Loretta Lynn's "Wouldn't It Be Great" Album Out in August

Legacy Recordings (a Sony Music Entertainment division ) will release Wouldn't It Be Great, the new studio album from American music icon Loretta Lynn, on Friday, August 18.
One of the most deeply personal albums of her career, Wouldn't It Be Great is comprised entirely of songs written (or co-written) by Loretta, premiering new compositions nestled alongside select soulful reinterpretations of enduring classics from her catalog.

Like its predecessor, the critically-acclaimed, Grammy-nominated Full Circle (released March 2016), Wouldn't It Be Great was mainly recorded at the Cash Cabin Studio in Hendersonville, Tennessee, with producers Patsy Lynn Russell and John Carter Cash.

Hamilton Mixtape Confirmed for December 2 Release

Hamilton star, and creator Lin-Manuel Miranda announced via Twitter that the long-awaited Hamilton Mixtape album is finalized and will be available for pre-order starting Friday, November 4. Release date for the album will be December 2, 2016 and available via Atlantic Records. Miranda also revealed the cover art, which reimagines the broadway show’s logo with the word “Mixtape” added.

As previously revealed, the Mixtape consists of a range of music artists putting their own stamp on tunes from Hamilton, see tracklist, below.

Executive produced by The Roots’ Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson and Tarik “Black Thought” Trotter, “THE HAMILTON MIXTAPE” sees songs from the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical covered and remixed by a remarkable cast of contemporary artists. Superstars contributing to the one of its kind collection include Sia, Usher, Kelly Clarkson, The Roots, Alicia Keys, Nas, Wiz Khalifa, Chance The Rapper, John Legend, Regina Spektor, Ashanti, Ja Rule, Miguel, Queen Latifah, Common, Ben Folds, Andra Day, Jill Scott, Jimmy Fallon & more. “THE HAMILTON MIXTAPE” also includes three previously unreleased HAMILTON demos.

The winner of the 2016 GRAMMY Award for “Best Musical Theatre Album,” “HAMILTON (ORIGINAL BROADWAY CAST RECORDING),” is available now.  The 2x RIAA platinum certified album (only the third cast recording to go 2x platinum in the last 20 years, joining the cast recordings of “Wicked” and “Rent”) made a stunning arrival on the Billboard charts upon its initial digital release, coming in at #1 on the “Top Broadway Albums” chart, #3 on the “Top Rap Albums” chart and #9 on the “Top Current Albums” chart. This impressive debut stands as the biggest first week sales for a digital cast recording and the second biggest first week sales ever for any cast recording, behind only “RENT” in the Nielsen SoundScan era.

 

The best-selling cast album of 2015, “HAMILTON (ORIGINAL BROADWAY CAST RECORDING)” continued to make chart history in the weeks and months following its arrival. The album eventually ascended to the #1 spot on Billboard’s “Top Rap Albums” – the first and only cast recording to ever reach the chart’s top position. Produced by Alex Lacamoire, Bill Sherman, Lin-Manuel Miranda, and Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson & Tarik “Black Thought” Trotter, founding members of the GRAMMY-winning hip-hop band, The Roots, “HAMILTON (ORIGINAL BROADWAY CAST RECORDING)” marks the first album to be mixed at the legendary Atlantic Records Studio in New York City.

Bruno Mars' "24K Magic" Album Arrives on November 18

Critically-acclaimed international megastar Bruno Mars has unveiled today his first piece of solo music in nearly four years. Written and produced by Shampoo Press & Curl, “24K Magic” (pronounced twenty-four karat magic) sees Bruno bringing the bounce to his newest single, which is now available for streaming and download at all DSPs. The multi-GRAMMY-winning Mars has also announced his highly-anticipated third studio album - also dubbed 24K Magic - will arrive on November 18th.

“24k Magic” is accompanied by a brand new music video directed by Bruno Mars and longtime collaborator Cameron Duddy. The clip - complete with jet skis being ridden through the famous Fountains of Bellagio - can be viewed below from B&T.

The two-time Super Bowl Half Time Show veteran performer will return to SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE for his fourth appearance next Saturday, October 15th.

COLVIN & EARLE PREMIERES IN ITS ENTIRETY ON NPR'S FIRST LISTEN

NPR's FIRST LISTEN has premiered the entire album from acclaimed GRAMMY Award-winning artists Shawn Colvin and Steve Earle. Out June 10 via Fantasy Records, COLVIN & EARLE is still available for pre-order now from B&T.

