New Albums - Page 110

Led Zeppelin has re-released its 1997 BBC sessions collection as the The Complete BBC Sessions, featuring eight previously unreleased sessions from BBC radio. All the recordings of the band, featuring bassist John Paul Jones, were captured during BBC radio performances between 1969 and 1971. The previously unreleased recordings include three performances from a 1969 session once believed to be lost....

A live performance from the late, great jazz vocalist and pianist Shirley Horn has been remastered and released as Live at the 4 Queens. The May 2, 1988 show at the 4 Queens Hotel & Casino featured Horn in her longstanding trio of bassist Charles Ables (d. 2001, and who switched from guitar to bass to join her group) and...

The Devin Townsend Project has released its seventh studio album, Transcendence. The record, from the progressive metal group led by Townsend (Strapping Young Lad, Steve Vai) features the huge, epic sound for which Townsend is known, as well as his take on the Ween song, “Transdermal Celebration.” The band has double bass cred this time out, too, featuring not only...

The story of baseball’s longest game, and the book written about it – Dan Barry’s Bottom of the 33rd, inspired jazz outfit Saltman Knowles’ latest effort, Almost. The book reflects the players’ commitment and dedication to the game, even if they weren’t destined to make it in the major league (the game was a minor league contest). They continued to...

The Ron Carter Quartet, led by the inimitable and prolific jazz bassist/cellist/composer, Ron Carter, has collaborated with vocalist Vitoria Meldonado to create the record, Brasil L.I.K.E. (short for Love, Inspiration, Knowledge and Energy). The Grammy-winning Carter is working with American and Brazilian standards in bossa nova on the album, and creating excerpts of jazz within each song. The record also...

Alabama’s St. Paul & The Broken Bones is back with a sophomore slab of retro-soul on Sea of Noise. The eight-piece band says the album is more reflective of its tastes than its debut, Half the City, and depends less on belting from lead singer Paul Janeway and more on incorporating his voice into the arrangements, according to a Wall...

ZZ Top has the longest-lasting original lineup of any major rock band – the Texas trio of Billy Gibbons (guitar), Dusty Hill (bass) and Frank Beard (drums) have remained together for more than 45 years. But until now, the Rock and Roll Hall of Famers have gone without releasing a live album. More than four decades on, they’ve assembled LIVE...

Wilco’s 10th studio album, Schmilco, (the title a nod to Harry Nilsson’s 1971 Nilsson Schmilsson) is garnering praise for its relaxed feel and its self-described joyous negativity. Featuring the work of founding bassist John Stirratt, the album from the Chicago band is “sad in a lot of ways but not in any that reach a conclusion of doom or hopelessness,”...

A taste of Beatlemania has arrived in a familiar, remastered form. The 1977 album, The Beatles: Live at The Hollywood Bowl, has been spruced up by the Giles Martin, the son of the band’s late, legendary producer, Sir George Martin. The album features performances from three sold-out Hollywood Bowl concerts in 1964 and 1965, when Beatlemania was at its height....

Canadian solo bassist Luke Vajsar has released Hyenas, an album featuring his loop style playing as well as his abilities as a vocalist, guitarist and trombonist. His brother, Andrew, provides the percussion. Recorded and mixed at Toronto’s Skycrib Studios, the record incorporates Vajsar’s melodic playing with funk, soul, jazz, rock and psychedelia. Check out the album’s opening track, “The Stream”:...

Electronica/jam band Sound Tribe Sector 9 (STS9) has released The Universe Inside, which the band says reflects the messages of the golden records that traveled on NASA’s Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 missions. According to the band, with Alana Rocklin on bass, the album is about identity “and the magical truth of who we are, where we’re going, and our...

Experimental composer/bassist/producer Bill Laswell has reissued a work previously available only in a 100-CD limited edition at a show in honor of the late postmodern novelist William S. Burroughs. The piece, The Road to the Western Lands, pairs a recording of Burroughs reading from his book “The Western Lands” and Laswell’s music, which has been remastered and enhanced since the...