Cherry Red’s ongoing series of small clamshell box sets filled with big content make for the perfect stocking stuffer! Here’s a look at three more titles you might have missed… Climax Blues Band’s The Albums 1973-1976 is the second such box set released this year by Cherry Red’s Esoteric Recordings imprint, following The Albums 1969-1972. This 4-CD set contains the following albums, culminating in the biggest commercial triumph for the band that began its life as The Climax Chicago Blues Band: FM Live (1973); Sense of Direction (1971); Stamp Album (1975); and…
So Many Roads: Cherry Red, Esoteric Collect Climax Blues Band’s Early Albums on New Box Set
The Climax Chicago Blues Band didn’t begin life in America’s Windy City, but rather in Stafford, England. Colin Cooper, Peter Haycock, Arthur Wood, Derek Holt, Richard Jones, and George Newsome bonded over their love of Chicago-style blues, and in 1969, the group released its first album on the Parlophone label. The self-titled LP featured classic blues from Sonny Boy Williamson, Big Bill Broonzy, and Big Joe Turner but also made room for Lee Hazlewood country-folk (The Shacklefords’ “A Stranger in Your Town”) and a Scott Joplin rag (“The Entertainer,” years before Marvin…





