To clear up some inevitable confusion right off the bat, this does not feature the same music as the 1989 LP compilation also titled , which came out on , a subsidiary of , the same label that put out the 2004 CD also titled . The 1989 LP bearing this title was devoted entirely to '60s female British acts, with the exception of , an American band who were based in Britain in the mid-'60s. The 2004 CD called has 24 entirely different tracks, all of them by American-'60s , many (though not all) of whom played their own instruments. appear on the 2004 as well, but are represented by four mid-'60s tracks that don't appear on the 1989 LP. Got all that? Moving on to the music, it's okay and usually competent enough to avoid categorization as mere . But it's not great -- it's mid-level period-'60s (actually from 1963-70), reflecting , , and trends of the day. Some of it has the raw approach associated with , but not all of it does, by any means. Few will have heard of any of these acts, save perhaps (whose tracks are only so-so); one-time , represented by an atypical (for her) piece of typical 1966 L.A. flower power ; and, perhaps, , who got some notoriety decades later after issued a CD of that band's material. There's also , who's not a woman, of course, but whose featured vocals by women singers . Some of the standout tracks are ' one of the most -influenced songs on the disc (as if you couldn't tell from the group's name), though some of the melody borrows liberally from 's ; 's awkward, gender-adjusted cover of ' hit ' moody 1965 single / ; and ' version of (which actually charted in in the "bubbling under" section of the Hot Hundred in 1966), a song strong enough that it's hard to ruin, though both and the did better versions. This anthology will benefit from much stronger distribution than the many volumes in the series, the best-known anthologies of the small-'60s group genre. But to be honest, if you cherry-picked the best tracks from that series into one or two volumes, you'd have collections that would blow out of the water. ~ Richie Unterberger