Music Releases 05-13-22

Written partially in Nashville and partially in the Compton house Keb’ grew up in, Good To Be… weaves together past and present into a heartwarming tapestry spanning more than forty years of sonic evolution. Joined by a variety of collaborators, including country legend Vince Gill, famed producer Tom Hambridge (B.B. King, Buddy Guy), Darius Rucker, Kristin Chenoweth, and Old Crow Medicine Show, Good To Be…is a deeply cohesive and optimistic collection of music about appreciating what you’ve got, where you come from, and who you get to share it with.

Florence + The Machine releases 5th studio album, Dance Fever. Written & produced through the haze of two lockdowns, in London & NY with producers Jack Antonoff & Glass Animals’ Dave Bayley. Dance Fever sees Florence at the peak of her powers, coming into a fully realized self-knowledge, poking sly fun at her own self-created persona, playing with ideas of identity, masculine & feminine, redemptive, celebratory, stepping into her place in the iconic pantheon. Indie Grey 2LP. 4th side etching.

Lyle Lovett returns with his first new album in over 10 years,“12th of June”, due out on Verve Records May 13th, 2022. The album is a fantastic and eclectic collection of new original songs and beloved interpretations that will please existing fans as well as invite new ones. Immaculately recorded, it highlights the dynamics of Lyle and his Large Band– and their singular ability to shift from one genre to the next with uncanny grace and ability.  From beautiful acoustic ballads to swinging big band numbers, this record will remind listeners why Lyle is national musical treasure.

Muddy Waters - Electric Mud - Electric Mud is the fifth studio album by Muddy Waters, with members of Rotary Connection playing as his backing band. Released in 1968, it imagines Muddy Waters as a psychedelic musician. Producer Marshall Chess suggested that Muddy Waters recorded it in an attempt to appeal to a rock audience.

A legendary event in the incredible 60-year history of the Rolling Stones is now available for the first time in-full. ‘Live At The El Mocambo’ marks the first official appearance of the group’s two famous secret concerts at the 300-capacity Toronto club in March 1977. It features the Stones’ full set from the March 5 show, plus three bonus tracks from the March 4 gig, newly mixed by Bob Clearmountain.

Released as part of the Acoustic Sounds Series celebrating 70 years of Contemporary Records, Saxophonist Art Pepper's classic big band album +Eleven features modern jazz classics by Dizzy Gillespie, Thelonious Monk, Charlie Parker and more. First released in 1960 and recorded by legendary engineers Roy DuNann and Howard Holzer this new edition features ALL-ANALOG mastering from the original analog tapes by Bernie Grundman. It is pressed on 180-gram vinyl at QRP and presented in a tip-on jacket.

Best New Artist GRAMMY nominee and critically acclaimed band Tank and The Bangas return with their third studio album, Red Balloon. Red Balloon was born out of a pandemic-ordered break from the band’s rigorous touring schedule. The hiatus gave the band space to grow, allowing them to reunite as a more unified group. This new work pushes the band to a new level, shedding light on their unique observations and reflecting on the ills of America while also celebrating the beauty of Black life.

Comfort To Me is the second album from Amyl and The Sniffers, somehow both heavier and more awesome than their debut. MOJO Magazine raved: "Skin-shedding, lethal, self-sufficient, cool: no wonder Amy Taylor digs snakes. With Comfort To Me, she proves she can be whoever she wants, while the Sniffers confound preconceptions of how great a rude and righteous rock’n’roll band can still be." This expanded edition features a bonus LP recorded live on a dock in Melbourne. Pressed on clear smoke vinyl.

Limited 180gm vinyl LP pressing. Get Ready is the legendary platinum-selling album by Rare Earth. It includes the full-length version (21:30) of the title track, originally penned by Smokey Robinson. The edited single version peaked at #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1970. It is remembered as the first song longer than 16 minutes to be a dance hit in European discotheques.

