The Editorial - Page 5


	M U S I C & E L S E W H E R E : 25TH ANNIVERSARY COLLECTION PLANNED FOR 2017
	Nope, it's not just MMATT celebrating a major anniversary, next April will mark 25 years since the first batch of releases went out on the Music & Elsewhere label. It was the album "Not At All" by Gypsy (who now works under the name of Arzathon) that bore the catalogue number M&E 001 (pictured left), which is now freely available on the RODENT TAPES BACKSTAGE collection on the Internet Archive, just click on the image and treat yourself. There was so much great music released throughout the 11 years M&E was fully active, it would've been a tragedy not to ensure the best part of it was digitised and made available once more for posterity. The M&E 25th Anniversary Collection plans to do just that; themed around our best selling Showcase series and other popular compilations, we are putting together collections of 25 albums, with accompanying PDF format booklets. Plus a "best of" compilation to die for. You thought the "Decadion" collections were good value? You ain't seen nothing yet! Coming up are details of the eight collections, covering 212 M&E releases, that are on the drawing board at the moment, and we'd naturally welcome any comments. Maybe there's a collection you'd like to see that we never did a compilation of, the experimental genres, for example, "Strictly Elsewhere"? We have ears, we will listen. Promise. In the meantime, the two DECADION COLLECTIONS remain in stock (though admittedly in rather small quantities), each offering 12½ hours of sounds for only £10 GBP. There's also a huge amount of stuff available via The M&E Index and Links page, both accessible from the navigation bar (left). Right, sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin... "The Best Of Music & Elsewhere 1987-2003" - the compilation to end all compilations, being a mega-compilation of ALL 37 of our compilations, featuring every track from; "Grain-Aid!", "The Guilfin Benefit Tape" (volumes 1-4), "The Radio Cracker Tape", "The Best Of M&E 1992-93", "Life, The Underground & Everything" (double cassette), "M&E Showcase" (volumes 1-7), "Better Things Are Electric", "All Things Dark And Beautiful", "Around The World In 90 Minutes", "Subterranean Psychefest" (double cassette), "Cherchez La Femme", "M&E Audiozine (volumes 1-12, Spring 2000, New Year 2001 & Rise 2003), "Decadion" (double cassette) and "United World Underground". Bonus: Plus at least one track by every M&E artist who never appeared on any of our compilations, thus making it the almost perfect complete sampler collection! (see 'Help' request) "United World Underground" - including the original 77 minute compact disc complilation featuring; Steve Andrews (featuring Ned Zero), Blacklight Braille, Cosmic Dance Society, Dark Star, Earth, Eye, Grass Harp, Idiom, Into The Abyss, Lord Litter, Love In A Plague, Neo (Operattack), Ras.Al.Ghul, The Stinking Badger Of Java and T.M.R. Plus a selection of a further 24 albums drawn from some of the artists on that list, as well as other M&E artists that embraced the digital revolution back in the day, to be specially chosen by myself. "Life, The Underground & Everything" - including the original 180 minute compilation featuring; Animal Factory, Axemaster, Barra, Blue Velvet, Burning Dollhouse, The Charles, Cosmic Dance Society, Cyborg Sex Babies, Hecate's Dreams, Herr Albrecht, Into The Abyss, The Invisible Band, Karg, Kava Kava, Kronstadt, Lord Litter, Magic Moments At Twilight Time, Mana Erg, Dave Munkhoff, No Exit, Opera Multi Steel, The Original Mind Band, Paradox, Sabotage, Solanaceae Tau, Sons Of Selina, Sosumi, Stormclouds, Twister, Viktimized Karcass, The Witches, Wobble Jaggle Jiggle and X Ray Pop. Plus a selection of a further 24 albums from the M&E catalogue, to be specially chosen by myself to capture the incredible diversity of talent present in the underground music scene of the day. "Better Things Are Electric" - including the original 90 minute electronic music compilation featuring; Communication Union, Dark Star, Emmellar, Endzietgeneration, Qubais Reed Ghazala, Invisible Universe, The Kitchen, Leviathan, Magic Moments At Twilight Time, L.G. Mair Jr., Nomuzic, Paracon and Cristian Vogel. Plus a selection of a further 24 albums drawn from some of the artists on that list, as well as some of the great electronic musicians that joined the label after it, such as Artemiy Artemiev, Karda Estra, Klangwart, Levente and Titania Moon.			