zaterdag 22 mei 2021

The Tragically Hip - Saskadelphia (EP) (2021)

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After The Tragically Hip played their farewell concert on August 20, 2016, in Kingston, ON, I thought maybe I had written about them for the last time. When Gord Downie passed away on October 17, 2017, I thought the same thing again. In January 2021, I put together a 10 Top List based on the streams on Spotify and YouTube… and today, we are back again thanks to the release of Saskadelphia.

That’s the thing about a band that is so deeply part of the plot, they never really go away. 
The Tragically Hip are so much a part of Canadian music and Canadiana that the memories they’ve created, with and for fans, stays strong. 
They are so deeply ingrained in our consciousness that we still sing their songs around campfires and celebrate their hits and b-sides with love and admiration.
This year, we celebrate the 30th anniversary of Road Apples and now, the release of Saskadelphia, giving us more of what they wrote and recorded in those sessions. We’ve learned now that their 1991 release had been planned as a double album – but the plan was scrapped. We thought that all of those songs were lost in 2008 during the Universal Studios fire.
Thankfully, some songs survived and last summer, the band (starting with Johnny Fay) listened to them, got them ready (added in the live audio for Montreal) and have given us this EP.
From the lead single “Ouch,” which greets listeners with the familiar roaring vocals of the late singer and lyricist Gord Downie, to “Not Necessary” a song whose fiery sound is layered with gentle and emotional lyrics – are pure, undistilled The Tragically Hip, as Rob Baker (guitar), Gord Downie (vocals, guitar), Johnny Fay (drums), Paul Langlois (guitar) and Gord Sinclair (bass) lay the groundwork for their unmistakable sound.

Saskadelphia is simultaneously new and old. It is fresh and nostalgic. It is us listening to Gord sing and Rob and Johnny and Paul and Gord (Sinclair) play songs in a studio in 1990 (and on stage in 2000) and being able to place them in that time – while enjoying them and embracing for the first time, in this time.


1.  Ouch - 3:10
2.  Not Necessary - 3:01
3.  Montreal (Live from The Molson Centre, Montreal, Dec 7th, 2000) - 3:49
4.  Crack My Spine Like a Whip - 3:11
5.  Just As Well - 2:35
6.  Reformed Baptist Blues - 3:30

vrijdag 21 mei 2021

Gary Numan - Intruder (2021)

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Ageless synth-rocker Gary Numan is back with a fierce and fascinating 14th solo album. ‘Intruder’ is a perfect foil to the sounds of the broken wastelands on his 2017, ‘Savage’ album. Numan gives our battered planet a voice that sonically rips through you, full of anger, sadness and betrayal.

Numan is undoubtedly making music he wants to make. Gone are many of the business & financial pressures that he felt back in the mid-'90s. In his revealing 2020 autobiography, (R)evolution, he ends the book looking ahead to his return to Wembley Arena, as part of the upcoming ‘Intruder' tour, following a gap of 40 years. Numan says himself that it "will be the final, glorious part of the jigsaw I've been putting together since 1981", after his regretful, knee-jerk statement, prior to the last time he played the venue, that he was quitting touring at the peak of his career. But this album, his 18th as a solo artist, is not an introspective spotlight on Numan, but more global - a much ‘bigger picture project.

Intruder follows 2017, post-apocalyptic Savage: Songs From a Broken World, his most commercially successful album in almost forty years. Intruder compliments the themes highlighted in ‘Savage’, however not from a human perspective, but from the viewpoint of our own, wounded planet. As Numan explains, “The planet sees us as its children with a total disregard for its well being. It feels betrayed, hurt and ravaged. Disillusioned and heartbroken it is now fighting back. Essentially, it considers humankind to be a virus attacking the planet. Climate change is the undeniable sign of the Earth saying enough is enough, and finally doing what it needs to do to get rid of us, and explaining why it feels it has to do it.”

‘Betrayed’ sets the table for the whole album. It is lamenting, mysterious, haunting and sonically huge. The Arabic instrumentation adds another level of depth to this opener. The lyrics go right to the core of the planet’s anguish - "I burn for you/you want death, so I'll die for you/you want pain, so I scream for you.”

There is a sense from Numan’s music that the earth has already made its decision to purge humanity so that it can hit the refresh button. You can’t help feeling tremendous sorrow that it may in fact already be too late for us to stop the juggernaut of destruction and re-creation. There is an element of this as you listen to the tracks, leaving a hollow emptiness within you.

