Release Round-Up: Week of June 19

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The Ventures, The Ventures On Stage / Wild Things! / Super Psychedelics / Hawaii Five-O (Sundazed)

Four classic Ventures albums, remastered on CD and LP.

Bob Mould, Bob Mould / The Last Dog + Pony Show / LiveDog98 (Edsel)

After the revelatory Sugar reissues, Mould’s late ’90s albums (plus one rare live disc from the same time period) are collated into one last deluxe set from the label.

Can, The Lost Tapes (Mute)

A triple-disc box set of completely unreleased works from the German band.

Ernie Kovacs, Percy Dovetonsils…Thpeaks / Buck Owens, Live at the White House (Omnivore)

The two newest from Omnivore: an unreleased set from iconic comedian Kovacs, and an expanded live album from Bakersfield’s favorite country musician.

BJ Thomas, The Complete Scepter Singles (Real Gone)

Cryin’s not for you with this collection of Thomas’ A and B-sides for the Scepter label.

Kylie Minogue, The Best of Kylie Minogue (EMI)

The U.S. release of Kylie’s newest greatest hits set, available as a deluxe CD/DVD edition.

Never Gonna Give You Up: Iconic Pop Production Team Stock Aitken Waterman Celebrated with New Box Set

It may have been the “flavor of the month” as European ’80s pop went, but the distinctive sounds of Stock Aitken Waterman and the PWL label was one heck of a flavor, earning a rather generous compilation/box set treatment, Pete Waterman Presents The Hit Factory: Soundtrack to a Generation  in the U.K. this summer.

Mike Stock, Matt Aitken and Pete Waterman began working for Waterman’s PWL production company in 1984, specializing in Hi-NRG dance music by U.K. pop artists like Hazell Dean and Dead or Alive; the latter group’s “You Spin Me Round (Like a Record),” produced by the SAW team, was a No. 1 hit in the U.K. and peaked at No. 11 in the States, the first step in solidifying the team’s popularity.

When they attracted the attention of girl group Bananarama, however, things really started to take off. The SAW/PWL collective turned into England’s equivalent of the Motown assembly line, with an array of fresh-faced young talent performing peppy originals and synthed-up covers of pop classics. Several of the artists, including Rick Astley and Kylie Minogue, enjoyed major international success.

While the mainstream press usually dismissed their works as fluff, those who came of age among ’80s and ’90s pop charts do love what they heard, and have been well-suited by the odd wave of nostalgia for that sound in the form of reissues and compilations (Cherry Pop has overseen expansions of many PWL albums in recent years, along with this compilation from longtime SAW partner and engineer/mixer Phil Harding).

A PWL “Hit Factory Live” Concert to be held in London next month will feature a good amount of the artists on this new set, which will be available from Sony in the U.K. as a double-disc compilation or a triple-disc box set with a bonus CD of rare and unreleased dance mixes. Both sets will be released in England on July 9, two days ahead of the anticipated live event.

Hit the jump to take a look at all the hits on The Hit Factory!

Release Round-Up: Week of June 5

The Beatles, Yellow Submarine (Blu-Ray) (Apple/EMI)

Take a trip back to Pepperland with the Fab Four’s animated film, now available as a feature-laden Blu-Ray Disc. The 1999 Yellow Submarine Songtrack remix album is also added to the Beatles remaster canon. (Keep a close eye on our giveaway; we’re announcing a winner very soon!)

Paul Simon, Graceland: 25th Anniversary Edition (Legacy)

A man walks down the street, sees many configurations of the Graceland reissue (namely a CD/DVD featuring newly released outtakes and the new documentary Under African Skies – also separately available on DVD and Blu-Ray – and a four-disc box set which adds an entire 1987 concert from the Graceland tour on DVD) and gets pretty darn excited.

David Bowie, The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and The Spiders from Mars: 40th Anniversary Edition (EMI)

Ziggy falls to earth once again, albeit just as a newly-remastered CD with no bonus content; the bonuses are on the LP/DVD combo, which features out-of-print and unreleased surround mixes.

Jerry Goldsmith, Star Trek: The Motion Picture – Limited Edition (La-La Land Records)

Available to order later today (around 4 p.m. EST), this three-disc edition is the definitive word on Jerry Goldsmith’s iconic score for the first Trek film, with the complete score, alternate and rejected cues, the original LP program and many other audio treasures. (If you haven’t yet, do check out the first part of our interview with the set’s co-producer Mike Matessino, and check back for part two later this week!)

Michael Jackson, I Just Can’t Stop Loving You (CD Single) (Epic/Legacy)

Available only at Walmart stores in the U.S., this CD single, backed with the unreleased demo “Don’t Be Messin’ ‘Round,” kicks off the Bad 25 campaign.

Maroon 5, Songs About Jane: 10th Anniversary Edition (A&M/Octone)

Weeks away from the release of their fourth studio album, a double-disc version of Maroon 5’s first breakthrough album, featuring demos and unlockable video content, is now available.

Sugar, Beaster: Deluxe Edition (Edsel)

The latest in the Sugar reissue campaign (seminal debut Copper Blue was reissued last week) is an expansion of the band’s second release, an EP, with a bonus DVD of performance clips.

