Hailu Mergia ‘Hailu Mergia & His Classical Instrument: Shemonmuanaye’ (Kaifa, 1985 / Awesome Tapes FROM Africa, 2013)

You might remember them as Scott 4, but it was as The Scott 4 Free Rock Orchestra that they released ‘E-S-P’, a record that flipped from electrofunk to chillout to weirdo reggae without missing a beat

The late 1990s and early 2000s threw up a slew of Air-style ambient masterpieces – but Fragile State’s 2004 classic ‘Voices From The Dust Bowl’ was criminally overlooked. It may just well be the UK’s ‘Premiers Symptômes’ of the era

They were called Vidéo Aventures. They were French, they had links to the extreme Rock In Opposition movement, and in 1981 they released ‘Musique Pour Garçons Et Filles’, a superb example of underground electropop weirdosity

The accepted history of electronic pop music that I was spoon-fed, via compilation cassettes and CDs, ran a well-worn patch cable back to 1981.

While tidying out a dark corner of the home office recently, some boxes of old CDs revealed themselves, among them a hillock of promos from the late 90s.