Tag Archives: Record Store Day

The It’s Time To Play B-Sides Top 20 of 2025

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Wow, 2025 went by really quickly! All of a sudden we’re at the end of the year.

I went to more live shows this year including two shows at Codfish Hollow in Maquoketa. This was the first time I’ve been back to Codfish since before COVID! I saw Bob Mould with Craig Finn from The Hold Steady in April which was a really awesome show. The last time I saw Bob was in February of 1997 at the Guthrie in Minneapolis. The last time I saw Craig Finn was with the Hold Steady at one of the “Barn on the 4th of July” shows at Codfish. In June I saw Keller Williams doing his DeadPettyKellerGrass tribute to Tom Petty and Grateful Dead. I also saw GA-20 at CSPS Hall in Cedar Rapids in August (my pictures here). I wanted to see more shows, and maybe 2026 I’ll ramp up. I already have a number of shows I’m interested in:The Iowa City Jazz Festival is hosting ARTEMIS, whose Arboresque album made my Top 20 list for this year. The creator of the long running Mission Creek Festival is now creating STOP/TIME which is a multi-venue spring festival. The lineup includes Tortoise, Ambrose Akinmusire, William Tyler, Pieta Brown, and a bunch more amazing acts. I’m bummed that Tortoise and William Tyler are probably going on at the same time… Also on the calendar is The Iron and Wine at the Englert, so things are really looking interesting for next year. We also have DeVotchKa : Tribute to the Music of Little Miss Sunshine at Codfish Hollow.

I participated in both Record Store Days again this year. My friends and I went to Davenport and Rock Island to hit both Ragged Records locations for April. I went to Analog Vault in Cedar Rapids for Black Friday RSD. I didn’t have a lot on my list for either event. The reissue of The Pale Saints final album Slow Buildings was a big want for me. Generally regarded as not the band’s best effort compared to In Ribbons, but it was an album I listened to a lot in 1992 when I was in the blush of a 4AD Records romance. I now have all three Pale Saints albums on vinyl, happily. The Blue Note comp of outtakes Alt’s N Outs was a cool release very much in the spirit of RSD. The Nathan Davis RSD exclusive reissue of his 1965 album Happy Girl was an obscure jazz title I’d never heard of, but picked that up as well after listening to some tracks on streaming. For Black Friday RSD I picked up the Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers – The Live Anthology – From the Vaults Vol. 1, which was a vinyl reissue of the 5th CD from the Best Buy exclusive version of the 2009 Live Anthology box set. The Black Friday RSD version was an aqua version and there has since been non-RSD versions of it. I also picked up the Fleetwood Mac Live 1975 2 LP which is essentially disc 3 of the Deluxe version of self-titled that came out in 2018. I was looking forward to this because I had a bootleg of the Capital Theater show which was based on a radio broadcast. This release is a compilation of two radio shows from that early tour. Really cool to hear a fresh-faced and newly-minted version of the Buckingham Nicks version of Fleetwood Mac tackling some early tunes. Plus, that version of “Rhiannon” has an off-the-hook vocal performance from Stevie Nicks that is worth the price of admission.

On last year’s post, I mentioned that I was a member of Vinyl Me Please and that 2024 was the first full year. This was short-lived. I ended up canceling VMP in January after I was able to order the reissue of the fantastic VMP box set The Blue Note Records Story, which originally came out in 2019 and sold out quickly. With the 80th Anniversary of Blue Note Records, there were a number of events around it, which included VMP’s reissue of that box set, which was welcomed by everyone who missed it the first time around. It was getting to the point that I wasn’t finding releases that I wanted, and they kicked off the year eliminating some of the genre channels, and then there was a bunch of news and online chatter about the label going under and I didn’t want to risk losing my monthly subscription fees, so I bailed. Based on the subreddits, there are a lot of people who still have credits and records due to them and the new owners are not handling support very well, so I’m glad I got out when I did.

Without further ado, here is my Top 20 list for 2025. This list is only for new releases in 2025– not reissues, and is in no particular order other than when I come across it looking at my discogs and Bandcamp additions for 2025.

ARTEMIS – Arboresque – I first became aware of the 5 piece jazz band ARTEMIS when they were included on the Blue Note Review Volume 3 box TRULY, MADLY, DEEPLEE as part of the tribute album to Lee Morgan. I included this in my 2024 Top 20 list. Their cover of “The Procrastinator” by Morgan was brilliant and was a catalyst into my deep dive into Lee Morgan this year. Arboresque is a breathtakingly beautiful album. It is anchored in a very post-bop sound (think late 60’s albums from Miles Davis’ second great quintet, Herbie Hancock, and the aforementioned Lee Morgan (in particular his 1964 album The Search for New Land, and his 1967 album The Procrastinator). Check out this Tiny Desk appearance where they perform songs from Arboresque.

Tortoise – Touch – I did not have “new album from Tortoise” on my BINGO card for 2025. 2025 finds the band split up geographically with only two members still living in Chicago, so it’s not surprising maybe that it took them a few years to reconvene. 2016’s The Catastrophist was the first album from the band that I wasn’t totally into. It lacked a cohesiveness that the prior albums had (not to mention a throwaway cover of David Essex’s “Rock On”). Touch is less a return-to-form as it is maybe a return to vision. The album dips pretty liberally into the tones of albums like Standards— the chiming synth patches for example. Touch also comes off more like a guitar album in spots. Jeff Parker brings in some really great guitar tones on this album. Which isn’t to say it’s a exclusively guitar album though, “Elka” is an excellent example of the Krautrock influences the band has with it’s motorik beats and fizzy synth pads. Touch is the first album not on longtime Chicago home Thrill Jockey Records, but is instead on Chicago’s new home for innovative jazz and jazz-adjacent music International Anthem/Nonesuch. IARC is also the label for Jeff Parker. Honestly, the clout (and track history) that IARC/Nonesuch has could bring Tortoise its first Grammy nom.

Steve Gunn – Music For Writers – Gunn returns to his instrumental guitar leanings with Music For Writers. Considered a follow-up to 2021’s Other You, Music For Writers is a lush landscape that, I suppose, could be used as a background to writing. Beautiful album to be certain. Reminds me of Brian Eno in spots, but also David Sylvian’s collaborations with Robert Fripp on Gone to Earth. Gunn also released a vocal album this year called Daylight, Daylight. I didn’t pick that up, but it’s on my list.

LANA GASPARØTTI – Dimensions – This is a reissue of her 2024 EP on vinyl by Portuguese label Now Jazz Agora. Their release of MAZARIN – Pendular was one of my favorite releases of 2024. This album is a sublime mix of jazz keys, lush vocals wrapped in slinky bass and skittering breakbeats. Reminds me of the peak of Acid Jazz and Roni Size’s Breakbeat Era. Fantastic. The album doesn’t take itself too seriously with snippets of 8-bit throwback and cat samples.

Scott Hirsch – Lost Padres – Scott Hirsch at one time was best known as MC Taylor’s partner in Hiss Golden Messenger and prior to that The Court And Spark, but he has been turning out some pretty fantastic solo albums in the self-proclaimed “cosmic country” style. Certainly he has held on to the laidback sound that existed on the early HGM records that sounds a lot like JJ Cale, but on Lost Padres Hirsch layers in some beautiful background vocals and some bubbly dubbiness making Lost Padres a standout album in his catalog and really an overlooked album in 2025.

Brother Trucker – Live at Octopus – Roots-rocking Iowa band Brother Trucker has been recording albums and playing live for over 25 years and to celebrate this, the band released its first live album recorded at one of the best live venues in the area, The Octopus in Cedar Falls. This album captures the live show from the band perfectly. I reviewed the album for Little Village.

James Elkington – Pastel De Nada – Pastel De Nada is an album of guitar instrumental sketches from the go-to sideman James Elkington. This album is a sequel of sorts to his 2023 album Me Neither. Elkington explores the gamut of tones, tunings and effects of guitar. Parts recall his other work in The Horses Ha, and The Zincs and his own solo works. His playing feels distinctly drawn from the history of British Folk, a little Richard Thompson and a little Robert Fripp. An album with no goal other than to catalog guitar sketches, and that works for me.

The Sure Fire Soul Ensemble – Gemini – There’s a reason that the artwork (cover and label) for The Sure Fire Soul Ensemble’s latest album looks like a vintage CTI Records release. SFSE brings the vintage breezy laid back jazz funk sound that CTI was known for. This album is a banger from beginning to end. Of course, brought to you by the fine folks at Colemine Records.

Okonski – Entrance Music – Speaking of Colemine, Steve Okonski of Durand Jones and the Indications was back with another fantastic piano trio album. This is an album that I was anxiously anticipating after his 2023 album Magnolia. Beautiful album.

