One of the most beautiful records to come out of the early 70s – a tremendous indie effort from a young Weldon Irvine! Irvine put this album together as sort of a musical "time capsule" of his generation – an effort to capture the era's thoughts, feelings, and emotions through a mix of music, vocals, and a few spoken bits – all woven together in a way that changes moods nicely, but always keeps the same righteously spiritual vibe! Weldon plays keys that are both electric and acoustic throughout – and he's joined by a very hip batch of players who include Jimmy Owens, Lenny White, Alex Blake, George Cables, and others – all working here in a very rough-edged and soulful mode. Titles include the classic break track "Bananas", the sweet vocal number "Deja Vu",and the soul classic "Feelin' Mellow" – also covered by Fatback Band, but even better here in the original! Other tracks include "Soul Sisters", "Watergate Don't Bug Me", "Spontaneous Interaction", and "I Am". CD

One of the most beautiful records to come out of the early 70s – a tremendous indie effort from a young Weldon Irvine! Irvine put this album together as sort of a musical "time capsule" of his generation – an effort to capture the era's thoughts, feelings, and emotions through a mix of music, vocals, and a few spoken bits – all woven together in a way that changes moods nicely, but always keeps the same righteously spiritual vibe! Weldon plays keys that are both electric and acoustic throughout – and he's joined by a very hip batch of players who include Jimmy Owens, Lenny White, Alex Blake, George Cables, and others – all working here in a very rough-edged and soulful mode. Titles include the classic break track "Bananas", the sweet vocal number "Deja Vu",and the soul classic "Feelin' Mellow" – also covered by Fatback Band, but even better here in the original! Other tracks include "Soul Sisters", "Watergate Don't Bug Me", "Spontaneous Interaction", and "I Am". LP, Vinyl record album

One of the most beautiful records to come out of the early 70s – a tremendous indie effort from a young Weldon Irvine! Irvine put this album together as sort of a musical "time capsule" of his generation – an effort to capture the era's thoughts, feelings, and emotions through a mix of music, vocals, and a few spoken bits – all woven together in a way that changes moods nicely, but always keeps the same righteously spiritual vibe! Weldon plays keys that are both electric and acoustic throughout – and he's joined by a very hip batch of players who include Jimmy Owens, Lenny White, Alex Blake, George Cables, and others – all working here in a very rough-edged and soulful mode. Titles include the classic break track "Bananas", the sweet vocal number "Deja Vu",and the soul classic "Feelin' Mellow" – also covered by Fatback Band, but even better here in the original! Other tracks include "Soul Sisters", "Watergate Don't Bug Me", "Spontaneous Interaction", and "I Am". LP, Vinyl record album

A totally great package – one that brings together some of the coolest cuts ever from the early solo years of Weldon Irvine! Side one of the record features two takes on his great "Deja Vu" – the initial short version, which has more of a take on the catchy jazzy lyrics – and the longer version, which runs for almost ten minutes, and has more jazzy solo work! The flipside features the totally wonderful "Feelin Mellow" – a cut with a few singers working next to Weldon's electric piano lines, giving the whole thing a very righteous vibe – which is carried through on the cool "Watergate Don't Bug Me" – complete with melodica from Weldon, Fender Rhodes from George Cables, and some cool extemporaneous lyrics about Watergate! LP, Vinyl record album

Vintage radio broadcasts with re-enactments of The United States' first week of war and Germany's march on Czechoslovakia. LP, Vinyl record album

A record with a very evocative title, and a sound that's even more so than you'd guess – definitely cosmic, way more than poetry, and filled with rhythms from the native scene of Gratien Midonet! The music was recorded in France, as part of that great cultural criss-crossing that happened in the scene during the 70s and 80s – when talents from the old colonial strongholds were able to take advantage of some of the better recording opportunities offered in Paris – on a scene that was very open to new sorts of musical experiments! The tracks here are from four different albums, and have this playful mixing of roots and contemporary elements, sung and spoken passages, acoustic percussion and electric instrumentation – all very much in the spirit of some of the best early experiments of the Saravah label. Titles include "Antille O Cristal", "Osana", "La Point De Neg", "Zandoli Leve Doubout", "Roulo", "La Reine", "Mari Rhont Ouve La Pot", and "Kannaval Sakre Pou Tout Z'Heb Pousse". LP, Vinyl record album

