Release Round-Up: Week of September 16

Jimi Hendrix, The Cry of Love and Rainbow Bridge: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (Experience Hendrix/Legacy)

Legacy and Experience Hendrix have reissues of Jimi Hendrix’s first two posthumously-released albums, both from 1971; The Cry of Love is long out-of-print on CD, while Rainbow Bridge makes its first authorized appearance in the CD format.  Both titles have been freshly remastered by Bernie Grundman from the original analog masters.

The Cry of Love: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

Rainbow Bridge: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack : Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

 

Charles Lloyd, Manhattan Stories (Resonance) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.)

Jazz great Charles Lloyd, on saxophone and flute, is joined by guitarist Gábor Szabó, bassist Ron Carter and drummer Pete La Roca on this set premiering two 1965 New York concerts.  The deluxe 2-CD edition, remastered by Bernie Grundman, features new liner notes by Stanley Crouch, Willard Jenkins, Don Heckman & Michael Cuscuna.

Scruffy the Cat – Good Goodbye: Unreleased Recordings 1984-1990 (Omnivore) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.)

College radio heroes and alt-country rockers Scruffy the Cat return on this new anthology from Omnivore Recordings featuring 23 songs – one issued on a rare single and 22 never released anywhere – encompassing both live and studio tracks.

James Galway, The Man with the Golden Flute: The Complete RCA Albums Collection (RCA/Masterworks) (Amazon U.S. /Amazon U.K.)

This 73-disc (!) box set chronicles the career of “The Man with the Golden Flute.”  Over  71 CDs and 2 DVDs, Galway tackles both classical and pop repertoire with collaborators including Henry Mancini, The Chieftains, Cleo Laine and John Dankworth, and many of the greatest orchestras and conductors in the world.

The Salsoul Orchestra, Christmas Jollies: The Deluxe Edition (Friday Music) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.)

Friday Music’s new collection re-presents The Salsoul Orchestra’s first holiday album from 1976, produced, arranged and conducted by the late, great Vince Montana, plus three bonus tracks – “New Year’s Americana Suite” and the single versions of “Merry Christmas, All” and “We Wish You a Merry Christmas.”

Ray Price, The Ray Price Christmas Album (Friday Music) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. )

Friday Music also has the late country crooner’s 1969 Columbia holiday LP on CD featuring “Jingle Bells,” “I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day,” “The Little Drummer Boy” and more.

Barbra Streisand, Partners (Columbia) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.)

Okay, this isn’t a catalogue title, but it’s Barbra Streisand!  The legendary artist returns with her latest studio album, featuring duets with Billy Joel, John Legend, John Mayer, Blake Shelton, Michael Buble, Stevie Wonder, Lionel Richie and the late Elvis Presley.  Target stores have an exclusive edition with five bonus tracks – four previously released duets with Barry Gibb, Barry Manilow, Bryan Adams and Frank Sinatra plus one outtake with the album’s co-producer, Babyface.  (He’s also heard on Partners with “Evergreen.”)  This edition is also available in the U.K. from general retailers!

Various Artists, Northern Soul: The Soundtrack (Harmless) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.)

Demon Music Group’s Harmless imprint has the soundtrack to director Elaine Constantine’s new film chronicling the U.K. Northern Soul movement that gave new life to classic American soul records; the soundtrack set consists of two CDs (the actual songs from the film on the first CD and other Northern Soul favorites compiled by the director on the second disc) plus an exclusive DVD with Elaine Constantine being interviewed about the making of the film by actor James Lance who portrays Northern Soul DJ Ray Henderson in the movie.  A special limited edition set of vinyl singles is also available.

Henry Mancini / Neil Sedaka / Paul Anka / Harry Belafonte / Aretha Franklin, The Real… (Sony U.K.)

The U.K. arm of Sony Music continues its series of 3-CD anthologies drawing primarily from the Columbia and RCA archives, adding a number of favorite classic pop artists to a series that’s already 25+-titles strong.

