Record Store Day Returns April 19, 2014 – MGMT Remastered, Tame Impala Live Album, REM Unplugged Box, Bowie Picture Discs, Grateful Dead, Neil Young, Thee Oh Sees, Multiple New Flaming Lips Releases, More

UPDATE – April 24, 2014
From Nirvana to Tame Impala and The Flaming Lips, see Record Store Day 2014’s sales charts and read more details on the top sellers here. Billboard’s latest vinyl album charts posted today are almost completely dominated by Record Store Day items. Nine of the top ten, and 43 of the top 50 vinyl LPs sold over that entire week were released last Saturday. Even more remarkable, all 25 of the top sellers on the vinyl Hot Singles Sales chart are affiliated with Record Store Day. The overwhelming success of Record Store Day 2014 counters criticisms of the day raised by some store owners and vinyl distributors in the past few weeks.

Visit here to stream Record Store Day releases – including Tame Impala’s Live Versions, The Flaming Lips 7 SKies H3, Pixies surprise release 7″ “Women of War” (also available as a free download), Jack White’s “Lazaretto” and many more – and a recap of this year’s event.
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Save your pennies – Record Store Day is just one month away.

Since its inception in 2007 artists from all genres have helped transform what began as a simple sales event into an international holiday. On this special date audiophiles, vinyl enthusiasts and casual music fans alike wake up early to stand in line at their local record shops…
…and buy limited-edition, one-day-only items pressed exclusively for independent retailers. There were over 350 releases last year – compared to just ten at the first event in 2008. As it’s grown artists have increasingly created exclusive split singles, special collaborations and other projects unlikely to exist under normal circumstances. This year’s splits include Deerhoof with Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog, Wilco side project Autumn Defense with Josh Rouse, Dawes with Conor Oberst, and Vetiver with Howling Rain. Among the collaborations, Grandaddy frontman Jason Lytle is teaming with Neko Case, Victoria Williams, Calexico’s John Covertino and others for a three-track 7″ themed around space (the tracklist: “Satellite of Love,” “Mars Cassette Waltz,” and “Untethered Space Walk”).

Remastering previously released albums for new reissues is also an annual Record Store Day tradition. This year MGMT will do just that with 180 gram vinyl remasters of their debut album Oracular Spectacular and its follow-up Congratulations. Other bands use Record Store Day to put out new music. Mazzy Star for instance is releasing two new songs as a 7″ single (“I’m Less Here” and “Things”) and Thee Oh Sees will drop Drop, their lucky 13th studio album (I know, I didn’t realize they had that many albums either). Drop, which features Mikal Cronin, was recorded in a banana ripening warehouse and will tide fans over as thee band takes an “indefinite hiatus.” The tracklist and a stream of album opener “Penetrating Eye” are below:

1 Penetrating Eye
2 Encrypted Bounce
3 Savage Victory
4 Put Some Reverb on My Brother
5 Drop
6 Camera (Queer Sound)
7 King’s Nose
8 Transparent World
9 The Lens

https://soundcloud.com/tellallyourfriendspr/thee-oh-sees-penetrating-eye

David Bowie 40th anniversary picture discs have become another annual Record Store Day tradition. First came “Starman” in 2012 and last year saw the release of the “Drive-In Saturday” picture disc.  Bowie has filled in the series with picture disc releases throughout the year – in other words not on Record Store Day – of “John, I’m Only Dancing,” “The Jean Genie,” “Life on Mars,” “Sorrow” and, just last week, “Rebel Rebel.” This Record Store Day brings two new Bowie picture discs, “1984” and “Rock n Roll Suicide.” Oddly the former will only be available in North America while the latter will only be issued in the U.K. (which is to say, fans on both sides of the pond will be hitting up eBay).

Dinosaur Jr. have two new items for RSD. Visitors is a box of five 7″ records, their first four singles on SST and Homestead plus a bonus 7″ featuring their cover of the Byrds’ “I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better” from this 1989 Byrds tribute album. Separate from that they’re also issuing a split with The Cure. Part of Warner’s “Side By Side Series,” this white 7″ single has both band’s versions of “Just Like Heaven.”

