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Daily stories about music and vinyl: albums, artists, labels. Read on the web or in the CrateCore app.
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September 19, 2026
STORY · Pop
Spice: The Album That Made the World Want More
The Spice Girls' debut album Spice reached Japanese shelves before the UK. By the end of 1997 it was the world's best-selling album, moving 19 million copies in twelve months.
3 min read
Cover of “Spice” by Spice Girls. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
3 min read
September 17, 2026
STORY · Rock
Queen's Bicycle Race: What 65 Nude Models on a Greyhound Track Meant
Sixty-five professional models, completely naked, pedaling rented bicycles around a greyhound racing track. That was the scene at Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium in…
4 min read
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4 min read
September 19, 2026
STORY · Rock
U2: How a Kitchen Rehearsal Birthed a Vinyl Empire
From a kitchen-table audition in 1976 to a 48-year catalog that still fills record shop bins, U2's rise began with Larry Mullen Jr.'s classified ad at Mount Temple school.
5 min read
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5 min read
September 18, 2026
STORY · Pop
Joanne Catherall: How a Sheffield Teen Defined Human League
Joanne Catherall, born in Sheffield in 1970, joined The Human League in 1980 and helped reshape British electronic pop with her voice and image.
4 min read
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4 min read
STORY · Pop
Ricky Bell: Why the New Edition Voice Still Resonates
Ricky Bell, born September 18, 1967, built his career on New Edition harmonies and Bell Biv DeVoe's harder edge, a door that never fully closed.
3 min read
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3 min read
STORY · Rock
Who's Next: How The Who's Only UK No. 1 Album Happened
On 18 September 1971, The Who's Who's Next reached number one on the British chart, the only album by the London quartet to ever hold that position.
4 min read
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4 min read
September 19, 2026
STORY · Alternative
Alan Jay of Lit: What 1973 Set in Motion
Alan Jay of Lit was born in 1973, the year Gram Parsons died and the course of popular music shifted in ways that shaped his generation.
4 min read
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4 min read
STORY · Rock
Gram Parsons: Why His Body Was Stolen After He Died
Phil Kaufman stole Gram Parsons' body after his 1973 death in Joshua Tree, fulfilling a cremation promise. It turned a country-rock tragedy into one of music's strangest postscripts.
5 min read
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September 18, 2026
STORY · Classical
Anna Netrebko Turned 55 After Starting as a Cleaner
The Mariinsky Theatre's principal soprano used to scrub floors at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory. Anna Netrebko, born in Krasnodar on September 18, 1971, spe…
5 min read
Manfred Werner ( Tsui ), CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
5 min read
September 19, 2026
STORY · Metal
Why did Lita Ford trade Black Sabbath for a Les Paul?
Lita Ford, born in London in 1958, went from a Black Sabbath concert at thirteen to a top-ten duet with Ozzy Osbourne in 1989. She spent years with The Runaways first.
3 min read
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3 min read
September 18, 2026
STORY · Rock
Frankie Avalon: Why a Trumpet Player Became a Teen Idol
Frankie Avalon, born September 18, 1939, traded the trumpet for singing and became a teen idol whose 1959 hit 'Venus' defined pre-Beatles American radio.
5 min read
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September 17, 2026
DROP · October 23, 2026 · Pop
Back to Black at 20: a 3LP deluxe on ultra clear vinyl, out 23 October
Republic and UMe mark twenty years of Back to Black with a three-LP deluxe edition on ultra clear vinyl, out 23 October. LP1 is the remastered album. LP2 colle…
1 min read
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DROP · October 2, 2026 · Alternative
Stadium Arcadium at 20: four colour LPs out on 2 October
The 2006 double album that topped the Billboard 200 and gave the band Dani California, Snow (Hey Oh) and Tell Me Baby gets a 20th-anniversary reissue. On 2 Octo…
1 min read
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DROP · September 25, 2026 · Rock
Freak Out! turns 60: the Mothers of Invention debut as a 5LP box
The first rock double album that dared to call itself a concept record comes back for its 60th birthday. On 25 September Zappa Records and UMe reissue Freak Out…
1 min read
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1 min read
STORY · Metal
Guns N' Roses: The Day Two Albums Hit at Once
Guns N' Roses released both Use Your Illusion albums on September 17, 1991. The second volume outsold the first, moving 770,000 copies in its opening week.
4 min read
Cover of “Use Your Illusion I” by Guns N' Roses. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
4 min read
STORY · Metal
How Ozzy Osbourne Made No More Tears His Last Great Stand
Ozzy Osbourne's 1991 album No More Tears became a quadruple-platinum consolidation of heavy metal. It marked the final album for his core rhythm section.
