Burning Airlines - Mission: Control! download album

Burning Airlines - Mission: Control!

Artist: Burning Airlines

Album: Mission: Control!

Release Date: February 23, 1999

Genre: Pop/Rock

Format: mp3 / FLAC

After Jawbox's amicable split in 1997, frontman J. Robbins and guitarist Bill Barbot teamed up with ex-Government Issue drummer, Pete Moffett, to form Burning Airlines, with Barbot switching from guitar to bass duties. Mission: Control! the band's debut album, brilliantly channels Robbins' pop sensibilities through muscular hardcore riffs with insistent, rhythmic foundations. With its seamless, dynamic shifts, thick riffs and killer melody, "3 Sisters" epitomizes the transition away from Jawbox's clipped, angular post-punk and onto a much more open-ended playing field. Barbot's bass work is a big surprise; Jawbox bassist Kim Coletta always rattled off cool melodies, but Barbot has a sharper and more intuitive sense of placement. His rubber-band lines do the dirty work on the slick "Wheaton Calling," and tug on Robbins' riffs like a magnet in "Pacific 231." Jawbox's music had begun to incorporate a greater range of moods by its final album, and Burning Airlines finds Robbins' melodies highly effective in a variety of settings: insanely catchy punk-pop ("Pacific 231"), furious Nirvana-esque rock ("Sweet Deals on Surgery" and head-spinning opener, "Carnival") and arty dissonance ("I Sold Myself In," the intelligently weird "Crowned"). "Scissoring" is the album's standout cut, with its wicked harmonic riff, bad-ass bassline and thrashy second-half. With rarely a dull or unoriginal moment, Mission: Control! is a very promising start to life after Jawbox.

Harry Belafonte - Legendary download album

Harry Belafonte - Legendary

Artist: Harry Belafonte

Album: Legendary

Release Date: August 28, 2001

Genre: Vocal

Format: mp3 / FLAC

Legendary is a three-CD Harry Belafonte compilation assembled by David Rowe for the various international territories of BMG from Belafonte's RCA Victor recordings of the 1950s and '60s. It's an unassuming package, a double jewel box containing little more than the discs and a three-page booklet listing the song titles with an unsigned seven-paragraph appreciation. But the value of the collection lies in the contents, not the trappings. Rowe well deserves his credits for researching and compiling the album. With a generous choice of 50 tracks and a running time of over three hours, Legendary offers an excellent overview of the bulk of Belafonte's most successful recordings. As of 2001, RCA had not given Belafonte the honor of the kind of box set retrospective other artists of his stature (and many of considerably less) had been given. In the absence of such a consideration, Legendary may be the next best thing, albeit without the lavish annotations typical of box sets. In roughly chronological order, it takes the listener from Belafonte's early triumphs with such albums as Calypso and Belafonte, through his exciting live recordings on Belafonte at Carnegie Hall, and on to the varied albums devoted to such genres as gospel and blues during the '60s. Rowe identifies and includes Belafonte's best-known songs, such as the hits "The Banana Boat Song (Day-O)" and "Jamaica Farewell"; key album tracks; and occasional rarities in the form of material originally issued only on singles. (The only real hit that is missing is "Island in the Sun.") With the waning of the folk revival he helped lead and his own turn toward social work and away from music, Belafonte saw his status as a major musical star erode after the '60s. Legendary reminds listeners of the breadth of this prolific artist's work. There was a lot more to the story than calypso, and the album suggests the actual outlines of that story. It would be nice to have better packaging, but that no doubt would drive up the price of an album that is available at modest expense in most of the world.

Brian Wilson - Reimagines Gershwin download album

Brian Wilson - Reimagines Gershwin

Artist: Brian Wilson

Album: Reimagines Gershwin

Release Date: August 24, 2010

Genre: Pop/Rock

Format: mp3 / FLAC

During his five decades of music-making, Brian Wilson has added countless songs to the canon of great American pop music, but he hasn't recorded many by other composers. Still, his affection for the work of George Gershwin is long, and quite evident from this tribute album. In it, Wilson presents 11 classics from Gershwin's pen, and received the blessing of the Gershwin estate to finish two incomplete songs, "The Like in I Love You" and "Nothing But Love." As usual, Wilson's musical instincts are impeccable, and with a full orchestra lending additional weight to these songs, it's easily the best production on a Brian Wilson record since 2004's SMiLE. (It doesn't hurt that the lyrics as well as the music are tried and true; most of Wilson's solo output, and much of the Beach Boys' after 1967, has suffered from trite or tone-deaf lyrics.) Wilson is also in fine voice for his age, finding the pathos in "Summertime" and "It Ain't Necessarily So" during a four-song medley, and even multi-tracking his vocals for the first time on the opener, a nearly a cappella version of "Rhapsody in Blue." "I Got Plenty O' Nuttin'" is done up, as an instrumental, in full Pet Sounds splendor (complete with bass harmonica), while "I Got Rhythm" is neatly transformed into an uptempo nugget to rank with "Surfin' U.S.A." or "Little Honda." Wilson's normal studio group is augmented here with an orchestra (the arrangements and orchestrations are by Wilson and Paul Von Mertens), and they stay in the background except when needed -- just one of the many fine touches to the entire production here. Granted, Wilson's bouncy take on "They Can't Take That Away from Me" is never going to compete with Ella Fitzgerald's (or even Julie London's), and "'S Wonderful" is nearly blanded out into easy listening oblivion, but nearly everything else here is loving, sincere, and worthy of hearing by fans of the Beach Boys or Broadway.