The Pixies return with Indie Cindy, the band’s first album since 1991’s Trompe le Monde. Although its release date is April 28th, a pre-release vinyl edition will be available on Record Store Day. Among other anticipated 12″ records are:

• Liars “Mess On A Mission” (12″ clear vinyl with coloured yarn pressed inside the record; includes “Mess On A Mission” plus its three remixes)
• The Black Angels Clear Lake Forest (follow-up EP to their recently released fourth LP Indigo Meadow; seven new songs on limited-edition clear vinyl)
• Joy Division An Ideal For Living (their 1978 debut EP reissued on 12″ from a newly cut master)

20 years on, Nirvana are finally releasing the single they were scheduled to issue when Kurt Cobain took his own life in 1994: “Pennyroyal Tea” b/w “I Hate Myself and Want To Die.” Other singles to look out for: Frank Zappa “Don’t Eat The Yellow Snow” (FZ 1974 single edit) b/w “Down In De Dew” (previously unreleased FZ 1973 alternate mix), Deer Tick’s “Eel Bowel,” Conor Oberst “Hundreds of Ways” b/w “Fast Friends,” and Parquet Courts “Sunbathing Animal.”

Most of all Record Store Day 2014 will bring us live recordings. Some are vinyl pressings of albums previously released on other formats: The Jimi Hendrix Experience Live at Monterey, Black Crowes and Jimmy Page Live at the Greek Theater, Alice Cooper Live at Montreux 2005, The Allman Brothers Band Selections from Play All Night: Live At The Beacon Theater 1992, Dave Matthews Band Live Trax: Volume 4.

Others are more unique. Frightened Rabbit is releasing live versions of four songs from Pedestrian Verse recorded last year at Criminal Records. Death Cab For Cutie’s new live album was recorded in 2012 and features Magik*Magik Orchestra. DEVO’s November 15, 1977 concert at Max’s Kansas City will be issued in its entirety for the first time (though nine of its tracks were on 1992’s live comp The Mongoloid Years). David Bowie’s introduction included.

The Grateful Dead’s Live At The Coliseum is another new-from-the-vaults live album due Record Store Day. This double LP comes in a gatefold jacket and features most of the band’s May 4, 1979 show, their first ever at Hampton Coliseum (never before released on any format, though a fan bootleg is available to stream or download here). This set was produced by the Dead’s legacy manager David Lemieux and the discs are being cut by acclaimed mastering engineer Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman. Deadheads will be pleased with the tracklist, especially the non-stop segues that fill the entire second LP:

Side 1
1 Loser
2 New Minglewood Blues
3 Don’t Ease Me In
4 Passenger

Side 2
1 I Need A Miracle>
2 Bertha>
3 Good Lovin’
4 Ship Of Fools

Side 3
1 Estimated Prophet>
2 Eyes Of The World

Side 4
1 Truckin’>
2 Stella Blue>
3 Around and Around

LCD Soundsystem’s marathon April 2, 2011 farewell show at New York’s Madison Square Garden will be released in its entirety – Arcade Fire guest vocals on “North American Scum” included – on 5 LPs. Titled The Long Goodbye, this vinyl box was produced and mixed by Murphy and includes a digital download.

Other live sets to look out for include Neil Young’s Cow Palace 1986 and R.E.M.’s Unplugged four-LP box pairing their first session on the popular MTV acoustic performance series with their second from a decade later, including non-televised songs. The 1991 platters draw heavily from Out of Time while the 2001 discs lean towards their then new album, Reveal. Mike Mills will sign copies at Bull Moose in Scarborough, Maine on Record Store Day and both CD and digital versions will follow on May 20th.

