S/D -- The Numero Group

Oh, I guess you aren't talking about MP3 download cards.

No, they just appeared on an Audio Downloads page on my account. After ordering sale CDs, they sent me this email:

"Due to popular demand, the Numero Group is paying a brief visit to the 21st Century to deliver you these popular packets of bits known as MPEG-2 Audio Layer IIIs, or mp3s as the kids are calling them. Enjoy your digital audio files by logging back into your account and downloading them to your preferred device or brain implant."

they had download cards for the first project 12

I decided to splurge on the Unwound box set. It's only 20 quid or so more than what I paid for the Husker Du one two years ago, so I reason that's a great deal for 11 discs and a book.

prices have gone back up. I assumed that until the 6th August included the 6th August.
Well I got some stuff. Was just thinking of grabbing more thgough.
Do wish they weren't dropping cds though.

Also discovered that pretty much all of the Numero group stuff is up on bandcamp which is useful.

I’m eternally grateful to Numero for reissuing that Jordan De La Sierra album, the most beautiful cloudy piano minimalism I’ve ever heard

THought that Willie Wright was in the sale possibly cos I discovered it on the bandcamp page. It does sound really good so shame it won't be around in that media though that label again. Is anybody else likely to pick things up on cd or is the death knell slowly tolling. I do find it a convenient format but maybe it is just too easy to copy.
Also just found the Happy Rhodes and Medusa over the last couple of days. THink medusa may have been talked about elsewhere when it was first out but somehow never got around to getting it.
ho hum.

anyone check out the seafaring strangers private label soft rock one from a couple years ago? stumbled on it this week and it's putting me in a great mood.

that “back to the streets” song is dope as hell. First heard it on the first soft rock for hard times mix.

yeah that song is a banger. the whole comp is a lot of fun, some goofy jams and some stuff that is genuinely inspired. "don't it make you feel" sounds like a cass mccombs tune. "madam operator" is just smooth as hell.

Ha, bang-on re: the Cass-ness of that "Don't It Make You Feel" track; also not worlds away from Donnie & Joe Emerson in terms of contemporaries--cool Beach Boys-y bass harmonica on that one, too.

hah yeah i love the harmonica hits. great arranging.

that “back to the streets” song is dope as hell

love that one, amazing song

http://www.numerogroup.com/d/reach-ride-the-algorithm

haha, i've read the email, i read part of that, i read the product page - and only now do i understand that no, there's not going to be a tracklist

TRACK LIST

Lenny White - Enchanted Pool Suite: Prelude & Part 1
Masumi HaraTo - Live In The Sea
Alex Johnson - The Kiss
LaRhonda LeGette - Thou Art With Me
Ascending Wave Modulation - Del Sol
A.R.T. Wilson - Past Life Regression
John D. Curnow - Wisconsin Bird Songs
Calvin Keys - Touch
Suse Millemann - Open Heart-Hawk Belly
Batang Frisco - Myth
Bob Siebert - Rain
Reach - Gold Dust Twins

whoops

Ascending Wave - Modulation Del Sol*

that Bob Siebert album is gorgeous, I got a cd of it that has some newer solo piano bonus tracks.. kind of a jazzy debussy-ish thing? very very cool. I asked them via email if they were planning on doing a physical release of the (also hot) Calvin Keys album that “touch” comes from... they said they’re partnering with another label to put it out later this year.

Great article!

oh duh, thanks Evan! i didn't see there was another tab on the website with the tracklist.

bummer though, i already know all of those songs inside-out

Gotta say I'm not a big fan of the move towards gimmicky packaging at the expense of actual liner notes. I understand the appeal of building an alternate reality with all the kayfabe stuff (Numero 95 and etc.), but context is one of the main things physical releases still have over browsing youtube or whatever.

Also if I'm reading the liner notes while listening that means I'm not on my phone.

yeah. the imaginary/conceptual releases are a fun idea in the abstract, an interesting take on how a reissue label continues and stays fresh in the 2020s, but I agree that I'm not terribly interested in reissue comps with fake liner notes or none at all.

It just bums me out so much that one of the few reissue labels that put so much time, care and thoughtfulness into their packaging is moving further and further away from physical releases. I mean, I get that physical media for reissues is a niche within a niche at this point, but if a label with the quality control and respect of Numero can't keep it up, it doesn't give me a lot of faith for other labels.

