Everyone who’s been exposed to it acknowledges that Ariel Pink and His Haunted Graffiti’s new album, ‘Before Today’ is one of the best things to come out this year so far. You know that 20jazzfunkgreats like to be contrary bitches, but in this case we have no other option than surrendering to join the shoal of mildly psychedelic mermaids as they skip through the kaleidoscopic coral reefs under the slurping waves of a cough syrup ocean.

We already raved about ‘Round and Round’, which will be rocking the best spring discotheques in lethargically intense styles- well, the rest is as good. No post-modern in-jokes or knowing recombination of references, nay, this is a man at the height of his instinctive alchemical pop powers on a mission of love and innocence. The track we leave with you today is perhaps the cutest of all, it sounds like an advert of the afterlife as broadcasted via Poltergeist’s unruly TV set. Let the ectoplasmic soul barrage begin, the world needs it.

Ariel Pink and his Haunted Graffiti- Fright Night (Nevermore)

Another cool thing about the blooming of a thousand weird labels out there is that bands have the space of experiment in different directions through a myriad outlets. Look at Blank Dogs, who have in previous releases marauded the shores of river Stix like murky ghost wave predators, and then tripped over each other in jangly anthemic delight.

In their latest EP, ‘Phrases’, out in Captured Tracks, they set the synthesisers to rejoice and deliver a collection of breezy springtime jams where warm harmonies glide free over tinny electropop rhythms. They close it with their most robotic tune yet, ‘End of Summer’, which sounds like one of the cassette experiments in NEU!72 as undertaken by Oppenheimer Analysis on a good hair day. One for those less keen on the electroclash side of the cold wave revival.

Blank Dogs- End of Summer

The good folks at Permanent Vacation never fail to make us happy. They are soon to put out Sally Shapiro’s ‘My Guilty Pleasures Remixes’ collection, where renegade disco stalwarts such as Lovelock or Bottin  give our adored snow fractal diva a dancefloor makeover.

We leave you today with Low Motion Disco’s remix, which ends the affair in a most epic manner. This is no cosmic workout or codeine stereo rocker. No, it is a total eclipse of the heart which sets Sally in a context of heart-throbbing drama, you can almost see her walking down the boulevards of Paris towards a fateful rendezvous, secret princess hailed by trumpets only we can hear while the crows bear witness indifferent from autumnal trees. And then the drums kick Bonnie and Clyde style to bring it all home. What happens next? 20jazzfunkgreats gasps, we will never know.

Sally Shapiro- Let it Show (Low Motion Disco Remix)

(Image by Tommy Boy)

Hex is the title track in a Gatto Fritto 12 released last year. I can’t believe more people have picked up on it, there are even some left in Juno. So, I’d advise all of you principled kids out there who like to put your money where your mouth is to run & grab a copy, because you are unlikely to find a sweeter cut of disco classicism this side of early evening at the Loft circa 1978 (although Arcade Lover, Watussi & The Off Key Hat might beg to differ). It all kicks off like one of those lethal weapons hidden in Mike Simonetti’s secret stash, stiletto strutting and dazzling mascara sliding into the psychedelic halo of synthesiser radiance which characterises Gatto Fritto’s music. And then, circa 4.30 comes the balearic opium drop, you have found the light and you will never go back home. Absolutely majestic.

Gatto Fritto- Hex

Another evening at home as the sun sets drawing the subtlest of gradients over the ample skies of Brightonia, another occasion to revel on the sweetness of our most adored disco princess Sally Shapiro, and the genius of Johan Agebjorn and . She has another album out, by the name of ‘My Guilty Pleasures’ on Permanent Vacation, and it is everything you would hope for: disco music to fly kites, draw shapes in the snow and play air keytar to, in front of the mirror watching the sweet reflection of a John Hughes flick , this could have been Giorgio Moroder’s imaginary sunday morning project, a nimble kitten to his fierce nocturnal panthers. Moonlight Dance shifts the tempo a bit, all 80s night dubbin’ and streetwise boogie synthesisers, drawing us into the floor for a few minutes of nerdy dancing, after which we step back into the shadows, shy as ever but happier than usual.

