S/D: Tompkins Square Records

Cannot believe this fantastic label doesn't have a thread yet. I'm still digging, but here's what I've discovered and been spinning to date. No doubt there is more amazing stuff on the label, if you have any pointers or praise, let's hear it!!

Imaginational Anthem parts I-IV :: thoroughly engaging folk/weird/experimental/etc. guitar sets from old and new faces, i've discovered a bunch of amazing players just spinning these over and over.

Shawn David McMillen - Catfish :: Charalambides/Jandek collaborator from Austin TX, very good.

James Blackshaw - everything :: tough to pick a favorite he's got so many great albums. the Sunshrine repressing is lovely (originally on Digitalis), Litany of Echoes is amazing, The Cloud of Unknowing probably the most consistent... but i like them all.

Tim Buckley - Live At The Folklore Center, NYC - March 6,1967 :: amazing, intimate sounding live set from '67 with a handful of songs that never saw release on his studio albums

Fire In My Bones: Raw + Rare + Otherworldly African-American Gospel 1944-2007 :: 3 discs packed with incredible gospel/soul finds, free of pretension and commercial considerations, put together by Mik3 McGon1gal of YETI magazine.

This May Be My Last Time Singing: Raw African-American Gospel on 45RPM 1957-1982 :: sequel to the above comp.... nuff said.

People Take Warning ! Murder Ballads & Disaster Songs, 1913-1938 :: folk songs from the Great Depression era. still just starting to play this one, it's fresh...

William Tyler - Behold The Spirit :: flat out incredible guitarist's debut album (as far as i know) is waaaaayy better than it has any right to be.

Michael Chapman - Trainsong: Guitar Compositions, 1967-2010 :: 2 disc retrospective from a nearly forgotten guitarist. thanks for the heads up Thurston..!

fire in my bones is incredible

To What Strange Place : The Music Of The Ottoman-American Diaspora, 1916-1929

Before the Golden Age of Americana on Record, immigrants from the dissolving Ottoman Empire were singing their joys and sorrows to disc in New York City. The virtuosic musicians from Anatolia, the Eastern Mediterranean, and the Levant living in the U.S. who recorded between WWI and the Depression are presented here across two discs, along with a third disc of masterpieces they imported as memories on shellac-and-stone. The intermingled lives and musics of Christians, Jews, and Muslims represent Middle Eastern culture as it existed within the U.S. a century ago.

A fascinating, new view of American Folk Music. Compiled by IAN NAGOSKI. Designed by Susan Archie.

really a great label! those imaginational anthem things are fantastic.

they reissued Harry Taussig's "Fate Is Only Once" which is a FANTASTIC acoustic guitar record.
william tyler has a track on the recent three-lobed comp, "Eight Trails, One Path" and it's stellar. He also re-issues records via his label Sebastian Speaks. great dude doing god's work.

William Tyler - Behold The Spirit :: flat out incredible guitarist's debut album (as far as i know) is waaaaayy better than it has any right to be.

^^listening now this is amazing

yeah he is a great player -- i want more!

mentioned on the takoma thread, but the forthcoming mark fosson thing T Sq. is putting out is amaaaaazing. www.fretboardjournal.com/audio/mark-fosson-digging-dust-exclusive-stream
and the Michael Chapman trib they just put out is pretty solid as far as tributes go. bridget st. john track is a+++++++++. they need to put out one of her albums. she sounds better than ever.

i have to admit i find a lot of these post-fahey guitarists pretty snoozeworthy. and michael chapman just doesn't really do anything for me. but taste is taste.

huh would've thought michael chapman would be right up your alley. and i know what you mean about some post-Fahey guitarists -- that's sort of what I think when I get another one of these Imaginational Anthem comps, but I always end up enjoying the hell out of them. guess it's some kind of musical comfort food for me at this point.

there's something too tasteful about chapman, or maybe it's just that few of his compositions engage me.

Tim Buckley - Live At The Folklore Center, NYC - March 6,1967 :: amazing, intimate sounding live set from '67 with a handful of songs that never saw release on his studio albums

i realize i am replying to my own post here, but was playing this again today and HOLY SHIT it is so so so good

first thing in the thread shouldve been

http://www.tompkinssquare.com/images/basho_cov.jpg

I would really like my own copy of that.

haaa, that record is great. that cover is something else.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJKhHY2OhEQ

The new collection of old-time music on Tompkins Square is really, really fantastic. I have a predisposition to love this music and had known a lot of the stuff beforehand but the selections and sequencing are impeccable. 19 previously unreissued sides including some really great stuff i had not heard before. great liner notes & a good story behind how the collection came to be as well. I think my one quibble is that their choice of an Alfred Karnes tune would not have been mine. I think some of his other sides are much better than "Where We'll Never Grow Old." But that's just my nitpick.

http://www.tompkinssquare.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/TSQ2783_WorkHardPlayHardPrayHard.900.jpg

New Harry Taussig album on tompkins square is one of my favorites of the year

yeah! i like that album. you checked out the daniel bachman record yet? totally killer.
and the work hard thing is wonderful too. the two-part train thing is my favorite, kind of dreamy.

the daniel bachman reacord is really nice, yeah!

i think my fave thing on the work hard set that i had not heard before was bill chitwood's 'fourth of july at the county fair.' amazing song.

btw guys i was thinking of making some catch-all thread basically like "New Albums That Would Appeal to ppl that post in the Takoma Obscurities" thread, do you think that's a good idea? would be nice to have one thread to go to

would post in that thread.

cool i'll do it later today cuz i just bought a new record that is great & in this vein but wouldn't fit in the takoma or tompkin's square threadzzzz

at first i thought the daniel bachman record was plain and 'tasteful' musicianship and now it's solid and good.

Daniel Bachman is something like 22 years old. He talked about how much work he still has to do to be "great", but to me it is pretty astounding how good he already is.

yeah i kind of had the same reaction as j. to the bachman record at first -- "oh another dude doing *this*" but it's been a record i've played every other day for the past three months or something. and yeah, nuts that he's just 22.

great FMU set up here: http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Daniel_Bachman/Live_at_WFMU_on_Irene_Trudels_Show_on_March_26_2012

at this point i think it's at least that he gives you enough music to be inside of for a while. the arrangements are very thick, the songs shift slowly over time and go places.

but yeah, 22, and dude doesn't even seem that into 'being a (working) musician'.

Yeah, the first song "Untitled" in that WFMU set covers all kinds of cool territory. I am no completist on the solo guitar front, but generally "the more the merrier" if the players can achieve results this good.

I think the dude has a healthy relationship to music, i.e., respects it as a craft and is trying to achieve on a high level, but doesn't imagine that this is going to make him a living. Which it won't really.

here's hoping he doesn't get his hand cut off in an industrial mishap or something.

i'm a zydeco neophyte but nevertheless loved their amede ardoin comp.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fk82td5cwYQ

Joining in to say I'd post in a Takoma fanboy thread but the Takoma obscurities thread/this one kind of work too so I dunno

just saw this thread for the first time! we were talking about some of these (Fire In My Bonees + People Take Warning) in I think in an Anthology of American Folk Music thread -- i love this stuff so much. i used tons of it when i was teaching american history. (folkways has a lot of great stuff that i think is comparable too)

did anyone else catch james blackshaw's twitter rant on what a shitty label this supposedly is? anyway, he's deleted it all by now so i guess they finally paid him.

hey guys i ended up creating the thread for talking about new stuff in this vein that isn't strictly tied to takoma or tompkin's square, join in!

Revolt of the ILX Brigade: New Post-Fahey Folk For PPL that post in the Takoma & Tompkin's Square Threads

too bad that there's bad blood betw. blackshaw and tompkins! can't imagine anyone is getting insanely rich over this stuff, so hopefully it was just a misunderstanding.

lol @ niche musicians expecting much in the way of monetary rewards

http://i1214.photobucket.com/albums/cc497/WardFowler/ny068_zps896c1432.jpg

idgi, no guitar in this photo.
tbh, you're more likely to hear drummers than guitarists at tompkins sq pk

i like just kind of hanging out near dog parks, watchin the dogs, getting dog envy.

2013 Daniel bachman album is A+, thanks for pointing me to it ILX!

George "Smoke" Dawson played banjo in MacGrundy's Old-Timey Wool Thumpers with Peter Stampfel (later of Holy Modal Rounders) in 1960, lived for years at Caffe Lena in Saratoga Springs, NY, and roamed around the US as an itinerant bagpipe and fiddle player for decades. His life is laced with small triumphs, and lots of tragedy. But he's still with us. Tompkins Square reissues his only album, a remarkable 1971 private press LP, on August 19th, 2014. LP/CD/DL

Excerpted notes by reissue producer / Tompkins Square label owner Josh Rosenthal :

I was doing some research for a box set of music recorded at Caffe Lena, the hallowed folk music venue located in Saratoga Springs, NY, when I came upon a photograph of a musician I didn't recognize. He looked like a sixth member of The Band - a handsome fiddler with wax moustache, goatee, black Western hat. There was a traditional air to him, a seriousness, but there was also something wild there. I needed to know who he was, and everything about him. The producers told me his name was Smoke Dawson, and they had tape on him. We listened, and his live version of "Devil's Dream" made it onto the box set. Then I started digging. I found a 1996 blog post from someone named Oliver Seeler, who claimed to have recorded a solo album by Dawson in 1971. I called the number on the site, not expecting much from an 18 year old blog post. But he picked up. He gave me background on the record. And, he gave me Smoke Dawson's phone number . . .

SMOKE DAWSON 'FIDDLE' AVAILABLE AUGUST 19TH
CD : TSQ 5036 / LP : TSQ 5043
Distributed BY INgrooves in NA, Cargo UK for Europe

HEAR / POST A TRACK

https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/connaughtmans-rambles-devils-dream-marche-venerie

AMES BLACKSHAW RELEASES 'FANTôMAS : LE FAUX MAGISTRAT' ON TOMPKINS SQUARE, JULY 8th
Live album features Simon Scott (Slowdive), Duane Pitre

In celebration of the centenary of Louis Feuillade's Fantômas silent film series, James Blackshaw was invited by Yann Tiersen to perform a live score to the fifth and final film, Le Faux Magistrat, at the beautiful and prestigious surroundings of the Théâtre de Châtelet, Paris on October 31st 2013.

Fantômas - a master of disguise and symbol of terror - is one of the most popular characters in French crime fiction, as well as a favourite with the avant-garde, particularly the surrealists.

Tim Hecker, Amiina, Yann Tiersen and Loney Dear also performed during the event (which was broadcast live on the European ARTE channel) each bringing their own unique sonic perspective to the other installments in the series.

Written during the course of a few months, Blackshaw drew influences from French impressionist composers, Brazillian guitar music, musique concrete and the works of other film composer such as David Shire and Pino Donaggio, to create a noirish score that is in turns sinister, quietly profound and thrilling.

Personally invited by James Blackshaw, experimental musicians Duane Pitre and Simon Scott (also of Slowdive) contributed drums, electronics, synth, bowed guitar, bass and more to Blackshaw's nylon string guitar and grand piano, with multi-instrumentalist Charlotte Glasson adding violin, vibraphone and several wind instruments to the 75 minute long work.

Available worldwide July 8th
CD : TSQ 5012 / 2LP : TSQ 5029
Digitally Distributed Worldwide by INgrooves
Distributed by INgrooves for North America, Cargo UK for Europe, Rocket for Australia

James Blackshaw on Tompkins Square :
The Cloud Of Unknowing - TSQ 1967
Litany Of Echoes - TSQ 1738
Lost Prayers & Motionless Dances - TSQ 1851
Celeste - TSQ 1837
Sunshrine - TSQ 1844

Better late than never:

ALICE GERRARD'S 'FOLLOW THE MUSIC' OUT SEPT. 30
Produced by M.C. Taylor (Hiss Golden Messenger). Featuring members of Hiss Golden Messenger and Megafaun

"Alice Gerrard has one of those voices that harkens back to the likes of Sara and Maybelle. She is the real deal with the right stuff and hasn't forgotten where country music came from."
- Emmylou Harris (June, 2014)

** Alice Gerrard turns 80 tomorrow, July 8 ! **

The trailblazing folksinger famously collaborated with Hazel Dickens. Their classic recordings for Folkways and Rounder in the '60's and 70's "rank among the most influential recordings in folk music history," (All Music Guide), and laid the groundwork for many artists, especially female bluegrass and folk musicians.

'Follow The Music' features traditional tunes and original songs by Alice, produced by Hiss Golden Messenger's M.C. Taylor, and features members of Hiss Golden Messenger and Megafaun. Available on LP/CD/DL via Tompkins Square, September 30th, 2014.

Hear / post a track from 'Follow The Music' - "Boll Weevil"
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/boll-weevil-by-alice-gerrard

smoke dawson LP is sounding pretty wonderful...

Nice vinyl sale & streams:

Smoke Dawson's 1971 private press LP "Fiddle" released today on LP/CD/DL !

George "Smoke" Dawson played banjo in MacGrundy's Old-Timey Wool Thumpers with Peter Stampfel (later of Holy Modal Rounders) in 1960, lived for years at Caffe Lena in Saratoga Springs, NY, and roamed around the US as an itinerant bagpipe and fiddle player for decades. His life is laced with small triumphs, and tragedy. Our reissue of his lone 1971 solo album, 'Fiddle', is out now.

To celebrate this release (and make you feel a little better about the end of summer) we're throwing a 25% OFF all VINYL sale. Now Thru August 31, buy two or more LP's off our site, we'll paypal you back the discount. Every purchase of Smoke Dawson will automatically be entered to win a signed copy (pictured below), of which there are only two in the Universe.

Sample our music via Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare

Loving that Smoke opener and a couple more; will have to adjust to others (used to more of a combo w this kind of instrumental music). This just in:

'Get In Union : Bessie Jones with the Georgia Sea Island Singers and Others' - 2CD set out on Tompkins Square, October 28th

* Produced by Grammy-nominated Curator of the Alan Lomax Archive, Nathan Salsburg
* Features 26 previously unreleased tracks. Unheard collaborations with Rev. Gary Davis, Sweet Papa Stovepipe, Mable Hillery, and others.
* Remastered from Lomax's original tapes

Bessie Jones was one of the most popular performers on the 1960s and '70s folk circuit, appearing-usually at the helm of the Georgia Sea Island Singers-at colleges, festivals, the Poor People's March on Washington, and Jimmy Carter's inauguration. "Get In Union" is a collection of her classic recordings with the Singers, combined with many previously unavailable solo and small-group performances captured by Alan Lomax between 1959 and 1966.

Alan Lomax first visited the Georgia Sea Island of St. Simons in June of 1935 with folklorist Mary Elizabeth Barnicle and author Zora Neale Hurston. There they met the remarkable Spiritual Singers Society of Coastal Georgia, as the group was then called, and recorded several hours of their songs and dances for the Library of Congress. Returning 25 years later, Lomax found that the Singers were still active, and had been enriched by the addition of Bessie Jones, a South Georgia native with a massive collection of songs going back to the slavery era. Over the next several years, Lomax and Jones worked together to present, promote, and teach Southern black folk song across the country, from nightclubs to elementary schools. "Get In Union" features freshly remastered audio from 24-bit digital transfers of Lomax's original tapes and notes by the Alan Lomax Archive's Nathan Salsburg and Anna Lomax Wood, who accompanied her father on his 1960 recordings of Bessie Jones and the Georgia Sea Island Singers.

HEAR / SHARE a track: https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/get-in-union

Get In Union : Bessie Jones With The Georgia Sea Island Singers and Others
TSQ 5074 2CD Set Available October 28th on Tompkins Square
Distributed in NA by INgrooves. Cargo UK for Europe. Planet for Australia.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Recent : Smoke Dawson 'Fiddle' / Alice Gerrard 'Follow The Music' / James Blackshaw 'Fantomas : Le Faux Magistrat

Tompkins Square To Release 'When I Reach That Heavenly Shore : Unearthly Black Gospel, 1926-1936' 3CD/3LP Set, DECEMBER 9th, 2014
Produced by 7-Time Grammy nominee Christopher King

Among the most powerful music to be captured on 78 rpm in America during the 1920s & 1930s are those recordings of black sanctified and gospel singing. Ranging from plaintive mourning to unbridled ecstasy, the sacred music from this time period represents a flowering of diverse and idiosyncratic rural songs styles. At no time was there a wider panorama of religious songs in America.

Selected exclusively from Christopher King's private collection, the 78s included here represent the most unhinged, the most compelling survey of pre-war black gospel. Of the 42 tracks in this 3CD/3LP collection, 34 have never been reissued until now. The complete recorded output of the Primitive Baptist Choir of North Carolina is also included in this collection for the first time. Several rare & previously unissued photographs are also contained within. Lovingly and respectfully designed by Susan Archie and firmly grounded in Scripture by Christopher King.

Tompkins Square has been steadily mining the history of black gospel through previous collections - the Grammy-nominated 'He Is My Story : The Sanctified Soul of Arizona Dranes'; 'Fire In My Bones : Raw, Rare & Otherworldly African-American Gospel, 1944-2007'; 'This May Be My Last Time Singing : Raw African-American Gospel on 45RPM, 1957-1982' ; Bessie Jones - 'Get In Union'; and 'I Heard The Angels Singing : Electrifying Black Gospel from the Nashboro Label, 1951-1983'.
Stream/Post track from Soundcloud:
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/let-that-lie-alone-by-edward-w-clayborn

god bless tompkins square.

Oh yeah!

is this another mike mcgonigal joint? i still have a bad taste in my mouth from that guy's poaching other folks' comps.

oh wait, it's chris king.

i probably own 3/4 of this stuff already but what the hell. hard to fault this label. what what.

what was the prob w/ mcgonigal's comps? i hadn't heard anything about it, i don't think? love all of them.

if i'm not mistaken, he simply took the entire tracklist from a famed underground comp of memphis gospel and included it in one of his "own" comps w/o acknowledgment -- may even have taken the "masters" directly from the CDR as well (IIRC i put one of the CDs in my machine and it actually came up as the previous comp)

just kind of tacky is all

oh i missed this part

Of the 42 tracks in this 3CD/3LP collection, 34 have never been reissued until now

nice!

although i have such a surfeit of prewar african-american music that i've gotten kind of jaded about it.... i no longer get a big pang of excitement when i find out about some new collection or even new 78 being discovered.

:(

aww don't be sad. i might not be as immersed in all of this as you, so i'm still finding plenty of exciting old stuff. did you check out that alexis zoumbas thing (also a christopher king project) from earlier this year? amazing.

i'm not so immersed in it these days. mostly listening to japanese pop music from the 1980s.

Not seeing the song listings, but this is a reliable guy, judging by his T. Square track record:

http://www.tompkinssquare.com/images/TSQ2486_SeanSmith_Christmas.mini.jpg

Sean Smith - Christmas

Accomplished Bay Area guitarist Sean Smith has released several albums under his own name, and has produced and contributed to the compilations 'Berkeley Guitar' (TSQ5252, TSQLP5252) and 'Beyond Berkeley Guitar' (TSQ2394).

'Christmas', is a gorgeous contemporary acoustic guitar recording featuring fourteen well-known Christmas classics and two Sean Smith originals. Considering the vast amount of syrupy instrumental music in this genre, "Christmas' is a most welcome holiday album, and one which could well become a classic for many years to come.

Nice, he's great

Tweeted these:
Alice Gerrard, Follow The Music: Strong subtle vox, smokey mountain ballads: most brush by, eerie & beguiling, others hover, waiting 4 train

She ain't no wood nymph tho:

Alice Gerrard, Follow The Music cont: trad & originals, 0 twang or trills needed. Fiddle, acapella, dobro, ragtonk, whatever's right 4 song. Hiss Golden Messenger produces good.

TOMPKINS SQUARE RELEASES THE 7th INSTALLMENT OF 'IMAGINATIONAL ANTHEM', THE ACCLAIMED ACOUSTIC GUITAR SERIES, FEBRUARY 17, 2015

HEAR / POST "Trees Return To Soil" by Slowdive's Simon Scott
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/trees-return-to-soil-by-simon-scott

Tompkins Square's very first release was 'Imaginational Anthem Vol. One' in 2005, featuring American Primitive guitar pioneers like Sandy Bull, Harry Taussig, Max Ochs, Steve Mann and Suni McGrath paired with new jack players like Jack Rose, Brad Barr (Barr Brothers), and Kaki King. The album received wide praise via Rolling Stone, NPR and MOJO, who called the album "Groundbreaking." The pairing of old and new would continue through vols. 1-3. The first three volumes were collected as a box set. Volumes four and five focused solely on all new players, and gave many folks their first taste of Chris Forsyth, Steve Gunn, William Tyler and Daniel Bachman. The first five volumes were collected in a box set, along with a bonus live disc by William Tyler. 'Imaginational Anthem Volume 6 : Origins of American Primitive Guitar' stretched the timeline all the way back to the first recorded solo acoustic guitar performances of the 20's & 30's. Artists like Sylvester Weaver, Sam McGee, Riley Puckett and Lemeul Turner created the template for John Fahey, and all who followed.

'Imaginational Anthem Vol. 7' is compiled by 20 year old guitarist Hayden Pedigo, from Albuquerque, NM. Hayden has recently been featured in Vogue and The FADER
behind his own recent album release, 'Five Steps'. Hayden's selections represent a mature and balanced cross-section across the modern solo acoustic guitar spectrum. As with previous volumes, this one truly represents the state of the art - an area of evolving musical expression that is very vibrant and healthy indeed.

Tompkins Square's entire catalog, including all six volumes of the Imaginational Anthem series and two IA box sets, on sale thru Dec. 15th

Track Listing :

1.On a Slow Passing Through a Ghost Town-Chuck Johnson
2.Culverts-Sean Proper
3.Enchiridion-Norberto Lobo
4.Trees Return to Soil-Simon Scott
5.Sea Retreat-DBH
6.Araucaria-Jordan Norton
7.The Great North American Wilderness-Kyle Fosburgh
8.Something, or Oil Paintings-Christoph Bruhn
9.USA Self-Michael Vallera
10.Red Bud Valley-Dylan Golden Aycock
11.0/3-M.Mucci
12.Shadow Study at 6 am-Mariano Rodriguez
13.Olympic Peninsula Blues-Andrew Weathers
14.My Grandfather's 12 Gauge-Wes Tirey

TSQ5104 Distributed by INgrooves for NA, Cargo UK for Europe

More News :
* We now have a shopping cart on our website to facilitate multiple holiday purchases. Hallelujah !
* Alice Gerrard has received a Grammy nomination for 'Follow The Music', Best Folk Album. Her first nom, the 7th for Tompkins Square.

The previously mentioned Get In Union, by Bessie Jones and the Georgia Sea Island Singers, covers a fair amount of ground (and sea)(and sky, at all times). Work songs, play songs, several kinds of play, and Bible songs: don't know how these last relate to the mainstream of spirituals---pretty sure they go back past what music historians designate as gospel, for the most part. But they are visions, scenes, stories from the Bible, as lived---some levels in there, like maybe if you wanted to add more of the black experience to Divided & United: Songs of the Civil War. Or your own start-from-scratch mixes: there's a lot of lilt, roll, strictness and flexibility. And speaking of living, the title track is one of those with acerbic comments on behavior/attitudes in the congregation (not that some of the play songs aren't uppity; life on islands might get crowded).
Sometimes compelling, rarely less than charming (I'd say "never less," but my attention does wander sometimes, when lyrics and performances get too much like lessons).

"ONCE AGAIN, THE GREATEST THING GOING IN ACOUSTIC GUITAR" - THE FADER

'IMAGINATIONAL ANTHEM VOL. 7' IS HERE !

*** GET CAUGHT UP ! ALL 7 VOLUMES OF IMAGINATIONAL ANTHEM (PLUS A LIVE WILLIAM TYLER BONUS DISC) FOR ONE LOW PRICE, THRU MARCH 1. *** CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS
http://www.tompkinssquare.com/

LISTEN TO THE ENTIRE ALBUM VIA
THE FADERhttp://www.thefader.com/2015/01/30/im-never-going-to-stop-listening-to-imaginational-anthem-vol-7
FRETBOARD JOURNALhttp://www.fretboardjournal.com/audio/album-stream-imaginational-anthem-volume-7
or
RELIX http://www.relix.com/media/audio/album_premiere_imaginational_anthem_vol_7

Tompkins Square's very first release was 'Imaginational Anthem Vol. One' in 2005, featuring American Primitive guitar pioneers like Sandy Bull, Harry Taussig, Max Ochs, Steve Mann and Suni McGrath, alongside new jack players like Jack Rose, Brad Barr (Barr Brothers), and Kaki King. The album received wide praise via Rolling Stone, NPR and MOJO, who called the album "Groundbreaking." The pairing of old and new would continue through vols. 1-3. The first three volumes are collected as a box set. Volumes four and five focused solely on all new players, giving many folks their first taste of Chris Forsyth, Steve Gunn, William Tyler and Daniel Bachman. The first five volumes were collected in a box set, along with a bonus live disc by William Tyler. 'Imaginational Anthem Volume 6 : Origins of American Primitive Guitar' stretched the timeline all the way back to the first recorded solo acoustic guitar performances of the 20's & 30's. Artists like Sylvester Weaver, Sam McGee, Riley Puckett and Lemeul Turner created the template for John Fahey, and all who followed.

