Folk

Formats:

CD, Vinyl

Genres:

Classic Rock, Country, Disco/Dance, Electronic, Everything Else, Folk, Pop, Reggae, Rock

The Weekend Stream: February 12, 2022

February 12, 2022 by Mike Duquette | 4 Comments

Welcome to The Weekend Stream, a relaxing weekly review of notable digital-only catalogue titles. There may be no CD or vinyl, but there’s plenty of great new/old music to discover! Michael Giacchino, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack/Expanded Edition) (Walt Disney Records) (iTunes / Amazon) A genuine, out-of-nowhere surprise: a generous expansion of Oscar-winner Giacchino’s score to the first Disney-era Star Wars spin-off in 2016, about the ragtag group of Rebels who stole the plans for the Death Star right before the original movie. The composer subtly mixes…

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The Weekend Stream

Formats:

Genres:

Country, Disco/Dance, Folk, Jazz, Pop, R&B/Soul, Rock, Soundtracks

Tags:

Barry White, , David Lasley, Doc Severinsen, Dr. John, Hank Williams, John Williams, Lobo, Meat Loaf, Meco, Michael Giacchino, Otis Redding, Richard Thompson, Roberta Flack, Shaun Murphy, Sting, Stoney and Meatloaf, Suzanne Vega

Release Round-Up: Week of February 11

February 11, 2022 by The Second Disc | 3 Comments

Welcome to this week’s Release Round-Up! Cat Stevens, Harold and Maude: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (A&M/Cat-o-Log/UMe) CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada A&M/Cat-o-Log/UMe delivers a long-awaited official wide-release soundtrack of Hal Ashby’s 1971 dark comedy Harold and Maude featuring the songs of Cat Stevens. The new release, available on CD, LP, and digital formats, includes the seven songs reprised from Stevens’ first two Island/A&M albums Mona Bone Jakon and Tea for the Tillerman (“On the Road to Find Out,” “I Wish, I Wish,” “Miles from Nowhere,” “Tea for the Tillerman,” “I Think I See the Light,”…

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Formats:

Blu-Ray, CD, DVD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, Vinyl

Genres:

Disco/Dance, Folk, Pop, R&B/Soul, Rock, Soundtracks

Tags:

Alan Parsons, Cat Stevens, Eddie Vedder, Nina Simone, Urge Overkill

Release Round-Up: Week of January 21

January 21, 2022 by The Second Disc | No Comments

John Williams and The Boston Pops Complete Philips Recordings

Welcome to this week’s Release Round-Up! John Williams and The Boston Pops, The Complete Philips Recordings (Decca) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada) Decca will celebrate John Williams’ 90th by turning the clock back to 1980 when the famed composer-conductor took the baton from the legendary Arthur Fiedler to lead The Boston Pops Orchestra into a new era. John Williams and The Boston Pops: The Complete Philips Recordings boasts 21 CDs and 22 albums originally released on Philips between 1980 and 1990, at which point the Pops switched affiliations to Sony Classical. (The Sony Classical era…

Categories:

Features, The Weekend Stream

Formats:

CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, Vinyl

Genres:

Cast Recordings, Classic Rock, Classical/Opera, Folk, Pop, Popular Standards/Vocal, Rock, Soundtracks

Tags:

Billy Stritch, Charles Strouse, Harry Connick Jr., Janis Ian, Jim Caruso, John Mellencamp, John Williams, Julie Christensen, Keb' Mo', Night Crickets, Peter Cetera

The Weekend Stream: January 15, 2022

January 15, 2022 by Mike Duquette | No Comments

Welcome to The Weekend Stream, a relaxing weekly review of notable digital-only catalogue titles. There may be no CD or vinyl, but there’s plenty of great new/old music to discover! This week features early works by John Denver, TV works by Jan Hammer and Giorgio Moroder, live stuff from Tegan and Sara and a real throwback of a compilation album. Denver, Boise & Johnson / The Mitchell Trio, Leaving on a Jet Plane: John Denver (Warner Records) (Amazon / Spotify) John Denver’s career took off when his “Leaving on a Jet Plane”…

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Formats:

Holiday Gift Guide, Reviews

Genres:

Classic Rock, Country, Disco/Dance, Everything Else, Folk, Jazz, Pop, Popular Standards/Vocal, R&B/Soul, Reggae, Rock, Soundtracks

