Still on Top: The Greatest Hits [Original recording remastered]

Van Morrison | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (November 6, 2007)
• Original Release Date: 2007
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Original recording remastered
• Label: Hip-O Records
• ASIN: B000VWYNOG
• In-Print Editions: Audio CD  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (68 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,759 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

THE FIRST-EVER CAREER-SPANNING SINGLE DISC GREATEST HITS COLLECTION FROM ONE OF THE MOST INFLUENTIAL ARTISTS OF OUR TIME One of the best-selling albums of the Nineties, the five-times-platinum, 1990-issued The Best Of Van Morrison, is out of print. For a new, career-spanning collection from the singer-songwriter ranked in the top half of both Vh1's "100 Greatest Artists Of Rock And Roll" and Rolling Stone's "The Immortals: 100 Greatest Artists Of All Time," only one man could possibly handpick the tracks and oversee their mastering -- Van Morrison himself. That is what the Rock and Roll Hall of Famer has done for Still On Top - The Greatest Hits. Spanning his work from 1964 to 2005 on a handful of different record labels, Still On Top - The Greatest Hits celebrates a singer who has influenced everyone from Bruce Springsteen and The Doors' Jim Morrison to Tom Petty and Elvis Costello. Van the Man has been hailed as one of "popular music's true innovators, a restless seeker whose incantatory vocals and alchemical fusion of R&B, jazz, blues, and Celtic folk produced perhaps the most spiritually transcendent body of work in the rock & roll canon" (All Music Guide).

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

55 of 58 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Sampling from a long and varied career, November 24, 2007

By 

hyperbolium (Earth, USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Still on Top: The Greatest Hits (Audio CD)

The aggregation of record labels into media conglomerates like Universal is turning out to be both a blessing and a curse. For an artist of Morrison's longevity, it means that a career-spanning retrospective can be assembled without the difficulties of cross-licensing. But doing so in only 21-tracks invariably short-changes important aspects of an artist's career, leaving off some hits (e.g., "Blue Money" and "Come Running") and benchmark album tracks in favor of covering beginning-to-end. On yet another hand, this anthology's producer has done a nice job of selecting tracks that demonstrate the evolution of Morrison's career, and sequencing them in a very palatable flow.

The collection spans Morrison's mid-60s rock with Them, an iconic string of turn-of-the-70s pop-soul hits, '80s ballads, and through to 2005's soulful "Stranded." But in the end, the limited space of a single disc, stretched across 40 years of recording, ends up serving neither Morrison the hit singles artist, nor Morrison the album artiste. In addition to the missing hits named above, key radio tracks ("Mystic Eyes," "Tupelo Honey," and "Into the Mystic") were also omitted, and the holistic sense of landmark albums "Astral Weeks," "Moondance," "Tupelo Honey" and "Wavelength" is left as additional purchase.

That said, what's here is magnificent, starting with the garage staple "Gloria" (a U.S. hit for Chicago's Shadows of Knight, but not for Them) and the impossibly blissful "Brown Eyed Girl." Morrison's voice transforms to a jazz instrument for "Moondance," and the trio of "Domino," "Wild Night," and "Jackie Wilson Said" are among the greatest blue-eyed soul ever committed to record. Morrison dialed it back for 1973's "Warm Love," but re-discovered his faith and backbeat for the joyous gospel-soul of 1978's "Wavelength." He continued to explore soul and jazz in the '80s, adding rootsy sounds on songs like "Tore Down ala Ribaud."

The mid-80s selections show Morrison mellowed but still soulful, his husky voice providing counterpoint to smoother backings on "In the Garden" and "Someone Like You." The latter is probably best known for its appearance in 2001's "Bridget Jones's Diary, Part 2," though it was originally recorded fourteen years earlier. The string-lined 1989 love song "Have I Told You Lately" became a new Morrison signature, turning up on the soundtrack of "One Fine Day" and spawning dozens of cover versions. More blue-eyed soul followed, including the sumptuous "Days Like This," the autobiographical "The Healing Game," and the '50s R&B of "Precious Time."

