With selections by King Oliver's Dixie Syncopators, New Orleans Rhythm Kings, Johnny Dodds' Black Bottom Stompers, Red Nicols & His Five Pennies, Jimmy Noone's Apex Club Orchestra, Jelly Roll Mortion, Pine Top Smith, James P Johnson, Elmer Schoebel's Friar Society Orchestra, Benny Goodman, Eddie Lang & Joe Venuti, and Duke Ellington. LP, Vinyl record album

Hypnotic organ funk from Lyman Woodard – an old bandmate of Dennis Coffey, and one of the shining lights of the 70s Detroit scene! This is amazing, amazing stuff – Woodard's electric piano, organ and occasional mellotron and Norma Bell's alto saxophone lend a cosmic funk aspect throughout, very much like Death Wish-era Herbie Hancock – with a laidback, tripped-out groove that's really mindblowing! Ron English accents the thing perfectly with his languid guitar and bass groove, while Leonard King and Lorenzo Brown's drumming and percussion can keep the groove adrift, or tear it up in a funky maelstrom depending on the mission of the cut. It's totally essential Strata jazz funk – and a record we've rarely seen in the original pressing. Tracks include "Saturday Night Special", "Joy Road", "Belle Isle Daze", "Creative Musicians", "Cheeba", "On Your Mind", "Allen Barnes" and "Help Me Get Away". LP, Vinyl record album

New Skin for Leonard Cohen, who by 1974 was ready to start singing with a bit more flair, and do so over more textured arrangements – but still raw both emotionally and in the unglossy instrumentation! The core of the sound is still Cohen's voice, his words, and acoustic guitar – but this record brings in some ragged acoustic instrumentation and loose percussion, as well as some more layered strings, some winds, and backing vocals – Janis Ian among the vocalists. On later records, bigger productions would nearly choke the natural life out of Cohen's songs, but this is one of those totally great records where the change in sound would actually enhance the material in the studio – allowing for one of his best albums of the 70s. Titles include "Is This What You Wanted", "Chelsea Hotel #2", "Lover Lover Lover", "Field Commander Cohen", "Ther Is A War", "A Singer Must Die", "Leaving Greensleeves" and more. LP, Vinyl record album

Leonard Cohen's debut for Columbia, one of the most astounding first albums of its era, and to this day a towering achievement in both songwriting and myth making! The production is that perfectly haunting mix of sparseness and grandeur, with Cohen's lyricism piercing and penetrating wonderfully – his voice never sounded better, and this is certainly one of the great "lightening in a bottle" efforts that was hard to top by Cohen or anyone else in the more poetic upper levels of pop music. Includes ""Suzanne", "Master Song", "Winter Lady", "The Stranger Song", "Sisters Of Mercy", "So Long, Marianne", "Hey, That's No Way To Say Goodbye", "Stories Of The Street", "Teachers" and "One Of Us Cannot Be Wrong". LP, Vinyl record album

Wild stuff – a soundtrack made up of a number of different avant classical pieces, designed to accompany the film The Female Prisoner. Boulez directs Webern's "Five Pieces For Orchestra OP 10", and Leonard Bernstein directs Mahler's "Third Movement from Symphony No 4". The best part, though, is side two – which features Berio's striking "Visage" – a classic magnetic tape work based on the vocals of Cathy Berberian and filled with nice electronics! LP, Vinyl record album

A return to folksier forms for Tom Rapp and Pearls Before Swine – working here in territory that's very different than some of the baroque light arrangements used on previous records. Rapp's emerging as a more confident singer/songwriter – recording in an almost Dylan-like setting, but with more of the irony of Leonard Cohen, and as always, working in a timeless idiom that's still beginning to be understood more than 30 years after its inception. Beautiful work throughout – as earthy as it is majestic – and with titles that include "My Father", "The Man", "Once Upon A Time", "City Of Gold", "Nancy", and "Wedding". LP, Vinyl record album

An overlooked gem from Diana Ross' 80s years – a record that's quite different than her Motown music of the 60s and 70s, but in a way that really shows the singer stepping out and trying something new! The album's maybe more soulful than some of Diana's previous albums – thanks to work from producer Tom Dowd – and the material is a surprising mix of songs, from sources as varied as Leonard Cohen, Luther Vandross, and Mick Hucknall! Ross does nice a nice job in reworking older soul classics – like Jackie Ross' "Selfish One" and The Drifters' "There Goes My Baby" – nestled in nicely next to more contemporary tracks that include "Dirty Looks", "Shockwaves", "Tell Me Again", "Shine", "Summertime", and "It's Hard For Me To Say". LP, Vinyl record album

