Contains songs from the first three Burritos albums, plus several unreleased tracks.
The greatest selling point on this "Best Of" collection is the incredible job the producer did in cleaning up and freshening the sound quality. One of the biggest problems with the original Burrito's releases was the often muddled and muffled sound and overbearing bass lines. The songs and the writing were always better than the quality of the studio versions. Not so here! I don't know how they did it, but every song here sounds better than the original version….clear, fresh, crisp treble tones are audible for the first time and the stereo separation seems more distinctive as well. They also did an outstanding and inclusive job in selecting the songs. Gram Parsons, Chris Hillman, and Flying Burrito fans should run, not walk, to add this to their collections!

The box comprises all (live) recordings made by Martha Argerich at the Lugano Festival, from 2002 to the last edition in 2016, and released by EMI Classics and Warner Classics. An impressive collection of 22CDs without equivalent. ü It includes a variety of genres: some solo piano music, lots of music for piano duo and among them many arrangements, chamber works and concertos. ü The composers span the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries, with Schumann, Mozart, Ravel, Beethoven, Rachmaninov, Brahms and Shostakovich being the most frequently performed. Among the artists appearing with Argerich on these recordings are: Stephen Kovacevich, Renaud Capuçon, Gautier Capuçon, Lilya Zilberstein, Mischa Maisky, Lyda Chen, Alexander Mogilevsky, Gabriela Montero, Yefim Bronfman, Maxim Vengerov, Gidon Kremer, Maria Joao Pires, Mauricio Vallina, Mikhail Pletnev, Alexander Vedernikov…

If you want a good idea of why Luca Marenzio (1553-99) was considered madrigalist during the late-16th century, the music and performances on this fine recording will provide a good starting place. The richly colorful vocal writing–and equally colorful texts!–are ideally illustrated by the tightly focused intonation, reedy timbre, and knowing inflections of the Concerto Italiano’s seven singers. Sampling from Marenzio’s five- and six-part madrigals, the ensemble avoids any temptation to over-state the music’s case with exaggerated accents or heavy-handed phrasing and dynamics (a common fault of less-competent groups). Instead, they trust the composer’s keen sense of text-setting and allow expressive effects to arise naturally from the score.

"Sky's the Limit" is the 14th studio album by The Temptations for the Gordy (Motown) label released in 1971. The album includes the #1 hit "Just My Imagination (Running Away with Me)", the Top 40 hit "Ungena Za Ulimwengu (Unite the World)", and the original version of "Smiling Faces Sometimes", later a Top 5 hit for The Undisputed Truth. In addition, "Sky's the Limit" features the final Temptations recordings for founding member Eddie Kendricks, the main lead vocalist on "Just My Imagination". During the recording of the album, Kendricks departed the group for a solo career. His best friend Paul Williams would soon follow him out of the group due mainly to health issues.

Thorns is the third solo album by English former Black Sabbath vocalist Tony Martin. It was released on 14 January 2022, 17 years after Martin's previous solo album Scream, released in 2005. This record features drummer Danny Needham from Venom, former HammerFall bass player Magnus Rosén, guitarist Scott McClellan, who helped co-write the album, bass player Greg Smith, and Pamela Moore sharing vocals with Martin on the title track. Tony Martin is an English heavy metal vocalist best known for his time fronting Black Sabbath, initially from 1987 to 1991 and again from 1993 to 1996. Martin was the band’s second longest serving vocalist after Ozzy Osbourne. Black Sabbath's «Eternal Idol» and «Headless Cross» are among the best known albums featuring Tony Martin.

For his latest album, Ólafsson presents some of his favourite Mozart keyboard works in the company of pieces by a selection of the composer’s leading contemporaries. Juxtaposing works by Mozart, Haydn and C.P.E. Bach with rarely-recorded Galuppi and Cimarosa, Mozart & Contemporaries dispels the image of Mozart as the angelic and prodigious idiot savant, instead presenting a mature composer through music primarily dating from the 1780s: a resourceful, hard-working adult who had come to know adversity. All is artfully brought together by Ólafsson’s signature thought-provoking programming.

A t this stage, the "show" was relegated to a continental cult of listeners whose musical tastes belonged to a bygone era. And it was for them that BJH continued to release fresh works every year or so, covering familiar ground while availing themselves of what new bells and whistles they could lay their hands on. "Welcome To The Show" sounds modern by BARCLAY's outmoded standards, suggesting any number of artists whose prog sensibilities had long since succumbed to the allure of well-crafted albeit timid pop music (e.g., Mike + The Mechanics)…

"Wrap Around Joy" is the 6th album by American singer and songwriter Carole King, released in 1974. The album peaked at #1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart in late 1974 and spun off successful singles with "Jazzman", reaching #2 on the Pop chart and earning Carole King a nomination for Best Pop Vocal Performance, Female in the 17th Grammy Awards (the award went to Olivia Newton-John for "I Honestly Love You"). Another song from the album, "Nightingale", reached #9 on the Pop chart and #6 on the Adult contemporary chart. The album was certified Gold by the RIAA.

Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s two Piano Concertos form a contrasting pair. Concerto No 1, written in 1927, is a vivid and witty example of his romantic spirit, exquisite melodies and rich yet transparent orchestration. Concerto No 2, composed a decade later, is a darker, more dramatic and virtuosic work. The deeply-felt and dreamlike slow movement and passionate finale are tinged with bleak moments of sombre agitation, suggestive of unfolding tragic events with the imminent introduction of the Fascist Racial Laws that led Castelnuovo-Tedesco to seek exile in the USA in 1939. The Four Dances from ‘Love’s Labour’s Lost’, part of the composer’s recurring fascination for the art of Shakespeare, are atmospheric, richly characterised and hugely enjoyable. This is their first performance and recording.

More than any other Fleetwood Mac album, Tusk is born of a particular time and place – it could only have been created in the aftermath of Rumours, which shattered sales records, which in turn gave the group a blank check for its next album. But if they were falling apart during the making of Rumours, they were officially broken and shattered during the making of Tusk, and that disconnect between bandmembers resulted in a sprawling, incoherent, and utterly brilliant 20-track double album…

More fun than any tribute album has a right to be, Stoned Immaculate is clearly a labor of love that manages to embrace the spirit of the Doors without regressing into parading a line of Jim Morrison impersonators through the studio. Much credit goes to producer Ralph Sall, who–in addition to setting up collaborations between the surviving Doors and an array of artists from John Lee Hooker to Days of the New–also breaks out the beats and samples to create a few "new" Doors tracks. While Sall is no Fatboy Slim (despite the winking nod to "Bird of Prey" during the fadeout of "Under Waterfall"), his reconstructions add texture and variety, especially when the late William Burroughs steps up to the mic. But the true highlights here are the more organic collaborations: the three remaining Doors backing Bo Diddley and Ian Astbury; an unexpectedly great "Love Me Two Times" from Aerosmith; and Stone Temple Pilots helping Kreiger and Manzarek "Break on Through" even harder on a track that threatens to transcend the original. Hell, even the weaker contributions beat out Jose Feliciano. Come to think of it, if the Doors are still auditioning Morrison replacements (Kevin Coyne and Howard Werth no longer being available), STP's Weiland, Creed's Stapp, or the Cult's Astbury all acquit themselves well enough here to warrant an offer. – Bill Forman

Stone cold classic Ethiopian cross over album. A hybrid of Ethiopian traditional music intermixed with jazz and funk.
Mind you this was recorded in a country that was going thru a major political strife when socialism had taken a stronghold of almost every aspect of Ethiopian society so Hailu had to tip toe thru very treacherous social waters in order to get his art across to his listeners. What you get is some very sincere organ(think Farfisa) based full band instrumentals featuring funky guitar licks, congas and horns. Hailu's band is tight yet slinky with a very velvet like rhythmic and textural under tone.
Afro-pop music of its time but a unique almost "alien" in form it is music drawn on Northern Africa but not in any way an emulation of what many people might perceive as African pop music. Review is drawn on a western perception of this music not something easy to do but it IS something special and worth seeking out.

"The Broadway Album" is the 24th studio album by director, composer, actress and singer Barbra Streisand, released by Columbia Records on November 4, 1985. Consisting mainly of classic show tunes, the album marked a major shift in Barbra Streisand's career. Streisand had spent ten years appearing in musicals and singing standards on her albums in the 1960s. Beginning with the album "Stoney End" in 1971 and ending with the album "Emotion" in 1984, Streisand sang mostly rock, pop, folk, and disco-oriented songs for Columbia Records. Noted Broadway composer Stephen Sondheim personally penned additional lyrics for the songs "Putting It Together" and "Send in the Clowns" on request of the singer. The album, originally released on the Columbia label and subsequently re-released by Columbia and Sony Records, was a critical and commercial success. First certified Gold by the RIAA on January 13, 1986, it reached four times Platinum on January 31, 1995.

Porcupine Tree were an English progressive rock band formed by musician Steven Wilson in 1987. The band began essentially as a solo project for Wilson, who created all of the band's music. By late 1993, however, he wanted to work in a band environment, bringing on frequent collaborators Richard Barbieri as keyboardist, Colin Edwin as bassist, and Chris Maitland as drummer to form the first permanent lineup…

"Light Up the Night" is the 4th album by the Los Angeles, California-based duo Brothers Johnson, released in 1980. The album topped the U.S. R&B albums chart and reached #5 on the pop albums chart. The single "Stomp!" became a dance hit, reaching #1 on both the R&B singles and disco charts and top ten on the pop singles chart. "Light Up the Night" was the final Brothers Johnson album to be produced by Quincy Jones. When Jones left A&M Records, he was contractually barred from having contact with the brothers.