Of Mamas, Papas, Raiders and Soundtracks: Real Gone’s February Slate Revealed

The announcement of Real Gone Music’s release schedule for February 2014 would be cause for celebration any day of the week. But this particular day is special, as you’re about to find out.

In addition to an ironclad lineup that includes A Gathering of Flowers, the long out-of-print 1970 collection from The Mamas & The Papas; The Complete Recordings by Brotherhood, an unfairly obscure psych-rock band comprised of Phil Volk, Drake Levin and Mike “Smitty” Smith of Paul Revere & The Raiders that cut three LPs for RCA; a twofer by Smith (A Band Called Smith/Minus-Plus), the L.A. soul band which had a Top 5 hit in a cover of “Baby, It’s You” (arranged by Del Shannon, who discovered the band) and a pair of 1976 Grateful Dead shows for the 20th volume of Dick’s Picks,  two intriguing, long out-of-print film soundtracks make their domestic CD debuts: Together? – a Burt Bacharach-led pop feast featuring lyrics from Paul Anka and vocals from Jackie DeShannon and Michael McDonald – and Toomorrow, a 1970 sci-fi movie musical assembled by Harry Saltzman and Don Kirshner with vocals from a very unknown Australian actor-chanteuse named Olivia Newton-John.

And what makes those two soundtrack releases so exciting? The Second Disc is extremely proud to report that our own Joe Marchese is writing the liner notes to these releases! Joe’s insight that served readers so well on a previous post about the Together? soundtrack will now guide fans through the first ever Stateside releases of this and Toomorrow. We’ve rarely been more thrilled for you to read some Second Disc-style work without even needing to open your laptop!

All titles are set for a February 4 release. For the full release schedule, which also includes releases by Canadian trio Troyka and country-gospel crooner Jim Reeves, hit the jump!