In The Groove

2CD: S&M2, the live set from Metallica & The San Francisco Symphony is the concert event of the year! S&M2 features 20 songs (over 2.5 hours of music) from the two-night event that opened San Francisco’s new Chase Center, with many Metallica fan favorites and 2 unique classical songs chosen by San Francisco Symphony Musical Director Michael Tilson Thomas. S&M2 has newly re-mixed and remastered audio for a whole new sound from the original theatrical run in October 2019. The 2CD set includes two CDs and a 36-page booklet featuring photos from the show by Anton Corbijn.

Metallica and San Francisco Symphony’s September 6 & 8, 2019 S&M2 concerts were historic on multiple levels: They served as the grand opening of San Francisco’s Chase Center, reunited the band and Symphony for the first time since the 1999 performances captured on the Grammy-winning S&M album, and featured the first-ever symphonic renditions of songs written and released since those original S&M shows.

The sold out shows were rapturously received by the 40,000 fans who traveled from nearly 70 countries, as well as the media: Rolling Stone raved “the group proved that anything was possible,” Variety noted an atmosphere “buzzing with excitement,” while the Mercury News witnessed "a concert that fans will be talking about for decades to come,” and Consequence of Sound hailed "a true celebration of Metallica and their musical prowess.”

4-panel softpack + 16-page booklet

The Waterfall II completes The Waterfall, My Morning Jacket’s acclaimed 2015 record. Originally intended to be a sprawling triple album, the band were advised to hold back and keep some of it on the shelf. Until now! Frontman Jim James says, "this is simply the second half of a long snapshot of life for me as a writer in the years leading up to 2014, and the life of us as a band as we lived and worked in the epic country in and around Stinson Beach, CA during these recording sessions."

Old 97's return with Twelfth, their aptly titled 12th studio album, recorded this spring in Nashville, Tennessee between a tornado and a pandemic. 2016's Graveyard Whistling took the 97's to new heights lead by the single "Good With God" - a bona-fide hit at non-commercial radio. Twelfth's lead single "Turn Off The TV" might be the unintentional anthem of 2020, celebrating the occasional and necessary need to turn off the TV set and tune out the outside world.

Sports Team a band of six singular characters who have been variously described as one of the most raucous, electrifying and chaotic acts in the UK release their debut album Deep Down Happy. The highly anticipated record, is their first release on the legendary Island Records label. Sports Team came up on the back of word of mouth live hype, drawing round the block queues to chaotic early gigs at The Five Bells and Moth Club before releasing any music. Recording their first EP (Winter Nets) in a converted Timberyard in Hammersmith, the band have consistently set themselves apart from the acts they came up playing with, showing an intoxicating ambition, and their debut album Deep Down Happy, delivers on all bold claims, and confirm their place at the head of a group of young guitar acts.They've been defined though by an increasingly cultish fanbase spawned from online community pages, making 1000s of memes, pieces of artwork and crucially turning up wherever Sports Team play - from the bands annual Margate trip (where many of the songs were written) to the living room of the group's shared house, first in Harlesden, now Camberwell. Sessions for Deep Down Happy have been snuck in between huge tours at various London studios, including Konk and Livingston, with long-time collaborator Burke Reid (Courtney Barnett, Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever) once again at the production desk. Having first worked together on the anthemic Kutcher in 2018, the debut features Reid-produced singles Here It Comes Again, The Races and Fishing while also featuring a re-recording of early single and live favourite Camel Crew - until now, only available on 2018's Winter Nets.

2020 release. The D'Addario brothers return with their third Lemon Twigs album, Songs For The General Public. The prodigiously-talented duo's showstopping melodies mined from every era of rock quickly earned fans in Elton John, Questlove, and Jack Antonoff. Songs For The General Public was written, recorded and produced by the D'Addarios at their Long Island home studio, Sonora Studios in Los Angeles and New York City's Electric Lady.

Produced by Shaun Morgan and engineered and mixed by Matt Hyde (Deftones, AFI), their new album Si Vis Pacem Para Bellum, (which translates to “If you want peace, prepare for war”) was recorded in Nashville, TN over two months in December 2019 and January 2020. The follow-up to 2017’s Poison the Parish, Si Vis Pacem Para Bellum is the eight album of their illustrious career and features Shaun Morgan’s, aggressive, highly melodic songwriting, some of the most expressive, politically charged music he’s ever made. SEETHER is joined on the album by their newest member, Cory Lowery (former guitarist/vocalist for Saint Asonia and Stuck Mojo) who adds a broad new sonic dimension to the band’s studio and live work. Tracks such as the anthemic “Dangerous” and the heavy-hitting “Beg” seem destined to reclaim SEETHER’s lofty position at rock radio and on preferred playlists here and around the world this summer.

