Omnivore Recordings Announces RSD Black Friday Releases From Janis Joplin & Jorma Kaukonen, Jonathan Richman, & Bobby Cole

Omnivore Recordings has announced three special vinyl releases for Record Store Day Black Friday 2022. On November 25, there will be limited vinyl releases for Janis Joplin and Jorma Kaukonen's The Legendary Typewriter Tape: 6/25/64 Jorma's House, Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers' Jonathan Sings!, and Bobby Cole's A Point Of View.

Watch the Omnivore Record Store Day Black Friday trailer here:

Janis Joplin & Jorma Kaukonen - The Legendary Typewriter Tape: 6/25/64 Jorma's House

Jorma Kaukonen (later of Jefferson Airplane and Hot Tuna) met a singer named Janis Joplin at a hootenanny in San Jose, California, in the fall of 1962. Over the following years, Janis would call on Jorma to accompany her at gigs. As they continued to play together, the Bay Area was changing musically and developing into the legendary San Francisco scene to which both Janis and Jorma would be integral.

During a rehearsal for a show in North Beach, Jorma started his reel-to-reel machine to capture what they were working on. For decades, this recording was the stuff of legend, with inferior, multi-generational transfers making their way through select collector's circles. Now, for the very first time, it is available officially, with the blessing and cooperation of both the Janis Joplin Estate and Jorma Kaukonen.

The Legendary Typewriter Tape: 6/25/64 Jorma's House contains this legendary recording, featuring Restoration and Mastering from acclaimed, Grammy®-winner Michael Graves. The tracks include Joplin on vocals, Kaukonen on guitar, and Jorma's wife Margareta typing away intermittently in the background. This may have just been a rehearsal, but it is so much more.

Featuring Joplin originals, as well as blues classics, The Legendary Typewriter Tape is an intimate glimpse into two major artists at the beginnings of what would become highly influential careers. As Jorma says in his liner notes: "This is indeed a window into a simpler time when the music truly was everything."

Available on CD and Digital December 2, 2022, the release will also be available on vinyl exclusively for Record Store Day Black Friday, November 25, 2022. Enjoy being a fly on the wall and revel in the magic of The Legendary Typewriter Tape.

Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers - Jonathan Sings!

Jonathan Richman formed The Modern Lovers in 1970 with Jerry Harrison, David Robinson & Ernie Brooks. The band would eventually travel to Los Angeles, and score a recording contract. However, while demos and recordings were made, an album was never finished, and the band was dropped (not before appearing on the classic Troublemakers compilation.)

Jonathan began recording for Beserkley Records mid-decade with new versions of The Modern Lovers, focusing on his desire for his band to be more of an acoustic/harmony based endeavor, releasing albums including their eponymous debut (1976), Rock & Roll With The Modern Lovers (1977), Modern Lovers 'Live' (1977), and Back In Your Life (1978), even scoring a Top 5 UK single in the process.

Putting together a new Modern Lovers in 1980, with Greg Keranen (who played on the early records), drummer Micheal Guardabascio, Ken Forfia, Ellie Marshall, and Beth Harrington. The group toured and recorded through 1981-82, and in 1983, Jonathan Sings! (produced by Peter Bernstein, bassist for the renowned LA power pop band The Cretones) appeared on Sire Records. It was worth the wait.

The album not only became an immediate fan favorite, but placed at #8 in The Village Voice's Pazz & Jop critics poll, and NME put it at #19 in their Album Of The Year list. The album has all of the hallmarks that would show why he made frequent appearances on Late Night With Conan O'Brien and was tapped by the Farrely Brothers for their smash film There's Something About Mary in the 1990s.

Jonathan Sings! marked a new decade, a new band, a new label, and a timeless sound. Available again, as Jonathan originally intended. Available on CD on December 2, 2022, the release will also be available on exclusive peach-swirl vinyl on Record Store Day Black Friday.

Bobby Cole - A Point Of View

Frank Sinatra walks into a bar . . .

Well, Frank called it a "bistro"-and Jilly's on 52nd Street even had matchbooks that when opened read, "My favorite bistro-Frank Sinatra." It also featured Frank's "favorite saloon singer," Bobby Cole, who held court there for many years. His other gigs around New York landed him a recording contract with Columbia, but the 1960 release from The Bobby Cole Trio, while well reviewed, failed to gain traction. It featured no original material from Cole, and was essentially a recorded version of his Jilly's act-one hard to capture on LP.

Judy Garland walks into a bar . . .

In 1964, and after hearing Cole's performance of and after hearing Cole's performance of one of her favorites, Cy Coleman's "You Fascinate Me So," Garland invited him to become the new musical arranger for CBS's The Judy Garland Show in Los Angeles. When that show ended, Cole returned to New York and Jilly's.

Jack Lonshein, whose day job was creating covers for artists including Sarah Vaughan, Maynard Ferguson, Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, (and eventually Big Brother & The Holding Company and The Amboy Dukes!), was a friend of Cole's. He knew Bobby's magic, and original songs, were what the jazz world needed.

Taking things into his own hands, A Point of View was released on Lonshein's own Concentric Records, and as can happen, no matter how well received and reviewed a record is, finding a copy was half the battle for fans. A Point of View made waves in the boroughs, was raved about in Billboard and Cash Box, and then disappeared-but became a coveted prize by those who experienced it. Artists including Freddy Cole (Nat's brother) and Tom Jones covered material from it.

A Point of View now returns 55 years later, fully authorized by the Estate of Bobby Cole. Produced for release by Grammy®-winner Cheryl Pawelski and lovingly remastered by Grammy®-winner Michael Graves, this new version presents the original release, plus thirteen previously unissued bonus tracks drawn from sessions likely intended for a follow up release to A Point of View that didn't happen. A fascinating and thorough essay from Grammy®-nominated writer Randy Poe tells the story of Cole, the scene, and the music.

Made available on CD and Digital earlier this year, the double-LP version will be released this Record Store Day Black Friday.

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