Present

All 11 tracks from the 1967 LP, with the addition of seven previously unreleased items and a couple cuts from non-LP singles. Although the production is beautiful and the songwriting melodic, the material is really too cloying to qualify this as a lost classic. When there's even a bit of a serious or melancholic edge — as on the graceful opening track "Another Time," or Gary Usher's strange and stunning slice of psych-pop, "The Truth Is Not Real" — it's much more memorable. Otherwise, this is kind of like the lesser fairy-tale, sing-songy British psychedelia of the time, but with state-of-the-art L.A. '60s production. The bonus cuts are similar to the album, highlighted by the gorgeous instrumental "Sister Marie," although the non-LP single "Hotel Indiscreet" is silly fluff.

It cannot be said that Robbie Williams is a Scrooge with his holiday album, The Christmas Present. In its deluxe edition – which is the only edition available upon its initial 2019 release – The Christmas Present is a double album, divided into a disc chronicling "The Christmas Past" on one disc and "The Christmas Future" on the other, thereby turning the record's title into a double-edged pun. The Christmas Past disc is devoted to shopworn seasonal standards, supplemented by a handful of newer tunes written in the same ornate fashion. The Christmas Future finds Robbie loosening his tie and shaking off the strings, splitting his time between sincere ballads and impish novelties. Naturally, The Christmas Future is livelier than The Past, with Williams camping it up with Tyson Fury on the naughty "Bad Sharon" and then happily tweaking both sides of the political aisle with "Snowflakes." Williams may like to act like a bad boy, but at his heart he's a sentimental cornball and, ultimately, he winds up making mawkishness seem merry on The Christmas Present.

Present Tense was born out of two very specific desires. First, saxophonist James Carter wanted a precise recorded portrait of where he was at as a musician, aesthetically and technically. Second was producer Michael Cuscuna's dead-on assertion that Carter, for all his instrumental and aesthetic virtuosity, had never been represented well on tape. Carter's inability to resist overdoing it on virtually everything he records (ten-minute solos in standards, etc.) makes that point inarguable. Cuscuna proves to be the perfect producer - as both ally and foil - and reins Carter in to benefit the recording as a whole. The band on Present Tense is solid: the young trumpeter and fellow Detroiter Dwight Adams, pianist D.D. Jackson, bassist James Genus, and drummer Victor Lewis round out the quintet, with percussionist Eli Fountain and guitarist Rodney Jones playing on three cuts each…

Michael Jackson's double-disc HIStory: Past, Present, and Future, Book I is a monumental achievement of ego. Titled "HIStory Begins," the first disc is a collection of his post-Motown hits, featuring some of the greatest music in pop history, including "Billie Jean," "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough," "Beat It," and "Rock with You." It leaves some hits out – including the number ones "Say Say Say" and "Dirty Diana" – yet it's filled with enough prime material to be thoroughly intoxicating…