So, this compilation album is, like fascism, exactly what it says on the tin. It’s 20 songs by artists including Little Richard, Gene Vincent, The Platters, The Coasters, The Del-Vikings, Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, etc. There are a couple of things that mark this album out as being different from a lot of these kind of cheapo compilations. Number one is the sound quality, which is amazing, on most of the tracks anyway. Number two is that note on the cover that these are “new stereo recordings by the original artists.” I don’t know if that means that they went back to the masters and turned the mono recordings into stereo recordings or if that means these are later recordings done by these artists and not the original releases of these songs. I mean, some of them sound like the original to me; on the other hand, there are some that are just obviously not because they’re live recordings and not the original studio recordings. So, I’m a bit puzzled by that. But setting that to side this is just a tremendously great compilation of great songs rendered, as I say, in really pristine musical quality. With, actually, just a couple of exceptions; the Jerry Lee Lewis tracks are live recordings and they’re of very poor sound quality. But honestly those are maybe my favorite tracks on this CD because they are just absolutely insane. He’s playing so fast and so violently that it kind of blows my mind and at one point in Whole Lotta Shakin’ Going On he just kind of starts scatting in this weird slurred thing . . . they’re amazing recordings really. So, yeah, I’m behind this CD all the way actually; this isn’t one of those cheapo bargain bin compilations. This one is really fun and crackling with energy. 4 stars.
tl;dr – compilation boasts a great slate of songs, surprisingly excellent sound quality and some great high-energy live recordings; not from the bargain bin. 4 stars.