It was 50 years ago this June 1st when The Beatles’ John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr astonished and delighted the world, ushering in the Summer of Love with Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, a groundbreaking masterwork that became popular music’s most universally acclaimed album. To salute the occasion, The Beatles will release a suite of lavishly presented ‘Sgt. Pepper’ Anniversary Edition packages on May 26 (Apple Corps Ltd./Capitol/UMe). The album is newly mixed by Giles Martin and Sam Okell in stereo and 5.1 surround audio and expanded with early takes from the studio sessions, including no fewer than 34 previously unreleased recordings.
Read more →Archive for the News & Releases – Latest & Greatest Category
Our story opens w/a jowly narrative enunciated by singer/guitarist Paul “Top Dollar” Major (as Aaron Burr) callin’ out all them sissy Dem-Rep blaggards, letting ’em know he’s on his own path. Naturally what follows is some tasty sun zoom riffage a’tween TD ‘n Jesper “The Governor” Eklow and the wily Dollar, backed solidly by the Marc Razo/Harry Druzd rhythm union. In fact, through the whole of this opus, Druzd effortlessly marshals through the sonic undertow while Razo rudders his bass like a brilliant pulse in a spasmodic vortex. Top Dollar, the aforementioned Herr Sween & The Governor gnash, morph, crystallize while the jams flow; it’s ‘Mirror Man’ bum-rushin’ ‘Pretties For You’. Before ya know it, we’re at track 5 (‘Back In ’74’) where the plot ostensibly takes us to a memory of Burr enterin’ college, but is surreptitiously more about the year Top Dollar gave up on Grand Funk in favor of Josefus. You’re followin’ all of this, right?
Read more →On studio album number twelve (there have also been five official live sets), Weller slings out another ten examples of what he once coined “heavy soul.” His booming, instantly recognizable voice drives songs that run the gamut from the sweeping, Beach Boys inflected widescreen pop of “The Impossible Idea” to the retro folk/pop with somewhat cheesy horns of the strummy “Hopper” and the funky, string enhanced R&B/jazz “She Moves with the Fayre” that features guest trumpet from UK icon Robert Wyatt.
Read more →Don’t bother asking The Mastersons where they’re from. Brooklyn, Austin, Los Angeles, Terlingua; they’ve called each home in just the last few years alone. If you really want to get to know this husband-and-wife duo, the better question to ask is where they’re going. Perhaps more than any other band playing today, The Mastersons live on the road, perpetually in motion and always creating. Movement is their muse. On tour, in the unpredictable adventures and characters they cross,
Read more →We’re still reeling from the two in-store shows we’ve had at Horizon in the Bohemian Café over the last few days. Both SARAH JAROSZ and OLD SALT UNION brought the acoustic-music thunder, and we were thrilled that they both had a packed house to play to. THANK YOU, GREENVILLE! Now let’s get ready for the chaos and surprises of RECORD STORE DAY 2017! Stay tuned for more info!
Read more →‘Bobby Fuller’ finds Chuck coming full circle. He cut the album to tape at Hyde Street Studio in San Francisco, which also happens to be the same studio where Prophet did his very first recording session, while still in high school. Chuck brought out his ’64 Stratocaster for the sessions, conjuring a sound that Jonathan Richman once described as “gasoline in the sand, like a motorcycle at a hot dog stand.” He’s backed by The Mission Express, a band featuring his wife Stephanie Finch (vocals, keyboards, guitar), Kevin White (bass), Vicente Rodriguez (drums, vocals) and James DePrato (guitar).
Read more →Veteran trumpeter Terell Stafford delivers the second installment of saxophonist Herb Harris‘s dynamic “Jazz Masters Unlimited” series production, with the unveiling of Forgive and Forget, providing a forum for Stafford’s talents and improvisational skills. Showcasing a repertoire penned and arranged by Harris, the trumpeter surrounds himself with a formidable quintet that makes his performance here […]
Read more →It’s Snakes features the husband and wife team of Hope Nicholls and Aaron Pitkin from Fetchin Bones, Sugarsmack and Snagglepuss plus long time collaborators Darrin Gray (Snagglepuss) and Greg Walsh (Aqualads). Fetchin Bones and the dynamic idiosyncratic married-couple power-team of vocalist Hope Nicholls and guitarist Aaron Pitkin should be on any list of great North […]
Read more →Randall Bramblett’s distinguished body of work is defined by a triple threat career as an acclaimed solo artist, an in-demand songwriter and a first call sideman. Among the artists who’ve recorded and performed Bramblett’s songs are Bettye LaVette, Hot Tuna, Delbert McClinton and most notably, Bonnie Raitt, who opened her 2014 Grammy winner, Slipstream, with one of his songs. In the ’70s he was a member of the seminal jazz/rock group Sea Level and as a sideman has toured with Gregg Allman, Widespread Panic and Levon Helm. Steve Winwood was such a fan of Bramblett’s keyboard, sax and vocal performances that he made Bramblett his go-to tour mate for 16 years, including the ’94 Traffic reunion.
Read more →The prolific MC, producer and musician Oddisee’s new album, ”The Iceberg,” is a plea for humanity to dig deeper in search of understanding and common ground. ”The Iceberg” is a distillation of stereotypical tropes in hip-hop and beyond, 12 tracks about money, sex, politics, race and religion that appear superficial until his multi-dimensional lyrics unfurl to expose the complexities of individuality and identity: How we see ourselves and how others see us. Deeply soulful, and shot through with jazz, go-go, gospel, thick r&b and hard beats, the album is a timely, poetic statement.
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