This set is near essential to fans of
Sam Cooke,
despite the fact that it contains none of his gospel recordings for
Specialty Records or any of the work from the final year of his career
(owned by ABKCO Records). Scattered every few minutes across this
four-disc collection are reminders of just how far ahead of all existing
musical forms Cooke was, creating sounds that stretched the
definitions of song genres as they were understood and created
completely new categories. Indeed, he was so successful that it's easy
to underestimate the impact and importance of many of his early
triumphs. "You Send Me," which opens this set, may seem today like the
safest, tamest pop music, but in 1957 it was a genre-bending single, a
new kind of R&B/pop music hybrid and one that quietly shook the
foundations of the music business when it hit number one.
Disc one offers a fresh appreciation of the best of the early Keen
Records sides, drawing on the best of nearly two years of singles and
the strongest of Cooke's LP tracks in the best account to date of his
early career in popular music. Disc two begins Cooke's RCA years, and
the quality of his singles, which clearly and easily bridge the gap
between genres, races, and generations, improves dramatically. The
development of Cooke's writing and singing and his growing confidence
and range culminate with disc four, which encompasses the Night Beat
album and Cooke's live performance from the Harlem Square Club. The
sound is extraordinary throughout, expansive, rich-textured, and
vividly detailed; a choice earlier CD release, The Man and His Music,
by comparison, sounds thin and tinny.
