Caribou - Our Love (2014)

posted by all-musicrecords

Our Love is the seventh studio album by Canadian musician Dan Snaith, released under the moniker Caribou on October 6, 2014 by City Slang worldwide and October 7, 2014 by Merge in North America and South America. It is Snaith’s fourth album as Caribou, having released his previous album, Jiaolong, as Daphni in 2012. It features collaborations with Jessy Lanza and Owen Pallett.

The album reflects on the success of Snaith’s breakthrough album, Swim, four years prior. The lyrics are more personal and reflective than his previous albums, influenced by the birth of his daughter. It is an electronic album with R&B and hip hop influences.

Electronic artist Dan Snaith, working as Caribou, produced brilliantly abstract albums for more than a decade, moving from the glitchy weirdness of his 2001 debut, Start Breaking My Heart, into more delicate mergers of organic sounds and electronic production, with his 2007 standout album Andorra and its more psychedelic follow-up Swim in 2010. The move toward the dancefloor that was hinted at on Swim is brought into full focus on sixth full-length Our Love, a collection of ten powerful grooves that still manage a bit of Snaith‘s trademark psychedelic production.

The underwater-sounding loop of electric piano and slowed-down vocals that begins album opener “Can’t Do Without You” lingers for a while in a soft, welcoming way, setting the tone for a good minute and a half before the song’s beat drops, offering the most good-natured take on a house track imaginable. Covered in aquatic phaser effects, the song builds to anthemic heights before settling back into softness for the end. Snaith‘s falsetto vocals throughout the album seem to find the middleground between James Blake‘s moody mysteriousness and Arthur Russell‘s curious wonderment.

Standout tracks like “Silver,” or the lovely title track, find Snaith‘s airy vocals floating atop a web of steadfast beats and murky vocal samples. Unexpected snippets of string samples, ’80s-sounding electronic percussion, and disconnected voices come in and out of the picture, with songs seamlessly blooming from blurry bedroom productions into full definition dance tracks. Snaith‘s ear for pop hooks keeps even the harder-edged tunes here catchy, as with the hypnotic but ever melodic forward push of “Your Love Will Set You Free.” All told, Our Love stands as the most straightforwardly danceable Caribou album to date, but holds on to both the experimental bent and composition-minded musicality that helped build the project’s one-of-a-kind sound world.

Track listing

1. Can’t Do Without You – 3:56
2. Silver – 5:16
3. All I Ever Need – 3:52
4. Our Love – 5:34
5. Dive – 2:06
6. Second Chance (Snaith, Jessy Lanza) – 4:00
7. Julia Brightly – 2:03
8. Mars – 5:45
9. Back Home – 3:33
10. Your Love Will Set You Free (Snaith, Owen Pallett) – 5:47

Expanded edition bonus tracks

11. Can‘t Do Without You” (Extended Mix) – 6:34
12. Your Love Will Set You Free” (C2’s Set U Free Remix) – 6:42
13. Second Chance” (Cyril Hahn Edit) – 4:46
14. Mars” (Head High’s Core Remix) – 4:54
15. Mars” (Head High’s Venus Remix) – 5:39
16. Our Love” (Daphni Remix) – 7:08
17. Can’t Do Without You” (Tale of Us & Mano Le Tough Remix) – 7:37

All tracks are written by Dan Snaith, except where noted.

Personnel

• Matthew Cooper – design
• Jason Evans – art direction, design, photography
• Bo Kondren – mastering
• Jessy Lanza – composition, vocals
• Owen Pallett – composition, viola, violin
• Dan Snaith – composition, production
• David Wrench – mixing

Notes

Released: October 6, 2014
Genre: Electronic
Length: 85:03

Label - City Slang / Merge

Darkside - Psychic (2013)

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Darkside (often stylized as DARKSIDE) is an American band based in New York City. The band was formed in Providence, Rhode Island in 2011 by electronic musician Nicolás Jaar and multi-instrumentalist Dave Harrington, both who were students at Brown University at the time. 

Their debut studio album, Psychic, was released in 2013 and was followed up by Spiral, released in 2021 after a hiatus.

Darkside is the work of electro-pop minimalist composer Nicolas Jaar and Brooklyn-based multi-instrumentalist Dave Harrington, which steeps Jaar's spacious solo work with brittle bursts of electronic distortion, watery drums, and slick neon guitar patterns. 

A self-titled EP in 2011 yielded three lengthy songs of the duo's wild combination of airy atmospheres and menacing fuzz, but debut full-length Psychic moves into more compositional territory, though it remains drifty and narcotic in ways similar to its predecessor. 

The album kicks off with 11-minute standout track "Golden Arrow," moving like a suite through an intro of dark, fuzzy ambience and wobbling stereo effects into a sleazy, submerged house beat and fragmented synth and string samples. 