The radio static intro of ‘The Gift’ could be straight out of David Fincher’s ‘Se7en’ movie. The stripped-back verse builds into the grand, middle-eastern driven chorus, where you can imagine the swirling sandstorm, punctured by the sound of what could be a pack of howling wolves in the mid-section. The planet’s disdain roars through Numan’s voice - “Everything I promised is ending with you." Is the ‘Gift’ our wasted reward of life & nature that we have all abused, or is it a ‘Gift’ to the planet from itself, using Covid-19 as the first weapon deployed in order to eradicate mankind and once again flourish?

The title track ‘Intruder’ has those vast, signature Numan hooks in the chorus that make it one of the best tracks on the album. The invasion of mankind that has led to so much ruin on earth in the eyes of the planet contains a multitude of brilliant, anti-religious and brutal lyrics -  "You can hide in the shadows and pretend I won't find you / You can drown in your sorrows and pretend that you're helpless / You can beg for God’s mercy and pretend that he hears you / Don't you just wish that you listened more?"

‘I am Screaming’ sounds like a final, desperate plea with a sprinkle of Far Eastern influenced synth keys to prolong the drama. It seems like we still have a fragile choice to make - "You're welcome to stand with me, you're welcome to stand alone."

‘Is This World Not Enough’ is mechanical and industrially tortured, one of the weaker outings on the LP. On the other end of the spectrum, the piano intro on ‘A Black Sun’ brings space and light to the proceedings, lifting us out of the industrial gloom and despair. There is profound melancholy on this track. It is regretful with the darkest shade of nostalgia - “When I was a child, the world seemed endless / I played the hero and held up the sky.” This track especially brings into focus how the likes of Trent Reznor from Nine Inch Nails were inspired by Numan, and as time passed, how Numan has been influenced by Reznor. Their music feels inseparable and seamless in many ways.

The late Keith Flint would be proud of the dance-fuelled, rhythmic ‘The Chosen.’ The planet’s disillusionment of our behaviour becomes manic and absorbing within these Numan beats - “How could you turn your hearts to stone / How could you steal their dreams away?"

The brooding guitar feedback on ‘And It Breaks Me Again’ is apocalyptic, making way for a sonically soaring chorus, with some brutally stark lyrics, “Is this how life is, just waiting for sorrow?” The synthesised riff in ‘Saints & Liars’ is exquisite, driving home the message of humanity’s recklessness and hypocrisy. ‘Intruder’ was recorded between sessions at Numan’s home studio in Los Angeles and at producer Ade Fenton’s studio in Bath. It represents their fifth studio album together since 2006.

The slower beat of ‘Now and Forever’ is the only time on the record that Numan lifts the bonnet on a more personal level. The song is a tribute to his wife, Gemma who he met in the early 1990s, and he credits with completely turning his career, and ultimately his life around. As the world seemingly descends into wreck and ruin, Numan has written this to document his eternal love for her, no matter what happens on a mortal level.

‘The End of Dragons’ is a haunting and mesmerising finale. The lengthy intro is followed by piano, leading into the verse. The tribal, metallic beat has a sombre peacefulness to it with complete poignancy in the lyrics - "Sometimes we're scared of the dark. Sometimes we're scared of the truth / Sometimes we are what we fear." - the most horrifying reality and potential cruelty that lies within all of us. Ultimately, we, the human race have become the harbingers of our own doom.

There is no doubt that this is a heavy, serious listen, with a rhythm that doesn’t stray too far off-beam from the industrial, synth foundation of Numan’s work. The production by Ade Fenton is super-slick, creating a wall of deafening sound, and Numan shows no sign of pulling back or slowing down. Although the message of the album is hardly visionary, it remains utterly shocking and devastating, which can be difficult to sit at ease with. However, the subject matter is something that should make all of us uncomfortable to begin to get people to take action and make a change in their own lives, no matter how little that change is. The time for talking is over; the time for action is urgently upon us.


