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Brilliant 60s pop from the team of Tommy Boyce & Bobby Hart – best known for their key early songwriting work for The Monkees, but a heck of a great duo on their own! Boyce & Hart have a sparkly, sunshiney sound that's very much a part of The Monkees generation – a beautiful post-folk, post-surf blend of styles, and one that's served up with all the warmth and charm that made The Monkees so great. But if you're thinking that the CD is just a Monkees rehash, it's not – because there's very little work here that was associated with the more famous group – and instead, the collection really gets at the jangly genius of the Boyce & Hart sound, a style that should have sparkled strongly on its own in the 60s, but which was unfortunately always eclipsed by their work for other artists. Looking at the great photos in the CD's well-done booklet, it's clear that Boyce and Hart have a hell of a lot of charm – and that charm comes through brilliantly in the set's collection of 24 numbers pulled from their 3 albums for A&M Records. Titles include "For Baby", "Sometime She's A Little Girl", "Girl I'm Out To Get You", "Where Angels Go", "The Ambushers", "Love Every Day", "Teardrop City", "Pretty Flower", "I Wonder What She's Doing Tonite", "Six & Six", "Alice Long", "PO Box 9847", and "Strawberry Girl".

Brilliant 60s pop from the team of Tommy Boyce & Bobby Hart – best known for their key early songwriting work for The Monkees, but a heck of a great duo on their own! Boyce & Hart have a sparkly, sunshiney sound that's very much a part of The Monkees generation – a beautiful post-folk, post-surf blend of styles, and one that's served up with all the warmth and charm that made The Monkees so great – yet also with some cool twists and turns that make a record like this so great – the kind of chance-taking that A&M sometimes allowed its artists to take at the time! Backings are super-groovy – arranged by Artie Butler and Don McGinis – and titles include "I Wonder What She's Doing Tonite", "Teardrop City", "I Wanna Be Free", "The Countess", "Population", and "Two For The Price Of One" – a great cover of a Larry Williams & Johnny Watson soul tune! Features bonus mono single tunes – "The Ambushers", "Love Every Day", "Where Angels Go Trouble Follows", and "I Wanna Be Free".

A standout set from the songwriting team who provided plenty of greatness for The Monkees – but who sound equally great on their own! The music here really soars nicely – tight LA pop from the late 60s, but never too overdone – and often set up with a jaunty groove that's a perfect A&M approach to the music! Vocals are often compressed nicely into the instrumentation – further enforcing the cooler sounds of these hook-heavy tunes – and titles include "Shadows", "Out & About", "I Should Be Going Home", "In The Night", "Abe's Tune", and the cool "Life". CD features both mono and stereo mixes of the album!

Ah, yes, it's a sunshine day, alright – and this batch of groovy, polyester 70s TV pop fits just right! God help us for admitting this, but these goofy, well arranged, dumb fun numbers from the Brady Kids 70s LPs are a heck of a good time, and a pretty true distillation of 70s vanilla pop sounds. It ain't nearly as glorious as the best stuff from the Monkees or the Partridge Family as real pop art, nor does it need to be. Like Jonny Bravo, they they fit the suit just fine! Includes "It's A Sunshine Day", "We Can Make The World A Whole Lot Brighter", the very Brady cover of cheese classic "American Pie", "Keep On", "Merry Go Round", "Candy (Sugar Shoppe)", "Truckin' Back To You", "We'll Always Be Friends"

Post-Monkees work from Mike – and a pretty sweet record, too! That twang that was always in the background comes forth nicely – and the set has some nice pedal steel and piano, too.

Tight grooves from this group who definitely live up to their name – a combo who's rooted in jazz, but equally adept at a rich range of other styles too! The New Cool Collective work with a tight brace of horns – including sax and flute from leader Benjamin Herrman – plus sweet keyboards, guitar, bass, and plenty of percussion – all to underscore the unusual mix of modes you'll find on the record – bits of Latin, rocksteady, surf, and straight funk – all played with a retro-styled vibe throughout! There's a bit of soulful vocals on the record, but the main focus is instrumental – and titles include "Snarky", "The Donkey", "Ogun", "12 Monkees", "The Bouncer", "Frankie & Gracie", "Como Camina", and "Sanctification".

