Nearly there with the cover art upgrades

I've now finished working my way through the whole site, and picked out the albums whose covers could do with improvement, and so here are the final batch that I've run through the programmes that I've been using. There will be one more batch in a few days which I was able to improve just by using colour adjustments and brightness/contrast, and then that will be every post updated. 
While I was adding the new cover the The Who's 'Rock Is Dead...Long Live Rock' I had a nagging feeling that there was something that I wasn't happy with on that album, and it was the fact that I had to use a live recording for the final reprise of the title track, and the sound was therefore a bit muddy compared to the other tracks. I've now boosted the high register to make it sound a bit clearer, and I've also removed the crowd at the end, so that the final chord ends the album in an echoey silence.  

    

    

 

Van Morrison - Hard Nose The Highway (1973)

Van Morrison released his sixth album, 'St. Dominic's Preview', in 1972, and it was warmly received by both fans and critics alike, with Erik Hage writing "it is one of the strongest albums in the Van Morrison canon because it seems to adapt and incorporate all of the lessons and discoveries of the rich period of evolution that came before it while still opening up new windows". Morrison now had to follow that with something as good, or even better, and so he built a recording studio next door to his home in Fairfax, California, and assembled a team of musicians that he felt could bring his new songs to life. This was to be the first album that was completely produced under his control, and during a series of prolific recording sessions, Morrison recorded nearly thirty songs, with at least three quarters of them original compositions. In fact, the new album would be his first solo album since his 1967 debut 'Blowin' Your Mind!' to contain songs not written by Morrison, and covers included the song 'Bein' Green', usually associated with Kermit the Frog, and a take of the traditional song 'Purple Heather'. In the end there was more than enough material to fill a double-album, and so Morrison proposed the idea to Warner Bros. Records, but he was ultimately convinced to release a single LP. A few of the leftover tracks, such as 'Bulbs' and 'Country Fair', were saved and re-recorded for his next album 'Veedon Fleece', but most of them, including 'Madame Joy', 'Contemplation Rose' and 'Drumshanbo Hustle', were consigned to the vaults. On the abridged version of the album, 'Snow In San Anselmo' is the opening song, featuring the backing vocals of the Oakland Symphony Chamber Chorus, and this was followed by 'Warm Love', which was released as a successful single. 'Bein' Green' was the first non-original composition Morrison had included on any album for Warner Bros., and the ten and a half-minute 'Autumn Song' reflects the splendours and moods of the season. The album enjoyed rave reviews at the time of release, although one dissenting critic, Charlie Gillett, didn't think the record lived up to the high standards that Morrison had set himself. If you've ever wondered what a double-album version of this release would have sounded like, then you can now experience just that, as I've slotted back in nine of the songs which were excised to trim it down to a single disc, and as would be expected, considering that they were recorded at the same time as the original eight songs which did make the record, they perfectly match the mood of those other recordings.   

Track listing

01 Snow In San Anselmo 
02 Warm Love 
03 Madame Joy
04 Contemplation Rose
05 Hard Nose The Highway 
06 Not Supposed To Break Down
07 Wild Children 
08 Laughing In The Wind
09 Try For Sleep
10 The Great Deception 
11 Don't Worry About Tomorrow
12 Bein' Green 
13 Wonderful Remark
14 Autumn Song 
15 Lover's Prayer
16 Drumshanbo Hustle
17 Purple Heather 

Atlanta Rhythm Section - Sleep With One Eye Open (1983)

In the spring of 1970, former members of the Candymen (Rodney Justo, Dean Daughtry and Robert Nix) and the Classics IV (Daughtry and James B. Cobb Jr.) became the session band for the newly opened Studio One recording studio in Doraville, Georgia, near Atlanta. After playing on other artists' recordings, the Atlanta Rhythm Section was christened in May 1970, with Justo (singer), Barry Bailey (guitar), Paul Goddard (bass), Daughtry (keyboards), Nix (drums) and Cobb (guitar), and they were soon signed by Decca Records, who released their first album, 'Atlanta Rhythm Section', in January 1972. Due to the record's limited commercial success, Justo quit the band and relocated to New York City as a session singer, being replaced by Ronnie Hammond. With Hammond on board, the band's second release, 'Back Up Against The Wall' appeared in February 1973, but it also failed to sell, and Decca dumped ARS from their roster. After signing to Polydor, they released their third album, 'Third Annual Pipe Dream', in August 1974, yielding the band's first hit single, 'Doraville', which peaked at #35, and pulled the album up to #74 on Billboard's Top 200. Their next two releases, 1975's 'Dog Days' and 'Red Tape' from 1976 sold in even lesser quantities, but the band toured extensively through those years, and they appeared with the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra during an outdoor show in Atlanta's Chastain Park in July 1975. 