1.  Betrayed - 4:41
2.  The Gift - 6:07 
3.  I Am Screaming - 3:53 
4.  Intruder - 4:24  
5.  Is This World Not Enough - 5:24  
6.  A Black Sun - 5:40 
7.  The Chosen - 4:43 
8.  And It Breaks Me Again - 4:45  
9.  Saints and Liars - 4:01 
10.  Now and Forever - 5:57 
11.  The End of Dragons - 5:12
12.  When You Fall - 5:08
13.  The End Of Dragons (Alt) - 4:58

vrijdag 29 januari 2021

The Weekend - The Highlights (2021)

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The Highlights arrives Feb. 5 and was curated specifically for his upcoming Pepsi Super Bowl LV Halftime Show appearance. While not a greatest hits collection, the 18-track set features some of his most notable hits spanning his decade-long career. The album kicks off with a trio of hits off 2020’s After Hours, including “Save Your Tears,” “In Your Eyes,” and the chart-topping “Blinding Lights.”

The XO crooner takes it back to the Starboy era with the Daft Punk-assisted “I Feel It Coming,” while including selections from 2015’s Beauty Behind the Madness and his 2018 EP My Dear Melancholy, plus his collaborations with Ariana Grande (“Love Me Harder”) and Kendrick Lamar (“Pray for Me”). 
The project caps off with “Wicked Games” and “The Morning” off his 2011 debut mixtape House of Balloons

The "Blinding Lights" singer will take the stage at the Super Bowl LV showdown between Tampa Bay and Kansas City on Feb. 7 at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Florida and the specially curated collection is an introduction to some of his career highlights for the gigantic audience that typically tunes in to the biggest annual TV broadcast.

But before then, he's offering fans the chance to order a copy of his hits comp, which features such beloved songs as "In Your Eyes," "Can't Feel My Face," "Starboy," "Heartless," "Die For You," "Love Me Harder" and "Wicked Games," among others; the singer's site says the CD version will ship in the next two or three weeks. According to XO/Republic Records, the project will be available on Feb. 5.

At press time, the collection was not available on major streaming services, and a spokesperson for The Weeknd hadn't returned requests for comment on when it would be released for streaming.

“Given the vast mainstream audience of the Super Bowl, The Highlights album is a way to present some of The Weeknd’s most notable works in one place,” reads a press release from The Weeknd’s label, Republic Records. “While this isn’t a ‘Greatest Hits’ album it does provide a new listener a rich foray into some of the iconic artist’s best and favorite work.”


Track listing

1.  Save Your Tears - 3:35
2.  Blinding Lights - 3:20
3.  In Your Eyes - 3:57
4.  Can’t Feel My Face - 3:33
5.  I Feel It Coming (With Daft Punk) - 4:29
6.  Starboy (With Daft Punk) - 3:50
7.  Pray for Me (With Kendrick Lamar) - 3:31
8.  Heartless - 3:18
9.  Often - 4:09
10.  The Hills - 4:02
11.  Call Out My Name - 3:48
12.  Die for You - 4:20
13.  Earned It (Fifty Shades of Grey) - 4:12
14.  Love Me Harder (With Ariana Grande) - 3:56
15.  Acquainted - 5:48
16.  Wicked Games - 5:23
17.  The Morning - 5:12
18.   After Hours - 6:01

St. Germain - Tourist (20th Anniversary Travel Versions) (2021)

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When first released back in 2000, Tourist was a global success, selling over four million albums worldwide. 
It was Ludovic Navarre’s (aka. St Germain) third studio album which really transformed his career into superstardom; combining elements of house and nu jazz to produce an impeccable album to chill out to. 
The album continues to be hugely popular to this day, with the critically acclaimed Jorja Smith doing a cover of Rose rouge earlier this year.
To celebrate the 20th anniversary of his Tourist album, Ludovic Navarre aka St Germain has invited UK, South Africa, USA, Reunion Island and France producers, DJs and remixers with various musical inspirations, from Deep House to Afro House and Chicago House. 
He declares: “I would like to thank all the people I asked to travel through their favorite Tourist album track. Some of them worked on my last Africa-in- spired album in 2015, like my dear friend Atjazz, who helped me a lot on this new project, and also Terry Laird, Dj Deep and Traumer. I don’t have to introduce highly respected newcomers such as Nightmares On Wax , Jovonn, Ron Trent, Black Motion, Osunlade and Jullian Gomes. 
I truly enjoy their passion for music, their personality and musical integrity. I know they’ve got soul!


