Bert Kaempfert had almost too much talent, ability, and good luck rolled into one career to be fully appreciated, even by his own chosen audience, the lovers of fine orchestral pop music. He was one of the most successful conductors, arrangers, and recording artists in the latter field, but was also a major producer and played a key (if indirect) role in the roots of the British beat boom of the early '60s, which evolved into the British Invasion of America in 1964…
Alison Maria Krauss (born July 23, 1971) is an American bluegrass-country singer-songwriter and musician. She entered the music industry at an early age, winning local contests by the age of ten and recording for the first time at fourteen. She signed with Rounder Records in 1985 and released her first solo album in 1987. She was invited to join the band with which she still performs, Alison Krauss and Union Station (AKUS), and later released her first album with them as a group in 1989.
A practical, no-frills clamshell box set celebrating the soft rock/folk-pop hitmakers' '70s heyday, the Warner Bros. Years 1971-1977 rounds up seven complete studio albums and one live LP. Comprised of America (1971), Homecoming (1972), Hat Trick (1973), Holiday (1974), Hearts (1975), Hideaway (1976), Harbor (1977), and America Live (1977), all of which were remastered in 2014, the collection is aimed squarely at completists…
In 1997 when “Big Men Cry” was originally released on Planet Dog Records, no one could have predicted the chaos that would surround and follow it. The campaign was a classic case of the record company marketing one thing and the artist recording another. In this instance, the label and many of the public alike wanted “another Last Train to Lhasa” but for Toby Marks (AKA Banco de Gaia), another “Lhasa” was the last thing on his mind.
Add to that a breakdown of relations between Toby and the record label and you have all the necessary components for a pretty uncomfortable album release. This was compounded by Ultimate Records, who licensed the Planet Dog label, going into liquidation shortly after the album’s release. As a result “Big Men Cry” never really got the attention it deserved and didn’t come close to the chart success of “Lhasa” or its predecessor “Maya”…
Beat music, British beat, or Merseybeat (after bands from Liverpool and nearby areas beside the River Mersey) is a pop and rock music genre that developed in the United Kingdom in the early 1960s. Beat music is a fusion of rock and roll (mainly Chuck Berry guitar style and the midtempo beat of artists like Buddy Holly), doo-wop, skiffle and R&B. The genre provided many of the bands responsible for the British Invasion of the American pop charts starting in 1964, and provided the model for many important developments in pop and rock music, including the format of the rock group around lead, rhythm and bass guitars with drums. The Beat Of The Pops - excellent selection of beat tracks.