Tags:

Bill Withers, Bing Crosby, Buddy Holly, Cab Calloway, Duke Ellington, Eric Clapton, Fats Waller, Giorgio Moroder, Grover Washington Jr., Jan Hammer, John Denver, John Prine, Sublime, Tegan and Sara, Waylon Jennings

Have Yourself a Merry Little Discmas…

December 24, 2021 by Mike Duquette | 12 Comments

Wow! And just like that, another year has flown by. Just a few weeks before The Second Disc hits its 12th anniversary(!), this Christmas Eve it is our custom to look back on the last 12 months and take some time to think fondly of the music, magic, memories and friends that made our lives worth living. As if last year wasn’t unconventional enough, 2021 packed more pop, clicks, skips and distortion than the most misguided vinyl pressings. We got vaccinated, we got boosted, we tentatively returned to concerts and live performances,…

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Features

Formats:

Blu-Ray, Blu-Ray Audio, Books, Box Sets, CD, Cassette, DVD, DVD-Audio, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, SACD, Vinyl

Genres:

Tags:

Holiday Gift Guide Review: Joni Mitchell, “Joni Mitchell Archives Vol. 2: The Reprise Years (1968-1971)”

December 6, 2021 by Joe Marchese | 6 Comments

Last evening in Washington, DC, Joni Mitchell joined the 44th class of Kennedy Center Honorees alongside Bette Midler, Berry Gordy, Lorne Michaels, and Justino Diaz. The singer-songwriter who has blurred the lines of folk, pop, rock, and jazz was celebrated by friends and admirers including Brandi Carlile, Herbie Hancock, Ellie Goulding, Norah Jones, Brittany Howard, Dan Levy, and Cameron Crowe. President Joe Biden, also in attendance, had earlier summed up the thoughts of many when he proclaimed, “Your words and melodies touch the deepest parts of our soul.” Mitchell has been probing…

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Formats:

Box Sets, CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, Vinyl

Genres:

James Taylor, Joni Mitchell

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Release Round-Up: Week of December 3

December 3, 2021 by The Second Disc | No Comments

Welcome to the first Release Round-Up of the last month of 2021! The Doors, L.A. Woman: 50th Anniversary Edition (Elektra/Rhino) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Rhino.com) The sixth and final studio album from The Doors featuring Jim Morrison gets a 50th anniversary expansion from Rhino on 3 CDs and 1 LP. The original stereo album (newly remastered by Bruce Botnick) is present on both CD and LP while the bonus discs have more than two hours of previously unreleased sessions. The first CD also includes two bonus tracks, a previously unheard Sunset Sound recording…

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Formats:

Blu-Ray, Box Sets, CD, DVD, Digital Streaming, Vinyl

Genres:

Country, Folk, Jazz, Pop, Popular Standards/Vocal, Rock

Tags:

Calvin Keys, Carmen McRae, Chris Connor, Depeche Mode, Doc Watson, Doug Carn, Garbage, Nina Simone, The Black Keys, The Doors, Tom Jones, Travis, Trini Lopez

Life’s Work: A Retrospective

December 1, 2021 by Joe Marchese

Craft Recordings salutes the remarkable legacy of Americana titan Arthel Lane “Doc” Watson (1923-2012) with Life’s Work: A Retrospective. The anthology features 101 key tracks from the guitarist’s discography including collaborations with Flatt and Scruggs, Chet Atkins, Ricky Skaggs, Alison Krauss, Bill Monroe, The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, and Watson’s son Merle. The 4-CD set (also available digitally) features an 88-page book with new liner notes by author and compilation co-producer Ted Olson plus previously unpublished photos.

Categories:

Holiday Gift Guide

Formats:

Box Sets, CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming

Genres:

Country, Folk

Tags:

Time Passages [Various Formats]

November 28, 2021 by Joe Marchese

2CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 3CD/DVD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 1978’s Time Passages concluded British singer-songwriter Al Stewart’s trilogy of albums with producer-engineer Alan Parsons which began with 1975’s Modern Times and continued with the following year’s Year of the Cat. During this purple patch, Stewart earned his first hit singles in the United States, transitioning from folk troubadour at home to bona fide pop star abroad. And while Year of the Cat, the album, charted higher than Time Passages, the latter’s title track was a bigger hit in the U.S. and Canada. Now, Time Passages has received the same expanded and remastered treatment…

