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21 August 2023

CRISPY AMBULANCE / Fin + Frozen Blood / FBN 18 CD

Factory Benelux presents a double disc anthology of singles, radio sessions and live tracks by cult Manchester group Crispy Ambulance, all recorded between 1980 and 1982.

Disc 1 is forceful live album Fin, comprising live performances mix-desk recorded around Europe and the UK during the winter of 1981-1982. Most of this material was never recorded in the studio and captures the band at their most powerful and hypnotic. The album closes with three bonus studio tracks, including both sides of the rare debut single on Aural Assault from 1980 (AAR 01), as well as Black Death, the b-side of 1982 single Sexus on Factory Benelux (FBN 18). 70 minutes of music.

Disc 2 is archive collection Frozen Blood, which includes both sides of the 10" single released on Factory Records (Fac 32) in 1980, all eight tracks from radio sessions for Piccadilly Radio (July 1980) and John Peel (January 1981), plus seven late-period live songs taped in 1982 but never studio recorded. 72 minutes of music, all transferred from the original master tapes.

FBN 18 CD features new artwork and an updated band biography. 32 tracks, 142 minutes of music in total.

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6 August 2023

THE WAKE / Here Comes Everybody / FBN 35

Back in stock! A remastered edition of Here Comes Everybody via Factory Benelux (FBN 35), limited to 500 copies pressed on 180 gram heaveyweight vinyl with a bonus 7-inch single featuring companion singles Talk About the Past and Of the Matter.

The outer album sleeve is printed on white reverse board; the inner bag featuring lyrics, photos and liner notes by Caesar and Carolyn Allen. The 7-inch single is housed in a facsimile Fac 88 sleeve.

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2 July 2023

SECTION 25 / 4x vinyl albums

Due late August 2023 are limited edition vinyl pressings of four albums by the mighty Section 25: Part-Primitiv (FBN 130), Nature + Degree (FBN 135), Retrofit (FBN 140) and Dark Light (FBN 145).

Each pressing is limited to 500 copies only, with FBN 130 pressed on 180g heavyweight black vinyl, and the other 3 on purple, orange and crystal clear vinyl respectively. Each include a digital copy with extra tracks and can be purchased either individually, or as part of a bundle available from FBN and Burning Shed featuring all four albums as well as a signed postcard and a bonus copy of the FBN 124 Alfresco live package.

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6 June 2023

DURUTTI COLUMN / Time Was Gigantic... / FACT 2.31

'Time Was Gigantic... When We Were Kids' was originally released in 1998 as the eleventh studio album from Vini Reilly’s eternally underappreciated The Durutti Column. Significantly, it was the project’s final release on Factory Records before the legendary label folded for good. Stylish, atmospheric and utterly unique, this newly remastered edition of FACT 2.31 is available through London Records on CD and double vinyl, feauring bonus tracks and liner notes. Limited edition poster print also available while stocks last!

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22 May 2023

JOSEF K / It's Kinda Funny (Singles) / TWI 022 CD

Crepuscule presents It’s Kinda Funny, an expanded 20 track CD collection of classic singles by iconic Scottish post-punk guitar group Josef K issued between 1979 and 1982, together with John Peel session tracks.

As well as the three legendary 45s on Postcard Records (Radio Drill Time, It’s Kinda Funny and Chance Meeting), the album also includes both Crepuscule singles (Sorry For Laughing, Missionary) as well as the original Absolute version of Chance Meeting from 1979. All b-side tracks are also included, as well as the BBC John Peel session from 1981.

Digipack cover art by Jean-Francois Octave. 8 page booklet features liner notes and archive images by Simon Clegg.

"Josef K specialised in cerebral, nerve-jangling funk, like disco played by Franz Kafka (or Franz Ferdinand). They also had some of the best, most insidious guitar riffs ever, notably The Missionary and Revelation, although they could do mordant: see It's Kinda Funny. What's no laughing matter is this music's dour brilliance" (Classic Pop, 03/2016)

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3 April 2023

FACTORY CLASSICAL / 5xCD box set / FBN 276

Factory Benelux presents a box set collection of the first five albums released by the celebrated Factory Classical imprint in 1989, featuring modern classical works composed by Benjamin Britten, Elliott Carter, Paul Hindemith, Theodore Lalliet, Gyorgy Ligeti, Steve Martland, Olivier Messiaen, Francis Poulenc, Dmitri Shostakovich and Michael Tippett.

Curated by Durutti Column viola player John Metcalfe, the performers include the Kreisler String Orchestra, German pianist Rolf Hind, The Duke Quartet and oboist Robin Williams, with Steve Martland’s material performed by Residentie Orkest Den Haag and pianists Gerard Bouwhuis and Cees Van Zeeland.

Explained Factory founder Tony Wilson: ‘The idea I had in mind was people like Peter Saville, the Factory designer, and his girlfriend - art school kids brought up with Bowie and Roxy Music, into punk, maybe they find acid house interesting, but they’re looking for something else. For people like them or younger, there is no easy way into classical music, because it’s all quite exclusive. They’re scarcely likely to read Gramophone magazine, or make head or tail of it if they did.’

‘I was a relatively angry young man at that time,’ adds Metcalfe, ‘and chose to channel some of that into a rather naïve disapproval of standard classical industry practices. The white tie and tails and very, very boring, reproductions of Constable paintings on album covers, all that stuff. So I had a chat with Tony and he said, “Off you go, fill your boots”.’