The increased exposure paid off as the group's next album, December 1976's 'A Rock and Roll Alternative', rose to #13 on the Billboard chart and was certified gold in the spring of 1977. In January 1978 the band released what would turn out to be its most successful album, 'Champagne Jam', which led off with the song 'Large Time', a tribute to Lynyrd Skynyrd, some of whom had lost their lives in a plane crash the previous October. 'Champagne Jam' became their biggest-selling album, shifting over a million units and being certified platinum. The album provided two more hits for the band, 'Imaginary Lover', which reached #7, and 'I'm Not Gonna Let It Bother Me Tonight' which peaked at #14. On 24 June 1978 the band appeared at the Knebworth Festival in Knebworth, England before a crowd of 60,000, on a bill that included Genesis, Jefferson Starship, Brand X, Devo and Roy Harper. The eighth Atlanta Rhythm Section album, 'Underdog', was released in June 1979, and produced Top 20 hits 'Do It or Die' and 'Spooky', which was a remake of Cobb's and Buie's 1968 Classics IV hit. Early in 1979, drummer and primary lyricist Nix had a falling out with manager/producer Buie over the group's musical direction, wishing to move the band in a more rocking direction, while Buie was content with their current approach, which incorporated the mellower ballads. The rest of the band's dissatisfaction with Nix's excessive "lifestyle choices" sealed his fate and he was replaced by Roy Yeager, who had previously played for Lobo. 

'The Boys from Doraville' appeared in August 1980, but showed a steep falling off in sales for the group as radio programmers began turning their attention away from Southern rock to other rock genres, such as new wave. The album provided no hit singles and was their last for Polydor. Bruce Lundvall offered a better deal at Columbia Records (CBS), who released the next ARS album, 'Quinella', in August 1981, which containing the hit single 'Alien', but like 'The Boys From Doraville', it struggled with sales. In 1982 ARS worked on a second album for CBS, to be titled Sleep With One Eye Open', but before completion, CBS wanted the band to drop some of the tracks and record more. Insiders regarded some of the tracks as among the best work the group had ever done, but CBS wanted to swap out certain songs, leading to a standstill and a creative dispute that resulted in the album being shelved entirely, and CBS dropping its contract with the group. Late in 1982 singer Ronnie Hammond decided to leave ARS for a solo career, and was joined by Buie, although their work with Alabama musicians never resulted in commercial release. The disappointment over the unreleased album, and the fact that CBS kept them in limbo for months by not releasing them from their contact, signalled the end for the first incarnation of ARS, but if 'Sleep With One Eye Open' had been released as the band intended then it might have turned around their fortunes, but we'll never know. Give it a listen, and if you are already a fan then you'll be able to tell if this would have been their swansong, or if CBS were right to can it. 

Track listing

01 Sleep With One Eye Open
02 High Time
03 Longing For A Feeling
04 Long Distance Love
05 Stone Cold Hit
06 Two Note Boogie
07 Bad Situation
08 Wine With Dinner

Cover art upgrades again

I'm still working my way through the site and picking out covers that I think are in need of improvement, and while I've been generally pleased with the subtle improvements that have been made, the cover for Gordon Lightfoot's 'Day Before Yesterday' was so washed out and pale that when I asked for the colour to be improved the programme gave it a complete makeover. I'm really pleased that I've managed to improve the She Trinity and The Orchids covers (where one of the girls had her eyes closed), as it was a disappointment that I couldn't find better pictures at the time. And speaking of She Trinity, I decided to listen to them again while sorting out their cover, and some of their tracks were ripped from really scratchy singles, so I've either sourced new copies or improved the ones I used, so that post has now had a complete revamp. Soulseek updated, and a new link will be in the next links pdf.

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

 

UK - Waiting For You (1979)

