Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

In the 1980s a brand new way of presenting music as a package appeared, the then much loved Now That’s What I Call Music collection which featured artists and groups such as Phil Collins, Heaven 17, Malcolm McClaren, The Human League and Simple Minds made its first appearance 30 years ago. In that three decades music has moved on, young musicians have made their way onto the scene and nowhere it seems is that energy more keenly felt in the U.K. than in the home of music, Liverpool.

Even if you are seasoned veteran of the musical culture that can be found on nearly every night of the week and in some of the iconic, the famous, the low key and impressive venues that the city has to offer, it is more than possible to find a new band to thrill you and immerse yourself into for a while. To showcase some of this young talent, to put some of this bristling music on to one C.D. is a masterstroke and like the days when the Now collection was on everybody’s wish list for the festive period or birthday celebrations, Cavern Records issued in 2011 a C.D., named neatly enough Cavern Records Presents The Best In New Music rammed with some of the brightest, the best and the brilliant artists to call Merseyside their home, and the final result is a tantalising peek at some of those acts.

Although taking songs out of their natural surroundings of an artist’s catalogue can be a bit hard on the listener to get to grips with as it never really captures the overall effect what the musicians were aiming for, this C.D. manages to transcend boundaries and put together artists such as the fantastic Natalie McCool, Strawhouses, Being Jo Francis, Fly With Vampires, the wonderful The Fifth Movement and the outstanding The Mono L.P.s in a way that makes them shine, it adds a collective reasoning which reveals once more that Liverpool and its surrounding areas deserves to be recognised as the finest city of music in the country.

Whether it is The Mono L.P.s’ striking 6 am, Strawhouses’ phenomenal and rocking Batteries, Natalie McCool’s Black Sun or This Life by Xander & the Peace Pirates, each song chosen by Cavern Records is a perfect indication of what the city’s young musical ambassadors produce.

Forget the days of the pig on the front cover of Now that’s What I Call Music, each city in the U.K. should be following this example of how to highlight the next generation of musicians.

Ian D. Hall