SACD

Deep Forest – Comparsa (1998) [Reissue 2001] [SACD / Epic Records Group – ES 68726]

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Deep Forest - Comparsa (1998) [Reissue 2001]

Title: Deep Forest – Comparsa (1998) [Reissue 2001]
Genre: Electronic, Ambient
Format: SACD ISO + Hi-Res FLAC

The duo’s third album, Comparsa, continues the world music potpourri Deep Forest are known for, though there is a pronounced focus on Latin and Caribbean grooves provided by musicians from Cuba, Belize, Mexico, and Madagascar, among other places. Although the nationalities present are truly global, the actual sound of Deep Forest hasn’t changed that much, centering mostly on lush new age music with just a bit more of an edge than is usual, plus several tracks with whispered or restrained vocals. For fans of the debut album, Comparsa is a noteworthy, though hardly necessary, acquisition.

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SACD

Death Cab For Cutie – Transatlanticism (2003) [SACD / Barsuk Records – bark32sa]

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Death Cab For Cutie - Transatlanticism (2003)

Title: Death Cab For Cutie – Transatlanticism (2003)
Genre: Rock
Format: SACD ISO + Hi-Res FLAC

US underground sensations’ fourth studio album is truly a major work, blending subtle intelligent songwriting, amazing production, boundless creativity, and thoughtful rock. This is their best offering to date – dreamy and lovelorn in places, but also epic, gritty and twisted in others.

As musical lunacy goes, things have gotten as crazy as it gets for Death Cab for Cutie since 2002’s You Can Play These Songs with Chords compilation. A wildly successful tour with Dismemberment Plan, a collaboration for singer Ben Gibbard with emo-electronic guru Dntel under the Postal Service moniker, and a whole new legion of fans swooning to Gibbard’s lyrics as if he were a modern day answer to Kiss Me-era Robert Smith have all amassed considerable hype around Transatlanticism. But the group proves themselves more than equal to the task, answering the call and proving the cynics wrong with their most focused and most mature work in their entire catalog. Transatlanticism wastes absolutely no time and dives in head first with “The New Year,” one of the most melodramatic openings to an album since the Smashing Pumpkins’ “Tonight, Tonight” from Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness. The mellow, mixed-meter percussion and dense atmosphere of “Lightness” is a brilliant lead into the pop-happy “Expo ’86” and “The Sound of Settling” before setting up the climatic and intensely dramatic title track. Unconsciously taking a page from Blur’s “Sing,” the hypnotic drumming and guitar call and responses through the eight-minute climax of the album are backed with a singalong finale that unquestionably will have every audience on the next tour singing along and holding up their lighters. And while most albums would be left exhausted after such a track, the group keeps things moving, albeit at a much slower pace than compared to the anthems that packed the first half. Gibbard seamlessly makes the transition between songs that full out rock to songs that are comparable to Elliott Smith’s finest hour with great ease. But it’s Gibbard’s poetic lyrics and signature introspection that remain a bench mark for Death Cab; and it’s the group’s maturity as musicians as well as songwriters that make Transatlanticism such a decadently good listen from start to finish. The band has never sounded more cohesive, the track sequencing is brilliant, and it caps off a triumphant year for not only Gibbard, but a band whose time and greater recognition is finally due.

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SACD

Dean Martin – This Time I’m Swingin’! (1960) [MFSL 2013] [SACD / Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab – UDSACD 2135]

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Dean Martin - This Time I’m Swingin’! (1960) [MFSL 2013]

Title: Dean Martin – This Time I’m Swingin’! (1960) [MFSL 2013]
Genre: Jazz, Easy Listening
Format: SACD ISO + Hi-Res FLAC

Dean Martin finally got access to conductor/arranger Nelson Riddle for an album project, and the result was an easy swinging collection with appealing horn charts and a series of comfortable readings of recent and vintage standards. Especially notable were the two songs borrowed from My Fair Lady, “On the Street Where You Live” and “I’ve Grown Accustomed to Her Face,” which Martin and Riddle re-imagined as straight-forward love songs; “You’re Nobody ’til Somebody Loves You” (which Martin would try again in a more contemporary arrangement four years later for one of his biggest hits); and a solo version of “Just in Time,” which the singer had recently done with Judy Holliday in the film version of the musical Bells Are Ringing. This Time I’m Swingin’! was a good, confident set by an artist who had figured out how to make competent albums without expending a lot of effort, which was a key to his charm.

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SACD

Deodato – Prelude & Deodato 2 (1972/1973) [Reissue 2017] [SACD / Vocalion – CDSML 8532]

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Deodato - Prelude & Deodato 2 (1972/1973) [Reissue 2017]

Title: Deodato – Prelude & Deodato 2 (1972/1973) [Reissue 2017]
Genre: Jazz
Format: MCH SACD ISO + Hi-Res FLAC

Produced by Creed Taylor and Rudy Van Gelder, ace arranger Deodato’s huge-selling 1972 debut solo album Prelude – which is here reissued back to back with Deodato 2 on an enhanced CD which features the rare quadrophonic mixes previously only available on 8 track – remains one of if not the key release in the CTI catalogue which unforgettably stirs into life with the stately Schifrin-esque jazz rock reworking of ‘Also Sprach Zarathustra’ which scored a 45 hit in both Europe and the US. Previously an arranger for Luiz Bonfa, Marcos Valle and Astrud Gilberto, surrounded here by a veritable ‘A’ list of session players including Hubert Laws, Ron Carter, Stanley Clarke, Airto Moreira and Billy Cobham, Prelude which comes bathed in the warm glow of the Fender Rhodes arrived as Deodato’s platinum coated international calling card by virtue of its phenomenal success.