The album will be available in a variety of formats, a standard 10-track CD, a deluxe 13-track limited edition with three exclusive bonus tracks as well as vinyl. Colvin & Earle will celebrate the album's release with a worldwide tour that kicks off June 10th at New York's famed City Winery and continues through the summer and fall. Highlights include a two-night stand at London's historic Union Chapel, Islington (June 13th and 15th) and an eagerly awaited performance at Bruce Hornsby's inaugural Funhouse Festival, taking place June 25th on the Lawn of the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg.

Shawn Colvin and Steve Earle first met nearly three decades ago as Colvin opened  a solo acoustic performance by Earle at Northampton, MA's beloved Iron Horse. The two proved fast friends, collaborating occasionally over the years until finally  teaming up for 2014's "Songs and Stories, Together Onstage" tour, a sold-out run that saw the duo uniting for one-of-a-kind evenings of song-swapping, duets and storytelling.  The Albany Times Union hailed the show as "a near perfect pairing,"  while The Morning Call praised Colvin & Earle for "(spurring) each other to greater eights." The Cleveland Plain Dealer summed it up best, declaring it "a joy to be able to witness two of the greatest at their craft."

photo : Alexandra Valenti/Courtesy of the artist

Bob Dylan's New "Fallen Angels" Album Receives Critical Raves

Bob Dylan's new album, Fallen Angels, is available now in CD and vinyl, released just a few
day's shy of his 75th birthday (May, 24).   Showcasing his singular interpretive artistry on twelve classic American songs,   Fallen Angels is the 37^th studio album from Dylan and the first since last year's Shadows In The Night.  Produced by Jack Frost, Dylan's unique approach to recording the songs included refining complicated arrangements for 30-piece orchestras down to those uniquely tailored for his five-piece band.  The album can be found at Baker & Taylor's ordering platform for your library, school, store.

Critical response to Fallen Angels has been enthusiastic, with rave reviews coming in from around the globe;  Randy Lewis wrote in The Los Angeles Times, "[Dylan] immediately liberates songs from the big band/big orchestra world from which they emerged, and in which they are most frequently revisited…. [He] reaches to the blues at the core of many of these songs. Thus, they elicit the ache of romantic yearning and loss that often gets subsumed by swelling orchestral forces, background choirs or by singers who are more focused on crafting elegant vocals than finding emotional resonance.   And, Entertainment Weekly's Jim Farber opined, "Dylan alights on these words with a wry delicacy…Tellingly, he delivers these songs of love lost and cherished not with a burning passion but with the wistfulness of experience. They're memory songs now, intoned with a present sense of commitment….Standards likes these and Dylan's own songs now stand as equal American totems."

St Vincent to Direct Segment of Magnolia's XX

Magnet Releasing, the genre arm of Magnolia Pictures, announced today that celebrated musician and songwriter Annie Clark (St. Vincent) will make her directorial debut on the firm’s upcoming all-female-helmed horror anthology film XX. Not only will each segment be directed by a woman, each will star female leads. Clark’s segment, scheduled to film this spring, has been co-written and will be produced by genre maven Roxanne Benjamin (SOUTHBOUND, V/H/S, V/H/S/2, FAULTS).

XX is a female-driven horror anthology with each director given full creative license to tell any story they choose revolving around a female protagonist. While the directors have been given free creative rein within budget and time constraints, all of the segments themselves will involve the horror genre. In addition to Clark, other directors attached include Karyn Kusama (THE INVITATION, GIRLFIGHT), Jennifer Lynch (SURVEILLANCE, CHAINED), and Jovanka Vuckovic (THE CAPTURED BIRD, former editor of Rue Morgue Magazine).

As St. Vincent, Clark is one of the most distinct voices and original guitarists of her generation. Her recent album, the self-titled St. Vincent (Loma Vista Recordings), won her "album of the year" designations from the NME, The Guardian, and Entertainment Weekly and the Best Alternative Album GRAMMY. An incredible live performer, Clark has been heralded as "the first truly 21st century guitar hero” by Guitar World magazine, and is constantly pushing the boundaries of today’s musical landscape.

