It’s Jill Scott New Vinyl Thursday at The Vinyl Underground at 7th Heaven. Check out this week’s list of new vinyl arrivals:
2Pac – All Eyez on Me
Alice Bag – Sister Dynamite
Albert King with S.R.V. – In Session
Aphex Twin – Richard D. James Album (Large Item, Digital Download Card)
Black Pumas – Black Pumas (Picture Disc Vinyl LP, Limited Edition, Indie Exclusive)
Bruno Mars – 24k Magic
Cigarettes After Sex – Cry (Clear Vinyl, Indie Exclusive)
The Cramps – Stay Sick!
Weekly Review:
While mainstream America was reliving the 1950s via sock hops and malt shops in “Happy Days,” the Cramps slid a hand underneath the decade’s poodle skirt to celebrate rockabilly music, monster movies and pin-up girls.
The Cramps roared into the 1990s with Stay Sick!, a debaucherous offering every bit as good as their first few albums nearly a decade earlier. The band’s musk is evident just by reading the song titles on Stay Sick! If a whiff of “The Creature from the Black Leather Lagoon” and “Journey to the Center of a Girl” don’t get you going, dig their perversion of Bob Seger’s milquetoast “Old Time Rock and Roll” into the infinitely superior “God Damn Rock and Roll.”
This is the music your parents warned you about – and for good reason. If that doesn’t provide enough motivation, there’s a song called “Bikini Girls with Machine Guns” which is every bit as awesome as it sounds. C’mon. You know you want to. -Joel Francis
Childish Gambino – Awaken My Love
Don Bryant – You Make Me Feel (Colored Vinyl, Indie Exclusive)
Dr. Dre – Chronic
David Bowie & Trevor Jones – Labyrinth (From the Original Soundtrack)
Dolly Parton – The Very Best Of Dolly Parton
Diet Cig – Do You Wonder About Me? (Glow in the dark- indie only release)
Evanescence – Fallen
Fleetwood Mac – Rumours
Five Finger Death Punch – War Is The Answer (Gatefold LP Jacket)
Flogging Molly – Drunken Lullabies (Limited Edition, Green, Colored Vinyl, Reissue)
Frank Zappa – Burnt Weeny Sandwich (180 Gram Vinyl)
Grachan Moncur III – Evolution
Gary Clark Jr. – Gary Clark JR Live
Glass Animals – How To Be A Human Being
GZA – Liquid Swords
Gil Scott-Heron – Revolution Will Not Be Televised
Greta Van Fleet – From The Fires
Hank Mobley – Soul Station
HAIM – Women In Music Pt. III
Weekly Review:
One of the best concerts I’ve ever seen was a trio of sisters that played a very, very sold out show at The Uptown Theater. The opener was Lizzo, but the crowd was there to see HAIM. I was already a fan. The first two albums were pop rock perfection. Days Are Gone was easily one of the best albums in 2013 and Something to Tell You proved that they could recreate the magic, even if the magic trick is less impressive the second time you see… or hear it. But that show in May, 2018 showed that the sky was the limit for this super talented trio.
So when Women in Music III was announced I expected, and would have been very happy with more of the same. Don’t panic HAIM fans, we did get some of the same… songs like “Don’t Wanna” and “Now I’m In It” are pages straight out of the HAIM playbook. They are comfortable, interesting and fun, however other tracks on the album provide more context to who HAIM is, not just as a band, but as human beings.
Take the into song “Los Angeles” for example. The wandering saxophone that finds its way home to a Sublime inspired drum beat which drops you right into the song. It an uptempo almost ska like take on downtempo feelings… “These Days I can’t win, These days I can’t see no visions.” Lead singer/songwriter Danielle Haim was in a darker place on this album, feeling alone, typecast and frustrated. It’s evident in the lyrics and themes of the album.
Song’s like “I’ve Been Down” and “The Steps” have that stream of conscious storyteller feel that helped make Sheryl Crow so famous. You feel as if you are sitting on a bar stool next to Danielle as she tells her story. “Would you even pick me out in the crowd? / ‘Cause I can’t recognize myself now / And I’m turning away help / Can you pull me out?”
Sometimes when bands start to branch out, it backfires, and admittedly not everything they try on this album works (there is some weird screaming on one of the tracks). But overall this album is a great collection of songs and one I am very excited to add to my collection. -Brad Simmons
Jill Scott – Who Is Jill Scott: Words And Sounds, Vol. 1 (Blue Colored Vinyl, Limited Edition)
Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit – Reunions
Jimi Hendrix – Electric Ladyland (180 Gram Vinyl)
John Coltrane – Blue Train
John Coltrane – A Love Supreme (Remastered)
John Coltrane – My Favorite Things
Jamael Dean – Black Space Tapes
John Prine – The Missing Years
Klaus Nomi – Klaus Nomi
Klaus Nomi – Simple Man
Kandace Springs – The Women Who Raised Me
Kiss – Love Gun
Kiss – Rock and Roll Over (Limited Edition, Remastered)
Khruangbin – Mordechai (Pink Vinyl, Indie Exclusive)
Weekly Review:
Working with vocals seems to please Khruangbin. After building an all-instrumental ouvre, the Texas funk trio released an EP with soul singer Leon Bridges earlier this year. Several months later, they released Mordechai, their third album, replete with singing.
