You Can’t Sit Down: Cameo Parkway Dance Crazes 1958 1964 + 
you Got The Power: Cameo Parkway Northern Soul 1964 1967

This Rhino U.K. 2012 box set rounds up the prime of Booker T. & the MG's, the five albums they released between 1962 and 1968: Green Onions, Soul Dressing, And Now!, Hip Hug-Her, and Doin' Our Thing. Often, Booker T. & the MG's are seen as nothing more than a singles act but these records illustrate just how deeply their gifts ran, as they are all deeply funky, gritty, soulful records that are easy to enjoy. And when they're collected in this convenient little box, they're even easier – and cheaper – to appreciate.

There are as many flavours of jazz as there are pebbles on a beach, but the majority combine rhythmic invention with instrumental virtuosity to create a sound that can transport the listener to a different plane. Whether your ear is caught by the saxophone of Earl Bostic or Eddie Harris, the flute of Herbie Mann, Ray Charles’ effervescent keyboards (he played sax too) or the music of Cuban-born ‘King of the Mambo’ Perez Prado, whose 1958 US chart-topper ‘Patricia’ is familiar from countless movies and television ads,one thing is certain – the jazz instrumental still reigns supreme.

20 original albums recorded beetween 1959 and 1975 on the legendary soul label Atlantic, including Ray Charles, Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett and Solomon Burke‘s masterpieces, the classic Stax/Volt recordings by Booker T. & The M.G.’s, Rufus Thomas, Sam and Dave, Eddie Floyd and Ben E. King, Percy Sledge, Don Covay and Donny Hathaway’s legendary LPs. Also includes material previously unreleased on CD, such as Sam Dee's classic The Show Must Go On.

Hound Dog Taylor's second album was every bit as wild as the first, bringing with it a fatter sound and a wider range of emotions and music. A recut here of Taylor's first single, "Take Five," totally burns the original while the smoldering intensity of "See Me in the Evening" and "Sadie" take this album to places the first one never reached.