Miles Davis Quintet, Live in Europe 1967: The Bootleg Series, Vol. 1 (Columbia/Legacy) A three-CD/one-DVD collection of live stints from Belgium, Germany, France and Sweden, and the inaugural title in a new series of archival material for Miles. And Joe's got the review this week! (Official site) DeBarge, Time Will Reveal: The Complete Motown Albums (Hip-o Select/Motown) All four of DeBarge's classic '80s R&B LPs on two discs, with a further bonus disc of remixes and rarities. (Hip-o
The Second Disc Interview: Talking with Ben Folds
Leave it to Todd Rundgren to spot The Difference. Hosting a 1995 episode of the late Philadelphia-based radio program of that name, Rundgren interviewed Ben Folds, “fronting his trio, The Ben Folds Five. Go figure,” the pop icon dryly noted. Reflecting on the experience sixteen years later, Folds recalled with typical candor the moment when Rundgren spotted the difference in the young musician. It was “fucking surreal…He said ‘you have a distinct voice.’ And I thought, ‘really? I think I
Release Round-Up: Week of August 29
Spin Doctors, Pocket Full of Kryptonite: 20th Anniversary Edition (Epic/Legacy) The "Two Princes" guys...hey, stop laughing...have their hit debut album remastered and expanded - cut that out! - with a bonus disc of demos and rarities. (Official site) Aerosmith, Celine Dion, The Byrds and Carole King, The Essential 3.0 (Columbia/Epic/Legacy) Four Essential compilations get the third-disc treatment. Note that the Celine Dion title is identical to 2008's My Love: The Essential Collection and
Live From D23: When We Wish Upon A Star
Greetings from beautiful downtown Anaheim! Your catalogue correspondent is reporting from the D23 Expo, or "The Ultimate Disney Fan Event." Every arm of The Walt Disney Company is here on the packed show floor, with special panels, presentations, signings and giveaways pertaining to each aspect of the company: film, television, theme parks, animation, publishing, and of course, music. As I'm immersed in all things Disney this weekend, both Mike and I thought it would be the perfect time to
Release Round-Up: Week of August 16
Breaking Benjamin, Shallow Bay: The Best of Breaking Benjamin (Hollywood) A decade of Breaking Benjamin is collected on this new compilation, available in both standard and deluxe editions. The deluxe edition offers an additional disc of rare and unreleased bonus material. (Amazon) Dazz Band, Hot Spot: Expanded Edition (Funkytowngrooves) The Dazz Band's 1985 swan song on Motown Records is expanded with five remixes. (Amazon) Nick Heyward, Tangled and The Apple Bed (Cherry Red) Heyward's
Release Round-Up: Week of August 9
GQ, Two (Funkytowngrooves) GQ's 1980 Arista album gets the remastered treatment. (Amazon) Jefferson Airplane, Red Octopus (Friday Music) The 1975 effort from Paul Kantner, Marty Balin, Grace Slick and co. arrives on 180-gram vinyl with the mega-hit "Miracles" a highlight! (Official site) Evelyn "Champagne" King, Music Box (Funkytowngrooves) King teams with T-Life for this groove-laden RCA set from 1979! (Amazon) The Motels, Apocalypso (Omnivore) The Motels' lost album from 1981 finally
Release Round-Up: Week of August 2
Arcade Fire, Scenes from the Suburbs (Merge) Last year's Grammy winner for Album of the Year is newly expanded with two unreleased tracks and a bonus DVD documentary. (Official site) Various Artists, Mightier Than the Sword: The Ronnie James Dio Story (Sanctuary U.K.) This new double-disc set, in honor of the late, beloved metal singer, is the first to compile just about every band Dio ever sang for - Elf, Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow, Black Sabbath, Dio and Heaven and Hell. (Official
Release Round-Up: Week of July 19
Ramones, Ramones / Leave Home / Rocket to Russia / Road to Ruin (Rhino) 180-gram vinyl reissues of the first four Ramones records! The first 500 to buy them from Rhino directly (as seen in this post) get replica 45s with each album, too. (Official site) Andrew Wood, Malfunkshun: The Andrew Wood Story (Hip-o Select/A&M) A late, underrated icon in the early days of grunge gets his due with this triple-disc set, featuring the acclaimed DVD documentary of his life and career (which gives the
Release Round-Up: Week of July 12
