Classic Hits

1960s baroque pop act The Left Banke‘s reunion album Strangers on a Train, which featured recordings made in 1978 by three of the band’s four core members but wasn’t released until 1986, will be reissued on CD for the first time on March 4.

The Left Banke are best known for the 1966 hits “Walk Away Renée” and “Pretty Ballerina.” The band initially was active from 1965 to 1969, and released two albums during that time period.

Strangers on a Train came about when original Left Banke singer Steve Martin Caro, bassist/guitarist Tom Finn and drummer George Cameron got together to record songs for a new publishing deal Finn had secured. Founding Left Banke keyboardist Michael Brown also is said to have participated in early sessions for what became Strangers on a Train, but was not credited on the album.

The Strangers on a Train reissue also features six previously unreleased tracks written by Brown that he recorded with Caro in 2001 for what he’d hoped would be a new Left Banke project.

The six songs also will be released separately on a digital EP titled High Flyer that’s due out on February 25.

Sadly, the four main members of The Left Banke all died in recent years — Brown in 2015, Cameron in 2018, and Caro and Finn in 2020.

You can pre-order the Strangers on a Train CD and High Flyer EP now at OmnivoreRecordings.com.

Here is the Strangers on a Train track list:

“Strangers on a Train”
“Heartbreaker”
“Lorraine”
“Yesterday’s Love”
“Hold On Tight”
“And One Day”
“You Say”
“I Can Fly”
“Only My Opinion”
“Queen of Paradise”

Bonus Tracks:
“Airborne”
“I Don’t Know” (2002 Version)
“Until the End”
“Buddy Steve (Long Lost Friend)”
“Meet Me in the Moonlight”
“High Flyer”

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In 1980, Stevie Wonder led the campaign to make Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday a national holiday, and recorded the iconic song, “Happy Birthday” in honor of Dr. King on his Hotter Than July album. On Monday, as the nation celebrated MLK Day, the 25-time Grammy winner demanded that the Senate ends its filibuster and enacts voting rights legislation.

“Any senator who cannot support the protection of voting rights to the United States of America cannot say that they support the Constitution,” the Motown legend said in a YouTube video. “Stop the hypocrisy. Cut the bull-tish. If you care and support our rights, do the hard work. You can’t please everybody, but you can protect all of us. And to keep it all the way real: The filibuster is not working for democracy. Why won’t you?”

Also on Monday, Martin Luther King Jr.’s eldest son, Martin Luther King III, and his 13-year-old granddaughter, Yolanda Renee King, led the annual Peace Walk in Washington, D.C. to honor the legacy of the Nobel Peace Prize winner, and demand action on two voting rights bills: the Freedom to Vote Act, and the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act.

“What we want is for Americans to be engaged,” King III told ABC News, adding that the need for federal safety guards is more urgent than ever. “This year, we are laser focused on getting the right to vote sustained and getting the right to vote empowered.”

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The new documentary Barn, about the making of Neil Young & Crazy Horse‘s 2021 album of the same name, will be streamed exclusively at Young’s official YouTube channel starting this Thursday, January 20, at 1 p.m. ET.

As previously reported, the Barn film was directed by Young’s wife, actress Daryl Hannah — aka “dhlovelife” — and offers an intimate look at Neil and the current Crazy Horse lineup working on the album in a restored 19th-century log barn in Colorado’s Rocky Mountains during the COVID-19 pandemic in June of last year.

Most of the album was recorded live.

A description of the movie notes that it “intentionally lingers on single shots for entire songs, showing there are no tricks, revealing the raw, organic and spontaneous process of the music bursting to life from unexpected moments.”

The Barn film previously premiered in a few select theaters around the time of the album’s December 10 release, and also is available on a Blu-ray disc that’s included in the deluxe box set version of the album.

Here’s the album’s full track list:

“Song of the Seasons”
“Heading West”
“Change Ain’t Never Gonna”
“Canerican”
“Shape of You”
“They Might Be Lost”
“Human Race”
“Tumblin’ Thru the Years”
“Welcome Back”
“Don’t Forget Love”

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Starting today, David Bowie‘s entire music catalog is available for Peloton users, and in conjunction with the launch, three brand-new mixes of Bowie songs by contemporary artists also have premiered exclusively for the home exercise platform.

The songs, 1980’s “It’s No Game (Pt. 1),” 1983’s “Let’s Dance,” and 1975’s “Golden Years,” were remixed, respectively, by alternative rocker St. Vincent and DJ/producers Honey Dijon and TOKiMONSTA.

