Classic Hits

Bob Marley & The Wailers’ classic album Catch A Fire is being reissued in celebration of its 50th anniversary.

Dropping November 3, the reissue will be released as a three-LP set, as well as a three-CD set and digitally. All versions will feature the full studio recording, along with a 10-song live album, Live From The Paris Theatre London, and Sessions, an album of alternative and extended takes, as well as instrumental Jamaican versions of Catch A Fire songs.

In addition, the vinyl will include a 12-inch featuring three live performances recorded at the Sundown Theatre in Edmonton, North London, in May 1973. Those three songs — “Slave Driver,” “Get Up, Stand Up” and “Stop That Train” — will also be included on the CD. You can listen to “Slave Driver” now via digital outlets and on YouTube. 

All formats of Catch A Fire are available for preorder now.

The reissue comes as a new biopic on Marley, Bob Marley: One Love, is scheduled to hit theaters January 12, 2024. It stars British actor Kingsley Ben-Adir as Marley and Captain Marvel actress Lashana Lynch as Marley’s wife, Rita.

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The Who is set to be honored at the Scottish Music Awards later this year.

The London Evening Standard reports that the Rock & Roll Hall of Famers will be honored with the icon award for their achievements and contributions to music. 

The Scottish Music Awards will take place November 4 at Barrowland Ballroom in Glasgow, with the ceremony raising funds for Nordoff and Robbins, a music therapy charity that’s been very important to The Who over the years.

“We’ve been involved with Nordoff and Robbins since the beginning… and it’s good to see it’s still going,” The Who’s Roger Daltrey shares. “I hope people continue to support the charity.”

Meanwhile, fans of The Who have a lot to look forward to this week. On Friday, September 15, they’ll drop Who’s Next/Life House super deluxe edition featuring a whopping 155 tracks, with 89 songs that have never been released and 57 fresh remixes. It is available for preorder now.

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Duran Duran gets in the Halloween spirit with the just-released video for their latest single, “Danse Macabre.”

The animated clip, directed by Linc Gasking, seems to channel Tim Burton’s classic “The Nightmare Before Christmas” and features animated versions of band members Simon Le Bon, Nick Rhodes, John Taylor and Roger Taylor.

“I like the idea that if you can imagine something you can make it come to life, well at least in animated form … With the ‘Danse Macabre’ video we did exactly that,” Rhodes shares. “We began by deciding who would be on the ultimate Halloween party guest list, then a selection of witches, mythical beasts, vampires and demons were rapidly developed, using the latest AI animation techniques.”

Those techniques helped speed up the animation process, with Rhodes noting, “Over a period of a few days we created a whole new universe populated with beautifully strange inhabitants to celebrate the release of ‘Danse Macabre’ with a gothic dream.”

“Danse Macabre” is the title tack off Duran Duran’s upcoming album, dropping October 27. The album will feature three new songs along with covers and new takes on old Duran Duran tracks. It is available for preorder now.

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A new documentary about disgraced late ’80s/early ’90s pop duo Milli Vanilli is set to premiere October 24 on Paramount+, and a new trailer for the film has been released.

The film, Milli Vanilli, which had its world premiere at the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival, seeks to tell the true story of Robert “Rob” Pilatus and Fabrice “Fab” Morvan, who rose to superstardom with their debut album, Girl You Know It’s True. It all came crashing down when it was revealed that they didn’t sing a word on the album and were recruited by music producer Frank Farian to be the face of his recording project.

The duo had sold millions of records and even won the Best New Artist Grammy in 1990 but were forced to give it back when their deception was revealed.  

The documentary, directed by Luke Korem, features never-before-seen archival footage and interviews, including a new interview with Morvan and interviews with those in the group’s inner circle. According to The Hollywood Reporter, it also includes an audio interview with Pilatus, given just two months before his April 1998 death at age 32. 

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On This Day, September 14, 1981…

The Rolling Stones headlined a surprise show at Sir Morgan’s Cove club in Worcester, Massachusetts. The concert was a warm-up show ahead of their American tour, and they were billed as Little Boy Blue & The Cockroaches.

After a local radio station spilled the beans on the secret, over 4,000 fans showed up to try and get into the 350 capacity venue.

Lucky fans who did get in got to see The Stones play such songs as “Under My Thumb,” “Honky Tonk Woman,” “Start Me Up,” “Sympathy for the Devil,” “Brown Sugar,” “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” and more.

The Stones’ full tour kicked off September 25 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

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R.E.M.’s Mike Mills is reminiscing about the band’s music in a new interview with Vulture and says he’s still surprised that “Losing My Religion” wound up being such a big hit for the group.

