Mountain Alabama

With an impressive run of hits in the '80s – thanks to a country sound washed in a sleek, pop sheen and with enough rock dynamics to put it all over – Alabama built an early template for how to be a country group in the 21st century. They had chart hits in three different decades, a pretty impressive lesson in longevity in a business that hardly encourages it. This well-sequenced set features some of the group’s most enduring songs, including “I’m in a Hurry (And Don’t Know Why),” “Song of the South,” and “Mountain Music,” among others, and makes it easy to hear why Alabama was so ubiquitous in the genre.

Sony Legacy reissued five albums recorded in the '80s by Alabama: My Home's in Alabama, Feels So Right, Mountain Music, The Closer You Get…, and Roll On…

There are probably people who can't name one–let alone 41–of Alabama's country-western hits and, for them, it probably comes as a shock to find out that this band has actually taken that many songs to the top of the C&W charts…

When the Mountain Goats got together in March 2020, it was to make not one album, but two. The idea was to again work with Matt Ross-Spang, the dashing Memphis wunderkind. Matt pitched we spend a week at Sam Phillips Recording, his home base in Memphis, followed by another at the storied Fame Recording Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, a plan that dovetailed nicely with John’s notion of corralling these songs into two complementary batches: one light, one dark. The Memphis album Getting Into Knives, would be brighter, bolder, marked by rich and vibrant hues; the Muscle Shoals album Dark in Here, is quieter, smokier, but more deeply textured and intense.

Die Hamburger Jazzszene ihre Vielfalt und Lebendigkeit bringen so manchen Musikliebhaber zum Schwärmen. Nach dem Zweiten Weltkrieg fanden sich in der Stadt an der Elbe hunderte spielhungriger Bands zusammen, für die bald auch unzählige Auftrittsorte entstanden. Der Cotton Club oder Dennis Swing Club wer kennt sie nicht? Für die Fans des Hamburger Jazz und alle, die mehr darüber erfahren möchten, entstand diese umfangreiche Kollektion. In Wort, Bild und Ton wird der Werdegang einer einmaligen Szene lebendig: von der Zeit, als die Hafenstadt in Trümmern lag, bis hin zum Sound von heute. Sie halten ein Set in Händen, das aus 18 CDs und einem 300 Seiten starken Buch besteht.

The Rough Guide series of compilations is generally excellent, but every once a while a dud does pop out. While not bad, this is far from everything it could be, given the range and history of gospel music. It captures some, but not all, the big names. And so listeners have vintage Five Blind Boys of Alabama with "Stand By Me," a song they later revisited, but no Five Blind Boys of Mississippi. And while the Soul Stirrers are here, it's not a cut from their heyday with Sam Cooke, and where are the Highway Q.C.'s? Gospel's real golden age, in the '50s, is woefully under-represented, and while the Golden Gate Quartet, whose influence was paramount to so many, is mentioned in the notes, there's nothing by them. Mahalia Jackson justifiably gets two tracks, but no Clara Ward, and you have to wonder about the inclusion of the Montreal Jubilation Gospel Choir. The new generation of gospel seems to be lacking, with nothing from the critically acclaimed Sacred Steel school.