It's been a big year for fans of Black Sabbath. In the first few months of 2021, Rhino has already released a box set of the band's 1972 album Vol. 4, followed by 2CD expanded editions of the first two Dio-era albums. Now, the label has announced another super deluxe box set - this time of 1975's Sabotage. Due on June 11, it will be available in both 4CD and 4LP/7" editions. While the album's title was inspired by the legal battle raging between Sabbath and its former manager, the album
God Knows I’m Good: Live Rarities, Singles Collected on Bowie’s ‘The Width of a Circle’
David Bowie's third album The Man Who Sold the World opened with the blistering "The Width of a Circle," an eight-minute blast of rock adrenaline culminating in the narrator's illicit encounter with a supernatural being in the burning pits of Hell. Bowie had quickly come a long way from the music hall theatricality of his first eponymous LP and the psychedelic folk-rock of his second. The 1970 LP welcomed guitarist Mick Ronson and drummer Woody Woodmansey, the first appearance on a Bowie album
How My Heart Sings: Craft Recordings Readies New Career-Spanning Box for Bill Evans
Bill Evans would have earned his place in the jazz history books if only for his role on Miles Davis' landmark 1959 set Kind of Blue. But the pianist-composer and modal jazz innovator recorded over 50 live and studio albums as a leader before his untimely death in 1980 at the age of just 51, leaving behind a legacy of some of the most beautiful jazz ever committed to tape. In addition to Davis, he also served as a sideman to musicians including Chet Baker, Cannonball Adderley, Charles Mingus,
Wake Up You Sleepy Head: “Oh! You Pretty Things” Collects 66 Glam Rock Nuggets
Oh! You Pretty Things: David Bowie's 1971 song became an anthem for the glam era: "Don't you know you're driving your mothers and fathers insane? Let me make it plain, you gotta make way for the homo superior..." Bowie's alien persona - androgynous, dangerous, sexy, and flamboyant - connected with youth and caused a stir among their parents. The song's title has now been adopted by a new 3-CD box set from Cherry Red's Grapefruit imprint. Alas, "Oh! You Pretty Things" doesn't appear anywhere
Release Round-Up: Week of April 9
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up! Fleetwood Mac, Live: Super Deluxe Edition (Warner/Rhino) (Rhino.com / Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada) Rhino reissues Fleetwood Mac's 1980 Live - the first live album from the line-up of Lindsey Buckingham, Stevie Nicks, Christine McVie, John McVie, and Mick Fleetwood - as a deluxe 3CD/2LP/7″ box set. The two CDs and two LPs will both have the remastered original double album. The third CD will offer 14 previously unreleased
Same Page, Different Book: New Prince Album, ‘Welcome 2 America,’ Coming This Summer
After turning Sign O' the Times into one of 2020's best box sets, the Prince Estate will move forward in time with an unreleased album from 2010 due this summer. Welcome 2 America was completed in the wake of Prince's 20Ten (issued free with the purchase of different newspapers and magazines in Europe) but, like so many of The Artist's projects, put aside. The Minneapolis icon intended it as "a statement record...document[ing] Prince's concerns, hopes, and visions for a shifting society,
A Case of You: Joni Mitchell’s First Four Albums Remastered, “The Reprise Albums (1968-1971)” Due June 25
Last year Joni Mitchell and Rhino stunned fans with the announcement of the Joni Mitchell Archives, an ongoing series of releases that look back at the career of the multifaceted songwriter, singer, producer, and visual artist. (Check out our interview with series co-producer, Patrick Milligan, here!) Today, Joni Mitchell and Rhino announced the next volume in the series: The Reprise Albums (1968-1971), to be released June 25, just fifty years and three days after she released Blue on June
Rhino’s Record Store Day Slate Features John Prine, Steely Dan, Joni Mitchell, CSNY, Donny Hathaway, Lou Reed, More
At 1:00 pm EST/10:00 am PST today, the list of Record Store Day's annual offerings was made public. As was the case in 2020, this year's RSD festivities will take place over more than one day. The two RSD Drops are scheduled for Saturday, June 12, and Saturday, July 17. We'll be sharing periodic announcements of various labels' releases, including this look at Rhino's whopping array of over 30 titles from heavy hitters including Black Sabbath, Donny Hathaway, Grateful Dead, Joni Mitchell,
Now More Than Ever: “Chicago at Carnegie Hall” Gets Super-Sized for Its 50th
