Joe Cocker – The Life of a Man – The Ultimate Hits 1968-2013 (2015)
Artist: Joe Cocker
Album: The Life of a Man – The Ultimate Hits 1968-2013
Genre: Blues Rock
Label: Columbia, Sony Music
Origin: UK
Year Of Release: 2015
Quality: mp3, 320 kbps
Tracklist:
CD 1:
01. Feelin’ Alright
02. High Time We Went
03. Marjorine
04. She Came In Through The Bathroom Window
05. I Can Stand A Little Rain
06. Many Rivers To Cross
07. Shelter Me
08. You Can Leave Your Hat On
09. Can’t Find My Way Home
10. Darling Be Home Soon
11. One
12. My Father’s Son
13. Fire It Up
14. Unchain My Heart
15. Delta Lady
16. Cry Me A River (Live At The Fillmore East)
17. The Letter (Live At The Fillmore East)
18. With A Little Help From My Friends
19. You Are So Beautiful (Live At The Lanxess Arena)
CD 2:
01. When The Night Comes
02. Come Together
03. First We Take Manhattan
04. Summer In The City
05. Joe Cocker & Jennifer Warnes – Up Where We Belong
(Love Theme From The Paramount Film “An Officer And A Gentlemen”)
06. Don’t You Love Me Anymore
07. Unforgiven
08. Have A Little Faith In Me
09. You Are So Beautiful
10. Woman To Woman
11. The Simple Things
12. N’Oubliez Jamais
13. Tonight
14. Night Calls
15. Hard Knocks
16. I Come In Peace
17. Performance
With the first anniversary of Joe Cocker’s death approaching, The Life Of A Man: The Ultimate Hits 1968-2013 – a two-CD, 36-track compilation – celebrates the hits and highlights of his wonderful career…
Billed as a ‘final and official posthumous’ album, this ‘Best Of’ retrospective showcases the husky-voiced British rock legend’s hits, key album tracks and live highlights from across six decades. Cocker released 22 studio albums, 10 live albums, 68 singles, so there was a wealth of golden material to choose from.
This two-CD set serves up tracks from his debut album, With A Little Help From My Friends – including the title song which went to number one in the UK in 1968, Cocker’s self-penned first single Marjorine, plus his cover of Traffic’s Feelin’ Alright – up to live performances from his 2013 tour. Along the way, enjoy other unmistakably Cocker covers, such as his versions of The Beatles’ She Came In Through The Bathroom Window, Leon Russell’s Delta Lady and George Harrison’s Something, plus, naturally, his smash-hit power ballad with Jennifer Warnes, Up Where We Belong.
https://youtu.be/2YubAVZBff8
Cocker always gave his carefully curated songs his own twist, a fact often publically acknowledged by the original writers. For instance, Paul McCartney said how especially pleased he was when With A Little Help From My Friends was given the Cocker signature stamp: “I remember him and Denny Cordell coming round to the studio in Savile Row and playing me what they’d recorded and it was just mind blowing, totally turned the song into a soul anthem and I was forever grateful to him for doing that.”
https://youtu.be/Sr3XHHMtrHw
SDE’s American readers may be particularly interested by the inclusion in this compilation of the title track to Cocker’s final studio album Fire It Up and a live version of You Are So Beautiful (recorded in Cologne, Germany in February 2013), neither of which have previously been available Stateside. If they’re not enough for you, the Fire It Up album as a whole is also receiving its first-ever US release. A hit across Europe when it was first issued in 2012 – going platinum in Germany – it features songs by the likes of Keith Urban, Joss Stone and Marc Cohn, and includes three bonus tracks: album producer Matt Serletic’s The Last Road, Marc Cohn’s Walk Through the World With Me and Let Love Decide.
Alternatively, the other CD reissue is for Hymn For My Soul, Cocker’s 20th studio album that made the top 10 of the Christian Album chart on first release in 2007. This long player was produced by Ethan Johns, who plays several instruments on the album, and also features the talents of guest musicians such as Benmont Tench from Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, guitar legend Albert Lee and drum icons Jim Keltner and James Gadson. The tracklist includes covers of songs by George Harrison (Beware Of The Darkness), Bob Dylan (Ring Them Bells) and Stevie Wonder’s (You Haven’t Done Nothin’).
BY JUSTYN BARNES, superdeluxeedition
