John Denver Album: “The Country Roads Collection [Box]”

You have to enjoy John's music a lot to want this box, but you don't have to be a fanatic. This set provides a comprehensive overview of his career from his years at RCA (which are really the only ones that matter to most people).

The first CD is interesting. It is made up entirely of tracks from Rhymes and reasons, Take me to tomorrow, Poems prayers and promises and Aerie. These were his first, second, fourth and fifth albums. The third album (Who's garden was this?) is mentioned in the accompanying booklet, but is not represented here at all. The collection starts with Leaving on a jet plane, which John wrote before he was famous. It became a huge international hit for Peter Paul and Mary. The most famous track is Take me home country roads, but there are many other great songs here. I would like to have seen his cover of Buddy Holly's Everyday and something from that third album included, but I have no complaints about what has been included.

The second CD is compiled from the next four original albums - Rocky mountain high, Farewell Andromeda, Back home again and Windsong. This was the period when John's popularity was at its peak. Many of his famous songs are on this CD, including Annie's song, Back home again, Sweet surrender, I'm sorry and Rocky mountain high. Thank God I'm a country boy, originally a track on Back home again, was later recorded live and that recording became another huge hit. It is that version which is included here, not the original studio recording.

The third CD begins with one last track from Windsong - Calypso, a tribute to Jacques Cousteau. During the period covered by this CD, John recorded two Christmas albums including one with the Muppets. Neither of these are represented here. So, the remainder of this CD contains tracks from Spirit, I want to live, John Denver (no other title) and Autograph. Although less successful than his earlier music, this was mainly due to changing public taste. The songs are brilliant.

There are some great moments on the final CD, although lacking consistency. It was a decade of experimentation and change, but it yielded two superb duets - Perhaps love (with Placido Domingo) and Wild Montana skies (with Emmylou Harris). The albums represented on this CD are Some days are diamonds, Seasons of the heart, It's about time, Dreamland express and One world.

This comprehensive collection contains many tracks not otherwise available on CD and is fitting tribute to a unique singer.

As soon as I started playing the first disc I thought to myself "something sounds different from what I remembered". I took out my old cassette tapes of his Greatest Hits album and compared each song. Sure enough, the instrumentals from the greatest hits album were much fuller sounding. Looking back through these reviews I see I'm not the only one to notice this. Very disappointed! Buy his "John Denver's Greatest Hits" rather than this collection.

I was hesitant at first about purchasing such a large volume of Denver's works, several of which I had never heard, but after I started playing the CDs, I became hooked! My CD player holds only three CDs at a time, so my biggest problem was which CD of the four would be left out!

Some of the songs that I'd never heard before became my favorites. I was delighted to learn that John had a very spiritual side that showed up often in his musical compositions. I especially love 'Singing Skies and Dancing Waters', 'How Can I Leave You Again, and 'It Amazes Me'. Songs like 'Come and Let Me Look In Your Eyes', 'Sweet Surrender', 'Looking for Space' and 'Wild Montana Skies' soon found their way to my 'must be played every day' list.

John's songwriting covered most of the happiness and complexities of the human condition as evidenced in 'For Baby','Follow Me','Seasons of the Heart','Shaghai Breezes', and 'I Can't Escape', just a few of his sensitive and lovely, although lesser known works that are included in this stellar collection. Two of the most beautiful songs he ever wrote, 'My Sweet Lady' and 'Perhaps Love', are also featured.

For the platinum hit fans, all the standards are included as well: 'Take Me Home Country Roads', 'Leaving on a Jet Plane', and 'Rocky Mountain High' among many, many others.

So many of us were impressed by the multitude of Denver megahits that we heard played daily on the radio but we never were introduced to the even more remarkable songs that he wrote and recorded during his career, many of which are included in this 4-CD set. I think that's what makes this collection so very special and a bargain at any price! I play it all the time and never get tired of it!

This 4 CD set does an excellent job of John Denver's career. All of the hits are here. But, it goes much deeper than that. It shows just how good a songwriter he was. While he didn't put out much right before he died, this is the way he should be remembered. These timeless classics should be heard by any person who says they are a serious music fan.

This is a very nice collection of John Denver's most popular songs, hits or otherwise. I could quibble about some personal favorites that aren't here, but all in all this is a very complete set. And the liner notes are very well written and informative, which is always a nice added value.

I already owned most of the individual studio albums this set culls from, but I bought the box set because of the re-mastered audio, and for the most part I am satisfied with the sound quality. The sound on this collection is much better than that of the older original albums, say, up through "Back home Again". But after that, from "Windsong" forward, the sound quality on the original albums was much improved and this set's re-mastering does not provide too much of an improvement in those cases. At least not one that's obvious without doing a direct A/B comparison, which I did not do.

So, to sum up, I would recommend this CD set to all big fans of John Denver, even those who may have most of the music on other CD's. The improved sonics are worth the purchase price. And if you are a more casual fan, I would recommend it to you as perhaps the only John Denver collection you'll ever really need. But if you just want the hit's, there are many other smaller best-of's available that would be a better choice.