Family of The Year

If 1976 was year zero for punk rock in the U.K. with the Sex Pistols and Clash blowing up and taking over the music press, 1977 was the year record shops were flooded with singles by all sorts of bands capitalizing on the sound, fury, and attitude of punk. Cherry Red's 1977: The Year Punk Broke is a chronologically chosen three-disc selection of singles that touches on some of the biggest releases of the year plus loads of tracks that still sound rough and ready by bands who didn't stand the test of time.

For over 35 years, Texas bluesman Lightnin' Hopkins was known as the leading performer of traditional Texas blues, his distinctive guitar style and sly mix of humor and tradition mixing to make him one of the most popular performers of his day. Moving from the guitar to the piano, Elmar, AR, native Roosevelt Sykes' influential style led to a successful recording career that endured for over half a century. In this release, both musicians sit down to discuss their rich legacies before offering evidence as to just how they made their mark in music history with a pair of unforgettable performances.

For those who lack the cash or incentive to invest in Bear Family's mammoth eight-CD Rock 'N' Roll Years box set, this two-CD, 40-song overview of Conway Twitty's 1958-1963 MGM sides is a fine summary of his early career. Nearly all his Top Hundred chart hits are here, as are numerous flops, B-sides, and LP tracks. It's true that these were the most rock-oriented years of Twitty's long career, and also that many of these sides are derivative of early Elvis Presley……..

The Polish-Jewish composer Mieczyslaw Weinberg (1919-1996), who lost his family due to National Socialism, fled to Russia and was again later subjected to Stalinist persecution, was one of the unjustly forgotten composers of the 20th century until recently. He left behind a considerable oeuvre, and with an impressive renaissance during recent years, including an acclaimed production of 'The Passenger' at ENO, he is now considered one of the most important composers of the Soviet Union alongside Shostakovich and Prokofiev.'The Idiot', based on the novel of the same title by Dostoyevsky, is Weinberg's final opera, composed during the mid-1980s. The plot: the young Prince Myshkin returns to St Petersburg, penniless after many years spent in a Swiss clinic.

Billy Joel is a New York icon who became one of the most successful singer/songwriters of the late 20th century. He first rose to success in the mid-'70s with a melodic piano-led pop sound that merged Beatlesque hooks with elements of rock, jazz, Tin Pan Alley, and even Broadway.

Sounds of the Seventies was a 38-volume series issued by Time-Life during the late 1980s and early-to-mid 1990s, spotlighting pop music of the 1970s. Much like Time-Life's other series chronicling popular music, volumes in the "Sounds of the Seventies" series covered a specific time period, including individual years in some volumes, and different parts of the decade (for instance, the early 1970s) in others; in addition, some volumes covered specific trends, such as music popular on album-oriented rock stations on the FM band. Each volume was issued on either compact disc, cassette or (with volumes issued prior to 1991) vinyl record.