Take Off €“ November 2006

Blue Note Plays Cole Porter is a solid single-disc collection of Cole Porter standards culled from various Blue Note jazz releases. Included are such vintage cuts as trumpeter Lee Morgan's 1957 version of "Just One of Those Things" off The Cooker and tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson's 1964 take on "Night and Day" from Inner Urge.

From Japan, an already consecrated prog state of art, comes - close in modern, alternative and resonating times - the band NAIKAKU (full name is Naikaku-No-Wa, with the meaning of Internal Nuclear Tide). At first Satoshi Kobayashi (bass) and Kazumi Suzuki (flute) formed the band, in mid-1998, and initiated their music, but eventually the lineup grew towards an eclectic sextet, drummer Norimitsu Endo, guitarist and trumpeter Mitsuo Muraoka, flutist Naoko Higashi and guitarist Kei Fushimi joining…

Between 1957 and 1968, Ray Conniff had 28 albums in the American Top 40. He started out at Columbia Records as their home arranger, backing artists such as Rosemary Clooney, Johnny Mathis, and Johnnie Ray, with his orchestra and was eventually offered the chance to do his own record. We Wish You a Merry Christmas is packed with traditional holiday tunes that Conniff and his (25) Singers wove into a series of medleys. This album has a retro studio sound, which, upon listening, may conjure up images of Lawrence Welk singers strolling the stage, dressed in matching holiday garb. Sometimes melodramatic ("Ring Christmas Bells"), other times, bright and exuberant ("Let it Snow! Let it Snow! Let it Snow!"), it's good, clean fun for the whole family and a solid addition to any Christmas catalog.

English-Irish teen-pop boy band formed during the British TV singing competition "The X Factor" in 2010. They finished third in the series and subsequently signed with Simon Cowell's label Syco Music. In November 2011 they released their debut album "Up All Night". The album went straight to number one on the US Billboard 200 chart, which made One Direction the first UK group in US chart history to debut at number one with their first album. Propelled to international success by social media, One Direction's four albums, Up All Night (2011), Take Me Home (2012), Midnight Memories (2013) and Four (2014) topped charts in most major markets, and generated hit singles including "What Makes You Beautiful", "Live While We're Young", "Story of My Life" and "Night Changes".