Avril Lavigne - Let Go download album

Avril Lavigne - Let Go

Artist: Avril Lavigne

Album: Let Go

Release Date: June 4, 2002

Genre: Pop/Rock

Format: mp3 / FLAC

Talk about pressure -- being under 21 and having a record deal no longer qualifies as extraordinary. And as mass-produced teen pop makes its exit and a glut of young singer/songwriters enter, child prodigies no longer have built-in marketing appeal. So if newcomer, 17-year-old Avril Lavigne truly wants to be "Anything But Ordinary," as she sings on her debut album, Let Go, she'll have to dig deeper. Luckily for Lavigne, aside from youth, she does have talent. Her debut runs the gamut from driving rock numbers like "Losing Grip" -- where Lavigne shows off her vocal range, powering into the anger-fueled, explosive rock chorus -- to singer/songwriter pop tunes like "My World," where Lavigne fills listeners in on the past 17 years of her life. Lavigne handles a variety of styles deftly, but she still has some growing up to do lyrically. "Sk8er Boi" has a terrific power pop bounce, but shows her lyrical shortcomings: "He was a punk/She did ballet/What more can I say" -- a lot. The phrasing is awkward and sometimes silly: "It's funny when you think it's gonna work out/Till you chose weed over me you're so lame," she sings on "Too Much to Ask." Not surprisingly, the standout track is the first single, "Complicated," a gem of a pop/rock tune with a killer chorus. But listen carefully and you'll realize that "Complicated"'s sing-song melody borrows just enough from Pink's "Don't Let Me Get Me" to make it familiar and likeable. Nonetheless, the song is a knockout radio hit. Lavigne, a self-professed skater punk and labelmate of Pink, shares her "Take Me As I Am" credo as well. And that said, it's hard not to look at this record, executive produced by Arista label head Antonio "L.A." Reid, who is thanked by Lavigne for allowing "me to be myself," and feel cynical about the music industry's willingness to reproduce a hit over and over. Lavigne, however, is a capable songwriter with vocal chops, and at her age, one imagines, she is still finding her feet, borrowing from the music she's grown up listening to. The problem is Lavigne is still so young she's listening to the radio hits of the '90s and early 2000s: she's Pink when she's bucking authority, Alanis Morissette when she's angry, and Jewel when she's sensitive. Let Go shows promise, but the question is whether Lavigne and only Lavigne will shine through on her next effort.

Joey Beltram - Form & Control download album

Joey Beltram - Form & Control

Artist: Joey Beltram

Album: Form & Control

Release Date: June 14, 2002

Genre: Electronic

Format: mp3 / FLAC

The title of Joey Beltram's fourth mix album takes on a special meaning after reading the inside statement of purpose: "The continuous mix heard here was recorded straight through and not edited in any way." Of course, it couldn't be any other way for a chance-taker like Beltram, a techno renegade and among the least likely to ever be associated with any Pro Tools-heavy mixes like the ones streaming out of Global Underground's hard drive. Burning through almost two dozen tracks in over an hour, Beltram stays on a course of hard techno, but offers up so much variety and so many change-ups that it sounds positively rangy. Midway through -- and beginning with his own remix of "A Gig in Cannes" by Conga Squad -- he briefly switches over to more of a high-energy disco sound, but ends with a few of his own harder productions and Jeff Mills' "Dynamic."

The Beatles - Introducing...The Beatles download album

The Beatles - Introducing...The Beatles

Artist: The Beatles

Album: Introducing...The Beatles

Release Date: January 10, 1964

Genre: Pop/Rock

Format: mp3 / FLAC

The first Beatles album released in the U.S., Introducing...The Beatles is a slightly abridged version of Please Please Me, which had been released in the U.K. four months earlier. It includes two fewer tracks than its British counterpart, deleting "Please Please Me" and "Ask Me Why." Today, of course, there's no reason to prefer it to Please Please Me, which was released in the U.S. in 1987, but from 1963 to 1965, when Capitol Records belatedly released the material on The Early Beatles, this (plus some inferior Vee Jay repackagings) was the only American album containing some of the Beatles' initial recordings.

