Howard Jones 1983

Howard Jones at the BBC is a new five-CD box set that features a wealth of BBC Sessions and live concert broadcasts that focuses on the classic, early part of Jones’ career.

The original 1983 Now That's What I Call Music compilation - forever after referred to as 'NOW 1' - is being reissued on double vinyl and double CD. Issued in November of 1983, the Various Artists set (issued on vinyl and cassette at the time) came about from a partnership between Virgin and EMI and featured an impressive 11 number one singles, amongst it's "30 great tracks". These included singles from Phil Collins, Duran Duran, Bonnie Tyler, Paul Young and Culture Club.

No doubt to the consternation of Warner Bros. Records, Rickie Lee Jones took more than three years to follow up her second (and second Top Five, gold-selling) album, Pirates (1981) with The Magazine. (In the interim, the label issued the mini-album of live tracks and outtakes Girl at Her Volcano [1983].) But from the evidence of the finished product, she might have been better advised to take a little longer. Her self-titled first album was a delightful collection of folk-jazz-pop, sparked by the hit single "Chuck E.'s in Love," but it also pointed toward the moodier and more ambitious Pirates. On The Magazine, Jones seems to be rewriting both albums at once…