Belena Lavallen Little Black Dress (playboy Plus 30 12 2013)

Nearly two decades after the first volume, the second installment of the Beatles BBC recordings arrives and, like its predecessor, On Air: Live at the BBC, Vol. 2 condenses the Fab Four's voluminous BBC sessions into an easily digestible double-disc of highlights…

Deep Purple have never quite been placed in the revered 1960s canon that includes the Who, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, or any of the other British rock bands who continue to reunite in various configurations to tour and even periodically release new albums, but given that the group has always been a riveting and brilliant live act, part prog, part heavy metal, part funky R&B, and imminently theatrical, that second-tier designation seems like both an oversight and a shame…

The 2013 mini-box Original Album Classics rounds up the early-2000s expansions of Texas Flood, Couldn't Stand the Weather, and Soul to Soul at an affordable price point. It's arguable that SRV's best work came a bit later (In Step often seems like his best), but all three of these showcase the guitarist at his best and this package is a good bargain.

The 2013 mini-box Original Album Classics rounds up the early-2000s expansions of Texas Flood, Couldn't Stand the Weather, and Soul to Soul at an affordable price point. It's arguable that SRV's best work came a bit later (In Step often seems like his best), but all three of these showcase the guitarist at his best and this package is a good bargain.

It's difficult to call a guitarist who routinely shows up in the upper reaches of "100 Greatest Guitarists Ever" lists underappreciated, and yet the first impression the towering seven-disc box set Skydog: The Duane Allman Retrospective makes is that Duane Allman does not receive his proper due…

Biffy Clyro's 2013 album, Opposites, is the band's sixth studio effort and follows up the band's hugely successful 2009 Mercury Prize-nominated release, Only Revolutions. Whether appreciated as a double- or single-disc album (the band released both versions), Opposites is a sprawling, ambitious work that once again finds the Scottish rock trio balancing its prog rock inclinations with its undeniable talent for mainstream, radio-ready pop. In that sense, Biffy Clyro are certainly one of the most album-oriented, '70s-style rock acts of their generation - though their sound is hardly retro. On the contrary, with lead singer/guitarist Simon Neil belting in a thick brogue over the band's knotty, metal-influenced arrangements, Biffy Clyro come off more like a Scottish version of Fugazi than, say, a classic rock band like Rush, although there is a twinge of nerd-rock power here, too…