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If this had only been Kronikles, 1963-1972 instead. It's the same problem with all the '60s greats who aren't named Neil Young. Their work rises like comets shot out of cannons in the early, R&B/Merseybeat beginnings, soaring ever higher toward the more expansive psychedelic era. Then they peak, level off around Woodstock, begin to descend in the earliest '70s, and then they plummet with a thud and a plop. To be fair, the Kinks made the tidiest, least offensive mess of it, and thus you could feel affection for them even when they sucked. Like, say, John Lennon or Pete Townshend, Ray Davies and his husky, Mickey Mouse-voiced sibling were capable of the odd later-'70s (or even later) gems that, if nothing like their fabled past, would remind of their prodigious talents in their early-twenties prime. Nevertheless, over a 35-year chronological presentation, the helpless spiral toward crap city is inescapable. All the more so with the junior Davies, who had such a smaller catalog to start. CD one plucks out the one or two songs Dave sang on each Kinks LP – blues-stomp covers, a few melodies Ray wrote for him, and some of Dave's earliest, best tunes. Most significantly, there's two huge vault-uncovered treats for '60s Kinks heads: a rare 1963 acetate of an unknown Dave number, the early-Beatles-like "I Believed You," the band's earliest unearthed recording from its days as the Ravens; and a 1969 Dave-alone eight-track, "Climb Your Wall," a nice piece of post-Dylan, post-Arthur happy shambles.

The Kinks were one of the most influential bands of the British Invasion. Early singles "You Really Got Me" and "All Day and All of the Night" were brutal, three-chord ravers that paved the way for punk and metal while inspiring peers like the Who. In the mid-'60s, frontman Ray Davies came into his own as a songwriter, developing a wry wit and an eye for social commentary that culminated in a pair of conceptual LPs, The Village Green Preservation Society and Arthur (Or the Decline and Fall of the British Empire), that proved enormously influential over the years.

With the power-riffs of a blues-rock band and the thick, pop sensibility of say, John Mellencamp, Mark Selby zeros-in on the essence of timeless roots rock. "Don't You Throw That Mojo on Me," has an intro that effectively weds modern, almost alternative studio devices with traditional acoustic blues then rolls along with New Orleans-style piano and a mean slide lead. Choogling through pop tunes ("She's Like Mercury") and the final, title song (which makes up for any lack of subtlety throughout), Selby has fashioned an atypically appealing modern blues-rock sound, easily filed between Kenny Wayne Shepherd and the Black Crowes.

Orchestral and choral arrangements of rock songs have been a curious subgenre ever since the mid-'60s when Andrew Loog Oldham arranged The Rolling Stones Songbook for syrupy strings, but The Kinks Choral Collection stands apart from the pack for the simple reason that it's not the project of some associate or admirer, but rather chief Kink Ray Davies. His very presence as arranger and lead vocal means The Kinks Choral Collection isn't nearly as stuffy and middlebrow as so many of these orchestral rock albums; he manages to inject some semblance of rock & roll by pushing the songs forward with guitar, and letting the rhythms swing instead of plod.

Kurt Cobain made a lot of mistakes in his life but loving the Vaselines was not one of them. Nirvana covered one of their songs for their MTV Unplugged session, two other covers show up on the Incesticide record and as Kurt might tell you if he were alive today, from 1986 to 1989 the Vaselines were the best pop band on the planet. Sub Pop was kind enough to cash in on the Nirvana connection and on The Way of the Vaselines: A Complete History, release everything the Vaselines recorded. From the stomping, singalong opener "Son of a Gun" to the distorted and nasty "Let's Get Ugly" 17 tracks later, this collection is the Holy Grail of indie pop music. It's unfailingly amateurish, almost completely silly, occasionally quite perverted, and always about sex. The music has the simplicity and ear-grabbing melodies of the best bubblegum, the loud and semi-competent guitars of punk, and some of the attitude and lo-fi sound of the noise rock scenesters like the Jesus & Mary Chain.

Though former Runaways guitarist Lita Ford has been absent from the recording industry since 1997, she hasn't exactly been idle. After releasing Kiss Me Deadly, her final album after a string of them in the '80s and '90s, the music scene – and the industry with it – changed, and alternative ruled the airwaves. Ford got married to Jim Gillette, former vocalist with hair metal rockers Nitro, and started a family. In addition, she relocated to the Caribbean. Wicked Wonderland is uncharacteristic of the pop-metal she released a decade ago. It's an in-your-face metal record, but ultimately it's a very studied and calculated 21st century pop-metal record.