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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The only real Smokey Fix available for CD Users, 20 Feb 2001
By A Customer
Due to the fact that Motown has made the baffling decision not to reissue Going to A-Go-Go and Away We Go-Go (at the very least), nor any other albums Smokey did in his hey-day with the Miracles, this Boxed Set and The Ultimate Collection is really all there is for enthusasts to litsen to. The selection is decent, done partially by the great Claudette Robinson herself, and contains some interesting rarities to go with the huge hit library that the Miracles amassed.These include some pre-Tamla singles, including a horribly scratched version of I Cry, and more interestingly the first version of Shop Around, which shows just how much a change in arrangement can do to liven up a song. Intrestingly, it also contains several previously unreleased songs, some of which are of exceptional quality. Claudette's voice on Father Dear is remarkable, almost in class with Smokey's own. Some of the previously unreleased songs succeed more on poetic merit than on musical, showing the extraordinary talent for heart-wrenching poetry from this "America's Greatest Living Poet" (Bob Dylan's words), while somehow failing to meet the musical standards that makes his hits so great. And they're all here too, at least the essential ones. I can't spot any major omissions in the hit material, except perhaps a few more of Smokey's solo hits. They could well have devoted an entire CD to what happened to Smokey and the Miracles after the split, but this is an area in which both Motown's publication record and the number of CDs available greatly increases, so perhaps this decision was a wise one. It is good to see a few post-split hits here, however, to round off and provide a kind of musical epilogue. The mastering is generally of good quality, especially on the more crisply arranged tracks (I Second That Emotion, for example), but it lags behind when it comes to creating central feelings in some of the songs, notably Going to A-Go-Go where the bongo drum feels timid by comarison to the recent Ultimate Collection remaster, and Baby, Baby, Don't Cry in which the importance of the central spoken-word sections seems to have been played down distinctly. Still, a remarkable collection with a good book, a decent selection, relatively many rarities and some fine pictures of the gorgeous Claudette. Five stars!
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~ Various Artists
~ Billy Butler
~ Bruce Springsteen
~ Various Artists
~ Various Artists
See all 26 tracks on this disc
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