Soundtrack of the eponymous film directed by Richard Lester (dubbed in French Quatre garçons dans le vent or Four boys in the wind), A Hard Day's Night is a first for The Beatles, as for this third album released at the beginning of summer 1964, John Lennon and Paul McCartney wrote every song on the disc without any covers! And what songs! Can’t Buy Me Love, A Hard Day's Night, I Should Have Known Better - the level is very high and each hit track shows a rapidly developing musical and artistic identity as the group went from being national treasures to international icons. Every corner of this changing pop façade is fascinating. The irresistible melodies are pulled together by sparkling guitars in an innocent, feel-good tribute to all things melodic. A Hard Day's Night is the epitome of the early periods of that famous 'sound' of the The Beatles. Even in ballads such as And I Love Her, the Fab Four already demonstrate a fascinating musical maturity... A true joy for the listener. ©MZ/Qobuz, Translation/BM

Among Ella Fitzgerald's gigantic discography, the eight volumes of her Ella Fitzgerald Sings The Complete American Songbook form a sacred pantheon. The idea for these records came from producer Norman Granz, who managed the singer and was the boss of Verve. The first volume, Ella Fitzgerald Sings The Cole Porter Songbook, which came out in 1956, was a runaway success with critics and the public alike. So much so that in that same year, Ella followed it up with Sings the Rodgers & Hart Songbook and then again in 1957 with Sings the Duke Ellington Songbook. This volume, which is given over to the songs of Irving Berlin, was conceived in sessions from 13 to 19 March 1958, with an orchestra directed by the classy and reserved Paul Watson. It's hard to sum up this double album in few words (it originally came out in two separate volumes) without breaking out reams of superlatives. Newcomers to her work can take this record as an easy base camp from which to ascend Ella Everest. Across a repertoire to die for (Berlin passed away in 1989 at the age of 101, having written more than 800 songs!), with light and gay numbers taking centre stage, Ella's voice picks out the great writer's romanticism, which never feels cloying. For fellow composer Jerome Kern, at the heart of Irving Berlin's writing was his faith in American vernacular: his songs were indivisibly linked with the country's history and image. Here, in ubiquitous favourites like Cheek to Cheek, in Watson's arrangements, in ambient swing, in freewheeling and sensual singing, we see the then-41-year-old American reaching the summit of perfection. This is one to play and play and play, again and again and again... © Marc Zisman/Qobuz

Capitol Records initially planned to release a live album from the Beatles in 1964, recording the band's August 23 concert at the Hollywood Bowl. Nobody at the label found the results satisfactory so they attempted it again almost exactly a year later, taping the August 29 and 30, 1965 shows at the Hollywood Bowl but, once again, it proved hard to hear the Fab Four from underneath the roar of the crowd, so those tapes were also shelved. They remained in the vaults until 1977, when Capitol president Bhaskar Menon asked George Martin to assemble a listenable live album from the two sets of Hollywood Bowl tapes, all with the idea of combating the rise of bootlegs and quasi-legit Beatles live albums. It was a difficult task, yet Martin and engineer Geoff Emerick managed to assemble a 13-track LP of highlights that was quite well received upon its 1977 release yet managed to earn a reputation as something of a disappointment in part due to the screams that overwhelmed the band. Whenever the Beatles catalog saw a digital release -- either in 1987 or in 2009 -- it was always left behind, not receiving a revision until 2016 when Martin's son Giles remastered the recordings, including four bonus tracks, for a CD/digital release to accompany Ron Howard's documentary Eight Days a Week: The Touring Years. Giles Martin's remastering does Live at the Hollywood Bowl a world of good, managing to somewhat suppress the thundering cheers without excising them at all, then boosting the Beatles so it's possible to focus on their crackerjack interplay. Perhaps the Beatles weren't able to hear themselves well on-stage but that's hard to discern from these performances, which are tight and swinging with the band clearly deriving energy from the audience. That's the primary difference between Live at the Hollywood Bowl and the two volumes of Live at the BBC: no matter how excellent those BBC collections are, there's no sense of the kinetic connection between the Beatles and their fans, something that's in ample display on Live at the Hollywood Bowl. Decades later, it's still thrilling to hear the band and the crowd feed off the excitement of the other.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

