JEFFREY MORGAN’S MEDIA BLACKOUT #535.166!

SIZZLING SERIES OF THE WEEK: The Mooney Suzuki and Terror and Toasters – CBGB/OMFUG Masters: The Bowery Collection (MVD Audio) :: Brace yourself because this is just the beginning of a multi-volume deluge of multi-track shows coming from the late Hilly Kristal’s extensive archive. What we got here are three separate discs featuring three different full-length gigs by three different bands in three different years (Mooneys: 2001; Toasters: 2002; Terror: 2004)—plus historical liner notes by Handsome Dick Manitoba, which put everything into its proper historical context. As it happens, these particular editions contain a crazy cross-section selection of the kind of music that CBGB championed for more than 30 years, ranging from the Toasters’ good-natured house-rockin’ ska to Terror’s aggro home-wreckin’ thrash to the Mooney’s infectious rent-party pop ’n’ roll. If you don’t faithfully scoop up this new CBGB series from MVD Audio, then OMg are you ever FUGed up!

Corb Lund – Horse Soldier! Horse Soldier! (Stony Plain) :: Gosh, I bet Pete Townshend wishes he’d recorded a country opera about the calvary.

SIZZLING PLATTER OF THE WEEK: Various Artists – Miles…From India (Times Square) :: You need schoolin’, so, baby, I ain’t foolin’ when I say that if you only buy one Miles Davis tribute record in this lifetime, then make sure that it’s this one. Producer Bob Belden has assembled an impressive array of primo Davis sidemen including John McLaughlin, Chick Corea, Ron Carter, Mike Stern, Jimmy Cobb and Marcus Miller—to name but only a few—who then essay ten pieces ranging from “So What” to “In A Silent Way” to “Miles Runs The Voodoo Down,” all filtered through an Indian aesthetic that’s authentically backed up by some two dozen Indian musicians; none of whom, I’m honest enough to admit, I’ve ever heard of. Then McLaughlin concludes the proceedings with the original title composition that’s resonant reverence incarnate. Bonus points for having an airy album cover that expertly evokes the very best of Miles’ classic Columbia years.

Be seeing you!