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Sleep No More is the fifth album from singer/songwriter Jack Savoretti and follows 2015's Written in Scars. Working with a carried selection of producers, including Mark Ralph, Steve Robson, and Sam Dixon, the album sees Savoretti penning 12 original songs influenced by the foibles of modern life. © Rich Wilson /TiVo

A gorgeously rendered holiday-themed effort, In Winter finds singer/songwriter Katie Melua backed by the 25-member Gori Women's Choir. The album is Melua's seventh studio production and first since parting ways with longtime collaborator Mike Batt. Recorded in her native country of Georgia (Melua left with her parents at age nine), In Winter is a lushly produced, thoughtfully conceived album featuring arrangements by esteemed choral composer Bob Chilcott. An acclaimed institution, the Gori Women's Choir are famous for their haunting classical harmonies. They prove a superb match for Melua, who both sings along with the choir and frames herself against its angelic, delicately layered harmonies. Although the album is technically a holiday-themed work, it's not a cheery collection of Yuletide favorites. Instead, Melua delivers a handful of ruminative and lyrical originals, many inspired by her memories of growing up in what was then the Soviet Union, as well as the complex and often heartbreaking history of Georgia's civil war. She also weaves in several well-curated covers, including poignant renditions of Joni Mitchell's "River," Sergey Rachmaninov's "All-Night Vigil-Nunc Dimittis," and the hymn "O Holy Night." Melua even finds room to sing in Ukrainian, opening the album with a magical rendition of the traditional song "The Little Swallow," whose melody is better recognized to Western audiences as "The Carol of the Bells." These are warmly arranged, beautifully executed recordings that capture the stark, introspective beauty of a rural Eastern Europe in winter. © Matt Collar /TiVo

The Anthology is a three-disc collection chronicling the progressive rock trio’s career between 1970 and 1998. A fitting tribute to the memory of the late keyboard virtuoso Keith Emerson, the collection features 39 tracks and contains brand new liner notes, rare photographs, and exclusive material traversing the band’s activities throughout their career. © Rob Wacey /TiVo

The edition of Sulk which was the most common to find while record shopping throughout the late '80s and '90s was originally the American issue. Heavy substitution and track reordering -- a typical enough move on the part of American companies no matter what the act -- resulted in a radically different record. For some strange reason, the European CD issue of the album relied on this American edition, something only finally rectified as part of an overall reissue program in 2000. All this said, while this second edition sacrifices some of the quirky edginess of the original, collecting all the major hit singles that made the band such a distinctive U.K. chart presence in the early '80s certainly isn't a problem at all. The three tracks from the second side of the original album -- the bizarro funk of "It's Better This Way," the swooning hyper-romance of "Partyfearstwo," and the nervy, sped-up rush of "Club Country" -- here lead off the record, followed by the OK-enough remake of Diana Ross' "Love Hangover" and the charming "18 Carat Love Affair." As for the remaining tracks, "Arrogance Gave Him Up," "No," "Skipping," and "Gloomy Sunday" are retained in a much different order, while "Bap de la Bap," "Nude Spoons," and "Nothinginsomethinginparticular" are removed in favor of early single "White Car in Germany" and "The Associate." All changes and switches aside, it's still very much the Associates at probably the best period of their career. Mackenzie's impossibly piercing cabaret falsetto rivals that of obvious role model Russell Mael from Sparks, while Rankine's ear for unexpected hooks and sweeping arrangements turns the stereotypes of early-'80s synth music on their heads. The bass work from ex-Cure member Michael Dempsey isn't chopped liver either, and the result is a messy but wonderful triumph no matter what version is found. © Ned Raggett /TiVo

Although the sleeve photos fittingly depict Billy Mackenzie and Alan Rankine immersed in a blue pool of seemingly chilly water, no set of images could bring the sound of the 1981 Situation Two singles collected on Fourth Drawer Down into full realization. Those who are familiar with Associates know this because of Mackenzie's operatically soulful voice, Rankine's wildly experimental production, and, when used, his atonal utilitarian guitar playing that seems like it's playing the multi-instrumentalist more than he's playing it. Just as there are Smiths fans who listen intently to Johnny Marr's guitar playing and attempt to block out Morrissey's flamboyance, there surely are numerous beings who tune out Mackenzie's crooning to hone in on Rankine's actions. Those who can appreciate both are in for a real feast, and those who prefer one over the other still have much to sink their teeth into. Cloistered noise fests like the aggressively doomy "Kitchen Person" still rattle the system as well as the best Siouxsie and the Banshees or Cure from the same era. "White Car in Germany," "A Girl Named Property," and "Q Quarters" glean from the three late-'70s records David Bowie made with Brian Eno, adding further dementia and corrosion like a torturer would dash salt on an open wound. To wit, this still sounds great front to back; the ballsiness in juxtaposing the A-sides and B-sides demonstrates their depth. The U.K. wing of V2 thankfully made Fourth Drawer Down part of their 2000 reissue campaign, improving the sound and adding five extras, including other B-sides and unreleased tracks from the era. The plodding Talking Heads sound-alike "Fearless" and decent "Point Si" are unearthed with good reason, and the charging murk of "Straw Towels" is almost as excellent as "The Associate." The programmed, insect-like percussive devices that provide anchor for the instrumental "Kissed" seem to predate the minimal techno acts on the Chain Reaction label by 15 years. As with the update of Sulk released the same year, Mackenzie biographer Tom Doyle provides excellent liner notes that fill the reader in on the duo's mystique. © Andy Kellman /TiVo

All ten songs on The Affectionate Punch are nearly swollen with ambition and swagger, yet those attributes are confronted with high levels of anxiety and confusion, the sound of prowess and hormones converging head-on. It's not always pretty, but it's unflaggingly sensational, even when it slows down. Having debuted with a brazen reduction of David Bowie's "Boys Keep Swinging" to a spindly rumble, multi-instrumentalist Alan Rankine and vocalist Billy Mackenzie ensured instant attention and set forward with this, their first album. Mackenzie's exotic swoops cover four octaves, from the kind of isolated swagger heard in Bowie's "Secret Life of Arabia" to a falsetto more commonly heard in an opera house than a bar. (Dude sounds like a diva, so proceed with caution if you'd much rather hear a voice in line with PiL's John Lydon or Magazine's Howard Devoto.) Though the subject matter of the duo's songs would later veer into the completely inscrutable, there's some abstract wordplay here that scans like vocal exercises or Scott Walker at his most surreal: "Stenciled doubts spin the spine, Logan time, Logan time"; "If I threw myself from the ninth story, would I levitate back to three"; "His jawline's not perfect but that can be altered." Meaningful or not, there's always a sense of great weight. When Mackenzie runs through the alphabet in "A," he could be singing in code about the butterflies of love. Rankine, with help from drummer Nigel Glockler and a background appearance from then labelmate Robert Smith, covers most of the other stuff, specializing in spare arrangements that can simultaneously slither and jump, crosscut with guitars that release weary chimes and caustic stabs, as well as the occasional racing xylophone. Two years later -- a year after the genius run of bizarre singles collected on Fourth Drawer Down and the same year as the high-drama overdrive of Sulk -- Rankine and Mackenzie partially re-recorded and completely remixed this album to spectacularly layered and glossy effect. Get both versions. © Andy Kellman /TiVo