Four of the best CDs

For some San Francisco visitors, a trip is not complete until they stop in Chinatown.
For music fanatics visiting San Francisco means a required stop at Amoeba Music on Haight Street.
I visited the 24,000-square-foot CD emporium, located in a former bowling alley, yesterday and I managed to limit myself to four CDs.
The four albums are among the best CDs in the whole shop, in my opinion.
They include:
1) "Think!" by Dr. Lonnie Smith. I am listening to this album as I type. Jazz organist Smith is joined on this FUNKY 1986 disc by an accompanying band that includes trumpeter Lee Morgan and tenor saxophonist David "Fathead" Newman. The title track is a cover of the Aretha Franklin number. It is scorching!
2) "Let 'em Roll" by Big John Patton. Another jazz organist, Patton is accompanied by Grant Green (one of my favorite guitarists in any genre) and Bobby Hutcherson on vibes. There is a reason all the hipsters sample jazz organ records for their hip hop concoctions -- the stuff just oozes funk.
3) "Behind the 8 Ball" by Baby-Face Willette. Roosevelt "Baby Face" Willette is one of the mysterious figures of jazz organ. He recorded only four albums in 1961-64 (two are combined here) and then... nothing. He could play, really swing, but something drove him out of the music business and into obscurity.
4) "From Croydon to Cuba: An Anthology" by Kirsty MacColl. One of the great shames of recent years is that one of Britain's greatest-ever singer/songwriters is becoming better known for the circumstances surrounding her death than for the songs she gave music fans in life. MacColl -- whose originals include "They Don't Know," "There's a Guy Works Down the Chip Shop Swears He's Elvis" and "Walking Down Madison" -- was struck and killed by a powerboat while she and her sons were scuba diving in December 2000 in Cozumel, Mexico. The boat belonged to Guillermo Gonzalez Nova -- the owner of Comercial Mexicana -- a "hypermarket" chain akin to Wal-Mart -- and it is suspected by some that his involvement in MacColl's death has consistently hindered proper investigation. Learn more about the investigation at the Justice for Kirsty Web site, located here. I purchased the MacColl three-CD anthology to remind myself and others that we lost a true musical original in December 2000.
I am sure I will be writing more about these CDs in the days and weeks to come!