Indie rockers and industrial icons. Psychedelic ’60s jam bands and ’70s arena-rockers. Jazz crooners and contemporary singer-songwriters. Bootlegs and B-Sides collections. These are a few of my favourite things this week. I suspect they’ll be some of yours too. See for yourself:
Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga
Love For Sale
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Love For Sale is the new collaborative album from Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga. This historic album will be Tony’s last studio recording, showcasing the Cole Porter songbook of classic popular music with both duet and solo selections from both artists. An album featuring Porter’s songbook was an idea the two performers discussed shortly after their first album Cheek to Cheek debuted at #1 on the Billboard chartsin 2015. Recorded at Electric Lady Studios in New York City, the album features a mix of jazz ensemble, big band and orchestral arrangements. At the time of the sessions, Bennett had already been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, a condition the family made public in a disclosure earlier this year.”
Brandi Carlile
In These Silent Days
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Only a global pandemic could have forced Brandi Carlile to hit pause. Finding herself stuck at home outside of Seattle in the rural foothills of the Cascade Mountains, Carlile had no choice but to slow down, reassess and realign her priorities. It was during this time that In These Silent Days took shape. Inspired by the mining of her own history while writing her bestselling memoir Broken Horses, the new 10-song record chronicles acceptance, faith, loss and love. “Never before have the twins and I written an album during a time of such uncertainty and quiet solitude. I never imagined that I’d feel so exposed and weird as an artist without the armor of a costume, the thrill of an applause and the platform of the sacred stage. Despite all this, the songs flowed through — pure and unperformed, loud and proud, joyful and mournful. Written in my barn during a time of deep and personal reckoning. There’s plenty reflection … but mostly it’s a celebration. This album is what drama mixed with joy sounds like. It’s resistance and gratitude, righteous anger and radical forgiveness. It’s the sound of these silent days.”
Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds
B-Sides & Rarities Part II
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “B-Sides & Rarities Part II was compiled by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, and contains 27 rare and unreleased tracks from 2006-2020, including the first recordings of Skeleton Tree, Girl In Amber and Bright Horses. “I always liked the original B-Sides & Rarities more than any of our other albums,” says Cave. “It’s the only one I’d listen to willingly. It seems more relaxed, even a bit nonsensical in places, but with some beautiful songs throughout. There is something, too, about the smallness of certain songs that is closer to their original spirit. B-Sides & Rarities Part II continues this strange and beautiful collection of lost songs from The Bad Seeds. I love the final side of the last disc because it reveals the small and fragile beginnings of some of my favourite Bad Seeds songs: Waiting For You, complete with bizarre ‘canning factory’ rhythm track, a gorgeous Life Per Se deemed too sad for Skeleton Tree, and Earthlings, that some consider the finest track of the Ghosteen sessions.”
The Doobie Brothers
Liberté
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Four-time Grammy Award winners and Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductees The Doobie Brothers have announced the release of their 15th full-length album Liberté. Produced and co-written by John Shanks (Bon Jovi, Sheryl Crow, Miley Cyrus), the body of work contains 12 brand-new tracks by Tom Johnston, Pat Simmons and John McFee. Selling nearly 50 million albums worldwide, The Doobie Brothers have had five top 10 singles, 16 top 40 hits, three multi-platinum albums, seven platinum albums, 14 gold albums and have earned a rare diamond record for their 1976 album, Best of the Doobies.”
The Grateful Dead
Listen To The River: St. Louis ’71 ’72 ’73
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Steamboats and BBQ, ice cream cones and Mardi Gras — are you ready to laissez les bons temps rouler with The Grateful Dead? Meet us, won’t you, in St. Louis for seven complete and previously unreleased concerts that capture the heart of the band’s affinity for the River City. Listen To The River: St. Louis ’71 ’72 ’73 is a 20-CD set featuring five shows from the Fox Theatre (Dec. 9 and 10, 1971; Oct. 17-19, 1972) and two from the Kiel Auditorium (Oct. 29 and 30, 1973). The seven shows in the collection span slightly less than two years, but they represent some of the best shows The Grateful Dead played during some of their peak tours. All told, the band played 60 different songs during these shows highlighted by blazing romps through Beat It On Down The Line and One More Saturday Night and wistful takes on Row Jimmy and Brokedown Palace (whose lyrics give the collection its name). Meanwhile, the copious jamming ebbed and flowed like the mighty Mississippi River on multiple voyages through The Other One and Dark Star. Naturally, the band paid tribute to one of its favorite rock and rollers and one of St. Louis’ biggest stars by playing Chuck Berry songs at every show in the collection, including Pigpen galloping through Run Rudolph Run.”
