Vinyl Releases: Bear Family, Nettwerk, Fruits de Mer and more!

Brief commentary of vinyl releases from Bear Family, Nettwerk, Fruits de Mer and more!

Direct from Germany’s Bear Family (www.bear-family.com) is Johnny Hallyday’s Shake the Hand of a Fool, a two disc collection of 1962 Nashville Sessions. An excellent collection of improvised Gallic arrangements.

We Are Vinyl offers Steve ‘Love Affair’ Ellis and Boom! Bang! Twang!, a new soul LP featuring Paul Weller and Manfred Mann’s Mike D’Abo. Great songs, enhanced by Ellis’ clear-voiced delivery.

From Aisha Badru, Bridges (Nettwerk; www.nettwerk.com) features that in-vogue, croaky, whisper, lo-fi, just about to burst into tears female vocal style (but with added lisp to infuse it with variance). Derivative.

Released as a 3LP plus 7” set, Goldfish (Fruits de Mer; www.fruitsdemerrecords.com) is a glorious, top notch, sprawling yet fascinating 10 year back catalogue celebration including The Pretty Things, The Chemistry Set and Astralasia. 

New one from Sparks (Lil’ Beethoven/Sony) is 2008’s double album Exotic Creates of the Deep. Thoughtful, multi-layered, complex songs that are well worth unravelling.

The Diissc Orchestra ensemble share an LP with laptop quartet, Twentytwentyone. Split LP (Lithuanian Music Information Center/Bôłt Records; www.boltrecords.pl). Experimental tones, processed instruments and avant-garde templates make for a fun time.