(3)Keyboardist Derek Sherinian is a man out of time. Raised in Santa Cruz,
California, the young Sherinian began playing piano at the age of five, then
came under the spell of the music of Elton John, along with the early
influences of The Beatles and Bob Dylan.
While still a junior in high school his musical talent was such that Derek
was offered a scholarship to the prestigious Berklee School of Music in
Boston, Massachusetts. After three semesters he was introduced to
Buddy Miles (Jimi Hendrix's Band Of Gypsys), who was putting together a
touring band. After an ultimately impressing audition, he earned his spot.
After leaving Miles, he soon landed a gig with rock legend Alice Cooper.
It was during the time with Alice which saw him perform over 250 shows
in support of his Trash album, that he was bestowed with the nickname
by the legendary shock rocker, 'The Caligula Of The Keyboards.'
After another tour, in 1991 he became offstage keyboardist for hard
rockers KISS. However, it was with him joining prog metal superstars Dream Theater that his profile began to rise. More technically challenging musically than anything he had previously been a part of, he was named the band's keyboardist just prior to the tour in support of the album Awake. After spending four years with the band, the relationship ran its course after which he immediately released his first solo record Planet X.
Sherinian has carved out a niche for himself in the progressive metal
scene. He has attracted the best players on Earth to his solo album
sessions, some of whom include luminaries Al DiMeola, Steve Lukather,
Yngwie Malmsteen, Slash, John Petrucci, John Sykes and Zakk Wylde.
With Oceana, again an assemblage of some of the most talented players
to ever strap on a guitar join Sherinian in the studio. Steve Lukather
once again collaborated with the keyboardist for the tracks 'Mulholland,'
'Euphoria' and 'Seven Sins.' Former Planet X guitarist and fusion legend
Tony MacAlpine laid down performances for 'Five Elements' and 'Mercury 7'. The one and only Steve Stevens is featured on 'Ghost Runner' and the title track 'Oceana'. Black Country Communion bandmate Joe Bonamassa makes an appearance as well on 'I Heard That,'
while Doug Aldrich performs on 'El Camino Diablo'. Jimmy Johnson plays
the bass on all tracks outside of 'Ghost Runner' and the title track which
features Tony Franklin. Simon Phillips performs all drums on Oceana
Favoring a guitar heavy rock based approach to fusion ala Jeff Beck, it
allows energy to come through the recordings, setting him apart from
most jazz fusion in the process, making the music appeal to fans of
technical heavy metal as well. In addition, touring with several well-known artists, including Billy Idol and the aforementioned Yngwie Malmsteen, Sherinian adapts to ever changing musical genres with ease while always maintaining his signature style. Earlier this year Über producer
Kevin Shirley, opened the door for the keyboardist to join Glenn Hughes,
Jason Bonham and Joe Bonamassa in the 'Supergroup' Black Country
Communion. BCC s debut album has set the stage for Oceana to propel
his inspiration in to the mainstream and continue to cement his legacy as
being one of the premiere rock keyboardist of today.
(1)A brand-new collection of 14 hits from yesterday and today. Includes the theme from the hit TV show, Big Bang Theory on CD for the first time. The Also includes fan-favorites "Pinch Me", "If I Had $ 1,000,000", "One Week", "Brian Wilson" and more.
The Barenaked Ladies will premiere a new video for the "Big Bang Theory Theme" including cast members from the show, and will be involved in promotions for the upcoming Warner Bros. TV syndication of the show.
A brand-new collection of 14 hits from yesterday and today. Includes the theme from the hit TV show, Big Bang Theory on CD for the first time. The Also includes fan-favorites "Pinch Me", "If I Had $ 1,000,000", "One Week", "Brian Wilson" and more.
The Barenaked Ladies will premiere a new video for the "Big Bang Theory Theme" including cast members from the show, and will be involved in promotions for the upcoming Warner Bros. TV syndication of the show.
With its play on words, Vice Verses, the title of Switchfoot's 2011 album, coherently suggests the album's theme: everything has two sides. If 2009's Hello Hurricane suggested a new chapter in the musical book that is Switchfoot, consider Vice Verses to be a sequel of sorts.