Kendra Morris – Next – Another wonderful release on Colemine this year was from Kendra Morris. I loved her 2022 album Nine Lives and this album has the lush and bright R&B sound that album had. Her music and her vocals remind me of the early albums from Nellie McKay.

Hiss Golden Messenger – Sanctuary Songs – Although this live album came out digitally in 2024, the limited edition (of 500) vinyl release of this came out in 2025 as a benefit for artists. Citizen Vinyl is a new vinyl pressing plant and label out of North Carolina and they did a fantastic job with the release. HGM has been overdue for a live album and this fits the bill nicely. Check out the fantastic cover of “Eyes of the World” on here, too.

Neal Francis – Return to Zero – Chicago-based musician Neal Francis came back in 2025 with his first album since the FANTASTIC 2023 live album Francis Comes Alive. He still brings the 70’s funk and R&B to the album but we get more disco bump this time. Francis is one of my favorite active musicians and I need to get to a show some time for sure.

Loess – Battens – For me any year that has a Loess album in it, is a good one. Battens still employs the digitally-manipulated palate of sounds we’ve heard on previous releases, but this album seems to be more organic sounding than the others. My first impressions of this album drew comparisons to Peter Gabriel’s Passion album. Very atmospheric, but also evoking a kind of cinematic feel.

William Tyler – Time Indefinite – For William Tyler’s latest album he fully commits to the found sound experimentation that he has been doing. Lots of tape manipulation and distortion. It’s far away from his early American Primitive guitar work, though there are bits that wear through the soundscapes. He considers this album to be his most personal work to date, and certainly it evokes the spirit of contemplation. Tyler continues to be one of the most compelling artists around for me.

The Tubs – Cotton Crown – I heard this in Ragged Records in Davenport during RSD and immediately needed to buy it. The Tubs are a Cardiff, Wales band that are kind of the darlings of a developing music scene there. This album is pure jangle-pop sounding a lot like The Smiths and other 90’s College Rock bands. Lead singer Owen Williams sounds a lot like Richard Thompson, but I hear a little Bob Mould in there as well. Brilliant album, I’m sad I missed their show at Rozz-Tox last spring.

Phil Cook – Appalachia Borealis – Phil Cook’s latest album is a collection of improvisational piano pieces recorded at his home gathering inspiration from the sounds of wildlife around him. Produced by longtime friend Justin Vernon (which is the least interesting thing about it, honestly) The resulting album is beautiful and reflective and one I spun a lot this year.

Jacob Lampman’s Ego Death – Cedar Falls, IA musician Jacob Lampman is probably better known in the projects he lends his guitar. I met Jacob while he was helping Joel Sires out a couple of years ago. I’m not sure what I thought a solo album from Lampman would sound like, but this album is a delightful mix of Seventies breeziness. It is a complex and layered pop with flirtations with jazz (helped out in no small part by a band made up of college music professors). It’s a mix of Van Morrison, Bill Withers, and the symphonic pop of David Axelrod. Is there a Freak Pop genre?

Holiday Innards – Maybe You Should Stay – I caught Holiday Innards opening for 10 Watt Robot this year at The Ideal Theater in Cedar Rapids. Holiday Innards is made up of guys who have been bands in Iowa for decades. Vocalist and guitarist Kelly Plumber was in DREDNEX, one of the very earliest college rock bands. Kylie Buddin on guitar and bass was in Iowa City band Stickman and in Peterbuilt with Tom Jessen (pre-Dimestore Outfit). Drummer Brian Thompson has been in quite a few bands as well including Paisley Bible with Buddin. Largely releasing EP’s under-the-radar, but these are all worth checking out on their Bandcamp. It’s a mix of rough-and-ragged punk and classic rock sounding at times like The Faces and The Stooges and Big Star. Maybe You Should Stay is their physical release available at shows. Made up of tracks from the EP’s

Bob Mould – Here We Go Crazy – Bob returns to the angry and very guitar forward sound that is generally accepted to be the best sound for him. I caught him on the tour for this album at Codfish Hollow in Maquoketa. A wonderful place to see him. Here We Go Crazy reminds me a lot of Sugar, and it sounds like we’re going to get a new Sugar album in 2026, which would be welcomed by me. It’s got a lot of the Black Sheets of Rain sound, too.

Samalandra – Samalandra – Samalandra is another band on Now Jazz Agora (who had three releases in 2025). The band was formed in 2022 by João Neves (drummer), Débora King (keyboardist and vocalist) and Tiago Martins (bassist). They don’t stick to a classic jazz sound, leaning more electronic and beats and rhythms inspired by hip hop. This album fits nicely with similarly influenced artists like Makaya McCraven or Robert Glasper.

That wraps my list of my favorite releases from 2025. A pretty wide-ranging list of releases stylistically showing that there is a lot of new music coming out all the time. It’s important to support artists who still feel it’s important to bring new music to the world, whether that is going to a show, buying records and merch, or just spreading the word.

RSD 2025 Release – Alts ‘n Outs – The Other Side of Blue Note – A Deeper Dive

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The Record Store Day 2025 list dropped this week and there are quite a few interesting releases to consider. Blue Note Records celebrated 85 years in 2024 and there were a lot of special releases continuing into 2025. Some big titles were the return of the Blue Note Review Series and Vinyl Me Please reissued the really cool boxset The Story of Blue Note. The Story of Blue Note was originally released to celebrate Blue Note’s 80th anniversary.

On the list for Record Store Day (which will be a bit early this year on Saturday, April 12th) kind of hidden in the Various Artists section is Alts ‘n Outs : The Other Side of Blue Note, which is a 1 LP compilation of session outtakes from some of Blue Note Records’ iconic releases on blue vinyl. The title seems to be a nod to the 1964 album In ‘N Out by Joe Henderson. This focuses mostly on the post bop, hard bop period from Cannonball Adderley (which sneaks Miles Davis onto the release), Grant Green, Wayne Shorter, Art Blakey, Jimmy Smith and Sonny Clark. The songs have been released previously as bonus tracks on the more recent CD versions of the albums. I’ll break down the tracks and the session information as well as provide a playlist of the songs in order.

  1. Bangoon (aka Alison’s Uncle) (outtake from Cannonball Adderley’s Somethin’ Else) – This song was recorded during the March 9, 1958 sessions for Somethin’ Else with Rudy Van Gelder in Hackensack, NJ, but not included on the original 5-track release. Somethin’ Else is one of the few times that Miles Davis appears as a sideman after 1955. Adderley was added to Davis’ “First Great Quintet” (actually expanding it to a sextet) and recorded Milestones before the sessions for Somethin’ Else. This song started to be added to the CD release of Somethin’ Else starting around 1986, originally titled “Alison’s Uncle” but eventually given its correct title “Bangoon” which was composed by session pianist Hank Jones.
  2. Jean de Fleur (alternate track from Grant Green’s Idle Moments) This track is actually the original 8:09 take of “Jean de Fleur” recorded on November 4, 1964 at Hackensack by Rudy Van Gelder. Because producer Alfred Lion liked the 15 minute version of “Idle Moments” (there was apparently some confusion over how many bars the chorus was supposed to have which caused the take to be longer than planned) the decision was to record shorter takes of “Jean de Fleur” and “Django” on November 15, 1964. The original takes would become bonus tracks on the CD versions of Idle Moments.
  3. Dance Cadaverous (alternate take from Wayne Shorter’s Speak No Evil) During the sessions on December 24, 1964 for Speak No Evil, Wayne Shorter backed by the powerhouse band of Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter, Freddie Hubbard and Elvin Jones an alternate take of “Dance Cadaverous” was recorded which was included in the 1999 RVG CD edition. Both takes of “Dance Cadaverous” are about the same length at over 6 minutes.
  4. Moanin’ (alternate take of Art Blakey’s Moanin’) During the October 30, 1958 session in Hackensack with Van Gelder, the Jazz Messengers recorded one of Blakey’s biggest releases Moanin’. The album release used take 4, and take 2 was added to the CD release as a bonus track.
  5. On The Sunny Side of the Street (outtake from Jimmy Smith’s Back At The Chicken Shack) On April 25, 1960, Jimmy Smith along with Stanley Turrentine, Kenny Burrell and Donald Bailey recorded a number of tracks that would become 1961’s Midnight Special and 1963’s Back at the Chicken Shack. During this session they also recorded the 1930 jazz standard “On The Sunny Side of the Street” composed by Jimmy McHugh and Dorothy Fields. This was included in the 1987 CD reissue of Back At The Chicken Shack.
  6. Lover (outtake from Sonny Clark Cool Struttin’) Pianist Sonny Clark hit Hackensack on January 5, 1958 along with Art Farmer, Jackie McLean, Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones to record what would become Cool Struttin’, out in August of that year. One of the unused songs was a 1932 Rodgers and Hart song “Lover” originally used in the Maurice Chevalier film Love Me Tonight, where the song was sung by actress Jeanette MacDonald. As with most Rodgers and Hart compositions, this song became part of the so-called Great American Songbook with other notable jazz greats like Dave Brubeck, John Coltrane, and Charlie Parker all recording versions of it.

