George Baer Wallace and the late JD Martignon founded High Moon Records in 2010, with the purpose of a record label as an exclusive outlet for the music they loved most.
George and JD had a long and expanding wish list of titles that needed to be properly illuminated. Always at the top of that list was Arthur Lee and Love’s unreleased masterpiece from 1973, Black Beauty. Although it had existed as poorly sourced bootlegs for years, High Moon Records’ mission was to finally give the lost record the proper distribution in December 2012 it deserved.
Black Beauty, the never-before-released outing by Arthur Lee's band Love is available as a TrueSound Audiophile CD packaged in a hardbound eco-book and as a 180 gram LP packaged in a tip-on sleeve. The deluxe CD comes with a 64-page photo-filled booklet.
Both formats come with bonus tracks featuring live performances, two unreleased Lee studio cuts and an unearthed Arthur Lee interview from 1974. Recorded in 1973 for the ambitious new label Buffalo Records, the album remained unreleased when the company folded.
Finally, after 39 years, High Moon delivered Arthur’s wish that Black Beauty be heard by music fans worldwide. Black Beauty made it's first-ever official release in any configuration, anywhere!
With its potent eclectic collection of songs, the album gives Love fans a rare glimpse into a previously-undocumented phase of Lee's career, while new ears get to discover the unique genius that is the music of Arthur Lee and Love. The marvelous liner notes are written by esteemed journalist and author Ben Edmonds.
“Black Beauty is as eclectic and eccentric as any of Love’s best.” – Mojo magazine.
“There are a handful of musicians I actively collect and want to support their work,” George Wallace explained to me in a 2024 High Moon-centric interview.
“Skip Spence, Alex Chilton, Townes Van Zandt, Moby Grape, Ace of Cups, Gram Parsons, Love, The Flying Burrito Brothers, The Byrds and their various permutations. No one sounds like any of those bands.
“I also sort of realized there is no other country like America, where guys who liked bluegrass, jug band, jazz and pop music could bring us the Grateful Dead and The Sons of Adam. I think the bohemian elements of both San Francisco and Los Angeles informed these rock bands.”
After spending considerable time exploring the High Moon catalogue, it was now really important to do a deep dive of their terrific retail endeavors and learn about the passion and efforts behind these albums that should be additions to your record collection.
George Wallace and his High Moon team have done a wonderful job giving us sonic gems often forgotten, neglected and underserved when initially issued on LP.
Out in late January 2025 is the Jeannie Piersol anthology The Nest, available on CD, LP and Digital formats. For fans of Jefferson Airplane, The Great!! Society!!, and Rotary Connection, The Nest is more than a curiosity—it’s a revelation. Piersol’s voice and vision finally step out of the shadows, offering a fresh perspective on the golden age of psychedelic rock.
The Nest is the first-ever anthology from the long-lost 1960’s San Francisco psychedelic siren Piersol.
The 12-track collection is accompanied by an extensively illustrated 20-page booklet with a 7500-word essay from compilation producer Alec Palao (featuring exclusive interviews with Piersol and many of her musical collaborators), plus lavish artwork, never-before-seen photos, memorabilia, and more.
The Nest gathers her Chess Cadet Concept label singles alongside outtakes, demos, and live recordings from San Francisco’s Matrix nightclub, capturing the raw energy of Piersol’s bands in their prime.
In 2025, Shindig! magazine hailed Piersol’s artifact as “sizzling soul-rock and exotic psychedelia…beautifully packaged and exhaustively annotated.”
High Moon in 2023 and 2024 also reminded us about singer/songwriter Laurie Styvers.
Let Me Comfort You: The Hush Rarities follows High Moon’s 2023 release of Gemini Girl: The Complete Hush Recordings, the first-ever comprehensive anthology of Styvers’ body of work, including her two deeply moving solo albums, Spilt Milk (1971) and The Colorado Kid (1973).
Akin to a lost third album, the new collection gathers 11 alternate takes, demos, and previously unissued songs from the original album sessions, further displaying the enigmatic Texas singer-songwriter’s honey-voiced intimacy and intangible magic, its lovelorn presents like 'Let Me Comfort You' and 'Crazy Rainy Spring' equal of anything on either now-rightfully acclaimed albums with Hush Productions, founded by noted producers Shel Talmy (The Kinks, The Who, Small Faces) and Hugh Murphy (Gerry Rafferty).
