First up this week is Ten Crowns, the new solo album from Andy Bell (Erasure), which features ten brand-new tracks of dazzling, joyous pop inspired by the dancefloor and gospel, including an incredible collaboration with Andy’s idol, Debbie Harry. Ten Crowns was written with and produced by Grammy-winning US producer, remixer and DJ Dave Audé.
Briston Maroney’s guitar-heavy, explosive and engrossing new album, Jimmy, finds the artist stepping into the minds of the two worlds he straddles, and ultimately letting them meld to life’s true masterpiece: simply being yourself.
The Way We Were Vol. 1 features the earliest recordings of tracks that would later appear on Status Quo albums or on Francis Rossi’s solo projects: raw, sincere and performed straight from the heart, without the influence of studio refinement or commercial considerations. This is how the songs you love originally sounded.
Flying with Angels is the first studio album of new songs in eleven years from Suzanne Vega. Bearing the stamp of a masterful storyteller who “observes the world with a clinically poetic eye” (New York Times), Vega’s new songs find her returning to observations on city life, ordinary people and real-world subjects.
Esther Rose blends her pop instincts with country storytelling on Want, her stunning fifth album. This is the hardest-hitting record of her career, travelling as far as she’s been from the stripped-down classic country of her celebrated early work, instead leaning toward confrontational arrangements full of distortion and full-band spontaneity while never sacrificing a gift for melody that makes each song instantly memorable.
Our release of the week can only be Pink Floyd at Pompeii MCMLXXII. The groundbreaking 1972 film directed by Adrian Maben has been digitally remastered from the original 35mm footage, with enhanced audio newly mixed by Steven Wilson. Set in the hauntingly beautiful ruins of the ancient Roman Amphitheatre in Pompeii, Italy, this unique film captures Pink Floyd performing an intimate concert with additional rare behind-the-scenes footage of the band beginning work on The Dark Side of the Moon at Abbey Road Studios. The performance is also now available on vinyl and audio CD for the first time.
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