Even though Duke Ellington and Coleman Hawkins had both been well-known jazzmen since the early 1920s, it wasn't until 1962 - at least 20 years after Duke first suggested it - that these two recorded their only session together. High points include an exuberant "The Jeep Is Jumpin'," an interesting remake of "Mood Indigo," and a few new Ellington pieces. Verve Acoustic Sounds Series features transfers from analog tapes and remastered on 180-gram vinyl in deluxe gatefold packaging.

Monophonics cordially invite you to attend the grand re-opening of the once thriving, once vibrant establishment, the legendary Sage Motel. A place where folks experience the highs and lows of human existence. A place where big dreams and broken hearts live, where people arrive at without ever knowing how they got there. It's where folks find themselves at a crossroads in life. So join us as we examine where the stories are told and experiences unfold.....and sink into a soft pillow of soulful psychedelia.....down at the Sage Motel.

Forrest Gump: The Soundtrack is based on the award-winning, critically acclaimed film, Forrest Gump. Originally released in 1994, the movie interweaves itself in time through the eyes of its title character, Forrest Gump, using music as a critical tool to tell the now classic story. Featuring 31 iconic pop hits including Elvis Presley’s “Hound Dog,” “California Dreamin’” by The Mamas & The Papas, and so many others, it’s no surprise this chart-topping album has gone on to become one of the greatest soundtrack albums of all time.

Instrumentals that really have the tone & feel. These records are in their own category with tones of vibe.

Dropout Boogie (INDIE EX) - The Black Keys

This is the indie exclusive White LP - limited to 4982 pieces.

As they've done their entire career, The Black Keys' Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney wrote all of the material for their new album,Dropout Boogie, in the studio, and the album captures a number of first takes that hark back to the stripped-down blues rock of their early days making music together in Akron, Ohio, basements. After hashing out initial ideas at Auerbach's Easy Eye Sound studio in Nashville, the duo welcomed new collaborators Billy F. Gibbons, Greg Cartwright, and Angelo Petraglia to the sessions, marking the first time they've invited multiple new contributors to work simultaneously on one of their own albums.

BLACK KEYS / DROPOUT BOOGIE (INDIE EXCLUSIVE)

Desmond Dekker & the Aces - This Is Desmond Dekkar - This Is Desmond Dekkar is an album by Desmond Dekker originally released in 1969. For unknown reasons Dekker is credited as "Dekkar" on the album's cover. - Sanctuary Records.

Leading reggae label Trojan Records have delved back in time to express their ongoing support for the most profound universal movement this year, the Black Lives Matter campaign.

Recalling Black musicians and artists that defined history, the record label is celebrating 50 years since Bob and Marcia's hit record Young, Gifted and Black peaked at number 5 in the UK chart by launching a new website showcasing Black excellence.

Originally recorded and released by Nina Simone in 1969, the song's powerful message struck a chord with Black communities across the globe and contributed to US history as an anthem of the Civil Rights Movement.

Writing the song with poet Weldon Irvine, Nina Simone told him that she wanted to lyrics that would "make Black children all over the world feel good about themselves forever".

BOB & MARCIA / Young, Gifted and Black

R.A.P. Music, the fifth studio album by rapper Killer Mike was originally released in 2012 and is finally back in print. Production was handled by rapper and producer Jamie "El-P" Meline; the album was the first collaboration between Killer Mike and El-P, who would later form the critically acclaimed duo Run the Jewels. R.A.P. Music received widespread acclaim from music critics. It landed on the Year End Best Album lists of Entertainment Weekly, Consequence of Sound, Complex, Chicago Tribune, Paste, NPR, Pitchfork, Rolling Stone, Stereogum, Spin, Vulture, Village Voice, and many more. Killer Mike's breakthrough LP, R.A.P. Music is being reissued by Adult Swim / WaterTower Music.