Stories from another time and place – and music that's almost without comparison, either – as the set brings together material recorded by Angolan guitarist Mario Rui Silva, a musician whose range of expression stretches far past his West African roots! There's a heck of a lot going on here – definitely plenty of the acoustic guitar pictured on the cover, but often used with sensitivity that's more Brazilian than you'd expect – and interspersed with tracks that have other instrumentation in the lead, including balafon – sometimes spare instrumentals, sometimes vocal numbers – mostly acoustic, but with a few electric elements from time to time. The music has both a complexity and really organic mixing of modes – maybe a bit like some of the global experiments that you might have found on the Crammed label at the time, but also very unique to Mario himself too. Titles include "Ngisumba", "Mgeni", "Kazum Zum Zum", "Maniku", "Lembranca De Um Veho", "Depois De Uma Conversa", "Kabanza K'Etu", and "Dembita". CD

There's plenty of keyboards, beats, and electronics here – a whole host of sounds from a new generation in Japanese music – one that had learned from the more experimental styles of a few years before, but who were able to weave things into more tuneful modes for a variety of animated projects! The cuts here are all pretty catchy, and share a bit with the city pop generation – but are much more electronic overall, and without vocals either which allows for plenty of focus on the keyboard lines and other instrumentation in the mix. Most are upbeat and have an 80s electro soul sort of groove – and titles include "Ryoko's Theme" by Keiichi Oku, "Into The Jungle" by Yoshinobu Hiraiwa, "Act 2 Scene 26" by Kazuihko Izu, "Shadow Rhythm" by Ichiro Nitta, "Honowo" by Kan Ogasuara, and "Kiki" by Nobuyoshi Koshibe & Takashi Kokubo. LP, Vinyl record album

An excellent set that was put together by Alvin Lucier, and which features pieces that use the voice altered by electronic processing – a pretty new concept at the time, and which comes across here with some wild results! Our favorites on the set include "She Was A Visitor" by Robert Ashley, "Christian Wolff In Cambridge" by Morton Feldman, "Solos For Voice 2" by John Cage, and "North American Time Capsule 1967" by Alvin Lucier. LP, Vinyl record album

The era that catapulted cult heroes Devo into pop culture history – with bubblier synths, catchier hooks, and crazier multimedia shenanigans than ever before from these pioneers of the video era – and time capsule pop angle aside, one of the best and most innovate pop albums of its time! It's pretty hard to imagine the early 80s without Devo, but the group and this record is just as amazing decades later, since there was never anyone else like them! Includes "Girl U Want", "It's Not Right", "Whip It", "Freedom Of Coice", "Cold War", "Don't You Know", "Gates Of Steel" and more. LP, Vinyl record album

Super-righteous work from William S Fischer – the ultra-hip arranger who was one of the most important forces in the late 60s underground soul jazz scene! Fischer is best known for his work with Eugene McDaniels, Eddie Harris, and Les McCann – almost akin to the sorts of collaborative influence that David Axelrod had with Cannonball Adderley or Lou Rawls, but with a style that was decidedly darker, and trippier. This album's one of the few ever recorded under his own name – originally done for the tripped-out jazz imprint Embryo, and featuring a unique blend of moog, strings, funk, and soul! Billy Cobham plays drums and percussion on the set, Bill Robinson sings on a few numbers, and Walter Sear adds in some extra moog next to Fischer's own work – but the real brilliance comes from the overall concept – funky one minute, laidback and trippy the next, very much in the spirit of some of the righteous crossover funk, soul, and rock recordings coming from McDaniels and Axelrod at the time! Titles include "Patience Is Virtue", "Saigon", "Green Forever", "Chains", "Electrix", "Capsule", and "There's A Light That Shines". LP, Vinyl record album