Illuminati Hotties
Let Me Do One More
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “2020 was a year no one could have predicted would turn out the way it did, including Sarah Tudzin and Illuminati Hotties. After the success of her debut album Kiss Yr Frenemies, and coining the term “tenderpunk,” Illuminati Hotties were on their way to recording and releasing a highly anticipated sophomore album. However, things at the label started to fall apart, and Illuminati Hotties found themselves stuck in a contract with a label who didn’t have the infrastructure to put out the album the band had been crafting for months. “It felt like any momentum came to a screeching halt. It felt painful to pick up a guitar, to write, to record any loose ends that needed to happen to wrap up the album,” Sarah recalls. With the emotional turmoil and uncertainty, Sarah turned her focus to songs that would become FREE I.H. The positive response brought back the energy and Sarah dove straight into the new album Let Me Do One More. The result is a diverse, layered album of “all riprs and no more skiprs.” From the vibrant, clever, and undeniably fun, Pool Hopping to the edgy and witty, MMMOOOAAAAAYAYA, to the intimate and vulnerable Growth, Let Me Do One More embraces Sarah’s autonomy as an artist, and the fearlessness of being figuratively open and exposed for art. According to Sarah, “The songs tell a story of my gremlin-ass running around LA, sneaking into pools at night, messing up and starting over, begging for attention for one second longer, and asking the audience to let me do one more.”
Ministry
Moral Hygiene
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “After incubating for the larger part of 2020 — a time when creative mastermind Al Jourgensen was able to ruminate on the new world we as a society have found ourselves in — the time has finally come for Ministry to unleash their much-anticipated 15th album. Aptly titled Moral Hygiene, the album includes some of Ministry’s strongest and most inspired material to date. The 10 tracks are a followup to 2018’s lauded AmeriKKKant and put forth Jourgensen’s societal manifesto and plea for civilization to get back to a set of standards that lives up to and embraces our humanity. “The good thing about literally taking a year off from any social activity or touring is that you really get to sit back and get an overview of things as they are happening, as opposed to being caught up in the moment. And what I saw with how we handled several public crises — from the pandemic to racial injustice to who we vote in to lead our country — is that times are changing, and society needed to change to get away from the idea that has permeated us of take care of yourself, fuck everything else. Now more than ever we need moral hygiene,” says Jourgensen of the new album. “It consumed me as I wrote this album. It’s not some pious term. It’s what we have to return to in order to function as the human species on this planet.”
Roger Taylor
Outsider
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Roger Taylor has had plenty of free time recently to reflect on his long, rich, extraordinary journey through life and music. With Queen + Adam Lambert’s blockbuster Rhapsody European tour postponed until 2022 by the Covid-19 pandemic, Roger has made good use of his lengthy lay-off. Fired up with creative inspiration, he spent much of lockdown writing and recording new material. Before long, he found himself with his first solo album in eight years, Outsider. Taylor’s world-class skills as a composer, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist served him well during the enforced isolation of the last 18 months. In a tradition dating back to his very first solo album, Fun in Space from 1981, he wrote, produced, sang and performed all the songs on Outsider himself, with just a little help from long-time friends and collaborators. Building on more than half a century in music, Taylor conceived Outsider as a kind of mature late-career statement, its prevailing mood autumnal and bittersweet. “Autumnal is a very good word for it,” he says. “It’s slightly nostalgic and wistful, and quite adult, a bit more grown-up than my last couple of albums.”
Neil Young
The Neil Young Official Bootleg Series: Carnegie Hall 1970
THE EDITED PRESS RELEASE: “Over Neil Young’s long and storied career, a few special shows have earned an almost mythic reputation, thanks to the dubious but nevertheless appreciated (in retrospect) practice of bootlegging. Shakey Pictures Records is now happy to announce the first of a new series — The Neil Young Official Bootleg Series: Carnegie Hall 1970. Five more series selections will become available in 2022. Carnegie Hall, recorded on original analog multitrack, was mixed by The Volume Dealers — Neil Young and Niko Bolas. This recording was made from the show on Dec. 4, 1970 and it was the first time Neil ever walked onstage at Carnegie Hall. The concert’s generous setlist covers one of the most revered eras of Young’s career, with stripped-down versions of Down By the River, Helpless and Sugar Mountain, plus After the Gold Rush from the album of the same name, released only nine weeks prior to the show. Neil even plays Bad Fog of Loneliness, Old Man and See the Sky About to Rain before they were recorded and released. Carnegie Hall is an album full of gems.”
