A huge amount of material from The Rockin Berries – one of the great almost-rans of the UK scene in the 60s – a group who should have stormed our shores during the British Invasion, but somehow got left off the boat! The group's got everything shared by all their best contemporaries – a great way with a tune, an ear for a catchy hook, and a way of mixing harmonized vocals with harder rocking moments at a level that means that there's plenty at the core, and the combo need no sweetening up in the studio! They also have two lead singers – Clive Lea and Geoff Turton – who sound great when harmonizing together, and can also split off and really let the group cover a nice range of material. Both of the albums here were produced by Brit sound maestro John Schroeder – Rockin Berries In Town and Life Is Just A Bowl Of Berries – and the set also features 36 more bonus tracks from singles and EP releases at the time – 60 tracks in all! CD

Rare rock from the Golden Triangle scene of Southeast TX in the late 60s and early 70s – a well-curated overview of the stylistically sprawling material being cut at Mickey Rouse's Lowland Recording Studio in Beaumont! Texas rock of the late 60s and early 70s justifiably brings to mind acts like The 13th Floor Elevators and The Bubble Puppy – tripped out psychedelia in other words, but Texas is huge, and there was a heck of a lot more going on than just the best remembered cult favorites. The music coming out of just the Beaumont, Port Arthur, Orange, Texas "triangle" chronicled here was incredibly diverse. It includes proto TX boogie rock that's a clear precursor to early ZZ Top, harmony flavored numbers that sound closer to Cali than they do The Lone Star State, one track that somehow fuses CS&N with The Beatles and does so with prominent cowbell in the mix (and it's good!!!), punchy psych grit, and swaggering country rock with some twang in the strings that feels a bit more profoundly Texan. You don't need our word that The Numero Group has devoted some serious attention to detail – with a 35-page booklet of notes, photos and histories, plus the impressive Lost In The Golden Triangle "family tree" of the regional musicians involved – as if discovering these long buried regional relics wasn't impressive enough already. Beautiful! 22 tracks in all: "Trash One" by the Lowland Studio Band, "Live My Life Today" by Insight Out, "Simple House" by Mother Lion, "Love Of The Morning" by Circus, "Take A Look At Your Friends" by Next Exit, "You Know I Love You" by Roy Briggs & Alton Tew, "Calling Me Home (Demo)" by Donald Thomas and more. (Funky Compilations, Rock) CD

A wonderful showcase for the wide-ranging talents of Stackridge – as the set features key production work from George Martin, who really has a way of expanding the sounds at the core of their music! Although Martin's best known for his famous Beatles work of the 60s, the maestro's touch in the studio seems to bring out even more here with a group like Stackridge – really focusing the energy of their songs, while also giving them a larger sonic platform to work from – larger arrangements at times, but never in a way that seems to cover up the energy at the core! Titles include "Pinafore Days", "The Last Plimsoll", "Humiliation", "Road To Venezuela", "Fundamentally Yours", "Dangerous Bacon", "The Galloping Gaucho", and "To The Sun & The Moon". 2CD edition features a full bonus disc of BBC recordings! CD

An amazing second chapter for The Music Machine – working here with the last name of leader Sean Bonniwell in their name – in a groove that's even weirder and wilder than before! The group take on an odd new sound here – still the heady brew of fuzz and Hammond on their original garagey recordings from LA – but with a mode that also really lets Bonniwell's offbeat character come to the forefront – both in the odd lyrics, and his stark presentation in the lead – a Sunset Strip sense of personality that's almost up there with Kim Fowley at times! The record's definitely one of the weirder, more edgey sides cut for Warner Brothers in the mid 60s – and titles include "Astrologically Incompatible", "Double Yellow Line", "The Trap", "Soul Love", "Bottom Of The Soul", "Me Myself & I", and "The Eagle Never Hunts The Fly". CD features an insane 49 tracks in all – the full 14 track album, other Warner singles, and demos and rare material that includes solo tracks by Sean Bonniwell too! CD

