This was Specter's fifth album for Delmark Records. It saw the Chicago guitarist team up with singer/harpslinger Lynwood Slim (who wrote or co-wrote four of the songs) and organist Jack McDuff. A smooth and easy listen, Left Turn on Blue shuffles, swings, and bops at the juncture of blues and jazz. From the blues chestnut "Party Girl" to the Albert Collins instrumental "Tremble" to the steady jazz groove of Slim's "Stop! Hold It," this is a very classy album. The horns are nicely done, and jazz buffs will particularly enjoy Specter's brief interjections of other tunes into the songs: "Til the End of Time," "Unleavened Soul," and "Killer Jack."

Esoteric Recordings is pleased to announce the release of the classic 1972 self titled album by Home. The band featured a line up of Mick Stubbs (guitar, piano, lead vocals), Laurie Wisefield (lead guitar, vocals), Cliff Williams (bass, vocals) and Mick Cook (drums) and formed in London in 1970. Signing to CBS Records they recorded their debut album in 1971. Their second self-titled album was released in 1972 and included the classic track Western Front . This Esoteric reissue has been re-mastered from the original master tapes and restores the original album artwork.

John Coltrane's matchup with singer Johnny Hartman, although quite unexpected, works extremely well. Hartman was in prime form on the six ballads, and his versions of "Lush Life" and "My One and Only Love" have never been topped. Coltrane's playing throughout the session is beautiful, sympathetic, and still exploratory; he sticks exclusively to tenor on the date. At only half an hour, one wishes there were twice as much music, but what is here is classic, essential for all jazz collections.

Shamanism is the oldest spiritual path on Earth of healing, maintaining balance and harmony and keeping our connection with Mother Earth and All Creation. This powerful Shamanic drumming album will help you reach a higher plain of healing and understanding. The complex rhytms, each carefully written to form a perfect counterpoint to the main heartbeat of the performance will touch your inner psyche and move the body and mind to a state of deep relaxation and calm. Designed to touch the very soul of all who listen and learn Shamanic Healing, this album is bound to leave a lasting and unforgettable impression.

Spread over four discs, this set contains every released recording the Yardbirds made under the leadership of their manager Giorgio Gomelsky from 1963 to 1966…

Deftly handling the alto, tenor, and baritone saxophone, bebop giant Sonny Stitt is heard to perfection here on a variety of early-'50s dates. Stitt not only shows off his patented speed throughout, but he goes a long way in dispelling criticisms of him being all fire and no grace. The 16-track disc kicks off with four tight, Latin-tinged swingers featuring an octet that includes trumpeter Joe Newman and timbales player Humberto Morales. Switching to piano quartet mode for the bulk of the disc, Stitt ranges effortlessly from frenetic blasts ("Cherokee") to golden-hued ballads ("Imagination"). Capping off the set with four bonus cuts featuring the likes of Gene Ammons and Junior Mance, Stitt delivers one of the top sets of performances from the late bebop era.

Following a few years after Levee Town, an album tightly focused on a specific place and time, Landreth dedicates The Road We're On to the more intangible magic of the blues. The music this time scans a vast panorama, from the Texas shuffle of "All About You" and zydeco pulse of "Gone Pecan" through the tub-thump beat of some Bayou dive on "Juke Box Mamma." Aside from a couple of cuts on which he plays standard guitar, Landreth fills this album with wizardly slide work: A shimmering lick at the end of "A World Away" provides the most gorgeous sonic moment, though his extended jam on the environmental call to arms "Natural World" sustains a high level of intensity through several choruses. On most of these tracks Landreth performs in a raw trio setting, almost all the time recording live; on "Hell at Home" he even keeps the scratch vocal, rather than overdub a fresh version, because the four-beat groove, reminiscent of "Walking Blues" on Paul Butterfield's East-West, is so in-the-pocket.

Harold Budd's discs tend to end up in the new age section of the record store, because his music is generally pleasant, quiet, and soothing. But where most new age composers go for the obvious (and sometimes saccharine) melody, Budd veers off into ambiguity; he also lacks the mystical bent that often goes along with the new age style. Instead, his compositional voice is more like that of a detached observer – one who creates beauty without getting too involved with it. By the Dawn's Early Light finds Budd writing for various combinations of viola, guitar, harp, and keyboards. All of the music is lovely, but not all of the compositions sound complete. In several cases, they sound like raw ideas rushed into the studio before their time. Guitarist Bill Nelson provides much of the interest throughout the album, and the sighing, slithery viola of Mabel Wong lends an occasional turn-of-the-century salon feel to the proceedings. The only really embarrassing moments occur when Budd – whose voice sounds like an unfortunate cross between Garrison Keillor and Kermit the Frog – reads his own poetry. Skip those tracks and you'll be fine.

UK compilation for the Scottish hard rock quartet. 19 tracks including the classic rock staple, 'Love Hurts', 'Ruby Tuesday', 'Star', 'Where Are You Now', 'Place In Your Heart', 'Holy Roller', 'Love Leads To Madness', 'Veteran's Song', 'Fallen Angel', 'Country Girl', 'Guilty', 'Moonlight Eyes', 'Dream On', 'Heart's Grown Cold', 'I Don't Want To Go On Without You', 'Sunshine', 'Games', 'Take A Little Piece Of My Heart' & 'Child In The Sun'. Nazareth are a Scottish hard rock band formed in 1968, that had several hits in the United Kingdom, as well as in several other West European countries in the early 1970s, and established an international audience with their 1975 album Hair of the Dog, which featured their hits "Hair of the Dog" and a cover of the ballad "Love Hurts". The band continues to record and tour.

The second of a pair of 2001-released discs compacting two full Manfred Mann albums onto a single CD, this covers their sophomore album (The Five Faces Of) from 1965 and fourth (Pretty Flamingo) from 1966, the latter being the last to feature original vocalist Paul Jones and multi-instrumentalist Mike Vickers. Taken as a whole, these 22 tracks exhibit the remarkable breadth of the band as they tackle blues covers ("I Put a Spell on You"), Beatleesque Brit Invasion pop hits ("Pretty Flamingo" and "Sha-La-La"), jazz (a vocal version of Herbie Hancock's "Watermelon Man"), and folk ("John Hardy"), as well as contributing their own derivative yet enthusiastic originals.

Perhaps the Sergio Mendes & Brasil '66 sound was at last beginning to show signs of wear, for not only didn't Ye-Me-Le produce any hits ("Wichita Lineman" reached a lowly number 95), but the album is also less enterprising and fresh-sounding than its predecessors. There is a surprising shortage of Brazilian material, which was always Mendes' most valuable contribution in the long run, and more reliance upon routine covers of pop/rock standards like "Easy to Be Hard" and "What the World Needs Now." But there are special moments, like the hypnotic "Masquerade" (no relation to the Leon Russell/George Benson hit), Sergio Mihanovich's haunting "Some Time Ago," and another winning treatment of a Beatles tune, "Norwegian Wood," where Mendes cuts loose a killer solo on electric piano (believe it or not, the 45 rpm single version features more of that solo than the LP).

Iron Duke is a Danish 1970's symphonic rock band. The 1974 debut album First Salvo line up was: Tommy Hansen, Jens Olesen, Hans Resen and Claus Sarup. The music of Iron Duke is keyboard oriented from the 70's and like ELP, they re-arrange classical songs with their first album in 1974. The second album was released in 1977 and contains rock versions of Danish songs. The song "Rockin Edward" adapted from "Per Gynt suite" and from the first album is probably the best one. They recorded a song for the benefit EP Greenpeace Sange Med in 1983.