Monday, October 20, 2014

New Music Releases - October 21, 2014










A Perfect Circle - Thirteenth Step (reissue) (colored vinyl)
Alanis Morissette - Jagged Little Pill Acoustic (reissue) (colored vinyl)
Alice Cooper - Raise the Dead - Live from Wacken
Andrew St. James - The Shakes
Annie Lennox - Nostalgia (vinyl)
Aretha Franklin - Aretha Franklin Sings The Great Diva Classics
As Tall As Lions - ST (colored vinyl)
At The Gates - At War With Reality (colored vinyl)
Ben Howard - I Forget Where We Were
Billy Idol - Kings & Queens of the Underground
Boyz II Men - Collide
Bush - Man on the Run (Deluxe)
Caught On Tape - Full Bleed
Charli XCX - Sucker
Cold War Kids - Hold My Home
Danger Danger - Danger Danger
Dennis DeYoung - ...And The Music Of Styx Live In Los Angeles (2CD/DVD)
Diana Krall - Wallflower
Doomsday Student - A Walk Through Hysteria Park
Earth, Wind & Fire - Holiday
Eliot Bronson - Eliot Bronson
Elliott Brood - Work And Love
Emigrate - Silent So Long
Foo Fighters - Sonic Highways
Forever Came Calling - What Matters Most (colored vinyl)
Gates - Bloom & Breathe (colored vinyl)
Happy Diving - Big World (colored vinyl)
Harold Melvin - Blue Album
Hollies - 50 at Fifty
Jakob - Sines
Jeff the Brotherhood - Dig The Classics (EP)
Jenn Grant - Compostela
Jerry Garcia - Garcialive 5: December 31st 1975 Keystone Berkeley
Jessie Ware - Tough Love
Jimi Hendrix Experience - Are You Experienced (reissue) (vinyl)
Jukebox The Ghost - ST (vinyl)
Kingdom Of Giants - Ground Culture
Little Big Town - Pain Killer
Malo - Malo
Mannheim Steamroller - 30/40
Marietta - Summer Death (colored vinyl)
Mark Lanegan Band - Phantom Radio
Mike Oldfield - The Studio Albums 1992 - 2003
Mineral - EndSerenading (reissue) (vinyl)
Mineral - The Power Of Failing (reissue) (vinyl)
Mott - Drive On
Mott - Shouting and Pointing
Mysteries - New Age Music is Here (vinyl)
Neil Diamond - Melody Road (vinyl)
Nude Beach - 77 (vinyl)
Of Montreal - Cherry Peel (reissue) (vinyl)
Of Montreal - Gay Parade (reissue) (vinyl)
Oozing Wound - Earth Suck
Pop Group - Cabinet of Curiosities (vinyl)
Primus - Primus & The Chocolate Factory (vinyl)
Rick Astley - Whenever You Need Somebody
Rory Gallagher - Irish Tour Special Edition (Full Cork Show)
Scott Walker and Sunn O))) - Soused (vinyl)
Seals and Crofts - One on One: Songs From the Original Motion Picture
Set It Off - Duality
Sleater-Kinney - All Hands On the Bad One (reissue) (vinyl)
Sleater-Kinney - Call The Doctor (reissue) (vinyl)
Sleater-Kinney - One Beat (reissue) (vinyl)
Sleater-Kinney - ST (reissue) (vinyl)
Sleater-Kinney - The Hot Rock (reissue) (vinyl)
Sleater-Kinney - The Woods (reissue) (vinyl)
Slipknot - .5: The Gray Chapter
Spandau Ballet - Story: The Very Best of
Susan Boyle - Hope
T.I. - Paperwork
The Body / Sandworm - Split LP
The Budos Band - Burnt Offering
The Frames - Fitzcarraldo (reissue) (vinyl)
Thurston Moore - The Best Day (vinyl)
Transit - Joyride
Various Artists - Footloose
Various Artists - Ghostbusters Theme Song (Stay Puft) (vinyl)
Weyes Blood - The Innocents (vinyl)
Wham - Final
Wrekmeister Harmonies - Then It All Came Down
Xerxes - Collision Blonde (vinyl)
Young Statues - The Flatlands Are Your Friend (vinyl)

Vinyl Record News & Music Notes


from our friends at NewOnVinyl

THIRD EYE BLIND - THIRD EYE BLIND

Third Eye Blind is the eponymous debut for the American alternative rock band Third Eye Blind, originally released in 1997. It spawned several singles, including top 10 charting “Semi-Charmed Life”, “Jumper”, and “How’s It Going to Be”. While Third Eye Blind peaked at #25 on the Billboard 200, it spent 104 weeks on the charts. It is the group’s bestselling album, having been certified 6x Platinum.