A dual milestone issue for Roctober – the 50th issue and 20th anniversary – a 140-page extraganza which both reminisces on the past 2 decades of Roctober coverage and looks to the future! Includes items on 60s, 70s & 80s Chi vocal combo The Green Berets, Lou Christie, Don Cornelius, Klaus Nomi. Tommie Wix & Them Good Biscuits, Breakfast With Boone, Nardwuar Vs Odd Future, one man's adventure as one of the little remembered New Monkees and much, much more.

An incredibly groovy album – filled with instrumental tracks that shift between funky big band and groovy 60s soundtrack – all arranged by Mike Nesmith and Shorty Rogers! The feel here is like that of some of Rogers' other groovy late 60s instrumental one-off albums – like his hot rod, dune buggy, or surf-orchestra sides – and Nesmith brings in a slightly cynical tone that manifests itself in the choice of some of the instrumentation for the tracks, and the overall setting of the record. Think Monkees instrumentals gone groovier, and you've got part of the picture – but there's also plenty of snippets of Sunset Strip hip and Warner Brothers longing for the past too! Titles include "While I Cried", "Don't Cry Now", "Tapioca Tundra", "Nine Times Blue", "Carlisle Wheeling", and "You Told Me".

One of the greatest songwriting partnerships of the 60s – featured here in a great mix of soul, rock, and vocal numbers from the time – including a fair number of unusual versions of hits from the team of Barry Mann & Cynthia Weil! Weil's got a style that's sometimes a bit deeper than her contemporaries – and when mixed with Barry's strong sense of punch in a tune, has a way of bringing some surprising sophistication to pop music – little emotive moments that peek out from more hook-heavy numbers – but all without ever sounding lachrymose or overblown. As part of that quality, lots of these tunes have some great New York-styled production – that uptown balance of emotion and class – and as with other titles in Ace's excellent songwriter series, the notes alone are almost worth the price of admission – given all the historical detail, cultural commentary, and cool images. Titles include "New World Coming" by Mama Cass, "Love Is Only Sleeping" by The Monkees, "Angelica" by Scott Walker, "Looking Through The Eyes Of Love" by Gene Pitney, "Love Him" by Doris Day, "Good Good Lovin" by Bobby Hebb, "You Baby" by Len Barry, "Born To Be Together" by The Ronettes, "This Is A Love Song" by Bill Medley, "Make Your Own Kind Of Music" by The Happenings, "Shape Of Things To Come" by Slade, and "Proud" by Johnny Crawford.

A damn classic entry in the Super Breaks series from BGP – one that's filled with crucial sample cuts from the old school – some really wonderful funky nuggets, brought together here as a great reminder of the tracks that first got us digging back in the day! There's less of the totally obscure numbers here than you might find on other Super Breaks volumes, but things aren't totally mainstream either – and the compilers have not only done a great job of pulling together tracks that were really important for hip hop, but have also managed to put a really fresh spin on the music altogether – reminding us once again that even in the age of digital music, nothing beats a well-done compilation! Titles include "Shifting Gears" by Johnny Hammond, "Mary Mary" by The Monkees, "Scratchin" by Magic Disco Machine, "It's Just Begun" by Jimmy Castor, "Africano" by Earth Wind & Fire, "Apache" by Incredible Bongo Band, "Got To Get A Knutt" by New Birth, "Get Up & Dance" by Freedom, "Super Sporm" by Captain Sky, "Who Is He & What Is He To You" by Creative Source, "Funky President" by James Brown, "Blow Your Head" by The JBs, "Johnny The Fox" by Thin Lizzy, "Let A Woman Be A Woman Let A Man Be A Man" by Dyke & The Blazers, "The Clapping Song" by Shirley Ellis, and "Get Ya Some" by Melvin Sparks.

A damn classic entry in the Super Breaks series from BGP – one that's filled with crucial sample cuts from the old school – some really wonderful funky nuggets, brought together here as a great reminder of the tracks that first got us digging back in the day! There's less of the totally obscure numbers here than you might find on other Super Breaks volumes, but things aren't totally mainstream either – and the compilers have not only done a great job of pulling together tracks that were really important for hip hop, but have also managed to put a really fresh spin on the music altogether – reminding us once again that even in the age of digital music, nothing beats a well-done compilation! Titles include "Shifting Gears" by Johnny Hammond, "Mary Mary" by The Monkees, "Scratchin" by Magic Disco Machine, "It's Just Begun" by Jimmy Castor, "Africano" by Earth Wind & Fire, "Apache" by Incredible Bongo Band, "Got To Get A Knutt" by New Birth, "Get Up & Dance" by Freedom, "Super Sporm" by Captain Sky, "Who Is He & What Is He To You" by Creative Source, "Funky President" by James Brown, "Blow Your Head" by The JBs, "Johnny The Fox" by Thin Lizzy, "Let A Woman Be A Woman Let A Man Be A Man" by Dyke & The Blazers, "The Clapping Song" by Shirley Ellis, and "Get Ya Some" by Melvin Sparks.

