With the run-up to Christmas approaching full speed, the holiday's musical queen is looking to take back her crown. To celebrate the 30th anniversary of Carey's Merry Christmas and its unforgettable, cross-generational hit single "All I Want for Christmas is You," the Elusive Chanteuse will deliver an expanded version of the album on vinyl, featuring material from its most recent reissue and a 24-page booklet in a hardbound package with some holiday surprises. To boost "All I Want for
One of this year's documentary darlings at the Sundance Film Festival, a look at the life and career of Luther Vandross, makes its theatrical debut in select cities this week. Ahead of its wider, planned streaming release in 2025, Legacy Recordings will issue a new double-disc anthology of his work, accompanied by several rare and unreleased tracks. Never Too Much: Greatest Hits, available December 13, offers 20 tracks on two CDs that represent the cream of Vandross' solo career. In addition
Welcome to another edition of The Weekend Stream, The Second Disc's review of notable catalogue titles (and some new ones, too!) making digital debuts. Pop goddesses, rock gods, one classic crooner and remixes aplenty are what you'll find this week! Mariah Carey, Rainbow (25th Anniversary Expanded Edition) (Columbia/Legacy) (iTunes / Amazon) The Elusive Chanteuse's seventh album built upon its 1997 predecessor Butterfly, integrating hip-hop production flourishes into her R&B/adult
Welcome to another edition of The Weekend Stream, The Second Disc's review of notable catalogue titles (and some new ones, too!) making digital debuts. This week has another rare track by Prince, promo for the new Beach Boys documentary, a powerful new remix by a legendary diva and more! Prince, "Silver Tongue" (NPG/Legacy) (iTunes / Amazon) A third Musicology-era rarity has landed digitally, following "United States of Division" and "Magnificent." "Silver Tongue" was a "virtual B-side" to
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up, featuring a selection of the new titles available today. As an Amazon affiliate, we earn from qualifying purchases. Andy Williams, When You Fall in Love: Lost Columbia Masters 1977-1982 (Real Gone Music) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada) When You Fall in Love: Lost Columbia Masters 1977-1982 rounds up eighteen rarities from the late, great Andy Williams. Over a dozen never-before-heard recordings premiere here which teamed Andy with
The third time was the charm when Mariah Carey released Music Box three decades ago. The elusive chanteuse last week announced plans to expand her third album with a wealth of rare and unreleased bonus material. Released as a 3CD or 4LP set on February 24, 2024 but available digitally now, the new expansion of Music Box features the original 10-track album expanded with international bonus track "Everything Fades Away"; a disc of studio material, including the unheard teaser "Workin' Hard,"
Welcome to The Weekend Stream, a relaxing weekly review of notable digital-only catalogue titles. There may be no CD or vinyl, but there's plenty of great new/old music to usher you into the weekend. Today sees digital expansions from Jan Berry, Brian McKnight and Weezer; new songs from The Guess Who and a member of Jellyfish - plus a great way to provide aid in the face of the week's biggest natural disaster. Brian McKnight, Anytime (Deluxe Edition) (Motown/UMe) (iTunes / Amazon) Soulful
Welcome to The Weekend Stream, a relaxing weekly review of notable digital-only catalogue titles. There may be no CD or vinyl, but there's plenty of great new/old music to discover - from quarter-century old R&B classics, a Fleetwood Mac heroine covering Buffalo Springfield, and an actor who sang enough to make you go a little mad. Stevie Nicks, For What It's Worth (Rhino) (iTunes / Amazon) The celebrated singer has recently been covering this Buffalo Springfield classic on her
Legacy Recordings has announced its release slate for Record Store Day 2022, with titles both coming for the primary RSD event on Saturday, April 23 and the additional RSD Drop scheduled for Saturday, June 18. Legacy's lineup draws on an array of heavy hitters, some of whom have featured in previous RSD releases, including Miles Davis, Lou Reed, Prince, Santana, Mariah Carey, Pearl Jam, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts, Patti Smith, and more. Below, you'll find Legacy's full list of releases,
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up! Herb Alpert, Herb Alpert Is... (Herb Alpert Presents) 3CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 5LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Herb Alpert Is...a trumpeter, songwriter, producer, artist, entrepreneur, philanthropist. The list goes on. To tie in with director John Scheinfeld's documentary of that name premiering this fall, Alpert's own Herb Alpert Presents label is releasing a 3-CD or 5-LP deluxe box set tracing his
Mariah Carey's continuing her #MC30 campaign in a big way with a new collection of rare and unreleased studio and live material, as well as vinyl reissues of her whole catalogue. The Rarities presents the flipside of the pop idol's incredible blockbuster career (one that's produced an impressive 19 chart-topping singles in the U.S. - just one less than The Beatles) through B-sides and outtakes as well as the premiere audio release of a full live set from 1996. Lead single "Saves The Day," a
