Staff Picks for July 2024
July 31, 2024
This 1989 debut from the French pop singer is a synthpop gem that may have gone unnoticed were it not for the international smash "Voyage Voyage," which went on to become an enduring favorite that has been covered by artists across multiple genres. Beyond that, the album is padded with great era-specific tracks that recall early Depeche Mode and Eurythmics. Other notable songs include "John," "Hari ôm Ramakrishna," and "Qui sommes-nous?"
July 30, 2024
Released in 1995, the second, home-recorded album from this English band perfected their specific approach to rural psychedelia, adding misty fuzz and mysterious layers of noise to softly-sung, late night acoustic tunes. Where earlier material had sounded like a rock band experimenting with volatile ideas, Further found Flying Saucer Attack cocooning themselves into a warm, if wobbly, otherworld of sound.
July 29, 2024
The Jimmie Lunceford orchestra served as an incubator for jazz talent like trombonist Trummy Young, saxophonist Willie Smith, and trumpeter and future bandleader Gerald Wilson. It was while working with the Jimmie Lunceford orchestra that trumpeter and arranger Sy Oliver got his chops together and prepared himself for his later triumphs in the music industry. Cabu's Jimmie Lunceford Anthology serves up 44 of the best recordings this band ever made, from the exciting early works of 1934 to the wartime swing of 1942.
![Spawn: The Album [Original Soundtrack]](https://fastly-s3.allmusic.com/release/mr0000072106/front/400/hJhnCYd9HV8fdeRF-JL435hUoDg0hsvx4F4sL4oO-nA=.jpg)
July 28, 2024
Original Soundtrack
Arriving at a time when soundtracks were almost as important as (and, in this case, better than) the movies they accompanied, this took the Judgment Night hybrid model and amplified the chaos with a rock-meets-electronic free-for-all. While some pairings work better than others (the Filter, Orbital, Metallica, Slayer, and Silverchair songs for starters), it's notable as both a time capsule and a strangely prescient look at a genre-less future.
July 27, 2024
Sidran's debut solo album was the beginning of a long, quirky, varied, and sometimes puzzling series of albums. The music ranges from dirty rock and R&B numbers like "Poor Girl," with Sidran playing both the B-3 and electric piano, to "Alexander's Rag Time Band," which brings '60s Blue Note soul-jazz to '70s Prestige and Mainstream funk. Sidran uses his voice so musically, with enough reserve, restraint, and savvy in his phrasing, that it's a delight to listen to. This offers proof that Sidran was already in full possession of his gifts as a writer, producer and arranger.
July 26, 2024
Rock Bottom, released 50 years ago today, was Robert Wyatt's most focused and relaxed album up to its time of release. In 1974, it won the French Grand Prix Charles Cros Record of the Year Award. It is also considered an essential record in any comprehensive collection of psychedelic or progressive rock.
July 25, 2024
One of the last in a run of solid work from these Nigerian twins, this 1979 album is a magical, groove-centric collection of pop-minded Afrobeat burners. As with much of the Lijadu Sisters' '70s output, these six songs are powered by dual vocals, joyously funky instrumentation, and locked-in polyrhythmic percussion.
July 24, 2024
With the release of this absolutely astounding seven-song, 23-plus-minute EP, released 25 years ago this month, At the Drive-In seemed to have finally come together and found the true and beautiful essence of their music. They took the raw intensity and power of their earlier efforts, and focused upon it, bringing forth something that surpasses anything they had done to this point.
July 23, 2024
They may have been too weird for Brit-pop, but Tiger's roaring take on indie-rock bristles with fuzzy guitars, call-and-response vocals, unconventional hooks and pounding rhythms that still sound fresh nearly 30 years after their debut album was released.
July 22, 2024
After the righteous anger and occasional despair of the socially motivated Innervisions, Stevie Wonder returned with a relationship record: Fulfillingness' First Finale, released 50 years ago today. The cover pictures his life as an enormous wheel, part of which he's looking ahead to and part of which he's already completed (the latter with accompanying images of Little Stevie, JFK and MLK, the Motor Town Revue bus, a child with balloons, his familiar Taurus logo, and multiple Grammy awards).