Antonio Pappano / Nina Stemme / Plácido Domingo - Wagner: Tristan und Isolde download album

Antonio Pappano / Nina Stemme / Plácido Domingo - Wagner: Tristan und Isolde

Artist: Antonio Pappano / Nina Stemme / Plácido Domingo

Album: Wagner: Tristan und Isolde

Release Date: 2005

Genre: Classical

Format: mp3 / FLAC

Remember the Furtwängler Tristan, the Böhm Tristan, the Kleiber Tristan, or any of the other great Tristans of the past 50 years? If you do, the first thing you remember about them is who did the conducting. Does anyone remember the Suthaus Tristan or the Windgassen Tristan or the Kollo Tristan? No: as important as the singers are, they are not nearly as important as the conductor in Tristan und Isolde. Indeed, it could fairly be said that the great Furtwängler, Böhm, and Kleiber Tristans succeeded even though, in every case, the weakest member of the cast was the tenor.No such charge could be leveled against this Tristan because Plácido Domingo is, even in his sixties, the best Tristan of the past 50 years. He has the golden tone, the soulful sensitivity, the muscular strength, and, because this is a studio recording made over six weeks, the long-term stamina that Suthaus, Windgassen, and Kollo lacked. If what you're looking for in great Tristan is a great Tristan, look no further. Indeed, if what you're looking for is a great male cast, look no further. From Domingo through René Pape to Olaf Bär to Ian Bostridge, they are all easily as good as or better than their competition.But, if what you're looking for in a great Tristan is either a great Isolde or a great conductor, keep looking. Nina Stemme is a passionate Isolde but nowhere near in the same league as Domingo, making this a very lopsided Tristan. More importantly, Antonio Pappano is a decent conductor whose recordings of Italian operas were clean and efficient but little more, and his Tristan is at best merely an orchestral backdrop for Domingo and at worst dull and directionless. EMI's studio sound is clear and warm, but naturally favors the singers.

Frank Black - SVN FNGRS download album

Frank Black - SVN FNGRS

Artist: Frank Black

Album: SVN FNGRS

Release Date: April 1, 2008

Genre: Pop/Rock

Format: mp3 / FLAC

Just as Black Francis' Bluefinger was a musical portrait of Dutch painter, poet, and punk rocker Herman Brood, Frank Black stays in a conceptual frame of mind with the mini-album SVN FNGRS, which draws inspiration from the Irish mythological figure Cúchulainn, who has seven fingers on each of his hands. Title aside, the album's references to Cúchulainn aren't often apparent, but what comes through loud and clear is how charged these songs are. SVN FNGRS kicks off with "The Seus," an instant classic in Black's catalog. Burly guitars, a stuttering rhythm, and layers of Black's shouty vocals wrestle each other into a prickly, funky groove, updating the weirdness, smartness, and undeniable hooks of Frank Black songs like "Los Angeles" and "Ten Percenter." Black works his Stooges fetish harder than he has in years on "I Sent Away," a song with jabbing riffs that rocks harder than anything on Bluefinger did. Though the set only has seven songs (of course), it shows off Black's range, with softer and more vulnerable songs like the sweetly ambling pop of "Half Man" and "The Tale of Lonesome Fetter" providing the yin to some of the louder tracks' yang. Song for song, this is one of Black's strongest solo releases.

Savath & Savalas - Folk Songs for Trains, Trees and Honey download album

Savath & Savalas - Folk Songs for Trains, Trees and Honey

Artist: Savath & Savalas

Album: Folk Songs for Trains, Trees and Honey

Release Date: March 14, 2000

Genre: Electronic

Format: mp3 / FLAC

Scott Herren's Folk Songs for Trains, Trees and Honey, recorded under the name Savath + Savalas, is a smooth and abstract connection between the genres of post-rock and intelligent dance music. Certainly, German bands such as To Rococo Rot, Kreidler, and Schneider TM work similar magic, but their omnipresent percussive backbeats keep them in a cleaner, more accessible vein than that of Savath + Savalas. It is because of Herren's dedication to abstraction that Folk Songs remains extremely unpredictable and succeeds without being entirely beat-driven. With Folk Songs, Herren weaves a complex tapestry of atonal guitar flecks and distorted electronic hums and buzzes. Herren even extrapolates some of the songs' central themes from digital sound-processor glitches. At times, Folk Songs becomes a suggestive criticism of modern recording gear (and other technologies), as the glitches begin to steal the focal point from any melodic tones. In doing so, Herren creates an organic mix of acoustic and electronic instrumentation that travels a great distance -- and in many different directions. His wide arrangement of instruments leaves him plenty of room to experiment and he keeps things constantly moving forward. An adventurous debut record.