Eden to Green

The third and last of Bear Family's Everly box sets, Chained to a Memory 1966-1972, chronicles the final act of the Everly Brothers' prime years, beginning just after the duo started to shake their mid-'60s doldrums and documenting their subsequent revival as they shifted to country-rock, the sound they continued to mine until their acrimonious split in 1973. This is a weighty set, containing a hefty hardcover book and a bonus DVD in addition to ten CDs, but the extra length isn't merely Bear Family's modus operandi – it's needed to bring an end to a story this epic. Indeed, the music on Chained to a Memory is in some ways some of the most interesting the Everlys ever produced. As their star began to fade, the Everlys reconnected with their country beginnings, quite deliberately titling their 1968 makeover, Roots, finding a wealth of new sounds and sentiments within country-rock. They exhibited a keen ear for material from emerging songwriters, and they wrote some terrific new songs, songs that exhibited the widening chasm between the two brothers who shared a sound and continued to harmonize beautifully together even as their sensibilities began to drift apart.

Anthems in Eden is a 1969 album by Shirley and Dolly Collins, with the Early Music Consort of London, directed by David Munrow. The album originally consisted of a 28-minute set of folk songs plus seven other individual pieces performed by the same group. The musical arrangements for these eight pieces included early music instruments, such as viols, recorders, sackbuts and crumhorns. In 1976, six new songs were recorded with a different assortment of accompanists, to replace the original seven individual songs. This 1976 album consisting of the 28-minute set plus the six new songs was released by Harvest Records under the title Amaranth. Subsequent releases have combined all fourteen pieces under the original title, Anthems in Eden.