VIA PRESS RELEASE | GRAMMY® Award-winning legendary hip-hop collective and Rock and Roll Hall of Fame® Inductees Public Enemy celebrate the 35th anniversary of their seminal sophomore offering, It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back, with a very special new vinyl edition out November 10, 2023 via Universal Music Enterprises’ (UMe). Fittingly, the release also coincides with UMe’s continued celebration of rap’s 50th birthday, Hip-Hop 50, as well.

It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back will be available in either 4-LP 180gram vinyl and 2LP 180 gram vinyl—pressed on limited-run red or standard. The 4LP package features bonus tracks from the Deluxe 2CD, extensive new liner notes penned by Chuck D, Flavor Flav, Q-Tip, and Questlove, and a 12×12 sticker insert of the instantly recognizable Public Enemy logo.

Speaking on this release, Chuck D said, “Thanks to Run-DMC, LL Cool J, and Whodini, we knew that hip-hop albums could explode on cassettes. At about the same time, Hank Shocklee was the manager of a record store, and he would point out how rock bands like Iron Maiden, The Rolling Stones, and even Bruce Springsteen were getting the most out of the album concept. So, we took that and went further with It Takes a Nation, approaching it like a rock band. It ended up becoming a part of rap’s evolution from a singles-driven genre into the dawn of rap’s album age.”

Public Enemy first dropped It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back on an unsuspecting world on June 28, 1988. Nothing would ever be the same in its wake. It not only climbed to #1 on the Billboard 200 and went platinum, but it also carved out a place in history thanks to singles such as “Rebel Without a Pause,” “Bring the Noise,” “Don’t Believe the Hype,”and many more. It yielded an unprecedented collision of jazz fluidity, punchy funk, and fascinating sample alchemy with provocative, powerful, and poetic wordplay about everything from race to revolution.

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Remembering John Entwistle, born on this day in 1944. —Ed.

The Who Sell Out, released in 1967 and the group’s third album, was a major breakthrough for The Who. It was the group’s first album that proved throughout that the band was more than a post-R&B, heavy English pop band. The thematic concept album presaged Tommy—which was more ambitious and a double album—by two years. With The Who Sell Out, Townshend and The Who offered a concept album, but one that was light and fun.

The album did include “I Can See for Miles,” another of the group’s dynamic hits, but it was now clear that Pete Townshend was a songwriter with lofty goals and the talent to back it up. The album featured faux radio commercials and station IDs with songs that reflected new pop ideas about commerce and youth culture, often from a very English point of view.

This new 180-gram vinyl reissue, which was remastered by Jon Astley, cut by Miles Showell at Abbey Road, and pressed in Germany at Optimal, comes on the heels of the 2020 deluxe CD box and vinyl remaster of the album. At first this new vinyl album remaster, particularly in terms of the vocals, doesn’t sound quite as bright as previous reissues and, in fact, at times it sounds best when the fake radio material is presented.

The album package comes complete with an OBI-strip, the original psychedelic poster that came with the record and a certificate of authentication, but the LP is only in a paper sleeve. Overall, however, this Abbey Road remaster is a worthy addition for Who fans.

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Feel free to call the Welsh-English band Swansea Sound one of the most exhilarating blasts of fresh ear to waft across the proverbial Pond since the pandemic. And feel free to call Swansea Sound a supergroup—although they’d have a hearty laugh at the term—seeing as how the band boasts members of such UK icons as Heavenly, the Pooh Sticks, Talulah Gosh, the Dentists, and Death in Vegas. And by all means feel free to call their recently released sophomore LP, the wondrously tuneful and wickedly smart Twentieth Century, the winner of the Great UK post-C86 Indie Pop Sweepstakes. But whatever you do, don’t call them twee.

