The Complete Hot Five and Hot Seven Recordings [Columbia/Legacy]

Disc 1
1	Gut Bucket Blues 2:28
2	My Heart 2:34
3	Yes! I'm in the Barrel 2:54
4	Come Back Sweet Papa 2:57
5	Georgia Grind 3:02
6	Heebie Jeebies 3:16
7	Cornet Chop Suey 2:32
8	Oriental Strut 2:42
9	You're Next 2:25
10	Muskrat Ramble 2:39
11	Don't Forget to Mess Around 3:03
12	I'm Gonna Gitcha 2:45
13	Droppin' Shucks 2:52
14	Who's It 2:46
15	King of the Zulus 3:05
16	Big Fat Ma and Skinny Pa 3:01
17	Lonesome Blues 3:04
18	Sweet Little Papa 2:45
19	Jazz Lips 3:02
20	Skid-Dat-De-Dat 3:05
21	Big Butter and Egg Man 3:00
22	Sunset Cafe Stomp 2:45
23	You Made Me Love You 2:54
24	Irish Black Bottom 2:40
25	[Pause Track] 0:04
Disc 2
1	Put 'Em Down Blues 3:15
2	Ory's Creole Trombone 3:05
3	The Last Time 3:29
4	Struttin' With Some Barbecue 3:06
5	Got No Blues 3:25
6	Once in a While 3:17
7	I'm Not Rough 3:04
8	Hotter Than That 3:04
9	Savoy Blues 3:28
10	He Likes It Slow 2:44
11	Gambler's Dream 2:27
12	Sunshine Baby 2:45
13	Adam and Eve Had the Blues 3:16
14	Put It Where I Can Get It 2:57
15	Washwoman Blues 2:58
16	I've Stopped My Man 2:53
17	Georgia Bo Bo 3:04
18	Drop That Sack Common Take / Take 2:49
19	Drop That Sack Rare Take 2:47
20	Cornet Chop Suey 3:17
21	[Pause Track] 0:04
Disc 3
1	Willie the Weeper 3:08
2	Wild Man Blues 3:11
3	Alligator Crawl 3:03
4	Potato Head Blues 2:58
5	Melancholy 3:03
6	Weary Blues 3:00
7	Twelfth Street Rag 3:04
8	Keyhole Blues 3:28
9	S.O.L. Blues 2:53
10	Gully Low Blues 3:16
11	That's When I'll Come Back to You 2:57
12	Chicago Breakdown 3:20
13	Weary Blues 2:50
14	New Orleans Stomp 2:46
15	Wild Man Blues common take 3:03
16	Wild Man Blues rare take 3:08
17	Melancholy common take 3:08
18	Melancholy rare take 3:23
19	You're a Real Sweetheart 3:11
20	Too Busy! 2:57
21	Was It a Dream? 3:02
22	Last Night I Dreamed You Kissed Me 3:10
23	[Pause Track] 0:04
Disc 4
1	Fireworks 3:11
2	Skip the Gutter 3:09
3	A Monday Date 3:14
4	Don't Jive Me 2:49
5	West End Blues 3:21
6	Sugar Foot Strut 3:21
7	Two Deuces 2:58
8	Squeeze Me 3:25
9	Knee Drops 3:26
10	No, Papa, No 2:53
11	Basin Street Blues 3:17
12	No One Else But You 3:23
13	Beau Koo Jack 3:01
14	Save It, Pretty Mama 3:17
15	Muggles 2:52
16	Hear Me Talkin' to Ya? 3:18
17	St. James Infirmary 3:14
18	Tight Like This 3:14
19	Weather Bird 2:47
20	I Can't Give You Anything But Love Common Take / Take 3:25
21	I Can't Give You Anything But Love Rare Take 3:29
22	Mahogany Hall Stomp 3:16
23	Knockin' a Jug 3:16
24	[Pause Track] 0:04

Barnes & Noble

These are the most important recordings of the most important figure in 20th century American music. Any questions?

Okay, okay, you're used to hyperbole - "this is essential music by an essential artist that you absolutely, positively must have if you have any shred of sense, any scintilla of humanity." It's often attached to crummy 12-CD boxed sets of mediocre material from third-rate artists.So how should we put this? How about-this is essential music by an essential artist you absolutely, positively must have if you have any shred of sense, any scintilla of humanity. Really.

Traditional New Orleans jazz, with its democratic group improvisation, was still a nascent art form and recording was in its earliest stages when a trumpet virtuoso named Louis Armstrong blasted out of King Joe Oliver's jazz band in 1925 with a group called the Hot Five. With a personality as large as America, Louis Armstrong set the stage for all the popular music to come. "West End Blues," "Weather Bird," "Wild Man Blues," "Gut Bucket Blues," "Heebie Jeebies," "Struttin' with Some Barbecue," and the rest -- recorded over the next five years -- introduced the concept of the jazz soloist, the concept of the instrumental virtuoso outside the realm of classical music, the concept of scat singing and the concept that art and popular entertainment were not necessarily mutually exclusive.

The Hot Five and Seven recordings don't need a Louis Armstrong centennial to be reissued. In fact, the tracks on this four-CD set have rarely been out of print in the 75 years since they were recorded -- on 78's, LPs, eight-track tapes, CDs, cassettes, and now MP-3 files, these groundbreaking recordings have rarely been unavailable. What we have here is the official Columbia Records version of everything, including recordings of Armstrong and his group backing up such singers as the eminently forgettable Lillie Delk Christian and sessions featuring Armstrong released under the names of other group members, 89 tracks in all. An unreleased track or two has been dug up. Some pitch correction has been achieved. A new order has been put to some of the recordings. And the sound has been tinkered with, again. You get a little more hiss and pop from those old 78s on some songs, but you get a little more music. Some people will prefer Columbia's earlier, cleaner CD versions -- a little less noise, but much less depth. Some will prefer the unofficial European versions (where this music is public domain). Some will prefer the "digital stereo" versions from England. Whatever. As the liner notes say, "Some of this may be sheer torture to the lay person, but to the cognoscenti and the enthusiast it is archeology of the highest priority."

What remains, of course, is the music. And what's most remarkable is just how enjoyable these recordings are, how much fun. Armstrong's trumpet is breathtaking-ask a trumpet player, these solos are still hard to play-and his singing is still a rollicking tickle to the ribs. "I'm with you sweet mama as long as you have the bucks, I mean money, mama," he sings in "S.O.L. Blues." Go ahead, don't smile. Everything good about America in the 20th century can be found in the recordings of Louis Armstrong's Hot Five and Seven. Essential? C'mon. Lee Jeske

Rolling Stone

What can the cyberworld learn from these Armstrong treasures, which, though cleaned up, do still sound like they were made in the Twenties? There’s his knack for generating soaring melodies, his ability to make his enthusiasm for everything he played feel contagious and, most of all, the order in which he got things done: He learned how to play before he turned on the charm. Tom Moon