Reissue of Clark's 1981 album of gospel and country faith Roy Clark's worn a number of hats during his career. He's been an ace guitar and banjo picker, a national television star (both on Hee-Haw and as a guest host for Johnny Carson), a country and pop hit maker, a pioneer in the Branson theater scene, and a member of both the Grand Ole Opry and the Country Music Hall of Fame. Lesser known is his work in singing gospel and songs of faith. His 1971 release [...]
Highlights from Brubeck's pre- and post-Columbia years By collecting early '50s sides waxed for Fantasy and post-70s sides laid down for Concord and Telarc, this two-disc set tells the story of Brubeck before and after his time at Columbia. The selections taste his earliest work with an octet, trio work with Cal Tjader and Ron Crotty, and his initial liaisons with saxophonist Paul Desmond. It skips the seminal quartet formed with Joe Morello and Eugene Wright, and rejoins Brubeck in the early 80s in a group that included his son Chris on electric bass [...]
West Coast vocal cool meets East Coast instrumental swing Concord Records initiated a new pass through their Original Jazz Classics catalog in March of 2010, and they now add five more titles to the program. Each reissue features a new 24-bit remaster by Joe Tarantino, extensive liner notes, and bonus tracks. By the time of this initial 1958 session for Riverside, Baker had been complementing his trumpet playing with vocal turns for several years. This release expands upon the vocal talent shown in earlier Pacific Jazz sessions: the tone of his voice is still [...]
The boss of the jazz guitar in a stellar '63 trio setting Concord Records initiated a new pass through their Original Jazz Classics catalog in March of 2010, and they now add five more titles to the program. Each reissue features a new 24-bit remaster by Joe Tarantino, extensive liner notes, and bonus tracks. This 1963 set finds jazz guitarist Wes Montgomery at the peak of his creative powers, backed by the talented Mel Rhyne on Hammond B-3 and the sharp-as-a-tack swing of Jimmy Cobb on drums. Montgomery's tone is both smooth and penetrating, [...]
Accomplished L.A. songsmith rocks soulful original pop Bleu (nee William James McAuley) is a Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter whose biggest commercial successes have come from album tracks placed with Disney stars Selena Gomez ("I Won't Apologize") and the Jonas Brothers("That's Just the Way We Roll"), singer/One Tree Hill television star Kate Voegele ("Say Anything"), and indie-rock and pop acts Boys Like Girls, Jon McLaughlin and Ace Enders. It's a resume that prepares listeners for the craft he puts into the details of his songs, but not the soulfulness he puts into his own projects. [...]
The intertwined creativity of Waylon, Willie, Cash and Kristofferson Though Waylon, Willie, Cash and Kristofferson recorded three full albums as The Highwaymen, the foursome had much richer musical relationships than the purpose-built quartet dates. Legacy's 2-disc Essential set documents both their official collaborations under the Highwayman moniker, and the duets and covers that found these artists returning to one another over the course of their careers. In addition to seven songs from the Highwaymen's three albums, this thirty track collection includes solos and duets drawn from the artists' original albums, television and [...]
Original country, folk and gospel songs of faith Singer-songwriter Ed Bruce's career evolved from songwriting ("The Man That Turned My Mama On," "Restless," "Mamas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys," "Texas (When I Die)" for Crystal Gale, Waylon & Willie, and Tanya Tucker) to hit making in the mid-80s, but by the end of the decade he'd turned to acting. He released albums sporadically over the next decade, including the inspirational titles Changed in 2004 and Sing About Jesus [...]
Contemporary bluegrass and gospel songs of faith Rick Lang is a contemporary songwriter whose works have been recorded by a who's-who of modern bluegrass players, including the Lonesome River Band, IIIrd Tyme Out and Southern Rail. Mandolinist Jesse Brock and guitarist John Miller have teamed with a collection of crack singers and acoustic instrumentalists to record fourteen of Lang's tunes. The lead vocalists include Russell Moore, Junior Sisk, Jeff Parker, and Dale Perry, with Brock, Miller and the supremely talented Dale Ann Bradley adding harmonies. Lang writes songs of praise that are filled with [...]
Rock 'n' roll Halloween! Just in time for Halloween, Asheville's Mad Tea Party ( not to be confused with some other Tea Parties that've recently been in the news) unleashes this four-song EP of horror-themed rock 'n' roll. The title track sounds as if the Fugs returned from the grave as a punkabilly band that feeds on the flesh of its own critics. "Possessed" digs up the bones of classic '60s garage rock, with Ami Worthen singing like Elinor Blake fronting the Pandoras, and producer Greg Cartwright ripping a Pebbles -worthy guitar [...]
Legendary jazz pianist's artistic and commercial breakthrough Concord Records initiated a new pass through their Original Jazz Classics catalog in March of 2010, and they now add five more titles to the program. Each reissue features a new 24-bit remaster by Joe Tarantino, extensive liner notes, and bonus tracks. Five additions grace this reissue of Vince Guaraldi's 1962 artistic and commercial breakthrough. The San Francisco pianist has been making a name for himself since the mid-50s, backing Woody Herman, Nina Simone, and Stan Getz, and sitting in with the Cal Tjader Quartet, but his [...]