GRAMMY®-nominated U.K. duo Disclosure will release their new album, ENERGY on the August 28th. A global spectrum of talented artists grace the album – and, for the first time, this includes rappers. Appearances from Mick Jenkins, ChannelTres, Aminé and slowthai sit comfortably alongside the legend that is Common. Other features include the inimitable Kelis, who opens the album, and Fatoumata Diawara, who the boys have also linked up with previously. Cameroon’s Blick Bassy brings his own flow to the table while a powerhouse team of Kehlani and Syd ease the pace with their contribution. Disclosure have worked diligently to produce environmentally responsible products by focusing on a number of recycled and sustainable materials across all formats. These include forgoing plastic hard-cases for both the CD and cassette formats, utilizing vegetable and water-based inks and varnishes and opting for a mixture of recycled and FSC-approved cardboard, which extends to two of the three vinyl options. This year marks 10 years since Disclosure debuted with the single “Offline Dexterity.” In that decade, the brothers, who are still in their 20s, have released two albums – Settle (2013) and Caracal (2015) – clocked up 4.5 billion streams and 4.5 million album sales, received five GRAMMY nominations, sold 500,000 tickets to their headline shows and topped festival bills all over the world, something they do with ease while also enjoying playing to packed-out sweaty clubs whenever they can.

Troye Sivan -"In A Dream - EP On August 21st, Capitol Records will release IN A DREAM, Troye Sivan's new six-song concept EP. Features leadoff hit "Take Yourself Home" and new single "Easy," an infectious plea to set a relationship back on course. "This small collection... explores an emotional rollercoaster period in my life when the feelings and thoughts were most shockingly fresh," he says. "I'm proud of this music and excited to have it out in the world." CD in slipcase with art cards, a sticker & a foldout poster booklet.

Combining the lulling ambience of shoegaze with the iconic melodies and vocal prowess of classic American country music, enigmatic outlaw cowboy - Orville Peck, croons love and loss from the badlands of North America. The resulting sound is one completely his own, taking the listener down dusty rose-colored desert highways, through a world where worn out gamblers, aloof road-dogs and lovesick hustlers drift in and out of his masked gaze. Orville’s upcoming debut album, Pony, delivers a diverse collection of stories that sing of heartbreak, revenge and the unrelenting tug of the cowboy ethos. Warm lap steel guitars and echoing drums move through dreamy ballads, campfire lullabies and sometimes frantic buzzsaw tunes, all the while paying homage to his country music roots. Orville’s music has been featured by Nylon magazine, ID mag, Vice, The Needle Drop, as well as numerous Apple Music and Spotify playlists. He has also had magazine features in New York’s Hello Mr. and the UK’s Notion.

The Shadow is an album of growth. In the years since our previous album SLUFF was recorded, we have toured around the world, honed our musical skills and found our own little place in the music industry - but we have also seen our share of shadows, and it is through acknowledging these shadows that we grow the most. Each song on The Shadow examines an aspect of this growth through a different musical lens, adding up to a series of rock-and-roll vignettes of light, shadow, anxiety and responsibility. Frantic punk-scenes of information overload are contrasted by patient drones of introspection; fun, ear-worm musings of life as a young rock band are juxtaposed with the heavier responsibility of having a voice and not quite knowing what to say. The amalgam of information in the songs is complemented with a blend of sonic perspectives - we threw in all our infl uences, from the usual suspects of punk rock and new wave to spacedout 80’s balladry, fuzzy garage-metal and psychedelic desert folk (with synths and tape loops added to taste). And with producer Chris Funk leading the way, our somewhat scatterbrained sprawl of musical and conceptual ideas are tied together in an artful way. Chris’ quiet but steady direction pushed us to serve the songs, reigning in the guitar pedal breaks and drum solo freakouts from our live set while leaving just enough unpredictability and experimentation to give the album a liveliness of its own.

ALL THEM WITCHES have built a career out of playing music that can not be pigeonholed into one specific genre. NOTHING AS THE IDEAL was recorded in Studio 2 at the world famous Abbey Road with the help of longtime mixing engineer Mikey Allred. The history and vibe of that setting laid the groundwork for what was to come. The band’s signature psychedelic blues riffs, relentless drums, melodic bass lines and non-linear lyrics are all present. The resulting album is a thought provoking head banger that is the band’s most cohesive album to date.

Imploding the Mirage is The Killers highly anticipated sixth studio album. The album - produced by the band in conjunction with Shawn Everett and Jonathan Rado of Foxygen - was recorded in Los Angeles and Park City, UT. It is the first album of their career to be created outside their hometown of Las Vegas, NV. Imploding The Mirage also features a brilliant array of collaborators, another first for the band who have typically kept guest spots on their albums to a minimum. The list of featured artists includes Lindsey Buckingham, k.d. lang, Weyes Blood, Adam Granduciel (War On Drugs), Blake Mills, and Lucius.