The group billed as "The Mitchells" is an unusual "family" projects put together by Leonard Feather – featuring Whitey Mitchell on bass, Blue Mitchell on trumpet, and Red Mitchell on both bass and piano – none of them related, but coming together here because they all share a last name! Whitey directs the music on the record, and is really the boss of the set – and other players include Frank Rehak on trombone, Pepper Adams on baritone sax, and Andre Previn on piano – working together in a tightly-focused way that carries some of the hallmarks of some of Adams' other albums of the period. Titles include the originals "Three Cheers", "Blues For Brian", "Get Those Elephants Outta Here", and "Monster Rally". LP, Vinyl record album

Beautiful music from singer Tom Rapp – probably best known as the lead voice behind Pearls Before Swine, but a hell of a solo act on his own! The work here follows in the same moody, melancholic territory as the best ESP sides from Pearls Before Swine – but there's also a bit tighter feel too – not one that's commercial, but just very well put-together – with a vibe that's a bit like some of the best early Leonard Cohen material for Columbia. Rapp's got an extremely unique sound in his vocals – which makes the tunes come across with an eerie quality that goes well beyond their simple lyrical content – and the backing mixes familiar folk elements with undercurrents of percussion and bits of jazzy phrasing – a bit like you might find on some mellower late 60s moments from Donovan. Titles include "Stardancer", "Marshall", "Les Ans", "The Baptist", "Tiny Song", "Summer Of 55", and "For The Dead In Space". LP, Vinyl record album

Sheesh, Howard Rumsey sure knew how to stick his name on a lot of records! (He must have been trying to give Norman Granz and Leonard Feather a run for their money!) Fortunately, most of them were also great – like this one, which features flute duets between Bob Cooper and either Bud Shank or Buddy Collette, over rhythms by Sonny Clark or Claude Williamson on piano, Max Roach or Stan Levy on drums, and Howard Rumsey on bass (actually making a rare appearance on wax here!) Titles include "Aquarium", "Still Life", "Bag's Groove", "Hermosa Summer", "Albatross", "Night In Tunisia", "Warm WInds", and "Happy Town". LP, Vinyl record album

A beautiful little record from Tony Kosinec – a lesser-known songwriter from the late 60s scene, and one with a pretty unusual sound as well! Tony originally hails from the UK, but was working in Canada at the time of this set – and the album's an unusual blend of folksy roots with jazzier phrasing – a set that sits nicely in the company of Columbia contemporaries like Leonard Cohen or Tim Hardin, and which also has a voice that's as uniquely formed as theirs! Tony's tunes are quite poetic, but never too much so – and his way of singing is sometimes fluid, but never flowery – almost informed by jazz, but not jazzy – if we can get away with that many qualifiers in one sentence. There's a slight hint of roots in the backings, but Tony's accent and performance never lapse into simple country cliches. Titles include "Mystic Fifties", "Tyrant", "Down On Words", "Cleopatra", "Feather Of A Boy", "Summer/Spring", and "I Can't Sing". LP, Vinyl record album

Includes recordings with Washboard Rhythm Kings, Bumble Bee Slim, Tampa Red, Leonard Scott, Victoria Spivey, and Lorraine Walton. LP, Vinyl record album

The incredible debut from Pearls Before Swine – a group who were a bit late to the New York folk party of the 60s – but at a level that really helped them evolve past the rest of their scene! The album's sometimes a bit overlooked – as it came out on the mostly-jazz ESP label – but it's a mindblowing treasure from the year of 1967, and one of the most forward-thinking albums of the time! The group begin with folk constructions, but really take off quickly with some trippier elements too – especially when they mix organ, vibes, or electronics with more familiar guitar and mandolin. Singer Tom Rapp maybe has a slight touch of Dylan in his approach, but he's already up there as his own man – and we love Rapp so much, we'd place him in the same heady territory as Tim Buckley, Tim Hardin, or Leonard Cohen – all of whose work is a good match for the energy here. There's a wonderfully dark quality to this album that gives it a timeless feel – strains of avant instrumentation underneath the gentler sound of Rapp's voice, and an undying sadness that's matched by the feel of songs like "Another Time", "Playmate", "Drop Out", "Ballad To An Amber Lady", "Miss Morse", "I Shall Not Care", and "Morning Song". LP, Vinyl record album

