Short Takes: Tabu, TV Mania, Living Colour All Have Plans

Some small morsels of potential catalogue-oriented stuff coming your way on this fine Thursday:

• Demon Music Group promised back in July a slew of reissues from the Tabu Records catalogue, a label that included R&B hits by Cherrelle, Alexander O’Neal and The S.O.S. Band. It looks like those plans may be moving further forward: the label’s official Facebook page yesterday teased “huge plans for the label” in 2013.
• Though not out of reissue ideas for their own proper catalogue, Duran Duran look to be hinting at a revival of the long-abandoned TV Mania project. The self-described “social junk culture triptych opera” was a collaboration between founding keyboardist Nick Rhodes and former guitarist Warren Cuccurullo that was assembled in the 1990s; none of it was ever officially released, but TV Mania was the listed producer for Duran’s Medazzaland (1997) and Pop Trash (2000) albums. Details are scant, but an official site with mailing list sign-up went live yesterday.
• Living Colour, one of the best hard rock groups of the ’80s and ’90s, are touring in honor of the 25th anniversary of their debut LP, Vivid. The Grammy-winning disc spawned the hit “Cult of Personality”; the band will play the album in its entirety in a string of dates across Europe and North America this spring. Frontman Corey Glover recently alluded to a reissue of the album as well, though no concrete plans have been confirmed.
• One of rock’s last holdouts is bringing his catalogue to iTunes: Kid Rock will release all of his studio and live albums (Devil Without a Cause (1998), The History of Rock (2000), Cocky (2001), Kid Rock (2003), Live Trucker (2006), Rock N Roll Jesus (2007), Born Free (2010) and Rebel Soul (2012)) to the digital service on Tuesday, January 15.

So Nice: Light in the Attic Remasters, Expands Four Albums From Brazilian Bossa Legend Marcos Valle

After The Walter Wanderley Trio introduced “Summer Samba (So Nice)” to American record buyers in 1966, the breezy bossa nova tune immediately caught on, transporting listeners to the tropics via recordings by Johnny Mathis, Vikki Carr, Connie Francis and the original voice of “The Girl from Ipanema,” Astrud Gilberto.  But “So Nice” is just one of the musical gifts bestowed over the years by Brazilian composer Marcos Valle.  Beginning next Tuesday, January 15, Light in the Attic is beginning a four-album Marcos Valle reissue series beginning with the 1970 self-titled album that reintroduced Valle and his rapidly-evolving music.  All of these remastered titles will be available on CD, LP and digitally.

Signed to EMI’s Odeon Records label in 1963, Valle and his brother Paulo Sergio Valle soon wrote the original “Samba De Verã,” the song that would become known as “So Nice” with Norman Gimbel’s English lyrics.  Valle headed for America, working with Sergio Mendes and riding the crest of the bossa nova wave.  He was introduced to the U.S. on the 1967 Warner Bros. album Braziliance! which featured Eumir Deodato’s arrangements of Valle’s soon-to-be bossa nova standards including “So Nice,” “The Face I Love” and “Crickets Sing for Anamaria.”  He then teamed with producer Creed Taylor at Verve for another upbeat outing, Samba ’68, again with Deodato in the arranger’s chair.  After rubbing elbows with the likes of Andy Williams and Henry Mancini, though, Valle ultimately chose to return to Brazil to pursue his creative muse.  He continued to record for Odeon following his American excursion, recording well-received albums including 1968’s Viola Enularada, and 1969’s Mustang Cor De Sangue.

After the jump: details on all four of LITA’s upcoming Valle reissues!

Deep Purple Duo: Blackmore’s Final Show, “Slaves and Masters” to Be Reissued

Deep Purple fans have much to be excited about this month with two new catalogue projects covering two very different eras of the long-running rock group.

Eagle Rock kicks things off with a new remaster and reissue of Live in Paris 1975, reportedly the first of 10 forthcoming titles from the band on the label. First released in full back in 2004 but excerpted on many Deep Purple live projects (starting with 1976’s Made in Europe), this show, recorded at Paris’ Palais de Sports in April 1975, is significant for being the final show (for a time, anyway) to feature founding guitarist Ritchie Blackmore. (Blackmore had already founded Rainbow earlier that year and would release his first album with that group in August.) With that, the Mk. III era of Deep Purple ended, with Tommy Bolin becoming the guitarist until the band disbanded in 1976. This version of Live in Paris features an interview as a bonus track.

The group’s disbandment would end in 1984, when the Mk. II lineup, featuring Blackmore, vocalist Ian Gillan, bassist Roger Glover, keyboardist Jon Lord and drummer Ian Paice came together once more. By 1987, Gillan (whose departure and replacement by David Coverdale established the aforementioned Mk. III lineup) would leave once again, to be replaced by onetime Rainbow vocalist Joe Lynn Turner.

The sole Mk. V album, Slaves and Masters, featured the Billboard Mainstream Rock hits “King of Dreams” and “Fire in the Basement,” and certainly remains a unique entry in their catalogue. Friday Music will bring Slaves back on CD in the U.S. for the first time since its original release, appending two bonus tracks: the single edit of “Love Conquers All” and its non-LP B-side, “Slow Down Sister.”

Expect Live in Paris 1975 in stores on January 29, while the expanded Slaves and Masters streets the following week on February 5. Find the usual pre-order links and track info after the jump!

Johnny Mathis’ Expanded “Special Part of Me” Highlights Paul Anka and Michael Jackson Collaboration

It’s been a wonderful, wonderful time to be a fan of Johnny Mathis, with the singer’s long-lost Mercury Records catalogue recently having been upgraded to CD by Real Gone Music.  As 2013 opens, another label is turning its attention to the Mathis catalogue.  Funky Town Grooves is returning the 1984 album A Special Part of Me to CD in a first-ever expanded edition due on January 15.

Mathis’ association with Columbia Records began in 1956 when he was just 21 years of age, and these many years later, he’s still a label fixture, with his most recent album (2010’s Let It Be Me: Mathis in Nashville) having arrived on Columbia.   Other than the 1963-1966 tenure at Mercury, Columbia saw Mathis through every conceivable genre of music.  While at Mercury, Mathis dipped his toes in the waters of the “covers album,” in which he would record “the Johnny Mathis” version of popular, charting songs.  The romantic, lush tones that had served him so well on readings of Broadway and Hollywood standards in his early years proved remarkably adaptable to songs by Bacharach and David, Lennon and McCartney, and Jimmy Webb.

Producer/composer/arranger Thom Bell was one of the first to realize Mathis’ untapped potential as a true soul singer, tailoring the lush 1973 album I’m Coming Home to the artist’s rich vocal talents.  Steadily recording throughout the seventies, Mathis reached the “top of the pops” in 1978 with “Too Much, Too Little, Too Late,” a duet with Deniece Williams, and stayed current with disco-flavored cuts (1978’s “Gone, Gone, Gone” for one), hit film themes (Marvin Hamlisch and the Bergmans’ “The Last Time I Felt Like This,” with Jane Olivor, from Same Time, Next Year) and even a funky, dancefloor-ready collaboration with CHIC (the still-unreleased album I Love My Lady).

We meet Mathis in 1984 after the jump!  Plus: a pre-order link and full track listing.