July 21, 2024
Various Artists
Sounding almost like an all-traditional country episode of "A Prairie Home Companion," the guests (including Alison Krauss, Dan Tyminski, the Whites, the Fairfield Four, and the Cox Family, among others) amiably exchange songs on-stage, reveling in the atmosphere of warm country, bluegrass, and blues music. Highlights include two non-traditional tracks from Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, whose earthy compositions fit in seamlessly with the time-honored traditional songs, and Emmylou Harris' contribution "Green Pastures" (which originally appeared on Roses in the Snow, her own Americana revival album from some 20 years earlier).
July 20, 2024
Released 25 years ago today, fans celebrated the return of original Soft Boy Kimberley Rew on two tracks for the first time in 18 years, and Hitchcock also commandeered a squadron of reverent co-conspirators in other cities to make a good LP into a first-rate one. Three-quarters of the Young Fresh Fellows along with R.E.M.'s Peter Buck are unmistakable on a trio of Seattle-recorded tracks, especially "Elizabeth Jade." Elsewhere, guitarist Tim Keegan of Homer reprises the sidekick color-man role he played in the film, and who wouldn't want Grant Lee Phillips and Jon Brion to sit in on some L.A. sessions?
July 19, 2024
The 2012 Clifford Brown three-disc anthology The EmArcy Master Takes, Vol. 2: The Singers Sessions collects all of the tracks Brown recorded with vocalists Dinah Washington, Sarah Vaughan, and Helen Merrill during one magical five-month period in 1954. All of these sessions are now considered classic recordings and landmarks in the careers of each singer, as well as legendary trumpeter Brown.
July 18, 2024
With their final album, released 50 years ago this month, Brinsley Schwarz turn in their most pop-oriented record, filled with infectious gems like "The Ugly Things," "Trying to Live My Life Without You," and "(What's So Funny 'bout) Peace, Love and Understanding."
July 17, 2024
Though she turned up on some compilations, television syncs, and the odd print interview in the interim, this was the first album in 16 years from Erin Moran's retro-pop project. With the aid of producer Daniel Tashian (the Silver Seas) and collaborators including "the" Paul Williams and the Watson Twins, she constructed affectionately nostalgic arrangements for her already '60s-styled song blueprints. Far from mere '60s pastiche, the album offers entries like "Jody," which suggests the sophisti-pop of Prefab Sprout, and "Someone’s Gonna Break Your Heart" recalls '80s Pretenders, and not only due to Moran's oft-noted vocal resemblance to Chrissie Hynde.
July 16, 2024
On On The Beach, released 50 years ago today, the barbs were mixed with humor and even affection, as Young seemed to be emerging from the grief and self-abuse that had plagued him for two years. But the album was so spare and under-produced, its lyrics so harrowing, that it was easy to miss Young's conclusion: he was saying goodbye to despair, not being overwhelmed by it.
July 15, 2024
This amazing album, released 50 years ago this month, is the product of six full-time Howard University students taking the direction of department head and jazz great Donald Byrd into the Fantasy Studios along with the aid of production wizard Larry Mizell. The result is some of the finest groove-oriented jazz music ever recorded.
July 14, 2024
In this era, the group featured future bluegrass luminaries Doyle Lawson, Ricky Skaggs, Mike Auldridge, and Jerry Douglas alongside the established legends guitarist/vocalist Charlie Waller and banjo player Bill Emerson. With talented artists like these, it comes as no surprise that the music is top-notch -- the thing that really sets these recordings apart is the fact that the band was choosing to perform songs by decidedly non-bluegrass musicians such as John Prine, Gordon Lightfoot, Paul Simon, and Kris Kristofferson, and still managing to transform these progressive songwriters' works into down-home stomps.
July 13, 2024
Four years after Disco Volante, Mr. Bungle returned with California, released 25 years ago today, which immediately distinguishes itself from its predecessors -- it's probably their most heavily orchestrated record to date and their most melodic overall, as well as the least dependent on rock styles. That's certainly not to imply that this is a tame or immediately accessible record, nor that Mr. Bungle has suddenly gone sane.
