Tamar - Ridiculous (1999)

Tamar Estine Braxton was born on 17 March 1977, and was the youngest of six children. She began singing as a toddler, eventually joining their church choir, where their father was a pastor, and she and her four sisters (Toni, Traci, Towanda, and Trina) formed a group and signed their first record deal with Arista Records in 1989. In 1990, they released their first single, 'Good Life', which peaked at No. 79 on the Billboard Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles chart, but marketing was a problem for Arista because of the ten year age difference between the eldest and youngest sisters, and subsequently The Braxtons were dropped by the label. In 1991, during a showcase with L.A. Reid and Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds, Toni Braxton was chosen and signed as the label's first female solo artist, after being told that their label was not looking for another girl group since it had just signed TLC. After Toni's departure from the group, the four remaining members became backup singers for Toni's first tour, music videos, and promotional appearances. In 1993, LaFace Records signed The Braxtons, although the group never released an album or single for the label, and when L. A, Reid moved on to work for Atlantic Records, he convinced executives at LaFace to allow him to take the group with him. In 1996, Tamar, Trina, and Towanda returned with a new album entitled 'So Many Ways', which peaked at No. 26 on the Billboard R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart, and the title track was released as a single, which made it to No. 83 on the Billboard Hot 100, but it did much better in the UK, where it reached number 32 on the UK Singles Chart.
In 1999, Tamar met Christopher "Tricky" Stewart, and with him producing she recorded her solo debut album, 'Ridiculous', so-named for the many different musical styles featured on it. It spawned two buzz singles in the form of 'Let Him Go' and 'Just Cuz', in the hope of garnering attention from the public, but when the songs failed to gain any impact on urban radio outlets, the album was pushed back, and eventually cancelled. Instead of shelving the album, Dreamworks Records kept two old tracks, added some new ones, and renamed it 'Tamar', and when the Jermaine Dupri-produced lead single 'Get None' was released and began to pick up airplay, Braxton announced the album would be released in early 2000. It featured production from Missy Elliott, Tim & Bob, and Tricky Stewart, and peaked at number 127 on the Billboard 200, but when the album's second single 'If You Don't Wanna Love Me', failed to gain significant radio airplay, the label dropped her from their roster. In 2001, she began to work alongside her sister Toni on a number of songs and music video cameos, and also performed, co-wrote and sang background vocals on songs for all of Toni's albums from 2000's  'The Heat' to 2010's 'Pulse'. In 2010 she signed to Universal Records, where she released a single. 'The Heart In Me' in July, and following a move to Epic Records in 2013 she finally released her second album, 'Love And War', which was a commercial success in the United States, only being kept off the number one slot on the Billboard 200 by Ariana Grande's 'Yours Truly'. It had taken a while, but she finally had the success that she'd worked for, and so we can now look back and listen to her abandoned debut album, 'Ridiculous', and see if we can work out just why the record company lost faith in it. 

Track listing

01 Reap What You Sow (Intro)
02 No Disrespect (feat. Missy Elliott & Lil' Mo) 
03 Respect Me 
04 Let Him Go (feat. Solé) 
05 Tonight (You and Me) 
06 Now I Only Dance for You 
07 Just Cuz 
08 It's Time (feat. Grand Puba & Antoinette Roberson) 
09 Call Me (feat. Sam Salter) 
10 Don't Cry 
11 Count The Ways 

Tangerine Dream - Chimes And Chains (1983)

German krautorck legends Tangerine Dream are more known for their hundreds of live bootlegs that have flooded the internet than for their studio rarities and out-takes, but there are in fact a number of singles, compilation contributions, bonus tracks from deluxe re-issues, and one-off soundtrack singles and EP's, that can make up an extremely enjoyable compilation. It was put together to compile all the Tangerine Dream music that was released outside the regular albums during the first decade or so of their career, from the best possible sources and with the best possible quality. All the tracks here are therefore taken from samplers, compilations, singles and promos that were released by the band during that period, and alternate versions of album songs were included only when they were a different mix, an extended version or an edited version. 'Ultima Thule' is the original 1971 mix, not the 2000 remix, and I've mixed parts one and two into one seven-minute piece. 'Oszillator Planet Concert' was recorded live on 21 June 1971, and was included on the German triple vinyl 'Ossiach Live' album. 'Overture' was part of the at-the-time unreleased 'Oedipus Tyrannus' project, recorded in June 1974, and was included on the Virgin sampler album 'V' in 1975. 'Stratosfear' and 'The Big Sleep In Search Of Hades' were taken from the 'Stratosfear' album and issued in edited versions on a 7" single. Similarly, 'Encore' and 'Hobo March' were extracted from the 'Encore' album, retitled and issued in edited form as both sides of a 7" single. The extended version of 'Dr. Destructo' just has a portion of the original track duplicated to make it longer, so not really a remix, but just extended for this promo, while the last six pieces are all soundtracks from the German TV series 'Tatort', from releases in 1982 and 1983. The original release of this collection was as a double album, but I felt that most of the good stuff was on the first disc, with a lot of the tracks on disc two being from the 'Risky Business' soundtrack, which I've already posted in full, but it you do want to hear the whole double album then it can easily be found on Soulseek.  

