Prince's influence has been discussed far and wide, from fashion to music videos to the actual, Hendrixian quality of his guitar playing. But it's always unusual when the mercurial purple genius decides to directly contribute to another artist's canon, particularly since one really never knows where he's going to end up next. What follows is a chronological list of ten of Prince's most interesting "guest appearances." Half of them are actual guest appearances, the other half either songs he
Prince Week Day 3: He Would Die 4 U
This particular installment of Prince Week is an unorthodox one. The Second Disc is usually a place for just catalogue type stuff, since that is the gateway to most of our feelings about classic music. But sometimes the feelings themselves are worth writing about, if they're particularly strong. It's with this in mind that The Second Disc presents a bit of an emotions-based look at Prince's music. The following (admittedly lengthy) essay is something I've worked on for a few years in college,
Prince Week Day 2: A Compilation Comparison
We continue our Prince week with a little something for the fans out there that may have never caught on to His Royal Badness enough to buy any of his music. Often times, in cases where you want to get a firm start on following an artist, a greatest-hits compilation is the way to go. But Prince, like many other rock legends, has more than one such set on the market. And money's tight for a lot of folks. So which one do you end up buying? Follow the jump for a detailed breakdown of each one.
Clouds on the Horizon
Even though The Second Disc is primarily geared toward catalogue matters, I'd be doing myself a disservice by not paying attention to music as it stands in the present day. There's a trend I've been trying to wrap my head around on the tech side of music, one which could actually have spectacular implications for catalogue works if done properly. They're calling it "the cloud" - mobile, streaming music services that keep the music on a server instead of directly downloading it to your computer.
In Defense of Playlist
In today’s radically-changed music climate, it should come as no surprise that record labels are trying many different series and business models to figure out just what the heck will sell. These releases aren’t necessarily aimed at the audience reading this site, most often targeting the casual music buyer. As such, these greatest hits series – whether Sony’s The Essential…, Universal’s 20th Century Masters or EMI’s Classic Masters, just to name a few – tend to be scorned by many collectors as
Boldly Going Back
Man, it's been a good week for Star Trek music enthusiasts. First Film Score Monthly announces a brand-new deluxe reissue of James Horner's score to Star Trek III: The Search for Spock last week. And now, Varese Sarabande has jumped ahead on the Trek timeline to give fans another new deluxe set: starting June 14, the label will ship Star Trek: The Deluxe Edition, featuring the complete score to last year's fantastic reboot of the sci-fi series. As if the movie wasn't great enough on its own
Friday Feature: A Discful of "Dollars"
Blame the continuing heat in the Northeast. Blame the recent release of video game Red Dead Redemption. But it's just a good time for some great music from the "spaghetti Westerns," that subgenre of film where the Italian film community emulated and built upon the traditions of the American Western picture. Ask any film scholar and they'll likely tell you that few directors contributed more for the genre than Sergio Leone - and futhermore, that his best works had Ennio Morricone providing a
Back Tracks: Billy Idol
Lately, I've been unable to turn the radio dial to a rock-oriented radio station without happening on the music of Billy Idol. There's nothing wrong with that - Idol was one of the best artists of the '80s - but it's a bit jarring, if only because it's hard to think of Billy Idol as a rocker, in the truest sense. Sure, his music is dominated by some excellent guitar (usually from the axe of the fantastic Steve Stevens), and it has a bit of an edge thanks to Idol's irrepressible snarling vocals.
The Setlist Situation
When Legacy announced a new compilation series called Setlist, featuring some of their roster's greatest hits in a live setting, some fans understandably started scratching their heads. The label's Playlist series, from which this new series obviously drew inspiration, made sense on a few levels. They were compilations priced for the budget-conscious, and sometimes had a few bones thrown to hardcore collectors in the form of single-only mixes or edits. For Setlist, however, the premise seems
Reissue Theory: Galactic Novelties
The Star Wars saga continues at The Second Disc with a trove of often-ridiculous but always intriguing musical curios devoted to the films. It's as much a story of disco and a rock legend from New Jersey as it is about Luke Skywalker and Darth Vader. And it's yours to read after the jump.
