Criterion Music Corporation

DETAILS

Format: LP
Label: Light In The Attic
Release type: RSD Exclusive Release
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Tracks:
“Califia (Stone Rider)” – featuring Suzi Jane Hokom
“The Bed”
“Sleep in the Grass” – featuring Ann-Margret
“Leather and Lace – featuring Nina Lizell
“If It’s Monday Morning”
“The Night Before”
“Bye Babe”
“Victims of the Night” – featuring Ann-Margret
“Chico”-featuring Ann-Margret
“Hey Cowboy” – featuring Nina Lizell
“No Train to Stockholm”
“Won’t You Tell Your Dreams”
“Nobody Like You” – featuring Suzi Jane Hokom
“Trouble Maker”
“What’s More I Don’t Need Her”
“Come on Home to Me”
“I Just Learned to Run”

With his handlebar moustache and booming baritone, Lee Hazlewood was one of the defining stars of the late ’60s. Though he’s perhaps best known for his work with Nancy Sinatra (including writing mega-hit “These Boots Are Made For Walking”), Hazlewood did stunning work away from that particular glamour queen and found latter day champions in Beck, Sonic Youth, and Jarvis Cocker. Now, for Record tore Day 2012, we are kicking off our excavation of the Lee Hazlewood archives with this anthology,Singles, Nudes & Backsides, collecting the best of Lee’s solo songs and duets from his LHI (Lee Hazlewood Industries) imprint.

As a true legend of the great American songbook and a rebellious pioneer who left behind a lengthy trail of echo laden pop masterpieces, Lee’s influence continues to reverberate today. Between 1968-71, Hazlewood not only released his finest solo work, but produced numerous artists on LHI. From acid-folk and country-rock to pop-psych and soul, LHI issued dozens of long forgotten 45s and LPs. This series will include material from LHI(re-mastered for the first time from the original analog tapes), along with Lee’s output for other labels, rarities, unreleased gems, and the films of Torbjörn Axelman.

See the sleeve: surrounded by nude girls, each wearing a fake moustache, Hazlewood wears a suit, ever-so-slightly awkwardly playing the role of the ’60s playboy. Just like the picture, the songs present a man conflicted; he’s the tender-hearted romantic, the broken-hearted loser and the rugged cowboy, all in one. It’s there in the western swing of “Califia (Stone Rider)”, the loneliness of “The Bed” and the bleak beauty of “If It’s Monday Morning.” Hazlewood’s tremulous voice was made for duets (indeed, he wrote “Some Velvet Morning”, one of the greatest of all time); here, Suzi Jane Hokom, Ann-Margret and Nina Lizell play counterpart to his manly tones.

In the wonderful liner notes, written by British journalist Wyndham Wallace, the writer describes his friend Hazlewood as “a curmudgeonly, unpredictable sort at the best of times, as impatient with his own talent as he is with other people.” The Hazlewood Wallace knew was puzzled by the growing interest in him in the last two decades of his life, which was ended by cancer at age 78. That late flurry of interest saw him perform at the Royal Festival Hall in 1999, his first ever solo performance in the UK.

A natural wanderer, Lee lived a big life, fighting in the Korean War, working as a radio DJ in Phoenix, Arizona, setting up Viv Records in the ’50s, working as a big-shot LA producer in the ’60s, signing Phil Spector to his Trey Records label and prematurely announcing retirement in the wake of the mid-’60s British invasion. He didn’t: Nancy Sinatra came along, the hits started flowing and he continued producing characterful solo albums into the ’70s, which saw his move to Sweden. By 2007, Hazlewood was living in Vegas, and begrudgingly enjoying that flurry of latter-day interest in his work. This landmark compilation promises to create many more converts.

Cuts from essential albums like Cowboy In Sweden
Features duets with Suzi Jane Hokom, Ann-Margret and Nina Lizell
Audio re-mastered from original tapes
Unreleased song “I Just Learned To Run”
In-depth liner notes & unseen photographs
50 random LP copies include a limited LHI Records patch!

In 1971, MARTIN landed on the country charts with her self-penned/self-produced “Nice Girl” on Prince Records.

Mandi recorded NICE GIRL in 1971 in Criterion’s Studio.

She wrote it, sang it, produced it, and got in her car with boxes of singles, and took it to Country Radio from LA to Bakersfield, and places in between.  We knew we had a HIT!

After 40 years, I could always sing the hook!  I knew Mandi as a nice girl, and knew she blossomed into a GREAT WOMAN.  I did reconnect with her just before her passing.

ENJOY NICE GIRL

Bo Goldsen

Criterion Music Corp.

