The seemingly bottomless record collection of Nick Saloman from the Bevis Frond has spawned the third in an ongoing series of albums collecting obscure instrumental tracks from the '60s and '70s, and while many of these songs support the popular notion that the hipper and more interesting rock artists of the day were fond of vocal numbers, there are some fun and exciting tunes to be found on this set. Roaring Blue draws its title from the lead-off track, a swinging dance tune by the Sound of Jimmy Nicol, featuring the drummer who briefly replaced an ailing Ringo Starr during a tour in 1964 (this may explain why Nicol's drums are so far up in the mix), while members of the long-running U.K. pop band Blue Mink appear on the track "Beat Party" under the pseudonym the Underground, and John McLaughlin adds guitar licks to "Trans-Love Airways" by Big Jim Sullivan.

The Yardbirds are certainly one of the most unstable British rock groups of all time, reflected by the fact that it produced three of the greatest guitarists in history: Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Jimmy Page. It is mostly because all three started out with the Yardbirds that the group is regarded so highly even though they only had a half-dozen Top 40 hits in 1965-1966: "For Your Love" (#6), "Heart Full of Soul" (#9), "I'm A Man" (#17), "Happening Ten Years Time Ago" (#30), "Over Under Sideways Down" (#13), and "Shapes of Things" (#11). I provide the list to show the shortcomings of this 25 track collection from Repertoire. You get only four of their top six hits and there are several "hits" collections which rectify this problem. True, most of those are multi-disc collections, but we are talking about one of the pivotal rock 'n' roll groups of the Sixties.

This is a reasonably comprehensive collection of Peter Green's catalog, with 78 minutes of music at mid-price, drawn from In the Skies, Little Dreamer, Blue Guitar, White Sky and Legend, the first two albums contributing the majority of the best material here. Green's guitar playing is as impressive as ever, and his singing is nothing to ignore, a sweet, gently soulful rasp that recalls his one-time rival Eric Clapton at his best behind the microphone. There's just a bit of fall-off in quality between tracks like "Apostle" and "Little Dreamer," and later stuff like "Last Train From San Antone" when they're heard side by side. And a lot of this doesn't seem as strong today as it did in the late '70s, when Green was one of the last exponents of British blues still working in that genre and getting heard. But the sound is good, and the price is right.

Wisely, The Madcap Laughs doesn't even try to sound like a consistent record. Half the album was recorded by Barrett's former bandmates Roger Waters and Dave Gilmour, and the other half by Harvest Records head Malcolm Jones. Surprisingly, Jones' tracks are song for song much stronger than the more-lauded Floyd entries…

On his second solo album, Barrett was joined by Humble Pie drummer Jerry Shirley and Pink Floyd members Rick Wright (organ) and Dave Gilmour (guitar)…