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Ultra-Lounge: Christmas Cocktails, Pt. 2
(more) »rank: 3466by: Various Artists
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Urban Cowboy: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
(more) »rank: 1684from: Denon Records
: :The aim was to do for country what Saturday Night Fever did for disco. The result was that bars from Kona to Kalamazoo suddenly had mechanical bulls, and slickers walking around in cowboy hats. You might also pinpoint this as the moment in time when 'country' music suddenly went cosmopolitan, paving the way for Garth Brooks. Johnny Lee's 'Lookin' for Love' was one of the decade's biggest singles, and this album briefly made a star of Mickey Gilley (whose Texas club provided a home for that alpha bull). Fans of Bob Seger, Jimmy Buffet, the Eagles, Dan Fogelberg, and Bonnie Raitt may want ...
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Blue Yule: Christmas Blues and R&B Classics
(more) »rank: 1570by: Various Artists
: :Blue Yule is without question one of the hippest collections of rhythm & blues Christmas music ever assembled. The disc boasts the likes of Louis Jordan, John Lee Hooker, the gospel-powered Pilgrim Travelers, and Johnny and Edgar Winter, as well as the likes of Detroit Junior ('Christmas Day') and Canned Heat ('Christmas Blues'). Lengthy even by contemporary CD standards, this 18-tracker also includes Charles Brown, Big Jack Johnson, Roy Milton, and the inscrutable Lightnin' Hopkins wishing you both 'Merry Christmas' and 'Happy New Year.' But perhaps the set's greatest gift is also it's strangest--Sonny Boy Williamson's 'Santa Claus,' a rousing midtempo blues-rocker with ...
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Wanted! The Outlaws
(more) »rank: 2645by: Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, Jessi Colter, Tompall Glaser
: :Less successful when it's sentimental (Waylon Jennings' 'My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys') than when it's wry (Willie Nelson's myth-puncturing 'Me and Paul'), this cash-in compilation of previously released cuts was just in time to grab the first platinum record ever awarded a country album. It's not bad, but both Jennings' contemporaneous Dreaming My Dreams and Nelson's Red Headed Stranger are more nuanced tastes of the good-bad-but-not-evil-ol'-boy lifestyle. (Not to mention much of Tompall Glaser's own Outlaw compilation.) This 1996 CD reissue adds nine more tracks from the era as well as a new Jennings-and-Nelson version of Steve Earle's 'Nowhere Road.' --Rickey Wright
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Ally McBeal: A Very Ally Christmas
(more) »rank: 4543by: Vonda Shepard, Various Artists - Holidays
: :Ally McBeal has dominated television for three years, so why not a Christmas album for fans who number 20 million or more? Truth be told, this is really a Vonda Shepard record (she's Ally's TV singing voice), with a little help from the McBeal cast, including Ally (née Calista Flockhart), who successfully tries on Eartha Kitt's silly, sassy, seductive 'Santa Baby.' With 14 tracks and Macy Gray's distinctive 'Winter Wonderland' included, the album covers lots of turf, as Shepard and company cover hymns and carols that are sparsely arranged and appealing for their soulful simplicity. Shepard's soprano talent continues to reveal its many ...
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On a Starry Night
(more) »rank: 1920by: Various Artists
: :The party line on most Windham Hill products seems to be that it's either the greatest stuff since wave machines, or that it all sounds alike. On a Starry Night, with its collection of world songs and reputable artists such as Flora Purim, Airto Moreira, the Turtle Island String Quartet, and others, does lean toward a seamlessly understated, homogeneous quality that is broken only occasionally by Bobby McFerrin's piece and a couple of others. That said, there can hardly be a more mellow or sonorous album of kid's music anywhere. Starry Night could calm a nursery with no nurses; why, it could even ...
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Hitsville USA: The Motown Singles Collection 1959-1971
(more) »rank: 1452by: Various Artists
: :Motown did so many things well in the '60s and early '70s that this overview of the label's smashes (and some lesser-known classics) practically demands four CDs. It gets them, too, filling them with single mixes of more than 100 tracks. That the running order begins with Barrett Strong's statement of purpose 'Money (That's What I Want)' and ends with Marvin Gaye's statement of concern 'Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)' says a lot about how far the company moved in its golden decade--but no more so than what the same two cuts' differences in sound get across. The company was able to blend ...
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Great Records Of The Decade: 40's Hits, Vol. 1
(more) »rank: 8217by: Various Artists
: :Motown did so many things well in the '60s and early '70s that this overview of the label's smashes (and some lesser-known classics) practically demands four CDs. It gets them, too, filling them with single mixes of more than 100 tracks. That the running order begins with Barrett Strong's statement of purpose 'Money (That's What I Want)' and ends with Marvin Gaye's statement of concern 'Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology)' says a lot about how far the company moved in its golden decade--but no more so than what the same two cuts' differences in sound get across. The company was able to blend ...
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A Winter's Solstice: Silver Anniversary Edition
(more) »rank: 1776by: Various Artists
: :Since the Windham Hill imprint's Winter Solstice series was born in 1985, the concept has gone through some changes, bottoming out with 1999's abysmally kitschy Winter Solstice on Ice. With this Silver Anniversary Edition, Dawn Atkinson, who produced the first Winter Solstice disc, has gone back to her original concept of nontraditional seasonal music and novel arrangements of Christmas classics. She's also brought in some old standbys, soliciting works from Paul McCandless, Barbara Higbie, Will Ackerman, Philip Aaberg, and Liz Story. Much of this new Winter Solstice turns on classical themes. Ex-Kronos Quartet cellist Joan Jeanrenaud teams with guitarist Steve Erquiaga on an ...
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Christmas Party: Holiday Piano Spiked with Swing
(more) »rank: 2976by: Dave McKenna
: :Since the Windham Hill imprint's Winter Solstice series was born in 1985, the concept has gone through some changes, bottoming out with 1999's abysmally kitschy Winter Solstice on Ice. With this Silver Anniversary Edition, Dawn Atkinson, who produced the first Winter Solstice disc, has gone back to her original concept of nontraditional seasonal music and novel arrangements of Christmas classics. She's also brought in some old standbys, soliciting works from Paul McCandless, Barbara Higbie, Will Ackerman, Philip Aaberg, and Liz Story. Much of this new Winter Solstice turns on classical themes. Ex-Kronos Quartet cellist Joan Jeanrenaud teams with guitarist Steve Erquiaga on an ...
