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Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraiso U.F.O. return with Sacred And Inviolable Phase Shift. One of the greatest Japanese psychedelic bands has a new studio album.

The U-Men are one of the best bands I’ve ever seen. They were hypnotic, frenetic, powerful and compelling. It was impossible to resist getting sucked into their weird, darkly absurd world. They effortlessly blended The Sonics, Link Wray, Pere Ubu, and Captain Beefheart. Their shows were loose-limbed, drunken dance parties and no two shows were alike. The U-Men were avant-garage explorers and, most importantly, they fucking rocked. I was lucky enough to live in their hometown and I saw them every chance I could.

French violinist Clement Janinet composes music for quartet inspired by the lyricism of the free jazz melodies of the 60s (Ornette Coleman, Phoraoh Sanders, &c.) and the timbral and rhythmic textures of repetitive music (Steve Reich, Philip Glass, John Adams, &c) in several quartet configurations including bass clarinet, tenor sax, bass, drums, guitrar, and cello.

French guitarist/producer U-Nam is again standing tall and looming large on the smooth jazz scene with another creative gem called C’est Le Funk. In addition to dazzling us with his graceful and funky instrumental work (and one funky delivery with vocals from Tim “TiO” Owens), the album is loaded with strong production and presence. Wasting no time putting the groove into high gear from the start, the guitarist leads off with a driving track called “Smoovin’,” continues plowing ahead with the party groover “Something’s Up” and strutting right through the super-funky, hook-rich title track which features Nivo Deux (Nivo Deux is actually a project organized by U-Nam and wife Shannon Kennedy focusing on the incorporation of 80’s Pop, Smooth Jazz, and Electro-Funk).

When Swedish artist Solar Fields (Magnus Birgersson) meets French artist Aes Dana (Vincent Villuis)… the outcome is H.U.V.A. Network, a downtempo project where North and South regions mix and jumble together in a fluid manner. The pair of sound architects explore ambient-electronica landscapes and their multiple layouts. Their works are thought out and composed in two studios: Studio Jupiter (Göteborg, Sweden) and Ultimae Studio (Lyon, France). Musical works and ideas are conceived in these two creation poles via a few travels and a high speed internet network connection, thus breaking "Distances" (2004) which separate the two composers…