Spector

Was round at a friend's house for a pre-Christmas mulled wine and nibbles kind of do in the afternoon. There was a generic Christmas music CD playing in the background which really got me thinking of my kind of Christmas music.

Now, it's not all dubstep and microhouse round ours at Christmas, that would just be a bit too much even for me. Instead we have something I've mentioned previously, one of the finest albums I've ever purchased, namely The Best Of Chet Baker Sings, a little bit of the soundtrack to LA Confidential and pretty much the whole of the Phil Spector - Back To Mono 4CD box set.

I remember coveting this box set ever since first seeing it for around £100 on import in HMV or somewhere similar, when I worked at Fopp we got it in one Christmas and with our generous staff discount it came in at around £20 + VAT. Well, it'd be rude not to...

And it came with a big book, and a badge !

Favourite track from this monumental slab of genius is today's link, Gene Pitney, just when you think he can't go any higher he goes positively stratospheric.