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Leaving Atlantic Records after the sales disaster of Ringo the 4th, Ringo Starr signed to CBS's Portrait label and returned to the record racks after only seven months with Bad Boy…

Despite becoming one of the rock's biggest concert attractions, Ted Nugent needed that one album and single that would break through in a big way, and the 1977 album and single of the same name, Cat Scratch Fever, did the trick. Cat Scratch Fever matched the focused ferocity of Nugent's excellent 1975 debut (due to singer Derek St. Holmes' re-entry into the band), featuring another first-rate set of brash hard rockers…

By 1973, Uriah Heep had progressed from an English heavy metal band to a worldwide success. They moved on to a new label (Warner Bros.) and began to explore new styles to flesh out their combination of prog complexity and heavy metal muscle. The band's desire to break new ground is established with the lead-off track, "Dreamer": while it riffs as hard as the band's past rockers, it adds a surprising element of funkiness into the band's sound…

Released in March 1976, Status Quo's ninth album was, depending upon how one viewed the last six years of relentless boogie, either the last of the band's "classic" LPs or the first step toward absolute household name-dom that the group has enjoyed ever since…

Accademia Bizantina under Ottavio Dantone are releasing a new album of Haydn Symphonies, Nos. 78-81. It is the first time Symphonies No.79 and 81 have been recorded on period instruments. This little-known quartet of Haydn symphonies 78-81 date from the years 1782-1784 when Haydn still served as kapellmeister to the Esterhazy family in their spectacular summer and winter palaces in Esterháza (present day Hungary) and Eisenstadt (Austria) where the music was first performed. These four symphonies have been specially recorded for the upcoming 36-CD set of Complete Haydn Symphonies, to be released later this year. It will be the first Haydn symphony cycle on period instruments.