On 31 December 1966, the Daily Mail's Virginia Ironside got to grips with a new trend in pop music. Under the heading “The bleeps take over”, Jimmy Hendrix (sic) The Move and The Pink Floyd were gathered together as purveyors of something The Who had started with “feedback, violence, ripping strings from their guitars.” “New groups,” it was said “are taking it farther and farther out.

The ninth track on this collection of interpretations of songs written by Kris Kristofferson is so surprising it’s bewildering. The commentary in the booklet of For The Good Times – The Songs Of Kris Kristofferson notes its “sneering Joe Strummer-like delivery” and that the “guitar-heavy riff is very Clash-like.” Baffling. Could a Kristofferson song merit these words?

“Witless punk” was the weekly music paper Sounds assessment of Disco Zombies’s first single “Drums Over London”. NME’s Paul Morley was more measured, declaring it “ill-disciplined slackly structured new pop but the chorus alone makes up for it.” That was March 1979. Heard now, “Drums Over London” comes across as energised pop-punk with a sing-along chorus and a wacky bent.

“I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked, dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix.” The opening words of Allen Ginsberg’s Howl are ingrained.

“Dorian Benediction” begins with a muted organ and spectral chorale. Minimal drums, an electric piano, vibes, melancholy saxophone and a jazzy solo guitar fill out the picture. Over its four-and-a-half minutes, the atmosphere is haunted and haunting. This is music which appears to have seeped from the walls of a baroque church. It’s the final track of The Free Design’s third album, 1969’s Heaven / Earth.

"Three plus versions of the same album. It’s ridiculous, but I’m glad.” The first paragraph of Richard Hell’s text in the booklet accompanying Destiny Street Complete lays it out. There are, indeed, three versions of his and his band The Voidoids’s July 1982 album Destiny Street on this double-CD set. It seems excessive.

The First Generation 1965–1974 is a 35-CD box set dedicated to the blues maven and propagator John Mayall. As well as the discs, there are three books: one a hardback, another reproducing fan club material, and the third a facsimile of the press pack for his first album. Also included are two posters and a signed photograph of Mayall. Five thousand copies have been made. As it sells for £275, the 3.8 kilogram The First Generation will not be a casual purchase.

Two of the four CDs in this set are of a live performance taped on 16 April 1964. The other pair of discs were recorded on 9 July 1975. Each show issued on Charles Mingus @ Bremen 1964 & 1975 was captured by the north German regional broadcaster Radio Bremen.

An old saw relating to The Doors says their ambition when they formed was to be as big as Los Angeles-based garage-psych sensations The Seeds. After listening to Lost Innocence – Garpax 1960s Punk & Psych, it’s hard not to wonder where the bands heard were aiming. What’s collected is from 1965 to 1969. All these combos operated in California, generally working in and around the LA area.

In 2020, one archive release exerted a more forceful presence than any other. Live At Goose Lake August 8th 1970 caught The Stooges as they promoted their second album Fun House. The source was a previously unknown, professionally recorded tape documenting the whole album as it was played live, in its running order. Iggy Pop and the band were hard yet sloppy, tight yet rough, always blazing. Wonderful – and a reminder that musical surprises still crop up.