Maria Callas / Tullio Serafin - Bellini: I Puritani

Waylon Jennings spent 20 years with RCA Records, signing with the label in 1965 and remaining with them until 1985, when he moved on to record for MCA Records. Needless to say, his key creative years were with RCA, particularly after 1972, when Jennings renegotiated his deal to give him more artistic control over what he produced. This box set package includes five of the resulting RCA albums that Jennings produced between 1973 and 1978, including 1973's Lonesome, On'ry and Mean, 1974's This Time and The Ramblin' Man, 1977's Ol' Waylon, and 1978's Waylon & Willie (with Willie Nelson), with whatever bonus tracks that were included on RCA's individual CD reissues of each album. It's a whole lot of Waylon, probably more than the casual listener would need and serious fans would most likely already have all of, but a big chunk of Jennings' legacy is here, so it makes an easy way to connect with his most creative period as an artist in one simple swoop.

A strong set of all-original material that has its cake and eats it too. With unobtrusive electric guitar and bass blending in with more traditional instruments like flute and djembe, it's both more accessible to modern audiences than traditional African instrumentation, and not as pop- and dance-oriented as much contemporary African music. The focus remains on Sangare's gliding singing (thickened by a couple of female backup singers) and the music's looping (but not laid-back) grooves.

Released to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the Notorious B.I.G.'s death, Greatest Hits places the two "collaborate with a dead legend" albums -- 1999's Born Again and 2005's Duets: The Final Chapter -- on equal ground with Ready to Die and Life After Death, the two landmark albums Biggie released while he was on the planet. Anthologizing one of the most compelling figures in hip-hop history seems like a right thing to do. Basing such a release around four albums that are greatly divided between essential and inessential, however, amounts to something of a mess. Two obscurities are used where it would've made much more sense to select "Mo Money, Mo Problems" and "Going Back to Cali," two of the biggest hits not included on this disc, and it's really off-balance to include three tracks from Born Again when only one more is pulled directly from Ready to Die. Longtime fans need not go near this; the same goes for beginners, who should reach for Ready to Die.