New Albums / CDs

April 26th is the set date (or as Wu members would say, "said date") Fat Joe's new CD / Album "All Or Nothing."

I'd be lying if I siad I wish Joe the best, after the revelations of how he's treated Big Pun's widow. But here's the pitch from his press release, for what it's worth:

For 2005, Joe is set to continue his dominance of music with his 6th solo release, All Or Nothing coming out on Atlantic Records on April 26th. This album features the production talents of Timbaland, Swizz Beatz, Cool & Dre, Just Blaze, Scott Storch and more. With the release of the Just Blaze produced track "Safe 2 Say" Fat Joe is continuing his plot of bringing NY hip-hop back while at the same time securing his spot as the King of NY hip-hop. The album proves to be Joe's best work to date as his rhymes continue to elevate. Over the years Joe has kept his hunger alive studying and perfecting his flow and rhymes. From his first single "So Much More" (produced by Miami heatmakers Cool & Dre) to the Scott Storch produced "Get It Poppin'" featuring Nelly, Fat Joe delivers a tight cohesive album that is sure to please all his fans as well as rise to the top of the charts. Fat Joe also recorded "Hold U Down" with Jennifer Lopez and just filmed the video with her in the Bronx. Although it is Jennifer's second single the song will also be featured on Joe's album. With the release of All Or Nothing, the crown is sure to be set upon BX's finest Fat Joe.

Moby's new album 'Hotel' is due out soon, and he describes it thusly:

Moby insists it is by total accident his new album Hotel is free of samples because he never intended to make a purely organic record.

The hitmaker composed a staggering 300 songs during recording sessions for the highly-anticipated new disc - and it is a fluke that his 14 favourite songs contained no samples.

The 39-year-old said: "That was a happy accident. I wrote 200-300 songs making the new record and a lot of them had samples, but I didn't like any of them as much as the 14 I chose.

"The record is a lot more personal and it seemed odd to want to make a personal album like that and not sing most of the songs myself."

and you can prevew the album here courtesy of mtv:

Everybody's favourite electronic pop fusionist, Richard Melville or as most people know him, Moby, is back. Many have already noticed, as the single "Lift Me UP" is already out. Moby has also recorded a brand new album to drop on March 8. This is the follow-up to 2002's "18" which included "We're all made of stars." After lurking around in the techno sub culture Moby rose to worldwide fame after 1999's multi platinum effort "Play."

Hotel is in fact a double disc. The first disc of "Hotel" is composed of melodic pop songs tinged with new-wave and post-punk references similar to the past two records. The second album, "Hotel-Ambient," features 11 electronic chill-out tracks in the vein of 1993's "Ambient" and 1997's "I Like to Score."

The politically active pop star targets issues such as the current global climate, President Bush and even pop celebrities Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson who were the inspiration for the coming single "Beautiful." "I was thinking of two not very bright celebrities singing it to each other," he commented on the song. Moby claims to have written over 2000 songs in the process and as that weren't enough he is also releasing a book later this year.

May 3rd is the release date, for the moment, of the new Nine Inch Nails album - 'With Teeth.' Details from NME:

NINE INCH NAILS REVEAL ALL ABOUT NEW ALBUM

NINE INCH NAILS have revealed the tracklisting for the long-awaited new album.

'With Teeth' is released on April 2 in the UK, and a day later in the US. The first single will be 'The Hand That Feeds', a video of which is currently in production.

The album tracklisting is:

'All The Love In The World'
'You Know What You Are?'
'The Collector'
'The Hand That Feeds'
'Love Is Not Enough'
'Every Day Is Exactly The Same'
'With Teeth'
'Only'
'Getting Smaller'
'Sunspots'
'The Line Begins To Blur'
'Beside You In Time'
'Right Where It Belongs'

According to MTV, band leader Trent Reznor has assembled a new line-up that includes former Icarus Line guitarist Aaron North, keyboardist Allesandro Cortini, drummer Jerome Dylan and former Marilyn Manson bassist Twiggy Ramirez, under his real name Jeordie White.