Track listing

01 Ultima Thule (Parts One & Two) (German single 1971)
02 Oszillator Planet Concert (from the 'Ossiach Live' album 1971)
03 Overture (from the 'V' sampler album 1975) 
04 Stratosfear (single edit 1976)
05 The Big Sleep In Search Of Hades (single edit b-side of 'Stratosfear')
06 Encore (UK single edit 1977)
07 Hobo March (single edit b-side of 'Encore')
08 Baryll Blue (from the 2019 re-issue of 'Cyclone' 1978)
09 Haunted Heights (from the 2019 re-issue of 'Cyclone' 1978)
10 Chimes And Chains (from the 2019 re-issue of 'Force Majeure' 1979)
11 Dr. Destructo (US promo 12" 1981)
12 Das Mädchen Auf Der Treppe (German 12" EP, from the TV series 'Tatort' 1982)
13 Flock (from 'Das Mädchen Auf Der Treppe' German 12" EP)
14 Katja (from 'Das Mädchen Auf Der Treppe' German 12" EP)
15 Speed (from 'Das Mädchen Auf Der Treppe' German 12" EP)
16 Daydream (German single 1983, from the TV series 'Tatort' 1983)
17 Moorland (b-side of 'Daydream', from the TV series 'Tatort')

My Jealous God - The Idiot's Ball (1992)

My Jealous God were formed in South London around 1989 by Jim Melly on vocals and guitar, Danny Burke on lead guitar, Chris O'Donnell on bass and Andrew Berkley on drums, and they played the sort of music that was always going to get them accused as being Southern chancers jumping on the Madchester bandwagon. Rough Trade snapped them up and released their first single 'Everything About You' in 1990, followed by 'Pray' in October of that year, and this was the track which gained them some attention. After a label change to Fontana, 'Easy' followed in 1991, before 'Pray' was resurrected in 1992 for a remix with new lyrics, but it was withdrawn shortly after release, although some copies have since surfaced. During their time at Fontana they recorded an album titled 'The Idiot's Ball', and this was slated for an April 1992 release, but just after review copies were sent out it was shelved by the label after the group broke up. After the band folded, singer Jim Melly embarked on a career in journalism and went on to edit 'Inside Edge' magazine, later writing a book on The Faces titled 'Last Orders, Please', which was published in April 2003. To remind ourselves of one of the many unsung bands who joined the Madchester scene in the early 90's, here is My Jealous God's shelved 'The Idiot's Ball' album from 1992. 

Track listing

01 Easy
02 Asked For
03 Carol Caviare
04 Pray
05 Suppose
06 Afraid
07 Petrol Bomb
08 I've Got Everything
09 The One I Love
10 Watching
11 Daisies

Kerli - Utopia (2013)

Kerli Kõiv was born in Elva on 7 February 1987, and was first introduced to music by her kindergarten teacher, who told her mother that Kerli had "nice pitch" and that she was interested in taking her to various singing competitions. She dropped out of school at the age of 16 to pursue her musical career, competing in the singing competitions Laulukarussell and the Baltic song contest Fizz Superstar, winning both of them. She then moved to Stockholm where she competed in Melodifestivalen in 2003 but was eliminated in the second semifinals, but reached the final in 2004's Eurolaul – a televised competition that determines the song that will represent Estonia in the Eurovision Song Contest – with her song 'Beautiful Inside'. After two miserable years in Stockholm, she moved to the United States at 18, where she continued to perform and write songs, ultimately getting an audition with L.A. Reid, who signed her to the Island Def Jam Music Group in 2006. She worked with producer, songwriter, and mixer David Maurice on an autobiographical set of songs, the first of which were released on a self-titled EP in 2007, and she finally released her debut album, 'Love Is Dead' on 8 July 2008, following her debut single 'Walking On Air', which charted at number 75 on the European Hot 100. In March 2010, 'Almost Alice', a compilation album featuring music inspired by Disney's 'Alice In Wonderland' was released, containing two songs performed by Kerli, 'Tea Party' and 'Strange', performed with Tokio Hotel. 

