STAR FOR GEORGE

George Harrison got a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame today.

Olivia and Dhani Harrison, Jeff Lynne, Tom Petty and Paul McCartney were among the many there for the ceremony.

Photo by Mark Ralston/AFP/Getty Images.

To coincide with the event, Capitol announced Let It Roll: The Songs of George Harrison for a June 16 release.  It's George Harrison's first ever career-spanning hits collection.

No track list yet, but Steve Marinucci from the reliable AbbeyRd's Beatle Page believes there could be a rarity on it.  My rarity vote is for Cheer Down.

A LITTLE FARTHER AWAY...

A press release on Regina Spektor's new album Far is out today.  The 13 track album is now due on June 23.  There's no track list or artwork or producer break down yet, but we do know the first single is a track called Laughing With. 

THE EVENT IS SET...

Here's the blurb on Jeff for his interview and Golden Note Award presentation at this year's ASCAP I Create Music Expo.  His event is set for Friday April 24.

INTERVIEWER: Erik Philbrook - ASCAP 
ASCAP is pleased to present Jeff Lynne with its prestigious ASCAP Golden Note Award for his extraordinary musical achievements and welcome him as our very special guest interview. Lynne has had an incredible 40-year career as a songwriter, producer and leader of the Electric Light Orchestra (ELO), co-founder of The Traveling Wilburys and producer of such artists as The Beatles, Roy Orbison and Tom Petty. Even with a lifetime of other musical accomplishments, Jeff Lynne is and always will be known as the man who turned on the Electric Light Orchestra, one of the most remarkable success stories in rock history. ELO has sold well in excess of 50 million records worldwide, and continues to be a remarkably popular catalog. Jeff Lynne wrote and produced 26 Top 40 hits in the UK, and 20 Top 40 hits in the US with ELO, and became a major arena and stadium draw. Lynne has also released a solo album, Armchair Theatre. His remarkable career includes producing and collaborating with many of the greatest musical artists of all time, including a number of Lynne's all-time heroes: George Harrison, Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, The Beatles, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty, Brian Wilson and Del Shannon. Together with Harrison, Orbison, Petty and Bob Dylan, Lynne was a member of the Grammy award-winning Traveling Wilburys - a supergroup like no other.

...and when you also count his outside collaborations during and since ELO, the number of songs he put into the American Top 40 jumps to at least 30.  There are not many musicians who can claim that.

SUDDENLY FROM THE BLU SPEC

ELO's A New World Record is unleashed in Japan on the new Blu-Spec CD format.  While it gets a slight uptick in sound quality (as per the other ELO blu-specs vs. standard CDs,) it gets a slight downtick in packaging quality, mostly because you get a old-fashioned opaque CD tray with a blank inlay underneath.

Otherwise, with this version, you get the entire remaster booklet in Japanese... pretty cool actually, the Jet disc label is pretty much the same design as the Mini-LP except for a few markings and there's a black and white lyric booklet inside.

Again, this is pretty much for the collectors who want everything.  The difference in sound quality won't make much of a difference for most fans.  

BIG BEATLES NEWS DAY

It appears there is big Beatles news.

First off, George Harrison will receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame a week from today April 14.  On the heels of that is supposedly an announcement sometime this month by Capitol/EMI concerning a new release of some sort by Harrison.  Is it another remaster(s)?  A career-spanning best-of?  Some fans believe it'll be something from his Apple days. More on that in the coming days.

And after years of rumors and fans holding their collective breath, the entire Beatles catalog has been remastered and will finally be released on September 9.  The grossly overdue sonic upgrade has apparently been at least 4 years in the making.  The link has a brief slide of what Sgt. Pepper and Abbey Road will look like.

The New York Times goes a little more in-depth as well.

What won't be included is The Beatles Anthology material as well as some of the projects that followed such as the Yellow Submarine Songtrack and the Beatles 1 collection.

... and check out the Beatles home page!

MAYBE I CAN GET HIM TO SIGN IT...

For those keeping score on Japanese card sleeve editions, Ringo Starr's 1993 CD Time Takes Time (with produced by Jeff Lynne titles) was also just released as a Mini-LP edition in Japan only.  It boasts JVC K2 24-bit remastering and does contain the Jeff Lynne-produced Don't Be Cruel as a bonus track.

