White & Black Ice Vinyl. Clear Light, Dark Matter is a career retrospective that reveals the many layers of Wang Chung's music. This double vinyl set spans the band's four-decade career, featuring a carefully curated selection of their greatest hits and hidden gems. More than just a collection of tracks, the album showcases the duality that defines Wang Chung: the upbeat, infectious energy of songs like "Everybody Have Fun Tonight" and "Dance Hall Days" balanced with deeper, complex rhythms and experimental production techniques. The album title, Clear Light, Dark Matter, reflects the band's ability to bridge different musical worlds effortlessly. Tracks like "Dance Hall Days" blend African Burundi shuffle rhythms with electronic elements and rock instrumentation. At the same time, "Everybody Have Fun Tonight" intertwines a Motown-inspired chord structure with modern dance production. These songs reveal Wang Chung's penchant for blending styles such as funk, pop, rock, and even prog elements. Often within a single track, creating a rich, multilayered soundscape. With it's mix of radio hits and deeper cuts, this collection is a testament to the band's influence and innovation across multiple genres.

Similar to his first Shelter outing (Getting Ready), but with more of a rock feel. That's due as much to the material as the production. Besides covering tunes by Jimmy Rogers, Howlin' Wolf, and Elmore James, King tackles compositions by Leon Russell and, more unexpectedly, Bill Withers, Isaac Hayes-David Porter, and John Fogerty (whose "Lodi" is reworked into "Lowdown in Lodi"). King's own pen remained virtually in retirement, as he wrote only one of the album's tracks.

This release features a previously-unreleased recording of pianist Emil Gilels, captured live in an acclaimed 1964 Seattle recital. With the exception of a single work, this recital has never before been made available to the general public and is now being released for the first time. Released in time to celebrate the pianist’s 100th anniversary, the recital includes works by Beethoven, Chopin, Debussy, Prokofiev, Stravinsky and more.

The Deep Purple Singles A’s & B’s is a compilation album of singles released by the British hard rock band Deep Purple. It was released on vinyl in October 1978. An updated version of the album was issued on CD in 1993 and contains the complete collection of Deep Purple’s UK singles, recorded and released from 1968 to 1976 by the Mk I, II, III and IV line-ups of Deep Purple.

As well as being a virtuoso soloist and improviser on the piano, Beethoven was also a competent violinist – an experience he put to good use in his ten sonatas for violin and piano. Isabelle Faust and Alexander Melnikov have long cherished the project of recording them all. The immense care they have taken over documentation and performance has enabled them to get as close as possible to the composer’s intentions.

With his unusually large output, Fayrfax bridges the gap between the Eton Choirbook and Tallis. No one before him had achieved the kind of expressive power he managed in these four antiphons, which every student of English music should study as being trailblazing and quite exceptional.

Rod Stewart's sixth album was called Atlantic Crossing because the singer was literally crossing the Atlantic, making America his new home for reasons of the heart (he was fully enamored with actress Britt Ekland at the time) and the wallet (he was eager to escape Britain's restrictive tax rates). As it happens, 1975 was a perfect time for a new beginning for Stewart: the Faces were falling apart, his last LP, Smiler, wasn't roundly loved, and he had wrapped up his contract with Mercury and signed with Warner, so he completely rebooted, hiring legendary producer Tom Dowd to steer him through a slick, streamlined revamping of his signature sound.

For his first CD with La Dolce Volta, Olivier Latry has chosen a programme devoted to the music of Johann Sebastian Bach. This recording, made on the massive Cavaille-Coll organ of Notre-Dame de Paris, of which he is titular organist, raises a number of fascinating questions.

Master pianist Eric Scott Reed leads an invigorating top-shelf session, capturing the late-night vibrations of New York City on OUT LATE, featuring trumpeter Nicholas Payton, tenor saxophonist Eric Alexander, bassist Peter Washington, and drummer Joe Farnsworth

Cannonball Adderley gave up his own band in 1957 when he had the opportunity to become a sideman in Miles Davis' epic ensemble with John Coltrane, eventually resulting in some of the greatest jazz recordings of all time (including Milestones and Kind of Blue). Davis returned the favor in March of 1958, appearing as a sideman on Adderley's all-star quintet date for Blue Note, and the resulting session is indeed Somethin' Else. Both horn players are at their peak of lyrical invention, crafting gorgeous, flowing blues lines on the title tune and "One for Daddy-O," as the rhythm team (Hank Jones, Sam Jones, Art Blakey) creates a taut, focused groove (pianist Hank Jones' sly, intuitive orchestrations are studies of harmonic understatement).