Double vinyl LP pressing. As the final chapter in the initial run of Jazz Is Dead releases, Remixes JID010 continues the creative catharsis of an exhilarating new chapter in jazz music. Adrian Younge & Ali Shaheed Muhammad tapped nine iconic creators to reimagine their personal favorites from Jazz Is Dead's catalogue to-date, who created striking new versions of songs by Marcos Valle, Roy Ayers, Gary Bartz, Azymuth, Joao Donato, Doug Carn, Brian Jackson and The Midnight Hour. Holding the line taut like a bass string, Younge & Muhammad only invited those special musical alchemists who have previously participated in Jazz Is Dead happenings, or those who are slated to share that stage soon: Cut Chemist, DJ Spinna, Georgie Anne Muldrow, Akili, Shigeto, Pink Siiffu, Dibiase, Natureboy Flako, and Kaidi Tathum. It's a family affair.

Double translucent coke bottle green colored vinyl LP pressing. Iowa is the second studio album by Slipknot. Released by Roadrunner Records on August 28, 2001, it was produced by Ross Robinson and Slipknot. The title derives from the band's home state, Iowa, which members have stated is one of their greatest sources of inspiration. With much anticipation for the album following the success of their 1999 self-titled debut, pressures on the band were high. Their relationships with each other suffered and this was later described as the darkest time of their career. It was also the first full album to feature guitarist Jim Root after only appearing on two songs from their previous album.

Acclaimed singer, songwriter and musician Molly Tuttle will release her anticipated Nonesuch Records debut, Crooked Tree, April 1 (on CD and digital. LP will be May 13) with her new bluegrass collective Golden Highway.

Recorded live at Nashville’s Oceanway Studios, Crooked Tree was produced by Tuttle and Jerry Douglas and features collaborations with Sierra Hull, Old Crow Medicine Show, Margo Price, Billy Strings, Dan Tyminski and Gillian Welch. The album explores Tuttle’s love of bluegrass, which she discovered through her father, a music teacher and multi-instrumentalist, and her grandfather, a banjo player. Across these thirteen tracks, all of which were written/co-written by Tuttle, she honors the bluegrass tradition while also pushing the genre in new directions.  

“I always knew I wanted to make a bluegrass record someday,” Tuttle says. “Once I started writing, everything flowed so easily: sometimes I’ve felt an internal pressure to come up with a sound no one’s heard before, but this time my intention was just to make an album that reflected the music that’s been passed down through generations in my family. I found a way to do that while writing songs that feel true to who I am, and it really helped me to grow as a songwriter.”

In celebration of the new music, Tuttle and Golden Highway—Bronwyn Keith-Hynes (fiddle), Dominick Leslie (mandolin), Shelby Means (bass) and Kyle Tuttle (banjo)—will embark on an extensive headline tour beginning tonight with shows at Seattle’s Tractor Tavern (two nights), Portland’s Mississippi Studios (two nights), Los Angeles’ Roxy, Salt Lake City’s State Room, Boulder’s Fox Theatre, Asheville’s The Grey Eagle and Nashville’s Station Inn, among several others. Full details can be found at mollytuttlemusic.com/tour.   

In addition to Tuttle (vocals, guitars), Douglas (dobro), Keith-Hynes (fiddle) and Leslie (mandolin), Crooked Tree also features musicians Darol Anger (fiddle), Ron Block (banjo), Mike Bub (upright bass), Jason Carter (fiddle), Viktor Krauss (upright bass), Todd Phillips (upright bass) and Christian Sedelmyer (fiddle) with additional harmony vocals from Tina Adair, Lindsay Lou and Melody Walker.

With its latest album, Fortune Favors The Bold, Russell County, Virginia-based 49 Winchesteris ready and roaring to break onto the national scene with its unique brand of tear-in-your-beer alt-country, sticky barroom floor rock-n-roll, and high-octane Appalachian folk.

Fortune Favors The Boldis not only a record that showcases the current state of 49 Winchester, it’s a melodic stake in the ground of how this group is constantly evolving and taking shape, sonically and lyrically. But, it’s also about looking into the rearview mirror with a genuine appreciation for where you came from and what you’re made of. Those salt-of-the-earth traits in your blood and character that define what it actually takes to climb that damn mountain of dreams. At its essence, Fortune Favors The Boldis about going against all odds to bring your art into fruition and into the world - come hell or high water.