Categories:

Holiday Gift Guide

Formats:

Box Sets, CD

Genres:

Features, The Weekend Stream

Tags:

The Weekend Stream: November 27, 2021

November 27, 2021 by The Second Disc | No Comments

Welcome to The Weekend Stream, a relaxing weekly review of notable digital-only catalogue titles. There may be no CD or vinyl, but there’s plenty of great new/old music to discover! Despite the Thanksgiving holiday (and recovery period from Record Store Day Black Friday) there are some surprises for lovers of rock, soul and soundtrack obscurities – check it out below! Joan Jett & The Blackhearts, Live, New York, 1981 (Blackheart/Legacy) (iTunes / Amazon / Spotify) If you can believe it, there’s almost no official representation of Joan Jett & The Blackhearts in…

Categories:

Formats:

Genres:

Comedy, Everything Else, Folk, Gospel, Holiday, Pop, R&B/Soul, Rock, Soundtracks

Tags:

Brenda Lee, Darlene Love, Debbie Gibson, Jim Nabors, Joan Jett, Melanie, The Drifters, Vaughn Meader

Release Round-Up: Week of November 26

November 26, 2021 by The Second Disc | No Comments

Welcome to this week’s Release Round-Up! It’s a smaller week than usual owing to the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday as well as to Record Store Day’s slate of Black Friday releases! To all those who celebrated Thanksgiving, we hope it was a wonderful one! David Bowie, Brilliant Adventure (1992-2001) (Parlophone) 11CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 17LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Parlophone continues its career-spanning series of box sets for the late David Bowie. The fifth Era box set, Brilliant Adventure, includes: Five remastered studio albums (Black Tie White Noise (1993), The Buddha of Suburbia (1993), Outside (1995), Earthling (1997), ‘hours…’ (1999)); A remastered and expanded…

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Formats:

Box Sets, CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, Vinyl

Genres:

Classic Rock, Folk, Holiday, Pop, Rock

Tags:

Alison Krauss, Carla Olson, David Bowie, Deep Purple, Gordon Lightfoot, Howard Jones, Michael Bublé, Robert Plant

Chronicles: 60 Years of The Chieftains

November 12, 2021 by Joe Marchese

This double-disc anthology brings together tracks spanning The Chieftains’ first album through their most recent, including collaborations with Van Morrison, Diana Krall, The Rolling Stones, and Alison Krauss plus previously unreleased live recordings.

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Formats:

Genres:

Everything Else, Folk

Tags:

Release Round-Up: Week of November 12

November 12, 2021 by The Second Disc | 1 Comment

Welcome to this week’s Release Round-Up! Elvis Presley, Back in Nashville (RCA/Legacy) 4CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 2LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 2LP Colored Vinyl: Graceland Official Store Elvis: Back in Nashville boasts 82 recordings on 4 CDs (or digitally) from The King’s final Nashville sessions in 1971. With country, folk, holiday and gospel songs, pop, and rock and roll, these seminal tracks represent some of the most richly diverse in Elvis’ storied catalogue. Like its predecessor From Elvis in Nashville, this collection features all new, stripped-down remixes by Matt Ross-Spang. A 2-LP highlights release is available…

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Formats:

Blu-Ray, Box Sets, CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, Vinyl

Genres:

Cast Recordings, Classic Rock, Disco/Dance, Everything Else, Folk, Holiday, Pop, Rock

Tags:

Blossom Dearie, Dolores Gray, Eagles, Elvis Presley, Eric Clapton, Jake Shimabukuro, Joni Mitchell, Kylie Minogue, NRBQ, Nirvana, Rod Stewart, She and Him, Taylor Swift, War

Release Round-Up: Week of November 5

November 5, 2021 by The Second Disc | 2 Comments

Welcome to this week’s Release Round-Up! Billy Joel, The Vinyl Collection Vol. 1 (Columbia/Legacy) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada) This 9LP slipcased box set collects Billy Joel’s first six solo studio albums plus his first live album and a box set-exclusive pressing of Live at The Great American Music Hall – 1975, a previously unreleased concert recording on 2 LPs from the famed San Francisco venue. All of the albums have been sourced from the original master tapes and prepared by Ted Jensen at Sterling Sound. Jensen previously mastered Joel’s entire albums discography for 2011’s…

