The fourth studio album from the instrumental collective Circles Around The Sun is set to be their most experimental yet. With the addition of guitarist John Lee Shannon, the band sets its sights on a new era as they look to continue to round out their spacious cosmic soundscapes. Giving classic psychedelic rock fixtures a facelift, the band is constantly building on itself to produce dense arrangements, and the lead single for “Language” is no different.
Shannon’s presence is immediately felt on “Outer Boroughs” as the rest of the band navigates his slick guitar playing. With a new guitar player at the ready and an insanely impressive single, Circles Around The Sun is set to release some of their best work yet.
“Did You Know That There’s A Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd” is the ninth studio album from acclaimed singer-songwriter Lana Del Rey, comprising 16 tracks and interludes with features including Father John Misty, Tommy Genesis, Jon Batiste, Bleachers and more. It follows the prolific artist’s 2021 albums ‘Chemtrails Over The Country Club’ and ‘Blue Banisters’.
The prolifically blunt songstress Lana Del Rey is returning with her 9th studio album. The winded title is one that needs to be said in full, Lana Del Rey has made a career off of her artistically ambitious approach to balladry, making sure every word she records matters, shortening her album title would be a disservice. The promotional tactics for this upcoming LP include the ambient title track that features Rey’s signature velvet vocals and a sweeping arrangement and one single billboard she placed in the town of an ex lover. With the extremely impressive single already wowing fans and Del Rey doubters alike, this upcoming LP seems to be falling right in line with the artist’s already beautifully poetic discography.
The Arcs are putting out their first album in eight years at the top of 2023; it’s called “Electrophonic Chronic”. Dan Auerbach and company recorded this album with Richard Swift before his passing in 2018.
The Dan Auerbach-led band The Arcs are returning with new music since they first debuted in 2015 with their album “Yours, Dreamily. Electrophonic Chronic” boasts 12 new songs from the band that were recorded with bandmate Richard Swift before he passed away in 2018. According to a post by Brooklyn Vegan, Auerbach commented on his friends passing and the album saying “It’s a way for us to say goodbye to him, by revisiting him playing and laughing, singing”.
It was chosen as the opener because one of the first things you hear is Richard Swift on drums, and the record is an homage to their great friend.”
There are currently three singles released for this album which also happen to be the first three songs of the tracklist. “Keep On Dreamin’”, “Eyez”, and “Heaven Is A Place” all have a loose feeling with a psychedelic tint to them to match the neon colors of the artwork.
Elvis Costello has compiled a new release called “The Songs of Bacharach & Costello” that brings together all of the published songs that he has written with Burt Bacharach.
This release celebrates the three decade songwriting partnership between the pair and first and foremost it offers a 2023 remaster (by Bob Ludwig from the original tapes) of the acclaimed 1999 album “Painted From Memory”. This wasn’t originally issued on vinyl back in the day, although a Mobile Fidelity reissue was put out in 2017.
“The Songs of Bacharach & Costello” also includes the entirety (on CD) of “Taken From Life”, including unreleased songs from the proposed “Painted From Memory” musical score and three newly recorded compositions.
Formats available include a pricey 4CD+2LP super deluxe edition which offers a 2LP vinyl set – of which three sides are the remastered “Painted From Memory” and the fourth and final side is ‘Selections from Taken From Life’ (6 tracks out of 16) – and 4CDs. The first two CDs are “Painted From Memory” and the full ‘Taken From Life’, while CD 3 and CD 4 offer rare live performances (with and without Bacharach). The super deluxe also offers a “detailed 10,000 word essay by Costello”.
A 2LP vinyl package is available on its own, as is a 2CD set which comprises CD 1 and CD 2 from the super deluxe. There’s no option to get the 4CDs by themselves.
The box collects all of their collaborations and offers abundant evidence of how well they worked together. The anthology offers four CDs with a total playing time of three hours, and includes 19 previously unreleased tunes.
“The Songs of Bacharach & Costello” is released on 3 March 2023, via Universal Music.
U2 will release “Songs of Surrender”, a collection of acoustic & re-imagined recordings from their back catalogue. This release will be available over five different physical formats. What started as an experiment quickly became a personal obsession as so many early U2 songs yielded to a new interpretation. Intimacy replaced post-punk urgency. New keys. New chords. New tempos and new lyrics arrived. It turns out that great song is kind of indestructible. Once we surrendered our reverence for the original version each song started to open up to a new authentic voice of this time, of the people we are, and particularly the singer Bono has become.
