... CD

One of the greatest albums to come from the New York underground of the early 80s – even if it was a relatively big "hit" on a major label! Laurie Anderson is in perfect form here – drawing on a strong tradition of avant garde performance, but without any of the indulgences that would mire down performance art in years to come. Instead, she's got a clean, clear style that's simply amazing – spoken passages that are poetic and pointed, but which also have a slight undercurrent of wit – a charming quality that never takes itself too seriously, even when the sounds and styles are somewhat dark. Instrumentation includes some great rhythm passages from David Van Tieghem, plus surprising performances from Rufus Harley on bagpipes and George Lewis on trombone. Titles include "From The Air", "Big Science", "O Superman", "Born Never Asked", "Walking & Falling", "Example #22", "Let X = X", and "It Tango". LP, Vinyl record album

One of the greatest albums to come from the New York underground of the early 80s – even if it was a relatively big "hit" on a major label! Laurie Anderson is in perfect form here – drawing on a strong tradition of avant garde performance, but without any of the indulgences that would mire down performance art in years to come. Instead, she's got a clean, clear style that's simply amazing – spoken passages that are poetic and pointed, but which also have a slight undercurrent of wit – a charming quality that never takes itself too seriously, even when the sounds and styles are somewhat dark. Instrumentation includes some great rhythm passages from David Van Tieghem, plus surprising performances from Rufus Harley on bagpipes and George Lewis on trombone. Titles include "From The Air", "Big Science", "O Superman", "Born Never Asked", "Walking & Falling", "Example #22", "Let X = X", and "It Tango". CD

... LP, Vinyl record album

... LP, Vinyl record album

Recorded live at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York City, February 7-10, 1983. A HUGE amount of material! Includes the tracks "Say Hello", "Walk The Dog", "Violin Solo", "Closed Circuits", "For A Large And Changing Room", "Pictures Of It", "Language Of The Future", "Reverb", "If You Can't Talk About It, Point To It", "City Song", "Finnish Farmers", "Democratic Way", "Private Property", "Neon Duet", "Difficult Listening Hour", "So Happy Birthday", "Dance Of Electricity", "Sax Duet", "Born, Never Asked", "From The Air", "Beginning French", "Talkshow", "Cello Solo", "Blue Lagoon", "Stiff Neck", "Hothead", "Telephone Song", "Sweaters", "We've Got Four Big Clocks", "I Dreamed I Had To Take A Test", "Big Top", "It Was Up In The Mountains", "Big Science", "Red Map", "Strike", "False Documents", and many, many more! LP, Vinyl record album

One of the greatest albums to come from the New York underground of the early 80s – even if it was a relatively big "hit" on a major label! Laurie Anderson is in perfect form here – drawing on a strong tradition of avant garde performance, but without any of the indulgences that would mire down performance art in years to come. Instead, she's got a clean, clear style that's simply amazing – spoken passages that are poetic and pointed, but which also have a slight undercurrent of wit – a charming quality that never takes itself too seriously, even when the sounds and styles are somewhat dark. Instrumentation includes some great rhythm passages from David Van Tieghem, plus surprising performances from Rufus Harley on bagpipes and George Lewis on trombone. Titles include "From The Air", "Big Science", "O Superman", "Born Never Asked", "Walking & Falling", "Example #22", "Let X = X", and "It Tango". LP, Vinyl record album

A special TV-only Monkees album! LP, Vinyl record album

An amazing run of music – the complete Laurie Records singles of Dion DiMucci – all presented here in original mono mixes, most of which have never been on CD before! The package is a real revelation to our ears – and takes us past both the early hits we know well, and the later oddities we like even more – to an extended realm of sounds that really illustrate why Dion's had such great staying power over the years. He's a hell of a singer – easily one of the most soulful of the crossover talents of his generation – and there seems to be a rawness to the mono mixes that really get back to the core of his essence. The package features detailed notes, and a whopping 36 tracks that include "Little Miss Blue", "Lonely Teenager", "After The Dance", "Purple Haze", "The Dolphins", "Runaround Girl", "The Majestic", "Heaven Help Me", "Little Girl", "Lost For Sure", "Little Diane", "Born To Cry", "Tag Along", "Daddy Rollin", "He Looks A Lot Like Me", "Abraham Martin & John", and "Shout". CD

... 7-inch, Vinyl record

... 7-inch, Vinyl record

... 7-inch, Vinyl record

... 7-inch, Vinyl record

... 7-inch, Vinyl record

... 7-inch, Vinyl record

A key later album from Dion – and a set that shows a newly maturing style in his music! The album was something of a follow-up to Dion's huge single "Abraham Martin & John" – the bittersweet track that was a surprise late 60s hit for the singer – and which allowed him to explore much more introspective space on this album. The style is extremely folksy throughout – with a lot of acoustic guitar next to Dion's vocals, which are themselves often recorded with a slightly echoey, almost watery quality. There's definitely echoes here of Tim Buckley and Tim Hardin, but the record's got its own soul as well – thanks to a newly fragile quality in Dion's voice. Titles include "Abraham Martin & John", "Sisters Of Mercy", "Both Sides Now", "Sun Fun Song", "He Looks A Lot Like Me", "The Dolphins", and "You Better Watch Yourself". CD featuers the bonus track "Daddy Rollin". CD

