Middle of the Road is a Scottish pop group who have enjoyed success across Europe and Latin America since the 1970s. Before ABBA established themselves in the mid 70s, Middle of the Road were the sound of early europop with their distinctive harmonies and lead vocals from Sally Carr. Four of their singles sold over one million copies each, and received a gold disc: "Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep". "Sacramento", "Tweedle Dee, Tweedle Dum" and "Soley Soley". By early 1972 the group had sold over five million records…
Middle of the Road’s discography is complicated, the end effect of being a Scottish band whose popularity was built on European hits. Their first album was an Italian release, they had records released only on the continent then later repackaged for the U.K. as a premature Hits collection, they barely had anything in the U.S. Cherry Red/7T’s 2010 set The RCA Years performs a useful function of rounding up the released master takes - in other words, the three LPs Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep, Acceleration, and Drive On, plus six cuts only on that Italian debut - presenting the complete recorded works and far too much Middle of the Road for anyone outside of Euro-pop obsessives.
The Pretenders Greatest Hits is a selection of 20 songs and their variously successful videos. Chrissie Hynde arrived in the UK in 1973, and after a period as the "Loud Yank" NME journalist, she realised her dream of putting a band together. "Stop Your Sobbing" was a terrific first single for The Pretenders, debuting a voice that defied comparison or description. Naturally it's included here. Chrissie hated the early videos for her songs, especially "Brass in Pocket", which was one of the very first shown on MTV. She relays this sort of information to camera in the terrific documentary, "No Turn Left Unstoned", featured on this DVD. Comments come in from Rosanna Arquette, ex-managers, Elvis Costello, Bono, and her oldest friend.
The Pretenders' 1987 collection, The Singles, did a fine job of assembling most of the group's finest tracks up to that point in their career, so after another decade passed, their record company felt it was necessary to compile a more "updated" collection, 2000's Euro-only release Greatest Hits. Although it contains a total of 20 tracks, Greatest Hits ultimately fails to improve over its predecessor, for the simple fact that the early '80s was the Pretenders' artistic and commercial peak, and Greatest Hits contains too much latter-day material. Whereas it would have been a wise move to showcase such oft-overlooked classics as "Tattooed Love Boys," "Mystery Achievement," "Precious," "My City Was Gone," or "Birds of Paradise" (all of which weren't included on The Singles), Greatest Hits includes such not-as-strong selections as "Night in My Veins," "Breakfast in Bed," and "Human" instead. Although there are quite a few gems included ("Brass in Pocket," "Message of Love," "Talk of the Town," "Kid," "Back on the Chain Gang," etc.), Greatest Hits leaves out far too many prime selections to be considered truly definitive.
Awakening… (1969). From the legendary hard rocking South African psych rock scene, alongside such greats as Freedom’s Children, and Suck, comes The Third Eye. Awakening is the Third Eye’s debut full length, originally released in 1969, and is a masterful and complex album of late sixties South African heavy psych, featuring fuzzed out guitars, great brass arrangements and virtuosic organ work, provided by the young Dawn Selby, who, at the time of recording was all of 14 years old…
The Fray is an American rock band from Denver, Colorado. Formed in 2002 by schoolmates Isaac Slade and Joe King, they achieved success with the release of their debut album, How to Save a Life in 2005, which was certified double platinum by the RIAA and platinum in Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the UK. A collection includes all the studio albums by The Fray at the moment, also 1 Live, 1 EP and 3 singles.
Awakening… (1969). From the legendary hard rocking South African psych rock scene, alongside such greats as Freedom’s Children, and Suck, comes The Third Eye. Awakening is the Third Eye’s debut full length, originally released in 1969, and is a masterful and complex album of late sixties South African heavy psych, featuring fuzzed out guitars, great brass arrangements and virtuosic organ work, provided by the young Dawn Selby, who, at the time of recording was all of 14 years old…