THIS is is the Jackson Browne complilation to get! Forget about "The Next Voice You Hear- The Best Of Jackson Browne", this one is 100% better and is the most complete complilation of JB you can get, to date! All of his great songs are here and some special gems, as well! The sound is wonderful and it's just perfect, really. My only complaint would be that the packaging is TOO flimsy, they really should have just used a standard jewel case, just be careful when you open it, the discs could easliy fall out. I highly recommend this to any Jackson Browne fan, or fan of 70's-80's rock!

What do you say about an album that does fatrithfully reprise an artist's career with as much verve and excitement as is in this compilation of hits that stretches out over nearly thirty years of public acclaim? My best word is "Wow"! There are many fine songs here, beginning with the early success of "Doctor My Eyes", whose success baffled and surprised Browne, and set his career on a slow burning and long to extinguish flame still blazing with millions of fans world-wide. Perennial favorites like "Late For The Sky", "Fountain Of Sorrow", and "The Pretender" are included, as are the previously unavailable "Somebody's Baby", along with "Running On Empty", "Tender Is The Night", and "Lives In The Balance". More importantly, a number of very strong Jackson compositions that were ommited from his previous collections are included, such as the Eagles mega-hit "Take It Easy" that Jackson co-wrote with Glenn Frey, along with other notable absentees like " Boulevard", and "The Load Out", and "Stay". I'm sure you can think of several others that escape my notice at the moment.

Of course, allowing for notable omissions suggests to me that perhaps the marketeers at Elektra have their eyes out for a second greatest hits album that might give us "That Girl Could Sing", "For Everyman", and my own personal favorite, "Our Lady Of The Well". Otherwise, this should have been a double CD. One can always hope. There are a number of newer songs here, such as the gorgeously written, arranged and sung "In The Shape Of A Heart", "The Barricades OF Heaven", and the absolutely soaring "Sky Blue And Black", which in my opinion is his single best song since "Late For The Sky", proving our amazing Mr. Browne still has the genius he has been sharing so well with us since he first stepped onto the stage and into the comfortable lap of public acclaim in the very early 1979s, a fresh and deeply personally autobiographical artist bridging the folk/popular divide with astonishing ease and virtuosity. This album provides a nice overview of his work, but given his considerable output over the last three decades, I recommend you also listen to his individual original releases. Enjoy!

Jackson Browne is a singer/songwriter who is idolized by other singer/songwriters. His lyrics are picturesque, his voice is mellow and honest, his musicianship (piano and guitar) is more than admirable. His music helped define country/rock (he wrote many of the Eagles' hits), then helped define a generation stuck in termoil, and then became the legacy of a truly gifted artist.

Songs such as "Jamaica Say You Will," "Late For the Sky," "Running On Empty," and so many in this collection act as portraits. Others, such as "For A Dancer," will bring tears to your eyes. And while some songs suggest regret for the past, such as "These Days" (and it's last two unforgettable lines: "Don't confront me with my sorrows/I had not forgotten them"), still others, like the rollickin' "I'm Alive," speak of rebirth and hope. Browne even managed to make some decent protest songs, such as his own "Looking East" and "Lawyers And Love," and remaking the Steve Van Zant tune "I Am A Patriot".

All the songs are sung in Browne's down-home, honest, uncompromizing voice, with skilled musicianship backing it thru and thru. This compilation is the study of an artist who, though he may not have the world-wide recognition he deserves, still helped to establish rock 'n roll as thrue artistry, and not just a pretty-boy convention. Without Jackson Browne, it's safe to say that rock 'n roll might never have made the progress it did.