Sinatra Duets and other great collectibles

I am not a fan of compilations. A lot of thought and work goes into the making of music albums from writing and choosing the songs to the way these are arranged, mixed and sequenced. The artists involved are saying something throughout the process. Listening to this experience is non-existent with greatest hits collections.

Compilations are only good if you are watching your budget or just want to listen to the hit songs of a particular artist. So, I always want to listen to the original album and try to understand the artist and find some unknown gems hidden among the other songs. But there are also special cases. Here are three of those, three compilation albums that no music lover should be without.

Sinatra Duets Twentieth Anniversary. Duets by Frank Sinatra was a landmark release in 1993. It brought together some of the biggest names in music and they were all singing the hits of Sinatra with the man himself. And I mean really big like Barbra Streisand, Julio Iglesias, Gloria Estefan, Liza Minnelli, Bono and others. The album was so successful that Duets 2, with more of the same, was released a year later.

The special 20th anniversary edition includes both albums, digitally re-mastered in their entirety and a booklet of photos and notes about the project.  There are also some bonus tracks, all previously unreleased, that should entice those who already have the Duets to also get this one. These are My Way with Luciano Pavarotti and another My Way with Willie Nelson, One More For My Baby with Tom Scott, Embraceable You with Tanya Tucker and Fly Me To The Moon with George Strait.

Sinatra singing is always a treat. You feel like you already know how he sounds but you still get this big jolt to the heart when you sit down and actually listen to his songs. These albums which he recorded live with a full orchestra are among his best. My big favorites like I’ve Got A Crush On You with Streisand; a medley of Guess I’ll Hang My Tears Out To Dry and In The Wee Small Hours Of The Morning with Carly Simon at her torchiest; Where Or When which swings with the husband and wife team of Steve Lawrence and Eydie Gorme; and a lovely Embraceable You with Lena Horne. 

There are also New York New York with Tony Bennett; They Can’t Take That Away From Me with Natalie Cole; All The Way and One More For My Baby And One More For The Road with Kenny G; Fly Me To The Moon with Antonio Carlos Jobim; The House I Live In (That’s America To Me) with Neil Diamond and lots of others.

The Best of Keane, a two-CD set by one of the best alternative bands to come out of the UK this past decade. Released to celebrate Keane’s 10th year, this is no ordinary greatest hits collection. There are 18 hits or defining tracks as the blurb says plus two new songs and what I like best of all 17, B-sides or album tracks that never got airplay. Songs like these always seem to get lost amidst the hustle and bustle that comes with the hits and I always like it when they get a chance to shine. And they do in this album.

The biggies are all here particularly several from the sensational Hopes And Fears. This was the album which introduced Keane’s piano-based orchestrated kind of emo music in 2003, Everybody’s Changing; Somewhere Only We Know; Bend And Break; Bedshaped; and This Is The Last Time. And from the unheralded tracks on CD 2, there are goodies like Russian Farmer’s Song; Allemande; Myth; Snowed Under; and Walnut Tree.  The new songs, typically Keane and as elegant as ever are Higher Than The Sun and Won’t Be Broken.

Direct Hits by The Killers. This is another 10th anniversary album and it is by one of the best rockers in the US today. Yes it has been 10 years since The Killers came along, a bright spot of music from the Las Vegas desert. The album is just a simple collection, all their hits in order of release in one album. But this band has a great knack for commercial melodies and a way with words, that make it so easy to like their songs. Besides, all Killers music comes with the fantastic singing of Brandon Flowers, one of the best rock vocalists of today.

 As a bonus, there are two new songs Shot At The Night and Just Another Girl, the original demo of Mr. Brightside and a Calvin Harris remix of When You Were Young. The rest are Mr. Brightside; Somebody Told Me; Smile Like You Mean It; All These Things That I’ve Done; When You Were Young; Read My Mind; For Reasons Unknown; Human; Spaceman; A Dustland Fairytale; Runaways; Miss Atomic Bomb; The Way It Was and Be Still.