After the release of 'Love Is Dead', Kerli began working on her second studio album, and 'Army Of Love' was made available for free download on her official website, before being released as a single for purchase on 12 April 2011. A song titled 'Skyscraper' was written by Toby Gad, Lindy Robbins, and Kerli for the 'Utopia' album, but she instead gave it to American musician Demi Lovato for her album 'Unbroken', and the same happened with 'I Feel Immortal', which was gifted to Finnish musician Tarja for her album 'What Lies Beneath'. 'Zero Gravity' was rescued from a previous project and was supposed to be the first single from the new album, but it was later announced the both this and 'Army Of Love' were only buzz singles, and not official releases. The album was complete by May 2012, and in September it was confirmed that a single from it, titled 'The Lucky Ones', would be released on 29 October 2012, with the album to follow in the Spring of 2013. However, in December the whole record leaked online and so the label decided to cut a number of the tracks and release it as an EP instead, and this appeared digitally in March 2013 and physically the following May, but in the Baltic states and Finland only. So that we can hear what a full album could have sounded like, here is the complete 'Utopia', as it was intended to sound in the Spring of 2013, and as about half of this album has been officially released, I've added her contribution to the 'Almost Alice' album, plus one of those songs written for the record but given away.

Track listing

01 The Lucky Ones
02 Can't Control The Kids
03 Sugar 
04 Kaleidoscope 
05 Love Me Or Leave Me 
06 Zero Gravity
07 Speed Limit
08 Last Breath 
09 Supergirl 
10 Chemical
11 Here And Now 
12 Tea Party
13 Skyscraper

Various Artists - The Hitmakers Sing Townes Van Zandt (2022)

John Townes Van Zandt was born on 7 March 1944 in Fort Worth, Texas, into a wealthy family, and after the family relocated from Fort Worth to Billings, Montana in 1952, his father gave him a guitar, which he practiced while wandering the countryside. After attending the Shattuck School in Faribault, Minnesota, he enrolled at the University of Colorado Boulder in 1962, and wrote poetry and listened to records by Lightnin' Hopkins and Hank Williams. In the spring of his second year, his parents flew to Boulder to bring Townes back to Houston, worried about his binge drinking and episodes of depression, and he was admitted to the University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, where he was diagnosed with manic depression. He received three months of insulin shock therapy, which erased much of his long-term memory, but in 1965 he was accepted into the University of Houston's pre-law program. After his father died in January 1966 at age 52, he quit school and went on the road for the first time, having been inspired by his singer-songwriter heroes to pursue a career in playing music. His early gigs in Houston clubs mostly consisted of covers of songs written by Hopkins, Bob Dylan, and others, as well as original novelty songs like 'Fraternity Blues', and in 1968 he met songwriter Mickey Newbury in a Houston coffee shop, and he persuaded Van Zandt to go to Nashville, Tennessee, where he was introduced to the man who became his longtime producer, "Cowboy" Jack Clement. With Clement producing, Van Zandt recorded sessions in the studio which became his debut album, 'For The Sake Of The Song', released in 1968 by Poppy Records. The next five years were the most prolific of Van Zandt's career, as Poppy released the albums 'Our Mother The Mountain', 'Townes Van Zandt', 'Delta Momma Blues', 'High, Low And In Between', and 'The Late Great Townes Van Zandt'. It's his third album which has some of his most covered songs, and the fact the many of them are by modern artists, such as The Magic Numbers, Laura Marling, and Bright Eyes shows the esteem in which he is still held as a legend of American song-writing. 

Track listing

01 For The Sake Of The Song (Azure Ray 2002)  
02 Columbine (Mike Molaro 2021)  
03 Waiting Around To Die (Nathan Hamilton 2020)  
04 Don't Take It Too Bad (Steve Earle 2009  
05 Colorado Girl (Laura Marling 2014)  
06 Lungs (Jonell Mosser 1996)  
07 I'll Be Here In The Morning (The Stonemans 1970) 
08 Fare Thee Well, Miss Carousel (Bright Eyes 2022)  
09 (Quicksilver Daydreams Of) Maria (The Magic Numbers 2010)  
10 None But The Rain (Robin & Linda Williams 1975)

Jean Michel Jarre - La Cage (1976)

