'Earl’s Closet: The Lost Archive of Earl McGrath, 1970-1980' (out July 15th from Light in the Attic)
Light in the Attic Announces Special Collection of Rare and Unheard Music
From the Private Collection of a 20th-century Legend Earl’s Closet: The Lost Archive of Earl Mcgrath, 1970-1980
Featuring 22 previously unheard recordings from Daryl Hall and John Oates, David Johansen (New York Dolls), Terry Allen, The Jim Carroll Band, Delbert McClinton and Glen Clark,
Andy Warhol’s Superstar Ultra Violet, Norma Jean Bell, and many more
Available to pre-order beginning today (5/26)
Due out July 15th in 2xLP, CD, and digital formats
First single “Dry In The Sun” by Daryl Hall and John Oates out today on all digital platforms
Plus, short film documenting the album’s incredible origin story premiered today
cover art
Click here to download cover art and product shots
Click here to pre-order album and stream/download first single “Dry In The Sun”
Click here to watch short film
“Earl was a wonderful man with a great eye for new and innovative art. And such an amusing companion, too.”
- Mick Jagger
Los Angeles, CA (May 26, 2022)─Celebrated archival reissue label Light in the Attic (LITA) is proud to announce Earl’s Closet: The Lost Archive of Earl McGrath, 1970-1980, a special collection of rare and unheard music from the private collection of a legendary figure of 20th century art and music.
Earl McGrath was the ultimate ’70s jet setter, an art collector and comic bon vivant, who stumbled into the record business and discovered Daryl Hall and John Oates, and later Jim Carroll, while holding court at his legendary salons in Los Angeles and New York. Atlantic founder Ahmet Ertegun gave Earl his own label, Clean Records, in 1970; Mick Jagger hired him to run Rolling Stones Records in 1977. “Earl was a wonderful man,” says Jagger, “and such an amusing companion, too.”
Friend to Joan Didion, Andy Warhol, Annie Leibovitz, and a galaxy of luminaries, Earl was an inveterate tastemaker. Actor Harrison Ford, who before Star Wars fame was Earl’s handyman and pot dealer, called him “the last of a breed, one of the last great gentlemen and bohemians.”
After Earl passed in 2016, journalist Joe Hagan, author of the critically-acclaimed Sticky Fingers, the biography of Rolling Stone founder Jann Wenner, discovered a trove of reel-to-reel tapes in Earl’s apartment in New York—literally inside his closet. “I asked for a step ladder and the first box I pulled off the shelf was a master tape of Some Girls, the Stones album,” says Hagan.
Hagan spent more than a year sifting through the hundreds of tapes to curate an album filled with treasures he unearthed, 22 songs in all, including tracks by Daryl Hall and John Oates, David Johansen of the New York Dolls, Terry Allen, Delbert McClinton, Warhol’s “Superstar” Ultra Violet, GRAMMY®-nominated songwriter Tom Snow’s country-rock group Country, Detroit sax legend Norma Jean Bell, Jim Carroll, and an eclectic cast of undiscovered artists who once vied for fame and glory—folk, rock, country, funk, and R&B gems that virtually no one has heard in decades. Whether it’s the almost-famous power pop of Shadow from Detroit, or the Delfonics-style soul of the Blood Brothers Six, Earl’s Closet retraces the dreams of artists who once sent demos to Earl McGrath.
At once an archival mixtape, a secret history, and a journey into the heart of an era, Earl’s Closet features a comprehensive booklet (LP: 20-pages/CD: 40-pages) featuring unseen documents, images, and ephemera from Earl’s archive, expansive liner notes by Hagan, who tracked down and interviewed the artists, and astonishing photographs by Earl’s late wife, the Italian countess Camilla Pecci-Blunt McGrath. The double LP edition is pressed on 180-gram vinyl, housed in a gatefold jacket, and available on red opaque wax (limited “LITA Anniversary” edition available exclusively on label’s site), clear wax (“Cocktail Party” edition available at select retailers), and classic black wax (standard edition).
