Bridge Over Troubled Water was one of the biggest-selling albums of its decade, and it hasn't fallen too far down on the list in years since. Apart from the gospel-flavored title track, which took some evolution to get to what it finally became, however, much of Bridge Over Troubled Water also constitutes a stepping back from the music that Simon & Garfunkel had made on Bookends – this was mostly because the creative partnership that had formed the body and the motivation for the duo's four prior albums literally consumed itself in the making of Bridge Over Troubled Water. The overall effect was perhaps the most delicately textured album to close out the 1960s from any major rock act.

Released when Mercury Records was still located in Chicago, IL, back in 1973, the second album from Bachman-Turner Overdrive was the first to break through in a big way. First the hit single "Let It Ride" went Top 25 circa March of 1974, then the anthem "Taking Care of Business" went Top 15 the summer of that year. By October they would top the charts with "You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet" from the follow-up LP, 1974's Not Fragile, but their seven chart songs were all made possible by this album and these two songs, "Let It Ride" and "Takin' Care of Business," in particular. "Let It Ride" features one of C.F. Turner's best vocals; keeping that gargle-with-Draino diesel sound down to a minimum, the song has two major guitar riffs, one a strum, the other from Led Zeppelin's 1970 "Immigrant Song," an inverted mutation of Randy Bachman's own "American Woman" riff which also hit in 1970.

Giuseppe Verdi’s second opera Un giorno di regno is one of the composer’s least known works. The premiere in Milan in 1840 was a failure, which Verdi said was due to his own personal circumstances: During the creative process two of his children and his first wife died within two months. Despite the rather weak libretto, the stage work has its merits and captivates, for example, with fresh, catchy melodies that, although they can not deny the influence of Rossini and Donizetti, are by no means imitative.

MelodicRock Classics is pleased to announce a partnership with English singer, songwriter, composer and musician Andy Qunta to deliver a Deluxe Edition of his one and only solo album 'Legend In A Loungeroom', originally recorded in 1989.

Claudio Abbado and the Vienna Philharmonic the Vienna Philharmonic interpret these dances as passionately as necessary and as as necessary and as intelligently as possible what one may expect:tempera- ment, melting, rhythmic temperament,melodiousness,rhythmic bite,refinement But 'there' is more: a perfect balance between fire and sobriety between fire and sobriety,a tone of great warmth often,a very A tone of great warmth, often, a very lifelike feeling, far from the sentiments of a Barenboim or a of a Barenboim or (sometimes) of a Bernstein.

"Little Girl" is a rock & roll classic. With its sneering vocals, vague threats, crude chords and rhythms, it's a menacing, swagger masterpiece of garage rock. It's also the only good thing the Syndicate of Sound ever recorded. Little Girl – The History of the Syndicate of Sound compiles nearly everything the group recorded, yet none of it comes close to matching the power of their hit single; it's a mess of weak originals and limp covers. The patience of even the most dedicated garage rock fan will be tested by the disc.

John Cage: Early Piano Music comes from Herbert Henck, an experienced hand with the work of Cage, having previously recorded Music for Piano, Music of Changes, and Sonatas and Interludes in addition to a mighty swath of first-tier twentieth-century literature for piano for various labels, most notably Wergo and ECM New Series. These are early works for standard, not prepared, piano, and some of these pieces will be as familiar to dyed-in-the-wool Cageans as "Happy Birthday." This puts the pressure on Henck to excel, and he does so spectacularly well here. The disc includes the two sets entitled Two Pieces for Piano, the piano version of The Seasons, Metamorphosis, In a Landscape, Ophelia, and the fragmentary Quest. The pieces date from 1935 to 1948, the same range covered by pianist Jeanne Kirstein in her pioneering 1967 survey of Cage's piano music for CBS Masterworks.

Ezra Collective’s new era, a venture in discovered maturity and raised stakes, will be defined by the anticipated second album. 'Where I’m Meant To Be' is a thumping celebration of life, an affirming elevation in the Ezra Collective’s winding hybrid sound and refined collective character. The songs marry cool confidence with bright energy. Full of call-and-response conversations between their ensemble parts, a natural product of years improvising together on-stage, the album - which also features Sampa The Great, Kojey Radical, Emile Sandé, Steve McQueen, and Nao - will light up sweaty dance floors and soundtrack dinner parties in equal measure.

Five-decades-running Americana pioneers Nitty Gritty Dirt Band have already played a major role in the preservation and popularity of folk music—their Will The Circle Be Unbroken album series introduced droves of new fans to folk, country, and bluegrass and earned the band multiple Grammy awards—but now, the long-running group have taken on another American institution near and dear to their hearts; the Bob Dylan songbook.

The return of a great band! The archival recording, 'Live and Unreleased', documents the Brecker Brothers at the peak of their powers during a European tour on a particularly happening night in Hamburg on July 2, 1980 at the legendary Onkel Pö's Carnegie Hall. One of the best-selling, most potent bands of the '70s, the Brecker Brothers defined the swaggering sound of New York funk-fusion during the decade. On the strength of such contemporary crossover recordings as their 1975 self-titled debut, 1976's Back to Back, 1977's Don't Stop the Music and 1978's Heavy Metal Be-Bop, brothers Randy and Michael Brecker set a new standard in jazz with their tight arrangements, catchy funk grooves, melodic grooves and scintillating solos.

US band Unified Past, at first known as Labyrinth, has been around in one shape or another for some 20 odd years by now. As Unified Past they made their debut as recording artists in 1999, but then a 10 year long pause followed before they resurfaced with their second production in 2009. The band appears to have entered a two year cycle of releasing albums since then. Following "Observations" from 2011, "Spots" from 2013 is their fourth studio effort, and was released through the US label Melodic Revolution Records. The band's fourth studio album "Spots" is a production that should see the band establishing a reach towards a fairly broad sized audience. Their blend of classic hard rock and progressive rock into what I'd describe as a pomp rock sound is often an interesting one, and fairly appealing at that.

In the mid- to late '90s and early 2000s, Novembre was usually categorized as a metal band. The Rome, Italy-based outfit (whose name means November in Italian) were called gothic metal, doom metal and alternative metal, and they were compared to bands ranging from My Dying Bride to Opeth to Katatonia. But it would be a mistake to think of Materia as strictly a metal album. Parts of the disc are relevant to metal (the generally clean vocals occasionally give way to a death metal-ish growl), but much of this 2006 release is simply alternative rock. But however one categorizes Materia, this is an enjoyable, well-crafted and highly melodic effort that thrives on all things melancholy. Very few rays of sunlight find their way to Materia; the songs have a dark, gloomy, brooding and less than optimistic perspective…