Customer Reviews

Essential Marty Robbins

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Robbins' musical legacy is often popularly pinned to his nostalgic song of the West, "El Paso," but over a 30-year recording career he waxed an astounding variety of honky-tonk, pop, blues, rockabilly, and standards. He moved mixed-up his core country and western sounds to jazz, tin-pan alley and Hawaiian influences. It's nearly incomprehensible how one person could sound so at home among the steel twang of honky-tonk ("I'll Go Alone"), hillbilly rock and blues ("That's All Right" "Singing the Blues" "Knee Deep in the Blues" "I Walk Alone"), sophisticated '50s teen ballads ("Mister Teardrop" "A White Sport Coat (And a Pink Carnation)"), and of course his beloved Westerns ("The Hanging Tree" "El Paso" "Big Iron"), but Robbins made it seem effortless.

What's particularly impressive is that Robbins wasn't a chameleon who reinvented himself with the style-of-the-day, he was a renaissance man whose singular style fit different genres with remarkable authority. In isolation, any one of these tracks seems to define Robbins' essence, but taken together, it's clear what a versatile singer and songwriter he was. After conquering the country and pop charts he added a Latin flavor with his 1962 original "Devil Woman" and a bit of New Orleans rock 'n' roll with "Ruby Ann," only to return to his roots with the countrypolitan "Cigarettes and Coffee Blues" and yodeling honky-tonk of "Begging to You." Throughout the '60s he zigzagged back and forth from genre to genre, penning hit originals (including a prequel and post-modern sequel to El Paso, "Faleena (From El Paso)" and "El Paso City," respectively) and cherry-picking songs from up-and-coming songwriters like Gordon Lightfoot.

Robbins' hit-making continued into the '70s, with a short stint on Decca followed by a successful return to Columbia, including new originals and interestingly selected covers, such as Connie Francis' "Among My Souvenirs" and Dean Martin's late-50s "Return to Me" Robbins closed out his career with the 1983 top-ten single, "Honky Tonk Man," completing a' catalog far too rich to be thoroughly anthologized on two discs.

Though one can point to missing sides (including top-charting hits and his Hawaiian sides for starters), the Essential series is more about capturing the essence of an artist's work than simply reciting their greatest hits. In this, these discs perform well. The out-of-print box set "The Essential Marty Robbins: 1951-1982" offers a slightly broader 50-track overview, and individual original album and genre reissues provide fans deeper views into particular aspects of Robbins' career, but as a roadmap to Robbins' career (or just a terrifically pleasant listening experience), this double-disc set gets top marks. [©2005 hyperbolium dot com]

This is a nice way to get most of Marty's highlights throughout his career at a relatively cheap price. The problem with this compilation & the others is that they leave off far too many Top 10 Country hits. For example, where's "It's Your World"? That single went to #3, and it even went to #51 on the Pop charts, yet it's curiously absent here. There are also several Top 100 Pop hits missing. Maybe the folks putting these collections together should look at Joel Whitburn's books now and again! My feeling is that if you're doing an "essential" collection by a country artist, you should include at least all of their Top 10 Country hits & Top 40 Pop hits. Is that too much to ask? I guess it is. Anyway...this is actually a pretty decent set if you enjoy Mr. Robbins' work but don't really care if it's missing some chart hits. But for a completist like me, it's somewhat frustrating. I just hope that some day Sony will get on the ball and do a 4-cd box set with all of his hits & some nice rarities.

Here's a good compilation of Marty Robbins' recordings. Beginning with his Do-Wop 1950's Rock-n-Roll sound, to his famous western ballads, and on up to his work on "Honky Tonk Man". All in all, a very good collection, although there are obviously some songs that could've been provided (for instance, where is "The Chair"?). The sound on this 2-CD set is great, no complaints there. Well worth your money and ear. B+

I can't reccomend this collection enough. The last thing you'll
do is waste your money. The new country cd's are a waste of money. There's only a few songs I don't like on this one. It's
confusing though to have 2 Essential Marty Robbins (One's a Box Set. The other one's not) I have both. I'm only 39 yrs old & I love his music. You won't be dissapointed

I truly believe that Marty Robbins was one of the most talented men ever to walk this good earth. His voice is a wondrous musical instrument that charms and thrills listeners with it's sensitivity and sincerity. That he wrote so much of his output is proof of his god given talent and the sheer variety and versatility he displays are quite astonishing. You can imagine Marty in the studio deliberately recording something entirely different from the previous release knowing that he would wow his wide fan base. There are all kinds of songs on this album sung by a man who loved to sing; you just have to listen to the voice and know this is so. There will NEVER be another like him.

This is a great oldie, having grown up with this kind of music. Love that the song "White Sport Coat and Pink Carnation" is on the CD, as well as his very popular other songs.

Marty Robbins recorded many types of music in his long and varied country music career. His forays into pop led to Top 40 success. This two-disc collection tries to boil down his career to 40 songs. Of course, it can't be done, but this is a wonderful introduction to a man with a golden voice.

You get his early cuts, such as "I Couldn't Keep From Crying," to his pop successes like "The Story of my Life," onto his wonderful gunfighter songs like the immortal "El Paso." You get the picture. These two discs draw a thumbnail sketch of Robbins' entire career, up to his final top ten "Honkytonk Man," which isn't a remake of the Johnny Horton song, but a song from the Clint Eastwood film of the same name. It's a wonderful way to round out the collection. Robbins was one of a kind, and this is a good way to discover his music.

This 2 Cd compilation is very well made. It has some early rock an roll like and early country of this great performer and composer that was Marty Robbins.
The remastering of it made it sound so fresh, just like the old turntable analog sound that I remember. It sounds as good as vinyl but without the needle sound.
I recommend this to anyone who like Marty Robbins.

Marty Robbins has always been my favorite singer and I wasted a lot of years not owning this collection. It was great to hear several of these songs for the first time.

This is an outstanding 2-DVD collection. Some seldom heard songs such as "Faleena" which is a prologue to El Paso and El Paso City.
This duo of DVD's is a must for all Marty fans.