Rarebird's Rock and Roll Nest

As you've probably heard by now, Metallica are the official ambassadors of Record Store Day 2016, which falls on Saturday, April 16th. The band that released a cassette on last year's Record Store Day will this year release a CD, entitled Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité, Metallica! - Live at Le Bataclan. Paris, France - June 11th, 2003 . As the title indicates, the CD documents a nine-song live set performed at the Bataclan in Paris in June of 2003. In light of the recent terrorist attack at that venue in November 2015 , proceeds from sales of the CD will be donated to the Fondation de France's Give For France charity. This concert was performed at a strange time in Metallica's history, just days after the release of their chaotic St. Anger album. This was the first year that the band employed current bassist Robert Trujillo, after they weathered two years of troubles documented in the film Some Kind Of Monster . This show was the second of three shows that the band ...

For Record Store Day 2016, ABKCO is reissuing the Animals' 1965 EP Animal Tracks in a 3,000-copy limited edition. This EP was originally released in the U.K. and Europe in 1965, and has never been released in the U.S. Animal Tracks was originally pressed as a 7-inch 45; the Record Store Day EP is pressed in 10-inch vinyl for better fidelity. This EP is not to be mistaken for the full-length Animal Tracks album, which was also released in 1965. None of this EP's four tracks appeared on the American version of that album, although all of them were included on the U.K. version of the album. The first three tracks find the British Invasion quintet playing covers of R&B classics from Chuck Berry ("How You've Changed"), Ray Charles ("I Believe To My Soul"), and Louis Jordan ("Let The Good Times Roll"). On each of these three tracks, Eric Burdon croons soulfully over Alan Price's restrained yet intricate piano arrangements. These tr...

After spotlighting the pre-Eagles work of the late Glenn Frey , I also wanted to talk about the early band of Frey’s Eagles co-founder Don Henley. Before Frey and Henley met, Henley played drums and sang lead vocals for a Texas band called Shiloh. Shiloh recorded one self-titled album in 1970, and it was released on the same label – Amos Records – which distributed the sole album of Frey’s early duo Longbranch/Pennywhistle. During the ‘60’s, Henley and other members of Shiloh had previously played together in at least two other bands. The first of these was the Four Speeds (no relation to the Gary Usher surf-rock band of the same name). Henley and two other future Shiloh members – bassist Richard Bowden and keyboard/trumpet player Jerry Surratt – were in this band, along with original guitarist Freddie Neese. These four teenagers cut two singles in 1964, “Variety” and “Why Did You Leave Me”, both of which were decent Texas-style garage rock songs that would fit in on a Nuggets box s...