Customer Reviews

Ultimate Collection

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This is one of my favorite CDs of the of Les Paul & Mary Ford ever recorded/ This CD has been out of print for many years. As a popular radio Dee-Jay, I use this set often on my radio show. A real good look at the early fifties. Almost all of their hits are in it.
If you like the oldies as my listeners do, it's hardly found anywhere else, this set is number one. I have to give it 5 stars!

Brian Lee Hart
WVUD FM, Newark Delaware

It was great to hear Les and Mary again. Wonderful to enjoy their innovation. I was prompted to order this CD after viewing a DVD titled "Chasing the Sound" which tells the story of Les Paul's creativity and love of music. At 90, he was still playing at the Iridium Club in Manhattan just for the fun of it!

...this CD offers more bang for the buck than any other Les & Mary compilation you're likely to find. Bought this to replace the duo's hits on my self-destructing old Time/Life "Your Hit Parade" cassettes of early 50s American Pop. Only song not covered is the effects-heavy novelty guitar instrumental "Nola" but that's okay because there are three other zany pieces of the same genre that I hadn't heard before. Audio quality is digitally-remastered great on all but two of these selections. "Just One More Chance" apparently missed the cleanup process, sounds like it came directly from a crackly old 78 record. Also, Les has a spaghetti western/border town/Marty Robbins-like instrumental titled "La Rosita" that sounds like a prankster is jacking with the volume control thruout the song. Might just be me, but early 50s was a time of experimentation with effects so maybe it's supposed to be that way.

Les has a few slower-paced blues instrumentals that are a nice departure from his usual manic style, all tastefully done like the master he is/was.

Mary's overdubbed voice is sensational, and on most songs Les is careful not to upstage her talent. She could bend notes as smooth as glass, check out Mary's vocals on "It's A Lonesome Old Town" and see if that's not the greatest smoky torch song in recording history. Oh yes - for you Patty Page fans - listen to Mary sing "Tennessee Waltz", the similarities of their overdubbed voices is almost scary! Only song that seems out of place is Mary's "Silent Night", sounds like it was recorded as an afterthought to fill up an album side.

Of course, most of the songs are Les and Mary together, performing in their trademark point-counterpoint style. For guitarists that want a decent sampling of Les Paul's guitar techniques and early 50s pioneering effects innovations they will certainly hear it here, and maybe pick up a new lick or two as well :)

To summarize, this 30-song single disk is not for the LP&MF purist, but should fill the bill nicely for most everyone else.

Les and Mary are at their best again on this CD, as the inventor of and master of the electric guitar and multi-track recording. Great stuff.

I bought this along with the 90th Birthday package as my introduction to Les Paul and Mary Ford, and this is far less interesting than that one. Although you do get the duo's main hits with this collection, the track listing here is heavy on unmemorable blues numbers and other novelties. The strange decision to arrange the 30 tracks on the CD in perfect alphabetical order might have something to do with that as well. I was also very disappointed to find out that this so-called "ultimate" collection does not contain any liner notes and only basic songwriting credits. Many of the songs here seem to be obscure album tracks and so locating recording date info for them is very hard. Such a simple thing and yet it's not included.

In all, there are better compilations out there and you're not missing anything by skipping this one.