Mike Cooper

Out Now: Mike Cooper’s Life and Death in Paradise + Milan Live Acoustic 2018

It’s Rocket Summer! The Wire calls Life and Death in Paradise “a fascinating album,” and we agree, twofold, of these utterly unique records by ageless octogenarian genius Mike Cooper, in shops and streaming worldwide today. This project has been in the works for nearly a decade, and we are thrilled finally to present it. Read on for links, an unboxing video, and critical praise.

Mike Cooper: Life and Death in Paradise + Milan Live Acoustic 2018

Mike Cooper wrote his final songwriter record, a suite of gloaming glam-rock anthems performed with a spiritual jazz trio, while living on the Costa Tropical of Granada, Spain, an era when he was considering retiring from music altogether. A chance encounter and a last-ditch record deal convinced him to make one last album, which he recorded in 1974 at Pathway Studios in London, with “The Greatest Rock and Roll Band in the World,” featuring the inventive South African jazz rhythm section of Louis Moholo and Harry Miller with UK saxophonist Mike Osborne.

This first-ever reissue includes a bonus CD of Milan Live Acoustic 2018, a previously unreleased solo set that represents Cooper’s return, after forty-four years pursuing free improvisation and electronics, to a new, deconstructed approach to singing, steel guitar, and songcraft.

Mind Over Mirrors: Undying Color Release Day + Our First 100 Days.

If you require a mind-expanding tonic to our national spell of ignorant, truculent insanity, the new Mind Over Mirrors album Undying Color is available today in your favorite record shops and online merchants, digital and physical alike. Listen, read critical acclaim for the album, learn about Secretly Group’s Our First 100 Days Project, and catch up on current and upcoming PoB tours.

Mike Cooper + Derek Hall’s Out of the Shades EP Now Available for Purchase.

For those of you inclined otherwise on Record Store Day—or immune to its charms—we are happy to announce that we now have copies of our RSD 2016 exclusive release, the first-ever reissue of Mike Cooper and Derek Hall’s 1965 EP, for sale directly from our website. The EP is available as a limited-edition 45rpm vinyl 7”—featuring heavy-duty color jacket, restored original artwork, and notes—as well as (for the first time) digitally.

Get Drunk and Goosey with Mike Cooper on Record Store Day.

In advance of tomorrow’s anticipated Record Store Day revelry/hysteria, we’d like to remind you of our very first official RSD exclusive release, the first-ever reissue of Mike Cooper and Derek Hall’s Out of the Shades EP, available as a beautifully restored 45rpm 7″ exclusively at participating shops tomorrow, April 16, 2016. Stream the little-heard “Skillet,” and remember to keep it good and greasy all the time.

Mike Cooper & Derek Hall: Out of the Shades (Record Store Day Exclusive).

We are pleased to announce the first-ever reissue of folk & experimental music icon Mike Cooper’s earliest recordings & PoB’s very first official Record Store Day exclusive release. Named for The Shades, the Reading, UK folk club where Cooper regularly performed, & which housed prodigy Derek Hall—“a guitarist who could actually match Davey Graham both in technique and musical ideas” —this rare EP was issued in 1965. Get it only on RSD 2016.

Mike Cooper & Derek Hall: Out of the Shades (PoB-025)

First-ever reissue of folk and experimental music icon Mike Cooper’s historic earliest recordings and PoB’s very first official Record Store Day exclusive release. Named for The Shades, the Reading, UK folk club where Mike Cooper regularly performed, and which housed prodigy Derek Hall—“a guitarist who could actually match Davey Graham both in technique and musical ideas”—this super rare EP was issued in 1965. (ON SALE)

Summer Solstice Sale and News.

In celebration of the Summer Solstice, get 20% off most PoB products through June 22 with coupon code SOLSTICE. Read on for details and other exciting PoB news about upcoming releases.