As the first compilation covering Eric Clapton's Reprise/Warner work since 2007's Complete Clapton, 2015's Forever Man is the third collection to focus specifically on these recordings from the '80s, '90s, and 2000s, and it's by far the most extensive, weighing in at two CDs in its basic edition and three in its deluxe. The difference between the two is the addition of a disc of "Blues," a nice addition to the "Studio" and "Live" discs of the collection. These themes make sense on paper but they're a little odd in practice, with the Studio selections hopscotching between eras and the live heavy on new millennial selections. Often, the length highlights how light Forever Man is on hits: "Tears in Heaven," "I've Got a Rock N Roll Heart," "Forever Man," "Change the World," "My Father's Eyes," "Pretending," "Bad Love," "It's in the Way That You Use It," and the unplugged "Layla" are all here…

If you want to know why producer Gary Usher is revered in some circles, play The Peanut Butter Conspiracy Is Spreading next to the pretty much self-produced For Children of All Ages. A name as trendy as the Jefferson Airplane - and a sound that is absolutely the Airplane - meets the Mamas & the Papas; the '60s guitars sound smart; the 1967 liner notes by Lawrence Dietz tell you nothing about the group; and the front cover looks like something Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper encountered during Easy Rider. "It's a Happening Thing," like much of this record, tries too hard. Decades after it was recorded, there is charm in a band like the PBC (which rhymes with PCP) being such an authentic figment of someone's countercultural imagination…

This nifty little record slipped under the radar in 1979. It is composed of tightly wound, keyboard driven new wave and an edgy sounding vocalist, just the kind of thing that everyone expected of the period's next charge of the British invasion. What set "English Garden" (the UK version of this album) apart was the pedigree. Woolley was a founder of The Buggles and a co-writer of two of their best known songs. The band also included a little known but inventive keyboardist named Thomas Dolby.
Most of the songs here are pretty good, and Woolley takes those two signature songs and works them out in a way that suggest why he split from Horn and Downes…he rocks them instead of machinates them…

Well, complete as far as his pre-war country blues waxings for OKeh sans Sonny Terry (except for one or two where the whooping harpist provided accompaniment). McGhee was working firmly in the Piedmont tradition by 1940, when he signed with OKeh and began cutting the 47 enlightening sides here, which represent some of the purest country blues he ever committed to posterity.

Never No Lament: The Blanton-Webster Band, covering the years 1940-1942 in the great composer and bandleader's career, is essentially the third time that RCA has issued this material on CD. The first was a botched job, appalling even, with its flattened-out, compressed sound, along with a chopped version of "Take the A-Train" and other sonic and editorial errors. The second version was completely remastered and corrected the editorial problems, but featured no alternate takes from the band's performances. Beyond the original 66 tracks, nine additional cuts are featured here, including four brand-new master-take issues of "Another Pitter Patter," "Body and Soul," "Sophisticated Lady," and "Mr. J.B. Blues," as well as alternate takes of "Ko-Ko," "Bojangles," "Sepia Panorama," "Jumpin' Punkins," and "Jump for Joy"…

Future Days (1973). On Future Days, Can fully explored the ambient direction they had introduced into their sound on the previous year's Ege Bamyasi, and in the process created a landmark in European electronic music. Where Ege Bamyasi had played fast and loose with elements of rock song structure, Future Days dispensed with these elements altogether, creating hazy, expansive soundscapes dominated by percolating rhythms and evocative layers of keys. Vocalist Damo Suzuki turns in his final and most inspired performance with the band. His singing, which takes the form here of a rhythmic, nonsensical murmur, is all minimal texture and shading. Apart from the delightfully concise single "Moonshake," the album is comprised of just three long atmospheric pieces of music. The title track eases us into the sonic wash, while "Spray" is built around Suzuki's eerie vocals, which weave in and out of the shimmering instrumental tracks…

The saga surrounding Ridley Scott's film Blade Runner is one of the most troubled and tweaked film mythologies in Hollywood history. The various cuts, bootlegged unauthorized VHS and DVD versions, different European and American cuts, etc., are too labyrinthine to go into here, but there's plenty available to read if you aren't already familiar with this murky story. Amazingly enough, the film's soundtrack has a similar narrative, one that is dark, full of conflict; it's so complex that even this mammoth, three-disc 25th Anniversary commemorative edition doesn't manage to straighten out. That said, it is a vast improvement on what has previously been released officially. Greek composer and pioneering prog rock and synth king - and subsequently a best-selling composer of film scores - Vangelis Papathanassiou was tapped to write the score for Scott's film and record the soundtrack…