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One of the grooviest records ever recorded – and pretty darn rare, too! The Moon People – aka Los Astronautas – were a Latin Soul studio band who played behind some of the other killer recordings on the Speed Label. They're best known for their sock-boogaloo instrumental "Land Of Love" – a stone jammer which kicks off the album – and their forte is blending together Latin rhythms, soul instrumentation, and kind of a mod 60s easy production style, handled here by maestro Morty Craft. The album's got a really really weird feel – part Latin Soul, part 60s soundtrack – almost as if Joe Cuba and Quincy Jones were hanging out together! Titles include "Land Of Love", "Morty's Harem", "Indian Soul", "Happy Soul", "Revolt", and "Last Train To Clarksville".

Moody vocals from the Jankowski Singers – a hip ensemble led by pianist Horst Jankowski, with a floating dreamy sound that's very much in the best MPS easy mode! The tracks on the set are as haunting as the "nightpeople" in the title might imply – harmonic, yet slightly off-kilter – and easy, yet with an undercurrent of 70s slink that makes everything feel a bit stranger than it otherwise might. The title track – "Nightpeople Only" – is a real gem, and worth the price of the record alone – but the rest of the set is pretty wonderful too, with a cool blend of male/female chorus vocals, Jankowski's piano and keyboards, and some sweetly compressed flugelhorn solos from Ack Van Rooyen. Other tracks include "Didn't We", "Let's Make A Day", "With Two Eyes", "Light My Fire", and "Lady Eve". CD also features lots of bonus tracks too – 9 more numbers that include "Heideroslein", "Ach Wie Ist's Moglich Dann", "Dreamflight", "Pink Balloon", "So Wie Heut", "Like A Ruby In The Street", and "Du Du Liegst Mir Im Herzen".

Breezy bossa nova – Hollywood 60s style! The album's one of the best cut for Capitol by guitarist Laurindo Almeida – and has a sweet groovy little style that features Laurindo's lovely guitar work over some lightly dancing small combo backings that include flute, harmonica, organ, percussion, and even a bit of whistling on a few tracks! The vibe's very much in the best Verve/Impulse takes on the bossa – done with a clear California influence, which keeps things cool and breezy – and which also pushes Almeida past his sometimes-staid style on guitar. Two cuts also feature some great vocals by Irene Kral – and titles include "Twilight In Rio", "Old Guitaron", "Sarah's Samba", "Izabella", "Winter Moon", "Girl From Ipanema", and "Choro For People In Love".

Insanely wonderful work by Bacharach – in a way that we can hardly begin to describe (but we'll certainly try!) By the time this one was recorded – 1971 – Burt's reputation as a songwriter and arranger were so firmly established that he had an incredible amount of freedom in the studio. Here, working with tunes that were mostly well-worn, plus a new one or two – Burt comes up with an amazingly complex set of arrangements, opening up his tunes like little flowers, focusing on a particular instrumental tendril, and drawing it out into incredible lines of melody and color. Proof of this is the album's extended version of "Wives & Lovers", or its suite for orchestra, entitled "And The People Were With Her". All tracks are great – from Burt's intimate vocal on "Hasbrook Heights", to the jangly instrumentation of "Freefall", to the completely recast versions of hits like "One Less Bell To Answer", "April Fools", and "Mexican Divorce". CD features a bonus track – a rare mono version of "All Kinds Of People".

Not the Hello Dolly album you might guess from the title, but instead a wonderfully groovy batch of tracks from pianist Pete Jolly – an album done with great larger arrangements from Dick Hazard and Dick Grove, and a tight vibe that makes the set one of Pete's grooviest albums ever! Pete's incredibly fluid on the keys of the piano – hitting with a hard punch on the left hand to really underscore the snapping rhythms of the tunes, but flying free on the right with these lyrical lines that are simply beautiful – really on a par with the best 60s work from Vince Guaraldi, and the kind of record that should have more folks talking about Jolly's genius. The core group features Howard Roberts on guitar, Chuck Berghofer on bass, and Nick Martinez on drums – and Jolly's one hell of a pianist in this sort of setting – and it always seems that when he's got a big group behind him, he really lets loose with some great solos, freed from the rhythm of the tracks so that he can skate over the top of the songs in a magical way! Tracks include "Hard Day's Night", "People", "Moment Of Truth", "First Of May", "Blues Two Ways", and "The Grass Is Greener".

A real mind-trip – and an incredible document of the times – not just ideas floating around in the late 60s, but also new ways of making records too! The album is loosely based around ideas and writings from The Medium Is The Massage – McLuhan's important 1967 book, co-written with Quentin Fiore – and represented here as a wild sound collage that blends together music, sounds, media snippets, and readings by McLuhan, Fiore, and a host of other voices! The album's actually much more of a "happening" than a spoken word album – a real studio party that's cut up and messed up by all the added effects, sounds, and music – genius that comes from Jerome Agel, who put the whole project together – and delivered it to the loving hands of John Simon, who produced some other wonderful records of this nature for late 60s Columbia. A real delight throughout – and the kind of an album we wish people still kept making! Great reissue package – in a gatefold LP-styled sleeve, with additional artwork, rare photos, full notes on the sessions, and more!

Van Dyke Parks' masterpiece – and one of the hippest records to come out of LA in the 60s! The album's a strangely anachronistic one – steeped in the kind of past-days scoring found on early records by Harpers Bizarre and Randy Newman (both of which Parks had a hand in!), wrapped around simply poetic songs about the scene and state of affairs in late 60s LA, all handled with a cinematic approach that's aging Hollywood at its best! Titles include Randy Newman's "Vine Street" – plus "By The People", "Laurel Canyon Blvd", "Donovan's Colours", and "The All Golden".

A sweet batch of grooves with a really trippy edge! The enigmatic Lord Sitar was one of a handful of late 60s sitar players who easily crossed into the world of groovy pop – blending traditional Indian instrumental styles with shorter pop tunes that had a wild psyche-out kind of feel. This album's a true gem – wonderful stuff with Brit easy orchestrations by John Hawkins that set the sitar lines in a setting that feels like a lost Peter Sellers soundtrack from the summer of love! Titles include "Black Is Black", "Blue Jay Way", "If I Were A Rich Man", "Emerald City", "Tomorrow's People", "In A Dream", and "I Can See For Miles".

Not the Hello Dolly album you might guess from the title, but instead a wonderfully groovy batch of tracks from pianist Pete Jolly – an album done with great larger arrangements from Dick Hazard and Dick Grove, and a tight vibe that makes the set one of Pete's grooviest albums ever! Pete's incredibly fluid on the keys of the piano – hitting with a hard punch on the left hand to really underscore the snapping rhythms of the tunes, but flying free on the right with these lyrical lines that are simply beautiful – really on a par with the best 60s work from Vince Guaraldi, and the kind of record that should have more folks talking about Jolly's genius. The core group features Howard Roberts on guitar, Chuck Berghofer on bass, and Nick Martinez on drums – and Jolly's one hell of a pianist in this sort of setting – and it always seems that when he's got a big group behind him, he really lets loose with some great solos, freed from the rhythm of the tracks so that he can skate over the top of the songs in a magical way! Tracks include "Hard Day's Night", "People", "Moment Of Truth", "First Of May", "Blues Two Ways", and "The Grass Is Greener".