Heart, Strange Euphoria (Epic/Legacy)

A 3 CD/1 DVD box chronicling the highs of Ann and Nancy Wilson’s lengthy careers, with hits and rarities in equal measure.

Lenny Kravitz, Mama Said: 21st Anniversary Deluxe Edition (Virgin/EMI)

Kravitz’s sophomore album, featuring hit single “It Ain’t Over ‘Til It’s Over,” expanded with non-LP B-sides, live material and archival demos.

America, Perspective / In Concert, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Close Up the Honky Tonks, Atlanta Rhythm Section, Are You Ready! (BGO)

Some hidden gems from some of the best ’70s and ’80s rockers, all of which are either rare or new to CD.

Kylie Minogue, The Best of Kylie Minogue (EMI Catalogue)

A simple, compact collection of Kylie hits. A special edition features a DVD of music videos.

Black Sabbath, Iron Man: The Best of Black Sabbath (Sanctuary U.K.)

A bare-bones Sabbath compilation.

The Association, The Complete Warner Bros. and Valiant Singles Collection (Now Sounds)

Every last one of The Association’s singles for the Valiant and Warner Bros. labels are collected on two CDs!  Watch for full coverage of this collection soon!

Kylie Minogue Celebrates Quarter Century with New Compilation

Twenty-five years is quite a long time for any pop star to survive, much less thrive. Australia’s darling Kylie Minogue has been doing just that for a quarter century, and is celebrating that landmark with a new greatest hits album to be released this summer.

The Best of Kylie Minogue compiles 21 tracks – 18 of them Top 5 hits in the U.K. – to celebrate the anniversary of the singer’s first single, a cover of Little Eva’s “The Loco-Motion” produced by the Stock Aitken Waterman team that became a worldwide Top 10. For the first chunk of her career, Minogue was Europe’s go-to girl next door, with a clutch of hits from the SAW/PWL team. She ultimately left the team’s employ in the mid-1990s to find her footing as a more mature performer, and eventually struck gold in the early 2000s with tracks like “Spinning Around,” “On a Night Like This” and “Can’t Get You Out of My Head” – the latter a No. 1 smash in nearly every territory (save for the U.S., which still welcomed it into the Top 10, her second-highest charting single on our shores).

While there’s no new material on this compilation, which will be available as a standard CD and deluxe CD/DVD with music videos, The Best of Kylie Minogue serves as a healthy primer for the pop diva’s career, who’s booked a high-profile gig at The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Concert in London on June 4, the album’s international release date. (The disc is out in America on June 19.)

Check out the track list after the jump.

Kylie Minogue, The Best of Kylie Minogue (EMI Catalogue, 2012)

1. Can’t Get You Out of My Head
2. Spinning Around
3. I Should Be So Lucky
4. Love at First Sight
5. In Your Eyes
6. Kids (with Robbie Williams)
7. Better the Devil You Know
8. All the Lovers
9. Give Me Just a Little More Time
10. Celebration
11. Slow
12. Red Blooded Woman
13. I Believe in You
14. On a Night Like This
15. Confide in Me
16. Get Outta My Way
17. The Loco-Motion
18. Tears on My Pillow
19. Wow
20. In My Arms
21. Never Too Late

Tracks 1 and 4-5 from Fever (Parlophone, 2001)
Tracks 2, 6 and 14 from Light Years (Parlophone, 2000)
Tracks 3 and 17 from Kylie (Mushroom/PWL, 1988)
Track 7 from Rhythm of Love (Mushroom/PWL, 1990)
Tracks 8 and 16 from Aphrodite (Parlophone, 2010)
Track 9 from Let’s Get to It (Mushroom/PWL, 1991)
Track 10 from Greatest Hits (Mushroom/PWL, 1992)
Tracks 11-12 from Body Language (Parlophone, 2003)
Track 13 from Ultimate Kylie (Parlophone, 2004)
Track 15 from Kylie Minogue (Mushroom/Deconstruction, 1994)
Tracks 18 and 21 from Enjoy Yourself (Mushroom/PWL, 1989)
Tracks 19-20 from X (Parlophone, 2007)

Can’t Get You Out of My Box: Kylie Albums Collected in New U.K. Set

Next up in our continued coverage of today’s new catalogue releases is a new, semi-notable box set from pop star extraordinaire Kylie Minogue.

Though the Australian singer/actress is unfairly known in the U.S. for two songs – a Stock-Aitken-Waterman-produced cover of Little Eva’s “The Loco-Motion” that hit No. 3 in 1988 and the slinky club track “Can’t Get You Out of My Head,” which hit No. 7 in 2002 – Minogue has rarely stayed away from the upper reaches of the U.K. and Australian charts. In 2010, her most recent album, Aphrodite, topped the British charts, making her the only female act to have a No. 1 album in every decade since the 1980s.

Her five albums for Parlophone in Europe over the past decade saw Kylie truly come into her own as a self-assured solo act with the greatest amount of artistic control she had enjoyed at the time. Now, those albums are collated into one set, Kylie: The Albums 2000-2010. While it offers no extra content (it in fact still offers only the second pressing of Fever, which offered the radio edit of “Come Into My World” instead of the original version), it’s as always a nice, concise way to get all of these albums in one shot if you haven’t previously done so.

Reacquaint yourself with the albums after the jump.