July 12, 2024
When Lalah Hathaway's self-titled debut album came out, there was reason to believe that she might evolve into one of the top female R&B singers of the 1990s. Donny Hathaway's daughter certainly had a lot going for her -- a big vocal range and plenty of charisma, passion, and charm to go with it. She doesn't always have fantastic material to work with, but when she does, the results are quite memorable. The producers/songwriters who really do Hathaway justice include Angela Winbush on "Baby, Don't Cry" and "I Gotta Move On," and Andre Fisher on "Smile" and "Somethin'."
July 11, 2024
Recorded on November 5, 1971, Live at the Gaslight stands as the final recording of Delta blues legend Mississippi Fred McDowell. The bottleneck guitarist was 67 years old when this album was cut, but his voice and playing show no signs of age and his passion and conviction seem to have strengthened with the years.
July 10, 2024
This marvelous collection gathers Lunceford's great Vocalion-Okeh and Columbia sides from 1939 and 1940 (the early war years), with meticulous track-by-track annotation and a concise historical essay by Bob Waldman. The infectious vocal performances of trombonist James "Trummy" Young ("Tain't What You Do," "Ain't She Sweet," "The Lonesome Road," "I Want the Waiter (With the Water)") are classic, as are the airtight arrangements of Sy Oliver, Eddie Durham, Will Hudson, and Billy Moore, Jr.
July 9, 2024
Before the sounds of the 1980s became a staple of indie music, there was Clor, whose lone 2005 album pays homage to tightly wound new wave with melodies that could have been composed on graph paper. The band teeters between catchy and off-kilter as ably as their influences, but the wit and heart they bring to this style is entirely theirs.
July 8, 2024
The singer-songwrtiter's debut album offers Texas country and honky tonk, fueled by biting, often profound, social commentary in songs like "Ride Em Jewboy" (a metaphor for the Holocaust) the title track, a honky tonk weeper that proved prophetic, and the anti-discrimination anthem, We Reserve the Right to Refuse Service to You.
July 7, 2024
Elvis Recorded Live on Stage in Memphis, celebrating its 50th anniversary of release today, was something special: it captured a beloved hero returning home. Presley made sure he was prepared for the occasion, running through much of the set two days prior the March 18th Memphis concert at the Richmond Coliseum.
July 6, 2024
Michael Brown was considered the mastermind of the Left Banke, the genius behind "Walk Away Renee" and "Pretty Ballerina," and when he departed the band in 1967, it was anyone's guess if the band had a future. Though no more hits came their way, 1968's The Left Banke Too was an ambitious and pleasing mix of thoughtful sunshine pop, light psychedelia, and baroque pop that is by turns delightful and haunting, and vocalist Steve Martin-Caro sounds stronger and more confident here than he did on their debut. A minor classic of sophisticated pop.
July 5, 2024
Though various live releases had emerged over the course of the band's existence, no full-length capturing of the Party's particular bacchanalia approved by the group had officially emerged until this release. Stitching together tracks from a London date in 1981 and a German show in 1982 (plus a ringer cut from Athens, Greece -- a version of the Stooges' "Funhouse" with Jim Thirwell aka Foetus on sax), Live threatens at all points to leap from the speakers and throttle innocent bystanders.
July 4, 2024
Speedy J switched from warm ambient techno and trance to challenging, experimental techno with this album, which remains his best. Though he'd later concentrate on Birmingham-style hard techno, this is less club-ready, and much closer to post-industrial and IDM. It's easily the most technically advanced and rewarding record he's ever made.
July 3, 2024
Kicking off with one of prime funk's purest distillations -- the outrageously great title track, with a perfect party chorus line and uncredited horns (presumably the Horny Horns were involved somehow) adding to the monster beat and bass -- Up for the Down Stroke, released 50 years ago today, finds Parliament in rude good health.
July 2, 2024
Joel Gibb's clever observations on life, love, and gay culture are just as naughty and scene-stealing as they were on 2003's Smell of Our Own, but there's a newfound sense of poignancy that overrides much of Mississauga's patchwork nihilism.
July 1, 2024
Rejuvenation, released 50 years ago today, is the definitive Reprise album from the Meters, not just because the material is stronger (which admittedly is true), but because the performances are continually inspired and the production is professional but hits at a gut level, resulting in a first-class funk album.