Children of Nuggets: Original ARtyfacts from the Second Psychedelic Era - 1976-1996
It would take thousands of dollars (or as many hours in download time) to hoard the most coveted songs from the eighties' top secret power pop bands, garage combos and post-new wave throngs into one collection. Or you can let Rhino Records, which masterfully conspired with writer/musician Lenny Kaye late last century to inflate and repackage Kaye's originalNuggetscompilation, do the legwork. These four discs, though chaotically sequenced, scour all sides of the ponds to capture the vitality and innovation of mostly 1980-'85, introducing (or reintroducing) to-be-influential bands like San Francisco's Flamin' Groovies, New York's Raybeats, England's Soft Boys, Australia's the Church and Sweden's Nomads. Where else can you find XTC spin-off Dukes of Stratosphear, the La's "There She Goes" and the Bangles a half-decade prior to their manic Monday, along with the Cramps, the Plimsouls, the db's and the Bevis Frond in a single shebang—and with Rhino's ample, informative, transcendent liner notes, to boot?--Scott Holter