Madlib invades Blue Note! He gets free reign of the catalog for this mix of sampler genius and live band interpretations, too, as/with Ahmad Miller, Yesterdays New Quintet, Malcolm Catto, Medaphoar, and others from the Stones Throw camp. This one's truly a conceptual triumph, if there ever was such a thing – one of the greatest hip hop producers alive, given carte blanche with the source beats of the century! Madlib's Blue Note crates are heavily weighed in the mid 60s through mid 70s electric beats that often get the shaft in mainstream jazz round-ups, but floor the beathead world into overdrive. Re-interpretations, remixes, and revisions are spliced seamlessly with the source samples, creating a whole new world where hip hop and late model live funk not only co-exists with classic Blue Note jazz, but it actually draws a linear transition between the 2 genius art forms. Beautiful stuff – if the album isn't the most original idea to come along all of these years into the hip hop & jazz underground, it's certainly one of the most perfectly realized projects of its kind, ever! It's one for the time capsule – easily one of Madlib's masterpieces, and pure funky sample wizardry by any standard! Includes Monk Higgins' "Slim's Return" interpreted by Ahmad Miller and DJ Lord Such on cuts, "Donald Byrd's "Distant Land", "Ronnie Foster's "Mystic Bounce", Yesterday's New Quintet's adaptation of Wayne Shorter's "Footprints", Madlib Invazion's "Funky Blue Note", the Joe McDuphrey Experience take on Horace Silver's/Herbie Hancock's "Peace/Dolphin Dance" and lots more. LP, Vinyl record album

On Things Fall Apart ?uestlove, Black Thought, DJ Scratch, Rahzel and co. reinvigorated the scene with a Philly style soulful, melancholy groove that seemingly influenced the entirety of the NuSoul world – and it could even be argued that the Roots birthed that whole scene. Phrenology carries that torch, but it's so, SO much more, as the heady nature weighed the previous LP down in spots, and Phrenology is a sprawling exercise in expectation-busting perfection! "Rock You" kicks things off in explosive fashion, forgoing the laid back, yet angry soul backbone the group pioneered in hop hop, for a massive electro pulse pounding style – with Black Thought frenetically spitting confrontational wisdom until the synth unexpectedly dives into a short burst of live hardcore punk with "!!!!!!!" (we know what you're thinking, but trust us, it REALLY works). "Sacrifice" features a surprisingly effective chorus sung by Nelly Furtado, and other guest spots include Kweli heating up "Rolling With Heat", Ursula Rucker kicking some reverential poetry on "Waok (ay) Rollcall", and Musiq on the single "Break You Off". Other highlights include the late 80s Bomb Squad-like production on "Thought @ Work", the group's live instrumentation (and ?uestlove's always great trap work) and soul claps on tunes like "The Seed (2.0)", the epic "Water", and "Complexity" with Jill Scott. If you're solely of the 2 turntables and a mic camp you may want to head elsewhere, but if you've been anxiously awaiting the new Roots LP like we have, you'll be knocked straight on your arse, welled up with tears of joy. The best major label hip hop album of '02, and a beauty to go in the time capsule for future generations to learn, and mourn what they missed first hand. Amazing!!! Other tracks include "Quills", "Pussy Galore", and "Something In The Way Of Things (In Town)". CD

A massive batch of music – and almost as worth it for the overall package as it is for the great tunes inside! Like other volumes in this series, this set is beautifully put together – not only stuffed with an amazing array of classic soul from a key year in the 60s – but also done with a full color booklet that's over 60 pages long – filled with track-by-track notes on the tunes, and filled with great photos, images, and historical data! The whole thing's a perfect soul music time capsule – with the depth of production that we've always loved in Bear Family releases for other genres. Titles include "Are You Lonely For Me" by Freddie Scott, "Eight Men Four Women" by OV Wright, "Dirty Man" by Laura Lee, "Come On Sock It To Me" by Syl Johnson, "Hypnotized" by Linda Jones, "Some Kinda Wonderful" by Soul Brothers Six, "Nothing Takes The Place Of You" by Toussaint McCall, "Baby Please Come Back Home" by JJ Barnes, "Soul Finger" by The Bar-Kays, "Girls Are Yout To Get You" by The Fascinations, "Funky Broadway (part 1)" by Dyke & The Blazers, "Piece Of My Heart" by Erma Franklin, and "I Wanna Testify" by The Parliaments. CD