I recently had the opportunity to chat with Swansea Sound bassist/guitarist and songwriter Rob Pursey (formerly of Talulah Gosh and Heavenly) and vocalist/keyboardist Amelia Fletcher (formerly of Talulah Gosh, Heavenly, and the Pooh Sticks) about the band, whose other members include Wales’ Hue Williams of Pooh Sticks fame, former Dentists guitarist Bob Collins, and Death in Vegas drummer Ian Button. Well also had the opportunity to discuss the bliss-enhancing properties of their new album. But before we got down to brass tacks, Fletcher and Pursey were more than happy to school me on the evil “twee” word.

Said Fletcher, “I think we’ve got used to it now. We didn’t like it at first because it was mainly used in the sense of fey and we thought we were really quite punk rock.” Added Pursey, “At the time it was a misogynist term. It pertained to women who didn’t like rock chicks or men who wore glasses and perhaps read books.” Fletcher went on to add, “In England it wouldn’t have become an acceptable term but in America it didn’t have as much of a negative aspect to it. People would say quite proudly that they liked twee and were twee and twee was their favorite kind of music. So it came back to the UK and it was like ‘Okay, we’re going to have to accept this’ because so many people were proud to be twee.’” And while they’ve hardly embraced the term, Swansea Sound have certainly had fun with it, even going so far as to print up “Riot Twee” t-shirts. I would kill for one, but they’ve long since sold out.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | BMG announces the latest instalment in Bryan Ferry’s career-spanning reissue collection. On 17th November Bryan’s ninth solo studio album Mamouna will be reissued for the first time since its initial release in 1994. Available in a deluxe expanded edition, the release celebrates the 30th anniversary of a unique chapter in Bryan Ferry’s solo catalogue, and will also feature a second, previously unreleased studio album titled Horoscope.

The gatefold 2LP edition includes the Mamouna and Horoscope albums, both mastered by Bob Ludwig, while the 3CD deluxe edition features an additional disc, Sketches, including 10 tracks of rarities and outtakes chronicling the genesis of Ferry’s songwriting for the Mamouna project, mastered at Metropolis Studios by John Davis.

The announcement coincides with the 50th anniversary of Bryan Ferry’s solo career which started in 1973 with the album These Foolish Things. The news closely follows last year’s Roxy Music arena tour of North America and the UK, widely acclaimed by critics and fans for their stunning live performances of some of the most cherished and celebrated songs in popular music.

Originally released in 1994, Mamouna ended a seven-year gap in new material from Ferry. The Mamouna album story begins after he completed his 1988 /1989 world tour, following the success of 1987 album Bête Noire. In 1989 he started working on a collection of new songs under the project title Horoscope. The work was suspended in 1992 whilst he worked on an album of cover songs, Taxi, released in 1993.

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Remembering Glenn Branca, born on this day in 1948. —Ed.

“Lesson No. 1” is Glenn Branca’s first release as a composer, originally issued in 1980 as a mini-LP on the 99 Records label. Not only does it stand as an avant-garde debut of remarkable assurance, it’s also a strikingly prescient document, sounding in retrospect like a harbinger of indie rock to come.

It was during the late-‘80s that many young underground rock listeners first encountered the name Glenn Branca, in large part due to the composer/guitarist’s association with Sonic Youth. For folks under the sway of Evol, Sister, and Daydream Nation, those LPs served as a gateway into a subterranean, art-drenched New York City that was extremely alluring, especially to suburbanites who perceived their immediate surroundings as being conspicuously lacking in worthwhile cultural activity.

Those residing in other large US cities often decried NYC’s significance as the country’s art Mecca, but for thousands of young people stuck in towns devoid of an extant scene, reading about and hearing the recorded evidence of the city’s defiant underbelly proved a fascinating antidote to the nagging strains of ‘80’s conformity.

Inquiring minds could browse text on Glenn Branca pretty easily in this era, since his symphonies for multi-guitar orchestras and percussion made for good copy, as did that connection to Sonic Youth and his impact upon Tin Machine, the unjustly maligned crew of the Sales brothers, Reeves Gabrels, and David Bowie (the group once cited their influences as Gene Krupa, Charles Mingus, Jimi Hendrix, Branca, and Mountain.)

