Flic ou Voyou Cop or Hood (1979)

Dynasty marked the first time that the original four members of Kiss didn't all appear together for the entire album – session drummer Anton Fig subbed for Peter Criss due to the latter's erratic behavior and injuries sustained in a serious car crash. And even though it was a platinum-plus smash, Dynasty marked the beginning of Kiss' unfocused period, which would ultimately end in a nosedive of the band's popularity, as well as Criss and Ace Frehley leaving the band by 1982. In latter-day interviews, the band admitted that they started to listen to outsiders about what direction the music should go around the time of Dynasty.

Bobby Rush was a journeyman blues singer, most famous for the novelty hit "Chicken Heads." On this album, however, he took his decades of his experience and his close study of Howlin' Wolf and made an urban blues album for his times, incorporating touches of Philadelphia soul, street-corner harmonies, and the rhythms of the pulpit. He tackled modern injustice ("Evil Is") alongside Seventies sexual mores ("I Can't Find My Keys"); Rush Hour was the first album in a sequence of ever-stranger "folk-funk" explorations. What We Said Then: "Rush Hour is so weird that it's a wonder George Clinton didn't think of it first. . .What emerges is outrageous and stunning. . .In a time when most black pop music sounds machine crafted, this record is more than an anomaly. Rush Hour is a tribute to resilience–a sign that the lessons Howlin' Wolf and his peers learned and taught have been neither lost nor forgotten. You're going to need something like this to get you through the Eighties".

Aera originated from Nürnberg, with roots going back to the late 1960. Although related to Ihre Kinder, Aera were always more of that great tradition of Bavarian/South German jazz-rock. One could compare them to other such bands as: Embryo, Missus Beastly, Munju, Moira, etc. Whilst fronted by Muck Groh they recorded two albums that were as much Krautrock as jazz-rock, with multi-tracked guitar riffing and near on ever-present wind solos, plus violin and ex Wind drummer Lucky Schmidt on their second. After that they got jazzier, due to big changes in personnel, with wheelchair-bound saxophonist Klaus Kreuzeder taking over as leader. Further albums diversified, with Roman Bunka from Embryo joining for a while, before they returned to the patent Aera Kraut-fusion style.

Brand X's most eclectic album to date, Product is perhaps most notable for its attempts at a pop crossover in the Phil Collins-sung "Don't Make Waves" and "Soho." The range of styles presented here – hard and soft fusion, pop, progressive rock – results from the now-interchangeable nature of the Brand X lineup, which, in addition to the returning Collins and Robin Lumley, is expanded to include bassist John Giblin and drummer Mike Clarke…

This fourth album from Manhattan Transfer was the first for Cheryl Bentyne, who replaced Laurel Masse after the original singer's auto accident and subsequent decision to leave the group. Though replacing Masse was difficult, Bentyne's energy and style proved to be the perfect complement to the group's already dynamic performance…

With this album, Oldfield began to make an attempt to break down his extended structures into a more commercially acceptable format, with the side-long title track being separated into four sections…