“When we started out, radio was still the dominion of what people disparagingly referred to as ‘corporate rock.’ It was safe and there was nobody taking many chances on it,” he says. “So the fact that we were able to break some of those doors down was very gratifying.”

Mills says “Losing My Religion” was only expected to be a “warm up track” to help get the next single played on the radio, but it took off. 

“Nobody would expect a five-minute song with no chorus and a mandolin being the lead instrument to be played on the radio at all — much less become a worldwide number-one hit,” he says. “It was just crazy. Anybody that says they saw that coming is lying to you.”

The tune was so big, Mills says they were once riding in the jungle in Paraguay and heard it being played on the radio. “That was pretty surprising,” he says. “That’s when we knew we had a worldwide hit.” 

Released February 19, 1991, “Losing My Religion” was the first single off R.E.M.’s hit album Out of Time. It reached #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and is the band’s highest-charting single to date. It also topped the Billboard Alternative Airplay and Mainstream Rock charts.

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Bruce Springsteen’s classic solo album Nebraska is being celebrated with a special show in Nashville.

Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska: Celebrating A Rough Masterpiece will take place Tuesday, September 19, at Analog at the Hutton and will be part of Americanafest, which is happening in Nashville September 19-23. 

The event will be taped for PBS’ Recorded Live at Analog series, which will debut in 2024. It will be hosted by Warren Zanes, who wrote the recently released book about the album, Deliver Me from Nowhere: The Making of Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska. Emmylou Harris, Lyle Lovett, The Lumineers, Lucinda Williams and Noah Kahan are confirmed to perform songs from the album.

Released September 30, 1982, Nebraska featured such classic Springsteen tunes as “Atlantic City,” “Reason to Believe” and “Johnny 99.” It was a critical darling and a top 10 hit for The Boss, and has been included on several lists of the greatest albums of all time.

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The music video for Bonnie Tyler’s 1983 hit “Total Eclipse of the Heart” is the latest to join the rankings of YouTube’s One Billion Views club.

The video, filmed in England’s Holloway Sanatorium, was added to YouTube 13 years ago and now becomes Tyler’s first video to ever reach that milestone. 

“Total Eclipse of the Heart” was the biggest hit of Tyler’s career, spending four weeks at #1. It was certified Platinum by the RIAA and earned Tyler a Grammy nod for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.

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Back in June, Paul McCartney sat down for a chat with Stanley Tucci at the National Portrait Gallery in London to promote McCartney’s photo exhibit, Paul McCartney, Photographs 1963-64: Eyes of the Storm. The event was livestreamed across the globe, but if you missed it, you now have a second chance to check it out. 

A recording of the chat is now available to rent on the National Portrait Gallery’s website for about $12; fans have until October 1 to check it out. 

McCartney offered a preview clip from the chat on his YouTube page, where he breaks down a photo he took of The Beatles‘ arrival at the Miami airport, discussing the folks in the crowd who gathered for their arrival.

“That’s one of the beauties of rediscovering these [photos], because I must admit when I took it, I just grabbed it quickly, because it looked so exciting,” he says. “But then when we started looking at them, that was the great thing. You actually started to pore over them.”

Paul McCartney, Photographs 1963-64: Eyes of the Storm is at London’s National Portrait Gallery until October 1. It then moves to North America, coming to the Chrysler Museum of Art in Norfolk, Virginia, from December 5, 2023, to April 7, 2024.

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You don’t often think of R.E.M. when you hear The Monkees’ Micky Dolenz, but that’s about to change.

Rolling Stone reports that Dolenz will release a tribute EP to the Athens rockers, Dolenz Sings R.E.M., on November 3. It features the just-released cover of the Out of Time track “Shiny Happy People,” produced by Michael Nesmith’s son Christian, who plays many of the instruments on the EP.  

The EP also includes Dolenz’s take on R.E.M.’s debut single, “Radio Free Europe,” as well as the Automatic for the People track “Man on the Moon” and Around the Sun’s “Leaving New York.” 

“These songs are absolutely incredible,” R.E.M. frontman Michael Stipe shares. “Micky Dolenz covering R.E.M. Monkees style, I have died and gone to heaven. This is really something. … ‘Shiny Happy People’ sounds incredible (never thought you or I would hear me say that!!!).”

R.E.M. has shared in the past that they were fans of The Monkees, something Dolenz calls “incredibly flattering.” “Those guys were such great poets,” he tells the mag. “The lyrics at times remind of Michael Nesmith lyrics. They’re very poetic, which I love.”

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