on Air Queen

A fabulous collection of rock numbers from Eddie Cochran to Wheatus by way of Status Quo and Black Sabbath that will appeal not only to the air guitarists among us, but to everyone who finds great rock music exhilarating and enjoyable. Whether you're giving the grand solo performance in the privacy of you own home or hammering down the motorway with the wind in your (remaining) hair this double album hits the spot. The exhausted will feel reinvigorated and the depressed can hardly fail to feel somewhat more cheerful after sampling a few of these tracks. A second volume is promised and I will be one of the first in line when it is released. A treat - don't miss it!

Bert At the BBC is a comprehensive collection of Jansch’s appearances at the BBC, featuring over eight hours of rare and unreleased recordings, including live-on-air spots, studio sessions and full concerts straight from the BBC vaults, delving further into this legendary performer’s canon. Bert Jansch was the very essence of folk music, providing inspiration for everyone from Paul Simon and Neil Young to Led Zeppelin and countless folk revivalists.

Bert At the BBC is a comprehensive collection of Jansch’s appearances at the BBC, featuring over eight hours of rare and unreleased recordings, including live-on-air spots, studio sessions and full concerts straight from the BBC vaults, delving further into this legendary performer’s canon. Bert Jansch was the very essence of folk music, providing inspiration for everyone from Paul Simon and Neil Young to Led Zeppelin and countless folk revivalists.

This 1981 recording was the first period-instrument version of Purcell's most famous "semi-opera." This Restoration-era hybrid was a play with a complete (spoken) script plus numerous musical numbers for soloists, chorus, and pit orchestra. The Fairy Queen is based on Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, although you'd never know it from the music, which has (typically for the genre) no real connection to the plot. (Most of the songs and dances are masques performed for the entertainment of Titania, Oberon, or Hippolytus.) The advantage to this is that Purcell's score can be performed fairly well on its own. The Fairy Queen includes some of Purcell's best-loved comic scenes ("The Drunken Poet" and "Coridon and Mopsa") and songs ("Hark the echoing Air," "Ye gentle spirits," and "Hark how all things in one sound rejoice"–the last sung here by Jennifer Smith, sounding more beautiful than on any recording she's made since).

Dutch band Alquin released four studio albums in the early to mid-'70s, initially playing prog rock influenced by Pink Floyd and Roxy Music. However, by 1975's Nobody Can Wait Forever (the only Alquin album released in the U.S.), the band turned to a more varied style encompassing blues and hard rock. The original group comprised guitarist/vocalist Ferdinand Bakker, vocalist Job Tarenskeen, bassist Hein Mars, drummer Paul Weststrate, and horn player Ronald Ottenhoff; Michel Van Dyke joined the band as lead vocalist in 1975. A live album appeared in 1976, and the best-of Crash! was released a year later. Bakker and Tarenskeen played in the new wave outfit the Meteors in the late '70s and early '80s.