R.E.M., Lifes Rich Pageant: 25th Anniversary Edition (EMI) The latest R.E.M. deluxe edition set features the original LP remastered alongside a bonus disc of demos, all of which are currently available for your streaming pleasure here. (Official site) Megadeth, Peace Sells...But Who's Buying? 25th Anniversary Edition (EMI) The metal heroes' breakthrough LP, remastered and featuring a live bonus disc...and for the adventurous super-fan, a deluxe box set adds two additional alternate mixes of
Release Round-Up: Week of July 5
Erasure, Wonderland / The Circus: Deluxe Editions (EMI) Vince Clarke and Andy Bell's first two albums, expanded with bonus B-sides and remixes across two CDs and DVDs full of live footage. (Official site) Jim Capaldi, Dear Mr. Fantasy: The Jim Capaldi Story (Universal U.K.) The late Traffic legend is memorialized in a four-disc box set. (Official site) Paul McCartney, Driving Rain (MPL/Concord) Another Macca remaster, this one of Paul's 2001 album. No frills, but I imagine "Freedom" will
Reissue Theory: WHAM! "The Final: Live at Wembley"
Welcome to another installment of Reissue Theory, where we take a look back at notable albums and the reissues they could someday see. Twenty-five years after one of pop's guiltiest pleasures said goodbye to a packed live audience, we wonder what a release of that show would look like. On June 28, 1986, twenty-five years ago today, WHAM! became a past-tense pop act. It wasn't your typical pop meltdown, however; it was a breakup for the ages. What other group bids their fan base (80,000
Release Round-Up: Week of June 28
Queen, News of the World / Jazz / The Game / Flash Gordon / Hot Space: Deluxe Editions (Island/UMC) The next wave of Queen remasters are out this Monday in England. If you don't want to get them as imports, you'll have to wait until September to get these as domestic reissues - by which point I'd imagine the third wave will be out in the U.K. (Official site) Alice Cooper, Old School 1964-1974 (Bigger Picture) This desk-sized box includes not pencils, not books, not black eyeliner, but four
Release Round-Up: Week of June 21
Peter Tosh, Legalize It: Legacy Edition / Equal Rights: Legacy Edition (Columbia/Legacy) The first two albums by the onetime Wailer are greatly expanded with rare alternate mixes and other goodies. (Official site) Ace, Five-a-Side: Expanded Edition / Time for Another/No Strings: Expanded Edition (Cherry Red) How long can you wait for expanded editions of the whole Ace catalogue? Each set (Five-a-Side as one set and the other two albums in another package) is remastered and expanded with a
Release Round-Up: Week of June 14
Paul McCartney, McCartney: Deluxe Edition / McCartney II: Deluxe Edition (MPL/Concord) The next entries in the Paul McCartney Archive Collection, Macca's first two purely solo LPs, originally released in 1970 and 1980. You've got your choice of formats: regular remasters, double-disc deluxe editions packed with extra content, vinyl sets or super-deluxe editions in hardback book cases (McCartney's deluxe edition adds a DVD while McCartney II adds another CD and a DVD). (Official site) The
Release Round-Up: Week of June 7
Marvin Gaye, What's Going On: 40th Anniversary Edition (Motown/UMe) Two CDs feature the original album and a host of rarities, single mixes, and all the best outtakes leading up to the making of this R&B classic (almost a dozen of which are unreleased). The deluxe package is rounded out by the great Detroit mix of the album on vinyl. (Check out our interview with Harry Weinger on the set!) (Amazon) Paul Simon, Paul Simon / There Goes Rhymin' Simon / In Concert: Live Rhymin' / Still Crazy
Release Round-Up: Week of May 31
Ozzy Osbourne, Blizzard of Ozz / Diary of a Madman: Legacy Edition (Epic/Legacy) The Prince of Darkness' first two LPs, finally put back into print with the original drum and bass tracks and expanded with bonus material (including a previously unreleased live disc for Diary). A box set packs all the CDs in with vinyl, a commemorative book and the new documentary Thirty Years After the Blizzard. (Official site) Twisted Sister, Under the Blade: Deluxe Edition (Eagle) Another welcome hard-rock
Make Me Wanna Holler: A Chat with Harry Weinger on "What's Going On" (Part 2)
The wait is over. We continue our discussion of Marvin Gaye's classic What's Going On, to be released as a super-deluxe edition on June 7, with reissue producer Harry Weinger. In this portion of the discussion, Weinger touches on the always-hot topic of remastering the source material, a thought on super-deluxe box sets, and future projects to honor both Gaye's legacy and other Motown greats. Read on after the jump!
