The great thing about most reissues over the past few years is that labels seem to want to follow one rule: if they can reissue it, they will do their best. Of course there are people out there who like, say, Cutting Crew or a-ha - but who could have seriously predicted that labels would be open to the idea of reissuing those records with bonus cuts and all that? Of course, this rule makes some of the great bands without reissues - Prince, The Go-Gos, that one Buckingham Nicks album - look like
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
Reissue Theory: Tears for Fears, "Elemental"
One of the hardest parts of being a reissue fan is waiting. Sometimes a project will get announced, then delayed or cancelled outright. Those long gaps between reissues can be irksome, particularly when the delay time fails to lead to any improvement or innovation in the packaging and presentation of a catalogue title. Other times, though, the reason behind the lack of a reissue is simply that nobody thinks to re-release it. Take, for instance, one of the better bands of the 1980s - Tears for
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
The Second Disc State of the Union
Readers: we need to talk. It's nothing bad. The Second Disc isn't going away, isn't reducing its output, nothing like that. We just need to talk about a few things. Around five months ago, The Second Disc was started with a list of great reissues that were released in 2009. It was a post copied from a Facebook note written some weeks before. A modest beginning, to be sure. It's hard to have high expectations about anything you're just starting out on, particularly a blog. How many blogs must
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.
Paying the Price
Next week is going to be much more comfortable when it comes to posting on The Second Disc. After several months of bitterly typing and researching over a creaky, aging Dell PC (having lost a nearly-just-as-creaky Thinkpad T60 laptop), the weekend should see your humble correspondent upgrading to a Macbook. As a lifelong Windows user (barring my time writing and editing for my newspaper in college), it's an unusual but worthwhile transition, and I can't wait to regain simple pleasures like
Our Castle and Our Keep
After yesterday's Miles Davis pricing madness, The Second Disc brings you some much more appreciable madness, through another set of reissues by Madness, one of the best-known ska acts of the '80s. Continuing the band's ongoing reissue project, Salvo and Union Square Music has prepped the band's fourth and fifth LPs, The Rise & Fall (1982) and Keep Moving (1984), as double-disc deluxe reissues. Both sets will feature various remixes, B-sides and promo videos to boot. It's notable that The
Review: Otis Redding, "Live on the Sunset Strip"
“Are you ready for star time?” Considering that the star in question was “the one and only, Volt recording star Otis Redding," the answer was bound to be in the affirmative. That was the introduction granted Redding by emcee Al Brisko Clark at West Hollywood’s Whisky A Go Go on the evenings of April 8, 9 and 10, 1966. The Whisky was the happening nightspot on the Sunset Strip in ’66, immortalized by Johnny Rivers on a 1964 LP and frequented by a who’s who of the Los Angeles music scene. (See
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
What They Did is No Longer Secret
Depending on who you ask, West Coast hardcore pioneers The Germs wanted to do one thing when they reunited at L.A.'s Starwood Club: they wanted to put punk rock into perspective for a new generation unfamiliar with their style. By all accounts, that happened; fans have called that show - done just four days before lead singer Darby Crash overdosed on heroin - The Germs' greatest ever. Now, fans will have the opportunity to judge for themselves, thanks to Rhino Handmade's newest release, Live at
R&B Releases: A Classic "Thing," Plus Some Buried Grooves
If you're itching for some vintage R&B from around the way, a few labels have some new releases to keep you satisfied. One is a classic soul LP making its debut on CD, the other two are some solid disco efforts with some bonus cuts to boot. Iconoclassic Records has planned a June 22 reissue of It's Our Thing by The Isley Brothers. Released on the Isleys' own label after leaving a solid but fleetingly successful tenure at Motown, this disc includes the funky, anthemic "It's Your Thing." This
The Trend
When The Second Disc's Exile on Main St. poll was posted, I mentioned that I had noticed a rather unusual trend in the purchase of the various deluxe sets that were available. As a member of the electronics/entertainment staff at a Target store, I was able to track a few of the big sets, some of which were only available through our retailers. Target was the only place to get the bonus disc of the deluxe edition (that is, the Rarities Edition), as well as the fan pack which bundled a t-shirt
Weekend Release Round-Up: SRV, Jayhawks, Sum 41 and More
This was a busy week for catalogue fans, what with the Elvis revelation from the other day and reactions to the new Exile on Main St. sets. Here, to close out the week, are a few announcements that fell through the cracks. The long-planned Legacy Edition of Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble's 1985 sophomore LP Couldn't Stand the Weather now has a release date: July 27. The set will feature bonus tracks from the original recording sessions and a previously-unreleased live show on Disc 2.
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,
Miles and Miles of Miles
Well, damn. After blowing minds in the jazz world with last year's The Complete Columbia Album Collection, Legacy gears up a few more Miles Davis reissues that are sure to pique the interests of devoted listeners and rarity hunters. On August 31, Columbia and Legacy will re-release the trumpeter's acclaimed Bitches Brew as a Legacy Edition. The original album in its eight-track studio mix (as opposed to more recent digital remixes) will be enhanced with bonus session tracks and a newly-released
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
Out of "Exile," Out of Curiosity
Dear readers of The Second Disc: I wonder, for those of you who've purchased the new reissue of Exile on Main St., what you ended up purchasing. Given my, er, "unique" perspective in retail, I've seen what looks like an unusual trend in the purchasing of this big new reissue and I wonder if the same trends are reflected among you. Take a look at the poll after the jump and please cast your vote. I'm excited to see what everyone has to say!
Legacy Announces Oasis' "Time Flies"
As previously reported, Oasis are releasing Time Flies...1994-2009, a lengthy compilation of their singles, on June 15. Legacy Recordings, which is handling the distribution of the set, issued a release detailing all the iterations of the set that can be purchased. The set exists in three forms. The standard double-disc set will include 26 of the band's U.K. singles plus U.S. hit "Champagne Supernova" (the U.K. edition will include all the proper singles, including "Sunday Morning Call" in
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
A Double Dose of Soul
Two newly-announced catalogue titles bring some rare tracks by R&B and soul legends to CD for the first time - and both have a bit of a Motown collection. First up is Reel Music's CD debut of Pressure Cookin', the only LP cut by Labelle for RCA Records. Recorded a year before "Lady Marmalade" shot the group to success, this record features some intriguing highlights, including a medley of Thunderclap Newman's "Something in the Air" and Gil Scott-Heron's "The Revolution Will Not Be
Back Tracks: Ronnie James Dio
The loss of Ronnie James Dio resounds greatly in the world of metal. The famed vocalist, best known for his time in Black Sabbath and his own eponymous band Dio, had a powerful voice that few in the hard rock spectrum could compete with. He was a prolific talent who left behind not only a lot of influences, but a lot of catalogue work from a half-century(!) of recording. That's right: Dio first got his start way back in 1957 as a bassist for The Vegas Kings, a teen-rock outfit that saw plenty
They've Done It Again - Delayed It, That Is
The next batch of Duran Duran reissues (Notorious and Big Thing) have been pushed back to September from July. Are you surprised? I'm not. Let's hope EMI exists by the fall. (Thanks to Slicing Up Eyeballs and Duranasty for their patient reportage.)
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