Caught between the creeping underground thump of minimal avant-techno experimentalists like Pole or Gas and the sharp, clean lines of nocturnal pop acts like the Chromatics or James Blake, the song is an unlikely success in its deep contrasts. 

Space is a primary concern throughout Psychic, with plenty of ambient interludes and raw tape experiments serving as cushioning between pop moments like the oddly bluesy dirge of "Paper Trails" and the dubby shadows of album-closer "Metatron." 

Ultimately, it's the contrasts and the way they fit so well together that makes Psychic a success. The meeting of hurried noise, slick dubstep-styled R&B undertones, wonky blues, and grainy electronics seems destined for ugly clashing, but somehow the organization of sounds, stereo field space, and the amount of distance Jaar and Harrington put between the disparate elements themselves makes so much compositional sense that the album floats by like a strange, faraway dream.

Track listing​

1.  Golden Arrow - 11:21 

2.  Sitra - 1:23 

3.  Heart - 4:58 

4.  Paper Trails - 4:50 

5.  The Only Shrine I've Seen - 7:56 

6.  Freak, Go Home - 6:37 

7.  Greek Light - 2:55 

8.  Metatron - 5:08 

All tracks are written by Nicolás Jaar and Dave Harrington.

Darkside

• Dave Harrington – production, writing, guitars, bass, acoustic bass, organ, electric piano, pianet, synthesizers, clarinet, drum machines, percussion, electronics, effects
• Nicolás Jaar – production, writing, vocals, sequencing, drum programming, synthesizers, wurlitzer, mellotron, drum machines, percussion, electronics, effects, mixing

Additional personnel

• Brian Gardner – mastering
• Matt de Jong – design, layout
• Jed DeMoss – photography

Companies, etc.

• Phonographic Copyright ℗ – Matador Records 
• Phonographic Copyright ℗ – Other People
• Copyright © – Matador Records 
• Copyright © – Other People
• Recorded At – The Barn, Garrison, NY

Credits

• Design, Layout – Matt De Jong
• Mastered By – Brian Gardner
• Photography By [Cover Photo] – Jed DeMoss
• Written-By, Producer – Darkside

Notes

Released:  October 4, 2013 

Recording Location: 

Clown & Sunset Studios, Providence, RI 

Other People, NY 

Studio De La Reine, Laurent Aurion, Jérémie Delvallée, Paris, FR 

The Barn, Garrison, NY 

The Loft, Brooklyn, NY 

Genre:  Electronic, Left-Field House

Length:  45:08 

Label - Matador / Other People

Flying Lotus - Until The Quiet Comes (2012)

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Steven Ellison (born October 7, 1983), known by his stage name Flying Lotus or sometimes FlyLo, is an American record producer, DJ and rapper from Los Angeles. He is also the founder of the record label Brainfeeder.

Until the Quiet Comes is the fourth studio album by American electronic music producer Flying Lotus, released on September 26, 2012 by Warp Records. Flying Lotus was inspired to create the album by psychedelic music, African percussion, and concepts of the human subconscious and dream world. 

He recorded for two years at his home in Los Angeles, experimenting with different mixing techniques and dynamics while primarily using an Ableton Live sequencer along with other instruments and software. The producer was accompanied on certain songs by guest vocalists, including Erykah Badu, Thom Yorke, and Laura Darlington. The album also continued his creative partnership with bassist Thundercat, who had appeared on Flying Lotus' 2010 record Cosmogramma.

An electronic jazz album, Until the Quiet Comes features free jazz elements, varying musical tones, contrasting scales, and shifts in rhythmic feel. Its songs are sequenced together and characterized by what music journalists noted to be ghostly vocal production, irregular drum beats, pulsating percussive textures, trembling basslines, trilled synthesizers, and fluctuating samples. 

The album has a journey-like concept and dreamy musical narrative, which Flying Lotus conceived while imagining himself in the process of astral projection. 

He later said the album could be interpreted uniquely by listeners; it has been interpreted by writers as a musical accompaniment to dreams and a process of emotional introspection by the producer.

Until the Quiet Comes was marketed with two singles and a short film featuring music from the album. Flying Lotus also promoted the album with an international concert tour from October to November 2012, performing at venues in North America and abroad. 

The album debuted at number 34 on the Billboard 200 and sold 13,000 copies in its first week of release. It was a widespread critical success, receiving praise for its complex music and Flying Lotus' sound engineering. 