In March 2020, Nashville-based artist Molly Tuttle experienced the devastating tornado that tore through much of East Nashville, followed by the global pandemic. Tuttle, who grew up in California and has toured as a solo artist for years, suddenly found herself - along with the rest of the musician community - sheltering at home. She found solace in revisiting favorite songs in an attempt to "remind myself why I love music." She conceptualized an idea for a record with renowned LA producer Tony Berg (Phoebe Bridgers, Andrew Bird) to be recorded over 2,000 miles apart. Tuttle taught herself how to use Pro Tools, recorded and engineered all of her parts alone at home before sending them to Berg in Los Angeles, who enlisted legendary session musicians to add instrumentation in their respective home studios. "This is how the astronauts do it!" she recalls Berg saying as they sent the files back and forth. The result is 10 tracks that cross the musical spectrum and the decades, from FKA Twigs to Cat Stevens, from Rancid to Karen Dalton, that will be released as... but i'd rather be with you on Compass Records.

Avatar returns in 2020 with a bold manifesto called Hunter Gatherer. The band's eighth album is an unflinchingly ruthless study of a clueless humankind's ever-increasing velocity into an uncertain future, furthering the reach of the band's always expanding dark roots. Songs like "A Secret Door," "Colossus," and "Age of Apes" are ready-made anthems for the modern age, each struggling for a collective meaning amidst the savagery of technology.

With his sophomore album Shape & Destroy, Nashville-based artist Ruston Kelly now documents his experience in maintaining sobriety, and finally facing the demons that led him to drug abuse in the first place. But while Kelly recounts that journey with an unvarnished honesty, his grace and conviction as an artist ultimately turn Shape & Destroy into a work of unlikely transcendence.

'Sun Racket' is the brand new album from legendary Boston trio Throwing Muses, consisting of Kristin Hersh, David Narcizo and Bernard Georges. The follow up to 2013's 'Purgatory/Paradise' is an outpouring of modal guitars, reverbed shapes, echoey drums and driving bass set behind Kristen Hersh's well-thumbed notebook of storylines. A ten-song opus of suitably wrought tales set against a wall of sound that's at once calm and ethereal before building into glorious cacophonous crescendos. When Throwing Muses wrote their last album, they were shattered. Pieces were coming and going, elements repeating and charging the whole. 'It sounded beautiful jumping around like that'. Two-minute songs reappearing as twisted instrumentals or another song's bridge. They mimicked the effect live which kept them on their toes. Whatever was happening was already over in other words. 'Sun Racket' is the opposite. It refused to do anything but sit still. It says, 'sit here and deal'. 'All it asked of us was to comingle two completely disparate sonic vocabularies: one heavy noise, the other delicate music box. Turns out we didn't have to do much. Sun Racket knew what it was doing and pushed us aside, which is always best. After thirty years of playing together, we trust each other implicitly but we trust the music more' - Kristin Hersh And so, they continue. Business unusual. 'A ground-breaking band who changed the face of alternative music rather than follow the rule book.' MXDWN 'Pioneers of the 80s/early 90s college rock sound' Pitchfork 'One of America's finest guitar bands' The Quietus

2020 release from the Oakland, CA-based death metal band.

Bruce Hornsby is on a roll. After taking the music world by surprise with his wide-ranging, critically acclaimed 2019 album Absolute Zero, the singer, songwriter, composer and bandleader returns with a follow-up that picks up where its predecessor left off. Non-Secure Connection features 10 new songs exploring a broad range of themes, from civil rights to computer hackers, mall salesmen to the tribulations of youth basketball.

Hornsby plays piano, of course, but the songs on Non-Secure Connection also feature Hornsby’s electric sitar and Chamberlin, along with guitars, horns, strings and subtle samples from sources as varied as minimalist composer John Cage and Scottish rockers Franz Ferdinand. Like Absolute Zero, Non-Secure Connection also features a wealth of collaborators: singer James Mercer of The Shins and Broken Bells, singer and poet Jamila Woods, Living Colour guitarist Vernon Reid, Bon Iver leader Justin Vernon and the late Leon Russell, who appears thanks to a demo that he and Hornsby recorded together more than 25 years ago.