His work on Nascimento’s 1969 album Courage brought him into contact with Creed Taylor, and when Taylor set up CTI in 1971, he wasted no time in engaging Deodato’s arranging skills. Deodato’s early CTI work included his beautiful orchestrations for Astrud Gilberto and Stanley Turrentine’s 1971 album Gilberto with Turrentine, and by 1972 Deodato himself had earned a solo contract with the label. He struck gold with his first effort, the aptly titled Prelude, thanks to Creed Taylor’s penchant for getting his artists to record jazz/crossover versions of well-known classical pieces. In Deodato’s case, it was the Sunrise fanfare from Richard Strauss’s Also Sprach Zarathustra, which had become popular through its use in Stanley Kubrick’s sci-fi epic 2001: A Space Odyssey. Deodato’s funked up, Fender Rhodes-laden reimagining of it brought both him and CTI chart success – it would become an international hit – and while it casts a long shadow over the remainder of the album, Prelude nevertheless contains several other gems. Notable among them is the Latin-flavoured jazz of Carly & Carole (Deodato’s tribute to singer-songwriters Carly Simon and Carole King) and the low-slung funk of September 13, powered by Billy Cobham’s muscular drumming. The sequel, Deodato 2, recorded during April and May 1973, adhered to the same formula: funky originals alongside his interpretations of various classical pieces. And although it failed to emulate the success of its predecessor, Deodato 2 is arguably the better album, containing one of Deodato’s finest compositions in the dramatic Skyscrapers – sounding for all the world like a theme in search of a film – and superb jazz-rock adaptations of The Moody Blues’ Nights in White Satin and George Gershwin’s immortal Rhapsody in Blue. Both Prelude and Deodato 2 feature stellar lineups, including CTI regulars Ron Carter and Stanley Clarke (basses), Billy Cobham (drums), Hubert Laws (flute) and Airto Moreira (percussion). As well as the original stereo mixes, Vocalion’s reissue includes the quadraphonic mixes of both albums (their first ever appearance in digital format), which were made by Rudy Van Gelder at his historic studio in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey. Heard in four-channel sound, both Prelude and Deodato 2 are given new and exciting life, and rounding out this reissue is a detailed essay giving the full lowdown on Deodato and the music itself.

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SACD

Dead Can Dance – Spiritchaser (1996) [MFSL 2008] [SACD / 4AD – SADCD 2713]

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Dead Can Dance - Spiritchaser (1996) [MFSL 2008]

Title: Dead Can Dance – Spiritchaser (1996) [MFSL 2008]
Genre: Electronic, Modern Classical, Rock
Format: SACD ISO + Hi-Res FLAC

Spiritchaser is the seventh studio album by Dead Can Dance, and the last before Brendan Perry and Lisa Gerrard went their separate ways. It expands on its exploration of world music, and like Into the Labyrinth, was recorded at Quivvy Church, Perry’s personal studio in Ireland. The album was dedicated to Lisa Gerrard’s deceased brother, Mark Gerrard. The track “Indus” contains a melody that is very similar to that of “Within You Without You”, a Beatles song that George Harrison wrote and recorded with Indian musicians in 1967. Although not deliberate, Perry and Gerrard were asked to contact Harrison for his permission to use it; he granted it, but the record company insisted that they give him partial songwriting credit on “Indus”.

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SACD

Dead Can Dance – Toward The Within (1994) [MFSL 2008] [SACD / 4AD – SADCD 2712]

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Dead Can Dance - Toward The Within (1994) [MFSL 2008]

Title: Dead Can Dance – Toward The Within (1994) [MFSL 2008]
Genre: Electronic, Modern Classical, Rock
Format: SACD ISO + Hi-Res FLAC

Toward the Within (1994) is the first official live album of Brendan Perry and Lisa Gerrard’s group Dead Can Dance. It contains 15 songs, of which only four appeared on their previous albums, and two of which were later re-recorded and included on Lisa Gerrard’s first solo album, The Mirror Pool. The others previously existed only in live performances and unofficial bootlegs, but were not officially released until Toward the Within. Along with Perry and Gerrard were a number of musicians who had performed with them on other occasions.

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SACD

Dead Can Dance – Into The Labyrinth (1993) [MFSL 2008] [SACD / 4AD – SADCD 2711]

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Dead Can Dance - Into The Labyrinth (1993) [MFSL 2008]

Title: Dead Can Dance – Into The Labyrinth (1993) [MFSL 2008]
Genre: Electronic, Modern Classical
Format: SACD ISO + Hi-Res FLAC

Into the Labyrinth is the sixth album recorded by the Dead Can Dance duo Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry. It marked a strong shift from the previous albums, putting ethnic music influences at the forefront as would be the case in the later albums. It was their first album completed on their own without the aid of guest musicians, and their first album to have a major-label release in the U.S., thanks to a distribution deal that 4AD had with Warner Bros. Records. It featured the single “The Ubiquitous Mr Lovegrove”.

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SACD

Dead Can Dance – Aion (1990) [MFSL 2008] [SACD / 4AD – SADCD 2710]

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Dead Can Dance - Aion (1990) [MFSL 2008]

Title: Dead Can Dance – Aion (1990) [MFSL 2008]
Genre: Electronic, Modern Classical
Format: SACD ISO + Hi-Res FLAC

Aion is the fifth studio album by Dead Can Dance, released in 1990. The first album Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry wrote after the end of their romantic partnership, it was recorded at Perry’s new estate, Quivvy Church in Ireland, and at Woodbine Street Recording Studios in Leamington Spa. The male soprano David Navarro Sust contributes vocals to tracks 1 and 7. The album cover shows a detail from the Dutch painter Hieronymus Bosch’s triptych The Garden of Earthly Delights (specifically, its central “Earth” panel).

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