This is a playlist of all of the tracks on Alts ‘n Outs:

Black Friday 2023 RSD Release – INXS – Shabooh Shoobah Rarities – A Deeper Dive

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The Black Friday RSD list dropped on Monday 10/3, and one of the releases that is interesting to me is the INXS Shabooh Shoobah Rarities colored vinyl LP release. It’s limited to 3500 copies in the US and should be $24.97.

Shabooh Shoobah was Australian band INXS’s third album, and the album that brought the band worldwide attention. The huge, anthemic singles “The One Thing” (July 1982) and “Don’t Change” (October 1983) hit the charts everywhere with “The One Thing” breaking the Top 30 in the U.S. as well as being the debut video from INXS for the fledgling music video channel MTV. “To Look At You” dropped as a single in March 1983, and the final single “Black and White” came out in June the same year.

In September 1983 the US was treated to an EP of remixes of singles from Shabooh Shoobah. Titled Dekadance, it included extended dance remixes of “Black and White,” “To Look At You,” “The One Thing,” and a “new version” of “Here Comes” called “Here Comes II.” The band is credited as producing the new remixes with Mark Opitz and David Nicholas credited as the engineers, so it seems by the credits that the band was fairly hands-on with the creation of the EP. Ostensibly, it seems that the band and their label wanted to ride the wave of excitement around the album and the band. When this EP dropped, the band was already in the studio with Nile Rodgers at the Power Station in NYC working on their next album The Swing.

In Australia, there was a related 12″ release just called Dance with a similar cover which was really just a single release of the extended mix of “Black and White” along with two b-sides, “Long In Tooth” and “No Day But Sunday.”

As an aside, the band released another EP confusingly also titled Dekadance in Australia in 1985 of remixes from The Swing.

By the time Shabooh Shoobah came out, INXS had established a standard practice of using non-album b-sides on their singles and these songs usually presented a more loose and fun version of the band including jazz instrumentals usually composed by Kirk Pengilly. As a fan of the band in the 1980’s I collected every 7″ and 12″ I could find to get all of the remixes and b-sides. I even created a mixtape of all of the b-sides and remixes as well as soundtrack songs that stayed in my car. In fact, my first car still belongs to my family, and my brother found the tape recently when they were detailing it.

The RSD release of Shabooh Shoobah Rarities is a collection of some of the non-album tracks from the 2022 Deluxe 40th Anniversary reissue of Shabooh Shoobah. The song titles listed below are links to YouTube videos of the songs.

A1 The Sax Thing – The b-side to the “To Look At You” single from March 1983. Jazzy Pengilly composition.

A2 Long in Tooth – The b-side to the “Don’t Change” single from October 1983. Also on the Australian Dance EP. Nice chiming synth track.

A3 The One Thing (Extended Mix) – From Dekadance EP.

A4 Black and White (Extended Mix) – From Dekadance EP. Also on Australian Dance EP.

A5 Here Comes II – From Dekadance EP. I have always loved this re-imagining of this song. Slower, moody.

B1 Go West – B-side from the Australian “Don’t Change” single. Very stripped down with Casio rhythm track. Almost seems like a demo, Hutchence’s vocals are dry/no reverb.

B2 Phantom of the Opera – “The One Thing” b-side from July 1982. This track as presented in the RSD information, is actually spelled wrong. This is a Tim Farriss track, so the real title is a pun: “Phantim of the Opera.” A pastiche of film dialog and synths.

B3 Soul Mistake (Live from the US Festival, 1983)
B4 Here Comes (Live from the US Festival, 1983)
B5 Spy of Love (Live from the US Festival, 1983)
B6 Old World New World (Live from the US Festival, 1983) – These last four tracks are live takes from the US Festival and haven’t been released anywhere other than the 40th Deluxe reissue. The band’s setlist at the US Festival was nine out of the ten tracks from Shabooh Shoobah.

Here are the songs missing from this release based on the 40th Deluxe:

You Never Used To Cry – From the Australian limited edition two 7″ single set for “To Look At You.” Written and performed by Tim Farriss. Also used in the Jon Cryer 1984 film No Small Affair.

Space Shuttle – B-Side from “The One Thing” Australian 12″. A kind of dark new-wave track.

Any Day But Sunday – Tim Farriss track. Also from the No Small Affair soundtrack.

This release, while good-intentioned is disappointing because it doesn’t include all of the bonus tracks from the 40th Deluxe reissue. It’s also missing the extended version of “To Look At You” from the Dekadance EP (which is also included on the 40th Deluxe). Honestly, the US Festival tracks aren’t essential on vinyl, in my opinion, and I would have rather had all of the b-sides and “To Look At You” extended remix. I’ll still pick it up since I’m a big fan of INXS.

(Upcoming Release) Miles Davis Gets RSD On The Corner Outtakes LP – Turnaround – A Deeper Dive – Out 4/22/23

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Cover art for RSD release Turnaround : Rare Miles from the Complete On The Corner Sessions

The much-anticipated list for Record Store Day 2023 dropped February 16th and the next (and likely last) Miles Davis release based on a “Complete Sessions” box set is on the list. Titled Turnaround : Rare Miles from the Complete On The Corner Sessions, it is a four-song excerpt from the 2007 box set of sessions before and after the ones used on Miles Davis’s 1972 album On The Corner.

On The Corner was the third in a series of Davis’s 1970’s Jazz Fusion releases and similarly to the previous Bitches Brew (1970) and Jack Johnson (1971) (both of which also got the Complete Sessions treatment) the album was a pastiche of recording sessions.

On The Corner’s Complete box spans a wide range of recording dates starting in March of 1972 and continuing through May of 1975. So, it’s a bit disingenuous to say that everything in the On The Corner Complete Sessions box was really sessions for On The Corner. Especially considering how many sessions were after the album itself was released– the tracks on On The Corner come from June and July 1972. But, I suppose that Sony’s attempt at clearing the vaults for release necessitated expanding the scope of sessions to include and there wasn’t enough material to give releases like Big Fun and Get Up With It their own box sets, so combining them makes sense.

Below is the tracklisting, which I got from the website of the French version of RSD called DisquaireDay. I got the session information from the infinitely-handy Paul Tingen site miles-beyond.com dedicated to the Electric Miles period. Per Tingen’s site, all four of these tracks were at-the-time remixed and remastered for the boxset by Richard King and Bob Belden in 2007.

Side A

  1. Jabali 11:04 – recorded June 12, 1972
  2. U-Turnaround – 08:27 – recorded November 1972

Side B

  1. The Hen – 12:55 – recorded January 4-5, 1973
  2. Big Fun/Holly-Wuud* – recorded July 26, 1973

The Jazzdisco.org site is missing the session information for “U-Turnaround” and “The Hen.” Tingen says that the “U-Turnaround” track is the same theme as used on Agharta after “Prelude.”

…Turnaround and U-Turnaround are based on the tune that appears after 22:01 in “Prelude” on Agharta. On the LP version it’s actually called “Prelude Pt2.” It also appears on another official Sony release, Bill Laswell’s Panthalassa. Laswell calls it “Agharta Prelude Dub,” and Enrico Merlin and I simply refer to it as “Agharta Prelude.” Why the makers of the OTC boxed set didn’t stick to convention as established by Sony itself is a mystery.

FROM HTTPS://MILES-BEYOND.COM/OTCBOX.HTM

The album comes out on sky blue vinyl and implements a pink version of the original artwork done by Corky McCoy with some of the clothing in different colors from the original art.

This is a custom YouTube Playlist I made of the four tracks on Turnaround:

Davis hit the studio as a bandleader with a concept of what On The Corner was to become. His intention with On The Corner was to reconnect with the African American audiences who had moved away from jazz to rock and funk bands like Sly and the Family Stone. Unfortunately, by creating an albums with a foot in both worlds, he was never fully embraced by either jazz or rock and funk fans and critics.

Following On The Corner Columbia would create a string of releases comprising studio outtakes. Big Fun (1974), Get Up With It (1974) and Water Babies (1976) while released before his four-year hiatus, were made up of outtakes and unused sessions dating back into the 1960’s which adds to the general confusion around his work during this time.