It's a terrific and surprisingly organic journey from Morrison's garage rock roots through his authoritative, pop, soul, jazz and R&B sides. This is a well selected anthology that could easily turn Morrison's more recent fans onto his classics, or clue early fans into his terrific body of later work. But in both cases, listeners will need to supplement the overview with deeper helpings from the original albums. Alternatively you could pick up a greatest hits collection for Them, and purpose-built anthologies of his early Bang-era material, seminal '70s work for Warner Brothers and Mercury, and the Morrison-curated anthologies of his later work "Best of Van Morrison" Vols. 2 and 3. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a truly satisfying one-stop shop - and with a catalog this sprawling and deep, there may never be. [©2007 hyperbolium dot com]

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Truly stupendous music., April 22, 2008

By 

Kevin H. Dudley (Roanoke, VA (USA)) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Still on Top: The Greatest Hits (Audio CD)

Still on Top:Greatest Hits was originally released back in 2007 as a single disc 21 track set. For the more casual fan, it is still IMO the best option to get.

Now in 2008, Van Morrison has seen fit to re-release this set as an expanded 3 disc set with the same title. All of the 21 tracks from the single disc version are here but with the addition of 30 more tremendous tracks. While most die hard Van Morrison fans scoff at the idea of trying to distill his artistry to a compliation of sorts, this new 3 disc set represents the best option for people wanting to dig a lot deeper than the single disc version without having to buy individual albums.

The good part here is that all of the tracks are brilliantly remastered and each CD is almost maxed out close to 80 minutes. Disc One is just shy of 78 minutes, disc two is about 78 1/2 minutes and Disc Three is just shy of 79 minutes. One of my huge gripes when buying greatest hits CD's or anthologies is when they fail to max out the CD (or CD's) as much as they can to 80 minutes. Thankfully they didn't do that here and gave the buyer the absolute most music possible on 3 CD's.

The one thing I thought I would have a problem with is that the CD's are sequenced in chronological order. But upon listening to the set it's clear that Van Morrison sequenced each CD with a particular feel/mood in mind. This is most evident on Disc 3 which is very laid back and chilled out in a most relaxing and enjoyable way.

While there have been way too many compilation sets of Van Morrison's stuff over the years, I feel that this is the best one to get for people wanting a really thorough anthology of this legendary artist's long, long career.

For the more casual fan, the 2007 single disc set is still the best option for those seeking more of a lighter sampling of his work.

21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Best As A Compendium For Casual Fans, March 22, 2008

By 

Kurt Harding "bon vivant" (Boerne TX) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Still on Top: The Greatest Hits (Audio CD)

What, yet another Van Morrison Greatest Hits assortment? Why do we need this continual barrage? Well, maybe one reason is that everything is remastered but the reason I bought it is that a review in an English music magazine promised some never before released outtakes on disc three. OK, turns out there is just one and that is on disc two. I'd already heard everything else before as I imagine most hardcore Van Morrison fans have, so what this package really amounts to is an excellent compendium for casual fans who think that he faded away in the 1970s.
This three-CD set is filled with undoubtedly great music and the price is very reasonable but like the first reviewer, I can think of many songs that could have been included and some that could easily be omitted. But that brings to mind the point that but for the quality of the remaster, any fan with a fairly comprehensive collection of Van's albums could have slapped this together himself.
Still On Top offers a broad overview of forty years of music, stretching from Morrison's days with Them to albums issued just in the last couple years. Nearly four hours long, it certainly covers a lot of musical territory yet somehow I was left feeling a lack of any real excitement about it.
Despite my slight disappointment, Still On Top: The Greatest Hits will often serve as my Van Morrison fix when I am taking a road trip and can't decide which of his many varied CDs to bring along. And here's an additional thought: Several songs from Moondance are featured here yet the album has never been remastered due reputedly to a dispute between Warner Brothers and Van Morrison. Can this mean a remaster of that classic is imminent? It was not listed in the remastering program included with this set.