Disc 1 – 1991 Unplugged
1 ‘Half A World Away’
2 ‘Disturbance at the Heron House’
3 ‘Radio Song’
4 ‘Low’
5 ‘Perfect Circle’
6 ‘Fall on Me’
7 ‘Belong’
8 ‘Love Is All Around’ (Troggs’ cover)

Disc 2 – 1991 Unplugged
1 ‘It’s the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)’
2 ‘Losing My Religion’
3 ‘Pop Song 89’
4 ‘Endgame’
5 ‘Fretless’ *
6 ‘Swan Swan H’ *
7 ‘Rotary 11’ *
8 ‘Get Up’ *
9 ‘World Leader Pretend’ *

Disc 3 – 2001 Unplugged
1 ‘All the Way to Reno (You’re Gonna Be a Star)’
2 ‘Electrolite’
3 ‘At My Most Beautiful’
4 ‘Daysleeper’
5 ‘So. Central Rain (I’m Sorry)’
6 ‘Losing My Religion’
7 ‘Country Feedback’
8 ‘Cuyahoga’

Disc 4 – 2001 Unplugged
1 ‘Imitation of Life’
2 ‘Find the River’
3 ‘The One I Love’ *
4 ‘Disappear’ *
5 ‘Beat a Drum’ *
6 ‘I’ve Been High’ *
7 ‘I’ll Take the Rain’ *
8 ‘Sad Professor’ *
* Not included in original television broadcast

Spiritualized frontman J. Spaceman and Kid Millions are issuing a 12″ and  7″ set captured at their first ever duo gig called Live at Le Poisson Rouge. Best known as Oneida’s drummer, Kid Millions also toured with Spiritualized last year and this completely improvised show at the illustrious Greenwich Village club was recorded on a night off from said space-rockers voyage through the northeast last September.

Perhaps the most anticipated concert release of Record Store Day 2014 is Tame Impala’s Live Versions, a 12″ featuring 8 tracks selected by Kevin Parker “based on how different the live versions are from the album versions” according to the press release. “His goal was to give fans something they won’t already have; something they’ve only previously experienced at a Tame Impala show.” The performance date(s) of these versions has not been revealed but we know they were recorded in Chicago in 2013. Comparing the tracklist with the band’s Chicago setlists suggests Live Versions is taken from October 10, 2013. [UPDATE – It was.] Tame Impala also played many – but note all – of these songs on March 6, 2013 in Chicago. Perhaps Live Versions mixes some of these with the October show? The former date is most likely the primary – if not only – source. Not only did that that night’s set include all the songs on Live Versions, but it was recorded by local radio station 93 XRT and aired as part of their Sunday night concert series last month (download a rip of the radio broadcast here). Only 5,000 copies will be pressed. The tracklist is below:

1 Endors Toi
2 Why Won’t You Make Up Your Mind?
3 Sestri Levante
4 Mind Mischief
5 Desire be, Desire go
6 Half Full Glass of Wine
7 Be Above It
8 Feels Like We Only Go Backwards
9 Apocalypse Dreams

Cate Le Bon shared the views of many music fans when she recently spoke with the Record Store Day film crew in the videos above. “I just love the sound of vinyl,” she said, “…that thing of buying a record and having the artwork in your hand when you’re playing it and having a physical collection and also listening to records in their entirety. There’s lots of records that I probably would have flicked through if it had been on CD or MP3.”

Cate noted the importance of not just vinyl, but the independent shops that sell them. “Record stores when they’re done properly can kind of sell out a gig,” she says. “They’re a hub of what’s going on and when they’re curated well and when they’re taste-making record stores it can make all the difference.”

Annual vinyl sales have risen yearly since Record Store Day was founded in 2007 and though the event isn’t the sole reason for the boom, it has brought a lot of positive attention to the enduring vitality of a format almost unanimously deemed antiquated in the not too distant past. Or, to put it another way, Wayne Coyne explained  to The Vinyl Factory last month how the popularity of records has spread using an example of a Justin Bieber concert he attended: “Everybody that was backstage with him getting their picture taken also had a Justin Bieber limited edition vinyl that was signed by Justin Bieber. It’s not old people or young people, it’s everybody.”

