Freedom Farther Than Imagination

This recording of the Ukrainian Freedom Orchestra’s emotionally charged Warsaw performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony captures one of the artistic highlights of 2023. The orchestra was created as a cultural riposte to Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine. Their Beethoven has the unique feature that its text, Schiller’s great poem of freedom “Ode to Joy”, is sung in Ukrainian, indeed it also expresses Schiller’s opening word of “Freude” (Joy) as the Ukrainian word “Slava” (Glory) to electrifying effect in a moving echo of Ukraine’s rallying call of resistance in the face of aggression, Slava Ukraini! (“Glory to Ukraine!").

An album title that fits perfectly in two respects: "Silver Romance" is the name of the latest release by southern German melodic power metal act Freedom Call. The moniker not only stands for the band’s 25th anniversary - referred to by singer/guitarist and band founder Chris Bay tongue-in-cheek as "our silver wedding anniversary" - but also applies to the content of the recording.

Throughout the Grammy-Award winning band’s illustrious 40-year career, Germany never wavered in its loyal and fanatical support of Motörhead’s untouchably loud rock ‘n’ roll, with the band regularly selling out tour after tour. And on December 5th, 2012, at the Berlin Velodrom, Motörhead played one of their biggest-ever German gigs to 12,000 delirious, delighted and demented Motörhead fans during the Kings of The Road Tour.
The event was thankfully recorded, and on April 23rd, Silver Lining Music will proudly present Louder Than Noise… Live in Berlin on CD with bonus DVD, double vinyl, and Limited Edition Boxset.

Straight off the bat, Go Farther In Lightness is a victory album. It’s a victory of love and loss; a triumph for hope and life. It’s an album with many peaks and just as many moments that make you ponder and appreciate your existence. It’s a compass for those lacking direction. It’s the ‘I may not know what I’m doing, but I’m going to have a real crack at it anyway’ moment we’ve all had. But most importantly, Go Farther In Lightness is an album that re-instills faith in the process called life. Coming two years after their acclaimed debut The Positions, Sydney locals Gang Of Youths have put together 16 tracks that will rival, if not better, any release this year for the impact it will have on its listeners. It’s a hefty listen, both in content and length. Coming in at 75 minutes, it’s a long, but hardly arduous listen. In an age where attention spans are dwindling and you can’t go longer than 10 minutes without looking at your phone, Go Farther In Lightness is an album that needs to be listened to in full. You’ll be doing yourself and the band a massive favour by doing so.

Trumpeter Toshinori Kondo has achieved the most impressive blend of yesterday and tomorrow. Since his decision to apply his study of computer technology to culture in the early 70s, he has worked on diverse projects. Kondo’s work as a film and theater actor, author, and performance organizer have complemented each other to create a very personal mosaic of expression, whose pivot point has always been his music. In 1978 he went to New York, partly out of curiosity and partly to make international contacts, and stayed for five years. He quickly got into the music scene there and played with Herbie Hancock, Bill Laswell, John Zorn, Eugene Chadbourne, Fred Firth, and others.

Bobby “Blue” Bland was one of the finest voices in post-war blues, and FARTHER UP THE ROAD offers a glimpse of his talent in its early, developmental phase.

After Radiohead stubbornly refused to accept the mantle of world's biggest and most important rock band by releasing the willfully strange rocktronica fusion Kid A in 2000, Coldplay stepped up to the plate with their debut, Parachutes. Tasteful, earnest, introspective, anthemic, and grounded in guitars, the British quartet was everything Radiohead weren't but what the public wanted them to be, and benefited from the Oxford quintet's decision to abandon rock stardom for arcane art rock. Parachutes became a transatlantic hit and 2002's sequel, A Rush of Blood to the Head, consolidated their success by being bigger and better than Parachutes, positioning Coldplay to not be just the new Radiohead, but the new U2: a band that belongs to the world but whose fans believe that the music is for them alone…

Canadian singer-songwriter John Vehadija has assembled a stellar cast for the project Light Freedom Revival, and their new album ‘Eterniverse Déjà Vu’ is released on March 7th, 2017. Accompanying him are Billy Sherwood (Drums, Bass, Guitar, Keyboards), Oliver Wakeman (Lead Keyboards), Eric Gillette (Lead Guitar) and Marisa Frantz (Harmony Vocals) as a like minded group of spiritual individuals who have joined together on this 13 track LP to lend their own skilled touches to help create a bigger sound in order to explore the concept of how consciousness and positive energy shape all our future destinies.