Angel Band is yet another fascinating left turn, an acoustic record comprised of country-gospel songs like "We Shall Rise, " "If I Be Lifted Up" and "Someday My Ship Will Sail, " performed with great subtlety and nuance…

Blah-Blah-Blah is the seventh studio album by Iggy Pop. Originally released in October 1986, on the label A&M, it remains his most commercially successful album to date. Blah-Blah-Blah appeared after a four-year hiatus for Pop, with David Bowie serving as his prime collaborator. It would be their final collaboration. A successful tour followed the album's release. The collection included a cover of Johnny O'Keefe's "Wild One" (here titled "Real Wild Child (Wild One)" and three original songs co-written with ex-Sex Pistols guitarist Steve Jones. The remaining tracks were co-written by Bowie, who also produced the album with David Richards but, unlike his previous work with Pop, The Idiot and Lust for Life (both 1977), did not sing or play any instruments. Bowie biographer David Buckley has reported that Pop "virtually disowned" the record, calling it "a Bowie album in all but name".

One of the most ambitious Euro-disco acts of the late 1970s was Space, which shouldn't be confused with the alternative rock band that recorded Spiders in 1996. By the time that Space was formed in the 1990s, the Euro-disco act heard on Deliverance had long since called it quits. Recorded in London and Paris in 1978, this conceptual, mostly instrumental LP employs a lot of futuristic sci-fi imagery and is quite high-tech for its time. Synthesizer-dominated instrumentals like "Air Force" and "Running in the City" give the impression that Jean-Philippe Iliesco, the album's producer, had been paying close attention to German innovators like Kraftwerk and Giorgio Moroder-and yet, Deliverance has a high-tech energy of its own.

Columbine marks the full-length album debut by Aura Dione, a Danish singer/songwriter with a pop style and English-language lyrics. Originally released in Denmark in 2008, the album was repackaged for German release in 2009. Highlights include the hit singles "Something from Nothing," "Song for Sophie," and "I Will Love You Monday." The German edition features a remix of the latter song retitled "I Will Love You Monday (365)."

Mary Stallings sings 12 excellent and soulful interpretations of songs by such great composers as Cole Porter, Burton Lane, Louis Prima, and Duke Ellington on her second release for the Maxjazz label, Live at the Village Vanguard. Her voice is strong, rich, and full of the introspection that only comes with musical growth. Accompanied by Ron Blake on tenor saxophone, Eric Reed on piano, Vicente Archer on bass, and Carl Allen on drums, Stallings is in touch with her music and in sync with her emotions on such notables as "You're Sensational," "Sunday Kind of Love," "All Night Long," and "I Didn't Know About You." Mary Stallings brings her seductive concept to listeners and will floor you with her exceptional phrasing on "Sunday Kind of Love" and "All Night Long"…

Keeping Chicago Blues alive, Robbert Fossen & Peter Struijk, were the winners of the Dutch Blues Challenge 2012, and finalists at the International Blues Challenge in Memphis, in January 2013. Fossen is also nominated for the 2013 Blues Awards "Best Vocalist!" Influenced by legends such as Muddy Waters, Magic Slim, Buddy Guy, and Jerry Portnoy, Fossen plays "real deal Chicago blues." With bands like A Crossroads Deal and the Robbert Fossen Blues Band, he performed incessantly all over Europe, backing American blues artists such as John Primer, Tail Dragger, Chick Rodgers, Nick Holt, Charles Hayes, and T-Model Ford.

The Petards have tried the impossible. In the early years of rock music, they met as a completely isolated German band from the provinces to achieve their national breakthrough on their own - the dream of international fame in the back of their minds. In their seven-year career, the Petards have made thousands of appearances, five long-playing records, a dozen singles and a lot of experience that groups in this country have been struggling with to this day. They were among the pioneers of German rock music who faced the thankless task of bringing new music to the rural areas of the Republic, where beat or rock music had previously only been accessible via radio. Although bands like the Petards met a starved and enthusiastic audience there, they were usually denied the boring recognition for their fundamental musical fieldwork.

Guitarist T-Bone Walker is one of the links–if not THE link–between the suave, intricate jazz styles of Charlie Christian and Lonnie Johnson and the crackling electricity of Buddy Guy and Jimi Hendrix. Not only is he massively influential as a guitarist, but he was a dynamic showman (played that guitar behind his head way before Hendrix did) and his original songs have become standards ("Stormy Monday Blues"). Originally entitled HOME COOKING, this 1966 album from blues wizard T-Bone Walker, where he's accompanied by only three other musicians (with no drummer), proves the blues can be mellow without losing the sting or the zing.

Gus Gus create a multi-vibe stir with Polydistortion. At times as cold and icy as their frosty homeland (Iceland), at other times a rumbling volcano of pyrotechnic rhythms, the CD is a study in the dynamics of the electronic. Atmospheric without ever being boring, Gus Gus rely on soul-filled or breathy vocals to turn their compositions into some of the more interesting and accessible aural amalgamations ever committed to disc. "Believe" is a rhythmic juggernaut, while "Gun" is a moody study of beats and texture. "Why" is particularly stunning, a sparse torch song carried along by a Fender Rhodes-style piano line. More eclectic than electronica, Gus Gus make aural sculptures out of rhythm.