Are there somehow not enough super deluxe box sets in the pipeline for you? Universal added another to the pile today: a 45th anniversary deluxe edition of The Velvet Underground & Nico. The iconic, Andy Warhol-produced LP, released to almost no fanfare in 1967 but today recognized as a classic example of art-rock, is no stranger to CD reissues. Two different remasters appeared in stores in 1986 and 1996, and the album (along with various bonus material) appeared in the career-spanning 1995
"Sugar Man" Revealed: Legacy, Light in the Attic Team to Rediscover Lost Folk Hero Rodriguez
The story of Rodriguez may not be a famous one (yet!), but it’s so big that it takes not one, but two, of our favorite labels to bring it to life! Legacy Recordings and Light in the Attic have teamed up to release the soundtrack to Malik Bendjelloul’s film Searching for Sugar Man about a “lost” singer-songwriter who made a big, and unusual, impact. The adjective "remarkable" may be overused, but it certainly applies to the life and career of Rodriguez. The film, distributed by Sony Pictures
Release Round-Up: Week of July 24
Booker T. & the MGs, Green Onions (Concord/Stax) The 1962 album from the Stax legends is expanded with two previously issued, live bonus tracks from Los Angeles in 1965. Read more here. David Cassidy, Cherish / Rock Me Baby (7Ts/Cherry Red) The Partridge Family star was on top of the world when he released his first two solo albums in 1972. They arrive on American shores today as one two-fer! Read more here. The Guess Who, # 10 / Road Food (Iconoclassic) Iconoclassic’s series of
A&M Records Celebrates Half-Century Mark with Three-Disc Compilation
Ask the most voracious of music trivia buffs what "A&M Records" stood for and they'll tell you simply: Herb Alpert, noted jazz trumpeter and bandleader; and music promoter Jerry Moss, a duo who crafted the label from Alpert's garage in 1962. 50 years later, with the upcoming release of the three-disc A&M 50: The Anniversary Collection, it's clear that A&M stood for something else, too: one of the most intriguingly eclectic rosters in pop history, encompassing everything from jazz
I Don't Know Where, But It Sends Me There: "Good Vibrations: The Beach Boys Songbook" Arrives
2012 has been a big year for The Beach Boys, and the fun, fun, fun shows little sign of abating any time soon. While we still wait for more details on the possible U.S. arrival of a series of reissued original albums, Sony Music Japan is celebrating with a unique tribute to America's band. Good Vibrations: The Beach Boys Songbook is a 25-track compilation drawn mostly, but not exclusively, from the Sony family of labels including Columbia, RCA Victor, Arista, Buddah and Bang, and offers a number
Saturday Spotlight: From Eelwax Jesus to Declan's Well
We interrupt our regularly scheduled programming... Another Saturday night and you ain't got nobody? Well, it has been called the loneliest night of the week. It's also been said that S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y night is alright for fighting. But here at Second Disc HQ, this evening will hardly be lonely, because Mike and I will be indulging in some of our favorite new music. Yup, that's right! For this special weekend update, if you will, we're turning the spotlight from back-catalogue favorites to
Lee Hazlewood Makes "A House Safe For Tigers"
One of our favorite characters here at Second Disc HQ is the one and only Lee Hazlewood. Whether singing psychedelic duets with the daughter of the Chairman of the Board, proving that Hollywood kids Dino, Desi and Billy were “Not the Lovin’ Kind” or going all twangy with Duane Eddy, Hazlewood made his mark wherever he went. Light in the Attic kicked off a new Hazlewood reissue campaign in April with the release of the deliciously offbeat The LHI Years: Singles, Nudes and Backsides 1968-1971,
Cherish Is The Word: David Cassidy Reissues Arrive From 7Ts
Everyone remembers David Cassidy, the bubblegum pop king and teen idol supreme. But Cassidy - still an active entertainer, singer, and actor today - was also a persuasive and versatile vocalist who stepped out of, and prospered beyond, the shadow of the fictional Partridge Family. Far from being simple fodder for the teenybopper crowd, the records he released as a solo artist were in many ways a continuation of the sophisticated pop sounds of the 1960. Cassidy enlisted top-tier songwriters,
Review: Sam Phillips, "Martinis & Bikinis"
To call the career of Sam Phillips a varied one is a colossal understatement. The singer and songwriter born Leslie Ann Phillips has played a mute terrorist opposite Bruce Willis, placed several singles in the contemporary Christian Top 10, and today can be found scoring the exploits of a headstrong dancer and her imperious mother-in-law on ABC Family’s drama Bunheads. Though Phillips has hardly slowed down in the intervening years, fans still hold close the creative period she shared with
The Feeling Is Right: Kent Offers Expanded Etta James LP, Clarence Carter Singles Collection
