The latest release in Now-Again’s Reserve Subscription series is Michael Cosmic’s Peace In The World & Phill Musra Group’s Creator Spaces, packaged as a double LP, with a bonus 3rd LP of unreleased material by Cosmic, Musra and the World’s Experience Orchestra available only to subscribers. Shipping October 2017.

SUBSCRIBE: NOW-AGAIN RESERVE – there are a limited amount of “Catch Me Up” subscriptions still available to get you the entire run of NOW-AGAIN RESERVE releases.

Now-Again Reserve: Custom-made LP’s delivered once per quarter, presenting some of the rarest records in their respective genres in high quality LP format. Each release is produced with the direct participation of the artist.

Free improvisation, first touched on by messengers like John Coltrane, Sun Ra and Albert Ayler, gives us an exuberant maelstrom that rejoices in life while it shoves back at complex, unforgiving social-political environments. The 70s Boston underground brought twin brothers Phill Musra and Michael Cosmic together with Turkish-born drummer Hüseyin Ertunç; as a trio, and with other Boston jazzers (John Jamyll Jones of Worlds Experience Orchestra, the 2nd Now-Again Reserve Edition entry), the twins each privately issued an album. Potent mixes of spirituality, expressionist fire and electrified newness, these LPs are presented as the 7th entry in the Now-Again Reserve Edition, mastered from the original tapes.

LP 1 (front cover): Michael Cosmic – Peace in the World
LP 2 (back cover): Phill Musra Group – Creator Spaces
LP 3 – bonus record available only to subscribers: previously unreleased tracks by Cosmic, Musra and World’s Experience Orchestra.

Rappcats
5638 York Blvd
Los Angeles
August 5, Noon-6PM

On August 5th, Egon’s hosting his first record store of 2017 at Rappcats, selling records from his collection, one-day only. What used to be a quarterly event is now semi-annual, with new records sourced from around the world available at each event. For this event, he’s selling records sourced from the collection of funk legends the Pazant Brothers, BT Express guitarist and record producer Billy Nichols, and records from the collections of twin brothers Michael Cosmic and Phill Musra, whose two free/spiritual jazz albums are the seventh entry in the Now-Again Reserve Edition subscription.

Of course, records from deep disco and boogie to West African afro-beat to Brasilian bossa-nova will also line the walls of the 1500 square foot Rappcats space in Highland Park. Also available on site will be the entire Now-Again catalog — for a one day discount of 25% less than our normal retail prices. If you can’t make it to Highland Park, all online Now-Again orders from the Rappcats store placed on August 5th will receive a 25% discount as well.

Phill Musra will be at the space, performing live from 12-4 pm, and signing any copies of the albums purchased from he and Michael Cosmic’s collection.

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On sale at our webstore at Rappcats: Welcome To Zamrock! Vols. 1 and 2.

LP/Book/Bundle ships immediately from our store.

Born Free was founded in 1972 by bandleader, drummer and vocalist Nicky Mwanza, but the band never recorded until a complete personnel change. Star-in-the-making Mike Nyoni joined as vocalist and lead guitarist; Zimbabwean-born Peter Lungu replaced Mwanza on drums; Joseph Musonda alternated between rhythm and bass guitar. Mwanza went on to form Cross Town Traffic, and Nyoni’s Born Free signed to ZMPL, recording the album Mukaziwa Chingoi (Promotion) LP in 1975.

The album showcases Nyoni’s talents first and foremost, and betrays a study of funk: this is not a fuzz guitar showcase, but a wah-wah guitar dominated album – the instrumental “Mad Man” sounds like it could have been cut in Detroit, Michigan in the early ’70s.
 
After Born Free, Nyoni went solo, signing to Christopher Ndhlovu’s Chris Editions for two albums: Kawalala (c. 1977) and his most straight forward funk/soul release I Can’t Understand You (c. 1978). This last album was released in Kenya and France with different cover art as an AIT/Reprise album, and it set up Nyoni for a string of kalindula releases in the 1980s. He gigged on his own and with Sounds Unlimited and Broadway Quintet before his death in the ’90s.

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On sale now at our webstore at Rappcats: BOTH Welcome to Zamrock! Vol. 1 AND Welcome To Zamrock! Vol. 2

How Zambia’s Liberation Led To A Rock Revolution. 1972-1977. An overview of the Zamrock scene, from its ascension to its fall to its resurgence, presented as two volumes, both as 2LPs and hardcover book/CDs.

Both volumes are out WW and we’re offering the individual formats and a special bundle of each volume at our Rappcats webstore.

By the mid 1970s, the Southern African nation known as the Republic of Zambia had fallen on hard times. Though the country’s first president Kenneth Kaunda had thrown off the yoke of British colonialism, the new federation found itself under his self-imposed, autocratic rule. Conflict loomed on all sides of this landlocked nation. Kaunda protected Zambia from war, but his country descended into isolation and poverty as he supported rebel movements in neighboring countries Angola, Zimbabwe and Mozambique and stood up against apartheid South Africa.

This is the environment in which the 70s rock revolution that has come to be known as Zamrock flourished. It’s no wonder that the Zambian musicians taken by American and European influences gravitated to the dark side of the rock and funk spectrum. Fuzz guitars were commonplace, as were driving rhythms influenced by James Brown’s funk and Jimi Hendrix’s rock. Musical themes, mainly sung in the country’s constitutional language, English, were often bleak.

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On sale at our webstore at Rappcats: Welcome To Zamrock! Vol. 1

LP/Book/Bundle ships immediately from our store. Vol. 1 worldwide release date: June 9th.

Teddy Khuluzwa, better known as Dr. Footswitch, had dual careers in his native Zimbabwe – Southern Rhodesia as it was known in the Zamrock days – and in his adopted homeland Zambia. He was, according to WITCH’s Jagari Chanda, the first African he’d met who had actually cut a vinyl record, which must have happened in Southern Rhodesia, some time prior to 1974. But in the ’60s and early ’70s Khuluzwa was found playing guitar alongside future Zamrock greats like Rikki Ililonga, Dereck Mbao, Keith Mlevhu and Ricky Banda in bands like the Rave Five and Lusaka Beatles. While Ililonga recalls starting the band Dr. Footswitch at the time Khuluzwa was known as “Teddy Jagger,” the alternate version of the story has Khuluzwa himself picking up the nickname and founding the band based on his abilities with the wah–wah pedal.

He released two albums in Zambia, Liquid Iron and Everyday Has Got A New Dream – amongst the rarest and best of the Zamrock scene – and a handful of singles in Southern Rhodesia, all in the mid- to late-’70s. But, though he was prolific and his sound unified, he found success fleeting. By the mid-’80s he left Zambia and Zimbabwe for South Africa, where it is assumed he died.

“Everyday Has Got A New Dream” is from Dr. Footswitch’s album of the same title and reflects the mid-‘60s garage rock influence that he carried with him throughout his career. It appears on Welcome to Zambia, Vol. 1

Below: Dr. Footswitch (second from right) as a member of The Rave Five in 1969; three photos of Dr. Footswitch in the 1970s.

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