Produced and compiled by The Edge the super deluxe edition of “Songs of Surrender” is available as a 4CD or 4LP vinyl box set and features 40 tracks arranged into individual band volumes (presumably their favourite tracks) including ‘With Or Without You’, ‘Beautiful Day’, ‘Where The Streets Have No Name’, ‘One’, ‘I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For’, ‘Pride (In The Name Of Love)’, alongside fan favourites such as ‘Stories For Boys’, ‘Bad’, & ‘Desire’. Both super deluxe editions are numbered.
“Songs Of Surrender”. 40 Songs. Re-imagined and re-recorded. March 17th, 2023.
U2’s ‘Songs of Surrender’ features “acoustic & re-imagined recordings” and is available across five physical formats, including 40-track 4CD and 4LP super deluxe editions.
Exclusive Limited Edition Numbered Super Deluxe 4 x 12’’ Collector’s Boxset. Featuring 40 new acoustic & re-imagined recordings from the U2 catalogue.
Produced & Compiled by The Edge and arranged into individual band volumes.
Though the exhaustive archival work that accompanied Genesis’ 2007 touring did not extend to the group’s latest (and likely last) outing in 2021 and 2022, this year brings a new box set for fans of the prog-turned-pop/rock icons: a collection of their live material as recorded by the BBC.
“BBC Broadcasts”, curated by founding keyboardist Tony Banks and longtime engineer Nick Davis, offers a trove of concert audio from all the major eras of Genesis from 1970 to 1998. The earliest material, taken from a 1970 appearance on BBC Radio 2 program “Night Ride“, features one of the band’s earliest line-ups: singer Peter Gabriel, keyboardist Banks, bassist Mike Rutherford, guitarist Anthony Phillips and drummer John Mayhew. Just over a year later, by the time the group cut appearances on “Sounds of the Seventies”and a session for John Peel, Philips and Mayhew were replaced by Steve Hackett and Phil Collins.
‘BBC Broadcasts’ contains favourites such as ‘Home By The Sea’, ‘Mama’, ‘Duchess’, ‘Carpet Crawlers’, ‘No Son Of Mine’‘Turn It On Again’ and many more. With only a handful of these tracks previously officially available, Genesis ‘BBC Broadcasts’ acts as both a collector’s cornucopia and an alternative “greatest hits”. Stretching from the very beginnings of the band’s career via appearances on ‘Night Ride’ and John Peel,
By the time the set’s second disc picks up with a 1978 appearance at the Knebworth Festival, Gabriel and Hackett had left the band, with Collins (now a singer and drummer), Banks and Rutherford continuing with touring members Daryl Stuermer and Chester Thompson; you’ll hear that line-up through much of “BBC Broadcasts”, including a 1980 performance at London’s Lyceum Theatre and 1987’s blockbuster stand at Wembley Stadium. The group’s 1992 Knebworth appearance and two 1998 tracks with vocalist Ray Wilson and touring members Anthony Drennen (guitar/bass) and Nir Z (drums) round out the set.
A vast majority of the material has never been released before; a few Gabriel-era tracks were released on a 1998 box set, one Lyceum track made it to the group’s “Three Sides Live”in 1982 and the Wembley set was issued on video and DVD over the years.
A total of 24 of the 53 tracks on the 5CD set will be issued as a triple-vinyl set, with all songs making their debut on the format. Author Michael Hann has penned liner notes for this box, included in an accompanying 40-page book.
Jeff Beck, one of our most influential rock guitarists of all time, has died at the age of 78. The British musician rose to fame as part of the Yardbirds, where he replaced Eric Clapton, before forming the Jeff Beck Group along with Rod Stewart.
His tone, presence and, above all, volume redefined guitar music in the 1960s, and influenced movements like heavy metal, jazz-rock and even punk.
Born Geoffrey Arnold Beck in Wallington, south London, the musician fell in love with Rock and Roll as a child, and built his first guitar as a teenager.
“The guy next door said, ‘I’ll build you a solid body guitar for five pounds’,” he later told Rock Cellar Magazine. “Five pounds, which to me was 500 back then [so] I went ahead and did it [myself]. “The first one I built was in 1956, because Elvis was out, and everything that you heard about pop music was guitar. And then I got fascinated. I’m sure the same goes for lots of people.”
After a short stint at Wimbledon Art College, he left to play with shock-rocker Screaming Lord Sutch and the Tridents.
When Eric Clapton left the Yardbirds in 1965, Jimmy Page suggested hiring Beck – and he went on to play on hits like “I’m AMan” and “Shapes Of Things”, where his pioneering use of feedback influenced musicians like Paul McCartney and Jimi Hendrix. “That [technique] came as an accident,” he later told BBC Radio 2’s Johnnie Walker.
