Music » Blues Box Set Music

This two-CD box contains all 41 recordings Johnson made, including 12 alternate takes, and each cut remains a classic. This set's release in 1990 caused quite a stir, selling more than 500,000 copies, and, on the basis of endorsements from Eric Clapton and Keith Richards, introduced a great number of rock fans to Delta blues. Amazingly, Johnson built his enormous legacy on the strength of just two recording sessions: the first session, in November of 1936, produced among others "I Believe I'll Dust My Broom," "Sweet Home Chicago," "Cross Road Blues," and "Walkin' Blues," making it perhaps the most influential single session in blues history. --Marc Greilsamer

When you're anthologizing the Rolling Stones, one of the first things you must accept is that you're doomed to failure. No one album can possibly tell the story of the band that's explored so many different musical avenues and recorded so many memorable songs. Still, the double-disc best of HOT ROCKS, and this, its sequel, come perilously close. This set wisely doesn't attempt to be comprehensive. Instead, it just picks out various gems from different points in the band's development.

Their R&B/roots period is well-represented by covers of "It's All Over Now" and "Not Fade Away." "She's A Rainbow" and "2000 Light Years From Home" are monuments to the band's psychedelic phase. "No Expectations" and "Let It Bleed" are bluesy tunes that cut to the quick, emphasizing the Stones' gift for visceral compositions and the sound that defined what was--arguably--their greatest period (the late '60s). Though HOT ROCKS is the place to turn for a comprehensive cross section of the band's biggest and most essential hits, MORE HOT ROCKS is an excellent companion piece, bringing together some of the Stones' lesser known but equally satisfying work.

No Description AvailableNo Track Information AvailableMedia Type: CDArtist: LED ZEPPELINTitle: COMPLETE STUDIO RECORDINGSStreet Release Date: 09/28/1993

Think five discs and 131 songs is too much Louis Jordan? Not a chance. Not for a man who so consistently and so definitively achieved the elusive and delicate combination of musicianship and accessibility. Not for a man who paved new and vital musical roads without ever losing his sense of style or his appetite for fun. Covering Jordan's historic (not to mention commercially successful) Decca tenure (1938 to 1950), this amazing collection finds the alto sax player, songwriter, and singer building blues and swing into a hot mix that came to be known as R&B, producing hit after hit with topnotch bands behind him, streamlining the big-band concept without diminishing the music's force. Much has been made of his role in the development of R&B--and as a result, rock & roll--and his importance as a musical pioneer can't be underestimated. But all ideas about "historical importance" fade away as these vibrant, insistent, irresistible tracks roll by. --Marc Greilsamer

Item is in mint condition great gift for any zeppelin fan.

Gentle, graceful, subtle, sweet--these aren't descriptions generally applied to the blues, but they offer a sense of Mississippi John Hurt's uniqueness and enduring legacy. Rediscovered during the 1960s folk boom after last recording in the late 1920s, Hurt cut the three albums compiled here when he was in his early 70s. His conversational phrasing sounds as natural as breathing, while his ragtime-tinged fingerpicking on acoustic guitar reveals more complexity the closer you listen. Beyond blues classics like "Candy Man" (the sly sensualist wasn't referring to lollipops), Hurt's range encompasses everything from folkish narratives ("Talking Casey," "Spike Driver Blues") to Southern spirituals ("Nearer My God to Thee," "Farther Along"). Though Hurt died in 1966, shortly after the last of these sessions, the music still sounds so fresh, you can almost hear the twinkle in his eye. --Don McLeese

Including both his band work (with the Yardbirds, John Mayall's Blues Breakers, Cream, Blind Faith, Delaney and Bonnie, and Derek and the Dominos) and his long, varied solo career, this four-CD set does a spectacular job in gathering several decades' worth of Clapton's best. There are the requisite classics--"Layla," "Blues Power," "After Midnight," "Further On Up the Road," "Crossroads," and "I Shot the Sheriff," among many others--some of them in previously unreleased live or alternate studio recordings. Released in 1988, when only superstars were granted the box set, Crossroads became the blueprint for what such a retrospective should be. For its scope, this box skims the cream of Clapton's large output. --Daniel Durchholz

This 1971 collaboration between primal one-part-Delta/one-part-Detroit singer-guitarist John Lee Hooker and Southern California blues revivalists Canned Heat works in large part because all parties involved are a little off. Hooker, the most unsystematic of the major bluesmen of his generation, isn't a good fit for disciplined players; rather, he requires sidemen who play by feel. In harp player-guitarist Alan Wilson, the Crawling King Snake found a particularly sympathetic foil; sadly, Wilson died shortly after these sessions were completed. Roughly divided into spare, gritty Delta exercises and full-on boogie stomps featuring the full band, Hooker 'n' Heat is surely one of Canned Heat's crowning moments, which isn't saying that much. But that it stands as a milestone in Hooker's oeuvre is quite a statement indeed! --Steven Stolder

Release Date: 2003-08-12, Audio CD, Jsp Records

This box set is a compilation of all the Rolling Stones' singles from 1963 to 1971, including A-sides, B-sides and alternate B-sides from the U.S. and the U.K. releases. These 58 songs on 3 discs have been digitally remastered with most tracks in mono to reflect the sound of the original 45s.

THE SINGLES COLLECTION: THE LONDON YEARS comes as advertised--the box includes every American and British A-side and B-side the Rolling Stones released between 1963 and 1971 (after which the band began releasing discs under the Rolling Stones Records imprint). The fantastic speed and scope of the Stones' early artistic development have few parallels in popular music, and this collection not only details that incredible process, but serves as a microcosm of '60s pop culture as well.

From the down-and-dirty Chicago-style blues and R&B of the group's early covers (Chuck Berry's "Come On," Willie Dixon's "I Just Wanna Make Love to You") to the dreamy chamber pop of "Lady Jane" and the proto-hard rock of "Street Fightin' Man," the band was always on the cutting edge, both reacting to and anticipating cultural and musical trends. One listen to this box, however, reveals that, unlike the Beatles, the Stones seldom veered far from their roots, always injecting a vital dose of raw sexuality and pure rock & roll spirit into even the boldest of experiments.