The Weekend Stream: June 7, 2025
Welcome to another edition of The Weekend Stream, The Second Disc’s review of notable catalogue titles (and some new ones, too!) making digital debuts. This week brings posthumous recordings by Prince and Donna Summer, a new spin on Star Wars disco, and plenty of cast recordings leading into the Tony Awards this Sunday! And just a quick programming note: our Unplugged series is taking the week off, but will be back with some new and exciting Weekend Stream extra content very soon! Prince, “Free” (Acoustic) (NPG/Legacy) (Apple / Amazon) “The Vault is now…
Sky Fits Heaven: Madonna to Release Scrapped ‘Ray of Light’ Remix EP
The fitful reissues of Madonna’s back catalogue (following an expansive deal to put her material under her original major label partner Warner Music) are yielding some choice archival fruit with the release of a long-rumored remix companion to her 1998 smash Ray of Light. The eight-track Veronica Electronica, coming to vinyl and digital music services on July 25, offers new edits of previously released dance remixes to hits like “Frozen,” “Nothing Really Matters,” “The Power of Good-bye” and the rousing title track. It’ll also feature the unreleased demo “Gone, Gone, Gone,” written with songwriter…
Release Round-Up: Week of June 6
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. Dusty Springfield, Longing (Real Gone Music) CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Real Gone Music premieres a lost album from Dusty Springfield: 1974’s Longing. Produced by Brooks Arthur, the album features a number of singer-songwriter-oriented compositions including songs from Colin Blunstone (“Exclusively for Me”), Melissa Manchester and Carole Bayer Sager (“Home to Myself”), Janis Ian (“In the Winter”), Stephen Schwartz (“Corner of the Sky” from…
Corner of the Sky: Real Gone’s June Line-Up Includes “Lost” Dusty Springfield Album Plus Jazz, Heavy Metal, Bluegrass, More
As we roll into summer, Real Gone has another varied line-up for June. It is anchored by an unreleased album by Dusty Springfield but also features a jazz rarity from Joe Henderson and Woody Shaw as well as metal, bluegrass, and even an adult film soundtrack. All of these titles are being released tomorrow, June 6, and you can read on for more information. By the beginning of the 1970s, Dusty Springfield was at a career crossroads. Although she remained on her U.K. label home Phillips, she had left her American record…
Say You Will: New Ivy Album, Built from Unreleased Tracks, Due in September
Five years after bidding a too-early farewell to one of pop’s most stalwart songwriters, a new album from his second-best remembered (but first major) band is coming, built off contributions he left behind. Traces of You, due September 5, is the first new album in a dozen years from alternative pop band Ivy. The news might come as a shock, as one of the group’s charter members, bassist/songwriter Adam Schlesinger, died in 2020 – an early victim of the COVID-19 pandemic. Happily, as a gift from somewhere beyond, he’s present on all…
You’ve Got a Friend in Me: ‘Toy Story’ Songs Pressed on Zoetrope Vinyl for 30th Anniversary
We’re not pulling your string: this year marks 30 years since Disney and Pixar rewrote the rules of animation with Toy Story. A new LP will collect nine tracks from all four of the films in the series since then – all from the pen of the one and only Randy Newman. Toy Story: Songs to Infinity and Beyond is a sonic love letter to the series, offering rare concept drawings and new art on the set’s front cover and gatefold and a zoetrope vinyl pattern that features moving images of the series’ lovable…
It Was Only Yesterday: Robinsongs Collects Soul-Jazz From Eddie Harris, Larry Carlton
Cherry Red’s Robinsongs imprint has been maintaining a busy 2025 schedule, with two new titles celebrating greats of jazz and soul. A 5 Classic Albums on 4 Discs collection from late saxophone titan Eddie Harris (1934-1996) offers all of Harris’ albums for the Atlantic label originally released between 1974 and 1976 (with the exception of his album of off-color, spoken-word routines). Harris enjoyed a versatile career before signing with Atlantic in 1965. His first albums as a leader were released by Vee-Jay, where he surveyed numerous standards and Hollywood classics (he even…
Splash City: Omnivore Celebrates Jeffrey Foskett on “Something There” Featuring Brian Wilson, Mike Love, America, More
Jeffrey Foskett surely embodied the California Dream. The San Jose native his dues gigging around the Golden State with such early bands as Reverie and The Pranks. A knock on Brian Wilson’s door in 1976 led to a long friendship with the Beach Boy, while Wilson’s cousin Mike Love became a Foskett fan three years later upon hearing Reverie live in a Santa Barbara bar. Love brought Foskett into the Beach Boys fold – first in The Endless Summer Beach Band, then in the Beach Boys themselves. Gifted with an ethereal falsetto,…
Soundtrack Watch: Bond Back on Vinyl At La-La Land, Intrada Unsheathes Kamen’s ‘Three Musketeers’