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Formats:

Blu-Ray, Box Sets, CD, DVD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, Vinyl

Genres:

Classic Rock, Country, Folk, Holiday, Jazz, Pop, Popular Standards/Vocal, R&B/Soul, Rock, Soundtracks

Tags:

ABBA, Alan Parsons, Billy Idol, Billy Joel, Cyndi Lauper, Deana Carter, Diana Ross, Jethro Tull, Jim Peterik, Pretenders, Radiohead, Ray Charles, Steve Goodman, Steve Perry, Steve Tyrell, The Brief Encounter, Vince Guaraldi

Lay Down My Old Guitar: Craft Recordings Preps Career-Spanning Box for Doc Watson

November 2, 2021 by Joe Marchese | 2 Comments

In a career spanning seven decades, North Carolina native Arthel Lane “Doc” Watson (1923-2012) brought the sounds of Appalachia to the world at large. A towering figure in Americana, the guitarist was dedicated to the sounds of folk, blues, gospel, bluegrass, and country. Now, a comprehensive collection will salute his remarkable legacy. On December 3, Craft Recordings will release Life’s Work: A Retrospective. The anthology features 101 key tracks from his discography including collaborations with Flatt and Scruggs, Chet Atkins, Ricky Skaggs, Alison Krauss, Bill Monroe, The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band, and…

Categories:

Formats:

Box Sets, CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming

Genres:

Blues, Country, Everything Else, Folk

Tags:

Alison Krauss, Chet Atkins, Doc Watson, Flatt and Scruggs, Merle Watson, Ricky Skaggs, The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band

The Weekend Stream: October 30, 2021

October 30, 2021 by The Second Disc | 4 Comments

While The Second Disc prides itself on connecting people to reissues and box sets they can keep on their shelves, it’s no secret that listening audiences are also digital – catalogue music lovers, too – and our passion is connecting people to music from the past that they might adore. So we’ve introduced a new feature: The Weekend Stream, which focuses on hidden gems that recently made it to digital channels that might make your playlists a little brighter! The Temptations, Emperors of Soul: The Rarities (Motown/UMe) (iTunes / Amazon / Spotify)…

Categories:

Features, News, The Weekend Stream

Formats:

Genres:

Disco/Dance, Everything Else, Folk, Pop, R&B/Soul, Rap/Hip-Hop, Rock

Tags:

CHVRCHES, Connie Francis, Ghostface Killah, Ice Cube, Ike Turner, Indigo Girls, Jermaine Jackson, John Mayer, Kim Carnes, Lionel Richie, New Radicals, Old 97's, Stevie Wonder, Syreeta, The Temptations, Tina Turner

Ladies Sing Lightfoot

October 18, 2021 by Joe Marchese

Carla Olson has brought together an array of female artists to celebrate the artistry of Gordon Lightfoot on this new 14-song CD release. Ladies Sing Lightfoot features Olson (“Ringneck Loon”) and her band The Textones (“Early Morning Rain”) as well as Susan Cowsill (“if You Could Read My Mind”), Natalie Noone (“Steel Rail Blues”), Shayna Alder (“Carefree Highway”), and many others on a variety of Lightfoot favorites.

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Formats:

Genres:

Folk, Pop

Tags:

The Best of Steve Goodman

October 12, 2021 by Joe Marchese

Omnivore returns to late folk hero Steve Goodman’s catalogue with a 19-track anthology of his finest songs drawn from studio cuts, live recordings, and demos. Highlights include a previously unreleased demo of “City of New Orleans” and a John Prine co-write, “You Never Even Call Me by My Name,” which has never received a commercial release. Lee Zimmerman provides the new liner notes, and Michael Graves has mastered.

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Formats:

Genres:

Folk

Tags:

Live at Carnegie Hall 1969

October 9, 2021 by Joe Marchese

Live at Carnegie Hall 1969 3LP (Black Vinyl): Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Live at Carnegie Hall 1969 3LP (White Vinyl): JoniMitchell.com Store Joni Mitchell’s landmark February 1, 1969 Carnegie Hall show (part of Mitchell’s Archives Vol. 2 box set) featuring “Chelsea Morning,” “Both Sides Now,” “The Fiddle and the Drum,” “Morning Morgantown,” and “The Circle Game” arrives from Rhino as a standalone 3LP set pressed on black vinyl; a white vinyl variant of this set (limited to 3,000 copies) will be available at JoniMitchell.com.