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We all know that crime doesn’t pay, but that doesn’t stop the world’s fascination with it. What is it about the seedy underbelly of our social structures that makes it such an intriguing topic? And there are no shortage of types of criminal activities to explore: white-collar crime, violent crimes, crimes of passion, cyber crime, and even crimes of the heart. How can we think about these things without glorifying them? It’s also a study of our individual morals: what you think is a crime, might be fine with me.

Harper Simon has chosen to explore these topics in a brand-new, wide-ranging, multimedia project titled, Meditations on Crime. What began as a music project eventually morphed into a book containing essays, artwork, a short film, and an album. It’s a thought provoking thesis that examines the unfortunately, ever-present entity of crime in our lives.

While we’ve all had criminal activities touch us in different ways, it’s those uncomfortable experiences that might bring us together in an exploration of crime—and in a more complicated way—it invites us to ask the question of what do we do about it?

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.

Celebrating Kevin Cronin on his 72nd birthday. —Ed.

I love this album, you most likely loathe this album, and you know what? I don’t give a shit! Feel free to mock this 1978 classic for its stupid title and awful cover, and even to hold your nose at the music contained within said cover, but be aware that proud know-nothings such as yours truly simply laugh at such criticism before drowning it out with the totally brilliant opening track, “Roll with the Changes.”

I’ll be the first to admit You can Tune a piano… isn’t the perfect album. The perfect REO album would include such earlier gems as “Ridin’ the Storm Out,” “Keep Pushin’,” “Anti Establishment Man,” and–it goes without saying–”Prison Women,” which includes such immortal poesy as “Like tears to a mouse, a biting to a clam” and “Life from limping eyes, yeah.” And how could I have forgotten “Light Up,” which is actually a Styx song but who’s counting?

You can Tune a piano… was the Champlain, Illinois band’s seventh LP in as many years, and it was the one that answered the question, “If this bunch of journeymen hacks really insists upon sucking, why can’t they at least sell a few records while they’re at it?” The critics hated ‘em; hell, even the rare plaudits they did receive were back-handed ones at best. “Pioneers of AOR schlock-rock schlock-pop,” Village Voice scribe Robert Christgau called them, and I think he meant it as a compliment.

But populist types like this guy knew better. Sure, their albums were uneven–a fate shared by You can Tune a piano… –but they all showed glimmers of originality; say what you will about the hard-charging “Roll with the Changes,” it’s anything but your hard rock same old same old. On it Gary Richrath lets loose on guitar, Neil Doughty struts his stuff on Hammond organ, and vocalist Kevin Cronin almost doesn’t sound like a pussy, and it evokes images of the band as entertainers on a 19th Mississippi riverboat, say the one in Herman Melville’s 1857 novel The Confidence Man. Although I suspect that’s just me.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | Iconic Artists Group (Iconic) is proud to announce the October 27 release of Linda Ronstadt’s a Merry Little Christmas on vinyl for the first time, and as a CD reissue.

Originally released in October of 2000, it became the best-selling Christmas album of the year and continues to be part of countless families’ holiday celebrations. For this gift-giving season, three colored vinyl versions of a Merry Little Christmas will be available for purchase: Metallic Silver (click here to preorder), Evergreen (exclusively at shop.lindaronstadt.com), and Poinsettia Red (exclusively at Barnes & Noble). The CD is available for preorder here.

A welcoming window into Linda Ronstadt’s favorite songs of the season, a Merry Little Christmas includes such yuletide classics as “White Christmas” (a duet with Rosemary Clooney), “I’ll Be Home For Christmas,” “Away In A Manger,” “Silent Night,” and “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas,” plus an emotive rendition of Joni Mitchell’s “River,” along with traditional Welsh and English carols, and more, all beautifully wrapped in the comforts of Linda’s warm and familiar voice.

a Merry Little Christmas was recorded at Jim Brady Studios in Tucson, at Recital Halls at the University of Arizona, at Ocean Way Nashville, and the infamous Capitol Studios in Los Angeles. This classic holiday album was produced by John Boylan and George Massenburg.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | In his 50-year tenure as conductor of The Boston Pops, Arthur Fiedler transformed the Boston Symphony Orchestra offshoot into perhaps the most renowned pops orchestra in the world.

