Music Connection May 2021

Japan-only compilation to coincide with the proposed but cancelled April 2020 Bob Dylan tour of Japan.
In “fat-boy” jewel case with clear trays and obi. A sticker with fifteen tour dates is attached to the front shrinkwrap.
A thirty six-page colour booklet includes reproductions of all thirty one single covers. A sixty-eight page black and white booklet includes two sets of liner notes in Japanese and lyrics to all tracks in English and Japanese. A promotional postcard was given with purchase at some outlets.

Dragon formed in Auckland, New Zealand, in January 1972 with a line-up that featured Todd Hunter on bass guitar, guitarist Ray Goodwin, drummer Neil Reynolds and singer/pianist Graeme Collins. All had been in various short-lived bands in Auckland, Collins is credited with using I Ching to provide the name Dragon…

Kurt Cobain made plenty of mistakes in his life, but loving the Vaselines was not among them. Nirvana covered three of their songs, and as Kurt might tell you if he were alive today, from 1986 to 1989 the Vaselines were the best pop band around…

Beyond the Darkness is an anthology of the second half of the career of the Italian band Goblin, best known for its propulsive scores for Italian film director Dario Argento.
Combining elements of progressive psychedelia with jazz-rock, Eastern European folk music and the Baroque, Goblin’s music remains an eerie one-off.

Musicians like to observe that for all his notoriety as the wellspring of bebop, Charlie "Bird" Parker's music was loaded with the blues. Swedish Schnapps is as good a place as any to make that connection with Parker's music, including as it does two of his most enduring bop heads based on the blues, "Au Privave" and "Blues For Alice." While you wouldn't mistake either composition for a Muddy Waters tune, both relate Bird's off-kilter accents and serpentine melodicism at walking tempos that let you hear what's actually going by, instead of leaving you astonished but bemused. To really drive the point home, there's "K.C. Blues," which finds the altoist at his hollerin' best, and "Lover Man," certainly one of the bluesiest 32-bar standards around.

Acclaimed composer and multi-instrumentalist Joe Chambers brings together a global cast of talent on Dance Kobina, a joyous and ruminative gesture from the drummer and vibraphone master. His third release for Blue Note Records — and sonic complement to 2021’s Samba de Maracatu — Dance Kobina spotlights Chambers’ original compositions, explores new music, and delivers a fresh, intimate treatment of enduring tunes — each selection heavily informed or subtly influenced by AfroCuban guaguancó. “To me, all these pieces are connected,” says Chambers, “in many ways.”