Wonderful work from the great John Holt – a Jamaican singer who managed to find a real way to weave connections between reggae and the sweeter side of soul music in the 70s – often at a level that had John taking on songs from the American scene and making them sound even better with a reggae groove! Yet the work of Holt also goes way past that formula used on some of his hits – as you'll hear on this massive collection that offers up some of the greatest cuts he recorded for Trojan Records, plus some nice surprises along the way. Most of the tracks have a loping midtempo groove that's perfect for Holt's vocal approach – and the 2LP set features 28 tracks in all, with titles that include "Stealing Stealing", "I Wanna Dance", "Help Me Make It Through The Night", "Sister Big Stuff", "Stick By Me", "Ali Baba", "You Baby", "The Tide Is High", "Let's Build Our Dreams", "Sweetie Come Brush Me", "Wild Fire", "I'll Be Lonely", "My Heart Is Gone", "Strange Things", "My desire", "I'll Take A Melody", and "Time & The River". LP, Vinyl record album

Compilation of tracks produced by Sly & Robbie just as they were getting the Taxi gang started and stepping out as producers in their own right, at the dawn of the Dancehall era. The rhythm tracks are top notch, and in a lot of ways, this is our favorite period for these 2 reggae greats. The set includes both vocal and instrumental numbers, including "Triplet", "Devil Pickney", "Rock Music", "Pure & True", "Fort Augustus", "Sitting & Watching", "Baltimore", "Taxi Connection", "Bang Bang", "Red Hot", "Those Tricks", "Unmetered Taxi" and "VIA Music". LP, Vinyl record album

A great little set that brings together the short but fantastic legacy of Risco Connection – a late 70s project led by Studio One drummer Joe Isaacs, after moving from Kingston and setting up shop on the scene in Toronto! Joe calls on plenty of his older roots in early reggae, but also serves up cuts that have a strong nod towards contemporary club – slowing down the rhythms from the pace of disco, but also not really working in a reggae groove either – and instead coming up with a really unique hybrid of both – one that's peppered by vocals from a variety of different singers, often has nice keyboard touches in a moogy/spacey style, and which also features dubby reworkings of most of the tunes too! As usual, Strut do a great job of putting together the material with nicely detailed notes – and titles include two versions each of "It's My House", "Good Times", "Ain't No Stoppin Us Now", and "Sitting In The Park" – plus "I'm Caught Up", "Argument", "Stopping", "Bringing Out The Sunshine", "Risco Music", and "Reggae Music". (Soul, Reggae) LP, Vinyl record album