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Just when I thought a nostalgic Christmas was over I came across this super 2 CD set from NotNow. The set boasts 50 songs and a whole host of well known stars too. It is good to have a mix of both American and British stars represented and there are even duets.
This is a welcome addition to the Christmas titles offering something just a little different and with Eartha Kitt, David Whitfield, Dickie Valentine, Bing, Dick, Frank, Perry, Nat, Ella, Peggy and Judy to serenade you whilst you cook that traditional roast turkey what more could you ask for?
Favourite songs for me are "Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas"; "Silver Bells"; "Santa Claus got Stuck in My Chimney" and the traditional carols.
Good sound throughout and attractive packaging make this a great gift too.

An improvement over "I Can't Stop" and "Everything's OK". Excellent collaborations. Still not quite as good as his work in the 1970s (is Al Green the top male soul singer ever ?). Recommended to old and new fans.

Really good album but like someone else said in the review, the old favourites have been ruined by bad recording..
It sounds almost live...

:(

Seven Lives Many Facesyet again another great album from Enigma,awsome cd a few riffs from the past and some great new stuff as well ,head phones a must,fav tracks 4and 9 but all great .

If the Grim Reaper traded in his scythe and recorded an album of melancholic country guitar music this, one imagines, is what it would sound like. Johnny Cash's rich Fire N' Brimstone tones haven't diminished one bit despite his advancing years, but listen carefully and we now find it tinged with something soft and imperceptibly fragile. Something almost like regret (or relief) of a life lived through.

Cash is one of those rare artists that can take a song, any song, and turn it utterly on its head, allowing the dark stuff of life to ooze out and re-contextualize it in ways you'd never even considered. Just listen to his version of We'll Meet Again. It belongs right at the end of Dr Strangelove when all the nukes are going off and the whole world has gone to heck. There's something quite morbidly beautiful about both the utter resignation and sheer joy in his voice that we know deep down in our marrow that he is indeed going to a much better place and the loss truly is all ours.

Ry Cooder is one of the most wonderful guitarists on the planet.Anyone looking to play guitar should listen to him,because when it comes to tone,to texture and beautiful playing he's among the very best there is.The rave over Stevie Ray's,Hendrix,et all as great as they are no question of that RC is a master of his art.This anthology has a wonderful range of varying styles from a whole range of his albums right upto his 2008 release I Flathead,and it's all fabulous stuff,no fillers here at all.listen to the texture in his film scores like Paris Texas,or his take on Johnny Cash's Get Rhythm to the wonderful unreleased track Let's Get Together.You get 34 tracks for your money,all put together by his son Joachim,plus notes by the man himself.This is surely among the best releases of the year,certainly the best anthology.You've no Ry Cooder ? then this is one truly great place to begin.TOTALLY FABULOUS SET.

I LOVE this album, so if you only read a few lines of this review I say go ahead and buy this FABULOUS album! However, for those interested here's my quick track-by-track guide:

Blue Christmas was always one of my faves and it sounds great here with a nice extra reprieve of the last 8 bars. Their vocals aren't exactly synchronised at all times but it doesn't detract from things.

I'll Be Home is again nicely done and at 3:36 a lot longer than the original with a really nice instrumental added.

I think Elvis's voice is slightly swamped on Here Comes Santa Claus but not bad.

Santa Claus Is Back In Town is a great song and Wynonna does seem to add something which seems to make it sound even more exciting!

Silent Night for me is a little messy as Sara does do some odd alternate tune stuff but it still sounds good.

White Christmas to me sounds fab with some really nice harmonies & a rather amusing sort of ad-libbed "Come on now big boy" towards the end!

I love Merry Christmas Baby and again Gretchen's ad-libs are great. What's even better is that it now lasts 8:06! It now has an even better-sounding backing to me.

Oh Little Town Of Bethlehem is a very pretty version with a much more contemporary backing track with a punchy bass (not just the organ as before). Karen and Kimberley add some lovely harmonies between them and it now has much more light and shade which I have to say I prefer to Elvis's original!

Silver Bells now sounds good to me! I always found Elvis's vocal on the original annoying; laboured, slightly slurry and he sounded completely uninterested in the song. They have done some very good work on this and seem to have very subtly changed the vocal track and allowed Anne to sing parts where his voice was particularly weak or shaky; the result is he now sounds pleased to be singing it and it sounds brilliant!

Next is the Olivia NJ duet version of O Come All Ye Faithful. They've added a few extra beats here and there and it now flows much better. I appreciate the crescendo at the end which I love as it now sounds more like an Elvis song ending!

The First Noel now has a tasteful string quartet and piano which sounds much better than what was previously just an organ plodding on in a rather pedestrian fashion! Again it is amazing what they have managed to do with Elvis's vocal on this track as they turned what I felt was a lack-lustre warbly effort into a great performance!!

If I Get Home On Christmas Day on the face of it sounds very similar until you play them both at the same time and flip between the two versions. Again I don't know exactly what they've done but the vocal is now greatly improved! I challenge anyone to listen to the original and then play this "remastered" version and not be blown away! Listen closely in particular where his vocal comes in at the 12 second point until about the 35 second point and then play the "remastered" version straight away; it really is amazing what can now be done with a dodgy vocal and it makes the original sound like it's been slowed down! The whole song is now a lot fuller and richer - Great job!

Winter Wonderland now sounds incredible with the organ and backing vocals subtly added but some of the original's clarity has been lost; however, when you play it after the "remastered" version is does sound very bare!

I have been an Elvis fan for more than thirty years, and yes I have all the remastered Sony/BMG albums/boxsets & the FTDs, but I am extremely pleased with what they have done here; we finally have some new fresh sounding Elvis material and I think it bodes very well for the future!

Buy with confidence!

This disc is simply beautiful. Two are its main characteristics:continuity and change. Continuity relates to individual tracks which display a pronounced element of recursion that is repetition with slight variation of the same theme which promotes a feeling of soothing, calm and relaxation. Recursion is something employed successfully in distinctly different areas:in music famously employed by J.S.Bach to excellent effect in his baroque compositions, in graphics by Escher and in Mathematics by Goedel while it forms the basis of fractal Geometry. The change is provided by the eight tracks each exploring a different theme or to use the more sophisticated word of the liner note a different 'soundscape'. This combination of continuity and change along with the beauty of the melody in each track are what provide this disc its unique fascination. The quality and clarity of the sound are excellent while the price of the disc inexpensive. The rare and attractive combination of these characteristics is seemingly too good to be true but it is true. I could not recommend this disc more wholeheartedly.