After signing to Capitol, the band recorded 1981's Completion Backwards Principle, an album based on an actual sales training instruction manual; both "Talk to You Later" and "Don't Want to Wait Anymore" earned significant radio play, and the LP became the Tubes' first Top 40 hit. Thanks to its provocative video, the single "She's a Beauty" reached the Top Ten, and pushed the 1983 LP Outside/Inside into the Top 20 Albums chart. After 1985's Love Bomb stiffed, however, the Tubes disbanded, and Welnick later joined the Grateful Dead (long suffering from depression, he committed suicide in June 2006). In 1993, the Tubes reunited; consisting of Waybill, Steen, Anderson, Prince, and new keyboardist Gary Cambra, they toured the U.S. and Europe before releasing a new LP, Genius of America, in 1996. Spooner also issued his own solo record, Mall to Mars. In 2000, the Tubes embarked on another extensive tour, issuing the live greatest-hits album Tubes World Tour to commemorate the event. The band appeared at London's Shepherd's Bush Empire in December 2004, and the show was documented on the CD Wild in London, released the following year. Bassist Rick Anderson died on December 16, 2022, at the age of 75.

Counting Crows' first full-length album in more than a decade feels like a bit of a cheat—nearly half of the songs were released on the 2021 EP Butter Miracle: Suite One. But "Spaceman in Tulsa" proves the band still has the chutzpah and pop chops that made them inescapable in the '90s. Just glam enough, and boasting an insidiously catchy chorus, it's cocksure with revved-up guitar and piano and frontman Adam Duritz's most rock 'n' roll growl. In many ways, it feels like a book-end to "Mr. Jones," the band's debut single that shot Counting Crows into the culture (and made them, right away, a love-or-hate band for most). In that 1992 song, Duritz came on like a big dreamer—a guy who wanted to be a "lion" and Bob Dylan: "We all wanna be big stars/ But we don't know why and we don't know how.

Sacred Steel is a trademark in the metal scene: all Metal with attitude, never everybody’s darling - and damn proud of it! For more than 25 years, they have offered the metalhead a deadly trend-free alternative to bloated trigger drums, cheesy keyboards and boring cliché sounds that are hyped year after year as "the next big thing in metal". "Ritual Supremacy" marks their 10th album, a refreshing true metal masterpiece full of hymns and headbangers.

"Songs For Evolution" the only album recorded by the group Anglo-Saxon Brown, considered a much sought-after collectable LP among rare groove music buyers and DJs alike. An expanded edition with one bonus track (the lone 1976 single, "Straighten It Out" released by Atlantic), "Songs For Evolution" was produced & mostly written by the Philadelphia team of Joseph Jefferson & Charles Simmons, who had penned a number of classic ‘70s hits for the Spinners including "Games People Play," "Mighty Love" and "Love Don’t Love Nobody") and recorded at famed Sigma Sound studios in Philly with string arrangements by Jack Faith, featuring the Don Renaldo Strings along with guitarist Bobby Eli. An accomplished ten member band based in Richmond, Virginia.

The Tubes were arch satirists of popular culture whose outrageous performance art concepts – which swung wildly from softcore pornography to suit-and-tie conservatism – frequently eclipsed their elusive musical identity. The beginnings of the group originated in Phoenix, Arizona, in the late '60s, where guitarist Bill Spooner, keyboardist Vince Welnick, and bassist Rick Anderson formed as the Beans (alternately billing themselves as the Radar Men from Uranus). After moving to San Francisco in 1972, the Beans recruited guitarist Roger Steen and drummer Prairie Prince (from Red, White & Blues), and later became the Tubes with the addition of Michael Cotten on keyboards and former roadie Fee Waybill on lead vocals.

Following four successful recordings released on the Ricercar, Alpha and Arcana labels, Rome-based Andrea De Carlo and his Ensemble Mare Nostrum continue their exploration of the Roman repertoire and inaugurate here a new series of recordings, with its own distinctive artwork, devoted to the vast and multifaceted musical heritage of the Eternal City.