Until the Quiet Comes is characterized by varying musical tones, contrasting scales, both consonant and dissonant sounds, counterpoint, and shifts in feel. Its complex, diverse soundscapes deviate from popular music song forms and employ contrast and improvisational adjustments in mood, structure, and time signature. Darryl Kirchner of The Huffington Post notes an emphasis on timbre throughout the album. Mark Richardson of Pitchfork observes Flying Lotus "putting a smaller frame around each individual part" throughout the album's shifts and finds the "energy" to be "just as strong" as on his previous albums, but "concentrated into a smaller space." Although he finds it less "imposing" than its predecessor, Thomas May of musicOMH comments that "Until the Quiet Comes is like a chamber concerto to Cosmogramma's symphony", noting "an increased sense of space and separation" on the former.

Songs on the album incorporate ghostly vocal production, winding basslines, uptempo drum-and-bass fills, broad orchestral elements, pulsating percussive textures, bright keyboards, trilled synthesizers, and fluctuating samples. 

They are sequenced together and exhibit a diminishing pace from the end of one track to the start of another. Joe Tacopino of Rolling Stone views that the album's guest vocalists "float into [Flying Lotus's] realm like visitors, just as fragile and malleable as the other elements he employs. 

This reiterates the album's feel as one complete story, instead of disparate songs." Fellow music journalist Vincent Pollard comments that most of the vocals are "used as subtle textures" and observes Flying Lotus "employing more organic tropes in his digital mix". 

He incorporates horn arrangements and live drum patterns, while his programmed beats evoke the "in the pocket" drumming of percussionists such as Rashied Ali. The songs also exhibits Flying Lotus' characteristic mix of skittering, muffled percussion atop slightly irregular drum beats, accompanied by Thundercat's trembling basslines.

Stylistically, the album eschews Flying Lotus' hip hop roots for jazz influences, including free form jazz tonality and undertones, and jazz-based time signatures and patterns. 

Gabrielle Ahern of CMJ calls it "a moody, electronic version of experimental jazz." Jonny Ensall of Time Out views the album as "a digital jazz record which pushes hip hop beats and R&B melodies into bold, new syncopated and atonal territory." 

Tony Ware of Electronic Musician attributes "certain chord choices and the interest in astral mystical states that permeates Until the Quiet Comes" to Flying Lotus' "family lineage" of jazz musicians. Uncut finds it "often reminiscent of his auntie's work", while Consequence of Sound's Derek Staples perceives a "free jazz aesthetic" similar to "his great-uncle John Coltrane's Ascension", viewing both albums as "exercise[s] in dense rhythmic layers and melodic dissonance." 

The album also repurposes elements of pop, soul, fusion, and psychedelia in a modern classical fashion. Q describes the album as "a lush, almost psychedelic mood piece." Lucy Jones of NME attributes the album's "meander[ing] and experiment[ing]" to a progressive rock influence.

Track listing​

1.  All In 2:59 

2.  Getting There  (featuring Niki Randa) - 1:49 

3.  Until the Colours Come - 1:07 

4.  Heave(n) - 2:22 

5.  Tiny Tortures - 3:03 

6.  All the Secrets - 1:56 

7.  Sultan's Request - 1:42 

8.  Putty Boy Strut - 2:53 

9.  See Thru to U  (featuring Erykah Badu) - 2:24 

10.  Until the Quiet Comes - 2:11 

11.  DMT Song  (featuring Thundercat) - 1:19 

12.  The Nightcaller - 3:29 

13.  Only If You Wanna - 1:42 

14.  Electric Candyman  (featuring Thom Yorke) - 3:32 

15.  Hunger  (featuring Niki Randa) - 3:39 

16.  Phantasm  (featuring Laura Darlington) - 3:51 

17.  me Yesterday//Corded - 4:39 

18.  Dream to Me - 1:36 

19.  The Things You Left  (Japanese bonus track) - 2:49 

Personnel

• Sam Baker – composer
• Brandon Coleman – keyboards
• Gene Coye – drums
• Daddy Kev – mastering
• Laura Darlington – composer, vocals
• Dorian Concept – keyboards
• Erykah Badu – composer, vocals
• Miguel Atwood Ferguson – strings
• Flying Lotus – composer, producer
• Jonny Greenwood – composer
• The Integration Players – strings
• Dan Kitchens – photography
• Austin Peralta – composer, keyboards
• Niki Randa – composer, vocals
• Stephen Serrato – art direction, design
• Thundercat – bass guitar, composer, vocals
• Thom Yorke – composer, vocals

Companies, etc.