Third Eye Blind is catchier than the average post-grunge album, and that fact alone reveals a lot about the band. Instead of relying on standard, plodding grunge influences, Third Eye Blind draw heavily from the simple hook-laden traditions of classic Arena Rock, which makes the album more immediate. Third Eye Blind is easy on the ears, and its straight-ahead professionalism makes it a pleasurable listen for post-grungers.

Order at NewOnVinyl


SOUNDTRACK (OST) - SIN CITY A DAME TO KILL FOR

Co-directors Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller reunite to bring Miller's visually stunning "Sin City" graphic novels back to the screen in ‘Sin City: A Dame To Kill For’. Weaving together two of Miller's classic stories with new tales, the town's most hard boiled citizens cross paths with some of its more notorious inhabitants.

On red colored vinyl

Order at NewOnVinyl


SOUNDTRACK (OST) - IF I STAY

If I Stay is an American romantic drama film directed by R. J. Cutler, based on the novel of the same name by Gayle Forman. The film stars Chloë Grace Moretz, Mireille Enos, Jamie Blackley, Joshua Leonard, Stacy Keach, and Aisha Hinds. It was released on August 22, 2014.

The story: life changes in an instant for young Mia Hall after a car accident puts her in a coma. During an out-of-body experience, she must decide whether to wake up and live a life far different than she had imagined.

New York based Indie Rock producer Adam Lasus prefers recording on analog tape over digital. He produced six original songs and a cover of the song “Today” by Smashing Pumpkins, that were performed by the fictional band Willamette Stone in the movie led by Jamie Blackley’s character Adam Wilde. Other songs on the If I Stay soundtrack include tracks by Sonic Youth, Beck and Tom Odell.

Clear White Colored Vinyl. Double Lp. Only 1000 copies in this color.

Order at NewOnVinyl

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Cliff Martinez 'The Knick' Gets Double Vinyl Release 

The Knick is the new exciting TV series by writer/director Steven Soderbergh (HBO's Behind the Candelabra, Side Effects...). Cinemax is to premiere The Knick on August 8. Starring Clive Owen and set in New York 1900, the show centers on Knickerbocker Hospital and the groundbreaking surgeons, nurses and staff, who push the bounds of medicine in a time of astonishingly high mortality rates and zero antibiotics. The soundtrack features a fantastic score by acclaimed composer Cliff Martinez (Drive, Springbreakers, Only God Forgives, Solaris).

Release Date: December 23, 2014

Pre-Order at MilanRecords

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Audacity 'Counting The Days' Pre-Order

If you've lived anywhere near Fullerton, California over the last decade, or if you've paid any attention to the recent flux of sun-baked, surf-soaked power pop proliferating along the Western coastline of the U.S. in recent years, chances are high you've taken notice of Orange County's rambunctious guitar pop mavens Audacity. And if you've taken in Fullerton's pride-and-joy both in a sweaty, dingy live environment and on your turntable, you're undoubtedly aware that there is a certain unbridled quality to the band that can't quite be replicated on record. While last year's Butter Knife LP came pretty damn close to capturing Audacity in all their wild and ecstatic splendor, they've finally captured the triumphant bedlam of their live show with their latest 7", "Counting the Days" b/w "Mind Your Own Business". The A-side is Audacity in all their ragged glory - righteous guitar leads, buoyant choruses, and unhinged energy. For the flipside, the OC boys pay tribute to British post-punkers Delta 5 with an explosive cover of their debut single from 1979. "Counting the Days" b/w "Mind Your Own Business" is available worldwide on vinyl and digital formats courtesy of Suicide Squeeze Records.

The vinyl version is limited to 750 (250 on fluorescent pink, 500 on black) copies and includes a download coupon.

Pre-order will ship on November 21, 2014. Release date is December 2, 2014.

Pre-Order at SuicideSqueeze

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of Montreal 'Cherry Peel' & 'The Gay Parade' Back On Vinyl Via Polyvinyl

After years of being out of print, two early of Montreal albums are now back on vinyl 

Hailing from the '90s-resurgent Athens, Georgia scene, unofficial homebase to the Elephant 6 collective, of Montreal is perhaps the least publicized band in the Elephant 6 stable but not because they make the least-worthy music.

To the contrary, Cherry Peel is one of the most unabashedly pretty releases from that group, and, in fact, stands apart from most everything in the pop scene due to its simple, unassuming innocence.