AWOLNATION's upcoming album My Echo, My Shadow, My Covers and Me, set for a May 6, 2022, global release, is a fiercely collaborative and celebratory project. It's an eclectic collection of masterfully crafted and carefully curated covers, with each track featuring at least one acclaimed musical artist. It includes epic re-imaginings of classics like "Wind of Change" by the Scorpions, "Take a Chance on Me" by Abba, and "Beds are Burning" by Midnight Oil; and features collaborations with artists like Portugal the Man, Brandon Boyd of Incubus, Jewel, Beck, Taylor Hanson & more. Available on one-of-a kind, recycled colored vinyl, mystery colored cassette and CD.

Mintpack. Set for release on May 13th via Communion Records, the album sees the much-loved folk-rock duo - made up of Andrew Davie and Kevin Jones - once again team up with producer Ian Grimble on what is one of their most personal records to date.Davie says: "Blue Hours is a kind of imaginary space you get into at night, a place where you process difficult things or where you try to figure everything out." Themes on the album include both self-reflection and mental health after both struggled with the latter in recent years. "It's the main over-arching theme with this record," Davie explains. The group, who have worked with mental health charity CALM (Campaign Against Living Miserably) previously added: "It probably speaks to our struggles and hopefully many other people's too. Men are not very good at talking. We're not really taught how to - men have no idea how to talk about this stuff, certainly to each other."The pair describe the conceptual blue hours headspace that gives the new album it's title as being "somewhere between a hotel, a mental health hospital, a bar that stays open later than anywhere else, a paradise, a dream, a nightmare and an endless sea of corridors and staircases leading you to rooms that represent memories - good, bad, happy or difficult." Despite the album's challenging themes, it's an album drenched in hope too. "We wanted this to be a celebration of music," Jones continues. "I think that informed some of the bolder decision making on this record. At a time when music was so distant, it felt important to make an album that sounded hopeful, celebratory, ambitious and beautiful in spite of the heavy subject matter in some of the songs." Jones adds: "It was almost like we needed to shout louder than before because we felt that there were more barriers between the audience and us. We needed something to transcend that."

Four-time Grammy® Award winner Delbert McClinton celebrates his coming-of-age musical heroes and influences with his 27th studio album, Outdated Emotion (Hot Shot Records/Thirty Tigers), coming on May 13, 2022.  The 16-track collection features Hank Williams, Jimmy Reed, Ray Charles, and Little Richard standards, as well as five original songs written or co-written by McClinton.

Delbert has spent much of the COVID isolation in Kevin McKendree’s Rock House Studio in Nashville.  This new album brings his music back to where it started. Outdated Emotion pays homage to McClinton’s earliest influences, Hank Williams and Jimmy Reed with a salute to Ray Charles and Little Richard, as well as five of his own compositions, influenced by the sounds of his heroes.  Along with Kevin and his son, musical prodigy Yates McKendree, Delbert has created the album he has often dreamed of.

“I’ve always wanted to do an album of the songs that influenced me the most. Hank Williams songs, Jimmy Reed songs, and songs that I love. And this was the perfect time to do it. It’s important music from another time. It’s music that people need to hear again, or for the first time. Nobody knows about them. Or has forgotten about them. Or was never turned on to them. There is a whole generation, maybe two generations now, who don’t know this music. My whole idea here was to show them how it was and how we got here.  Hank Williams, Jimmy Reed, Lloyd Price, Ray Charles. These songs take me to my youth. They are good if not better now than they were then, and they were great then. They are songs people should just get to hear.”

