Sly and The Family Stone There's A Riot Goin' On (1971)

The breakthrough top ten single that became the name of their sophomore album was everywhere in 1968! As well as being the most innovative 'introduce the band' track ever, hearing Larry Graham, Cynthia Robinson, Rosie Stone, Greg Errico, Freddy Stone and Jerry Martini name-checked by Sly is so addictive it might cost the unwary a few days in rehab. As Sly says in the liner notes, his band is 'as funky as nine cans of wet magic shave.' To which Cynthia answers, 'All the squares go home!'"

w/ Jan Hammer band

USA pressing 1967 Donovan album that never came out in the UK

Featuring David Sancious, George Duke and John McLaughlin and including "Hot Fun"!

'Wanna Be Startin Somethin', 'Beat It', 'Billie Jean' and, er, 'The Girl Is Mine'. Still one of the greatest albums ever!

Sly Stone, 1973, still funky 'n' fresh, with "If You Want Me To Stay", "Babies Makin' Babies" and more

Weather Report bass man showcases his solo skills on "Donna Lee" and goes heavy on the jazz dance classics "Kuru/Speak Like A Child" and "Used To Be A Cha-Cha".

Original USA country 45

Debut 1969 album

formed out of Buffalo Springfield, second lp (1970)

Southern soul 77, w/ Muscle Shoals horns, arranged by New Orleans legend Wardell Quezergue.

Disco

ORIGINAL USA GATEFOLD VINYL

TOTALLY AWESOME CLASSIC RARE GROOVE BOMB!

Arranged by Vince Montana, Norman Harris and Ronald Baker + MFSB, a 'Philly sound' CLASSIC .The only original 7 inch from the 70's change hands for £150! Don't miss out!

USA only release. Rare

Original = Original USA Vinyl VG+/Sleeve VG+ (cutout hole)

100% Guarantee on this and all Original Vinyl at Sounds Of The Universe - 'if you're not happy we're not happy' or your money back!

Original = USA 12" Vinyl VG+ /Sleeve VG+

100% Guarantee on this and all Original Vinyl at Sounds Of The Universe - 'if you're not happy we're not happy' money-back guarantee!

Original USA Vinyl VG+ /Sleeve VG+
100% Guarantee on this and all Original Vinyl at Sounds Of The Universe - 'if you're not happy we're not happy' or your money back!

It's a classic ...

Barcelona's The Slingshots deliver authentic funky sounds via their hammond heavy cover of the Galt MacDermot classic 'Coffee Cold' and the groovy vocal number 'She Ain't Got No Soul'.

Gilles Peterson's hottest tip!

Man Made Object is the exciting new release from GoGo Penguin on the iconic Blue Note Records, a follow up to their previous album, v2.0, which saw itself on the Mercury shortlist. Although they're an acoustic band, GoGo Penguin’s music draws from many areas of contemporary electronic music, one where you can hear arcade game bleeps, glitchy breakbeats, hypnotic Aphex-style melodies, grinding basslines and a rumbling low-end. It has been described as “acoustic electronica”, which perfectly sums up the writing process.

ORIGINAL FIRST PRESSING BLUE/WHITE LIBERTY PRESSING. TAPE AND MARKINGS ON SPINE AND SLEEVE. LP GREAT

A rare and beautiful Andrew Hill session with a full choir! One of Andrew Hill's best albums! One of the classic Blue Note entries into the "jazz and voices" sound that the label pioneered with Donald Byrd and Eddie Gale. 

KILLER rare soul jazz deep deep organ on Blue Note. 

Original 1969 issue blue/black label

Essential wigged-out rocky funk! Out-there psychedelic brilliance!

Expanded edition of Bobbie Gentry's 1968 classic featuring a new stereo mix of the album along with outtakes, alternative versions and demos; plus an previously unreleased ballad, 'The Way I Do'.

B

Reissue of this ESSENTIAL deep jazz rarity! You need this album! Rare little label gem featuring the much loved track 'Let The Sunshine In'! Highly recommended!

Wicked new combination roots 7" from U.K. singer Paul Fox and Tracks & Dubs, no progamming just real instruments playing roots & culture. Limited run of 500 only.

Rare soulful gospel r&b on Chess Records

Very funky jazzy instrumental album recorded at Muscle Shoals and released on Stax subsiduary Enterprise. Original USA gatefold vinyl.

Minister of the new super heavy funk does "Funky President" and more, helped by Fred Wesley and the JB's - people it's bad !

Original USA Vinyl VG+ /Sleeve VG (bit creasing at bottom)

100% Guarantee on this and all Original Vinyl at Sounds Of The Universe - 'if you're not happy we're not happy' or your money back!