St. Vincent says she chose to remix “It’s No Game (Pt. 1)” a song from David’s Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps) album, “because it has a part 2 on the record, and I figured maybe Bowie wouldn’t mind so much if I made a part 3.” She adds, “I wanted to take Bowie’s throat-shredding vocal take from part 1, and make it front and center.”

Honey Dijon notes, “When I was asked to remix one of my favorite David Bowie songs, I chose ‘Let’s Dance’ because it’s a true celebration of music and movement — just like Peloton!”

As for TOKiMONSTA, she says she relates to Bowie because he was “an amazing innovator,” pointing out that he “was always reinventing himself and pushing the envelope of music, while somehow never ceasing to be authentically himself.”

The David Bowie Collection, including the remixes, will be available for various exercise classes under the “Collections” sections in the Peloton App or the Peloton hardware touchscreen.

For non-Peloton members, a free two-month trial of the app is available. Visit OnePeloton.com for more details.

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Rick Wakeman is preparing to return to North America in February for a new leg of his Even Grumpier Old Rock Star solo tour, but the former Yes keyboardist also says he’s making progress on a new concept album on which he’s been working for a while.

As he told ABC Audio late last year, the project is called A Gallery of the Imagination. Explaining the concept, the 72-year-old Rock & Roll Hall of Famer noted, “[I]f you go into an art gallery, you’ll see all kinds of paintings…from surrealistic to renaissance paintings to modern art…So I wanted to have an album which was a gallery of all different kinds of music.”

In a recent post on his website, Rick said of the project, “I am really pleased with how it’s coming together and I now am going to spend some time playing around with the song melodies and the lyrics ready to send to [singer/sax player] Hayley [Sanderson] and also some more work from me is [needed] as regards the keyboard arrangements for the instrumentals.”

Wakeman told ABC Audio that in conjunction with the album, he plans to encourage fans to create works of art inspired by each track, and then “we want to collect them all and…get hold of a big gallery somewhere…and have those pictures [displayed].”

Rick envisions people who visit the gallery will put on headphones and listen to the songs from the album while looking at the corresponding pieces of art inspired by the tracks.

He added, “I suppose [it’s] the next stage of being interactive with the audience.”

Wakeman’s 2022 The Even Grumpier Old Rock Star Tour starts on February 22 in Seattle and is mapped out through a March 14 show in Toronto.

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Tears for Fears have debuted a new song called “Break the Man,” the third advance single from the veteran British New Wave duo’s forthcoming studio album, The Tipping Point.

The song, which is available now via digital formats, was co-written by founding singer/bassist Curt Smith and the group’s current touring guitarist, Charlton Pettus, who also co-produced The Tipping Point.

Smith says of the new tune, “‘Break the Man’ is about a strong woman, and breaking the patriarchy. I feel that a lot of the problems we’ve been having as a country and even worldwide to a certain degree has come from male dominance. It’s a song about a woman who is strong enough to break the man. For me, that would be an answer to a lot of the problems in the world — a better male-female balance.”

The Tipping Point, which will be released on February 25, will be Tears for Fears’ first new studio album since 2004’s Everybody Loves a Happy Ending. The group will support the record with a 2022 U.S. tour featuring support act Garbage that’s scheduled to kick off May 20 in Cincinnati and run through a June 25 concert in Wantagh, New York.

Prior to “Break the Man,” Tears for Fears also released The Tipping Point‘s title track and a song called “No Small Thing” as advance singles, as well as companion music videos for both tunes.

You can pre-order the album now.

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An archival live album capturing the very first concert by the veteran rock band Cactus will be released this Friday, January 21, on multiple formats.

The album, titled The Birth of Cactus 1970, was recorded at a show that also featured The Jimi Hendrix Experience, The Grateful Dead and Steve Miller Band. The concert featured Cactus playing several tunes from its 1970 self-titled debut, as well as select songs from its second and third albums — 1971’s One Way…or Another and Restrictions.

Cactus was formed by Vanilla Fudge drummer Carmine Appice and bassist Tim Bogert around the time of their group’s initial breakup. The band’s original lineup also included singer Rusty Day of The Amboy Dukes and guitarist Jim McCarty of Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels.

Appice recalls of Cactus’ first gig, “I remember…hanging out with Hendrix who was a friend of Cactus. We got on stage and the energy level was off the charts! All the songs kicked major a**. We were so excited to get Cactus going and this show helped. Crowd was great and we did ROCK!!”

The Birth of Cactus 1970 can be pre-ordered now and will be available as a CD digipak and a limited-edition purple-vinyl LP, as well as in digital formats.

