Holy Ghost Kolosa

The Helicopter Of The Holy Ghost resuscitates music which literally nobody had even a memory of and brings it blinking into the light; thank your lucky stars then that Afters is timeless but very much alive…

Mark Lanegan's first solo album, 1990's The Winding Sheet, was a darker, quieter, and more emotionally troubling affair than what fans were accustomed to from his work as lead singer with the Screaming Trees. The follow-up album, 1994 's Whiskey for the Holy Ghost, used The Winding Sheet's sound and style as a starting point, with Lanegan and producer/instrumentalist Mike Johnson constructing resonant but low-key instrumental backdrops for the singer's tales of heartbreak, alcohol, and dashed hopes. While The Winding Sheet often sounded inspired but tentative, like the solo project from a member of an established band, Whiskey for the Holy Ghost speaks with a quiet but steely confidence of an artist emerging with his own distinct vision. The songs are more literate and better realized than on the debut, the arrangements are subtle and supportive (often eschewing electric guitars for keyboards and acoustic instruments), and Lanegan's voice, bathed in bourbon and nicotine, transforms the deep sorrow of the country blues (a clear inspiration for this music) into something new, compelling, and entirely his own. Whiskey for the Holy Ghost made it clear that Mark Lanegan had truly arrived as a solo artist, and it ranks alongside American Music Club's Everclear as one of the best "dark night of the soul" albums of the 1990s.

Holy Ghost is the first comprehensive attempt to build a monument in sound to Albert Ayler. The settings – radio and TV sessions, studio demos, private recordings, live concert footage – find his music at its most liberated. And with the sponsorship and assistance of Ayler's family, friends, and colleagues, Holy Ghost documents his never-before-heard first and last recordings, bookending rare and unissued music from every stage of his career.

revenantrecords.com

Gifts From The Holy Ghost, Dorothy Martin's third studio album as frontwoman for their pseudonymous rock band Dorothy, is the album she's always wanted to make. Born from a sense of diving urgency, it's their most bombastic rock n' roll work yet. While the debut album was made on a combination of whiskey and heartbreak, Gifts was built on sobriety, health, and spiritualism, in a way that reverses the cliched "good girl gone bad" narrative.