The Swedish Ensemble Villancico under its conductor Peter Pontvik guide us through the world of Latin American baroque music. This music is a merging of cultures and traditions - Indian, Spanish, and African. The Ensemble Villancico is currently regarded worldwide as one of the most important interpreters of early music from Latin America, uniting Nordic voices and the spirit of Latin American baroque music.

Listeners used to the Hanover Band will need no prompting to buy this excellent series of performances, excellently recorded. They avoid some of the more quirky and, to some, off-putting aspects of period performance. There are no ugly bulges of tone and wirey shafts of under-nourished violin tone. The wind and brass play bang in tune and the instruments are fully under the control of these top players.

Absolute glorious collection of Mellow Soul, Jazz & Funk tunes. Well put together compilation CD from Sony music Japan, features George Duke, Mtume, Webster Lewis, Pattie Labelle, & Alphonso Johnson. Essential collection for any soul music fan.

After 2010's relatively somber One Life Stand, Hot Chip's members resurfaced in side projects including the About Group, the 2 Bears, and New Build, all of which took different approaches to electro-pop but shared an almost tangible joy in music-making. It sure feels like some of that happiness rubbed off on In Our Heads, one of Hot Chip's most confident, joyous, and danceable albums yet; if the band's previous album was about how seriously they take the relationships in their lives, then this album explores how much fun they have in them.

From the provocative opening track, "She Loves To Be In Love" (which the listener immediatley associates with the cover girl of the album), to the hilarious "Watching T.V." (wittily namechecking many a 1970's t.v. show) this album neatly encapsulates the oh so slightly off kilter and musically mannered sensibilities of this engaging band. Charlie mainstay, Terry Thomas, has a somewhat nasal vocal delivery which is instantly recognizable and brings an idiosyncratic edge to the laid back 70's vibe of the downbeat "L.A. Dreamer" and the impossibly catchy "Life So Cruel." Terry Thomas has a sharp sense of humor and fun and it works well on stuff like the already mentioned "Watching T.V." Equally though, he brings a somewhat obscure sense of class, for lack of a better word, to the proceedings on stylish excursions like "No More Heartache" and "No Strangers In Paradise"…

War Ina Babylon is the 1976 album by Max Romeo & The Upsetters. It was produced by Lee "Scratch" Perry, whose band backed up Romeo for this recording. This is the 2004 Limited Edition, Numbered, Reissue, Remastered, Digipak Edition.

Juanita Hall is best-known for being a stage actress, playing Bloody Mary in South Pacific. However on this 1958 set for Counterpoint she shows that she could effectively sing blues. Mostly sticking to songs from the Bessie Smith songbook (including "You've Been a Good Old Wagon," "Gimme a Pigfoot" and "Nobody Wants You When You're Down and Out"), Hall's extroverted and shouting style fit the music quite well. Pianist Claude Hopkins arranged for the sextet and gathered quite an all-star backup group that includes tenor-saxophonist Coleman Hawkins, clarinetist Buster Bailey and trumpeter Doc Cheatham. Well worth getting.

In fact this is the most complete and most symphonic album by Dutch band Finch from the Hague. Unfortunately there had been this dramatic turn of the tide in which Punk rock flushed away all good music without having been carefully listened to. This appeared to be fatal for a quality band like Finch and "The Galleons Of Passion" sadly sunk away in an ocean of musical oblivion. True progfans however should certainly check out this album, because it shows Finch at their best.

A great issue of some of Billie Holiday's classic sides for the Commodore label - a company she didn't work with often, but home to some of her best material of the early years! The tracks here were mostly recorded in 1944, but the set also features some early bits from 1939 as well - and backing on all numbers is by small combos, with players who include Eddie Heywood on piano, Frankie Newton or Doc Cheatham on trumpet, Tab Smith or Lem Davis on alto, Teddy Walters on guitar, and Kenneth Hollon on tenor sax. Titles include Holiday's seminal "Strange Fruit" - a track that's stunning both for its handling of racial subject matter, and for the fact that it's one of the few penned by Billie herself!