Well, if you’re looking for a record-release bonanza to follow your gluttonous intake of grilled goods yesterday…you might want to look elsewhere. The release schedule for July 5th is incredibly light. I suppose everyone’s taking a break at the midway point of the year. Ain’t nothing wrong with that, right?
If anyone has anything to say about the fact that I quoted Fall Out Boy in the title of today’s column, the comments area is below.
At any rate, this week’s biggest mainstream release is probably King of Hearts, the latest studio effort from Atlanta R&B singer Lloyd. It looked like the former Murder Inc. associate was on the edge of mainstream success a few years back with his Spandau Ballet-sampling single “You”, but follow-up efforts have proved not as successful. Can the hearthrob take advantage of a barren release schedule and get his career back on track?
Punk and metal enthusiasts (specifically those from the Popblerd homebase of New England) have hotly anticipated records coming out today as well. Big D & the Kids Table formed in our backyard of Allston, Massachusetts, and the ska-punk favorites will be invading record stores with the imaginatively titled For the Damned, the Dumb & the Delirious today. If you like your rock and roll a little (OK, a LOT) harder, then you might want to check out the latest from Unearth. Darkness in the Light is the name of the album, and if this all looks familiar to you, it might be because we covered it in last week’s Metal Monday column (go ahead, click on the link!)
Other albums coming out today include Brian Eno’s Drums Between the Bells (a collaboration with British poet Rick Holland) and Shangri-La, a new album from dance/rock favorites Yacht. There’s an interesting looking Billie Holiday tribute album (featuring Shelby Lynne, Boz Scaggs and Esperanza Spalding), and the reissue fairy brings several entries in 2Pac’s catalog to iTunes for the first time (his first three solo albums, plus the Thug Life group effort and the posthumous R U Still Down? (Remember Me)) and the first-ever collection to combine Joy Division and New Order’s biggest hits (for the uninformed, after Joy Division’s frontman Ian Curtis passed away in the early Eighties, the remaining members plugged along (for over two decades) as New Order.
Make sure you get your new release news (as I do) from the good folks at Pause and Play!