It became official at some point in the '90s: The holidays cannot exist without box sets and compilations. So according to decree, we present our select overview of musical retrospectives. Need we say it? They make perfect holiday gifts.
The Band: A Musical History (Capitol) In 1968, while much of rock music had gone trippy, four Canadians and a guy from the Arkansas Ozarks hit the scene all earthy-like. The Band was a road-tested bunch, having backed rockabilly wild man Ronnie Hawkins and Bob Dylan during his controversial plugging-in phase. The debut album, Music From Big Pink, was an immediate revelation — "roots-rock" and "Americana" well before those terms existed.
Up until The Last Waltz, an opulent farewell concert in '76, The Band made some of the most vital, timeless music in the annals of American pop. A Musical History is not the only Band box set, but it's easily the definitive one, the most comprehensive collection of material by five unique talents who coalesced into the ultimate musical unit. The five CDs and one DVD contain the whole magilla: all the crucial album tracks, live stuff, work with Dylan and Hawkins, demos and song sketches. Thirty-seven of the selections are previously unreleased.
The Band stirred just about every imaginable style into its lively cauldron — rock 'n' roll, blues, R&B, gospel, country, classical and more — boiling it down into something very much their own. The ensemble locked into a collective groove, one that managed to be at once laid-back and buoyant (exhibits A, B and C: "The Shape I'm In," "Across the Great Divide," "Up on Cripple Creek").
Three distinctive singers brought guitarist Robbie Robertson's far-ranging songs to life: drummer Levon Helm's twangy belting (exhibit D: "Rag Mama Rag"), bassist Rick Danko's yearning yelp (exhibit E: "Stage Fright"), and keyboardist Richard Manuel's stirring blue-eyed soul (exhibit F: "I Shall Be Released"). When they joined voices in harmony, it was ragged and real (exhibit G: "The Weight," or as some folks know it, "Take a Load off Fannie").
While most rock during The Band's heyday was in some way a showcase for guitar pyrotechnics, these guys took a collective approach — Robertson kept his solos minimal, and the group incorporated such atypical instruments as accordion, fiddle and horns. Keyboardist Garth Hudson added extra sonic dimensions with his swirling organ and boogie piano parts.
I could write and write and write, but I'll stop and recommend that you listen, listen, listen. The Band: A Musical History is the cream of this year's compilation crop.
Bill Evans: The Complete Village Vanguard Recordings, 1961 (Riverside) Most of jazz master Bill Evans' prodigious recorded output was in the standard "piano trio" format (piano/acoustic bass/drums), but this was the mother lode. Over the years, Evans' playing went through various phases, from borderline frilly to almost acerbic before his death in 1980. The Vanguard sessions capture a fresh talent, blending romanticism and pensive probing.
Not long after Evans made his mark on the scene by playing on Miles Davis' Kind of Blue and releasing a handful of well-regarded LPs as a leader, he was coerced by producer Orrin Keepnews into New York's Village Vanguard club to record a live set with a combo that was gaining a rep for its telepathic interplay. Evans, bassist Scott LaFaro and drummer Paul Motian played five short sets on June 25, 1961 — two in the afternoon, three in the evening. Over the years, the music was released in various configurations, but here, for the first time, it's been compiled sequentially into a three-CD box set. How to sum up? The is my favorite piano-trio music ever — and I love piano-trio music.
Hank Williams: The Ultimate Collection (Mercury/Universal) Unless you're an absolute Hank nut, this is about all you'll need for a thorough overview of the legendary country singer's life, times and music. Two CDs compile 42 of his songs, including the classics ("Your Cheatin' Heart," "Hey, Good Lookin'," "Jambalaya," "Honky Tonk Blues," "Cold, Cold Heart"), live material and a handful of demos.
To give you the full measure of the man, the third disc is a DVD called Honky Tonk Blues, an hour and 20 minutes of interviews, anecdotes, old footage and stills, originally part of the American Masters series — terrific stuff that ranges from the celebratory to the sordid.
Billie Holiday: The Ultimate Collection (Hip-O/Universal) Lady Day has long been defined more by her legend than her music. Apparently, that's what a hit movie called Lady Sings the Blues will do for a legacy. May I suggest this three-disc set? Previous Billie boxes have concentrated on her work during a particular period, usually taken from the vaults of one of the nine record labels she recorded for.
The Ultimate Collection rounds up material from 1935-1958, spanning virtually her entire recording career. The third disc is a DVD that compiles a riveting array of film and TV performance clips, interviews with her jazz peers, and rarities like a 1956 audio interview with Mike Wallace for his radio show Night Beat. In all, a fitting overview of the most revered of all jazz singers.
