Think About the Times: The Chrysalis Years (1969-1972) [Remastered]

This includes everything from the albums Ssssh (their fourth), Cricklewood Green, Watt, A Space In Time and Rock & Roll Music to the World and the B-sides and single edits that accompanied them. It’s a sizable collection of 48 tracks that includes most of the band’s greatest music. The purebred blues blast of Ssssh, their first album to completely shed their jazz influences, with the touching “If You Should Love Me” and the brutal “Stoned Woman” meeting up with the nearly perfect shadings of Cricklewood Green and the brilliant “Sugar the Road,” “50,000 Miles Beneath My Brain,” “Circles” and “As the Sun Still Burns Away” make for some of the era’s most underrated and powerful music. By the time they’ve made it to “I’d Love to Change the World,” the band has an acoustic / electric dynamic second to none. “Here They Come” and “Over the Hill” are two beautifully calm pieces surrounded by plenty of powerful, basic rock ‘n’ roll exercises. The single edits remind us of what the band sounded like coming out of the radio with the guitar solos reduced.