With only a few weeks until Christmas, Edsel is prepping a host of multi-album box sets and vinyl reissues up for consideration under your tree. The four below titles span a few icons and notable names of British rock in the ’70s and ’80s – and two of them even include unheard material from the artists’ respective vaults! First up is Too Nutty to Be Naughty (Studio Recordings 1977-2002), a celebration of the late Ian Dury. The post-punk renaissance man – as at home as the frontman of Stiff stalwarts The Blockheads (they…
Q’s Cues: New ‘Écoutez Le Cinéma’ Box Celebrates the Music of Quincy Jones
When Rhino released Q: The Musical Biography of Quincy Jones – a 4CD, 74-track collection – in 2001, it was a valiant attempt to tell a story that was still being written. The gifted bandleader, composer and producer, who passed away at the age of 91 in 2024, had an enduring way with sound, be it jazz, pop, R&B, rock or even film and television scoring. His decades of work with the 20th century’s greatest luminaries made him a tremendous (if controversial) raconteur, with countless stories to tell and luminaries to work alongside….
THE SECOND DISC’S 2025 HOLIDAY GIFT GUIDE IS HERE!
Well, today is Cyber Monday, which means one thing at Second Disc HQ: it’s time to launch our annual Holiday Gift Guide, featuring (more than) a few of our favorite things for the music enthusiast in your life. Sure, we might not have included raindrops on roses or whiskers on kittens, but we’ve filled the guide with over 50 essential selections: sprawling box sets and deluxe vinyl editions, as well as noteworthy releases on CD from favorite artists that just might make great stocking stuffers. So just click here or visit the handy red…
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Summer Time: The Singles Collection 1974-2010
Summer Time: The Singles Collection 1974-2010 is set to be a staggering tribute to the late, great Donna Summer’s decades-long presence as a dancefloor filler. Timed to celebrate the 50th anniversary of her breakthrough hit “Love to Love You, Baby,” this 40CD set highlights five decades’ worth of single sides she issued all over the world, from early Dutch single-only tracks to material from her tenures on Casablanca, Geffen, Mercury, Warner Bros., Atlantic and more. Amidst the familiar hits (“Love to Love You, Baby,” “I Feel Love,” “Last Dance,” “Heaven Knows,” “Hot…
Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn and Jones, Ltd.: Super Deluxe Edition
This indispensable addition to The Monkees’ catalogue of super deluxe sets follows the 4CD format that is by now familiar to the group’s fans. (The last album to receive this treatment was Headquarters back in late 2022.) The first disc offers the remastered stereo album plus a new 2025 album mix and a couple of bonuses. Disc 2 presents the remastered mono mix (including a unique, slightly different version of “Pleasant Valley Sunday”) and twelve alternative versions including previously unreleased mono mixes and both the TV and single mixes of “Daydream Believer” B-side…
Enzyclopedia Volumes One and Two
5CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 3LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Enzyclopedia Volumes One and Two focus on the Neil and Tim Finn-founded group’s early years, coalescing around the material leading up to 1975 debut Mental Notes, which celebrates a half-century this year. The 5CD set features a plethora of material including remasters of Mental Notes and its sort-of follow-up Second Thoughts, a rework of the Mental material with Roxy Music’s Phil Manzanera in the producer’s chair. Second Thoughts is also newly remixed for the set by Enz keyboardist Eddie Rayner; he’s done similar work on parts of the band’s…
Adios, Farewell, Goodbye, Good Luck, So Long: On Stage 1964-1974
Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Omnivore is returning to the discography of Bakersfield’s favorite son, Buck Owens, with a new 3CD set that chronicles a decade of music-making on the concert stage. Buck and His Buckaroos’ Adios, Farewell, Goodbye, Good Luck, So Long: On Stage 1964-1974 boasts 89 tracks (78 songs plus 11 introductions and pieces of onstage chatter) – the majority of which are new to CD. A full 25 tracks have never been issued in any format, while a whopping 43 others are premiering in CD and digital formats including the complete contents…
Release Round-Up: Week of November 28
Welcome to this week’s Release Round-Up! With Record Store Day’s Black Friday event taking place today, the slate is usually a small one…not so this year, though, thanks to Rhino’s CD releases of numerous RSD titles. As an Amazon affiliate, we earn from qualifying purchases. Neil Young, Tonight’s the Night 50 (Reprise/NYA) 1CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Greedy Hand Store 2LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Greedy Hand Store Clear Vinyl: Greedy Hand Store Neil Young’s sixth album, released in 1975 but mostly recorded two years earlier, was the closer to his “Ditch Trilogy.”…
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Holiday Gift Guide Review: The Beatles, “Anthology Collection”
1995: Bill Clinton was President of the U.S., John Major was Prime Minister of the U.K., phones weren’t yet smart, Braveheart won Best Picture, the O.J. trial was on everyone’s mind, Jerry Garcia died, and the biggest songs of the year were Coolio’s “Gangsta’s Paradise” (U.S.) and Robson and Jerome’s “Unchained Melody/White Cliffs of Dover” (U.K.). In November, the band that changed pop music forever launched its first major archival project at a time when such vault deep dives weren’t yet (so) commonplace. The Beatles Anthology was a true multimedia venture, encompassing…
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And Then I Wrote… The First Three Albums of the ’90s
This 4CD box set from the Bakersfield country hero (also available on 4 LPs for Record Store Day Black Friday) includes a full LP of rarities from the era including covers of “Things We Said Today,” “Suspicious Minds,” and “Crazy Little Thing Called Love.”
