*Gladys Knight has one of the most distinctive and recognizable singing voices in the world today, and her speaking voice isn’t so bad either.

Our Lee Bailey recently had the opportunity to speak with Ms. Knight. When asked about the modern state of popular music he touched a nerve. Here’s why Gladys says modern music annoys her.

“One of my pet peeves is being categorized, so to speak,” the music legend told our publisher. “Not just because of the kind of music you were doing, but how you looked. Whether you could do pop music material sometimes was dependent upon whether you were African-American or not African American and that used to bother me so much.”

Day of Silence

BY DANIEL MCSWAIN
Webcasters are speaking with a powerful voice today, as nearly all U.S.-based Internet radio streams have “gone silent” in a reaction to new royalty rates that threaten to decimate the majority of the webcast industry within weeks.

Webcasters of all stripes, from public broadcasters like KCRW to major webcast-only services like Yahoo! LAUNCHcast and Pandora, in addition to some of the country’s major terrestrial simulcasters (including Greater Media, Saga Communications, and B-101/Philadelphia), are participating in today’s “Day of Silence” to underscore the urgent need for Congressional intervention to keep webcasters alive.

Running up to today’s event, national media outlets have been following webcasters’ struggle against the excessive rates with growing attention and coverage. Today, that coverage, most of it highly sympathetic to webcasters’ efforts, continues to pour out, including in the Washington Post, San Francisco Chronicle, San Jose Mercury News, the Associated Press, the BBC, and more.

Many webcasters have blocked access to their streams, while others are broadcasting loops of ambient sound interspersed with PSAs urging their audiences to take action today by contacting their representatives in Washington D.C.

The table below shows examples of how webcasters are presenting today’s silence to their audiences.

read more

LOS ANGELES , CA – Shout! Factory, in partnership with music legend Herb Alpert, expands the label’s historic Herb Alpert Signature Series reissue program with the fully restored and remastered release of Alpert’s disco-infused 1979 masterpiece, RISE.

Alpert’s artistic comeback started with the release of “Rise,” a down-tempo dance single departing from Alpert’s signature Tijuana Brass sound. It climbed to number one on the Billboard charts and became the biggest hit of his career. Met with such success, Alpert and his recording team created an entire album around the new, laidback disco sounds of the single and RISE – the album – was born, topping the charts and revitalizing Alpert’s already decades-long career.

Every album in the Herb Alpert Signature Series has been meticulously remastered under Alpert’s personal supervision, and the expanded CD booklets include new liner notes with reflections from Alpert himself. The 11 previous releases in the series include Whipped Cream & Other Delights, The Lonely Bull, Going Places, rarities collection Lost Treasures and many more. RISE joins the Herb Alpert Signature Series on CD May 29, 2007 with two previously unreleased tracks, for the suggested list price of $13.98.

Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss, co-founders of A&M Records, will be honored with the President’s Merit Award by the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences for their contributions to popular music. The ceremony will take place at a post-Grammy® reception on February 11, 2006 at the Los Angeles Convention Center .

ABOUT HERB ALPERT
Herb Alpert’s celebrated career in music began over four decades ago, with early—and extraordinary–successes including his 1958 co-write, with Lou Adler and Sam Cooke, of the evergreen hit “Wonderful World.” Today, 75 million+ in record sales down the road, Alpert’s versatile talent is legendary. His myriad credits encompass triumphs as a superstar trumpeter and bandleader, label founder, producer, composer, arranger and vocalist…the latter, most notably for his 1968 #1 single with the now-classic track “This Guy’s In Love With You,” which was also the first #1 hit for the songwriting team of Burt Bacharach and Hal David. Among Alpert’s many music awards garnered over the years are seven GRAMMYs®, including Record of the Year/Best Instrumental Performance (Non-Jazz) for the ’65 Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass smash “A Taste Of Honey,” as well as Best Pop Instrumental Performance wins for the 1966 TJB hit “What Now My Love” and Herb’s 1979 solo masterpiece “Rise.” Alpert has also been honored with the prized GRAMMY Trustees Award for Lifetime Achievement, which he and longtime music business partner Jerry Moss received jointly in 1997.

In 1962, Alpert and Moss co-founded A&M Records, long the world’s leading—and largest—independently owned record label. The company was revered internationally for its artist-driven agenda, and acts that over several decades included The Police, Sting, Janet Jackson, Joe Jackson, The Brothers Johnson, Joe Cocker, Bryan Adams, Soundgarden, Supertramp,, Sergio Mendes and Brasil 66, Cat Stevens, The Carpenters, Sheryl Crow, Barry White and Quincy Jones.

In many ways, though, in addition to being one of its founding fathers, Alpert was A&M’s signature artist. Immediately after forming the label, he introduced the Tijuana Brass phenomenon, which propelled him, and the A&M name, to global fame. By putting the trumpet out front, Alpert revolutionized the instrument as a pop radio staple with a trademark sound fusing Latin influences, Jazz instincts, and unerring pop sensibilities.