Excellent postwar work from Joe Turner – not as well-known as his Altantic material, but featuring great small combo backings – with players who include Pete Johnson on piano, Otis Finch and Don Byas on tenors, Riley Hampton on alto, Ellsworth Perkins and Leonard Ware on guitars, and Ellsworth Ligget on piano! LP, Vinyl record album

A really great album from Nancy Wilson – a set that still has her working with the jazzy undercurrents of her best 60s work for Capitol Records – yet also moving into some hipper, more sophisticated soul styles too! There's a really strong adult vibe to the record – not that Nancy didn't have one before, but this time around there's even more sense of personality and experiential depth that really comes through in the choice of songs – and in Wilson's wonderful treatment of them. Tunes that might be stiff in the hands of someone else are really transformed here – with added thanks to Phil Wright for great arrangements on the record. Titles include a version of Leonard Cohen's "Suzanne", Burt Bacharach's obscure "Waitin For Charlie To Come Home", and the tracks "Trip With Me", "This Girl Is A Woman Now", "Mixed Up Girl", and "Words & Music". LP, Vinyl record album

A great batch of moogy grooves from the In Search Of Orchestra – really the team of Laurin Rinder & Michael Lewis, working here on a slightly wider variation of the styles used in their dancefloor work for AVI! The album's somewhat of a soundtrack for the In Search Of TV show hosted by Leonard Nimoy – and it's a wonderful blend of keyboards and subtle funky rhythms – often at a pace that's a lot more laidback and spacious than some of the more familiar disco from Rinder & Lewis. Lewis plays a host of great keys – including Fender Rhodes, clavinet, harpsichord, and synth – and the tracks range from long to short, with plenty of great funky bits and samples in the mix. Titles include "A Taste Of Ghosts", "Time Traveler", "The Rise & Fall Of Vlad Dracula", "In Search Of", "Nazca Lines", "Easter Island Suite", and "Afterthought". LP, Vinyl record album

Funky Funky New Orleans is back – in this 2-part part 2 series! (Confusing, ain't it?) Like the now-famous first volume, both of these second volumes feature a stunning array of rare funky tunes from the Crescent City – obscure funky 45 numbers that go way way past the hits you might find on some of the more general New Orleans compilations, to feature a wealth of material that even we haven't heard before. The sound is a bit rough on a few of these numbers – in a stone-heavy garage funk style that makes the grooves come across even more strikingly than they might otherwise – and there's also a fair bit of 70s jazz funk jamming on these tunes, freer and more upbeat than the usual heavy New Orleans groove. Titles on this first volume include "Quiet Village (parts 1 & 2)" by Dome City Rock Orchestra, "Dull Knifin" by Trick Bag, "Git It" by Sam & The Soul Machine, "Get Down (parts 1 & 2)" by Gary Brown & Soul Machine 2, "Funky Sweep" by Isaac Price II, "Thief" by The Enticers, "Keep The News To Yourself" by Larry Hamilton, "The Joke" by Leonard Harris, and "Gossip" by Larry Hamilton. LP, Vinyl record album

A really moody little record from David Blue – a folksy singer who's got a style that definitely lives up to the melancholy promise of his name! Blue's definitely an artist with a difference – working in the familiar mode of vocals and acoustic guitar, but with an edge and distinctness that really sets him apart from the folkies of a few year before – that sense of different that really set apart a new wave of contemporaries, like Leonard Cohen, Fred Neill, or Tom Rapp. Titles include "These 23 Days In September", "The Sailor's Lament", "Scales For A Window Thief", "You Will Come Back Again", "Slow & Easy", and "The Grand Hotel". LP, Vinyl record album

The second album by Tom Rapp's legendary group Pearls Before Swine – and a haunting batch of tracks that is far and away one of our favorite rock albums of the 60s! The style of the music is incredible – a dark blend of rock and folk, with slight avant influences, in a style that's influenced countless groups in later years, most famously some of the British acts on 4AD. Rapp's vision and vocals are instantly captivating – sad and moody but never self-pitying, with a sound that's as striking as the production of the album's jagged musical backings. Includes the tracks "Translucent Carriages", "I Saw the World", "Lepers and Roses", and a cover of Leonard Cohen's "Suzanne". LP, Vinyl record album

With backings from Leonard DePaur – and titles that include "Strange Fruit", "Lamento Esclavo", "Partisian Song", "Oh Freedom", and "Cry The Beloved Country". LP, Vinyl record album