In 1972, John Wetton (formerly of Family) and Bill Bruford (formerly of Yes) both joined King Crimson, recording three albums before guitarist Robert Fripp disbanded the group at the end of 1974. Wetton then spent a brief time with Roxy Music, who also included Eddie Jobson, before joining Uriah Heep for two albums. In July 1976, after leaving Uriah Heep, Wetton reconnected with Bruford, recording demos originally proposed for a Wetton solo album, but by September they'd formed a band with keyboardist Rick Wakeman, who had previously worked with Bruford in Yes. The project was stopped after rehearsals by Wakeman's label, and so Bruford and Wetton next approached Robert Fripp to reform King Crimson, but when Fripp eventually declined, Bruford and Wetton decided that each would choose a musician in order to form a new band. Wetton brought in Eddie Jobson, who since leaving Roxy Music in 1976 had joined Frank Zappa's band, thus "stealing" him from Zappa, while Bruford recruited Allan Holdsworth, formerly of Soft Machine, Nucleus, Gong, Tempest and The Tony Williams Lifetime, who had played on Bruford's debut solo album, 'Feels Good To Me', in 1978. The band's formation coincided with the introduction of the Yamaha CS-80 synthesizer, and this instrument became an integral part of their developing sound. Naming themselves UK, they released their self-titled debut album in 1978, and followed it with a supporting tour and two lengthy American tours, but when they were finished Wetton and Jobson decided to fire Holdsworth over musical differences and, since Bruford had indicated to Wetton that he would favour Holdsworth’s more improvisational approach in the event of a disagreement on the direction of the band, he was also fired and another former bandmate of Jobson's, Terry Bozzio, was brought in to replace him. 

UK attempted unsuccessfully to find another guitarist, notably auditioning a then-unknown Steve Vai, before resolving to continue as a trio, and as such they recorded the studio album 'Danger Money', released in March 1979. The album spawned a minor hit single, 'Nothing To Lose', which reached number 67 on the UK charts, and a live album, 'Night After Night', was recorded in Japan that spring and released in September 1979. Following a final European tour in December 1979, and in spite of plans to record a new studio album in the USA in March 1980, UK disbanded as Jobson and Wetton had different ideas on how the band should develop. Jobson wanted UK to go on with more long instrumental pieces, while Wetton thought that performing shorter, more commercial songs was a better idea, with one particularly pop-oriented song, 'When Will You Realize', contributing to the band dissolving. Jobson worked with Jethro Tull on their 1980 album 'A', while Wetton, following the recording of his solo album 'Caught In The Crossfire' in 1980, started Asia with Steve Howe, Carl Palmer and Geoffrey Downes, and Bozzio formed Missing Persons with his then-wife Dale Bozzio. When Bruford left the band, they kept a couple of his songs which they sometimes played live, and Jobson had also written a couple of instrumentals, and so they already had enough material for the fourth album that they were planning to record in the USA. As they never got round to that, I've taken all the tracks that we have from them post the 'Danger Money' album, and put together a third "studio" album from the group. 

Track listing

01 Forever Until Sunday
02 As Long As You Want Me Here
03 Waiting For You
04 Night After Night
05 Nostalgia
06 When Will You Realise
07 The Sahara Of Snow

Pink Floyd - It Would Be So Nice (1970)

This post is very much an album that I wish existed, as I fancied hearing some of Floyd's early singles, and when I looked in my Pink Floyd folder on the laptop I had so many collections by the group that it was overwhelming. There were the official releases, live albums, bootlegs, collections that I'd put together, collections that other people had put together, anthologies and archive box sets, soundtrack albums, and some that I'd downloaded when I saw them but have only listened to them once, such as 'Wish You Were Tranced', 'Double Core', 'Early Flights', and even a live concert with Frank Zappa. What I couldn't find was an album of just their early singles, and so just for my own listening pleasure I put this collection together. I just wanted the original seven singles from 1967 to 1970, plus their b-sides, (single edits if they were taken from an album), plus the studio version of 'Embryo', the aborted single 'Scream Thy Last Scream', and the second album out-take 'Vegetable Man'. Now that I have these songs all together in one place I'm sure that I'll play them much more often than if I have to hunt around for them on the dozens of Floyd albums that I have. And if anyone out there has the same problem as me, then this should solve it for you as well.   

Track listing

01 Arnold Layne (single 1967)

02 Candy And A Currant Bun (b-side of 'Arnold Layne')

03 See Emily Play (single 1967)

04 Scarecrow (b-side of 'See Emily Play')

05 Scream Thy Last Scream (aborted single 1967)

06 Apples And Oranges (single 1967)

07 Paint Box (b-side of 'Apples And Oranges')

08 Point Me At The Sky (single 1968)

09 Careful With That Axe Eugene (b-side of 'Point Me At The Sky')

10 It Would Be So Nice (single 1968)

11 Julia Dream (b-side of 'It Would Be So Nice')

12 Vegetable Man (second album out-take 1968)

13 Let There Be More Light (single 1968)

14 Remember A Day (b-side of 'Let There Be More Light')

15 Embryo (studio version 1970)

16 The Nile Song (single 1970)

17 Ibiza Bar (b-side of 'The Nile Song')

More cover art upgrades

Here's the next batch of upgraded album covers for you to download from this page and add to your folders.