'Imaginational Anthem Vol. 7' is compiled by 20 year old guitarist Hayden Pedigo, from Amarillo, TX. Hayden has recently been featured in Vogue and The FADER behind his own recent album release, 'Five Steps'. Hayden's curation represents a balanced cross-section across the modern solo acoustic guitar spectrum. Vol. 7 is also the most geographically diverse of all volumes in the series, with players hailing from Lisbon, Malta, South America and the UK as well as the US. As with previous volumes, this one truly represents the state of the art - an area of evolving musical expression that is very vibrant and healthy indeed.

TSQ5104

Dear Friend,

One of our favorite musicians, Harvey Mandel, celebrates his 70th birthday today, but it is not a happy one.

Tompkins Square's Josh Rosenthal wrote an Appreciation for Aquarium Drunkard.

If you are a media person, we hope you will pick up on this story.

Please read and share. Thank you !

Tompkins Square Label Covers Mandel's achievements and present plight with equal care---brace yourself, but it's worth reading, at the very least...http://www.aquariumdrunkard.com/2015/03/11/harvey-mandel-an-appreciation-on-his-70th-birthday/#more-43771

When I Reach That Heavenly Shore comp on vinyl for record store day!

REMEMBERING MOUNTAINS : UNHEARD SONGS BY KAREN DALTON
RELEASE DATE : MAY 26 ON LP/CD/DIGITAL

Karen Dalton (1937-1993) recorded two studio albums during her lifetime,
neither of which contain any songs she wrote. By the good graces of legendary
guitarist Peter Walker, who oversees Karen's Estate, we are gifted with these
lost lyrics, now given voice by other great women of song.

TRACK LIST :

1) REMEMBERING MOUNTAINS - SHARON VAN ETTEN
2) ALL THAT SHINES IS NOT TRUTH - PATTY GRIFFIN
3) THIS IS OUR LOVE - DIANE CLUCK
4) MY LOVE, MY LOVE - JULIA HOLTER
5) MET AN OLD FRIEND - LUCINDA WILLIAMS
6) SO LONG AGO AND FAR AWAY - MARISSA NADLER
7) BLUE NOTION - LAUREL HALO
8) FOR THE LOVE I'M IN - LARKIN GRIMM
9) DON'T MAKE IT EASY - ISOBEL CAMPBELL
10) AT LAST THE NIGHT HAS ENDED - TARA JANE O'NEIL
11) MET AN OLD FRIEND - JOSEPHINE FOSTER

AVAILABLE ON TOMPKINS SQUARE MAY 26
INgrooves in NA, Cargo UK for EU/UK
CD : TSQ 5173 / LP : TSQ 5180

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0ZlWK-b_KY

That's interesting that Peter Walker oversees her estate

Yeah, I wonder if that helped to get any or all of those singers on there: "Oh wow, the Rainy Day Raga dude has Karen Dalton lyrics for me--?!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDjaOSqxLos

i missed an appearance by him in minneapolis last year because i had to work, really sad about that

NPR has the Patty Griffin cut from that Dalton record streaming:

http://www.npr.org/sections/allsongs/2015/05/21/402031771/new-music-patty-griffin-records-lost-karen-dalton-song

Nice continuation of the soul/gospel sound she perfected on Impossible Dream/Downtown Church.

** TOMPKINS SQUARE SPRING SALE ! NOW THRU JUNE 1 **

FOR US CUSTOMERS : ALL SINGLE-DISC CATALOG CDs AND LPs ARE $9.99 ! (KAREN DALTON CD/LP NOT INCLUDED. BUY WHATEVER YOU LIKE, WE'LL PAYPAL BACK YOUR DISCOUNT)

FOR INT'L CUSTOMERS : BUY ANY FOUR OR MORE ITEMS ON THE SITE, GET $10 BACK VIA PAYPAL
(INCLUDES THE NEW KAREN DALTON CD/LP, IF YOU WANT IT)

GRAB LP's & CD's from Daniel Bachman, Tim Buckley, Ryley Walker, Peter Walker, Dino Valente, Charlie Louvin, Polk Miller, Hiss Golden Messenger, Max Ochs, Grammy-nominated Alice Gerrard, Imaginational Anthem guitar comps, more . . .

The tribute album is the more cohesive for the occasional startling turn, which always quickly turns out (or in) to be appropriate: there are ancient quests, clues, disturbances now as landmarks, back there---but mainly: long gone lovers over troubles, recalled and still savored. Avidly, baby. Which makes some of those (still) startling sounds in the Julia Holtzer track work, building and not disturbing the vibe. Must check out some more Holtzer. Some of it seems too obvious a folkie approach at first, but think it all works (maybe/maybe not the last two cuts, but they are the last two, in any case). Dang, Rainy Day Raga Walker done good! Wonder if he got any turn-downs or no-shows, as surely can happen on these things.

speaking of^ recently discovered that walker put out a small dalton memoir/collection of her writings & songs a few years ago, excerpts here:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/KAREN-DALTON-Songs-Poems-Writings/dp/1939374006/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1434482425&sr=1-1

it's Holter, not Holtzer

Yep, Julia Shammas Holter, will check out more of her stuff. Lime, the CD booklet excerpts material from Walker's round-up of Dalton's writing, incl. his own intro: a memoir of their friendship, which lasted from 1961 'til 1993, the year of her death.

No Lime, that is (so bad with names today).

JOHN HULBURT - OPUS III - Out On Tompkins Square August 28, 2015

https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/the-freak-on-the-black-harley

Guitarist and singer-songwriter Ryley Walker discovered the 1972 private press LP in a Chicago record store, loved what he heard, and teamed with Tompkins Square to produce the reissue.

John Hulburt (1947-2012) was a member of legendary mid-60's Chicago garage rock band The Knaves, whose records were recently reissued by Sundazed. Opus III showcases his exceptional talent on the acoustic guitar, proving somewhat of an anomaly in a city not known for its solo guitar recordings during this era.

Walker writes in his liner notes, "Solo acoustic guitar music was adopted by several in the Berkeley school and the ever expansive roots fanatics in the South, but here in the middle of the country with harsh winters and the landlocked prison of corn fields, it was almost destiny that the amplifier assault of electric blues and controlled chaos of dance music came from the South Side."

Opus III has another notable Chicago connection : It's one of the earliest studio credits for Styx and Ohio Players engineer / producer Barry Mraz. Styx's debut album would also be released in 1972.

The reissue of Opus III includes illuminating liner notes by John Hulburt's sister, Cynthia Fritz; The Knaves' Gene Lubin; and Ryley Walker, as well as vintage photographs.

'Opus III' Originally Released as Clarence Records CR-003, 1972
Recorded at Plynth Studios, Chicago February/March 1972
Engineer : Barry Mraz

PRODUCED FOR REISSUE BY RYLEY WALKER & JOSH ROSENTHAL

Available AUGUST 28, 2015
CD : TSQ 5159 / LP : TSQ 5166
INgrooves in NA, Cargo UK for Europe

tonight:

Tompkins Square ‏@tsq2 27m27 minutes ago

I'm live on @kzsu 6-9pm PST. Stream it :http://kzsu.stanford.edu/live/"> http://kzsu.stanford.edu/live/

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CJrDSQlUAAQxx4y.jpg

MICHAEL CHAPMAN RELEASES NEW ALBUM 'FISH'
AVAILABLE WORLDWIDE SEPTEMBER 25 ON TOMPKINS SQUARE LP/CD/DIG
CELEBRATING HIS 75th BIRTHDAY JAN 24, 2016
U.S. TOUR DATES WITH RYLEY WALKER
In recent years, the revered British guitarist and songwriter has seen his classic Harvest records from the 70's reissued by Light In the Attic, and he's toured with Bill Callahan, Kurt Vile, Thurston Moore and Bonnie "Prince" Billy. On the eve of the Fully Qualified Survivor's 75th birthday, 'Fish' finds Chapman vital as ever. Tompkins Square also released Chapman's 2010 double CD 'Trainsong : Guitar Compositions 1967-2010' and a tribute album, 'Oh Michael, Look What You've Done : Friends Play Michael Chapman' featuring Hiss Golden Messenger, William Tyler, Lucinda Williams and Thurston Moore among others.

"The footnotes and legends that line Chapman's 40-year career are the stuff of thick biographies and fireside storytelling sessions." - PITCHFORK

Chapman will appear at Tompkins Square label's 10th Anniversary Show
at Rough Trade in Brooklyn, NY on October 9th along with Peter Walker, Bob Brown and Ryley Walker. He will also play select dates on the East Coast with Ryley Walker:

10/08/15 North Bethesda, MD (USA) AMP
10/09/15 Brooklyn, NY (USA) Rough Trade
10/10/15 Portland, ME (USA) Waking Windows Music And Arts
10/11/15 Providence, RI (USA) Columbus Theater
10/13/15 Albany, NY (USA) The Low Beat
10/14/15 Northampton, MA (USA) Iron Horse Music Hall

MICHAEL CHAPMAN - FISH - CD: TSQ 5197 / LP : TSQ 5203

Speaking of that 10th Anniversary Show:
http://www.roughtradenyc.com/event/861695-tompkins-square-label-10th-brooklyn

http://cdn.ticketfly.com/i/00/01/62/04/17-elg.jpg

as announced upthread, garage rocker John Hurlburt made a solo acoustic LP, rediscovered/discovered by Ryley Walker, out now on TS; Stereogum compares the vibe to Nick Drake--I haven't had time to check it yet, but here tis, for the moment, on The Fretboard Journal's site:
http://www.fretboardjournal.com/audio/stream-john-hulburts-opus-iii

The Record Store of the Mind
A BOOK BY GRAMMY-NOMINATED PRODUCER AND TOMPKINS SQUARE LABEL FOUNDER JOSH ROSENTHAL
AVAILABLE EVERYWHERE OCTOBER 27th

"Josh Rosenthal is a record man's record man. He is also a musician's record man. He is in the line of Samuel Charters and Harry Smith. In this age where we have access to everything and know the value of nothing, musicians need people like Josh to hear them when no one else can."
- T Bone Burnett

Grammy-nominated producer and Tompkins Square label founder Josh Rosenthal presents his first book, The Record Store of the Mind. Part memoir, part "music criticism," the author ruminates over unsung musical heroes, reflects on thirty years of toil and fandom in the music business, and shamelessly lists some of the LPs in his record collection. Crackling with insightful untold stories, The Record Store of the Mind will surely delight and inspire passionate music lovers ... especially those who have spent way too many hours in record stores.

Celebrating ten years in 2015, Rosenthal's San Francisco-based independent record label Tompkins Square has received seven Grammy nominations and wide acclaim for its diverse catalog of new and archival recordings.

Digital pre-orders:
Kobo
Amazon
Barnes & Noble
iBooks

Paperback pre-order
http://www.tompkinssquare.com/therecordstoreofthemind.html
Book release events :
October 7 - WORD Books, Jersey City NJ (Q&A w/ Amanda Petrusich, author of Do Not Sell At Any Price)
October 17 - Aquarius Records, SF (Litquake Lit Crawl. Also Ann Magnuson)
November 15 - Book Soup, Los Angeles (Q&A w/ Pat Thomas, author of
Listen, Whitey !)
December 5 - Folk Arts Records, San Diego (plus Roscoe Holcomb record release)
(More events to come, check therecordstoreofthemind.com for updates)

Tompkins Square will celebrate its 10th Anniversary with a concert at Rough Trade in Brooklyn on October 9th with Ryley Walker, Peter Walker, Michael Chapman and Bob Brown. Tickets and info:
http://www.roughtradenyc.com/event/861695-tompkins-square-label-10th-brooklyn

'LEGENDS OF OLD -TIME MUSIC : FIFTY YEARS OF COUNTY RECORDS' - A 4-CD BOX SET AVAILABLE NOVEMBER 6, 2015
* Essential Traditional Americana
* 113 tracks. 30 Previously Unreleased.
* Co - produced by multiple Grammy-winner Christopher King

Tompkins Square invites you to check out the new box set from our friends at County Records. County has long been one of our favorite labels, so we are sharing their information with the press community in the hope that you will want to cover this monumental set. This treasure belongs in every traditional music fan's collection, right next to Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music.

'Legends of Old-Time Music' is a deluxe 4-CD box set containing one hundred thirteen old-time performances recorded for County Records from the 1960s to the 1990s.

Originally issued primarily on LP, most of these tracks have never been released on CD. Thirty of the tracks are previously unissued and heard for their very first time in this edition. Collected and recorded by Charlie Faurot, Bobby Fulcher, Rich Nevins, Barry Poss and others, these performances are among the very best old-time recordings made by "true-vine" musicians. Legendary performers include: John Ashby, E.C. Ball, Fred Cockerham, Kyle Creed, Tommy Jarrell, Clark Kessinger, Steve Ledford, Hiram Stamper, Wade Ward, Melvin Wine and many others.

This set contains a 28-page booklet with notes by Kinney Rorrer, annotations by the late Charlie Faurot and Kinney Rorrer, several
unpublished photos of musicians, and essays.

Ten Years of Tompkin Square---they've posted a playlist:
https://play.spotify.com/album/62O6ew7v2Z3qL2nK5SJCTn?play=true&utm_source=open.spotify.com&utm_medium=open

and a listening companion to the book Playground of the Mind:

https://play.spotify.com/user/tompkinssquare/playlist/6MNJ5c9qZb0ScEOcsQtXA5?play=true&utm_source=open.spotify.com&utm_medium=open

Such a great label wish I didn't hear so many bad things abt the dude that runs it

??

ROSCOE HOLCOMB
SAN DIEGO FOLK FESTIVAL 1972
LIMITED EDITION VINYL LP NOVEMBER 27th, 2015
CD & DIGITAL DECEMBER 4th, 2015

POST / SHARE A TRACK : "SINGLE GIRL"
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/single-girl-roscoe-holcomb

Tompkins Square label is proud to announce the release of the first commercially available full live concert recording of old-time legend Roscoe Holcomb. The vinyl LP will be released in limited quantity on Black Friday via independent record stores. The CD and digital versions will be available widely on December 4th.

Discovered by folklorist John Cohen in 1959 in East Kentucky, Roscoe Holcomb is among the most revered traditional musicians to emerge during the folk boom of the 60's. A favorite of Bob Dylan (who name-checked him in his 2014 MusiCares speech), Eric Clapton, and many others, Holcomb's high lonesome singing and driving banjo style can be heard on several classic Folkways recordings.

San Diego Folk Festival 1972 was recorded at the annual event produced by Lou Curtiss, who provides insightful notes on how the concert came together. John Cohen, author of 'The High Lonesome Sound' (Steidl) also contributes new notes to the set. Previously unseen photographs from the event were shot by Virginia Curtiss. Jean Ritchie duets with Holcomb on a beautiful eight-minute version of 'Wandering Boy'.

CD : TSQ 5210 / LP : TSQ 5227
Tompkins Square is distributed by INgrooves and REVOLVER in NA, Cargo UK for Europe

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/5a/Roscoeholcomb.JPG

Quite a good album, posted about it on the Roscoe Holcombe thread. Re the xpost rediscovered Hurlbert LP, here's a follow-up:

SUNRISE : BILL MACKAY PLAYS THE SONGS OF JOHN HULBURT
Available now on Tompkins Square via every digital service, worldwide (also LP & CD)


Hear / Post "Sunrise" performed by Bill MacKay
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/sunrise-bill-mackay

Tompkins Square and Ryley Walker teamed up to produce a reissue of guitarist John Hulburt's 1972 private press LP, Opus III, released in 2015. Ryley and Bill MacKay released their duo LP, Land of Plenty, this year as well. And now Bill MacKay releases his own album of John Hulburt tunes !

Through his extensive work in creative folk, experimental rock, and improvised jazz, Bill MacKay has emerged as a highly inventive composer-songwriter and versatile, unpredictable guitarist. MacKay's recent releases include a duo record with Ryley Walker entitled 'Land of Plenty', and 'Altamira', the third recording by his band Darts & Arrows. MacKay is now featured on Tompkins Square in a unique setting playing music by Chicago folk legend John Hulburt.

'Sunrise: Bill MacKay plays the songs of John Hulburt' features MacKay's intimate takes on a handful of songs from Hulburt's 'Opus III' LP. 'Opus III' demonstrates Hulburt's incisive and melodic songwriting and sure command of fingerstyle guitar.

Rather than radically reinterpret the material, MacKay chose to largely follow the contours and melodic structures of Hulburt's originals while imparting his own unique phrasing and colors to the arrangements. His very personal interpretations on Sunrise should lead listeners not only to 'Opus III', but also to MacKay's own impressive and diverse catalog of songs and sounds.

** This release is dedicated to the memory of Gene Lubin, John Hulburt's dear friend and bandmate in The Knaves, who passed away on December 10th, age 71. Gene graciously gave us notes and photographs for the Opus III reissue, and was an inspiration to Bill, Ryley, and so many other musicians **

The Record Store of the Mind
Book Tour 2016
17 Cities. 17 Special Guests.

"One of the most thoroughly enjoyable, informative, wise and good-hearted books ever written about music and the industry"
-- MOJO * * * * 4 STARS

"What pulls its disparate elements together is the accommodating warmth and wit of his writing and the wealth of great stories he has to tell"
-- UNCUT 8/10

Tompkins Square label's Josh Rosenthal will read from his new book, 'The Record Store of the Mind', w/ Special Guests :

April 2 - Deep Thoughts, Jamaica Plain MA w/ Sam Moss
April 3 - Feeding Tube Records, Northampton MA w/ Trevor Healy
April 4 - Albany Public Library, Albany NY w/ Mike Eck
April 5 - Rocket 99, Kingston NY w/ Peter Walker
April 6 - Secret Project Robot, Brooklyn NY w/ Kid Millions, Harry Taussig
April 7 - Brickbat Books, Philadelphia PA w/ Chris Forsyth
April 8 - Red Onion Records & Books, Washington DC w/ Bob Brown
April 9 - Atomic Books, Baltimore MD w/ Max Ochs
April 10 - Steady Sounds, Richmond VA w/ Diane Cluck, Mark Fosson
April 12 - Flyleaf Books, Chapel Hill NC w/ Steven Weiss (UNC)
April 13 - Horizon Records, Greenville SC w/ Wes Tirey
April 14 - Downtown Books, Asheville NC w/ Wes Tirey
April 15 - A Cappella Books, Atlanta GA w/ Tyler Higgins
April 16 - Grimey's, Nashville TN - Record Store Day DJ set & signing
April 17 - Carmichael's Bookstore, Louisville KY w/ Nathan Salsburg
April 18 - Boxcar Books, Bloomington IN - A Bill Wilson tribute
April 20 - CityLit Books, Chicago IL w/ Mike Vallera

Media Inquiries

'The Record Store of the Mind' by Josh Rosenthal
Praised by The Believer, Oxford American, Boing Boing, Record Collector (5/5)......
ISBN : 9781625179135
Retailers : Available via Ingram, Baker & Taylor, Think Indie, Revolver

'THE RECORD STORE OF THE MIND' SPOTIFY PLAYLIST
https://player.spotify.com/user/tompkinssquare/playlist/6MNJ5c9qZb0ScEOcsQtXA5

"Josh Rosenthal is a record man's record man. He is also a musician's record man. He is in the line of Samuel Charters and Harry Smith. In this age where we have access to everything and know the value of nothing, musicians need people like Josh to hear them when no one else can."
- T Bone Burnett

Grammy-nominated producer and Tompkins Square label founder Josh Rosenthal presents his first book, The Record Store of the Mind. Part memoir, part "music criticism," the author ruminates over unsung musical heroes, reflects on thirty years of toil and fandom in the music business, and shamelessly lists some of the LPs in his record collection. Crackling with insightful untold stories, The Record Store of the Mind will surely delight and inspire passionate music lovers ... especially those who have spent way too many hours in record stores.

Celebrating ten years in 2015, Rosenthal's San Francisco-based independent record label Tompkins Square has received seven Grammy nominations and wide acclaim for its diverse catalog of new and archival recordings.

ALSO :

> Check out the new Tompkins Square model guitar, built by Trevor Healy ! Video (linked in article) features William Tyler, Ryler Walker, Chris Forsyth and more. https://www.fretboardjournal.com/video/tompkins-squares-10th-anniversary-guitar

> Roscoe Holcomb 'Live at San Diego State Folk Festival 1972' recently
featured in The New Yorker http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-discovery-of-roscoe-holcomb-and-the-high-lonesome-sound?intcid=mod-latest

BEYOND THE CONFESSION : KID MILLIONS REWORKS HARRY TAUSSIG
AVAILABLE AS A LIMITED EDITION VINYL LP FOR RECORD STORE DAY

NEW HARRY TAUSSIG LP, TOO LATE TO DIE YOUNG, OUT APRIL 22

HEAR / POST A TRACK FROM 'BEYOND THE CONFESSION :
KID MILLIONS REWORKS HARRY TAUSSIG'
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/piano-wire

HEAR / POST A TRACK FROM 'BEYOND THE CONFESSION :
KID MILLIONS REWORKS HARRY TAUSSIG'

HEAR / POST A TRACK FROM HARRY TAUSSIG'S FORTHCOMING ALBUM,
'TOO LATE TO DIE YOUNG'
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/where-sparkling-stars-twire

Kid Millions is a musician, composer and writer best known as the drummer and founder of Brooklyn's experimental rock behemoth Oneida. For the last twenty years, Millions has been at the forefront of the NYC experimental music community collaborating with artists as varied as Laurie Anderson, Yo La Tengo, Boredoms, So Percussion and William Basinski.

Enter his album-length conversation with the recordings of the unjustly obscure guitarist Harry Taussig, whose 1965 private-press album Fate Is Only Once was reissued by Tompkins Square in 2006. This strange gem was followed by two new Taussig recordings - Fate Is Only Twice (2012) and The Diamond of Lost Alphabets (2014). Tompkins Square proposed that Millions take this raw material and fashion something completely new. Millions took the material up to Kingston NY and through working with his engineer Matthew Cullen emerged with an album of rare beauty in keeping with the spirit of Taussig's work while suggesting directions previously unexplored in his oeuvre. To create this new work, Millions and Cullen overdubbed guitars, drums and organs onto the original tracks and sent the material into other damaged psychedelic dimensions only hinted at in the original works.

Millions writes in the liner notes, "[Taussig is] not slavishly attended to technique but we also don't feel any boundaries to his expression. One of his classic tunes is subtitled "Fantasia in A" and in a way this term is a perfect label for his entire oeuvre. A fantasia is an improvisation that touches on many themes and styles. Some of his songs are very tight and tidy and I was drawn to some of them. But I also wanted to stretch these moments of loose revelation and turn a spotlight on Taussig's generous search."

We're left with a kind of revelation - a so-called "remix" album which can actually stand on its own and illuminate both artists' work.

* Kid Millions and Harry Taussig will perform at Secret Project Robot, Brooklyn NY on April 6th to celebrate the release. This will be Taussig's first-ever concert in New York City. Tompkins Square's Josh Rosenthal will also read from his new book, The Record Store of the Mind

TSQ 5234 / AVAILABLE VIA INDEPENDENT RECORD STORES ON RECORD STORE DAY, APRIL 16th. FIND A STORE NEAR YOU
http://www.recordstoreday.com/Stores

TOMPKINS SQUARE LABEL REISSUES TWO LP's BY BOB BROWN;
'THE WALL I BUILT MYSELF' (1970) & 'WILLOUGHBY'S LAMENT' (1971). BOTH PRODUCED BY RICHIE HAVENS, ORIGINALLY RELEASED ON HAVENS' STORMY FOREST LABEL.
AVAILABLE WORLDWIDE MAY 13th - LP/CD/DIGITAL

HEAR / POST A TRACK
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/it-takes-the-world-to-make-a-feather-fall-bob-brown

The first legit reissues of these rare, stellar LP's by DC-based singer/songwriter Bob Brown. Richie Havens took Bob under his wing, produced both albums, and released them on his Stormy Forest label distributed by MGM. Although they failed to make a commercial impact at the time, cosmic-folk enthusiasts and vinyl-heads have long placed these albums in high esteem alongside the works of exploratory greats like Tim Hardin and Tim Buckley.