An incredibly ambitious record – despite the fact that it was recorded in a tiny home studio! Ithaca are basically the same group who recorded the Agincourt album a few years before – and like that one, this set is awash in some of the best elements from bigger progressive groups of the time – filtered down into much leaner, more personal levels of presentation. The tunes are all longish, and build with a gently layered blend of guitars, piano, organ, mandolin, flute, and recorder – plus some especially cool tape effects, which are used to electrify a few moments, and create some subtle sonic intensity. There's also a beautiful female voice on the record – floating through the tunes with an eerie feel – and the overall sound is almost a folksy take on Pink Floyd – with great acoustic and electric elements slowly simmering together. Titles include "Journey", "Feelings", "Dreams", "Times", and "Questions". CD also features 3 bonus tracks – and a well-done set of notes! CD

The lasting legacy of Screaming Lord Sutch – and an album that's almost equally well-known for its work by a host of famous guests – including Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, John Bonham, and others! Page is perhaps the most involved here – as he produced the set with Sutch, co-wrote some tracks, and plays some mighty searing guitar – as does Beck, which makes the album almost worth it alone for all the wonderful solos! But Sutch himself is pretty great too – kind of a mish-mash of late 60s nasty camp references, with the same sinister vibe as Kim Fowley – and an equally freewheeling approach to a tune that makes the album a heck of a lot of fun. Titles include "Gutty Guitar", "Flashing Lights", "Wailing Sounds", "Thumping Beat", "Union Jack Car", and "London". CD

A set that really digs deep into the British scene of the early 70s – a package pitched around the idea of opening acts for supergroups at a rock festival, and one that serves up a whole host of groups who never fully got their due on our side of the Atlantic at the time! These aren't underground or experimental groups – and most recorded for major labels – but they also weren't chart-topping acts, or those that have gone into the classic rock pantheon – which makes for a really great discovery to most ears not fully acquainted with this moment in UK rock! The set was put together by Bob Stanley and Pete Wiggs – who've given us other seminal sets of UK music from the 70s, and groovy 60s compilations too – and they really do a great job here of setting the scene, and picking the best cuts from groups who are top-shelf in their effort and execution. As always with the pair, the notes with the set are as illuminating as the music – and titles include "Taken All The Good Things" by Stray, "Out Demons Out" by Edgar Broughton Band, "One Way Glass" by Manfred Mann Chapter Three, "Hold On To Your Mind" by Andwella, "Big Boobs Boogie" by Slowload, "Third World" by Paladin, "For Mad Men Only" by May Blitz, "Met Pies Ave Come" by Stack Waddy, "Ricochet" by Jonesy, and the surprising inclusion of some rocking KPM sound library tracks – including "Hot Pants" by Alan Parker & Alan Hawkshaw, "Led Balloon" by Steve Gray, and "Confunction" by Dave Richmond. CD

A pivotal album in the career of Ryuichi Sakamoto – a set that got wide global circulation right at a time when he was a rising star on the screen as much as a surprising international music star as well – of the sort who became a key global representative for all the changes that had been taking place in Japanese music at the start of the 80s! Sakamoto's got an elegant look on the cover, and the music shares that approach too – jazzier than before, but still with that key knowledge of electronic elements that Ryuichi had in YMO – almost a blend of late 70s Japanese fusion with keyboards, samples, and other technology that Sakamoto helped bring into the mainstream at the time – but also with a quality that points the way to soundtrack shifts in the Ghibli generation! This package presents the original Japanese album – not the Illustrated Musical Encyclopedia set that was circulated globally – with tracks that include "May In The Backyard", "Paradise Lost", "Self Portrait", "Etude", "Tibetan Dance", "Tribute To NJP", and other titles in Japanese. Also includes bonus material from the 12" EP – "Replica", "Tibetan Dance (version)", and "Ma Mere L'Oye". (Japanese, Rock) CD

