In a sign of good things to come for music lovers, Record Store Day has announced their RSD Drops for 2021! On June 12 and July 17, participating independent record stores around the world will stock up with exclusive rarities and new pressings of old favorites. This year's got a long list of cool titles, but for classic rock fans, we figured we'd pick out a baker's dozen of albums and box sets you won't want to miss!
Available June 12
Black Sabbath's Heaven & Hell and Mob Rules, recently expanded on CD with bonus material, will receive special picture disc versions. For Grateful Dead fans, Olympia Theatre, Paris, France 5/3/72 gets the deluxe vinyl treatment, featuring the complete set - one of the highlights of the band's Europe '72 tour - as well as an etching on the last side. Joni Mitchell's beloved Archives, Vol. 1 (1963-1967) box set from last year gets another look in the form of a single album of highlights from the set. Steely Dan's Grammy Award-winning Two Against Nature and follow-up Everything Must Go - the duo's final studio albums - will be released on vinyl for the first RSD Drop (it's the first time ever on vinyl for Nature). Some outtakes from The Doors' Morrison Hotel Sessions will make their vinyl debut, while The Pleasure's All Yours includes outtakes issued on The Replacements' Pleased to Meet Me box set from 2020.
Finally, Angel Dream is a fresh new take on Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers' Songs and Music from "She's the One." Released as a soundtrack album in 1996, this remixed and remastered set, pressed on cobalt blue vinyl, is reimagined as a proper Petty album, swapping songs included on the acclaimed Wildflowers & All the Rest for four previously unreleased tracks: originals "105 Degrees" and "One of Life's Little Mysteries," a cover of JJ Cale's "Thirteen Days," and an instrumental called "French Disconnection."
Available July 17
The second RSD Drop offers plenty of treats for rock lovers as well. Déjà Vu Alternates brings to vinyl a collection of unreleased material from the forthcoming 50th anniversary edition of Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young's beloved Déjà Vu. Lou Reed's 1996 album Set the Twilight Reeling and Dire Straits' 1993 live Encores EP will each get reissued, with the latter featuring a lithograph and a transparent pink vinyl pressing. An unreleased Ramones gig from down under will be released as Triple J Live at the Wireless Capitol Theatre, Sydney, Australia, July 8, 1980, featuring several songs that would never pop up in the band's sets again. And another unreleased concert honors the recently-departed John Prine. Live At The Other End comprises two full shows performed at the end of 1975 at New York club The Other End (since renamed The Bitter End, as originally known). This one will be available as a 4LP or 2CD set, for you compact disc lovers.
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