Bob is still with us. He recently performed with Ryley Walker's band at Tompkins Square's 10th Anniversary show at Rough Trade, and he'll make special appearances to celebrate the reissues :

April 8th - Red Onion Records & Books, Washington DC (w/ Tompkins Square's Josh Rosenthal reading his book, The Record Store of the Mind) (6pm)

June 29th - Joe's Pub, NYC (9:30pm)

Available Worldwide May 13th, 2016
The Wall I Built Myself (CD : TSQ 5111 / LP : TSQ 5128)
Willoughby's Lament (CD : TSQ5135 / LP : TSQ 5142)
Tompkins Square is distributed by INgrooves and REVOLVER in NA, Cargo UK for Europe

What a voice--the soundcloud post in there between Karen Carpenter and Tim Buckley

Higher than Karen's? But the poise, with slightly precarious balance of both voices

TOMPKINS SQUARE LABEL SIGNS IRELAND'S BRIGID MAE POWER

Irish singer/songwriter Brigid Mae Power has shared stages with Lee Ranaldo, Alasdair Roberts, Richard Dawson, and Ryley Walker.

Born in London to a big Irish family, she moved to Ireland (Galway) when she was twelve years old. In addition to the guitar, she plays accordion, baritone ukulele, piano and harmonium; creating hauntingly dreamlike soundscapes.

Her self-titled debut album, recorded with Oregon-based musician Peter Broderick, will be released worldwide by Tompkins Square on LP, CD and digital on June 10th, 2016.

LISTEN / POST A TRACK
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/its-clearing-now-by-brigid-mae-power

^^^sounds good!

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a1242850928_16.jpg

https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/the-diamond-of-lost-alphabets

Imaginational Anthem vol. 8 : The Private Press
Out September 16th on Tompkins Square
2LP set (only 500 - ltd ed) / CD / Digital

8th volume of the acclaimed acoustic guitar series focuses on impossibly rare private press recordings 1968-1995

The guy who taught Bob Dylan how to fingerpick. A sitar gifted by Jimi Hendrix. Among other obscure tales . . .

LISTEN /POST Gary Salzman "The Secret Forces of Nature" (1968)
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/the-secret-forces-of-nature-by-gary-salzman-68-from-ia-vol-8-the-private-press
ompkins Square label presents the 8th volume of Imaginational Anthem, the acclaimed series focusing on acoustic guitar, particularly in the American Primitive vein.

Since 2005, the series has revived interest in old masters of the genre while also giving many folks their very first taste of artists like William Tyler, Steve Gunn, Chris Forsyth or Daniel Bachman.

Volume 8, compiled by hardcore record collectors Michael Klausman (former used LP buyer for NYC's recently shuttered Other Music) and Brooks Rice, features some of the best and most obscure private press guitar records virtually no one has heard. In fact, so-called guitar soli expert, Tompkins Square owner Josh Rosenthal, had never heard of a single artist on the comp (except for Perry Lederman, whose track was Josh's sole contribution to the collection). "Just goes to show what a bottomless pit music discovery from the past continues to be. There's just no end to all the riches from past decades."

Amidst the obscure entries are bits of rock-star lore; Joe Bethancourt was supposedly given a sitar by an admiring Jimi Hendrix, and Perry Lederman was reportedly responsible for teaching Bob Dylan how to fingerpick. But the true joy of this collection is derived from discovering incredible acoustic guitar performances completely lost to time. Until now.

BINGE-LISTEN TO ALL 7 volumes of Imaginational Anthem on Spotify
https://play.spotify.com/user/tompkinssquare/playlist/5W9uRE4Yfhmm4X74lcT7Qw?play=true&utm_source=open.spotify.com&utm_medium=open

2LP Gatefold set (Ltd 500) : TSQ 5289
CD : TSQ 5272
Distributed by INgrooves and Revolver in NA, Cargo UK for Europe

Tompkins Square Catalog: http://www.tompkinssquare.com/releases.html

IMAGINATIONAL ANTHEM vol. 8 :
THE PRIVATE PRESS

1. One Kind Favor Perry Lederman
2. Snow Queen The Keithe Lowrie Duet
3. Obadiah Michael Kleniec
4. Where The Pinery Narrows Lee Murdock
5. White Pines Tom Armstrong
6. Raga Joe Bethancourt
7. The Presence Kip Dobler
8. Wen Also Found Herb Moore
9. That Spanish Thing Nancy Tucker
10. The Diamond Cutter Jackdaw
11. Missy Christa Rick Dietrick
12. The Secret Forces of Nature Gary Salzman
13. Prayer Blessing Stan Samole
14. Blue Wind Boy Russell Potter

Thought I'd just stick this here (from the Rolling Takoma thread)

got to check out the new imaginational anthem - private press thing coming out soon, and seriously, it is fantastic. not the same old-same old by any stretch. lots of interesting surprises, all killer no filler.

― tylerw, Tuesday, August 9, 2016 3:37 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

You were right when you said exactly the same thing about the latest Wayfaring Strangers so I'll take your word for this one too.

― Evan, Tuesday, August 9, 2016 3:49 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Speaking of IA Vol. 8, think somebody on here was asking about track list? Just posted that & other info, with a couple audio links, on the Tompkins Square thread.

― dow, Tuesday, August 9, 2016 5:11 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Saw that, thanks! So is this all stuff with vocals or guitar soli style?

― Wimmels, Tuesday, August 9, 2016 5:44 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

all instrumental, mostly acoustic

― tylerw, Tuesday, August 9, 2016 5:48 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Ah, great! Gonna pre-order this one. Thanks.

― Wimmels, Tuesday, August 9, 2016 6:59 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Just had the promo for this - cracking cover! Some of those titles, though - the genre is ripe for parody, innit.

― Sunn O))) Brother Where Art Thou? (Chinaski), Tuesday, August 9, 2016 7:03 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Tyler's right, this is a great comp. The stuff on here I'm not immediately connecting with has less to do with the quality of those tunes as it does my relationship to some of these styles and my personal saturation point irt Westernized 'ragas' (give me "East West," Peter Walker, and Sandy Bull, and I'm good for like three lifetimes) and the endless "bluesy and bendy" recitations of things that all sound like variations on One Kind Favor / Satan Your Kingdom Must Come Down / Cannon Ball Rag / etc. The tracks on here that fall into those camps are very good, they just don't move me. Stuff like Stan Samole's "Prayer Blessing" and Herb Moore's "Wen Also Found," though - whoo boy, those are hitting the spot.

I'm like most of you in that all but one or two names here are completely unfamiliar to me (which, as someone else said, is kinda insane if you think about it), and though the temptation is always great to just seek out the full albums by the three or four players you like most on the comp and forget to buy the comp, I'm glad I pre-ordered this one and look forward to many more spins.

― Wimmels, Wednesday, August 10, 2016 11:35 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

LEGENDARY GUITARIST HARVEY MANDEL TEAMS WITH RYLEY WALKER COHORTS FOR EXTRAORDINARY LATE-CAREER ALBUM

Snake Pit out November 18th on Tompkins Square LP/CD/Digital

Listen/Post:
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/snake-pit

Harvey Mandel is among the most innovative guitarists to emerge from the Chicago blues scene of the late 1960s. His career began at Twist City and other local hotspots, sharing stages with Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf and Buddy Guy. He came up in that scene alongside Charlie Musselwhite, Mike Bloomfield, Barry Goldberg and Steve Miller, leading to an invitation from Bill Graham to open for Cream at San Francisco's Fillmore Auditorium in August 1967.

Mandel was a member of Canned Heat, appearing with them at Woodstock. He played on numerous John Mayall albums, and on the Rolling Stones' 1975 LP Black and Blue ("Hot Stuff", "Memory Motel"), having auditioned for Mick Taylor's job, which ultimately went to Ron Wood.

Known for his "tapping" technique and sinewy, sustain-driven phrasing (thus his nickname, "The Snake"), Mandel's solo albums such as Cristo Redentor, Baby Batter and Righteous have been sampled and drooled over by guitar geeks, DJ's, and fans of funky, soulful, otherworldly composition.

Harvey's fifteenth studio LP and his first widely distributed album in 20 years, Snake Pit was recorded in two days at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley, CA. Harvey teamed with fellow Chicago-based musicians Ben Boye (keys), Ryan Jewell (drums), Brian Sulpizio (guitar), and Anton Hatwich (bass), who have all played with singer/songwriter Ryley Walker, among their many other musical pursuits. Harvey and the band had not met previously, nor had they rehearsed. He played snippets of song ideas for the band on his iPhone, and then they would lay down a track in one or two takes. Hard to believe when you hear the album, but that's exactly how it went down. Minimal overdubs with strings and percussion were added, but mostly what you hear is what happened spontaneously in the studio. The album contains six new original compositions by Mandel and two revisited songs : "Baby Batter" from his 1971 Janus LP of the same name, and "Before Six" by Larry Frazier, which appears on his first album, Cristo Redentor.

Snake Pit marks a spirited return in a career that now spans six decades -- all the more intense and poignant given Harvey's recent battle with cancer.

Read more about Harvey Mandel via Aquarium Drunkard:
http://www.aquariumdrunkard.com/2015/03/11/harvey-mandel-an-appreciation-on-his-70th-birthday/

Track list:
Snake Pit
Space Monkeys
NightinGail
Baby Batter
JackHammer
Buckaroo
Before Six
Ode to B.B.
Harvey Mandel - Guitar
Ben Boye - Keys
Anton Hatwich - Bass
Ryan Jewell - Drums
Brian J Sulpizio - Guitar
Jose Najera - Percussion
Recorded at Fantasy Studios
Real strings arranged and performed by Dick Bright
Produced by Harvey Mandel and Josh Rosenthal
Recorded & mixed by Jesse Nichols
Mastered by George Horn

Had missed Richard Crandall's TSQ reissue In The Flower Of Our Youth 'til tylerw's recent tweet about listening to it, and just got this about his new album:

Eugene-based guitarist Richard Crandell's 1980 private-press LP
In The Flower of Our Youth is one of our favorite rainy day / road trippin' solo guitar records. Reissued on Tompkins Square in 2008, it captures the aura of the Pacific Northwest in unique and powerful ways.

Crandell's struggle with Essential Tremor moved him toward the mbira (African thumb piano), and he recorded on the instrument for John Zorn's Tzadik label. But Richard has returned to the guitar at times. Then And Now is comprised of material recorded over the past 25 years, some recorded this year, all previously unreleased.
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/swallowtails-by-richard-crandell

Here is Richard's own take on the new album, Then And Now :

"Most of these recordings were discovered about five years ago. They were recorded on a DAT recorder in the '90s. "Road Trip" was in standard guitar tuning, capo on the 2nd fret, inspired by my 50-state 'American Friends' tour. "Funk Dat" (love the blues), "Haley Suite" (love Bach) and "Route 22" (love Tennessee) were tuned in DADEAD, capo on the 2nd fret. "Over/Under" (love John Fahey) was in dropped D tuning with the capo on the 2nd fret. "V-Blues" (love Scott Joplin) was in DADGAD, capo 2. It was the only tune which I've written that has a modulation by "brute force." "American Friends" was my 12-string rendition of a Bill Bartels' classic, reflecting his Virginia roots. "Swallowtails" was a solo 12-string version of a duet which I wrote in the early '80's. I like my foot-tapping on this one. The duet was originally on Oregon Hill with Bill Bartels. "Unknown Lament" was a 12-string piece from the same album. This solo version has a unique coda. "Down to Earth" was recorded 3 years ago. and was written in CGDGBE, a tuning which Tim Danforth showed me. The last tune, "Cinema Verité", was recorded a couple of weeks ago, on Kyle Lindros' ukulele. It is my only uke composition. Kyle's dad Billy, named it, as well as In The Flower Of Our Youth and many of my other tunes. English is my second language. Music is my first. Especially rhythm. Enjoy!"

Then And Now is now available via every digital service, worldwide.

Available Everywhere Jan 27, 2017

Richard Osborn, Endless

https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/in-a-monastery-garden-by-richard-obsorn"> https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/in-a-monastery-garden-by-richard-obsorn

First-generation American Primitive guitarist Richard Osborn studied with Robbie Basho in the late 60's. 40 years later, Osborn finally recorded, appearing on Tompkins Square's 'Beyond Berkeley Guitar' comp in 2010. 'Endless' is his first widely available solo guitar album.
LP (TSQ5340) ltd. ed of 500 / CD (TSQ5333)

"[Osborn has] an unhurried, quiet spirit of adventure, a love of ringing strings and slowly revelatory meditations on the natural world."- Acoustic Guitar

"He's a student of mine and he's better technically than me or Fahey."
- Robbie Basho

Acoustic Guitar Sessions Presents Richard Osborn's Steel-String Ragas:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgFWiJ4hJoA

awesome, he's Proper, looking forward to it

yeah, this one was pretty great: https://richardosborn.bandcamp.com/album/freehand

Tompkins Square to Reissue Rare 1975 Private-Press LP by Philip Lewin, Available on LP/CD/digital 2.24.17

"Phil Lewin's homespun debut is a loner folk masterpiece; accidentally psychedelic, lit by heartbreak and timeless in its sadness and hope."
- Jeff Conklin, WFMU

Philip Lewin
Am I Really Here All Alone ?
1975 Private-press LP (only 300 signed and numbered copies pressed at the time) now remastered from the original tapes.
HEAR / SHARE A SONG
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/watercolours-by-philip-lewin

In his own words, today :

In 1967 I began my life in the student union of a university. In other words, I was in school. But, classes definitely took a back seat to people-watching and attempts at relationships. I would not say that I was particularly good at the latter, but I made a great observer. I even stayed near the school community for an extra year until an opportunity came up to move in with friends in Toronto, Canada, which turned out to be a pivotal opportunity for me.

I was once told that one should first write about one's own experiences, then, expand to documenting the observed experiences of those around, and, finally write about what one imagines. Am I Really Here All Alone? encompasses all of the above. Something else I realized in writing lyrics is that sometimes it is good to be transparent about the meaning and others times, not so much. "Unusual Day" is an example of me being honest struggling to develop and maintain a relationship, but ultimately realizing it was not going to succeed. "Watercolours" documents a crushing experience, but is couched in metaphor. I hope that listeners will relate through their own experiences, and because my reality is implied, not specified, will not be limited to mine. "Sweet Georgia" is an example of me, as a writer, leaving my personal space. I think of it as an attempt to clone William Faulkner to Bobbie Gentry. "The Magic Within You" is actually a commission where I was asked to write a song for a benefit to be performed by Doug Henning, the groundbreaking stage magician and friend. I once heard John Prine complain that there was no point in writing a 'train song' because Steve Goodman had already written the perfect one with "City of New Orleans". Naturally, I had to write "Back Home, To You", my idea of a train song where I tried to capture the movement of the train in the rhythm of the guitar. As for the other six songs, to me, they all reflect realities, experienced, observed and imagined. Descartes said, "I think, therefore I am." However my question is, "Am I Really Here All Alone?"

-Philip Lewin, 2017

LP (ltd 750) - TSQ 5326 / CD - TSQ 5319

Listening to this Lewin LP, it's pretty great

https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/am-i-really-here-all-alone

You know, it's weird: I always though this was a pretty good / above average psych folk record, but then I heard the far-less loved follow up, Diamond Love and it was way more my speed. Totally different vibe (more cocaine-and-jacuzzi / real people than stoned / pensive), an entirely different mood. If you have any interest whatsoever in that style, it's worth finding!

yeah, i just had a friend tell me the same thing -- kinda more of a full-band boogie thing?
i like the one Tompkins just released, though (though occasionally that noodly lead guitar action wears thin).

Good news about this guy today:

Legendary guitarist Harvey "The Snake" Mandel (Canned Heat, John Mayall, Rolling Stones) has had quite a week in support of his new album, Snake Pit. His MOJO interview just hit, he was featured on NPR World Cafe, he announced a show in Chicago with Ryley Walker's crew backing him up (May 13th, Martyr's), and today is his BIRTHDAY !

Tompkins Square's Josh Rosenthal wrote about Harvey in honor of his 70th birthday two years ago.http://www.aquariumdrunkard.com/2015/03/11/harvey-mandel-an-appreciation-on-his-70th-birthday/ A couple of things have changed since then - Harvey is presently cancer-free, and Tompkins Square released Snake Pit, his most acclaimed new album in decades.

BUY 'Snake Pit' on LP/CD

"Mandel's trademark sound is as supple and searing as molten steel" - DOWNBEAT Editor's Pick
"A storming return to the fray" - MOJO, 4 Stars
"True musical heroes are hard to find, and Snake Pit could be the album that finally gets Mandel his due as a top-shelf guitar savior" - CHICAGO READER

Snake Pit - TSQ 5296 CD / TSQ 5302 LP - Tompkins Square is distributed by INgrooves and Revolver in NA, Cargo UK for Europe

wait rolling stones? when?

ha, i think he auditioned in the mid 70s (and maybe plays on a track on Black and Blue?)

looked it up, yeah he plays on "hot stuff" and "memory motel"

Yeah---Wood wasn't totally settled in, so they also had Mandel and Wayne Perkins and maybe some others.

A Weekly Sale from Tompkins Square

Each Friday, we select 4 titles from our deep catalog under a theme, and they're 5 bucks each. Sometimes CD, sometimes vinyl. The only catch is you gotta buy all four, which is still a pretty good deal.

Inevitably, when we do a limited edition piece, we wind up with a few extra boxes around the ol' HQ. Here's what's on offer this week ! :

Roscoe Holcomb - San Diego Folk Festival 1972 - Vinyl LP
Michael Hurley - 78rpm 10" vinyl
Dillard Chandler - The End of An Old Song - Vinyl LP
Tyler Ramsey (of Band of Horses) - 78rpm 10" vinyl

For all 4 items above, paypal $20 directly to :
orders at tompkins square dot com
For Canada, add $25
For the rest of the world, add $35

The deal is good til next Friday, when we'll pick another four titles for you.

Brigid Mae Power is releasing some new stuff (not on Tompkins Square, but her album from last year was so good I figured i'd post it here nonetheless)

https://soundcloud.com/oscarson/brigid-mae-power-i-dont-know-how-to-do-this-naturally/s-EzcTA

5ive Dollar Fridays ! A Weekly Sale from Tompkins Square

This Week : A Salute to Harry Taussig

Today (March 31) is pioneering American Primitive Guitarist Harry Taussig's 76th birthday !

He released a private press LP in 1965, Fate Is Only Once, reissued by Tompkins Square in 2006, and has recorded three more albums for the label. Harry was also honored with a recent tribute/remix album by Oneida drummer Kid Millions.

Tompkins Square will release a new Taussig/Max Ochs joint LP, out May 26th, to mark the 50th Anniversary of Contemporary Guitar, Spring '67, a Takoma sampler which featured Max, Harry, Bukka White, Robbie Basho and John Fahey. Harry will also play select dates with Max on the West Coast in support of the new release !
More on that new LP and tour here.
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/into-the-veil-of-years-by-harry-taussig

Meanwhile, we celebrate Harry's birthday with a sale (see label site; it's his stuff and other)

You did what you could back then:

http://www.tompkinssquare.com/tomarmstrong.html

Tompkins Square's recent double-LP, Imaginational Anthem vol. 8 : The Private Press, shed light on forgotten, impossibly rare guitar recordings spanning several decades. Tom Armstrong's The Sky Is An Empty Eye is the first of several reissues planned by Tompkins Square of full albums by artists featured on IA8.

Armstrong's self-released LP from 1987 sports blissed out acoustic numbers like the one featured on IA8, along with some electric workouts and even a deep psych vocal tune.

In his own words, today

..."In 1984 I was offered a half partnership in an engineering firm in Dallas, so I moved to Texas. Made a big pile of money. My wife bought me a Tascam 4 track recorder for my birthday, I went crazy with it. Recorded a bunch of melodies that had been rattling around my brain since I was 8 years old. Liked what I heard, decided to make an LP.

"It wasn't too hard to track down a studio to master my 4 tracks. By this time I was an old hand at graphic design for promotional material, so I designed the cover myself.

"Handed the albums out to business associates, as promotional material for other business interests, at a drunken open mike at a bar in Pinos Altos, NM."

That was one of my favorite tunes n IA8 and that LP's been on my Discogs wantlist since I heard that comp, so I'm happy about this one

yeahhhh love that one ...

This is quite the reminder---I def need to get Vols. 1 and 2, for inst.

Each Friday, we select 4 titles from our deep catalog under a theme, and they're 5 bucks each. Sometimes CD, sometimes vinyl. The only catch is you gotta buy all four, which is still a pretty good deal.

This week, we announced our reissue of Tom Armstrong's rare 1987 private-press LP, which you can Pre-Order Here. Tom was featured on Volume 8 of our acoustic guitar series, Imaginational Anthem.

So our theme this week is 'Guitars' :
Get the first FOUR volumes of our Imaginational Anthem series for $20 !
(Vols. 1-3 come as a box set, plus you'll get vol. 4)

For all 4 CDs, just paypal $20 directly to :
orders at tompkins square dot com
For Canada, add $15
For the rest of the world, add $35

The deal is good til next Friday, when we'll pick another four titles for you.

Thanks as always ! ...

Imaginational Anthem vol 1 :
Max Ochs, Brad Barr, Suni McGrath, Harris Newman, Harry Taussig, Jack Rose, Steve Mann, Glenn Jones, Gyan Riley & Terry Riley, Bern Nix, Bob Hadley, Janet Smith, John Fahey, Kaki King, Sandy Bull

Volume 2
James Blackshaw, Peter Lang , Jose Gonzalez, Jesse Sparhawk, Michael Chapman, Sean Smith, Fred Gerlach, Christina Carter, Billy Faier, Sharron Kraus , Robbie Basho

Volume 3
Richard Crandell, Ben Reynolds, Greg Davis, Nathan Salsburg, Steffen Basho-Junghans, Cian Nugent, Matt Baldwin, Mark Fosson, George Stavis, Keenan Lawler, Shawn David McMillen

Volume 4 :
Chris Forsyth, William Tyler, Sam Moss, Nick Jonah Davis, Pat O'Connell, Tyler Ramsey, Micah Blue Smaldone, Mike Fekete, Aaron Sheppard, C Joynes

Wow---TS breaking through to what was (maybe still is) called The New Music---I'm intrigued by the implied possibilities and by news of this specific album; I only know her via Dolmen Music and Turtle Dreams.

Meredith Monk's Groundbreaking 1971 Debut LP 'Key', Reissued by Tompkins Square for Record Store Day - April 22, 2017

Composer, singer, director/choreographer, creator of new opera, musical theater works, films and installations, Meredith Monk is one of the most unique and influential artists of our time. Awarded a National Medal of Arts by President Obama in 2015, Monk has blazed her own influential trail through music and movement over the past 50 years. Pitchfork noted in a recent review of her latest ECM release, 'On Behalf of Nature': "Meredith Monk's influence as a singer and composer extends through Björk, Joanna Newsom and beyond."

'Key' contains Monk's earliest compositions for voice, composed and performed from 1967-1970. In her words:

"In 'Key' I wanted to create a constantly shifting ambience. Each song dealt with a different vocal character, landscape, technical concern or emotional quality. I was trying for a visceral, kinetic song form that had the abstract qualities of a painting or a dance. I knew that I didn't want to set music to a text; for me, the voice itself was a language which seemed to speak more eloquently than words. I chose certain phonemes for their particular sound qualities. In a sense, each song became a world in itself with its own timbre, texture and impulse."

The Tompkins Square reissue faithfully reproduces the original 1971 LP on Increase Records, with textured cover and original insert images and notes, exclusively released in a limited edition for Record Store Day - April 22, 2017.

LP - TSQ5371 / Tompkins Square is distributed by INgrooves and Revolver in North America, Cargo UK for Europe.

Recordstoreday.com
Meredithmonk.com
tompkinssquare.com

xgau:
Dolmen Music [ECM, 1980]
Monk has classical voice training, but I expect it was her folk and rock experience that taught her how to make these almost wordless songs sound so demotic, so literally unrefined--they obviously don't merely "express" emotion, but they don't merely distill it either. On record, the ostinato structures mean that the four shorter pieces composed between 1972 and 1975 come across better than the title work, which lasts 23:39 and features six voices with intermittent accompaniment. But anybody who wants to go further than Lora Logic and Pere Ubu will listen to it all. A-

Alice Gerrard alb is pretty cool, ditto all the Charlie Louvin I've heard, although I haven't heard this 'un. Lena Hughes will have to grow on me more than expected, but def intriguing. Haven't heard Spencer Moore.

5ive Dollar Fridays !
A Weekly Sale from Tompkins Square . . .