A double-disc set released for the holiday season of 2000, The Essential Bob Dylan is a fine choice for the casual listener that just wants all the songs they know on one collection -- it's Dylan's equivalent of Beatles One. Outside of the remastering and the previously non-LP (and very good) "Things Have Changed," there's nothing here for collectors, but, then again, that's not who this was designed for. This collection is for the listener that wants "Blowin' in the Wind," "Like a Rolling Stone," "All Along the Watchtower," "Quinn the Eskimo," "Lay Lady Lay," and "Tangled Up in Blue" in one tidy place. Yes, it's easy to find great songs missing, but for those casual fans, and for those looking for a fairly comprehensive yet concise entry point, The Essential Bob Dylan comes close to living up to its title.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

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This show, taped for MTV, finds Dylan turning in an 11-song set, with eight of the songs dating from his 1963-1967 heyday, including such standards as "The Times They Are A-Changin'" and "Like a Rolling Stone." ("John Brown," a powerful antiwar song from 1963, had not been released on a Dylan album previously.) The '70s are represented by "Knockin' on Heaven's Door," and the '80s by "Shooting Star" and "Dignity" (a trunk song, the studio version of which had emerged only the previous November on Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits, Vol. 3). Dylan, accompanied by a competent five-piece band, approaches his material in a gentler fashion than on some of the originals -- "The Times They Are A-Changin'" and "With God on Our Side," for example, seem sadder and less defiant than they did back in 1964. Otherwise, unlike some other Unplugged performances, this one doesn't offer a noticeably different view of the artist's work. But then, Dylan has been unplugged for much of his career, anyway.© William Ruhlmann /TiVo

Crazy Clown Time may be David Lynch's first solo album, but he’s far from a newcomer to music-making. He worked so closely with Angelo Badalamenti on the soundtracks to his films and television shows that the term “Lynchian” can be applied to music as well as movies, and his work with acts such as Blue Bob, Sparklehorse's Mark Linkous, and Danger Mouse as a musician and sound designer underscored that he has clear, and creative, musical ideas of his own. He continues to explore these ideas -- plus a few new ones -- on Crazy Clown Time, handling all the instrumental and vocal duties, with one notable exception: opening track “Pinky’s Dream,” which features the Yeah Yeah Yeahs' Karen O. A careening joyride of a song, it harnesses Lynch's surreal storytelling and O's breathless wail to thrilling effect; it’s so good that Lynch should consider doing more collaborations like this and Dark Night of the Soul. The second track, “Good Day Today,” is nearly as striking, if only because on the surface, it seems like such a departure from Lynch's usual approach. Its brisk synth pop and slightly processed vocals added to the single’s mysterious air when it was released on a small U.K. label nearly a year before the album arrived, but the way its tentative hopefulness hovers above ominous industrial sounds is pure Lynch. After this pop gambit, Crazy Clown Time gets progressively weirder -- or perhaps progressively more normal for a David Lynch album. “The Night Bell with Lightning” and “I Know,” previously the B-side to “Good Day Today,” serve up the kind of avant-surf and roadhouse blues played at Twin Peaks’ One Eyed Jack’s or The Pink Room, while the eerie “Movin’ On” recalls how the soundtrack to Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me edged away from the TV show’s dreamy nostalgia into much more unpredictable territory. However, the album offers more than just one flavor of eccentricity: on “Strange and Unproductive Thinking,” Lynch tackles everything from cosmic awareness to tooth decay in a vocodered tone that evokes electronic pioneer Bruce Haack; the dark innocence of “These Are My Friends” suggests Daniel Johnston. Appropriately, “Crazy Clown Time” is the most twisted of all, pairing a nightmarish musique concrète backdrop with a spoken word rant that sounds like Lynch reading a new screenplay and voicing all of the characters. Even if Crazy Clown Time isn’t as accessible as some of the collaborations that arrived shortly before the album, Lynch fans will appreciate it as another example of his ability to put his unmistakable stamp on every art form he attempts.© Heather Phares /TiVo

