Various Artists : Soul Jazz Records Presents Inner Space - Private Press, Rare Library And Cosmic Sounds 1978-87

Soul Jazz Records’ new ‘Inner Space’ collection is a mixture of cosmic electronic music and proto-New Age sounds. The album features a wide range of European, British and American auteur electronic artists, including Hans-Joachim Roedelius, Steven Halpern, Michael Garrison, Ose, Klaus Schønning, Bernard Xolotl and others.

Their cosmic, exploratory music sits somewhere between the worlds of personal, inner space and galactic outer space. All of the music featured here was recorded in the 1970s and 1980s, much of it released on small bespoke private-press record labels, often owned by the artists themselves.

The album also features rare tracks from a number of Library Music artists, all of whom used electronic music to explore a variety of common celestial or Gaian themes - cosmology, spirituality, science, Mother Earth, wellness, technology, consciousness, exploration, healing and harmony - in their work. These include pieces by Sauveur Mallia, Keith Mansfield and Sven Torstenson.

Here on this album, you will find the Sun Ras of New Age, the Picassos of Library Music and the Burroughs of space-related electronic music. Away from contemporary music fashions, these unique and highly individual artists remained free in their music to explore new ideas of sound and technological experimentation-together with the larger concepts of time, space and matter-a freedom rarely granted, and one that we celebrate here.