I'm not paying a ton of attention so I'm really asking here- is that what is happening? Or is it that they're expanding their catalog overall but most of the expansion is digital format?

I think it's the latter, so far, but they have explicitly said they aren't doing CDs anymore and hinted multiple times that they may be scaling back vinyl as well.

this gimmicky stuff is incredibly lame, did they determine that most people don’t read liner notes or something? depressing.

what release are y'all talking about?

xp ive always assumed its a combination of them looking at the decline in physical sales plus the idea of them prepping the 247th comp of local soul singles from Wichita Falls or w/e and thinking they need to find a different way forward

which i can relate to, but as a fan of lavishly notated historical reissues is still a drag

I remain totally baffled by this conversation

are the liners for that Reach comp fake or something?

Sorry, I was talking more generally wrt what they've been saying about physical releases in general. I'm not sure which comp has the fake(?) liners.

xp lack of geographic/contextual cohesiveness at the expense of packaging that looks like cigrette boxes

https://www.discogs.com/Various-NuLeaf/master/1781797

ah, thank you. that one makes more sense.

I do like the Reach comp, fwiw, and it has extensive liner notes that seem real to me.

this one rules and i quickly got over the fact there were no liner notes.

https://www.discogs.com/Various-Planisphere/release/13692923

yeah I mean I love comps like those, it’s just I really admired/enjoyed numero’s nerdiness/throughness/idk tbh they’ve been going this way for years idk what I’m complying about lol

speaking as a Light Sounds Dark fan, lol, hypocrisy

Ha ha. Light Sounds Dark take it to ridiculous degrees but then they are bootlegs pretty much so i guess they have to. i do love a dose of LSD too though.

i guess for Numero comps it depends on the comp. For some I'd want to know what time the drummer was born but some, like 'Planisphere' I'm happy to listen as a sort of anonymoys concept album.

plus the idea of them prepping the 247th comp of local soul singles from Wichita Falls or w/e

I LOLd

but probably because I'm in the key demo for such things

what release are y'all talking about?

The one brimstead posted is what prompted my post - doubly annoying because part of the gimmick there is it's a cigarette case so at the top there's a "seal" you have to rip to get at the actual record, so you're damaging the gimmick - but I was also thinking of stuff like Escape From Synth City and "imaginary soundtrack" You're Not From Around Here. They seem to all be part of the Cabinet Of Curiosities line:

http://www.numerogroup.com/d/the-cabinet-of-curiosities-a-numero-universe

I'm generally trying to buy less vinyl these days so I don't have any particular views on the packages here - but I think the point of these Cabinet of Curiosities comps is the rather abstracted, conceptual links they draw between things rather than it documenting a scene/period/genre/location. Tbh this approach will rise or fall on the music, but what I will say is that the extended essay thing about the Reach comp (linked further up the thread) had me adding the album to my basket without listening to a single note. (And I think Numero 95 is a great concept, though obviously the jury's out on whether it'll hold up as a listening experience.)

i guess the danger w/out the historical scene is it just becomes guys playlisting things. i trust them based on previous experiences with them but don't necessarily trust it as a permanent direction, and think there are lots of scenes and styles of music that could use this kind of curatorial ear that have been ignored

Their Spotify playlists are the only Spotify playlists I trust

I'm generally trying to buy less vinyl these days so I don't have any particular views on the packages here - but I think the point of these Cabinet of Curiosities comps is the rather abstracted, conceptual links they draw between things rather than it documenting a scene/period/genre/location.

Yes, but these links are interesting in and of themselves and thus worthy of liner notes instead of just telegraphing "you know, super mario" or "well it's like noir" via packaging. This is even more the case because the artists featured on these compilations are as obscure as anything Numero put out, so it's not like a playlist where some David Bowie b-side follows an Ebo Taylor track or whatever.

Fair point - I'm mainly thinking about the Reach comp here, where the online notes not only set out their stall well but persuaded me to actually buy it. (It's really good.)

"Santa Claus Ain't A Hippie", from the recently released Christmas Dreamers: Yuletide Country (1960​-​1972) is like a Marine Todd meme in song; totally baffling premise of hippies protesting against Santa and the song's protagonist righteously defending his honour.

It came out three years after "Okie From Muskogee" so was prolly riding the wave

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-MBp1V7WRs

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— numerogroup (@numerogroup) August 10, 2022

technicolor paradise 3LP repressed, your choice of four different colors. still regret selling the original so i went for “moon mist”