The 5000 Spirits or the Layers of the Onion was the second LP by The Incredible String Band, released in July 1967. The album demonstrated considerable musical development and a more unified ISB sound. It displayed their abilities as multi-instrumentalists and singer-songwriters, and gained them wide acclaim. As well as winning favourable reviews in the music press, it was received enthusiastically by the DJ John Peel, who regularly featured tracks from the album on his influential Perfumed Garden programme on the pirate radio ship Radio London. The 5000 Spirits… went to Number One in the UK folk chart, and was named by Paul McCartney as one of his favourite records of that year. wikipedia
For most of the last decade and a half, guitarist Steve Gunn has been quietly going about his business as a musician's musician. In addition to collaborating with Meg Baird, the Magik Markers, and Kurt Vile, he has been an active recording artist as a member of GHQ, the Gunn Truscinski Duo, and in his low-key way, as a solo artist. Time Off is his first trio recording under his own name. Gunn is a guitarist of wide interests and skillful versatility, whether it be early blues traditions like Piedmont or Delta styles, American Primitive, Indian music, psych, Gnawan, etc. He seeks out what inspires him then masters it. This set was reportedly cut in the breaks he had between other projects.
Escalay: The Water Wheel is not only the most popular album by the Nubian-born soloist Hamza El Din, it's arguably the best-known album of traditional Egyptian folk music in the west.
"This heady blend of instrumental pop covers, fuzzed-up guitars and sitar is a kitsch blast from start to finish. Featuring the cream of LA's session players alongside sitar virtuoso Harihar Rao (Ravi Shankar's senior disciple), it was originally released in 1966 and makes its long-overdue CD debut here, showing itself to be the first and best ‘sitarsploitation’ album ever recorded."