Ten Takeaways From ‘Cheaper Than Cheep,’ A Frank Zappa Film Like No Other. An abandoned TV special, unearthed after 50 years, provides musical thrills while giving intimate insights into a genius at work.On June 21, 1974 Frank Zappa assembled his group The Mothers at their rehearsal hall on 5831 Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles, to record Cheaper Than Cheep, a TV special that would remain unseen for over 50 years. The early ’70s had seen a boom in rock music on mainstream TV, with shows including The Midnight Special, ABC’s In Concert and, in the UK, The Old Grey Whistle Test, giving groups an opportunity to reach large audiences. Albums had taken over from singles as the dominant format for the serious music fan and the pop shows of the day had been usurped by these relatively serious, longform showcases.

Add 3121 to the mounting pile of evidence: Prince is the black Beck. He's a whole lot sexier, no doubt, but there's more to both musicians than image. All-out weirdness for one. Edginess for another. And a fine-tuned sense of how to combine the two to create some of the decade's most vital music for a third. Prince–looking ageless in videos for the first two singles, the controversy-courting "Black Sweat" and the sauna-steeped "Te Amo Corazon"–proves fearless as ever here, folding fat slabs of disco-funk into rock, heaping measured doses of hip-hop atop soul-tinted jazz supports, and slamming Latin rhythms against old-school R&B riffs. Nothing sounds as slinky-stylish-smart. And nobody delivers quite so deliciously, especially when what they're delivering is ultimately a madcap sonic mash. The usual hype surrounding a Prince release attended this one; over the long-term, expect a few standouts within a way worth-it set to emerge. They include the danceable "Love"; the gospel-lite falsetto feast "Satisfied"; and the summer-breezy "Beautiful, Loved & Blessed".

As a story, Jewel's origin is impossible to beat: on her way up, the singer/songwriter lived in a van on the West Coast, struggling to find an entrance to a career as a professional musician. This hardscrabble tale, only enhanced by her Alaskan upbringing, stood in direct contrast to the sweet, gentle hits "Who Will Save Your Soul," "You Were Meant for Me," and "Foolish Games" from her 1995 debut Pieces of You, songs that never suggested a tough background. Nevertheless, Jewel's sensitive side and blue-collar beginnings served her well over the years: once her books of poetry started to fade and her pop makeover fizzled, she was able to capitalize on her back-story and refashion herself as a modern country singer.

Amazon Review by Stuart Jefferson: If you're a blues fan chances are you're already familiar with (if you don't already own) some/many/all of these albums. But if you don't own these sets (or have only a few) this is a good way to own all 20 albums in one nice, neat box. The sound is the same as the individual albums which is very good for the various periods when these tracks were originally recorded. The jackets are fairly thick cardboard and are reproductions of the original covers. The outer box is also of good quality. There's a 34 page booklet that has a few paragraphs on each disc, and track lists, but no detailed liner notes to really put this music into some kind of perspective, but information on these artists and styles is available in various blues books/encyclopedias and on the internet.

As we know, Ekseption was a band leadered by keyboardiste and great Dutch musician Rick van der Linden, and as we know, Ekseption was a band which made instrumental songs, all based in Classical Music, classical pieces converted into rock. After 5 sutdio albums, in 1973 they released their first "The Best of", compillation called "Ekseptional Classics", which has the most well known clasical pieces converted by them into rock, jazz, and symphonic.
There are few own compositions in some albums, but not here. This compilation is entirely instrumental and, of course, if you see the tracklisting, you'll know that chosen themes are masterpieces of classical music. The lower points are some simplicity and the weak percussion section, but -in the other hand- Rick van der Linden is the keyboardist: even if this kind of music isn't your favorite, you must hear mister Rick playing.