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Because they work in a field that isn't usually taken seriously, the Pet Shop Boys are often ignored in the rock world. But make no mistake - they are one of the most talented pop outfits working today, witty and melodic with a fine sense of flair. Very is one of their very best records, expertly weaving between the tongue-in-cheek humor of "I Wouldn't Normally Do This Kind of Thing," the quietly shocking "Can You Forgive Her?," and the bizarrely moving cover of the Village People's "Go West." Alternately happy and melancholy, Very is the Pet Shop Boys at their finest.

Essentially, this 17-track album is a second-volume Queen's Greatest Hits, picking up the story from that album's 1981 release and taking it to the end of Queen's career. But the album also contains a few tracks – "Bohemian Rhapsody," "Keep Yourself Alive," and "Under Pressure" – that appeared on that first set, as well as a couple – "Stone Cold Crazy" and "Tie Your Mother Down" – from the same era…

When Alice in Chains' debut album, Facelift, was released in 1990, about a year before Nirvana's Nevermind, the thriving Seattle scene barely registered on the national musical radar outside of underground circles (although Soundgarden's major-label debut, Louder Than Love, was also released that year and brought them a Grammy nomination). That started to change when MTV jumped all over the video for "Man in the Box," giving the group a crucial boost and helping to pave the way for grunge's popular explosion toward the end of 1991. Although their dominant influences - Black Sabbath, the Stooges - were hardly unique on the Seattle scene, Alice in Chains were arguably the most metallic of grunge bands, which gave them a definite appeal outside the underground; all the same, the group's sinister, brooding, suffocating sound resembled little else gaining wide exposure on the 1990 hard rock scene…

Here's the question for Small Faces fans: Is it better to own the original Immediate albums or to invest in the splendid double-disc set, The Darlings of Wapping Wharf Launderette? The question is a tricky one, since Darlings contains all of their Immediate recordings, meaning all of Autumn Stone (or There Are But Four Small Faces, as it's known in its American incarnation), plus all of the landmark Ogden's Nut Gone Flake. Granted, Ogden's is divided cleanly in half, with the first side appearing on disc one and the second on disc two, which may irritate listeners who like to hear the concept album uninterrupted…