• Phonographic Copyright ℗ – Warp Records Limited
• Copyright © – Warp Records Limited
• Published By – Just Isn't Music
• Published By – Third Side US Publishing
• Published By – Divine Pimp Publishing
• Published By – Universal Music
• Published By – Copyright Control
• Published By – Music Rights Management Ltd.
• Published By – 41GP Music Ltd.
• Published By – Warner/Chappell Music Ltd.
• Made By – Optical Experts Manufacturing – 2216500

Credits

• Art Direction – Stephen Serrato
• Art Direction [With] – B+
• Design – Stephen Serrato
• Mastered By – Daddy Kev
• Photography By – B+
• Photography By [With] – Dan Kitchens
• Producer [Produced By] – Steven Ellison
• Written-By – Steven Ellison (tracks: 1, 3 to 8, 10, 17, 18)

Notes

Released:  September 26, 2012 

Recorded:  2011–12 Studio Home recording (Mount Washington) 

Genre:  Electronica, Electronic Jazz, Psychedelia

Length:  49:41 

Label - Warp Records

Steven Wilson - Grace For Drowning (2011)

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Grace for Drowning is the second solo studio album by Steven Wilson, producer, songwriter, and frontman of Porcupine Tree. 

It was released by Kscope on 26 September 2011 as a double album. The album received a nomination at the 54th Annual Grammy Awards for Best Surround Sound Album.

After the release of his first solo album, Insurgentes, Steven Wilson spent time on a number of his other projects. 

These include Porcupine Tree's album The Incident in 2009, Blackfield's third album Welcome to My DNA, on 28 March 2011, and an ongoing project with Mikael Åkerfeldt (the leader of the band Opeth) named Storm Corrosion. However, amongst these projects, in 2010, he announced that he had started working on his second solo album as well.

In early June 2011, Wilson launched a minisite for the new album revealing the album's name and album art photographed by his longtime collaborator Lasse Hoile. Additionally, a free download of the track "Remainder the Black Dog" was also added. Sound and Vision magazine's website premiered the video of "Track One" on 10 August 2011. Not long after, Yahoo! Music debuted the music video for "Index". On 16 August, WNYC's website premiered a free download for the radio edit of "Like Dust I Have Cleared From My Eye". A video clip for "Remainder the Black Dog" was finally released on 31 August, through Guitar World magazine's website.

Upon completion of the album, Wilson said:

"'Insurgentes' was an important step for me into something new. This record takes that as a starting point, but it’s more experimental and more eclectic. For me the golden period for music was the late sixties and early seventies, when the album became the primary means of artistic expression, when musicians liberated themselves from the 3 minute pop song format, and started to draw on jazz and classical music especially, combining it with the spirit of psychedelia to create "journeys in sound" I guess you could call them. So without being retro, my album is a kind of homage to that spirit. There’s everything from [Ennio] Morricone-esque film themes to choral music to piano ballads to a 23 minute progressive jazz –inspired piece. I've actually used a few jazz musicians this time, which is something I picked up from my work remixing the King Crimson records".

For prolific British progressive rocker Steven Wilson, the two-CD set Grace for Drowning is his second official solo album, following 2008's Insurgentes. Recording under his own name, Wilson tends to fall somewhere between his popular Porcupine Tree group project and his ambient recordings as Bass Communion. 

Grace for Drowning's two discs are divided into one called Deform to Form a Star and another called Like Dust I Have Cleared from My Eye, both named after tracks on them. In the relatively sparse lyrics that Wilson sings with a calm, British-accented tenor, he seems melancholy at first, apparently suffering from the aftermath of a romantic breakup. 

"There's nothing left for me to say or do," he declares in "Postcard." By the second disc, he has become angrier about the situation, but the closing title track finds him reaching resolution and moving on. The words are spread out over music that builds and ebbs in a manner that allows for different styles and soloing by Wilson and a few musical guests. 

He is not abashed about evoking his prog predecessors. The obvious antecedent is Pink Floyd, particularly recalled in the space rock of "No Part of Me." The 23-minute "Raider II," coming toward the end, allows room for a flute-and-piano section that could have been excerpted from a Traffic album as well as guitar-bass-drum sections in rapid 6/4 time suggestive of Yes. By the end, Wilson has subsided into an ambient coda on "Like Dust I Have Cleared from My Eye," as if readying himself for the next Bass Communion album. 

Grace for Drowning has a particular conception in terms of its emotional journey from sadness through anger to acceptance, but it is also just another in a lengthy discography of albums by Wilson under various names in relatively similar styles. 

Track listing

Disc 1: Deform to Form a Star

1.  Grace for Drowning - 2:06 

2.  Sectarian (instrumental) - 7:41 

3.  Deform to Form a Star - 7:51 

4.  No Part of Me - 5:45 

5.  Postcard - 4:29 

6.  Raider Prelude (instrumental) - 2:23 

7.  Remainder the Black Dog - 9:27 

Disc 2: Like Dust I Have Cleared from My Eye

1.  Belle de Jour (instrumental) - 2:59 

2.  Index - 4:49 

3.  Track One - 4:16 

4.  Raider II - 23:21 

5.  Like Dust I Have Cleared from My Eye - 8:01 

All tracks are written by Steven Wilson.

