Saved by Sound

The blues is a river with tributaries that flow into virtually every channel of American music. Dan Auerbach’s Nashville-based label Easy Eye Sound — Billboard’s Blues Label of the Year in 2022 — is charting a new course in “21st century juke joint blues.” The label’s new anthology Tell Everybody! is a bracing compilation, produced by Auerbach — winner of the GRAMMY Award as 2013 Producer of the Year, Non-Classical — featuring all new, exclusive recordings cut at Easy Eye Sound’s eponymous Nashville studio. From old masters to brilliant youngbloods, acoustic blues to roiling blues-rock, the collection is a fully realized survey of the blues tradition.

As digital technology began to prevail in the recording industry in the early '80s, Elton John's original record producer, Gus Dudgeon, was among the first to actively embrace the seemingly infinite possibilities in the medium. Although the promise of perfect sound may have been a bit of an exaggeration, the notable improvements to the subtleties as well as the expanded frequency response of recordings remastered in the digital domain were most certainly not. Dudgeon's original idea for this 11-track compilation was to not only present some of John's best-known works in this new realm, but also a few of the deeper album cuts that would most aptly demonstrate the awesome dimensions inherent in digital audio reproduction…

The Bee Gees were a music group formed in 1958, featuring brothers Barry, Robin, and Maurice Gibb. The trio were especially successful as a popular music act in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and later as prominent performers of the disco music era in the mid-to-late 1970s. The group sang recognisable three-part tight harmonies; Robin's clear vibrato lead vocals were a hallmark of their earlier hits, while Barry's R&B falsetto became their signature sound during the mid-to-late 1970s and 1980s. The Bee Gees wrote all of their own hits, as well as writing and producing several major hits for other artists.

The most romantic album to come out of the Moody Blues' orbit, and the biggest success by any of the members during the group's five-year hiatus, Justin Hayward and John Lodge's Blue Jays actually started life as a busted collaboration between Hayward and Moody Blues keyboardist Mike Pinder, with Tony Clarke producing and John Lodge in a supporting role, until Pinder pulled out. Clarke then salvaged the early work by holding it together as a collaboration between Hayward and Lodge. Hayward has the more distinctive body of songs, but their strength as a unit lies in their vocal pairing, which is as strong here as it ever was with the group. The pair play the guitars and basses, backed by a group that includes members of Providence, who were signed to the Moodies' Threshold Records.

The righteous and bombastic nature of the great bassist/composer Charles Mingus made him a polarizing personality. His unique personality, combined with his groundbreaking music, were magnetic for open-minded listeners. Clarinetist Harry Skoler discovered Mingus and his music early in life. This discovery would change his entire trajectory as a person and musician, which Skoler celebrates on his new recording, Living In Sound: The Music of Charles Mingus.