Search - Cat Stevens :: Cat Stevens/Gold

+ 1/2 stars...A Comprehensive Overview of a Magical Artist

Steve Vrana | Aurora, NE | 11/22/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Cat Stevens' GOLD fills the gap nicely for those fans who felt that 2000's THE VERY BEST OF was too brief, but didn't want to spring for 2001's exhaustive 79-track box set ON THE ROAD TO FIND OUT. However, before you rush out and purchase GOLD, here are some things to consider.



BOOS:



Four of Cat Stevens' early UK hits are not here, including his 1966 debut "I Love My Dog" (#28). Also missing is his final Top 50 U.S. hit "Banapple Gas" (#41, 1976). [All five of these tracks are on the box set.] In fact, Stevens' first three albums are represented by only five tracks.



Also missing are Stevens' final Top 40 hits, "Ready" and "Two Fine People." [Inexplicably, they are also missing from THE VERY BEST OF as well as the box set.]



Bottom line, this two-disc set could have been more complete, considering disc 1 runs 54:32 and disc 2 runs 71:05. There was easily room for another 30 minutes of music.



BRAVOS:



Nearly half of the tracks (15 altogether) are taken from his three best albums: TEA FOR THE TILLERMAN, TEASER AND THE FIRECAT and CATCH BULL AT FOUR. [On a personal note, I regret the omission of "The Boy With the Moon And Star on His Head."]



In addition, GOLD includes two wonderful tracks from the HAROLD AND MAUDE SOUNDTRACK: "Don't Be Shy" and "If You Want To Sing Out Sing Out."



While THE VERY BEST OF included only an edit of "Foreigner Suite," GOLD includes the entire 18-minute original.



Finally, the inclusion of "Indian Ocean" alone makes this a required purchase. This song was recorded earlier this year with royalties going to Yusuf Islam's charity "Small Kindness" to benefit victims of last December's devastating tsunami. Without being preachy, the song juxtaposes Western opulence with Third World poverty. [Favorite lyric: "But just look at those eyes/She must be Paradise."] More than twenty-five years after his last commercial album, the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens shows he is still an artist to be reckoned with. VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED"

Superb, right-sized two-disc retrospective

hyperbolium | Earth, USA | 11/20/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Though many radio stations dropped Stevens in response to his (out-of-context, according to the artist) comments on Salman Rushdie, there's no denying that beyond this shadow his recordings retain all of their well-crafted, 1970s singer-songwriter effervescence. With his original albums remastered and reissued, and several other greatest hits collections on the market, one might wonder if there's a need for this 2-disc set. The answer is a definite yes, as it serves the audience interested in hearing more tracks, but insufficiently rabid to snap up original LP reissues or the 2001 rarities-filled box set "The Cat Stevens Box Set." These two discs go beyond the canonical oldies-radio playlists to draw a fuller picture of Stevens' career with excellent lower-charting hits and album tracks.



Stevens' found success on both the singles and album charts throughout the latter part of the '60s and into the late-70s, and A&M samples from throughout this fertile period. The classic material opens with Stevens' first major UK hit, "Matthew and Son," and closes with the emotional "Last Love Song" from 1978's "Back to Earth." The entire set ends with Stevens' most recent release, the spellbinding "Indian Ocean," recorded in support of tsunami relief in early 2005. In between the collection pulls together the familiar U.S. hits and augments them with tracks that made a bigger splash in the UK (e.g., "Matthew & Son" "Can't Keep it in" "Lady D'Arbanville"). Many of the UK hits became favorite FM album tracks in the US, and several original songs were brought to prominence in cover versions (including "Here Comes My Baby" by The Tremeloes, "Wild World" by Jimmy Cliff, and "The First Cut is the Deepest" by P.P. Arnold, later by Rod Stewart, and yet again by Sheryl Crow). Also included is Stevens' 1974 cover of Sam Cooke's "Another Saturday Night."



A few chart items are missing, including early UK hits "I Love My Dog," "I'm Gonna Get Me a Gun," and "A Bad Night," as well as minor US top-40s, "Ready" and "Two Fine People" (the latter originally tacked onto Stevens' 1975 greatest hits release), but these are made up for by a generous helping of fine album cuts, including 1970's "Trouble" and "Sad Lisa" (both from the classic "Tea for the Tillerman" LP and covered in later years by Marianne Faithful, Bruce Robison, and Kristen Hersh, among others), "Don't Be Shy" (from the soundtrack to "Harold & Maude"), 1972's "Bitterblue," the ambitious 18-minute side-long "Foreigner Suite" from 1973's "Foreigner," and many more. Despite their lack of release as singles, many of these non-charting tracks will be familiar from then-dominant album-oriented radio formats.



This is an excellent set, representing all of Stevens' original albums with hits and finely selected album tracks. All 31 vintage pieces were remastered from the original stereo analog tapes and sound fresh and crisp. Unless you're in for the original albums (which you may well be after this sampling), this is the place to start appreciating Stevens' classic works. [©2005 hyperbolium dot com]"

(Most Of) The Best Of Cat

Alan Caylow | USA | 07/17/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The main thing that strikes me about Cat Stevens (or Yusuf Islam as he calls himself now) is that, during his Cat Stevens phase from 1966 to 1978, he made really, really *nice* music. The melodies, the words, and of course, the man's distinctive voice and guitar-picking....just really good, spiritual, uplifting songs. He is an incredibly talented troubadour, and this 2-CD set,"Gold," collects a healthy dose of classic Cat Stevens music. Although, as other reviewers have pointed out, "Gold" is a bit incomplete, most of the big hit songs are here, such as "Matthew And Son," "Morning Has Broken," "Wild World," "Moonshadow," etc., but "Gold" also features tracks from Stevens' later albums that aren't as well known. These songs are just as wonderful as the hits, including "Angelsea," "Last Love Song," and the very impressive, 18-minute "Foreigner Suite." And, for the grand finale, "Gold" features the brand-new song, "Indian Ocean," which Stevens/Islam recorded for charity. It is a *beautiful* song, and worth the price of admission alone. There are several Cat Stevens compilations already on the market, but "Gold" is an excellent one, and a great introduction to the magical music of Cat Stevens."