Classic Pop Icons

Pop megastar Michael Jackson sadly died in Los Angeles this afternoon after suffering a cardiac arrest at his home. He was taken to UCLA Medical Center, but efforts to revive him failed. This will be a huge shock to Jackson’s millions of fans, but it will also be felt outside his fan base too because he was one of those few stars who came to define a generation.

Michael was rarely far from controversy in the last 15 years and his often unusual behaviour came to overshadow the music, but his talent was enormous and his musical legacy will live on.

My favourite Michael Jackson song is Billie Jean from the phenomenol Thriller album. On this day, let’s remember Michael in his prime.

Rest in peace Michael.

For more videos, check our Jackson 5 video section.

To share your thoughts on Michael, head over to the Jackson 5 section of the forum.

Dagger Records has announced the forthcoming release of ‘The Jimi Hendrix Experience: Live At Woburn’.The CD features a previously unheard concert performance by The Jimi Hendrix Experience at the Woburn Music Festival on July 6 1968.

The Woburn Music Festival was one of Britain’s first large scale, open-air rock music events. The two-day event featured afternoon and evening sets on Saturday July 6 and Sunday July 7.

The Jimi Hendrix Experience closed the Saturday evening show in front of a crowd of 14,000.

The band skipped songs from Axis: Bold As Love altogether, kicking off the set with ‘Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band’, the start of which was unfortunately missed by the recording machine. This was followed by ‘Fire’, during which technical problems that would continue throughout the show were evident.

The complete tracklist is:

• Introduction (1:07)
• Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1:11)
• Fire (4:19)
• Tax Free (10:11)
• Red House (11:30)
• Foxey Lady (4:55)
• Voodoo Child (Slight Return) (6:38)
• Purple Haze (8:10)

The performance at Woburn Music Festival would mark the trio’s last performance in England until the two celebrated concerts in February 1969 at the Royal Albert Hall.

The Jimi Hendrix Experience: Live At Woburn’ is due for release on July 28 2009, but pre-orders are being accepted now.

Click here to order the CD.

Click here to check out the Jimi Hendrix video pages.

With summer now finally upon us and some welcome warm weather, it’s a good time to break out some of those Beach Boys classics. If you don’t have any Beach Boys records in your collection, you might want to take a look at the new release: ‘The Beach Boys - Summer Love Songs.’ There are 20 tracks in total and all have been remastered very nicely by Mark Linett.

While the material is for the most part familiar, there are some interesting tracks for the collector on this set, including:

• Fallin in Love, which is an unreleased Dennis Wilson track
• New stereo mixes of Why Do Fools Fall In Love, Don’t Worry Baby, Hushabye, I’m So Young, Good To My Baby and Time To Get Alone.

You can pick the CD up at Amazon (UK), Amazon (US) and Play (UK).

Head over to the Beach Boys video page to watch some great performances.

You can have your say on the band in the Beach Boys section of the brand new Classic Pop Icons Forum. Sign up and join the fun.

‘The Mandela Day Celebration’ will also feature Wyclef Jean, Queen Latifah, Josh Groban, TLC, Cyndi Lauper, Jesse McCartney, Angelique Kidjo, Baaba Maal, Yvonne Chaka Chaka, Chris Chameleon, Freshlyground and Vusi Mahlasela, among others.

The event is organized by 46664, which is a campaign for global HIV/AIDS awareness and prevention that was launched by Eurythmics’ founder Dave Stewart in 2002 and named after Mandela’s Robbens Island prison number.

The concert will cap off a week-long series of events in Mandela’s honor, including a fundraiser dinner hosted by former U.S. President Bill Clinton.

Head over to Aretha’s page in the video section to check out some great performances by the soul legend.

Source: Billboard Online