Artists Palette 2023

Richter Ensemble is a new chamber music initiative in which the members share a mutual passion for bold artistic expression. Emphasising flexibility and freedom, the group works mainly as a string quartet, but can expand to a larger chamber orchestra. It is fervent about highlighting hidden connections in music ranging from the 17th to the 21st centuries, demonstrated through its innovative programming. Benefitting from members' vast experiences of performing with leading period ensembles, the Richter Ensemble presents a fresh palette of colors by playing uniquely on gut strings. It seeks to bring spontaneity and new light to every performance and is enthusiastic about collaborating with artists from other fields such as dance and visual media (i.e. projections, installations, art exhibitions, and film). The ensemble has a particular affinity for music from Fin-desiècle and the Second Viennese School, and strives to reintroduce that music to audiences through a new lens.

Limited five CD set. London 1982. As the new romantic youthquake of 1981/1982 faded, and after what felt like a lifetime since punk's last gasp, a tiny nightclub opened it's doors in London's Soho. Drawing to it a new generation of misfits and miscreants with a penchant for polysexual hedonism, for dressing up and showing out, The Batcave became the dark heart of alternative club culture, just like The Roxy and The Blitz before it. With it's very strong tracklisting, Young Limbs Rise Again includes music from just about everybody that mattered - from The Cure to Joy Division, from The Sisters Of Mercy to Sparks. Accompanying the 5CDs is a stunning 80-page hardback book, with an introduction from Kris Needs, packed with flyers, record sleeves, over 100 photographs, many previously unseen, and the full story of the club as told by the people who were there. From Sydney to Mexico City to Paris to Brazil to Berlin - what came to be known as goth here in early-80s London, is arguably one of the UK's greatest cultural exports. The goth aesthetic forged in those tiny west end dives has gone on to inform generation after generation of bands from Nine Inch Nails to Yungblud as well as walking fashion runways for Burberry, McQueen and Galiano and giving Hollywood a whole new dark palette to work with - from Tim Burton's weird cinematic adventures to TV shows as diverse as Buffy The Vampire Slayer and American Horror Story.

“Harmony”, “concord/accord”, “syntony”… there are numerous terms which properly belong in the vocabulary of music (or are akin to it, as is the case with accord and chord) and which express the human values of friendship, sympathy (another term widely employed in acoustics!), and amity.

"Every man has two deaths, when he is buried in the ground and the last time someone says his name" - Ernest Hemmingway. Evoking similarities to Hemmingway’s musings on the impact we as individuals can have on those around us, Danish trio Human Being Human’s second record strives to celebrate the joy that comes with the fragility of life instead of mourning loss and the notion of fading into obscurity. ‘Disappearance’ is set to release on November 10th on April Records.

A listless album about being listless, Mac DeMarco’s new collection of instrumentals summons the bleary, exhausted feeling of time spent on the road. Bob Rafelson’s 1970 film Five Easy Pieces ends with the hero, played by Jack Nicholson, hitching a ride on a northbound truck and disappearing into anonymity. Mac DeMarco is too larger-than-life to ever be anonymous, but this scene is a good starting place for considering his new Five Easy Hot Dogs. Ever since he sang “What mom don’t know has taken its toll on me” on 2014’s Salad Days, he has been exploring a long post-adolescent hangover, the feeling of emerging on the other side of your young and carefree days and seeing little that looks exciting in your future. This thread came to a head on 2019’s Here Comes the Cowboy, a record whose burnt-out ballads were full of dead friends, departed lovers, and uncertain plans. Now here are 14 instrumentals made on a long and spontaneous solo road trip, where DeMarco pledged “not go home to Los Angeles until I was done with a record.” This is a listless album about being listless, and it’s a pretty accurate picture of the stretches of useless, money-burning time that come with being on the road.

After a recording of Book II of The Well-Tempered Clavier that earned unanimous acclaim from the press, Andreas Staier now gives us an equally poetic and flamboyant interpretation of the first book. At once architect and colorist, he constantly varies the atmospheres, unfolding an infinite palette of musical landscapes. Under his fingers, this immense cathedral in sound is revealed in all it's thrilling diversity.

Three years ago, we got our hands on the first solo songs from Maddie Mae (one of the singers from THE YEARNING, the main project from Joe Moore, who has also been responsible for producing and writing for Lia Pamina, THE PERFECT KISS, JULIE ET JOE, Cristina Quesada and Maddie Mae herself).

Nabihah Iqbal returns with ‘DREAMER’, her long-awaited new album out 28th April 2023 on Ninja Tune. Five years on since the London-born artist, curator, broadcaster and lecturer's debut ‘Weighing Of The Heart’ was released and two years in the making, ‘DREAMER’ is Nabihah’s rawest and most reflective work to date.

The roots of Yulia Petrova’s extraordinary & exquisite technique as an artist & composer today, can all be traced back to the earliest days of her childhood, when she first discovered her connection to music by learning how to play piano at the age of five. Though extremely young at the time, it was instantly clear she had a genuinely special gift and exceptional talent for her age, and it was only three years later before Yulia began to compose her very first songs, establishing her passions & pathway forward in life.

Since her fantastic 2016 EP, N15, British Algerian singer-songwriter Miraa May has been a lesser-known but essential part of UK pop.