The British R&b Sounds Of 1964

In the golden age of the British R&B revival, few groups created as much excitement and controversy as the Pretty Things. They came up alongside the Rolling Stones in the early 1960s, but were deemed by critics and fans as wilder and bluesier than even Mick Jagger & co. When long-haired Phil May sang and shook his maracas with manic intensity, audiences and record buyers knew they were in for a wild ride.

This exemplary four-disc box takes the high road, attempting nothing less than an honest reconstruction of the Who's stormy, adventurous, uneven pilgrimage. While offering an evenhanded cross-section of single hits and classic album tracks, 30 Years garnishes the expected high points with B-sides, alternate and live versions of familiar tracks, and the quartet's earliest singles as the High Numbers…

The Shadows are usually thought of as the quintessential British instrumental group and, along with the American band the Ventures and the Swedish group the Spotnicks, one of the most popular instrumental groups in the world. But that barely tells the story of their true significance in the history of British rock & roll – including the fact that they were the first homegrown British rock & roll band to dominate the U.K. charts, or that they weren't originally an instrumental group, either.

Them forged their hard-nosed R&B sound in Belfast, Northern Ireland, moving to England in 1964 after landing a deal with Decca Records. The band's simmering sound was dominated by boiling organ riffs, lean guitars, and the tough vocals of lead singer Van Morrison, whose recordings with Them rank among the very best performances of the British Invasion…

The original Who's Better, Who's Best: The Videos was a handy laserdisc consisting of 17 videos, an inordinate number of them overlapping at least in part with material from the movie The Kids Are Alright – which was OK, as the latter was never widely available as a laserdisc…