4 min read
Cover of “No More Tears” by Ozzy Osbourne. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
4 min read
September 16, 2026
STORY · Rock
How Bruce Kulick Made Kiss Sound Whole Again on Asylum
Bruce Kulick's first credited album with Kiss, Asylum, arrived on September 16, 1985, bringing a stable lineup and a polished sound to the band.
4 min read
Cover of “Asylum” by Kiss. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
4 min read
STORY · Rock
B.B. King: How a $15 Guitar and a Fire Named Lucille
Born on a Mississippi cotton plantation in 1925, Riley B. King became B.B. King, the most important electric guitarist of the second half of the twentieth century, according to AllMusic.
5 min read
Eugene F. Tourangeau, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
5 min read
STORY · Alternative
The Fairlight in a Barn That Made Kate Bush Immortal
Kate Bush's Hounds of Love, recorded in a converted barn in Welling with a Fairlight CMI, remains her defining work forty-one years after its release.
4 min read
Cover of “Hounds of Love” by Kate Bush. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
4 min read
STORY · World
Buena Vista Social Club: How a 1997 Album Took Over the World
Ry Cooder's 1997 album Buena Vista Social Club, recorded in six days in Havana, became one of the best-selling Latin albums ever made.
3 min read
Cover of “Buena Vista Social Club” by Buena Vista Social Club. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
3 min read
STORY · Hip-Hop
DJ Shadow: A Beat Built From Other Records
Two years in a Davis, California bedroom with an Akai MPC60 MKII and a wall of vinyl produced DJ Shadow's Endtroducing....., a debut album made entirely from other people's records.
4 min read
Cover of “Endtroducing.....” by DJ Shadow. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
4 min read
STORY · Rock
Dire Straits: Love over Gold's Five Chart-Topping Tracks
Dire Straits' Love over Gold, a five-song album released on 24 September 1982, topped charts in six countries and turns 44 this month.
4 min read
Cover of “Love over Gold” by Dire Straits. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
4 min read
STORY · Metal
How Lordi's Monstereophonic Split One Band Into Two
In 2016, Lordi released the split-personality album Monstereophonic. The Theaterror and Demonarchy halves stretched the Finnish band's formula into two distinct identities.
3 min read
Cover of “Monstereophonic (Theaterror Vs. Demonarchy)” by Lordi. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
3 min read
September 15, 2026
STORY · Metal
Crazy Nights by Kiss: The 1987 Album That Vanished
Kiss's fourteenth studio album sold a million copies by February 18, 1988. Yet within a few years, most of its songs vanished from the band's live sets.
4 min read
Cover of “Crazy Nights” by Kiss. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
4 min read
STORY · Metal
Why Did Queen Record an Album Without Freddie Mercury?
Queen + Paul Rodgers released their lone studio album The Cosmos Rocks in September 2008. Roger Taylor floated the idea to Brian May in 2006.
4 min read
Cover of “The Cosmos Rocks” by Queen. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
4 min read
STORY · Soul
Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation 1814: A Utopia Built From Headlines
Janet Jackson turned CNN headlines into a social-political utopia on Rhythm Nation 1814, the fourth studio album released on A&M Records in September 1989.
4 min read
Cover of “Janet Jackson's Rhythm Nation 1814” by Janet Jackson. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
4 min read
STORY · Rock
Porcupine Tree: The 55-Minute Song That Swallowed an Album
Porcupine Tree's tenth studio album The Incident, released on September 14, 2009, was built around a 55-minute song cycle. That cycle swallowed the entire first disc.
3 min read
Cover of “The Incident” by Porcupine Tree. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
3 min read
STORY · Pop
Why Did Jesse McCartney's Second Album Stall at 33?
The single peaked at number thirty-three on the Billboard Hot 100, and the album it came from still turned twenty in 2026. That gap between a chart placement th…
5 min read
Cover of “Right Where You Want Me” by Jesse McCartney. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
5 min read
STORY · Pop
The Kinks: The Album That Flopped Twice Over
Two top-three singles preceded The Kinks' Something Else. Yet the album landed as the band's lowest-charting release of its era, a disconnect that still puzzles critics.
3 min read
Cover of “Something Else by The Kinks” by The Kinks. Source: Cover Art Archive (coverartarchive.org)
3 min read
STORY · Rock
Led Zeppelin's In Through The Out Door: Why It Endured
Led Zeppelin's 'In Through The Out Door' arrived in September 1979. A commercial triumph masked an unstable creative period and became their final album with John Bonham.
4 min read
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