... 7-inch, Vinyl record

... 7-inch, Vinyl record

A really cool album from the Japanese scene of the 80s – one that's much more experimental and creative than some of the city pop material of the time – with a shifting style of music that really keeps things interesting! Ryuichi Sakamoto helped with the first track on the set, which also rounds out the end of side one – and there's definitely elements of the YMO-era electro pop on the record, but mixed with more instrumental material that partly echoes the ambient sounds of the era – but also with more experimental material that's sometimes playful, sometimes a bit dark – almost echoing some of the hipper New York downtown experiments of the Laurie Anderson generation. Koharu Kisaragi handles most of the work herself - through a variety of keyboards, samples, and electronics next to her vocals – but there's also some live percussion, piano, bells, and recorder on the record too. Titles include "Neo Plant" in two versions – plus "Paraffin", "Bon Voyage", and "Traumerei". (Japanese, Rock) LP, Vinyl record album

A cool set from a percussionist who was both a figure in the more cutting-edge side of the New York downtown scene of the early 80s – and who had done some work for bigger groups as well! The album's one of the few under Van Tieghem's name – and features the artist on a huge amount of percussion instruments, both electric and acoustic – plus keyboards and a variety of objects. Peter Gordon co-produced, and plays saxes on the set – and the record's a nice one in the same territory of Laurie Anderson and David Byrne experiments on early 80s Warner. LP, Vinyl record album

Features selections by Talking Heads, Peter Gabriel, Time, Gang Of Four, Laurie Anderson, Ramones, Roxy Music, Pretenders, and others! LP, Vinyl record album

Music from Linda Laurie, Gary Stites, Lathy Linden, Bobby Peterson Quintet, Steve Lawrence, Paul Chaplain, Lolita, Ronnie Love, Ray Peterson, James MacArthur, and more – 27 songs in all. CD

Not rock n roll, but some great King Records R&B from the 50s – work by Titus Turner, Annie Laurie, Bill Jennings, 5 Royales, Otis Williams & The Charms, James Brown, Hank Ballard, Little Willie John, and others! (Soul, Rock) LP, Vinyl record album

Fremeaux's nice Roots of Rock 'n' Roll series – includes 36 tracks from artists including Tiny Bradshaw, Ramblin' Jimmie Dolan, Goree Carter, Annie Laurie, Red Foley with Cecil Gant, Hank Snow, Lester Williams, Tennessee Ernie Ford, Billy Jack Wills, Roy Hogsed, Joe Hill Louis, Wesley Holly, Johnnie Lee Wills, Calvin Boze, Wynonie Harris, and more. CD

Colin Stetson on alto saxophone, tenor saxophone, bass saxophone, and French horn – with vocals by Laurie Anderson and Shara Worden. (Jazz, Rock) CD

The world of girl groups might seem cliched to some – but if you know where to look, you'll find a host of really amazing material – and that's definitely the case in this well-chosen set, a superb Ace Records package that's overflowing with material that goes way past the obvious! At some level, Ace are approaching the style in the reverse way of more mainstream collections – not starting with hits, then trickling down to obscurities – and instead pulling together unusual bits from a variety of indie labels that might have gotten otherwise overlooked, including a few cuts that were never issued at the time, mixed here with rock and soul gems from singles on labels like Keetch, Challenge, Bang, Mira, and Etiquette. As with their CD-length dips into the music, the quality here is superb – with 14 titles that include "Chu Sen Ling" by The Bermudas, "My Little Baby" by The Witches, "Tossin A Ice Cube" by The Hollywood Chicks, "Chico" by Linda Laurie, "A Dumb Song" by The Delicates, "Baby That's Me" by The Carolines, "Don't Worry About Me Baby" by Mayalta Page, "You May Be Holding My Baby" by The Pussycats, "I Wanna Know Right Now" by Carol Slade, "Sweet Kind Of Loneliness" by The Darlettes, and "My Baby Looks But He Don't Touch" by Carol Connors. (Soul, Rock) LP, Vinyl record album

A really great record from David Byrne – songs and spoken bits that were originally designed to be used in Robert Wilson's Civil Wars – but which work great on their own! Byrne is completely charming in the spoken bits – with a sense of dry wit mixed with humanism, not that different from Laurie Anderson at the time – and instrumentation features a range of reeds and trumpets, gently cascading with the rhythms of the tunes – but in a relatively subtle way. Tracks include the wonderful "Tree" – aka "Today Is An Important Occasion" – plus "In The Upper Room", "Sound Of Business", "Admiral Perry", "I Bid You Goodnight", "In The Future", "Where The Sun Never Goes Down", "Theadora Is Dozing", "Social Studies", "Winter", and "The Jungle Book". LP, Vinyl record album

