This 1972 attempt at an overview of Fairport Convention's radical, spirited and beautiful contribution to music in the period 1969 to 1972 was originally a double album. To allow conversion to a single CD, it unfortunately lost two tracks, "Crazy Man Michael" and "Jigs And Reels", because it was assumed that anyone interested in the band would also want to own the superb Liege And Lief from which they are drawn. The flaw in this is that the songs on What We Did On Our Holidays, Unhalfbricking and Full House are just as classic and unmissable. The tracks drawn from these, that form much of the collection, span the broad range of styles that Fairport so expertly made their own. Every number is a stand-out of a different kind, but the Sandy Denny tunes "Fotheringay" and "Who Knows Where The Time Goes" and the Richard Thompson/ Dave Swarbrick collaborations "Sloth" and "Walk Awhile" are immortal by any standards. For those who own the four core albums, this CD still has its value. It contains the superb "Now Be Thankful", a stand-alone single, and a selection of most of the best tracks from the somewhat lesser album Angel Delight and the decidedly poorer Babbacombe Lee. Meet On The Ledge, the 1999 compilation of 1967 to 1975 material is a better overall collection-mostly because it is twice as long-but its track selection post-Full House is somewhat bizarre, only containing one track from each of the above two albums, a serious omission. -James Swift.

Opening with a few bars of Stravinsky to set the adoring crowd on its feet, this once-three-LP set is Yes at their finest. This was, after all, probably the most mainstream act that had even provisional "prog rock" status, and their tunes show it. While "Heart of the Sunrise" may be one of the more modestly titled Yes songs (compare it with "The Six Wives of Henry VIII" or "The Fish (Schindleria Praematurus)" or even "Total Mass Retain"), it also bears marks of the band playing at its most frenetic pace around Jon Anderson's soaring near-falsetto. Rick Wakeman's grand synthesizer flashes are more than textural, finding visual meshes aplenty with Roger Dean's cryptic cover art-most of which is shrunken or absent on this two-CD reissue. When Yessongs was cut, Marshall stacks were in their heyday, and Yes happily engaged in harmonic and melodic excessiveness as well as carefully planned layers of complexity. "Roundabout" was the band's biggest hit to this point. It appears here faithfully reproduced. As for the rest, it's entertaining in a 1970s way-full of light shows, staged visuals, and more. It took a few years for prog rock to dwindle and for punk-coloured art rock to swerve toward songs about buildings and food. On Yessongs, the band was peaking, singing songs with far grander purpose (Siberia, the Apocalypse, etc. [+]

The success of Who's Next and its slate of classic-rock tracks has often obscured its true roots-Lifehouse, the unwieldy multi-media project that Pete Townshend originally concocted as the follow-up to Tommy. Variously informed by apocalyptic visions, sci-fi notions of interconnectivity that neatly presaged the Internet and, of course, an unwavering conviction that rock & roll would save the world, the core tracks of the sprawling Lifehouse were recorded, cut, re-recorded and finally boiled down into a collection that seems to represent as much alienation ("Behind Blue Eyes") and overweening cynicism ("Won't Get Fooled Again") as it does liberation and unity. Aside from Townshend's own self-released, multi-disc meditation on the project, this expanded new edition is the most rewarding attempt to place Lifehouse and the over-exposed classic it spawned in their proper context. Six tracks from the album's original but abandoned New York sessions flesh out the familiar material, with previously unreleased outtakes of "Getting in Tune" and a revealing, early arrangement of "Won't Get Fooled Again" warranting special note. The second disc documents one of Lifehouse's most quixotic elements with the first-time release of one of the series of concerts staged at London's Young Vic theatre during the project's gestation-events during which band and audience would somehow mystically become one. Core tracks from the project are interspersed with typical hard-rocking Who fare of the time, resulting in a show whose focus and dynamics belied something very different from the arena-rock clichés that would eventually overwhelm them. -Jerry McCulley.

Nearly a quarter-century (and bassist John Entwistle) passed between what had been considered the Who's career-capping album, It's Hard and this 21-song epic, which at its best has the band of two pining for the days of Who's Next. Built from the triumph of the mini-opera Wire & Glass EP (included here in its entirety), Endless Wire mixes metaphors of music, war, and religion, while showcasing Roger Daltrey's ageless vocal cords and Pete Townshend at his windmilling best. Launching with a "Baba O'Riley"-like synth break in "Fragments," Daltrey asks "Are we breathing out or breathing in?" and Townshend answers with a thrashing, crashing Gibson. When the volume is turned up, there are echoes of three decades ago. "It's Not Enough" and "Mike Post Theme" conjure images of Entwistle and Keith Moon-the latter song, with its quiet verse and thunderous chorus, recalls "Going Mobile" and longs for Moon to whack it into shape. But the linchpin remains Townshend's songwriting, whether he's questioning faith ("Man in a Purple Dress"), showing gratitude for support ("You Stand By Me"), or dreaming of entertaining immortals into eternity ("Out on an Endless Wire"). By the time it wraps up, Endless Wire tells two things. No, it does not quite rank with the band's best work. But yes, as long as Pete Townshend and Roger Daltrey walk the earth in tandem, the Who live on. -Scott Holter.

Y34RZ3R0R3M1X3D-or "Year Zero Remixed", if you don't do leetspeak, is the latest example of Trent Reznor's urge to see Nine Inch Nails material dissected, reworked, mistreated and reinterpreted by his friends and peers. For many artists, remix albums are by their nature slightly uneven collections, lacking the common thread that makes a good record a consistent piece of work-yet past NIN offerings like 1995's Further Down the Spiral have somehow bucked this trend, and Y34RZ3R0R3M1X3D is no exception. This isn't, you suspect so much to do with any similarities between the artists-everyone's here from British synth-poppers Ladytron to beat poet Saul Williams to minimalist classical ensemble Kronos Quartet-as it is the consistency of Reznor's vision; no matter how thorough the audio mangling, his damaged humanity still has a habit of poking through the gaps. Highlights include the smudged ambience of Fennesz's take on "In This Twilight" and the immersive, abstract techno of Olof Dreijer's 15 minute remix of "Me I'm Not", but the real coup here is two mixes by Stephen Morris and Gillian Gilbert of New Order that pull off machine-like synth-pop and drifting vintage electronics ambience leaving Reznor's vocals wholly intact. -Louis Pattison.