She famously doesn't count birthdays, but Mariah Carey is taking 2020 to commemorate the birth of her music career with some rare and unreleased material. Earlier this month, the pop icon announced #MC30, a celebration throwing all the way back to her self-titled debut, issued three decades ago this past June. The campaign promises weekly "digital EPs, remixes, bonus cuts, rare tracks, acapella moments and mind-blowing live performances" - and five releases have occurred so far. The first,
Sitting atop the Billboard Hot 100 this week is a song which took a quarter-century to reach that peak: Mariah Carey's "All I Want For Christmas Is You." The song achieved a couple of milestones with that ranking: it now holds the record for the longest time between a song's debut and its reaching the top of the charts, and it's the first Christmas song to reach the peak in 60 years since The Chipmunks did it in 1959. Before this new milestone for Carey's tune, the song and the album of its
One of the best-selling Christmas albums of all time is getting the deluxe treatment today with Columbia Records and Legacy Recordings' 2-CD reissue of Mariah Carey's Merry Christmas in time for its 25th anniversary. Carey's fourth album and first holiday effort (the sequel Merry Christmas II You arrived in 2010) teamed the chanteuse with producer-arranger Walter Afanasieff (Barbra Streisand, Celine Dion, Johnny Mathis), among others, on a sparkling set of original songs and holiday classics.
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up! Bob Dylan featuring Johnny Cash, Travelin' Thru, 1967-1969: The Bootleg Series Vol. 15 (Columbia/Legacy) 3CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada 3LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada Columbia Records and Legacy Recordings chronicle Dylan's 1967-1969 recordings in Music City - including those made with a very special guest - on the latest volume of the artist's long-running Bootleg Series. Bob Dylan (featuring Johnny Cash) -
Welcome to this week's Release Round-Up featuring a number of rock legends! Yes, Progeny: Seven Shows from Seventy-Two (Rhino) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.) This whopping 14-CD box captures seven complete concerts from Yes circa 1972 - the same tour leading up to the performances preserved on Yessongs. For those who don't need 14 discs, 2-CD and 3-LP Highlights distillations are also available (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.) ! Jeff Beck, Live+ (Rhino) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon
Monday marked the release of the new Mariah Carey single, "Infinity." This latest single is the sole new recording from Carey's forthcoming greatest hits collection #1 to Infinity which is hitting stores in a couple of weeks on May 18. The new compilation is the singer's first project since returning to her original label home of Sony after having spent most of the 2000s on Island Records and Def Jam Records. Since releasing her self-titled debut album on Columbia in 1990, Mariah Carey has
Barenaked Ladies, Stop Us If You've Heard This One Before! (Rhino) A single-disc compilation of mostly unreleased odds and ends from the BNL catalogue. Bill Withers, Just as I Am: 40th Anniversary Edition (Big Break) A remaster of Withers' breakthrough 1971 album, featuring the immortal "Ain't No Sunshine" and "Grandma's Hands." Phil Collins, ...But Seriously (Audio Fidelity) Collins' 1989 solo album, featuring hits "Another Day in Paradise" and "Something Happened on the Way to
Janis Joplin, The Pearl Sessions (Columbia/Legacy) Essentially a new double-disc deluxe edition of Joplin's final album, with mono single mixes and a heap of mostly unreleased session outtakes as bonus tracks. Little Richard,
There's something familiar about many of Legacy's new entries in their ongoing The Essential series hitting stores in April and May. Of the four double-disc compilations - one for prog-rock masters Blue Öyster Cult, one apiece for country stars Alan Jackson and Brooks & Dunn and one for pop chanteuse Mariah Carey - three have already been reissued under different names. The country ones are repackages of each performer's latest hits set (Jackson's 2010 contract-closing 34 Number One Hits
Prince's influence has been discussed far and wide, from fashion to music videos to the actual, Hendrixian quality of his guitar playing. But it's always unusual when the mercurial purple genius decides to directly contribute to another artist's canon, particularly since one really never knows where he's going to end up next. What follows is a chronological list of ten of Prince's most interesting "guest appearances." Half of them are actual guest appearances, the other half either songs he
It greatly pleases me that The Second Disc has attracted an interested readership. It's a pleasure that there are many out there interested in how the industry behaves and evolves. And as a writer and enthusiast with such devotion to the niche, it's just exciting to connect with like-minded individuals. To that end, I pose something of a catalogue-oriented challenge to you. In all my years collecting and listening to pop music, I have only come across the following track once. The complete lack