New Albums - Page 131

Acclaimed singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen’s 2012/13 Old Ideas World Tour featured what many critics called his best band ever. That band featured bass guitarist/upright bassist Roscoe Beck, who also served as the band’s musical director. The sound the band made with Cohen as he supported his Old Ideas album was captured in film and audio recordings in a performance at Dublin’s...

2014 proved to be a rough year for AC/DC, with illness pulling founding rhythm guitarist Malcolm Young’s out of the stalwart Australian hard rock band as it prepared to release its 15th studio internationally-released album. Legal problems have also left the position of drummer Phil Rudd unclear, heading into a 2015 tour to support the new album, . The music...

When Jack Bruce wanted to celebrate that he had turned 50, he decided to throw a party. A really big musical party. The shows put together by the legendary bassist were held over two days in Cologne, Germany on Nov. 2nd and 3rd, 1993. His former Cream bandmate, Ginger Baker played drums at the show, as did Simon Phillips. Parliament-Funkadelic...

The legendary progressive rock band King Crimson is promoting its The Elements of King Crimson tour with a limited edition two-CD “tour box” set of performances — some previously unreleased on CD — from the entirety of its long, storied career. The performances are culled from a wide variety of sources — everything from alternate takes and extracts to live...

Former Béla Fleck and the Flecktones sax player and current Dave Matthews Band member Jeff Coffin has yet again joined with a group of musicians called The Mu’tet, featuring electric bassist Felix Pastorius (son of Jaco and a Yellowjackets member) for a new album. , is the sixth album from Coffin and the Mu’tet. Gypsy, African, Brazillian and New Orleans...

So, with the Jeff Beck: Live in Tokyo , a viewer not only gets to see the guitarist in action, but also electric bassist Rhonda Smith. Smith, who previously worked with Prince, has released solo albums, and played in a band of her own as well an all-female rock/funk band with percussionist Sheila E., is a musical force in her...

A performance by Bob Marley and the Wailers, filmed for German television the year before Marley’s death from cancer at age 36, is now available on the . The show, recorded in June 1980 in Dortmund, Germany features not only the charismatic, now-legendary Marley, but also Aston “Family Man” Barrett, bassist and bandleader for The Wailers. The restoration of the...

The Art of McCartney may be the most spectacular tribute album ever assembled for a bassist. McCartney, a legendary singer/songwriter/bassist (The Beatles, Wings and solo), has one of the most enviable catalogs of songs in popular music and a host of his musical contemporaries and descendants signed to sing on the collection of his work. Compiled over more than a...

Gentle Giant might be the prog-rock band that casual fans of the genre overlook. However, the group had a decade-long career (1970-80), turning out creative pieces, often written by bassist/multi-instrumentalist Ray Shulman and keyboardist Kerry Minnear. Fans have long adored the band’s one previous official live album, Playing the Fool, released in the late 1970s. While other live recordings are...

The Rolling Stones have issued the second DVD in the band’s From The Vault vintage live performance series. This time out, the Stones take viewers back to a July 12, 1975 concert at the L.A. Forum. The show, which lasted more than 2.5 hours, featured what for many is the classic band lineup — then-new guitarist Ron Wood, guitarist Keith...

Eclectic bassist and producer Bill Laswell has teamed with Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith and New Orleans pianist/keyboardist Jon Batiste on the new album, . “The original idea was to film unfamiliar musicians playing together in a room with no preconceived direction. Over time it began to transform into making a record,” Laswell said. The movie was never...

Job for a Cowboy’s fourth album, , featuring bassist Nick Schendzielos (also of Cephalic Carnage and the YouTube channel Bassfordays), has been released to critical acclaim. Alternative Press calls it one of the year’s best metal albums. Sun Eater marks the band’s departure from its earlier sound, in favor of “futuristic tones” and “slightly more ancestral song construction,” according to...