Jean-Michel Jarre was born in Lyon on 24 August 1948, and is the son of composer Maurice Jarre. When he was five his parents separated and his father moved to the United States, leaving him with his mother, and he didn't see his father again until he was 18. His musical education was fraught, and he struggled with classical piano studies, although he later changed teachers and worked on his scales. As a young man Jarre earned money by selling his paintings, exhibiting some of his works at the Lyon Gallery, and also by playing in a band called Mystère IV. In 1967 he played guitar in a band called The Dustbins, who appear in the film 'Des garçons et des filles', and he mixed instruments including the electric guitar and the flute with tape effects and other sounds. More experimentation was followed in 1968, when he began to use tape loops, radios and other electronic devices, and in 1969 he joined the Groupe de Recherches Musicales, founded and led by Pierre Schaeffer, inventor of musique concrete. Around this time he was introduced to the Moog modular synthesizer and spent time working at the studio of influential German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen in Cologne. In the kitchen of his apartment in Rue de la Trémoille, Jarre set up a small makeshift recording studio. linking his EMS VCS 3 and EMS Synthi AKS synthesisers to Revox tape machines, and for a 1969 exposition at the Maison de la Culture in Reims, Jarre wrote the five-minute song 'Happiness Is A Sad Song', after which he composed and recorded his first single 'La Cage'/'Erosmachine', a mixture of harmony, tape effects and synthesisers, which was released in 1971. That same year he was commissioned by choreographer Norbert Schmucki to perform a ballet called 'AOR' (in Hebrew "The Light'), and he also composed background music for ballet, theatre, television programs, department stores, and advertising jingles for Pepsi-Cola, Nestlé and RTL. 

He also formed The Popcorn Orchestra to record a cover version of Gershon Kingsley's Moog instrumental 'Popcorn', although Hot Butter had the international hit with it the following year. From 1972 to 1975 he wrote music and lyrics for artists like Françoise Hardy, Gérard Lenorman, Christophe and Patrick Juvet, and he also appeared on Samuel Hobo's 1972 single 'Freedom Day' and Triangle's 'Recreation' the same year. In 1973 he released his first solo album, 'Deserted Palace', as well as composing the soundtrack for 'Les Granges Brûlées', and he also composed the song 'Zig Zag Dance', which he seemed so determined to have a hit with that he released it nearly half a dozen times, either under pseudonyms such as Jo Sherman, The Electric Choo Choo Band and The Superfly, or playing on recordings of it by artists Foggy Joe and Tony Lopez. 1974 saw another mystery band appear, but once again 1906 was just Jarre with another single, 'Cartolina', while his next few appearances on record were collaborations with stage illusionist Dominique Webb, Gerard Lenorman, Blue Vamp and Bill And Buster. In 1976 he recorded and released his low-budget solo album 'Oxygène', recorded at his home studio with analogue synthesizers like the EMS VCS 3 and the EMS Synthi AKS, and taped on a Scully 8-track recorder. It was initially turned down by several record companies, until Jarre decided to meet with Francis Dreyfus, the head of the Disques Motors label, to see if he could release the album, and it was accepted. The first pressing of 50,000 copies was promoted through hi-fi shops, clubs and discos, and by April 1977 it had sold 70,000 copies in France. It was to be his breakthrough record, launching him to international stardom, and so he no longer needed to pretend to be one-man bands or work with other artists. This collection of his early work shows the effort that he put in to get to that point in his career, and there are glimpses of what was to come in some of these pieces, so enjoy these early efforts from Jean Michel Jarre, and so you don't get completely fed up with 'Zig Zag' I've only included two versions of it.  

Track listing

01 Happiness Is A Sad Song (for the Maison de la Culture exposition 1969)

02 La Cage (single 1971)

03 Erosmachine (b-side of 'La Cage')
04 Pop Corn (single as The Pop Corn Orchestra 1971)
05 Black Bird (b-side of 'Pop Corn' as The Pop Corn Orchestra)
06 Freedom Day (single with Samuel Hobo 1972)
07 Recreation (single with Triangle 1972)
08 Le Matin Du Premier Jour (b-side of 'Recreation' with Triangle)
09 Zig-Zag Dance (single as Jo Sherman, with Christopher Laird 1973)
10 Ping-Pong Song (b-side of 'Zig-Zag Dance' as Jo Sherman 1973)
11 Zig-Zag (Instrumental) (single as Electric Choo Choo Band 1973)
12 Cartolina (single as 1906 1974)
13 Helza (b-side of 'Cartolina' as 1906)
14 Hypnose (single with Dominique Webb 1974)
15 La Belle Et La Bete (single with Gerard Lenorman 1975)
16 Jolly Dolly (single with Blue Vamp 1976)
17 Lady (single with Bill And Buster 1976)

Ray Davies - Return To Waterloo (1985)

