Customer Reviews

Time in a Bottle

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3 star:		(1)
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This CD offers some of Jim's greatest love songs. But, why purchase a CD that only limits Jim's talent. His best (CD's) to date is The 50th Anniversary Collection, The Definitive Collection. And if it is ever released on CD The Faces I've Been album would be the icing in any Croce collection. By the way for the record. Jim Croce did not die in a helicopter crash. It was a small plane. Info is from Jim's DVD Have You Heard Jim Croce Live.

Isn't it wonderful when something from your past is still every bit as wonderful as it was way back when.

This CD is awesome and brings back many happy memories of my soulmate/husband/and father of my children who recently passed away. Time in a bottle was our wedding song. Best purchase i've made in a long time.

Great songs, relaxing and easy going music. Too bad he is still
not making music...he is greatly missed.

Time In A Bottle--Jim Croce's Greatest Love Songs offers up twelve classic musical numbers that showcase the talent of Jim Croce. Although Jim was taken from us all too soon when he died in that plane crash, he lives on through his music which brings joy, happiness and even an emotional outlet for people hurting from love affairs gone wrong. The sound quality is excellent and that artwork is very well done.

The album starts off with a wonderful number that was also one of Jim Croce's best songs ever, "Time in a Bottle." This tender love song, which Jim actually wrote for his son A.J., moves me with its beauty and it invariably tugs at my heartstrings. Jim created a masterpiece when he penned this song; it's absolutely flawless and just one listen proves it! Jim's excellent diction bolsters his performance and this ballad lacks nothing--this music is all THAT good. "Operator (That's Not the Way It Feels)" sounds mellow even though the lyrics aren't all that happy; Jim sings and plays this to perfection and beyond. His talents carry him through and that's grand.

"Salon and Saloon" displays Jim's excellent ability to handle complex tempo and key changes; and I'm very impressed. He gives this quite a sensitive treatment, too. "Alabama Rain" has a good melody as Jim sings of a man who recalls his first love; and "Alabama Rain" keeps Jim's vocals squarely in the spotlight. The music is perfect; but it never steals the show away from Jim's lyrics--a wise move indeed!

"It Doesn't Have to Be That Way" stuns me with its natural beauty; this love song explores both heartbreak and hope sounds fresh and new every time I hear it. And if you REALLY want a masterpiece, listen for "I'll Have to Say I Love You in a Song." "I'll Have to Say I Love You in a Song" uses the guitar very well in the arrangement; I could never tire of hearing Jim Croce do this one up right! This is the most tender, sweet love song I think I've ever heard. "Lover's Cross" explores a love that didn't exactly go well; and "These Dreams" is certainly quite a sad song. "These Dreams" really gets the royal treatment from Jim Croce; it certainly doesn't need anything more than what it Jim gives it here! The CD ends with Jim Croce performing "Photographs and Memories;" "Photographs and Memories" is quite moving and it's very well written, too.

Jim Croce was one of the best we'll ever see; you owe it to yourself to get this album. Jim was one of a kind and the songs on this CD prove it. I highly recommend this album for his fans if they don't have this already; and the casual fan will be delighted with this CD.

This is a delightful item that is sure to go right to the heart.

Croce's music, the art of a master storyteller, lives decades after the fact and after the passing of this musician himself because of its profound and accessible human-ness.

Croce might be carrying on about Leroy Brown and his 'diamond ring under everybody's nose' who ended up looking like 'a jigsaw puzzle with a couple of pieces gone'. Or revealing his own heart in 'Operator', whereupon having given up on reaching an old lover who's taken up with 'my best old ex-friend Ray', he offers the operator all that he has: a compllment ('you've been so much more than kind') and a dime. Or working his way through the album's reflective, tempo-and-emotion-shifting title song 'Photographs and Memories'. In all of these, Croce shows himself to have been a man who was remarkably in touch with both the private and social movements of human hearts. His powers of observation are both ironic and sympathetic, ranging down to the detail of Rapid Roy's 'tattoo on his arm that says "Baby!" and another one that just says "Hey!".

To judge by the man's lyrics, his short life was a lonely one, full of wistful longings for lovers who he still can't believe are gone, a hometown far from New York, and friends without talons.

Yet in the midst of his transparent fragility, Croce maintains a man's dignity. The moving 'I've Got a Name' is a testament with roots that goes deep in several directions. 'If it gets me nowhere, I'll go there proud'.

Though he makes it virtually impossible to choose a crowning moment in this album--one follows another like mountain ridges before a hiker--the most emblematic of his short career and life may be the unforgettable song that is built around these find words:

"Every time I tried to tell you,
The words just came out wrong.
So I'll have to say "I love you"
In a song.

Which is just what Croce has done.

Wilma i feel the same way as u do, I love Jim too but he gets too little attention since he died. Until now, his music remains one of my best favorites!!

Jim Croce and Harry Chapin they found the best characters to write stories about. The everyday people you encounter through your life. I had this as an album and it is certainly worth changing over to a CD as well as "Photographs and Memories" as I recall these are the only 2 albums that were released before he died.

Just wanted Wilma to know.