Willie Bobo's 1965 LP, Spanish Grease, has been combined with his Uno Dos Tres 1-2-3 LP from 1966 on one CD reissue. One pass through the title cut of Spanish Grease and you know that Carlos Santana was listening. The easy R&B/Latin jazz shuffle on this Bobo original, with its mix of Spanish and English vocals, is an obvious touchstone to cuts like "Evil Ways" on Santana's first two albums. What a shame, then, that the rest of the record is primarily comprised of covers of pop hits of the day like "It's Not Unusual" (a vocal and an instrumental version!) and "Our Day Will Come." The timbales player and his band lay down respectable grooves, but "Spanish Grease" is the only original on the album, and by far the most rewarding number. Similarly, the toughest and most memorable track on Uno Dos Tres 1-2-3 is the one Bobo original, "Fried Neck Bones and Some Home Fries." Its creeping Latin soul groove was, like "Spanish Grease," an obvious inspiration for Carlos Santana. But on most of the rest of the recording, Bobo coasts through interpretations of period hits like "Michelle," "Goin' Out of My Head," and Jay & the Americans' (!) "Come a Little Bit Closer," with some jazz and pop standards as well.

Collectables combines two very different back-to-back recordings made by guitarist Charlie Byrd for Columbia in the mid-'60s. Travellin' Man (issued in 1965) is a live gig at the Showboat in Washington D.C., a club he was playing in - and owned - 36 weeks out of the year. He is featured with his bass playing brother Joe, and the rather astonishing drummer Bill Reichenbach. The program consists of everything from originals like the title cut and the country and bluegrass tinged opener "Mama I'll Be Home Someday" to Michel Legrand's "I Will Wait for You." With tunes like the Richard Rodgers and Stephen Sondheim standard "Do I Hear a Waltz," Billy Strayhorn's "U.M.M.G.," and Django Reinhardt's "Nuages" sandwiched in between. It' is a hard swinging date where Byrd, a great melodic improviser, turns original arrangements inside out and pours his love for bossa and blues into everything he plays…

The departure of frontman Paul Jones left Manfred Mann with a large void to fill in the summer of 1966. Not only was Jones a charismatic vocalist, he was also a writer and one of Manfred Mann's key selling points with the record buying public. The group's record company, HMV, realised this and hedged their bets by signing Jones for a new solo deal, but dropping the band from its roster. In late 1966 while Jones was enjoying success with his first solo single, "High Time," a new version of Manfred Mann emerged with a cover of Bob Dylan's "Just Like A Woman" on Fontana. The new line up featured Mike D'Abo as vocalist (previously with A Band Of Angels) and was augmented by Klaus Voorman on bass, with Tom McGuiness switching to lead guitar. Despite the magnitude of this personnel change, the single was a top 10 hit and paved the way for this album, As Is.

The debut album of Ryder and the Wheels, fresh from the teenage ballroom circuit in Detroit, where they held court in earlier days as Billy Lee & the Rivieras. One of the defining moments in the history of Motor City music, Take a Ride is the sound of poor White kids claiming the music as theirs, too, while infusing it with the manic energy of the color-blind dreams of anybody who ever wanted to be somebody. Built entirely around their stage act, this album captures a band in full cry at the peak of their powers. This is what they mean when they say the words "high-energy Motor City rock & roll."

Two classic easy-listening albums by Paul Mauriat and His Orchestra, originally released in 1966 on the Philips label, together on one CD and remastered from the original analogue stereo tapes for Vocalion's trademark crystal-clear sound. French composer/conductor Paul Mauriat is a classically trained musician who decided to pursue a career in popular music. His first major success came in 1962, as a co-writer of the European hit "Chariot." In 1963, the song was given English lyrics, renamed "I Will Follow Him," and became a number one American hit for Little Peggy March. Mauriat is best remembered for his 1968 worldwide smash "Love Is Blue."

Otis Redding's talent began to surge, across songs and their stylesand absorbing them , with the recording of The Soul Album. In contrast to The Great Otis Redding Sings Soul Ballads, which was an advance over its predecessor but still a body of 12 songs of varying styles and textures, rising to peaks and never falling before an intense, soulful mid-range, The Soul Album shows him moving from strength to strength in a string of high-energy, sweaty soul performances, interspersing his own songs with work by Sam Cooke ("Chain Gang"), Roy Head ("Treat Her Right"), Eddie Floyd ("Everybody Makes A Mistake"), and Smokey Robinson ("It's Growing") and recasting them in his own style, so that they're not "covers" so much as reinterpretations; indeed, "Chain Gang" is almost a rewrite of the original, though one suspects not one that Cooke would have disapproved of…

Otis Redding's now historic four-night stand at Hollywood's Whisky a Go Go in April of 1966 has been selectively documented on two previous releases. The first was 1968's In Person at the Whisky a Go Go, which included ten selections chosen from the run. Good to Me: Recorded Live at the Whisky a Go Go, Vol. 2, released in 1982 and expanded for CD release in 1993, was also assembled from various nights. This release is very different. No mere attempt to milk a few more gems from a legendary set of gigs, Otis Redding & His Orchestra Live on the Sunset Strip contains three full sets on two discs from that stand. It's a warts-and-all, rowdy, magical set of performances that reminds the faithful of Redding's singular gifts as a singer and performer, and will open the ears of the uninitiated…

Love broadened their scope into psychedelia on their sophomore effort, Arthur Lee's achingly melodic songwriting gifts reaching full flower. The six songs that comprised the first side of this album when it was first issued are a truly classic body of work, highlighted by the atomic blast of pre-punk rock "Seven & Seven Is" (their only hit single), the manic jazz tempos of "Stephanie Knows Who," and the enchanting "She Comes in Colors," perhaps Lee's best composition (and reportedly the inspiration for the Rolling Stones' "She's a Rainbow"). It's only half a great album, though; the seventh and final track, "Revelation," is a tedious 19-minute jam that keeps Da Capo from attaining truly classic status.

Veteran Italian rock band Pooh formed in Bologna in 1966. During the late '60s, the band featured Roby Facchinetti, Valerio Negrini, Dodi Battaglia, and Riccardo Fogli, but after Negrini left in 1971, the band recruited guitarist, bassist, and vocalist Red Canzian plus drummer and percussionist Stefano D'Orazio, and began a long run as one of the best and most popular Italian rockers of their times. The band recorded for many labels, including CBS, Vedette, CGD (Compagnia Generale del Disco), and Warner Music Italy, selling over 100 million records in the process. Pooh continued to tour and record continually up into the 2010s, but in late 2016 they decided to call it quits by the end of the year, in order to complete their 50-year anniversary as a band. The concert album Pooh 50: L'Ultima Notte Insieme, recorded in mid-June at two shows in Milan, promptly hit number one in the Italian charts upon release in September.

This LP finds pianist Oscar Peterson at a transitional point in his career. Louis Hayes was the new drummer in his trio and, although veteran Ray Brown was on bass during the earlier of the two sessions, he would depart by 1966 (after 15 years) and be replaced by Sam Jones. However, the basic sound of the Oscar Peterson Trio remained unchanged (Peterson was the dominant voice anyway) and the personality of the group remained intact. Peterson contributed three originals (including the hard-swinging title cut) to this program and also sounds typically fine on "Let's Fall in Love," "The Shadow of Your Smile," "If I Were a Bell," and a definitive version of "Stella by Starlight."