More than six decades after “Come And Get These Memories” became her first chart success, Martha Reeves has a chance to score another one. It’s hard to believe, but the rhythm-and-blues legend has only five solo albums to her name, from the eponymous 1974 platter to “Home To You” which was out in 2004, and now, a mere twenty-two years later, the lady’s about to release her sixth longplay.
It’s almost impossible to conceive that an artist who’s solo career spans more than five decades could be as consistent as to allow maximum four years to pass between his two consequent albums – but Robin Trower has always defied expectations, so nobody can attribute the British guitarist’s recent run of records to his sense of mortality. Aged 81, the veteran last released a new studio platter as late as 2025, and "Come And Find Me" was as stunning as usual, yet September 25th will see him follow it with another offering.
There’s no shortage of THRESHOLD concert recordings – in fact, their live-to-studio albums ratio is 7:12 and is about to become 2:3 with the issue of “Live At Rock Hard 2025” on September 4th, which will nevertheless be a special one. When the British band hit the stage of Amphitheatre in Gelsenkirchen, Germany on June 7th of the titular year, it was their third appearance there – and their first with singer Glynn Morgan; the prog-metal ensemble planned to play there in 2024 but had to postpone their performance, so fans greeted the guests with a lot of warmth.
Geoff Downes and Chris Braide, collectively known as DOWNES-BRAIDE ASSOCIATION love to play with their listener’s mind, so at least three of the duo’s albums – "Skyscraper Souls" from 2017, 2021’s "Halcyon Hymns" and "Celestial Songs" from 2023 – had at least one thing in common, apart from music: phonetical, if not strictly visual, alliteration of the titles. Or two things, if you add Roger Dean’s artwork, which is also a feature on the friends’ forthcoming offering, set to be issued in CD and vinyl form on September 25th under the title of “Trauma” that breaks this first-letter trend.
Known universally as the Day the Music Died, February 3rd, 1959 saw Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper enter immortality. Not fading away as they might if not for the fatal plane crash, the rock ‘n’ roll upstarts became an influence not only on the future generation of artists but also on their peers. And now some of these – led by Pat Boone and including such luminaries as Frankie Avalon and Chris Montez – covered 31 one of the fallen heroes classics.