Largely drowned out by relentless Acid House beats and faddish Madchester guitar rock in 1989, the bold, contrarian Factory Classical catalogue is now ripe for re-appraisal by much the same audience identified by Wilson. Indeed since 1989 Metcalfe has worked as an arranger for artists such as Peter Gabriel, U2, Blur, Coldplay and Bat for Lashes, as well as performing and recording with the Max Richter Ensemble. Sadly contemporary composer Steve Martland passed away in 2013.

The new Factory Benelux clamshell box set includes a 24 page booklet featuring the original Factory commissioned liner notes from 1989, as well as a contemporary essay by writer Stuart Huggett and an interview with Tony Wilson. Each individual CD is housed in a card wallet which reproduces the original artwork by designers Peter Saville, Trevor Key, Ben Kelly, Mark Farrow, Neville Brody and Trevor Johnson.

The 5 CDs have been newly re-mastered in 2022 by Peter Beckmann at Technology Works.

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11 March 2023

ERIK SATIE / Art Works 1892-1924 / TWI 1258

Les Disques du Crepuscule presents a comprehensive 4 disc CD boxed anthology by visionary French avant-garde composer Erik Satie, collecting together works associated with the Dada, Cubist and Surrealist art movements, as well as his celebrated musique d'ameublement (furniture music) written between 1917 and 1923.

Disc 1 offers Satie's extraordinary Vexations, the score for which is just three lines long, yet a complete performance (840 repetitions) may last for anything between 14 and 28 hours. First performed under the supervision of John Cage in 1963, this radical, enigmatic, proto-Surrealist work is now recognised as a significant milestone in the avant-garde canon. This meditative 70 minute recording features 40 repetitions of the motif, performed by Alan Marks on piano.

Disc 2 is a collection of Dada-related works, including music used by Francis Picabia, Tristan Tzara, Kurt Schwitters and Rene Clair. An enthusiastic Dada activist in Paris between 1920 and 1924, Satie collaborated extensively with Tzara, Man Ray, Pablo Picasso and Jean Cocteau. Performed on piano by Bojan Gorisek, this disc includes Trois morceaux en forme de poire, performed by Satie in 1923 at Tzara's notorious Soiree du Coeur a Barbe, as well as Ragtime Dada, an extract from the ballet Parade performed at Dada events staged by Kurt Schwitters and Theo van Doesburg in 1922. Also included is Satie's score for Entr'acte, Picabia's dazzling multi-media 'instantaneist' ballet. Relache dates from 1924, while Cinema is Satie's music for an intermission film by Rene Clair.

Cubist Works on Disc 3 offers four works composed by Satie between 1913 and 1924 for his collaborations with Pablo Picasso. These include piano and orchestral versions of his scores for the celebrated 'Cubist' ballets Parade (1917) and Mercure (1924), as well as a seldom-heard organ 'diversion', The Statue Found (1923). This third disc also includes The Puppets Are Dancing, written for the French Futurist dancer/poet Valentine de Saint-Point in 1913, and the ludic Trois valses distinguees du precieux degoute ('Three Disgustingly Precious Waltzes'), a barbed swipe at rival Maurice Ravel, premiered at an exhibition of works by Picasso, Matisse and others in 1916. Solo piano performed by Bojan Gorisek.

Disc 4 leads with Satie's often referenced (but seldom heard) musique d'ameublement (furniture music), written to order for various benefactors between 1917 and 1923. Intended to be heard in the background, rather than actually listened to, these five disparate pieces have been cited as a conceptual precursor to the ambient, minimal, functional and serial works of Brian Eno, Paul Hindemith, Steve Reich and Philip Glass.

Also included are the experimental pieces Descriptions automatiques and Sports et divertissements, the latter a collection of 21 miniatures from 1914 published with illustrations by Charles Martin. Disc 4 also finds space for Satie's single-act, neo-Dada lyric comedy Le Piege de Medusa, comprising 'seven tiny dances for Jonah the Monkey', illustrated by Cubist painter Georges Braque., as well as his 'Christian ballet' Uspud from 1892.

The 4 full length CDs are housed in a clamshell box, which also includes an illustrated 32 page booklet featuring detailed liner notes by James Nice and Stephen Whittington.

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| Josef K It's Kinda Funny (The Singles) TWI 022 | | Ultramarine Signals Into Space TWI 1236 | | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | A vinyl only collection of single As and Bs by cult Postcard combo Josef K, including Sorry For Laughing, Chance Meeting, Radio Drill Time and The Missionary. Package includes digital copy. | | A brand new album by acclaimed electronic duo Ultramarine, with guest vocals from Anna Domino. Recorded and mixed by Andy Ramsay (Stereolab). Available on CD/2xLP/ digital. | | | | | | | Durutti Column M24J (Anthology) FBN 164 | | Blaine L. Reininger Commissions 2 TWI 1246 | | A double disc anthology of favourite Durutti tracks recorded for Factory, Factory Benelux, Les Disques du Crepuscule and F4, available on 2xCD, 2xLP + 7" and digital. | | Brand new collection of soundtrack material by Tuxedomoon founder member Blaine L. Reininger, recorded between 2015 and 2019. Mixed by Koti K. Available on 2xLP and digital (MP3) |