Louis Hardin, who renamed himself Moondog, was one of the most unusual composers of the 20th century. Tall, bearded, and blind from a childhood accident involving fireworks, he spent much of the 1960s living on the streets of New York City, often standing ramrod straight at the corner of West 54th Street and 6th Avenue, dressed in square-patch clothing of his own making, his head cased in a Norse helmet (some dubbed him “the Viking of 6th Avenue”), playing his music,... Read More

Sub-genres aside, Green Day can be considered one of the elder statesmen of punk. The Bay Area punk rockers have been in the game for 35 years and are marginally responsible for bringing the DIY aesthetics of punk into the mainstream forefront. Albums like Dookie, Insomniac, and Nimrod established Green Day’s unique sound of power chords, melodic vocals, and fast tempos. Instead of the group growing with only its core audience, they crossed a musical threshold with... Read More

Court and Spark, Joni Mitchell's best selling album, originally released 50 years ago yesterday (January 17th 1974) was preceded by a series of well-recorded by Henry Lewy demos that Rhino and the Joni Mitchell Archives say were "newly unearthed". The record was released on RSD Black Friday November 24th, 2023. Copies are easy to find on Discogs.A friend told me it's a "must have" so I ordered one. He was correct. Hearing these songs in... Read More

Keb Mo was released in 1994. Good to Be in 2022. One of the frustrating parts of being me is that people who know me (guitarist and Twisted Sister founder) and my history in the music business (and my age—71) think that I must have heard and have an opinion on just about everything (music wise) that was ever released since the 1950’’s! It is even more frustrating when an artist, who seems to have had a long career, especially in a genre that I thought I really knew,... Read More

While Rhino's "High Fidelity" series lacks a clearly identifiable direction or purpose—it seems to meander around the catalog without regard to time, place or purpose—there's one consistent strategy: each two record release has a rock title and a jazz title. Credit Rhino with chance-taking guts this round. Marquee Moon isn't exactly mainstream rock (though the reissue gives it that sound), and Ornette Coleman's music scares a lot of... Read More

The three Heath brothers, Jimmy, Percy and Albert formed their short-lived group in 1975 a year after The Modern Jazz Quartet gave its "final" performance at Carnegie Hall, November, 1974. Of course like many groups and solo artists, it wasn't really the MJQ's final performance and the group had been performing its "farewell" tour around the country all year, but for the time being following the Carnegie Hall appearance bassist Percy... Read More

Los Angeles, CA (January 16, 2024) – Craft Recordings announces the latest batch of reissues for the acclaimed Original Jazz Classics series, championed by both collectors and critics. The latest reissues include Cannonball Adderley & Bill Evans’ Know What I Mean?, Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers’ Caravan and Ron Carter’s Where?, all of which can be pre-ordered today. These new reissues feature lacquers cut from the original tapes (AAA) by Kevin Gray at... Read More

Rhino's "High Fidelity" series released last week a reissue of Television's classic "Marquee Moon" cut by Kevin Gray at Cohearent Audio, using the original analog master tape. The reissue sounds great! Far better than the original pressing in terms of bass response, transient clarity and all of the audiophile "check marks" but, I argue, it's not likely what Tom Verlaine intended at all! That's partly due to the fact... Read More

When in 2018 Micha Huber's Switzerland-based HiFiction AG bought the storied brand EMT Tontechnik, taking control of EMT's cartridge business including development, production, repair, and international distribution and moving it to his Winterthur, Switzerland factory, he clearly had more in mind than just phono cartridges, though that's the core business he purchased.A year later in order to have space for both the EMT production line and increased... Read More

The winner of the Rega Planar 3 50th Anniversary turntable is "Gary" from PA. That's all he wants you to know and of course we respect that. "Gary" subscribed to the site almost simultaneously with it going "live". We didn't pick him. The random number generator did, but it was a good call!Thanks to everyone who signed up back then and even those who signed up now just to try to snag the turntable. We appreciate your... Read More

This morning using a random number generator we picked the winner of the Rega Planar 3 50th Anniversary Edition Turntable. Thousands entered the contest, with each entrant getting a number. A random number generator chose the winner. Actually, we picked five numbers in case the winner was from overseas or the winner doesn't respond to being notified of the win.We are not going to name the individual now, pending permission to do so. If we don't hear back... Read More

The third record in the new Original Source Series box devoted to William Steinberg's BSO recordings brings us less well-known works by the great early 20th-century German composer Paul Hindemith. Less well-known they may be, but these recordings make the strongest possible case for this incredibly attractive and original music. Is this the secret gem lurking in the Steinberg box....?

Johnny Hallyday (1943-2017) was the stage name of Jean-Philippe Léo Smet. In a career spanning nearly 60 years, Hallyday released 79 albums and sold 110 million records. In the year 2000, he sang in front of the Eiffel Tower to a paying audience of about half a million people. And in 2017, nearly one million people showed up to watch his funeral procession. Hallyday's funeral service at the Church of Sainte Marie-Madeleine was attended by French President... Read More

Alright, Las Vegas, let’s lose our money and lose our minds!On September 20, 2003, The White Stripes took hold of Sin City and rocked it into oblivion. The Detroit garage rock duo blitzed through a setlist of familiar favorites, such as “Hotel Yorba” and “Fell in Love With A Girl.” Their then-new album, Elephant, took precedence with blistering renditions of “The Hardest Button to Button” and “Black Math.” The show caught its breath once drummer Meg White stepped away... Read More

William Steinberg was never one of the "Big Name" conductors, but he had a stellar career, working with every major orchestra in Europe and America. His recorded legacy is held in high esteem amongst collectors, and no more so than the three records he made for Deutsche Grammophon while Music Director of the renowned Boston Symphony Orchestra in the late 1960s, early 70s. So when it was announced that Deutsche Grammophon and Emil Berliner Studios would be issuing a special boxed edition of all three recordings as part of their ground-breaking Original Source Series of vinyl reissues, hopes for something truly special ran high. In the first of three articles we examine what makes each of these legendary records worthy of the deluxe OSS treatment, beginning with the grand-daddy of all orchestral spectaculars, Holst's The Planets. (For a recap of the background and technical processes behind these Original Source Series vinyl reissues, you can read TA's review of the first two records in this fourth batch of OSS releases).

Richard Strauss's epic orchestral tone poem, whose opening "Sunrise" captured the imaginations of millions when it was used in 2001: A Space Odyssey, here receives an outstanding recording. We explore the history of this work, which was written at a time of great change in classical music, and place Steinberg's interpretation within the history of this work on record.