As previously mentioned, Hip-O Select had yet another release up their sleeve: Lena Horne Sings: The M-G-M Singles Collection. It's a set of 16 early Lena Horne classics cut for M-G-M Records in the '40s and '50s and largely unavailable on CD until now. There's a heap of standards, including "'Deed I Do," "Where or When," "I've Got the World on a String" and "The Lady is a Tramp," plus liner notes from Horne biographer James Gavin. Pre-order it here and hit the jump for some specs (culled
Rick James Coming Into Your Life Again
Just a day after readying a deluxe edition of Meet the Supremes for the world, Hip-O Select comes through with a pair of out-of-print Rick James titles. Fire It Up (1979) and Garden of Love (1980) are both making their way to CD (the latter being pressed on CD for the first time) with a few bonus tracks. The original artwork will be replicated for each and complemented with liner notes by Yale music professor Michael Veal. Links are here and here and full song specs are below. Rick James -
Devo's "Duty" Has a Tracklist
Amazon has posted the tracklist for the upcoming reissue of Devo's Duty Now for the Future coming from Warner Bros. The band's sophomore LP is getting a CD and vinyl reissue on April 13, just in time for Record Store Day, and it'll feature five B-sides as bonuses. Check it out after the jump!
Insanity, Bohemian-Style
Legacy recently hipped their Facebook fans to the pre-order page for the double-disc Legacy Edition of This is Big Audio Dynamite, the 1985 debut LP by Big Audio Dynamite. Led by Mick Jones, who was at the time recently fired as guitarist of The Clash, BAD was quite the stylistic melting pot, fusing punk with reggae and club music and garnishing it with samples aplenty. The new edition, released for the album's 25th anniversary, includes an extra disc of rare and unreleased remixes. Have a look
Re-Meet the Supremes
Although the track list was up and running at Amazon some time ago, Meet The Supremes: Expanded Edition is finally up for pre-order from Hip-O Select. And this two-disc set has a lot of rarities for Motown fans. The set has the original stereo and mono versions of the LP, a four-song set from the Apollo Theater in 1962 (touted by Universal as "the earliest known Supremes live recording"), seven more live tracks from 1964 and more than a dozen unreleased alternate takes. The packaging looks
Labelled with Love
It might not mean as much now in an era dominated by digital files (not to mention a music business that is more or less split between four major labels), but there's a certain beauty in looking at the label on a piece of vinyl. Next to a picture sleeve, it's the prettiest art you could get in the early days of buying music. With that label, there would be an image, not only literally but spiritually as well; the image a label projected onto its LPs and singles usually called a certain emotion
Reissue Theory: Various Artists - "Soup for One: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack"
There may not be enough positive words to write about Nile Rodgers. The sole surviving member of The CHIC Organization (which included bassist Bernard Edwards and drummer Tony Thompson), Rodgers helped shape the sound of late '70s and early '80s pop and R&B, either as a performer with CHIC, a producer - often alongside Edwards - for Diana Ross, Sister Sledge, Madonna and others or even as a sampled artist (see The Sugar Hill Gang's "Rapper's Delight" and "The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash
Never Gonna Give You Up. No, Really.
In a move that proves that any reissue is possible, or at least probable, the Edsel label has set an April 13 release date for expanded reissues of Rick Astley's Whenever You Need Somebody and Hold Me in Your Arms. Yes, you are reading this right. You are also reading correctly that each reissue will be two discs with expanded liner notes by Pete Waterman Entertainment, Ltd. expert Tom Parker. More info is here, here and here and a detailed tracklisting for each is after the jump.
Every Day Should Be Record Store Day
And perhaps it is, depending on how often you buy from one. The fourth annual Record Store Day is happening in less than a month (April 17) but already a lot of releases have been announced for the occasion. Best of all, there are some neat releases for catalogue fans out there, too. You can have a look at the full list here, but here are some of the neatest catalogue offerings coming on Record Store Day. Devo, Duty Now for the Future (1979) (Warner Bros.) As previously mentioned, Devo's
Back Tracks: Alex Chilton
A potentially embarassing confession: it took the death of Big Star frontman Alex Chilton for me to realize just what I knew about him. I knew his name was the title of a Replacements song (thanks, Rock Band), I'd known of Big Star thanks to the justifiable hype over last year's box set from Rhino and I'd known a handful of his most famous, very solid compositions that he either wrote or popularized ("Thirteen," "The Letter," "In the Street") through inevitable cultural osmosis (thanks, That
Reissue Theory: Howard Jones, "Dream Into Action"
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?gl=IT&hl=it&v=ZZEGHnAxEpo] Predicting the future is a tough game. While the above video - a possibly-not-entirely-live performance by Howard Jones, Herbie Hancock, Thomas Dolby and Stevie Wonder at the 1985 Grammys - probably looked like the future of music some 25 years ago, it seems a little, shall we say, overdone in hindsight. But nobody will ever stop predicting the future - certainly not here at The Second Disc, where (ideally) every day
Still Your Dog
After a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction and an upcoming reissue of their most iconic record, what more can The Stooges pull from their back catalogue? Not surprisingly, there's an answer: Rhino Handmade is prepping a two-disc reissue of the band's 1969 self-titled debut LP. Of course, as you may have read last week, the album already was given a double-disc reissue by Rhino in 2005. This set ups the ante by presenting a complete, alternate mix of the record and several unearthed songs. The
Slightly Cynical News Round-Up
To the surprise of almost nobody and the anguish of '80s catalogue fans, EMI has again reshuffled the dates for the next batches of Duran Duran reissues. Duran Duran, Seven and the Ragged Tiger and Arcadia's So Red the Rose are set for April 20 in the U.S. (note that the U.K. March 29 date for Duran and Tiger still stands - impatient fans, go for an import if you can). Additionally, Notorious and Big Thing will street on July 6, not June 7. Phil Collins hinted to The Rock Radio that more
