Felony

The term felony, in some common law countries, means a serious crime. The word originates from English common law (from the French medieval word " félonie "), where felonies were originally crimes that involved confiscation of a convicted person's land and goods. Other crimes were called misdemeanors. Many common law countries have now abolished the felony/misdemeanor distinction and replaced it with other distinctions, such as between indictable offences and summary offences. A felony is generally considered a crime of high seriousness, while a misdemeanor is not.

A person convicted in a court of law of a felony crime is known as a felon or convict. In the United States, where the felony/misdemeanor distinction is still widely applied, the federal government defines a felony as a crime punishable by death or imprisonment in excess of one year. If punishable by exactly one year or less, it is classified as a misdemeanor. Note that the actual prison sentence handed out has no effect on this; the decision is based on the maximum sentence possible under law. For example, if a person is sentenced to six months, but the charge can be "up to two years", it counts as a felony, in spite of the actual time served being well under a year. The individual states may differ in this definition, using other categories as seriousness or context.

Felony (band)

Felony is an American new wave and rock band formed in Los Angeles, California in the early 1980s by brothers Jeffrey Spirili and Joe Spirili. The brothers were also known as Jeff Spry and Joe Spry.

History

Before Felony, Jeffrey Spry had been the singer with Detroit Proto-Punk/Hard rock legends, Ron Asheton (of Iggy & The Stooges) and Dennis "Machine Gun" Thompson (of The MC5) in a short lived super-group (based in Los Angeles) that was called "The New Order" (preceding the English new wave group of the same name). Jeff was in the band in 1975 and recorded an album with them that was released in 1977.

After a period playing shows and making music business connections in the Los Angeles scene, Felony appeared in the horror b-movie Graduation Day (1981), playing their song "Gangsters of Rock." Soon after, they signed with producers/managers Don Rubin, formerly of pop group The Ivy Three, and Artie Kornfeld. Some live shows were mixed by sound engineer Steve Sands.

Felony went into the studio and emerged with single "The Fanatic," which became a hit on Los Angeles radio station KROQ-FM with help from program director Rick Carroll. The song reached the top 50 in the singles charts and topped the alternative and dance charts. It became a key track in the development of the Modern Rock radio format. "The Fanatic" was included in the influential 1983 Valley Girl soundtrack, which also featured Modern English's "I Melt With You". Felony also performed the track on American Bandstand. A video was made from "The Fanatic" "The Fanatic" video was shot in Hollywood, California in 1983 and aired on MTV. The Fanatic video includes a cameo of Jeffrey Spry with his first wife, SAG actress, Lucrecia Sarita Russo.

Felony (disambiguation)

A felony is a type of crime.

Felony may also refer to:

See also

Exotica

Exotica is a musical genre, named after the 1957 Martin Denny album of the same title, popular during the 1950s to mid-1960s, typically with suburban Americans who came of age during World War II. The musical colloquialism exotica means tropical ersatz, the non-native, pseudo experience of insular Oceania, Southeast Asia, Hawaii, Amazonia, the Andes and tribal Africa. Denny described the musical style as "a combination of the South Pacific and the Orient...what a lot of people imagined the islands to be like...it's pure fantasy though." While the South Seas forms the core region, exotica reflects the "musical impressions" of every place from standard travel destinations to the mythical "shangri-las" dreamt of by armchair safari-ers.

History

Les Baxter's album Ritual of the Savage (Le Sacre du Sauvage) was released in 1952 and would become a cornerstone of exotica. This album featured lush orchestral arrangements along with tribal rhythms and offered such classics as "Quiet Village", "Jungle River Boat", "Love Dance", and "Stone God." Ritual is the seminal Exotica record, influencing all that came after it. As the 1950s progressed, Baxter carved out a niche in this area, producing a number of titles in this style including "Tamboo!" (1956), "Caribbean Moonlight" (1956), "Ports of Pleasure" (1957), and "The Sacred Idol" (1960). Baxter claimed Ravel and Stravinsky as influences on his work.

Exotica (disambiguation)

Exotica is a musical genre.

Exotica may also refer to:

See also

Exotica (Bananarama album)

Exotica is the eighth studio album released by the British female vocal duo Bananarama. This is Bananarama's third album as a duo, and was produced by Pascal Caubet and issued only in France in 2001 on the M6 Interactions label. The work is a combination of new compositions along with re-recordings of past Bananarama hits, including a Latin pop version of the U.S. and UK Top 10 hit, "Cruel Summer".

Two promo-only singles were released from the album: "If" (which was abandoned mostly before release) and a cover version of George Michael's "Careless Whisper". The album was not a commercial or critical success for Bananarama, but the few copies of "If" which made it to the French market have become one of the rarest items ever by the band, heavily sought after by fans and collectors.

Track listing

France CD version