A great groovy moment from the legendary Perez Prado – a sweet late 60s record that's quite different than some of his work from the decade before! Perez still has all that great sense of punch in his rhythms – but he's also picked up some energy from the Latin Soul scene, plus other groovy touches from both bossa and 60s soundtrack styles – which makes for some great mod elements that really fit the image on the cover! The arrangements are large at points, but always really well-focused – and most tunes have some sort of standout instrument that really makes things move – like a bit of bongos, a honking tenor, or sweet organ line. Titles include a number of tracks written by Deodato – like "Cabo Frio", "Ate Parece", and "Quem Vem Depois" – which might mean that he's on the album, too – and other titles include "O Ganso", "Theme from the Monkees", "On My Mind", "Tamara", "San Remo Sunset", and "Llevame A La Luna".

Nothing but great songs from the team of Gerry Goffin & Carole King – the third volume of greatness from the pivotal 60s songwriters to be put together by our friends at Ace UK – with several of the bigger hits for good measure, but strongly focused on lesser-remembered jewels that are just as deserving! Goffin & King's stratospheric success is a testament to both their immeasurable craft and the adaptability. The latter is key, as a wildly diverse roster either hit big of should have done so with these absolutely great songs – The Drifters, Chiffons, Freddie Scott, The Byrds, The Monkees, Rick Nelson, Tony Orlando, Lesley Gore, The Tokens, Dee Dee Sharpe. Soul, rock, pop or a combination thereof – Goffin & King's reach is amazing! 26 tracks: "One Fine Day" by The Chiffons, "Hey Girl" by Freddie Scott, "Sweet Young Thing" by The Monkees, "Soul Waltzin'" by Big Dee Irwin, "Will You Love Me Tomorrow" by Bunny Sigler, "Chains" by The Everly Brothers, "Can't Stop Talking About You" by Tobin Matthews, "Take Good Care Of My Baby" by Dion, "Goin' Back" by The Byrds, "Don't Say Nothin' Bad (About My Baby)" by The Cookies and more.

A great collection of the classic pop-soul-rock songwriting of Neil Sedaka and Howard Greenfield – very well curated to show how far-reaching their talents are in writing across genres and styles – as well as to more simply play brilliantly as great collection of songs,purely iconic and relatively forgotten ones alike! It's got soul, pop vocal and proto rock icons – Connie Francis, Bobby Darin, The Everly Brothers, Little Anthony & The Imperials, Peggy Lee, Ben E King, The Monkees, Tom Jones, The Tokens, Patti Drew, The Globetrotters, The Tokens and many more – including Neil Sedaka himself! 25 tracks in all: "Stupid Cupid" by Connie Francis, "Keep-A-Walkin'" by Bobby Darin, Calendar Boy" by Dee Dee Sharp, "Get Rid Of Him" by Dionne Warwick, "Foolish Little Girl" by The Cookies, "Magic Colors" by Leslie Gore, "Bewitched" By Peggy Lee, "Walking In The Footsteps Of A Fool" by Ben E King, "Don't Look Over Your Shoulder" by Nanciy Wilson, "You're Knocking Me Out" by Neil Sedaka and more.

Wow! Here's leftfield singer-songwriter Biff Rose's rare late 70s Roast Beef album – financed and produced by Mike Nesmith of The Monkees and supposedly recorded in a single sitting – pretty cool stuff from one of the most idiosyncratic cats of his era! Titles include "Home Is Just As Good As Anyplace", "She Said", "Anxious Moments", "Time Was Very Long Ago", "I'd Rather Be With You Than Alive Or Dead", "Afraid To Fall In Love Again", "Be Happy (Smile While You Can)", "We Were Only Fourteen" and more.