The three-CDs comes in white, green, red & black colour scheme flip box packaging- each of the discs comes it's own cardboard slip sleeve. There’s also a twenty-three-page inlay booklet- taking in various write-ups about Stockhausen, and the other composers featured here, along with a fair selection of black & white photos.

Each of the three discs has a lengthy runtime of 70 plus minutes- so you get a bumper crop of material- it’s just  as a compilation it does feel ,at times, a little muddled & manic- as we dart from one time frame, composer, or instrumental/ sound source through-out the three-discs- all making it somewhat difficult to review in a even & coherent manner. So, as a result, I’ve decided to pick a selection of tracks that stood out to me on each disc.

Opening up the first discs we have Pierre Schaeffer’s  "Cinq études de bruits( Five Studies Of Noise)"- this five-track piece is from 1948, and is one of the earliest examples of both musique concrete & noise compositions- blending together elements of train sounds, noise textures as percussive elements, and proto-industrial loops. It really is an astonishing, wildly shift & creative work- which still sounds as daring as it did in the forties. Midway through the first disc we get the first two Stockhausen tracks- these both come from the early 1950’s- we have the just over nine minutes of "Studie Nr.1" & spot on three minutes of "Studie Nr.2"- the first track is a wonderful unbalancing & jarring collection of wavering, stabbing, and knocking elector textures pulled together to create a manic & alien sonic landscape- which is both off-kilter, yet kind of haunting- bringing to mind early robots chattering to themselves.

Moving onto disc two, and personally highlights here include later tracks like "Kontra-Punkte( Counter Points)"- this is an eleven & half minute piece from Stockhausen- which sees him blending together a wonderful nervy & angular selection of doomed-to- higher pinging piano notion, with violent string slices & darting horn work- all to create a wonderfully unpredictable, but malevolent work. Ending out the disc we have Pierre Boulez "Refrain For Three Performers"- this eight-minute track from 1959 finds a cleverly considered at times jarring sonic tapestry of vibraphone, glockenspiel, and cowbells- with sudden playful-to-moody piano and Celeste darts.

The third & final disc I’d say is the highlight of the set, both in its more even focused  track listing, lengthier Stockhausen work, and general rewarding moments. The disc begins "Kontakte (Contracts For Electronic sounds)" from 1958-60, this is a just shy of thirty-five minute composition from Stockhausen- it finds him creating a truly epic & far-reaching work, that sees him stretching, darting, and pulling his varied pallet of electro sounds from: brooding & sinister purrs, onto darting forest of alien percussive matter, through to angularly slurred-to-manically twitching, onto slicing & proto-industrial constructs.
Later on we have the noise & choppy unease of John Cages "Cartridge Music"- this twenty minute track from 1960 is a dense & shift blend of dragged out rips, unsettling scuttles, and sourly wavering higher end tones- all making for something that would sound out of place as the backing for violently woozy modern day PE track.

In conclusion is  Adventures in Sound is a worthy, if at times unevenly arranged three-disc compilation that brings together some of the more daring, noisy & creative modern compositions of the 40’s, 50’s, and early 60’s. The box presently retails for just over ten pounds, which is certainly good value-  so it’s certainly worth pick-up- just don’t go into this expecting either a purely Stockhausen set, or a coherent & organised study of early modern composition.