The band play two sold-out UK dates at London Astoria on March 30-31 before returning for the following summer shows:

London Brixton Academy (July 4)
Glasgow Barrowlands (7)
Birmingham Academy (8)
Manchester Apollo (10)

The new album from System Of A Down is called Mezmerize,' and it hits the stores at some point this spring, allegedly. to be followed by he "Hypnotize" album around the end of 2005. The Scoop:

The first of two System Of A Down CDs will come out at the end of spring after being pushed back from a January release date.

Mesmerize will now be released on May 17. The first single, "B.Y.O.B. (Bring Your Own Bombs)," should be out later in March, according to Billboard.com.

The track "Cigaro" is already being playing on radio stations, but the band has no plans to release the song as a single. After airing for a few weeks, the song managed to make its way to #30 on Billboard’s Modern Rock chart.

The second record that SOAD’s been working on, Hypnotize, is going to be released closer to the end of this year.

American Recordings head honcho Rick Rubin and SOAD guitarist Daron Malakian produced both discs. Soon after Mezmerize’s release the band have a 17-date European tour planned. A North American tour should be announced later on.

If you can’t wait that long you can always go out and buy SOAD vocalist Serj Tankian’s latest project, Axis Of Justice Vol. 1, which was released in November. Rage Against The Machine’s Tom Morello, Pete Yorn and Jurassic 5 appear alongside Tankian on that album.

—Stephanie Joudrey

Coldplay's new album entitled "X&Y" is set to come out on June 6th.

COLDPLAY NAME NEW ALBUM

COLDPLAY have titled their eagerly awaited new album 'X&Y'.

The LP will be out on June 6, and will be preceded by a single,'Speed Of Sound', on May 23.

The group recently confirmed their biggest ever UK dates to follow the release of the album, starting at the Crystal Palace Athletics Stadium in June. They have now added more Euro tour dates, as well as a host of support acts.

The tour now visits:

Hamburg Volks Park (June 15)
Koln Fuelinger (17)
Berlin Wuhlheide (19)
Dublin Marlay Park (22) (Support from Interpol and Morning Runner)
London Crystal Palace Athletics Stadium (27-28) (Morning Runner support on both dates, Interpol on 27, and Supergrass on 28)
Glasgow Bellahouston Park (July 1-2) (Support from Supergrass and Morning Runner)
Bolton Reebok Stadium (4-5) (Morning Runner support at both shows, Elbow on 4th, Doves on 5th)
Arnhem Gelredrome (7)
Munich Coubertin Platz (9)
Vienna St Polten Open Air (10)
Verona Open Air (11)

"I think we were in no hurry, because the prospect of touring again was so daunting that we felt we should take our time, and also we wanted to make sure that it was the best it could possibly be," drummer Will Champion said in an interview in the band's quarterly e-zine. "Having no deadline became a problem because we never really felt the need to finish anything. As soon as we gave ourselves a proper deadline, we started to be much more productive, and the stuff we were doing was miles better. It's always the same with us: The best stuff comes when we start to panic."

That panic has produced "about 14 or 15 songs," of which 10 or 11 will make the final cut. According to the e-zine, song titles include "Square One," "What If," "Talk," "X&Y," "Till Kingdom Come" and "The Hardest Part."

"There are songs that kind of pick up where 'Clocks' left off, but also ones that have moved on a bit," Champion said. "On one song, I played the pump organ, and we all sat in a room together recording live takes. On others, I would play the drums to a guide piano or guitar and singing, and then we'd layer it up from there."

One fundamental difference with the new album is that it's the first Coldplay are recording without Ken Nelson, who produced both 2000's Parachutes and A Rush of Blood. Originally, Nelson was on-board as the producer for album #3, but he has since been replaced by Danton Supple, who served as an engineer on A Rush Of Blood...

The New Album from Daft Punk, Human After All, is due out soon allegedly:

Daft Punk is set to revolutionize dance floors and music playlists once again with the release of their innovative new album “Human After All”. The album is the follow-up to 2001’s “Discovery,” which sold 2.6 million copies around the world and spawned the smash hit “One More Time” The new album’s debut single will be the body-thumping, guitar-drenched “Robot Rock”; the video for the song will be directed Daft Punk themselves.

