High Moon Rising: Reissues From Gene Clark and Arthur Lee’s Love Now Available For Pre-Order

At long last, High Moon is rising.  Yesterday, on January 2, the long-aborning record label revealed on its Facebook page that pre-orders were being taken for the label’s CD releases of Gene Clark’s Two Sides to Every Story and Love’s Black Beauty. We’ve closely followed the High Moon story here at The Second Disc, from the label’s initial announcements in Spring 2011 through an optimistic status update almost two years ago on January 30, 2012.  Deluxe, 180-gram vinyl LPs arrived for both titles in 2013, but until now, the promised CD releases hadn’t materialized.  Thankfully, these titles look to be worth the wait and are promised to ship this month (January)!  See below for full details on both releases, including complete track listings and further new information in bold.

POST OF 1/30/12: Some of you with long-term memories might recall our happily breaking the news about High Moon Records back in May 2011.  The New York-based independent label had recently held a release party to announce reissues of Love’s 1973 unreleased album Black Beauty and Gene Clark’s 1977 Two Sides to Every Story.  Both inaugural titles were slated to arrive on June 7.  June came and went, as did 2011, with no sign of either of these much-anticipated releases.

So we’re happy to relate the news shared last month by High Moon’s owners George Wallace and J.D. Martignon.  As of December 9, High Moon was “finalizing the artwork for both releases on LP and CD” and offered new hints as to the talented names working on the albums.  Both albums were remastered by multi-Grammy Award nominee Dan Hersch; the lacquers were mastered and cut by Doug Sax, a name likely familiar to all collectors of audiophile vinyl.  The same care is being put into the albums’ booklets.  The essay for Black Beauty was written by Ben Edmonds (Rolling Stone, Mojo), and Edmonds’ notes will be joined by over fifty never-before-seen pictures of Arthur Lee and the band during the sessions, taken by Herbert Worthington (Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours).   As for Clark’s Two Sides, his biographer John Einarson has provided the new essay.  High Moon will include more never-seen photography, this time by Ed Caraeef from the original album photo session.

Both discs will be packaged in hardbound eco-books for the CDs, while the 180-gram LPs will be housed in tip-on jackets with full-color, 11″x 11″ magazine-style inserts.  For much more on High Moon Records, including track listings and discographical info for these two albums, hit the jump for the salient details!