The Real Henry Mancini: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

The Real Neil Sedaka: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

The Real Paul Anka: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

The Real Harry Belafonte: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

The Real Aretha Franklin: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

Elmer Bernstein, Themes from the General Electric Theatre / See No Evil (Intrada)

The Intrada label has two new titles from the composer and maestro Elmer Bernstein including the CD premiere of Columbia Records’ soundtrack to the anthology television series starring future President Ronald Reagan, and the world premiere release of Bernstein’s score to Richard Fleischer’s 1971 thriller starring Mia Farrow, See No Evil!

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!

Review: Paul Anka, “Duets”

Whether you prefer your “My Way” by Sinatra or Sid (Vicious, that is), you have Paul Anka to thank.  It was Anka who took the melody to the chanson “Comme d’habitude” and crafted the ultimate anthem of survival and tenacity with his English-language lyrics.  When Sinatra recorded the song, a gift to him from Anka, he was just 53 years of age yet could still ring true when singing of that “final curtain.”  Today, Paul Anka is 71, and his new memoir is entitled, what else, My Way.  Thankfully, the end seems far from near for the entertainer, who has kept busy not only with the book, but with an album from Legacy Recordings.  Duets (88765 48489 2) is a blend of new and old tracks with one thing in common: the unmistakable voice of Paul Anka.  (He also wrote or co-wrote all but two of its songs.)

The Ottawa-born pop star scored his first hit at the ripe old age of 15 with 1957’s “Diana.”  It earned him a No. 1 in the U.S. Best Sellers in Stores and R&B charts, as well as No. 1 in the U.K., Canada and Australia. But overnight sensation Anka was a teen idol with a difference: he was a true singer/songwriter, writing both music and lyrics for his own songs. By the age of 20, Anka was reportedly raking in $1.5 million a year and selling some 20 million records, but he knew that he had to take himself to the next level. The singer poised himself for a reinvention for the adult market with more mature material aimed at the supper club crowd.  Throughout his chart career, Anka has successfully balanced contemporary pop with timeless showbiz tradition.

To its credit, Duets isn’t a rehash of the formula enjoyed by so many superstars, from Frank Sinatra to Tony Bennett, of remaking “greatest hits” with familiar partners.  There’s no “Puppy Love,” no “Times of Your Life” or “One Woman Man/One Man Woman.”  Nor is Duets a career retrospective, per se, as the only vintage tracks are drawn from 1998’s A Body of Work.  In many ways, Duets is an update of that Epic release.  A Body of Work included seven duets among its eleven tracks, and four of those have been reprised on Duets.  (That album also included a posthumous duet with Sinatra on “My Way.”  Frank and the song are here, too, but in a newly-created recording.)  None of Anka’s hit seventies duets with Odia Coates like “One Woman Man” or “You’re Having My Baby” are heard here.  Though Jay-Z reportedly denied Anka’s invitation to participate, a number of top talents did show up to celebrate Anka’s 55 years in entertainment, including Dolly Parton, Leon Russell, Willie Nelson and Michael Bublé.

Come join us after the jump!

Release Round-Up: Week of April 9

Brainstorm / S.O.S. Band / Cherrelle / Alexander O’Neal, “Tabu Reborn” Expanded CD Editions (Wave 1) (Tabu/Edsel)

After a fresh batch of vinyl last week, the Tabu Records reissue campaign (going strong through next year) kicks off with expanded editions of Brainstorm’s Stormin’, The S.O.S. Band’s III, Cherrelle’s Fragile and Alexander O’Neal’s self-titled debut. All feature bonus tracks (Alexander O’Neal has a bonus disc) and fresh deluxe packaging.

Stormin‘: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.
III: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.
Fragile: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.
Alexander O’Neal: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

Morrissey, Kill Uncle: Expanded Edition / The Last of the Famous International Playboys (Single) (EMI)

Moz’s latest remastered, reconfigured album is his 1991 sophomore effort (featuring a revised track list with two B-sides and an unreleased alternate version of “There’s a Place in Hell for Me and My Friends”), and it will be promoted with new versions of his hit 1989 single with unreleased songs from a BBC session serving as the B-sides.

Album (CD): Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.
Album (LP): Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.
Single (CD): Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

Sandie Shaw, Sandie / Me / Love Me, Please Love Me: Expanded Editions / Long Live Love: The Very Best of Sandie Shaw (Salvo)

The irrepressible Sandie Shaw’s first three albums are remastered and expanded with many single sides, and a new career-spanning compilation puts it into perspective for the new fan.

