Editorial Product Review: :No other Otis compilation quite satisfies the way the old double-LP best-of does, but never mind: any way you hear Redding's many great moments is a good one. The Very Best splits ballads and up-tempo stuff half-and-half, letting you hear the great one's humanity in every mood--the pile-driving rock of 'Respect,' the preaching fervor of 'Try a Little Tenderness,' the nascent reflection of 'Dock of the Bay.' A record collection with no Otis is a poor thing: here's yours. --Rickey Wright
Editorial Product Review: :\N :A glimpse of the future, and not because of its huge influence and umpteen million sales. The poor-little-rich-boy protest 'Out ta Get Me' intimates that Axl Rose's egotism and martyr complex were soon to grow bigger than his head; still, Appetite's night-train wreck of punk and metal sounds and sensibilities make it more than just an emblem of its time. Whether GN'R are dancing with Mr. Brownstone, penning a callow kiss-off letter to some chick named Michelle, or passing out on somebody else's ...
Editorial Product Review: :If they are to believed, David Gates and the other members of Bread never intended to become the enduring icons of a subgenre they virtually invented: soft rock. Indeed, scattered throughout this expanded edition of a perennial bestselling catalog album are tuneful evidence of their original intent, as one band mate said, 'to make the '60s last a little longer.' But it's the familiar, largely Gates-penned and -sung hit singles that remain the band's legacy, from 'Make It with You' through the reunited band's last ...
Editorial Product Review: :Fresh Cream, the album that introduced this seminal super-blues trio to America, was perhaps a bit too blues-based to do the advance hype ('Clapton is God!') justice. Two of its three best-known tracks, after all, were blues covers. It was Disraeli Gears that turned Cream into a 'supergroup.' Here they pursue the psychedelic ideals of the era with total abandon (the LP cover art still stands as one of the 1960s' most striking designs), merging these ideals with their take on the blues and adorning ...
Editorial Product Review: essential recording:Born in the U.S.A. is an album painted in big, broad strokes. But it was still too subtle for some--namely politicians who tried to tap the title track as a jingoistic anthem when it is in fact a bitter diatribe by a Vietnam War vet whose country forgot him. The rest of the album is a glorious grab bag of radio-ready populist anthems--his best display of pure pop songwriting ever--including 'No Surrender,' 'Dancing in the Dark,' 'Bobby Jean,' and 'Glory Days' alongside more ...
Editorial Product Review: :Forrest Gump (1994) is one of the most successful films ever made, winning Tom Hanks his second successive Best Actor Oscar (he won the previous year for Philadelphia) as well as claiming the Best Picture Oscar and many other awards and nominations, including several for music. A unique fable of American life from the 1950s to the 80s, the film blends comedy, drama, war, romance and groundbreaking special effects into a social and political portrait of the passing years, all seen through the eyes of ...
Editorial Product Review:Album Description:On 'Brass in Pocket,' one of the pretenders earliest singles-and their first to chart in the U.S., scoring #14 in Billboard-Chrissie Hynde sings, 'I'm special, so special, I gotta have some of your attention, give it to me.' Formed in London in '78 with Hynde, James Honeyman Scott, Martin Chambers, and Pete Farndon, the band received massive attention for that hit and other stellar songs from their 1980 self-titled debut album. Via impeccable musicianship and Hynde's charismatic persona-equal parts cool swagger, tough-but vulnerable lyrics ...
Editorial Product Review: essential recording:Kicking off A&M's ambitious Cat Stevens reissue program is this 20-song introduction. The set surveys all of Stevens's stages, from the orchestrated late-1960s sides through his early-'70s peak to his more eclectic late-1970s experiments. Following the progression makes for an interesting endeavor as Stevens learns to harness his ambitious ideas with arrangements that don't obscure his rhapsodic messages. Few artists of his generation were more gifted when it came to plucking timeless melodies out of thin air, and his sumptuous voice was always ...
Editorial Product Review: essential recording:Kicking off A&M's ambitious Cat Stevens reissue program is this 20-song introduction. The set surveys all of Stevens's stages, from the orchestrated late-1960s sides through his early-'70s peak to his more eclectic late-1970s experiments. Following the progression makes for an interesting endeavor as Stevens learns to harness his ambitious ideas with arrangements that don't obscure his rhapsodic messages. Few artists of his generation were more gifted when it came to plucking timeless melodies out of thin air, and his sumptuous voice was always ...
Editorial Product Review: :An Oscar win might suggest a score that would need a miracle to be bettered--but this colorful stage adaptation of Disney's The Lion King does so with flair. Composers Mark Mancina and Lebo M worked closely together to fuse the movie's many disparate elements. Where there was a veritable army exercising creative influences for the animated tale, this brings it all under the wings of a like-minded few. This is genuinely apparent as one track flows into the next. The African rhythms--both vocal and in ...
Canon's XH A1 and XH G1 are excellent camcorders for entry-level professionals and independent filmmakers, with hard-to-beat prices for what they offer.
Thanks to a rich set of features and some great new additions, Evite maintains its stature as the top service for issuing e-invitations —but competitors are catching up.
