David Lacapelle

After their acclaimed recording of Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice, La Nuova Musica and David Bates expand their PENTATONE discography with Handel’s Unsung Heroes, in which the instrumentalists of Handel’s operas are put centre stage. Traditionally restricted to an “invisible” existence in the orchestra pit, La Nuova Musica’s obbligato instrumentalists – violinist Thomas Gould, oboist Leo Duarte and bassoonist Joe Qiu – are now in the limelight. They will stand as equal partners alongside a world-class line up of soloists – soprano Lucy Crowe, mezzo-soprano Christine Rice and countertenor Iestyn Davies – showing how Handel wrote music as virtuosic and lyrical for his unsung heroes as for their singing counterparts. The album includes arias from Handel masterpieces such as Rinaldo, Giulio Cesare, Agrippina and Ariodante.

Rhino released a new David Lee Roth box-set, The Warner Recordings 1985-1994, which features newly remastered versions of the former Van Halen lead singer’s first five solo releases. Roth released his debut EP, Crazy From The Heat while still a member of Van Halen. Consisting of cover versions, it was a hit, reaching number 15 on the Billboard 200. Following on from this success, David Lee Roth departed Van Halen in the summer of 1985 and his first solo album, Eat ‘Em and Smile, would follow in the July of 1986. More straightforwardly ‘rock’ than his EP, it still retained some of the wide-ranging tastes explored previously, including a cover of Frank Sinatra’s ‘That’s Life’. 1987’s Skyscraper, included the hit ‘Just Like Paradise’ and 1991’s A Little Ain’t Enough continued Roth’s run of success, with another top 20 placement on the Billboard 200. 1994’s Your Filthy Little Mouth was produced by Nile Rogers although the shifting musical landscapes, especially the emergence of grunge, meant Your Filthy Little Mouth would not match the success of Roth’s previous albums, in America. The new box set features the debut EP and the following four albums as a 5CD set in a clamshell box.

"On the Outside tour, Bowie quietly served as a grounding point for Reznor; he offered, in his music and his performances, the potential of a future. … Bowie and Reznor designed an interim sequence to bridge their sets. There would be no NIN encore. Instead Bowie, then his band, would join NIN on stage, and then NIN would depart, leaving Reznor singing with Bowie's band. The concert featured on this remarkable 2CD set finds the entourage playing at The Riverport Amphitheatre in St Louis, Missouri, on 11th October 1995.

The audio companion to David Toop's excellent book advances the case he made, that Les Baxter, Aphex Twin, The Beach Boys, Herbie Hancock, King Tubby and My Bloody Valentine are all related by their effect on sound pioneering. A double-disc set, Ocean of Sound impresses not only with its incredible diversity of musical styles, but with how easily these artists work next to each other. The second disc includes consecutive contributions by Paul Schütze, the Velvet Undergound, Holger Czukay of Can, The Beach Boys, African Headcharge and Sun Ra. Besides illustrating Toop's point beautifully, the album is an excellent addition to the collection of any wide-ranging ambient fan.