Customer Reviews

Essential Dolly Parton

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2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

There are literally dozens of compilations to sift through when it comes to one of country music's most prolific artists, but THE ESSENTIAL DOLLY PARTON is hands down the most thorough. Of course, you're not going to get every hit from a nearly 40-year career, but this 37-song collection touches on most of the highlights.

Beginning with the 1967 hit "Dumb Blonde" from her major label debut HELLO, I'M DOLLY and ending with "Shine" from 2001's bluegrass roots album LITTLE SPARROW, this is a chronological look at one of country music's most gifted artists. In addition to early classics like "Jolene" and "Coat of Many Colors," there are the crossover hits like "Here You Come Again" and "9 to 5." In addition there are duets with her late-sixties partner Porter Wagoner ("Please Don't Stop Loving Me") and Kenny Rogers ("Islands in the Stream"), along with her work with Emmylou Harris and Linda Ronstadt ("To Know Him Is To Love Him"). It's also worth noting that Parton wrote more than half of these songs, including her original rendition of "I Will Always Love You"--which, frankly, I prefer to Whitney Houston's over-the-top version.

If you're looking for a solid introduction to Parton's entire career, look no further. THE ESSENTIAL is exactly what you've been waiting for. VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Being released on the newly formed Legacy/BMG merged label, one would think Legacy would try to feature more songs from their vaults and tracks recorded from her brief stint with UMG. While the mastering of this cd with her over compiled recordings from RCA sound the best ever, I really feel Legacy missed out on a golden opportunity. While "Shine" closes out this set, the bluegrass album that preceeded it, "The Grass Is Blue," isn't represented at all, as isn't "Halos and Horns." Dolly's one off album with MCA/Decca "Hungry Again" could have be represented by "Paradise Road," and "Treasures" could have been represented by it's huge hit "Peace Train," which was subject to a number of remixes for club consumption. The Sony label could have been better highlighted with hits like "Romeo" and the gospel anthem "He's Alive." I think now we must move past compilations and focus on re-issues. A lot of Dolly's albums, there are a lot of them, have been langushing in the vaults for years; dust 'em off already.

For reasons of cluelessness, that I have long since quit trying to figure out, RCA and BMG have spend the past 15 years or so constantly taking the same handful of Dolly Parton songs and put them on compilation after compilation while they continue to allow many, many of her songs and albums, particularly those from her pre-pop country phase (from circa 1977 back) languish in their vaults gathering dust and never ever even issued once on CD. Do a song search on Amazon for "Here You Come Again," "9 to 5," "Two Doors Down," "I Will Always Love You," "Old Flames," and "Islands in the Stream" and you'll find that there are already dozens of CD compilations that have these songs. Then do a search for "My Blue Ridge Mountain Boy," "Just Because I'm a Woman," or "Down From Dover" and you'll find far, far fewer and for that later song you will find that only a new version, which she recorded for her "Little Sparrow" album remains in print.

OK. So this 2- disc compilation goes a little ways to correct some of that. Unlike most other compilations it does acknowledge that there was more to Dolly Parton before her mid to late 70's pop sellout than "Coat of Many Colors" and "Jolene" both marvelous songs (and in the case of CoMC magnificent) which are usually to two songs tossed on all the pop compilations that are supposed to make up for the absence of any comprehensive collection of Parton's most artistically compelling period, this one gives a decent, if far from complete, overview of it. Nevertheless, this compilation remains problematic.

For starters, rather than giving us a two disc set of songs that have generally been ignored in the CD era, it uses the second disc to, once again give us songs that have been released over and over and over again. Face it. Does anyone who really wants to have "Here You Come Again," "I Will Always Love You," or "9 to 5" on CD STILL not have it? And since a large number of people who have an interest in Parton's more traditional country period have little to no interest in her pop sellout phase why bundle these discs together and slap a twenty dollar plus list price on it meaning that we have to choose either between paying a premium cost for a single disc (since disc two will go unplayed) or (the more likely option) forgoing buying this altogether? And all of this doesn't get into the fact that the less satisfying pop stuff begins to creep in on disc one.

BMG & RCA: WAKE UP!!!! You have a treasure trove of material by this woman collecting dust in your vaults. Can't SOMEBODY give the American market a first rate collection of Dolly Parton's pre pop career? An Australian label released one a few years ago called "Mission Chapel Memories." What do they Aussies know that you all don't?