Friday Feature: The Star Wars Trilogy
It was three decades ago today that The Empire Strikes Back was released. Much has been written about what the movie did for the Star Wars trilogy as a cultural force (no pun intended), for sequels in general and so on. But let's not kid ourselves here: when Empire first came out, it was not seen as the masterpiece it is now. The New York Times gave this film - easily the most watchable of the three Star Wars movies - a largely negative write-up. But whatever the merit of such reviews nowadays,
Review: The Rolling Stones, "Exile on Main Street" Deluxe Edition
Few records hold the mystique of the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main St. Myths have grown and books have been published in an attempt to explain the sprawling album. The story generally goes that 1972 found the band, literally, as tax exiles, seeking refuge across the English Channel in France. A villa in Villefranche-sur-Mer named Nellcote is rented. Music is made. Sex and drugs abound. Somehow in all this debauchery a record is produced, and that record is Exile on Main St. When Universal Music
Back Tracks: The Solo Bacharach
May 12, 2012: Happy 84th birthday, Burt Bacharach! The living legend was recently the recipient, with longtime lyricist Hal David, of The Library of Congress' Gershwin Prize for Popular Song, bestowed upon the team by President Barack Obama. In celebration of the maestro's birthday and this great honor, we're republishing this special installment of Back Tracks, exploring Bacharach's solo career from 1965's Hit Maker! through 2008's Live at the Sydney Opera House! Age hasn’t slowed Burt
Friday Feature: "Psycho"
It is one of the greatest motion picture scores of all time. A suspense classic that immortalized its composer and director for all time. Arguably the most influential in its style. And, half a century later, has never been properly released on any format, ever. Psycho, Alfred Hitchcock's 1960 film, was a stunner from the get-go - not only unlike any film at the time, but unlike any in The Master of Suspense's lengthy career. The film starts out simply: a conflicted young woman steals a hefty
Reissue Theory: Naked Eyes
Eighty-two years ago today, a Kansas City, Miss. couple named Bert and Irma Bacharach welcomed a son, Burt, into the world. In 1957, the young songwriter met a lyricist, Hal David, at a meeting in the Brill Building in New York City. The rest, as they say, was history, with some of the most enduring popular songs of century flowing from their pens. This is a difficult fact to grasp if you're a young person. Nowadays, people couldn't really care less who writes the songs that make the whole
Reissue Theory: "Stoney and Meatloaf"
This week sees the release of Hang Cool, Teddy Bear, the 11th studio offering from Meat Loaf. The outsized rock personality skyrocketed to fame with 1977's Bat Out of Hell, the theatrical rock opus penned by Jim Steinman and produced by Todd Rundgren. As Meat prepares to unleash his latest work (cheekily placing a roman numeral "IV" on the album's back cover, making it clear that he intends Hang Cool as another Steinman-less sequel to Bat), could there be a better time for a Reissue Theory-style
Back Tracks: Barry Manilow, Part 1 (1973-1984)
Where Barry Manilow is concerned, it's best to let the facts speak for themselves. A Grammy, Emmy and Tony Award winner, Manilow scored his first Billboard No. 1 album in 1977, his most recent in 2006. His string of hit singles extended from 1974's chart-topping "Mandy" to 1983's Top 20 "Read 'Em and Weep," with 38 songs hitting the Top 40. He's recorded over 25 studio albums and released countless more live discs, compilations and soundtracks, and regularly plays to sell-out houses after over
Recapturing the Magic
It was during a recent, animated conversation about back catalogue affairs that a stunning realization was made. Of all the major companies dealing in music and pop culture, there is one that has a surprisingly subdued place in the world of reissues. Were this company to change their mind about catalogue affairs and start utilizing their vast discography for more box sets and other special titles, it might be a step in revitalizing the whole reissue practice in general. I'm talking, of course,
Reissue Theory: Martika
The recent realization that Cherry Pop has been remastering and expanding the Kim Wilde catalogue to considerable reaction (enough to warrant two waves of reissues, at least), it makes you wonder what other female pop acts might get the same treatment someday. If you're an '80s fan and you're wondering the same thing, there's little doubt that Martika is probably near the top of your list of must-haves. To many, Martika is at best a footnote in pop history. Her simple yet powerful "Toy
Friday Feature: "Commando"
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teSmRfAtDOU] As a forgiving film fan, I was appalled by the recent news that 20th Century Fox was planning on remaking Commando, the 1985 action flick that became Arnold Schwarzenegger's first star vehicle after The Terminator the previous year. Hollywood's fascination with remakes is too well-known, but surely someone could have drawn a line with Commando. The film has Schwarzenegger as - what else? - a one-man wrecking crew named John Matrix determined
Review: Carole King, "The Essential Carole King"
“Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow.” “(You Make Me Feel Like a) Natural Woman.” “Up on the Roof.” “You’ve Got a Friend.” All of these songs have found a permanent home as part of The Great American Songbook, and all come from the pen of one Carole King. Her repertoire as both singer and songwriter is celebrated with this week’s release of Legacy’s The Essential Carole King (Ode/Epic/Legacy 88697 68257 2), the first set to focus on both aspects of King’s now 50-plus year career. Producers Lou
Boxed In
Reaction to the recently-released tracklist for John Mellencamp's On the Rural Route 7609 box set has been a bit mixed, and for good reason. It's hard to greet a four-disc box set full of album tracks and just over a dozen unreleased outtakes with a price tag of nearly $100. But it's becoming clear that there's a bigger issue here at stake than Mellencamp fans getting soaked. Friends, the entire concept of a box set is in a state of crisis. It's been a long two decades since compact disc box
Release Round-Up: Wilde and Grey Edition
We've got a few reissue notes (in case you missed them) to start off your week. First up, Cherry Pop is prepping another batch of Kim Wilde reissues. The label re-released Wilde's RAK-era LPs - Kim Wilde (1981), Select (1982) and Catch as Catch Can (1983) to a strong reaction from her fanbase, and are now prepping two-disc editions of Teases & Dares (1984) and Another Step (1986), Wilde's first two records for the MCA label. The latter is notable for being co-produced by Rod Temperton and
Reissue Theory: Neil Diamond with a Bang!
Long before he read about a frog who dreamed of being a king – and then became one – Neil Diamond was an up-and-coming songwriter in the waning days of the Brill Building. After a few unsuccessful stabs at recording in the early part of the decade, Diamond was taken under the wing of Jeff Barry, Ellie Greenwich and Bert Berns. In January 1966, the hits started coming: first “Sunday and Me” for Jay and the Americans, then “I’m A Believer” and “A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit You,” both for the
On the Right (Sound)Track
Here at The Second Disc, there's a lot of coverage of soundtracks. (For proof, check Joe Marchese's recent exciting review of a few vault reissues by Henry Mancini.) Granted, not every fan of classic pop, rock and R&B catalogue releases is big on orchestral scores and whatnot, but it's an integral genre in the wide, wild world of reissues and worth covering from an artistic point of view. But recent revelations have shown that soundtrack catalogue comings and goings are worth covering from