Tagged: reissue

I learned a great many things today. The first one being that it is actually possible to be locked inside your own apartment building. Sometime after that I learned about a dude named Liam Betson who has been releasing music under the moniker Liam the Younger for quite some time now. I know I can't be the only one who missed out on After the Graveyard or Clear Skies Over Black River - as both albums have recently been re-released Underwater Peoples and Liam's own label, A Learning Computer . [...]

Here at HAD, we are of two minds when it comes to the imminent "two disc" reissues of classic records. With bands we obsessed over before the reissues, they can be a bit of a let down: sometimes they don't include one or two key tracks, sometimes the ordering is less than ideal, and (let's be honest) it just hurts to see the tracks you paid hundreds of dollars to obtain as import B-Sides on one convenient $15 bonus disc. However, with bands for whom we had never invested that level of time and money the two [...]

Righteous Brother goes solo in 1968 and 1969 Following his 1968 break with fellow Righteous Brother Bobby Hatfield, Bill Medley kicked off a solo career with this pair of releases for MGM. Both albums grazed the bottom of the Billboard 200, and three singles ("I Can't Make it Alone" and "Brown Eyed Woman" from the first album, "Peace Brother Peace" from the second) charted short of the Top 40. It would be Medley's last solo chart action for more than a decade, as he'd reteam with Hatfield in 1974 and forgo solo releases for [...]

Glen Campbell lights up the Tokyo stage in 1975 Originally released only in Japan, this 54-minute set found Campbell entertaining with a tightly-paced set at Tokyo's Kosei Nenkin Hall in May 1975. The chart-topping run Campbell had started with 1967's "Gentle on My Mind" was slipping ever so slightly lower by the early '70s, as his television program ended in 1972. Campbell's albums started to edge out of the Top 10 and his singles out of the Top 20, but three days before this show, he released "Rhinestone Cowboy," and rode it [...]

Country-charting 1970s Nashville pop Jody Miller's recording catalog is often abbreviated to her first hit, the Grammy-winning "Queen of the House," and though its novelty answer to Roger Miller's "King of the Road" may get the most spins on nostalgia radio, it's hardly representative of her lengthy hit-making career. Her personal appearances on teen shows Hollywood-A-Go-Go and Shindig positioned her for pop success, but her follow-up singles found only middling results and failed to cross back over to the country chart. She had only one other hit for Capitol (the [...]

If you're a fan of both Sparklehorse and vinyl, you know how hard it is to land a copy of what some would argue is their best album (including me) , It's A Wonderful Life . On Ebay, an original and only pressing of the record goes from $99-$199 depending on condition. Fans can get excited as It's A Wonderful Life and Dreamt For Light Years In The Belly Of The Mountain will get the 180 gram deluxe gatefold reissue treatment. I haven't seen any news for this because an official statement [...]

Cirith Ungol Servants Of Chaos Metal Blade 30 January 2012 by Von Don't know who Cirith Ungol were ? In a nutshell, there were hard rock/proto-metal pioneers turned doom heroes with a hard-on for fantasy literature and some of the coolest album covers around. Go and listen to Frost And Fire [...]

Chicago based Alona's Dream Records made their debut recently with a reissue of a 45 originally released in 1965 by The Ravens . Hailing from the Chicago suburb of Wheaton, IL the band included high school students Michael Blasucci, Tony Pavolonis, Dick Blasucci, Phil Special, and a 16 year old future Blues Brother named John Belushi. The band self released a single, "Listen To Me Now" backed with a cover of The Kingsmen 's "Jolly Green Giant" in 1965, with fewer than 50 copies being produced. The reissue is limited as [...]

March 20th is the release date for The Bizarros "Complete Collection 1976-19803 on Windian Records . Formed in Akron, Ohio in the mid 70s, The Bizarros released just a few singles and a lone LP before tapering off in 1981. The 25 track "Complete Collection 1976-19803 double LP contains tunes from all their releases, as well a a few live tracks, and some demos originally intended to be used for a second album. Pressed in an edition of 1000 copies, with the first 100 on clear vinyl, the record will be available [...]

The Reissue is a brand new feature, taking a monthly look at four albums from 10, 20, 30, and 40 years ago, all of a certain ilk, aesthetic, genre, or style. Some of these albums are not widely available for purchase on vinyl, and some have been reissued at some point. More importantly, these are the albums that we should be talking about in 2012 - again. The first installment is all about the Drone. "Which is more musical: a truck passing by a factory or a truck passing by a music school?" -John [...]

