So Real: Songs From Jeff Buckley, Instant Hit Across Europe and Australia

So Real: Songs From Jeff Buckley, Instant Hit Across Europe and Australia

#1 IN IRELAND, AND TOP 10 AT iTUNES ACROSS EUROPE; 'HALLELUJAH' ENTERS AS TOP 20 SINGLE DOWNLOAD WHILE VIDEO HITS TOP 5

NEW YORK, June 6 /PRNewswire/ --
IRELAND
So Real -- #1 album in the Irish chart
So Real -- #1 album at iTunes Ireland
"Hallelujah (new single) is the highest new entry in physical/digital
singles chart at #19
"Hallelujah" is the highest new entry in the download chart at #9
"Hallelujah" (new video) is the #3 video at iTunes Ireland

UK
So Real -- #16 album first week in the chart
"Hallelujah" -- #60 singles chart
Live In Chicago -- re-enters DVD chart at #6

AUSTRALIA
So Real -- #26 in the album chart
So Real -- #3 on the iTunes album chart
"Hallelujah" video is #4 on the video chart
"Hallelujah" single enters the digital singles chart at #37
Live In Chicago -- #28 on DVD charts

(Logo:

http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20060130/LEGACYLOGO )

Since its release on Columbia/Legacy in May 2007, the 14-song collection So Real: Songs From Jeff Buckley has captured the imagination of fans new and old around the world -- especially across Europe and Australia -- with impressive early sales on retail store charts, as well as iTunes album and video download charts. Topping the list is Ireland, where So Real checks in as the #1 album on the Irish national chart, and #1 on iTunes Ireland.

Across the Continent, the album is #5 on the iTunes chart in the Netherlands (and #52 on the national chart), #7 on iTunes in Italy, #10 on iTunes in Denmark (and #28 on the national chart), and #16 on the UK national chart. Overall, So Real has been a Top 10 seller for two weeks now at iTunes pan-Europe. In Australia, the album is #3 on the iTunes chart and #26 on the national chart.

From Buckley's debut album Grace, released in the summer 1994, comes his version of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" -- "ode to the holy," as described in Rolling Stone senior editor David Fricke's liner notes to So Real. The track has been issued as a single in selected markets, and comes in as the highest new entry on Ireland's download chart at #9, and highest new entry on the physical/digital singles chart at #19. The song is #20 on the download chart in Denmark, #60 on the UK national singles chart, and entered Australia's digital singles chart at #37.

(In addition, the video created for "Hallelujah" is charted #3 at iTunes Ireland, and #4 on Australia's video chart. The long-form concert DVD, Live In Chicago, recorded at the Metro in May 1995, and issued worldwide on Columbia Music Video in 2000, has re-entered the UK's national DVD chart at #6, and Australia's DVD chart at #28.)

So Real was issued one week prior to the tenth anniversary of Buckley's tragic and untimely death on May 29, 1997 (at age 30), in a swimming mishap at the Wolf River Marina in Memphis. The collection underscores one of rock's hardest lessons -- that the impact of an artist's career is often not measured by the time he spends among us, but rather by the intensity with which his music reverberates after he is gone. Now, a multitude of fans are exploring Buckley's work on the first official anthology of his years at Columbia Records, starting in 1993.

Jeff Buckley yielded one original studio album on Columbia Records during his lifetime, Grace, released in the summer 1994. It made its way onto many a fan and critic's list as one of the most important recordings of the '90s.

So Real, which includes two previously unreleased live performances, will be "the closest Jeff Buckley -- singer, songwriter, guitarist, seeker -- ever comes to having his own greatest-hits record," as David Fricke points out.

Of primary interest to fans, collectors and completists are the two live tracks making their album debuts here. "So Real," originally the centerpiece of Grace, is heard in an acoustic version recorded in Japan -- "acoustic as far as the guitars go and electric in every other way," as Fricke comments. It was previously available only on a promotional single.

The other rarity closes the album, a live version of Buckley and his band "space walking with elegance through the harrowing resignation of 'I Know It's Over'," as Fricke introduces this cover of a song from the Smiths' 1986 album, The Queen is Dead. The scene was a live session at Sony Studios in New York intended for broadcast on WNEW-FM on April 6, 1995. But the session was edited and the song was not included on the radio broadcast.

In addition to the liner notes written by David Fricke, So Real's package booklet also features previously unseen photographs and tributes from friends, fellow artists, and band members. Among the latter are bassist Mick Grondahl, drummer Matt Johnson, and drummer Parker Kindred, who writes, "Jeff was an old soul. His standard for life, love and expression was inspired and inspirational to all who knew him and hear his music. He truly was a messenger."

Web site:

http://www.legacyrecordings.com/

Photo: NewsCom:

http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20060130/LEGACYLOGO
PRN Photo Desk, photodesk@prnewswire.com
Source: Legacy Recordings

CONTACT: Randy Haecker at Sony Bmg Music Entertainment, +1-212-833-4101,
Randy.Haecker@sonybmg.com

Web site:

http://www.legacyrecordings.com/

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