Blood 2: The Blood Group (1998)

As the second Millennium AD drew to a close, The Residents began to take stock on a couple of thousand years of reasonably fruitful human endeavour. One text, they felt, had inescapably set the tone and dominated the narrative throughout the Western world for most of that period, often clouding the view as they looked back. Sure enough, The Bible, Testaments Old and New, seemed like fertile ground for a confused, anonymous band approaching their fourth decade. Throughout 1998 and 1999, The Residents set about writing, recording and extensively touring a set of songs based around some of the more curious, unsettling and downright messed up stories they found upon revisiting their old Sunday School Bibles, and present here the results of those industrious years. Complete with demos and sketches, two full live recordings, a live-in-the-studio reworking and the usual assorted ephemera plus later live recordings, 'The Wormwood Box' showcases a project the band still think of very fondly, and have often revisited. Join us and marvel as the Eyeball Oddballs somehow cram murder, rape, incest, vengeance, slaughter and, erm, circumcision into a radio friendly pop format!

While audiophile editions of Thick as a Brick, Aqualung, Living in the Past, and A Passion Play are easily obtainable, Tull's very earliest albums have languished in substandard editions on CD for ten years. This triple-CD box from England, part of EMI's 100th Anniversary reissue series, rectifies the problem, featuring newly remastered versions of This Was, Stand Up, and Benefit, each packaged in a miniature re-creation of the original LP sleeve…

Kin Ping Meh are not your typical Krautrock band. Although they're quite frequently labelled as such, theor sound is more akin to Art Rock, or "Hard Prog," like in the case of Birth Control. Kin Ping Meh, whose name was of Chinese origin, was founded in 1970 in Mannheim as a quintet featuring Joachim Schaffer, Werner Stephan, Torsten Herzog, Kalle Weber, and Joachim Schafer. In their early years, Kin Ping Meh performed many covers by bands like Blood, Sweat & Tears, Deep Purple, The Steve Winwood Group, etc… Soon, they were discovered by Polydor records, who signed them immediately. Schaffer left before the first album was recorded, but was replaced by Willie Wagner, who wrote perhaps their most famous track, "Fairy Tales."
This box set edition presents 4 1/2 hours of only unreleased stuff, which should be interesting not only for KPM fans…