After the guest-star-drenched No Reason to Cry failed to make much of an impact commercially, Eric Clapton returned to using his own band for Slowhand. The difference is substantial – where No Reason to Cry struggled hard to find the right tone, Slowhand opens with the relaxed, bluesy shuffle of J.J. Cale's "Cocaine" and sustains it throughout the course of the album. Alternating between straight blues ("Mean Old Frisco"), country ("Lay Down Sally"), mainstream rock ("Cocaine," "The Core"), and pop ("Wonderful Tonight"), Slowhand doesn't sound schizophrenic because of the band's grasp of the material. This is laid-back virtuosity – although Clapton and his band are never flashy, their playing is masterful and assured. That assurance and the album's eclectic material make Slowhand rank with 461 Ocean Boulevard as Eric Clapton's best albums.

The Faces were unanthologized on CD prior to 1999, but ever since Rhino's corking single-disc Good Boys…When They're Asleep…, the group has seen a number of different compilations of different sizes, of which Rhino U.K.'s 2012 set Stay with Me: Anthology is the fifth. At two discs, this has 2007's The Definitive Rock Collection as its closest cousin: they're both double discs that cover a tremendous amount of ground, but Stay with Me has a slight edge, weighing in at 36 tracks compared to Definitive's 30. Of those 30 tracks, 27 cuts are present and accounted for on Stay with Me – the missing numbers are "Open to Ideas," "Jodie," and "(I Know) I'm Losing You," the latter two cuts from solo Rod Stewart albums where he was backed by the Faces – and those other nine songs include some of the Faces' very best, including the roaring rocker "That's All You Need," Ronnie Lane's sweet, plaintive "Richmond," and the gloriously shambolic "On the Beach." Serious fans should pony up for 2004's Five Guys Walk into a Bar…, which is one of the great rock & roll box sets, but this double-disc set is like that box in miniature, containing the essence of the Faces in all their messy glory.

Phoenix is the sixth studio album by the rock band Grand Funk Railroad. It was released in 1972 on Capitol Records. The album was produced by Grand Funk and marks the band's first album not produced by Terry Knight. "Rock & Roll Soul" was released as a single and went to #29 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1972.

Neo-prog band Pendragon formed in London during the heady days of punk, but didn't coalesce until 1983, when the band began playing around London and earned a small spot at that year's Reading Festival. The lineup stabilized, after the 1985 album Jewel, around vocalist/guitarist Nick Barrett, bassist Peter Gee, drummer Fudge Smith and keyboard player Clive Nolan. Pendragon recorded the live album 9:15 in 1986 and began to establish a continental fan base the following year. European audiences proved enthusiastic, spawning a contract with the French M.S.I. label; nevertheless, the group was forced to form its own Toff label just to release material in England.

Recorded during the summer of 1977, the ambitious Supernature was a surprising departure from Cerrone's two previous albums, Love in C Minor and Cerrone's Paradise. Those who expected the Parisian producer/composer/drummer to come up with another happy, sexy party record had a major surprise when they discovered that Cerrone's third album is a moody, conceptual effort that could be described as the Euro-disco equivalent of a horror or science fiction movie. But Cerrone doesn't go for pure shock value, and the lyrics are never gruesome or graphic. Supernature, although entertaining, has a social conscience.

With their 1998 comeback disc, The Last Wave of Summer – their first album of new material since 1984's Twentieth Century – Aussie rock legends Cold Chisel proved that they still had "the stuff." A tad shy of the standard of their heyday albums of the '70s and '80s, Summer is still formidable rock & roll. As the band's first release in the CD age and, at just under an hour running time, LWOS was considerably longer than their previous studio albums. Hence the makeup is a little different. There is more down-tempo and lighter fare here, which shifts the feel from the usual short sharp-shock of a Chisel disc to a quite different type of listening experience.

Parting Shot represents a most special moment for Steve, because it is the first time that he has felt ready to present an entire recording dedicated to Latin Jazz. Anthony Jackson, Manolo Badrena, and Steve are together yet again, alongside their bandmate of 20 years, Dennis Chambers, where, joined by master Latin musicians, Marc Quinones and Bobby Allende, they have crafted these 10 pieces of music. It is their hope that everyone will enjoy the recording to the fullest.

Joseph Eybler was one of the most promising young composers in Vienna when Mozart died in 1791, and it was to him that Constanze Mozart turned for a completion of the already-commissioned Requiem mass. Eybler, whom the often acerbic Mozart had praised in strong terms, had the wit to realize the difficulty of the task, resulting in the path-of-least-resistance completion by Süssmayr that has come down to the present day. The two symphonies on this disc date from the late 1780s. Their model is not so much Mozart but Haydn, with their slow introductions and their striving toward highly original minuets (the Symphony No. 2 has two of them).