I was just doing a short roundup of web site browsing and saw that Rossif Sutherland has updated his MySpace page. In short, the album is coming along and should be out soon. He's financing and selling the CD himself, no record company.
He also writes that the songs he did with Jeff Lynne were done two years ago, so we can only assume These Words is a final mix, which I think is a good thing. He writes that all three of his produced by Jeff Lynne songs will be on the album, thankfully.
Well, bang my bongos and call me Desi. It appears Xanadu is a hit on the Great White Way. One symbol of its success, Xanadu On Broadway is being released on CD on January 8, 2008. CD Universe and Barnes & Noble among other retailers have preorders up for it.
Now I guess I have to see it.
Pause & Play.com is reporting that ELO's Ticket To The Moon: The Very Best of Electric Light Orchestra Volume 2 will be released in the states on February 12, 2008. One can only assume at this point that the CD will be exactly like the UK version, only with an FBI warning on it.
I have to say, it has been a really nice 18 months (or so) for ELO and/or Wilbury fans. We now have a rather nice collection of new and refreshed music to savor... and believe me, I have been! The Rossif Sutherland surprise was the perfect cherry on top to 2007.
Personally, my favorites: A New World Record, Balance Of Power, Highway Companion, Maxine, Idle Race Japanese remasters and the complete set of ELO Mini-LP CDs.
But now, look ahead at some of the many projects which are currently rumored or waiting for a green light:
The Move - we should be beginning the year with a Looking On remaster and an all-out box set; Rossif Sutherland's album should be finished soon with a reported 3 tracks produced by Jeff Lynne; Roy Orbison's Mystery Girl and King Of Hearts should be remastered and released in 2008; An Idle Race Box set; an expanded and remastered edition of Jeff Lynne's Armchair Theatre; a re-release of ELO's Zoom; an ELO singles box (which should flush out remastered versions of Buildings Have Eyes and two versions of A Matter Of Fact); ELO Zoom Greatest Hits Live; Into The Mysterious, a collection of solo ELO and closely related tracks.
As for my wish list, that includes remasters of the Long Beach concert, Xanadu and a re-do of Secret Messages with remastered versions of Mandalay, Buildings Have Eyes, Hello My Old Friend and *gulp* a full-on, untampered with and unedited Beatles Forever; a CD collection of unreleased session material from ELO post-1973; a 70s box set of unreleased material from Del Shannon; and of course, a new album from Jeff.
It’s not exactly hard to see why the Traveling Wilburys Collection on vinyl was priced as high as it was. In a nutshell, it’s the deluxe CD/DVD edition, only larger… and without video.
The contents of the box, though, are pretty impressive. Both LP covers and labels are faithfully reproduced, the inner sleeves are now just one sheet inserts while the albums themselves are held in a more storage-friendly paper/poly sleeve. With the poster and postcards included, the set works. It may not be the biggest value for your dollar, but it makes for an excellent collector’s piece.
But any vinyl pressing is only as good as the source music. While Volume One and Volume 3 are pretty solid sound wise, some of the bonus tracks have detectible tape flaws. The extended version of Handle With Care is particularly bad. Whatever the case, the bonus tracks are worth the price. There’s a sizable improvement in the extended version of End of the Line.
The main exclusive here (for me anyway) is the remix of Not Alone Any More. Will most people shell out $75 for that feature? Probably not. But it’s a nice soon-to-be rarity using different vocal takes from Roy Orbison while uncovering some nice instrumental parts.
I never really weighed in on the debate over vinyl vs. CD. And frankly, I’m holding off on it until I have the ability to rent a high-end turntable and capture these tracks in 24-bit digital on this PC. But, after I spent a considerable amount of time using my (not high-end premium nor bottom of the line) consumer turntable, running the audio thru a small professional-grade mixer/amp, digitizing it into a consumer (but not cheap) audio restoration program, then creating uncompressed audio files for the iPod, I still can’t get satisfactory results sound-wise. So, for now, my stance on preferring remastered CDs stands. I'll hold out hope there will be some CD of these bonus tracks (whether promo or not) eventually.