Styvers recorded a small number of tracks in addition to Spilt Milk and The Colorado Kid. Drawn from the original session reels, Let Me Comfort You: The Hush Rarities compiles those completed masters that remained in the can, along with a smattering of alternate versions and early demos, all appearing on vinyl for the first time.
Pitchfork applauded Styvers’ heretofore obscure music as “a piano-driven wonderland that invoked the buoyant pop side of Laurel Canyon vogue to frame a complicated internal portrait.”
Gene Clark served as The Byrds chief songwriter in the mid-sixties, penning some of their most essential songs, including “Feel a Whole Lot Better,” “Eight Miles High” and “You Showed Me.” Two Sides To Every Story, the criminally long out-of-print solo album from founding Byrds member, Clark, finally returns to vinyl. 35 years after its initial 1977 release on RSO.
High Moon Records re-mastered, 180-gram audiophile vinyl LP is presented in rich and crisp audio fidelity on this beautifully-crafted Gene Clark classic.
The album was produced by Thomas Jefferson Kaye. Singer Emmylou Harris, banjo-virtuoso Douglas Dillard (The Byrds, Dillard & Clark), Country violin legend Byron Berline, guitarist Jeff “Skunk” Baxter (Doobie Brothers, Steely Dan, Joni Mitchell), and pedal-steel ace Al Perkins (Flying Burrito Brothers, Bob Dylan, Rolling Stones) contribute to Clark’s album.
In 2023, record collectors, author Jan Henderson and myself were thrilled by the High Moon edition of The Sons of Adam’s Saturday’s Sons: The Complete Recordings 1964-1966, the first-ever comprehensive anthology of the fabled 1960s L.A. band.
All formats – including a gatefold 2 LP set, CD, or digital download –feature remastered recordings, along with deluxe packaging, extensive liner notes, lavish artwork, never-before-seen photos, and more.
Steve Stanley is the founder of Now Sounds, a reissue label distributed by Cherry Red Records. In addition to his work with Now Sounds, and High Moon Records, Steve is a graphic designer who has art directed and/or designed releases for Rhino Records, Sony, Warner Bros., ABKCO, and many other labels.
In 2019 he assembled High Moon’s absorbing compilation, Curt Boettcher & Friends: Looking For The Sun. It houses a remarkable liner note essay from Dawn Eden Goldstein, who last century first chronicled and spearheaded the awareness of Boettcher’s legacy.
Shindig! magazine hailed the various artist collection as “the best of 2019.”
Best known for his groundbreaking hit productions for The Association (“Cherish,” “Along Comes Mary”), Boettcher formed the pioneering rock bands The Ballroom and The Millennium, and add heavily to classic pop-psych album Sagittarius created and crafted by producer Gary Usher (Beach Boys, Byrds). Boettcher was innovative in utilizing the studio as an instrument—an approach that made a lasting impression on a young Brian Wilson.
Looking For The Sun is the first release to focus on Boettcher as a producer and arranger rather than a performer, highlighting cuts that were released only as singles. Most of the tracks have remained out of print since their initial release. Collected here are 21 tracks (18 on LP)—all sourced from the original master tapes—which Boettcher wrote, produced, arranged, or sang on.
Artists include: Cindy Malone, Sandy Salisbury, Gordon Alexander, Keith Colley, Summer’s Children, Jonathan Moore, Ray Whitley, Eddie Hodges, The Bootiques, Action Unlimited, and Sagittarius. The musical contributions of Glen Campbell, David Gates, Gary Usher and Keith Olsen are also showcased.
The 36-page booklet that accompanies the release, beautifully designed by Stanley, features fascinating and deeply researched notes on each of the songs, rarely-seen archival photos, that match the words penned by Boettcher scholar Dawn Eden Goldstein.
“I am very attached to Curt’s legacy,” enthused Goldstein in a 2025 interview. “There is a need to educate people and teach the present generation beyond what they read on the internet. Steve had actually tracked down the artists himself. And so, it was the most pleasant collaboration.
“The whole design of the booklet was done in such a way that the designers knew how to let the visuals compliment the text, and everything is beautifully integrated. It’s the closest thing that I’ve come to my original dream of writing Curt’s biography.”
