Funeral Songs

Compilations are highly useful in understanding the works of the inexhaustibly tuneful British composer Henry Purcell (1659-1695). He had a few big hits, like the Funeral Music for Queen Mary (which is included here) and the opera Dido and Aeneas (which isn't). But much of his best music is scattered around in small bits, residing within genres that are rather odd from today's perspective. Purcell spent much of his short adult life as a theater composer, and his incidental music, for example, is filled with perfect miniatures…

Swedish black metallers DARK FUNERAL will release their new album, "Where Shadows Forever Reign", on June 3 via Century Media. Comments DARK FUNERAL guitarist Lord Ahriman: "Wow, did six years pass already? Time surely flies fast! But you know what, we're back! DARK FUNERAL is back! And in true DARK FUNERAL spirit, like so many times in the past, we continue to push all boundaries musically and bring black metal into a new, fresh and dark dimension. This is by far our most professional, technical, dynamic and epic album thus far. And compared to previous albums, each new song offers a unique spirit and identity that is more profound than ever. And whether you like extreme black metal or not, I'm sure every fan of metal will find songs on this album that they can enjoy to its fullest!"

A stunning collection of artists and performances celebrate the timeless music of legendary gospel bluesman Blind Willie Johnson. From Derek Trucks’ and Susan Tedeschi’s reverent reading of Keep Your Lamp Trimmed And Burning to Lucinda Williams’ slide guitar-fueled lament in Nobody’s Fault But Mine, from Luther Dickinson’s spirited take on Bye And Bye I’m Going To See The King (with The Rising Star Fife & Drum Band) to Tom Waits’ virtual embodiment of Johnson himself on The Soul Of A Man and John The Revelator, this record is packed with incomparable recordings that speak as much to the greatness of the performers as they do the enduring legacy of Blind Willie Johnson. Featuring Tom Waits, Lucinda Williams, Derek Trucks & Susan Tedeschi, Cowboy Junkies, The Blind Boys Of Alabama, Sinéad O'Connor, Luther Dickinson, Maria McKee and Rickie Lee Jones.

Reduced to a quartet for the most part, with Barry Adamson joining Nick Cave, Blixa Bargeld, Mick Harvey and Thomas Wydler on only a couple of tracks, the Bad Seeds turn from the interpretive triumph of Kicking Against the Pricks to another strong high, the mostly-original Your Funeral…My Trial. The one cover is a sharp, unsurprisingly dramatic version of Tim Rose's "Long Time Man." As for the rest of the album, Trial shows the Seeds working as, again, a remarkably accomplished and varied act, ever available and ready to explore a wide range of musics distilled into Cave's often dark, always passionate vision. Arguably Cave and company have by now so clearly established their overall style that Your Funeral…My Trial is much more a refinement of the past than anything else, but so good is their work that resistance is near impossible. If anything, the brooding power of the Seeds is more restrained than ever, suggesting destructive endings and overwhelming love without directly playing it.

Funeral is the debut studio album by the Canadian indie rock band Arcade Fire, released on September 14, 2004 in North America by Merge Records and on February 28, 2005 in Europe by Rough Trade Records.The album produced five singles. The most successful, "Rebellion (Lies)", peaked at #19 on the UK Singles Chart. The album was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2005 for Best Alternative Music Album. It received wide critical acclaim and topped many year-end and decade-end lists. According to the website Metacritic, the album had the second most appearances on end-of-decade Top 10 lists, only behind Radiohead's Kid A. In the updated version of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, it was ranked at #151.

Falloch started in 2010 and with their first part of this two part debut album they wiped away any competition. You have no other option but to listen and love. This album is as bombastic as it’s atmospheric. Falloch explores the darker side of their performance, of life itself. These songs are beautiful, atmospheric. Describe life through all its hardships and are touching the soul in such a fashion it leaves you calm and somewhat of a fragile state. It isn’t just about listening, you live this album as though you live life itself, from the raging battle to the sanctuary of the end of life… or the beginning of a new adventure?

In a second disc of Ives’s songs, the unbeatable partnership of Finley and Drake again enthral their listeners and bring them to the emotional core of each work. The range of style and approach in Ives’s text-setting is startling—from simple, sentimental ballads to complex and strenuous philosophical discourses, sometimes encompassing the most dissonant and virtuosic piano parts, sometimes with the accompaniment pared down to an almost minimalist phrase-repetition. Even those composed in a superficially conventional or ‘polite’ tonal idiom usually contain harmonic, rhythmic or accentual surprises somewhere.