William Haggard

Merle Haggard - Hag: The Studio Recordings 1969 - 1976 (2007) {6CD Bear Family Records BCD 16749}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 2.98 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 1.06 Gb | Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 19 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2007 Bear Family Records | BCD 16749
Country / Bakersfield Sound / Honky Tonk / Folk Rock / Progressive Country / Traditional Country / Western Swing Revival

Merle Haggard, RIP. In Memoriam. Merle Haggard, an icon of American music, died at his home in California on Wednesday, April 6, 2016. It was the singer, songwriter, and musician’s 79th birthday. In 2008 he battled lung cancer, and was hospitalized in December 2015 with double pneumonia. Haggard returned to the stage soon after, but was sidelined again in February due to continuing health concerns. “A week ago Dad told us he was gonna pass on his birthday,” Merle’s son and lead guitarist, Ben, revealed the day his father died, “and he wasn’t wrong.”

Merle Haggard - Hag: The Capitol Recordings 1968-1976 - Concepts, Live & The Strangers (2008) {6CD Set Bear Family Records}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 2.78 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 1.00 Gb | Artwork | 5% repair rar
© 1968-76, 2008 Capitol / EMI / Bear Family Records | BCD 16782 FK
Country / Bakersfield Sound / Honky Tonk / Folk Rock / Progressive Country / Traditional Country / Western Swing Revival

Twelve years after they released their first Merle Haggard box, The Untamed Hawk, Bear Family delivered the sequel, Hag: The Studio Recordings 1969-1976. This picks up where The Untamed Hawk left off, which is more of a musical dividing point than it initially seems. If The Untamed Hawk caught Haggard as he was reaching full flight, Hag captures him in his prime, as every single he released reached the Country Top Ten – often capturing the number one slot – and as he sometimes crossed over into the pop Top 40. Hag was without a doubt the biggest star in country music but the remarkable thing about his reign at the top was that he never played it safe.

William Bell is probably the most woefully underappreciated artist in the Stax Records stable. Primarily a ballad singer, Bell avoided the charismatic stage histrionics of singers like Otis Redding and Wilson Pickett in favor of a more subtle and melodic approach. He was also a gifted songwriter, penning in conjunction with his writing partner Booker T. Jones (of MGs fame) a handful of country-soul classics, including "You Don't Miss Your Water," a hit for Bell in 1961, and "Born Under a Bad Sign," which became the theme song for blues giant Albert King after his version was released in 1967. Bell wasn't afraid to mix pure country elements into the deep soul stew, as "You Don't Miss Your Water" shows, and his 1967 hit "Everybody Loves a Winner" is as much Merle Haggard as it is Otis Redding. "Eloise (Hang on in There)," another Bell/Jones collaboration, sounds like a great, lost Four Tops song, and is one of the many highlights on this revealing anthology, which works not only as an introduction to this underrated artist, but also as a solid survey of his top moments.

Classics Illustrated were comic book adaptations from classic literature, a series that Russian-born Albert Lewis Kanter (1897-1973) began in 1941 for Elliot Publishing. Introduced under the heading Classic Comics, the series started October, 1941, with a 64-page adaptation of Alexandre Dumas‘ , followed by and . With the fourth issue, The Last of the Mohicans, Kanter began his own Gilberton Publications. The first 12 issues had 64 pages, but wartime paper shortages forced Kanter to reduce each issue to 56 pages. In 1947, after the first 34 issues, Kanter changed the title from Classic Comics to Classics Illustrated, a logo with a high visibility over the next 15 years because Kanter, unlike other comic book publishers, kept his titles in print, going back to press with occasional reprintings. --

An acclaimed singer/songwriter whose literate work flirted with everything from acoustic folk to rockabilly to straight-ahead country, John Prine was born October 10, 1946, in Maywood, IL. Raised by parents firmly rooted in their rural Kentucky background, at age 14 Prine began learning to play the guitar from his older brother while taking inspiration from his grandfather, who had played with Merle Travis. After a two-year tenure in the U.S. Army, Prine became a fixture on the Chicago folk music scene in the late '60s, befriending another young performer named Steve Goodman…