Tag: Mill No. 5
Former textile mill in Lowell, MA that was home to Vinyl Destination, then later A Damn Shame records, as well as host of many record fairs. Now closed and being converted into apartments.
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Sade, Stronger Than Pride, 1988 on Epic
Third studio LP from the group Sade, named after singer Sade Adu and including (on this LP) Stuart Matthewman, Andrew Hale, and Paul Denman. What a fantastic run they had in the 80s and early 90s: Diamond LIfe, Promise, Stronger Than Pride, and Love Deluxe are all fantastic. I could just put “Turn My Back…
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Bob Marley & The Wailers, Babylon By Bus, 1978 on Island
Wonderful live album recorded (despite the maps on the inner sleeves showing the US leg of the tour) in Paris, Copenhagen, London, and Amsterdam. It’s 2xLP but not a gatefold. It’s die-cut in the front windows of the bus, so depending on the order you put the printed inner sleeves you determine what shows through.…
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Nick Lowe, Labour of Lust, 1979 on Columbia
Second album released under the Nick Lowe name, recorded with the same personnel from Rockpile and in the same year as Dave Edmunds’ Repeat When Necessary. The US and UK versions have different track list – this is the US version, including “American Squirm” as track A4. This has “Cruel To Be Kind” which became…
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Sturgill Simpson, Cuttin’ Grass Vol. 2: The Cowboy Arms Sessions, 2020 on High Top Mountain
Follow up to Cuttin’ Grass Vol. 1, released a couple of months later. More bluegrass renditions of Simpson’s catalog. The band again includes many well known bluegrass musicians: Stuart Duncan, Sierra Hull, Miles Miller, Mark Howard, Tim O’Brien, Scott Vestal,and Mike Bub. Although there isn’t an explicit recorded-at credit, The Cowboy Arms is Jack Clement’s…
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Tom Waits, Closing Time, 1973 on Asylum
Tom Waits’ debut album, after David Geffen met him performing at the Troubadour in West Hollywood. Amazing how fully-formed Waits is here, kicking off his debut album with “Ol’ 55” and “I Hope That I Don’t Fall In Love With You” – all originals. Tom Waits always feels to me like he could have come…
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Sturgill Simpson, Cuttin’ Grass Vol. 1 (The Butcher Shoppe Sessions), 2020 on High Top Mountain Records
Sturgill Simpson is one of my favorite contemporary artists, who generally gets classified as a Country artist but here breaks out into bluegrass. The Butcher Shoppe is actually a studio in Nashville set up by David Ferguson and John Prine. (There’s also a Nashville studio called The Butcher Shop, operated by Butch Walker). The band…
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Nick Lowe, Pure Pop for Now People, 1978 on Columbia
Issued as Jesus of Cool in the UK and elsewhere, but as Pure Pop for Now People in the US and Canada. this was NIck Lowe’s solo debut. The track list also differs between the North American and European releases. Yep Rock put out an expanded reissue in the US in 2008 under the name…
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Silk Sonic, An Evening with Silk Sonic, 2021 on Aftermath / Atlantic
Super duo with Bruno Mars and Anderson .Paak, with special guest “host” Bootsy Collins. So far this is their only full length LP, but “Leave the Door Open” won a ton of awards. It’s a wonderful album and I hope the first of many more to come. My copy via a record fair at Mill…
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The Police, Outlandos D’Amour, 1978 on A&M
Outlandos D’Amour was the debut album by The Police, released on A&M in 1978. You’ll find cover variations with red, yellow, and green lettering – I don’t think there’s any logic to that, just variety. Love this whole album from the jump: “Next To You” / “So Lonely” / Roxanne” And “Hole in My Life”…
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Mazzy Star, So Tonight That I Might See, 1993 on Capitol
Mazzy Star grew out of an earlier band called Opal – David Roback and Hope Sandoval actually performed as Opal before renaming themselves to Mazzy Star. (Yes, like most people, I thought Mazzy Star was the lead singer’s name but it is not – she’s Hope Sandoval). Roback was also a founder of Rain Parade…
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The Beatles, Revolver, 1966 on Parlophone / Capitol
Classic Beatles LP as they started shifting toward innovative studio techniques, took more drugs, and got more experimental – continuing the shift that started on Rubber Soul with tracks like “Tomorrow Never Knows”: Turn off you mind / relax and float downstream / it is not dying / it is not dying Artwork by Klaus…
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Wet Leg, Wet Leg, 2022 on Domino
Wet Leg’s “Chaise Longue” was hard to miss back in 2022 – appearing in multiple movies and shows as well as many many best of the year podcasts. The whole self-titled debut album is wonderful and I can’t wait for more. I originally thought this was a malpropism for “chaise lounge” – but then realized…
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Lou Rawls, Come On In, Mister Blues, 1969 on Pickwick/33
One has to be careful about some of these discount releases on Pickwick/33 – they were a discount label for a reason, offering cheap compilations of previously released material – but this one is really fantastic. Lou Rawls passed in 2006 and he put out over 70 albums, so there’s a lot to collect, especially…
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Def Leppard, Pyromania, 1983 on Mercury
For me this is one of those albums I loved as a 13 year old, then outgrew for many years (aka thought I was too cool for something so massively popular and unapologetically hair metal) but have come again to appreciate with wiser ears. It was their massive breakout, with “Photograph,” “Rock of Ages,” and…
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13th Floor Elevators, Flivver, 1988 on World Productions of Compact Music
I first heard Roky Erickson and the 13th Floor Elevators on fourth or fifth generation tape copies from friends in the 80s, but didn’t really come to appreciate them fully until much later. This record, on a bootleg Italian label with releases in the late 80s and early 90s, gathers live performances from The Avalon…
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Daryl Hall and John Oates, Private Eyes, 1981 on RCA
I thought of this as an early Hall & Oates record, until I checked out their discography, which goes back to 1972’s Whole Oats. Turns out it is their 10th full length studio record! It was the source of the hit singles “Private Eyes” and “I Can’t Go For That (No Can Do).” The album…
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Various Artists, Big Hits of Mid-America Volume Three, 1980 on Twin/Tone
Technically the first version of this 2xLP set came out in 1979, but my pressing is from 1980. Twin/Tone was concerned about the Yipes’ track “The Ballad Of Roy Orbison” for legal reasons (copyright clearance) and replaced it with “Specialization” by the New Psychenauts. “SPECIALIZATION” (side four, track two) was recorded at Blackberry Way in…
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The Cure, Boys Don’t Cry, 1980 on PVC/Fiction
Fiction was the UK label, PVC the US label (a sublabel of Passport Records). This was really a compilation album for the US market, drawing eight tracks from Three Imaginary Boys (their UK debut) supplemented with five other tracks from that era. It’s been reissued multiple times with different track order this is the same…