Footsteps in the Dark

Yusuf/Cat Stevens | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (October 25, 1990)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: A&M
• ASIN: B000002GCU
• Also Available in: Audio Cassette  |  Vinyl
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #145,034 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. The Wind

2. (I Never Wanted) To Be a Star

3. Katmandu

4. I Want to Live in a Wigwam

5. Trouble

6. On the Road to Find Out

7. If You Want to Sing Out, Sing Out

8. Where Do the Children Play?

9. Daytime

10. Don't Be Shy

11. How Can I Tell You

12. Father and Son

13. The Hurt

14. Silent Sunlight

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Not a greatest hits collection, despite its subtitle, June 6, 2001

By 

John S. Ryan "Scott Ryan" (Cuyahoga Falls, OH) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Footsteps in the Dark (Audio CD)

I have no idea why this collection is subtitled "Greatest Hits, Vol 2." (I also have no idea why it's not currently available. Check back.)

In fact it's a collection of lesser-known "Cat Stevens" (the stage name of the former Steven Georgiou) favorites, including a few that are not recorded elsewhere. These are "If You Want to Sing Out, Sing Out" and "Don't Be Shy" (recorded for the film _Harold and Maude_ and never released on any album before this one) and "I Want to Live in a Wigwam" (the "B" side of the single 45-rpm -- remember those? -- release of "Morning Has Broken").

Neither these songs nor the others are "hits" by any stretch of the imagination, with the possible partial exception of "Father and Son." They were selected by Cat Stevens himself, and they seem to be a little mini-documentary of his longtime spiritual search. (The liner notes don't say, but I suspect Cat himself chose the _order_ in which they appear too. They do seem to form something of an orderly progression, and they sure aren't arranged chronologically.)

As this collection was released in 1984, there's a note in it from Cat Stevens explaining to his confused fans just what the heck had happened to him. As most of us probably know by now, he had read the Qur'an, become a Muslim, changed his name to Yusuf Islam, and left the music business.

Thus the title of the present collection. These songs represent what he came to see as his progress toward the light he hadn't yet found when they were written. (This isn't all that different from his characterization of them at the time, by the way. Long before 1984 he had described himself as being "followed by a moon shadow" -- the light was in front of him, you see, and he was moving toward it through the night.)

Speaking of Islam, some readers of this review will be worried about a related matter. For the record, you can feel safe in ignoring the comments from people who think the man has become "rigid" and/or "intolerant." The simple fact is that nearly every Cat Stevens album (the exceptions being his first two) is filled with "spiritual seeking," and he eventually found what he was looking for in Islam. His "recent" (actually, 1990) remarks on Salman Rushdie were not what you probably think they were (and in particular he didn't call for Rushdie's death). He's no more "rigid" or "intolerant" than the rest of us; he's simply a religiously observant Muslim, that's all.

There's a problem here only for people who think seekers should never get around to finding, or that traditional religion is more "dogmatic" than irreligion. His songs don't need to "transcend" their creator in order to be great; there's no need to run down Yusuf in order to elevate Cat. (And since these songs _were_ written during his "seeker" stage, they're suitable for everybody -- future Muslims or not.)

And this collection -- if and when it ever becomes available again -- will be of interest even to those who have all of his other albums, owing primarily to the inclusion of the aforementioned not-elsewhere-available songs and secondarily to the note from Yusuf. (Or maybe your priorities will be the other way around.)

The rest of the songs are good; in fact they probably include most of the really good stuff from his post-Tea-and-Teaser albums (one from _Catch Bull at Four_, though probably not the one I'd have picked; "The Hurt" from _Foreigner_; "(I Never Wanted) To Be A Star" from _Izitso_; "Daylight" from _Back to Earth_; perhaps oddly, nothing at all from _Numbers_ or _Buddha and the Chocolate Box_). But the fact is that if you have _Mona Bone Jakon_, _Tea for the Tillerman_ and _Teaser and the Firecat_, you've already got most of Cat Stevens's "very best." The rest of that "very best" is on _Buddha and the Chocloate Box_ ("Sun/C79" and "Oh, Very Young"), so you won't get it here anyhow.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This CD is awsome!!, April 7, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Footsteps in the Dark (Audio CD)

I bought this cd, because I liked the movie Harold and Maude. I originally bought this cd, because of a lack of movie soundtracks. I am now ecstatic that there was no soundtrack. If there were, I would have been missing some of the greatest songs of all time. I bought every Cat Stevens album I could find. I would recommend that everyone else do the same.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I love Cat Stevens!!, September 22, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Footsteps in the Dark (Audio CD)

This album has all the songs from "Harold and Maude". Need I say more? OK, I'll say more. The music is pure magic, and the CD has a nice little blurb in the insert telling us what Cat (now Yusef) is up to these days. I don't want to spoil it for you - BUY THE CD!! It's worth every penny.