Songs like "Afterlife" and "The War Inside" take the harder-edged approach of Hello Hurricane a step further, creating what Billboard has called "powerful, anthemic rockers... like an amalgamation of U2's Achtung Baby, Linkin Park." Overall, Vice Verses is a more eclectic collection than its predecessor with quiet gems like "Souvenirs" and the title track butting up against the infectious "The Original," reminiscent of Foo Fighters, and the biting, largely spoken-word "Selling the News."
This deluxe edition features a second disc which contains a live version of the album Hello Hurricane.
Inni-- (3-LP + DVD + Download) Inní is the definitive Sigur Rós live experience, comprised of a double live album and a seventy-five minute concert film, capturing Sigur Rós last show before their well-documented "indefinite hiatus" at the end of 2008. Recorded and shot over two nights at London s Alexandra Palace, at the close of the world tour around their fifth full length album, Með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust.
The live album Inní a first for the band is comprised of the full set from Alexandra Palace, played in order with just one omission, and clocks in at one-and-three-quarter hours. Recorded by Sigur Rós in-house studio engineer Birgir Jón Birgisson, Inní s live audio recording is far and away the best way of replicating the full-force effect of standing in front of one of the world s most extraordinary bands for an evening.
Inní, Sigur Rós second live film following 2007 s hugely-celebrated tour documentary Heima, was directed by Vincent Morisset (Arcade Fire s Miroir Noir) and captures the band as a core four-piece for the first time since they were joined by string section amiina at the start of this century. The film debuted at this year s Venice Film Festival on September 3, 2011. Inní focuses purely on the band s performance, and stands as a stark counterpoint to Heima s kaleidoscopic richness. Where Heima was lush and colorfully expansive, Inní is spare and near-monochromatic in its tunnel vision. Filmed in a manner that invites both intimacy and claustrophobia, Inní cocoons the viewer in a one-on-one relationship with the band, eschewing the audience for closeness, depicting how it feels for both band and fan to experience Sigur Rós live.
When taken in together, Inní s live album and film give us an incredible account of one of the most celebrated and influential rock bands of recent years, showing where they ve come from, where they ve been, and like all things Sigur Rós, where it is they will be going next.
453 days in the top 100 
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1342 days in the top 100 (1789)
(189)Seattle's Fleet Foxes traffic in baroque harmonic pop. They draw influences from the traditions of folk, pop, choral, gospel, sacred harp singing, West Coast music, traditional music from Ireland to Japan, film scores, and their NW peers. The subject matter ranges from the natural world and familial bonds to bygone loves and stone cold graves.
(1)
M83 (aka Anthony Gonzalez) releases his epic new double album, Hurry Up, We're Dreaming.
Produced by Justin Meldal-Johnsen (Beck, NIN, The Mars Volta, Goldfrapp) and including contributions from Brad Laner (from 90's band Medicine) on guitar, Saturdays=Youth vocalist Morgan Kibby, and guest vocalist Zola Jesus, Hurry Up, We're Dreaming is a double-album journey that takes us to the horizon and introduces us to new landscapes. About awakening, craving, and conquering, Hurry Up, We're Dreaming pushes into new vocal territory for M83. Here we see Gonzalez test out different ways of singing, ranging from a spectral breathy whisper to a howling scream. "I think it is a reflection of my 30 years of being a human being. It's a compilation of all my previous music together. It's a retrospective of myself", says Gonzalez.
The first single, "Midnight City",is a humid, adrenaline-driven dreamlike track, unlike anything we have heard from M83 in the past. "Midnight City" adeptly sweeps you through abandoned concrete streets swimming in broken neon light.
Hurry Up, We're Dreaming is the follow up to the John Hughes inspired and critics' favorite Saturdays=Youth. Pitchfork called it, "An unaccountably alive, complete album", giving it an 8.5 rating while, The New York Times, said "The music recalls the pumping beats and keyboard hooks of the 1980's as if through a haze of time, floating in lush echoes that round off the edges."
M83 is Los Angeles based French artist Anthony Gonzalez.