Nice Girl

Lyle Lovett’s new “Release Me” is his last album for Curb Records after 26 years and 11 albums. But he wants to make clear that it’s a fond farewell.

“I’m only grateful for my relationship with my record company,” Lovett tells Billboard.com, adding his decision to part ways with Curb is “just the record business. I don’t have any bad feelings about my deal. MCA Nashville passed on me; it wasn’t until… Curb took the very same project back to them that they said, ‘OK, we’ll do it.’ I do appreciate all that. The relationship’s been a good thing.”

Lovett says he wanted “Release Me,” which comes out today (Feb. 28), to be “a punctuation mark for this whole part of my career.” The album is comprised primarily of covers, “some songs that have been important to me and have been an important part of my career. Several of these songs I’ve played since 1976 and just had never recorded.” Among them are tunes by Jesse Winchester, Townes Van Zandt, Michael Franks, Frank Loesser and Chuck Berry, as well as the traditional instrumental “Garfield’s Blackberry Bottom.”

Lovett contributed two originals to the set: “The Girl With the Holiday Smile” came from a real-life 1978 encounter at a Houston 7-11 “where I met this young lady hiding out from the cops” and also appeared on his 2011 holiday EP “Songs For the Season;” and he composed “Night’s Lullaby,” which features Nickel Creek’s Sara and Sean Watkins, for a 2011 run in the Shakespeare Center Los Angeles’ production of “Much Ado About Nothing” that the three appeared in.

Lovett co-produced the album with Nathaniel Kunkel, and other guests include k.d. lang and Kat Edmonson. Lovett will promote “Release Me” with appearances on “The View” on Feb. 29 and “Morning Joe” on March 2. He’ll play an acoustic show at The Concert Hall in New York tonight before hitting the road with John Hiatt on March 7, then mix Large Band and acoustic dates during the summer.

Meanwhile, Lovett says he’s “very excited” about moving forward from Curb, but he’s hasn’t determined exactly what he’ll do yet. “I know I want to continue to write songs and to play — I want to keep my job,” he says with a laugh. “I haven’t worked out any new business relationships. What I’d really like to do is be able to make my own records, then probably affiliate with someone for distribution. We live in an age where it’s so possible to let people know you have something out, but I still value greatly the capability of the major companies to get your product where it needs to go. So I have to figure out what’s the right way to go for me, and where I’ll feel the most comfortable.” – Gary Graff (Billboard, Feb. 28, 2012)

Preview The Girl With The Holiday Smile HERE.

Lee Hazlewood and Ann Margret :: The Cowboy & The Lady

The “Cowboy” got to Nashville on a Friday. His plane wasn’t a direct flight from Gobbler’s Knob, Kentucky, or Chittlin Switch, West Virginia. The “Cowboy” flew in from London. (He claimed it was a business trip). The “Cowboy” was met at the airport by Donnie Owens (no relation to Buck) and Joe Nixon (no relation to Richard, though there is a rumor they have the same tailor). Donnie and Joe arrived in a new Caddy. The “Cowboy” had requested a limo, but his semi-clever associates thought a new Caddy ambulance would do well. (Funny cigarettes and bad whisky had long ago destroyed the last molecule of reasoning in their brains). So, the “Cowboy” entered the rear of the ambulance and lay on the stretcher, while Donnie and Joe hummed old Jinks Carmen rifts all the way to the hotel.

The “Lady” arrived on Saturday. She looked beautiful when she stepped off the plane. Not at all like a “Lady” who had just flown 2,000 miles. She was late. (She claimed the rains had destroyed her driveway and made her tardy). She brought an excuse written by her husband, named Roger Smith. The “Lady” and her husband registered in a hotel as Mr. and Mrs. Smith. (They claimed it was their real name).

A Harmonica player named Charlie McCoy, who doubles on a tuba, arrived at Victor Studios with some of his friends and the recording session started.

The “Lady” sang the first song alone. The “Cowboy” (who claims to be a record producer) liked what he heard, and they started another song. The “Cowboy” moved slowly out of the booth and into the studio. You could tell by the look in his eyes, that the half-dozen shots of Chivas Regal had put his ego to rest, and he was ready to sing with the “Lady.”

They sang for three nights – the “Cowboy” and the “Lady,” and the Gods were kind, and their album was finished on time. Herein, lie the results…Some good, some bad and some more.

“The Cowboy”

Listen: You Turned My Head Around

Hear Criterion writer and Glee music producer Adam Anders’ “Extraordinary Merry Christmas” and “Christmas Eve With You” on Glee: The Music, The Christmas Album Volume 2 out now!

http://amzn.to/sEqo9O