Sally Shapiro- Monlight Shadow

Having shaken the floor silly with blinding releases in Italians do it Better and Eskimo, Bottin comes back with the 12 sampler of a horror themed album for Bear Funk, this is not very scary, but then what is Phenomena about, a girl who talks with insects teaming up with Donald Pleasance to chase a defomed midget which is eventually hacked to death by a vengeful monkey? Cue Iron Maiden to soundtrack a funeral? Not an ounce of irony on sight? Dario Argento must have some weird dreams indeed, and we love him for that. Horror Disco album succeeds in the same way, as an epic 80s synth bubblegum disco extravaganza for the freaks to swing, gnarly butcher knives swinging in the air as the tomato sauce splatters all over the glitterball, best party you ever attended, standard.

Bottin- Disco for the Devil

Sally Shapiro’s music is a shy supernova of pure and ethereal light which doesn’t blind but glows there in front of you like the pages of the Neverending Story upon first being opened, it doesn’t expand to engulf you but draws you inside a luminous scene of 80s stylish cinematography and pastel warmth, constellations of silver stars which are smooth pearls which are perfect teeth of a smile forming as eyes follow breathless the spiral of scribblings of a scented love letter, in her new single ‘Miracle‘ she mesmerises you into a state of delighted trance with wave after wave of emotions turned into perfect pop music, ravishing strings bringing it to a conclusion which deserves crimson curtains and a subdued tear.

Sally Shapiro-Miracle

Songs have stories, songs tell us stories and then there are the stories we make around songs. We just returned from a long journey into distant archipielagos shrouded in mystery and wonder, pushed forward by the capricious sounds of this beautiful music. May its power take you in the direction of glimmering treasures as valuable, but different, from those we found.

We have been in love with Quiet Village for a long time, ever since we first delved into their unfathomable depths of subtle emotion and discovery, pressed into the sweet black wax of already legendary Whatever We Want 12 inches. Their full-length, Silent Movie, is but breath-taking, a hidden beach of pristine water where you can see yourself reflected in a blue world, all worries and difficulties shed from your soul like black clouds blown away by a breeze, healing. We hear their music, and other music of the past resonating in the perfection of their pastel coloured compositions, echoes of memories always palpitating warm, arranged with love-begotten precision.

And the strings, oh, the strings.

Quiet Village Project- Pacific Rhythm

If Rinder and Lewis sins’ are deadly, then hell must be a rather sweet place, and the transition into it one where we are led by the slender hands of graceful devils of such unearthly beauty they had to be cast away from Heaven least they make the angels crazed with envy. This music is a beacon illuminating the sidereal darkness from the silvery hull of a cruiser sailing towards the coral reefs of Andromeda, which are in outer space but feel underwater, as Sven Libaek and Werner Herzog know.

Rinder and Lewis- Lust

Our beloved chanteuse Sally Shapiro is releasing a Remix Romance with participation from wonderful peoples such as Lindstrom, Junior Boys, Skatebard or Holy Fuck. And then The Juan McLean, who has been making us shake our hips piano with his fantastic Happy House. In his remix of ‘I Know You Are My Love’ he builds a Moroderian Nostromo around Sally’s small body and launches it in a robotic disco odyssey through delighted galaxies of pink, destination unknown, and lucky.

Sally dreams of singing inside a frosty cryogenic chamber, and in dreaming sings, and is her song one of such beauty that even the forbidding guardians of the walls of sleep are convinced to let it pass into reality, and thus it resonates sweet and ghostly inside the quiet corridors of the ship, and makes machines fall from homoeostasis into love, the tapestry of synths which surge in the blissful breakdown but their enthralled response.

Sally Shapiro- I Know You Are My Love (Juan MacLean Remix)

Friday- Join us at:

Loves Saves the Day

Sunday 30th in Brighton at Heist, free entry and cosmic sounds, dress to impress and above all, dance. 8-1AM