This is the single-CD successor to
Creeque Alley
, the double-disc career retrospective issued in the early '90s. All of the hits from
"California Dreamin'"
to
"Dream a Little Dream of Me"
are here, along with their more celebrated album tracks, and the notes by
Joseph Laredo
provide a decent overview of the group's formation and history. The records have been remastered yet again, although the level of improvement over
seems modest (
sounded really good) compared with that double disc's improvement over the earlier, wholly inadequate masters from the 1980s. For someone who doesn't have a lot of money to spend on the band, this is the place to start, superseding all other single-disc hits collections. [Not to be confused with earlier hits compilations, the catalog number on this 20-song collection is MCAD-11740.] ~ Bruce Eder