Gone Digital: Al Bowlly, Glen Campbell, King Curtis, James, and MUSIC FOR A BACHELORETTE’S PAD

If it’s Tuesday, then it must be time for Gone Digital, our weekly look at five recent additions to Rhino’s digital catalog. As ever, the types of music we’ll be covering will be all over the place, but that’s Rhino for you: we’re all about variety!

•    Al Bowlly, LOVE IS THE SWEETEST THING: MAGIC OF AL BOWLLY: If you’re not terribly well versed in what was all the rage in 1930’s England, then you probably don’t know Bowlly’s work, but this anthology offers up a nice blend of his best efforts during that decade. Depressingly, Bowlly died during World War II and wasn’t even in the service: a Luftwaffe parachute mine detonated outside his flat, blowing his bedroom door off its hinges and hitting him in the head, delivering a fatal blow.

•    Glen Campbell, OLD HOME TOWN / LETTER TO HOME / IT’S JUST A MATTER OF TIME: You diehard Campbell fans out there – Glenheads, perhaps? – will know that all three of these albums have been available digitally for some time now, but only recently have the trio been made available as a single package for a bargain price, so if you don’t have ‘em, now’s the time to get ‘em!

•    King Curtis, THE COMPLETE ATCO SINGLES: Curtis’s two-decade-long career as a master sax player ended abruptly in 1971 when he was stabbed outside his Manhattan apartment after an argument when a pair of drug dealers, but the saxman delivered a whole lot of great singles during those twenty year, and this is as solid a compilation of his work as you’re likely to find anywhere.

•    James, JUSTHIPPER: THE COMPLETE SIRE & BLANCO Y NEGRO RECORDINGS 1986-1988: For American audiences, James might as well not have existed until they found top-40 fame with their single “Laid,” but the band had been around for a number of years prior to that U.S. success. Indeed, they’d actually released several albums by that point, but the first two were on Sire Records, and they’ve been compiled, along with the additional tracks they recorded for their UK label at the time, Blanco Y Negro Records. If you’ve never heard this stuff, prepare to dive into some delicious tunes.

•    Various Artists, MUSIC FOR A BACHELORETTE’S PAD: Although we don’t generally spotlight compilation albums in this column, this one was just a little bit too much fun to ignore. In these dark times of ours, this ought to lighten your mood considerably, so hunt it up and give it a spin, for the same of your mental health. Trust us, it’ll make you smile