The latest evidence that 1998’s The Complete Hank Williams is erroneously titled is Pictures from Life’s Other Side, a six-CD, 144-track collection of performances from the country legend’s 1951 radio show on Nashville’s WSM. (These are commonly known as the Mother’s Best recordings, because the Mother’s Best Flour Company sponsored the 15-minute programs.) Much of […]
The booklet that accompanies a new anthology from the Honeycombs begins by noting that they are “best remembered” for their 60s hit, “Have I the Right?” In fact, if you recall this British Invasion pop group at all, it is probably solely for that number, which in mid 1964 topped U.K. charts and made it […]
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If you’re looking for an anthology with enough heft to do double duty as a doorstop, look no further: like Pink Floyd’s The Early Years, its just-released follow-up, The Later Years, fits in a ton of material, including five CDs, six Blu-rays, five DVDs, and two vinyl singles. Also featured are two hardcover books (one containing photos, […]
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Leonard Cohen’s excellent You Want It Darker—which appeared in October 2016, less than a month before his death—features vocals that he recorded from a hospital chair and lyrics about his own mortality. “I’m ready, my Lord,” he declares. “I’m out of the game.” As I wrote at the time, the backup by a synagogue choir […]
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Bob Dylan, who painted the cover picture for the Band’s 1968 debut, Music from Big Pink, also wrote or cowrote three of its best songs. But if any listeners even flirted with the idea that the group needed him to excel, they likely abandoned that notion after the 1969 release of the Band’s terrific eponymous […]
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Songs for Groovy Children: The Fillmore East Concerts isn’t the first album—or even the second, third, or fourth—to result from Jimi Hendrix’s four-set engagement at the New York venue on Dec. 31, 1969 and Jan. 1, 1970. Band of Gypsys, which came out only a few months after the shows, whetted appetites with six tracks. […]
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When it comes time to assemble a retrospective box set, record labels undoubtedly start by evaluating what material is available as well as possible production costs and revenues. Then they decide whether to spare no expense; to deliver a few modest extras; or, sometimes, to spare almost every expense and offer a barebones package. This […]
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Asked to name a favorite Doors album, many fans would pick the group’s eponymous 1967 debut, 1970’s Morrison Hotel, or 1971’s L.A. Woman. Some might vote for 1967’s Strange Days or 1968’s Waiting for the Sun. Few, one suspects, would point to 1969’s The Soft Parade, the group’s fourth album, which is widely seen as a bit of a misstep because it frequently eschews the Doors’ trademark hard […]
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A HALF-CENTURY-OLD TIM BUCKLEY CONCERT SURFACES Nothing in my rather gigantic CD collection means more to me than the music of Tim Buckley; his soaring, arresting vocals and penchant for experimenting with the fringes of jazz-tinged folk/rock resulted in some of the most memorable albums of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Like his son […]
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Bruce Springsteen’s moving and mesmerizing Western Stars, which I reviewed when it came out less than five months ago, enjoyed the success it deserved, though it perhaps wasn’t “#1 on charts in every continent on earth,” as a recent press release claimed. (They have record charts in Antarctica?) Now Springsteen has taken the unusual step […]
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