Absolute glorious collection of Mellow Soul, Jazz & Funk tunes. Well put together compilation CD from Sony music Japan, features George Duke, Mtume, Webster Lewis, Pattie Labelle, & Alphonso Johnson. Essential collection for any soul music fan.

Another installment in Collectables' The Ultimate Christmas Album series, volume four gathers a mix of well-known and offbeat holiday tunes, including Elvis Presley's "Blue Christmas," the Platters' "Winter Wonderland," and Perry Como's "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas." Brook Benton's "You're All I Want for Christmas," Percy Faith's "Christmas Is," and Otis Redding's "Merry Christmas Baby" are some of the collection's soulful highlights, while Santo & Johnny's "Twistin' Bells" and Stan Freberg's "Christmas Dragnet" add some novelty to the festivities. Though it's a somewhat uneven collection, The Ultimate Christmas Album, Vol. 4: WCBS 101.1 has enough interesting and classic moments to make it worthwhile for anyone looking to go beyond the season's basic music.

Patti LaBelle's entry in the Universal Masters Collection is a decent compilation that covers most of her hits from the latter half of the '80s and the whole of the '90s, containing singles like "New Attitude," "Kiss Away the Pain," "Oh, People," "Feels Like Another One," "Stir It Up," "Yo Mister," "Beat My Heart Like a Drum," and "When You Talk About Love." Though it's not comprehensive with this phase of LaBelle's career, it's one of the better sets available with this kind of scope. This is a European release, so it is slanted toward the singles that made a big impact outside of the U.S., but there isn't a great deal of variance between what was most popular in the two territories.