Which brings us to the Flaming Lips, perhaps the biggest proponents of Record Store Day to never officially be appointed as “ambassadors.” They released a split 7″ with The Black Keys in 2009, a full LP cover of The Dark Side of the Moon in 2010, Heady Nuggs: First 5 Warner Bros. Records in 2011, Heady Fwends and “A Spoonful Weighs a Ton” “baby pink” split 7″ (with Mastodon covering the same song on the B-side) in 2012 and a four vinyl edition of Zaireeka last year.  They were particularly active last November for Record Store Day’s spin-off on Black Friday.  First there was Peace Sword – their Ender’s Game associated EP – out on 12″ vinyl and CD.  There was also Peace and Paranoia, a 12″ split EP with Tame Impala, and Come To Shoot You Down…What A Sound, a remake of the Stone Roses entire debut LP with New Fumes, HOTT MT, Stardeath and White Dwarfs, Spaceface, Polica, Depth and Current, Def Rain, Peaking Lights, and Jonathan Rado of Foxygen.

For Record Store Day 2014 The Flaming Lips are releasing 7,500 copies of their cover of DEVO’s “Gates of Steel” on silver vinyl as a tribute to the group’s recently deceased guitarist Bob Casale. Part of Warner’s “Side By Side” series, it includes a 1981 live version by Devo of the same song as the B-side and will be packaged in a “Single Pocket Jacket.” The Flaming Lips have also confirmed a reprint of their classic early ’90s “I drank blood with God” T-shirt on Record Store Day, and most notably, a vinyl edit of their “24 hour song” 7 Skies H3. The latter will be pressed on clear 12″ vinyl and limited to 7,500 copies. Full details are here. The Lips also might release test records on Record Store Day, as Michael Ivins explains in this video.

The full Record Store Day release list will be announced March 20th on recordstoreday.com. UPDATE It’s here. In other news, Jack White will attempt to create “The World’s Fastest Record,” as explained here, along with Third Man Records full day itinerary for Record Store Day (which includes Whirlwind Heat reissuing Do Rabbits Wonder? on a variety of colored vinyl and playing a comeback farewell show at Third Man in Nashville). Follow additional updates at twitter/TheFutureHeart and facebook/TheFutureHeart.

The Future Heart Record Store Day 2014 events guide is here. More specific details on Good Records’ bash – including an unplugged Midlake show and Stardeath and White Dwarfs covering Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust LP in full – are here. Below are some of the most anticipated releases already revealed (artist “title” – description – quantity):

