Gordon Lightfoot Book, Music and More!

Janet Jackson is a survivor. As the baby in pop’s most famous family, Janet had to fight for attention and to be taken seriously. Launching her recording career just as brother Michael’s popularity was exploding, she lived in his shadow for many years—until she asserted her own image and a sound that mixed elements of r&b, funk, rap and new jack swing. By the end of the 1990s, she rivaled even the King of Pop as one of the decade’s most successful recording artists. A new compilation, Number Ones, charts Jackson’s rise from her 1986 breakthrough Control album to 2001’s multimillion-selling All for You. The 12 tracks range from love songs to statements of female empowerment. Control’s “Na...

He’s got a new album coming this fall, but in the meantime fans will enjoy this 18-track collection that neatly summarizes two decades of Costello’s prolific output. Included are songs from Costello’s piano-ballad rich North, his Burt Bacharach collaboration Painted from Memory and his country flavored The Delivery Man, with guests Lucinda Williams and Emmylou Harris. There’s also some of his blistering, acerbic rock from When I Was Cruel and New Orleans magic from his elegiac The River in Reverse. Eclectic Elvis.

At one point in this nearly three-hour marathon DVD, Springsteen clambers back up on stage from the audience pit and yells “somebody get me an elevator—I’m 60!” He may be approaching senior citizen status, but the indefatigable Boss is still in fine form. Roaring through hits like “Badlands,” “Born to Run” and “Dancing in the Dark,” the working-class hero—shirt drenched, fist pumping—is having the time of his life. Bonus footage includes a smoking version of “The River,” with steam literally rising from Springsteen’s body.

It’s proving to be another Katy Perry kind of summer. Just like 2008, when her spunky ode to bi-curiosity “I Kissed a Girl” filled the airwaves, this summer’s most ubiquitous tune is Katy’s “California Gurls.” A breezy West Coast anthem, it’s a sun-kissed jam about Daisy Dukes and girls “so hot [they’ll] melt your Popsicle.” The song and its video, a frothy fantasy with cotton candy clouds and cupcake bikini tops, go down as easily as cold soda.     One of pop’s hottest stars, Katy didn’t always sing about sex on the beach and locking lips with girls. Born in Santa Barbara to Christian pastors, she was once a gospel-rock singer who bounced around between record labels before re-branding hers...

The movie finds Julia Roberts eating in Italy, praying in India and falling in love in Bali. The soundtrack is equally nourishing, spiritually and romantically, with wistful Neil Young ballads, sumptuous Brazilian bossa nova from João Gilberto and daughter Bebel and stirring Indian Karnatic classical music from U. Srinivas. But the highlights are Eddie Vedder’s new song “Better Days” and “The Long Road,” the Pearl Jam singer’s stunning duet with Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, first heard in the film Dead Man Walking.

He’s the Midas Man—everything he touches turns to gold, from his own albums (sales of 45 million to date) to his chart-topping protégé Justin Bieber. Now Usher has released this nine-track EP, which he calls “the last chapter” of his best-selling CD Raymond v. Raymond. Rappers Jay-Z, Bun B and Pitbull join him on “Hot Tottie,” “Get In My Car” and the dancefloor filler “DJ Got Us Fallin’ in Love” respectively. And the “OMG” singer mines yet more gold with his slamming remix of Justin’s hit “Somebody to Love.”

His musical identities and styles have changed over the years, beginning as pop singer Johnny Cougar and then John Cougar, before shifting into heartland rocker John Cougar Mellencamp and finally Grammy winner John Mellencamp. Throughout this evolution, he had a string of hits like “Jack and Diane” and “Wild Night.” He also became a passionate activist, co-founding Farm Aid with Willie Nelson and Neil Young and campaigning against George W. Bush. Mellencamp has enjoyed an equally rich and variable personal life, having fathered five children from three marriages. Currently married to former supermodel Elaine Irwin, with whom he has two sons, the Hall of Famer recently announced that he’s “do...

When the revered singer-songwriter toured the world in 2008, after an absence of 15 years, his return was hailed by one newspaper as “an event of Biblical dimensions.” That tour was documented on last year’s fine DVD Live in London. This CD-DVD serves as an excellent companion package, capturing stellar live performances from Tel Aviv to San Jose of such beloved hits as “Suzanne,” “Hallelujah” and “Closing Time” and featuring backstage interviews conducted by Leonard’s own daughter, Lorca Cohen.

It’s a marriage made in heaven: the architect of the Beach Boys’ classic surf-sound and the renowned songwriting team of the Great American Songbook. Brian takes George and Ira standards like “Rhapsody in Blue” and “I Got Plenty of Nothin’” and recasts them with his trademark California harmonies. The transformations are stunning: “They Can’t Take That Away from Me” has unmistakable traces of “Wouldn’t It Be Nice,” while “S’Wonderful,” with Brian in fine voice, is all sunny bossa nova. S’wonderful, indeed.

Few indie rock bands have made as big an impact as Arcade Fire. The Montreal collective burst on to the scene with stirring strings and bracing brass. Its concerts, ecstatic performances that resembled emotionally charged, church-based gospel, attracted a fervent following with celebrity fans like David Byrne and David Bowie. The group’s first two anthemic CDs, the best-selling Funeral and Neon Bible, topped year-end polls. Now Arcade Fire, led by Win Butler and his wife Régine Cassagne, has released its third CD, a provocative concept album about suburbia. Arcade Fire knows of where it speaks. Win grew up in the suburbs of Houston, before settling in Montreal and marrying Régine, the daught...