The Grateful Dead's "Touch of Grey" was a spirited 1987 marching order to an aging Baby Boomer generation to "get by" and its assuring affirmation that "we will survive" was a stroke of timing and musical genius. The song became an unlikely hit for a group that didn't have or need hits and helped propel the band to further heights of both popularity and creativity.

All of Fiona Apple's albums have been been personal and confessional (some might say "self absorbed") but this one is really personal and confessional and attractively self-absorbed too.

She takes on her demons with spunk and determination, not pity and she does it with humor and wry detachment— other than when an uncomfortable realization has her shrieking. "Every single night's a fight with my brain!"she spiritedly exclaims on "Every Single Night," the album opener that sets the standard for all nine songs.

Why listen to "purist" British blues bands recreating what they've heard on record or in clubs, when you can hear the real thing? That's how I've always felt about it. This album by the British blues band Ten Years After is something else and perhaps in retrospect it's unfair to tag TYA as a "purist blues band."

The group played Woodstock and obviously listened to some Moody Blues and Traffic albums too before creating this mix of blues and psychedelic power back in 1971, probably pushed into a more pop vein by Columbia, its new record label.