(5)On American Goldwing, Blitzen Trapper's 6th album and third on Sub Pop, the band let their loves and influences hard guitar rock, country picking and pawn-shop Casio aplomb hang out for all to see. Singer/songwriter/guitarist Eric Earley says American Goldwing will make you want to shotgun a beer in the shower while listening to the Stones or Joe Walsh (well, or Blitzen Trapper) and we are not inclined to argue.
Wild Flag is a Portland, Oregon- and Washington, DC-based quartet consisting of Carrie Brownstein, Rebecca Cole, Mary Timony, and Janet Weiss. The members of Wild Flag have played in numerous and notable bands including Sleater-Kinney, Helium, Quasi, The Minders, Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks, and others. In April of 2011, they went to Sacramento, California, where they recorded their self-titled album with engineer Chris Woodhouse at the Hangar. All tracks were recorded live except for the vocals.
Girls return with their long awaited second full-length. More spontaneous and stripped-down than either their self-made debut or their lush EP, Father, Son, Holy Ghost is a gorgeous, largely minor-key record, enlivened by flashes of innocent pop and given depth by its wealth of influences and willingness to face sadness.
Staind marks the iconic hard rock band's seventh studio album and first full-length release in three years. Produced by Johnny K - known for his work with 3 Doors Down, Disturbed, and Sevendust, not to mention his Grammy Award-nominated collaboration with Staind, 2008's The Illusion of Progress - and mixed by the legendary Chris Lord-Alge, Staind stands as Staind's most intense and powerful work to date. The album is heralded by the viral "Eyes Wide Open" and official single "Not Again." Singer/songwriter/guitarist Aaron Lewis recently described Staind as "the heaviest thing we have recorded in a long time. It's definitely one of the heaviest collections of songs that we have put together." "It's completely different than the last record," agrees guitarist Mike Mushok. "It's more of a throwback to where we came from. I definitely think it's fresh. It's a modern-sounding version of a heavy Staind record. It's pretty cool."
This deluxe version features a documentary contained on a DVD bonus disc.
The release of The Rapture's long-awaited third album In The Grace Of Your Love marks the dawn of a new chapter in the band s history and a welcome return to the DFA Records family, having re-signed with the label that released some of their most acclaimed early singles, and whose founders James Murphy & Tim Goldsworthy produced their debut album Echoes.
Produced by French by Phillippe Zdar (Phoenix, Beastie Boys, Chromeo) In the Grace of You Love exhibits bold & euphoric sound that is definitively & distinctly like The Rapture and no one else. Through the course of its eleven tracks, you can immerse yourself as waves of lyrical optimism & introspection crash between angular guitars & pulsing synthesizers, pounding drums & into sweet rhythmical lullabies. This is the sound of The Rapture re-engaged and revitalized with a voice as clear as they ever had. In The Grace Of Your Love was recorded at Motorbass, Paris and Gary's Electric in Greenpoint, Brooklyn.
Throughout a career that stretches back to the mid-'80s, Matthew Sweet has never followed trends, though his landmark 1991 album Girlfriend was responsible for starting one; in fact, many critics note that most power pop records made during the '90s owe a tremendous debt to Sweet. Two decades after the release of that iconic album, Sweet has once again swung for the fences and connected with the boldly experimental, yet deeply personal Modern Art.
Defiantly unorthodox, but often playfully so, Modern Art features 12 new compositions of Sweet's trademark wistful, yearning pop that recall some of Sweet s touchstones: the Beatles, Beach Boys and Big Star. ''She Walks the Night'' is reminiscent of earlyperiod Byrds, while ''Ladyfingers'' stomps along with the authority of T. Rex. Other standout tracks include the swirling, psychedelic ''Oh, Oldendaze!,'' the ruggedly assertive ''Late Nights With the Power Pop,'' the acerbically witty ''Evil By Design, Goodbye Nature'' and the sweetly soulful ''Modern Art.''
Longtime musical cohort Ric Menck (Velvet Crush) does all the drumming on the album (except for ''Ivory Tower,'' which is built on a random drum pattern supplied by Sweet's friend, actor/musician Fred Armisen). Dennis Taylor s deft and urgent guitar lines serve as a running commentary to Sweet s introspective singing. Finished by mastering engineer Glenn Schick, Modern Art promises to be another trend-setting release by Sweet.
