Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up! Neil Diamond, 50th Anniversary Collector's Edition (Capitol/UMe) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada) Neil Diamond revisits a 50+-year career with a new 6-CD, 115-song retrospective box set featuring hits, rarities, and 15 previously unreleased tracks including the original demos of "America" and "I Am...I Said." Everything is packaged within a deluxe hardcover book-style format. 50th Anniversary Collector's Edition expands upon 2017's
Cherry Red Records has a pair of treats for fans of English singer-songwriter and '80s synthpop hero Howard Jones. On November 30, the label will expand and remaster Jones' chart-topping debut album Human's Lib and its follow-up, Dream Into Action. Originally issued in March 1984, Human's Lib rocketed into the U.K. Album Chart at No. 1 with sales of over 100,000 units in the first week alone. The double platinum smash spent a total of 57 weeks on the British chart, and yielded four top 20
Howard Jones is more than his synths. The British keyboardist dominated his home country's charts in the '80s (and flirted with success on American shores more than a few times in the same period) with fascinatingly busy, seriously catchy slices of synthpop with more than a little R&B influence. But peel back the hooks and riffs and you'll find the work of a man who is searching--for what, it's not always clear, but the search is there. Best 1983-2017 (Cherry Red Records PCDTRED 707), an
Don't crack up, bend your brain: a new triple-disc Howard Jones compilation is coming out from U.K. label Cherry Red Records. The blonde keyboardist from Southampton was a staple of early-mid '80s U.K. pop thanks to his catchy synth-driven melodies with often heavy, introspective lyrics. This combination took "New Song," "What is Love," "Things Can Only Get Better," "No One is to Blame" and five more songs into his home country's Top 20. Success in the United States was later but slightly