ANOTHER ONE SEES THE LIGHT...

Here's an amusing article on ELO by columnist Joe Stannard.  Here's the set-up:

Interplanetary scribe Joe Stannard picks the best of ELO's back catalogue . . . by picking nearly their entire back catalogue.

NOT FAR OFF...

Amazon has Regina Spektor's new album "Far" listed for a June 2 release.

TOM PETTY - MINI-LPs FROM JAPAN

I'll be honest.  I'm not completely sure why I dig these Japanese paper sleeve editions so much, but I do.  The latest batch (related to Jeff Lynne's producing) comes from Tom Petty.  Full Moon Fever and Into The Great Wide Open were released in Japan last week on higher quality Super High Material CDs or SHM-CDs.  

As mentioned previously, this is the first re-issue of any kind for Into The Great Wide Open.  On the downside, there's not much to it.  You get a plain lyric booklet and the sleeved plainly designed CD.  There was indeed a vinyl edition of this album, though not many were pressed.  

Where this Mini-LP CD lacks in physical content, it gains in sound quality.  It's a definite improvement over the original CD, and it has nothing to do with SHM-CD format.  Although there's nothing in the credits to suggest it, the CD sounds remastered to me.  Maybe it's mentioned in Japanese, I don't know...

Geffen released a remastered Greatest Hits for Tom Petty last year.  The sound quality on the Mini-LP CDs pretty much matches that.

Now, to Full Moon Fever.  Quite simply, the sound quality blows the doors off of the original CD and even beats the MFSL Gold edition.  Again, nothing in the credits suggests it's remastered, but the sound is much stronger and some finer details are more prominent than before.  

Funny, they never "officially" remastered this landmark CD and it was released 20 years ago next month.

The contents of the Full Moon Fever Mini-LP are much better and include the plainly designed disc, a replica of the original inner sleeve, a lyric booklet, and a numbered card certificate (pictured above) with an image of the original LP label. 

There are no bonus tracks on either CD.  Maybe that'll come with an official remastered edition down the road.  But in the meantime, these two albums sound totally rejuvenated and are worth revisiting again.

AND THE GOLDEN NOTE GOES TO...

Jeff Lynne will be among the attendees at this year's ASCAP I Create Music Expo and while he's there, ASCAP will present him with the Golden Note Award for his outstanding contribution to music.

The expo takes place on April 23-25 at the Renaissance Hollywood Hotel in Los Angeles.

Another similar report from Variety.

NEWS: REGINA SPEKTOR

According to Strangeglue.com, Regina Spektor will release a new album called Far this June.  Jeff Lynne is reportedly one of the album's producers.  

Another report from FMQB. 

Spektor tells Pitchfork she wanted to work with Lynne due to his recent production work with Tom Petty

Here's the full Pitchfork article.  You have to click "more" at the bottom of the article to read the interview portion.

More as we find it.

Here's Regina Spektor's MySpace page for samples of her previous work.  And here's one of her cool videos.

REMASTERING HARRISON

Here's an interesting blog entry from Yer Blogger about George Harrison's past and hopefully future remaster projects.  A career-spanning box set of Harrison's work is way overdue and will hopefully, if and when it arrives, fill in the many gaps left in his reissue series so far.

The Dark Horse remasters yielded decent remastered sound, but yielded little in bonus material.  Most CDs added just one bonus track.  Cloud Nine was the exception with two.  To add to the insult, the digital versions (released in 2007) made an additional bonus track available, but only if you bought the whole album again.  Lame decision.  You'll likely make more money offering those tracks individually.

The Dark Horse Years left off some key tracks including the studio version of the Jeff Lynne co-produced Cheer Down, but I'm guessing they'll be part of the longer-term plan if there's a box set.

Yer Blogger says of Cloud Nine:

1987's hit album "Cloud Nine" featured two bonus tracks, but excluded the silly (but still desirable) "extended" version of "When We Was Fab".

...which I think isn't desirable at all.  It was the last part of the track in reverse.  What would be better for a potential box set is a clean copy of Fab with a section that was ultimately cut out for the original LP.  At least that's something new to hear.  A bootleg with the unedited Fab also carries That's What It Takes with a different mix in the very beginning.  You can bet there are other unreleased "ideas" that are worth hearing.  If you're that invested into an artist that you'll buy an expensive box set, an extra (or different) verse isn't going to make or break a track... or the artist.