Now, anyone is welcome to change my mind about vinyl. But when I hear the Traveling Wilburys on vinyl, I hear these songs as good quality recordings. But, whenI hear the remastered CDs, I hear these songs like they’re happening in front of me. I understand the Vinyl + Analog = warmer, fuller & better versus the CD + Digital = thinner, weaker & shittier argument. But, making uncompressed audio files (stressing uncompressed here) from remastered CDs and listening to those files on an iPod is currently blowing the doors off of any vinyl I’ve ever heard. Again, if you have any suggestions on the right way to hear vinyl records properly, I’m all ears.
I tried to get some opening thoughts on the Wilburys Vinyl box set on here this morning, but I flat out ran out of time. Been trying to capture a good quality version of the bonus 12" before I start writing. I will get to that this evening after work.
The box set in one word (so far): impressive.
A few readers of this site have sent e-mails about their music. They're fans of Jeff and ELO and many times their music reflects it. So, when you get a moment check out:
From Dom: http://cdbaby.com/cd/domnk and
Paul: http://myspace.com/paulraab
And spread the word if you like them!
How many ways can you recycle and remarket ELO CDs? From Sony/BMG's Custom Marketing Group comes this: a 2CD collection of previously released budget compilations smartly titled 2CD Collection (A 712251). They're the same discs released in the early 90s: ELO Classics and Burning Bright. They're not remastered and retail for about $10.
After giving it a day to soak in, a thumbs up for Rossif Sutherland's These Words. A nice and understated little tune. The uh-huh's in the verses grow on you. Funny, some of his new songs have been up on his MySpace page since at least September. Hopefully, the wait for the entire CD won't be long now.
It just kinda occurred to me, this is the first Jeff-related studio track that didn't involve ELO, Wilburys or Beatles in ages. His stuff with Rosie Vela was never released and probably won't be.
Showdown, The Official ELO Mailing List has taken the wraps off this rather exciting news tidbit. Rossif Sutherland, the brother of 24 star Kiefer Sutherland, is releasing an album (perhaps by the end of the year) with three songs produced by Jeff Lynne. A rough mix of one, These Words, is available to hear on his MySpace page.
It's a nice simple little tune and as with many Jeff Lynne productions, the devil's in the little details: a laid-back style with some nice sounds. A cleaner version will flush those details out. As awlays, it's great to hear something new coming from Jeff's corner.
Makes me wonder how far (if at all) Jeff is working towards an album of his own songs again.
Hold On Tight ha a pretty high profile airing on a Honda commerical under its belt. Now it has press as well. And while channel surfing, I stopped on Countdown with Keith Olbermann, where he said something to the effect of... "to invoke the words of a song that comes to mind, 'hold on tight to your dreams'..."
Not including box sets and special editions, Ticket To The Moon is the 36th compilation title in my (and probably many other's) private collection. With its companion CD, All Over The World, this would be the current definitive 2-disc retrospective of the band's works for the masses. In an overall sense, it'll do. But for my money, there is no career retrospective unless it starts with Fire On High and finishes with Hello My Old Friend. I still compile the ELO retrospectives for friends who want them... and they get it.
Ticket To The Moon had a lot going for it quality-wise since it was being companioned with All Over The World. But, it fell to the cheap side.
Right out the gate, Twilight barges in with no fade and ends with the intro to Yours Truly, just as it's indexed on the Time CD. To me, that says no effort was put into this. Can't Get It Out Of My Head still starts with a rough edit. I thought that's what Pro-Tools was for! These are easy fixes!
Secret Messages and Eldorado had fast (and rather thoughtless) fades at the end when a more prolonged fade could have made a better dramatic statement. Again, we're dealing with the masses, the hardcore fans already know what's going to happen next. I figured this would be a good time to smooth over the tape flaws on Calling America and It's Over. I figured incorrectly.
I try not to nickpick at the track list too much. It may be an ideal track list for someone out there. But Starlight? If we're going to highlight album tracks from Out Of The Blue, why not put something a little more daring and edgy, like Jungle or Birmingham Blues. Starlight is just more light pop.