A record that some might call the last truly great Peter Gabriel album – and a key cap to his excellent initial solo run! The album's got a deeper feel than before – slightly richer colors, more spiritual themes, and arguably more of a sense of majesty – almost an echo of some of the Native American modes explored by Laurie Anderson, who was then a recent collaborator of Gabriel! Instrumentation builds a bit more than before – with less guitars in parts, more percussive bits, and some funkier elements at the bottom that aren't exactly funky – more just a punch in force from the ground up. Gabriel's definitely feeling a sense of power here – and titles include "Lay Your Hands On Me", "Shock The Monkey", "San Jacinto", "I Have The Touch", "The Family & The Fishing Net", and "The Rhythm Of The Heat". LP, Vinyl record album

An incredible chapter in the Arthur Russell story – and one that's not nearly as well-known as his club singles and art rock work of the 80s! The 2CD package presents some long-lost longer form work by Russell – instrumental pieces composed and recorded in the 70s and early 80s, most of which have a decidedly minimalist feel! In addition to being a dancefloor artist in the post-disco years, Russell was also music director of The Kitchen, and had ties to the more experimental side of the New York scene – and worked in a world that included Philip Glass, Laurie Anderson, Rhys Chatham, and many others from time. There's echoes of all 3 on this collection, and a large number of tracks that recall the brighter, more optimistic years of modern music – the almost DIY style that hit composition and performance in the stretch after early minimalism, conveyed beautifully on these recordings done for smaller ensembles, often in a mix of electric and acoustic instrumentation. A number of the titles here have never been released at all, and even those that did see the light of day did so only briefly – and often not under optimal conditions. The 2CD package features full notes on the music, and titles that include "Instrumentals Vol 1", "Instrumentals Vol 2", "Reach One – With Two Fender Rhodes (1973)", "Tower Of Meaning", and "Sketch For The Face Of Helen". CD

A deep look at the electronic music underground in the 60s, 70s, and 80s – not the academic theoreticians who were slaving away in university laboratories, but the more independent, freewheeling talents who were using the initial analogue moment to open up their own boundaries in time and space! The work ranges from unusual 60s instrumentals, through 70s hippie electronics, to some 80s recordings that might have been termed new age by the uninitiated – but which instead, all these years later, stand as some lost moments of cosmic expression! There's few folks we trust to lead us down a musical path as much as the guys at Soul Jazz – and this time, they've definitely taken us in the right direction – with cuts that include "Midnight" by Tim Blake, "Gang (For Rock Industry)" by JB Banfi, "To The Other Side Of The Sky" by Michael Garrison, "By Water" by Stratis, "Improvisation On A Concerto Generator" by Laurie Spiegel, "Starborn Suite (part 1)" by Steven Halpern, "Ceres Motion" by Mother Mallard's Portable Masterpiece Company, "As Above So Below" by Carl Matthews, "In The Beginning" by Michael Stearns, "Ever New" by Beverly Glenn-Copeland, "Variations VII Sur Le Theme Des Bene Gesserit" by Richard Pinhas, and "Ancient Stars" by Kevin Braheny. (Out Sound, Rock) LP, Vinyl record album

A record that's as beautiful and ethereal as the image on its cover – a collaboration between singer Dorothy Moskowitz and composer Francesco Paolo Paladino – served up in a mode that almost mixes the darker corners of Nico's solo work with some of the spacier tones of the early new age underground, and maybe a touch of Laurie Anderson performativity as well! Moskowitz was originally part of the famous United States Of America group of the late 60s with Joseph Byrd – but she's clearly transformed a lot as an artist here, and works with lyrics by Luca Chino Ferrari, but often in ways that are less word-based than you might expect. Instrumentation includes keyboards, harp, and bells from Paladino, plus light strings, guitar, electronics, and guitar – all in a spacey blend that comes off especially well on the 23 minute "Under An Endless Sky", and still sounds great on shorter cuts that include "My Doomsday Serenade", "The Disappearance Of Fireflies", "Cut The Roots", and "Unknown To Ourselves". CD

A deep look at the electronic music underground in the 60s, 70s, and 80s – not the academic theoreticians who were slaving away in university laboratories, but the more independent, freewheeling talents who were using the initial analogue moment to open up their own boundaries in time and space! The work ranges from unusual 60s instrumentals, through 70s hippie electronics, to some 80s recordings that might have been termed new age by the uninitiated – but which instead, all these years later, stand as some lost moments of cosmic expression! There's few folks we trust to lead us down a musical path as much as the guys at Soul Jazz – and this time, they've definitely taken us in the right direction – with cuts that include "Midnight" by Tim Blake, "Gang (For Rock Industry)" by JB Banfi, "To The Other Side Of The Sky" by Michael Garrison, "By Water" by Stratis, "Improvisation On A Concerto Generator" by Laurie Spiegel, "Starborn Suite (part 1)" by Steven Halpern, "Ceres Motion" by Mother Mallard's Portable Masterpiece Company, "As Above So Below" by Carl Matthews, "In The Beginning" by Michael Stearns, "Ever New" by Beverly Glenn-Copeland, "Variations VII Sur Le Theme Des Bene Gesserit" by Richard Pinhas, and "Ancient Stars" by Kevin Braheny. (Out Sound, Rock) CD