Rock Encyclopedia

The Historic, First-Time-Televised Concert Will Simulcast On VH1 Classic, VH1 And Palladia

Celebrating the 20th anniversary of Nirvana’s genre-defining second album Nevermind, VH1 Classic will televise a special, never-before-seen concert “Nirvana: Live At The Paramount” Friday, September 23 at 11 PM ET/PT. The 60-minute, hometown concert will also be simulcast on VH1 and Palladia, MTV Networks’ high-definition music channel.

Shot at Seattle’s Paramount Theater on Halloween night in 1991, the historic and riveting concert will remind viewers how one band changed the music scene with an inspirational bounty of seminal songs including their 90′s anthem “Smells Like Teen Spirit.”  Launching the 11 song set with a brilliant cover of the Vaselines’ “Jesus Doesn’t Want Me For A Sunbeam,” the band tears through Nevermind hits including “Lithium” and “Breed,” plus other favorites including “Aneurysm,” “Polly,” “Sliver,” “On A Plain,” Blew,” “Territorial Pissings” and “Endless, Nameless.”

Twenty years since Nirvana’s groundbreaking 1991 album Nevermind was released, VH1 Classic is celebrating and honoring the punk trio Kurt Cobain, Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl on Friday, September 23 at 11 pm ET/PT. Tune in to VH1 Classic for a front row seat to “Nirvana: Live At The Paramount” and witness how an alt-rock trio from Seattle became one of the most renowned rock bands in history. To learn more about Nirvana visit their official Web site at www.nirvana.com.

Released in September 1991, Nirvana‘s sophomore album and major label debut elevated Kurt Cobain, Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl from a critically acclaimed Aberdeen, Washington, cult band to generational spokesmen who’d unwittingly created a cultural shift and musical touchstone.

Rising to No. 1 the world over by year’s end and ultimately selling over 30 million copies worldwide, Nevermind would come to be much more than one of the most successful and influential albums of its or any era.  As the album that returned unaffected rock ‘n’ roll integrity and passion to the top of the charts, Nevermind would prove a singular inspiration to fans and musicians alike over the last two decades–and will undoubtedly do so for generations to come.

Now on the occasion of Nevermind’s 20th anniversary, Universal Music Enterprises presents a full spectrum re-release worthy of such a pivotal classic. With configurations ranging from a 4-CD/1-DVD Super Deluxe Edition to a standard digital/CD remaster of the original album, the 20th anniversary reissue of Nevermind makes the most of the occasion, unearthing literally dozens of previously unreleased recordings, obscure B-sides, alternate mixes, radio sessions, studio rarities and live recordings, including a 1991 Halloween concert at Seattle’s Paramount Theatre in its entirety. (more…)

Historic Jimi Hendrix concerts… a legendary performance from Nirvana… U2′s remastered The Unforgettable Fire… every recording by Buddy Holly… nearly every Rolling Stones album since 1971… and a collection from famed sideman Klaus Voormann. With new box sets and albums from UMe, holiday gift-giving has never sounded so good.

Buddy Holly:

He had a brief three-year professional recording career, but Buddy Holly left the music world a vast recorded legacy of 203 tracks–all of them on the limited edition six-CD Hip-O Select box set Not Fade Away/The Complete Studio Recordings And More.

The tracks range from his earliest recordings to demos with Bob Montgomery; from his earliest recordings with The Crickets to his first studio recordings for Decca in Nashville; from the Coral and Brunswick recordings and hits that made him famous to his heralded apartment tapes. There are six previously unreleased tracks plus another 11 previously unreleased in the U.S. All of the original, locatable undubbed recordings and all 57 overdubbed versions recorded after the “day the music died” are here. Many are hard-to-find or make their CD debuts.

Jimi Hendrix:

Two box sets from Dagger Records (Experience Hendrix through Geffen/UMe), offered exclusively through Amazon.com, are each presented with exclusive reproductions of Hendrix memorabilia, including a poster, postcard set replicating classic Hendrix concert posters, set of badges reminiscent of the era, Hendrix iPod Skin, PikCARD with four guitar picks adorned with Hendrix artwork from the concert posters and more.

