Doo Wop has to be one of the most fascinating music sub-genres ever. During its long and vibrant life it's been reinvented again and again, but has remained ever popular. That last fact helps explain the frequent PBS specials and other TV events, along with boxed sets such as the one we're reviewing here.

Time-Life, that vast repository of all media relating to nostalgia, has put together a boxed set called It All Started With Doo Wop. It consists of 9 CDs containing 146 songs, plus a bonus DVD containing 78 minutes of video from the aforementioned PBS shows. It's all housed in a cute little miniature replica of one of those hinged boxes that teenagers in the 1950's used to hold their 45's. (45 rpm records, not .45 Colts.)

For those who have recently returned from outer space or might have been otherwise occupied, I'll take a moment to attempt to explain Doo Wop. Most music experts agree that it can be loosely defined as the music produced by a group of singers performing together in close harmony, often with little or no musical accompaniment other than their own inventive sounds.

Doo Wop is generally considered to have started in the early 1950's, coming out of black communities in big Eastern cities. Smooth-singing groups such as the Mills Brothers and the Ink Spots had already found a lot of success in pop music, providing inspiration for newer groups like the Mello-Moods and the Clovers. And although some of the earliest Doo Wop groups had names like the Orioles, the Ravens, the Cardinals, the Swallows and the Larks, their music was definitely not for the birds.

Later the Doo Wop sound became a popular specialty for white groups too, especially Italian-American New Yorkers, and there were even a few groups that were mixed. The Dell-Vikings, who had a super-hit with "Come Go With Me," were a group of servicemen that rotated members so often that they were often racially integrated. (They also had ex-members creating a competing group, the Del-Vikings, confusing fans even more.)