A natural showman, the maestro fervently believed in broadening the reach of classical music to a wide audience. He famously incorporated the music of The Beatles into his programs and began the tradition of the Pops concert and fireworks every July 4th on Boston’s Esplanade. Under his auspices, The Boston Pops made more recordings than any other orchestra in the world. Along with the Fourth, one holiday was closely associated with Fiedler and the Pops: Christmas!

The orchestra introduced Leroy Anderson’s now-classic “Sleigh Ride” in 1948, and the very next year recorded it for RCA Victor. That first-ever recording, shockingly never before issued on CD, opens Real Gone Music and Second Disc Records’ definitive celebration of Arthur Fiedler and The Boston Pops’ holiday recordings.

The Ultimate Pops Christmas Party! lives up to its title with 2 CDs and 35 tracks of yuletide cheer in the grand and lavish Boston Pops fashion. Spanning 1949-1971, The Ultimate Pops Christmas Party! includes two full albums: the original 1959 Pops Christmas Party in RCA’s Living Stereo splendor and 1969’s new-to-CD Christmastime in Carol and Song.

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Celebrating Steve Miller on his 80th birthday. —Ed.

Steve Miller took the long and winding road to superstardom, putting out eight albums before he hit paydirt with bicentennial year smash Fly Like an Eagle. And there was a reason for his prolonged stint as a journeyman; most of those first seven albums were middling at best, and even Miller conceded as much.

Here’s Steve in the liner notes to 1972 comp Anthology: “Always before, you know, people more or less needed to be fans to like the albums. Oh, I mean there’d be some good cuts and a couple of not-so-good cuts, and then some cuts I don’t even like to remember. But Anthology is what I always wanted to make–two good LPs that’ll hold up.” Hardly a killer endorsement for his earlier work.

But all middling is not created equal, and I have a soft spot in my heart for the Steve Miller Band’s second LP, 1968’s Sailor. I wouldn’t go so far as to call it a psychedelic rock masterpiece–that notion goes out the window right from the get go with the Pink Floydesque opening track “Song for Our Ancestors,” which is all whale farts and organ noodle and should have come with a tab of acid to render it interesting–but it includes more than its fair share of “good cuts.”

On Sailor–the last Steve Miller Band album featuring original members Boz “Lido Shuffle” Scaggs and keyboardist Jim Peterman–the group splits their affection for white blues and psychedelic rock more or less down the middle, and tosses in a couple of Dylan/Stones/Beach Boys homages while they’re at it. All of which is to say they’re all over the damn place, but still manage to turn what might have been an impossibly diffuse LP into a charmer.

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VIA PRESS RELEASE | In 2003, longtime musical legends Little Feat presented a career-spanning set at The Pageant in St. Louis, MO. Their first live performance to be captured in high definition, the concert was an extraordinary celebration of their 30+ year career.

Mercury Studios is proud to feature this very concert on Blu-ray+2CD and digital video, when Little Feat: Highwire Act In St. Louis is released on November 3. Previously issued on DVD in 2004, this marks a digital upgrade for the concert film, as it’s being made available on Blu-ray for the very first time. This is also the first time the 2CD portion is being bundled with the video and the concert being available on digital video.

Originally founded by Lowell George (formerly of Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention) and keyboardist/vocalist Bill Payne, Little Feat were an incredibly unique collective. Organically blending blues, Rock ‘N’ Roll, country, folk, and soul into Southern-brewed fusion, their funky yet impeccable musicianship led to such classics as “Dixie Chicken,” “Willin,’” “Oh, Atlanta,” and “Fat Man In The Bathtub.” Sadly, Little Feat went on hiatus with the passing of George in 1979, but their legacy reignited when the band resurfaced in the late ‘80s.

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