“We played larger venues, around about ’64-’65, and the PA was inadequate. So we cranked up the level and then found out that feedback would happen. “I started using it because it was controllable – you could play tunes with it. I did this once at Staines Town Hall with the Yardbirds and afterwards, this guy says, ‘You know that funny noise that wasn’t supposed to be there? I’d keep that in if I were you.’
“So I said, ‘It was deliberate mate. Go away’.”
“Still I’m Sad”,From their 1965 album “Having a Rave Up with The Yardbirds”, This is the only original song on this album, written by bassist Paul Samwell-Smith and drummer Jim McCarty. Excellent and innovative psychedelic pop with a mock-Gregorian chant. Rhythm guitar player Chris Dreja: “We were just trying to do something different. The 12-bar blues was very predictable, and now we wanted to make things more exciting, for us and the audience. We had the rave up and it was now time for something new. And of course, Jeff had all these sounds, this orchestra of sounds, and we really wanted to use them.”
Beck stayed with The Yardbirds for nearly two years, before declaring he was quitting music altogether… then releasing his first solo single “Hi Ho Silver Lining”. Recorded in just three hours, the song was his only top 20 hit in the UK, charting in both 1967 and 1972. But the singer was famously ambivalent about it.
Beck formed the Jeff Beck Group, whose first two albums “Truth” (1968) and “Beck-Ola” (1969), took a ferocious approach to the blues. But the band members were unhappy – with a US tour regularly descending into arguments and physical fights.
Singer Rod Stewart and bassist Ronnie Wood quit in 1970 to join the Small Faces (later The Faces), and when Beck was injured in a car accident, so he had to put his career on hold. When he recovered, Beck assembled a second line-up of his band but their albums were commercially unsuccessful and Beck went solo in 1975.
The band had a few minor hits, including a song which pointed the way forward called “Beck’s Bolero.” Bolero was originally recorded in 1966 prior to Beck’s newest band, with a studio supergroup which included Nicky Hopkins on Keyboards, John Paul Jones on bass, Keith Moon on drums, Jimmy Page on guitar, and Beck laying down what became a concert staple in a career which spanned 60 years.
That year, he recorded an album, “Blow By Blow”, with Beatles producer George Martin. Entirely instrumental, Beck’s lyrical, mellifluous guitar playing essentially replaced the parts of a lead vocalist, an approach he would take for most of the rest of his career. “Blow By Blow” made the US top 10 and was awarded a platinum disc, and Beck quickly followed it up with 1976’s “Wired” (also produced by George Martin) .
The 1980s saw him collaborate with Nile Rodgers on an album called “Flash”, which contained his first hit single – a cover of Curtis Mayfield’s “People Get Ready” with Rod Stewart on lead vocals – and earned him a Grammy Award. Beck has been described as a huge influence for movements like heavy metal, jazz-rock and even punk.
In 1987, he played on Mick Jagger’s solo album “Primitive Cool”, and continued to work with artists like Roger Waters and Jon Bon Jovi in the 1990s, as well as contributing to Hans Zimmer’s score for the Tom Cruise movie “Days Of Thunder”. But his solo output slowed down, until the release of 1999’s “You Had It Coming”, featuring Imogen Heap on vocals, followed in 2003by an album he simply called “Jeff”.
He toured extensively in the 2010s, including a joint-headline venture with Beach Boy Brian Wilson. After each had their solo set, the two would combine forces for a few of Wilson’s biggest hits. Beck would add fun leads on songs like “Fun, Fun, Fun” and “Surfin USA.” However, it was his string bending take on Beach Boy’s classics like “Surf’s Up,” and “Don’t Talk” which also appears on “18,”
The duo had hoped to record together but those plans fell apart. Instead, Beck ended up befriending actor Johnny Depp, with whom he released a full-length album, “18“, in 2022. While, it’s mostly covers of songs first recorded by John Lennon, Marvin Gaye, The Miracles, and The Everly Brothers, as with all of Beck’s music, the songs are as fresh and unique as the original productions. The album also features songs by Beck with his latest collaborator, Johnny Depp. Having been one of the founders of The Hollywood Vampires, along with Alice Cooper and Joe Perry, Depp comes to the recording process and stage with some serious rock and roll cred. The seemingly odd couple met at a Beck concert many years ago, and as Jeff came to respect Depp as a musician, he was soon invited to join the 60’s guitar God onstage at The Royal Albert Hall. With that, a rock and roll partnership was born.
