1960s soul singer James Carr was never as well-known or successful as contemporaries Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett , and Solomon Burke, but Carr had a voice equal to if not better than all of them. Best known for singing the original and definitive ve…

Ska is to reggae as blues is to rock & roll, and as ska's founders and foremost practitioners, the Skatalites are the single most influential group in Jamaican music. Starting in the mid-'60s, the Skatalites forged a horn-led sound that merged Jamaic…

b. William Wainwright, England. Although he has been recording under various guises since 1983, it is only recently that William Orbit has become a household name because of his Emmy-award winning, internationally acclaimed production and writing wor…

b. Mike Pratt, USA. This idiosyncratic singer-songwriter, the youngest son in an itinerant military family, grew up in Pensacola, Florida, a town which is home to one of the most god-fearing communities in America. Pratt's eventful early years saw hi…

Psych pop band from Perth, Australia, formed by mercurial singer-songwriter Luke Steele (b.1980, Australia) in the mid-90s. The Sleepy Jackson went through several incarnations during the latter part of the decade, with a low point reached in 1999 wh…

The definitive British folk-rock band, Fairport Convention took the traditional music of England and injected it with electricity and rock energy, sparking a whole musical movement in the U.K. in the late 1960s and early '70s. The late-'60s incarnati…

Before the grime scene of the early 2000s gave the U.K. its own unique, homegrown hip-hop nation, there was really only Roots Manuva holding it down for the Brits during the preceding decade. Influenced as much by reggae and electronica as by America…

Noel Scott Engel, better known as Scott Walker, was born in the US, but found fame in the UK as a member of the Walker Brothers, who became teen pop idols in England in the 1960s. After the group's demise, Walker's darker, artier side eventually came…

In the heady days of swinging London, Marianne Faithfull was a sex kitten/wispy-voiced waif singing orchestral-pop versions of Rolling Stones songs (she had a highly publicized relationship with Mick Jagger at the time). In the late '70s, she re-emer…

Saint Etienne were purveyors of a groundbreaking mix of various British indie styles and straight-up dance music. The ensemble--comprised essentially of old friends Bob Stanley and Pete Wiggs, with the addition of Sarah Cracknell as the permanent voc…

In a manner not dissimilar to that of their spiritual older brothers the Flaming Lips, Mercury Rev started out making a kooky, chaotic sound that gradually developed into a masterful amalgam of psychedelia, alt-rock, prog, and pop. Their 1998 masterp…

Along with Badfinger and the Raspberries, Big Star helped forge the power pop template in the early-1970s. But unlike these other bands, there was always something darker lurking under the obvious pop hooks in leader Alex Chilton's songwriting and ly…

Scottish brothers Jim and William Reid formed the Jesus & Mary Chain in 1984. With their monotone vocals, feedback-drenched guitar sound, and notoriously chaotic gigs, the band garnered plenty of media attention and then backed up the hype with their…

Ireland's first heavy rockers, Thin Lizzy rocked throughout the '70s with a mix of teenage rebellion and working-class angst, becoming known for wild behavior on and off the stage. Phil Lynott's Bruce Springsteen-meets-Jimi Hendrix voice perfectly su…

Few musicians have managed to change the course of music--trumpeter Miles Davis did it several times. An early disciple of Charlie Parker, Davis created an austere, understated approach that became the model for cool. His superb albums in the 1950s m…

Yo La Tengo started out in the mid-1980s and became perhaps the ultimate critics' band. Led by former NYC rock journalist Ira Kaplan, they syncretized numerous, often esoteric influences to eventually create a distinctive sound. They started out in h…

The Clash was one of the first and most important British punk bands. In the 1970s, they were the Beatles to the Sex Pistols' Stones, and went on to incorporate elements from all the roots music they loved--reggae, rockabilly, soul, blues--without ev…

Formed in Chicago in 1957 and originally known as the Roosters, this group comprised Jerry Butler (b. 8 December 1939, Sunflower, Mississippi, USA), Curtis Mayfield (b. 3 June 1942, Chicago, Illinois, USA, d. 26 December 1999), Sam Gooden (b. 2 Septe…

One of the great 1960s soul men, Otis Redding combined the rhythmic grit of James Brown with the sweet gospel croon of Sam Cooke. The Georgia-born singer/songwriter had his first flush of success in '63 with "These Arms of Mine," and the hits kept fl…

James born May 12 1944 and Bobby born September 2 1939 of this Southern soul duo were not actually brothers but cousins James Purify and Robert Lee Dickey joined forces for some classic Southern soul duets during the mid-60s Producer Papa Don Schroed…