Forty-fifth anniversary box set release from The Velvet Underground & Nico featuring the latest remastering. Set consists of 6 discs includes 29 unreleased tracks in a 92-page hardcover book packaging with a sticker of banana. Japanese edition features the high-fidelity SHM-CD format (compatible with standard CD player). The set includes both stereo and mono versions of the album "The Velvet Underground & Nico" (Disc 1-2), as well as Nico's 1967 solo debut CD "Chelsea Girl" (Disc 3), a studio session at Scepter Studio recorded to acetate, and unreleased recording footage from rehearsal at Andy Warhol's Factory in January 1966 (Disc 4), and a live show from Columbus, Ohio (Disc 5-6).

Sly & the Family Stone's debut album is more restrained and not nearly as funky or psychedelic as their subsequent efforts, owing far more to traditional soul arrangements. These aren't that traditional, though; Sly is already using goofier and/or more thoughtful lyrics than the soul norm, and taking some cues from rock in his adventurous and unexpected song construction…

The Honeysuckle Breeze was the debut album by saxophonist Tom Scott. The California Dreams were a vocal group who contributed their singing and harmonies. Scott brought in musicians like Mike Melvoin, Carol Kaye, Max Bennett, Lincoln Mayorga, Glen Campbell, Jimmy Gordon and others to this session. Some of the same set of musicians, including Scott, would also play on Gabor Szabo's album Wind, Sky And Diamonds, also featuring The California Dreamers and also released on Impulse, also in 1967. The Honeysuckle Breeze is celebrated in hip-hop circles for Scott's cover of Jefferson Airplane's "Today", which was sampled in the celebrated song by Pete Rock & CL Smooth, "They Reminisce Over You (T.R.O.Y.)", but the album shows a side of Scott that he would abandon eight years later as his music retained funkiness but started to become lightweight. The Honeysuckle Breeze also features covers of The Beatles' "She's Leaving Home", Donovan's "Mellow Yellow", and The Association's "Never My Love". Scott contributes one original song to the album, "Blues For Hari".

Procol Harum's debut album is amazingly engaging, considering that it was rushed out to capitalize on the hit title track. The material was all already written (before the hit, in fact), but the group recorded the LP in just two days, simply to get a long-player out, and came up with one of the more pleasingly straightforward releases in their history…

Procol Harum's self-titled, debut album bombed in England, appearing six months after "A Whiter Shade of Pale" and "Homburg" with neither hit song on it…

If you want to know why producer Gary Usher is revered in some circles, play The Peanut Butter Conspiracy Is Spreading next to the pretty much self-produced For Children of All Ages. A name as trendy as the Jefferson Airplane - and a sound that is absolutely the Airplane - meets the Mamas & the Papas; the '60s guitars sound smart; the 1967 liner notes by Lawrence Dietz tell you nothing about the group; and the front cover looks like something Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper encountered during Easy Rider. "It's a Happening Thing," like much of this record, tries too hard. Decades after it was recorded, there is charm in a band like the PBC (which rhymes with PCP) being such an authentic figment of someone's countercultural imagination. Sandi Robison is stunning on "Then Came Love," and the production by Gary Usher really is impressive - it makes the record something special…

Though born in New Jersey, smooth soul diva Madeline Bell enjoyed her greatest success in the United Kingdom (where she began living in 1963), and her first album, 1967's Bell's a Poppin', is a thoroughly enjoyable example of British pop record-making at its most poised and professional. Bell had a world-class voice and sang supper-club soul in the manner of Dionne Warwick and Dusty Springfield (the latter of whom was a friend of Bell's and often used her as a backing vocalist); those looking for Southern soul grit will be disappointed, but Bell's a Poppin' is a marvelous example of the British equivalent of Brill Building pop. The arrangements are clever and sophisticated, the musicians are spot-on throughout, producer John Franz adds just the right amount of polish without rubbing away the personality of the music, and Bell's vocals tell a story just beautifully, boasting smarts and understated passion while maintaining a firm sense of control and balance throughout.

Procol Harum's debut album is amazingly engaging, considering that it was rushed out to capitalize on the hit title track. The material was all already written (before the hit, in fact), but the group recorded the LP in just two days, simply to get a long-player out, and came up with one of the more pleasingly straightforward releases in their history…