisation. Fahey's unique style, fully realized in the heady days of the late '60s, incorporated traditio…

"Saxophone colossus" is not a bad description for a tenor player who is one of the greatest living jazz artists. Sonny Rollins made his first record date at the age of 19 in the late 1940s, and unlike Parker and Coltrane, the magnitude of his talent …