Given nothing but the song selection here, this compilation would warrant three to maybe three and a half stars (the second disc dragging down the overall rating) but given the overall problems I have to drag it down to two which alone resists strong temptation to vent my frustrations at BMG & RCA with a one star rating.

In the mid-90s, RCA finally began treating the back catalogs of its legendary artist with respect, with their Essential series, which included two volumes focusing on Dolly Parton's work during her 19-year stint with the label.

This new two-disc Essential collection from Sony BMG replaces the earlier RCA volumes. When RCA's parent company BMG merged with Sony, and the bulk of Dolly's catalog was controlled by one company, many fans, myself included, were excited at the prospect of finally getting an anthology that included hits from her Monument days through her 1987-1995 association with Columbia Records. It was inevitable that the RCA material would dominate, given Parton's long association with that label (1967-1986); however it is disappointing that her Columbia work remains under-anthologized. Only two of her Columbia hits - 1989's "Why'd You Come In Here Looking Like That" and her 1991 duet with Ricky Van Shelton, "Rockin' Years" are represented here. At the very least, "Yellow Roses", "He's Alive", "Eagle When She Flies", and "Silver And Gold", deserved inclusion in this collection. Instead, we get a single track from the Trio albums -- "To Know Him Is To Love Him" with Emmylou Harris on lead vocals, and a duet with Porter Wagoner, "Please Don't Stop Loving Me", which, though excellent, probably should have been excluded in favor of some of Dolly's solo work.

On the bright side, this collection does include a pair of brilliant early tracks that failed to catch on commercially at the time. It's nice to see that "My Blue Ridge Mountain Boy" and "Dumb Blonde", her first (modest) hit for Monument Records, each earned a slot here. I'd have preferred more selections from these early years, instead of some of the later crossover hits which are widely available on other collections, but at least this was a step in the right direction.

The remaining tracks on this collection, are by and large, a rehash of the earlier RCA Essential volumes. It's impossible to do justice to such a long and successful career as Dolly Parton's with a two-disc set. It's also impossible to please everyone - I'd have made some different choices if I were the one compiling this collection - but overall, it is a good introduction to Dolly's work and the best retrospective of her career currently available, despite its shortcomings.

Diehard Parton fans might consider purchasing "The Tour Collection", a 4 CD boxed set recently released by Sony BMG in the UK that contains a handful of Dolly's hits, along with a generous sampling of rare tracks, several of which are making their first appearance on CD. There is some duplication with the Essential discs, but the two collections combined will provide a comprehensive look at this amazing singer-songwriter's entire career.

You may remember a previous compilation, Ultimate Dolly Parton, that was released a couple of years ago. The standard American version was a single CD containing 20 tracks. The UK version had those tracks plus a bonus re-mix of Early morning breeze. There was also a double-CD version that contained 36 tracks, available by mail order only from one outlet in the USA, which did not allow orders from outside the USA. However, this version was released as standard in Germany so anybody who wanted it could buy the German version if they couldn't buy (or didn't know about) the mail order version - it is available from several Amazon sites. This new compilation is a re-packaging and re-issue of that double-CD with one extra track added - Shine. Therefore, if you've already got the 36-track version of Ultimate Dolly Parton, you don't need this - you can buy Shine elsewhere. The remainder of this review is for those who haven't got the 36-track double CD.

To anybody who already owns a compilation of Dolly's music for RCA, the track listing here has a familiar look to it with few exceptions. The exceptions are Please don't stop loving me, a sensational duet with Porter Wagoner not normally included on Dolly's solo compilations, To know him is to love him, from the first Trio album, and Why'd you come in here looking like that, from Dolly's period with Columbia.

The other tracks here include many Dolly classics, notably Jolene (her only UK top ten solo hit), Islands in the stream (a duet with Kenny Rogers that became a USA number one pop hit and UK top ten hit), Here you come again (a USA top three pop hit), Coat of many colors (Dolly's autobiographical signature song), Bargain store (which some radio stations thought too risqué), 9 to 5 (a USA number one pop hit), It's all wrong but it's all right (much more risqué than Bargain store), My Tennessee mountain home (a look at the good times in her childhood), Love is like a butterfly (one of Dolly's finest romantic songs), The seeker (another great romantic song though this one can also be interpreted as a gospel song), Mule skinner blues (a cover of a Jimmie Rodgers song that provided Dolly with her first major American country hit - it made the top three), Joshua (her first number one country hit) and Dumb blonde (her first country hit of any size - it made the top thirty).