Each Friday, we select 4 titles from our deep catalog under a theme, and they're 5 bucks each. Sometimes CD, sometimes vinyl. The only catch is you gotta buy all four, which is still a pretty good deal.

Our theme this week is 'Americana' :

Charlie Louvin - Murder Ballads & Disaster Songs
(w/ William Tyler, Chris Scruggs, Andrew Bird. Notes by Holly George-Warren)
Spencer Moore - s/t
(He witnessed a show by the Original Carter Family)
Alice Gerrard - Follow The Music
(Grammy-nominated, produced by Michael Taylor of Hiss Golden Messenger)
Lena Hughes - Queen of the Flat-Top Guitar
(Notes by John Renbourn)

For all 4 CDs, just paypal $20 directly to :
orders at tompkins square dot com
For Canada, add $15
For the rest of the world, add $25

Armstrong update:

TOM ARMSTRONG - THE SKY IS AN EMPTY EYE
OUT TODAY on Tompkins Square
Rare Private-Press LP reissued for the first time on LP/CD/digital

Listen to / share 4 songs from the album
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/sets/tom-armstrong-the-sky-is-an-empty-eye

BUY LP / CD

Tompkins Square's recent double-LP, Imaginational Anthem vol. 8 : The Private Press, shed light on forgotten, impossibly rare guitar recordings spanning several decades. Tom Armstrong's The Sky Is An Empty Eye is the first of several reissues planned by Tompkins Square of full albums by artists featured on IA8.

Armstrong's self-released LP from 1987 sports blissed out acoustic numbers like the one featured on IA8, along with some electric workouts and even a deep psych vocal tune.

** Tom will play a few tunes and sign records at Good Records, 1808 Lower Greenville Ave., Dallas TX on Thursday, May 18th, 8pm **

Never lose that Louvin feelin'(Guessing that Ben was not discovered when Charlie was a teen) (Roland White protesteth too much---he's got the R&R drive)

5ive Dollar Fridays !
A Weekly Sale from Tompkins Square . . .

Each Friday, we select 4 titles from our deep catalog under a theme, and they're 5 bucks each. Sometimes CD, sometimes vinyl. The only catch is you gotta buy all four, which is still a pretty good deal.

Our theme this week is 'Nashville':

Ben Hall - Ben Hall !
(Discovered by Charlie Louvin as a teenager, produced by Eric Ambel)
William Tyler - Behold The Spirit
(His debut album)
Roland White - I Wasn't Born To Rock N Roll
(Reissue of 1976 solo album by bluegrass legend)
Charlie Louvin - Hickory Wind : Live at Gram Parsons Guitar Pull
(Live recording from Gram's hometown of Waycross, GA)

For all 4 CDs, just paypal $20 directly to :
orders at tompkins square dot com
For Canada, add $15
For the rest of the world, add $25
(Don't forget to include your address !)

Behold the Spirit is great, Tyler before he figured out what he was gonna be but more adventurous and stranger

5ive Dollar Fridays !
A Weekly Sale from Tompkins Square . . .

Each Friday, we select 4 titles from our deep catalog under a theme, and they're 5 bucks each. Sometimes CD, sometimes vinyl. The only catch is you gotta buy all four, which is still a pretty good deal.

Our theme this week - "String Dazzlers" :

Peter Walker - Lost Tapes 1970
(Recorded in Levon Helm's living room in Woodstock)
Don Bikoff - Celestial Explosion
(1968 private press reissue. Playing in the UK in May !)
John Hulburt - Opus III
(1972 private press reissue discovered/produced by Ryley Walker)
Mark Fosson - Digging in the Dust
(Unreleased home demos recorded for John Fahey's Takoma label)

The deal is good til next Friday, when we'll pick another four titles for you.

Thanks as always ! .

Lost Tapes is great. Living in the UK, these deals make my teeth itch.

For all 4 CDs, just paypal $20 directly to :
orders at tompkins square dot com
For Canada, add $15
For the rest of the world, add $25 I see what you mean.

(Oops, just came across this, which runs through midnight 5/18 I reckon, with new sale this Fri.)

Weekly Sale from Tompkins Square . . .

Each Friday, we select 4 titles from our deep catalog under a theme, and they're 5 bucks each. Sometimes CD, sometimes vinyl. The only catch is you gotta buy all four, which is still a pretty good deal.

This week, Tompkins Square announced a very special limited edition LP,
The Music of Harry Taussig & Max Ochs, celebrating the 50th Anniversary of their first Takoma recordings.(See site for T&O show info too.)

So it's entirely appropriate for our sale this week to focus around guitar, namely the past 4 volumes of our Imaginational Anthem series :

Imaginational Anthem vol 5
(Steve Gunn, Jordan Fuller, Danny Grody, Nick Schillace, Will Stratton, Bill Orcutt, Daniel Bachman, Eric Carbonara, Tom Lecky, Alexander Turnquist, Cam Deas, Yair Yona)
Imaginational Anthem vol 6 : The Roots of American Primitive Guitar
(Sylvester Weaver, Sam McGee, Riley Puckett, Davy Miller, Lemuel Turner, Frank Hutchison, Bayless Rose)
Imaginational Anthem vol 7
(Chuck Johnson, Sean Proper, Norberto Lobo, Simon Scott, DBH, Jordan Norton, Kyle Fosburgh, Christoph Bruhn, Michael Vallera, Dylan Golden Aycock, M. Mucci, Mariano Rodriguez, Andrew Weathers, Wes Tirey)
Imaginational Anthem vol 8 : The Private Press
(Perry Lederman, The Keithe Lowrie Duet, Michael Kleniec, Lee Murdock, Tom Armstrong, Joe Bethancourt, Kip Dobler, Herb Moore, Nancy Tucker, Larry Conklin, Rick Deitrick, Gary Salzman, Stan Samole, Russell Potter)

For all 4 CDs, just paypal $20 directly to :
orders at tompkins square dot com
For Canada, add $15
For the rest of the world, add $25

Texas Songwriter Will Beeley's Rare LPs from 1971 & 1979 Reissued by Tompkins Square

On June 30th, Tompkins Square will reissue two albums by Texas singer/songwriter Will Beeley - the self-released mega-rare (only 200 copies) private press LP Gallivantin' from 1971, and Passing Dream, originally released by Malaco Records in 1979.

Recorded in San Antonio, Gallivantin' shows Beeley's heartfelt, folky side - a wistful set of original tunes, plus a cover of Bob Dylan's "You Ain't Goin' Nowhere" and a spaced-out, 10 minute+ Eastern-influenced psych take on Buffy Sainte-Marie's "Little Wheel Spin And Spin / Co'Dine".

Recorded in Jackson, Mississippi, Passing Dream reveals the shifting musical direction of opposite sides of the 70's - a tougher, huskier, more alt-country sound emerging, presaging modern day troubadours like Chris Stapleton and Jamey Johnson. Released by Malaco Records in 1979, the album features the very first studio credit by guitarist Larry Campbell (Bob Dylan, Levon Helm), along with drummer James Stroud (Marshall Tucker Band, Eddie Rabbitt), keyboardist Carson Whitsett (Paul Simon, Tony Joe White) and other crack studio players.

Now a truck driver living in New Mexico, Will Beeley recently recorded his first new album since 1979's Passing Dream. Produced by Jerry David DeCicca of The Black Swans (who also produced Larry Jon Wilson's final album), the new one features Michael Guerra (The Mavericks), and is mixed by Stuart Sikes (Loretta Lynn's Van Lear Rose, Cat Power's The Greatest). The album is slated for release on Tompkins Square sometime in 2018.

PRE-ORDER

Hear / Share a Track

Gallivantin' - CD - TSQ 5395 / LP - TSQ 5401 / digital
Passing Dream - LP only - TSQ 5418
---------------------------------------------------
In his own words, April 2017 :

I grew up in San Antonio, Texas. From the time I could remember I had always made up lyrics so I learned how to play guitar so I could put the lyrics to music. I had gotten into folk music and singer/songwriters like Dylan and Tim Hardin so learning how to play the acoustic guitar was my only choice. Plus with an acoustic guitar you can play it anywhere. A friend of mine named James Harris, taught me the basic chords and showed me how to play "The House Of The Rising Sun," and "Don't Think Twice." Those two songs and Bm had pretty much all the chords I'd ever need to know -- James was right.

I started playing around San Antonio in '67 at a place called Doogie's Stonehenge, near San Antonio college and a folk music coffee house called the Gate House on 4th St. At the Stonehenge I saw people like Townes Van Zandt and singers who played the Austin, Houston, and Dallas clubs. By '69 I was getting warm up spots in some of those clubs. I did the Gallivantin' album in 70 with the financial help of a friend of mine, Phil Pena. We only had 200 copies pressed but it was enough to get the attention of a couple of DJs at KTSA, Ron Houston and Johnny O' Neal, who liked it and started looking around for a label. In '71 Elektra flew me to Memphis and then down to Muscles Shoals to meet with Russ Miller. He liked the new songs I had written and said they'd be interested in 9 months to a year. I was also looked at by Capitol Records and then A&M. Wayne Shuler was a promotion rep for A&M who had done work with Malaco on the Mississippi Fred McDowell album and introduced me to Tommy Couch and Wolf Stephenson. They signed me in late '71. Between '71 and '73 we cut enough tunes for an album. Malaco looked for a label deal to release it and in '74 Malaco released a single called "Rainbow Highway". It charted on a few radio stations but never really went anywhere. I was pretty disappointed and not writing all that much so Malaco released me from my contract, with first refusal on future material, and I went home to San Antonio to concentrate on writing. I got a job selling new cars for a Ford dealer by day and wrote songs by night. In '76 I went back to Malaco and played my new album's worth of songs. Malaco liked them and on the week of the 4th of July '77 we cut the Passing Dream album. The album and the arrangements of the tunes have always been my favorite studio work.

Passing Dream was released in October of '79. A single, "Rainy Sunday/Standing At The Station" came out and went pretty much nowhere. I got airplay on the country stations in San Antonio but very little anywhere else. After playing in honky tonks for a couple of years and not really doing all that well I came to the conclusion that it was time to make some changes. My wife was expecting our second child and getting a real job was the obvious decision. We opened a small record store that lasted less time then my wife's pregnancy. I had been selling more records to clubs than people walking in, and one of the clubs offered me a job as a DJ. This started a career that lasted 21 years. I was moved to Albuquerque where I bought the talent for the Midnight Rodeo for 13 years. We brought in everyone from Willie Nelson to most of the acts that topped the country charts in the '90s. In 2002, I found myself at 51 and too old to be doing what I had been doing for over 20 years and had to start a third stage in my life.

For the last 14 years I've been a long haul truck driver. My wife and I team drive going coast to coast hauling different types of cryogenic frozen liquids--liquid natural gas, liquid nitrogen, and most recently liquid helium. Josh (Rosenthal) contacted me to see if I was interested in the reissue of Gallivantin' and Passing Dream. I was totally surprised there was any interest. I sent Josh a homemade demo of some recent tunes I've written and he blew me away with an idea to record a new album. Half of it are songs I wrote as a follow-up to Passing Dream and the other half new material. I told my wife a few weeks after I sent the demo to Josh I'd love to go back in the studio one more time. My voice has seen better times but the spark was still there. Recording in the 21st century is very different from a hundred years ago. Something else that was interesting was working with people who hadn't been born yet or were toddlers when I wrote the tunes as a follow-up to Passing Dream. Jerry DiCicca did a great job producing the new album. It's very different from Passing Dream and I hope you enjoy it.

touring re 50th Anniversary album mentioned above:
Tompkins Square‏ @tsq2 May 28
More
Max Ochs & Harry Taussig at Down Home Music, El Cerrito CA

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DA8XijjU0AAa32X.jpg

Hear/post a track from Gentle Wilderness:
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/at-morning

Hear/post a track from River Sun River Moon:
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/morningstar-by-rick-deitrick

Tompkins Square is proud to release two solo acoustic guitar albums by Rick Deitrick, out August 25th. Gentle Wilderness was released as a private press LP in 1978.River Sun River Moon consists of previously unreleased recordings from the same time period. Deitrick came to our attention via Brooks Rice and Michael Klausman, who compiled Imaginational Anthem Vol 8 : The Private Press, which features Rick's "Missy Christa" from Gentle Wilderness.

Ohio-born Rick Deitrick took up the guitar at 16 and decided to approach his playing as if he was the only guy on an island and the instrument had just washed ashore one day. According to Rick, "I completely divorced my playing from any formal music knowledge, but it was very important to me to use original tuning. During those years, the sixties/seventies, there was a lot of acoustic guitar playing, often using open tuning as a base. I wanted to create whole tones without de-tuning and keep access to the complex sounds stock tuning provided."

Rick pressed 500 copies of his tranquil solo guitar record, Gentle Wilderness, in 1978 on Niodrara Records, and sold many at performances and directly to music shops who would pay for them. He gave copies to various libraries and left a few albums in the middle of the wilderness, next to trails, "so people would find them." Rick sought inspiration in nature and in particular the various rivers scattered around the Western United States, often composing songs seated beside them -and even occasionally perched on boulders in them. He never played the songs the same way twice and did two passes on each composition in studio. Rick would sometimes literally come straight out of the mountains and rush to the studio to record the ideas he'd gathered. "Missy Christa" was recorded at Mount Olympus studio in Hollywood and was named after Rick's daughter; it was originally composed right next to the Big Sur River where he had been camping.

Rick currently resides in Los Angeles, "still strumming, waiting for the other shoe to drop."

These records are part of an ongoing series of full album reissues from artists featured on Imaginational Anthem vol. 8 : The Private Press. The first was Tom Armstrong'sThe Sky Is An Empty Eye, which just received a 4 star review in MOJO.

TSQ 5456 River Sun River Moon (LP)
TSQ 5432 Gentle Wilderness (LP)
Tompkins Square is distributed by INgrooves and Revolver in NA, Cargo for Europe

Larry Conklin & Jochen Blum - Jackdaw -
Available on LP and via every digital service worldwide - October 6th, 2017

Hear / share a song:
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/water-time-by-larry-conklin-jochen-blum

Larry Conklin bought his first guitar, a Gibson J-45, in 1970, after he got out of the army. "I taught myself to play. I wrote songs and instrumentals (at that time Bert Jansch was my guiding light). I listened to a lot of people - Leo Kottke, John Renbourn, Django Reinhardt, Lonnie Johnson, Robert Johnson - and especially Rev. Gary Davis, who played only with his thumb and index finger as I did."
Larry's first record, Jackdaw was self-released in 1980 and includes beautiful solo 12 string acoustic guitar tracks, as well as gentle acoustic duets with violinist, Jochen Blum. Larry met Jochen in Florence, Italy, in 1980 and commented that "his violin playing put excitement into my music. It was special. I pressed 300 copies and sent them out into the world."

Larry wrote "The Diamond Cutter" in 1978 while going to Seattle Community College, in a creative writing course. The inspiration for the song, according to Larry "was a girl who wrote a poem to a departing lover - 'You only deal with cut glass. I deal with diamonds.' I introduced myself to her as the Diamond Cutter." In 1985 while living in Berlin, Larry got a letter from a woman in Seattle who informed him that Charles Royer was running for a third term as Mayor of Seattle and that "The Diamond Cutter" was being used as a campaign song. Royer won, November 5th 1985.

Post-Jackdaw, Larry moved to Europe and in 1987 began recording for Tukan Records. In the 21 years that he lived in Europe, Larry toured and recorded with John Renbourn as well as blues artist Sidney "Guitar Crusher" Selby. Larry returned to the United States in 2002 and now lives in Hilo on the Big Island of Hawaii. "My ambition these days is to work up the perfect set list, an evolving challenge, but on any night when I am playing in Hilo I will play "The Diamond Cutter". It's on my set list. It somehow led me here."

Jackdaw is the fourth in an ongoing series of reissues by artists featured on Tompkins Square's recent 2LP set, Imaginational Anthem vol. 8 : The Private Press.

from latest newsletter:

Sonny Clark : The 1960 Time Sessions with George Duvivier and Max Roach Limited edition 2LP set will be released November 24th, 2017
for Record Store Day / Black Friday. Please get with your local indie record store and encourage them to carry it. WBGO has premiered the set.http://wbgo.org/post/sonny-clark-steps-out-shadows-revelatory-new-reissue-1960

Tompkins Square has signed Welsh multi-instrumentalist, Gwenifer Raymond. Her debut LP will be released in early 2018. Check out the new video for her first single, "Sometimes There's Blood."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UudOLTjmgZc

Philip Lewin dropped by WFMU and played songs from his 1975 private press LP, Am I Really Here All Alone ?, reissued by Tompkins Square this year. Listen HERE.
http://www.wfmu.org/playlists/shows/75512

Larry Conklin talked to The Stranger in Seattle about his newly reissued 1980 private press LP, Jackdaw.
http://www.thestranger.com/slog/2017/10/24/25485939/how-seattle-folkie-larry-conklin-survived-leeches-and-recorded-the-reissued-1980-cult-classic-jackdaw

Texas singer-songwriter Will Beeley talked to BBC4 about his two 70's LPs reissued (out now on Tompkins Square), heart attacks, and truck driving. Look for a brand new Will Beeley studio LP in 2018!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b095rbtc

Brigid Mae Power - 'The Two Worlds' out February 9th, 2018 on Tompkins Square

Ireland's Brigid Mae Power returns with a new album, 'The Two Worlds'. The album will be released worldwide in all formats February 9th, 2018 on San Francisco's Tompkins Square label.
advance track(steady churn)
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/dont-shut-me-up-politely
Power's self-titled debut, released on Tompkins Square in 2016, received wide praise from UNCUT (9/10, "Masterpiece"), MOJO (4 stars), The Guardian (4 stars), Irish Times (4 stars) and was featured on NPR World Cafe, as well as several BBC programs.

'The Two Worlds' was produced by Peter Broderick and recorded at Analogue Catalogue in County Down, Ireland.

The sadly topical first single, "Don't Shut Me Up (Politely)", seems to express what's on the minds of many women right now. Tompkins Square's Josh Rosenthal noted on social media, "I don't usually have the opportunity to say something political about the music I put out, but in the case of Brigid Mae Power's new single, "Don't Shut Me Up (Politely)", I think this song may resonate with any woman who's been gaslit, mansplained to, paid less, bullied, sexually harassed by a C-List celebrity or famous movie producer, had her birth control systematically taken away, or told she had to go to another country or across state lines to get an abortion."

In her own words :

Most of these songs were written in the last year in Ireland and they're all about the different feelings I had at the time. Last year I moved back to Galway, Ireland where I mostly grew up and I was feeling and noticing again the repressive and oppressive environment. So I revisited a song I had half written a few years previous called 'Don't Shut Me Up (Politely)' and I found that moving home, I had the ammunition to finish it. I had actually tried to record this song in Portland, Oregon the previous year but at the time it just did not work. It was the wrong atmosphere, it was summer and a sunny day and just was not repressive enough in the way that it can be here! So I didn't really feel real singing it as I didn't feel held back at all! It felt like singing to a brick wall and it wasn't going anywhere... So when I moved back I had the idea to go up to an analogue studio in the North of Ireland and specifically record that song there, so we booked in some time at the studio and I hurried to finish some other scraps of songs I had lying around with the idea of recording them live and just seeing what happened.

I had been thinking about my Grandmother a lot, so there are a couple of songs about her.. I'd been thinking about lost friendships. I'd been thinking about how to balance being settled and also being up in the clouds. I'd been thinking a lot about cutting out the crap and letting go of things that don't serve you, so I feel like these songs are pretty direct. I wanted them to sound direct too and the studio Analogue Catalogue was the perfect place and had a great sound and live room.... When we went up there the second time to record the other batch of songs, it was a very busy time in our life and I hadn't finished writing the lyrics to a lot of them. Not as a choice - I just literally didn't have time. So when we got there I thought I would just try them out anyway and as a natural procrastinator I was much happier with the sound of the result of being pushed to the last minute. Peter added in different instruments really naturally and then mixed and mastered the record. 'I'm Grateful' was written in Oregon and for me I can tell that it wasn't written in Ireland. The rest of the album feels quite like what my environment looks like here at the moment out of my window.

Brigid Mae Power - The Two Worlds - Available February 9th, 2018
CD - TSQ 5487 / LP - TSQ 5494

Tompkins Square is distributed by INgrooves and Revolver in NA, Cargo for Europe

tompkinssquare.com

Tompkins Square label is proud to announce the release of Entourage - 'Ceremony of Dreams : Studio Sessions & Outtakes, 1972-1977'
https://i1.sndcdn.com/artworks-000289654886-zj2tmp-t500x500.jpg

3 CD / 1 LP set available March 23rd, 2018.
Liner notes by former Rolling Stone music critic J.D. Considine, and surviving band member, Wall Matthews.

Sampled by Four Tet, their name whispered in reverence through the decades, Entourage forged bold musical ideas on their two rare ’70s Folkways LPs. Now, collected for the first time, 30 previously unreleased tracks from their archives.

PRE-ORDER 3CD / 1LP sets

HEAR/ SHARE A TRACK
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/tarbox-poltergeist-alt-take

WATCH THE ALBUM TRAILER :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOY7gd7_1Lk&feature=youtu.be

Entourage - 'Ceremony of Dreams - Studio Sessions & Outtakes, 1972-1977'
Available everywhere March 23rd, 2018
3CD Set (TSQ 5463) / 1LP set (TSQ5470)

Eh, you can see and hear the worthy trailer on youtube, look up Entourage: Ceremony Of Dreams Tompkins Square Promo

Also, the youtube link is on the xpost soundcloud page for that *good* alt take of "Tarbox Poltergeist."

Legendary Guitarist Duck Baker Releases 'Les Blues Du Richmond : Demos & Outtakes 1973-1979' for Record Store Day

Stream the album via SoundCloud https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/sets/duck-baker-les-blues-du-richmond-demos-outtakes-1973-1979/s-ZoJCj

Post / Share a Track: https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/pretty-girl-milking-a-cow

“Duck Baker is a true genius of the guitar.” – Stefan Grossman
“Duck has discovered a way to write which is purely and originally beautiful. I think he sets a standard we all can aspire to.” – Leo Kottke
“Listening to Duck Baker makes me feel good.” – Charlie Byrd
“One of the most interesting pickers around” – Chet Atkins

Les Blues Du Richmond : Demos & Outtakes 1973-1979
All tracks previously unreleased
TSQ 5517 (1000 LPs for Record Store Day)
TSQ 5500 (CD)

Duck Baker is one of the most highly regarded fingerstyle guitarists of his generation. His repertoire ranges from traditional Irish music through old-time mountain music and bluegrass to blues, gospel, and ragtime to swing and modern jazz, to free improvisation, and while he is best known in the guitar world, he has made a reputation in several other camps, including the Celtic music world and the avant-garde scene. He explains this eclecticism by pointing out that folk musicians have always been more eclectic than folklorists want to admit, and noting that his approach to American music is similar to that of a classical musician to that tradition. Baker is also a prodigious composer, having written well over 200 pieces, mostly for guitar, and an even more prodigious arranger for the instrument. His recording career spans five decades and includes some 29 records under his own name, another 8 in duo or trio settings, and a further 32 appearances on anthologies or as a sideman. He has also authored 12 music books and a similar number of instructional videos.

Tour dates :

March 27th - Freight & Salvage, Berkeley CA
April 10th - Vortex Jazz Club, London
May 20th - Wonder of Nature, Brooklyn NY

"Hulburt’s gentle, somber plucking is more than enough to capture the soul like Nick Drake would." - Stereogum

Guitarist and singer-songwriter Ryley Walker discovered John Hulburt's 1972 private press LP, Opus III, in a Chicago record store, loved what he heard, and teamed with Tompkins Square to produce a reissue in 2015. Ryley co-conspirator Bill MacKay then released a tribute album to Hulburt.
https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/sunrise-bill-mackay-plays-the-songs-of-john-hulburt

Now, John Hulburt's sister has located lost tapes from the late guitar master. Recorded in 1998, Leap Frog is released today on every digital service, worldwide....
https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/leap-frog

John Hulburt (1947-2012) was a member of legendary mid-60's Chicago garage rock band The Knaves, whose records were reissued by Sundazed. Opus III showcases his exceptional talent on the acoustic guitar, proving somewhat of an anomaly in a city not known for its solo guitar recordings during this era.

Ryley Walker writes in his liner notes, "Solo acoustic guitar music was adopted by several in the Berkeley school and the ever-expansive roots fanatics in the South, but here in the middle of the country with harsh winters and the landlocked prison of corn fields, it was almost destiny that the amplifier assault of electric blues and controlled chaos of dance music came from the South Side."

