Audio CD review:
The Mamas & the Papas - All the Leaves Are Brown: The Golden Era Collection

The Mamas & the Papas - All the Leaves Are Brown: The Golden Era Collection

Band: The Mamas & the Papas Title: All the Leaves Are Brown: The Golden Era Collection Rating: Release Date: 28 August, 2001 Media: Audio CD Tracks: 1: Monday, Monday 2: Straight Shooter 3: Got A Feelin' 4: I Call Your Name 5: Do You Wanna Dance 6: Go Where You Wanna Go 7: California Dreamin' 8: Spanish Harlem 9: Somebody Groovy 10: Hey Girl 11: You Baby 12: The In Crowd 13: no Salt On Her Tail 14: Trip, Stumble & Fall 15: Dancing Bear 16: Words Of Love 17: My Heart Stood Still 18: Dancing In The Street 19: I Saw Her Again 20: Strange Young Girls 21: I Can't Wait 22: Even If I Could 23: That Kind Of Girl 24: Once Was A Time I Thought 25: Dedicated To The One I Love 26: My Girl 27: Creeque Alley 28: Sing For Your Supper 29: Twist And Shout 30: Free Advice 31: Look Through My Window 32: Boys And Girls Together 33: String Man 34: Frustration 35: Did You Ever Want To Cry 36: John's Music Box 37: Glad To Be Happy 38: The Right Somebody To Love 39: Safe In My Garden 40: Meditation Mama (Transcendental Woman Travels) 41: For The Love Of Ivy 42: Dream A Little Dream Of Me 43: Mansions 44: Gemini Childe 45: Nothing's Too Good For My Love 46: Too Late 47: Twelve Thirty (Young Girls Are Coming To The Canyon) 48: Rooms 49: Midnight Valley 50: I Saw Her Again (mono) 51: Words Of Love (mono) 52: Creeque Alley (mono)

Customer Reviews fine collection of The Mamas & The Papas at their peak The first CD has many highlights of their career together: "Monday, Monday" starts the CD off with a beautiful theme that has some great harmonizing; they never sounded better! The percussion enhances the beauty of "Monday, Monday," too. This excellent two CD set by The Mamas & The Papas gives us their four best albums; and everything we get is five star quality! The sound is excellent, too. "Do You Wanna Dance" features some great percussion and guitar arrangements as The Mamas & The Papas do an awesome cover of this classic ballad. Love those strings, too! Moreover, "California Dreamin'" demonstrates just how well The Mamas & The Papas could sound; this flawless ballad encouraged a lot of people to migrate to California, too. Great! The group then does a terrific cover of "Spanish Harlem. " They sing and harmonize to perfection; and you will like their rendition of "Spanish Harlem" very much. "The 'In' Crowd" gets a great cover from these troopers, too--Mama Cass belts it out better than anyone ever could! Love that organ on "The 'In' Crowd," too! Listen also for the classic "I Saw Her Again" by The Mamas & The Papas; and the group does a great job with "Dedicated To The One I Love. " The first CD ends strong with the semi-autobiographical ballad "Creeque Alley;" the guitar arrangement shines like gold and they sing this to perfection! The second CD continues the hits. "Sing For Your Supper" gets the royal treatment from Mama Cass as the guitars and piano play so sweetly. The group covers "Twist And Shout" very well with a tempo much slower than usual; and "Frustration" is a mighty instrumental number that you won't soon forget. We also get their single "Glad To be Unhappy;" the group bats this one straight out of the ball park for a grand slam home run! "Dream A Little Dream Of Me" features Mama Cass performing at her best; she sings this sweetly with all her heart and soul with a handsome guitar arrangement. The musical arrangement becomes more elaborate as the song progresses; and the piano works wonders to infuse "Dream A Little Dream Of Me" with that piano bar feel! Listen also for "Mansions," a number about their lives as a great musical group. "Mansions" is done very well and the minor keys work wonders for this song. We also get three mono selections at the end of the second CD. "Words Of Love" showcases Mama Cass's excellent vocals as they harmonize and play to perfection! "Creeque Alley" provides the same strong ending for this CD just as it did with the first CD. The liner notes include a lengthy, informative essay by Matthew Greenwald; and there are some fine photos of the group as well. The Mamas & The Papas gives us their best work on this two CD set; you get their best four albums and their single release of "Glad To Be Unhappy. " Although diehard fans will want their fifth album as well; many others will choose to skip People Like Us because it just isn't this group at their best. This two CD set IS their best; and just one listen proves it. Thank you, everyone! We miss The Mamas & The Papas! . An aural revelation A couple of years ago I heard this compilation. I've loved The Mamas & The Papas music for nearly 40 years and never got tired of hearing their songs on the radio or putting an a greatest hits compilation and just chilling out to the wonderful melodies and harmonies. The first track I played was my favorite, 'Safe in My Garden' followed by 'Look Through My Window'. I couldn't believe what I was hearing; it was like I was hearing these wonderful songs for the first time. I am no audiophile and what I know about the technicalities of remastering you could write on the back of a postage stamp, in a font size of 72; all I know is that this collection makes every other M&TPs release seem like the music is being filtered through a bunch of dirty old socks. Yes, the remastering may not have removed every single audio artifact but it just sounds. . . . . fantastic! if you love the music of The Mamas & The Papas but have not heard this collection, do yourself a favor and try and track down a copy, you won't regret it. . For a digital remaster, I've heard better sound quality... What finally convinced me, though, were the glowing reports of the superb sound quality. I was peripherally aware of the release of this collection, and was finally moved to purchase by the news that it might disappear as MCA is replacing it with a more scale-down release with fewer tracks. I own all of the original albums in their original, "from analog sources"-disclaimered CD releases, as well as the Creeque Alley collection. I now sit with those, as well as the Golden Era Collection, and am comparing the audio side by side. While there is no question in my mind that this release has the best sound quality, it simply does not deserve the glowing reports heaped upon it here - not enough for the average listener who owns previous issues to dump them in favor it this one. Yes, the original analog-mastered releases are sonically awful. Creeque Alley which, by the way, says "transferred to digital" in its liner, is not much of an improvement. But compared to a contemporary remaster, such as (a semi-random choice) the recent Japanese reissues of the Spanky and Our Gang original albums, this Mamas and Papas collection is still woefully inadequate. Just listen to the opening of Monday, Monday, for instance, and hear the abundant tape noise and other artifacts in the background. Perhaps the original source material was not available for this project, or perhaps they were damaged so as to limit what could be salvaged, but in any case . . . I expected more. . You can see a complete list of all The Mamas & the Papas discography, or go back to the The Mamas & the Papas tabs