A sweet set of soundtrack funk – from a film named after one of our favorite streets in Chicago! Although the record's got an approach that's perhaps a bit tighter and smoother than anything going down on Stony in the late 70s, it does manage to share a good deal of styles with the Chi-soul scene of the time – thanks to work on the record from Chicagoans Gene Barge, Sonny Seals, and Tennyson Stephens! Many of the tracks on the set have a bad-walking soul approach – one that's kind of a mixture of funky and bluesy – and these are laid out next to some jazzier instrumentals that we like most of all – tunes that have a great funky soundtrack feel, but with a bit more fusion touches than usual, probably because of the work of David Matthews. Titles include "Percy Fired", "Party Lights", "High Speed Posters", "Back To Business", "Chase The Train", "Gangster City", "Dream Ride", and "Peace Of Mind". LP, Vinyl record album

A real standout effort from ex-Animal Alan Price – not just because it was the soundtrack for a film in which he starred, but also because it features some of his hippest tracks to date! Price has a great post-60s feel here that's a bit like the territory Georgie Fame was hitting at the time – still with some elements of his rougher, R&B-inspired style of the previous decade – but served up with a newly sophisticated approach to rhythms and vocalizing that really stand out. The whole thing's pretty hard to characterize with a few simple labels, but there's a nice sense of depth and play going on – due partly, no doubt, to the freedom that Price was given with the music by director Lindsay Anderson. Titles include "O Lucky Man", "Pastoral", "Arrival", "Look Over Your Shoulder", "Justice", "My Home Town", "Changes", and "Sell Sell". LP, Vinyl record album

A record that's not only a landmark in Jamaican music – but also a set that was to reggae what Curtis Mayfield's Superfly was to 70s soul! In other words, the set not only raised the bar for all the competition, it also ended up in a lot more record collections than most of them too – maybe in part because it was a soundtrack, as was Superfly – but also because it has this global power that makes it a defining album of the genre! Jimmy Cliff is obviously the mainman here, but there's help from other key players in the growing reggae scene – and titles include Jimmy's classic "You Can Get It If You Really Want", in two versions – plus two takes on "The Harder They Come", "Many Rivers To Cross", and "Sitting In Limbo" – plus "Sweet & Dandy" and "Pressure Drop" by The Maytals, "007" by Desmond Dekker, "Johnny Too Bad" by The Slicers, "Draw Your Brakes" by Scotty, and "Rivers Of Babylon" by The Melodians. (Reggae, Soundtracks) LP, Vinyl record album

Really funky sounds from Maurice Lecoeur – an overlooked French soundtrack genius of the 70s – and one who worked in territory that was way past familiar standards for film! If you know the music of Francois DeRoubaix, you'll find plenty here to love – because like DeRoubaix, Lecoeur effortlessly mixes acoustic and electric, groovy and laidback, funky and jazzy – all with styles that move from full instrumentation to much sparer moments – at a level that matches if not beats some of the coolest sound library material of the time! Each track seems to have a very different vibe, which really keeps things interesting – and plenty funky too – and the package features 22 rare nuggets that include "Le Ballet Inacheve", "Sans Premeditation", "Baoou", "Safari Au Kivu Theme 1", "Faux Suspense", "Le Soleil Qui Rit Rouge", "Les Petites Filles Modeles", "Donne Moi La Terre", "Tartares", and "Chili". (Sound Library, Soundtracks) LP, Vinyl record album

Mancini's light lilting groovy score to this flop of a film by Howard Hawks! Again, the score is better remembered than the film – probably because it gave the world the great cut "Baby Elephant Walk", a goofy little number that still gets churned up a lot today. There's lots of other nice bits like that one on here, including "Big Band Bwana", "Night Side", "Crocodile Go Home", and "Theme From Hatari". LP, Vinyl record album