From deep within the heart of Memphis to your stereo, the rich legacy of Stax Records will be honored this year as two label partners join forces to commemorate the label’s 60th anniversary. Rolling Stone reported yesterday a massive campaign to celebrate Stax artists and albums across physical and digital formats. Notably, this initiative will be carried out by both owners of the Stax catalogue: Rhino/Warner Music Group, which controls much of the label’s Atlantic-distributed output from 1957 to 1968, and Concord Bicycle Music, handler of the Stax masters released from 1968…
Love Byrd: Big Break Collects Funky Jazz-Soul of Donald Byrd’s Complete Elektra Years
Trumpeter/bandleader Donald Byrd began his career as a member of Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers while still pursuing his master’s degree at the Manhattan School of Music. Upon graduating from both institutions, Byrd played with John Coltrane, Sonny Rollins, Thelonious Monk, and a host of jazz’s finest leaders. By 1958, he was leading his own quintet. Twenty years later, however, much had changed for Byrd and the sound of jazz. After a nearly twenty-year association with the venerable Blue Note label (following stints with Transition, Prestige and others), Byrd decamped for Elektra Records. …
Good Times! The Second Disc’s Essential RSD Black Friday 2016 Release Guide
From all of us here at Second Disc HQ to all of you, we hope you’re enjoying a wonderful Thanksgiving in the company of family and friends. Of course, from this day which conjures nostalgic and warm feelings comes a celebration of a different kind with this year’s annual Black Friday – the day for consumers to start off the holiday shopping season on a mad, frenetic note. But 2016 is just in the latest year in which numerous retailers in the U.S. have made headlines by blackening Thursday, or Thanksgiving Day…
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Do Your Thing: 20 Record Store Day Black Friday Essentials
Are you making a list and checking it twice? We are! Record Store Day Black Friday is here in less than a month, and this week we’re showcasing all of our favorite titles. We’ve shown you the goods from Legacy, Real Gone, Rhino and Omnivore; now, here are 20 more titles we think you should absolutely check out. There’s soundtrack goodies from Varese Sarabande and Light in the Attic; holiday favorites from Bob & Doug McKenzie, Frank Sinatra and “Dolemite” himself; lost gems from Isaac Hayes, The Runaways and Harry Nilsson; and…
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SoulMusic Records Round-Up: Label Reissues Isaac Hayes, Curtis Hairston, Mass Production
A quartet of recent releases from SoulMusic Records in association with Cherry Red turn the spotlight onto overlooked classics of 1980s R&B. Isaac Hayes’ Love Attack (1988) put the hot buttered soul man squarely into Big ’80s territory with thumping drum machines and gleaming synthesizers. It was the Stax legend’s second album for Columbia Records and built on the sound of his label debut U-Turn on which he’d played almost every instrument on the record. For Love Attack, he was joined by Bill Mueller on guitar, Gerald Jackson on synthesizer and Ronnie Garrett…
From Memphis To New Orleans: Ace Collects Stax, DeLuxe Rarities
Bring on the B-sides! Despite its title, the massive, indispensable box set The Complete Stax/Volt Singles 1964-1968 concentrated on A-sides, presenting only a fraction of the labels’ valuable flips. The box left many worthy B-sides overlooked in the CD era, but Ace Records’ Kent imprint has redressed that situation with the release of The Other Side of the Trax: Stax-Volt 45 RPM Rarities 1964-1968. All but one of the 24 tracks on this new compilation are all making their official CD debuts – which is even more unbelievable considering the caliber of…
Stax of Wax: Ace Mines Stax Records For New Anthology, Isaac Hayes and David Porter Reissues
Ace Records has recently celebrated the enduring legacy of Stax Records with a trio of exciting releases from some of the label’s leading lights. The Isaac Hayes Movement’s 1975 Disco Connection makes its first ever CD appearance, joined by Hayes’ songwriting partner David Porter’s equally rare 1970 …Into a Real Thing in a newly-expanded edition. Ace tops it all off with Ian Levine’s Solid Stax Sensations, a revelatory collection showcasing the varied sides of the Stax label family. It’s likely that songwriters Bert Berns and Wes Farrell never imagined “Hang On, Sloopy”…
Reviews: First Family of Soul – Rare Albums From Dionne and Dee Dee Warwick, Cissy Houston Reissued and Expanded
If there’s such a thing as a First Family of Soul, it might as well be the combined Houston/Warwick clan. Born in Newark, New Jersey in 1933, Emily “Cissy” Drinkard sang gospel with her family as part of The Drinkard Singers, which counted Cissy’s sister Lee Warrick among its members. Marie Dionne Warrick was born in 1940 to Lee and her husband Mancel; Delia Mae “Dee Dee” Warrick followed in 1942. Though The Drinkard Singers remain an important part of the history of gospel music, said to have recorded the very first…
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