Managerial

• Andy Leff – Acme Music
• Alex Leeks – assistant

Technical and production

• Steven Wilson – production, mixing
• Pat Mastelotto – additional production, electronic drums on "No Part of Me" and "Index"
• Dave Stewart – string & choir arrangements
• Mat Collis – engineering
• Paschal Byrne – mastering

Musicians

Steven Wilson – keys (CD1 tracks 1–5 and 7 / CD2 1–5), guitars (CD1 tracks 2, 3, and 5 / CD2 tracks 1–5), autoharp (CD1 track 2 / CD2 tracks 1, 2, 5), bass guitar (CD1 tracks 2 and 5 / CD2 tracks 1 and 4), percussion (CD1 track 4 / CD2 track 4), piano (CD1 tracks 5–7 / CD2 tracks 4 and 5), gong (CD1 track 6), glockenspiel (CD1 track 7), programming (CD2 track 2), harmonium (CD2 tracks 4 and 5) Jordan Rudess – piano (CD1 tracks 1 and 3 / CD2 track 4) Theo Travis – saxophone (CD1 tracks 2, 4 and 7 / CD2 track 4), clarinet (CD1 track 3 and 7 / CD2 track 4), flute (CD1 track 7 / CD2 track 4) Ben Castle – clarinet (CD1 track 2) Nick Beggs – Chapman stick (CD1 tracks 2 and 7 / CD2 track 4), bass guitar (tracks CD1 tracks 4 and 7 / CD2 track 4) Tony Levin – bass guitar (CD1 track 3 / CD2 track 5) Nic France – drums (CD1 track 2–3, 5 and 7 / CD2 track 3–5) Pat Mastelotto – acoustic and electronic drums (CD1 track 4 / CD2 track 2) Markus Reuter – U8 touch guitar (CD1 track 4) Trey Gunn – warr guitar and bass guitar (CD1 track 4) London Session Orchestra – strings (CD1 tracks 4 and 5 / CD2 tracks 1 and 2) Steve Hackett – guitar (CD1 track 7) Mike Outram – guitar (CD2 track 4) Sand Snowman – guitar (CD2 track 4) Visuals and imagery Lasse Hoile – photography, film director Bettina Ejlersen – photography assistant Carl Glover – art director Ray Shulman – Blu-ray authoring Sounding Steven Wilson – vocals on all tracks except "Sectarian", "Raider Prelude" and "Belle de Jour" Dave Kerzner – sound design on "Raider II" Synergy Vocals – choir on "Postcard", "Raider Prelude" and "Raider II"

Notes

Released:  26 September 2011 

Recorded: January 2010 – June 2011  

Studio No Man's Land (Hemel Hempstead) Koolworld (Luton) 

Angel Recording Studios(London) 

various locations in the UK, USA and Germany 

Genre:  Progressive rock, experimental rock, jazz fusion 

Length:  83:01 

Label - Kscope Records

G. Love & Special Sauce - Coast To Coast Motel (1995)

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Coast to Coast Motel is the second album by G. Love & Special Sauce, released in 1995.

Although not as commercially successful as G. Love & Special Sauce's self-titled debut, Coast to Coast Motel is a definite improvement. 

The band keeps its hip-hop influence (much more prevalent on the debut) in check here, concentrating more on creating a mighty instrumental groove. 

It's also more of a traditional rock & roll approach for the band, with the results quite often being successful. 

Coast to Coast Motel, the singer/guitarist's second shot with his bass and drums ensemble Special Sauce, does not even grant us the minor pleasures of his debut's "blues rap" novelty. This time, Mr. G focuses primarily on the R&B sounds of New Orleans, where the band recorded the album. That G. Love counts John Hammond Jr. an inspiration is telling: What Coast to Coast Motel offers is bratty suburban recreations of Hammond's competent but uninspired blueblood appropriations of classic blues music. New Special Sauce tunes like "Kiss & Tell" and "Bye Bye Baby" are absolutely fine but inauthentic and unnecessary given the breadth of great blues already available to motivated listeners. And any college-educated kid, like Garrett, who insists on singing with the slurred drawl of elderly sharecroppers needs to be slapped silly.

The opening "Sweet Sugar Mama" is bass-driven and funky; other highlights include the smooth "Nancy," the uplifting "Chains #3," and the startling Led Zeppelin attack (musically, anyway) of "Small Fish." "Kiss and Tell" is an obvious attempt at a hit single, while some may consider the lyrics to "Soda Pop" a bit too foolish. 

As mentioned earlier, however, the group achieves some great, groovy interplay that can easily suck the listener in. Jimmy Prescott's upright bass playing and Jeff Clemens' drumming are tight and locked together, as G. Love adds his scratchy blues guitar on top. These guys have found the groove.

