Gordon Lightfoot: The Complete Greatest Hits

I've been listening to this CD for a few weeks in my car and while I'm not exactly a "hard core" fan of Gordon Lightfoot, I am not a casual listener either. I have two or three Lightfoot CDs in my collection, I think another hits compilation and Summertime Dream. The Complete Greatest Hits is a nice collection of the tunes that most people over the age of 30 may actually know. What is apparent to me is that how Greatest Hits collections really betray the artist, but it is not false advertising either. These are the songs that were charted not necessarily the "good songs" of an artist. Mind you, this is a fine record and it has on it, all the hits one needs to have for a non "fan".

My personal favorites in order on this CD are:

1. Beautiful
2. The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald
3. Carefree Highway
   
4. Sundown
5. If You Could Read My Mind

I have to qualify choices 2, 3 and 4. They are all excellent songs and the reason they are not contending for first place is that I think Beautiful is poetry and musically a work of art. So as of today, this is the ranking. So based on this, it's clear that I'm a fan of Lightfoot's work at the height of his powers. There are other interesting songs on this album and I think I prefer his earlier pieces to the later ones. The later ones are good too but their styles reflect the times in which they are written too much. The above mentioned songs fall into a category of music that is, at least to me, timeless.

In the interest of full disclosure I have to say that my parents were Canadians from Ontario and Gordon Lightfoot is a Canadian from Orillia, Ontario.