Goin' Back traces a century of Crescent City musical history, starting in the mid-19th century with Louis Moreau Gottschalk, a classical composer influenced by the African chants and slave dances he witnessed in New Orleans' Congo Square. With support from some of the city's most prominent musical pioneers (including Danny Barker, Pete Fountain, and the Neville Brothers), Dr John breathes new life into the work of Jelly Roll Morton, Louis Armstrong, James Booker, Professor Longhair, Fats Domino, Smiley Lewis, and Huey Piano Smith. From early jazz to junkie blues, Goin' Back covers it all, ranging from well-trod standards ("Basin Street Blues", "Careless Love") to otherwise forgotten jewels ("I Thought I Heard Buddy Bolden Say", "How Come My Dog Don't Bark"). What's most remarkable is how utterly alive and timeless it sounds. -Keith Moerer.

Soul and r&b legend Ray Charles may not have lived to see the success of Hollywood's ultimate tribute to him, but director Taylor Hackford's biopic (featuring a landmark performance by Jamie Foxx as the musical legend) will further burnish his legacy as one of the cornerstones of contemporary American music. Though it stretches from 1953's ecstatic, proto-soul "Mess Around" to a sublime, bluesy live take of "Georgia On My Mind" recorded in Japan in the mid-70's, this 17-track song-score can only be an inviting appetizer to the singer's epochal body of work. Charles' artistry may have virtually defined soul music itself, yet it also triumphed in genres as far afield as blues blues ("Nightime is the Right Time") and country ("I Can't Stop Loving You," "Bye Bye Love") during the 60's, the impossibly rich era from which the bulk of this soundtrack is culled. Crucially, fully a third of the cuts here are live recordings - including electrifying 1965 performances of "What'd I Say," "You Don't Know Me" and "Hallelujah I Love Her So" hand-picked for the film by Charles himself - the forum in which the singer consistently operated on a whole other artistic plateau from mere mortals. - Jerry McCulley.

For a man renowned for his sartorial elegance and the most prudently maintained facial hair in rock, you'd expect One More Car, One More Rider-Eric Clapton's first live album since 1992's zeitgeist-capturing Unplugged set-to be full of well-tailored highlights from his biblically-proportioned (well, some people still call him "God") back-catalogue of bristly, well kempt blues. And of course you'd be absolutely right. Recorded in Los Angeles and Tokyo during his 2001 world tour (the simultaneously released DVD of the same name is taken exclusively from the Los Angeles show) and featuring the musical accompaniment of such luminary hired-hands as Andy Fairweather-Low and Billy Preston, it's an album that serves to satisfy both the Clapton purist (there's a four-song segue of tracks from Pilgrim, shorn of their original anodyne synthesizer embellishments) and the adult popsters who prefer their blues from the decanter rather than the bottle ("Tears In Heaven", a sublime "Bell Bottom Blues" and a rather poised, applause-ridden "Layla"). It's a shame that the solo-slot extemporisations of Reptile-Joe Pass meets George Benson meets Weather Report-arrive a little too early in the main course for the listener to prepare for full-on mastication. And there also remains a minority of people for whom "Wonderful Tonight" is the biggest pre-coital turn-off this side of farting in bed (or "Lady in Red" by Chris de Burgh). However, such pallid flaws are only trifling grievances for One More Car, One More Rider is an engaging live document that finds Clapton far from asleep at the wheel. -Kevin Maidment.