'Return To Waterloo' is the only album ever credited solely to Kinks singer/songwriter/guitarist Ray Davies, and it contains "music from the motion picture" of the same name. The film was written and directed by Davies, and depicts the daydreams and nightmares of a commuter taking a one-hour train trip from the London suburbs to Waterloo train station. The format allows Davies to write a series of story-songs, including 'Going Solo' and 'Missing Persons', both of which refer to the commuter's daughter who had left home, while 'Sold Me Out' and 'Not Far Away' are punk rock rave-ups expressing the anger of the young people on the train, and 'Expectations' is a Davies reflection on one of his favourite subjects, the decline and fall of the British Empire. This would have been an excellent Kinks album, and in fact three of the songs had appeared on the last Kinks album, 1984's 'Word Of Mouth', but 'Return To Waterloo' is credited as a solo Davies record, possible because his brother Dave reputedly refused to play on it, and so despite the fact that the rest of the The Kinks did contribute, it would be pushing it to call it a Kinks album. The hour long feature film was a unique approach to the synthesis of music, video and cinema, and instead of dialogue, the story is told through music and lyrics. The haunting songs take renowned actor Ken Colley on a suspenseful journey through his imagination, as he confronts reality and fantasy, love and violence, and it also features Valerie Holliman, Dominique Barnes, Tim Roth and (briefly) Ray Davies himself as a busker. It was broadcast just the once by Channel 4 on a Sunday evening on 04 November 1984, and has become something of a cult classic, particularly among Kinks fans, and so this expanded edition of the "soundtrack" album is a god-send. It includes songs which were not on the original album, and the tracks which were on there are either remixed or alternate versions. It's been put together with a lot of attention to detail, and includes sound-bites of dialogue, sound effects, and ambient segues which all enhance the listening experience, whether you've seen the film or not.  

Track listing

01 Intro (Unreleased Extended Version)
02 Return To Waterloo (Edited Mix)
03 Ladder Of Success (Unreleased Recording)
04 Going Solo (Alternate Mix)
05 Missing Person (Alternate Mix)
06 Sold Me Out (Alternate Mix)
07 Lonely Hearts (Extended Alternate Mix)
08 Good Times Are Gone (Unreleased Recording)
09 Not Far Away (Alternate Mix)
10 Expectations (Alternate Mix)
11 Return To Waterloo (Reprise) (Unreleased Recording)
12 Voices In The Dark (Alternate Mix)
13 Outro (Unreleased Recording)

Allie Hughes - The Hard Way (2011)

In 2008 Allie Hughes took part in CBC Television's 'How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria?', the Canadian version based on the UK series of the same name, which was searching for a singer to play the part of Maria in the stage show of 'The Sound Of Music'. She performed 'My Favourite Things' from the show and 'It's Oh So Quiet' by Björk, but was eliminated after two weeks. She released her second demo album that same year, titled 'Ladies And Gentlemen', which included some songs from her first album alongside some new recordings. In 2009 she recorded her debut studio album, collaborating with Leon Taheny, Dave Newfeld of Broken Social Scene, and Adam King of Run With Kittens. It was titled 'The Hard Way', and was initially set to be released in late 2010, but was then delayed to 2011, until it was ultimately scrapped later that year. She released a 4-track self-titled extended play in 2010, which included four songs from the proposed album, and which are the only officially released tracks from the project. Following the cancellation of 'The Hard Way', Hughes developed her synth-pop and electronic inspired band, ALX, in late 2011, releasing their debut and only single, 'I Will Love You More' in March 2012, and they had their final known live performance at the Hillside Festival in July, where they performed seven unreleased original songs and one cover. In July 2013 Hughes moved to Los Angeles to pursue a full-time career as a songwriter, but despite this she didn't stop working on her solo material, and after adopting the name Allie X she began working with producers Cirkut and Billboard. In early 2014 she released her debut single under the Allie X name, 'Catch', and it received praise from multiple sources, kick-starting a second career under the new name. She finally managed to get her music officially released by Twin Music Records, issuing numerous singles and three albums, and so as a reminder of what she was doing when she started out, here is her second shelved album, 'The Hard Way' from 2011, and you can definitely hear the progression of her music, from that idiosyncratic debut to this much more mature and assured sophomore effort.   