A new month kicks off with a bonanza of soundtrack reissues from La-La Land and Intrada – including more planned activity from the world of James Bond. La-La Land has made three archival titles available for sale from yesterday (June 1). First is a vinyl edition of their remastered CD of John Barry’s score to Goldfinger. The third James Bond film (and the second to be scored by the British composer/arranger) scored big with the series’ first-ever title theme, co-written by Barry, Anthony Newley and Leslie Bricusse and sung with paint-peeling gusto by…
The Weekend Stream Extra: A Guide to ‘MTV Unplugged’ on Paramount+ (Part 3)
Welcome to a special Sunday feature of The Weekend Stream, which takes a look at one of MTV’s great live music programs thanks to a recent reissue of one of its best-known episodes. We’re running a five-part deep-dive on every episode of MTV Unplugged that’s currently streaming on the station’s parent streaming network Paramount+! (Part 1 and 2 can be read here and here.) With rock music undergoing a transformation after the death of Kurt Cobain in 1994, MTV Unplugged continued to settle into institutional status. The show held court primarily in New York…
The Weekend Stream: May 31, 2025
Welcome to another edition of The Weekend Stream, The Second Disc’s review of notable catalogue titles (and some new ones, too!) making digital debuts. We’ve got solo appearances aplenty: Bono, Al Jardine, Grace Potter, John Fogerty, and more new/old music – plus a new subscription service from Crowded House, a Barry Manilow music video, and a tribute to one of the undisputed guitar gods of his generation. Bono, Stories of Surrender EP (Island/Interscope/UMe) (Apple / Amazon) In 2023, U2 frontman Bono embarked on his first ever solo tour, promoting the memoir Surrender: 40 Songs, One…
Young Blood: UFO’s ‘No Place to Run’ Gets Reissued with Remixed Concert Audio
A transitional album in the discography of British rockers UFO will be revisited in a deluxe edition this summer. The band’s eighth album No Place to Run, originally released in 1980, will be reissued as a 2CD or 3LP set on August 15. It pairs a new remaster of the original album created at London’s AIR Studios alongside selections from a concurrent live set at the Marquee Club in London. Some of the live material was reissued as bonus tracks on various sets between 2009 and 2013, but has been newly remixed for…
After the Glitter Fades: Stevie Nicks, Wilco Classics Added to Rhino’s High Fidelity Vinyl Series
Rhino’s High Fidelity series of audiophile vinyl titles continues today with two (relatively) modern classics. Stevie Nicks’ 1981 solo debut Bella Donna and Wilco’s 1995 debut A.M. are the two albums in question, with both available now exclusively from Rhino.com and select international Warner Music Group online storefronts. Both albums are housed in old-style “tip-on” jackets; they’ve been newly mastered by Kevin Gray and pressed on 180-gram vinyl at Optimal. They’re limited and numbered to 5,000 units each. As Mike D. wrote in his review of Nicks’ Complete Studio Albums and Rarities…
Release Round-Up: Week of May 30
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. Grateful Dead, The Music Never Stopped (Rhino) 3CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 6LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada This live 3CD or 6LP compendium (also available digitally) from Grateful Dead to commemorate the band’s 60th anniversary includes 27 tracks representing every one of the venues in the 60-CD, 450-song Enjoying the Ride box set. Highlights include the title track from the Spectrum, 1978; “Scarlet Begonias,” “Fire on the Mountain,” and “Touch of…
Stay Hungry: Rhino Rebuilds Talking Heads’ ‘Buildings and Food’ for Box Set Release
Rhino is taking Talking Heads fans to the river with their next deluxe edition: a 3CD/Blu-ray edition of the group’s 1978 sophomore album More Songs About Buildings and Food. Available July 25, the box will include the remastered album alongside a bonus disc of rare studio material (including four unreleased alternate takes and a host of material included on previous expansions) and a live set recorded at the Entermedia Theatre in New York City, just about a month after the album was released. Video of highlights from that same show feature on the…
Pryor Conviction: An Interview with Dan Schlissel of Stand Up! Records
If you’ll forgive the stupidly obvious lede, Dan Schlissel takes comedy pretty seriously. As the founder of Minneapolis-based Stand Up! Records, he’s carved a considerable niche in the music industry as one of the longest-lasting and most stalwart homes for stand-up comedy on CD, LP and many other formats. Schlissel, a first generation American whose parents came from Israel, first started the indie-rock label -ismist, which provided a crucial stepping stone to an up-and-coming band of masked alt-rockers called Slipknot, who’d become one of nu-metal’s pre-eminent acts in the late ’90s and…
Mystery of Love: Sufjan Stevens Expands ‘Carrie & Lowell’
