Songbook [Box Set]

Disc 1
1	(Remember Me) I'm the One 2:20
2	It's Too Late, He Wins 2:30
3	For Lovin' Me 2:25
4	Early Morning Rain 3:04
5	The Way I Feel 3:42
6	Steel Rail Blues 2:48
7	A Message to the Wind previously unreleased 3:10
8	Song for a Winter's Night 2:58
9	Canadian Railroad Trilogy 6:19
10	Go-Go Round 2:35
11	Crossroads 2:56
12	You'll Still Be Needing Me previously unreleased 2:58
13	The Mountains and Maryann 3:35
14	The Last Time I Saw Her 5:10
15	Did She Mention My Name 2:27
16	Pussywillows, Cat-Tails 2:48
17	Boss Man 2:10
18	Something Very Special 3:19
19	Bitter Green 2:42
20	Affair on 8th Avenue 3:25
21	Medley: I'm Not Sayin'/Ribbon of Darkness 2:51
22	Softly 3:14
23	Mama Said previously unreleased 2:32
24	Station Master previously unreleased 3:05
Disc 2
1	Sit Down Young Stranger 3:26
2	If You Could Read My Mind 3:48
3	Poor Little Allison 2:30
4	The Pony Man 3:27
5	Cobwebs & Dust 3:20
6	Too Much to Lose previously unreleased 2:38
7	Summer Side of Life 4:05
8	Cotton Jenny 3:26
9	10 Degrees & Getting Colder 2:43
10	Nous Vivons Ensemble 3:45
11	Same Old Loverman 3:21
12	Heaven Don't Deserve Me previously unreleased 2:58
13	Don Quixote 3:38
14	Alberta Bound 3:05
15	Beautiful 3:22
16	Ode to Big Blue 4:45
17	Stone Cold Sober previously unreleased 3:32
18	Old Dan's Records 3:03
19	That Same Old Obsession 3:42
20	Lazy Mornin' 3:40
21	Hi'way Songs 3:30
22	Can't Depend on Love 3:07
Disc 3
1	Sundown 3:41
2	Carefree Highway 3:45
3	Seven Island Suite 6:00
4	Borderstone previously unreleased 3:40
5	Cold on the Shoulder 3:00
6	Now and Then 3:09
7	Rainy Day People 2:48
8	Fine as Fine Can Be 2:58
9	All the Lovely Ladies 3:35
10	Summertime Dream 2:27
11	The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald 6:28
12	Never Too Close 3:02
13	Betty Called Me In previously unreleased 3:07
14	Endless Wire 4:01
15	The Circle Is Small 3:56
16	Sea of Tranquility 3:14
17	Make Way for the Lady 3:40
18	Dream Street Rose 2:55
19	Ghosts of Cape Horn 4:07
20	Keepin' on Yearnin' previously unreleased 3:40
21	Canary Yellow Canoe previously unreleased 2:50
Disc 4
1	Shadows 2:59
2	She's Not the Same 3:10
3	14 Karat Gold 3:54
4	Baby Step Back 3:57
5	In My Fashion 3:04
6	Never Say Trust Me previously unreleased 3:36
7	Why Should I Feel Blue previously unreleased 3:30
8	Someone to Believe In 3:21
9	Romance 3:29
10	Broken Dreams 4:01
11	Always on the Bright Side previously unreleased 3:54
12	Forgive Me Lord previously unreleased 3:45
13	Lifeline previously unreleased 4:08
14	East of Midnight 3:58
15	Morning Glory 3:24
16	A Lesson in Love 4:05
17	A Passing Ship 3:55
18	Waiting for You 3:35
19	Drink Yer Glasses Empty 3:16
20	I'll Prove My Love 3:10
21	A Painter Passing Through 3:55

Barnes & Noble

"A Painter Passing Through" is the title of the last and most recently recorded track on this retrospective of Gordon Lightfoot's career. And this lavish four-disc set makes the point again and again over 66 tracks: His is the work of a musician with a painter's eye for both detail and scope. The roughly chronological collection opens with two early '60s cuts on which Lightfoot sounds like a cross between Jim Reeves and Marty Robbins. He joined the folk revival soon after (under the influence of Ian & Sylvia and Bob Dylan), and hits including "Early Morning Rain," "Steel Rail Blues," and "For Lovin' Me" are here, blending history and human emotion, especially on the epic "Canadian Railroad Trilogy." Disc two examines Lightfoot's main themes: love gone wrong in "If You Could Read My Mind," observations of a traveler in "Ten Degrees and Getting Colder," the working life in "Cotton Jenny," the natural world in "Ode to Big Blue," and his native Canada's landscape in "Alberta Bound." At the height of his popular success, Lightfoot achieved a sinuous blend of the personal with folkier themes in songs like 1974's masterful description of sexual tension and infidelity, "Sundown"; "Carefree Highway," a song which combines the traveling life and unrequited love; and the evocative vignette of love and landscape "Seven Island Suite." His later work couldn't match their popularity, but his happier perspectives on love ("I'll Prove My Love," "Romance") and changes in life ("East of Midnight," "Morning Glory"), and that wonderful painter's view, show that Lightfoot's indispensable catalogue is still growing. Kerry Dexter

All Music Guide

Gordon Lightfoot's Songbook is a career-spanning, four-CD, 88-song box set with a pretty chronologically even balance of material from the mid-'60s through 1998. It also has 15 previously unreleased cuts, as well as his 1962 debut single, "(Remember Me) I'm the One"/"It's Too Late, He Wins" (which is lame MOR Nashville country). One could quibble with the song selection ("Black Day in July" is missing, for instance) and the relatively light attention to his 1960s work (which is limited to disc one); an opportunity was also missed to include a rarity by excluding his mid-'60s single of Bob Dylan's "Just Like Tom Thumb Blues." But generally it's a representative sampling of his most meaningful, or commercially successful, recordings. As for the previously unreleased songs, it's a tribute to Lightfoot's consistency that these don't sound out of step with the rest of the program, but also true that none of these are particularly exceptional or interesting. The following is true of so many box sets of this type that it feels like a cliché to point this out once again, but by giving equal space to various phases of his career, the music starts to go downhill steeply at around the middle of disc three, marking Lightfoot's descent (more graceful than some) into adult contemporary office music. There are extensive liner notes in the enclosed hardbound book, along with comments on each song by Lightfoot himself. Unless you're a Lightfoot obsessive, though, The United Artists Collection (with the bulk of his 1960s recordings) and Gord's Gold will cover just about everything you would want. Richie Unterberger