There has been a reappraisal of Davis’s jazz and rock fusion albums of the late 60’s and early 70’s in the last decade with tastemakers like The Wire and Pitchfork praising albums like On The Corner. It clearly took a while for audiences to catch up with the genius of Miles Davis. As a fan who only recently came around to Electric Miles, I’m happy to have these really unique and cool RSD releases in my collection.

A side note: These Rare Miles from the Complete Sessions releases have been “RSD First” releases, which means that Sony/Universal could choose to reissue these later. I think that a boxset treatment with all four of these would be a cool release and would give some people who missed out on these a chance to get them.

Here are links to the previous article I wrote about the series:

Early Minor – Rare Miles from the Complete In A Silent Way Sessions (Black Friday RSD 2019)

Double Image – Rare Miles from the Complete Bitches Brew Sessions (RSD Drop #3 2020)

Champions – Rare Miles from the Complete Jack Johnson Sessions (RSD Drops July 17th, 2021)

(Upcoming Release) Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers – Angel Dream : Songs and Music from The Motion Picture ‘She’s The One’ 25th Anniversary Reimagining Out 7/2 – A Deeper Dive

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new cover art for She’s The One

At some point I found a copy of She’s The One in a CD cutout bin not too long after the album was released in 1996. From a Tom Petty fan perspective, ironically, I heard this before I ever heard Wildflowers completely. 1995 and 1996 were years of exploration for me musically. I was living in Minneapolis (Eagan, specifically) and my ears were filled with the alternative nation of REV-105 and I was discovering new bands and music every day it seemed and I wasn’t focused on classic rock. I missed the Wildflowers release completely and ended up picking up its neglected sibling purely coincidentally. The irony being that She’s The One became the home for tracks that were lopped off Wildflowers when Warner Brothers suggested it be a single album rather than Petty’s original vision of a double.

As much as I have come to love Wildflowers and its 2020 bloated retort to the eternal Pettyfan joke “When is Wildflowers going to be reissued?”, Wildflowers… And All The Rest gave us nearly every minute of tape we could stand of the album, with every possible session that could be considered related to Wildflowers proper, I still hold a fondness for She’s The One, the quirky non-sequitur of songs collected spanning incidental music, covers and multiple takes.

One of the criticisms put forth about Wildflowers… And All The Rest was that it didn’t include any of the at-the-time new songs from She’s The One. Most people looked at She’s The One as kind of an extension of Wildflowers— particularly since the soundtrack benefitted by the inclusion of four very strong songs from those sessions: “Climb That Hill,” “Hung Up And Overdue,” “California,” and “Hope You Never.” The rest of the original soundtrack was new material recorded specifically for the film including two songs which would become important songs in Petty’s catalog, “Walls” with its amazing chorus “‘Cause you’ve got a heart so big/ it could crush this town/And I can’t hold out forever/Even walls fall down” and Petty’s tribute to his future second wife Dana, “Angel Dream” which became a staple in later live shows.

Amidst all of the personal turmoil in Petty’s life including the firing of drummer Stan Lynch from the Heartbreakers, divorce from his wife of 22 years Jane and the beginning of a heroin addiction that was hidden from public view until Warren Zanes’ “Petty” biography came out in 2015, he was approached to curate the soundtrack for the Ed Burns film She’s The One. Quoted in “Petty,” he says about the project, “I was approached about putting together a soundtrack for the movie. I liked what I’d seen of Ed Burns’s work. But, when I took the job I didn’t think it through. I wound up in a situation where they wanted different artists for a soundtrack. They had a few, but they wanted me to call more artists.” Eventually he called his manager Tony Dimitriades and told him he couldn’t do this. Dimitriades suggested that he should do the soundtrack himself, “like Paul Simon did for The Graduate.”

Ultimately, it was a failure on many levels. Petty was forced to rush to meet a deadline, “I was completely off my game.” he says in his biography, “I was doing something that was against my grain.” The film’s release was pushed back six months, leaving the soundtrack to appear to be a Heartbreakers album, “Some people thought I was following up Wildflowers… My record came out with no movie, I was so depressed– that just made me more depressed.” The album sold only 490,000 copies and ultimately went gold, but marks the sole disappointment in his catalog.

All the work that was put into the 2020 release Wildflowers… And All The Rest left the team of the Petty Estate, The Heartbreakers and producer/engineer Ryan Ulyate to take a closer look at the soundtrack. With the four Wildflowers songs on She’s The One returned to the fold (as part of the original 2015 10 track sequencing of All The Rest, the 2nd CD for the original concept for a Wildflowers reissue tentatively called Wildflowers: 2), the question of what to do to put a new focus on the rest of the songs was presented.

I would say that the 1996 version of She’s The One suffers from being a somewhat literal listing of the songs included in the soundtrack. We get two versions of “Walls”: one version is what was the single (“Walls (Circus)” and the other is “Walls (No. 3)” apparently created to satisfy Burns’s request of having a different one for the closing credits. We get two versions of “Angel Dream” as well and things cap off with a 57-second bouncy piano/organ instrumental “Airport.” The strings/piano/guitar instrumental arrangement of “Hope On Board” is positively breathtaking and too short. Another complicating factor are the two cover songs, which Petty typically didn’t include on proper albums. The resulting release comes off as kind of a cast-off in that regard, and if anything a bit unbalanced particularly considering the usually careful sequencing on Petty albums.

What the team ultimately settled on is now titled Angel Dream: Songs and Music from The Motion Picture ‘She’s The One’ and capitalizes on the great songs included on She’s The One: “Walls,” “Grew Up Fast” (a personal favorite), “Zero From Outer Space,” the Lucinda Williams cover “Change The Locks” (a typo according to Dana Petty in her interview with David Fricke on SiriusXM since the correct title is “Changed The Locks”) the Beck cover “Asshole,” “Supernatural Radio” (which is presented now as an extended take) and adds two songs recorded in July 1993 (in the middle of the sessions for Wildflowers, incidentally) during the sessions that produced “Mary Jane’s Last Dance” for the Greatest Hits album (“Something’s In The Air,” the other new track, was recorded in February that year). These songs are notable as having Stan Lynch on drums. None of the songs on the original Wildflowers nor the original She’s The One had him on them. These songs are a JJ Cale cover “Thirteen Days” (recorded on July 22, 1993, this shows up in a photo of a proposed tracklist for Wildflowers included in the box set), “105 Degrees” (recorded on July 23, 1993) and “One Of Life’s Little Mysteries” (the earliest track, recorded on August 4, 1992). We also get an instrumental reworking of “Angel Dream” titled “French Disconnection.”

blurry picture of 25 song sequence of Wildflowers from the box set showing “13 Days” being considered
Official lyric video for “Angel Dream”

For the first RSD Drop in 2021 on June 12th, a cobalt blue vinyl pressing of Angel Dream was released limited to 12000 copies. I managed to pick up a copy during my trips. The regular release comes out on 7/2 in black vinyl, CD and download.

It’s interesting to note that the song “Lonesome Dave” from the Wildflowers sessions which was included in the An American Treasure box set and not in the …All The Rest boxset was recorded on July 23 as well. In the “Petty” biography by Zanes, George Drakoulias remembers cutting many more tracks than “Mary Jane’s Last Dance,” and we’re getting a bit of a peek into those sessions with Stan Lynch with the posthumous releases.

The idea of a reboot of She’s The One as if it existed in the alternate reality of a 1994 2 CD Wildflowers is certainly a compelling one. Ryan Ulyate gives his perspective in a post on the Steve Hoffman forums on 6/15:

“…The idea behind Angel Dream was to make it a tighter album, and something that would make sense with this music after the three original Wildflowers tracks were taken off of it (for inclusion on Wildflowers All The Rest). It was important to have a really tight set of songs, sequenced in a way that honors Tom’s sense of how important albums are, in the story that they can tell. (This logic is behind the decision to leave certain songs off of the original Wildflowers, as McCool discussed in his earlier post.)

For Angel Dream the decision was made to not include the second versions of two songs (Walls and Angel Dream) that are on the She’s The One soundtrack, and also to not include the music cues that related more to the film. This was reconfigured to be a Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers album, not a film soundtrack album. Since we needed more material to fill out the album, we went back to three tracks that were recorded during the Wildflowers sessions, and an unreleased instrumental track.”

Steve Hoffman Forums post 6/15/2021

Ulyate touches on the inclusion of the new songs, “Can songs that were not recorded at the same time as others live on the same album? Yes they can, if they fit into the “vibe”. Without Tom there will always be second-guessing, but please know we did our best.”

The album is a really good listen and while I question the absolute necessity of its existence, it’s a record I’ll play frequently. The idea is that this is the version that will “replace” the original album in the new cataloging of Petty, though the original 1996 version (which was remastered in 2018) will continue to be available as a download.