Available for pre-order today (5/26) and due out July 15th in 2xLP, CD, and digital formats, Earl’s Closet was co-produced by Hagan and Pat Thomas, features newly-remastered audio by GRAMMY®-nominated engineer John Baldwin, with design by Darryl Norsen. Plus, LITA is releasing three singles including: “Dry In The Sun” by Daryl Hall and John Oates (out today on all digital platforms), "Just Look-ah What You'll Be Missing" by Norma Jean Bell (due out June 9th), and "Tension" by Jim Carroll Band (due out July 7th). Click here to pre-order the album and stream/download the first single.
In celebration of the release, LITA premiered a short film today, directed by critically-acclaimed filmmaker Brendan Toller (Danny Says), documenting the album’s incredible origin story. Click here to watch.
Tracklist:
Side One
1. Delbert & Glen – Two More Bottles of Wine
2. Daryl Hall and John Oates – Baby Come Closer
3. Terry Allen – Gonna California
4. Kazoo Singers – Only Yourself to Lose
5. Michael McCarty – Christopher
6. Jim Hurt – Dixie Darling
Side Two
1. Mark Rodney – California
2. Country (Fondiler & Snow) – Killer
3. Daryl Hall and John Oates – Dry in the Sun
4. Shadow – Oh La La
5. Terry Allen – Cocaine Cowboy
6. Ultra Violet – How Do You Do (Children of the Most High)
Side Three
1. Johnny Angel (Johnny Angelino) – Invisible Lady
2. Shadow – I See My Days Go By
3. Blood Brothers Six – Where Have All the Flowers Gone?
4. Len and Betsy Greene – Salt Showers
5. Paul Potash – Holy Commotion
Side Four
1. Jabor – Sail Away
2. David Johansen – Funky But Chic
3. Norma Jean Bell – Just Look-ah What You’ll Be Missing
4. The Jim Carroll Band – Tension
5. Little Whisper and the Rumors – Waiting for Me
About Joe Hagan:
Joe Hagan is a special correspondent for Vanity Fair, who has also written for The New York, Rolling Stone, Wall Street Journal, and many more. His work includes long-form profiles and investigative exposés of some of the most significant figures and subjects of our time, including Beto O’Rourke, Stephen Colbert, Hillary Clinton (her first post–Secretary of State interview), Liz Cheney, Henry Kissinger, Karl Rove, Dan Rather, Goldman Sachs, and Twitter. In 2010, Hagan discovered the diaries of singer Nina Simone and wrote about them for The Believer magazine. For more info, visit JoeHagan.net.
About Light in the Attic:
Since rising to worldwide prominence off the grassroots success with reclusive singer-songwriter Rodriguez, whose unlikely story of personal triumph received long-overdue worldwide acclaim in the 2012 Academy Award®–winning documentary Searching for Sugar Man, Light in the Attic (LITA) has gone onto earn GRAMMY®–nominations for Native North America (Vol. 1) in 2015, Kankyō Ongaku: Japanese Ambient, Environmental & New Age Music 1980-1990 in 2020, and Creation Never Sleeps, Creation Never Dies: The Willie Dunn Anthology in 2021.
Their exuberance and dedication to spreading joy through music has propelled LITA through the release of 200+ titles worldwide (from Nancy Sinatra to Donnie & Joe Emerson, Betty Davis to Haruomi Hosono, Karen Dalton to Serge Gainsbourg, and so many more), setting the pace for reissue labels and the archival process.
LITA is co-owned and operated by high school friends Matt Sullivan and Josh Wright. In addition to the label’s acclaimed output, the company also distributes for a 100+ record labels. In 2010, LITA expanded from their native Seattle, opening offices in Los Angeles, which includes a successful music house focused on licensing for film, television, and advertisements, along with music supervision. LITA also operates a thriving brick-and-mortar record store, Light in the Attic Record Shop, located in Seattle at KEXP’s Gathering Space. In 2021, the label celebrated its 20th anniversary. For more info, visit LightInTheAttic.net and follow on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Spotify, Apple Music, and TikTok.
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