An Italian grand requiem written around the axle of the 19th and 20th centuries might almost be predictable. It will be operatic. It will doff the hat to Verdi. It will have its vulgar moments. It will be recorded by an Italian orchestra on an Italian label like Dynamic, Bongiovanni, Aura or Nuova Era. Wrong, in this case, on most counts…..This is commendable revival. A requiem in which the Fauré-like reticence of plainchant meets the drama of apocalyptic visions.

Rob Barnett @ musicweb-international.com

Wolfgang Rihm has had a long and varied career, which Hanssler's Rihm Edition aims to document by exploring the archives of German radio orchestras. This disc here focuses on the period when he first came to prominence in the European contemporary music scene. In the 1970s, Rihm was writing in an effusive expressionistic style, often going with the white-hot inspiration of any given moment instead of an elaborate preconceived form. The SWR Sinfonieorchester Baden-Baden und Freiburg perform three works in this vein…..

Christopher Culver @ Amazon.com

In the grand tradition of MTV's Unplugged series, MTV Unplugged in Athens features German hard rock stalwarts Scorpions putting on an all-acoustic set for the good people of Greece. Rather than the intimate studio performances that put the series on the map in the '90s, however, the set was recorded at the Lycabettus Theatre in Athens, a setting that feels appropriately grand given the band's arena-rocking tendencies. Despite the larger venue, the set still feels fairly personal, stripping away the bombast of the plugged-in versions to reveal the emotions at the core of the band's…

Wes Montgomery appeared as leader or co-leader on a dozen Riverside albums, in a wide variety of formats ranging from organ trios to one with full string orchestra. Some of the most rewarding simply placed him in a studio with a superior rhythm section and let him deal with the mixture of ballads, blues, and swingers. So Much Guitar!, his fourth album for the label, is a notable example of this straightforward approach. Recorded in 1961, it features the flawless support of Ron Carter (in one of his very first sessions) and Hank Jones, and includes Montgomery's only entirely unaccompanied recording While We re Young. An added bonus in this Original Jazz Classics Remasters edition are eight selections recorded that same year during a Montgomery Brothers tour.

"Triunity" is the result of an unexpected reunion gathering two major entities of the extreme French musical scene, the Legendary Unorthodox Black Metal entity BLUT AUS NORD and P.H.O.B.O.S. the Genius of Industrial Dark Drone !