The new sound of the European scene at the end of the 70s – music that carries plenty of inspiration from post-punk modes, but which also carries forth some key elements of prog as well – all at a level that's quite a surprise if you only know more iconic material of the time! The artists here aren't all British or European, but the sound within definitely showcases the way that later electronic experiments of the 70s were thinning down in the work of underground UK and German labels – and also showing the way that the instrumental excesses of the earlier part of the decade were being packed down into more economical packages, but all without losing any sense of freshness or experimentation! The set takes its title from a song on the last Bowie Berlin album – a great reference for the music – and titles include "Tight As A Drum" by Thomas Leer, "Silent Command" by Cabaret Voltaire, "Theme For Great Cities" by Simple Minds, "White Car In Germany" by The Associates, "Nite Flights" by The Walker Brothers, "3,000,000 Synths" by Chaz Jankel, "Nightcrawler" by Patrick Cowley, "Riot In Lagos" by Ryuichi Sakamoto, "Silicon Chip" by Basil Kirchin, "Ode To Perfume" by Holger Czukay, "Do Weit So Gut" by Harald Grosskopft, "The Farther Away I Am" by Daryl Hall (with Robert Fripp), and "Patriarcat" by Areski & Brigitte Fontaine. CD

The mindblowing first album from The Deviants – one of the weirdest, wildest groups on the UK scene in the late 60s – more garagey than psych, but pretty trippy at times too – and with a nasty edge that almost makes you feel like Kim Fowley was urging them on in the studio! The legendary Mick Farren is at the head of the group on vocals, but the set is clearly a collective effort – recorded by The Deviants themselves, before any label made them an offer to hit the studios – which may well be why the whole thing has such a distinct vibe of its own! The group almost have a proto-punk attitude at times – more LA than London – and they effortlessly shift through gems here that include "I'm Coming Home", "Garbage", "Bun", "Deviation Street", "Child Of The Sky", and the percussive heavy, batucada-like "Nothing Man". CD

Amazing music from Laurance Vanay – actually a recording name for Jacqueline Thibault, a hell of a great keyboardist but an artist the label thought would be better off billed as a man! The sound here is halfway between the spacey experiments of Brian Eno and Cluster, and some of the more ambitious sound library work of the time – particularly those rare moments when prog artist got to do some studio work! Thibault's keyboards are wonderful – lots of Fender Rhodes mixed with Hammond and early synth – usually spun out at an instrumental level that has the tunes building slowly in these really great layers of sound – almost like a Popol Vuh soundtrack, but a lot more tuneful too. There's a fragile complexity that really makes the music special – and unlike anything we've ever heard from the European scene of the time – and titles include "Alone In The Rain", "Evening Colours", "Forgotten Moments", "Twin Cities", "Eyes Closed On The Way", "Sunshine In My Heart", and "Underwater Light Reflection". CD features a huge amount of bonus tracks – includign "Mamie"," Mop", and "Fausse Fn" – plus alternate takes of songs on the album. CD

A really cool blend of voice and electronics – years ahead of its time, and with a vibe that maybe prefaces some of the European industrial work to come at the end of the 70s! Ruth White is well known for her electronic experimentation – right up there with the work of Pierre Henry at the same time – but for this release, she also adds a bit of her own voice too – readings of words from the poems of Charles Baudelaire, but processed in ways that really emphasize some of the darkness in the lines in a really great way! White does all sorts of cool things with her voice, in ways that are again years ahead of their time – and titles include "Owls", "The Cat", "Spleen", and "The Litanies Of Satan". (Out Sound, Rock) CD

