New Releases For The Week Of August 26, 2007

'Ben Harper's Life' Goes On

Technically speaking, Ben Harper's new record, "Lifeline," due this
week on Virgin, was recorded during a single lively week in the
artist's Paris home base. But it was truly born during two months'
worth of sound checks on a European tour by Harper and his band the
Innocent Criminals.



"It all hit me in a split second," Harper says. He explains that he
was "basically tired of mundane sound checks. We were at the end of
an eight-month run, about to start a two-month tour, and I thought,
'We own our own sound system, amps, speakers -- everything you want
when you're bringing music to life. But when you get to sound check,
you're playing the same material. This can't stand.'"



So Harper and his band hatched a plan: Each member would come to
sound check with song ideas that they would refine before the show.
"The operative term was 'acoustic soul,' " Harper says of the
record's framework. "'Soul' meaning anything from Motown to Blind
Willie Johnson. And we said, 'What do you got? Throw it out.'"



"Lifeline" finds Harper and his Innocent Criminals -- drummer Oliver
Charles, percussionist Leon Mobley, bassist Juan Nelson, guitarist
Michael Ward and keyboardist Jason Yates -- at their most
thematically united. Though there are tastes of gravel-road blues
("Needed You Tonight"), gospel ("Say You Will"), soulful anthems
("Heart of Matters") and subtle but sharp calls to arms ("Fight
Outta You"), there's a certain organic unity to its sound.





Yung Joc 'Hustle' And Flow

Bad Boy rapper Yung Joc just wants to have fun. And judging by the
success of his first two singles last year, so do his listeners.
Joc's "It's Goin' Down" -- a ditty about clothes and cars that even
spawned a "joccin' " dance -- spent eight weeks atop the Hot
R&B/Hip-Hop Songs chart and helped the rapper become Warner Music
Group's No. 1 ringtone artist, according to the company. The
similarly catchy follow-up, "I Know You See It," reached No. 5 on
Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs.



But a third single, "Dope Boy Magic," which awkwardly cast Joc as a
drug-slinger, failed to catch on. So on his sophomore album, "Hustlenomics,"
Joc is tailoring his rhymes to the younger fans he attracted with
"It's Goin' Down" while attempting not to lose sight of the core
hip-hop audience. Due this week, the set is led by the single
"Coffee Shop," on which he implores, "Kids, please don't do drugs."



"I always hear parents tell me, 'My 5-year-old daughter loves you.'
That's why I didn't want to talk about drugs when I talked about
hustling on this record," the Georgia native says. "That's not what
people expect from me. 'Coffee Shop' is fun because I know the kids
feel me. The song's title is really about me selling everything. I
used to cut hair, sell clothes, shoes, women's bags, accessories,
cars, whatever, so my hustling headquarters is the coffee shop."



In an effort to beat the sophomore jinx -- which Joc says happens
because most MCs don't have enough material to choose from -- he's
been recording since his debut, "New Joc City," dropped in 2006.
Unlike on the first album, several big-name producers (the Neptunes,
Cool & Dre, DJ Quik, Jazze Pha and Collipark) and guests (the Game,
Snoop Dogg, Rick Ross and Jim Jones) appear on "Hustlenomics."





Lyle Lovett Bigger And Better

Texas-bred singer/songwriter/actor Lyle Lovett has been as busy as
ever in the past year in preparation for his new album, "It's Not
Big It's Large." Recorded live in the studio with his longtime
collaborator the Large Band, the follow-up to 2003's "My Baby Don't
Tolerate" is due this week via Lost Highway. Lovett admits he's
taking a more proactive approach to marketing this time around,
offering the album in a deluxe CD/DVD edition as well as in a
Starbucks-exclusive format with extra tracks.



As for the unusual album title, "The name of the band was always
sort of a double-meaning thing," Lovett says. "It's my way of
saying, 'I'm not trying to do legit big band,' but it hints at it.
And there are 36 people on the road every day right now, so it's
larger than ever. That was the intent of the name originally, but
people still invariably will refer to it as 'the big band,' and
people invariably are asking me, 'Are you touring with your big
band?" I always just say, 'Yes, we are," but [the album title] is a
small attempt to clarify."



Lovett hit the studio last October "but with our touring schedule
through the end of last year and the beginning of this year, it just
took us this long to finish it," he says. "I was trying to feature
the whole band since we hadn't done that in a while. We recorded
everything live. I've always felt as though recordings come out
different when you record all together, like you play live. Just
being a little less careful in the performing in terms of recording
always feels better.



On the road this summer with k.d. lang, Lovett and company have
"been playing quite a few [new] songs. The response has been good,
and it's fun to perform songs people haven't heard or they're not
used to listening to. I always try to put a set together that
features the group that we have out on the road. So some of the
bigger songs like 'I Will Rise Up' that we're doing, they feature
the singers and the horns. We're doing 'Don't Cry a Tear' because
that enables us to break down and do something in a smaller setup
onstage."



Also out this week



Veteran vocalist Paul Anka's "Classic Songs, My Way" (Decca).

The Cledus T. Judd-steered album "Boogity Boogity, A Tribute to the
Comic Genius Of Ray Stevens" (Curb).

R&B vocalist Lil' Mo's "Pain & Paper" (Koch).

Trumpeter Christian Scott's "Anthem" (Concord).

Kentucky rock act VHS Or Beta's "Bring on the Comets" (Astralwerks).

A double-disc collection from Beatles drummer Ringo Starr,
"Photograph: The Very Best Of" (Capitol).

The debut from the Raekwon-reared Ice Water, "Icewater: Polluted
Water" (Babygrande).

Emo rock outfit the Honorary Title's "Scream and Light Up the Sky"
(Reprise).