Two scores with a tone of righteous fury woven throughout. While there are differences in the approach to the two scores, Quincy Jones did manage to provide a unifying style – no mean feat, considering that the intent behind In the Heat of the Night was to get a Southern, blues-inflected atmosphere to support the angry, anti-racist approach of the picture, while They Call Me Misters Tibbs! had a more open, urban attitude from its San Francisco setting. The music throughout has an edge (the lighter music in the second score is generally source music), with some interesting musical experiments going on (Jones, as one example, used cimbalom to reflect Tibbs' feelings in They Call Me Mister Tibbs!.) The Ryko CD release includes an Enhanced CD portion with film material. The sound throughout the disc is excellent, although the cues from In the Heat of the Night show their age, and the dialogue excerpts sound very rough.

Still Loving You and Pains Of Love, the two self-released albums under Bay Area musician Lawrence Ross's Twilight moniker in 1981 and ’86 respectively have enjoyed near mythical “Grail” status among fanatic crate diggers. Considered stone soul/funk classics; copies have treaded for huge sums. Ross recorded and pressed his records on his own Galaxy Productions, and due to lack of funds or distribution let them disappear when pressings sold out. In 2010, Ubiquity’s Luv N’ Haight licensed them for re-release on CD and limited edition vinyl, thus allowing them to evaluated strictly on their musical merits.

Fat Freddy's Drop present the ‘LOCK-IN’ album, a sonic moment in time as the band jam conscious songs of freedom and hope for a generation.

A versatile drummer, Lenny White is still best-known for being part of Chick Corea's Return To Forever in the 1970's. White was self-taught on drums and he largely started his career on top, playing regularly with Jackie McLean (1968) and recording "Bitches Brew" with Miles Davis in 1969. White was soon working with some of the who's who of jazz including Freddie Hubbard, Joe Henderson, Woody Shaw, Gato Barbieri, Gil Evans, Stanley Clarke and Stan Getz among others. As a member of Return To Forever during 1973-76, White gained a strong reputation as one of the top fusion drummers, but he was always versatile enough to play in many settings.

One of the biggest and best albums ever for Hamilton Bohannon – filled with quirky rhythms and really unusual grooves! Bohannon was one of the key forces in setting the scene for disco in the early 70s – and by the time the rest of the country was hitting the dancefloor in the middle part of decade, he was still moving forward, into a whole new realm of groove! The tracks on this set have some really mad rhythms – skittish and scattered, still with a dancefloor approach, but with lots of odd touches that set them apart from the rest of the pack. A key example of this is the great tune "Me & The Gang", which has this off-key piano loping out over chunky beats – but the whole thing's great, with a lot more of a sly edge than you'd expect from the cover. Titles include "Summertime Groove", "The Street Dance", "Let's Start The Dance", "Listen To The Children Play", and "I Wonder Why". (Cover has some wear and creasing.)

Fable is a small independent record label started in Austin, Texas in the early 1970s by a young trombone player named Michael Mordecai. In autumn 1975 he debuted a trio of albums on Fable by Austin bands 47 Times its Own Weight, Steam Heat and Starcrost. With only 1000 of each pressed, and each carrying a different emphasis on soul, funk or jazz, all 3 have gone on to become highly sought after by collectors and DJs around the world.

2012 two CD collection from the British R&B band. Led by charismatic singer/songwriter, Errol Brown, Hot Chocolate are without doubt one of the UK s most successful and popular singles bands. The hits started in 1970 and continued right up until 1984 in a remarkable fourteen-year run that witnessed the chart-topping So You Win Again, and such memorable songs as You Sexy Thing (which was a Top 10 smash in three separate decades), Disco Queen, Emma, No Doubt About It and Every 1 s A Winner. This stunning 38-track retrospective features 29 chart hits, including 12 Top 10s!

The biggest pop star of the '80s, and one of the most popular artists of all time, with a brilliant, soulful voice and breathtaking dance moves. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he was one of the most popular entertainers in the world, and was the best-selling music artist at the time of his death. Jackson's contributions to music, dance, and fashion along with his publicized personal life made him a global figure in popular culture for over four decades.

Tight 80s soul from Kleeer – one of the group's standout classics, and a set that's produced with kind of a jazzy finish by Deodato, who also plays some nice keyboards on the record. The Kleeer sound is at its height here – tight, warm, and filled with great harmonies on the vocals – which are then underpinned by a lot of keyboards and bass pedal work, yet in a way that never overwhelms the vocals. The balance is beautiful – at a level that few other groups ever seemed to reach – and there's plenty of hooks that keep things catchy throughout. Titles include "Go For It", "Intimate Connections", "Next Time It's For Real", "Tonight", "Do You Want To", and "Break".

Tease was formed in 1979 in California. When they performed in a talent show organized by Los Angeles radio station KACE, they were discovered by record label RCA and they signed a record deal in 1983. At that time Tease consists of: Kipper Jones (lead vocals), Derek Organ (drums), Thommy Organ (guitar), Cornelius Sims (bass, followed by Jay Shankin in 1986) Rex Salas (keyboards) and Joseph Parson (guitar). Chuckii Booker replaced Rex in 1986 and played the keys on their second album 'Tease'. Their third album 'Remember' was produced by James Mtume.

Star Time is the 1991 box set by American soul singer James Brown. After years of successful reissues and remasters on both sides of the bond, Polygram decided to honor the Godfather of Soul with a box set. It features a number of songs being remastered for the first time plus a small handful of unreleased material, including a few live tracks, covering four different decades of his career. This includes scans of the complete booklet.

Hannah Williams is back with a new album and a new band but the trademark powerful, throaty vocals are there on ‘Late Nights & Heartbreak’ as are the tough funk grooves, this time produced by Heliocentrics wizard Malcom Catto. The sanctified feel of ‘Tame In The Water’ has Aretha/Marlena tones while the punchy, infectious ‘Fighting Your Shadow’ is a strong dancer. ‘Woman Got Soul’ has an afro feel in the horns, ‘Still In My Head’ is a big, drama filled epic – another big dancefloor number – while ‘Fool’ is a lush slice of soul with a blues edge. ‘Another Sunrise’ again touches on Southern Soul, the down tempo foot tapper ‘Your Luck Can Change’ is an impassioned, dark-edged epic while the instrumental ‘7am To Seville’ allows the band to forefront their playing with Catto indulging in some great, far-out production work. Great album.

The finest of Labelle's original albums, Nightbirds was recorded in New Orleans with funkmeister Allen Toussaint handling the production chores and, one assumes, members of the Meters taking care of the session work. Worth the price of admission for the Bob Crewe-written "Lady Marmalade" alone, the album veers between the strutting New Orleans, horn-laden singles and more mainstream pop material.

This album has prominent boogie, soul and funk influences. These had been present in Valle's work since the beginning of the 1970s and would be permanent influences on his music, also being solidified by his work with Leon Ware and Chicago.

Berry Gordy was more than just a visionary label owner, he was also an astute businessman who studied and understood how the pop charts worked, and his stable of songwriters, arrangers, musicians, and singers all worked toward the same aim of refining R&B and soul music into a pop product that appealed across race, gender, and generational lines. And Gordy knew – although the radio play and sales period was extremely brief – that nothing endured more than a good Christmas record, which could regenerate sales each and every year when the holiday season rolled around again. It should come as no surprise, then, that Motown issued a sizable amount of seasonal material, and as this two-disc, 51-track collection shows, a lot of it was done at a high level of quality.