Shawn Phillips - The Best of Shawn Phillips

I debated whether or not to go with the best of, as I had picked up a couple of Shawn's earlier albums before stumbling upon this one. True, the cover had seen better days, but the record itself was pretty much flawless.

When I found this one, I still hadn't had a chance to sit and listen to the ones I already had. Collaboration from 1971 had a cool cover, and the gatefold had the credits and the lyrics. Aside from recognizing Trident Studios, I didn't immediately recognize any of the players. Not long after finding that one I stumbled upon Bright White from 1973, and this one featured a truly horrible cover, but I recognized several names: Russ Kunkel on drums, Leland Sklar on bass, and Danny Kortchmar on guitar, who all appear on the title track. It was a buck, so I got it.

Over the last few days I'd spun Collaboration a couple of times, and it was a cool and challenging record. I liked it, but I just couldn't get my head around it. So I figured I'd jump ahead and listen to Bright White, and a number of tracks stood out. It was like the previous album, but different at the same time. I really liked this one too, but was still having difficulty getting my thoughts together. Considering I'd never heard of Shawn Phillips before, I was starting to get a sense that he was the real deal. He was hard to nail down to a specific style. It was a good weird. That's why I settled on the best of album. It's likely whoever selected the songs was looking for continuity, and being able to cherry-pick songs from previous albums would smooth out some of the edges.

Shawn is cut from the singer-songwriter cloth, and the songs are very much of their time, but there's also a timeless quality to many of them. The best of did indeed seem to hammer the lumps into the carpet, and it was an enjoyable listen.

If I'm being honest, most of the songs sort of washed over me, but songs like "Spaceman" and "Bright White" stood out. However, don't mistake me saying they washed over me for dismissing them as filler. To the contrary, all of the songs were enjoyable. There's something about Shawn Phillips that bears repeated listening, but I'll be going back to the albums and taking more time to appreciate what was going on. It was the lumps that made his music interesting. The best of, while good, was missing the very elements that made his albums challenging and rewarding.

However, if you're looking for a teaser to get you started, the twelve selections represented here should be enough to point you in the right direction.

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