“Human After All” was recorded at Daft Punk’s home studio in Paris between September and November of 2004. Notoriously press-shy—and uniquely loath to have their photos taken for publication--the duo did have this to say to British music magazine NME in January 2003: "The way the music industry is at the moment is allowing us to experiment. If everything is formulaic and we can finance ourselves to work outside of that formula, then for us there are no rules. We're setting our own agenda."

Daft Punk strike out on their own singular path on “Human After All.” Creating some of the most assertive and uncompromising music of their career, Thomas and Guy Manuel have married emotion and technology in a way that perfectly mirrors the fast-paced and hard-hitting rhythms of our modern lives. Songs like “The Prime Time of Your Life,” “The Brainwasher,” and the title track are state-of-the-art aural soundscapes that take the exhilaration of techno and the beat-driven delirium of dance music to bold new heights. Daft Punk also portray another side to their music with the soulful and affecting romantic themes, “Make Love” and “Emotion.”

The new album from Oasis, 'Don't Believe The Truth' is due out on May 30th. Reportedly the alubm features a lot of mediocre, vaguely beatlesque noodlings. Here's a more detailed rundown:

Oasis have confirmed that their new album will be called Don't Believe The Truth. The album will hit shelves on May 30th. A single, 'Lyla', precedes its release on May 16th.

About the single, Noel Gallagher remarked: "It's The Who. 'Lyla' was specifically designed for pogo-ing. We wrote 66 tracks and 'Lyla' was one that we revisited late on and it's ended up on the album. I'm happy with every track on the album."

Oasis' new studio album has been christened "Don't Believe the Truth" and will arrive May 30 internationally via Big Brother Recordings/Epic and a day later in North America. First single "Lyla" will precede the set on May 16th

The new album from Outkast, '10 The Hard Way' has a release date. That date is June 10th. It's been widely rumored to be a return to the hardcore hip-hop, straight spitting over raw beats. Here's the scoop:

Rapper and actor Andre 3000 says he and Big Boi are feeling some pressure to make the next OutKast album "10 The Hard Way" equally as strong as the best-selling, Grammy-winning 2003 double album Speakerboxxx/The Love Below. Their next studio album is tentatively titled 10 The Hard Way and is expected in June.

Asked about whether OutKast is experiencing any anxiety about matching the level of their last commercial release, Andre said: "It's a lot of pressure because this album is like 11 million plus -- like 10 millions plus, 11 millions plus. And, you know, once you do numbers like that the whole world is watching, watching what you're doing next. So we've always had fun and kinda like -- people underdogging and not paying attention to what we're doing and we've always found energy in that. Now we have to find where the energy is coming from."

He adds that he doesn't know how OutKast, with its ever-evolving, envelope-pushing sound, has managed to stay on top of its game for so long: "The only way I can explain how we've stayed on this long with switching and changing is, it's a power that we have nothing to do with. I mean, that's true. A lot of times I write lyrics and come up with melodies and music and write songs and I don't even know where it's coming from. So I guess it's because we're supposed to be doing it."

Another OutKast album due this year is the soundtrack to the group's HBO Prohibition-era musical, which bears the tentative title My Life In Idlewild. The film stars OutKast, Ving Rhames, Paula Jai Parker, Terrence Howard, and Malinda Williams.

Sly and Robbie, Mario Caldato.. these are good names to see:

Outspoken musician/poet/activist Michael Franti will record his next album in Kingston, Jamaica, with Island Records founder Chris Blackwell executive producing. Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare and Mario Caldato Jr. (Beastie Boys, Jack Johnson) are also on board for the project.

The as-yet-untitled album is due in the fall via Blackwell's Palm label and was inspired by a summer 2004 excursion that took Franti to Iraq, Palestine and Israel. The trip has already spawned the feature-length film documentary "I Know I'm Not Alone," which recently screened at the Slamdance independent film festival.

Sly & Robbie will contribute live drum and bass parts to the set, which will also feature Kingston-based percussionists Uzziah "Sticky" Thompson and "Bongo" Herman, keyboardist Robert Lynn and members of Franti's longtime band Spearhead, multi-instrumentalist Carl Young and guitarist Dave Shul.