Release Round-Up: Week of December 16

December 16, 2016 By Joe Marchese — No Comments

Welcome to this week’s Release Round-Up!

The Kinks, The Mono Collection (Sanctuary/BMG) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

The Kinks’ The Mono Collection brings together eight of the band’s classic albums in their original U.K. Pye Records mono editions on ten LPs, all pressed on 180-gram vinyl. The set includes 1967’s Live at Kelvin Hall and 1970’s original 2-LP collection The Kinks (otherwise known as The Black Album. A hardcover 48-page book including never-before-seen photos and new interviews with Ray Davies, Dave Davies and Mick Avory tops it all off. Read more here!

Tony Bennett, Celebrates 90 (Columbia)

Standard Edition (Concert Only): Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
Amazon-Exclusive Deluxe Edition (3 CDs): Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada

This past August 3, Tony Bennett celebrated his milestone 90th birthday…and made it clear that he had no intentions of slowing down. Indeed, the legendary vocalist has dates booked well into 2017, but first, he’s looking back with a new 3-CD set including rare and previously unreleased material. Tony Bennett Celebrates 90 premieres the recording of the all-star concert tribute held at Radio City Music Hall on September 15 of this year, but the Amazon-exclusive Deluxe Edition will add two discs of rare and classic Bennett. The second disc of the Deluxe Edition has 20 rarities, ten of which are previously unreleased; the third has 18 lesser-known Bennett favorites. Read more here!

Rush, 2112: 40th Anniversary Edition (Mercury/UMe)

2-CD/1-DVD Set: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
3-LP/2-CD/1-DVD Super Deluxe Edition: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
3-LP Vinyl Only: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada

Rush’s fourth album, from 1976, returns in a deluxe edition with different content than the last such reissue, from 2012. The 40th Anniversary 2112 has Sean Magee’s 2015 Abbey Road remaster on CD plus a bonus disc featuring cover versions by Dave Grohl and Taylor Hawkins of Foo Fighters along with Nick Raskulinecz, Billy Talent, Steven Wilson, Jacob Moon and Alice In Chains, as well as 1976 and 1977 live outtakes and a radio spot. The DVD has the 6-song Live at Capitol Theatre 1976 performance plus three bonus videos. The Super Deluxe set has all of the above plus the audio content on three 200-gram LPs, and some box-exclusive swag such as buttons, a ticket stub and handbill reproduction.

Rage Against The Machine, Evil Empire Hybrid SACD (Audio Fidelity) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

Steve Hoffman and Steven Marsh have remastered RATM’s chart-topping sophomore album, from 1996, for this hybrid stereo SACD playable on all CD players.

And now…three titles slightly delayed from last week!

Randy Newman, The Randy Newman Songbook (Nonesuch) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

The Randy Newman Songbook box set marks the first-ever combined release of all three of the legendary songwriter’s piano-and-voice Songbook albums (including the new Vol. 3) recorded in 2003 and 2010 with producers Mitchell Froom and Lenny Waronker. All songs have been resequenced as one cohesive, thematically-linked listening experience spread over 4 CDs. Additionally, the box boasts five exclusive, previously unreleased bonus tracks: the now-standard “Feels Like Home,” “A Wedding in Cherokee County,” “I’m Dreaming,” “Family Album: Homage to Alfred, Emil and Lionel Newman,” and “Wandering Boy” – the latter the debut recording of one of Newman’s oldest compositions. This set is also available on vinyl.

The Doors, London Fog 1966 (Elektra/Rhino) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

The earliest known live recording of The Doors – recorded in 1966 at Sunset Strip’s London Fog club – is presented for the first time on a CD/LP box set limited to 18,000 copies. Read more here!

Social Distortion, The Independent Years 1983-2004 (Concord Bicycle) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

Punk icons Social Distortion are rounding up four of their albums for your turntable in a new vinyl box set. The Independent Years 1983-2004 fills in the gaps on either side of their major-label tenure from 1990 to 1996, with fresh vinyl pressings of Mommy’s Little Monster, Prison Bound, Mainliner (Wreckage from the Past), and Sex, Love and Rock ‘N’ Roll. Read more here!

Categories:

Release Round-Up

Formats:

Box Sets, CD, Digital Download, Vinyl

Genres:

Classic Rock, Jazz, Pop, Popular Standards/Vocal, Rock

Tags:

Rage Against the Machine, Randy Newman, Rush, , The Doors, The Kinks, Tony Bennett

Joe Marchese

JOE MARCHESE (Editor) joined The Second Disc shortly after its launch in early 2010, and has since penned daily news and reviews about classic music of all genres. In 2015, Joe formed the Second Disc Records label. Celebrating the great songwriters, producers and artists who created the sound of American popular song and beyond, Second Disc Records, in conjunction with labels including Real Gone Music and Cherry Red Records, has released newly-curated collections produced and annotated by Joe from iconic artists such as Dionne Warwick, Diana Ross and The Supremes, Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, The Spinners, Johnny Mathis, Bobby Darin, Meat Loaf, Laura Nyro, Melissa Manchester, Liza Minnelli, Darlene Love, Al Stewart, Michael Nesmith, and many others.

Joe has written liner notes, produced, or contributed to over 200 reissues from a diverse array of artists, among them America, JD Souther, Nat "King" Cole, Paul Williams, Lesley Gore, Dusty Springfield, BJ Thomas, The 5th Dimension, Burt Bacharach, The Mamas and the Papas, Carpenters, Perry Como, Rod McKuen, Doris Day, Jackie DeShannon, Petula Clark, Robert Goulet, and Andy Williams.

Over the past two decades, Joe has also worked in a variety of capacities on and off Broadway as well as at some of the premier theatres in the U.S., including Lincoln Center Theater, George Street Playhouse, Paper Mill Playhouse, Long Wharf Theatre, and the York Theatre Company. He has felt privileged to work on productions alongside artists such as the late Jack Klugman, Eli Wallach, Arthur Laurents, Betty Comden and Adolph Green. In 2009, Joe began contributing theatre and music reviews to the print publication The Sondheim Review, and in 2012, he joined the staff of The Digital Bits as a regular contributor writing about film and television on DVD and Blu-ray.

Joe currently resides in the suburbs of New York City.