The ultimate in an inspired random idea for retrospection becoming a foundational document, Lenny Kaye’s original Nuggets compilation for Elektra Records in 1972 remains a remarkable effort, pulling together a slew of mid-sixties one-offs, including both actual major chart hits and a few near-misses, to perhaps unintentionally codify a core vision of American rock of the era, covering everything from frat rock frugs to Bob Dylan and Beach Boys rips to garagey British Invasion responses to, indeed, wigged-out psychedelia and much more besides. Nearly everything on it has become subsequently famous as markers of the time and place, not to mention covered more times than can be counted by both earnest revivalists and less scenebound acts just wanting to kick out the jams in their own way. (Would you believe that the seeming arch-goths of Bauhaus once covered the Strangeloves’ “Night Time,” for instance?) From the snotty punches of the Standells’ “Dirty Water” and the Count Five’s “Psychotic Reaction” to the winsomely-sung “Sit Down, I Think I Love You” by the Mojo Men, from the opening cut trippiness of the Electric Prunes’ “I Had Too Much To Dream Last Night” to the concluding moody rumble of “It’s-a-Happening” by the Magic Mushrooms, it’s one heck of a good time. (Rhino’s 1998 expansion of the original into a four CD set made it an even more commanding overview, drawing on both their 1980s Nuggets series as well as many cuts featured on later compilations that used Nuggets as their own origin point for their deeper dives.)