When Argo Records crowned Etta James The Queen of Soul on the cover of a 1964 LP, Aretha Franklin hadn't yet staked claim to that title. Revisiting that album today, Etta's status as royalty still seems unassailable. Thankfully, we have that opportunity thanks to Kent Records via its new expansion of Queen of Soul with fourteen bonus tracks added to the original LP's ten songs. Plus, Kent has delivered a new release from one of the undisputed kings of soul: Clarence Carter. The Fame Singles
Back to "Barcelona": Queen Frontman's Final Solo Disc Gets Super Deluxe Treatment
"I'm moving into opera now. Forget rock and roll." With those words, Queen frontman Freddie Mercury moved in on what may be the most grandiose phase in a long career full of theatrics. In 1987, with Queen not yet knowing they would have played their final live show one year before, the band's whimsical frontman ventured into uncharted waters with Barcelona, an operatic rock album featuring a talented soprano whose voice he idolized, and put one of the final great flourishes on a career (and a
Wonderful! Wonderful! Johnny Mathis' Long-Lost Mercury Catalogue Comes to CD from Real Gone Music
Johnny Mathis’ association with Columbia Records began in 1956, which makes it one of the longest relationships between artist and label in popular music. But it’s often overlooked that Mathis departed Columbia for a brief period at rival Mercury Records, right as some young upstarts from across the pond were changing the face of music forever. (Keep in mind that Mathis himself wasn’t even 30 when he made the shift!) During a prolific three years (1963-1966) at Mercury, Mathis recorded eleven
Some Kind of a Summer: Real Gone Offers David Cassidy, Gary Lewis, Grateful Dead, Johnny Mathis In August
Real Gone Music is looking ahead to August, and it's going to be one hot summer! The label has just announced new titles from all around the pop/rock spectrum: Gary Lewis and the Playboys, David Cassidy, The Grateful Dead and Johnny Mathis! Gary Lewis and the Playboys' Complete Liberty Singles first arrived in 2009 from the late Collectors' Choice Music label, with 45 tracks on 2 CDs. This anthology definitely proved that there was much more to the group than just "This Diamond Ring,"
Release Round-Up: Week of July 17
America, Perspective/In Concert (BGO) Two out-of-print albums from Gerry Beckley and Dewey Bunnell circa 1984 and 1985 are now available as a two-for-one CD from the U.K.’s BGO label! Read more here. Donny Hathaway, Live + In Performance (Shout! Factory) The Shout! Factory label combines two of the late soul man’s live albums (the first, from 1972, and the second, a posthumous set from 1980) in one package, newly remastered by Steve Hoffman. Read more here. Elton John vs. Pnau, Good
"HELP MEEEEE!" "The Fly" Is Back! Horror Classic Joins Crime Drama "Wallander" On CD
Take a look over to your right…if you’re anything like me, it might be hard to suppress a smile at the fearsome Fly! Yes, horror pictures have changed quite a bit since 1958, and even since The Fly was remade in 1986 with Jeff Goldblum as the eponymous bug-man. But for thrills and chills, it’s hard to beat the original Fly: “Once it was human…even as you and I!” Kritzerland is revisiting the fifties classic along with its sequel, Return of the Fly (1959), on a new two-for-one CD, and is also
Heaven In Her Eyes: BBR Reissues Two From Deniece Williams
The curriculum vitae of Deniece Williams can boast some of the most esteemed names in popular music: Maurice White, Charles Stepney, David Foster, Thom Bell and George Duke, just to name a few. All of those gentlemen produced albums for, or with, Williams, whose career has been the subject of a series of deluxe reissues from Big Break Records. Earlier this year, BBR (part of the Cherry Red group of labels) added Williams' 1976 debut This is Niecy to its previous four titles from the artist:
Short Takes, International Edition: INXS Celebrates 25 Years of "Kick" Plus The Byrds Go Mono and Stereo
Welcome to the working week! This morning's Short Takes brings us to the U.K. for the 25th anniversary of a pop classic, and to Japan, where one of the 1960s' greatest bands is getting the red carpet treatment! Though we're reluctant to rush the summer away, it sure looks like this September's going to be a month with kick! Kick, that is. It appears that Universal U.K. will be giving the full, Super Deluxe treatment to Aussie band INXS' 1987 breakthrough album. The multi-platinum Kick
Review: B.J. Thomas, "The Complete Scepter Singles"
What sweeter words are there to a catalogue music enthusiast than "Complete Singles"? Thanks to the herculean efforts of the Real Gone Music team, three more artists now can boast of such a collection. And while we'll soon turn our attention to The Electric Prunes and Timi Yuro, today the spotlight is on a man for whom raindrops might keep falling...but nothing's worrying him: B.J. Thomas. Perhaps the most overdue of these sets is Real Gone's delayed, but worth-the-wait collection of B.J.
