VIA PRESS RELEASE | In 1994, The Brand New Heavies shot from underground acid jazz favourites to mainstream success with Brother Sister.

Packed with hits—”Dream On Dreamer,” “Midnight At The Oasis,” “Back To Love,” and “Spend Some Time”—the album balanced sophisticated musicianship with insistent soul grooves, heightened by the gorgeous soul tones of vocalist N’Dea Davenport and the band’s shimmering live feel. Ultimately Brother Sister became their highest peaking album with a #4 UK Chart position leading a strong selection of international chart placings. Its success continued with a BRIT Award nomination for Best Dance Act and an MTV MVA nomination for “Dream On Dreamer.”

Now The Brand New Heavies celebrate the impact of Brother Sister with the release of its 30th Anniversary Remastered & Expanded Editions on September 27th. They launch the album by sharing one of Andrew Levy’s personal favourites, “Put Yourself In My Shoes” (Demo ft N’Dea Davenport and Jan Kincaid) which really highlights the splendour and power of N’Dea’s voice.

The 30th Anniversary Deluxe Edition features the original Brother Sister album, which has been freshly remastered by Tom Parker, feels just as fresh and invigorating as it did all those years ago. CD1 is completed with three additional tracks: “Los Burritos” from the US version of the album, and two exemplary B-sides from the era—”Baby Don’t Use Me” and “Touch of Your Love”— both of which demonstrate just how deep their inspiration ran.

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It’s already been a busy 2024 for Craft Recordings Latino, as the label has placed some prime reissues in the racks with more releases available for pre-order. Thoughts are found below on Vagabundeando! Hangin’ Out by the Joe Cuba Sextet, Cañonazo by Johnny Pacheco, Gypsy Woman by Joe Bataan, The Big Break – La Gran Fuga by Willie Colón with Hector Lavoe, and Latin-Soul-Rock by the Fania-All Stars. All are available on vinyl and digital now except for Cañonazo; that one’s scheduled to hit stores September 13.

Formed in the mid-1950s in New York City, the Joe Cuba Sextet was a well-honed unit by the time of Vagabundeando! Hangin’ Out’s recording in 1964. It was the band’s third LP and the first for Tico Records after two for the Seeco label. Cuba had already cut a few albums, including one with an orchestra, prior to debuting his sextet on wax in 1961, but from that point they remained the conguero bandleader’s focus for the rest of the decade and into the next.

Known as the Father of Latin Boogaloo, Cuba was still a couple years away from unveiling that stylistic milestone. Instead, Vagabundeando! Hangin’ Out delivers a strong Afro-Cuban thrust with a considerable Salsa vibe and a rich tonal spectrum, as two alternating vocalists, Cheo Feliciano, singing in Spanish, and Jimmy Sabater, crooning in English, complete the lineup.

Ballads? Oh, yes, but they don’t dominate the proceedings. Vibraphonist Tommy Berrios lends a distinct flavor, forceful and in the pocket rather than mallet spillage riding roughshod, as Cuba, bassist Jules Cordero and pianist Nick Jiménez establish a foundation that’s sturdy but flexible. Everything comes together in the slowed-down groove potency of “El Ratón,” the album’s highpoint amongst a handful of standouts.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | Acclaimed archival label Light in the Attic (LITA) continues their partnership with legendary singer, actress, activist, and icon Nancy Sinatra with a definitive reissue of her 1966 album Nancy In London.

Originally released on the heels of her hit debut album, Boots, and her sophomore follow-up How Does That Grab You?, the album was cut in three days at Pye Studios where The Kinks, Petula Clark, and David Bowie recorded their songs in the mid-1960s. By going directly to the source and choosing songs like “On Broadway,” “Wishin’ and Hopin’,” and “This Little Bird,” the album has an unequivocally British feel. The album also includes Nancy and Lee Hazlewood’s timeless duet “Summer Wine.”

Due out September 6th in vinyl, CD, and digital formats, with the LP edition being offered on classic black wax and special limited-edition colored wax (including “Summer Wine” red or “Little Bird Blue” with peach splatter)—click here to pre-order. All formats feature audio freshly remastered from the original analog tapes by GRAMMY®-nominated engineer John Baldwin.

Pressed at Record Technology, Inc. (RTI), the vinyl edition is presented in an expanded gatefold jacket accompanied by a 20-page booklet (featuring a new Q&A with Sinatra conducted by the reissue’s GRAMMY®-nominated co-producer Hunter Lea, plus never-before-seen photos from the artist’s personal archive). All music configurations, plus limited-edition autographed vinyl, will also be made available at Nancy’s Bootique.

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Remembering Martin Phillipps. —Ed.

For some, the two early 1990s releases from New Zealand’s The Chills, Submarine Bells and Soft Bomb, served as a doorway of introduction to one of the finest tunesmiths in the whole pop-rock shebang. But for folks who were previously clued-in to the band’s work for the Flying Nun label, these albums, both cut for Slash Records, represent leader and sole constant Chill Martin Phillipps’ already considerable pop ambitions in full flower. Both albums are available through Fire Records.

Although it was never my preferred format, back in 1990 when Submarine Bells came out, I was still in the habit of occasionally buying music on cassette. I mention this because I did indeed initially purchase Bells on that very format, a decision spurred by impatience, as on my visit, the store didn’t have any copies in stock.