Release Round-Up: Week of November 21
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. The Beatles, Anthology Collection (Capitol/Apple/UMe) 8CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Official Store 12LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Official Store The Beatles’ Anthology Collection premieres remastered editions of the original three collections of rarities and outtakes compiled by George Martin and released through 1995 and 1996, available across six CDs or nine LPs. Martin’s son Giles, who remastered those albums for this release, also curates a new collection, Anthology 4, across a further two CDs or…
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Juvenilia: The Columbia Years
Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Official Site (with signed print) Prolific pop/rock/soul singer/songwriter Sananda Maitreya is set to release an artist-approved colored vinyl box set featuring remastered and slightly redesigned editions of his early albums for Columbia, originally released under the name Terence Trent D’Arby but now issued under his current name. Includes Into the Hardline According to… (1987 – translucent green), Neither Fish Nor Flesh: A Soundtrack of Love, Faith, Hope and Destruction (1989 – red), Symphony or Damn (Exploring the Tension Inside the Sweetness) (1993 – gold double vinyl) and Vibrator (1995 – blue double…
Sign Your Name: Sananda Maitreya’s Early Works Due for Vinyl Box Set
What’s in a name? The world didn’t know Sananda Maitreya as such in the ’80s and ’90s, but his arresting early works will finally be remastered and reissued on vinyl next year under the moniker he is now known by. Juvenilia: The Columbia Years, available February 6, offers on six LPs the four albums Maitreya released in the U.S. and the U.K. under the name Terence Trent D’Arby: Introducing the Hardline According to… (1987), Neither Fish Nor Flesh: A Soundtrack of Love, Faith, Hope and Destruction (1989), Symphony or Damn (Exploring the Tension Inside the Sweetness) (1993) and Vibrator…
Holiday Gift Guide Review: Split Enz, ‘Encyclopedia Volumes 1 & 2’
It’s kind of a minor miracle that Enzyclopedia Volumes 1 & 2 (Chrysalis CRC/CRV1899) – the first in what we hope is an ongoing reissue campaign for Antipodean rock icons Split Enz – exists at all. Their catalogue is probably a tough sell if you live outside of Australia or New Zealand (none of their discography is consistently available worldwide), and their best-known work, where they became a razor-sharp, New Wave-adjacent ensemble, doesn’t come until years after what’s covered in this collection (available as a 5CD or 3LP set). And that’s before you get…
Release Round-Up: Week of November 14
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. Nicolette Larson, Look in My Direction: The Warner Bros. Recordings (Cherry Red/Lemon/Second Disc) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Cherry Red) Look in My Direction: The Warner Bros. Recordings from Cherry Red’s Lemon imprint and TSD presents all of the late Nicolette Larson’s original studio and live albums for Warner Bros. Records on 4 CDs, produced by Ted Templeman (The Doobie Brothers, Van Halen) and singer-songwriter Andrew Gold (“Thank You for Being…
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OUT TOMORROW! The Second Disc, Lemon Collect Nicolette Larson’s Warner Bros. Albums on “Look In My Direction”
On the evenings of February 21 and 22, 1998, a host of musicians took the stage of the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium to pay tribute to one of their own. Linda Ronstadt, Carole King, Jackson Browne, Jimmy Buffett, Bonnie Raitt, and Crosby, Stills and Nash were just a few of the artists who paid their respects in song to the late Nicolette Larson. The luminous singer with the honeyed voice had unexpectedly died just a couple of months earlier at the far too young age of 45. In the decades since her…
Holiday Gift Guide Review: The Monkees, “Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones, Ltd.” [Super Deluxe Edition]
Next year marks the 60th anniversary of The Monkees, an occasion soon to be commemorated by last Monkee standing Micky Dolenz with a new tour. The group’s home of Rhino Records has started the party early with the recent release of the latest (and last?) of the label’s series of lavish album reissues. 1967’s Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones Ltd. has been expanded as a comprehensive 4CD/1-7″ box set by producer/annotator Andrew Sandoval, and as usual, the result is manna for longtime fans and collectors. Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones, Ltd. found Davy Jones,…
Sweet and Lovely: Bill Evans’ Trio Explorations Revisited in New Set from Craft