His legacy lies in the balance between the fluidity and aggression of his playing, a technical brilliance equalled only by his love of ear-crunching dissonance. “It’s like he’s saying, ‘I’m Jeff Beck. I’m right here. And you can’t ignore me’,” wrote Mike Campbell of the Heartbreakers in an essay for Rolling Stone’s Greatest Guitar Players of All Time, where Beck was placed seventh.
“Even in the Yardbirds, he had a tone that was melodic but in-your-face – bright, urgent and edgy, but sweet at the same time. You could tell he was a serious player, and he was going for it. He was not holding back.”
Beck’s death was confirmed on his official Twitter page. “On behalf of his family, it is with deep and profound sadness that we share the news of Jeff Beck’s passing,” the statement said. “After suddenly contracting bacterial meningitis, he peacefully passed away yesterday. His family ask for privacy while they process this tremendous loss.”
Describing his playing style in 2009, Beck said: “I play the way I do because it allows me to come up with the sickest sounds possible.” “That’s the point now, isn’t it? I don’t care about the rules. “In fact, if I don’t break the rules at least 10 times in every song, then I’m not doing my job properly.”
The True West 3CD is being curated by noted reissue producer Pat Thomas, who is well known with music fans and collectors for his reissue work with Light In The Attic, Omnivore, Fire, Water, 4 Men With Beards, and other great labels.
The True West was born in California in 1981, and alongside its contemporary Dream Syndicate, Green on Red, Rain Parade, Thin White Rope, Long Ryders among others, paved the so-called Paisley Underground, a DIY scene inspired by its foundations and doctrines Punk’s nas, flourished with influences from the sixties psychedelia Byrds, the experiments of VU, Acid Folk of Buffalo Springfield, the leisery of Pink Floyd circa Syd Barrett and Big Star’s power pop, the same R.E.M. source matrix of R.I.M. meaning, any coincidence is not mere resemblance, or vice and vice versa.
Gavin Blair and Russ Tolman are the minds behind the sound beauty of True West, Tolman reportedly began his musical saga with The Suspects, alongside Steve Wynn and Kendra Smith, both of Dream Syndicate.
“Drifters” is the guys debut, originally released in 1984, a pearl lost in the limbo of the underworld of good sounds, melodically exuberant, acidic and smooth in proportionally accurate measures, became a cult album years after its release this.
Michael Stipe and Peter Buck confessed True West fans, since the early days, True West were the opening band of the “Fables Of The Reconstruction” tour.
Another iconic fan of the guys was Stan Ridgway from the great wall of voodoo.
True West should have conquered the world like R.E.M. but the music gods have reserved cult band status to them,
The True West set will contain all three studio albums (Hollywood Holiday, Drifters, Hand of Fate), with tons of rarities including extra tracks from the Hand of Fate sessions, recently surfaced demos, live tracks, and other rarities, all packaged in a multi-fold digipack with 24 page book with liner notes by producer Pat.
This Traffic concert was broadcast on WNEW-FM in New York City. The next day, these songs were recorded so well at this concert were planned for a Live Traffic album by UA that was never released.
Possibly because the recording was damaged on “Glad”. This was edited between songs possibly for a recorded album.
Setlist: 01. Introduction by Bill Graham 02. Medicated Goo 03. Pearly Queen 04. Empty Pages 05. Heaven Is In Your Mind 06. Forty Thousand Headmen 07. John Barleycorn Must Die 08. Who Knows What Tomorrow May Bring 09. Every Mother’s Son 10. Glad/Freedom Rider ( Sadly, some screw-ups on the master. ) 11. Means To The End 12. Dear Mr. Fantasy
Personel: Steve Winwood – Keyboards, Guitar, Vocals Chris Woods – Flute, Sax, Organ Jim Capaldi – Drums, Vocals Rick Grech – Bass
Dublin four-piece Inhaler look to have 2023 in the palm of their hands, and it could be the year they sky-rocket to superstardom. Their debut album, “It Won’t Always Be Like This”, went to number one in the United Kingdom and their native Ireland. For their second album, “Cuts & Bruises”, could be the one for them to break big time.
Inhaler haven’t reinvented themselves, but they’ve found an extra gear on the singles, ‘Love Will Get You There’ and ‘These Are The Days’, which gives fans reason to be optimistic about the release.
For the new record, Inhaler reconvened with producer Antony Genn, and drummer Ryan McMahon previously said they were intent on making “very much a band album”. Detailing further, singer Eli Hewson added: “Get Back (The Beatles documentary) was hugely influential, just being in the room and writing. It sounds so obvious, but when you’re on tour, you actually don’t get a chance to do that, so we tried to do that as much as possible.”
The Fat Angel Sings 