Reissue CDs Weekly: Crass - The Crassical Collection

The entire catalogue of the totemic anarcho-punk disruptors is revisited - again

The cultural imprint Crass were leaving was apparent while they were active. As well as their own music, their label Crass Records released records by Flux Of Pink Indians, the pre-Sugarcubes outfit Kukl and The Damned’s Captain Sensible – Crass were instrumental in him becoming a vegetarian.

Reissue CDs Weekly: Peephole In My Brain - British Progressive Pop Sounds Of 1971

PEEPHOLE IN MY BRAIN - BRITISH PROGRESSIVE POP SOUNDS OF 1971 A fresh perspective on the year glam rock began flexing its muscles

A fresh perspective on the year glam rock began flexing its muscles

The title comes from the lyrics of “Andy Warhol”: track two, side two of David Bowie’s late 1971 album Hunky Dory: ”Put a peephole in my brain, Two new pence to have a go, I'd like to be a gallery, Put you all inside my show.” The new pence reference recognised Britain’s recent adoption of decimalised currency.

Reissue CDs Weekly: Helen Shapiro - Face The Music The Complete Singles 1967-1984

HELEN SHAPIRO - FACE THE MUSIC: THE COMPLETE SINGLES 1967-1984 A lack of hits doesn't weaken this homage to the UK's first home-grown female popstar

A lack of hits doesn't weaken this homage to the UK’s first home-grown female pop star

What happens when the hits dry up? And what happens a little further down the line, as the years of being on the charts recede into the past? For Helen Shapiro, the questions are answered by the intriguing Face The Music: The Complete Singles 1967–1984, a 25-track compilation collecting all her pop singles from the period covered by the title. Her work in jazz is not heard. The latest tracks were originally issued by Charlie Gillett’s Oval label and became her final singles.

Reissue CDs Weekly: John Coltrane - Giant Steps

REISSUE: JOHN COLTRANE - GIANT STEPS 60th-anniversary edition of the jazz landmark doesn't go far enough

60th-anniversary edition of the jazz landmark doesn’t go far enough

Giant Steps doesn’t suffer from a lack of availability. A couple of weeks ago, two editions of John Coltrane’s 1960 landmark set were available in a central London music store. One was a 2002 CD version which supplemented the album’s seven tracks with eight bonus cuts: alternate studio takes which were not originally released. It was selling for £7.

Reissue CDs Weekly: The London Pub Rock Scene, The Year The UK Turned Day-Glo

Box sets underlining how Brit-punk didn’t create a cleavage with the musical past

The standard recitation goes like this. In the early Seventies a London scene evolved, centring on bands playing in pubs. Music was taken back to the grassroots. Finesse was unnecessary. What happened was dubbed pub rock and it laid the ground for an even more basic style: punk rock. Pub rock fed into and helped foster punk rock.

Reissue CDs Weekly: The Stooges - Live At Goose Lake

THE STOOGES - LIVE AT GOOSE LAKE Iggy and pals roar through full ‘Fun House’

Blistering 1970 recording of Iggy and pals roaring through the full ‘Fun House’ album

So far this year, Live at Goose Lake August 8th, 1970 is 2020’s most exciting archive release. The album is a previously unknown soundboard recording of The Stooges playing at Jackson, Michigan’s Goose Lake Festival. The event was formally billed as Goose Lake Park – International Music Festival. Also on were Faces, Ten Years After, The Flying Burrito Brothers and The James Gang.

Reissue CDs Weekly: This Is Our Music - Jazz Out Of Norway

Double-disc testament to a nation’s fertile musical seedbed

The Turnamat is a type of washing machine made by AEG. In the composition titled “Turnamat”, Seventies-type synths, wobbly keyboard lines and hard-grooving drums give way to a brass-led interlude suggesting an acquaintance with the compositions of Lalo Schifrin. It’s as if a jazz-inflected soundtrack from 45 years ago has been shoved into a blender rather than a washing machine, then reconstituted and given a major buff-up.

Reissue CDs Weekly: Ready Or Not - Thom Bell's Philly Soul Arrangements & Productions

THOM BELL'S PHILLY SOUL ARRANGEMENTS & PRODUCTIONS 1965-1978 Homage to the great American sonic auteur

Overdue homage to the great American sonic auteur

A skim though the track listing confirms that this is no typical soul compilation. Actress and some-time pop singer Connie Stevens crops up. So does Johnny Mathis. Such seeming quirks are fitting as Thom Bell was never a typical arranger, producer or songwriter. There’s much more to the story than the timeless O’Jays and Stylistics hits he created for Gamble and Huff’s label Philadelphia International Records.

Reissue CDs Weekly: Be-Bop Deluxe - Axe Victim

BE-BOP DELUXE - AXE VICTIM Box-set makeover of Bill Nelson & Co’s impressive debut

Box-set makeover of Bill Nelson and Co’s impressive but ‘NME’-slated debut album

Bill Nelson’s views on his band Be-Bop Deluxe’s debut album are measured. In the essay accompanying its reissue, he writes “Axe Victim is one brief snapshot of a band in the process of becoming something else…a modest beginning, flawed but not without charm. And not the end of the story. I’ll always be grateful for the way that it helped launch a more appropriate vessel for my music, a ship which sails onward to this very day.” He sees the album as transitional.

Reissue CDs Weekly: Dudu Phukwana and the "Spears"

DUDU PHUKWANA AND THE 'SPEARS' Illuminating reissue of Joe Boyd-produced debut album

Dudu Pukwana’s Joe Boyd-produced debut album reappears, with added Fairport Convention input

Whether explicitly or indirectly, what’s written on a master tape box can tantalise. Revealing part of a picture creates a desire to want to know more. Take the example seen above. It’s for an album by South African alto saxist Dudu Pukwana.