Angel Dream Tracklist with my notes (special thanks to Mark Felsot for corrections):

Side 1:

  1. Angel Dream (No. 2) from original 1996 soundtrack, remixed for this release
  2. Grew Up Fast from original 1996 soundtrack, remixed for this release
  3. Change The Locks (Lucinda Williams cover) from original 1996 soundtrack, remixed for this release
  4. Zero From Outer Space from original 1996 soundtrack, remixed for this release
  5. Asshole (Beck cover) from original 1996 soundtrack, remixed for this release

Side 2:

  1. One of Life’s Little Mysteries new track recorded August 4, 1992 with Stan Lynch
  2. Walls (No. 3) from original 1996 soundtrack, remixed for this release
  3. Thirteen Days (JJ Cale cover) new track recorded July 23, 1993 with Stan Lynch
  4. 105 Degrees new track recorded July 24, 1993 with Stan Lynch
  5. Climb That Hill from original 1996 soundtrack, remixed for this release
  6. Supernatural Radio (extended version) new version recorded June 4, 1996
  7. French Disconnection (Instrumental) new track recorded April 11, 1996

Pre-Order Angel Dream from tompetty.com.

(Upcoming Release) New Miles Davis Release Based on Jack Johnson Sessions Out July 17 RSD Drop

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Cover Art for Champions – Rare Miles from the Complete Jack Johnson Sessions. Photo by Jim Marshall

The new RSD Drops lists came out April 7th for both the June 12th and the July 17th Drops. Similar to 2020, Record Store Day is being split into multiple dates to help with crowding in the stores. I think this also helps with the vinyl pressing delays as the record manufacturing is still catching up from the COVID shutdowns and related problems.

As I predicted in my post last year about the excellent Double Image: Rare Miles from the Complete Bitches Brew Sessions 2 LP release, the next in the series is one based on the 1970 sessions that resulted in the Jack Johnson (AKA A Tribute To Jack Johnson) album. Titled Champions – Rare Miles from the Complete Jack Johnson Sessions, it will come out for the second RSD Drops on July 17th, and will be around $21.97 according to Bull Moose, and will be on opaque yellow vinyl.

According to the expert in all things Electric Miles, Paul Tingen, Davis was spurred on by his recent exposure to Jimi Hendrix to state in a 1969 Rolling Stone interview, “I could put together the greatest rock ‘n roll band you ever heard.” Tingen surmises that Davis seeing Hendrix’s Band of Gypsies at the Fillmore East New Years Day, 1970 was the biggest catalyst for his new sound.

Davis was in the Columbia studios with his band for a marathon 12 dates starting February 18th and continuing through June 4th– an incredibly productive time for Davis yielding many more recordings than the two that ended up on the 1971 LP. Distilling the massive amount of time in the studio for Davis into releases that make sense organizationally continues to be a challenge, and has since the beginning involved some creativity on the part of the record producers and the label. This is compounded by the fact that Davis rolled tape for every minute he was in the studio.

Following the sessions that would form Bitches Brew (August 19th-21st, 1969) Davis continued recording music that followed the new electric Jazz/Funk path he was taking. The compilers of the Complete Bitches Brew opted to take sessions from November 1969 through to February 1970 that used the same band lineup as Bitches Brew. In that regard, the Double Image release is less of an outtakes of Bitches Brew as it is maybe a part II.

The Complete Jack Johnson Sessions pretty much pick up where The Complete Bitches Brew Sessions drop off. “Take It Or Leave It” was recorded on February 2nd, and the initial “Willie Nelson” sessions start just over two weeks later on February 18th.

Side A
1. “Duran – Take 4” (March 17, 1970 at Columbia Studio C)
2. “Sugar Ray” (March 20, 1970 at Columbia Studio B)
3. “Johnny Bratton Take 4” (February 27, 1970 at Columbia Studio B)

Side B
1. “Ali – Take 3” (May 19, 1970 at Columbia Studio C)
2. “Ali – Take 4” (May 19, 1970 at Columbia Studio C)
3. “Right Off – Take 11” (April 7, 1970 at Columbia Studio B)

A YouTube Playlist of the tracks on Champions

As an entry in the catalog of Miles Davis music, The Complete Jack Johnson Sessions represent a transitional snapshot. These are the sound of Davis and his sidemen searching. Big looped sections on the eventual album from these sessions show the band landing blocks of music that work, but also seems to include the band kind of reaching. A lot of this was a result of the very unstructured approach in the studio. From the Tingen article:

“Everything was experimentation,” recalled drummer Billy Cobham. “There was not one moment that whatever was put on a piece of paper would not be changed.” “A lot of times the way we did things was very fragmented,” added Dave Holland. “Often I didn’t know whether we were recording or rehearsing. We would have these fragments, these sketches of ideas, and we’d play them for 10 minutes. And then we might do one more take like that, and move on to the next thing. One of the things that created the sound of the studio recordings is that were all trying to figure out what was going on. This created a certain space—it wasn’t tentative, but it was searching. And Miles had a policy of taping everything. When it was then finally put together, there was a lot of editing that went on.”

Even with this somewhat randomly-organized recording, the highlight is Davis, who plays some fantastic runs around the grooves. This seems to be a result the physical and mental health of Davis during this time. The cover of Champions is a photograph of Davis in the ring taken by Jim Davis shortly after these sessions. Tingen quotes Chick Corea, “Miles was, “totally clean, working out in the gym, physically looking great, and living the life of a health freak. He had this thing about fish and told me how good fish was for you.” In short, Miles was in great physical and mental shape, and at the peak of his trumpet powers.”

In the Davis catalog, Jack Johnson is a record that is somewhat obscure; maybe “obscured” is a more accurate description. Even though it uses a similar approach of editing miles of tape into a two-track epic funk, it is overshadowed by achievements of Bitches Brew. The Champions collection of tracks from these sessions helps put some context around somewhat meandering Jack Johnson album and also opens the door for the following Electric albums which include my personal favorites Big Fun and On The Corner.

Speaking of On The Corner, it’s almost certain that the next RSD-exclusive title based on the series of “Complete Sessions” for Miles Davis will be from the 2007 Complete On The Corner Sessions made up of sessions from June of 1972 through May of 1975.

(Upcoming Release) Aimee Mann – Bachelor No. 2 : 20th Anniversary Edition for Black Friday RSD – A Deeper Dive

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Cover Art for the 20th Anniversary Reissue of Aimee Mann’s Bachelor No. 2

I’m a sucker for earnest songs about heartbreak. Clearly.

When I watched Paul Thomas Anderson’s film Magnolia, I was struck by the songs from Aimee Mann. Like many, I was familiar with her band, the MTV darlings Til Tuesday, but I hadn’t really kept up. Though, there wasn’t much to keep up with. The classic yarn of a band breakup followed by a couple of brilliant solo albums that her label didn’t know what to do with caused her to crash land in 1999 with no label and a record in the can that wouldn’t be released.

As the story goes, Paul Thomas Anderson was moved enough by the demos of this album to craft Magnolia around it and get some more songs from her. He connected to Mann through her husband Michael Penn who scored Anderson’s first two films. She got an Oscar nom for “Save Me” (a song that was written for the film).

I rewatched Magnolia recently. A horrific storm called a “derecho” blew 130+ MPH winds across Iowa, removing over 65% of the tree cover of Cedar Rapids and knocking power out for days and cell service and internet for weeks. Once power was restored, my wife and I still didn’t have internet and cell service was spotty, so we took to digging through our sadly-neglected collection of DVD’s and Blu-Rays for stuff to watch. We hadn’t seen it probably since I bought the DVD when it came out in 2000. The film’s three hours is not an easy watch, and twenty years later the heavy-handedness of the story arc and plot devices seems almost dated. Considering this was Anderson’s carte blanche film following the breakout success of Boogie Nights, it’s apparent he was pulling out all of his directorial tools for this. The soundtrack and score of the film end up being an essential part of the narrative with songs belonging to the characters, the culmination of which is when the film pauses for the characters to sing “Wise Up.”

This part of the film was a real lump-in-the-throat moment for me and how I became a fan of this soundtrack and Bachelor No. 2. I wrote an article back in 2008 proposing a mix people could make of the two CD’s to make a perfect version of the album.

Bachelor No. 2 was released in May 2000 on Mann’s own record label Super-Ego Records. It included “How Am I Different,” “Deathly,” and “You Do” from Magnolia. “Nothing Is Good Enough” appears on the soundtrack as an instrumental. Interestingly, “Wise Up” was originally intended for the film Jerry McGuire. A really great article breaking down the soundtrack by A/VClub by Alex McLevy makes the observation that in a literal sense the song says that the film “is not going to stop” until the characters wise up. Certainly the scene in the film where the characters sing “Wise Up” is a point of inflection.