Spruced-up set of Ray Charles vault finds Of course, this should really be titled "The Previously Undiscovered Masters" since they've obviously been discovered at this point, but that quibble aside, this is an impressive set of ten tracks that were, for one reason or another, left in the can. Waxed in the 70s, 80s and 90s at Charles' RPM International Studios, some of the tracks emerged from the vault completely finished, and some were fleshed out with matching contemporary arrangements. There's soul, blues and jazz, as one would expect from a Ray [...]
Fund-raising collection of country and pop classics Former Arkansas governor, part-time bass player and conservative television pundit Mike Huckabee has joined with singer-songwriter Aaron Tippin and producer James Stroud to create this collection in support of the National Association of Music Merchants Foundation's Wanna Play Fund. The fund sponsors research and public education, raising awareness of music making's educational and health benefits. This CD project will help fund community-based programs that provide music education and instruments to children. Five of the ten tracks (1, 5, 7, 9 and 10) are newly produced (though you'd [...]
A terrific, if too short, collection of the Coopers' songs of faith Wilma Lee & Stoney Cooper were one of country music's most popular husband-and-wife duos for over 40 years, particularly during their stints on the Wheeling Jamboree and the Grand Ole Opry. Lee (nee Leary) began singing gospel music with The Leary Family in the early 1930s, and upon marrying Cooper in 1939 she began singing bluegrass and country as well. The duo signed with Hickory (the house label of the Acuff-Rose publishing empire) in the mid-50s, and hit it big with Don [...]
6 chart-toppers, 14 top-tens, 30 tracks = 2 hours of bliss After the June release of the twelve-track Playlist collection, fans were left wondering if a more complete Dixie Chicks anthology would be issued. That question is answered in the affirmative with this thirty-track 2-CD set that includes all six of the group's Country chart toppers, and fourteen (of seventeen) top-ten hits spanning all four of their studio albums on Sony imprints. That's nine years compressed into two hours over which the trio proves themselves consistently original interpreters [...]
Scare yourself with these chilling horror stories! Pulp writer Michael Avallone's Tales of the Frightened was published as a book of short stories in 1956, and first recorded in 1961 by Boris Karloff for a pair of record albums [ 1 2 ]. The stories have been reprinted many times, but the original Mercury LPs have become quite rare. Avallone's son thought to have the Karloff readings reissued, but decided a fresh approach might be a more interesting goption. He set to work with Australian actor [...]
Good selection of Willie Nelson live material from 1966 through 1979 The Legacy division of Sony continues to explore new ways to keep the CD relevant. Their Playlist series was the first out of the gate with eco-friendly packaging that used 100% recycled cardboard, no plastic, and on-disc PDFs in place of paper booklets. Their new Setlist series follows the same path of a single disc that provides an aficionado's snapshot of an artist's catalog. In this case the anthologies turn from the studio to the stage, pulling together tracks [...]
Watson makes old-school sounds with old-school players Dale Watson has always been a country music militant. But as he's aged, he's moved away from explicit railing against the modern country music establishment, choosing instead to show them up by crafting songs that are more country than "country." Of course, there's some irony in Watson's embrace of an era that was scorned by then-contemporary critics who felt Nashville had irrevocably compromised the hillbilly roots of earlier times with the introduction of electric guitars and drums. But one can easily trace the DNA shared by the [...]
Terrific spin on paisley, psych and sunshine pop These leftovers from the sessions that produced 2009's Bonfires on the Heath include several memorable mélanges. The title track brings to mind the baroque sounds of the Left Banke, the paisley patterns of the Rain Parade and the sunshine pop of Curt Boettecher. The second track, "Jerry" is even more beguiling, feinting towards progrock with its opening, but quickly giving way to vocal harmonies reminiscent of the Robbs and Three O'Clock, with drifiting piano and a melodic bass displaced by [...]
Live Airplane flights from 1966 to 1972 The Legacy division of Sony continues to explore new ways to keep the CD relevant. Their Playlist series was the first out of the gate with eco-friendly packaging that used 100% recycled cardboard, no plastic, and on-disc PDFs in place of paper booklets. Their new Setlist series follows the same path of a single disc that provides an aficionado's snapshot of an artist's catalog. In this case the anthologies turn from the studio to the stage, pulling together tracks from an artist's live [...]
Live Airplane flights from 1966 to 1972 The Legacy division of Sony continues to explore new ways to keep the CD relevant. Their Playlist series was the first out of the gate with eco-friendly packaging that used 100% recycled cardboard, no plastic, and on-disc PDFs in place of paper booklets. Their new Setlist series follows the same path of a single disc that provides an aficionado's snapshot of an artist's catalog. In this case the anthologies turn from the studio to the stage, pulling together tracks from an artist's live [...]
Hyperbolium
Avicii – Two Million
Beck – I Just Started Hating Some People Today
iamamiwhoami: kin - Teaser
