Yellow Magic Orchestra was a Japanese electronic music band formed in Tokyo in 1978 by Haruomi Hosono, Yukihiro Takahashi and Ryuichi Sakamoto. The group is considered influential and innovative in the field of popular electronic music. They were pioneers in their use of synthesizers, samplers, sequencers, drum machines, computers, and digital recording technology, and effectively anticipated the "electropop boom" of the 1980s. They are credited with playing a key role in the development of several electronic genres, including synthpop, J-pop, electro, and techno, while exploring subversive sociopolitical themes throughout their career.
Spyro Gyra is an American jazz fusion band that was formed in Buffalo, New York, in 1974. The band's music combines jazz, R&B, funk, and pop music. The band's name comes from Spirogyra, a genus of green algae which founder Jay Beckenstein had learned about in college.
ARP Instruments, Inc. was a Lexington, Massachusetts manufacturer of electronic musical instruments, founded by Alan Robert Pearlman in 1969. It created a popular and commercially successful range of synthesizers throughout the 1970s before declaring bankruptcy in 1981. The company earned a reputation for producing excellent sounding, innovative instruments and was granted several patents for the technology it developed.
Aja is the sixth studio album by the American rock band Steely Dan, released on September 23, 1977, by ABC Records. For the album, band leaders Donald Fagen and Walter Becker pushed Steely Dan further into experimenting with different combinations of session players, enlisting the services of nearly 40 musicians, while pursuing longer, more sophisticated compositions and arrangements.
Haruomi Hosono, sometimes credited as Harry Hosono, is a Japanese musician, singer, songwriter and record producer. He is considered to be one of the most influential musicians in Japanese pop music history, credited with shaping the sound of Japanese pop for decades as well as pop music outside of Japan. He also inspired genres such as city pop and Shibuya-kei, and as the leader of the Yellow Magic Orchestra, contributed to the development and pioneering of numerous electronic genres.
Cluster were a German musical duo consisting of Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Dieter Moebius, formed in 1971 and associated with West Germany's krautrock and kosmische music scenes. Born from the earlier Berlin-based group Kluster, they relocated in 1971 into the countryside village of Forst, Lower Saxony, where they built a studio and collaborated with musicians such as Conny Plank, Brian Eno, and Michael Rother; with the latter, they formed the influential side-project Harmonia. After first disbanding in 1981, Cluster reunited several times: from 1989 to 1997, and from 2007 to 2010.
Nigel Olsson is an English drummer, best known for being a lifelong member of the Elton John Band. He has had an equally long career as a session musician and composed, recorded and produced albums as a solo artist.
Marion Brown was an American jazz alto saxophonist, composer, writer, visual artist, and ethnomusicologist. He was a member of the avant-garde jazz scene in New York City during the 1960s, playing alongside musicians such as John Coltrane, Archie Shepp, and John Tchicai. He performed on Coltrane's landmark 1965 album Ascension. AllMusic reviewer Scott Yanow described him as "one of the brightest and most lyrical voices of the 1960s avant-garde."
"Damn U" is a song by American musician Prince and the New Power Generation, released in November 1992 as the fourth single from his fourteenth studio album, Love Symbol (1992). It is a slow-grooving romantic R&B ballad, featuring strings and violin. Prince sings of a woman who affects him greatly emotionally, and uses the term "damn u" as an expression of surprise at the woman's power over him. His vocal range shifts throughout the song from very high falsetto to his deeper lower baritone. The B-side was "2 Whom It May Concern", which was also available on the maxi single for "7". Its music video was directed by Randee St. Nicholas.
Anthony "Rebop" Kwaku Baah was a Ghanaian percussionist who worked with the 1970s rock groups Traffic and Can.
Åse Maria Kleveland is a Norwegian singer, guitarist, politician and activist. She represented Norway in the Eurovision Song Contest 1966 with the entry "Intet er nytt under solen".
David Paton is a Scottish bassist, guitarist and singer. He first achieved success in the mid-1970s as lead vocalist and bassist of Pilot, who scored hits with "Magic", "January", "Just a Smile" and "Call Me Round" before splitting in 1977. Paton is also known for his work in the original lineup of The Alan Parsons Project (1975-1985), and for working with acts such as Kate Bush, Camel and Elton John.
David Hentschel is an English recording engineer, film score composer and music producer who engineered on George Harrison's All Things Must Pass and Elton John's Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, as well as for such artists as Genesis, Tony Banks, Ringo Starr, Queen, Nazareth, Marti Webb, Andy Summers, Mike Oldfield, Renaissance, Peter Hammill and Ronnie Caryl.
Elvis: A Legendary Performer Volume 2 is a compilation album featuring recordings by American singer and musician Elvis Presley. As with the first volume of the series, issued in 1974, the collection was a mixture of previously released and never-before-released recordings.
Welcome to My World is a compilation album by American singer and musician Elvis Presley, released by RCA Records on March 17, 1977, five months before his death. The album was certified gold on September 30, 1977, and platinum on January 14, 1983, by the RIAA.
Luke Hurley is an independent New Zealand guitarist and singer-songwriter, who works mostly outside the confines of the music industry. He was born in Kenya, and moved with his family to Gore in Southland, New Zealand when aged 12. He achieved a degree of early success on student radio with the song "Mona Lisa" in the early 1980s at University of Otago in Dunedin.
The Brecker Brothers were a jazz fusion music duo consisting of siblings Michael and Randy. Michael played saxophone, flute, and EWI, and Randy played trumpet and flugelhorn. The brothers attended Cheltenham High School in Wyncote, Pennsylvania.
The following is a comprehensive discography of Rainbow, an English hard rock band. They have released 8 studio albums, 16 live albums, 16 compilation albums, 8 box sets, 3 EPs and 24 singles.
If Not for You is the debut studio album by British-Australian singer-songwriter Olivia Newton-John, released in November 1971 by Festival Records. The album was released on the Pye International label in the UK as Olivia Newton-John, with a slightly different cover.
Masayoshi Takanaka is a Japanese musician, producer and composer. Takanaka rose to fame and achieved commercial success during the 1970s and 1980s. He is known for his virtuosic guitar playing and skilled musicianship, composing and performing across various different music genres.