Jimi Hendrix Experience Live 1968 Paris/Ottawa encompasses a pair of concerts, highlighted by performances of “Purple Haze,” “The Wind Cries Mary” and “Little Wing” from the L’Olympia Theater in Paris and a “Hendrixized” version of the Beatles’ “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” taped at Ottawa’s Capitol Theater later that same year. Jimi Hendrix Experience Paris ’67 is a custom-swirled, colored vinyl album documenting an earlier concert at L’Olympia and featuring performances of “Stone Free,” “Hey Joe,” “Wild Thing,” etc.

Nirvana:

One of the most bootlegged concerts in the annals of rock– Nirvana’s August 30, 1992, headlining appearance at the U.K.’s Reading Festival–Nirvana Live At Reading (DGC/Geffen/UMe) will be issued in a limited edition DVD+CD Deluxe Edition in November. The footage and audio come in the original multi-track masters and are presented in 5.1 Surround Sound. Only two of the 25 performances on the DVD have ever been released before.

The concert ranked #1 in Kerrang’s “100 Gigs That Shook The World” and “Nirvana’s #1 Greatest Moment” by fans in an NME poll includes nearly the entire Nevermind tracklist, early performances of then-unrecorded songs (“All Apologies,” “Dumb” and the first performance of “Tourette’s”) and live versions of songs later heard on Incesticide. The career-spanning set list also reaches back to the band’s beginnings.

The Rolling Stones:

Thirteen of the 14 Rolling Stones albums since 1971 have been newly remastered and are available from UMe separately or in a limited edition collectible box set exclusively through Amazon.com (1972′s Exile On Main St. will be remastered and released in early 2010). Included is a full-color poster of the band’s Sticky Fingers classic promotional image re-created specially for this package.

The box brings together Sticky Fingers (1971, “Brown Sugar,” “Wild Horses”); Goats Head Soup (1973, “Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker),” “Angie”); It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll (1974, “It’s Only Rock ‘n’ Roll (But I Like It)”); Black And Blue (1976, “Hot Stuff,” “Miss You”); Some Girls (1978, “Beast Of Burden,” “Shattered”); Emotional Rescue (1980, “She’s So Cold”); Tattoo You (1981, “Start Me Up”); Undercover (1983, “Undercover Of The Night”); Dirty Work (1986, “Harlem Shuffle”); and Steel Wheels (1989, “Rock And A Hard Place”) plus Voodoo Lounge (1994), Bridges To Babylon (1997) and A Bigger Bang (2005).

U2:

U2′s fourth album, The Unforgettable Fire, has been remastered for the first time with direction from U2 guitarist, The Edge, and will be released by Island/UMe on October 27, 2009. This special edition marks 25 years since the album’s original release in October 1984. Recorded at Slane Castle, Ireland, The Unforgettable Fire was the first U2 album to be produced by Brian Eno and Daniel Lanois, and spawned the US top 10 hit – “Pride (In The Name Of Love).”

The limited edition super deluxe box set features bonus audio material, including two previously unheard tracks from the Slane Castle sessions: “Yoshino Blossom” and “Disappearing Act” (a track which the band recently completed), and a DVD including music videos, a documentary and unreleased live footage from the Amnesty International Conspiracy of Hope Tour in 1986.

Klaus Voormann:

On A Sideman’s Journey (UMe), famed musician Klaus Voormann, who played bass on solo albums for every Beatle as well as for Harry Nilsson, Randy Newman, Yoko Ono and others, is joined by musical friends in seven studio sessions in London, Memphis, Hamburg, Los Angeles and Munich. The limited edition two-disc box set, available exclusively through Amazon.com, includes three bonus audio tracks, a DVD documentary on the making of the album, a hardbound book of photos (renowned graphic designer Voormann created the Beatles’ Revolver cover) and more.

Featuring Ringo Starr, Paul McCartney, Joe Walsh, Yusuf (aka Cat Stevens), Dr. John, Bonnie Bramlett, Van Dyke Parks, Albert Lee, and others, A Sideman’s Journey finds Voormann & Friends performing favorites such as “Blue Suede Shoes,” “All Things Must Pass,” “Mighty Quinn” and “Just Like A Woman.”

Source: Universal Music Enterprises