Sophisticated yet folk-tinged indie pop from Portland, with a literary edge provided by vocalist Colin Meloy. A collection of 11 CD, which includes seven studio albums by The Decemberists, also 3 EPs and one single.

Despite its moments of inspired songcraft, Julian Lennon's fourth album, Help Yourself, didn't find an audience in 1991. Shortly after its release, Lennon parted ways with Atlantic and entered a period of seclusion. By the time he returned to recording in 1998, the Beatles had already undergone one of their periodic "hip" phases, thanks to the hook-crazy Brit-pop crew. In many ways, bands like Oasis and Blur gave Lennon the go-ahead to return to the Beatlesque songcraft of his debut, Valotte, and that's exactly what he does on Photograph Smile, his first album in seven years. Much of the record is devoted to piano ballads similar to his big hit, "Valotte," with a couple of guitar pop numbers thrown in for good measure. There's not much range on the album, but all the music is well crafted and melodic – the kind of music that would receive greater praise if it weren't made by the son of a Beatle.

It was much to soul singer Spanky Wilson's surprise – she didn't realize she had had such an impact – when British multi-instrumentalist/producer Will Holland contacted her in her Los Angeles home in 2004, professing his love of her music and wondering if she'd collaborate with him. Still, she agreed to go the studio, and together they did two songs, "Don't Joke with a Hungry Man" and "When You're Through," for Holland's solo project, Quantic, on the album Mishaps Happening. That collaboration worked out so well that they decided to make an entire record together, this time with Holland's full band, the Quantic Soul Orchestra. Wilson's lovely voice is the centerpiece of I'm Thankful, and it does show a bit of its age, but only in the best of ways, deepening it and giving it an added measure of credibility and authenticity while still preserving its expressiveness and strength.

Brand new recording from guitar master is his long-awaited follow-up to 1997's "Shadowman" - now over 70 years old, Link still dishes up what he does best, displaying the depths of his musical roots with some acoustic songs, plus his trademark blistering guitar lines.

Andre Previn was a celebrated German/American pianist, composer and conductor, whose long career – he died in 2019 at the age of 89 – encompassed movie music, jazz and classical music. He composed or arranged music for more than 50 films, and was music al director and conductor for many top symphony orchestra as well as composing classical art music. This collection focuses on his early career as a jazz pianist. His family, who were Jewish, left Berlin for Paris and then the USA in 1938, and when he graduated from high school in Los Angeles in 1946, started working at MGM studios. However, by then he was already playing jazz piano in Hollywood clubs and had made his first records. This 66-track 3-CD collection comprises most of his recordings from these early years as a solo pianist, with small groups and with strings, released on the Sunset, V-Disc, Monarch, RCA-Victor and Tops labels. It includes the titles from his “Andre Previn Plays George Gershwin” and “Andre Previn Plays Fats Waller” albums. He was especially noted for his recordings with his trios, and this set features trio and quartet recordings with Irving Ashby, Red Callender, Lee Young, Al Viola, Charles Parnell, Jackie Mills, Bob Bain, Ralph Collier, Lloyd Pratt, Art Shapiro, Irv Cottler, Al Hendrickson Buddy Clark and Shelly Manne. Among his remarkable musical accomplishments, he was a brilliant pianist, and even at this early stage of his career, his playing is fast, fluent and imaginative, and this collection offers a fine showcase for those talents.

Following 2023’s Good Rockin’ Tonight: Killer In Stereo, Country Sides: Killer In Stereo is the second LP in our series of remastered Jerry Lee Lewis stereo mixes. Recently inducted into the Country Music Hall Of Fame, this collection foreshadows Jerry Lee's future country stardom with of his versions of country classics like “Cold, Cold Heart” and “I Love You Because,” plus alternate takes of “How’s My Ex Treating You” and “One Minute Past Eternity.” Pressed on blue and gray splatter vinyl.

Anyone who knows Abbey Lincoln’s history is aware of the sizable recording gap-a barren stretch from 1962 to 1972 followed by close to two decades of very sporadic live and studio sessions-that preceded her vibrant comeback in the early ’90s. Any unearthed Lincoln material from that fallow period is a welcome find. This 54-minute date, captured at San Francisco’s Keystone Korner in 1980, is a particularly great discovery.

3CD box set spotlighting the pioneering movement that brought the world The Beatles but has been overshadowed by their success. Merseybeat was a brief phenomenon but hugely influential throughout the world. It blew up nationwide in 1963 before Merseybeat groups spearheaded the ‘British Invasion’ of the US charts. This box celebrates the scene on the first two discs, then on disc three presents some of the brilliant mod, freakbeat, psych and Mersey soul music that came from Liverpool when the Merseybeat bubble burst and press and public looked elsewhere. Inspired by US rock ‘n’ roll, R&B and Motown and the D.I.Y. attitude of skiffle, the Liverpool beat groups rocked clubs such as their hometown’s The Cavern and the Star-Club in Hamburg and larger ‘Big Beat’ sessions at The Tower Ballroom in New Brighton. The Searchers and Gerry And The Pacemakers achieved success on the world stage, others never made it out of their local area, made a couple of 45s or even demos and disappeared.