Hey, Mr. Producer: A Second Disc Interview! Talking Remastered, Remixed Edition of Stephen Sondheim's "Follies" with Bruce Kimmel
Hats off, here it comes: the Kritzerland label is unveiling a new edition of the Original Broadway Cast Recording of Stephen Sondheim and James Goldman’s Follies, but the Broadway babies and girls upstairs will likely have never sounded better. Following similar releases for Promises, Promises and Sugar, Kritzerland has completely remixed and remastered Capitol Records’ 1971 Follies, affording listeners the opportunity to hear a Sondheim masterwork anew. The label began accepting pre-orders
Review: Jimi Hendrix, "Jimi Plays Berkeley" and "Live at Berkeley"
When Jimi Hendrix asked from the stage of the Berkeley Community Theatre on May 30, 1970 that his audience of approximately 3,500 patrons “forget about yesterday or tomorrow…this is our own little world tonight,” he wasn’t making such a request idly. Just outside the walls of the intimate theatre, fans were trying to crash the gates, scale the walls and even gain entry via the roof. For many, the pure, unfiltered and raw music created by Hendrix and his Experience was much-needed escapism, as
When Worlds Collide! John Barry and Matt Monro Spy Thriller Joins George Pal Sci-Fi Flicks
His name is Barry...John Barry. And the famed film composer's score to the 1966 spy thriller The Quiller Memorandum is one of the two latest soundtrack reissues from Intrada. The film score specialists have also just released a 2-CD set of four scores drawn from the legendary films of George Pal. War of the Worlds/When Worlds Collide includes, as bonuses, The Naked Jungle and Conquest of Space. These four soundtracks are the work of Leith Stevens (War of the Worlds, When Worlds Collide),
Shadow of the Bat: Dark Knight Joins Myriad of Superheroes for La-La Land's Comic-Con Soundtrack Lineup
This evening, Preview Night kicks off 2012's Comic-Con International: San Diego, or as most of us know it, just Comic-Con! As the years have passed since the very first event in 1970, Comic-Con has broadened its scope from the world of comic books to every possible corner of pop culture, including music. A number of our friends have set up shop in San Diego, including La-La Land Records at Booth 429 and Shout! Factory at Booth 3849! Mike's checking in with a report on some of the special
Review: The Beat, "I Just Can't Stop It," "Wha'ppen?" and "Special Beat Service" Expanded Editions
When the members of The Beat had the opportunity to create their own record label, the six-piece unit (“Ranking” Roger Charlery on vocals and toasting, Dave Wakeling on vocals and guitar, Andy Cox on guitar, Everett Morton on drums, David Steele on bass and Lionel Augustus Martin a.k.a. Saxa on – what else? – saxophone!) chose “Go Feet Records” as its moniker. Now, roughly 32 years after the band’s first album was released, it will still have your feet going in wild and unexpected directions.
Release Round-Up: Week of July 10
Bananarama, 30 Years of Bananarama (Rhino U.K.) The U.K. division of Rhino compiles the best of the “Venus” hitmakers in this CD/DVD package out today in the U.K. and next week stateside! Read more here. The Beat, I Just Can’t Stop It/Wha’ppen?/Special Beat Service (Demon/Edsel) The complete studio output of The Beat (or The English Beat, if you prefer) gets the deluxe reissue treatment in the U.K. from Edsel as 2-CD/1-DVD sets chock-filled with extra material! Don’t miss our review of
Review: Carly Simon, "Spoiled Girl: Expanded Edition"
The title of Spoiled Girl had a knowingly ironic resonance for Carly Simon. A scion of the Simon and Schuster publishing firm (her father was founder Richard L. Simon), Carly was considered by some to be a "spoiled girl." In fact, that couldn't have been further from the truth, despite a somewhat privileged upbringing. Yet here she was, mockingly singing of a woman who "thinks of nothing but herself," the kind of gal who sends her chauffeur to supply more bubbles for her bath! 1985's Spoiled
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