A deceased mother and a grieving son laid the groundwork for one of the best-reviewed records of 2015. A decade later, it’s being expanded with unreleased material – and its creator is sharing some unexpected opinions on how he regards the album. Sufjan Stevens’ seventh album Carrie & Lowell will be reissued this Friday, May 30, for its 10th anniversary. The 2CD or 2LP set includes a small trove of seven unreleased demos – including a version of a track that would be the closest thing Stevens may have to a signature song…
Take Your Mama Out: Scissor Sisters’ Debut Gets Deluxe Reissue
One of the most dynamic pop acts of the 2000s is ready to have a kiki with fans once more, thanks to a new expanded edition of their debut album and return to touring. The self-titled first album by Scissor Sisters turns 20 (and a year, but who’s counting) in 2025, and will be reissued by Republic Records as a greatly expanded edition offering the album in a digipak alongside two bonus discs of B-sides, remixes and seven previously unheard tracks. A truncated offering of the B-sides and outtakes will be included…
Close Up the Honky Tonks: Omnivore Collects A Decade of Live Buck Owens on New Collection
Buck-le up! 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 is due from the label on June 27. It 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…
The Weekend Stream Extra: A Guide to ‘MTV Unplugged’ on Paramount+ (Part 2)
Welcome to a special Sunday feature of The Weekend Stream, which takes a look at one of MTV’s great live music programs thanks to a recent reissue of one of its best-known episodes. We’re running a five-part deep-dive on every episode of MTV Unplugged that’s currently streaming on the station’s parent streaming network Paramount+! (Part 1 can be read here.) The evolution of MTV Unplugged was not unlike that of the network itself. If those first years on the air from 1989 to 1991 were proof of the format’s artistic viability, the episodes recorded…
The Weekend Stream: May 24, 2025
Welcome to another edition of The Weekend Stream, The Second Disc’s review of notable catalogue titles (and some new ones, too!) making digital debuts. This week offers a trio of classic rockers advancing a cause through new tracks, rare covers and live material, plus a new take on Peggy Lee’s “Fever” and a pair of dance albums getting greatly, unexpectedly expanded. Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Land of Hope & Dreams EP (Columbia) (Apple / Amazon) The Boss has been touring Europe this week. Perhaps you’ve heard about it: he had a…
Release Round-Up: Week of May 23
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. Sheena Easton, Modern Girl: The Complete EMI Recordings Volume 1 (Cherry Pop) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada) Sheena Easton’s latest reissue collaboration with Cherry Red covers familiar ground in a slightly new way. Modern Girl: The Complete EMI Recordings, Vol. 1 is a 5CD set that covers the bulk of the Scottish singer’s first five albums – Take My Time (1981), You Could Have Been with Me (1981), Madness, Money and Music (1982), Best Kept Secret (1983), and the…
Somewhere North of Nashville: Ace Takes Listeners to ‘Springsteen’s Country’
Ace Records continues its quest to offer variations on a theme by exploring country interpretations of the music of Bruce Springsteen. Springsteen’s Country will collect 20 covers of The Boss, some familiar (Johnny Cash’s “Johnny 99,” Steve Earle’s live take on “State Trooper”), some offbeat (a take on Tunnel of Love opener “Ain’t Got You” by Solomon Burke, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s version of beloved outtake “From Small Things (Big Things One Day Come)”), and some altogether lesser known (Americana acts like Lera Lynn and The Whiskey Treaty Roadshow interpreting “Fire” and…
Jethro Tull’s ‘Living in the Past’ Arrives in the Present with New Steven Wilson Remix
An early, classic compilation by Jethro Tull will be remixed, expanded and wildly reconstructed by engineer Steven Wilson. Still Living in the Past, available July 11 from Rhino, will reinterpret the group’s odds-and-ends compilation from 1972 as a 5CD/1 Blu-ray set boasting some 35 unissued mixes and versions alongside just about every one of the 21 original tracks that appeared on the original double album. Alongside the original mixes of the non-album material that comprised Living in the Past, Wilson has compiled his mixes of those tracks – both versions done for box…
In Memoriam: Roger Nichols (1940-2025)
If you don’t know the name of Roger Nichols, you know the man’s songs. His compositions have been sung by Carpenters, Barbra Streisand, Diana Ross, Petula Clark, Jackie DeShannon, Bobby Darin, Paul Anka, The Monkees, and Nichols’ most frequent lyrical collaborator, Paul Williams – just to name a few. Many of those songs have become bona fide American standards, among them “We’ve Only Just Begun,” “Rainy Days and Mondays,” “I Won’t Last a Day Without You,” and “Times of Your Life.” He and Williams are also responsible for one of the greatest…