Sandie: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.
Me: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.
Love Me: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.
Long Live Love: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

Julio Iglesias, 1: Greatest Hits (Columbia/Legacy/Sony Music Latin)

Celebrate the Spanish crooner with this two-disc set of classic and newly-recorded versions of his greatest hits, also available as a deluxe set with a remastered 1990 concert on DVD.

Standard: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.
Deluxe: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.

Paul Anka, Duets (Legacy)

The acclaimed singer-songwriter has a new compilation of old and new duets with legends from Michael Jackson to Willie Nelson and almost everyone in between! (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.)

Electronic, Electronic: Special Edition (EMI)

A double-disc expansion of this collaborative effort between New Order’s Bernard Sumner and former Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr, with a bonus disc of mostly unrelated extras. (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.)

Bravo Giovanni and Lady in the Dark: Cast Recordings (Masterworks Broadway)

Two musical scores from the Masterworks vault make their way to digital retailers, with the latter score featuring six bonus tracks from the show’s star, Danny Kaye.

Those Oldies But Goodies: Bear Family Offers Up Vintage Everly Brothers, Paul Anka

Though best known for its definitive box sets spanning careers or large swaths of them, Germany’s historically-minded Bear Family label also keeps busy with a steady flow of single-disc anthologies, all with the label’s hallmarks of quality.  Three such anthologies have recently arrived from Bear Family, two focusing on The Everly Brothers and one on Paul Anka.

Brothers Don and Phil Everly successfully straddled the line between country and rock-and-roll (with a healthy dollop of R&B in there) beginning with their first hit record, 1957’s “Bye Bye Love.”  Still an oldies-radio staple today, the Felice and Boudleaux Bryant classic began a long stretch of successes for the duo.  Archie Bleyer, of Cadence Records, signed the boys in February 1957 and was keenly aware of their potential to appeal to both teenaged and adult markets.  And so the Everlys were instructed to pair a rocking A-side with a romantic B-side on each single.  Bear Family has now tapped into both styles for their pair of releases, The Everly Brothers Rock and The Ballads of The Everly Brothers.

Bear Family’s long-running Rocks series has previously put the spotlights on rave-ups from artists both expected (Ronnie Hawkins, Wanda Jackson) and unexpected (Pat Boone, Marty Robbins) and everybody in between (Bobby Darin, Conway Twitty).   The Everlys’ volume chronologically includes 30 songs from “Bye Bye Love” on the Cadence label to “Dancing on My Feet,” recorded in 1962 but not issued until 1995 on Bear Family’s box set The Price of Fame 1960-1965.  (That box falls between Classic Everly Brothers and Chained to a Memory: 1966-1972.  Taken together, the three boxes tell the entire Everly story up to 1972.  A subsequent mini-box, The Outtakes, was released as a companion volume.)  The compilation includes beloved Cadence records like “Wake Up Little Susie” (1957), “Bird Dog” (1958), “Till I Kissed You” (1959) and “When Will I Be Loved” (1960) along with tracks from the duo’s subsequent Warner Bros. stint such as “Cathy’s Clown” and “Temptation” (both 1960).  Among the most interesting tracks are a trio from lyricist Gerry Goffin – two co-written with Carole King and one with Jack Keller.  This collection truly takes Don and Phil from Nashville to Hollywood.