"Within these forty minutes, Hulburt makes a case for inclusion alongside the better-known names of the time." - PopMatters

Out :
Gwenifer Raymond - You Never Were Much of a Dancer
Rick Deitrick - Home Grown : Recordings 1969-1979

Coming Sept 14th : Harmony Rockets w/Special Guest Peter Walker - Lachesis/Clotho/Atropos (w/Nels Cline, Steve Shelley)

Harmony Rockets with Special Guest Peter Walker
+ Nels Cline (Wilco), Steve Shelley (Sonic Youth) et al
Available Worldwide on Tompkins Square
LP: TSQ 5555
CD: TSQ 5548

Peter Walker came up in the Cambridge MA and Greenwich Village folk scenes of the Sixties. He recorded two albums for the Vanguard label in the late Sixties in a style best described as American folk-raga. He studied with Ravi Shankar and Ali Akbar Khan, and was Dr. Timothy Leary's musical director, organizing music for the LSD advocate’s “celebrations.”

Tompkins Square is proud to have the following records in our catalog :

A Raga For Peter Walker - 2006 tribute ft. original tracks by James Blackshaw, Jack Rose, Thurston Moore et al
Echo of My Soul (Peter's first full album after a 40-year recording hiatus)
Long Lost Tapes 1970 (free-flowing date with a group, recorded in Levon Helm's house)
Remembering Mountains : Unheard Songs by Karen Dalton (Liner notes by her good friend, Peter Walker. Note : Peter plays Karen's Gibson on the new Harmony Rockets LP !)

LISTEN TO / SHARE A TRACK : "Atropos"

ORDER Harmony Rockets/Peter Walker LP/CD

"Mercury Rev and special friends tune into Woodstock space rock . . . the lineup gel beautifully."
-- MOJO * * * * stars

"a casebook on the nature of true collaboration; everyone here places himself at the service of music made in the moment from mutually assured trust and goodwill; it sparks creation at every turn. God knows we need more albums like this. What an unexpected pleasure. "
-- All Music Guide * * * * stars

"it’s a seriously beautiful slice of gently throbbing, contemplative psych-folk brilliance."

-- The Line of Best Fit 8/10

“Peter Walker was actually a bigger influence on my acoustic playing than John Fahey or Robbie Basho.”
– Ben Chasny, Six Organs of Admittance

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"…this small town (Woodstock), housing as it did so many maverick talents, fostered a scene of damage and dysfunction that endures to this day. It pulled in all manner of wannabes and hangers-on, alcoholic philanderers, dealers in heroin and cocaine, and left at least one generation of messed-up children with no direction home."
-- from 'Small Town Talk' by Barney Hoskyns

Longtime Woodstock resident, guitarist Peter Walker recorded two albums for the Vanguard label in the late Sixties in a style best described as American folk-raga. He studied with Ravi Shankar and Ali Akbar Khan, and was Dr. Timothy Leary's musical director, organizing music for the LSD advocate’s “celebrations.” He was also a close friend of fellow Woodstock resident, the late folksinger Karen Dalton, and helped produce Remembering Mountains : Unheard Songs by Karen Dalton (Tompkins Square), which features unrecorded Dalton compositions brought to life by Sharon Van Etten, Patty Griffin, Lucinda Williams and others.

Rediscovered by Tompkins Square in 2006 after decades out of sight, Walker has remained active into his 8th decade, recording for Jack White's Third Man label, and now, collaborating anew with fellow Upstaters, Harmony Rockets. Joined in a mighty super-session with Harmony Rockets (Mercury Rev), Martin Keith, Nels Cline (Wilco), and Steve Shelley (Sonic Youth), Lachesis/Clotho/Atropos is a mind-melting inter-generational collaboration that could only have coalesced around the wool sweaters, warm teacups and moldering bookstores of "Old Old Woodstock", both the real and mythologized versions.

Fricke's Picks:
Harmony Rockets with Peter Walker, Lachesis/Clotho/Atropos (Tompkins Square)
The upstate-New York psychedelic rangers Mercury Rev, here under a periodic alias, take on extra crew for this studio excursion in galactic instrumental travel: Wilco-etc. guitarist Nels Cline, ex-Sonic Youth drummer Steve Shelley and a Sixties cult legend, guitarist Peter Walker...
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/david-frickes-picks-rem-arthur-buck-soft-machine-peter-walker-748566/

Kinloch Nelson
Partly on Time : Recordings 1968-1970
LP (Ltd Ed 500) /CD/Digital
Available Worldwide March 22nd

Unheard Recordings from Secret Rochester Guitarist

HEAR / POST A TRACK
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/solitudes-by-kinloch-nelson

Kinloch (sounds like "kin-law") Nelson (b. 1950) studied classical guitar privately with Stanley Watson, jazz guitar with Gene Bertoncini at Eastman School of Music, and music theory at the University of Rochester. In 1973, he began teaching both privately and at The Hochstein Music School where he was on the faculty for twenty-five years. In 1985, Nelson co-founded the Guitar Society of Rochester, which during its ten-year run presented many of the world's greatest guitarists. Nelson is the author of a book, Alternate Guitar Tunings. He currently teaches privately, conducts guitar workshops and maintains a performance schedule.

Nelson came to the attention of Tompkins Square via Duck Baker, who visited Rochester in 2018 supporting his own Tompkins Square archival release, Les Blues Du Richmond : Demos & Outtakes, 1973-1979.

Kinloch Nelson live dates
April 6 Rochester / Bop Shop in-store
April 8 WFMU 10-11am ET
April 8 Brooklyn / Troost
April 11 Phili / TBA
April 12 DC / Rhizome (w/ Max Ochs)
Arpil 14 Harrisburg / Artisan Guitar Festival
April 15 Boston / Lilypad

Some time in the turbulent summer of 1968 I went to visit my sister who was studying theater at Dartmouth College that semester. Big stages, spotlights, cat walks, backstage access - it was pretty exciting stuff for a high school kid from a small town. One night we walked across campus to check out the college’s radio station, WDCR. She had a friend, Dave Graves, who was doing a nightly radio show there and she figured I needed to see this. I walked into the station and time stopped. I had spent many an hour, pretty much from the crib on up, glued to AM radios, soaking up the music and the mystery. And now, here was the real deal. I took a look around: there was a production room with a couple Ampex tape recorders, a mixing console, fancy microphones and a recording room. Hmmm... So, I called up my high school friend Carter Redd and said, “Get on a bus and come on up and record.”

Since late 1967 Carter and I had been playing guitars together, working on songs of the day: Simon & Garfunkel, Bob Dylan, Donovan. Before long we were writing songs and instrumental guitar tunes. We borrowed someone’s Sony reel-to-reel tape recorder and started making recordings. But, WDCR raised the bar. Somehow we persuaded Dave Graves to record us, and that’s how these recordings came about. Recorded at various times in the summers of ’68, ’69, and ’70, and in the winter break of ’69-’70, three of the songs in this collection are ones we did together, the rest are solo tunes of mine.

The first two songs we recorded were "Funky Susan” and “Partly On Time.” “Funky Susan” was Carter’s invention; I added the harmonica part and the second guitar part. “Partly On Time” we wrote together. “Lazin’ In my Sleep” was done a year later. Dave engineered the first two, and a few months later he took a chance and sent them off to John Phillips of The Mamas And Papas. Phillips was looking for new acts to produce and, sure enough, he liked what he heard. Months went by…then out of the blue he sent word for us be at a recording studio in Connecticut one day in January of 1969 to record a Mason Williams song which he figured we could learn and record. It never happened. Carter, a year ahead of me, had already graduated and taken off for a drive across the country. He was nowhere to be found, and there were no cell phones in those days. Weeks went by. Phillips, engrossed in producing the film “Monterey Pop” eventually lost interest. I’ve often wondered what might have happened had we recorded all these tunes for him and put them out way back then…

In the summer of 1969 I went back and recorded some more, this time alone, and was there when Apollo 11 landed on the moon. The first rumors of the coming Woodstock Music And Art Fair were circulating. FM underground radio was emerging. Music genres were cross pollinating. It was an exciting time to be writing music. Carter and I went back to WDCR to record again that winter, and I went again by myself in the summer of 1970 to work at the station and record some more. But after those days, we pretty much went our separate ways. Sadly, somehow during all this the master tapes got lost or erased. The tapes that survived are copies.

So, one night in the summer of 1970, after I recorded “Kittens,” Tom Siebert’s Boat,” and “Winnipesaukee Night,” a friend of mine and I were listening to the tapes on my crummy little stereo and decided to take them over to his house to play them on his dad’s amazing hi-fi set. Off we drove with the tapes, my new tape recorder and my guitar in our family car. There’s an intersection in my hometown where a town road crosses a highway. That night as we were crossing the highway, a drunk driver, running from an accident he had caused at the previous light, ran the red light and hit us broadside. Wham! The car folded in half, the windows shattered, our car spun around 180 degrees and the tape recorder and all my tapes flew out the window and landed all over the highway. I should have been killed, but fortunately the driver hit the brakes and crashed into the passenger door just behind me. Amazingly we survived with only whiplash! My guitar, a 1960s era Gibson J-50, was in the back seat and didn’t fare as well, taking the full brunt of the crash. But the tapes and the recorder survived, and no one ran over them. I never met the driver. He was immediately taken to the hospital. He never showed up in court. They jailed him. The insurance company replaced our car, gave us some cash and I bought a brand new Martin D-18. And, they let me keep the J-50, which I later fixed.

That tape recorder has long since failed, but the tapes held up. I never thought they could be released commercially because, being copies, the quality wasn’t that good. Over the years I figured I would re-record the songs. But ultimately I never did, because how can one recapture the original mindset, feeling, vibe of the times and in particular the sound of that now-replaced studio? But thanks to the digital era the tapes have cleaned up reasonably well and the songs have come to life.

As I write this, I am sitting in a hotel room in, of all places, Woodstock NY. At the concert here last night I happened to play one of the songs from those tapes, “Kittens.” And now, looking back, it occurs to me that the wrecked family car was the same one my sister and I drove in to that infamous Woodstock Music And Art Fair…that same summer in which I wrote and recorded that song...back when all of these songs were spinning constantly in my head. Now, half a century later, I guess they still are… Cheers, K. Nelson

Media inquiries / interview requests
info [at] tompkinssquare.com

TSQ 5609 (CD) / TSQ 5616 (LP) Ltd Ed 500

Teodross Avery - After the Rain : A Night for Coltrane out May 10th on Tompkins Square Gatefold LP (Ltd Ed 500) / CD/ digital)
Liner Notes by Ben Ratliff

WBGO Premiere by Nate Chinen https://www.wbgo.org/post/hear-first-track-teodross-averys-potent-after-rain-night-coltrane#stream/0

HEAR/POST A TRACK https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/blues-minor-by-teodross-avery

In the beginning there was John Coltrane. Growing up in a family that listened to a vast and global array of music, Teodross Avery experienced an epiphany at 13 when he first heard Trane’s epochal harmonic steeplechase “Giant Steps.” Taking up the tenor saxophone, he emerged in the mid-1990s as one of the most powerful young voices on the scene, with two critically hailed releases for GRP/Impulse! Avery’s long and productive journey has taken him down many musical paths, from gigs with jazz legends and hip hop stars to sessions with NEA Jazz Masters and platinum pop albums. With his Tompkins Square label debut After The Rain: A Night for Coltrane, Avery has found his way back home, reasserting himself as a supremely eloquent exponent of the post-Trane jazz continuum. Recorded live at Oakland’s Sound Room, the album is slated for release on May 10, 2019.

“It is a return to my roots,” says Avery, 45, who possesses a huge, brawny tone and a capacious harmonic imagination. “Listening to Trane’s music was my foundation, and this album is definitely a reintroduction to this area of my career. I’ve been busy with a lot of other stuff, but I was always playing acoustic jazz with top level cats. I wasn’t putting out albums. I was on record dates, but not my own albums. This was the perfect opportunity to make my own statement.”

He found an ideal outlet with Tompkins Square. Over its 13 years, the label has released new and reissued recordings by renowned jazz masters such as Calvin Keys, Charles Gayle, Ran Blake, Terry Waldo, Bern Nix, and Giuseppi Logan. The label recently releasedThe 1960 Time Sessions by the Sonny Clark Trio featuring George Duvivier and Max Roach (2LP/2CD set), which received a Grammy Award nomination for Best Album Notes (Ben Ratliff). It was Tompkins Square’s eighth Grammy nomination, and the first for Mr. Ratliff, who also wrote the liner notes for After The Rain.

For the Sound Room concert Avery reconnected with some of the Bay Area’s most formidable improvisers, joining forces with pianist Adam Shulman, Oakland-reared, New York-based drummer Darrell Green, and bassist Jeff Chambers, who played on the Yoshi’s album release gig for his seminal 1996 hip-hop inflected album My Generation.

“I grew up hearing Jeff with Freddie Hubbard, Bobby Hutcherson, Ahmad Jamal and other heavyweight players,” Avery says. “He’s one of the greatest bassists around, but after he made the date at Yoshi’s we didn’t play together until about 2014. He was the logical choice, and so was Darrell, who I played with in the Bay Area and New York. I always love his feel. And I’ve played with Adam since the early 2000s when I did gigs with Marcus Shelby.”

With the highly cohesive band Avery delves deeply into Coltrane’s songbook, opening with a brightly burning run through “Blues Minor.” Maintaining a steady level of energy throughout the nine-minute sojourn, the quartet offers a master class in the power of a briskly swinging mid-tempo groove. The set’s longest piece, “Africa,” is also drawn from the classic 1961 album Africa/Brass, Coltrane’s debut release on Impulse! orchestrated by Eric Dolphy and McCoy Tyner. It’s an epic performance that builds to ecstatic heights and then simmers back down with Chambers’ eerie arco bass solo backed by Green’s clackety trap work.

Cal Massey’s Latin-tinged “Bakai” is a piece introduced on the 1957 Prestige album Coltrane, the saxophonist’s first session as a leader (an underrated composer, Massey is due for rediscovery). Opening unaccompanied, Avery hints at the sing-song theme with a series of smeary ascending figures. As the band joins, he’s off, pushing against Green’s deft cymbal work with some extra grit in his tone. Shulman, a sought after arranger and first-call Bay Area accompanist, takes a particularly graceful, soul-steeped solo.

“Coltrane was one of the first records I bought myself, and I’ve been listening to that album ever since,” Avery says. “I liked that 12/8 rhythm. It relates to my mom, with an Ethiopian rhythmic feel. It’s a song that almost no one’s recorded. I felt like it was time.”

Of all the music that Avery explores, Mongo Santamaria’s “Afro Blue” is the piece that Coltrane played most frequently. First released on 1964’s Live at Birdland (Impulse!), the tune also appears on several posthumously released live Trane albums (but interestingly a studio version has never surfaced). Like Coltrane, Avery trades his tenor sax for a soprano and also lays out quickly after stating the theme. The rhythm section steadily ramps up the momentum and when Avery rejoins he’s at full sprint. It’s a cathartic, impassioned performance that leaves no doubt about his prowess on the wily horn.

He follows the thunderous “Afro Blue” with a gorgeous rendition of Coltrane’s ballad “After the Rain.” Back on tenor, he caresses the melody, which unspools over Chambers rumbling bowed bass and Green’s shimmering cymbals. Quietly majestic, it practically begs for another ballad or two, but Avery gets back to burning. He closes the set with a blast of spiritual sustenance, offering an extended take on “Pursuance,” the third movement of Trane’s devotional masterwork A Love Supreme.

“I’ve studied all areas of his music,” Avery says. “I was just trying to take songs that were important to him and important to the real connoisseurs of his music. Africa/Brass was a really important album for him. ‘After the Rain’ isn’t his most popular ballad, but it’s a very beautiful piece and a brilliant composition.”

As Ben Ratliff writes in the album’s liner notes, the band approaches Coltrane’s music with reverence and freedom, revealing themselves in the act of interpreting iconic compositions. “The synthesis achieved here is the result of scholarship…But it is also the result of relaxing an academic mind-set, something that comes later in life—a little bit of forgetting what you’ve learned, or of finding meaning beyond the limited binary thinking of structure/no structure.”

Born July 2, 1973 in Fairfield, California, Avery grew up in Oakland and Vacaville, where he spent most of high school. Looking for more rigorous musical training he attended Berkeley High his senior year played in the school’s award-winning jazz band under director Charles Hamilton (a mentor for future jazz stars such as Joshua Redman, Dayna Stephens and Justin Brown). Wynton Marsalis recognized his oversized talent and purchased him a saxophone. Berklee College of Music made a similar judgment, giving him a full scholarship. At 19, he found another champion in eminent A&R executive Carl Griffin, who signed him to GRP/Impulse Records. His 1994 debut album In Other Words focused on his original compositions, and earned widespread critical praise. Sought out by stars like Aretha Franklin, Betty Carter and Ramsey Lewis, he soaked up head-turning bandstand experiences and still managed to finish college while on the road in 1995.

It’s hard to overstate the impression Avery made when he hit New York. Within a week of moving to the city in 1995 he was playing at the Blue Note with piano legend Cedar Walton’s sextet featuring trumpet great Art Farmer. Over the next few years, he performed and recorded with veteran jazz masters such as Hank Jones, Ben Riley, Harold Mabern, Bobby Watson and Dee Dee Bridgewater, while also working with rising stars like Cyrus Chestnut, Lewis Nash, Donald Harrison, and Roy Hargrove. With the manifesto-like My Generation, a guitar-centric session featuring John Scofield, Peter Bernstein, and Mark Whitfield on alternating tracks, Avery embraced his Ethiopian heritage and the protean power of hip hop (with Black Thought of The Roots rapping on the title track).

While Avery has kept a relatively low profile on the jazz scene over the past two decades, he’s never put down his horn. After touring internationally with Lauryn Hill in the late 1990s, he started recording prolifically as a session musician in New York City, contributing to hit albums by Amy Winehouse, G-Unit All Stars, Joss Stone, and Talib Kweli. Returning to academia, he completed a PhD in Jazz Studies from the University of Southern California in 2016, and is now assistant professor of Jazz Studies and Commercial Music at California State University Dominguez Hills in Los Angeles.

Avery started gaining attention again in straight ahead circles as part of a powerhouse tenor sax tandem with Howard Wiley on Hammond B-3 great Doug Carn’s 2015 album My Spirit (Doodlin' Records). He revealed a different side of his musical personality on 2017’s Post Modern Trap Music (Katalyst Entertainment), a duo collaboration with drum master Marvin “Bugalu” Smith, who has played with the likes of Archie Shepp, Sun Ra, and Chet Baker. In many ways, the project was a primal scream of freedom after years battened down in grad school.

“I had this sense I need to record an album and not be guided by piano and bass,” he says. “I needed to be in the driver’s seat as to where the harmony was going. It was like a release. When I was at USC, everything was very regimented. That’s part of the point of pursuing a doctorate. I needed to clear my intellectual palette.”

The saxophone/drums duo was pioneered of course by John Coltrane and Rashied Ali, and Post Modern Trap Music paved the way for After The Rain. A major addition to his slim but growing discography, the album catapults Avery back into jazz’s top ranks as a fierce and captivating improviser ready to reclaim his vaunted reputation.

Teodross Avery 'After the Rain : A Night for Coltrane'
Gatefold LP (Ltd Ed 500) - TSQ 5630 / CD - TSQ 5623

Listen to songs from many of our releases via SoundCloud
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare

responses to xpost Kinloch:

Fricke's Pick (4/26)
Kinloch Nelson, Partly on Time: Recordings 1968–1970 (Tompkins Square)
“It was an exciting time to be writing music,” Kinloch Nelson, a guitarist-composer-teacher based in Rochester, New York, writes in the liner notes to this album of his earliest footprints: 12 pieces recorded as the Sixties ended and his style of solo finger-picking composition was receding with the folk boom. Nelson tells how he missed one shot at the big time — John Phillips of the Mamas and the Papas was briefly interested in producing him — and details the modest odyssey of these tapes, made at a college radio station in New England. The rolling poise and cumulative harmonics of “Pearl St.” and “The Eyes of the Fair Molly” are partly descended, inevitably, from John Fahey. But there is some David Crosby — his penchant for jazzy, gently angled chord progressions — and a refreshing, unhurried pace in “Kittens” and the ’68 title piece. In a genre where players often seem to rush to mysticism, Nelson plays here as if he has all the time in the world to leave his mark. It just took more than he knew.

"This is an American guitar music born not of the blues, but glistening, plaintive chaconnes and tone poems with their roots in Segovia medievalism, European folk music, and the Northern renaissance. Beguiling and strange, this is a real find."
- MOJO (4 stars)

"Nelson is an original; he rambles but never meanders, wanders but never gets lost. A total gem."
- Aquarium Drunkard

"The joy of the music comes in its defiance of easy categorization."
- DUSTED

Will Beeley - Highways & Heart Attacks - out June 14th on Tompkins Square. The Texas songwriter's first album in 40 years

Rolling Stone Country premieres the first single, U.S. 85:

HIGHWAYS & HEART ATTACKS is a remarkable return from a singer-songwriter whose work might well have been lost to dusty record crates and the secret annals of Americana musical history. But with Tompkins Square’s 2017 reissues of Beeley’s two stunning albums, 1971’s Gallivantin' and 1979’s Passing Dream, the Texas-based troubadour finally earned the applause his distinctive songcraft long deserved, with Noisey praising his “deeply felt, little heard, folk music” and Paste noting, “With the re-release of these fine LPs, we can spend some time more fully appreciating them before (Beeley’s) very welcome return to the music world.”

“The music business is one of those things where you expect it to happen now,” Beeley says. “When it takes 40 years to happen, it kind of makes you sit back and go, I’m surprised it ever happened.”

Born at Southern California’s March Field Air Force Base, Beeley traveled the world with his family before they finally settled down in San Antonio, TX. His natural love of music was further fueled watching Townes Van Zandt performing regularly at local bars and honky tonks, inspiring him to try his own hand at singing and playing songs for a living. Though only 200 copies were printed and sold from the stage and back of Beeley’s car, 1971’s stark Gallivantin' was undeniably marked by Beeley’s emerging lyrical voice, comparable to such contemporary Lone Star State peers as Van Zandt and Michael Martin Murphey. Beeley signed an artist contract with the Mississippi-based soul label, Malaco Records, recording sessions in 1971 and 1973, with a single released in 1974.

Beeley was then given a release to concentrate on his songwriting but in 1977, he reunited with Malaco and backed by the label’s house band – which by a stroke of good fortune included such young Texas studio musicians as guitarist Larry Campbell (Bob Dylan, Levon Helm), keyboardist Carson Whitsett (Paul Simon, Z.Z. Hill), and drummer James Stroud (Mickey Newbury, Eddie Rabbit) – recorded Passing Dream. The LP saw Beeley taking a far more ambitious approach than his debut, imbuing his deeply personal songcraft with an edgy psychedelic outlaw energy. Most strikingly, Beeley’s singing voice had evolved, colored by experience and struggle.

“But nothing ever happened,” he says. “It just kind of dissolved. I was pretty discouraged.”

Beeley withdrew from his own musical career and went about the business of real life, raising a family in New Mexico whilst working as an over the road truck driver. His guitar and pen sat untouched for years, his dreams of being a working musician long relegated to his personal back pages. But when Tompkins Square reached out about reissuing Gallivantin' and Passing Dream, Beeley was inspired once again. He reached out to Tompkins Square founder Josh Rosenthal, wondering if the label might be interested in new material. The answer was of course an enthusiastic ‘Yes!’ and plans were made for Beeley to hit the studio for the first time in nearly four decades.

Recorded at San Antonio’s Blue Cat Studios with producer Jerry David DeCicca (Chris Gantry, Ed Askew, Larry Jon Wilson), GRAMMY® Award-winning engineer Joe Trevino (Flaco Jimenez, Los Lobos, Los Texmaniacs), and GRAMMY® Award-winning mix engineer Stuart Sikes (Loretta Lynn, Cat Power, Phosphorescent), HIGHWAYS & HEART ATTACKS sees Beeley backed by a combo of Americana all-stars that includes accordionist Michael Guerra (The Mavericks), guitarist Don Cento (Sarah Jaffee), bassist Canaan Faulkner (The Black Swans, Ed Askew), drummer Armando Aussenac (Neon Indian), organist Richard Martin, and GRAMMY® Award-winning violinist Bobby Flores (Freddy Fender, Doug Sahm, Willie Nelson). Songs like “Been A Drifter” and “Don’t Rain On My Parade” are both wistful and warm-hearted, Beeley’s rough-hewn vocals the ideal vehicle for his one-of-a-kind tales of a road well traveled and a surprise ending hard earned.