Track listing

1.  Sweet Sugar Mama   (G. Love, J. Clemens, J. Prescott) – 4:05

2.  Leaving the City – 3:40

3.  Nancy   (G. Love, J. Clemens, J. Prescott) – 3:21

4.  Kiss and Tell – 3:14

5.  Chains #3   (G. Love, J. Clemens, J. Prescott) – 2:58

6.  Sometimes – 4:23

7.  Everybody – 3:40

8.  Soda Pop   (G. Love, J. Clemens) – 3:49

9.  Bye Bye Baby – 4:39

10.  Tomorrow Night – 4:55

11.  Small Fish   (G. Love, J. Clemens, J. Prescott) – 5:21

12.  Coming Home – 4:35

All songs by G. Love, except as noted

Personnel

G. Love – guitar, harmonica, vocals

Jeffrey "Thunderhouse" Clemens – drums, backing vocals

Jimi "Jazz" Prescott – double bass

Rebirth Brass Band – horns

Jim Dickinson – electric piano, producer

BroDeeva – backing vocals

Technical

Chika Azuma – Art Direction, Design

Richard Hasal – Assistant Engineer

Keith Keller – Producer, Mixing

Ron Kruit – Photography

Bob Krusen – Engineer

Stephen Marcussen – Mastering

Trina Shoemaker – Assistant Engineer

Don Smith – Mixing

Special Sauce – Producer

Ski Williams – Illustrations

Coast to Coast Motel is also an actual motel in Hinton, West Virginia, where the New and Greenbrier Rivers meet. 

Notes

Release Date:  September 19, 1995 

Recording Location:  Chez Flames Studios, New Orleans, LA Kingsway Studios Sea-Saint Studios 

Genre:  Pop, Rock

Styles:  Blues-Rock

Duration: 48:40 

Label - Epic Records

Luther Vandross - Songs (1994)

Songs is the ninth studio album by American R&B/soul singer-songwriter Luther Vandross. It was released by Epic Records on September 20, 1994. 

The album, a collection of cover versions, produced the singles "Endless Love", "Always and Forever", and "Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now". According to an interview both Vandross and Mariah Carey gave in Japan following the release of their duet "Endless Love", there was mention that Carey had given advice as to what songs Vandross would cover on this album.

Seeing that Luther has always had such great success in cover songs, the fact that he would eventually record an all-covers album should not be that surprising. 

 The public responded enthusiastically to the disc, sending it to the #5 position on the Hot 200 and to Double-Platinum status in sales. While SONGS isn't in the same league with Luther's eighties albums, it is his best album of the nineties. The song selection is well done for the most part, although I do wish that a few more chances had been taken with the arrangements. 

 Naturally, there's nothing here that matches his past landmark covers like "A House Is Not A Home" or "Superstar," but he does deliver a few a choice renditions that surpass the original versions.

That is certainly the case with his well-respected gospel-infused take on Steven Stills' "Love the One You're With" (#95 Pop, #28 R&B), which easily should have been a much bigger hit. 

 However, this is certainly not the only instance where Luther outdoes the original performer. His renditions of "Reflections" and "Always and Forever" (#58 Pop, #16 R&B, #25 Adult Contemporary) are more soulful and sexier than the original classic recordings, and he adds much need personality to the groovin' "Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now." 

 Even more amazingly, Luther manages to brings a genuine poignancy to the generally bland ballads "Hello," "All the Woman I Need," and "The Impossible Dream." There's a pained beauty in Luther's interpretations that was completely glossed over in all the previous renditions. 

 The best cover of all, however, is definitely his spin-tingling cover of "Killing Me Softly," which is even more haunting and heartbreaking than Roberta Flack's original, which is a terrific recording in it's own right.

Luther also turns in good renditions of "Evergreen" and "Since You've Been Gone," however, he cannot top the legendary versions by Barbra Streisand and Aretha Franklin, respectively. 

 The remaining three sections are only average. "Going In Circles" and "What the World Needs Now Is Love" suffer slightly from intrusive arrangements, while the big hit "Endless Love" (#2 Pop, #7 R&B, #11 Adult Contemporary) never really hits it's intended mark due to the lack of vocal chemistry between Luther and duet partner Mariah Carey. 

 However, even these tracks are perfectly listenable, and do not sound jarring out of place in the context of the rest of the album. 

 In summary, SONGS is really one of the best pop cover albums in recent memory, and it never falls into the various traps that most records of this kind routinely do. Leave it to Luther to pull off the near-impossible.

Songs earned Vandross four nominations at the 1995 Grammy Awards for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance for "Love the One You're With", Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals for "Endless Love", Best Male R&B Vocal Performance for "Always and Forever", and Best R&B Album. 

