Features / Release Round-Up

Welcome to this week’s Release Round-Up, featuring a selection of the new titles available today.  As an Amazon affiliate, we earn from qualifying purchases.

Queen, Queen II: Collectors’ Edition (Virgin/EMI/Hollywood)

5CD/2LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
2CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
1CD: Amazon U.S. Link TBD / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
Picture Disc: Official Store
Cassette: Official Store

Queen have remixed their second album, featuring their first Top 10 hit “Seven Seas of Rhye,” for a new multi-format reissue. The box set edition is the most expansive, of course, packed with rare and unreleased demos and session outtakes, a disc of backing tracks and two live collections comprised of previously released archival material. The package includes a 112-page booklet of liner notes and rare archival photos and ephemera along with a double LP black and white pressing of the remixed album and four art prints.  Read more here.

Van Halen, 5150 (Expanded Edition) (Warner/Rhino)

3CD/BD/LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
2CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
2LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Rhino.com (green vinyl)

Van Halen’s seventh album was their first of four with a new vocalist: The Red Rocker himself, Sammy Hagar. The sound was slightly different – keyboards and mid-tempo ballads were profuse – but audiences kept the fever for VH carrying over from 1984, their last album with original singer David Lee Roth. For its 40th anniversary, 5150 comes back with a 3CD/Blu-ray/LP that features the album (remastered in 2023 as part of a different box set), a disc of rare single edits, live B-sides and extended versions; and the audio from a live show in the summer of 1986 – also filmed for the home video Live Without a Net, which will feature in HD on the accompanying Blu-ray alongside two original promo videos. Read more here.

Heaven & Hell, Breaking Out of Heaven 2007-2009 (Rhino)

4CD/Blu-ray: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
7LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada

A new box set offers the complete output of Heaven & Hell, the renamed reunion of Black Sabbath’s early ’80s line-up (vocalist Ronnie James Dio, founding guitarist and bassist Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler, and drummer Vinny Appice). An expanded edition of 2009’s The Devil You Know (featuring the group’s 2007 recordings for a Dio-era Sabbath compilation) joins two live shows from Radio City Music Hall in New York City and the Wacken Open Air Festival; among the last dates Dio took on before his passing in 2010. The CD edition of this box includes a Blu-ray featuring video versions of the two shows plus bonus band interviews. Both editions feature a new illustrated book with liner notes by Hugh Gilmour, along with a replica tour program and poster. Get more details here.

The Lovin’ Spoonful, What a Day for a Daydream: The Complete Recordings 1965-1969 (Cherry Red/Strawberry) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada/ Cherry Red)

Cherry Red’s Strawberry imprint celebrates the legacy of New York’s Lovin’ Spoonful with What a Day for a Daydream: The Complete Recordings 1965-1969.  This 7CD box set brings together all of the classic band’s albums originally released between 1965 and 1969 including two soundtracks, Zal Yanovsky’s lone solo record, and tracks from the Elektra compilation What’s Shakin’.  The core albums are presented in mono and stereo, and the set also appends the bonus tracks which originally appeared on the 2002-2003 BMG Heritage/Buddha reissues.  The set has been mastered by Alec Palao. Get the full track listing and more here.

Digital Underground, Sex Packets (35th Anniversary Edition) (Tommy Boy)

2CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
2LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada

The 1990 debut album by Bay Area collective Digital Underground was a lighthearted affair featuring the club classic “Doowutchyalike” and the immortal crossover hit “The Humpty Dance.” These new pressings feature the original album as it appeared on CD, plus a host of bonus tracks including a cassette-only bonus track, an instrumental of “The Humpty Dance” and the unreleased “Blue View.” (A fourth bonus cut, the extended cassette version of album track “Gutfest ’89,” appears exclusively on the 2CD, with a radio mix of “The Humpty Dance” rounding out the set’s digital versions.) The album’s original executive producer Atron Gregory pens new liner notes, and both physical packages include a gatefold sleeve with pop-up artwork of a recording studio, originally illustrated by the group’s longtime founder, the late Gregory “Shock G” Jacobs.  Read more here.

Johnny Cougar, a.k.a. John Mellencamp, American Dream: The Mainman Recordings 1976-1977 (Cherry Red/Lemon) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

Perhaps the most comprehensive retrospective of John Mellencamp’s earliest work as “Johnny Cougar,” American Dream includes the original albums Chestnut Street Incident (1976) and The Kid Inside (recorded in 1977 and released in 1982); U.S. Male, an EP of early recordings making its CD debut; and a further 20 outtakes and alternate versions from the period – half of which are previously unreleased!  Get more info here.

Various Artists, Black America Sings Stevie Wonder (Ace/Kent) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

Black America Sings Stevie Wonder brings together 20 compositions by the Motown legend from across the pop and soul spectrum. From familiar tracks in less familiar versions to songs Wonder gave others both on and off the label he was part of for more than half a century, there’s quite a bit to appreciate here, even kicking off with a cameo from the man himself, writing, producing and performing on labelmate Jermaine Jackson’s hit “Let’s Get Serious.”  Other artists here include The Supremes, Four Tops, Quincy Jones, Nancy Wilson, Aretha Franklin, and Lou Rawls.  Read more here!

R.E.M., R.E.M. at the BBC (Craft Recordings) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

Craft Recordings reissues the 2018 box set, R.E.M. at the BBC, collecting the band’s performances for the Beeb from 1984-2008.  It’s available as a super deluxe 8CD/1DVD box set curated from the archives of both the band and the BBC, and it’s chock full of rare and previously unreleased live and studio recordings of such favorites as “Man on the Moon,” “Losing My Religion,” and “What’s the Frequency, Kenneth?” Read our 2018 review here.

Charlie Daniels Band, The Epic Singles As & Bs (Floating World) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

The U.K.’s Floating World label brings together 26 single sides from the late Daniels’ band originally released on Epic Records.  Contrary to the label’s description, this set does not appear to have all of Daniels’ Epic sides, and they do not appear to be presented chronologically.  We have no information as of this writing as to whether the original single mixes have been utilized for this release.

Melissa Etheridge, rise (Sun) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

Etheridge returns with a new album on the venerable Sun label, co-produced by the artist and Shooter Jennings at LA’s Sunset Sound.  Chris Stapleton guests on “The Other Side of Blue.”  Available on CD, LP, and digitally.

The Puppini Sisters, The Birthday Party (Millionaire Records) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

The retro, Andrews Sisters-styled British girl group is back with a new album featuring reimagined versions of such varied songs as “Dream a Little Dream of Me,” “Honeysuckle Rose,” “Kokomo,” and “Total Eclipse of the Heart.”  Out today on CD in the U.K. and next Friday in North America.  Also available digitally.

Charlie Puth, Whatever’s Clever (Atlantic) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

The New Jersey singer-songwriter’s fourth studio album features an array of original songs and guests including Kenny Loggins and Michael McDonald (on “Love in Exile”), Jeff Goldblum (on “Until It Happens to You”), and Kenny G (on “Cry”).  Available on CD, LP, and digitally.