More from Yer Blogger, this time about the Wilburys re-issues:

The four bonus tracks included were all from the “Volume 3” era, but were split evenly between the two CD's. There were also some alternate mixes and edits, as well as one unreleased alternate take, that were saved for the vinyl release. These could have easily fit as bonus tracks on the collection.

I understand they want to keep the continuity of the original CDs, but I agree.  What little bonus material we got out of this was oddly placed and ultimately fan-deflating.  Even the jarring edit (1:55) in the otherwise excellent Maxine was getting to me after a while.

YB continues:

Curiously, there was also a different edit for the video of “Inside Out”, which was included on the DVD.

They were all re-edited except for Handle With Care, plus they were all cropped for widescreen.  Inside Out was such a disappointment because it had a lot of funny moments between the guys... most all were edited out.  They either had no choice but to re-edit them or they simply lost their minds.  The documentary is the only reason to own the DVD.  

So, here's to looking forward to a possible Harrison box and here's hoping better decisions are made.  Yer Blogger will have some ideas in an upcoming post.

REVIEW: THE VERY BEST OF THE MOVE

I have to admit, this is probably the first time I ever looked at a CD and was this amazed at how crammed full of material it is.  This new 25-track Move best-of comes from Salvo, the label that gave us the impressive (however somewhat unfulfilling for Jeff Lynne fans) restoration series of The Move's original LPs and career spanning box set.

Some highlights on The Very Best of The Move:

• The CD is housed in a standard jewel case with card slipcover.
  
• Five tracks are unique to this collection. 
  
• Flowers In The Rain is the "original stereo album track" (apparently different from the newly created stereo version released in 2007... okaaaay) 
  
• I Can Hear The Grass Grow and Fire Brigade are enhanced stereo.
  
• Omnibus and Wild Tiger Woman are the original mono versions which didn't appear on previous Salvo releases.
  
• Do Ya is thankfully full-length.
  
• There's a reference to Nip/Tuck's recent use of Piece of My Heart.
  
• For the masses, the liner notes are concise.  For the fans, some of the pictures are new.  A thoughtful balance.

The Move can't claim as many comp CDs as ELO.  For that matter, neither can most bands.  But it's pretty safe to say you can stash away any old Move best-of's for good.  

When you teach your friends Move 101, this is your textbook.

LAST MOVE...??

Salvo's latest newsletter is just out with info on the new Move best-of CD.  Interesting quote at the end of it's blurb, "...the perfect way to round off Salvo/Fly's acclaimed Move reissue programme."

Does that mean that's it for Move releases?  What about the proposed BBC and live discs?  Who will handle those, if anyone?  I thought Salvo seemed so keen on The Move.

That would probably explain why Disc 2 of the Move Anthology was all Marquee.  I thought the concert was worth "documenting" on CD, but as its own release.

MARCH MADNESS

Quietly sneaking on to store shelves this week, a USA edition slider pack for All Over The World: The Very Best of Electric Light Orchestra.  There's a Fin Costello picture on Jeff on the inner flap (the UK edition has a generic star field) and a '78 concert tour pic under the disc.

If you find one this week at Best Buy, the price is $6.78...  it doesn't get much cheaper.

Also quiety out this week, the 5CD grouping of On The Third Day, Face The Music, A New World Record, Discovery and Time in the EU... as well as the new UK Move compilation on Salvo.

RECOMMENDATION: M. Ward

I just wanted to pass on a quick recommendation.  While I can't say it totally resembles Jeff Lynne's producing, there are traits about this album's tracks that, for me, pacify the gaping holes between Jeff Lynne releases.  

This is M. Ward.  I saw him play live last Friday and he was quite good.  His new album "Hold Time" was released a week ago and has several standout tracks.  Jailbird and Never Had Nobody Like You (almost a T.Rex clone) currently have me hooked.

He produced the album, wrote most of its tracks, and plays much of it.  ELO worshipper Jason Lytle is one of the guest musicians.

While on this topic, Sarah McLachlan's new song U Want Me 2 has some familiar rings to it, 2.

KELLY GROUCUTT

Former ELO bassist Kelly Groucutt has died of a heart attack at the age of 63.

