[18+] Rötmånad (1970)

This album, cut live at London's Queen Elizabeth Hall in July of 1970, was the first Strawbs album to be released in the United States. It didn't do much in the U.S., but it did chart in England, and the original concert also got Rick Wakeman his first front-page coverage in the British music press, owing to his bravura performance on the solo piano spot, "Temperament for a Mind." The group is trying really hard here to make the jump from folk to folk-rock. They still play a lot of acoustic music, and some of it is surprisingly diverse, but this is a fairly successful album bridging the gap between the acoustic Strawbs combo of their first incarnation and the harder, more strident folk-rock stylings that followed on From the Witchwood, with hints of progressive leanings.

Jesus Christ Superstar started life as a most improbable concept album from an equally unlikely label, Decca Records, which had not, until then, been widely known for groundbreaking musical efforts. It was all devised by then 21-year-old composer Andrew Lloyd Webber and 25-year-old lyricist Tim Rice. Jesus Christ Superstar had been conceived as a stage work, but lacking the funds to get it produced, the two collaborators instead decided to use an album as the vehicle for introducing the piece, a fairly radical rock/theater hybrid about the final days in the life of Jesus as seen from the point of view of Judas. If its content seemed daring (and perhaps downright sacrilegious), the work, a "sung-through" musical echoing operatic and oratorio traditions, was structurally perfect for an album; just as remarkable as its subject matter was the fact that its musical language was full-blown rock music.

This album stands as something of a minor landmark, musically - as far back as the late '70s, its presence in used record bins attracted a great deal of attention from historically minded collectors, as a genuine live recording of its era, and of a hard rock, heavy metal band, at that. Not too many concert recordings were attempted in hard rock in those days, and even a lot of what was issued in the way of live albums - John Lennon's Live Peace in Toronto and the Rolling Stones' Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! come to mind - were done under duress, as an attempt to undermine bootlegs that had shown up. And when one considers that Atlantic Records never even got around to recording the Rascals in concert, the very existence of Iron Butterfly Live can only be regarded something of a gift (though one that a lot of us would gladly trade for a period concert recording of Felix Cavaliere, et. al)…

Royal Servants, the forerunners of the more widely known Eulenspygel, were formed by a couple of schoolboys from the town of Reichenbach in Swabia. Since 1964, they had been playing together as the Sounders, changing the name to Royal Servants in 1965. In the Summer of 1970, they decided to release an LP and the tracks were recorded in October 1970, in the tried and tested Jankowski studio, and mixed shortly afterwards. The LP was released under the title of "We" in an edition of probably one or two thousand copies, and has meanwhile become a quite sought-after collectors' item. The present CD, which was taken from the master tapes, includes the four songs from the first two singles as bonus tracks. It is thus a collection of all the recordings ever released by the Royal Servants. Only "The Blues Comin' My Way" had to be taken from vinyl and was digitally de-crackled, since the master tape of this track is now lost.

For what would be his final of over 20 Blue Note albums, tenor saxophonist Hank Mobley uses a sextet that also includes trumpeter Woody Shaw, the obscure guitarist Eddie Diehl, pianist Cedar Walton, bassist Mickey Bass, and drummer Leroy Williams for a typically challenging set of advanced hard bop music. For the first and only time in his career, Mobley recorded a "Suite" (consisting of "Thinking of Home," "The Flight," and "Home at Last"); the remainder of the set has three of his other attractive originals plus Mickey Bass' "Gayle's Groove." This music was not released for the first time until 1980. It is only fitting that Hank Mobley would record one of the last worthwhile Blue Note albums before its artistic collapse (it would not be revived until the 1980s) for his consistent output helped define the label's sound in the 1960s. Mobley's excellent playing and the adventurous solos of Woody Shaw make this LP (his last as a leader) one to hunt for.

When a major artist dies, labels can usually be counted on to release anything and everything the artist had in the can, regardless of quality. In the case of Otis Redding, most of the posthumous releases were of a very high quality. One example is Tell the Truth, which was recorded the year he died, 1967, and remained unreleased until 1970. Though it falls short of essential, Truth has a lot to excite the soul icon's more devoted followers. Tracks like "I Got the Will," "Snatch a Little Piece," and "Demonstration" are pure Redding - frenzied, passionate, relentlessly gritty Memphis soul that makes no concessions to pop tastes or Northern soul. "Out of Sight" speaks volumes about him - while others would have been afraid to cover a song written and defined by James Brown, Redding confidently tackles the song with splendid results. Redding's last major hit, "Dock of the Bay," indicated that had he lived, he would have explored softer, Northern R&B sounds. But on this album it was Memphis all the way.

Elton John is the second studio album by English singer-songwriter Elton John, released on 10 April 1970 by DJM Records. It was released by Uni Records. The album was the first release by John in the United States because Empty Sky was not released in that country until 1975…