Track listing

1.  Rose rouge (Atjazz Galaxy Aart Remix) - 7:46
2.  Sure Thing (Osunlade Yoruba Soul Mix) [Version longue] - 6:53
3.  Rose rouge (Terry Laird Nu Maloya Fusion Mix) - 7:13
4.  Rose rouge (Ron Trent JazzFunkSuite for Musicandpower Remix) - 10:26
5.  So Flute (St Germain Radio Edit remix 2020) - 3:43
6.  Sure Thing (Black Motion Anniversary Mix) - 6:47
7.  Rose rouge (Travel with Jovonn) [Jovonn BND Remix] - 7:29
8.  Sure Thing (Jullian Gomes Remix) - 7:08
9.  Rose rouge (Nightmares on Wax ReRub) - 7:15
10.  What You Think About (Travel with Traumer) [Re-Jammed Remix] - 6:43
11.  Sure Thing (DJ Deep Remix) - 6:25

dinsdag 26 januari 2021

Foo Fighters - Medicine at Midnight (2021)

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On Feb. 5, Foo Fighters return with Medicine at Midnight, their delayed tenth studio album and the follow-up to 2017’s Concrete and Gold, which debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 chart.
After releasing their ninth studio album, Concrete and Gold in 2017, and touring extensively behind it through much of 2018, the Foo Fighters announced they would be taking a break in October 2018, with frontman Dave Grohl stating that although they needed a rest, he already had some initial ideas for the band’s next album. 
The break would last for less than a year, as by August 2019, drummer Taylor Hawkins reported that Grohl had already been demoing material by himself, and that the rest of the members planned to start contributing shortly thereafter. 
The band collectively started recording for the album in October 2019.

The following month, Grohl described the band as being “right in the middle” of the recording process, and that the album was sounding “fucking weird”.

The album was recorded in a large, old house from the 1940s in Encino, Los Angeles.Recording sessions proceeded quickly, something Grohl attributed two things – that the material was progressing quickly and that they were recording in an environment where strange things kept happening. Grohl recalled: “I knew the vibes were definitely off, but the sound was fucking on. We would come back to the studio the next day and all of the guitars would be detuned. Or the setting we’d put on the [mixing] board, all of them had gone back to zero. 

We would open up a Pro Tools session and tracks would be missing. There were some tracks that were put on there that we didn’t put on there. But just like weird open mic noises. Nobody playing an instrument or anything like that, just an open mic recording a room.”

Grohl noted that they captured unexplainable footage on video, but due to a non-disclosure agreement with the house’s owner, who was attempting to sell the property, the footage cannot be shown. Contrary to the Concrete and Gold sessions, which frequently ended in nights of large cookouts, drinking, and parties, the sessions were wrapped up as quickly as possible. In February 2020, Grohl confirmed that the album was finished.

Grohl likened the album’s sound to David Bowie’s Let’s Dance album, with him explaining that it’s “not like a EDM, disco, [or] modern dance record” but rather “this really up, fun record” that is “filled with anthemic, huge, sing-along rock songs.
”Hawkins described the album as being more “pop-oriented” than prior releases, different from their usual post-grunge sound. He also noted the use of a drum loop on the album, another atypical trait for the band. One song on the album contains a guitar riff that Grohl wrote 25 years ago in Seattle, but was never able to find a song to use it in until now. Grohl stated: “Some of those songs, the best ones happen in 45 minutes. 
Then there’s other songs — there’s a riff on the new record I’ve been working on for 25 years. The first time I demoed it was in my basement in Seattle.”

Grohl states the album was inspired by “Our love of rock bands that make these upbeat, up-tempo, almost danceable records.


Track listing

1.  Making a Fire - 4:15 
2.  Shame Shame - 4:17 
3.  Cloudspotter - 3:53 
4.  Waiting on a War - 4:13 
5.  Medicine at Midnight - 3:30 
6.  No Son of Mine - 3:28 
7.  Holding Poison - 4:24 
8.  Chasing Birds - 4:12 
9.  Love Dies Young - 4:20

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Barry Gibb & Friends - Greenfields The Gibb Brothers Songbook Vol. 1 (2021)

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The last surviving Bee Gee takes the easy route with these glossy, country-inflected retakes of their greatest hits with Dolly Parton, Sheryl Crow, Keith Urban etc.

It’s not been tested in a lab, but anecdotal belief holds that sibling harmonies vibrate at particularly sublime frequency. On How Can You Mend a Broken Heart, the illuminating Bee Gees documentary released last month, Noel Gallagher and a Jonas Brother reflect wryly on the vicissitudes of being in a band with your brothers, but also on how uncanny the musical entente can be.