News links: BBC

NME    antiMUSIC.com     Associated Press    

From Phil Bates    Bev Bevan     

Kelly Groucutt Official Website announcement.

While there will always be debate about how the ELO story plays out, there's not much debate on Kelly's popularity among fans.  He was outright the most accessible member of that band.  It was Kelly Groucutt who kept the ELO torch lit from the 1990s on and seemingly was the most passionate about it.  It was because of him that so many fans stayed passionate all these years... and still are.

Imagine how many shows ELO Part II played since the early 90s, how many fans wanted to meet the band members after concerts, and how many times he was gracious to let that happen... over and over again.  Think of how many records and CDs have his autograph because he always took enough time to sign everything.  Do you know how many pictures of him with fans are floating around out there?  Thousands, at least.  He had outright friendships with several fans I know personally.  Kelly gave so many fans a rare distinction others will never have.

All of the right and wrong aside, we all lost a very charismatic member of our family today.

ANOTHER NEW WORLD RECORD

The great Blu-Spec experiment continues.  Sony Music Japan is issuing A New World Record on the new Blu-Spec CD format on March 25.

I'm rooting for the whole catalog on Blu-Spec now...

OFF TOPIC: A COLD NIGHT AT THE GRAMMYS

If my prediction holds, and I hope it does, Coldplay will have an awesome night at the Grammys tonight.  Maybe not a complete sweep, but close.  If there's any band I feel has earned it, it's this one.  The marketing around Viva La Vida was unconventional and genius.  For me, they have managed to become the only band since ELO to keep me completely engaged this long.  

Since last May/June:

• They've released (by my count) 27 tracks.  27.  
  
• The lead off album track was a free download (on their web site) for a week.
  
• The album's signature track was available for purchase prior to the albums release.  This isn't a new idea, but at least it wasn't a free 30 second clip. 
  
• There was a vinyl 7" made available with an exclusive session outtake.
  
• The 12" vinyl version of the album had a promo CD of the album enclosed.
• To celebrate their tour's launch, they released another song (a short little ditty) as a download-only track on their web site... for free.  (The song ended up being performed by the band in the middle of the audience in the back of whatever venue it was.  A thrill for the cheap seats.)
  
• They made music videos (remember those??) and offered one on iTunes for a week... for free.  One of their videos was a first ever "video cover version."
  
• Their live appearances on TV weren't necessarily centered around the "single of the moment." The "venue" dictated which song was used.
• They issued a promo CD for Lost! with a unique Instrumental version.  There were just enough of them made so any resourceful fans could find one.
  
• A re-release of their album (later in the year) added an 8 track EP: 5 new songs, 3 remixes.
  
• One of the best tracks on the album, Lost!, was issued on Violet Hill's CD single in "acoustic" form weeks before the album.  I learned the song before I got the album and was never, I mean never, so floored than when I heard the album version at last.
  
• Their latest single, out last week, has an outtake called The Goldrush.  The lyrics were printed in their tour's concert program suggesting it may have originally been planned as another hidden or bonus track for the album.  It may have been edited out and put here instead... but it's another example of how good even the outtakes are.

And they did all of that while carrying out 2008's most successful concert tour in the world.

I have dreams that Jeff Lynne projects yield nearly this much.  But Jeff Lynne projects don't get Coldplay's budget, do they? The link I personally find between the two is the quality of their recordings.  Anytime both make records, every sound is extremely well thought-out and laid-out.  

So, my money's on a big night for Coldplay.  If that doesn't happen, oh well.  At least they're a rare example of how fans became a top priority... and how so many fans were willing to actually shell out money to hear more.

OUT OF THE BLU SPEC

In terms of this new ELO release in Japan, there's not much to add from the Discovery Blu-Spec comments earlier.  Currently, this version of the Out of the Blue remaster is the best sounding available.  The improvement is slight, but I have to admit, to my ears, there's one track seems to benefit the most from this new format: Latitude 88 North.  I hear a few more details (or is it stability) in this version.

Anyway, if you buy one, take care of the case.  It's an extra thick jewel case that houses the deluxe remastered booklet, Blu-Spec info sheet, black & white lyrics booklet and (unique to any other release) a standard CD fold insert (because the deluxe OOTB booklet isn't standard CD size) of the album cover art on the front, the inside of the spaceship on the flip side.