This two-CD, 51-song set is indeed the complete output of Chuck Willis for Columbia. It's the kind of overview that 1950s collectors expect only of import labels such as Bear Family, in fact, gathering not only every last single, but various songs that didn't surface at the time, including three previously unissued tracks (one of them an early version of "Search My Heart"). It isn't, of course, the complete work of everything he waxed before his death in 1958, as it has nothing from his subsequent stint at Atlantic, a period which though brief included his best and most commercial music. That means there's no "What Am I Living For," "C.C. Rider," "Hang Up My Rock & Roll Shoes," or "Betty and Dupree." It also means that this collection is far more tilted toward early-'50s R&B and jump blues than rock & roll. For those reasons it's the second Willis compilation of choice, but it's still superior R&B on the verge of transition into rock & roll, including the Latin-tinged number that became something of a standard, "I Feel So Bad." Much of the earlier sides here were spirited but similar-sounding jump blues-R&B, broken up by some urbane ballads, most of the material written by Willis himself. Truthfully, it gets more interesting and diverse on the later sides on disc two, in which Willis started admitting some rock & roll and doo wop into his style, as on the romantic ballad "I Can Tell," the minor-keyed "Night of Misery," and "Bless Her Heart," which sounds like an early rock & roll spin on Little Walter's "My Babe." Also of interest is "Keep a Knockin'," a 1954 recording that seems to foreshadow some of the ideas used in the 1957 Little Richard hit of the same name, though it's far from the exact same song.
Disc 1
01. Can't You See
02. Be Good Or Be Gone
03. It Ain't Right To Treat Me Wrong
04. Let's Jump Tonight
05. It's Too Late Baby
06. I Rule My House
07. My Baby's On My Mind
08. I Tried (To Get Along With You)
09. Here I Come
10. Caldonia (What Makes Your Big Head So Hard)
11. Loud Mouth Lucy
12. Salty Tears
13. Take It Like A Man
14. Wrong Lake To Catch A Fish
15. My Story
16. I've Been Treated Wrong Too Long
17. Don't Decieve Me
18. My Baby's Coming Home
19. You Broke My Heart
20. When My Day Is Over
21. Going To The River
22. Baby Have Left Me Again
23. You're Still My Baby
24. What's Your Name
25. Make Up Your Mind
26. I Feel So Bad
Disc 2
01. Need One More Chance
02. You Win This Time
03. Keep A Knockin'
04. If I Had A Million
05. Change My Mind
06. My Heart's Been Broke Again
07. I Don't Mind If I Do
08. Blow, Freddy Jackson
09. Welcome Home
10. Give And Take
11. I've Been Away Too Long
12. Peace And Love
13. Love-Struck
14. It Were You
15. Lawdy Miss Mary
16. Search My Heart (early version)
17. Come On Home
18. One More Break
19. I Can Tell
20. Search My Heart
21. Ring-Ding-Doo
22. Two Spoons Of Tears
23. Charged With Cheating
24. Bless Her Heart
25. Night Of Misery
