Bonnie Waters 
Revisiting A&M Records No. 33
Nat Adderley: ‘You, Baby’ (late winter ’68)
Sometimes these CTI albums impress immediately, seizing our attention with intricate compositions, remarkable interplay and an enveloping warmth that offsets bracing coolness. Other times it takes multiple spins before arrangements click, distinctive solos sink in and subtler charms emerge.
Revisiting A&M Records No. 28
Herbie Mann: ‘Glory of Love’ (December ‘67)
I must not be jazzbo enough to understand why this very enjoyable one-off the groundbreaking flutist cut for Creed Taylor’s CTI subsidiary isn’t held in nearly as high regard as albums that came before and after it.
Finally, 14 years later, a second solo album!
And what can be most quickly discerned from even a cursory spin? That at this point, late January ’84, Christine McVie had become such a reliably strong songwriter that she’d fully established a signature style as recognizable as Elton John’s.
This flick is still a wicked knockout a decade later, a near-epic with Scorsese-level aspirations that quite often measures up to the master’s flashiest sagas, ‘GoodFellas’ and ‘Casino.’ The reason why, however, ultimately has less to do with director David O. Russell’s consummate skills, even if this was his strongest work since the startlingly funny war drama ‘Three Kings’ in ’99, concluding a superb three-picture run of vivid realism begun by ‘The Fighter’ in 2010 and extended with ‘Silver Linings Playbook’ two years later.
Revisiting A&M Records No. 27
Various artists: ‘Million Dollar Sound Sampler’ (Nov ’67)
Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass: ‘Herb Alpert’s Ninth’ (Dec ’67)
This is somewhat a housekeeping post as we near the end of the most crucial year yet in my more-or-less chronological look at A&M’s history. Certainly won’t be the last time we encounter Mr. A as a recording artist or take stock of these assortments his label compiled to entice buyers, but both topics have been addressed in previous installments.
There’s a really great film to be made about the influential rise and payola-plagued downfall of seminal rock ’n’ roll disc jockey Alan Freed. This well-intentioned yet utterly incoherent mess isn’t that flick any more than the ’99 TV movie that miscast Judd Nelson as the ingenious impresario.
Revisiting A&M Records No. 26
Tamba 4: ‘We and the Sea’ (November ’67)
Now this is serious shit. Makes Sérgio Mendes seem exactly like the lightweight he was — highly capable, yes, and plenty enjoyable, just nowhere near the heavyweight class that this prodigious quartet was punching at by the time sunset fell on the Summer of Love.
Revisiting A&M Records No. 25
Phil Ochs: ‘Pleasures of the Harbor’ (November ‘67)
In hindsight there couldn’t have been a more sadly ironic song for this under-appreciated folkie to choose as an opening statement for the next phase of his career.
Time once more to play the vinyl community’s favorite new game, Who Among Us Remembers This Guy?
Full disclosure: I sure as hell don’t.
And I haven’t found out much about him, either.
Half a century later this is still the oldies set par excellence, a prescient feat all the more astonishing given this curated compilation was merely a decade removed from the pre-Beatles limbo it resurrects.