Manfred Mann's Earth Band Live in America

Somewhere in Afrika, an ode to Mann's home country of South Africa, contains a formula that is atypical of Manfred Mann's Earth Band sound. With rhythms that combine an African flavor with a modern rock feel, vocalist Mick Rogers takes over on vocals with the number 22 hit "Runner," released as the album's only single. Tracks such as "Demolition Man" and "Eyes of Nostradamus" are model Earth Band efforts, but the compelling material lies in songs such as "Lalela," "Koze Kobenini," and the title track, which conveys Mann's love for his birthplace without sounding overly pretentious or manufactured. The instrumentation is solid and free-flowing, with drums and other percussion work coming to the forefront while maintaining the group's atmosphere as a rock band.

Remakes can be atrocious wastes of wax: subpar carbon copy re-treads dressed up as calculated idolatry, or deconstructionist reconfigurations basking in the laziness of lyrics already written. However, two of the greatest rewrites in history belong to Manfred Mann's Earth Band. The treatments of Bruce Springsteen's "Blinded By the Light" and "For You" included here create a wholly unique variation on the stark, earthy originals by flipping the tracks and exposing the soft, white underbelly, then piling on excessive musical ornamentation like a master filmmaker visualizing a novel, blowing the inspiration at the nucleus into a bowdlerized paronomasia of sonic perfection.

The Best Of Manfred Mann's Earth Band is a compilation album released in 1993 by Manfred Mann's Earth Band. After a very successful period in the 60's with the pop group named after him and a much less successful intermezzo in Jazz with Chapter Three, the South-African born keyboardist Manfred Mann turned towards Rock music. In 1971 he formed Manfred Mann's Earth Band (MMEB). Mann's use of the Moog synthesizer was key to the sound of this band. MMEB had a very successful area during the mid 70's and early 80's but was disbanded by Mann in 1987 after being fed up with trying to produce hit records. He started a project which was based mostly on the music of Native American Indians named Manfred Mann's Plain Music and which released one album. After this Mann reformed the MMEB in 1991 and was starting again to release records with them occasionally but also to be a regular live band with extensive tours mostly in Europe until today.

2009 five CD live set from the veteran British band. Manfred Mann's Earth Band has toured consistently since their inception in the early '70s. No wonder then, that there are countless bootleg recordings doing the rounds. The band is renowned for shaping their songs on a gig-by-gig basis and this collection shows how the sets have been molded and developed over the years. The CDs contain recordings from various European venues, dating from 1981 to 2007. Apart from Volume One, they are all taken from single concerts. For timing purposes, some sets have been edited, but no other enhancements, re-records or overdubs have been added. The performances on this set were recorded in Europe 1981, Austria 1986, Germany 1991, Norway 1999, and Germany 2007.

Most folks know Manfred Mann from his '60s hits, but too few have ever heard the brilliant Manfred Mann's Earth Band album. Exploring arty and progressive directions, the Earth Band was a wholly different group from Mann's earlier lineup…

Blinded By The Light: The Very Best Of Manfred Mann's Earth Band is a compilation album released in 1992 by Manfred Mann's Earth Band. Manfred Mann's Earth Band are an English rock band formed by South African musician Manfred Mann. The band's hits include covers of Bruce Springsteen's "For You","Blinded by the Light" and "Spirit In The Night". After forming in 1971 and despite a short hiatus in the late 1980s/early 1990s, the Earth Band has continued to perform and tour through the present.

An R&B band that only played pop to get on the charts, Manfred Mann and its various permutations ranked among the most adept British Invasion acts in both styles. South African-born keyboardist Manfred Mann was originally an aspiring jazz player, moving toward R&B when more blues-oriented sounds became in vogue in England in the early '60s. Original Manfred Mann singer Paul Jones was one of the best British Invasion singers, and his resonant vocals were the best feature of their early R&B sides, which had a slightly jazzier and smoother touch than the early work of the Rolling Stones and Animals…

The album that was Manfred Mann's commercial breakthrough was a departure from the previous albums made with the Earth Band. Though the personnel are the same and the musicianship is as mind-blowing as ever, the songs are shorter and punchier, in some cases more poppy. This is not to say that the band had sacrificed a bit of ingenuity or complexity, but the long jams are gone in favor of briefer sound portraits. Nightingales and Bombers included Manfred Mann's first cover of a Bruce Springsteen song, the album-opening "Spirits in the Night," a single that charted, and became one of the only pieces written in 10/4 time ever to do so.