Imagine, then, being Barry Gibb. Thanks to the munificent quirks of the 20th-century music industry, he has long sat atop vast sierras of cash generated by songwriting. The Bee Gees were screaming-meemie famous not once, but twice – first as 60s popstrels and again as disco mavens. No one talked as much about cultural appropriation then, but the Gibbs had an unabashed love of male falsetto vocal groups, soul and R&B, which they put to excellent use.

But Gibb lost his brothers: twins Robin and Maurice, and young Andy. Now 74, Barry Gibb is in an expansionary phase, keen to remind the world of the catalogue. After the doc comes this album of country-inflected duets, which pairs brothers Gibb songs with a range of collaborators. Some, such as Dolly Parton, are former associates. Others, like Olivia Newton-John, are fellow survivors of the 70s/80s cusp.

The country feel here finds Gibb luxuriating in the genre of his childhood. Butterfly is an unreleased song that references the brothers’ Australian neighbourhood, Greenfields. It closes the tracklisting, with Gillian Welch and David Rawlings – always classy – providing a relatively rare three-way harmonic episode.

Although outfits such as Little Big Town provide a few more, it’s telling that harmonies are, mostly, not the focus here. Sweet-voiced Robin, and Maurice’s uncanny synchromesh, cannot be replaced. You presume lockdown did not exactly favour the exchange of spittle around one microphone either. The singing, in which Gibb and the other vocalist mostly trade verses, is perfectly serviceable. He has lost little of his etiolated upper register, as the crowds that saw his set at Glastonbury 2017 can attest. (Apparently, a scepticism around cocaine helps.)

But Greenfields is an opportunity missed. It doesn’t lack for big box office – Keith Urban, Miranda Lambert and Sheryl Crow figure – but the whole endeavour is overproduced and under-brave. The glue here is producer Dave Cobb, who contributed to the soundtrack for the Lady Gaga-starring reboot of A Star Is Born (2018); apparently, the film’s Bradley Cooper may play Barry Gibb in a forthcoming biopic.

Cobb’s associates – Jason Isbell, formerly of Drive-By Truckers, who also wrote a song for A Star Is Born; Jay Buchanan, singer in US rock band Rival Sons; and Brandi Carlile – acquit themselves pleasantly enough on a range of still-great Bee Gees songs. One of the more unexpected performances comes from Buchanan, a man most often given to bawling bluesily over heavy guitars. It’s hard to ruin To Love Somebody, but such is Buchanan’s unexpected way around a soul vocal, you do a double take and squint at the credits.

Alison Krauss’s voice is as pure as a mountain stream on Too Much Heaven, but you get the feeling that Gibb, faced with the intoxicating possibilities of an Italian gelateria, would opt for an aerated Mr Whippy. Pulling in lesser-known voices would have been a savvier A&R move too. On his American Recordings, Johnny Cash found all sorts of unlikely songs to sing. Gibb might have trawled the vast reservoir of roots artists more inventively. Even if it was all outsourced through Cobb, Gibb could have had Sturgill Simpson, a country artist both genre-bucking and prolific. (Gibb professes his love of bluegrass; Simpson recently dropped two albums of bluegrass reworkings of his own catalogue.)

If only Greenfields went heavy on the banjo and whooping; there is an airless soft focus here that dovetails logically with the Gibb brand but mislays the Bee Gees’ genre-rifling flexibility and joie de vivre.

The Bee Gees aren’t a legendarily experimental band. But the recent documentary reveals that in 1977, Bee Gees drummer Dennis Bryon had to rush home from the Saturday Night Fever sessions for a family emergency. So the Bee Gees’ engineers physically spliced several feet of tape of his Night Fever drumming into a loop, which in turn formed the basis of Stayin’ Alive. Necessity was the mother of invention then. But with the stakes not particularly high here, Greenfields takes the easy path.


Track listing

1.  Barry Gibb with Keith Urban - I've Gotta Get A Message To You - 3:14 
2.  Barry Gibb with Jason Isbell - Words Of A Fool - 3:48  
3.  Barry Gibb with Brandi Carlile - Run To Me - 3:22  
4.  Barry Gibb with Alison Krauss - Too Much Heaven - 3:39  
5.  Barry Gibb with Little Big Town - Lonely Days - 3:44  
6.  Barry Gibb with Dolly Parton - Words - 3:11  
7.  Barry Gibb with Miranda Lambert And Jay Buchanan - Jive Talkin' - 3:57   
8.  Barry Gibb with Little Big Town And Tommy Emmanuel - How Deep Is Your Love - 4:26   
9.  Barry Gibb with Sheryl Crow - How Can You Mend A Broken Heart - 3:26  
10.  Barry Gibb with Jay Buchanan - To Love Somebody - 3:35  
11.  Barry Gibb with Olivia Newton-John - Rest Your Love On Me - 4:01   
12.  Barry Gibb with Gillian Welch And David Rawlings - Butterfly - 3:43

maandag 25 januari 2021

Sting - The Soul Cages [Expanded Edition] (2021)

