Linda Ronstadt Album: “Best of Linda Ronstadt”

Linda Ronstadt has one of the most expressive voices in all of popular music. While she didn't write any of her own hits, she and principal producer Peter Asher knew how to pick songs. Beginning with her first hit ("Different Drum") by Monkee Mike Nesmith to her final big hit in 1990, Karla Bonoff's "All My Life," Ronstadt put her own unique stamp on these songs. Whether it was outcharting Roy Orbison with her cover of "Blue Bayou," Chuck Berry on "Back in the USA" or Smokey Robinson & the Miracles on "Ooh Baby Baby," Ronstadt dominated the charts in the late-Seventies.

The only problem I have is that this collection is somewhat incomplete. It's missing minor hits like "Get Closer" and her cover of the Rolling Stones' "Tumbling Dice." Even more disappointing is the exclusion of the Top 10 hit "How Do I Make You" from 1980. [And with a running time of 68:25, these could have been easily included.] But this does a nice job of including the big hits, a few key album tracks, and the 16-page booklet includes some great photos and track-by-track info. Overall, this is a very satisfying collection and will no doubt please casual fans with an overview of Ronstadt's career from 1967 to 1993. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Linda Ronstadt has probably lived more musical styles than any one singer. This Rhino remastered product is a huge improvement over the greatest hits vol. #1 which I have. OK, the song selection isn't perfect, but I'll take it. My original greatest hits CD sounds muddy and too bassy, this Rhino product sparkles with sonic delight. The record sounded better than the original greatest hits which contains a caveat;(the source of this recording is inferior to the digital medium,all attempts were made to make the sound quality as good as possible). That shows it must have been a very early CD and not much was known about mastering, because Rhino makes the original tapes shine.

I find that in the early to mid Seventies, Linda was probably one of the best country singers who didn't call herself one. Her Band of Sneaky Pete Kleinow and Andrew Gold were a a great country rock unit. Her songs like "I Fall To Pieces", "Silver Threads and Golden Needles", "Willin'" and even the way a lot of songs presented here are much better and more country sounding than the Shania Twains and Faith Hills of today. Get it and enjoy the great quality update.

I remember first hearing Linda Ronstadt's amazing voice come crashing out of the radio sometime in the late sixties as the lead vocalist for the folk-rock group, the Stone Ponies. Her distinctive melodic scream of a vocal style is so distinctive it is hard not to compare with Roy Orbison, whose hit song of "Blue Bayou" is covered here in Linda's own hit cover version is included in this terrific collection of her hit songs over a ten to fifteen year period, before she went for the big band and "lush" sounds of her more recent work. It is hard to not appreciate a voice so singular and versatile, even if it is most usually delivered with a fevered wail. I once saw her in a small venue in Lenox, Massachusetts in a small amphitheater setting, with the audience sprawled over an expansive lawn that gradually rose above the covered stage area. She was so good with just her guitar and small group that it is difficult to describe her in words short of superlatives such as phenomenal.

All of her seminal work is included here for you casual enjoyment, from "Poor, Poor Pitiful Me" to "When Will I Be Loved", from "You're No Good" to "It's So Easy", and all the others, including "Blue Bayou", Long, Long Time", "That'll Be The Day", "Love Is A Rose", "Different Drum", "Heat Wave", and many others. This album gives us all of Linda's formidable hits, all here in a definitive and fairly comprehensive play list that anyone would want to have to ensure an accurate representation of her volumes of work, from dozens of hit albums recorded and released over more twenty years of popular work. This is an essential album for your collection, and one I have both in the house and in the car. For easy listening as I zoom down the highway. Other than the Beach Boys, on the one hand, or Jackson Browne on the other, nobody articulates the southern California folk rock style as well or as consistently as Linda Ronstadt, the little woman with the big, big voice. Enjoy!

Those of us who grew up in the 70's and 80's can remember how popular Linda Ronstadt was back then. Most of her big hits from that period are all here.

Linda had a good singing voice, and often covered other people songs, in her own style. Who can foget her versions of "Heat Wave" (Martha and the Vandellas), "When Will I be Loved" (The Everlys),"Ooh Baby Baby" and "Tracks of my Tears" (both Smokey Robinson),"Just One Look"(Doris Troy),or "It's so Easy" and "That'll be the Day"(both Buddy Holly)?

This albums includes all those, and will bring plenty of memories back to quite a few people. Linda also supported such songwriters as Warren Zevon("Poor Pitiful Me"),giving them much needed exposure. The album also includes two duets with Aaron Neville, "All My Life" and the lovely "Don't Know Much", which deservedly won a Grammy.

None of her acclaimed work with jazz music (On three albums with Nelson Riddle),nor with Dolly Parton and Emmylou Harris is included. Nor from her Spanish language albums, either. This album would probably had to have been a double cd to include those. Otherwise, this is a good single "best of".

Linda Ronstadt gives her fans her very best with this collection. This collection even includes her 1967 hit DIFFERENT DRUM with the Stone Poneys. Ronstadt's fans will always remember YOU'RE NO GOOD from the Grammy-winning HEART LIKE A WHEEL. I'm sure those who heard Van Halen's cover of the song love that one also. A fan of the Everly Brothers as well,she kicks ass on WHEN WILL I BE LOVED? and IT'S SO EASY. She beautifully covers OOH BABY BABY,which was first a hit for The Miracles and HEATWAVE,made famous by Martha & The Vandellas. Other great hits include HURT SO BAD,which is a cover,SOMEWHERE OUT THERE with James Ingram which is from the Disney film THE SECRET OF NIMH(nim),and with Aaron Neville,DON'T KNOW MUCH and ALL MY LIFE. In 1983,Ronstadt musically converted from pop/rock to easy listening. DKM and AML are two easy listening tracks that found a place on the pop charts in late 1989. Ronstadt went country briefly,recording 1987's TRIO with Dolly Parton and Emmylou Harris. The other songs are good.