Remembering Charlie Watts, born on this day in 1941. —Ed. Step back in time with me, won’t you, to the year 1965, when Dylan went electric, The Beatles went “Nowhere Man,” and a scruffy English R&B band called the The Rolling Stones released The Rolling Stones No. 2, which included a few tentative attempts at […]
Like David Byrne and Paul Simon, Peter Gabriel fell hard for world music. Unlike his fellow aesthetes, Gabriel is afflicted with terminal cases of both gravitas and bombast. The former Genesis front man may have injected that band’s music with a degree of absurdist levity (at least live) uncommon in a genre, progressive rock, not […]
Celebrating Ronnie Wood on his 76th birthday. —Ed. If your idea of heaven would be a cross between the Rolling Stones and the Faces, then Ronnie Wood’s your man. He’s done stints in both bands after all, and while I infinitely prefer his work with the Faces (he kinda disappeared into the Stones machine, in […]
If you dig rhythm and are unfamiliar with percussionist-bandleader Ray Barretto, jeepers creepers are you in for a substantial series of treats. And in a sweet turn of events, Craft Latino, the Craft Recordings subsidiary that specializes in reissuing prime Latin heat from numerous labels including Fania (the imprint’s logo a reliable sign of quality), […]
Over the years, many compilation albums of the music of The Kinks have been released. Reprise Records, the group’s first American record label, famously released the double-album set The Kinks Kronicles in 1972. The impetus behind the release was the group leaving the label and signing with RCA. Reprise actually created an excellent and still […]
Having previously played on three 2st century albums by Tropicalia kingpin Caetano Veloso, the Brazilian multi-instrumentalist, vocalist, and songwriter Ricardo Dias Gomes released his debut solo album in 2015. He’s remained productive since, with his latest Muito Sol scheduled for release June 9 on vinyl (500 copies, black) and digital through Hive Mind Records. Recorded […]
Remembering John Bonham in advance of his birthdate tomorrow. —Ed. Now listen here: Once upon a time there was a band called Led Zeppelin, and they laid down more barbaric heavy metal riffs than anybody, ever. They came from the land of ice and snow, and produced a Hun-like din, and if you heard them […]
People often associate Christian Rock with an aura of the milquetoast, enough so that describing the genre as rock can register as a wee bit inappropriate. At its beginnings however, Christian Rock (yet to have a name) was an appealingly unkempt affair inhabiting the countercultural fringe. Jesus People Music, Vol. 2: The Reckoning, released jointly […]
Remembering Levon Helm, born on this day in 1940. —Ed. Talk about your survivors; legendary Band drummer/vocalist Levon Helm was 69 years old when he released 2009’s wonderful (and moving) Electric Dirt, and he packed a whole lot of very hard living (and a near fatal case of throat cancer) into those 69 years. But […]
Miserablism may be an “ism” of my own devising but it’s a very real thing, and its sufferers—if they’re of the cynical bent, and most are—tend towards the use of industrial strength sarcasm. Take musical miserablist Harvey Williams’ name for his late ‘80s/early ‘90s solo project, Another Sunny Day. It’s every bit as sarcastic as […]
Celebrating Paul Weller, born on this day in 1958. —Ed. In the year punk broke, 1977, The Jam carried with them a whiff of a year far past, namely 1965. Paul Weller brought punk’s jacked-up velocity and coiled tension to the band’s debut LP, In the City, but the LP is also steeped in the […]
On May 26, Craft Recordings’ relaunch of the Original Jazz Classic series continues with a reissue of Thelonious Monk with John Coltrane on 180 gram black vinyl tucked into a tip-on jacket with an obi strip. It offers essential documentation of a key collaboration in Modern Jazz. By the latter half of the 1950s the […]
Continuing to reissue some of the best jazz music in bespoke audiophile editions, Craft Recordings has released Birth of Bop: The Savoy 10-inch LP Collection, a five-disc, 10-inch vinyl box set, that is easily one of the best jazz vinyl box sets of the year and which celebrates the 80th anniversary of Savoy Records. The […]
Real Gone Music just keeps on rolling with the inspired reissues in 2023 and even finds time to include some new sounds in the mix. Dionne Warwick’s The Complete Scepter Singles 1962-1973 3CD (limited to 3,000 copies), Mary Mundy’s Mother Nature LP (1,000 copies), Roslyn & Charles’ Everything Must Change LP (1,000 copies), The Donnas’ […]
Celebrating Phil Selway, born on this day in 1967. —Ed. Not long after Radiohead released 2000’s Kid A, my friend Patrick and I gave it a scathing review without having actually listened to it, on the basis that its only appeal was to depressives better served by listening to the Archies. We also surmised that […]
