Nothing in my Heart

Ivan Lins is one of the most treasured and recorded Brazilian composers in the world and a melodist with few equals. The winner of four Latin Grammy Awards, Lins has recorded nearly fifty albums since 1970; they contain countless songs, notably “Madalena” and “Começar de Novo” (To Begin Again), that have become standards in his country. “Love Dance,” cowritten with his longtime arranger, Gilson Peranzzetta, and lyricist Paul Williams, is Lins’s English-language classic. Its performers include Sarah Vaughan, Peggy Lee, Mark Murphy, Shirley Horn, Blossom Dearie, Carmen McRae, George Benson, Nancy Wilson, Barbra Streisand, and Quincy Jones, who helped maneuver Lins’s U.S. breakthrough in the early ‘80s.

The Eclipse Sessions, John Hiatt's newest album, offers up his strongest set of songs in years. Long celebrated as a skilled storyteller and keen observer of life's twists and turns, Hiatt can get at the heart of a knotty emotion or a moment in time with just a sharp, incisive lyric or witty turn of phrase. The 11 tracks presented in The Eclipse Sessions, from the breezy opener ''Cry to Me,'' to the stark ''Nothing in My Heart,'' the lost-love lamentation ''Aces Up Your Sleeve'' to the rollicking ''Poor Imitation of God,'' demonstrate that the singer-songwriter, now 66, is only getting better with age, his guitar playing more rugged and rootsy, his words wiser and more wry. Hiatt goes all in with The Eclipse Sessions. There's a grit to these songs' a craggy, perfectly-imperfect quality that colors every aspect of the performances, right down to Hiatt's vocals, which are quite possibly his most raw and expressive to date. ''They ain't pretty, that's for sure,'' he says about the creaks and cracks that punctuate his phrases in songs like ''Poor Imitation of God'' and ''One Stiff Breeze.'' ''But I don't mind a bit. All the catches and the glitches and the gruffness, that sounds right to me. That sounds like who I am.'' The Eclipse Sessions is the sound of an artist not only living in but also capturing the moment.

It's often unfair to compare the Rolling Stones to the Beatles but in the case of the group's mono mixes, it's instructive. Until the 2009 release of the box set The Beatles in Mono, all of the Fab Four's mono mixes were out of print. That's not the case with the Rolling Stones. Most of their '60s albums – released on Decca in the U.K., London in the U.S. – found mono mixes sneaking onto either the finished sequencing or various singles compilations, so the 2016 box The Rolling Stones in Mono only contains 56 heretofore unavailable mono mixes among its 186 tracks…

It's often unfair to compare the Rolling Stones to the Beatles but in the case of the group's mono mixes, it's instructive. Until the 2009 release of the box set The Beatles in Mono, all of the Fab Four's mono mixes were out of print. That's not the case with the Rolling Stones. Most of their '60s albums – released on Decca in the U.K., London in the U.S. – found mono mixes sneaking onto either the finished sequencing or various singles compilations, so the 2016 box The Rolling Stones in Mono only contains 56 heretofore unavailable mono mixes among its 186 tracks…

Set My Heart On Fire Immediately is the fifth studio album from Perfume Genius that will be released May 15th on Matador Records. It sees artist and musician Mike Hadreas re-teaming with GRAMMY-nominated producer Blake Mills and features contributions from musicians Jim Keltner, Pino Palladino and Matt Chamberlin. It was recorded in Los Angeles, where Perfume Genius settled in 2017 with longtime partner and musical collaborator Alan Wyffels.