The vocals of songwriter Kevin Barnes are achingly heartfelt and puppyish, and his songs seem to spring directly out of childhood, or at least seem touched by a childlike yearning, so much so that you can't help feeling all fuzzy inside and perhaps desirous of hugging someone, maybe your mom, after hearing them.

And the songs are uniformly expert: "In Dreams I Dance With You" comes across like a cupid-struck Pinocchio's sweet longing; "Montreal" is a wasteland ballad worthy of Neil Young; and "Don't Ask Me To Explain" will make your heart palpatate and bubble up into your throat it is so unpretentiously euponic. The closest cousin to of Montreal is probably The Apples In Stereo, and like that band, the influence of The Beatles, particularly Paul McCartney, and the Beach Boys is pervasive, and other Sixties music such as Brill Building pop and Lovin' Spoonful ("Everything Dissappears When You Come Around") and a bit of psychedelia, as well as a pinch of new wave occasionally reaches the surface of the songs.

But of Montreal touches on so many other sources than those, such as circus music and, on "I Can't Stop Your Memory," even a bit of jazz, and the entire album has the sentiment and conviction of early twentieth-century, old timey and Tin Pan Alley tunes.

The gorgeous lushness of Cherry Peel conceals the bedroom-bred genesis of the entire undertaking. And though it would be easy to dismiss the whole album as so much cuteness, of Montreal never hint at irony. The band is not mocking pop, it loves the form and the chance to express that joy; and that joy is on full display on Cherry Peel like no band since the early Beatles.

Order at PolyvinylRecords


The Gay Parade is indie-pop's very own Sgt. Pepper, a richly detailed, grandly ambitious concept record which forgoes the ponderous pretensions the phrase implies to instead exult in the simple joys of everyday life.

Kevin Barnes' songs radiate a childlike wonder and boundless enthusiasm, discovering beauty in the most unlikely of places; his lyrics suggest psychedelic nursery rhymes, populated by absurdist characters (each and every one depicted on the jacket art) sketched in Crayola across a series of majestic melodies and ornate arrangements which belie the record's surface naïveté.

For all of The Gay Parade's effervescence and whimsy, there's also a melancholy that pervades songs like "Jacques Lamure," "The Autobiographical Grandpa" and "My Friend Will Be Me," recalling the lovelorn hues of the previous of Montreal record, The Bedside Drama: A Petite Tragedy; far from deflating the euphoria, however, these moments simply acknowledge the necessity of sadness and loss to the human experience, and deem them worthy of celebration as well.

These are songs in the key of life, Zen-like expressions of simplicity and innocence resonating with remarkable complexity and wisdom.

Order at PolyvinylRecords

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Hierophant's 'Peste' on Clear-With-Smoke Vinyl

Pre-orders from B9Store.com include a 320 kbps MP3 version of the album sent on the release date. If you order after the release date, you may receive a 256 kbps download. Audiophiles: If you would like a wider range of sound quality options, check out this release on our Bandcamp.

All Peste pre-orders also include a free copy of the Inganno 7" and an instant download of both its tracks: "Inganno" and a cover of Nirvana's "Negative Creep".***

It was hard to fathom Italy's Hierophant harnessing the potential to create a record heavier and more malicious than 2012's Great Mother : Holy Monster, an already pummeling whiplash of American D-beat-inflected metallic hardcore. Lo and behold: Peste manages just that as a superior, succinctly crushing assault, its tendencies largely erring on the side of European death metal. Hierophant spell out the desolation and desperation leveled by a war amid the id, ego and super-ego, all torturous, violent imagery and morbid, damning assertions that make it a pleasantly grim nightmare to suffer through.

Limited to 100 copies, and a digital download. 

***NOTE: This is a pre-order. Your item will be mailed and download will be sent on November 25, 2014. 

Pre-Order at B9store

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Album Review

Bobby Hutcherson – Total Eclipse – Blue Note (vinyl reissue) 

The Blue Note remastering is a definite sonic improvement over the ‘60s original LP.

Bobby Hutcherson – Total Eclipse – Blue Note (1968) BST 8429/ 2014B0020431-01 stereo vinyl, 40:32 ****:

(Bobby Hutcherson – vibes; Harold Land – tenor saxophone, flute; Chick Corea – piano; Reggie Johnson – double bass; Joe Chambers – drums)

It is not surprising that Bobby Hutcherson became a vibraphonist after listening to Milt Jackson. He adopted some of the improvisational fluidity of Jackson but connected with a modern sense of harmonics and band play. As a member of Jackie McLean’s band (his debut was on the critically acclaimed One Step Beyond), he began a long, productive association with Blue Note Records. Gigs with Eric Dolpy, Dexter Gordon and Hank Mobley enhanced his reputation, but his career as a bandleader propelled his success. His Blue Note tenure (1963-1977) was second only to Horace Silver. At the core of this catalogue was Hutcherson’s union with saxophonist Harold Land that resulted in seven albums. With drummer Joe Chambers and pianists like Chick Corea, Stanley Cowell and Joe Sample, Hutcherson’s unique brand of hard bop/post-bop and mainstream jazz flourished.