• Tame Impala “Live Versions” – 8 tracks live in Chicago on 12″ vinyl – 5000
• Thee Oh Sees “The Drop” – New Album
• Deerhoof/Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog – split 7″ – 900
• Mazzy Star “I’m Less Here” – 2 new songs – 3,000
• R.E.M. “Unplugged” – 4xLP box set of 1991 and 2001 sessions
• The Flaming Lips “7 Skies H3″ – clear 12” vinyl – 7,500
• The Flaming Lips/Devo “Gates Of Steel” – Side By Side Series on silver 7″ vinyl – 7,500
• Devo “Live at Max’s Kansas City 11/15/77” – full concert  previously unreleased – 2,000
• The Cure/Dinosaur Jr. “Just Like Heaven” – Side By Side Series on white 7″ vinyl
• Dinosaur Jr. Visitors – 5 x 7″ box set
• MGMT “Oracular Spectacular” – newly remastered on 180 gram vinyl – 5,000
• MGMT “Congratulations” – newly remastered double LP on 180 gram vinyl – 4,000
• The Pixies Indie Cindy – 12″ pre-release vinyl edition of the band’s first album since 1991
• LCD Soundsystem The Long Goodbye – 5LP vinyl box with digital download
• Autumn Defense (Wilco side project)/Josh Rouse “Sentimental Lady”/”Trouble” – 7″ vinyl split – 2,000
• Neko Case, Jason Lytle and Friends “Satellite Of Love” – red vinyl – 1,500
• Neil Young “Official Release Series Discs 5-8” – 4xLP box set on 180 gram vinyl – 3,500
• Neil Young “Cow Palace 1986”
• Grateful Dead “Live At The Coliseum” – 180 gram vinyl double LP with gatefold jacket; recorded May 4, 1979, their first-ever show at Hampton Coliseum
• Built to Spill “Ultimate Alternative Wavers” – gold vinyl – 4500 copies (plus 500 copies on green vinyl available only at Pacific Northwest music stores)
• J. Spaceman/Kid Millions “Live at Le Poisson Rouge” – 12″ + 7″ – 3,000
• Soundgarden “Superunknown” – singles and B-sides from album in 5 x 10″ box set
• The Allman Brothers “Selections from Play All Night: Live At The Beacon Theater 1992” – double LP – 4,000
• Death Cab For Cutie “Live 2012” – double LP
• Nirvana “Pennyroyal Tea” b/w “I Hate Myself and Want To Die” – 7″ single
• Frightened Rabbit – recordings of 4 songs from Pedestrian Verse recorded live at Criminal Records in 2013
• Bruce Springsteen “American Beauty” – 4 previously unheard tracks on 12″ vinyl – 9,000
• Vetiver/Howling Rain – split 7″
• Alice Cooper “Live at Montreux 2005” – 140-gram white vinyl, double LP
• Of Montreal “Jigsaw Puzzle”/”Triumph of Disintegration” – light green 7″ vinyl – 1,500
• Of Montreal “Satanic Panic In The Attic” – 180 gram yellow and blue vinyl with 7 bonus tracks – 2000
• Parquet Courts “Sunbathing Animal”
• David Bowie “1984” – 7″ Picture Disc (North America only)
• David Bowie “Rock n Roll Suicide” – 7″ Picture Disc (UK only)
• The Jimi Hendrix Experience “Live at Monterey” – 200 gram vinyl – 6,000
• The Black Angels Clear Lake Forest EP – seven new songs on limited-edition clear vinyl
• Frank Zappa “Don’t Eat The Yellow Snow”/ “Down In De Dew” – “” single with previously unreleased alternate mix B-side
• Fun “Point and Light” – rainbow splatter 10″ vinyl compilation of demos – 1,500
• Jerry Garcia “Garcia” – remastered, 180 gram white vinyl – 1,500
• Liars “Mess On A Mission” – 12″ clear vinyl with coloured yarn pressed inside the record
• Brian Jonestown Massacre/Magic – split grey splatter 12″ vinyl – 1,500
• Joy Division An Ideal For Living – 12″ reissue from a newly cut master
• The Byrds “Straight for the Sun” – double LP on 140 gram white vinyl
• Jon Spencer Blues Explosion “She’s On It” / “Jack the Ripper” – live mashup of Beastie Boys and Link Wray on 12″ vinyl
• Creedence Clearwater Revival “The ’69 Singles” – 10″ compilation
• Dave Matthews Band “Live Trax: Volume 4” – 4 LP box recorded April 30, 1996 – 2,000
• The Ramones “Meltdown with the Ramones” – 10″ vinyl
• Conor Oberst “Hundreds of Ways” b/w “Fast Friends” – 7″ single
• Genesis “From Genesis To Revelation” – 1,500
• Sun Ra “Outer Spaceways Incorporated” – white and purple 10″ vinyl – 1,500
• Green Day “Demolicious” – 18 demos and 2 previously unreleased tracks, double LP on red or clear vinyl (also available on cassette)
• Black Crowes “Warpaint” – triple LP on 140 gram white vinyl
• Black Crowes and Jimmy Page “Live at the Greek Theater” – triple LP on red, clear and blue vinyl – 2,000
• Deer Tick “Eel Bowel” – 7″ single
• Velvet Underground “Loaded” – pink, white and black splatter vinyl

Record Store Day is is April 19, 2014.
Click here to locate participating shops near you.