Rolling Stone calls Delbert McClinton the “Godfather of Americana Music.” In a career that has spanned more than six decades, his honkytonk blues sound and signature smooth voice have provided a soundtrack for American music history. He is a four-time Grammy winner (Traditional Blues Album in 2020 for Tall, Dark, and Handsome; Contemporary Blues Album in 2006 for Cost of Living and 2002 for Nothing Personal; and Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal in 1992 for "Good Man, Good Woman"), and received the Americana Lifetime Achievement Award in 2019. Growing up in Lubbock and Fort Worth, Texas allowed Delbert McClinton an early appreciation for the best of 20th century American music, with the songs of postwar America, honkytonk country, and southern blues.  Delbert remembers where he was when he heard his first Hank Williams song. And he knew he wanted to play music for a living when he first heard Jimmy Reed.  Leading the house band in the desegregated roadhouses on the outskirts of Fort Worth, Delbert backed Jimmy Reed, Muddy Waters, Bo Diddley and other blues legends, while making a name for himself as a regional player in the birth of rock and roll, opening shows for Little Richard, Jerry Lee Lewis and other pioneers of the new sound; and even headlining shows in Great Britain with Bruce Channel (“Hey Baby”), with a little-known Liverpool quartet. The Beatles as the opening act.  In the early 1970s, as his “Two More Bottles of Wine” reflects, Delbert “went out west with a burning desire to set the west coast on fire….” He teamed up with Glen Clark for the Delbert and Glen sessions (Clean Records) and released two critically acclaimed albums before returning to Texas as the progressive country/blues awakening movement was starting to happen in Austin. Hippies and cowboys crowded together on sawdust dance floors watching history in the making as Delbert, Doug Sahm, Jimmie and Stevie Ray Vaughan, Freda and the Firedogs and Asleep at the Wheel set the stage for a new sound coming out of Texas. There, Delbert began to develop his signature sound, mixed rocking blues and hardcore country to create the unique style that has served him well through the last half century.
Further solidifying his sound, Delbert went into the famed Muscle Shoals, Alabama studio and called on the Muscle Shoals Horns, who had recorded with everyone from Jimi Hendrix to Elton John. They joined his longtime band to create his next album. That signature horn sound has remained a mainstay in Delbert’s music.
 
When Texas became the rage in New York City, a music venue called the Lone Star Café served as capital of Texas chic. Austin musician Cleve Hatttersley was the manager of the Lone Star.   He said, “Everyone who was anyone came through the door on any given night: Mick Jagger, Johnny Paycheck, Tommy Tune. Jerry Garcia… and Delbert was the biggest star of the bunch. Delbert is the absolute heart and soul of Texas rhythm and blues. We had James Brown, George Strait, Elvis Costello… but the one that all the other stars came out to see was Delbert.” Delbert had succeeded in creating his own genre, a melting pot of American music, and people still cannot get enough of it. From those early days in Fort Worth roadhouses until the recent COVID crisis shut down touring shows Delbert and his band have crossed the country playing festivals, theatres, and iconic music institutions. From Farm Aid to Carnegie Hall, his popularity grew, and Delbert continues as a “musician’s musician,” influencing many artists along the way.  Delbert released Tall, Dark & Handsome, (Hot Shot Records/Thirty Tigers) in 2019, to celebrate his 79th birthday. The album earned Delbert his fourth Grammy® for Best Traditional Blues Album. He also received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Americana Music Association, and has been featured several times in the Country Music Hall of Fame’s series of live performances, programs and podcasts.
 
In May of 2021, Delbert announced his retirement from touring. Fans and music journalists speculated about what he would do next. This was to be the first time in 64 years that he was not traveling interstate highways and backroads, playing a rigorous schedule.  Outdated Emotion brings Delbert McClinton full circle to the songs that started it all.  