Johnny Guitar Watson: The Funk Anthology (Shout Factory) Proto-hip-hopper, auteur, mackin' pimp, Johnny Guitar Watson was the most underappreciated funkateer of the '70s and early '80s. He had a brassy voice and stinging blues guitar skills, but he also played most of the instruments on his tunes. Songs like "Ain't That A Bitch," "Superman Lover," "You Can Stay But the Noise Must Go," and especially the irrepressible "A Real Mother For Ya," resonate with deep grooves, barbed humor and the kind of hard-won street cred that you never heard in an Earth, Wind & Fire record.
The two-disc Funk Anthology gathers the late artist's best material, but because music was as much a living as a calling to an artist like Watson, he occasionally dabbled in disco and other artistically ill-advised stuff. So not every track is an absolute gem, but enough of them are to make this set a must-have for any true funk fan.
Isaac Hayes: Can You Dig It? (Stax) While he doesn't get the same props as Marvin, Stevie, Aretha, Curtis Mayfield and other titans of late '60s/early '70s R&B, Isaac Hayes belongs in their company, as this two CD/one DVD comp bears out. Hayes can legitimately lay claim to being the founder of the disco precursor called symphonic soul — a lush, orchestrated blend of R&B and jazz (with a penchant for chicken-scratch wah-wah guitar) — that's best heard in the Shaft soundtrack (which, by the way, beat Mayfield's Superfly to the charts by a year).
Elsewhere on Can You Dig it? we get an ample earful of Hayes' smoldering cover versions of such unlikely tunes as Jimmy Webb's "By the Time I Get to Phoenix," Bread's "Baby I'm-a Want You" and Kris Kristofferson's "For the Good Times," mixed with rawer stuff and some late '70s proto-disco. The brief DVD captures Hayes and his large ensemble paying three tunes (including "Theme From Shaft") at the 1972 Wattstax festival in Los Angeles.
THE CHRONICLES SERIES
There are no stats on this, but a general rule is that if an act is going to produce anything approaching a masterpiece, it'll probably happen within its first three albums. To that end, Universal Music Group has released a series of three-fers called Chronicles, most of which capture the artist's first trio of long-players. These sets contain just the three discs and their original booklets, packaged in a fold-over box. Here are reviews of five. Others in the series include Aerosmith, Eric Clapton, B.B. King, Marvin Gaye, George Strait, Kiss and Bryan Adams (who most certainly never smelled anything close to a masterpiece in his life).
The Velvet Underground: The Velvet Underground and Nico; White Light/White Heat; The Velvet Underground (Polydor) It's odd, to me, that this NYC band formed in the late '60s is considered the earliest progenitor of punk rock. The Velvet Underground doesn't really sound punk in the conventional sense — the songs aren't often fast and aren't often short, the vocals are more conversational than raging — but there is an overlap of general ethos that involves an egalitarian amateurism, emotional honesty and a propensity for noise.
VU's first three LPs — released in '67, '68 and '69 — staked some fairly diverse sonic terrain. The self-titled debut, hatched at Andy Warhol's Factory, stood in stark contrast to the breakthrough sophistication of The Beatles' Sgt. Pepper; its lo-fi crudeness, sloppy rhythmic churn, sketchy songs and flat, offhanded vocals (mostly by Lou Reed) capture the urban underbelly, a kind of sordid disaffection that remains visceral nearly 40 years later. While the Beatles and Stones were making coy references to hallucinogenics, The Velvets put out a song called "Heroin," with the unambiguous lyrics, "'Cause it makes me feel like I'm a man/ When I put a spike into my vein." Not exactly Summer of Love stuff.
Warhol and his handpicked chanteuse Nico were out of the picture for White Light/White Heat, and the result is an unrelenting blast of molten guitar distortion and feedback that is nigh impenetrable. The album is, if anything, proto-Sonic Youth. The album-closing "Sister Ray" is a grinding 17-and-a-half minute romp that finds an overdriven organ doing battle with fuzz-drenched guitars and bass.
The band did an abrupt about-face for The Velvet Underground, which was recorded in California after the forced departure of prime noisemaker John Cale. The LP was a much more polished and tuneful effort, anchored by chiming 12-string guitars and marked by a virtually skronk-free intimacy.
A year later, the Velvets released one more studio album, Loaded (not included here), which featured "Sweet Jane" and "Rock and Roll," songs with real commercial potential. The band fell apart shortly after.
Rod Stewart: Gasoline Alley; Every Picture Tells a Story; Never a Dull Moment (Mercury) Rod Stewart used to rock. No, really, he did. These three early '70s albums, starting with his sophomore solo effort Gasoline Alley, prove it. The LPs have a rough-and-ready quality, in large part because Stewart surrounded himself with a bevy of rootsy players, including his six-string sidekick Ron Wood. Not surprisingly, there's a Stonesy guitar flavor to many of the uptempo tunes.