The disembodied vocals on “First Class,” the opening cut, give way to actual lyrics on “Time (You and I),” which recalls Kool and the Gang sans horns. While most songs feature vocals, the singing complements and reinforces the vibe set by the instruments. The upbeat “Pelota” features handclaps and Spanish lyrics delivered with so much gusto it is impossible to listen without moving your body to the rhythm. A couple other high points feature African elements. “Connaissais de Face” incorporates bits of film dialogue alongside African guitar elements and dub rhythm. The relaxing “So We Won’t Forget” floats on a midsummer breeze with its Afro-pop arrangement and chill vocals.
Far from being a gimmick, by the end of Mordechia it becomes clear that the human voice is yet another texture for Khruangbin to play with in their impressive musical arsenal. It will be fun to see where this leads them next. – Joel Francis
Leon Bridges – Coming Home (180 Gram Vinyl, Download Insert)
Led Zeppelin – Led Zeppelin IV (180 Gram Vinyl, Remastered)
Michael Franti & Spearhead – Work Hard And Be Nice
Mac Miller – Watching Movies With The Sounds Off (Gatefold LP Jacket, Limited Edition)
Mac Miller – Swimming
Miles Davis – Kind Of Blue
Norah Jones – Pick Me Up Off The Floor (Colored Vinyl, Black, White, Limited Edition, Indie Exclusive)
Norah Jones – Begin Again
Norah Jones – Come Away with Me
The National – High Violet (Colored Vinyl, Purple, Clear Vinyl, Expanded Version)
Nirvana – Bleach (Remastered, Digital Download Card)
Ol’ Dirty Bastard – Return to the 36 Chambers
Post Malone – Hollywood’s Bleeding (Colored Vinyl, Pink)
Panic! At the Disco – Too Weird to Live Too Rare to Die
Queen – Greatest Hits I
The Rolling Stones – A Bigger Bang (180 Gram Vinyl)
The Rolling Stones – Bridges To Babylon (180 Gram Vinyl)
The Rolling Stones – Let It Bleed
The Rolling Stones – Some Girls
The Rolling Stones – Voodoo Lounge (180 Gram Vinyl)
Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble – Soul To Soul
Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble – The Essential Stevie Ray Vaughan And Double Trouble
The Strokes – The New Abnormal (180 Gram Vinyl, Poster, Download Insert)
Son Volt – Search (Deluxe Edition, Reissue)
Sparks – A Steady drip drip drip
Tech N9ne – Something Else
Thundercat – It Is What It Is (Colored Vinyl, Cream, 140 Gram Vinyl, Indie Exclusive, Photos)
Tom Waits – Small Change
Weekly Review:
Tom Waits’ fourth album plays like the daydreams of a janitor resigned to cleaning up a strip club as the sun rises and the last customer stumbles out. “Tom Traubert’s Blues” opens the album, a romantic fantasy set against a lush orchestra, borrowing the melody and chorus from “Waltzing Matilda.” Jim Hugart’s upright bass propels the next number, “Step Right Up,” a monologue that dances in the common ground between carnival barkers, beat poetry and TV preachers.
The rest of the album settles in between these two poles. Small Change is largely filled wistful, piano ballads with “Step Right Up,” “Pasties and a G-String” and “The One That Got Away” puncturing the fatigue of the late-night blues. Waits quotes a bit of Casablanca’s “You Must Remember This” in the opening and closing bars of “Bad Liver and a Broken Heart,” illuminating a major influence on the compositions here and the booze-fueled perspective from which Waits was writing.
Waits mined this same fertile territory across the half-dozen albums he released annually in the 1970s, but he never did it better than he did on Small Change. -Joel Francis
Tool – Lateralus
Various – High Fidelity (Original Soundtrack) (180 Gram Vinyl)
Webb Wilder – Night Without Love
Willie Nelson – First Rose Of Spring (150 Gram Vinyl, Download Insert)
Weezer – Weezer (Blue Album)
Warren Zevon – Life’ll Kill Ya (Anniversary Edition)
FLASH SALE!
50% OFF Kandace Springs “The Women Who Raised Me” – Thursday, July 2nd ONLY!
Turntables! We got ’em. From starter tables to audiophile, and everything in between, we have you covered. We are honored to once again be carrying a full line up of the award winning, top of their class, made in America, U-turn Orbits! We have all the colors- including the high performance walnut and maple. Get here fast for best selections. They have stopped all wholesale orders until after the first of the year so there won’t be more before the holidays. Get yours today!
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Here’s where we talk about the virus. We are all freaked out. We are all nervous and anxious. We are OPEN. If you want to come shop in person, we will say hello, give you a virtual high five- a virtual hug if we know you that well- and we will keep our distance. We love all of our customers and are glad to keep this little bit of normalcy in these crazy times. With that being said, we will also offer various other ways to get your vinyl fix. We have always shipped music and we will continue to do so. We also offer curbside pick up. Call us, pay, call us when you are outside and we will deliver your freshly sanitized purchase to your car.
Upcoming Events:
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Enjoy the music and we will see you soon. Your loving Vinyl Underground at 7th Heaven staff:
Sherman, Gordon, Cat, Matt, Dylan, Doyle, Heather and Max
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