21 #1 Hits: The Ultimate Collection

1	Act Naturally 2:22
2	Love's Gonna Live Here 2:02
3	Streets of Backersfield / T Double 2:49
4	I've Got a Tiger by the Tail 2:15
5	My Heart Skips a Beat 2:27
6	Together Again 2:27
7	I Don't Care (Just as Long as You Love Me) 2:10
8	Before You Go 2:11
9	Only You (Can Break My Heart) 2:21
10	Buckaroo 2:00
11	Waitin' in Your Welfare Line 2:19
12	Think of Me 2:17
13	Open Up Your Heart 2:29
14	Where Does the Good Times Go 2:20
15	Sam's Place 2:00
16	Your Tender Loving Care 2:46
17	How Long Will My Baby Be Gone 2:14
18	Who's Gonna Mow Your Grass 2:23
19	Tall Dark Stranger 3:00
20	Made in Japan 2:42
21	Johnny B. Goode Live 2:23

Barnes & Noble

Gone too soon at age 76 in March 2006, Buck Owens could hardly have had a better tribute to his artistry than this collection of his 21 influential chart-toppers. An architect of the enduring Bakersfield Sound -- and along with Merle Haggard, its most commercially successful proponent -- Owens fashioned his heady hybrid from honky-tonk, rockabilly, and a dollop of western swing; added in his own gifts as a nimble lyricist; assembled an absolutely killer band in the Buckaroos; and set a furious pace between 1963 and 1967. Seventeen consecutive No. 1 singles make up the lion's share of this essential set. Indicative of his broad-based appeal, Buck saw the Beatles cut a hit 1965 cover of his first No. 1, "Act Naturally"; Ray Charles create a signature hit with "Cryin' Time"; and, in 1988, Dwight Yoakam top the charts with "Streets of Bakersfield," a duet with Owns himself. A single disc can tell only a bit of the story, but what a story it tells -- these are the songs most of America knew Buck by and loved him for, songs that reached across generations and genres to make a lasting impact. Many of Buck's hits were relentlessly sunny -- even the laments in "How Long Will My Baby Be Gone" are articulated at a brisk pace -- but when he got in the mood he could put an aching ballad across with the best: Witness the classic status of 1964's "Together Again" and the beautiful, moaning 1965 heartbreaker, "Only You Can Break My Heart." They're all here, remastered, well annotated, and better than ever. David McGee

All Music Guide

It's not accurate to say that Buck Owens' catalog has been mistreated on CD -- he was one of the first major country artists to be given an excellent, comprehensive multi-disc box set, and he's one of the few country artists to see most of his actual full-length LPs reissued on CD. Despite all this activity, there has been one glaring omission from his discography: a single-disc overview of his career containing all his big hits. Released a few months after his death, Rhino's 2006 release 21 #1 Hits: The Ultimate Collection comes close to filling that bill. Like most collections that narrow their focus to just Billboard chart-toppers, 21 #1 Hits contains the lion's share of the artist's best-known songs -- in this case, "Act Naturally," "Love's Gonna Live Here," "I've Got a Tiger by the Tail," "Together Again," "Buckaroo," and his duet with Dwight Yoakam on "Streets of Bakersfield" are all here -- yet misses some important and popular sides that came up shy of the pole position. Here, such early singles as "Second Fiddle," "Under Your Spell Again," "Above and Beyond," and "Mental Cruelty" are missing in action, and all deserve a spot on a definitive introduction to Buck, particularly since there's room for them on this 50-minute disc. Also, this comp suffers from odd sequencing: most of his best-known songs all arrive within the first six songs, including the 1988 re-recording of "Streets of Bakersfield," which sounds out of place sandwiched between the '60s classics "Love's Gonna Live Here" and "I've Got a Tiger by the Tail." After that introductory burst, it settles into a rough chronological order, which only highlights the fact that the 1988 "Streets" would have been a better closer than Buck's admittedly fine 1969 live version of "Johnny B. Goode." But this is nitpicking: there is no other single-disc Buck CD that comes as close to offering as much of his best in one disc as 21 #1 Hits: The Ultimate Collection, and it's nice to finally have such a collection in his catalog after such a long wait. Stephen Thomas Erlewine