Each of the discs blend boogie-fueled rockers, mid-tempo numbers and acoustic narrative ballads. "You Wear it Well," from 1972's Never a Dull Moment, is a clear attempt at re-creating the magic of "Maggie May" from the previous year's Every Picture Tells a Story, the unmitigated classic of the three. Don't overlook Gasoline Alley, though; with an array of acoustic folk numbers ("Only a Hobo," the title song), it's an unassuming pleasure.
Remember, it wasn't until 1978 that Stewart put out "Hot Legs" and "Do Ya Think I'm Sexy?" and pissed away his rock cred for good.
Tears for Fears: The Hurting; Songs From the Big Chair; The Seeds of Love (Mercury) With Tears for Fears, childhood mates Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith led one of the more creative and credible bands of the '80s post-New Wave. Big synths and thudding drum-machine beats were the group's sonic hallmarks — 20 years on, they grate on the ears some — but TFF outfitted its grabby tunes with enough detail to easily outdo the one-hit wonders that surrounded them.
The often complex songs provided apt vehicles for Orzabal's brassy lead vocals and the duo's creamy harmonies — these are the reasons Tears for Fears merit a reissue of this sort.
The Hurting (1983), save for a handful of tunes, sounds basically ponderous. Two years later, TFF busted out internationally with Big Chair, fueled by the singles "Shout," "Head Over Heels" and "Everybody Wants To Rule the World," which still excites two decades later. Too bad the album is burdened by a few noodling instrumentals at the end.
With Seeds of Love (1989), TFF turned to a different kind of epic, a sort of updated take on Beatle-esque psychedelia blended with supper-club jazz (and featuring guest vocalist Oleta Adams). Although the disc contains some worthy tunes — "Woman in Chains," the title song — many of them meander too much, and ultimately sag under impossibly thick arrangements.
None of these three discs marks TFF's best album. That honor goes to Everybody Loves a Happy Ending, which came out just last year. This three-fer is recommended for hardcore fans; others can make do with a single-disc anthology.
The Allman Brothers Band: The Allman Brothers Band; Idlewild South; At Fillmore East (Mercury) ABB apotheosis has always been 1971's At Fillmore East, a double live album that's one of jam music's absolute early hallmarks. But the group's 1969 debut set the bar high from the powerhouse opening riff of "Don't Want You No More," which unveiled the trademark harmony guitar lines of Duane Allman and Dickey Betts. The instrumental tune segues into the anguished slow blues of "It's Not My Cross to Bear," which introduces Gregg Allman's lusty R&B shout. The LP ends with two extraordinary tracks: "Dreams," which floats along on a pulsing swing groove, and the lunging "Whipping Post."
In light of such an out-of-the-box accomplishment, the following year's Idlewild South proved a minor drop-off, although the acoustic ballad "Midnight Rider," the jazz-infused instrumental "In Memory of Elizabeth Reed" and the slow R&B tune "Please Call Home" are all stellar.
At Fillmore East finds a six-piece band exquisitely synched in, blending Coltrane-inspired improvisation with vigorous singing and the supple groove laid down by drummers Butch Trucks and Jaimoe. The original double LP fits on a single disc, but it can't substitute for the expanded, double-CD versions currently available.
Duane Allman died from wounds suffered in a motorcycle accident in '71, followed a year later by bassist Berry Oakley under similar circumstances. What ensued was year after year of intermittently good music and plenty of pain, chaos and upheaval. These three albums are unquestionably ABB's pinnacle.
Lynyrd Skynyrd: Pronounced leh-nerd skin-nerd; Second Helping; Nuthin' Fancy (Geffen) Despite the ironic-iconic stature of the jam staple "Free Bird," Lynyrd Skynyrd was more song-oriented than most of the Southern rock flock. The seven-piece Jacksonville ensemble scored a bevy of rock-radio staples, and even a handful of pop hits ("Sweet Home Alabama," "Saturday Night Special," "What's Your Name").
Singer Ronnie Van Zant carried himself with sexy redneck swagger — his lyrics ranging from playfully funny to darkly cautionary — and the group's three-guitar attack could emit a mighty noise. Skynyrd's first three albums, released in '73, '74 and '75, are solid throughout, although they sound far more dated than the Allman Brothers' cerebral and dynamic work. This Chronicles package includes bonus tracks on each of the three discs, the most generous extras portions of the ones reviewed here.
This article appears in Nov 16-23, 2005.