Digital Roundup: 8/6/2014
New this week in the Rhino Room at iTunes:
Chic & Aristofreeks, Le Freak Remixes EP: Who or what is Aristofreeks? Well, to quote directly from their SoundCloud profile, “Aristofreeks is the name of the funky beast that comprises DMC mixing championship finalist Max Martire and the internationally renowned musical chameleon Lenny Ibizarre.” If you’re questioning if these upstarts have got the goods to remix such a classic song, then you’ll be interested to learn that they’re contributing to a new single, “Everybody Get On Up,” by Next Step, a group consisting of former Chic singers Norma-Jean Wright, Luci Martin, Alfa Anderson and featuring Kathy Sledge of Sister Sledge. Hello, instant dance-floor credibility!
Various Artists, Woodstock – Music from the Original Soundtrack and More / Woodstock 2: Just in time to celebrate the 45th anniversary of the musical festival to end all music festivals – or, at the very least, the one to inspire more people than any other to claim they were there whether they actually were or not – both the original soundtrack (and more) from the original film and its sequel have been added to our digital catalog.
The whole affair is so iconic at this point that everyone probably already knows who appears on these albums, but just in case you don’t, between the two collections you can find performances by – hang on, let us take a breath first – John Sebastian, Canned Heat, Richie Havens, Country Joe McDonald (both with and without the Fish), Arlo Guthrie, Sha Na Na, Joan Baez (both with and without Jeffrey Shurtleff), Crosby, Stills, Nash, and sometimes Young, the Who, Joe Cocker, Santana, Ten Years After, Jefferson Airplane, Sly and the Family Stone, the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, Jimi Hendrix, Melanie, Mountain, and, to close out Woodstock 2, an audience performance of “Let the Sunshine In.” And bother telling us that you were there and can hear yourself singing, because we’re not buying it.
Barbara Lynn, Here is Barbara Lynn: If you don’t know Barbara Lynn, then you don’t know one of the great R&B and electric blues guitarists to emerge during the early ‘60s. You wouldn’t even need all of your fingers to name all of the high-profile female guitarists during that timeframe – sadly, most people wouldn’t even need all of the fingers on one hand – but Barbara Lynn made a mark for herself straight out of the gate, with her debut single, “You’ll Lose a Good Thing,” which she co-wrote with producer Huey Meaux, hitting #1 on the Billboard R&B chart and #8 on the Billboard Hot 100. Here is Barbara Lynn was her third album, and in addition to being the only one she recorded for Atlantic, it was also the last proper album she’d end up recording for two decades. Although it’s well worth checking out, it must be noted that, given her dissatisfaction with the way the label promoted the album, perhaps it’s appropriate that it closes with a song entitled “This is the Thanks I Get.”