Grammy-winning hard rock band Halestorm announce Back From The Dead, their fifth studio album due out May 6, 2022, and follow-up to 2018’s Vicious. Produced by Nick Raskulinecz (Foo Fighters, Mastodon, Alice in Chains) with co-production by Scott Stevens (Shinedown, Daughtry, New Year’s Day), Back From The Dead quickly evolved from songwriting exercises into a matter of survival for the band, taking the listener through ‘a journey of navigating mental health, debauchery, survival, redemption, and rediscovery, while still maintaining faith in humanity’ says frontwoman Lzzy Hale. The album features the title track which earned the band their sixth #1 at Rock Radio, and current single, “The Steeple.” Halestorm has grown from a childhood dream of siblings Lzzy and Arejay Hale into one of the most celebrated rock bands of the last two decades. Halestorm’s music has surpassed a billion streams worldwide. Fronted by the incomparable Lzzy Hale with drummer Arejay Hale, guitarist Joe Hottinger, and bass player Josh Smith, Halestorm has earned a reputation as a powerful live music force, headlining sold-out shows and topping festival bills around the world.

2022 release. Acclaimed vibraphonist and composer Joel Ross returns with his third Blue Note album, The Parable of the Poet, an expansive album-length suite comprised of seven evocative movements. The suite is performed by a dynamic 8-piece ensemble with Ross joined by Immanuel Wilkins on alto saxophone, Maria Grand on tenor saxophone, Marquis Hill on trumpet, Kalia Vandever on trombone, Sean Mason on piano, Rick Rosato on bass, and Craig Weinrib on drums.

The latest album from the prolific singer-songwriter offers a unique window into life’s next chapters. 

Two decades into their venerable careers, Baltimore Death Metal savants Misery Index are back with their 2022 record, Complete Control. Their 7th studio album and Century Media debut is a riff-driven assault that captures the tension of the modern condition and channels it into 9 songs of ripping end-times Death Metal. Spewing with Orwellian invective and razor-sharp songwriting, Complete Control is a much-needed hammer to the face; a wake-up call for the disaffected and dispossessed. The album was mixed by Will Putney (Fit For An Autopsy, Thy Art Is Murder, Body Count), mastered by Jens Bogren / Fascination Street studios (Kreator, Opeth, Arch Enemy) and features uncanny artwork by visual artist Matt Lombard.

Phototroph is the 2022 album from Moon Tooth.

Neil Young / Royce Hall 1971 - A live solo acoustic show recorded at UCLA's Royce Hall on January 30 1971. - Recorded on January 30, 1971, this concert was performed at the beautiful Royce Hall on the campus of UCLA in Los Angeles near the end of Neil's 1971 solo tour. This 16-track acoustic set features Neil on guitar, harmonica, piano and vocals. The album is produced and mixed by The Volume Dealers (Neil Young and Niko Bolas) and tracks include "Journey Through The Past", "Ohio", Don't Let It Bring You Down", and "Love In Mind".

Apollo’s long-awaited debut album IVORY brings him to another level in his career. Crossing genre lines as well as language barriers, the full-length showcases even greater musical diversity from the already boundless creator. Despite being at this pivotal moment in his career, Omar feels like he's just getting started. The artist who once called himself “just a kid from Indiana” is breaking new ground, abandoning all comfort zones, and never looking back.

Record-breaking, award-winning, Grammy-nominated RAMMSTEIN - one of rock's most individual and successful names - are returning with their new album "Zeit" (English: Time) on 4/29/22.  4-panel Digipak CD with gold embossed logo. 20-page booklet included.

Really Really Happy is the album that kicks off the second phase of The Muffs career.” So begins Roy McDonald’s liner notes for the expanded reissue of the band’s fifth album. After eight years and four albums, The Muffs had written, recorded, and toured non-stop. After a break, the group was ready to do it all again, and was approached by friends (and sisters in law) Charlotte Caffey (Go•Go’s) and Anna Waronker (that dog), who had just started their own label – Five Foot Two Records. McDonald, bassist Ronnie Barnett, and singer/guitarist/songwriter Kim Shattuck had a new home, and were ready to do it all again. Really Really Happy arrived in 2004 to rave reviews. Now, nearly two decades later, it returns as an expanded double-CD / Digital release with 22 bonus tracks, including 16 of Kim Shattuck’s original demos for the album. There will also be a very limited edition of the LP available only at indie retail on colored vinyl with a 7” EP containing 6 bonus tracks, with a sleeve hand-stamped by Ronnie.