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Formats:

Vinyl

Genres:

Tags:

Joni Mitchell Archives Vol. 2: The Reprise Years (1968-1971)

October 9, 2021 by Joe Marchese

5CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 10LP: JoniMitchell.com Store Joni Mitchell Archives Vol. 2 follows the format of last year’s acclaimed first volume. (See TSD’s interview with Archives co-producer Patrick Milligan here.) Over 5 CDs or 10 LPs and nearly six hours of previously unreleased studio, live, and home recordings, it chronologically traces Mitchell’s musical journey in the period that yielded her first four albums: Song to a Seagull (1968), Clouds (1969), Ladies of the Canyon (1970), and Blue (1971). Those albums have recently been collected in a companion box set, The Reprise Albums 1968-1971. Once again, Cameron Crowe’s conversation with Mitchell about this…

Categories:

Holiday Gift Guide

Formats:

Box Sets, CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, Vinyl

Genres:

Tags:

Feel the Earth Move: Legacy’s Record Store Day Black Friday Slate Features Carole, Jimi, Ozzy, Miles, and More

September 15, 2021 by The Second Disc | No Comments

Leonard Cohen Songs of Love and Hate RSD

It’s that time of year again! Record Store Day has released the full list of titles for its annual RSD Black Friday event, happening this year on Friday, November 26 and unofficially kicking off the holiday shopping season. Legacy Recordings’ slate draws on some of the most beloved artists on the label’s roster, representing genres including pop, folk, rock, metal, jazz and R&B. Below, we’ve reprinted the descriptions supplied by the label. All titles are due in your local independent record store on Friday, November 26. Visit here for the full list…

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Formats:

Vinyl

Genres:

Classic Rock, Folk, Jazz, Pop, R&B/Soul, Rock

Tags:

Carole King, James Taylor, Jimi Hendrix, John Legend, Leonard Cohen, Maxwell, Miles Davis, Ozzy Osbourne, Record Store Day, The Jimi Hendrix Experience

My Eyes Have Seen: Odetta, The Weavers, Joan Baez, More Featured on Vinyl Me, Please’s “Anthology: The Story of Vanguard”

August 9, 2021 by The Second Disc | 1 Comment

A vanguard is, by definition, a position at the forefront of new ideas or developments. And in the fertile musical stomping ground of the early 1960s, some of the newest, most avant-garde ideas were being espoused on the Vanguard Records label. Yet these so-called radical, even “dangerous” thoughts were being espoused in forms so traditional, they might have seemed as old as time. Vanguard was formed in 1950 by Maynard and Seymour Solomon as a classical label and later moved into jazz. The Solomons dived headfirst into the flourishing folk music scene…

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Formats:

Box Sets, Vinyl

Genres:

Folk

Tags:

Buffy Sainte-Marie, Doc Watson, Joan Baez, Odetta, Pete Seeger, Skip James, The Weavers

Review: Joni Mitchell, “The Reprise Albums (1968-1971)”

July 19, 2021 by Joe Marchese | 3 Comments

Joni Mitchell fiercely announced her independence with “I Had a King,” the haunting soliloquy which opens her 1968 debut album, Song to a Seagull. “I can’t go back there anymore,” she proclaimed. “You know my keys won’t fit the door/You know my thoughts don’t fit the man. They never can…they never can…” The song is bold, wise, and flecked with a graceful equanimity as the singer declares her freedom both from a husband who “lives in another time” and the societal constraints of the day. That freedom would be forcefully expressed on…

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Reviews

Formats:

Box Sets, CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, Vinyl

Genres:

Tags:

David Crosby, James Taylor, Joni Mitchell, Stephen Stills

Release Round-Up: Week of July 2

July 2, 2021 by The Second Disc | 2 Comments

Welcome to this week’s Release Round-Up! It’s a much smaller one than usual, owing to the U.S. Fourth of July holiday, but we’ll have more new releases in the Weekend Stream! In the meantime, may those celebrating have a safe and happy holiday weekend! Joni Mitchell, The Reprise Albums (1968-1971) (Reprise/Rhino) 4CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 4LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Joni Mitchell’s first four albums, all recorded for the Reprise label, are collected in a new box set available on CD and LP. The Reprise Albums (1968-1971) is…

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