Sector 3, the third installment of Rush’s Sector series of box sets, finds the band diving headlong into the ‘80s with a more synth-oriented approach. Featuring the albums Signals, Grace Under Pressure, Power Windows, Hold Your Fire, and the live album A Show of Hands, this period of Rush's career finds them focusing more on Geddy Lee’s multi-layered synthesizer excursions and finds guitarist Alex Lifeson moving into more of a support role as he begins to experiment with a more effects-heavy sound…

While it can be easy to dislike and dismiss some cookie-cutter electronic music, the challenge lies in finding reasons to listen to it again. Such is the case with Revolutions by Jean Michel Jarre. One reviewer wrote, simply, "(This) is not revolutionary." That is true; Jarre breaks no new ground with the release of this album. He does, however, continue to create original music in his own style. He is often imitated and that is the sincerest form of flattery…

Bernie Marsden was well into a recording career when he struck out on his own for 1979's And About Time Too, which may explain the album's joking title. At the time, Marsden was playing guitar in Whitesnake, following years with UFO, Wild Turkey, Cozy Powell's Hammer, and Babe Ruth, among others, so he had a significant résumé, all suggesting that he was ready for a spot of heavy rocking, but And About Time Too is much softer than his past or present, a slick and phased collection of '70s album pop and rock featuring such impressive players as Powell, Jack Bruce, Ian Paice, and Jon Lord…

Beth Hart first teamed up with guitarist Joe Bonamassa in 2011 and the partnership proved to be mutually beneficial. Hart gave the rock-edged Bonamassa some blues bona fides while the guitarist brought the vocalist to a wider audience. Plus, it was evident from their two studio albums and live set that the two had an easy chemistry: They shared a similar vernacular in Chicago blues and classic soul…

David Gilmour's Live in Gdansk was recorded and filmed in 2006 at the Polish city's shipyards, the very same historic location where Lech Walesa's Solidarity movement began its populist assault on the country's repressive Soviet-installed regime in 1980. By all accounts of the time it was a truly awesome multimedia spectacle. But there are strange and sad ironies that accompany this release as well. For starters, it was released in the U.K. exactly a week after the death of Richard Wright, Gilmour's longtime bandmate in Pink Floyd, and his keyboardist here. Secondly, it appears during a period of increased tension between Russia and the United States over the latter's proposed missile defense system to be placed in Poland (by the U.S.) and the country's membership in NATO…

Returning to Gentle Giant's fourth album after any kind of lengthy absence, it's astonishing just how little Octopus has dated. Often written off at the time as a pale reflection of the truly gargantuan steps being taken by the likes of Jethro Tull and Barclay James Harvest, the band's closest relatives in the tangled skein of period prog, Gentle Giant often seemed more notable for its album art than its music. Octopus, however, marries the two seamlessly, with the cover speaking for itself, of course…

Free Hand is perhaps Gentle Giant's most realized effort. After the excellent In a Glass House, the group further developed its Renaissance-medieval approach, producing one of the most creative and complex recordings in progressive rock history…

Generally considered to be the last must-have recording from these progressive rock giants. Recorded at a frenetic pace, the band had the impossible task of topping their classic, Free Hand. While they didn't surpass the success of previous efforts, they did continue to propel their unique brand of complex music into surprising new directions. Interview is actually a concept album centering on a fictitious interview based upon the music business…

The group's first U.S. release in two years featured ornate playing from Kerry Minnear on keyboards and Gary Green's loudest guitar work up to that time. The Power and the Glory is also a fairly dissonant album, yet it made the charts, albeit pretty low…

As Robert Fripp had done with King Crimson's first live LP, Earthbound (1972), USA (1974) is a single-disc concert package documenting the quartet during its most concurrent swing through North America. As with its predecessor, USA was also issued as a sonic cenotaph of the concurrently defunct Krim…

The concept is as bombastic as ever and its tropes are properly secured, though the emphasis on the project’s heavier side may make this album a highlight for fans of Star One and Stream of Passion…

Decades after its release, Tales from Topographic Oceans is still the most controversial record in Yes' output. This was the place where Yes either fulfilled all of the promise shown on their previous five albums or slid off the rails in a fit of artistic hubris, especially on the part of lead singer Jon Anderson and guitarist Steve Howe, who dominated the composition credits here…

Stormwatch is the album that they often call the third of the Tull folk rock trilogy and after Songs From The Wood and Heavy Horses (and their subsequent five star extended version in this series) it has a hard job to do…