Rarebird's Rock and Roll Nest

For Record Store Day 2024, the Culture Factory label is issuing yet another live album by Nico, the late German chanteuse best known for her association with the Velvet Underground. Nico At The Live Inn, Tokyo '86 was recorded at Shibuya Live Inn in Tokyo, Japan on April 11, 1986. This RSD LP is pressed in transparent green vinyl, and is limited to 2,000 copies. The Record Store Day website states that the album "has never been released on vinyl", but that is not exactly true. Although this album has never before been commercially issued in the U.S., it was released on vinyl in the U.K. and Japan in 1987 as Nico In Tokyo , and was issued on CD during the '90's in those same territories under the same title. Also, the album was released on vinyl in Italy for Record Store Day 2017, under the title Live In Tokyo 1986 . The sound quality of the album is usually excellent, and the album itself is quite good as well. Nico, who was born in Germany in 1938 as Christa

The 59th set of exclusive vinyl items offered to members of Third Man Records’ Vault service was mailed out to the members in March and April of 2024. For those who are unaware, Third Man Records is the label owned by Jack White, who is the leader of the White Stripes, the Raconteurs, and the Dead Weather, and is now a solo artist. The Vault service promises to deliver exclusive vinyl-only records (usually one full-length album and one 7” single) to its members every three months. The 59th Vault package was titled Elvis Presley at 706 Union Ave: The Sun Singles 1954-55 , and contained five 7-inch vinyl reproductions of Presley's first five singles, which were originally released on Sun Records seventy years earlier. These five discs were pressed in yellow-and-black-marble-colored vinyl, resembling the colors of the Sun Records logo. An additional 7-inch disc contained four more tracks recorded during Elvis' sessions at Sun Records, pressed in a different design of yellow and

For Record Store Day 2024, Rhino Records is issuing a previously unreleased live album from The Doors, in both CD and LP formats. Live at Konserthuset, Stockholm, September 20, 1968 will be limited to 6,000 vinyl 3-LP sets (pressed in light-blue translucent vinyl), and 8,000 double-CD sets. The album documents two live shows performed on that day at that concert hall in Sweden, recorded for a radio broadcast. The documented concerts were performed during the final date of the band's only European Tour. The recordings have been used for bootlegs many times, but this is the first time the concert is receiving an official release. The sound quality on the unofficial releases was often quite good; if it has been cleaned up further for this official release, then it may end up sounding great. Musically, it sometimes sounds as though the Doors were tailoring their act just a bit to adjust their music for the tastes of European audiences. The earlier show of the day is the one featur

For Record Store Day Black Friday in 2023, Amoeba Records issued a previously unreleased live album by the late country-rock pioneer Gram Parsons, recorded in Philadelphia in 1973. The double-LP titled The Last Roundup: Live from the Bijou Café in Philadelphia, 3/16/73 was limited to 7,500 vinyl copies. The concert documented on this album took place on March 16, 1973, six months before Parsons died at the age of 26. Gram's singing partner was the then-unknown Emmylou Harris. The Fallen Angels also consisted of Neil Flanz (pedal steel guitar), Kyle Tullis (bass), Jock Bartley (lead guitar), and N.D. Smart II (drums). The double-LP was sourced from the soundboard recording made at the intimate Bijou Café venue in Philly, and the sound quality -- though not 100% squeaky clean -- is closer to that of a commercial release than of an unofficial recording. The set list was drawn from Gram's first solo album GP and from his work with the Flying Burrito Brothers and the Byrds, and

For Record Store Day Black Friday in 2023, a live LP by Sparks was issued in a limited edition of 3,500 copies, pressed in clear vinyl. Live At The Record Plant 1974 documents a live-in-the-studio eight-song set from a lineup consisting of most of the personnel from that year's Propaganda album. This live album has frequently appeared as a bootleg in the past. This RSDBF LP marks its first official release, on Sony's Sound City imprint. For those not familiar with Sparks, they are an art-pop duo with a long and complicated 50-plus-year history that isn't over yet. (Their 26th studio album, titled The Girl Is Crying in Her Latte , was released last year). The Mael brothers -- the only two constant members -- were born in Los Angeles, but you wouldn't know it from their seemingly Euro-centric sound. In fact, they never achieved much commercial success in America, but they were all the rage in England in the mid-'70's, when they successfully appealed to that co

It's that time of year again for Pink Floyd's biggest fans. As they did at the end of 2021 and of 2022, the Floyd have released a large number -- 18, to be exact -- of full-length concert recordings to streaming services. This year's offerings consist of 18 shows recorded in 1973, the year in which their landmark album Dark Side Of The Moon was released. The first of these 18 concerts took place on March 6th of that year, just a few days after the release of the album. The last two of them took place the following November 4th, both performed at London's Rainbow Theatre. Why have they done this? Reportedly, the release of these recordings extends copyright ownership for a longer time, whereas the legal rights to the recordings would expire and fall into public domain if the owners did not make use of them before a certain date. A Sony representative explained it this way to Rolling Stone magazine in 2013: “The copyright law in Europe was recently extended from 50

The 58th set of exclusive vinyl items offered to members of Third Man Records’ Vault service was mailed out to the members in December of 2023. For those who are unaware, Third Man Records is the label owned by Jack White, who is the leader of the White Stripes, the Raconteurs, and the Dead Weather, and is now a solo artist. The Vault service promises to deliver exclusive vinyl-only records (usually one full-length album and one 7” single) to its members every three months. The 58th Vault package featured a 3-LP live album by the White Stripes recorded in 2003 during the Elephant tour, as well as a 7-inch single containing two additional live performances of "Ball And Biscuit" -- one of them performed as a duet by Bob Dylan and Jack White. As bonus items, the package contained a patch, a bumper sticker, and two art prints by Rob Jones. The 3-LP set Live In Las Vegas 2003 was recorded at a September 2003 White Stripes show at the Joint in the Hard Rock Casino in Vegas,