According to the Wikipedia article on Bachelor No. 2, Mann secured a distribution deal after selling the album from her website and Soundscan data as of 2008 showed that 230,000 copies had been sold.

In 2006, Mobile Fidelity Soundlab corrected sin of this album not existing on vinyl by pressing a limited run of 200g half-speed mastered LP’s based on the original US CD (which means it doesn’t have “Save Me” on it in place of “Driving Sideways” as the UK version did). These days copies of this are running around $200 and I was keeping an eye out to see if any might show up for a deal.

Thankfully, Aimee Mann is reissuing Bachelor No. 2 for its 20th anniversary for Black Friday Record Store Day as a 2 LP expanded version taking the original album and adding the Magnolia songs at the end. (this approach makes sense since it is a reissue of Bachelor No 2 primarily, but I think my mix is more fun) as well as a re-recorded version of “Wise Up.” Looking at Amoeba’s website, it will be priced at a reasonable $34.98. This is being touted as an “RSD First” which means that it will be generally available after RSD, though it’s hard to tell if the 4000 copies they’re showing is the total of all of the pressings or just what is available for RSD.

It will be interesting to hear that new version of “Wise Up.” If I had to guess, it probably removes the drum machine. In the press release she mentions that she “used a lot of drum loops” and nowhere is it more apparent than on “Wise Up.” Though for me, that works great.

The Super Ego Records twitter account posted the packaging:

The packaging is really nice with what appears to be a version of the cover art that looks like someone practicing calligraphy over it. The green vinyl and labels are gorgeous.

Here is the track listing from The Vinyl District (which had it by sides).:

Side A

  1. How Am I Different
  2. Nothing Is Good Enough
  3. Red Vines
  4. Optimist

Side B

  1. Deathly
  2. Ghost World
  3. Calling It Quits
  4. Satellite

Side C

  1. Save Me
  2. Driving Sideways
  3. Just Like Anyone
  4. Susan
  5. It Takes All Kinds

Side D

  1. One
  2. Wise Up Re-record
  3. Momentum
  4. Build That Wall
  5. You Do

(Upcoming Release) Miles Davis Gets RSD Bitches Brew Outtakes LP – Double Image – A Deeper Dive – Out 10/24/20

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Double Image : Rare Miles from the Complete Bitches Brew Sessions Cover Art

UPDATE: The 2020 COVID pandemic resulted in the standard April Record Store Day being canceled in favor of three “Record Store Day Drops” August 29th, September 26th, and October 24th. All of these are Saturdays, incidentally. The original Record Store Day list has been split up over these three dates. It’s worth noting that Black Friday Record Store Day (Friday, November 27th) has not been changed, yet, and is kind of a 4th “Drop” I suppose, coming a month after the last Drop.

The Miles Davis Double Image: Rare Miles from the Complete Bitches Brew Sessions will be released on the 3rd drop on October 24th.

The 2020 Record Store Day List came out this week, and I’m pleased to report that Sony is continuing the trend of releasing compilations of Miles Davis outtakes that they started for the 2019 Black Friday RSD Early Minor release for the In A Silent Way sessions. This release titled Double Image: Rare Miles from the Complete Bitches Brew Sessions, takes the unreleased studio recordings from the 1998 Columbia boxset The Complete Bitches Brew Sessions.

Double Image Full Packaging

Sony is stepping up their game with this release. It is a two LP gatefold with opaque red LP’s. Bull Moose Records (kind of the original home of RSD) shows their list price as being $25.97 (note: this price went up $1 since it was originally announced in March) which is a pretty fair price for such a nice presentation. According to the RSD site, there will be 6000 pressed worldwide.

The importance and influence of Bitches Brew in Miles Davis’s catalog can’t be overstated. The new electric direction he established with In A Silent Way in 1969 was refined even further for Bitches Brew by focusing on African rhythms and funk. Betty (Mabry) Davis, who was his wife from 1968 to 1969 is credited with being the inspiration for turning Davis on to the explosion of rock and funk from James Brown and Jimi Hendrix (and apparently renaming the project from “Witches Brew”) which fueled the somewhat polarizing (at least among fans of Davis’s career up to this time) new direction that he’d pursue through 1975, up until his disappearance from performing for five years.

Like many people, my first exposure to Miles Davis’s catalog started with his groundbreaking 1959 album Kind of Blue and by most accounts this is the album most people wanting to get into Davis or jazz in general should start with. Wanting to dig further into his catalog I went earlier in his career with his pre-modal style Prestige Records catalog, then moved into his early Columbia career with albums like Round About Midnight (1957), Sketches of Spain (1960) and Someday My Prince Will Come (1961). At the time I was aware of Bitches Brew, but it took a long time for me to really appreciate the album, initially seeming too cacophonous and lacking any discernible structure. For me it took listening to the Chicago jazz artists like The Chicago Underground Ensemble/Chicago Underground Trio and bands on Delmark Records who were related to post rock band Tortoise to really be able to appreciate Bitches Brew. Further, it was interviews with Tortoise bass player Doug McCombs about how Teo Macero’s tape editing work on Bitches Brew informed how his 2009 album with David Daniell Sycamore was created– improvisational recording sessions were edited into the resulting album that pushed me to take a closer look at the album.

The album as released was recorded over three days in August of 1969 (19th-21st) at Columbia’s Studio B in New York City. The band was the largest collection of musicians Davis had assembled to date. The core of the band was a partial carry over from the In A Silent Way sessions with Wayne Shorter on tenor saxophone, Dave Holland on bass, Chick Corea on electric piano, and Jack DeJohnette on drums. Notably, this was the live touring band and had already been performing some of the key pieces from Brew including early versions of what became “Miles Runs the Voodoo Down”, “Sanctuary”, and “Spanish Key”. According to Paul Tingen (who wrote the essential book on this period “Miles Beyond : Electric Explorations of Miles Davis, 1967-1991”), this pre-work with a band before hitting the studio was rare (apparently not considering the fact that most of the 1950’s Prestige releases were based on in studio takes of what was his live show at the time). The five-piece was joined in the studio by Joe Zawinul (electric piano), John McLaughlin (electric guitar), Larry Young (electric piano), Lenny White (drums), Don Alias (congas), Juma Santos, and Bennie Maupin (bass clarinet).

After some meetings with the band at his house where they, according to the JazzTime article Tingen wrote, brought in their own compositions for Davis to choose from and he made sketches that they would work from in the studio during the three days booked. At these sessions (with Teo Macero producing and engineer Stan Tonkel), Davis acted more like a conductor than composer. The tapes typically ran the entire time and he used playbacks to further tailor the works.

Davis left the post production work to Teo Macero. Macero used extensive tape editing and effects like delay and echo on previous albums In A Silent Way and Circle in the Round to create new works from the raw recordings which many consider to be groundbreaking work in itself. Extensive tape edits were done to create the first two tracks on the album “Pharaoh’s Dance” (which has 19 edits) and “Bitches Brew” (which has 15). Davis had the final approval of the recordings, but according to Tingen never really gave Macero the full credit he deserved and Macero’s own opinion was that Davis didn’t really want to credit even the musicians. This is why In A Silent Way and Bitches Brew are credited as “Directions in Music By Miles Davis” as a kind of way to take full credit for the recordings.

The second LP in Bitches Brew had less studio manipulation than the first two sides. This was largely because these songs were more fleshed out due to live performances. “Spanish Key” and “Miles Runs the Voodoo Down” had no edits. “Sanctuary” has one edit where Macero clips in a different take. “John McLaughlin” is an edit of a studio improvisation where Davis isn’t playing. According to Tingen, Davis gives some rough vague instructions during the session and they lumber along not knowing where to take the work until Davis says “John” and McLaughlin takes a guitar solo and then the band falls into lock step. Macero edited this down to McLaughin’s solo and following for the final recording.

The resulting album was somewhat baffling to the musicians who performed on it. Tingen quotes a famous story by Zawinul where he says he was standing in the offices of CBS and heard music over the speakers and asked a receptionist what it was when she replied that it was “that Bitches Brew thing.”

When you look at the jazzdisco.org entries for August 19-21, 1969 sessions and compare it to the track listing for Double Image, you’ll notice that the songs included were not recorded during the sessions that were used for Bitches Brew. So, what are these recordings?

