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Nick Cave finally gives the dedicated fans what they've desired for years (and have probably amassed in various guises in shoddy bootlegs): an official career-spanning cataloging of the various Bad Seeds odds and ends on three CDs. There are 56 tracks compiled here…

Rolling Stone Magazine released a list of "500 Greatest Songs of All Time" in November 2004. It represents an eclectic mix of music spanning the past 50 years, and contains a wide variety of artists sharing the spotlight. The Rolling Stone 500 was compiled by 172 voters comprised of rock artists and well-known rock music experts, who submitted ranked lists of their favorite 50 Rock & Roll/Pop music songs. The songs were then tallied to create the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

‘Samson de la nuit’ was the affectionate epithet given to this pianist who seemed never to sleep and who was almost as famous for spending his early morning hours in Parisian jazz clubs as he was for playing Ravel’s Gaspard de la nuit. Like the Biblical Samson, Samson François wore his hair long – it often hung in front of his eyes as he played – and like the character Scarbo in Gaspard, he could be mischievous and evasive. A man of contrasts, he was in many ways the epitome of what one thought a romantic pianist should be – confident, dashing, poetic, moody, passionate, tender and temperamental. Today, more than 40 years after his premature death, a new generation of listeners has come to appreciate the qualities that made him one of the great pianists of the 20th century.

As MCA reconfigures their Chess catalog, this 20-track single-disc compilation now takes the place of their original 12-track Best of Little Walter collection, a landmark blues album which had remained in print for over three decades. His Best (Chess 50th Anniversary Collection) reprises ten of those seminal tracks (leaving off the echoey "Blue Light" and "You Better Watch Yourself," the latter being available on the two-disc anthology The Essential Little Walter) and brings ten others cherry-picked from the catalog to the mix. If you've never experienced the innovative instrumental genius of Little Walter, classics like "Juke," "Off the Wall," "Mean Old World," "Sad Hours," "Blues with a Feeling," "My Babe," "Boom Out Goes the Light," "Last Night," "Mellow Down Easy" and "Roller Coaster" (written by Bo Diddley, who also guests on guitar) will come as a major revelation.

The set kicks off with the 1969 live album Concerto For Group and Orchestra and also includes In Rock (1970), Fireball (1971), Machine Head (1972), Made In Japan (1972), Who Do We Think We Are (1973), Burn (1974), Stormbringer (1974), Come Taste The Band (1975) and Made In Europe (1976)

Wisely going only by her first name, Polish-by-way-of-England pop singer Basia Trzetrzelewska ("pronounced Basha Tshetshelevska"), joined by her musical partner Danny White, steps out of the band Matt Bianco to launch her solo career with Time and Tide. She and White create a series of keyboard-based dance-pop arrangements to support her smooth alto. This is sophisticated pop music that sounds ideal for playing in any number of upholstered locations – a black-tie cocktail party, a fashion-show runway, the back seat of a limousine.