9 best alfred live albums

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November 2003 saw the release of Peter Gabriel's Growing Up Live DVD , chronicling his world tour, which was celebrated for its spectacular theatrics. Still Growing Up Live & Unwrapped brings Peter Gabriel together again with the award-winning director Hamish Hamilton, capturing his performances in all sorts of smaller and more intimate venues around Europe for the Live version of the DVD. For the "Unwrapped" version (Disc 2), which explores the world behind the songs, Anna Gabriel took over the director's chair with the collaboration of Hamish Hamilton. A simpler approach suggested a different set list, and Peter, Hamish, and Anna were determined that this should be filmed in a very different style. It shows Peter Gabriel as many of his fans love to see him, just playing his music.

Recorded in Europe in the summer of 2004, Peter Gabriel's Still Growing Up - Live and Unwrapped is a follow-up to 2003's Growing Up Live. The idea this time was to capture Gabriel and his band performing a variety of songs not heard on the earlier tour, with the gigs taking place in what he describes as "all sorts of smaller venues," where "we get up onstage with minimal lights and simply play the music." Of course, "smaller" is a matter of perspective; the town squares, outdoor amphitheatres, and other sites in Belgium, England, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, and France where the band appeared are still plenty big enough to hold several thousand people, and the production values are hardly what you'd call spartan. But whatever their dimensions, the shows yielded some extraordinarily powerful performances. After a haunting "The Feeling Begins" (a track from Gabriel's Passion, the score for Martin Scorsese's The Last Temptation of Christ), played solo on the Armenian doudouk, Gabriel and company take the stage and almost immediately forge a palpable bond with their audience. Indeed, what we are witnessing is as much a tribal rite as a concert, with the febrile, hypnotic intensity of the music matched by the crowd's chanted responses on such tunes as "Solsbury Hill," "Sledgehammer," and "Biko" (along with the latter, songs not heard on the previous DVD include "San Jacinto," "White Ashes," "The Tower that Ate People," and "Games Without Frontiers"; there's also a wonderful performance of "In Your Eyes" among the bonus tracks). Overall, this is a moving experience that viewers with sophisticated home systems will delight in sharing. The centerpiece of the set's second disc is Unwrapped, an approximately 70-minute "band on the road" documentary that would have been a standard variation of the form were it not for Gabriel's strong visual sense; check out the cool lighting and film projection effects used during the interviews with the artist. --Sam Graham

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Filmed over two performances in Rotterdam, Holland in October of 2007, Rush's new DVD Snakes & Arrows Live captures the legendary band in peak form, performing classic Rush material and nine new songs from their critically acclaimed 2007 CD Snakes & Arrows. Bonus footage of four songs added for their 2008 American tour, including "Ghost of a Chance," filmed here for the first time.



Since the release of their eponymous first LP in 1974, Rush has continually expanded the definition of "progressive power trio." Guitarist Alex Lifeson, bassist/keyboardist/vocalist Geddy Lee and drummer/lyricist Neil Peart combine dazzling virtuosity, laser-beam intensity and unbridled creativity to create a cohesive whole that's infinitely greater than its parts. The Toronto-based group has become one of Canada's leading exports, with a catalog of genre-defining releases including 2112, Permanent Waves, Moving Pictures, Vapour Trails and Snakes & Arrows and a live show which combines musicianship, showmanship and multi-media effects that engage all the senses. Following their previous best-selling DVDs Rush in Rio and R30, Snakes & Arrows Live presents a band not resting on its considerable laurels but still earning its reputation as one of the world's best live bands - one night at a time.

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A collection of promos by monsters of 70s and 80s rock, Van Halen, including such classics as' Jump', 'Finish What Ya Started' and 'Dreams'.

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Lucky To Be Me - A Life in Music' represents the first time a solo album of Alfred Drake's recordings has been issued. Presented as a Deluxe 2CD set, the album includes an entire disc of "Demos, Live Performances and Rarities" culled from Drake's own private archive of recordings. Alfred Drake is undoubtedly one of the most iconic figures in the history of musical theatre. In a career that encompassed every possible aspect of the performing arts, from Gilbert and Sullivan operetta to classic Broadway musicals and the plays of Shakespeare, his legacy is unparalleled. However, when you listen to his elegant voice a true picture of his spectacular artistry emerges. Stage Door have selected beloved songs from 'Oklahoma!', 'Kiss Me, Kate', and 'Kismet', but have used less familiar performances to create a truly unique compilation with which to honour the great man. Of special note is the inclusion of the great "Soliloquy" from Carousel, the recording of which he was most proud. Highlights from these unreleased treasures on disc 2 include his 1940 Metropolitan Opera Audition and demos recorded for the Broadway musicals 'The Liar' and 'Courtin' Time'. Compiled with the assistance of Broadway historian and Alfred Drake archivist George Dansker, 'Lucky To Be Me - A Life in Music' showcases the brilliance of Alfred Drake's work on stage and in the recording studio. There were many great stars on Broadway in the 1940s, 50s, and 60s. The distaff side had, of course, Mary Martin and Ethel Merman, to name only two of the most famous of that era. But there was only one comparable male star in this musical theatre galaxy - and that was the great Alfred Drake - who remains to this day Broadway's ultimate leading man.

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A never-before-released studio album vinyl by Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers recorded at Rudy Van Gelder's Hackensack, New Jersey studio on March 8, 1959, and featuring the legendary drummer-whose centennial is being celebrated this year-along with trumpeter Lee Morgan, tenor saxophonist Hank Mobley, pianist Bobby Timmons, and bassist Jymie Merritt. The 6-song set includes 2 previously unissued compositions: "Quick Trick" and "Jimerick."