"All Things Dark And Beautiful" - including the original 90 minute gothic/darkside compilation featuring; The Charles, The Evasion On Stake, The Fiends Of Zacharia, The Flowers Of Romance, Flowers Of Sacrifice, Grass Harp, Into The Abyss, Kiss The Blade, The Radiance, Religious Vision, Revenge Of Nephthys, Siela, Sweet William and The Venus Fly Trap. Plus a selection of a further 24 albums drawn from some of the artists on that list, as well as some of the great dark-leaning musicians that joined the label after it, such as Dark Side Cowboys, Gothica, Ignite, Mugwump and Troll. "Around The World In 25 Albums" - including the original "Around The World In 90 Minutes" compilation featuring; Steve Andrews Wales), Christ! (England), The Drum Fondu (Belgium), Kevyn Dymond & Mark Shafer (U.S.A.), Elza (Ukraine), The Flowers Of Romance (Greece), Toshiyuki Hiraoka & Okaniwa Fumihiro (Japan), Introit (France), Invisible Universe (Finland), Ir Visa Tai Kas Yra Grazu Yra Grazu (Lithuania), Jaws Of The Flying Carpet (Canada), Tommy Mill Home (Germany), Political Asylum (Scotland), Rotton Kidz (Thailand), Alex Schiavi (Italy), Those Who Survived The Plague (Austria) and Zartipo (Belarus). Plus a selection of a further 24 albums drawn from some of the artists on that list, as well as some of the other great artists that joined us from the far-flung corners of the world, such as Eye/Aya (Australia), The Legendary Poptones (Bulgaria), Space Invaders (Croatia), Chateau De Fleurs (Norway) and Spinhx (South Africa). "Subterranean Psychefest" - including the original 180 minute space/psychedelic rock compilation featuring; Alien Planetscapes, Almost Human, Alphane Moon, Animal Factory, Burning Dollhouse, Cerise Eclipse, Cosmic Dance Society, Cyborg Sex Babies, Disc, Doctor Brown, Grass Harp, The Invisible Band, Kava Kava, Lord Litter, Magic Moments At Twilight Time, Mana Erg, Nomuzic, The Original Mind Band, Otherworld, Paradox, Psychedelic Dancefloor, Sons Of Selina, Sosumi, Sponge, Stormclouds and Zartipo. Plus a selection of a further 24 albums drawn from some of the artists on that list, as well as some of the great cosmic trippers that joined the label after it, such as Earth, The Rabbit's Hat, The Now, Judge Trev & Nik Turner & Pseudo Sun. "Cherchez La Femme" - including the original 90 minute compilation released to pay fitting tribute to some of the incredible female talent in the underground back in the day, which features; Barking Dogma, Bild Der Frau (BDF), Cosmic Dance Society, L'Edarps A Moth, Galactic Lilah, Internal Autonomy, Jaws Of The Flying Carpet, Magic Moments At Twilight Time, Otherworld, Sabotage, Screamworld, Scrooge, Sigis Bruder, Solanaceae Tau, Stormclouds, The Thamesmead Rollers, This Window, Twister, Unpleasant Surprise, The Witches and X Ray Pop. Plus a selection of a further 24 albums drawn from some of the artists on that list, as well as some of the great female artists that joined the label after it, such as Terri B, Endymion, Equinox Revolution, Robin O'Brien and Pornorphans. H E L P ! ! ! As you can imagine, over the years, not all of our master cassettes have survived. There were always the dangers of tape stretching, errant cassette recorders chewing them up and even a few rare examples of accidental damage ("Fuck! Why didn't I remove the record tab?"). As luck would have it, whenever we have lost material, we have always managed to track down the artist concerned, or other source, to replace at least some of it. So, for "The Best Of Music & Elsewhere 1987-2003", I'm pleased to say we can include at least one track by everyone who appeared on the label in those 16 years... except one! The band we've not been able to find a trace of were called Friction, they released the one album through M&E, "Vindolanda", in the Summer of 1993. Our band contact was a Nick Hill, then of 9 Hagholm Road, Cleghorn, Lanark, ML11 7SG, Scotland, UK. If anybody out there knows where he or any member of the band can be contacted, has a copy of any of their material or knows where we can get some, please do get in touch, we would be eternally in your debt (which generally means some free music)!