Like many jazz greats, Hutcherson continued to record for different labels (Landmark, Columbia). A brief excursion into fusion resulted in Little B’s Poem, his most recognized composition He remained in demand as a sideman and worked with Sonny Rollins, Donald Byrd, Woody Shaw, Herbie Hancock, John Lewis Pharoah Sanders, Kenny Barron, Sonny Stitt and Roy Haynes, to name just a few. In 2004 he was an original member of the SF Jazz Collective and established two performing quartets in that decade. Hutcherson returned to Blue Note in 2014, releasing Enjoy The View, featuring Joey DeFrancesco, David Sanborn and Billy Hart.

As part of their 75th anniversary, Blue Note Records had re-mastered their vintage albums in hi-def resolutions of 96k and 192k. Now they have decided to release low-cost, higher-quality pressing of the original vinyl recordings, including the original packaging. One of these re-mastered vinyl albums is Total Eclipse. This was the first Bobby Hutcherson Blue Note album project with Harold Land. With mostly original compositions, this is a definitive representation of Hutcherson’s acumen as an ensemble leader (He also was active in Gerald Wilson’s orchestra, and incorporated complex arrangements into his work). Opening Side 1 is a hard bop swing opus, “Herzog”. This piece explodes and the furious pace never abates. Chick Corea starts off with percolating runs that lead into Hutcherson’s initial solo. And it is breathtaking in its flexibility. He expands the overall tonality and depth of the vibes. Reggie Johnson and Joe Chambers are a solid rhythm section. Chambers is a driving force (not unlike Philly Joe Jones) and provides subtle tempo breaks. Land contributes to the intensity with a hard-driving saxophone translation. At the end, the quintet unites with vibes and saxophone sharing a unison lead. The title cut has an ethereal, moody resonance. Land’s sax is smoky and evocative. Hutcherson is fluid, with a late night ambiance. His ascending and descending vibraphone technique is compelling. Corea adds a delicate, expressive interlude. Hutcherson is comfortable with his band mates and encourages their creativity. “Matrix” (a Corea song) is a variation on twelve-bar blues that cooks with Land burning on saxophone. Hutcherson matches his fury with scintillating eloquence. Chambers’ crashing drums bring a powerful energy to the jam.

“Same Shame” celebrates the fearless exploration of modern jazz. Anchored by a pulsating, Latin-tinged aesthetic, Hutcherson revels in versatility, offering a variety of tonal shadings. There is a graceful transition to a Chick Corea solo that is fresh and graceful. The finale (“Pompeian”) is an intriguing waltz that showcases Land on flute. The inherent chemistry between Land and Hutcherson is palpable. The group engages in a swirling blend of sound that envelops this ballad. Artistry and emotional depth are merged in musical context.

This vinyl re-mastering is a definite improvement over the 1960s analog technology. It is not as dynamic as hi-res digital format, but still manages to capture the warmth and texture of jazz instrumentation. The vibraphone shading is subtle (especially on a track-ending fade). Tenor and flute sound organic, not harsh. Liner notes by Herb Wong provide a back story to the album. A picture of a smiling, cigarette-dangling Hutcherson is a glimpse of 1968 personal style. Total Eclipse is a good jazz album, and reasonably priced (under $20) as well!  —Robbie Gerson

TrackList: 
Side 1: Herzog; Total Eclipse; Matrix
Side 2: Same Shame; Pompeian

Order the LP HERE

I want to thank John over at www.audaud.com for the exclusive rights to reprint this great review!

AUDIOPHILE AUDITION focuses on recordings of interest to audiophiles and collectors, with an accent on surround sound for music, and on all hi-res disc formats. Over 100SACD, DVD Video/Audio and standard CD reviews are published during each month, and our archives go back to January 2001. 

Copyright © Audiophile Audition   

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Aphex Twin Syro listed for over $1000 by first time sellers on Discogs






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cool article


Funky Frankenstein: Musician resurrects vinyl record cutting








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nice feature from paste magazine


The Best of Jazz Album Art











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album cover art of the day:


PANZER Featuring ACCEPT And DESTRUCTION Members: 'Panzer' Lyric Video