Track listing

1.  Love the One You're With  (Originally recorded by: Stephen Stills) - 5:03 

2.  Killing Me Softly  (Originally recorded by: Lori Lieberman) - 5:33 

3.  Endless Love  (duet with Mariah Carey) (Originally recorded by: Lionel Richie & Diana Ross) - 4:21 

4.  Evergreen  (Originally recorded by: Barbra Streisand) - 3:54 

5.  Reflections  (Originally recorded by: Diana Ross & the Supremes) - 3:21 

6.  Hello  (Originally recorded by: Lionel Richie) - 4:44 

7.  Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now  (Originally recorded by: McFadden & Whitehead) - 4:53 

8.  Always and Forever  (Originally recorded by: Heatwave) - 4:53 

9.  Going in Circles  (Originally recorded by: The Friends of Distinction) - 5:12 

10.  Since You've Been Gone  (Originally recorded by: Aretha Franklin) - 4:15 

11.  All the Woman I Need  (Originally recorded by: Linda Clifford as "All the Man I Need") - 4:54 

12.  What the World Needs Now  (Originally recorded by: Jackie DeShannon) - 5:18 

13.  The Impossible Dream (The Quest)  (Originally recorded by: Richard Kiley) - 5:16 

Personnel

• Luther Vandross – lead and backing vocals, BGV arrangements (1, 7, 10)
• Walter Afanasieff – arrangements (1, 3, 4, 5, 10-13), keyboards (1, 3, 4, 6-13), synthesizers (1-4, 6, 7, 8, 10-13), Hammond B3 organ (1, 5, 8, 9, 10), bass guitar (1), drums (1), percussion (1), rhythm programming (1, 3, 4, 6-13), acoustic piano (2), Synclavier (2, 3, 4, 6, 11, 12, 13), acoustic guitar (2, 3, 4, 6, 11, 12, 13), Moog bass (3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 10-13), drum programming (3, 4, 6-13), additional programming (5), synth horns (10)
• Gary Cirimelli – digital programming, Macintosh programming, synthesizer programming
• Ren Klyce – digital programming, synthesizer programming
• Dan Shea – keyboards (2, 5, 6-10), synthesizers (2, 5, 8, 9), Moog bass (2, 5, 9), drum programming (2, 9), rhythm programming (2, 5, 9), arrangements (2, 6-9), programming (6, 8, 10)
• Dann Huff – guitar, nylon guitar solo (3)
• Michael Landau – additional guitar (2, 5, 7, 11)
• Michael Thompson – additional guitar (8)
• Stephen "Doc" Kupka – baritone saxophone (9)
• Emilio Castillo – tenor saxophone (9)
• David Mann – tenor saxophone (9)
• Lee Thornburg – trombone (9), trumpet (9), flugelhorn (9)
• Greg Adams – trumpet (9), flugelhorn (9), horn arrangements (9)
• Jeremy Lubbock – orchestra arrangements and conductor (3, 4, 6, 9, 11, 12, 13)
• Isobel Griffiths – orchestra contractor (3, 4, 6, 9, 11, 12, 13)
• The London Symphony Orchestra – orchestra (3, 4, 6, 9, 11, 12, 13)
• Narada Michael Walden – original arrangements (11)
• Tawatha Agee – backing vocals (1, 2, 5, 7, 9, 10, 13)
• Johnny Britt – backing vocals (1, 7, 8, 9, 11)
• Alexandra Brown – backing vocals (1, 7, 9, 11)
• Lynn Davis – backing vocals (1, 7, 9, 11)
• Jim Gilstrap – backing vocals (1, 7, 8, 9, 11)
• Phillip Ingram – backing vocals (1, 7, 8, 9, 11)
• Paulette McWilliams – backing vocals (1, 2, 5, 7, 9, 10, 13)
• Phil Perry – backing vocals (1, 7, 8, 9, 11)
• Brenda White-King – backing vocals (1, 5)
• Lisa Fischer – backing vocals (2, 5)
• Mariah Carey – lead vocals (3)
• Robin Clark – backing vocals (7, 9, 13)
• Cindy Mizelle – backing vocals (7, 9, 10)
• Fonzi Thornton – backing vocals (7, 9)
• Claytoven Richardson – backing vocals (8)
• Cissy Houston – backing vocals (10, 13), BGV arrangements (10)
• Darlene Love – backing vocals (10)
• Phillip Ballou – backing vocals (13)
• Kevin Owens – backing vocals (13)