Robert Lamm, Peter Cetera, Terry Kath, James Pankow, Lee Loughnane, Walt Parazaider, and Danny Seraphine took the world by storm with 1969's Chicago Transit Authority. The double album inaugurated a string of twelve successive platinum or multi-platinum LPs for the group over the next decade. The largest of them all was 1971's Chicago at Carnegie Hall, colloquially referred to as Chicago IV. Over a whopping eight sides of vinyl, the 4-LP box set presented highlights from the band's six-night,
Over, Under, Sideways, Down: The Yardbirds’ “Roger the Engineer” Goes Super Deluxe from Demon
Last Record Store Day Black Friday, Demon Music Group reissued The Yardbirds' Roger the Engineer as a 2-LP Expanded Edition. Now, the 1966 rock classic is getting even more expanded - this time, as a 2-LP/3-CD/1-7" single deluxe box set. Utilizing the original master tapes, the box (announced this morning) features new remastering by Phil Kinrade at Alchemy Mastering at AIR, overseen by original album producer Paul Samwell-Smith. Despite leaving behind a strong legacy of classic songs, The
The Original Philadelphia Sound: Sony Classical Collects 120 Discs of Eugene Ormandy’s “Columbia Legacy”
Eugene Ormandy's 44-year tenure as music director of the world-renowned Philadelphia Orchestra remains the single longest affiliation between conductor and orchestra. Though Ormandy passed away in 1985 at 85 years of age, the enormous body of work he left behind continues to resonate. Though he also recorded for RCA Victor, EMI, Telarc, and Delos, his most long-lasting label association was with Columbia Records. Between 1944 and 1968, Ormandy surveyed a broad swath of the classical
Release Round-Up: Week of April 2
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up! Allen Ginsberg, At Reed College: The First Recorded Reading of Howl and Other Poems (Omnivore) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada) The first public reading of Allen Ginsberg's "Howl" took place at San Francisco's Six Gallery in October 1955, but that performance wasn't recorded. It was long believed that the first recorded reading was in March 1956 in Berkeley, California, but that turned out not to be the case. On February 13 and 14,
A Song for You: Recent Ace Collections Spotlight Songs of Leon Russell, Kris Kristofferson
Ace Records' two most recent entries in its Songwriter Series of collections both spotlight artists who bucked tradition to forge their own paths at the end of the 1960s and the dawn of the 1970s: Leon Russell and Kris Kristofferson. As we wrote upon his passing in 2016 at the age of 74, Leon Russell was an extraordinary talent unlike any other: A true renaissance man and an extraordinary talent as composer, musician, arranger, producer, and artist, The Master of Space and Time led many
Pendulum Force: Cherry Red Reissues, Expands Shadows Drummer Brian Bennett’s Space Disco “Voyage”
Brian Bennett began drumming for The Shadows in 1961, and save for a handful of periods, he's been with the band ever since. Yet his work with the band only encompasses one aspect of his career. A composer, producer, and pianist as well as a drummer, Bennett has maintained a solo career since 1967 as well as prolifically creating library music (one-size-fits-all music not written for a specific project but intended for use on television and film). One of his albums, Counterpoint in Rhythm,
Review: Neil Young, “Young Shakespeare”
When Neil Young announced the release of Young Shakespeare as Disc 3.5 of the Neil Young Archives Performance Series, many wondered, "Why another solo acoustic show?" Since the archival series began in 2006, Young has released six solo acoustic concert albums, three of which chronicled performances from 1970-1971; Young Shakespeare was recorded in that time frame, on January 22, 1971, at Stratford, Connecticut's Shakespeare Theatre. While the venue sadly burned to the ground in January 2019,
Big Bang Baby: Rhino Reissues, Expands Stone Temple Pilots’ “Tiny Music…Songs from the Vatican Gift Shop”
Stone Temple Pilots' Tiny Music is about to get a lot bigger. On July 23, Rhino will reissue Tiny Music...Songs from the Vatican Gift Shop: Super Deluxe Edition as a 3-CD/1-LP set, expanding the band's third album to mark its 25th anniversary. This box follows the label's previous expansions of Core and Purple. Tiny Music was recorded during a particularly fraught time in Stone Temple Pilots' career. In early 1995, lead singer Scott Weiland was arrested for drug possession. Sentenced to
Let My Spirit Carry Me: Steve Miller Band Is “Breaking Ground” On Previously Unreleased 1977 Concert Release
Following the 2019 box set Welcome to the Vault, Steve Miller has dipped into his archives once again for a new release. On Friday, May 14, Sailor/Capitol/UMe will release Steve Miller Band Live! Breaking Ground: August 3, 1977, a seventeen-song set, on CD, double vinyl, and digital formats. The accompanying video of the full performance will stream on Amazon Prime Video's The Coda Collection, a channel dedicated to music documentaries and concert films. Breaking Ground chronicles The Steve
