"2022 repress. The long awaited repress of Slight Freedom, acclaimed guitarist & composer Jeff Parker's first solo album & a New York Times' best albums of 2016 selection, is here. Pressed on premium 120-gram audiophile-quality vinyl by RTI from lacquers cut at sterling sound by Steve Fallone, presented in a retro flipback jacket. Second edition of 1,399 copies. What we said in 2016:
" Slight Freedom, Jeff Parkers first ever solo record, presents the first opportunity to hear the guitarist in fully self-revealed circumstances. Recorded in 2013 and 2014 in the Hollywood Hills as he relocated from Chicago to Los Angeles, Parker combines the dark tonal palette and percussive attack hes known for with real-time processing elements and field recordings, deftly crafting a unique world of solo guitar music - multi-lingual, mysterious, alive with extraordinary sonic events, with a sturdy intelligence in charge and a raw home-style vibe. Jeff Parker is a longtime member of Tortoise. He creates works that explore the contrary relationships between tradition and technology, and improvisation and composition. Slight Freedom is yet another defining moment for Parker in 2016, a year that already includes a brilliant ensemble album (The New Breed) and Tortoises 25th anniversary tour and record (The Catastrophist). Parkers title composition sets the albums cavernous mood. Terse lines and ricocheting loops morph into a gnarly ambient section that resembles Neil Young droning out over a copy of Discreet Music (1975). Parker creates a different sort of ambient space in his take on Frank Oceans Super Rich Kids", bending the melody around a bossa nova rhythm into a Moodsville tone poem. Parker makes an extraordinary long-form statement out of Chad Taylors "Mainz", a piece he first recorded with Taylor and bassist Chris Lopes on the album Bright Light In Winter (2011). Twice the length of the trio recording, the multi-layered soliloquy finds Parker leaping from the high rung to damn near orchestral heights, pushing his techniques and concepts to their breaking points. Its one of the great solo performances youll hear from a musician this year. To say "Lush Life" comes with formidable baggage is an understatement. Parker achieves instant classic status with a rendition that sounds beamed-in from a decommissioned satellite - burned out, covered in space grit, yet still formally nuanced and beautifully reflective of Strayhorns world-weary lyrics." - Eremite.
After nearly a decade of false starts, multiple game plans veering off the rails, and a handful of shattered hopes and/or dreams, the odyssey is finally complete—the new Fusetron site is here.
This is the first phase of a multipart rollout that will span the next few months: the currently browsable stock includes miscellaneous new releases from the past 8+ months (we have a lot of catching up to do), plus approximately a third of our backstock. Note that we’ve reduced/slashed prices on many titles and will continue to do so in order to make room for new stock. We’ll also be expanding / tweaking / improving / debugging the site itself (for example, we still have work to do on the automated international postage system, not to mention the inevitable inventory discrepancies that come with transferring an ancient and massive database to a new system).
Over the next few months, as we take inventory, clean house, and delve into our storage, we will be uploading thousands of additional items, gradually, on a near-daily basis. This will include the majority of the LPs, as well as many titles, in all formats, once thought long-gone. Many currently “sold out” items are likely to resurface.
Finally, once our general backstock is up (probably in the next two or three months) we’ll begin making our extensive stockpile of rarities available online for the first time: tons of random out-of-print titles, "deadstock," warehouse finds, secondhand collectibles, etc., accumulated over the past few decades.
Frequent/returning customers will be getting early access to these items. Details to follow on how this will work (a priority mailing list? a 'frequent flyer'-like program?), but it will not be based on dollars spent. We want to reward those who consistently support us, especially in the discogs marketplace era (to those who show up trying to poach five copies of a one-off rarity, and nothing else, ever… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ).
So—we suggest you take some time to dig through the site—even we’ve been surprised by what’s been turning up, and there’s much more to come.