Here’s the album’s track list:

“One Way…or Another”
“Sweet Sixteen”
“No Need to Worry”
Medley: “Let Me Swim/Big Mama Boogie/Oleo”
“Feel So Good”
“Parchman Farm”

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Heart‘s Ann Wilson has released a music video for her cover of Alice in Chains‘ 1993 grunge classic “Rooster” that you can watch now at her official YouTube channel.

The clip mixes visually distorted footage of Wilson singing the song with a variety of disturbing images and segments, including new and archival photos and film of soldiers, a baby doll set on fire, maggots feeding on a dead fly, a depressed looking older man drinking a bottle of liquor, a military drone and more.

Alice in Chains guitarist/singer Jerry Cantrell wrote “Rooster” about the psychological scars his father experienced while serving in the Vietnam War.

Wilson first released her version of “Rooster” in December 2020 as the B-side of a limited-edition vinyl single that also featured her rendition of the 2004 Steve Earle song “The Revolution Starts Now.”

A video of Ann performing “Rooster” also was shown during the virtual Founders Award tribute honoring Alice in Chains that was presented by Seattle’s Museum of Pop Culture, a.k.a. MoPOP, in December 2020.

On her social media pages, Wilson has posted a screen grab of a Seattle Times interview from December 2020 in which she explains that the “Rooster” music video originally was created to be shown at the Founders Award tribute to Alice in Chains, noting that the organizers decided not to use it because they preferred live footage of artists performing.

Ann added, “[S]ometime I’ll put that video out because it’s really cool. Just maggots and war stuff and darkness and insanity.”

Wilson’s “Rooster” cover also is available as part of a five-song EP compiling some of her recent solo recordings titled Sawheat 8 that she released last June.

(Video contains images that may disturb some viewers.)

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On the heels of the release of their latest studio album, The Boy Named If, Elvis Costello and his longtime backing group The Imposters will be the musical guests this Friday, January 21, on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, airing 11:35 p.m. ET on CBS.

Costello also will take part in an interview on the show.

The Boy Named If, which was released this past Friday, is a 13-track collection that’s described in a press statement as an album “of urgent, immediate songs with bright melodies, guitar solos that sting and a quick step to the rhythm.”

Costello explained about the project, “The full title of this record is The Boy Named If (And Other Children’s Stories). ‘IF,’ is a nickname for your imaginary friend; your secret self, the one who knows everything you deny, the one you blame for the shattered crockery and the hearts you break, even your own.”

The Boy Named If is available on vinyl, CD, cassette and digital formats. There’s also “an 88-page hardback storybook edition,” each copy of which is signed and numbered by Elvis, although that version appears to be currently sold out.

The storybook edition features 13 illustrated short stories that have the same titles as the album’s songs and relate to the corresponding tunes in some way. The stories feature the lyrics of the songs, and the illustrations were created by artist Eamon Singer.

Meanwhile, coinciding with The Boy Named If‘s release, Costello debuted a lyric video for the title track on YouTube. The clip appears to offer an animated version of the illustrated story that accompanies the song.

Costello and The Imposters’ current plans to promote the album include a U.K. tour that kicks off June 5 in Brighton, England.

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John Mellencamp‘s latest studio album, Strictly a One-Eyed Jack, gets its release this Friday, January 21, and the lauded singer/songwriter shares some details about the project in a new interview with Forbes, including how he wound up collaborating with Bruce Springsteen on three songs.

Mellencamp says the collaboration came about “quite by accident,” after he and Springsteen played together at the 2019 benefit concert for Sting‘s Rainforest Fund.

“Bruce and I…met each other years ago, but we just knew each other enough to say hi. But we did a rainforest thing for Sting and…all of a sudden he was like my big brother, and he treated me like I was his sibling, and I treated him with respect,” John explains. “And then we became really good friends, and it just kind of happened. He came to Indiana, he stayed at the house. It was great.”

Springsteen appears on the songs “Wasted Days,” “Did You Say Such a Thing” and “A Life Full of Rain.”

Mellencamp tells Forbes that rather than a collection of disconnected individual songs, Strictly a One-Eyed Jack features 12 tunes he wrote from the perspective of a specific character.

“[A]ll the songs are really one guy speaking,” John notes. “It’s just one guy talking about his life, his future, his self.”

Mellencamp also addressed how his singing voice has changed as he’s gotten older, admitting he’s pleased with its weathered quality.

“I was happy when I heard me sing [the new song] ‘Gone So Soon,’ that I sounded like Louis Armstrong,” the 70-year-old Rock & Roll Hall of Famer maintains. “It wasn’t anything I tried to do, it’s just that cigarettes take their f***ing toll on your vocal cords…But I’m happy that I sound that way.”

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