Reissue producer of the Complete Bitches Brew Sessions Bob Belden told Tingen that they included the extra tracks that used a lot of the same musicians as Bitches Brew and also that these songs were additionally electric piano focused. As was typical of this later period Davis studio work, he had a lot of sessions recorded that were not intended for any particular album release, and CBS kept cranking out new albums that were ostensibly just compilations of unrelated songs– oftentimes songs many years apart. The 1979 compilation album Circle in the Round has tracks from 1955 through 1970. Exploitative? Maybe, but the renewed posthumous effort of getting Davis’s work released in a somewhat orderly fashion serves the purpose of making some sense of the progression made over his life in music.

Below is the track listing from Double Image: Rare Miles from the Complete Bitches Brew Sessions with my added notation of what the recording dates were.

LP 1 / Side A
“1. Yaphet” (11/19/69) 2. “Corrado” (11/19/69)
LP 1 / Side B
“1. The Little Blue Frog (master)” (11/28/69) 2. “The Big Green Serpent” (11/28/69) 3. “Trevere” (11/28/69) 4. “The Little Blue Frog (alternate take)” (11/28/69)

LP 2 / Side A
“1. Double Image (first version)”(1/28/70) 2. “Feio” (1/28/70)
LP 2 / Side B
“1. Recollection” (2/6/70) 2. “Take It Or Leave It” (2/6/70)

A YouTube Playlist of the tracks from Double Vision.

I’m going to predict that since we have had an LP from In A Silent Way’s complete sessions (which was box set #5 of the “complete” series) and now Bitches Brew (which was box set #3) that the next RSD release will be based on the 2003 box set for The Complete Jack Johnson Sessions (box set #6). The Jack Johnson album only had two tracks on it and there were a lot of sessions not used, so it should be interesting to see what they’d include on a vinyl comp.

(Upcoming Release) Black Friday RSD Release “Miles in Tokyo” Reissues Exclusive Japanese Live Album – A Deeper Dive

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Get On Down reissue of 1969 album Miles in Tokyo reproduces the original Japanese LP artwork down the OBI strip.

Miles Davis fans are being treated with not one, but TWO exclusive releases for the 2019 Black Friday Record Store Day! The first one, a special release of outtakes from the Complete In A Silent Way Sessions, we covered HERE.

If that wasn’t enough, reissue label Get On Down is releasing a previously Japan-only album of Miles Davis in concert from 1964 with an early iteration of his “second great quintet.” It was released in the US on CD in 2005, but not on vinyl. Titled simply Miles in Tokyo, the album originally came out in 1969 on Sony/CBS and this release copies that release down to the gorgeous black and white cover art and the OBI strip (which is slightly modified to show the Get On Down catalog number and logo). The original pressing was a gatefold, I’m hoping the replicated that as well, but I have no indication one way or another. (Chris from Bull Moose hasn’t done his rundown yet. I’ll update this if he mentions it).

This recording follows the legendary February 12th, 1964 performance at the Philharmonic Hall at Lincoln Center in New York City. The performance was a benefit show to raise money to get black voters registered in the South. The band, made up of Herbie Hancock on piano, Ron Carter on double bass, Tony Williams on drums and George Coleman on tenor sax (who would be replaced by Sam Rivers for the overseas shows including Live in Tokyo) were not told until just before the show that they would be donating their salaries for the night and told that if they didn’t like it they could leave the band. Davis would credit the resulting tension for creating the fiery performance captured on two albums: My Funny Valentine and Four & More both released in 1965.

Sam Rivers joined Miles Davis’s quartet in April of 1964 replacing George Coleman according to the Sam Rivers sessionography. This database quotes Davis as saying he wanted to hire Wayne Shorter but Art Blakey had him tied up in the Jazz Messengers, so he hired Rivers at Tony Williams’s suggestion and took him on tour. Rivers would stay with the quintet through July 15th, which is the day after the Miles in Tokyo recording took place. Rivers would be replaced evenually with Wayne Shorter in September, which would establish the “second great quintet” which would stay in place until 1968 and recorded the albums E.S.P., Miles Smiles, Sorcerer, Nefertiti, Miles in the Sky, and Filles de Kilimanjaro.

I think the reason for Rivers’s short stint in Davis’s band is two-fold. Clearly Rivers was Davis’s second choice, and also the general opinion is that Rivers’s style on the sax didn’t mesh well with Davis’s, and this is apparent according to critics on the Miles in Tokyo album. To me the recording is notable in its frenetic pacing of the songs. I think it picks up the energy from the Lincoln Center performance, which shares a lot of the same songs, including the sped up “So What.”

Here is the track listing for Miles in Tokyo:

A Side : “If I Were A Bell”, “My Funny Valentine”
B Side : “So What”, “Walkin”, “All Of You”

Helpfully, there is a YouTube video of the complete album:

(Upcoming Release) Tom Petty : An American Treasure Career-Spanning Box Set Out 9/28 : A Deeper Dive

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The big news from the Tom Petty camp is the announcement of a new 60-track career retrospective called Tom Petty: An American Treasure. It comes in three physical formats, one is a 4 CD version that includes an 84-page hardcover book (available only through tompetty.com) there is also a 4 CD version without the hardcover book. Additionally, there is a 6-LP version of it that doesn’t include the hardcover book, which comes out on Black Friday Record Store Day on 11/23, coincidentally (though likely not– it is probably an “RSD First” release, which means it is a regular release, and not limited to RSD).

The box set has a mixture of album tracks, outtakes and alternative versions and live tracks. In some ways this box set is the sequel to the 1995 Playback box set which focused on studio songs, outtakes, unreleased and b-sides. This set mixes in some live tracks like the 2009 The Live Anthology did. An American Treasure is a fairly complimentary addition to those collections.

With the assistance of posts on Steve Hoffman Forums and Mudcrutch Farm Tom Petty forums, I started taking a look at what is on this box in greater detail. There is some disappointment from folks due to the 18 album tracks and the bit of overlap with the Playback boxset and tracks that were available on Highway Companion bonus downloads. That said, there is a treasure trove of new stuff here. The album tracks are kind of deeper tracks from albums that haven’t been focused on before. And– surprise– no “Free Fallin'”!

Here is a breakdown (so to speak) of the new tracks on here. This is the full track list, so I’ve included the album tracks, but didn’t provide any commentary on those. I also provide some thoughts about possible future archive releases.

CD 1

Surrender (Previously unreleased track from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers sessions—1976) – The first place we heard this song in any form was on 2000 release Anthology: Through the Years.  The version on this compilation was a new recording of the song created specifically for this release (and was the last studio recording of Howie Epstein before his death, according to Wikipedia). In 2009 we got a version on The Live Anthology as a live performance from June 11, 1983 from Irvine Meadows. In 2010 a studio version of this song was added to the Deluxe Edition reissue of Damn The Torpedoes. We don’t know yet whether the version here is the same version that was included on that reissue, since Damn The Torpedoes was, according to Wikipedia, recorded between 1978 and 1979.

Listen To Her Heart (Live at Capitol Studios, Hollywood, CA—November 11, 1977)
Anything That’s Rock ‘N’ Roll (Live at Capitol Studios, Hollywood, CA—November 11, 1977)

These two tracks came from a radio broadcast on KWST FM 106 in Los Angeles. This recording has been floating around as a widely-traded bootleg.

When The Time Comes (Album track from You’re Gonna Get It!—May 2, 1978)
You’re Gonna Get It (Alternate version featuring strings from You’re Gonna Get It! sessions—1978) Unheard version from what I can tell.

Radio Promotion Spot (1977)

Rockin’ Around (With You) (Album track from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers —November 9, 1976)

Fooled Again (I Don’t Like It) (Alternate version from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers—1976)

Breakdown (Live at Capitol Studios, Hollywood, CA—November 11, 1977) See above.

The Wild One, Forever (Album track from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers—November 9, 1976)

No Second Thoughts (Album track from You’re Gonna Get It!—May 2, 1978)

Here Comes My Girl (Alternate version from Damn The Torpedoes sessions—1979) Not on the Deluxe Edition of Damn The Torpedoes!

What Are You Doing In My Life (Alternate version from Damn The Torpedoes sessions—1979) Not on the Deluxe Edition of Damn The Torpedoes!

Louisiana Rain (Alternate version from Damn The Torpedoes sessions—1979) Not on the Deluxe Edition of Damn The Torpedoes!

Lost In Your Eyes (Previously unreleased single from Mudcrutch sessions—1974) On the 1995 Playback box set, we got a few Mudcrutch sessions tracks (“On The Street”, “Depot Street”, “Cry To Me”, “Don’t Do Me Like That”, “I Can’t Fight It”) but this is a new one. There is a bootleg that collects all of the Mudcrutch sessions from 1974 and 1975 which doesn’t include the Playback tracks, but does include this (other Mudcrutch songs that haven’t seen official release: “Another Lonely Night, “Don’t It Get Weird”, “You’re Driving me Crazy”, “She’s A Screamer”, “Parade of Loons”, “Makin’ Some Noise”, “You Don’t Care”, “Don’t Bring me Down”, “Save Me”, “Don’t Make It Any Easier”, “Long way From Home”, “Once Upon a Time Somewhere”, “Country Girls Run Dry”)

CD 2

Keep A Little Soul (Previously unreleased track from Long After Dark sessions—1982) The first single from this box set, and is the download you get for the pre-order.

