Acoustic From October 2014

Bobby Hutcherson - San Francisco (1970) {2014 Japan SHM-CD Blue Note 24-192 Remaster}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 258 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 98 Mb
Full Artwork @ 600 dpi (png) -> 248 Mb | 5% repair rar | 24-bit 192 kHz remaster
© 1970, 2014 Universal Japan / Blue Note | BN 75th The Masterworks | TYCJ-81070
Jazz / Post Bop / Vibraphone

Features the high-fidelity SHM-CD format (compatible with standard CD player) and 24 bit remastering. Bobby Hutcherson's late-'60s partnership with tenor saxophonist Harold Land had always produced soulful results, but not until San Francisco did that translate into a literal flirtation with funk and rock. After watching several advanced post-bop sessions gather dust in the vaults, Hutcherson decided to experiment with his sound a bit, but San Francisco still doesn't wind up the commercial jazz-funk extravaganza that purists might fear. Instead, Hutcherson and Land stake out a warm and engaging middle ground between muscular funk and Coltrane-style modality; in other words, they have their cake and eat it too.

Arriving ten years after The Dark Horse Years: 1976-1992, The Apple Years: 1968-75 offers the first act of George Harrison's solo career presented in a handsomely produced, impeccably remastered box set. The outside packaging mirrors The Dark Horse Years but the discs housed inside the box show a greater attention to detail than the previous set: each of the albums is presented as a paper-sleeve mini-LP replicating the original album art (Extra Texture does indeed have extra texture on its sleeve), while the brief hardcover book contains perhaps the glossiest paper to ever grace a rock music box set. Better still, the remastering of all six albums is superb. Supervised by Harrison's son Dhani, the team mastermind by Paul Hicks, who worked on the acclaimed 2009 Beatles remasters, and featuring Gavin Lurssen and Reuben Cohen, bring The Apple Years to the same sonic standard as the 2009 Beatles remasters and the results are rich, deep, and alluring…

Emerson, Lake & Palmer's most successful and well-realized album (after their first), and their most ambitious as a group, as well as their loudest, Brain Salad Surgery was also the most steeped in electronic sounds of any of their records. The main focus, thanks to the three-part "Karn Evil 9," is sci-fi rock, approached with a volume and vengeance that stretched the art rock audience's tolerance to its outer limit, but also managed to appeal to the metal audience in ways that little of Trilogy did…

Arriving ten years after The Dark Horse Years: 1976-1992, The Apple Years: 1968-75 offers the first act of George Harrison's solo career presented in a handsomely produced, impeccably remastered box set. The outside packaging mirrors The Dark Horse Years but the discs housed inside the box show a greater attention to detail than the previous set: each of the albums is presented as a paper-sleeve mini-LP replicating the original album art (Extra Texture does indeed have extra texture on its sleeve), while the brief hardcover book contains perhaps the glossiest paper to ever grace a rock music box set…

Arriving ten years after The Dark Horse Years: 1976-1992, The Apple Years: 1968-75 offers the first act of George Harrison's solo career presented in a handsomely produced, impeccably remastered box set. The outside packaging mirrors The Dark Horse Years but the discs housed inside the box show a greater attention to detail than the previous set: each of the albums is presented as a paper-sleeve mini-LP replicating the original album art (Extra Texture does indeed have extra texture on its sleeve), while the brief hardcover book contains perhaps the glossiest paper to ever grace a rock music box set. Better still, the remastering of all six albums is superb. Supervised by Harrison's son Dhani, the team mastermind by Paul Hicks, who worked on the acclaimed 2009 Beatles remasters, and featuring Gavin Lurssen and Reuben Cohen, bring The Apple Years to the same sonic standard as the 2009 Beatles remasters and the results are rich, deep, and alluring…

Tudo is Brazilian singer and songwriter Bebel Gilberto's first album in five years. It marks a reunion with producer Mario Caldato, Jr., who helmed her breakthrough offering, 2000's Tanto Tempo. Recorded in six different studios in America and Brazil, Gilberto's MPB weds modern bossa, samba, contemporary jazz, and adult pop. Tudo's sound is elegant, more restrained yet more colorful than anything she's attempted before. She wrote or co-wrote seven of these tunes and sings in Portuguese, English, and French. The dreamy, sun-drenched opener, "Somewhere Else," with bossa guitars, jazzy piano, brushed drums, and gentle percussion, is brilliantly but subtly illustrated by a slightly dramatic string arrangement from Miguel Atwood-Ferguson (who does the same on two other selections), making the tune a kind of manifesto.

A jazz amalgam which embodies various elements from Indian, Funk, Rock, African, Balkan and Greek music. Melodic compositions for Guitars, Trumpet, El. Sitar, Tabla, Piano, Synth, Bass and Drums full of spirited improvisations.

Hakim is again having a great time on We Are One, his first solo album in 14 years, as he does a deep-dive into his long and varied history as a supporting player for acts as diverse as Madonna, Dire Straits, Sting, David Bowie and Miles Davis to craft an album that doesn't neatly fit into a single category. Hakim isn't as much about meeting expectations as he is making music that comes across as honest and sincere without a trace of calculation or catering to trends.

Brand X's most eclectic album to date, Product is perhaps most notable for its attempts at a pop crossover in the Phil Collins-sung "Don't Make Waves" and "Soho." The range of styles presented here – hard and soft fusion, pop, progressive rock – results from the now-interchangeable nature of the Brand X lineup, which, in addition to the returning Collins and Robin Lumley, is expanded to include bassist John Giblin and drummer Mike Clarke…