Stories — Releases

Earlier today, Oahu entered another lockdown. It's not the first one this year— back in April, the entire state entered a stay-at-home mandate, an unprecedented move that shut down — but it definitely heightens the reality of the pandemic, reminding us to be smart, safe, and respectful to the community-at-large. Back in April, Likkle Jordee, a local reggae artist who hails from my hometown of Mililani, posted a string of singles on his Bandcamp and Shopify pages. These were tune he'd made during the lockdown with his go-to producer, Pana. Together they created one of the most relevant and timely songs of...

I'm a bit late to announcing this on the blog, but Catching A Wave (AGS-038) dropped last Friday. We're elated with the response it's generated among fans new and old!  It's the first classic Hawaiian album that we've reissued on Aloha Got Soul. Up until now, most the albums we've released have been lesser known diamonds in the rough that sit outside of the Hawaiian music genre spectrum. I believe it's a solid first step in the label's ongoing progression. And I can't thank Teresa and Steve enough for this opportunity. Earlier today, Bandcamp published a feature on the album, detailing its origins in the early 1980s to...

Today I'm happy to share with you the second installment in our Disco Island Edits series. The six tracks composing Volume 2 were pieced together with care by our crate-digging cohort in NYC, Sticky Dojah, real name Phil Lembke. Phil has been an enthusiastic supporter of AGS for a few years now, his love of local music really kicking in when his father-in-law moved to Hawai‘i Island. Annual family vacations to Hilo side yielded Phil with a growing collection of hard-to-find Hawaiian gems, as evidenced by his (current) photo on his Bandcamp page, where he's seen holding up a copy...

Steve and Teresa captivated Hawaii in the 1980s with their debut album, Catching A Wave, which showcased the duo's effortless style that blended jazz, Hawaiian, and hapa haole music. Now for the first time, the timeless title track "Catching A Wave" will be available on 7-inch vinyl. Over the years we've befriended Steve Ma‘i‘i and Teresa Bright, who have graciously given Aloha Got Soul the opportunity to reissue their debut album for the world to hear once again. After all, it's been out of print since 1983! (Except for a few Japan-only reissues on CD, which now sell for $100...

Last year on our quest to find Liz Damon in hopes of securing permission to reissue her band's underrated funk gem, "Woota (Feelin Good)", we discovered that Liz had been living and working in Las Vegas for several years now. No one I knew had her contact info, so I took to the Facebook fan page and asked if anyone could put me in touch. Thankfully, someone did! And soon enough, I was hearing from Liz Damon herself. She'd recently retired and, although keeps a low profile herself on social media etc, was pleasantly surprised to hear from us about...