Another stunning kosmiche/hauntological set from Ghost Box co-founder, Jim Jupp aka Belbury Poly!

Classic funky blaxploitation soundtrack rarity that's even better than the well known Isaac Hayes soundtrack to the first Shaft film! A frenzy of horn stabs, furious tribal percussion and wah wah guitar...full of classic breaks! Composed, arranged and conducted by Johnny Pate with the storming title song "Are You Man Enough" by the Four Tops!

Peter Tosh was the first reggae artist to realise the limitless possibilities of the melodica (listen to the Wailers' first Tuff Gong release 'Sun Is Shining') and here he adds its haunting power to one of Bunny's best ever rhythms the prophetic 'Amagideon' from 'Black Heart Man'.

Original Nigerian vinyl (Afrodesia label)

Vinyl G+ , sleeve G+

Rare LP from Chicago's finest: Curtis Mayfield, Sam Gooden and Fred Cash. Produced by Johnny Pate

nice mod/jazz vocal version of Why Am I Treated So Bad. Rare album 

In collaboration with Tate Liverpool, Soul Jazz Records release this stunning new collection entitled The World of Keith Haring featuring music influential to the artist Keith Haring including Fab 5 Freddy, Yoko Ono, Gray (Jean-Michel Basquiat’s group), The Jonzun Crew, Larry Levan, Talking Heads, Sylvester, Johnny Dynell and many others.

The World of Keith Haring coincides with the presentation of the first major exhibition in the UK of Keith Haring’s work at Tate Liverpool on now.

The album comes in deluxe artwork and three formats: Double CD + 48-page book; 3xLP + download vinyl version. All formats of the album feature original photography, extensive sleevenotes and interviews.

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Haring’s many friends and collaborators included Jean-Michel Basquiat, Andy Warhol, Madonna, Fab 5 Freddy, William Burroughs, Jenny Holzer, Yoko Ono, Bill T Jones, Larry Levan, Timothy Leary, Futura 2000. If you were looking for a person to guide you through the wide variety of nightclub scenes of downtown New York in the 1980s, then Keith Haring would have been your man.

Keith Haring was diagnosed as HIV-positive in 1988 and died at the age of 31 on February 16, 1990. During his short time on the planet his work featured in over 100 solo and group exhibitions across the world and was seen on subways, in public spaces, on club flyers and consumer products.

Keith Haring was one of the key members of a group of New York-based artists who redefined the boundaries of modern art in the 1980s. Like his friends, including the artist Jean-Michel Basquiat and graffiti artists Fab 5 Freddy, Lee Quiñones and LA II, Haring helped first bring the aesthetics of graffiti and street art to New York’s downtown; into both the fine art world, with his own shows at the Shafrazi Gallery and Patti Astor’s Fun Gallery, as well as into the alternative punk and new wave club scene, curating art shows at spaces like Club 57 and the infamous Mudd Club.

During this time the art and music worlds of downtown New York, especially that of the East Village, were colliding as the musical boundary lines between punk rock, dance music and hip-hop also blurred. Musicians were also artists, film-makers or actors. Artists formed bands and music was art. This was the world of Keith Haring’s New York; a collaborative world where the numerous artists he worked with were also friends, all inhabiting the same fertile, febrile and creative world of New York City in the 1980s.

Music played a central role in the creation of Haring’s art. In 1981 Keith Haring, Fab 5 Freddy and Futura 2000 organised ‘Beyond Words,’ the first downtown graffiti show on the top floor of the Mudd Clubb, with Afrika Bambaataa DJing at the opening, while downstairs the sounds of spiky punk/dance music played to a dancefloor populated with New York’s new punk and no wave glitterati – David Byrne, Deborah Harry, The Contortions et al – who mixed with poor East Village aspiring artists and Studio 54 celebrities like Andy Warhol, Grace Jones and David Bowie.

At his early solo art shows Haring hired break-dancers and DJs (including his partner Juan Dubose) to play at gallery openings. As hip-hop and electro exploded into the world, body-popping and electro boogie-ing characters also populated Haring’s paintings with much of the kinetic energy of his work part inspired by the dancefloor and street moves of B-Boys and B-Girls.

But the decisive moment in creating Haring’s musical tastes and inspiration came with a chance discovering of the Paradise Garage one night in 1984 while walking through the streets of the West Village with his friend Fab 5 Freddy. As Haring told biographer John Gruen:

‘I have never been the same since I walked into Paradise Garage … The music was phenomenal – Larry Levan was the DJ there and he was like a god in the DJ booth. I was totally mesmerized.’