Life Is A Banquet: Stage Door Records Reissues 1969 London Studio Cast of “Mame” Starring Beryl Reid
Light the candles, get the ice out...roll the rug up, it's today! Everybody's favorite madcap auntie, Mame Dennis, made her first appearance in Patrick Dennis' 1955 novel Auntie Mame. The book was a cultural phenomenon, selling more than two million copies and staying over two years on the New York Times Best-Seller List. It was quickly followed in 1956 by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee's Broadway comedy of the same name starring Rosalind Russell and then by Warner Bros.' lavish film
Flight of the Moorglade: Cherry Red, Esoteric Reissue Jon Anderson’s “Olias of Sunhillow”
Jon Anderson's 1976 solo debut Olias of Sunhillow was a lockdown album decades before those were in vogue. Recorded in his home's garage with Anderson on every instrument, the singer-songwriter recalled three months of 10-hour days to bring the ambitious sci-fi/fantasy concept album to life. While its success was modest - it peaked at No. 47 in the U.S. and a stronger No. 8 at home in the U.K. - Olias musically anticipated Anderson's collaborations with Vangelis and is today fondly looked upon
Release Round-Up: Week of March 26
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up! Neil Young, Young Shakespeare (Reprise) [Various Formats] CD/DVD/LP box: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Greedy Hand CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Greedy Hand LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Greedy Hand DVD: Greedy Hand Digital: Neil Young Archives (Streaming) / XStream (Digital Download) / Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. Young Shakespeare documents the earliest known filmed live concert footage of
Everybody’s Talkin’: Crimson Releases “Gold” Collections from Nilsson, Kris Kristofferson, Jim Reeves, Glenn Miller, Joe Brown
Crimson Productions' series of budget-priced Gold compilations has continued with a number of new titles spotlighting artists from the pop-rock, country, and big band genres. Today, we'll take a look at five of those recent releases. Nilsson: Gold features 45 tracks from singer-songwriter Harry Nilsson's RCA recordings. As Nilsson's oeuvre has been comprehensively addressed in the past - most notably on the 2013 box set The RCA Albums Collection - there's not much that's new here. Arranged
Down the Road: Grateful Dead’s ‘Skull & Roses’ Album Expanded with Unreleased Show
Grateful Dead's 50th anniversary series keeps on truckin' with the June 18 reissue of the band's 1971 eponymous live album also known as their "Skull and Roses" album after the cover artwork by Alton Kelley and Stanley Mouse. While the Dead was still a young band at that point, Grateful Dead was their second double-LP live album following 1969's Live/Dead. It also was one of their most successful LPs, peaking at No. 25 on the Billboard Top LPs chart and earning their first Gold sales
Feelin’ Groovy: Cherry Red, El Collect Harpers Bizarre’s “Complete Warner Bros. Recordings”
When Harpers Bizarre made their debut on Warner Bros. Records in spring 1967, they joined an eclectic roster of pop stars (Petula Clark, The Association), folksingers (Chad Mitchell, Peter Paul and Mary), comedy titans (Bob Newhart, Allan Sherman), MOR artists (The Anita Kerr Singers, Rod McKuen), and one forward-thinking psychedelic rock band (Grateful Dead). The group defied easy categorization, and over the course of four albums merged pop, MOR, rock, and even dashes of folk and comic whimsy
Short Takes: Triumph Prepares New Box Set as RSD Ambassadors; Omnivore Celebrates “Yesterday’s Tomorrow;” and Evie Sands Releases New LP
Canadian hard rock heroes Triumph have been selected as the Canadian Ambassadors for Record Store Day 2021 - and the band isn't showing up empty-handed! As previously reported, RSD will be held in two "Drops" this year due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The first of those drops is June 12, with the second to follow on July 17. On June 12, Triumph - Rik Emmett (guitars/vocals), Mike Levine (bass, keyboards) and Gil Moore (drums, vocals) - will release a 40th Anniversary vinyl box set of
Mysteries of Love: Two Alphaville Albums Get the Deluxe Treatment
German synthpop trio Alphaville is best remembered today in the U.S. for the Dance chart-topper "Big in Japan" and other floor-filling hits including "Forever Young," "Jet Set," "Dance with Me," and "Red Rose." Alphaville's 1984 debut, also titled Forever Young, was released as a Super Deluxe Edition in 2019; now, on May 7, Rhino will follow that reissue up with Deluxe Editions of the band's next two albums, Afternoons in Utopia (1986) and The Breathtaking Blue (1989). These remastered