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…A deeply-felt song cycle, The Soul Cages found Sting simultaneously looking backward & forward. In the studio, he reunited with producer Hugh Padgham, who’d overseen The Police’s Ghost in the Machine and Synchronicity; he also diversified his backing band, picking up session guitarist Dominic Miller – his musical right hand ever since. (Saxophonist Branford Marsalis and keyboardist Kenny Kirkland return from Sting’s original solo band; other musicians include drummer Manu Katche and keyboardist David Sancious.)
Lyrically, the album takes Sting in a different territory than ever before: deep into his past growing up in the English shipbuilding town of Wallsend. Drawing from the death of his father, who’d passed on only a year after his mother, "The Soul Cages" addressed grief, love and humanity in more personal (but typically literary) terms than his prior works.

For his trouble, he earned his first solo Grammy Award (for the title track in the category of Best Rock Song), and the philosophical “All This Time” became his highest-charting single credited solely to him, reaching No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100. (“All for Love,” a soundtrack ballad for The Three Musketeers with Bryan Adams and Rod Stewart, remains his only Stateside solo chart-topper.) 
Other favorites include the pulsing “Mad About You” and the introspective “Why Should I Cry for You”; in 2018, when putting together the musical The Last Ship for a troubled Broadway run, Sting augmented the new material with the album’s opening tracks, “Island of Souls” and “All This Time.”

The expanded The Soul Cages includes nine bonus tracks, many of which have never been available digitally. There’s foreign-language versions (“Mad About You” in Italian, “Why Should I Cry for You” in Spanish), single edits, rare remixes of “Mad About You,” B-side curiosities like the instrumental “I Miss You Kate” and obscurity “Oo La La Hugh,” live covers of Squeeze’s “Tempted” and Jacques Brel’s “Ne me quitte pas” from his 1988 tour, and even a cover of Elton John’s “Come Down in Time” for a tribute album to the artist released later in 1991.


Track listing

1.  Island of Souls - 6:40
2.  All This Time - 4:54
3.  Mad About You - 3:53
4.  Jeremiah Blues (Part 1) - 4:54
5.  Why Should I Cry for You - 4:46
6.  Saint Agnes and the Burning Train - 2:42
7.  The Wild Wild Sea - 6:41
8.  The Soul Cages - 5:52
9.  When the Angels Fall - 7:48
10.  I Miss You Kate - 3:42
11.  Come Down in Time - 3:45
12.  Tempted  (Live) - 4:42
13.  Ne Me Quitte Pas  (Live) - 3:32
14.  Oo La La Hugh - 2:45
15.  Mad About You  (Original Remix) - 4:33
16.  Mad About You  (Remix Edit) - 4:05
17.  Mad About You  (12″ Remix) - 5:43
18.  Mad About You  (Italian Version) - 3:57
19.  Why Should I Cry for You  (Spanish Version) - 4:48
20.  Why Should I Cry for You  (Extended Mix) - 7:22
21.  The Soul Cages  (Edit) - 4:26
22.  All This Time  (Edit) - 3:59

Marvin Gaye - What's Going On (Deluxe Edition - 50th Anniversary) (2021)

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Motown/UMe has marked the 50th anniversary of Marvin Gaye’s single release for “What’s Going On” — the title track from Rolling Stone’s Greatest Album of All Time — with an all-encompassing digital reissue of the 1971 LP out now on streaming services.

“What’s Going On” was released on January 20th, 1971, four months before the LP arrived. Over the past 20 years, the album has been reissued every decade, with early mixes, instrumentals and other rarities culled from the era added to each release.

To honor the single’s 50th birthday, Motown/UMe grouped together all that bonus music for the digital release dubbed What’s Going On: Deluxe Edition/50th Anniversary, which contains the original album plus 12 bonus tracks including single versions, demos and more, the “Detroit Mix” of the album and the collection of “Funky Nation” instrumentals from Gaye’s post-What’s Going On recording sessions.