Haring fell in love with the Paradise Garage, creating large scale artworks and flyers for the club, flying home from his exhibitions around the world to religiously attend Saturday nights there. Haring became friends with Larry Levan and in 1984 he put on his own Party of Life at the Garage with DJs Levan and Juan Dubose, and live appearances from his friends John Sex and the then-unknown singer Madonna.

By the second half of the 1980s Haring was spending more and more time away from New York and working in Europe. Despite this he remained connected to New York’s dance culture at all times through a constant stream of cassette mixtapes that he would listen to while working. These mixtapes were supplied by friends and lovers such as Jean Dubose and Gil Vazquez and playlists from the likes of Larry Levan, Frankie Knuckles and Junior Vasquez.

About the music:

The music collected on The World of Keith Haring is a combination of rare disco, early electro and New York punk/dance tracks reflecting the vibrant and hybrid world of downtown New York in the 1980s.

Here you will find early electro from The Jonzun Crew, Adiche and The Extra T’s alongside angular jerky crossover punk/dance and disco/not disco tracks like Pylon’s ‘Danger,’ John Sex’s ‘Bump and Grind’, Yoko Ono’s ‘Walking on Thin Ice’ and Mudd Club DJ Johnny Dynell’s ‘Jam Hot.’

The music of some of Haring’s favourite visual artists (and friends) also feature heavily including Jean-Michel Basquiat’s experimental group Gray, George Condo’s art rock group The Girls (produced by David Thomas of Pere Ubu) and early rap from Fab Five Freddy.

Paradise Garage soul and disco classics here include Sylvester’s seminal ‘Over and Over’; London DJ Tony Williams’ fusion of Jamaican dub and New York dance music as The Funk Masters, Damon Harris’s uplifting ‘It’s Music’ and disco producers extraordinaire Peter Brown and Patrick Adams’ homage to the new phenomenon of the day – The Guardian Angels of the New York subway system.

Together these are some of the tracks first heard in New York’s prolific underground club scene of the 1980s – including Club 57, The Mudd Club, Danceteria, Hurrah, Area, The Fun Club, Tier 3, The Palladium, Roxy, Pyramid and Paradise Garage. Haring was a regular face at many of these clubs, often a creative participant, both shaping and defining the cultural identity of downtown New York.

Also included is a track by the long-standing French experimental group Art Zoyd. ‘Sortie 134’ made as part of the music for ‘Le Mariage du Ciel et de L’Enfer’ (‘The Marriage of Heaven and Hell’), a ballet created by Roland Petit, choreographer at the National Ballet of Marseille, based upon a collection of pose and poetry by William Blake. As one of many works that Haring took on in Europe at the time, Petit commissioned the artist to create a massive 100-square metre backdrop painting for this show.

The selection of music on this collection is itself like a mixtape that reflects Haring’s wide-ranging musical influences and connections. And for someone who neither DJ’d nor played in a band he had impeccable musical tastes, with music playing a pivotal part in both his life and work, and functioning as an essential and always present soundtrack to both.

Exhibition details:

Keith Haring exhibition at Tate Liverpool 14th June 2019 - 10th November 2019

In 2020 the show then travels to:

Centre for Fine Arts (BOZAR), Brussels, Belgium: 5th December 2019 - 20th April 2020

Folkwang, Essen, Germany: 22nd May 2020 - 20th September 2020

Formats: Tr 10 CD/D only, Tr 8,14 on deluxe 3xLP/CD/D only

Reviews:

"★★★★★ Soul Jazz compilations make an excellent argument for the physical album purchase in the age of Spotify: substantial liner notes, great photos, collections put together to tell a story. The label has outdone itself with this one, released to coincide with Tate Liverpool’s retrospective of Eighties New York’s foremost creator of blocky, stylised pop art." The TIMES

Two long-time associates of the legendary Fela Kuti come together on Rejoice. Afrobeat drumming pioneer Tony Allen and the (now sadly departed) South African trumpeter Hugh Masekela got together in 2010 when their touring schedules allowed, with the unfinished sessions laying in an archive until last summer when producer Nick Gold applied the finishing touches.

Afro disco boogie

Rare Original Nigerian vinyl.Tony Okoroji's first solo effort - a monumental record as he was one of the first Nigerian boogie producers to play all the instruments on a record.

Includes the seminal original of "I'm Still Waiting" as covered by many of jamaica's rocksteady groups (including The Wailers).

Original USA Vinyl VG+/Sleeve VG
100% Guarantee on this and all Original Vinyl at Sounds Of The Universe - 'if you're not happy we're not happy' or your money back!