Even The Losers (Live at Rochester Community War Memorial, Rochester, NY—1989) No songs from this show are on The Live Anthology, so this is an unheard track.

Keeping Me Alive (Previously unreleased track from Long After Dark sessions—1982) A version of this song is on Playback. Is this a different take?

Don’t Treat Me Like A Stranger (B-side to UK single of “I Won’t Back Down”—April, 1989) Not part of the b-sides on Playback.

The Apartment Song (Demo recording (with Stevie Nicks)—1984) From Playback.

Concert Intro (Live introduction by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, The Forum, Inglewood, CA—June 28, 1981)
King’s Road (Live at The Forum, Inglewood, CA—June 28, 1981)
Clear The Aisles (Live concert announcement by Tom Petty, The Forum, Inglewood, CA—June 28, 1981)
A Woman In Love (It’s Not Me) (Live at The Forum, Inglewood, CA—June 28, 1981)

In 1981 during the Hard Promises tour, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers played a three-night run at The Forum in Inglewood, CA: June 28-30th. Tracks from this run have appeared before. The two duet tracks with Stevie Nicks on the live album Pack Up The Plantation: Live (“Insider” and “Needles and Pins”) were from one of those nights (I haven’t found setlists for those shows yet). The Live Anthology has a bunch of songs from those nights:

“Ladies and Gentlemen…”, “Nightwatchman.” (June 30, 1981)
“A Thing About You” (June 28, 1981)
“Breakdown” (June 30, 1981)
“A Woman In Love (It’s Not Me)” (June 29, 1981)
“The Waiting” (June 28, 1981)
“Good, Good Lovin'” (June 30, 1981)
“I Need To Know” (June 29, 1981)

In my opinion, at the risk of redundancy, they could do a Grateful Dead style boxset encompassing all three nights, since clearly they have very high quality recordings of those nights.

Straight Into Darkness (Alternate version from The Record Plant, Hollywood, CA—May 5, 1982) A version we haven’t heard.

You Can Still Change Your Mind (Album track from Hard Promises—May 5, 1981)

Rebels (Alternate version from Southern Accents sessions—1985) As someone on the Mudcrutch board observed,  the sessions for Southern Accents were “problematic” and Petty broke his hand punching a wall during them in frustration. Maybe this will be a very different version of “Rebels” due to all of the recording they did trying to get the album completed.

Deliver Me (Alternate version from Long After Dark sessions—1982) This is a new outtake we haven’t heard.

Alright For Now (Album track from Full Moon Fever—April 24, 1989)

The Damage You’ve Done (Alternate version from Let Me Up (I’ve Had Enough) sessions—1987) Another new version we’ve not heard.

The Best Of Everything (Alternate version from Southern Accents sessions—March 26, 1985) 

Walkin’ From The Fire (Previously unreleased track from Southern Accents sessions—March 1, 1984) New version.

King Of The Hill (Early take (with Roger McGuinn)—November 23, 1987) – Interesting inclusion. Petty co-wrote this with Roger McGuinn for his Back From Rio album.

CD 3

I Won’t Back Down (Live at The Fillmore, San Francisco, CA—February 4, 1997) Tom Petty performed an epic 20-night sold out run from January 10th to February 7th, 1997 at The Fillmore in San Francisco. This was the 20th anniversary of the band.  We also have some songs on The Live Anthology from this run:

“Diddy Wah Diddy” (2/1/97)
“I Want You Back Again” (2/7/97)
“Friend of the Devil” (2/7/97)
“Jammin’ Me” (2/7/97)
“Goldfinger” (1/31/97)
“County Farm” (2/4/97)

Similarly to the run of shows at The Fillmore in 1981, we could get a boxset of these shows. That would be pretty amazing.

While we’re talking about it, they did another residency at The Fillmore in 1999, from March 7th to the 16th. The nights of the 15th and 16th created the High Grass Dogs : Live at The Fillmore film.

Gainesville (Previously unreleased track from Echo sessions—February 12, 1998) Too new to be included in Playback— but I’m looking forward to hearing other tracks from the under-appreciated album.

You And I Will Meet Again (Album track from Into The Great Wide Open—July 2, 1991)
Into The Great Wide Open (Live at Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Arena—November 24, 1991) 

No 1991 tour songs at all on The Live Anthology.

Two Gunslingers (Live at The Beacon Theatre, New York, NY—May 25, 2013) This is the same version that was on the Highway Companions fanclub download Live 2013 and on the Kiss My Amps Vol. 2 Record Store Day vinyl release.

Lonesome Dave (Previously unreleased track from Wildflowers sessions—July 23, 1993)
To Find A Friend (Album track from Wildflowers—November 1, 1994)
Crawling Back To You (Album track from Wildflowers—November 1, 1994)
Wake Up Time (Previously unreleased track from early Wildflowers sessions—August 12, 1992)
Grew Up Fast (Album track from Songs and Music from “She’s the One”—August 6, 1996)

Oh boy. The hopeful amongst the Tom Petty faithful are now looking at 2019 as the 25th anniversary of Wildflowers to get the expanded version with “All The Rest.” So, now we have what is likely some of the tracks that would have been included in the promised expanded edition of Wildflowers here in this box set. I just hope Wildflowers: All The Rest comes out before I die.

I Don’t Belong (Previously unreleased track from Echo sessions—December 3, 1998) More cool unheard stuff from Echo.
Accused Of Love (Album track from Echo—April 13, 1999)
Lonesome Sundown (Album track from Echo—April 13, 1999)

Don’t Fade On Me (Previously unreleased track from Wildflowers—sessions—April 20, 1994) See above.

CD 4

You And Me (Clubhouse version—November 9, 2007) This is a song from The Last DJ. The Clubhouse is the Heartbreakers rehearsal and gear storage space. I’m sure there’s lots of interesting recordings from The Clubhouse we haven’t heard.

Have Love Will Travel (Album track from The Last DJ—October 8, 2002)
Money Becomes King (Album track from The Last DJ—October 8, 2002)

Bus To Tampa Bay (Previously unreleased track from Hypnotic Eye sessions—August 11, 2011) Oooh. Hypnotic Eye outtakes!!

Saving Grace (Live at Malibu Performing Arts Center, Malibu, CA—June 16, 2006) The 2006 tour was a strong one– it also generated the “Live From Gatorville” show and they played Bonnaroo.

Down South (Album track from Highway Companion—July 25, 2006)

Southern Accents (Live at Stephen C. O’Connell Center, Gainesville, FL—September 21, 2006)
Insider Live (with Stevie Nicks at O’Connell Center, Gainesville, FL—September 21, 2006)

“Live From Gatorville” or “One 30th Anniversary Concert from Gainesville, FL” which was a pay-per-view (I think) and then the bonus DVD included with the “Runnin’ Down A Dream” documentary. These songs are from this. We got a bunch of songs from this show on The Live Anthology: “I’m A Man”, “Mary Jane’s Last Dance”, “Southern Accents” (so this is repeated here)

Two Men Talking (Previously unreleased track from Hypnotic Eye sessions—November 16, 2012)
Fault Lines (Album track from Hypnotic Eye—July 29, 2014)
Sins Of My Youth (Early take from Hypnotic Eye sessions—November 12, 2012)

Cool to hear more from the Hypnotic Eye sessions.

Good Enough (Alternate version from Mojo sessions—2012)
Something Good Coming (Album track from Mojo—July 15, 2010)

I would have thought that there would be more alternate and outtakes from Mojo, since it seemed like they were jamming more. Nevertheless, it will be cool to hear something from those sessions.

Save Your Water (Album track from Mudcrutch 2—May 20, 2016)

Like A Diamond (Alternate version from The Last DJ sessions—2002) 

Hungry No More (Live at House of Blues, Boston, MA—June 15, 2016) This was previously released on the Highway Companion club download The Very Best Performances of the 2016 Mudcrutch Tour live Mudcrutch compilation.

An American Treasure seems like a really thought out tribute to Tom Petty, even though it’s kind of a mixed bag. The inclusion of album tracks and other tracks that have been released elsewhere makes it not exactly a perfect collection for die-hard fans of Petty. The album tracks it does have, don’t include any hits, so it’s not really for the casual fan either. For a Tom Petty completist like me, it’s one to add to the collection, even if it is kind of a compromise.