“I feel this is really the best stuff I’ve written,” Beeley says. “I recorded Passing Dream more than 40 years ago. I’m just thankful I got another chance to go in the studio and lay down some more of my tunes.”
Album Trailer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvNpvh0Ka2U

update: good little Beeley interview, musical bits---stream, download:
https://www.npr.org/2019/07/13/741391179/will-beeley-on-trucking-and-songwriting

Ryley Walker Presents ...
Imaginational Anthem Vol. 9
CD/LP/Digital out Sept 20th, 2019

"If you're reading this, you've cracked open a deep fried black hole to some of the most far out guitarists on the planet. Some real heads in the mix. The future of the axe all on one nice and easy record to spin around. Super excited to have the chance to compile some pals of mine for this one. I searched near and far and the results are dope! My hope is that you'll continue to support all the artists here by going to their gigs and buying the music. Music biz is a shit biz but guitar players are pretty intuitive at making it work. Thanks so much for your patronage to the future of solo gtr tunes!"

-- ryley walker

Tompkins Square label's very first release in 2005 was the acoustic guitar compilation, Imaginational Anthem Volume One. The concept was to showcase new talents alongside first-gen American Primitive guitar legends, a formula that stuck across the first three volumes. Volume Four, released in 2010, featured all contemporary players, giving many folks their first taste of William Tyler, C Joynes, Chris Forsyth and Tyler Ramsey. The label then started farming out curation duties : Sam Moss for Volume 5, Chris King for Volume 6 (Origins of American Primitive Guitar), Hayden Pedigo for Volume 7, and Michael Klausman & Brooks Rice for Volume 8 (The Private Press). Tompkins Square recruited label alum Ryley Walker to compile Volume Nine. Given his deep Rolodex and exquisite taste, it's no surprise that this comp is probably the most diverse of the series. Nine of the eleven artists were previously unknown to us, so we get to discover new artists just like our label fans do.

Track List :
Mosses - Om Ah Hung
Shane Parish - Leicester Hwy
Eli Winter - Woodlawn Waltz
Dida Pelled - Walkin' My Cat Named Dog
Kendra Amalie - Boat Ride
Matthew Sage - Camaro Canyon
Pete Fosco - Variations on Themes for Blind Dogs
Fire-Toolz - World of Objects (Guitar Edit)
Lucas Brode - Knots Where Never Was
Dave Miller - Seedlings
Matthew Rolin - I Used To Sing
Art by Darryl Norsen
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare

xpost so far disappointed in the new Beeley album--the pickers are really into it, but his voice usually doesn't hang onto my attention span, such as that is. Some of it works, though. Will listen more.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Documentary film Voice of the Eagle : The Enigma of Robbie Basho available on Blu-Ray/DVD December 13th. 5-disc boxed set of previously unreleased Robbie Basho music in the works

ABOUT THE FILM :

Before his bizarre death at the hands of a chiropractor, Robbie Basho was sure that his compositions would not outlast him. Orphaned during infancy, diagnosed with synaesthesia (a union of the senses that caused him to interpret sound as colour) and claiming to be the reincarnation of a 17th century poet -- the Baltimore-born guitarist and singer's musical output was as equally as outlandish as his persona.

In his brief and troubled life he laid the foundations for radical changes to the musical landscape of America during the 1960s and 70s but reaped little more than a sparse (if fervent) following during his lifetime.

Voice of the Eagle: The Enigma of Robbie Basho is a journey into the heart of an artist's lifelong struggle -- designed to illuminate and satiate existing fans while serving as a perfect starting point for the uninitiated.

Featuring interviews with Pete Townshend and Country Joe McDonald as well as Basho's former students, contemporaries, religious associates and few close friends, the documentary integrates new information and anecdotes on Basho with previously uncovered archival material and photography of the natural phenomena and landscapes that informed his work.

Available via MVD Entertainment
RELEASE DATE : DECEMBER 13th, 2019
PRE-ORDER

-----------------------------------

ABOUT THE BOXED SET :

Robbie Basho (1940-1986) is widely regarded as one of the progenitors of what's commonly known today as American Primitive guitar. Growing up in Maryland alongside neo-traditional guitar explorers John Fahey and Max Ochs, Basho's path would take a decidedly different turn, bringing Hindi, Indian, Japanese and Native American musical traditions into his work. His albums for Takoma and Vanguard have left an indelible trail of influence across generations of musicians, from William Ackerman and Pete Townshend to Ben Chasny and William Tyler.

Liam Barker first became aware of Basho having purchased Tompkins Square's reissue of Venus in Cancer, released in 2006. This led him on an incredible fact-finding expedition, unraveling the many layers of mystery surrounding Basho's life and death, all deftly compiled and depicted in his documentary film, Voice of the Eagle : The Enigma of Robbie Basho.

During the research process, Barker came across a large cache of unheard Basho tapes recorded throughout his career, ranging roughly from 1965-1985. By arrangement with Basho's Estate and the original custodians of the tapes, Tompkins Square is set to release Song of the Avatars : The Lost Master Tapes, a 5CD set of previously unreleased material. The label will release a single disc vinyl LP as well. The set includes notes by Barker, Henry Kaiser, Steffen Basho-Junghans, Glenn Jones and Richard Osborn, as well as many unseen photographs.

Release date TBA.

tompkinssquare.com

LISTEN to our 14th Anniv Playlist on SPOTIFY
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4uiu05uzg7qB17xNRBee7c?

Their 14th anniversary show the other week was very good.

Anti: The debut album by Daniel Mandrychenko. Recorded by Bill Frisell collaborator Adam Munoz. One of the last records made at Fantasy Studios. Listen to/download "Chicken Tenders" via All About Jazz:
https://media.allaboutjazz.com/media.php?id=12081
Daniel Mandrychenko is a guitarist and a member of the Bay Area jazz community. For his debut album, Anti, Daniel chose producer Adam Munoz, known for his work on multiple Grammy-nominated Bill Frisell records, as well as projects by Herbie Hancock, Joanna Newsom, Branford Marsalis and many more. Daniel assembled a crack team to accompany him on his debut. Evan Williams (drums) has cut his teeth playing in the Bay Area’s vibrant jazz scene. Danny Castro (upright and electric bass) has played with Tiffany Austin, Calvin Keys, and Justin Rock. Dann Zinn (tenor saxophone) has become one of the most sought after sax players around, with a discography that includes over 100 appearances as a featured soloist and sideman. Anti is one of the last records ever recorded at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley, CA. A remarkable musical statement from this promising young guitarist.

Tompkins Square has released jazz albums by Charles Gayle, Ran Blake, Giuseppi Logan, Sonny Clark, Teodross Avery, Terry Waldo, Bern Nix and more.

Daniel Mandrychenko - Anti
CD : TSQ 5685
Available February 21, 2020
---------------------
Recent :

Sam Burton - "I Can Go With You" - 7"

No Other Love : Midwest Gospel, 1965-1978 4 Stars - MOJO

Ten Year Gone : A Tribute to Jack Rose Best of '19 pick - Folk Radio UK

Listen to songs from many of our releases via SoundCloud

Spine River : The Guitar Music of Wall Matthews, 1967-1981
Limited Edition LP (500) and digital out April 10th.

Guitarist Wall Matthews is surviving member of experimental 70's collective, Entourage. Sampled by Four Tet, their name whispered in reverence through the decades, Entourage forged bold musical ideas on their two rare ’70s Folkways LPs. Tompkins Square released Ceremony of Dreams : Studio Sessions and Outtakes, 1972-1977, in 2018 to wide acclaim. Spine River : The Guitar Music of Wall Matthews, 1967-1981 is a collection of unreleased or obscure music by the master guitarist. This volume will be released as a limited edition LP, along with four other digital volumes of Wall's music, chronologically mapping his career. All five albums will be released on April 10th, 2020.
Praise for Entourage :

"A three-hour stream of instrumental riches, whether you’re looking to find samples or get lost in a trance....These 30 tracks alternately conjure the ecstatic minimalism of John Cale and La Monte Young, the billowing clouds of Arvo Part, the aleatory intrigue of Derek Bailey, and the strange guitar beauty of Sandy Bull" - Pitchfork

"As seriously as they clearly took their playing, the music never lost its sense of playfulness and joy" - PASTE (8.7/10)

"This is essential and irresistible vintage American weirdness." - All Music Guide (4.5)

"...it's transporting stuff." - Rolling Stone

"Erring between Alice Coltrane-esque spiritual jazz, Steve Reich’s minimalism and stunning instrumental folk, Ceremony of Dreams highlights 30 tracks from a fiercely creative period between 1972 and 1977 that did not appear on the two Folkways albums released at the time." - Vinyl Factory

"New age gongs, drones, sax, pastoral guitar, scraped violas … Think Third Ear Band's druid rock meets early Popol Vuh with the obvious chops of a less slick Weather Report"
- Record Collector (4 stars)
See more about them upthread.

"Music Is The Healing Force of the Universe" - Albert Ayler

Despite all the terrible news, we solider on. We have never felt closer to the music we love - in our record collection, or on our roster.

Today only, bandcamp is waiving their commission so all sales go directly to vendors. Please support the labels you love today, including ours ! You can also get ALL 63 Tompkins Square titles up on bandcamp for 75% off. Just click on any album and scroll down for offer.

We made a Spotify playlist for these times - 'Hermit's Delight' - hope it takes you elsewhere for 2 hrs and 48 min.https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3cFEIERvFa1MZyfPn3SfUM?_php=1

NEWS :

Robbie Basho - Selections from Song of the Avatars : The Lost Master Tapes LP will be out on Record Store Day - June 20th, 2020. A 5CD box set of unreleased Robbie Basho music will follow later in 2020.

Sam Burton's debut single, "I Can Go With You", is out now on all digital platforms, and a 7" with two songs from his June debut album is available now. Produced by Jarvis Taveniere (Woods, Purple Mountains).

"Dave Miller has a penchant for melodies that stick with you, in a good way. His latest album provides the joy and the lift we all need right now-- through his bad ass guitar playing, a myriad of unexpected shifts reveal a brilliant sonic universe." - Mary Halvorson

Guitarist Dave Miller releases self-titled album on Tompkins Square, May 22, 2020

HEAR / PRE-ORDER https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/dave-miller

Guitarist and composer Dave Miller (Greg Ward’s Rogue Parade, Dustin Laurenzi’s Snaketime, Joe Policastro Trio, Algernon, Ted Sirota’s Rebel Souls), has been a prominent fixture in the Chicago music scene for nearly two decades. His last record, Old Door Phantoms (ears&eyes Records), hailed by Audiophile Audition as “the multi-genre instrumental album of the year”, as well as “a complex and beautiful piece of work” by New City, explored themes of nature, spirituality, and the human condition through the lens of an instrumental psychedelic garage rock band.

Echoes of Neil Young’s Crazy Horse and guitarist ‪Marc Ribot‬ continue into Miller’s new album, Dave Miller, though he has expanded his focus to now include detailed arrangements and more refined production techniques. With the opening of Miller’s new recording studio, Whiskey Point Recording (co-run with ace pianist/engineer, Dan Pierson (V.V. Lightbody)), Miller’s music has become even more alive and exploratory. Beautiful mellotrons collide with fuzzed out guitars over swampy drums and non-ironic bongos, as if ‪Brian Wilson‬ got into a bar fight with The Meters and ‪Link Wray‬ before realizing they were kindred spirits, with Miller composing the score. Miller’s music, above all, aims to create its own utopic universe where all the cool music coexists.

Dave Miller - guitars
Matt Ulery - fender bass (Wild Belle, Greenleaf Music)
Dan Pierson - keyboards (V.V. Lightbody)
Devin Drobka - drums (Field Report)
Juan Pastor - percussion (Howard Levy, Fareed Haque, Miguel Zenón)
Mikel Patrick Avery - tambourine (Joshua Abrams Natural Information Society, Theaster Gates)
Mike Harmon - fender bass (track 4)(V.V. Lightbody)

Dave Miller is featured on Ryley Walker Presents Imaginational Anthem vol 9
http://www.tompkinssquare.com/ia9.html

this looks promising

Yeah---impossible comparisons, but/and promising.

And a new virtual screening possibility that looks to be ov virtue:
Tompkins Square was really looking forward to today. We had hoped to celebrate Record Store Day with a beautiful LP of unreleased music by Robbie Basho. That will have to wait until the new RSD date, June 20th.

Meanwhile, you can support indie record stores by screening a new documentary about New York City's iconic and very missed Other Music. Our label has NYC roots, and we spent many hours at this store.

You can purchase the film from the indie record store or theater of your choice listed on this site. 50% of net proceeds will go to indie record stores, who could use our support at this time.
http://www.factorytwentyfive.com/other-music/

Listen to our Hermit's Delight playlist via Spotify:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3cFEIERvFa1MZyfPn3SfUM

no bandcamp link for this yet:

Tompkins Square Releases A Benefit Album for Groceries For Seniors with exclusive music via bandcamp, this Friday May 1.

As part of bandcamp's campaign to waive their fees for artists and labels on Friday May 1, Tompkins Square releases a compilation to benefit Groceries for Seniors. Heroic even in the best of times, this organization is providing vital outreach to seniors in San Francisco during the pandemic.
http://www.groceriesforseniors.org/

The compilation features 15 tracks, EIGHT of which are previously unreleased digitally, including exclusive tracks by Luther Dickinson, Nathan Salsburg, Gwenifer Raymond, Duck Baker and more.

We would very much appreciate your posting our news !
Thank you.

Tracks :

* = Available for the first time digitally

Nathan Salsburg - Blues for Eight Belles (early version) *
Josh Kimbrough - Backyard Hawk (from the forthcoming album, 'Slither, Soar & Disappear'. Out June 5th) *
Wall Matthews - Roping 1 (from Spine River : The Guitar Music of Wall Matthews 1967-1981)
Sam Burton - Everything Must Make It On Its Own (demo) (B side of new 7") *
Kinloch Nelson - Solitudes (New 2020 version. 1968 version appears on 'Partly on Time : Recordings 1968-1970) *
Bill McKay - Freak on the Black Harley (from 'Bill Mackay Plays the Music of John Hulburt')
Bob Brown - In These Flames (from 'Willoughby's Lament')
Dave Miller - Fellow Man (from the forthcoming self-titled album. Out May 22)
Rick Deitrick - Gabrielle (previously unreleased) *
Daniel Mandrychenko - Anti (from 'Anti')
Max Ochs - Imaginational Anthem (1969 version) (from 'Imaginational Anthem vol 1')
Duck Baker - Sheebeg and Sheemore (from the forthcoming album 'Plymouth Rock : Unreleased & Rare Recordings, 1973-1979.' Out July 31) *
Will Beeley - The Homeless Ain't Just Hobos Anymore (from 'Highways & Heart Attacks')
Gwenifer Raymond - Deep Sea Diver (from 7") *
Luther Dickinson - Nobody Knows The Trouble I've Seen/Peace in the Valley (from the Tompkins Square 78RPM record) *

xxxxpost Echoes of Neil Young’s Crazy Horse and guitarist ‪Marc Ribot‬ continue into Miller’s new album, Dave Miller, though he has expanded his focus to now include detailed arrangements and more refined production techniques...Miller’s music has become even more alive and exploratory. Beautiful mellotrons collide with fuzzed out guitars over swampy drums and non-ironic bongos, as if ‪Brian Wilson‬ got into a bar fight with The Meters and ‪Link Wray‬ before realizing they were kindred spirits, with Miller composing the score. Miller’s music, above all, aims to create its own utopic universe where all the cool music coexists.
Well, first listen does not bring Brian to mind--Neil maybe implicitly, in some of the surprise turns of the first 12 minutes, first three tracks---no Crazy Horse cave stomp, maybe cave art--but the rest of that, incl Ribot's more acerbic hipster jazz turns, in there w Neilian jolts---yeah, and there are at least three tracks, past the first three, that immediately summon Link Wray's speculations, and yeah, picking up the Meters in mid-70s NOLA, heading toward yon high plains truck stop after midnight--but not quite, because the drumming, bongos or whatever, is simpler/stricter than Z. Modeliste's with the actual Meters---most of it is stricter than that, also than the first 13 minutes, although most music is, and "simpler" prob isn't quite the word: more a matter of nerve and focus on just. these. notes, played just so, w/o getting anal about it.
(First 12 minutes might be called "flowery," in sense of tunneling through flowerbeds, coming up and going back in.)
He prob also likes Shuggie Otis, Santo & Johnny, the band Man, Rainbow Bridge---but I'm not enough of a liftologist to spot any lifts. in the spirit, but never the letter, of the Sunwatchers too. O Vintage Youth!
(I may live to regret such effusions, but for now, what the hell.)
Out May 22.

40 minutes, 30 seconds, calm and eventful.

xpost Groceries For Seniors---slight return, now w link:

As part of bandcamp's campaign to waive their fees for artists and labels today, Friday May 1, Tompkins Square releases a compilation to benefit Groceries for Seniors. Heroic even in the best of times, this organization is providing vital outreach to seniors in San Francisco during the pandemic.

The compilation features 15 tracks, EIGHT of which are previously unreleased digitally, including exclusive tracks by Luther Dickinson, Nathan Salsburg, Gwenifer Raymond, Duck Baker and more. The album is only available for a limited time.

Here is a link to the album
https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/a-benefit-album-for-groceries-for-seniors

Please consider giving above the minimum donation - it would be greatly appreciated !

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a3539788696_10.jpg

See complete tracklist in orig. post here.

Josh Kimbrough - Slither, Soar & Disappear. Out on Tompkins Square, June 19th, 2020

Josh Kimbrough is a fingerstyle guitarist and composer from Chapel Hill, NC. For the last 15 years he’s been a core member of the NC collective, Trekky Records (Lost in the Trees, Phil Cook, Sylvan Esso). He learned to play by studying Freddie King instrumentals and Fernando Sor classical guitar exercises. Josh has teamed up with producer and bass player Jeff Crawford (The Dead Tongues, Big Star’s Third) for the first full length under his own name. Slither, Soar & Disappear is an intimate and immersive song cycle inspired by the natural world, fatherhood, and the joy of solitude. On it, small ensembles of double bass, flute, strings, mandolin, banjo, and drums adorn his nylon and steel string guitar work.

words about the record . . .

Slither, Soar & Disappear is an instrumental, fingerstyle guitar record. It’s an ode to fatherhood and the restorative power of the natural world.

The music came to me on my back deck, where I would go to find solitude while my son, Simon was sleeping. I found that the rustling of squirrels in the leaves, and the hooting of barred owls, among other sights and sounds, would bring me a sense of peace and belonging. I imagined myself and my guitar as part of the chorus of natural sounds.

Fatherhood, I was finding, forces one to abandon parts of the self--a heavy proposition in a society that emphasizes individualism. Cultural critic, farmer, and novelist, Wendell Berry in his book A Native Hill muses, “In order to know the hill, it is necessary to slow the mind down to the hill’s pace.” This principle applied to me at the time as I was adapting to a new speed of life and striving to be present as a father. On the deck, as my mind slowed down to take in the chirps and wind gusts these songs began to blossom.

The following musicians appear on the record:

Casey Toll - bass (Jake Xerxes Fussell, Nathan Bowles Trio)

Jeff Crawford - bass (The Dead Tongues, Big Star’s Third)

Andrew Marlin - mandolin (Mandolin Orange)

Peter Lewis - drums (Skylar Gudasz, Loamlands)

Leah Gibson - cello (Bowerbirds)

Bobby Britt - fiddle (Town Mountain)

Wilson Greene - banjo (Mipso)

Rachel Kiel - flute

Out of the Ashes : A Benefit Album for Minneapolis is out today exclusively via bandcamp. The album features newly recorded tracks by Steve Tibbetts, Charlie Parr, Paul Metzger and more, compiled by local guitarist Matt Sowell. 100% of the proceeds from this album will benefit two organizations in Minneapolis :

MIGIZI acts as a circle of support that nurtures the development of Native American youth in order to unleash their creativity and dreams. Migizi's building was destroyed by fire on May 28th.

Association for Black Economic Power is partnering with PIMENTO to provide black businesses without insurance relief after white supremacists set them on fire during the protests.

Imaginational Anthem Vol. X : Overseas Edition is out today via every digital service ! Buy via bandcamp and receive a pdf booklet with artist photos and notes by compilation producer Marcus Obst (Dying for Bad Music).

Josh Kimbrough - Slither, Soar & Disappear - Exclusive pre-order via bandcamp. Album out June 19th.

100% of Josh Kimbrough's sales today via bandcamp will go to BUMP, a NC-based non-profit education organization fostering urban youth empowerment through African Diaspora music.

Chicago-based guitarist Dave Miller drops two new songs from the sessions that produced his recent, acclaimed self-titled Tompkins Square debut, exclusively via bandcamp. If you haven't heard the album, today is a good day to get it.

100% of proceeds from the single today will go to Black Lives Matter.

"Dave Miller has a penchant for melodies that stick with you, in a good way. His latest album provides the joy and the lift we all need right now-- through his bad ass guitar playing, a myriad of unexpected shifts reveal a brilliant sonic universe."
- Mary Halvorson

Mossy Kilcher’s 1977 Private Press Double-LP ‘Northwind Calling’ out digitally worldwide via Tompkins Square, July 10

Hear/Post A Track: https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/coyotes-cry-by-mossy-kilcher (some related tracks after that)

Over the years, unearthed folk records by lost sirens have made their way beyond hardcore collectors into the collective consciousness of the indie music-buying public: Vashti Bunyan, Linda Perhacs, Sibylle Baier, Tia Blake, Connie Converse, to name a few.

One such artist recorded a self-released (and now, very expensive) double LP in 1977, issued under her name at the time - Mossy Davidson - mainly for her family and friends. What sets Mossy Kilcher apart from the other Lost Women of Song is that she is from . . . Alaska. And the album is a love letter to the land outside of Homer where her family built a homestead and lived as pioneers beginning in the late 1930’s, and where she resides to this day.

Some may remember the Kilchers from a reality show, ‘Alaska: The Last Frontier,’ which premiered on Discovery Channel in December 2011. A musical family, the Kilchers also produced Alaska’s most successful recording artist of all time, Mossy’s niece, Jewel. Jewel lived with Mossy at Seaside Farm in Homer as a teenager. “Jewel would be my horse-riding sidekick, helping me out on the farm,” Mossy said. The two performed together on a televised Christmas special filmed in Nashville in 2016.

Musically, ‘Northwind Calling’ is fascinating all on its own, even without the backstory. The gentle accompaniment of 12 and 6-string guitar, harmonica, banjo, flute and piano is so sympathetic and exquisitely placed. Mossy’s reedy woodwind of a voice is full of feeling and seemingly untainted by and firmly outside the era’s commercial singer-songwriter machinery or conventions. A tinge of unintended psychedelia and natural sound effects take it all over the top.

Tompkins Square’s Josh Rosenthal made a special trip with his daughters to Homer last summer and spent time with Mossy at Seaside Farm. It was an unforgettable experience, and the beauty of Mossy’s album coupled with the natural surroundings and Kilcher Homestead - it all came together. Tompkins Square is very proud to bring this album to many more ears – in Alaska and all around the world!
----------------
From the original liner notes:

These songs are for you ~

My dear children, family, and friends, and for all who have felt the enchantment of the North Country ~

for my 7 sisters and brothers
and the close times we shared singing together ~

songs of our hopes and dreams,
and the adventures of growing up in a log cabin in the wilderness ~

where we learned to make our own music

~ singing along with the music of nature
~ with the coyote's cry,
and the calling of the seabirds ~

for times of travelling by
horse and wagon
along the beach of
Kachemak Bay ~

where the Fox Sparrow sings high above the windy shore ~

where the eagle soars ~

and where the melody of the Hermit Thrush echoes
from the deep, wild canyons
and mossy forests ~

the true music of Alaska~

for my pioneer parents, Ruth and Yule,
who came from Switzerland
to homestead in Alaska in the 1940's ~
and who taught us the folksongs of the old country ~

for the last wild places where someday our children also may go to daydream and explore nature,
for the salmon returning,
for the old timers who have gone,
for all who live close to the land,
for the seasons and the times ever changing ~

Love,
Mairiis (Mossy)

Exciting things happening today ! It's June 19th (Juneteenth), and bandcamp is donating its revenue share to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. We will match their % of today's sales and donate it to the NAACP as well. Among the new offerings on our bandcamp page :

> North Carolina guitarist Josh Kimbrough's new album, Slither, Soar & Disappear is out today !

> Several catalog titles added to our bandcamp page for the first time, including albums by Charles Gayle, Giuseppi Logan and Teodross Avery (duo album w/Marvin "Bugalu" Smith (Sun Ra, Archie Shepp))

> A digital pdf booklet designed by Grammy-winner Susan Archie has been added to No Other Love : Midwest Gospel 1965-1978. We add this today because the notes by producer Ramona Stout are extremely powerful and relevant right now.

