Viola Wills
If You Could Read My Mind

long overdue reissue with rock city pioneer Billy Jones.. here's what he had to say about his crew....in the early 80's Billy Jones was the lead guitarist for an outstanding group of touring musicians who called themselves 'The Incredible Rock City Band'. They performed on military installations all over the United States for the U.S. Dept. of MWR for more than ten years during the 80's and 90's. ...I'm sure that there are many veterans out there who remember seeing this band at NCO and Officer's clubs back in the day.

On the fourth album of his fusion cycle for the man from the Black Forest, George Duke substantially expanded the number of his colleagues. As before, drummer Leon “Ndugu” Chancler beats as the heart of the rhythm section, and the Brazilian couple, Airto and Flora are again on board. The ten tracks perform a stylistic balancing act. The jittery funk of Chariot and the smooth ballad Someday show off Duke’s soulful vocal flair. Flora Purim crowns the complex Look Into Her Eyes with her spheric sound as she and guitarist George Johnson take care of business on this stratospheric piece with its bluesy electric shuffle. With two high-voltage guitarists (Daryl Stuermer and Byron Miller), That’s What She Said points to the tie between rock and funk. The most eye-opening outing occurs with star guitarist Lee Ritenour stomping on Rokkinrowl, I Don’t Know, and its Hendrix parody. Sister Sirene shows that, naturally, the typical dreamy Duke instrumentals are not left off the album. An almost animistic soundscape is woven into the fabric of Mashavu, and Giant Child Within Us – Ego is a small fusion suite encompassing the spectrum from the classical to the Zappaesque finale. The title piece is indeed a blues, dished out pure and simple – a far cry from the sounds of the preceeding piece with its mountains of synthesizers. Rather, the sultry delta heat, the acoustic simplicity and raw truth of the song prevail – the blues.

NBN (Nothing But Net) Records are very proud to present ‘In The Beginning’, first solo LP from South-Carolinian singer, composer, songwriter, producer and multi-instrumentalist Teddy Bryant.Following dynamic musical years playing local shows with his Contemporary Jazz band Urbyne (since 1998), and releasing a Neo Soul album in 2012 as Moonlight Ora, Bryant now presents his first solo album. The son of a Jazz musician, Bryant began learning the piano from an early age, his natural talent for melodic and harmonic compositions didn't go unnoticed for long.With this entirely self-produced album Teddy invites listeners to a trip around his world, at the crossroads of Contemporary Soul, Street Soul, Neo Soul and R&B, with the intention of creating a “dreamy concept of sonic realness, an ode to everlasting love, paying tribute to Sade, Marvin Gaye, Prince and Quincy Jones”.

Sketches is the limited edition vinyl run from fika, showcasing a collection of songs from their exploration of R&B.The record serves as an aperture into their artistic development and compositional ideas or ‘sketches’ to date, featuring collaborations with trumpet virtuoso Jackson Mathod (Stormzy, Jordan Rakei) on ‘Make You Feel’, El Train (Barney Artist) on ‘Free’, and Jafunk (James Vickery, Dirty Radio) on ‘Only One’.