Track listing

01 Overture
02 Rolling Days  
03 Damaged Nail 
04 The Hard Way 
05 Stars (feat. Darcy Rego) 
06 Elevator 
07 I Will Love You More 
08 Headmaster 
09 O Chad 
10 Mistake  

David Bowie - The Leon Suites (1994)

David Bowie and Brian Eno were two of music’s most avant-garde figures, and throughout their lifelong friendship they often collaborated, most notably on Bowie's Berlin records. After reuniting at Bowie's 1992 wedding, they started emailing each other about what they felt was missing from music, and in a bid to reignite some artistic bravery that they clearly felt was lacking, they decided to embark on an album together without so much as "a gnat of an idea". They put together a band consisting of Bowie/Eno, Reeves Gabrels, Mike Garson, Erdal Kizilçay & Sterling Campbell, and began recording at Mountain Studios, in Switzerland, and the resulting album was far more fleshed out than its initial beginnings, being a narrative-focused cyberpunk curiosity built largely of interviews the pair conducted with patients at a wing of a Vienna psychiatric hospital, who were well-known for their outsider art. 'The Leon Suites' was a bold attempt to bring more conceptual artistry to the modern album, a bizarre offering that was influenced by murder, Twin Peaks, and hospital interviews. The two musicians put together a three-hour recording consisting of mainly spoken word passages and strange jams, employing the cut-up technique employed by William Burroughs and Brian Gysin, relying on an app Bowie had co-developed, called the Verbasizer. It allowed him to auto-generate random sentences to bulk out tracks or use its words to trigger an idea that formed the shape of a song. Eno was said to hand out cards to backing musicians each morning with their unique backstory, which contained instructions like: "You are the disgruntled member of a South African rock band. Play the notes that were suppressed". 

He also used the Oblique Strategies cards that he and artist Peter Schmidt had pioneered in 1975, which involved using a series of prompts on cards drawn only when faced with a creative blockage. Everything was highly improvised and written by Bowie in the studio, and he described what emerged as an almost obsessive interest in ritualistic, outsider artists. He told Vox magazine: "It's like a replacement for a spiritual starvation that's going on, like a tribe with dim memories of what their rituals used to be. They're sort of being dragged back again in this new, mutated, deviant way, with so-called gratuitous sex and violence in popular culture and people cutting bits off themselves. For me, it seems like a natural kind of thing". There were five suites recorded for 'Leon...', but two were deleted, with three receiving a final mix and then being presented to the record company for release, but they were not as forward-thinking as Bowie, and rejected the project as being too uncommercial. He therefore scrapped the whole thing and started work on something that the record company would accept, with snippets from 'The Leon Suites', including some of its narrative arcs and characters, ending up appearing on his 1995 album '1. Outside'. Although these tracks are often touted as 'Outside' outtakes, its more true to say that 'Outside' was based on outtakes from 'The Leon Suites', which was an album in its own right, and if the record company had accepted this as Bowie's next album, then '1. Outside' would never have happened. It's great that we can now get to hear these tracks, in the best quality so far, as these come from a CDR provided by Adam Bedstroke, and so thanks to him for letting these demos be shared amongst fans.

Track listing

01 Suite 1: I Am With Name  
02 Suite 2: Leon Takes Us Outside 
03 Suite 3: Enemy Is Fragile 

Elvis Presley - Memphis Revisited (1969)

In 1968, Elvis Presley's manager Colonel Tom Parker arranged a deal with NBC for a Christmas television special starring Presley in front of a live audience. Parker originally planned to have Presley sing Christmas carols only, but the producer, Steve Binder, convinced him to perform songs from his original repertoire, and the high ratings received by the special, plus the success of its attendant LP, re-established Presley's popularity with his fans. For the previous half-decade, Parker had decided that Presley should only record soundtrack albums, as he viewed films and their soundtracks as complementary, with each helping to promote the other. However, the commercial success of these had steadily diminished throughout the 60's, and following the success of the TV special, he was persuaded to leave the RCA studios and record a new, non-soundtrack album at a different location. During a January 1969 meeting at Graceland, Presley told his producer, Felton Jarvis, that he did not want to record his next album at RCA, and American Sound Studio in Memphis, which was at the peak of a hit-producing streak, was suggested as an alternative. RCA contacted the studio's producer Chips Moman, and he was so keen to work with Presley that he postponed a session with Neil Diamond in order to put aside ten days to record with him. He was to be backed by the studio's house band, the 827 Thomas Street Band (informally known as the Memphis Boys), which consisted of Reggie Young on guitar, Tommy Cogbill and Mike Leech on bass, Gene Chrisman on drums, Bobby Wood on piano, and Bobby Emmons on organ. 