"Machine Gun Etiquette", the 1979 album by The Damned is one of the greatest punk albums ever and if you've never had a copy in your collection, now's the time. Due in mid February from Drastic Plastic Records , the album has been fully remastered by the pros at Masterdisk, and pressed in a limited edition of 1000 copies, with 500 being on blue vinyl and the other 500 on 180 gram vinyl. This album features killer Damned tracks like Smash It Up, I Just Can't Be Happy Today, Love Song, and more, and is [...]

Just in time for Valentines Day, you can pick up this incredible reissue of the Tronics classic Love Backed by Force . Sure, it came out decades ago, but you can definitely throw it right into the current mix, and it would fit right along side bands like Beat Happening or Television Personalities -both solid bands in my book. The good people over at Whats Your Rupture will be releasing the album February 14th for all you fans of art-pop, [...]

• Tronics - They're Talking About Us

Two-fer from early '60s Cameo-Parkway vocal group Shortly before the Collectors' Choice label was sold to Super D , they embarked upon an ambitious program of reissues from the Cameo-Parkway catalog. The Cameo-Parkway tapes had mostly sat idle in ABKCO's vault ever since Allen Klein acquired them in the late '60s, and the first program of legitimate reissues began in 2005 with a series of Best Of's, including a volume on this Philadelphia vocal group. Five years later, a series of two-fers returned full, original albums to print, including this pairing [...]

The charming singing career of a talented actress There have been many actors whose musical aspirations out-distance their vocal abilities. Not so for Connie Stevens, whose singles and albums for Warner Brothers were sung with both charm and talent. Though best remembered for co-starring roles in 77 Sunset Strip and Hawaiian Eye , Stevens sang these early-to-mid '60s sides in a voice that conveyed both sweet innocence and Hollywood sophistication. Better yet, Warner Brothers often supplied her with very good material, top-notch arrangements by Don Ralke, Perry Botkin Jr., and Neal [...]

Superb folk-pop singles from an under-known '60s vocalist Shelby Flint had but one Top-40 single, 1961's "Angel on My Shoulder," but the purity of her voice, the quality of her technique and the sophistication of her melodic sensibility has been enough to sustain a music career. Perhaps even more important is that, uncharacteristically for "girl singers" of the early 1960s, she wrote much of her own material. From these early singles, recorded for the Valiant label, you can hear her combining folk, pop and especially jazz in her phrasing and tone. Her jazz leanings [...]

Holiday odds and sods from the legendary Cameo Parkway vault With the departure of Gordon Anderson from Collectors' Choice, and the apparent sidelining of the label's activities, their reissue program for the Cameo-Parkway catalog has moved with Anderson to his new label, Real Gone. This eighteen-track set of holiday-themed material combines tunes from two of the label's stars, Bobby Rydell and Chubby Checker and two of the label's fine doo-wop groups, the Cameos and Jaynells. The track-list features a number of fun one-offs, including Bob Seger's rock 'n' soul "Sock it to Me Santa," [...]

Holiday odds and sods from the legendary Cameo Parkway vault With the departure of Gordon Anderson from Collectors' Choice, and the apparent sidelining of the label's activities, their reissue program for the Cameo-Parkway catalog has moved with Anderson to his new label, Real Gone. This eighteen-track set of holiday-themed material combines tunes from two of the label's stars, Bobby Rydell and Chubby Checker and two of the label's fine doo-wop groups, the Cameos and Jaynells. The track-list features a number of fun one-offs, including Bob Seger's rock 'n' soul "Sock it to Me Santa," [...]

Theatrical Hammond organ takes on standards Edwin "Buddy" Cole's Hammond albums are probably better known by sight than sound. The album covers – particularly Have Organ, Will Swing and Powerhouse! – are treasured icons of the space-age bachelor pad genre, seen by many, but actually heard by few. Surprisingly, the music inside isn't particularly exotic. Cole was more of a lush, theater organ stylist (a job he'd actually held in the 1930s) than a bluesy howler, and though he had significant chops as a jazz pianist, they were spent mostly [...]

Excellent shows from August 1971, long-lost at sea The Grateful Dead were far ahead of their time in many respects, but none perhaps more so than the breadth, depth and quality of the tapes they archived (and as will be described below, occasionally lost) from their legendary live shows. The Dick's Picks series was named for and originally curated by the band's tape archivist, Dick Latvala. Following Latvala's passing in 1999, the series was continued by the band's current archivist David Lemieux. In contrast to the multi-track remixes released under the [...]

Elvis caps his remarkable comeback Recorded in 1970 and released in 1971, Elvis Country was the culmination of a remarkable career resurrection. Starting with his 1968 Comeback Special , Elvis went on to reel off the brilliant From Elvis in Memphis (and the second-helping, Back in Memphis ), the smartly constructed Vegas show of On Stage , and the studio/live That's the Way It Is . [...]