The Anthology: 1947-1972

Disc 1
1	Gypsy Woman 2:35
2	I Can't Be Satisfied 2:43
3	I Feel Like Going Home 3:12
4	Train Fare Home Blues 2:48
5	Mean Red Spider 2:19
6	Standin' Here Tremblin 2:27
7	You Gonna Need My Help 3:03
8	Little Geneva 2:48
9	Rollin' and Tumblin', Pt. 1 2:59
10	Rollin' Stone 3:08
11	Walkin' Blues 2:58
12	Louisiana Blues 2:54
13	Long Distance Call 2:41
14	Honey Bee 3:22
15	Country Boy 3:13
16	She Moves Me 2:58
17	Still a Fool 3:19
18	Stuff You Gotta Watch 2:51
19	Who's Gonna Be Your Sweet Man When I'm Gone 3:04
20	Standin' Around Cryin' 3:23
21	Baby Please Don't Go 3:18
22	(I'm Your) Hoochie Coochie Man 2:48
23	I Just Want to Make Love to You 2:52
24	I'm Ready 3:05
25	Young Fashioned Ways 3:02
26	I Want to Be Loved 2:42
Disc 2
1	My Eyes (Keep Me in Trouble) 3:12
2	Mannish Boy 2:58
3	Sugar Sweet 2:31
4	Trouble No More 2:42
5	Forty Days and Forty Nights 2:53
6	Just to Be With You 3:15
7	Don't Go No Farther 2:56
8	Diamonds at Your Feet 2:26
9	I Love the Life I Live, I Live the Life I Love 2:52
10	Got My Mojo Working 2:53
11	Rock Me 3:13
12	Look What You've Done 2:24
13	She's Nineteen Years Old 3:19
14	Close to You 3:07
15	Walking Thru the Park 2:47
16	Take the Bitter With the Sweet 3:08
17	I Feel So Good Live 2:58
18	You Shook Me 2:44
19	My Home Is in the Delta 4:00
20	Good Morning Little Schoolgirl 3:15
21	The Same Thing 2:44
22	You Can't Lose What You Ain't Never Had 2:57
23	All Aboard 2:53
24	Can't Get No Grindin' 2:45

Barnes & Noble

Fifty cuts by the late great Muddy Waters is a fine choice anytime, because the Chicago singer/songwriter/guitarist remains the pivotal figure in American electric blues. Waters took the sounds of the Delta to the city and never looked back, but he also never forgot where he came from. Anthology 1947-72 traces much of that transition via Muddy’s recordings for Chess Records. There are the classics -- “Good Morning Little School Girl,” “Got My Mojo Working,” “Hoochie Coochie Man,” and “Mannish Boy” -- but lesser-known tunes give the listener deeper insight into this bluesman's power. The plaintive feelings Waters had for his Mississippi homeland come through on “I Feel Like Going Home,” “My Home Is in the Delta,” and “Train Fair Home Blues.” “Stuff You Gotta Watch” and “I’m Ready” capture the sounds of juke joints and South Side Chicago blues clubs of the ‘50s. “Long Distance Call” and “I Just Want to Make Love to You” give insight into Waters as a supreme entertainer. He could laugh and cry in the same tune, his voice and guitar working together as smoothly as the assembly line workers who left their jobs on Fridays and headed to catch Muddy Waters live. Anthology 1947-72 doesn’t replace The Chess Box set of three CDs; it simply streamlines it into two discs, but more important, it’s a reminder that Muddy Waters is hard again, and the virility of his music never falters. Roberta Penn

All Music Guide

There have been countless collections of Muddy Waters' classic Chess material released over the years, but Chess began to whittle down the domestic catalog toward the late '90s. The triple-disc Chess box remained in print, but they added two single-disc collections that each covered a specific period in Waters' career at Chess. Then, in 2001, MCA/Chess released The Anthology, a double-disc set that essentially contained much of those two single-disc collections, with several extra tracks, remastering and new liner notes. This still didn't correct the lack of a concise, single-disc overview with all the hits -- something that Muddy, Chuck Berry, and Howlin' Wolf all desperately need -- but if you're going to be buying two discs to get the full Muddy Waters story, you should get this instead of two separate discs, since it's simply easier. Besides this, even if it does contain a bunch of familiar material, it also contains some of the greatest music of the 20th century, and if you're not going to get the box but still want a comprehensive Muddy set, this is it. Stephen Thomas Erlewine