Five CD set. The five albums Jerry Jeff Walker recorded for ATCO and Elektra between 1968 and 1979. Inspired by Bob Dylan, a host of singer songwriters came to the fore and one of the most significant was Jerry Jeff Walker. He merged folk, country and rock and as well as writing his own classic compositions and being a natural storyteller, he encouraged young songwriters and gave many of them their own start. Garth Brooks, Robert Earl Keen, Pat Green and Jack Ingram were all inspired by him. He wasn't born Jerry Jeff Walker. Ronald Clyde Crosby was born in Oneonta, Otsego County, New York State on 16th March 1942. That's not a bad name but it's not as good as Jerry Jeff Walker. Jerry Jeff re-invented himself as a lone star Texas country rocker and today is a major figure in the Austin musical community. His most famous song is 'Mr Bojangles'. This affectionate song became a US Top 10 Hit for The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and has been recorded by Sammy Davis Jr., Nilsson, Harry Belafonte, Bob Dylan, Nina Simone and Robbie Williams. President Nixon once said it was his favourite song. This CD set also includes compositions by Kris Kristofferson, Rodney Crowell, Guy Clark, Lee Clayton and John D. Loudermilk. Trivia: 'Mr Bojangles' is NOT about Bill 'Bojangles' Robinson, a tap dancer who found fame in films with Shirley Temple, as Sammy Davis Jr. Thought.

Recent issues of the Bach partitas on the harpsichord have provoked reservations about the quality of the recordings: the set by Kenneth Gilbert so uncomfortably close to the microphone as to pick up distracting action noise from the instrument, Trevor Pinnock's somewhat fuzzy, Scott Ross's too reverberant to be ideal. So perhaps I may start by commending the admirably warm but clean and natural sound secured by the producer (Chris Sayers)—even in a church (not far from Toulouse)—of the very fine Hemsch harpsichord of 1751 that Rousset has used before.

Thomas-Louis Bourgeois (1676–1751) is one of the masters of the French chamber cantata at the time of the Régence, when – at last – it was permissible to introduce Italian influences openly in France. His imaginative music, as elegant as it is compositionally skillful, forms a welcome complement to the works of contemporaries such as Campra or Rameau who are infinitely better known today. Carolyn Sampson and Le Concert Lorrain revive for us the charming insouciance of the Régence.

This Septem verba a Christo in cruce moriente proloata (The Seven Words of the Dying Christ on the Cross) was rediscovered nearly a century ago, and scholars down through the years have reached differing conclusions as to whether or not the work was really by Giovanni Battista Pergolesi, as one manuscript claimed. More and more copies surfaced, and finally the discovery by musicologist Reinhard Fehling of a new set of parts at an Austrian monastery in 2009 showed that the work was at the very least popular over a good part of Europe, and the forces represented here gave the work its modern-day premiere performance and first recording.

Hurricane Ruth Live at 3rd and Lindsley is 14 songs of unbridled blues rock fury! Hurricane Ruth is old school, real and raw. Her vocals are deeply rooted in the blues, but make no mistake she can rock the house! She is cut from the same cloth as Big Mama Thornton, Janis Joplin, and Tina Turner. Hurricane Ruth pulls from all these greats to create her own unique sound. Hurricane Ruth is a powerful, unpredictable, everchanging MUSICAL FORCE OF NATURE!

Bryan Adams' influence extends four decades, over which time he has released 14 studio albums. His songwriting has garnered him numerous awards and accolades including three Academy Award nominations, five Golden Globe nominations and a Grammy Award. Of his 2022 album, 'So Happy it Hurts' he said, 'The pandemic and lockdown really brought home the truth that spontaneity can be taken away. Suddenly all touring stopped, no one could jump in the car and go. The title song is about freedom, autonomy, spontaneity and the thrill of the open road. The album of the same name, touches on many of the ephemeral things in life are really the secret to happiness, most importantly, human connection'.

Esoteric Recordings are pleased to announce the release of a new 2CD anthology celebrating the British rock band Widowmaker. Formed in 1975 by former Mott the Hoople and Spooky Tooth guitarist Luther Grosvenor, also known as Ariel Bender. The original line-up of the band featured vocalist Steve Ellis (ex-Love Affair & Ellis), guitarist Huw Lloyd-Langton (ex-Hawkwind), Australian bassist Bob Daisley (ex-Chicken Shack) and drummer Paul Nicholls who had previously been a member of Lindisfarne. A few months after they had begun rehearsing at Emerson, Lake & Palmer's Manticore Studios in London, Widowmaker signed to Don Arden's Jet Records label.