Production

• Walter Afanasieff – producer
• Luther Vandross – co-producer
• Dana Jon Chappelle – engineer, recording, mixing (1, 5, 7, 8, 10, 12)
• Mick Guzauski – mixing (2, 3, 4, 6, 9, 11, 13)
• Paul Brown – vocal recording (Luther Vandross)
• Jay Healy – vocal recording (Mariah Carey)
• Hadyn Bendall – strings recording
• Kyle Bess – assistant engineer
• Gus Garces – assistant engineer
• David Gleeson – assistant engineer
• Bill Leonard – assistant engineer
• Chris Ludwinski – assistant engineer
• Kent Matcke – assistant engineer
• Gil Morales – assistant engineer
• Mike Reiter – assistant engineer
• David Reitzas – assistant engineer
• Mike Scott – assistant engineer
• Andy Smith – assistant engineer
• Bob Ludwig – mastering
• Marsha Burns – production coordinator
• Barbara Stout – production coordinator

Studios

• Mixed at The Hit Factory, Right Track Recording and Sony Music Studios (New York, NY); The Plant Studios (Sausalito, CA).
• Mastered at Gateway Mastering (Portland, ME).

Notes

Released:  September 20, 1994 (U.S.) 

Recorded:  1993–94

                   The Hit Factory

                   Right Track Recording

                   Sony Music Studios

                   (New York, New York)

                   The Record Plant

                   (Hollywood, California)

                   The Plant Recording Studios

                   (Sausalito, California)

                   Abbey Road Studios

                   (London, United Kingdom)

Genre:  Soul

Length:  1:01:40

Label - Epic Records

The Prodigal Sons - Wine Of Life (1993)

The Prodigal Sons was een Nederlandse muziekgroep die actief was tussen 1991 en 1996.

De groep werd in 1991 opgericht en bereikte dat jaar de finale van de Grote Prijs van Nederland. De groep bestond oorspronkelijk uit Erwin Nijhoff (zang), Albert Bartelds, Gerrit Veldman en Rick Mensink. 

Met Nijhoff, bassist Bartelds en drummer Henk Holsappel verscheen in 1993 hun eerste cd Wine of Life en de single You Still Think werd veel gedraaid op de radio.

Ze halen in 1991 de finale van de De Grote Prijs Van Nederland, maar de ogen zijn vooral gericht op het solo-optreden van Erwin Nijhoff in Haenen Voor De Nacht, waarna de platenmaatschappijen toesnellen. 

Maar Nijfhoff en zijn band, The Prodigal Sons, zijn al onder dak en komen in september 1993 zeer verrassend voor de dag met hun debuut Wine Of Life. 

The Prodigal Sons, afkomstig uit Zwolle en omstreken , bestaan dan naast grote man Nijhoff – zanger, gitarist, songschrijver en slechts 20 jaar – uit bassist Albert Bartelds en drummer Henk Holsappel. Op de plaat krijgen ze versterking van gospelkoortjes, piano en slidegitaar, wat resulteert in een gedegen, volle sound. 

De vlotte rockers gebaseerd op de bluesy hardrock van Bad Company en de southern rock van The Black Crowes geven Wine Of Life dan ook een flinke vaart. 

Maar het zijn de traag trekkende nummers, ingekleurd met Hammond en mellotron, die indrukwekkend zijn: de fantastische single ‘You Still Think’, het Gene Clark-achtige ‘In Another Land’ en de epische afsluiter ‘Dark Days’, die schitterend naar een climax wordt gewerkt. 

Wine Of Life is een uitstekend product van vaderlandse bodem, dat een essentiële toevoeging is aan de dan in Nederland heersende hausse van fiere gitaarpop. 

In 1994 staat de band op Pinkpop; een jaar later komt het nog rootsier The Eye Of A Stranger uit, het tweede en tevens laatste album van The Prodigal Sons

Track listing

1.  Last Long (3:22)

2.  Wine of Life (3:26)

3.  You Still Think (4:25)

4.  Shut Your Mouth (5:02)

5.  That's When I Love You (4:30)

6.  In Another Land (5:44)

7.  What About Yourself (4:26)

8.  Jimi (5:35)

9.  Waiting (3:33)

10.  Gone (4:56)

11.  Dark Days (8:17)

Companies, etc.

• Marketed By – Zensor Musikproduktion GmbH
• Licensed From – Munich Records
• Distributed By – Indigo
• Distributed By – Cod Records
• Distributed By – Extraplatte

Credits

• Acoustic Guitar – Erwin Nijhoff
• Bass Guitar – Albert Bartelds
• Drums – Henk Holsappel
• Electric Guitar – Erwin Nijhoff
• Harmonica – Erwin Nijhoff
• Percussion – Henk Holsappel
• Photography By – Ben Vulkers
• Producer, Mixed By – DiMaestro
• Vocals – Erwin Nijhoff
• Written-By – Erwin Nijhoff

Notes

Release: 1993

Genre: Pop, Rock

Tijdsduur: 53:14

Label - Munich Records