Non-Secure Connection by Bruce Hornsby

2020 release. Blending folk intimacy, country grit, and alt-rock muscle, Carolina Story's resilient album, Dandelion, is an ode to survival in the face of struggle, a full-throated tribute to the power of hope and the unbreakable bonds of family. Recorded with acclaimed producer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Paul Moak (Joy Williams, Ashley Monroe), the collection is fueled by raw, honest storytelling and lush, cinematic arrangements, expanding the homespun craftsmanship of the Nashville duo's debut to draw on a broader, more ambitious palette, one that hints at everything from The Jayhawks and Lucinda Williams to R.E.M. and Nirvana. Though the record was written over the course of the last few years, the songs here feel eerily prescient given the current state of the world, reflecting on loneliness, depression, and economic hardship with the kind of vulnerability and empathy that can only come from lived experience. Much like the dandelion, though, Carolina Story insist on reaching for the light with their music. After more than a decade in the business, it's all they know how to do.

2020 release. The Waterboys, one of the most creative, loved and literate bands of the last four decades, return with their 14th studio album Good Luck, Seeker - coming just over one year after the release of the critically acclaimed album Where The Action Is. Standout track is the seven-minute mash-up manifesto 'My Wanderings In The Weary Land'. Is it psychedelic soul? Is it trance? Is it punk?

Fresh off their 30th Anniversary & World Tour in 2019, the genre-bending, multi-platinum selling Mavericks are changing the game once again with the release of their first-ever Latin format album En Español. Produced by the band's longtime creative partner Niko Bolas (Neil Young, Prince, Sheryl Crow) and Mavericks lead singer & principal songwriter Raul Malo, En Español features a compelling mix of standards and Spanish-language originals in signature Mavericks style.

The Third Gleam marks a return to the Avett Brothers’ roots, both sonically and with Seth & Scott playing as a trio with longtime bassist Bob Crawford. The eight tracks capture their personal experiences and perspectives on undeniably timely, universal themes: isolation, gun violence, incarceration, historical prejudice, mortality, resilience, love, hope, redemption. 12 years in the making, this is the third installment of the brothers’ ongoing Gleam series.

As chaos envelopes the world, Manson penned the perfect prescription. The aptly titled WE ARE CHAOS was written/produced by Manson & Shooter Jennings. Rock & roll icon and painter, Manson continues to infiltrate fashion, film, and music, leaving his fingerprints on modern culture. "Making this record, I had to think to myself: Tame your crazy, stitch your suit, try to pretend that you are not an animal. But I knew that mankind is the worst of them all.”

Diana Krall's new self-produced album, This Dream Of You, was mixed by Al Schmitt, who worked closely with her to achieve the notable intimacy and immediacy. Performances from 2016-2017 sessions, on which she collaborated with late friend/longtime creative partner Tommy LiPuma. A record for right now but also feels like a movie you might share with someone you know will stay with it until the final reel. As she says, "If But Beautiful is the overture, then `Singing In The Rain' is the end title.

"Live at the Roundhouse” is unlike any other concert film connected with Pink Floyd. It’s the nearest thing you can get to a time machine, transporting you back to the very earliest days of the band. Nick Mason, the only band member to have played on all of Pink Floyd’s studio albums, returns to the group's earliest records, joined in the line-up by Gary Kemp, Guy Pratt, Lee Harris and Dom Beken.

 

Nick Mason’s Saucerful of Secrets took the drummer back to clubs for the first time in 1967, then to theatres, across the UK, North America and Europe, playing only music his old band had recorded before The Dark Side of the Moon.

 

Captured from the band’s celebrated shows at London’s Roundhouse, where Pink Floyd played some of their most revered early shows in the 1960s, the film features a uniquely thrilling setlist including songs hailing from Syd Barrett’s time with the band. Only four songs from this eclectic roster have ever previously appeared on official live releases by Pink Floyd or its members. Everything else is being experienced for the first time since their original live performances.

From the pinnacle of confrontational instrumental extremity and steadfast lyrical humanity, Napalm Death's new album warps musical landscapes all over again. The 16th studio album by UK's Gods of Grind and much anticipated follow-up to 2015's acclaimed "Apex Predator - Easy Meat" includes 12 songs seething with caustic evolution and unrelenting scope.

2020 live release. On An Evening of New York Songs and Stories, Vega revisits some of the most iconic songs in her repertoire as well as more hidden gems in a stunning live recording on which she is backed by longtime guitarist, Gerry Leonard, bassist Jeff Allen and keyboardist Jamie Edwards. Recorded at New York City's famed Café Carlyle in early 2019, An Evening of New York Songs and Stories includes both familiar songs like "Luka" and "Tom's Diner" and deep cuts from her catalogue like "Frank and Ava" and "Ludlow Street". The mix of repertoire also features "New York Is My Destination" from Lover, Beloved: Songs from an Evening with Carson McCullers, Vega's one woman play about the Southern gothic novelist Carson McCullers, and a cover of her late friend Lou Reed's "Walk on the Wild Side."

2020 release, the seventh studio release from the R&B superstar. Alicia features the singles "Show Me Love", "Time Machine", and "Underdog".