Great groovy pop from the Italian scene of the 60s – a wealth of rare singles from female singers, almost all of whom we've never heard before! We'll confess to a long love and deep knowledge of female French singers from the time – but also admit a strong ignorance about most Italian pop, which always seems a bit harder to find – especially collected together in sets like this for the English-speaking world. And while we totally love the French sets from Ace Records, we almost dig this one even more – as the whole thing's so fresh, so groovy that each new tune is a real delight – as bold orchestrations mix with mod rhythms, rockish instrumentation, and some totally cool Italian lyrics sung by a batch of female singers who've definitely got us already digging for more. Titles include "Baluba Shake" by Brunetta E I Suoi Balubas, "Il Mio Posto Quale" by Ornella Vanoni, "Sono Qui Con Voi by Caterina Caselli, "Un Amore Inutile" by Isabella Ianetti, "La Notte E Fatta Per Rubare" by Catherine Spaak, "Il Geghege" by Rita Pavone, "Ragazzo Triste" by Patty Pravo, "Se Telefonando" by Mina, and "Questa Sinfona" by Carmen Villani. CD

The title's a bit confusing, but that's the way we like it – as the package brings together all sorts of weird and wonderful tunes – work that maybe even pushes past the boundaries of the other wild work we've loved on previous volumes in this series! The set list is huge – 50 tracks in all – and the package runs the gamut of unusual rare singles, with certainly some that might reference the odd jumble of words in the title – but others that all take off in the wonderful melange of modes. We'd not heard most of the work here before – and once again our hat's off to Lux & Ivy for hipping us to so many underground gems – in a huge set list that includes "Rat A Ma Cue" by Pat Patterson, "You're Gone I'm Left" by Tyrone Schmidling, "Red Tiger Shoes" by The Century Five, "Busy Line" by Billy Williams, "Chilli Dippin Baby" by Joyce Poynter, "Big Bowl Of Soul" by The Huntsmen, "I've Been Wrong" by Sweetie Jones, "Hot Shot" by Ronnie Pearson, "Lover Boy" by Chris Christian & The Chordaires, "Ford & Shaker" by James Gallagher, "Leather Jacket Cowboy" by Pepper Pots, "Oh Death" by John Reedy & His Stone Mountain Trio, and "Bongosera" by Grupo Afro Cubano. CD

A really heady set of tracks from the American scene – music that effortlessly bridges the 60s sounds of garage, blues rock, and psych – and prefaces some of the metal and more guitar-heavy modes to emerge later on in the 70s! The work here definitely shares more with the sounds of the 60s, but also really captures the music at a moment when things were really transforming – groups were getting past a slavish presentation of their influences, finding bold new modes of expression, and really letting their freak flag fly with fuzzy brilliance throughout – all at levels that were also different than some of the longer-spun modes of the European progressive world. As with other Grapefruit packages, the distillation of a sound and scene here is wonderful – and supported with very detailed notes too – in a package that includes 62 tracks in all - with work from Bang, Sudden Death, Dust, Arthur Lee, Boomerang, Cactus, Grand Funk, The Flow, Head Over Heels, Sir Lord Baltimore, ZZ Top, Brigade, Fuse, Conception, Morgen, Coven, Alice Cooper, Nazz, Stack, Spirit, Kim Fowley, SRC, Mass Confusion Rock Band, Society's Children, Omnibus, Wildwood, Human Beinz, The Sound Barrier, Fever Tree, and many others! CD

The seminal debut of The Cosmic Jokers – a Krautrock supergroup who really offer up a genre-setting standard with the work on the set! Each track takes up a full side of the record – spun out by the spacious electric talents of Manuel Gottsching, Dieter Dierks, Klaus Schulze, Harald Grosskopf, and Jurgen Dollase – often with a sound that's much leaner than you might expect, which is what makes the record so amazing! These guys are almost an antidote to the heavy jamming of the prog scene – as instead of sounding like a quintet really blowing the roof off the studio, they work this kind of alchemy with their instruments, slowly shifting sound and style in ways that are still as mindblowing now as they were back in 1973. The set features two long tracks – "Galactic Joke" and "Cosmic Joy". CD