> Thanks to many of you, we have raised many thousands of dollars for causes in Minneapolis in the aftermath of destructive fires through bandcamp purchases of Out of the Ashes : A Benefit Album for Minneapolis. If you have not purchased it yet, today is a great day to do so, because you will be supporting Migizi (Native American org whose facility was destroyed), ABEP (Black businesses torched by white supremacists) AND the NAACP. 100% of proceeds will go to those organizations.

It's all happening today on bandcamp.

Thanks as always for your support !

> "Sky Breaking, Clouds Falling" from Brooklyn-based guitarist Mason Lindahl is available on every digital platform, worldwide. His Tompkins Square debut album will be out October 16th (Digital/ Ltd Ed LP).

Bandcamp Spotify Apple Amazon Tidal

> Several catalog titles added to our bandcamp page for the first time, including albums by Michael Chapman, Roland White and Sonny Clark.https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/
Also got all of https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/imaginational-anthem-vol-x-overseas-edition
and xpost thee amazing D-D-D-Dave Miller, Brothers and Sisters! https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/dave-miller

Robbie Basho - Selections from Song of the Avatars : The Lost Master Tapes - Vinyl LP Exclusively Available at Independent Record Stores for Record Store Day (Drop #2), September 26th

Robbie Basho (1940-1986) is widely regarded as one of the progenitors of what's commonly known today as American Primitive guitar. Growing up in Maryland alongside neo-traditional guitar explorers John Fahey and Max Ochs, Basho's path would take a decidedly different turn, bringing Hindi, Indian, Japanese and Native American musical traditions into his work. His albums for Takoma and Vanguard have left an indelible trail of influence across generations of musicians, from William Ackerman and Pete Townshend to Ben Chasny and William Tyler.

Liam Barker first became aware of Basho having purchased Tompkins Square's reissue of Venus in Cancer, released in 2006. This led him on an incredible fact-finding expedition, unraveling the many layers of mystery surrounding Basho's life and death, all deftly compiled and depicted in his documentary film, Voice of the Eagle : The Enigma of Robbie Basho.

During the research process, Barker came across a large cache of unheard Basho tapes recorded throughout his career, ranging roughly from 1965-1985. By arrangement with Basho's Estate and the original custodians of the tapes, Tompkins Square is set to release Song of the Avatars : The Lost Master Tapes, a 5CD set of previously unreleased material, on December 4th, 2020. The set includes notes by Barker, Henry Kaiser, Steffen Basho-Junghans, Glenn Jones and Richard Osborn, as well as many unseen photographs.

Selections from Song of the Avatars : The Lost Master Tapes vinyl LP will be exclusively available at independent record stores worldwide on September 26th. The best way to obtain a copy is to ask your favorite record store in advance if they plan to carry the set. A full list of participating record stores is HERE.https://recordstoreday.com/Stores

TSQ 5722 - Robbie Basho / Selections from Song of the Avatars : The Lost Master Tapes - vinyl LP

Some goood shit here, good range too, don't sleep on Roscoe and Roland:
The following CD's are $6 each thru Friday, October 30 !! :

Polk Miller & His Old South Quartette
(Grammy-nominated historical set. Mark Twain-approved)
Face A Frowning World : An E.C. Ball Memorial Album
(w/Michael Hurley, Jon Langford, Bonnie "Prince" Billy)
Philip Lewin - Am I Really Here All Alone ?
Charles Gayle - Time Zones
Tom Armstrong - The Sky Is An Empty Eye
Roscoe Holcomb -San Diego State Folk Festival 1972
Max Ochs - Hooray For Another Day
Imaginational Anthem vol 8 : The Private Press
Bob Brown - Willoughby's Lament
(Produced by Richie Havens)
Daniel Bachman - Jesus I'm A Sinner
Tim Buckley - Live at Folklore Center, NYC - March 6, 1967
Brigid Mae Power - The Two Worlds
Harvey Mandel - Snake Pit
Duck Baker - Les Blues du Richmond : Demos & Outtakes, 1973-1979
Roland White - I Wasn't Born to Rock 'n Roll
John Hulburt - Opus III
(Reissue produced by Ryley Walker)
Lena Hughes - Queen of the Flat Top Guitar
(Liner notes by John Renbourn)
Imaginational Anthem vol. 5
(Exclusive tracks by Steve Gunn, Bill Orcutt, Daniel Bachman et al)

15th Anniversary Spotify Playlist:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4uiu05uzg7qB17xNRBee7c?si=qE12oHGNS-aVD7AGi9E1uw

2020 : A Couch Odyssey is a sampling of our output thus far this year.
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0GUymsKmbgK6lqfQxWLut6

Lena Hughes - Queen of the Flat Top Guitar

incredible record

yeah so nice — she's on this comp, too, which scratches the same itch: https://www.discogs.com/Estil-C-Ball-Earl-Blair-Lena-Hughes-Lewis-Thomasson-Rural-Parlor-Guitar/release/12120837

Oho: https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/selections-from-song-of-the-avatars-the-lost-master-tapes
https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a2505370611_10.jpg

Oh here's thee whole:

Robbie Basho - Song of the Avatars : The Lost Master Tapes - 5CD set Available Now

All tracks previously unreleased

"I think anybody, any young guitar player that hears his music today, would be influenced by him. It's beautiful and eloquent and profound, and full of love and devotion and melancholy."
- Pete Townshend

★ ★ ★ ★ 1/2 - ALL MUSIC

★ ★ ★ ★ - MOJO

ORDER via Tompkins Square (US Only)

ORDER via AMAZON

NPR Morning Edition Feature

Hear 'Selections from . . .'
Spotify / Apple / Tidal / bandcamp

Robbie Basho (1940-1986) is widely regarded as one of the progenitors of what's commonly known today as American Primitive guitar. Growing up in Maryland alongside neo-traditional guitar explorers John Fahey and Max Ochs, Basho's path would take a decidedly different turn, bringing Hindi, Indian, Japanese and Native American musical traditions into his work. His albums for Takoma and Vanguard have left an indelible trail of influence across generations of musicians, from William Ackerman and Pete Townshend to Ben Chasny and William Tyler.

Liam Barker first became aware of Basho having purchased Tompkins Square's reissue of Venus in Cancer, released in 2006. This led him on an incredible fact-finding expedition, unraveling the many layers of mystery surrounding Basho's life and death, all deftly compiled and depicted in his documentary film, Voice of the Eagle : The Enigma of Robbie Basho.

During the research process, Barker came across a large cache of unheard Basho tapes recorded throughout his career, ranging roughly from 1965-1985. By arrangement with Basho's Estate and the original custodians of the tapes, Tompkins Square has released Song of the Avatars : The Lost Master Tapes, a 5CD set of previously unreleased material. The set includes notes by Barker, Henry Kaiser, Steffen Basho-Junghans, Ronnie Dawson, Glenn Jones and Richard Osborn, as well as many unseen photographs. The box set package featuring gold foil inlay, poster and extensive booklet, was designed by Barbara Bersche, known for her work on the 2009 Grammy-nominated Alan Lomax in Haiti box, as well as the new Dust-To-Digital Harry Smith B-Sides box.
https://ci4.googleusercontent.com/proxy/snbDxbbsa8kmsLVtUXEtRyaR6B7jQpgSCQwRhFtGwrT5cV6GbS3Jyi1S9_rIpID2UmT76094wNsnfA0J71XA0jE-0Et-lghR4OdnE6jTaPNWG90WlQNnIoDjNoMaoHg4gURfRqPwzuaf=s0-d-e1-ft#https://files.constantcontact.com/877158f6001/94985d17-9261-41b1-9508-7003784b554d.jpg/

SHEFFIELD UK - BASED MULTI-INSTRUMENTALIST BOBBY LEE RELEASES ORIGIN MYTHS via TOMPKINS SQUARE.

March 5th digital, May 7th vinyl LP (Ltd Ed 600)
(Note : The digital version has 8 songs ; the LP will have 12 songs)

Hear/Post A Track:
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/broken-prayer-stick
Bobby Lee trades in a wide screen brand of cosmic country-folk, full of space and pawn shop guitars. There are touches of JJ Cale's analogue Americana, the swampy groove of Tony Joe White and Richard Thompson's sinewy, modal guitar work. Amps hum in the warm afternoon sun, kids and dogs snooze on the grass and broken drum machines keep time with the universe…Open sky/scorched earth improvisations recorded to four track tape during the rare moments of solitude afforded by lockdown and early fatherhood. Bobby Lee’s “worn-denim psych-country” remains, but the ancestral spirits of Ashra, Popol Vuh and Terry Riley are present here too. Time and technological limitations have been embraced. A song dreamt up, tracked and mixed in an afternoon, never to be tampered with again. Imperfections allowed to stand; knowing that nothing is ever truly finished. The Bob Ross school of philosophy.

“Overdriven drum-machine low slung choogle" - MOJO

“The further Bobby unmoors himself from songs and heads towards long-form abstraction, the more engrossing it becomes” - UNCUT

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a3484584777_10.jpg

Robbie Basho - Song of the Avatars : The Lost Master Tapes sold out in a flash. Today, the entire 5CD set is available via bandcamp. Download includes a pdf of the 48p booklet.
https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/song-of-the-avatars-the-lost-master-tapes

https://www.npr.org/2020/12/04/940190972/song-of-the-avatars-resurrects-guitarist-robbie-bashos-lost-recordings

Happy 70th Birthday, Will Beeley ! To mark the occasion, we are releasing 1970 Sessions exclusively via bandcamp today. https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/1970-sessions (A portion of proceeds will benefit hunger relief in NM and TX) This album was recorded as the follow up to Gallivantin', and never heard until today.

OurGallivantin' reissue and Will's 2018 "comeback" LP Highways & Heart Attacks are both on sale today via bandcamp.
https://www.npr.org/2019/07/13/741391179/will-beeley-on-trucking-and-songwriting

That Bobby Lee record is great. Kinda came outta nowhere

Tompkins Square label's Spring Sale !
Thru April 30, grab $5 CDs

"Not undermining records, but CDs are just plain cool.”
- Ryley Walker

All hail the CD. We still love 'em. Take advantage of our Spring Sale.

Buying is EASY. Select the items you want, add them up, and PayPal us the total using this link. List the items you want in your PayPal notes. Shipping is FREE in the US ! Add $15 for Canada. Add $25 everywhere else.

**A minimum order of two items is required for this sale **

The following CDs are $5 each, this week only :

Harvey Mandel - Snake Pit
Gwenifer Raymond - Strange Lights Over Garth Mountain
Tim Buckley - Live at the Folklore Center, 1967
Will Beeley - Gallivantin'
Harry Taussig - Fate Is Only Once
Tom Armstrong - The Sky Is An Empty Eye
Roland White - I Wasn't Born to Rock & Roll . . .
Duck Baker - Les Blues du Richmond : 73-79
Imaginational Anthem vol. 8 : The Private Press
Philip Lewin - Am I Really Here All Alone ?
Will Beeley - Highways & Heart Attacks
Harry Taussig - Fate Is Only Twice
Spencer Moore - s/t
Richard Osborn - Endless
Polk Miller - & His Old South Quartette
Sam Burton - I Can Go With You
Bob Brown - Willoughby's Lament
John Hulburt - Opus III
Brigid Mae Power - The Two Worlds
Ryley Walker Presents Imaginational Anthem vol 9
Daniel Bachman - Jesus I'm A Sinner

------------------------------------

Recents:
Bobby Lee
Mason Lindahl
Will Beeley
Gwenifer Raymond
Robbie Basho

Listen to songs from many of our releases via SoundCloud

link for sale: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/TompkinsSquare

harry taussig -fate is only twice is a good un

LONDON-BASED MUSICAL POLYMATH ELSA HEWITT RELEASES 'LUPA'

VINYL LP on Tompkins Square

Listen / download / pre-order LP via bandcamp
https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/lupa
released April 30, 2021

Elsa Hewitt is a London-based music producer and writer hailing from Sussex, via Yorkshire. Beginning as a young singer-songwriter producing demos on a four-track, she progressed through fronting post-punk bands and solo electronic songwriting, all the while developing a passion for album-making which would ultimately lead her to electronic production, establishing her name producing avant-garde, experimental & ambient, leftfield dance, and lo-fi, psychedelia. Since her 2017 official debut ‘Cameras From Mars’, stepping onto the scene as a Future Bubbler and Lynsey de Paul Prize winner, Hewitt has amassed a series of distinct yet interlinked philosophical worlds; each one holding its own tones of joyful beauty and abstract darkness. With a boundless approach to merging elements of dance & ambient, Hewitt’s adventurous approach remains pinned by her earthy voice, idiosyncratic songwriting style and sharply poetic lyricism.

Tompkins v. generous w streams on bandcamp.

RECORD STORE DAY NEWS !

Tompkins Square will release Ruthann Friedman - Hurried Life : Lost Recordings 1965-1971 for Record Store Day (NA) July 17th, 2021 (Aug 20th outside NA)

Limited edition of 1000
Her first music on vinyl LP since 1969 !
"Windy blue" colored vinyl

This LP will be available exclusively at independent retail stores for Record Store Day. Find a participating store near you here.https://recordstoreday.com/Stores

In 1967, the folk-pop group The Association had a massive hit with a song called “Windy” penned by an unknown young woman named Ruthann Friedman. Two years later, she released her own album Constant Companion on Warner/Reprise Records that sounded nothing like “Windy” – it had more in common with her labelmate Joni Mitchell or cult-hero Linda Perhacs. Decades later, Ruthann would be declared an “astral folk goddess” and championed by the likes of Devendra Banhart.

Around that time, reissue producer Pat Thomas compiled a collection of previously unreleased demos, home recordings, and lost songs circa 1965-1971 from Ruthann's personal archive including the original version of "Windy."

Titled Hurried Life, Ruthann recently declared, “That’s the one that I really like - that was the first time going back into the archives to find songs that might be reissued. I think those were representative of me.”

** HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO RUTHANN who turns 77 today (July 6th) ! **

Notes by Pat Thomas
Produced for reissue by Nathaniel Russell and Pat Thomas

1. Hurried Life
2. That's All Right
3. Sky Is Moving South
4. Looking Glass
5. Silver Bird
6. Between the Lines
7. I'm Askin'
8. Windy
9. Typical Sunday
10. Southern Comfortable
11. Alone At Last
12. Boy Took A Ticket
13. Method Madness
14. Little Girl Lost & Found
15. To Treat A Friend
Limited Ed LP : TSQ 5814
Tompkins Square is distributed in NA by Ingrooves and Revolver, Cargo UK for Europe
-------------------------------------------

NEW : Russell Potter reissues -
A Stone's Throw (1979) / Neither Here Nor There (1981)

This LP will be available exclusively at independent retail stores for Record Store Day

for Record Store Day (NA) July 17th, 2021 (Aug 20th outside NA)

Cool. This stupid fucking "holiday".

The recent Russell Potter is streaming here: https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/a-stones-throw
Buy one or both of RUSSELL POTTER's private press LPs via our site or bandcamp, get a FREE CD of Imaginational Anthem vol 8 : The Private Press - the one that started it all !!! - plus we'll throw in one "mystery" CD ! (Good thru Aug 27)

BUY Russell Potter's LPs via bandcamp / via Tompkins Square

PRAISE FOR RUSSELL POTTER :

“One listen to Potter’s lone albums will make you wish the guitarist’s recording career hadn't ended so abruptly. His playing is articulate but warm, proficient yet soulful.” - Vintage Guitar

“He’s a deft guitarist putting his own youthful spin on the music, combining the processional melodies of UK folk with the rawer dirges and dissonance of Appalachian music.” - UNCUT

"Both are fantastic. The earlier LP is crackling with energy and the excitable spirit of someone who has cracked a musical code and wants to share his findings with the world. The latter is much more controlled and contained as Potter’s studies of his chosen instrument allowed him to explore more textured compositions and traditional folk music from Europe.”
- PASTE

"Two excellent and obscure guitar soli LPs from the late 1970s and early 1980s. Russell Potter showed up a few years ago on the mind-bending Imaginational Anthem: The Private Press, and it’s great to hear more from his fertile imagination. On this pair of albums, Potter proves himself to be an extremely versatile player — there’s 12-string mysticism a la Basho, warm Kottke-ish moments, glances across the pond at Renbourn and Jansch … Whatever he gets up to, there’s always a sense of playfulness and a lightness of touch. Most interesting of all is the electrified, almost punk-ish rendition of Fahey’s “Dance of the Inhabitants.” Kind of hilarious, but kind of awesome, too.”
- Tyler Wilcox (Doom & Gloom / Aquarium Drunkard)

--------------------------------------------

The latest in a series of reissues spawned from Imaginational Anthem Volume 8 : The Private Press, following Conklin/Blum - Jackdaw, Tom Armstrong - The Sky Is An Empty Eye, and Rick Deitrick - Gentle Wilderness/River Sun River Moon.

Limited Ed LPs (500)
A Stone's Throw - TSQ5791 / Neither Here Nor There - TSQ 5807

PRE-ORDER Rick Deitrick - Coyote Canyon - out Aug 27th !!
bandcamp /Tompkins Square

Bola Sete - Samba in Seattle : Live at the Penthouse, 1966-1968 - a 3CD set of previously unreleased live recordings. Available worldwide December 3, 2021 via Tompkins Square.

Bola Sete - Samba in Seattle : Live at the Penthouse, 1966-1968 is the first official release of the legendary and influential Brazilian acoustic guitarist BOLA SETE's live recordings at the Penthouse jazz club in Seattle, WA featuring bassist SEBASTIÃO NETO and drummer PAULINHO MAGALHÃES.

Produced by Grammy-nominated jazz detective Zev Feldman, and remastered from the original tape reels in cooperation with The Bola Sete Estate, this deluxe 3-CD set includes an extensive 40 page booklet with rare photos from The Penthouse; essay by music critic Greg Casseus (aka Greg Caz); new interviews and statements by guitar icon Carlos Santana, legendary composer/pianist Lalo Schifrin, Sete's friend, pianist and producer, George Winston, and Bola Sete's widow Anne Sete; plus an effusive tribute by the late guitar great John Fahey.

Samba in Seattle is a significant addition to the recorded legacy of an oft–sampled musician (A Tribe Called Quest, J Dilla and Dan The Automator) whose career straddled bossa nova, jazz–pop and early New Age.

TSQ5852

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=osLby9iruK8

Rick Deitrick - Coyote Canyon - Available TODAY
on every digital platform worldwide and on Ltd Ed Vinyl LP (500) (TSQ5838)

BUY LP via bandcamp
BUY LP via Tompkins Square

Coyote Canyon is the fourth Rick Deitrick album released by Tompkins Square, and the eighth album of guitar music spawned from the label's 2016 album, Imaginational Anthem vol. 8 : The Private Press. Others include Conklin/Blum - Jackdaw, Tom Armstrong - The Sky Is An Empty Eye, Rick Deitrick - Gentle Wilderness, Homegrown and River Sun River Moon, and Russell Potter - A Stone’s Throw and Neither Here Nor There.

Coyote Canyon was recorded 1972-1975 (except "Three Sisters" recorded 1999)

From Rick :

Coyote Canyon is a wilderness area behind my daughter's house where coyotes gather and howl before taking off for their nightly foraging. Little Tujunga (pronounced "Tuhunga") is a river running through the Angeles Forest near a house I lived in five decades ago. Half my ideas for this piece came from onshore guitar ruminating. The rest was improvised in studio. Emma was my close and sweet companion during this period, a lifelong deep friend. I composed her song one evening at the kitchen table of our place while she was cooking. Tumbleweedin' describes a desert tumbleweed storm. I menaced every inch of the Yamaha, recreating the effect of these windblown monsters screeching along boulders, smacking into cactus and anything else in their way at often impossible speeds, following the whims of the heavy winds. This song was completely improvised at the moment in studio and forgotten. Roy's Rain is a tribute to my great good friend and musician killed in a car accident in 1973. I found For Marsha (Version 2) on a well-worn studio tape. It's a variant of the same composition on the Gentle Wilderness album. I like this loose and flowy version. Movin' On has one thing on its mind -- getting away fast and now. Going Home is my improvised take on an American root song. The above seven were recorded between 1972-1975. Three Sisters was recorded on a 20-minute studio break in 1999 describing three barren red hills somewhere in the Arizona desert, a cherished location.

Who’s Calling, the new single by Harvey Mandel - released via every digital platform worldwide today, on his 77th birthday !!

Harvey played with Canned Heat at Woodstock, with John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers, on ‘Black & Blue’ by The Rolling Stones, and released many solo albums since his 1968 debut album, including Snake Pit on Tompkins Square, 2016.

The new single features :

Harvey Mandel - gtr
Andy Hess - b (Govt Mule, Black Crowes)
Ryan Jewell - dr (Ryley Walker, Laraaji)

Pay-what-you-want download via bandcamp
https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/track/whos-calling
Stream It: https://ingrv.es/who-s-calling-ywc-3

Guitarist Russell Potter produced Ohio bluegrass outfit Hot Foot Quartet's cover of Devo's "Mongoloid", recorded at the famed Boddie Studios in 1979. His retelling of the whole story is here.https://russellapotter.blogspot.com/p/bluegrass-version-of-mongoloid.html

** Russell has given us two signed copies of this mega-rare 7" single !! You are automatically entered to win one if you buy one or both of Russell Potter's LPs (A Stone's Throw / Volume II : Neither Here Nor There) via bandcamp or via Tompkins Square - now through March 18 !

PRAISE FOR RUSSELL POTTER :(see upthread)

Bola Sete!
★ ★ ★ ★ - MOJO !
★ ★ ★ ★ - UNCUT !
★ ★ ★ ★ 1/2 stars - Downbeat !
★ ★ ★ ★ ★ - All Music !
KCRW Song of the Day !
NPR Music Best of 2021 Pick

“There is only one Bola”
- Carlos Santana, 2021

Disc 1 of our 3CD set (the 1966 show) is now available via every digital platform, worldwide !

Full album download and 3CD set available via bandcamp.

Buy the 3CD set via Tompkins Square.

Bola Sete : Samba in Seattle - Live at the Penthouse, 1966-1968
TSQ 5791

Greetings and Happy Spring to all !

We've been busy making records with new artists and working on archival projects. Most are either in production, or in late stages of completion. There’s been a bit of a lull this year - not our usual release-a-month clip, perhaps you’ve noticed. Some of this is self-imposed - to take a break, go to Europe etc. - some of it is market forces, such as the lag in vinyl production, delays in recording due to Covid, and other things. Despite all the turmoil in the world, we remain laser-focused on our Mission...

We will have two NEW releases for you June 5th ! And more exciting announcements to come. Meanwhile . . .

Gwenifer Raymond’s Strange Lights Over Garth Mountain will be available again on CD in a couple of months. She’s playing WOMAD, End of the Road and many other festivals, as well as dates with Ryley Walker and Yasmin Williams this summer. Rumor has it we might even see her Stateside this year.

Bobby Lee is completing a new album for Tompkins Square and playing some upcoming dates with someone you know.

Guitarist Russell Potter, whose two 70’s private press LPs are ON SALE today for 10 bucks, was recently interviewed by Rick Moody ! https://salmagundi.skidmore.edu/articles/367-the-home-key-5

Wall Matthews, surviving member of Folkways collective Entourage, was recently interviewed by In Sheep’s Clothing !https://insheepsclothinghifi.com/entourage-music-theater-ensemble/
Disc 2 (1967 show) of our acclaimed Bola Sete live 3CD set is now available digitally via your favorite digital platform. The 3CDs set is only $25 on our bandcamp page.
★ ★ ★ ★ - MOJO !
★ ★ ★ ★ - UNCUT !
★ ★ ★ ★ 1/2 stars - Downbeat !
★ ★ ★ ★ ★ - All Music !

No Other Love : Midwest Gospel, 1965-1978 was recently selected as a 'Best Gospel Deep Cuts' title by bandcamp !

Legendary guitarist Harvey Mandel’s new album with Ryan Jewel (Ryley Walker, Laraaji) and Andy Hess (Govt Mule, Black Crowes) is almost done. We released a single: https://ingrv.es/who-s-calling-ywc-3 Hot tip : His last album Snake Pit is SOLD OUT on vinyl, except for whatever’s left on our bandcamp page…
Roland White passed away on April 1st in Nashville. We reissued his classic 1976 LP, I Wasn’t Born to Rock n' Roll (But I Love to Cook and enjoyed spending time with Roland in Nashville, hearing stories about his late brother Clarence, Bill Monroe and so much more. He was a lovely person, and contributed mightily to Bluegrass.