Even 37 tracks can't include everything though I will admit to being particularly disappointed at the omission of Yellow roses, a number one country hit and one of my favorite Dolly songs. Other omissions include Real love (a duet with Kenny Rogers), Applejack, Baby I'm burning, Think about love and Do I ever cross your mind.

If you only want one collection of Dolly's music covering both her traditional country and her pop-country music, make it this one. Even if you want to build a collection, this is a great way to start.

This is probably the most comprehensive collection there is for Dolly Parton's music (unless you can find a copy of the Australian 3 cd import LEGENDARY). With the recent merging of RCA/BMG and Sony/Columbia, I hope that they will be responsible and release her albums that are not yet available on CD. Fans would buy that. Yet RCA is still releasing these collections, year after year. At least this time, it's somewhat complete. It's far from definitive, but it's a good place to start. 37 tracks spread out over 2 discs give a quick overview of her career. Lets hope they do a boxed set or something different than the average compilation with the same tracks on it.

About ten years ago RCA released, separately, a pair of best of collections by Dolly Parton. Each was called "The Essential Dolly Parton" and had Vol.1 and Vol. 2 to distinguish them.

They appeared to be misnumbered. Vol. 1 was made up exclusively of her undistinguished pop hits like "9 to 5," while Vol 2. was made up mostly of her older country material with some of the pop stuff infiltrating it (which, tellingly, the country stuff was not allowed to do on Vol. 1). Vol. 2 of those collections is now out of print and, it appears, that Volume 1 is in the process of following it to that status.

It would thus appear that this two disc set, which has a very similar set list to those previous collections (even to the point that the pop songs infiltrate the country disc while, by and large, the pop disc is all pop) is designed to fill the void left by the status of those earlier "Essentials." I suppose one could be pleased that the list price of this two disc set is actually lower than the combined list price of the two separate discs but if all you want is the country stuff you're outta luck. You have to plop down about two dozen hard earned dollars to get a second disc you probably don't want and may well never even play.

Three cheers for the previous reviewer who pointed out that an Australian label has released a 24 track collection of Parton's pre-pop country career called "Mission Chapel Memories." Many of the songs on it have never even been released on CD in the United States even though that format is now nearly 25 years old. That collection is an infinitely better value than this redundant one that offers us nothing new other than the song order.

This essential collections has pretty much everything you could want from Dolly all on 2 discs. If you are looking for the complete Dolly collection, then look into the 4 disc box set. This is a great collection regardless with 14 number one hits on here, you really can't miss. Enjoy and Stay 2nd :-)

I bought this item for my brother as he couldn't find it anywhere in stores. He loved it and plays it in his truck constantly.

A career as long and rich as Parton's can't possibly be fully surveyed in only thirty-seven tracks on two discs. But this latest Essential volume does an admirable job of pulling together many of the singer-songwriter's catalog highpoints, mixing her best-loved solo hits with duets from Porter Wagoner, Kenny Rogers and Ricky Van Shelton, her trio work with Linda Ronstadt and Emmylou Harris, and finishing with a track ("Shine") from her trio of recent bluegrass-influenced albums.

The track list here covers much of the same ground as the two volume mid-90s "Essential" set, though notably adding Parton's first charting single, "Dumb Blond," and stretching into Parton's twenty-first century's return to her mountain roots The merger of RCA/BMG and Sony/Columbia opened the doors for the breadth of material pulled together here, but it's simply not enough to fully essay Parton's artistry; the list of missing essentials is as long as the list included here. Further, the space available on each disc suggests a desire to keep the mechanical royalties in line with a list price that's affordable to an audience beyond Parton die-hards.

This set is well positioned to replace the previous two volume series as a value-priced overview/entry-point to Parton's extraordinary catalog. That it repeats much of the same core catalog as earlier compilations is something of an empty complaint, given that it's not intended to probe any deeper. Still, with most of Parton's RCA album catalog out of print, this view of the better-known highlights does re-beg the question of when individual album reissues or a comprehensive box set will be produced for Parton's hardcore fans. [©2005 hyperbolium dot com]