In her extensive and inspiring scripture, Goldstein illustrated the excursions producer Boettcher forged, and underscored his participation in his profound work with the Association, The Millennium, The Ballroom, and Sagittarius.
High Moon in 2018 released the self-titled debut studio album by The Ace of Cups, the pioneering all-female rock band from the 1960s San Francisco scene.
A High Moon press announcement mentions, “The Ace of Cups may not have been the first all-women rock and roll band, but they were the one that mattered within that bizarre wrinkle in time that constituted late 1960s San Francisco. Yet despite the avowed interest of the industry and obvious hometown support, the original Ace of Cups never got to make a record. Until now…
“High Moon Records is honored to present the first studio record by the mesmerizing Ace of Cups. Produced by Dan Shea (Santana, Jennifer Lopez, Mariah Carey), and recorded at Marin’s Laughing Tiger Studios, the record’s twenty-one tracks span fifty years of masterful songwriting, that sound as timeless as they do cathartic.
“Special guests include legendary players (and longtime Ace of Cups friends) Jorma Kaukonen, Jack Casady, and Charlie Musselwhite as well as lead vocal turns by Bob Weir on ‘The Well,’ Taj Mahal on ‘Life In Your Hands,’ Peter Coyote on ‘As The Rain,’ and Buffy Sainte-Marie on ‘Pepper In The Pot.’”
“I have a serious soft spot for the small, independent re-issue label,” writer and author Daniel Weizmann emphasized in a 2025 phone conversation.
“These are the heroes and heroines I tried to immortalize in Cinnamon Girl, my second mystery…often working with old acetates and faded tapes, with aging Letraset cover art on art boards with printer's instructions and mucilage smears. These people are more than historians, more than nostalgia nuts. They connect the dots for us and bond us to the legacy. They're keepers of the flame.”
“We’re all constantly searching for new sounds or sounds from the past that truly deserve to be heard,” underlined George Wallace.
“Almost an elusive journey that can yield results we never planned on. Especially when you are running a label and searching for recordings that need to be discovered and heard.
“It’s a real pleasure to receive wonderful comments from fans and collectors. Some fans in England raved about Arthur Lee’s Black Beauty, others tout the Ace of Cups album, while some are just happy to hear more music from Gene Clark.”
In 2025, we can look forward to High Moon titles, including the deluxe reissue of the Bob Crewe-produced Lotti Golden Motor-Cycle 1969 debut album on Atlantic Records.
High Moon Records has also scheduled for 2025 an unprecedented upcoming collection of Arthur Lee and Love recordings called Just To Remind You. Recorded during the last fifteen years of his life, and sourced from Arthur’s trove of tapes, most of these songs are being heard here for the first time ever.
The album will be comprised of the songs Arthur asked his wife Diane Lee to release after his death. Having been hospitalized for several months, Arthur realized he was losing his fight with Leukemia, and asked Diane to oversee the release of a final record of his unreleased songs. Although many of the tracks were in various stages of completion, Arthur left some specific musical notes to execute his sonic vision.
I’ll have additional news and details in 2025 about High Moon audio delights.
Harvey Kubernik is the author of 20 books, including 2009’s Canyon Of Dreams: The Magic And The Music Of Laurel Canyon, 2014’s Turn Up The Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll In Los Angeles 1956-1972, 2015's Every Body Knows: Leonard Cohen, 2016's Heart of Gold Neil Young and 2017's 1967: A Complete Rock Music History of the Summer of Love.
Sterling/Barnes and Noble in 2018 published Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik’s The Story Of The Band: From Big Pink To The Last Waltz. In 2021 the duo wrote Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child for Sterling/Barnes and Noble.
Otherworld Cottage Industries in 2020 published Harvey’s Docs That Rock, Music That Matters. His book Screen Gems: (Pop Music Documentaries and Rock ‘n’ Roll Television Moments) is scheduled for 2025 publication.
Harvey wrote the liner notes to CD re-releases of Carole King’s Tapestry, The Essential Carole King, Allen Ginsberg’s Kaddish, Elvis Presley The ’68 Comeback Special, The Ramones’ End of the Century and Big Brother & the Holding Company Captured Live at The Monterey International Pop Festival.
During 2006 Harvey spoke at the special hearings by The Library of Congress held in Hollywood, California, discussing archiving practices and audiotape preservation. In 2017 Kubernik appeared at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio, in their Distinguished Speakers Series.