Also enjoying Roland White and Friends' (incl. youngbloods, from the Gracals, for inst) A Tribute To The Kentucky Colonels, which reworks several tracks from the KCs' 1964 (before Clarence joined the Byrds)Appalachian Swing. If that title appeals to you, you'll probably dig this set.

really wish they'd repress that Bobby Lee LP. only way i can get it right now, as far as i know, is to pay crazy shipping from Europe.

Two new releases, starting with one that somebody shoulda done lonnng ago:

'Luke Schneider Presents Imaginational Anthem vol. XI : Chrome Universal - A Survey of Modern Pedal Steel' out on Cassette June 3, 2022 ! (TSQ 5890)

BUY via bandcamp
BUY via Tompkins Square
DEMAND it from yr local indie store !

Curated by in-demand Nashville pedal steel maverick and Third Man recording artist Luke Schneider, the eleventh volume of Tompkins Square’s venerable Imaginational Anthem acoustic guitar series features exclusive tracks by legend BJ Cole, as well as leading exponents on the instrument including Susan Alcorn, Luke himself, and British expat /Nashville hotshot Spencer Cullum among others. Nashville native and Merge recording artist William Tyler has written a beautiful detailed history of the pedal steel for the package (CD & LP versions only).

We will release on other formats later. This is our first-ever cassette.

*** To celebrate the release, ALL Imaginational Anthem series CDs and LPs are now $10 on bandcamp ! ***

We also scared up a few vol 1-5 box sets with live William Tyler CD bonus disc, ltd ed of 1000, long sold out.

Dave Miller's xpost s/t was a Top Ten for me---mostly a band record; this one is all solo acoustic:

Dave Miller - Daughter of Experience
Out today everywhere !
via Your favorite digital platform (choose) https://ingrv.es/daughter-of-experien-ghi-8
via bandcamp
Guitarist and composer, Dave Miller (Algernon, Greg Ward’s Rogue Parade, Ted Sirota’s Rebel Souls, Jazz at Lincoln Center, The Scientist, Patricia Barber, Joe Policastro Trio, etc), has been a prominent fixture in the Chicago creative music scene for nearly two decades. His last album (Dave Miller, Tompkins Square, 2020) received unanimously positive reception from publications, including Mojo Magazine and Fretboard Journal. It was hailed by Cult MTL as ”The psychedelic record Booker T and the MGs never made” while the widely celebrated guitar trailblazer, Mary Halvorson, gushed “Dave Miller has a penchant for melodies that stick with you, in a good way. His latest album provides the joy and the lift we all need right now-- through his bad ass guitar playing, a myriad of unexpected shifts reveal a brilliant sonic universe.”
Since the album’s release, never one to rest on his laurels, Miller has lead a quartet with legendary drummer, Jeff “Tain” Watts, performed at Chicago’s Symphony Hall with Greg Ward’s Rogue Parade, and held down the guitar chair for Terence Blanchard’s masterful opera, Fire Shut Up In My Bones at the Lyric Opera of Chicago. On the heels of these accomplishments, Miller has taken a musical right turn, positioning his guitar playing front and center on his new release, Daughter of Experience (Tompkins Square, 6/3/22).
In the midst of mixing Dave Miller at his Chicago studio, Whiskey Point Recording, Dave retreated to the Catskill Mountains for two weeks to write a new record. Despite the intent of at least demoing the resulting material in the studio he was renting while there, he ended up primarily playing a lot of acoustic guitar outside, taking in the solitude, fresh air, and beautiful scenery. Given the full-band electric, ecstatic, and celebratory nature of Dave Miller, this trip, predictably, bore a different breed of musical fruit. Fittingly, Miller recorded these performances alone, entirely on an antique acoustic parlor guitar.
Each of Miller’s solo offerings tend to occupy its own individual stylistic and sonic universe, the through lines being Miller’s singular, melody-driven songwriting and his emotionally-fueled, instantly recognizable guitar playing. Daughter follows suit, but is distinct in that it is his first specifically solo guitar album and his first playing acoustic guitar, exclusively. Did we mention it must be one of the most difficult guitars in existence to play and that it began to literally fall apart during the making of the record? [Insert witty comments here about artist suffering for his art and art imitating life].
And as the world shut down, Miller, once again, retreated into solitude, this time back to Whiskey Point, where developing and recording these pieces became a daily meditation. The resulting unedited performances, stark and vulnerable, capture much of the feeling he experienced while in communion with the natural beauty and rich musical history of the Catskill region. Miller’s “And Haze and Vista” recalls the soul-infused Americana of Woodstock luminary, Bobby Charles. His reduction of Brian Wilson’s sprawling “Wonderful” takes the piece out of sunny California and into the mountainous woods of upstate New York.
Miller, here, also tackles Duke Ellington’s “Single Petal of a Rose”, viewing this masterpiece through a roots music lens, falling somewhere between Marc Ribot and Gabor Szabo. His performance of ace composer Matt Ulery’s “Lushing” (commissioned by Miller specifically for this record) plays as if in an alternate reality where Joe Pass arranged the music of the Impressionists. And, perhaps the most traditional of the pieces, Miller’s own “O Envious Age!” recalls the feeling of a Neil Young lamentation.
Throughout the entirety of Daughter of Experience, Miller’s utterly unique voice on the guitar, steeped in the blues and brimming with soul, is on full display, making for an incredibly intimate and emotional listening experience. He takes his time, breathing through the demanding material, squeezing the beauty out of every phrase. In effect, the album feels like front porch music for the concert hall.
As of this writing, the world has mostly opened up again, reverting back to its old ways, for better or worse. Similarly, Miller has emerged out of solitude once more, though not without a certain hard-won wisdom and inspiration. The world, nature, and one’s own life remain mysterious and unpredictable. As is evident in the music on Daughter of Experience, Miller is content to find, embrace, and express the beauty in any and all of it.

Searching In Grenoble: The 1978 Solo Piano Concert is a previously unissued recording of jazz icon Mal Waldron's mesmerizing performance at the "Five Days of Jazz" series in Grenoble, France on March 23, 1978.

Waldron was Billie Holiday’s final accompanist, played on classic sessions with John Coltrane, Charles Mingus and Eric Dolphy among others, and recorded dozens of solo albums as a leader before his passing in 2002.

Originally produced by the legendary André Francís and transferred from the original Radio France tapes, this is the first official release of this music in cooperation with the Mal Waldron Estate and Ina (The Institut national de l'audiovisuel). The beautifully designed, deluxe 2-CD set includes photos by K. Abe, Brian McMillen and Raymond Ross; an extensive 24-page booklet with a heartfelt statement by Mal's daughter Mala Waldron, plus essays by producer/"Jazz Detective" Zev Feldman, journalist Adam Shatz and Ina's Pascal Rozat; and interviews with modern jazz piano luminaries Ran Blake and Matthew Shipp. Searching In Grenoble features classic Waldron originals such as "Soul Eyes" and "All Alone," and jazz standards "You Don't Know What Love Is," "It Could Happen to You" and "I Thought About You.”

The 2CD set will be available worldwide September 23rd on Tompkins Square (TSQ5906), and was produced for release by Zev Feldman and Josh Rosenthal.

Tompkins Square has released jazz recordings by Sonny Clark, Ran Blake, Calvin Keys, Bola Sete, Giuseppi Logan, Charles Gayle, and Bern Nix among others.

Pre-Order Links :

bandcamp / Amazon / Indie

I know he's not exactly the usual Tompkins Square type, but I was really glad to see there's another Harvey Mandel record coming out. A trio record this time with Andy Hess (former Gov't Mule) on bass and Ryan Jewell on drums.

Yep--

HARVEY MANDEL - WHO'S CALLING
NEW ALBUM OUT DECEMBER 9th, 2022

Harvey Mandel is among the most innovative guitarists to emerge from the Chicago blues scene of the late 1960s. His career began at Twist City and other local hotspots, sharing stages with Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf and Buddy Guy. He came up in that scene alongside Charlie Musselwhite, Mike Bloomfield, Barry Goldberg and Steve Miller, leading to an invitation from Bill Graham to open for Cream at San Francisco's Fillmore Auditorium in August 1967.

Mandel was a member of Canned Heat, appearing with them at Woodstock. He played on numerous John Mayall albums, and on the Rolling Stones' 1975 LP Black and Blue ("Hot Stuff", "Memory Motel"), having auditioned for Mick Taylor's job, which ultimately went to Ron Wood.

Who’s Calling is the 16th album under Harvey Mandel’s name as a leader, and his second for Tompkins Square following the 2016 acclaimed comeback, Snake Pit. Joined by drummer and co-producer Ryan Jewell (Ryley Walker, Laraaji) and bassist Andy Hess (Gov't Mule, Black Crowes), Who’s Calling finds the 77 year old guitar legend as vibrant and creative as ever. Despite unspeakable health setbacks and of course a Covid shutdown, Harvey has emerged miraculously stronger, proclaiming he’s never played better than on Who’s Calling.

REMEMBERING RICHARD CRANDELL
March 30, 1943 - October 28, 2022

Before we launch into the usual release announcements and sales this new year, we want to take a moment to remember guitarist Richard Crandell.

He died without a mention in the music press, or even among our little circle of guitar fans. It's strange that someone with a body of work as strong and beautiful as Richard's could pass with nary a mention ... but I guess that's our world. Everything moves so fast.

Such is the case with our friend, Richard Crandell. Hopefully this email blast with help rectify this ! If you are a media person, we hope you will share Richard's music with your readership or listening audience, so that he is remembered. If you are a fan of Tompkins Square, we hope you will share some of the links in this email, so that he is remembered.

Richard wasn't exactly ignored in his lifetime. His 1980 debut album, In The Flower of Our Youth, was reissued by Tompkins Square in 2008. We (and other folks) consider it one of the finest solo acoustic guitar records of all time, a quintessential "rainy day" record. "Rebecca" from that LP was covered by Leo Kottke on his album Chewing Pine. When Essential Tremor derailed his guitar playing, Richard turned to the mbira, recording for John Zorn's Tzadik label. NPR's All Things Considered ran a story about his progression in 2009.

Richard recorded about a dozen albums, including two wonderful guitar duet records with Bill Bartels, two with koto player Masumi Timson, appears on Imaginational Anthem vol. 3 and a Numero Group guitar comp, and released a collection of unreleased guitar tunes spanning 25 years in 2016 via Tompkins Square entitled Then and Now ; the set was reviewed in depth by Joseph Neff at Vinyl District, and UNCUT gave it an 8/10 ("gorgeous guitar hypnosis").

On March 3, 2013 Richard played WOW Hall with Daniel Bachman in his hometown of Eugene, OR. Before the show, Richard banged out an improvised tune on an old upright piano in the hallway. Raggy, bluesy, heady and inside out, it was pure Richard - the same clever, surprising phrasing that could be found in his guitar recordings. Just a pure musician.

We hope you will revel in the joy of discovering Richard Crandell. A gentle soul, a dedicated swimmer, and one amazing Obscure Giant of Acoustic Guitar. In the pantheon, forever.

2016 post about Crandell, with his own comments:

Eugene-based guitarist Richard Crandell's 1980 private-press LP
In The Flower of Our Youth is one of our favorite rainy day / road trippin' solo guitar records. Reissued on Tompkins Square in 2008, it captures the aura of the Pacific Northwest in unique and powerful ways.

Crandell's struggle with Essential Tremor moved him toward the mbira (African thumb piano), and he recorded on the instrument for John Zorn's Tzadik label. But Richard has returned to the guitar at times. Then And Now is comprised of material recorded over the past 25 years, some recorded this year, all previously unreleased.
https://soundcloud.com/tompkinssquare/swallowtails-by-richard-crandell

Here is Richard's own take on the new album, Then And Now :

"Most of these recordings were discovered about five years ago. They were recorded on a DAT recorder in the '90s. "Road Trip" was in standard guitar tuning, capo on the 2nd fret, inspired by my 50-state 'American Friends' tour. "Funk Dat" (love the blues), "Haley Suite" (love Bach) and "Route 22" (love Tennessee) were tuned in DADEAD, capo on the 2nd fret. "Over/Under" (love John Fahey) was in dropped D tuning with the capo on the 2nd fret. "V-Blues" (love Scott Joplin) was in DADGAD, capo 2. It was the only tune which I've written that has a modulation by "brute force." "American Friends" was my 12-string rendition of a Bill Bartels' classic, reflecting his Virginia roots. "Swallowtails" was a solo 12-string version of a duet which I wrote in the early '80's. I like my foot-tapping on this one. The duet was originally on Oregon Hill with Bill Bartels. "Unknown Lament" was a 12-string piece from the same album. This solo version has a unique coda. "Down to Earth" was recorded 3 years ago. and was written in CGDGBE, a tuning which Tim Danforth showed me. The last tune, "Cinema Verité", was recorded a couple of weeks ago, on Kyle Lindros' ukulele. It is my only uke composition. Kyle's dad Billy, named it, as well as In The Flower Of Our Youth and many of my other tunes. English is my second language. Music is my first. Especially rhythm. Enjoy!"

Then And Now is now available via every digital service, worldwide.

Dorothy Moskowitz & The United States of Alchemy - Under an Endless Sky - Available via Tompkins Square - March 17, 2023

Under An Endless Sky represents the interchange that took place between electronic composer Francesco Paolo Paladino, composer and writer Luca Chino Ferrari, and the legendary Dorothy Moskowitz, an icon of underground culture who broke all kinds of new ground as a member of The United States of America. Led by the charismatic composer Joseph Byrd, the band released their lone eponymous album on Columbia Records in 1968. It has taken on a mythic status that has grown through the years, sampled by Diplo and Mac Miller and widely acknowledged as a visionary psychedelic classic.
Francesco Paolo Paladino, an avant-garde Italian composer contacted Dorothy, inviting her to sing on some of his compositions. When she heard his 2021 CD release of Barene & Other Works, she recognized that they shared a similarly experimental point of view and she accepted his invitation. Paladino is known for his collaborations with Martyn Bates, Allison O'Donnell, Simon Fisher Turner, and other world-renowned contemporary composers, as well as his own sought-after 1985 debut LP Doublings and Silences Volume 1.

Francesco has long collaborated with Italian writer Luca Chino Ferrari, author of biographies of Nick Drake, Third Ear Band, Captain Beefheart, Tim Buckley and Syd Barrett. He submitted lyrics to Dorothy and together they began a profound and unique collaboration on the adaptation of lyrics to music, delving into words and meanings, phonetic properties and their singability. “Lyrics that have the audacity to deal with complex themes of human existence, real philosophical cutaways that look at reality and question it, often without offering answers,” says Ferrari.

Moskowitz's extraordinary voice and modal melodies float over Paladino's magical musical textures. There are no guitars, bass, drums or other technological devilry, but only virtual sounds (sometimes without even keyboards) upon which are grafted some acoustic interventions: violins and violas, woodwinds and percussion entrusted to excellent musicians such as Italians Riccardo Sinigaglia, Angelo Contini, Stefano Scala, Trio Cavallazzi and Gino Ape, and English folker Sean Breadin.

Recommended If You Like : Late-stage Marianne Faithfull, Mercury Rev, Terry Riley, Flaming Lips, Italian electronic music, The United States of America.

American Primitive OG Harry Taussig releases '80' on his 82nd birthday, March 31st, 2023

Released as a short-run private press LP in 1965, Fate Is Only Once has long been a coveted collectible among American Primitive guitar enthusiasts. The album presages the broader movement. Acoustic musicians were still largely stuck in a rigid "folk" mindset in 1965, and there are just not that many other examples of the exploratory guitar sounds found on Fate from this time period. Alternating between haunting originals and jaunty blues-based traditional numbers, the private press LP was reissued by Tompkins Square in 2006. Taussig's only other recorded works appeared on the long out-of-print Takoma compilation Contemporary Guitar Spring '67 alongside John Fahey, Robbie Basho, Max Ochs and Bukka White. Taussig spent years as an educator, published instructional guitar books, and traveled extensively to photograph weird museums.

Taussig returned to music in 2012 with his first album in 47 years, Fate Is Only Twice, and followed with Diamond of Lost Alphabets, Too Late To Die Young, a split album and tour with fellow Takoma pioneer Max Ochs, and a remix album by Kid Millions (Oneida).

Harry Taussig on '80' :

"With a perspective of about 60 years, I finally understand what I’ve been trying to do in my musical compositions over these six decades. I grew up with two musical streams – at home it was European classical music, at college it was American folk music. And I bathed in both streams.

Like several of my contemporary guitarists, I wanted to extend the American folk guitar tradition into previously unexplored territories. Each found their direction: blues, psychedelia, etc. Mine was using the theories of classical musical forms, both traditional and contemporary.

One of the delights of classical music is that the composer will constantly play with the listener, allowing him or her to guess where the music is going and then surprise them by not going there at all, but going to another place unexpected but equally logical. This seems to be the throughline in my musical heroes: Bach, Schoenberg, Glass, and many others. I have adopted many of their structural schemes, rhythmic devices, and harmonic stratagems to counter the comfort and predictability of folk (and popular) music. I delight in the response, “You can’t do that … oh, I guess you can.”


01 – Etude in G Major #7 (take 1)
02 – Etude in D Major #2
03 – Lullaby in D Modal
04 – Etude in G Major #9
05 – Recessional for Banjo in D Major
06 – Etude in D♭ Major (take 1)
07 – Etude in D♭ Major (take 2)
08 – Sugar Babe
09 – Etude in G Major #4
10 – Etude in G Minor #3
11 – Etude in G Major #7 (take 2)

SURPRISE LP DROP : SHEFFIELD UK-BASED MULTI-INSTRUMENTALIST BOBBY LEE REISSUES ORIGIN MYTHS via TOMPKINS SQUARE !

The 2021 black vinyl LP sold out in a flash.

"Milky Myths" off-white / clear vinyl version available NOW !

North America : Exclusively via bandcamp

x-NA : Shops, online stores, Bobby's bandcamp

(Note : The digital version has 8 songs ; the LP has 12 songs)

“Overdriven drum-machine low slung choogle" - MOJO (4 stars)

“The further Bobby unmoors himself from songs and heads towards long-form abstraction, the more engrossing it becomes” - UNCUT (8/10)

COMING SOON : Endless Skyways
Cassette available now for early adapters !
via Bandcamp:
Endless Skyways is Bobby Lee’s third full album and second release on Tompkins Square. Returning to the full band sound of his debut, the name “Endless Skyways” is borrowed from a line in Woody Guthrie’s This Land Is Your Land, one of the cornerstones of American music. That song’s mix of the terrestrial (“ribbons of highway”) and celestial consciousness encapsulates Lee’s brand of widescreen cosmic americana; a duality also evident in the album’s split between deep-fried rural rock and ambient country. Dusty boots but third eye open.

Opener and lead single “Reds For A Blue Planet” inhabits a geographically different realm to any of Lee’s previous work, equal parts Michael Chapman’s Anglo-Primitivism and Tinariwen’s desert-choogle. Slowdive/Mojave 3’s Ian McCutcheon turns in a muscular drum performance, with just a hint of sleng-teng creeping into Mark Armstrong’s bassline. The title hints at an ecological frustration which radiates through the taut, spiraling, modal grooves.

Origin Myths’ “Impregnated by Drops of Rainbow” is revisited here in full band garb, shifting gear from the 117 seconds of skeletal krautrock into almost 7 minutes of soaring Kosmiche Country, complete with a glistening pedal steel solo from Joe Harvey-Whyte. Neu Riders of The Purple Sage, if you will.

“Thunder Travels To Loftier Mountain Heights” is a gradually evolving waking dream of gently chugging tremolo and delicate interplay between Piano (a rare foray away from the drums from Guy Whittaker) and Fender Rhodes, redolent of Brightblack Morning Light, or Spirit of Eden-era Talk Talk. Picture the scene; a gang of slow movin’ outlaws briefly glimpsing eternity after a rare downpour in the desert. McCutcheon’s drums echo through the canyons and out into space…

The woozy swamp rock of “Acid Grassland” is a return to more familiar territory for Bobby; an ancient drum machine moseys along with a loping groove and riff straight outta Cosmo’s Factory. Joe Harvey-Whyte appears again with the most fuzzed-out pedal steel this side of Sneaky Pete on “Christine’s Tune”.

Oh yeah, xpost Origin Myths is already out, except on the updated, tricked-out vinyl pimped above; here's the Bandcamp pitch (alb is streaming there too):

Digital out worldwide March 5th.
Ltd Ed (600) LP out May 7th with FOUR extra songs

“Overdriven drum-machine low slung choogle" - MOJO

“The further Bobby unmoors himself from songs and heads towards long-form abstraction, the more engrossing it becomes” - UNCUT

Bobby Lee trades in a wide screen brand of cosmic country-folk, full of space and pawn shop guitars. There are touches of JJ Cale's analogue Americana, the swampy groove of Tony Joe White and Richard Thompson's sinewy, modal guitar work. Amps hum in the warm afternoon sun, kids and dogs snooze on the grass and broken drum machines keep time with the universe... Open sky/scorched earth improvisations recorded to four track tape during the rare moments of solitude afforded by lockdown and early fatherhood. Bobby Lee's "worn-denim psych-country" remains, but the ancestral spirits of Ashra, Popol Vuh and Terry Riley are present here too. Time and technological limitations have been embraced. A song dreamt up, tracked and mixed in an afternoon, never to be tampered with again. Imperfections allowed to stand; knowing that nothing is ever truly finished. The Bob Ross school of philosophy.
credits
released March 5, 2021

Bobby Lee: Electric Guitar, Bass Guitar, Drum Machine, Organ, Acoustic Guitar, Dulcimer, Lap Steel, recording, mixing and artwork.

Tompkins Square is proud to announce a NEW 5CD BOX SET, OUT JUNE 16th !

Rick Deitrick - The Unguitarist : Complete Works, 1969-2022 (Ltd. ed. of 500)

Pre-order starts today via bandcamp

Listen to "Free and Easy", recorded in 2022, via every digital service, worldwide

The box set contains :

Disc 1: Gentle Wilderness - 1978 album. Tompkins Square LP reissue out of print. First time on CD
Disc 2 : River Sun River Moon - Recorded 1977-78. Tompkins Square LP out of print. First time on CD
Disc 3 : Coyote Canyon - Recorded 1972-75, except one song 1999. Tompkins Square LP almost out of print. First time on CD
Disc 4 : Homegrown : Recordings 1969 - 1979 - First time in a physical format
Disc 5 : Sage & Sand - Recorded 1969-2022 - CD of previously unreleased material

Plus :
- A litho card hand-signed by Rick
- Notes by Rick Deitrick and Acoustic Guitar Editor, Adam Perlmutter
- Transcription of Rick’s “Ballet La Jeunesse"
- Design by D. Norsen

Ohio-born Rick Deitrick took up the guitar at 16 and decided to approach his playing as if he was the only guy on an island and the instrument had just washed ashore one day. According to Rick, "I completely divorced my playing from any formal music knowledge, but it was very important to me to use original tuning. During those years, the ‘60s/70's, there was a lot of acoustic guitar playing, often using open tuning as a base. I wanted to create whole tones without de-tuning and keep access to the complex sounds stock tuning provided."

Rick pressed 500 LPs of his tranquil solo guitar record, Gentle Wilderness, in 1978. He gave copies to libraries and left a few in the middle of the wilderness, next to trails, "so people would find them." Rick sought inspiration in nature and in particular the various rivers scattered around the Western United States, often composing songs while seated beside them.

Now, Tompkins Square is proud to present a 5CD retrospective box set, Rick Deitrick - The Unguitarist : Complete Works, 1969 - 2022 , which makes a strong case for Rick as one of the most individual voices in acoustic guitar music over the past half century.

TSQ 5913
856225005913

Thanks for the heads up on that one!

Welcome---Tompkins' prev Rick releases are streaming on their very generous Bandcamp:
https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/music

maginational Anthem vol. XII : I Thought I Told You - A Yorkshire Tribute to Michael Chapman. Available on Cassette, CD, LP and digital October 20th

Hear Henry Parker's cover of "In the Valley"
https://ingrv.es/in-the-valley-r98-7

Michael Chapman (1941-2021) released his debut album Rainmaker in 1969 on Harvest. He went on to release over fifty albums and influence many with his evocative songwriting and guitar prowess. From heady jams to expressive ballads to experimental noise, Chapman’s work continues to inspire. Tompkins Square recruited Henry Parker to curate a collection of covers by working musicians from Chapman’s home turf in Northern England. With stunning artwork by local artist Bunty Marshall mapping the important places in Michael’s life, and package design by D. Norsen, this 12th volume of Tompkins Square’s Imaginational Anthem series is the ultimate tribute to a very dearly missed artist.