It combines tracks from previously released special editions, and includes the original album, plus 12 bonus tracks featuring each of the LP’s original mono single versions and their B-sides. Two of those b-sides – “God Is Love” and “Sad Tomorrows” -- are different takes, and there's also an earlier version of “Flying High (in the Friendly Sky)” as well as the original single version of “What’s Going On” with no “party” intro and a false fade.

There's also a few other mixes of the title track, including an early mix which Motown used as a reference and contains no orchestration, a “Coffeehouse Mix” by that emphasizes the acoustic guitars, an instrumental mix, and more.

They've also released "The Detroit Mix" of the whole album, which was the original mix -- more stripped back and percussive -- which Gaye scrapped and redid in Los Angeles. "The Detroit Mix" was unreleased till the 30th Anniversary edition of the album in 2001.

Governor Gretchen Whitmer recently announced that January 20th would be What’s Going On Day in the state of Michigan to honor the classic song and album. “Having this tribute on the calendar provides us with an important moment — one where we can come together as a unified state to pause, reflect, and appreciate the need for ideas, perspective, love, and understanding. These are values that mean more today than ever before,” Whitmer said.

“Through the recognition of What’s Going On Day, we hope to bring awareness to Marvin Gaye’s profound words as his timeless music remains in our hearts and minds and continues inspiring generations to come.”


What’s Going On: Deluxe Edition/50th Anniversary Track List

Set 1: Original Album
1.  What’s Going On - 3:51
2.  What’s Happening Brother - 2:57
3.  Flyin’ High (In The Friendly Sky) - 3:40
4.  Save The Children - 3:04
5.  God Is Love - 2:31
6.  Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology) - 3:05
7.  Right On - 7:20
8.  Wholy Holy - 3:20
9.  Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler) - 5:16

Set 2: Bonus Tracks
1.  What’s Going On (Mono Single Version) - 3:54
2.  God Is Love (Single Version) - 2:52
3.  Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology) (Mono Single Version) - 2:30
4.  Sad Tomorrows (Mono Single Version)  2:23
5.  Inner City Blues (Make Me Wanna Holler) (Mono Single Version) - 2:58
6.  Wholy Holy (Mono Single Version) - 3:09
7.  What’s Going On (mix 1/no horns or strings) - 3:46
8.  What’s Going On (rhythm & strings mix) - 3:50
9.  What’s Going On (Coffeehouse Mix by Russ Elevado) - 3:56
10.  What’s Going On (duet with B.J. the Chicago Kid) - 5:06
11.  Symphony (Demo Version) - 2:49
12.  I Love the Ground You Walk On (instrumental) - 2:27

zondag 24 januari 2021

Steven Wilson - The Future Bites (2021)

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The Future Bites (stylised as THE FUTURE BITES™) is the upcoming sixth studio album by British musician Steven Wilson. The album was initially set for release on 12 June 2020 through Caroline International, but later was pushed back to 29 January 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which affected the marketing and production related to the album. 
It was co-produced by Wilson and David Kosten and recorded in London.

The album deals with "two recurring themes" of Wilson's musical output, identity and technology, with a press release noting that it "picks apart our 21st century utopia, while also allowing for moments of personal growth and optimism". It was also called "less a bleak vision of an approaching dystopia, more a curious reading of the here and now", and lead single "Personal Shopper" was noted to expand on the electronic elements of Wilson's previous work, "fully diving into dance and neo-disco while somehow keeping a rock edge".

If there’s one person in contemporary progressive rock circles who needs no introduction, it’s Steven Wilson. Over the last thirty years he has slowly but surely carved out a successful career path and now stands as a solo artist with the genuine prospect of having tangible success. Of course, with this possibility comes the inevitable risk; broadening appeal may mean alienating those fans who helped build that success. Is Steven Wilson worried about this? Well, even a cursory listen to The Future Bites makes it clear that the answer is categorically ‘No’. This album is bold and defiant, and there is little room for compromise. Large portions of it are basically electronic dance music, a far cry from the ‘prog’ of The Raven Who Refused to Sing, or the guitar heavy rock of In Absentia.

