To the uninitiated, the biography of Jerry Lee Lewis in 2022 read like a list of rock tropes so basic you can't believe they all happened to one man. Born to a poor Louisiana family that included a lot of famous Southerners (including cousins Mickey Gilley and Jimmy Swaggart), Jerry Lee's parents mortgaged their farm to buy him a piano and hoped he would honor the Lord in song. What they got instead was a firebrand, whose boogie-woogie sensibilities galvanized and scandalized the
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up, featuring a selection of the new titles in stores today! Michael Nesmith, Different Drum: The Lost RCA Victor Recordings (Second Disc Records/Real Gone Music) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada / Real Gone Music) Second Disc Records and Real Gone Music are bringing Michael Nesmith's Different Drum: The Lost RCA Victor Recordings to vinyl for the first time today! This 2-LP compendium features 22 tracks on CD drawn from the RCA Victor
We've already filled you in on Ace's recent anthology collecting works by Philly soul maestro Thom Bell; now we're looking to the American South with another release! Way back in 2012, Ace Records collected the multifaceted sounds of Chips Moman and Don Crews' American Studios on Memphis Boys: The Story of American Studios. The 24-song tribute collection featured such visitors to Memphis as Dusty Springfield, Wilson Pickett, B.J. Thomas, and Solomon Burke as well as Elvis Presley, one of the
"Be My Baby." "Can't Take My Eyes off You." "Stand by Me." "You Don't Own Me." Songs such as these not only defined the era in which they were first written and performed, but continue to resonate today. They're just four of the classic songs included on an upcoming 7-DVD set from Treasury Collection that serves as a definitive concert anthology of classic American R&B music. Rock, Pop, and Doo Wop has been curated by executive producer and director TJ Lubinsky from his acclaimed onstage
Johnny Cash is coming to town (again)! When the legendary Man in Black was unceremoniously dropped by his longtime home of Columbia Records in mid-1986 - "the hardest decision I've ever had to make in my life," opined then-label chief Rick Blackburn - he wasn't yet finished. Mercury Records stepped up to sign Cash, beginning a relationship that lasted for five years and six albums. Now, that fertile 1986-1991 period of rebirth is being revisited by Mercury and UMe in a multi-platform
Along with Buck Owens - with whom he shared a musical history and a wife - Merle Haggard (1937-2016) defined The Bakersfield Sound of country music: authentic, raw, rooted in honky-tonks. But unlike the Texas-born and Arizona-raised Owens, Haggard was actually born in Bakersfield and raised just across the river from that California town. "Hag," as he preferred to be known, rocketed to superstardom thanks to "Okie from Muskogee," his controversial 1969 song that was either a scathing
In February 1952, Sam Phillips launched Sun Records at 706 Union Avenue in Memphis, Tennessee - the site of his Sun Studio, previously known as Memphis Recording Service. Two years later, the visionary entrepreneur signed Elvis Presley, and then opened the doors to such other legendary talents as Johnny Cash, Jerry Lewis, Carl Perkins, Roy Orbison, Charlie Rich, and more. The Sun Records rockabilly sound incorporated rhythm and blues, country, rock and roll, and gospel, forever changing the
Ace Records has recently continued its Golden Age of American Popular Music Series with another volume dedicated to the sounds of country-and-western. More Country Hits follows The Country Hits, released in 2008, and like that volume, presents a collection of country classics that crossed over to the pop side on the Billboard Hot 100. Many familiar names from the first collection show up here, too, including Johnny Horton, Johnny Cash, Faron Young, Ray Price, George Jones, Skeeter Davis, Marty
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up, with some of the most high-profile releases yet for 2016! The Beach Boys, Pet Sounds 50 (Various Editions) (Capitol/UMe) 4-CD/1-BD Deluxe Edition: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 2-CD Deluxe Edition (CD 1 + highlights from 4-CD set): Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Mono 180-Gram Vinyl Edition: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Stereo 180-Gram Vinyl Edition: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada The Beach
To our U.S. readers, today is the day of shopping known as Black Friday - but happily, the diverse slate of releases due in stores today should lift your spirits - no matter where you're located! Love, Reel to Real: Expanded Edition (High Moon Records) (Amazon U.S.) High Moon Records has the premiere reissue of Arthur Lee and Love's 1974 album Reel to Real as a newly-expanded Deluxe Edition boasting a color, 32-page booklet. A vinyl edition will follow early next year. Read more
Welcome to the Release Round-Up for the week of March 3! The Staple Singers, Freedom Highway Complete: Recorded Live at Chicago's New Nazareth Church (Epic/Legacy) CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. The Staple Singers' 1965 LP celebrating that year’s historic civil rights marches from Montgomery to Selma, Alabama is generously expanded to complete form on Legacy's new reissue available on both CD and vinyl. Watch for a review here soon! The J. Geils
Today, Legacy Recordings issues a number of titles from some of music's greatest artists as part of the label's ongoing Essential series of anthologies. We're taking a look at the collections from Harry Nilsson, Andy Williams, Jerry Lee Lewis, Pete Seeger, Mott the Hoople and Midnight Oil! Plus: we have track listings for all titles! A 2010 documentary posed the question, Who is Harry Nilsson (And Why is Everybody Talkin' About Him)? Well, if you don't already know the answer, The