Recording began on 13 January 1969, when Presley arrived at the studio nursing a cold, but he worked through the next two days before his cold worsened, and on 15 and 16 January the house band recorded backing tracks for subsequent sessions without him. Presley returned on 20 January, recording 'In The Ghetto' in 23 takes and finishing the vocal track for 'Gentle On My Mind', and on 22 January he recorded Eddy Arnold's 'I'll Hold You in My Heart (Till I Can Hold You in My Arms)' and the non-album single 'Suspicious Minds'. He then took a break from recording for a vacation trip to Aspen, Colorado to celebrate his daughter Lisa Marie's first birthday, and recording re-commenced on 17 February, completing about a dozen songs before the sessions ended on 22 February. Moman moved away from the usual Presley pop recordings aimed at an established audience, and he incorporated a Memphis sound integrating soul, country, gospel and rural and electric blues. Many arrangements lean heavily on the rhythm section, with lesser contributions from strings, brass and woodwinds, and arrangers Glenn Spreen and Mike Leech changed Presley's image on the tracks with the addition of violas, cellos and French horns. The single 'In the Ghetto' was released on 14 April 1969, with 300,000 copies shipped by RCA, and in its second week of release it entered the US charts, where it remained for thirteen weeks, eventually reaching number three, and it also reached number two on the British Singles chart. 

'From Elvis In Memphis' was released on 2 June 1969, topping the UK Albums Chart, and reaching number thirteen on Billboard's Top Albums. Although it received mixed reviews at the time, with The Los Angeles Times' Pete Johnson criticizing the music arrangements that he considered inconsistent with Presley's original Sun Records style, or the contemporary Memphis Sound produced by Stax Records, 'From Elvis In Memphis' has continued to receive praise in retrospective reviews. Following the release of the album, some of the songs which were left off the track listing were released as singles, with 'Don't Cry Daddy' reaching No. 6 on the Billboard Hot 100, and 'Kentucky Rain' becoming a moderate hit in 1970. That same year ten unused track from the 1969 sessions were issued under the title 'Back In Memphis', and while it pales in comparison to 'From Elvis In Memphis', it's still a fine collection of songs, with his rendition of Mort Shuman's 'You'll Think Of Me' being a soaring, passionate recording. Even after extracting these ten tracks from the studio leftovers, there were still a few completed tracks which were left behind, and so for this mopping up exercise I've taken all the non-albums singles which were recorded in Memphis, added an alternate take of 'Suspicious Minds', plus a couple of outtakes and b-sides, and in a controversial move I've included a version of the aborted vocal take of 'Poor Man's Gold' which has been completed using AI. It might rankle with the purists, but it is exceptionally well-done, and perfectly rounds off this one final Memphis album from The King. 

Track listing

01 Rubberneckin'
02 Mama Liked The Roses

03 I'll Be There

04 Kentucky Rain
05 Suspicious Minds
06 Don't Cry Daddy
07 Poor Man's Gold
08 My Little Friend

09 If I'm A Fool (For Loving You)
10 Medley: It's My Way/This Time/I Can't Stop Loving You
11 Who Am I?
12 Hey Jude

B*Witched - Where Will You Go? (2001)

B*Witched were an Irish girl group consisting of twin sisters Edele and Keavy Lynch, Lindsay Armaou and Sinéad O'Carroll, and all four members knew each other vaguely from dancing at Digges Lane dance studios in Dublin. O'Carroll met Keavy Lynch in a garage in the Dublin suburb of Finglas, where Keavy was working as a part-time mechanic, and the two became friends after talking about music, which sparked the idea of being in a band. In 1996 they decided to put a group together, and invited Keavy's identical twin sister Edele to join, originally calling themselves Butterfly Farm, and they later became a four-piece when Armaou joined, having met Keavy at a kickboxing class. They experimented with the names D'sire and Sister, before settling on B*Witched, and the band members deliberately cultivated a tomboy image and, in order to appeal to a younger audience, they also understated their ages in their early years. Edele and Keavy's older brother Shane (of the band Boyzone) helped the group find a manager, and Kim Glover signed them to Glowworm Records in 1997. B*Witched released their debut single 'C'est la Vie' on 25 May 1998, and despite mixed reviews, it reached number one on the UK Singles Chart, making them the youngest girl group to have a number one in the UK. Following its release in the United States, the song went to number nine on the Billboard Hot 100, and subsequent singles 'Rollercoaster', 'To You I Belong' and 'Blame It On The Weatherman' also topped the UK chart. 

