The Very Best of Eagles

Even though the 1976 compilation Their Greatest Hits (1971 – 1975) is tied with Michael Jackson’s Thriller as the bestselling album in music history, this 2003 collection offers the same overview as well as the songs included on the 1982 sequel Eagles Greatest Hits, Vol. 2. But you also get 13 more songs and a re-mastered production that resonates so pristinely, it sounds like you’re listening to playbacks in the recording studio. It opens with their household hit, that soaring cover of Jackson Browne’s “Take It Easy” before the sultry “Witchy Woman” slithers from your speakers. Less obvious album tracks weave their way into the sequence like the hangover ballad “Doolin-Dalton” and a twangy cover of Tom Waits’ “Ol’ 55” from their 1974 LP On the Border followed by a barn-burning bluegrass take on Paul Craft’s locomotive train tune “Midnight Flyer.” Other highlights include a 1978 non-album single of the Charles Brown tune “Please Come Home For Christmas” and a drop-dead gorgeous cover of Steve Young’s “Seven Bridges Road” recorded live in Long Beach in 1980.