Wukir Suryadi
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boomkat: ...Peter Mekwunye aka Pedro’s self-released side of homebrew boogie pop is a total one-of-a-kind find dating to 1993 Portland, OR, and has been newly discovered by Musique Plastique, who issued Visible Cloaks eponymous debut LP in 2015. Trust that you’ve hardly ever heard such a raw, lo-fi slab so full of soul and vibes as One Kind of Love!As a new arrival from Nigeria to Portland, OR in North West America, Peter Mekwunye assembled a small home studio consisting of casio keyboard, microphone and a multitrack recorder to realise his dream of making and releasing his own music a reality with One Kind of Love. As these things go, Peter self-distributed the album on tape to local shops and it pretty much disappeared without a trace of acclaim In the history books.Fast fwd to the modern day and its rediscovery tees up a total melter of an album for a whole new generation, offering the kind of obscurity that you’d well expect to hear on Awesome Tapes From Africa, especially with its distinctly Nigerian-sounding melodies and loping grooves influenced by Fela Kuti and the piquant dance-pop of William Onyeabor. But this this one ended up coming out in America and therefore kinda by-passed ATFA to end up in its own geo-temporal time-warp.Now remastered from tape by Brandon Hocura at Invisible City, One Kind Of Love’s blend of impassioned pop songs and hushed, spoken word poetry set to wobbling grooves and rhythmelodies possesses a deeply special charm, remaining as testament to the idea of going it alone and finding your place in the world, which, although it only took him 24 years, Pedro has clearly come back into circulation at a time when bedroom boogienauts and dreamers are especially hungry for this stuff - a deeply familiar yet at once alien and enigmatic sort of electronic soul.Highly recommended!

EM Records: ...A revered figure in his native Isan region, and indeed throughout Thailand, Doi Inthanon is a legendary producer, composer, visionary and talent-spotter, a man who combines business acumen with an unerring ability to both predict and engender new directions in Thai popular music. Fittingly naming himself after the tallest mountain in the nation, he has towered over Thai music since the early 70s, and is still active today. This compilation, the first "various artists" collection in the EM Records + Soi 48 Thai music series, is an avalanche of Doi Inthanon productions, big hits and rare treasures spanning the early 70s to the mid-80s. The songs here cover a range of genres, comprising luk thung isan, Thai funk, and molam, including examples of "lam phaen", one of several styles created by the producer himself. Doi Inthanon is highly regarded as a developer of singers, and this compilation has no shortage of greats: national icons Angkanang Khunchai and Po Chalatnoi Songsoem, second-generation molam idols such as Onuma Singsiri and Hongthong Dao-udon, soul sister No. 1 Khwanta Fasawang, and 80s-90s Isan star Thongmai Mali.Doi Inthanon is a key figure in Isan pop music, and this essential collection conveniently gathers hard-to-find tracks which have been issued on various labels in Thailand, including Double Rabbits, Apple, Uea Aree and his own private label. Available now on vinyl and CD, with most of the tracks on the CD version making their appearance in that format.

Hopestreet Recordings: ...Cult band The Bombay Royale are set for a triumphant return with their third studio masterpiece ‘Run Kitty Run’. A Retro Bollywood fuelled rampage through Psyche-Surf, 80’s Electro-Pop and Desert Rock, ‘Run Kitty Run’ is, like its predecessors, conceived as the soundtrack to a lost film. The music conjures into life a devastated futuristic landscape peopled by robotic horsemen, killer satellites and grinning sadhus. Overlaid with vocals in Hindi, Bengali and English, the resulting soundtrack is one of love and betrayal, hopeless escapes and unlikely salvation.