The Sky Is Crying

Comprised of ten previously unreleased studio performances from Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble cut between late 1984 and early 1989, The Sky is Crying serves as the legendary guitarist's unofficial "fifth" album as well as an homage to extraordinary musician's exceptional abilities as a musician, songwriter, and interpreter. It also contains the tremendously moving "Life By the Drop," the first-ever recorded take of Vaughan playing acoustic guitar. Few, if any, posthumous collections are more complete, satisfying, and revealing as this 1990 set.

With the set never before remastered in any form, we have taken the honors seriously, remastering from the original master tapes and presenting these life-affirming songs in jaw-dropping fidelity on hybrid SACD. At times, it feels as if you are sitting in the studio control room with the band just a few feet away, as nearly every selection here was recorded live with minimal overdubs. The degree of presence, immediacy, and detail is on par with the best-sounding blues albums – on LP or CD – in existence.

When Vaughan was killed in a helicopter crash in August 1990, his brother, Jimmie, set to work on finding finished material that his younger sibling left in the vaults. To his surprise, there weren't many completed leftovers – save for the tracks on this set, which lent to the opinion that, in some way, Vaughan intended The Sky is Crying to be an actual record. Nearly every song here had long found its way into the group's live sets, including the supremely soulful title track, bathed in Reese Wynan's warm organ accompaniment. It would be a standou