reissue

Michael Jackson Off The Wall CD/Blu-Rae (Epic/Legacy) It’s unlikely that anyone would ever attempt to downplay Michael Jackson’s importantce in pop music and pop culture history. In the era when pop and rock did battle for supremacy on radio and television airwaves, Michael Jackson – the youngest member of the Jackson 5 – elected to ignore the popular trends which dominated both and simply chart his own course using elements of both but sounding like niether. It worked beautifully too;...

A deeper look at the grooves pressed into the Sounds Wrong EP by Swingin’ Utters. My heart goes out to the Swingin’ Utters, not just because they’re a band who is fantastic in their own right, but because they are a band that has grown and matured over the years and has let me grow along with them. Even so, as hard as they try, they will always be under-appreciated and underrated; but that’s fine. The Swingin’ Utters evolved in...

The Flaming Lips Heady Nuggs 1994-1997 – 20 Years After Clouds Taste Metallic (Warner Brothers Records) As most fans know, The Flaming Lips had already gone through a few semi-seamless transitions by the time they were ready to begin making Clouds Taste Metallic. By then, they’d already been DIY Okie punks and goth-y pseudo rockers, and had even managed to sort of put together an arresting estimation of their first genuinely golden sound (see Transmissions From The Satellite Heart, released...