Craft Recordings is revisiting a halcyon period of The Bill Evans Trio. Due on November 21, Haunted Heart: The Legendary Riverside Recordings collects the complete studio recordings by the Bill Evans Trio lineup of Evans (1929-1980), bassist Scott LaFaro (1936-1961), and drummer Paul Motian (1931-2011). The 3CD or 5LP set presents the complete albums Portrait in Jazz (1960) and Explorations (1961) plus 26 alternate takes – a full 17 of which are previously unreleased. Evans, a pioneer in the area of modal jazz (in which the solos build from the key, not – as…
Holiday Gift Guide Review: John Williams, ‘The Anthology Vol. 1 (1969-1990)’
Let’s look at the numbers: John Williams has been on this mortal plane for 93 years, and has been composing for visual media for 73 of those years. Compact discs have been a part of music lovers’ collections for at least four decades, and the “art” of John Williams on CD – a real, curatorial approach to his iconic film scores – began in earnest more than 30 years ago, when the 4CD box set Star Wars Trilogy: The Original Soundtrack Anthology hit record stores in 1993. From basic compilations like Greatest Hits 1969-1999…
The Complete Elektra Albums
Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada One of Rhino’s flashiest vinyl box sets for Record Store Day Black Friday is also getting a general CD release the same day! Love’s The Complete Elektra Albums includes the definitive selection of Arthur Lee and company’s inimitable work. In addition to newly remastered versions of 1966’s Love and Da Capo and the landmark Forever Changes (1967), this box also includes the CD debut of Lee’s original mix for 1969’s Four Sail (first released on vinyl for its 40th anniversary in 2019) plus a disc of single sides and rarities that appeared on a series…
Got to Choose: Weeks After Expanding ‘Dressed to Kill,’ KISS’ ‘Alive!’ Gets Its Own Deluxe Box
Only a few weeks after unveiling a deluxe box set of their third studio album Dressed to Kill – which featured, in part, overdub-free versions of shows utilized for their breakthrough concert album Alive! – KISS have revealed that they will, in fact, release a whole box set for Alive! as well, confirming previous rumors and reports. Available on four CDs or eight LPs and a Blu-ray Audio disc, Alive! features the original double album (here for the first time pressed on one CD) along with two more complete shows (plus some relevant rehearsal audio and…
Feel the Heat: Supergroup The Power Station Goes Deluxe on New Box Set
Fans of Duran Duran and supergroups will multiply for this one: Rhino is expanding the self-titled debut from The Power Station into a 4CD box set next year. The Power Station DLX includes the remastered album (featuring the hits “Some Like It Hot” and a cover of T. Rex’s “Get It On (Bang a Gong)”) alongside three discs of bonus material, including unreleased “raw instrumental” versions, single mixes and live material, including the band’s performances from the charity concert Live Aid and an unissued full set from nearly a month later at…
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Release Round-Up: Week of November 7
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. Wings, Wings [Various Formats] (MPL/Capitol/UMe) 2CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 3LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 1CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 1LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada On November 4, Paul McCartney released Wings: The Story of a Band on the Run, an oral history of the superstar’s other band. The hardcover tome, created in collaboration with film director Morgan Neville and editor Ted Widmer, tells Wings’ story through text, photographs, a timeline, a gigography,…
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High the Memory: Rhino Sets Yes’ ‘Tales from Topographic Oceans’ As First Major Box of 2026
Having released arguably more reissues and box sets than any major label in 2025, Rhino has already set sights on their first catalogue title of 2026. Might you be interested? In a word: Yes. Following a deluxe box set of Close to the Edge this past spring, the label will next give the lavish treatment to 1973’s Tales from Topographic Oceans. Available February 6, this 12CD/2LP/Blu-ray box set will offer more than a dozen unreleased outtakes and live tracks alongside a suite of new mixes of the original album by acclaimed engineer Steven Wilson. Building…
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Step Into Christmas: UMe Preps Holiday Singles Box, Expansion of Connie Francis’ Holiday Album
With the spookiest holidays of the fall now in the rear view mirror (that’s right: Halloween and Election Day!), there’s nothing wrong with looking ahead to the Christmas music season and checking out a pair of now-available titles from Universal Music Group spotlighting some of their classic holiday hits and an album by one of catalogue’s biggest success stories this year. UMe is selling a nifty collection of more than a dozen seasonal 7″ singles in a collectible carrying case. This Classic Holiday Singles Box features Christmas perennials spanning from the ’40s to…
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