At the turn of the '60s, Lee Hazlewood decided to leave America for Sweden. He had already spent time in the country, appearing as an actor in two television productions, so his decision wasn't completely out of the blue -- especially since he had become close with the Swedish artist/filmmaker Torbjörn Axelman. The year that he arrived in Sweden, he starred in Axelman's television production Cowboy in Sweden and cut an album of the same name. Judging by the album alone, the film must have been exceedingly surreal, since the record exists in its own space and time. At its core, it's a collection of country and cowboy tunes, much like the work he did with Nancy Sinatra, but the production is cinematic and psychedelic, creating a druggy, discombobulated sound like no other. This is mind-altering music -- the combination of country song structures, Hazlewood's deep baritone, the sweet voices of Nina Lizell and Suzi Jane Hokom, rolling acoustic guitars, ominous strings, harpsichords and flutes, eerie pianos, and endless echo is stranger than outright avant-garde music, since the familiar is undone by unexpected arrangements. Though the songs are all well-written, Cowboy in Sweden is ultimately about the sound and mood it evokes -- and it's quite singular in that regard.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

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The English music press can never let anyone be. They're always quick to hail the next big thing, and in this case, the next big Coldplay is Keane. (Lowgold briefly held that title upon its debut release in 2001, but U.K. critics rushed to give that crown to someone else.) Keane haven't positioned themselves to be kings of anything, though, let alone the next Coldplay. Sure, Coldplay's biggest hit to date, "Clocks," included only pianos, and they released the Safety EP on Fierce Panda, which is also Keane's label, but those are the only things Keane have in common with Coldplay. Alongside their beautiful, emotive dalliance of instrumentation is one thing that'll separate Keane from all the rest, and that's drive. The band's open-hearted ambition on Hopes and Fears is audible on every song. Lead vocalist Tom Chaplin's rich vocals are as vibrant as any choir, and track such as "This Is the Last Time," "Bend and Break," and "Can't Stop Now" reflect Keane's more savory, dramatic moments. Confidence bursts throughout, and for a band that has been around seven years and has never released a studio full-length album until now, achieving nearly epic-like status is quite impressive. Keane obviously have the songs and they have a strong voice leading the front; however, Tim Rice-Oxley (piano/keyboards/bass) and Richard Hughes (drums) allow Hopes and Fears to come alive with glamour and without the sheen of slick studio production. Even slow build-up tracks like "Bedshaped" and "We Might as Well Be Strangers" are just as passionate, if not more so, than some of the bigger numbers on the album. Some might find Keane's debut a bit stagy, or too theatrical at first, but that's okay. Listening to "Somewhere Only We Know" alone a few times is more than enough to convince you that Keane stand next to Coldplay -- challenging them rather than emulating -- and it's a respectable match at that.© MacKenzie Wilson /TiVo

A song of lost love shouldn't be confused with a torch song. Carrying a torch for someone is a lonely occupation, and torch singers inevitably address only a wall, or a bartender, or perhaps their intended love in absentia. Lost love is a broader lament and can be directed inwardly or outwardly; it can remain alone in its grief or grow accusatory and confrontational. Guess Who I Saw Today: Nancy Wilson Sings Songs of Lost Love is one in a loose series of three Capitol compilations to compile Wilson's late-'50s and early-'60s prime, the others focusing on blues balladry and the Great American Songbook. Many of Wilson's greatest performances fit this disc's concept, suiting her talents at performing songs while adding dramatic turns more associated with speaking than singing. The title track (and opener), "Guess Who I Saw Today," is the best, one of her signature songs. Elsewhere she neatly removes the melodrama from "The Days of Wine and Roses" (no small feat) and injects just the right amount of sober dismissal into "You Can Have Him."© John Bush /TiVo