Back Tracks: U2
Is it inherently lazy to do a U2 post on a music blog for St. Patrick's Day? Whether it is or not, it's done for two reasons. First, since The Second Disc is all about reissues, it's worth tipping a hat to Universal's ongoing series of U2 reissues. They have been some of the best on the market in recent years. The packaging is nice, the content is comprehensive and groundbreaking (in other words, the fan gets all those hard-to-find tracks he or she is looking for plus a score of vault material)
News Round-Up: Disintegrated, Devo and Lena Horne Unearthed
Chain of Flowers reports that the upcoming expansion of Disintegration by The Cure still lacks a release date. In a related story, ARRRRRRRGH. Amazon is taking pre-orders for a reissue of Duty Now for the Future, Devo's 1979 sophomore album. This title, due on April 13 (presumably with bonus content), follows the deluxe versions of Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo! and Freedom of Choice released last year. Hip-O Select tweeted a tease for an upcoming release: "Lena Horne did 16 singles on MGM
Reissue Theory: - Public Enemy, "Fear of a Black Planet"
Yesterday was the 20th anniversary of Fear of a Black Planet, the third album by hip-hop legends Public Enemy. Billboard did a great write-up about the album's impact after two decades, which dovetails rather interestingly into a highly-recommended recent documentary I had the pleasure to see last week. The film, Copyright Criminals, is a thought-provoking look into the rise of sampling in music and the ongoing legal challenges faced by samplers. Public Enemy frontman Chuck D, as well as
Five Things the Michael Jackson-Sony Deal Should Consider
After a deafening silence broken only by the just-OK This is It album, Michael Jackson's posthumous release projects at Sony just amped up. The King of Pop's estate and Sony Music have brokered a $250 million, ten-album deal that will keep the Jackson train rolling at Sony through 2017. Speculation has already begun over what the nine forthcoming titles (the This is It soundtrack is retroactively included in the deal) will be. Rumored audio titles include: New reissues of Off the Wall and
Cratediggers
Inspiration comes from strange places. My latest bout would never have happened if it hadn't been for a burst water heater. That part of the story's not worth recounting - suffice to say that a new carpet had to be installed in the basement - but while my family began moving furniture back downstairs, I made a crucial discovery: a shelf full of records and tapes that I'd never bother to look through. As we put the boxes back in their place, I intended to take a cursory glance through the
Reissue Theory x2: Phil Collins - "No Jacket Required" and Peter Gabriel - "So"
It has been encouraging to see, in light of Genesis' impending induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, a number of commenters showing their respect for the Phil Collins-led, pop-savvy incarnation of the band. The group's output was always listenable - one could argue the 1990s was largely an exception - but it always seemed popular opinion was against them around the Invisible Touch era. This is ironic, since the same year Invisible Touch was released, former Genesis frontman Peter
Back Tracks: ABBA
Continuing the Rock and Rall Hall of Fame coverage leading up to Monday night's induction, here is another catalogue retrospective for one of the artist inductees. In his latest book, 2009's Eating the Dinosaur, Chuck Klosterman includes an essay praising ABBA for their intriguing critical status (contending that, like AC/DC, ABBA's work never operated near relevance or irrelevance, thereby guaranteeing that it will have a more lasting impact) as well as their somewhat unusual commercial
Back Tracks: The Stooges
We continue our ongoing Rock and Roll Hall of Fame pre-game coverage by looking back at another batch of reissue offerings from one of the inducted artists. The Stooges were one of those bands that were in the right place at the wrong time. Their music was raucous and energetic, their antics were nothing short of ostentatious. But when they rolled onto the scene in 1969, they really had no place in the rock music landscape behaving the way they did. Sure, other big rock bands of the day were
Channel One
There's a lot of older music fans out there who would give anything to "bring things back" - whatever that might mean to them. Bring it back to the days of radio hits, record stores and so on. Optimistic though we may be, we're pretty much resigned to the fact that most things aren't going to revert back to the way they were. One notable exception exists in the catalogue world, though: it's a simple four-letter word that is quite literally changing the way we listen to our older music. It's
Back Tracks: Genesis
Continuing with our Rock and Roll Hall of Fame pre-coverage, we have the first of five catalogue overviews from our artist inductees. Genesis is one of many bands without a definitive entry point into their catalogue. As a five piece outfit composed of Peter Gabriel, Steve Hackett, Tony Banks, Mike Rutherford and Phil Collins through the early 1970s, the band put out some delightful prog-rock that was surprisingly accessible. (Considering that their live sets consisted of twenty-minute jams and
News Round-Up: Meet The Supremes (Again), Costello Clues and More Stones
Amazon has posted the track list for Hip-o Select's upcoming deluxe reissue of Meet The Supremes before Hip-o Select actually did. Read it here and expect an analysis here soon. It seems that Japan is getting a SHM-CD release of Live at Winterland, San Francisco by Elvis Costello and The Attractions in June. It'll be out on Universal, but not part of The Costello Show series of live material. Will it end up part of the series in America? Doubtful, since the show was recorded only a few days
Rock Hall: Fame or Shame?
From now until Monday, The Second Disc will be bringing out some features and opinions on Monday's upcoming Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductions. Let's start with a column that ultimately addresses what a mixed blessing the Hall can be. Few music-oriented entities draw so much criticism and debate as the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In its 25-year history, it has inducted 165 artists into its ranks (with another five to be inducted on Monday), spurring decades-long debates about which of them
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