Their self-titled debut album was released in October 1998, and reached number three on the UK Albums Chart and number 12 on the US Billboard 200. In 1999 the group appeared on the ABBA tribute single 'Thank ABBA For The Music', which reached number four in the UK, and they also recorded a cover of 'Does Your Mother Know' for the subsequent 'ABBAmania' album and TV special. Their second album, 'Awake And Breathe', appeared a year after their debut, and peaked at number 5 on the charts, but singles from the album were less successful than earlier releases. After touring Europe and America, the band began work on a third album, but although three new songs were recorded: 'Hold On' (featured in the film 'The Princess Diaries'), a cover of Toni Basil's 'Mickey' (featured in the film 'Bring It On'), and a cover of Wild Cherry's 'Play That Funky Music', the sessions didn't produce much other new music. The band had chosen 'Where Will You Go?' as their next single for release in October 2001, but before they could film a music video for it, the girls received a phone call from their manager telling them their record label Sony had dropped them. In June 2002, after one year without signing a new record deal, O'Carroll left the band, unhappy with the forced hiatus, and in September the group split up. There has been a tentative track listing doing the rounds for what could have been their third album, but only two songs from it have ever surfaced, so the best we can do is to gather up all of the tracks from their 2000 EP, a few b-sides, and the ABBA cover, and I've topped and tailed the album with a rather strange piece from the flip of their 'Rollercoaster' single entitled 'B*Witched Go To The Moon'. 

Track listing

01 B*Witched Go To The Moon/

02 Where Will You Go?
03 Mickey
04 Get Happy
05 Together We'll Be Fine
06 Play That Funky Music
07 Coming Round Again

08 Does Your Mother Know
08 Don't Say Never

09 Fly Away
09 Hold On

Soft Machine - Soft Machine's Little Red Records (1970)

johntest has been busy recently upgrading the artwork for some of the posts on the excellent Soft Machine alternate universe blog https://softmachinerigamarole.blogspot.com, and I think that this one is such an improvement that I'm replacing the original cover on the post and in the album file with this one. If you already have the album then just save it from this page. The illustration of Kevin Ayers is by Neal Anderson. 

Various Artists - The Hitmakers Sing Van Morrison (2021)

After the commercial failure of his first Warner Bros. album 'Astral Weeks' in 1968, Van Morrison moved to upstate New York with his wife and began writing songs for the follow-up album 'Moondance', attempting to produce a record that would be more accessible and appealing to listeners. The musicians who went on to record 'Moondance' with Morrison were recruited from Woodstock, and would continue working with him for several years, including guitarist John Platania, saxophonist Jack Schroer, and keyboardist Jef Labes. Recording sessions began at Century Sound in New York, accompanied by most of the musicians from 'Astral Weeks' and its engineer Brooks Arthur, but Morrison soon manipulated the situation and got rid of them all. He had his own ideas for how he wanted the music to sound, and so enlisted the help of a horn section and chorus, and brought in the musicians recruited from Woodstock. Recording then moved to Studio A penthouse of A & R Studios in New York from August to September 1969, coming to the studio with only the basic song structures written down, and the song's arrangements in his memory, and they were developed throughout the album's recording. Most of Morrison's vocals were recorded live, and he later said that he would have preferred to record the entire album that way, and the finished album was the first for which Morrison was credited as the producer, later saying that as no-one else knew what he was looking for, he just did it. The resulting album found him abandoning the abstract folk/ jazz compositions of 'Astral Weeks' in favour of more formally composed songs, and its lively rhythm and blues/rock music was the style he would become most known for in his career. 'Moondance' was released by Warner Bros. on 27 January 1970 in the UK and on 28 February in the US, receiving immediate acclaim from critics on both sides of the Atlantic, being hailed by both Greil Marcus and Lester Bangs jointly in Rolling Stone as a work of "musical invention and lyrical confidence; the strong moods of 'Into the Mystic' and the fine, epic brilliance of 'Caravan' will carry it past many good records we'll forget in the next few years." The title track is one of his most covered songs, attracting nearly 250 versions, and some of the other tracks aren't far behind, with soul stars like Ben E. King, Lorraine Ellison, Merry Clayton and Esther Phillips all recognising the soulful quality of the song-writing, so here are some of the very best takes of the songs from Van Morrison's classic 'Moondance'. As it's quite a short collection I've added a track from Miriam Makeba from the same time period to close the album. 

Track listing

01 And It Stoned Me (Jackie DeShannon 1971) 
02 Moondance (Irene Reid 1970)   
03 Crazy Love (Rita Coolidge 1971)
04 Caravan (Lorraine Ellison 1971) 
05 Into The Mystic (Ben E. King 1972)
06 Come Running (Lynn Anderson 1979)
07 These Dreams Of You (Jesse Colin Young 2021)
08 Brand New Day (Esther Phillips with The Dixie Flyers 1970)
09 Everyone (Elizabeth Mitchell 2012)
10 Glad Tidings (Merry Clayton 1970)
11 I Shall Sing (Miriam Makeba 1970)