Bette Midler Love Song Collection; "A Gift of Love" in December

Bette Midler has been singing her way into people's hearts since her debut album, The Divine Miss M back in 1972, became a platinum-seller and helped the singer win her first Grammy Award. Since then, she has sold more than 30 million albums worldwide and earned the distinction as only the second female singer to score a Top 10 album in five consecutive decades. Throughout her career, Ms Midler has demonstrated a remarkable musical range, but many of her signature hits have focused on matters of the heart. That's why Rhino will bring together 18 of her best love songs for a new collection A GIFT OF LOVE, available on December 4 on CD. After Atlantic Records president Ahmet Ertugun discovered Midler in 1972, the irrepressible singer with the unmistakable voice went on to enjoy an amazing career that continues to this day. This new collection includes highlights from albums she recorded for both Atlantic Records and Warner Bros. between 1976 and 2014.

Paul McCartney Adds Tug of War and Pipes of Peace Albums to Archive Collection!

MPL and the Concord Music Group are proud to announce two more landmark installments in the multiple GRAMMY-winning Paul McCartney Archive Collection. On October 2, 2015, Paul’s early ‘80s back-to-back classics Tug of War and Pipes of Peace will receive lavish multiple configuration reissue treatment including exclusive 2015 remixes of both the entire Tug of War album and the Pipes of Peace classic collaboration with Michael Jackson “Say Say Say,” a treasure trove of previously unreleased tracks and never before seen video, and much more.

Released in 1982, Tug of War was Paul’s first album following the break-up of Wings and his third solo LP overall. Hailed upon its release as “exquisitely crafted” by The New York Times and a “masterpiece” by Rolling Stone, Tug of War went to #1 in no less than nine countries. Tug of War yielded such classic tracks as Paul’s #1 duet with Stevie Wonder “Ebony and Ivory,” the top 10 single “Take It Away,” and of course “Here Today,” the conversation Paul never had with the late John Lennon that remains a staple of Paul’s live set to this day. Pipes of Peace, Paul’s fourth solo album, followed in 1983 and continued Paul’s early ’80s run of platinum records. Singles from Pipes of Peace included the title track and of course Paul and Michael Jackson’s timeless “Say Say Say,” a multi-format global chart-topping smash continually cited as a landmark of that or any year–as recently as 2007, Vibemagazine rated “Say Say Say” as one of the greatest duets of all time.

As with the GRAMMY-winning Band On The Run and Wings Over America Archive editions, Paul personally supervised all aspects of these releases and their various formats, which include:

photo: Linda McCartney

Remembering Orrin Keepnews, GRAMMY-Winning Jazz Producer (1923–2015)

We mourn the loss of legendary jazz producer and record executive Orrin Keepnews, who passed away Sunday morning, 3/1/15. Keepnews, who died one day short of his 92^nd birthday, was a creative force behind some of the greatest jazz recordings ever produced , including such seminal albums as Bill Evans’ Waltz for Debby and Sunday at the Village Vanguard, Thelonious Monk’s Brilliant Corners, Monk’s Music and Thelonious Monk and John Coltrane, Chet Baker’s Chet Baker in New York, Sonny Rollins’ Freedom Suite, Wes Montgomery’s Boss Guitar, and Clark Terry’s In Orbit.

Born in the Bronx, NY, in 1923, he began his career as a music journalist. As co-founder and producer at Riverside Records in 1953, he would soon become a staple of the modern jazz scene, producing new works by future jazz giants such as Thelonious Monk, Wes Montgomery, Sonny Rollins, and Cannonball Adderley and also become credited for discovering famed jazz pianist Bill Evans. Keepnews went on to found the renowned jazz labels Milestone (1966) and Landmark Records (1985). He was the Director of Jazz A&R at Fantasy Records in 1972 and in more recent years was the producer and annotator of Concord Music Group’s acclaimed reissues series Keepnews Collection, beginning in 2007.

Shelby Lynne Set to Release 'I Can't Imagine' on May 5th

Shelby Lynne will release her 13th full-length album, and first for Rounder Records, called I Can’t Imagine, on May 5, 2015.  Said to possibly be her most beautifully crafted and intensely affecting set of songs since her landmark I Am Shelby Lynne in 2000, I Can’t Imagine is powered by Lynne’s lustrous vocal performance, indelible, illuminative songwriting, and the sympathetic, versatile playing of her top-flight band. Listen to her new song, below.

The new album includes 10 new songs written or co-written by the GRAMMY-winning singer-songwriter, I Can’t Imagine reflects an array of Lynne’s influences; from Southern soul, Crescent City R&B, and California country & western to the ardent social consciousness of precursors like Woody Guthrie and even the roots 'n' blues vocalizing of Billie Holiday, all brought into clear focus by Lynne’s keen pop sensibility.