 Anyone who follows the artist will doubtless have checked out the videos to the songs which have been trailed on social media so far, such as Personal Shopper or Eminent Sleaze, so may have already made up their minds about the album and its direction. Personal Shopper is probably the album’s centrepiece, and certainly the longest track on offer, bouncing along with a Donna Summer dance beat. This is Steven Wilson though, so there’s an ominous edge as we explore the human obsession with consumerism and its effects on the way we think and act. There’s more than a hint of irony in the lyrics:

“Buy the box set and the kind of stuff
You’ve bought before a million times
Buy in green, buy in blue, buy in patterns ’cause I tell you to”

Objects of desire, read in deadpan style by Elton John, are linked with the supposed motivation to buy them:

“Designer trainers (self-indulgence)
Diamond cufflinks (self-expression)
Detox drinks (self obsession, self defence)”

The insistent electro-dance beat reinforces the all consuming message, as this piece covers the two main themes of the album – identity and technology. It is superficially upbeat, but always with that subversive twist as we are sucked into a world of unending buying of “the shit you never knew you lacked”. It might seem difficult for some fans, but there is the unmistakable Wilson darkness permeating proceedings, which I find perversely reassuring.

But let’s go back to the beginning. The Future Bites begins gently, with what sounds like an acoustic demo snatch of a song, Unself, which barely begins, then mirror image second track Self shatters all illusions in shocking fashion. In a stab at electronic pop, reminiscent of Bowie in the Eighties, we have three minutes of music most un-Wilson-like, hardly a ‘proper’ rock instrument to be discerned, and very catchy. But is it really un-Wilson-like? Actually, not really – it still has that dark side as it examines the cult of self amid clashing noise interjections. It’s pop, but it’s not comfortable or easy, and Wilson’s dispassionate delivery sets the tone for much that follows. A girlie chorus of “We are self, the self that loves itself now, doo doo doo do do”. You’re either going to love it or hate it, there’s no middle ground here.

 King Ghost follows, and is one of the album’s stand out tracks, mesmeric and a thing of great beauty. It comes to life on a bass pulse with percussive embellishment, and tinkling electronic keyboard loops. The falsetto chorus makes the song, and if you’ve seen Jess Cope’s animated video, you’ll know how captivating this song is. What it’s about is frankly lost on me, it seems rather abstract, but it matters not a jot – it’s simply one of the best songs I’ve heard this year. 12 Things I Forgot follows, and is in much more familiar territory musically. It’s another lovely song inhabiting a similar sound world to Nowhere Now from the last album, To the Bone, or perhaps even Lazarus, and might appease some traditionalists who are feeling lost. There’s even a guitar on this one!

Eminent Sleaze breaks the reverie with handclaps and a dirty bassline, Wilson playing the slimy businessman with aplomb.

“Me, I’m a bona fide reptile
The closer I get to the dirt
The sharper the suit that I’m wearing”

“I turn on the charm and you’re down there on the tarmac
I say something funny, you give me all your money”

The song turns into a sort of mid-tempo Floyd rocker, with female vocal backing; it could almost be an updated Money for the internet generation.

The guitar comes in clipped stabbing shards, and is used sparingly for maximum effect. It’s not the Wilson we are used to, but it’s undeniably classy. The insinuated Floyd connection continues on Man of the People, which floats in on echoey keyboards and gently strummed guitar, sounding rather like Sheep. Move along, nothing to fear here prog fans.

The penultimate track, Follower, is another up-tempo Bowie-esque rocker, and almost leaves the listener on a high with its social media commentary and sing-along chorus, but closer Count Of Unease brings things right down with a typically atmospheric final floating six minutes of other-worldly wonder, “always outside, always out of my mind” he breathes.

So there it is, a concise forty-minute album. Some of it shouldn’t be too indigestible for those of a delicate prog diet, but much is brave and more challenging. As a long-standing Steven Wilson listener, I doubt I’ll regard this as his finest work in years to come, but not every album can top the previous. What’s important is the journey, not what each stop on the way looks like. The Future Bites is an essential step on the evolutionary journey of an extraordinary talent. Great artists have always thrown us curve balls and refused to stand still, been reluctant to repeat former glories, and I have to say that the day Wilson panders to expectation is the day he’ll make a truly duff album. This certainly isn’t it, and there are moments that rank with his best achievements. And the beauty is that the next album will undoubtedly be completely different again. I’m confident most of us will still be listening.


Track listing

1.  Unself - 1:05 
2.  Self - 2:55 
3.  King Ghost - 4:06 
4.  12 Things I Forgot - 4:42 
5.  Eminent Sleaze - 3:52 
6.  Man of the People - 4:41 
7.  Personal Shopper - 9:49 
8.  Follower - 4:39 
9.  Count of Unease - 6:08