Showing posts with label New music Friday. Show all posts
Showing posts with label New music Friday. Show all posts

New Music Releases: Waxahatchee, Jesus and Mary Chain, Alice Coltrane, More

Our picks this week. Click the links to order from Amazon.

One of the hardest working singer-songwriters in the game is named Katie Crutchfield. She was born in Alabama, grew up near Waxahatchee Creek. Skipped town and struck out on her own as Waxahatchee. That was over a decade ago. Crutchfield says she never knew the road would lead her here, but after six critically acclaimed albums, she's never felt more confident in herself as an artist. While her sound has evolved from lo-fi folk to lush alt-tinged country, her voice has always remained the same. Honest and close, poetic with Southern lilting. Much like Carson McCullers's Mick Kelly, determined in her desires and convictions, ready to tell whoever will listen.And after years of being sober and stable in Kansas City-after years of sacrificing herself to her work and the road-Crutchfield has arrived at her most potent songwriting yet. On her new album, Tigers Blood, Crutchfield emerges as a powerhouse-an ethnologist of the self-forever dedicated to revisiting her wins and losses. But now she's arriving at revelations and she ain't holding them back.

Marking 40 years of The Jesus And Mary Chain, 'Glasgow Eyes' was recorded at Mogwai's Castle of Doom studio in Glasgow, where Jim and William continued the creative process that resulted in their previous album, 2017's 'Damage and Joy', becoming their highest charting album in over twenty years. What emerged is a record that finds one of the UK's most influential groups embracing a productive second chapter, their maelstrom of melody, feedback and controlled chaos now informed more audibly by their love for Suicide and Kraftwerk and a fresh appreciation of the less disciplined attitudes found in jazz.

Alice Coltrane's "The Carnegie Hall Concert" is a previously unreleased recording of a historic 1971 concert. The original multi-track recording was commissioned by Impulse but wasn't released at the time. Features an all-star group including Pharoah Sanders, Archie Shepp, Jimmy Garrison, Cecil McBee, Ed Blackwell and others. This was a triple bill placing her in the company of Laura Nyro and The Rascals. Concert produced by Sid Bernstein, who promoted the first Beatles concert in the US.

Four-hour, 72-track anthology of the Laurel Canyon music community that became a dominant worldwide force in the late 60s/early 70s. Tracing the scene's development from The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, Love and The Doors through to early country-rock and the singer/songwriter boom that defined the early 70s. By the end of the 60s, the international music world's nexus had shifted from such previous hotspots as Liverpool, London and San Francisco to Laurel Canyon, a rural oasis in the midst of the bustle of Los Angeles. Just minutes from Hollywood, the Sunset Strip and the LA record companies/studios, Laurel Canyon became home to a folk, country, rock and pop hybrid that encompassed everyone from early players The Byrds and Buffalo Springfield to The Doors, Frank Zappa, Glen Campbell and manufactured pop kingpins The Monkees. The canyon's rustic charms and the proximity of leading folk den The Troubadour attracted a phalanx of singer/songwriters while also giving birth to the country-rock movement, kickstarted by various Byrds/Springfield spin-offs (Dillard & Clark, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Poco) and former teen idol Ricky Nelson. Highly incestuous, the Laurel Canyon family featured some unlikely bedfellows: The Monkees worked with Frank Zappa, The Turtles sponsored Judee Sill and hung out with The Doors, Kim Fowley collaborated with both Steppenwolf and Warren Zevon, and the individual members of CSNY appeared on each other's solo records as well as everyone else's. A follow-up to Grapefruit's acclaimed 2022 compilation 'Heroes & Villains: The Sound of Los Angeles 1965-1968', the painstakingly-assembled 'I See You Live On Love Street: Music From Laurel Canyon 1967-1975' charts the scene's birth and gradual development until a revitalised, relocated Fleetwood Mac spearheaded a new, sleeker Laurel Canyon sound to go stratospheric in the mid-70s. Housed in a clamshell box that includes a heavily annotated and illustrated 48-page booklet, 'I See You Live On Love Street' features many of the biggest names in the canyon community alongside acts who failed to find success at the time but went on to achieve cult status.

A pairing of two great bassists.

From Glenda Collins to Diane And The Javelins, during the 1960s Joe Meek worked with countless female artists, many of whom issued just one single, or perhaps never even made it that far. 

But, until now, the extent of this work, and the volume of material recorded, has remained buried among the Tea Chest Tapes. 

This unprecedented 3-CD set explores that archive in-depth for the first time. Featuring established names and previously unknown artists (and indeed, at least one artist whose identity is still unknown), 'Do The Strum!' shines another spotlight on Meek's remarkable work with everything from the serene tones of Pat Reader to the gutsy soul of Glenda Collins and the proto girl-punk of The Sharades.

Spanning almost seven years, and mirroring the changing pop scene of the era, from pre-Beatle to powerful, stripped-down hard rock, this set recontextualises both Meek himself and the artists within. 

Lost classics and shoulda-beens pervade, and the imagination and production quality never drops below Joe Meek's perfectionist standards. And, most importantly, it'll all make you want to shake a tail feather! 
Includes every known A and B side, material from the abandoned Live It Up! Film soundtrack, singles that never were, auditions, demos and alternate versions of familiar recordings. 

A must- have for fans and collectors of girl groups, Meek freaks young and old and students and historians of British pop. Don't settle for the tried and tested story you'll read in books and magazines - this is the real deal, restored, remastered and as fresh as the day it was recorded!

Embassy Records, the cover versions label sold exclusively in Woolworths, was one of the most successful and profitable UK record labels of the 50s and 60s. 

Retailing at around half of the (cartel controlled) usual price, most Embassy releases sold in their tens - some, in their hundreds - of thousands, and many outsold the actual UK hit versions of their songs. 

Yet none of their records ever made the UK charts, due to objections from the established major labels. 

This compilation presents a cross-section of their output, between 1955-62; 68 covers of songs that were predominantly U.S. hits, before charting in the UK. Includes Maureen Evans' celebrated 'Stupid Cupid', which is believed to have sold more than Connie Francis' chart-topping version. There is a thriving Embassy collectors' market in the UK, nowadays, who will love this release.