"I Just Wanna Ask a Question": Harry Weinger on the "What's Going On" Box Set
For most music producers, there's a kind of strangeness to working on multiple reissues of the same classic album over time. Not so for Harry Weinger, vice-president of A&R at Universal Music Enterprises and, as one of UMe's resident Motown gurus, the producer of several deluxe editions of Marvin Gaye's classic LPs, including What's Going On. "You learn between anniversaries," Weinger said. "And luckily, I was there for both of them." When What's Going On became one of Universal's first in
Release Round-Up: Week of May 17
Queen, Queen / Queen II / Sheer Heart Attack / A Night at the Opera / A Day at the Races: Deluxe Editions (Hollywood) No, you're not seeing double. The first batch of 40th anniversary Queen expanded editions, available in the U.K. since March, make their stateside debuts. There's an Amazon-exclusive box with all of them included, too. Dear readers: any big box retailers carrying these? The only one I imagine that is would be Best Buy. (Official site) The Go-Go's, Beauty and the Beat: 30th
Release Round-Up: Week of May 10
Aerosmith, Tough Love: Best of the Ballads (Geffen/UMe) Geffen augments the craziness of American Idol host/Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler (who has a solo single out today) by putting out a compilation of the band's Geffen-era ballads hits ("Love in an Elevator" isn't a ballad in any configuration). Apparently it's only available at Target, so if you visit a local indie store you should be fine. (Official site) Booker T. & The MG's, McLemore Avenue / The Staple Singers, Be Altitude:
In Case You Missed It: A Full Spectrum of U.K. Compilations in May
The Spectrum family of labels in the U.K., which includes the catalogues of what Americans count toward Universal Music Group, have a few affordable compilations on the market in the coming month from a diverse crop of artists. On May 23, the label will release compilations from Styx as well as both Fleetwood Mac and Rod Stewart. (The latter two artists, whose catalogues reside with Warner Music Group in the U.S., will focus on each act's "early years.") It's also worth noting that Spectrum has
Release Round-Up: Week of May 3
Sade, The Ultimate Collection (Epic) The sultry British soul band anthologized across two discs, featuring several brand-new tracks - the perfect teaser for their long-awaited summer tour. (Official site) Loudon Wainwright, 40 Odd Years (Shout! Factory) The witty singer/songwriter is anthologized across four CDs and a DVD. Check for Joe's review later today! (Shout! Factory) Rush, Moving Pictures: Deluxe Edition (Blu-Ray) (Mercury/UMe) Already available at Best Buy since April, the
Release Round-Up: Week of April 26
Derek and the Dominos, Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs (Universal) The 2-CD remastered/expanded 40th Anniversary Edition (previously a Best Buy exclusive) and super deluxe 4-CD/2-LP/1-DVD box set of the seminal album both arrive in stores today. Read more here. (2-CD – Amazon, Box Set – Amazon) Bob Dylan, The Other Side of the Mirror: Live at the Newport Folk Festival 1963-1965 (Columbia/Legacy) Murray Lerner’s film chronicling Dylan’s incendiary performances at Newport is released on
Release Round-Up: Week of April 12
Bob Dylan, In Concert: Brandeis University, 1963 (Columbia/Legacy) Did you miss this when it first came to pass as a bonus disc with Amazon orders of the latest Bootleg Series? Here's your second chance. (Official site) Danny Elfman, The Tim Burton/Danny Elfman 25th Anniversary Music Box (Warner Bros.) Can you believe it? These things are finally starting to ship after four months and endless posts of addressing speculation and delays. (Official site) Jimi Hendrix, South Saturn Delta / Band
Release Round-Up: Week of March 29
Derek and The Dominos, Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs: 40th Anniversary Edition (Polydor/UMe) Unbeknownst to us at Second Disc HQ, a lot of weird stuff has been going on with this deluxe edition. It seems that, for whatever reason, the 2-CD edition of this set is retailing only at Best Buy until April 26, at which point it'll be released more widely. No extra material seems to be present, just a lengthy lead time in terms of exclusivity. Weird, man. And of course there's that super-deluxe