The Ballads of the Everly Brothers is comparable in scope, also including 30 tracks from the same 1957-1962 time period.  Previous Ballads volumes have focused on Johnny Horton, Johnny Burnette, Wanda Jackson and Gene Vincent, among others.  The Everlys’ entry begins with the flipside of “Wake Up Little Susie,” the Don and Phil co-write “Maybe Tomorrow,” and ends with Goffin and Keller’s “No One Can Make My Sunshine Smile,” also first issued on the Price of Fame box and featuring Wrecking Crew personnel including Ray Pohlman and Billy Strange.  The Keller/Goffin team also supplied the Everlys with “Don’t Ask Me to Be Friends,” while Carole King teamed with Howard Greenfield for the hit “Crying in the Rain.”  Both songs are included here.  There are also a number of Broadway and Hollywood songs that might strike casual fans as atypical: Cole Porter’s “True Love” from High Society, Bob Merrill’s “Love Makes the World Go Round” from Carnival, and Jule Styne and Betty Comden and Adolph Green’s “The Party’s Over” from Bells Are Ringing.  Ironically, Ballads also includes “Hi Lili, Hi Lo” from Lili, the screen version of the same story depicted in Broadway’s Carnival.  The versatile Brothers even stretched back to the thirties for Jimmy McHugh and Dorothy Fields’ “Don’t Blame Me” and Sigmund Romberg and Oscar Hammerstein II’s “When I Grow Too Old to Dream.”

Even when their personal lives were far from harmonious, The Everly Brothers sure sounded heavenly.  Both volumes, produced and annotated by Andrew Sandoval, are available now, and both feature 34-page booklets with complete discographies/sessionographies for the disc’s songs.  You’ll find the full track listing and order links after the jump, along with the scoop on Paul Anka’s Dianacally Yours!

He Did It His Way: Paul Anka Joins Friends For “Duets”, New CD Features Michael Jackson, Frank Sinatra, Leon Russell and More

Do you remember the times of your life?

Paul Anka posed that musical question in 1975, taking Roger Nichols and Bill Lane’s onetime Kodak film jingle all the way to the Top 10 Billboard pop chart and No. 1 Easy Listening.  At that point, Anka could rightfully reflect on the times of his own storied life, nearly two decades in the music business.  But could he have imagined that he would still be going strong almost forty years after “Times of Your Life” hit?  The Canadian-born singer, songwriter, producer and manager is celebrating 55 years in the music business with the release on April 9 of Duets, a 14-track collection of vocal pairings both old and new.  The Legacy Recordings album coincides with the same day’s debut of his autobiography, naturally entitled My Way after the song he co-wrote for Frank Sinatra.

Ottawa-born Anka had his first hit with 1957’s “Diana.”  When the song was released, Anka was just shy of 16 years old, and it earned him a No. 1 in the U.S. Best Sellers in Stores and R&B charts, as well as No. 1 in the U.K., Canada and Australia.  But overnight sensation Anka was a teen idol with a difference: he was a true singer/songwriter, writing both music and lyrics for his own songs.  In 1962, Anka departed his home of ABC-Paramount for the more lucrative pastures of RCA Victor, which is now under the same corporate umbrella of Sony Music Entertainment as Legacy Recordings.  Anka followed up his ABC hits like “You Are My Destiny,” “Lonely Boy,” “Puppy Love” and “Put Your Head on My Shoulders” with a string of charting pop singles (“A Steel Guitar and a Glass of Wine,” “Remember Diana,” “Goodnight, My Love”) that continued through 1964 when The British Invasion threatened to cut short the careers of artists like Anka and his RCA Victor compatriot Neil Sedaka.

Of course, Paul Anka bounced back.  Hit the jump for the rest of the story, plus the full track listing, pre-order link and more about Duets!

Release Round-Up: Week of January 15

New Order, The Lost Sirens (Rhino) (Amazon U.S./Amazon U.K.)

A cadre of outtakes from the Waiting for the Siren’s Call sessions, this marks the last New Order material with original bassist Peter Hook.

Johnny Mathis, A Special Part of Me: Expanded Edition (Amazon U.S./Amazon U.K.) (Funkytowngrooves)

FTG’s latest R&B expansion has a Michael Jackson connection: the future King of Pop co-wrote for Mathis “Love Never Felt So Good” with Paul Anka!

Talk Talk, Natural History: The Very Best of Talk Talk 1982-1988 (Amazon U.S./Amazon U.K.) / Natural Order 1982-1991 (Amazon U.S./Amazon U.K.) (Virgin/EMI)

Not only a CD/DVD reissue of Talk Talk’s first compilation, but a new set, assembled by frontman Mark Hollis, featuring lesser-known and rare tracks from the band.

