Search - Bobby Vee :: Singles Collection

Just as the title says...

Zub | Forks Twp., PA | 02/16/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Anyone familiar with top-40 radio in the 60's knows Bobby Vee and could name several tunes of his that made it into the top 10. During his decade-long run of charting songs, he had a very impressive 38 of those make it into the top 100. So here is no flash-in-the-pan artist. The CD reissue market is loaded with Vee's albums on CD, two-fers and a myriad of compilation CD's, running the gamut from excellent to lets-make-a-buck cheapos-on-the-fly. So why do we care that there is yet another Bobby Vee compilation CD? For several reasons, actually. First, with all the CD's out there, this is the first time EVERY top-100 charting single of Vee's becomes available. While that may not be of interest to casual listeners satified with the familiar stuff, this piece does fill a long-standing void in Vee's recordings on CD. As an aside, of all the distilled-down compilations, the EMI Legends of Rock 'n' Roll single collection is the best of the lot. While not being, or pretending to be, a comprehensive collection of Vee's recordings, this piece does live up to its promise of a "singles" collection, at least as far as those that charted along with their b-sides are concerned. And for good measure, Italian-language versions of a few of his hits are included. The sixteen-page liner notes booklet contains an accounting of Vee's musical history along with a number of photos and record and album illustrations. And while the sound quality of the EMI Legends piece may have the edge, there are no apologies needed here. The majority of the tracks are in stereo, the exceptions being tracks 2,4,6,24 on disc one, 5,6,10-14,16,17,19-23,25,27 on disc 2 and 14,16,27-30 on disc 3. As a greatest hits package, this is the ultimate and well-done in every way."

A lot, but not all there

Leganto | USA | 10/12/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The Bobby Vee Singles Collection is supposedly complete. You get some of the frequently heard favorites: Rubber Ball, Everyday, Come Back When You Grow Up, to name a few. Then there are some of my less known personal favorites that I haven't heard in years: My Love Loves Me, Laurie, Baby Face. All in all, a very pleasing collection.



Amazon and at least one other seller lists 96 tracks. But there are actually only 95 spread out over the three discs: 33, 32, 30. Close examination shows that #76, Sunrise Highway, does not really exist as #11 on the third disc. And it is not on the printed back cover list that comes with the CD, although it is mentioned in the accompanying booklet.



As a final touch, the last four tracks are some of his hits sung in Italian. Nice to listen closely and make some comparisons, especially if you have at least a little understanding of the language.



The collection is not what you can call "complete" if you want everything of Bobby's that was released. There are cover songs from different albums that you can't get here. These were most famous by their original artists: Peggy Sue, Little Star, Lollipop, Do You Want To Dance, etc. So you would still have to supplement this set with something else.



But it's worth the price, regardless."

Comprehensive British and American singles collection

Peter Durward Harris | Leicester England | 05/23/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This triple CD contains the A side and the B side of every Bobby Vee single ever released in Britain or America for Liberty records, plus four tracks recorded in Italian. Oh, and it also includes two tracks from a 1962 Christmas album that were intended for a single release that never actually happened. The set is presented in chronological order except for the Italian tracks, which make up the last four tracks of the final CD. Being in chronological order, almost all the hits are on the first CD, a reflection of the fact that Bobby had a relatively brief period when he was extremely popular, followed by a much longer period when his records were still of a high quality but no longer fashionable.



Bobby was a huge Buddy Holly fan, eventually recording an album with the Crickets as well as an album filled with covers of Buddy's songs. It therefore seems a bitter irony that Bobby's big break came when he was called in at short notice as a substitute following Buddy's fatal plane crash. Although those albums are beyond the scope of this singles collection, there are a couple of covers of Buddy's songs here, these being Everyday (the B-side of Rubber ball) and Well all right (a seventies A-side that flopped).



Bobby's vocal style was best suited to ballads so it is no surprise that Take good care of my baby and The night has a thousand eyes were among his biggest hits on both sides of the Atlantic. On the more up-tempo tracks, female background singers often helped out (hear the bouncy, bouncy on Rubber ball, surely the best of Bobby's up-tempo songs) but even on the up-tempo songs, Bobby dispenses with their services occasionally, particularly on Baby face, when Bobby seems to be straining just a little. Actually that track works quite well, but it illustrates what I mean about Bobby being ideally suited to ballads.



The first CD contains classic hits such as Devil or angel, Rubber ball, More than I can say (later covered by Leo Sayer who had a UK hit with it in the seventies), Take good care of my baby and The night has a thousand eyes. Among the other tracks is What do you want?, which was Bobby's second single. It was actually a cover of an up-tempo British song that provided Adam Faith with a UK number one hit. At a time when so many British singers and groups were quite content to cover American songs, it was a rarity for Americans to find any original British songs that they were interested in covering, prior to the emergence of the Beatles. Sadly, the song didn't provide Bobby with his hoped-for American hit.



Hits are few and far between on CD 2 and CD 3, much the biggest of them being Come back when you grow up, an American top ten hit from 1967. Nevertheless, there's a lot of good music to be heard among these tracks. The lack of hits certainly wasn't caused by lack of effort. Bobby tried all sorts of ideas including recording with George Martin at Abbey Road, presumably hoping to capture some of that Beatles magic. Bobby also recorded a country single (Gone) but it flopped. The B-side of that single (A girl I used to know) is a cover of a George Jones country hit that country music fans also know by a slightly different title, Just someone I used to know, under which title it was a hit country duet for Porter Wagoner and Dolly Parton. Given that Gene Pitney had some success with country music in the sixties, maybe Bobby might have succeeded had he persevered.



If you are only looking for Bobby's big hits, forget this set and buy a single CD instead, because it'll be cheaper, take up less space and you won't have to skip all the other tracks. If, however, you are interested in B-sides and singles that missed the charts or weren't released at all, this is the treasure trove you've been looking for."