Along with ECM, ENJA and ACT, MPS has a secure place in the pantheon of great German jazz labels. Between the early 1960s and late 1970s it gave a home to both local and international talent, recording proven quantities from America such as Francy Boland, co-leader of an inspirational orchestra with drummer Kenny Clarke, Mark Murphy and Mary Lou Williams, as well as important emerging Germans such as Wolfgang Dauner and Gunter Hampel. Master selector Gilles Peterson cherry picks some gems from the back catalogue, underlining how artfully the MPS output shuttled between modalism, swing, funk and psychedelia, as artists often kept one foot in acoustic traditions all the while striding into a new world of imaginatively moody electric sounds. Dark, emotionally charged Trane-like waltzes with gorgeous melancholic brass are something of a recurrent feature, but the track listing is well-leavened by the inclusion of great vocals from the aforementioned Murphy, The Third Wave and The Singers Unlimited. The only questionable decision is the clunky moulding of Peterson’s name to the MPS acronym, which is really a step too far in branding. Purveyor of sunshine or not, the DJ has cast the artists he has valiantly championed into shadow, the irony of which makes for heavy weather.