{"title":"Ide Fixe Records","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"gathering","title":"Gathering","description":"\u003cp\u003e Arresting three-part harmonies and acoustic instrumentation are the backbone of this quartet that merge folk traditions with contemporary takes on growing pains and epiphanies. The album is a collection of songs written over three years of growing pains and epiphanies. Three friends, Ali, Lauren and Loris, started singing together as a kind of group therapy to work out life’s bumps and detours through music. Later, when they were joined by Fez these communal exercises coalesced into Maybel. Written and recorded while surrounded by nature and sung in harmonies that are nothing short of arresting, \u003ci\u003eGathering’s\u003c\/i\u003e songs are rooted in tradition while lyrically they embrace a modernity not unlike Gillian Welch’s\u003ci\u003e Time (The Revelator)\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Ide Fixe Records","offers":[{"title":"Black | LP","offer_id":50499331752267,"sku":"1123856","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/579eb0f6-5570-47bc-8382-705c08f3fc0d_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727772263"},{"product_id":"roys-garage","title":"Roys Garage","description":"\u003cp\u003eRoy returns with stories of alien enlightenment, but with tales of personal vision. We now know the man behind Roy is Patrick Lefler, a psychedelic scholar whose deep musical knowledge is run through a panoply of archaic and homespun devices to create the sound of Roy. Welcome to \u003ci\u003eRoy’s Garage\u003c\/i\u003e, where both wow and flutter rule and all must observe the law of diminishing track widths. The LP’s side A opens with In The Garden Defeated, a sly nod to one of the sixties most renowned singles and what follows is a succession of 8 quick hits of succinct psych pop, ranging from the cold fact garage stomp of Let Me Tell Ya to the Wilson-esque pocket symphony of Where Did MyMind Go? Side B offers a more expansive vision within the Roy universe with its sprawling modal jams filled with free fuzz riffing and cascading acoustic leads, all culminating in the sage advice of a knowing guide in album closer As Long As You’re Feeling. Projecting forth from his mind’s eye, Roy declares he is “not afraid to be a freak” and “it’s time to love myself” and in doing so Roy’s Garage acts brother and sister no doubt peer through time and space smiling.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Ide Fixe Records","offers":[{"title":"Black | LP","offer_id":50499554804043,"sku":"1118676","price":22.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/8b48d9c5-1999-452f-b0c5-e2babe73563d_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727773261"},{"product_id":"the-isolater","title":"The Isolater","description":"\u003cp\u003eReaching across the Atlantic to the lofty mountain ranges of her Swiss heritage, Lisa Conway (aka L CON) began to write and record The Isolator during the early days of the coronavirus pandemic. Composing music for the German production of a theatrical play remotely from her studio in Guelph, Canada and navigating a calendar otherwise wiped blank, she sought to anchor herself and hone her piano chops by enrolling in online lessons. Encouraged by her teacher to lean into what felt comfortable, Conway found herself repeating short sequences on the piano when it occurred to her to pursue a record that would allow her to exist in her comforts. “Not that I wasn't striving towards artistic growth and challenging myself on this record,” Conway clarifies, “but I finally gave myself permission to fully live in sound worlds and lean into writing tendencies that are very instinctual and restorative to me.” The album opens with dusty tape loops of Conway’s compositions for alphorns, traditional wooden horns originally used as a means of alpine communication, and sets the scene for The Isolator as a deeply personal and vulnerable exploration of Conway’s relationship to her dual citizenship with Switzerland. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTaking its title from a line on her Swiss passport that indicates one’s “home place” or “place of origin,” lead track Heimatort contrasts widescreen, mountainous expanses of sound design with comparably dense minimalist melody lines. While a short, circular musical phrase played on a Prophet synthesizer repeats and inverts, Conway lyrically untangles complex layers of feelings towards her inherited hometown. “When you're told stories as a child, you create a mythology about a place — my heimatort is a little town in the mountains I was told I could return to if I was ever in trouble and needed to be taken care of,” Conway says. “As an adult, I'm faced with the practical reality of what that would actually look like — many of my family members are buried there, but I don't have a place to stay, or someone to call, and the rest of my family lives in other areas. How at home do I really feel in my ‘home place’?” \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eA conflicted record bouncing between romanticism and the loneliness of navigating the layers of your identity, The Isolator dials into the stories we’ve internalised about nationality, home, our families, and ourselves. Thankfully, this sort of reflective work was not done entirely alone: the album features an array of contributions from musicians including Drew Jurecka, Cedric Noel, Karen Ng, Isla Craig, Victoria Cheong, Morgan Doctor, and more. Holding Swiss exceptionalism to task, title-track The Isolator blossoms from a lonely piano ballad to a sweeping string ensemble suite, while What If Heidi Likes the City (a riff on Heidi, the popular and frequently adapted 19th-century Swiss children’s story Conway has known most of her life) flips the script on the traditional pastoral romance to underline an inexpressible emptiness that can be felt after leaving city life for a rural existence. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOn Big Pile of Nothing, Conway struggles to take stock of what’s concrete and questions what she can really hold true, singing over a spiralling piano progression and swelling strings. An intimate, modernist expression from a singular artist whose work in sound art and composition continually pushes her into the unfamiliar, The Isolator arrives as a resolute and deeply lived interrogation of self, wrapped in stunning sonics, lush string arrangements and L CON’s remarkable voice.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Ide Fixe Records","offers":[{"title":"Black LP","offer_id":50505779577163,"sku":"2014438","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/L_CON_-_The_Isolater_412b4256_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727816681"},{"product_id":"some-kind-of-way","title":"Some Kind of Way","description":"\u003cp\u003eSome Kind Of Way is beloved Toronto band Bart’s third full length release and follow-up to their critically acclaimed sophomore album Today, Tomorrow, \u0026amp; The Next Day. Seeking to abandon the protracted and meticulous creative process of previous albums, chief architects Christopher Shannon and Nathan Vanderwielen assembled a core group of players to form a new iteration of Bart by inviting multi-instrumentalists Harrison Forman (Hieronymus Harry, Dr. Joy), Patrick Lefler (ROY, Possum) and drummer Micael Brushey to help capture the record’s spontaneous ensemble performances. This core was then augmented by a cadre of collaborators both old and new drawn from Toronto’s deep musical well. Familiar voices return including Joseph Shabason (Tenor Sax), Jason Bhattacharya (percussion) along with newcomers to the Bart universe Carl Didur (piano\/synth), Patrick Smith (soprano sax, flute), Ewan Farncombe (Trumpet), Eliza Niemi (cello) and Rachel Cardiello (viola). \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTogether they combine to create Bart’s most eclectic and immediate album to date. The album charges out of the gate in classic fashion with two of the LP’s singles back to back, When Will I Find It? (a retro acoustic pop nugget reminiscent of the band’s recent spate of standalone singles) and Turncoat (a scathing post-punk condemnation of an imposter) which combine to clock in at a mere 3:50. With third track, the Crimson-esque instrumental Gorge, introducing wah-wah guitar, mellotron, flute, sax and strings to the proceedings all bets are off on what will come next. What does follow is one of the album’s highlights, Song of Spring (which features a star turn on vocals and composition courtesy of luminous Toronto legend Drew Smith of Bicycles and Bunny fame). As the confessional cut unwinds with a Joseph Shabason sax solo casting a distinct counterpoint to the narrator’s sense of loss and regret, the tune makes a strong case for the band to further explore their soul leanings. Side A concludes with Rose Quartz, which is perhaps the album’s freest expression of ensemble playing. A deep groove provides a launch pad for sax soloing and psychedelic verse that takes a page from electric jazz and also, but not surprisingly, another of Toronto’s purveyors of psych, Possum, whose overlapping membership with Bart cannot be ignored. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eSome Kind Of Way’s Side B contains the record’s deep cuts and an even more eclectic sound emerges. Home Before 5 is classic Bart with its series of musical movements, progressive leanings, sophisticated tone and opaque lyricism. Second cut Forced Perspective is another accusatory post-punk shouter with the band at its most sly and mathy. Next up is The Breeze (credited to the entire band) which is a particularly dank visit to the swamp of psychedelic jammers that inhabit B-sides and B-movies; clearly the band was getting loose in the studio and this is perhaps the most spontaneous track in the entire Bart catalogue. Closing track All Good Things (written by Vanderwielen and Mark Smith) is a wonderfully melancholic acoustic and string ode and, although a true outlier, it sends the album off in elegant fashion. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWith Bart being a group of such avid musical seekers, Some Kind Of Way feels as though a deep musicologist has made a mixtape of songs from albums you need to own. Let it act as a gateway to explore Bart’s catalogue and the music of those who contributed to Some Kind Of Way, as this is the work of a group of some of Toronto’s most talented players and studio talents working together collectively to produce a stunning and timeless work.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Ide Fixe Records","offers":[{"title":"Black LP","offer_id":50506981343563,"sku":"2014444","price":24.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/Bart_-_Some_Kind_Of_Way_ef427595_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1727835403"},{"product_id":"to-cry-out-in-the-wilderness","title":"To Cry Out In The Wilderness","description":"\u003cp\u003eScions are a new innovative experimental ensemble. The group features members from the award-winning minimalist chamber-jazz quartet New Hermitage, the Polaris-nominated drone-hymn duo Joyful Joyful, and the acclaimed producer and composer Michael Cloud Duguay. Their collaboration began at the Sappyfest music festival in Sackville, New Brunswick, in August 2022. During this event, New Hermitage and Joyful Joyful connected for the first time and teamed up with Duguay for a spontaneous improvisational performance based on his song writing. The enthusiastic response, capped by a standing ovation, solidified the ensemble's decision to pursue the project further, with Duguay deftly shifting from front-person to producer and musical director. After being awarded a Canada Council project grant in early 2023 the group took residence in Hotel Wolfe Island on Wolfe Island. Over a week the seven core members lived and worked together, culling material from sunrise improv sessions and collaboratively shaping it into a unique body of work that would later become To Cry Out In The Wilderness. In June 2023, the ensemble, now joined by double bassist Gabriella Ciurcovich, recorded their debut album in Halifax’s north end. Led by Duguay’s distinctive approach to site-specific production, the recording took place in the sanctuary of St. George’s Round Church, with engineering by Jake Nicoll, known for his sustainable recording methods using a solar-powered, mobile control room. The resulting album, To Cry Out In The Wilderness, finds the ensemble expertly exploring and powerfully combining their skills in jazz, devotional, classical, drone, folk, ambient, metal, improvisational, minimalist and avant-garde music. The project culminated in a week of production, with contributions from numerous artists from Halifax’s creative music community. Scions then presented their work live, performing on the opening night of Halifax’s Everyseeker festival of experimental music, where they shared the spotlight with the renowned Sun Ra Arkestra. Speaking on the narrative of To Cry Out In The Wilderness vocalist and lyricist Cormac Culkeen said: \"When we came together to make this body of work, we started from a narrative seed; a post-apocalyptic humanity relearning and recreating itself, after a total ecological collapse.\" Speaking on \"Fight Song\" they add, \"“Fight Song” became the song we thought the last of us might need. It is sung for an imagined last stand. It is a rallying cry to wholeheartedly fight a losing battle. So it is for us now, in this time of great dismay and unease. The axe must be disobeyed.\"\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Ide Fixe Records","offers":[{"title":"Black LP","offer_id":50916197990731,"sku":"2231265","price":27.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0867\/1120\/6219\/files\/Scions__To_Cry_Out_In_The_Wilderness_98950014_thumbnail_4096.jpg?v=1733033436"}],"url":"https:\/\/shop.roughtrade.com\/fr\/collections\/ide-fixe-records.oembed","provider":"Rough Trade","version":"1.0","type":"link"}