Eddie Money, Eddie Money (Amazon U.S./Amazon U.K.) / Life for the Taking (Amazon U.S./Amazon U.K.) / Playing for Keeps (Amazon U.S./Amazon U.K.) / No Control (Amazon U.S./Amazon U.K.) (Rock Candy)

Available in the U.K. now and Stateside next week: the Money Man’s first four Columbia albums, newly remastered and repackaged by Rock Candy.

Marcos Valle, Marcos Valle (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.) /Garra (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K.)

This pair of 1970 and 1971 albums found the Brazilian bossa nova legend exploring new sonic terrain.  Light in the Attic tells the whole story with these remastered deluxe reissues!

The Jackson 5, The Jackson 5ive: The Complete Series (Classic Media) (Amazon U.S.: DVD, Blu-Ray)

The entirety of the (probably ridiculous) Rankin-Bass J5 cartoon comes to DVD and, for some reason, Blu-ray!

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.

Burt Bacharach’s “Together?” Finally Arrives On CD, Features Jackie DeShannon, Michael McDonald

Sexual liberation only goes so far…

So went the tagline of director Armenia Balducci’s 1979 film Amo non amo.  When the Italian drama starring Jacqueline Bisset, Maximilian Schell and Terence Stamp was slated for U.S. release, though, the decision was made to replace the score by Italian prog/symphonic “horror rock” band Goblin with a new, more accessible soundtrack.  Burt Bacharach was tapped, and the Oscar-winning composer went far in lending an American flavor to the film, retitled for the U.S. market as Together?  Like the film itself, though, its RCA Victor soundtrack album was seemingly destined for obscurity.  But good news has just come from Japan.  Together?, featuring vocals from Jackie DeShannon, Michael McDonald and Libby Titus, and songs by Bacharach and Paul Anka, has received its eagerly-awaited, first-ever CD release on December 26, 2012, courtesy of Sony Music Japan.

Bacharach came out swinging as a film composer with his very first Hollywood scoring assignment.  He supplied a felicitous and memorable score for 1965’s What’s New Pussycat?, the first of his three consecutive movies with star Peter Sellers.  Bacharach and Hal David earned an Academy Award nomination for their playful title song, and followed Pussycat with another animal title: The Fox.  “You Caught the Pussycat…Now Chase the Fox!” proclaimed posters for 1966’s After the Fox.  For the comedy directed by Vittorio De Sica, Bacharach supplied a swinging score and another fun title track with David. This time the title song was a kooky romp with Sellers in character as the thieving Fox, bolstered by the vocals of The Hollies.  Oscar gold didn’t greet After the Fox, but Bacharach and David received a second nomination in 1967 for their title song to Alfie, although the rest of the film wasn’t scored by Bacharach but by Sonny Rollins.

Bacharach, David and Sellers were at it again for 1967’s Casino Royale, which also featured Woody Allen among its all-star cast.  (“Small World” Dept.: Allen had starred in Pussycat, and Neil Simon, like Allen an alumnus of Sid Caesar’s writers’ room, had written the screenplay for After the Fox!)  The much-troubled Casino Royale yielded a score that was the best part of the picture, and also introduced another Oscar-nominated future standard: “The Look of Love.”  Bacharach and David finally made their way to the Academy Awards stage in 1970 when “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” from Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid took home the Best Song statuette; Bacharach also won a solo trophy for his original score.

Following 1973’s disappointing big-screen musical Lost Horizon, though, the Bacharach and David partnership acrimoniously dissolved, and the composer’s profile receded somewhat.  He collaborated with lyricists including Neil Simon, Bobby Russell and Norman Gimbel, but his once-prolific pace was a thing of the past.  Just one new Bacharach song was recorded in 1974.  In 1975 a brief reunion with David resulted in an album for Stephanie Mills; the pairing with Bobby Russell led to two more songs.  The composer laid low in 1976 and returned the following year with Futures, an album which introduced a new Bacharach sound: jazzier, funkier.  After another hiatus in 1978, he delivered Woman in 1979, a stylistic successor to Futures, with long, extended compositions that could be described as classical-jazz-pop fusion.  This was the artistically-revitalized Burt Bacharach who was tapped to return to film scoring for Together?.

Join us after the jump for the rest of the story, won’t you?