This pained me a little at the time, but I also knew I could remove the shrink wrap and pop that tape right into the car’s deck for immediate listening out on the highway, which was enticing as The Chills’ sound, which flows from a jangle pop/ indie pop fount with tangible if savvy nods to the 1960s, is well-suited for vehicular absorption. Upon reflection, Submarine Bells hits something of an apex in the windows down volume up mode, beginning with one of the band’s signature tunes, “Heavenly Pop Hit.”

That song’s stature relates largely to pure skill in the construction, but as said up above, Submarine Bells was many folks’ intro to The Chills, and sequenced on that album first, “Heavenly Pop Hit” no doubt deepened this first impression. Along with reaching No. 2 on the New Zealand singles chart (the album hit No. 1, as The Chills weren’t an u-ground thing at home), it snuck into the UK singles sales list at No. 97 and even made the Alternative Airplay chart in the US at No. 17.

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The Beatles confidently proclaimed that “Love is all you need” during the summer of—well, you know—love (1967). And while no one can argue with the fabs’ proclamation, the 21st century finds human beings on a search to define exactly what love is and how it can mean so many different things to just as many people. We each have our own love language, but just like everything else on planet Earth, it’s our individual perceptions of those feelings that sometimes cause our miscommunications.

Enter Suzanne Jamieson who has released a string of albums that aren’t exactly children’s music, they’re more like bundles of concepts and catchy music appropriate for the whole family. Her newest album is titled Love Is… and explores varied paradigms of love, providing context for each exploration backed with a purely pop production provided by co-producer and co-writer—and three time Grammy nominee—Jason Rabinowitz who himself has been recognized for his work with his children’s group, The Pop Ups.

So, hang out with Suzanne and me as we discuss her new album, performing for a diverse audience, and a few special friends that she and I have in common. We can all agree that love is all we need, but let’s take a moment with Suzanne to explore exactly what love is.

Evan Toth is a songwriter, professional musician, educator, radio host, avid record collector, and hi-fi aficionado. Toth hosts and produces The Evan Toth Show and TVD Radar on WFDU, 89.1 FM. Follow him at the usual social media places and visit his website.

I can imagine a planet whose inhabitants listen only to AC/DC. The same cannot be said for Television, Iggy Pop, Harry Chapin, The Cars, Canned Heat, The Velvet Underground, Joni Mitchell, The Swans, T. Rex, U2, The Indigo Girls, The Supremes, The Clash, Joan Jett, The White Stripes, Wilco, Green Day, Jethro Tull, or Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes. I can imagine a planet whose inhabitants listen only to Barry Manilow, but I don’t want to.

Aussie brutalists with filthy minds and even filthier riffs, AC/DC only knew how to do one thing, and they did it with puritanical austerity; they make the Ramones sound positively baroque. When you’re a hammer everything looks like a nail, and like any simple (but anything but dumb) tool AC/DC knew their function—during their tenure on this planet they kept it missionary position simple, pounding out primal riff after primal riff, album after album, year after year, decade after decade, with nary a synthesizer, ballad (power or otherwise), concept album, string section, or abortive disco move to sully their bad reputation (although they used bagpipes once!).

They kept things as basic as an electric chair, and theirs has been the preferred method of execution for generations of metalheads savvy enough to understand that songs with more than three chords in them (are you paying attention, Rush and Metallica?) are wastes of perfectly good chords. The things don’t grow on trees, you know. There are only 4,083 of them, and if you play them all music’s finished! AC/DC were musical conservationists, and one rock’s biggest contributors to the Save the Chords Foundation.

Only one thing changed in AC/DC’s long, drunken tour bus ride on the highway to hell’s bells. I’m talking, of course, about Bon Scott’s booze-related death on February 19, 1980. Scott was the personification of rock ’n’ roll—no matter what he was singing about it came out sounding like a dirty joke, and you got the idea he had to have his tonsils into the car mechanic’s every six weeks to have them degreased.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | Oscilloscope Laboratories in conjunction with MVD Entertainment Group announce the release of Not Not Jazz via video on demand, Blu-ray, and DVD on August 9th.

The documentary, directed by Jason Miller and produced by Tyler Davidson, Jim Stark, and Elie Weiss, is an in-depth look at the unique and wholly improvisational creative process of the revolutionary “avant-groove” band Medeski Martin & Wood, as they endeavor to record a new album at the famed Allaire Studio, twenty-five years after their formation. The film premiered at the Woodstock Film Festival—not far from where the documentary was filmed in New York’s Hudson Valley—and most recently screened during the Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, TN this past spring.

Director Jason Miller notes: “I am deeply grateful to have met John, Billy, and Chris and to have been entrusted with documenting their process as musicians and exploring their personal lives. It’s been a long and arduous journey to get the film made and released, and I learned a lot from them along the way. It’s my hope that everyone who watches the film will take something away as well.”

Medeski Martin & Wood is a group that effortlessly straddles the gap between avant-garde improvisation and accessible groove-based jazz. They have simultaneously earned standing as relentlessly innovative musicians and as an enormously popular act. Emerging out of the New York Downtown scene in the early ’90s, MMW soon set out on endless cross-country tours before returning home to Manhattan to further refine their sound through myriad influential experimentations.

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