Heaven Only Knows. Two words: alternate version.
Eldorado. Wonderful track, but very out of place here.
In My Own Time. Good. I'm glad this made it on here. Of all the songs on Zoom, this was the one that really brings out the qualities in Jeff's voice. And it's an airtight pop song. I've always loved this one.
Besides the sleeve notes which help, the bare minimum was done for the packaging as well. A dinky tri-fold computer graphics cover, with a spaceship (naturally) and a generic and rather artifical-looking backside and inlays.
How possible is it in the next go-around to have a dignified-looking career retrospective? I mean, Flashback is great, but come on. Come back to Earth once in a while and appear to try.
The Traveling Wilburys website is updated in antcipation of next month's Deluxe Edition re-release. They're confirming that the vinyl edition will be released December 4. And it looks like the new deluxe edition may be in a blue box.
But the website is also advertising something on the Sundance Channel, most likely an airing of the True History of the Traveling Wilburys. The dates are:
11/5 @ 10:15pm EST/PST
11/10 @ 6:30pm EST/PST
11/23 @ 1:50pm EST/PST
11/25 @ 11:35pm EST/PST
Here's a little red carpet stuff from Tom Petty's premiere screening of Running Down A Dream in LA. Jeff does his best to give this poor humorously clueless Hollywood reporter a soundbite. Regardless of how much she knows, this was an incredibly strange line of questioning.
A few opening thoughts on the new Tom Petty documentary just released to DVD by Best Buy. I'll keep to the Jeff Lynne-relevent parts.
The story of Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers needed the four full hours to tell. The pace of the documentary is nice and even, but I can't imagine being in a theatre for that long regardless of the topic. Anyway, of course, my main interest in this documentary is when Jeff entered the picture.
I suppose I expected to see some new raw footage from the Roy Orbison, Wilburys, Full Moon Fever sessions because there seems to have a been a good deal of videotape rolled around this time.
Instead, they (and by they I mean Bagdanovich) lifted the exact part of recording You Got It from a previous documentary, Going Home. When it got to the Wilburys, all of the video was essentially lifted from the recently released True History of the Traveling Wilburys documentary... even down to the May 1988 date stamp used on the DVD! I shit you not.
The filmmakers apparently had nothing to b-roll the Highway Companion part of the documentary. They ended up using those horrendous music videos made for a few of the songs, plus some b-roll shot after Jeff gave his (recent) interview for the film.
One thing I was glad to see was Jeff's role as a producer put in perspective. Tom Petty draws the difference between making a record and playing live. Some people just can't separate the two, which may partially explain the visceral response Jeff Lynne gets by some critics.
More thoughts to follow...
In two places including Amazon, I've seen/read that the Traveling Wilburys Collection on LP may be pushed to the first week of December. Could mean nothing, could mean something.
My copy hasn't arrived yet, but from what I'm told, this comp is not impressing anyone... at all.
We knew it was going to happen eventually, just not so soon. Much of George Harrison's catalog (mainly the recently remastered stuff) has become available on iTunes. George is the last of the Fab Four to enter the digital realm, but sadly, nothing yet from the Fab Four.
One thing that may not sit well with fans: several of the new digitial editons contain an additional bonus track from their 2004 remastered editions, but only available if you buy the whole album. Further proof that there's a long way to go before record companies stop being clueless about how to deal with digital music.
Cloud Nine's bonus bonus track is Got My Mind Set On You (Extended Version) which was previously only available on vinyl. I wish I can purchase just that. Oh well, another lost sale for them.
I hope Radiohead blows the doors off the current digital music industry with their new album. I'm buying it and paying them for it, too.
Thumbs down on the new Del Shannon Rock On! re-issue. Unless you want the extra bonus tracks (which may or may not feature a few Wilburys) there's not much reason to own this. It's not remastered and I'm told the booklet is nothing to write home about.
Del's official website promotes the bonus tracks (sans the end demo) as having three of the five Wilburys playing. But that has long been a matter of dispute, namely with one of his former stuido musicians who claims to have played on them.
What I'm waiting for is a 70s era boxed set like the one they put out for his 60s material.
