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Next Voice You Hear: The Best of Jackson Browne | 
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| Artist: Jackson Browne
Label: Elektra / Wea
Category: Music
List Price: $11.98
Buy Used: $0.64
You Save: $11.34 (95%)
New (25) Used (72) Collectible (1) from $0.64
Rating:  65 reviews
Sales Rank: 17232
Media: Audio CD
Discs: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 5.5 x 5 x 0.4
MPN: 62111
UPC: 075596211123
EAN: 0075596211123
ASIN: B000002HQY
Release Date: September 23, 1997
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Tracks:
| • | Doctor My Eyes | | • | These Days | | • | Fountain of Sorrow | | • | Late for the Sky | | • | The Pretender | | • | Running on Empty | | • | Call It a Loan | | • | Somebody's Baby | | • | Tender Is the Night | | • | In the Shape of a Heart | | • | Lives in the Balance | | • | Sky Blue and Black | | • | The Barricades of Heaven | | • | The Rebel Jesus | | • | The Next Voice You Hear |
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| Customer Reviews:
 Soulful, powerful August 11, 2007
A. Cargile (Anthem, AZ United States)
Few songwriters distill the essence of human emotion and existential question in such purity as Jackson Browne. Each time I listen to his music is like reconnecting with an old lover: time stands still, regrets unfold and sweet memories resurface. Thanks for the music, Jackson!
Sensitive, insightful and musically clever April 13, 2007
Dennis Littrell (SoCal)
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
I was listening to this the other day, listening to Jackson Browne for the first time in over a decade, and I was struck not so much by the music itself, although "Doctor My Eyes" did raise my pulse a beat or two. What I was struck with is how prescient and how beautifully expressed were some of the lyrics, and how some of the songs were able to fill me with emotions that I had forgotten.
The best song on the album, and I would say the best song Browne ever wrote is "The Pretender." "Oh yes! I am the Great Pretender...pretending that I'm not alone..."
Well, no, Jackson Browne's "The Pretender" is nothing like the Platters' "The Great Pretender" from an earlier age, and those are not the sort of lyrics--outstanding as they are--that I am thinking about. He begins with a Sisyphean theme, that of getting up in the morning each day in his house in the shade of the freeway and going to work each day and then the next day doing it again. And then he wonders about the changes:
I've been aware of the time going by
They say in the end it's the wink of an eye
And there's being "Caught between the longing for love/And the struggle for the legal tender...Where the veterans dream of the fight/Fast asleep at the traffic light/And the children solemnly wait/For the ice cream vendor" You've got to love that "solemnly."
And he ends with being a happy idiot..."Where the ads take aim and lay their claim/To the heart and the soul of the spender." Could he have been talking about today's generations?
And how contemporary is this lyric from "Lives in the Balance"?: "You may ask what it takes to remember/When you know that you've seen it before/Where a government lies to a people/And a country is drifting to war/And there's a shadow on the faces/Of the men who sent the guns/To the wars that are fought in places/Where their business interest runs"
"Fountain of Sorrow" is the one that touches me the most emotionally. He was "taken by a photograph of you...You were turning 'round to see who was behind you/And I took your childish laughter by surprise/And at the moment that my camera happened to find you/There was just a trace of sorrow in your eyes"
Also touching is "Call it a Loan."
You were meant to play your part
In the design of a desperate heart
And while you gave your love to me
I was betting I was getting it free
...can we call it a loan?
I also love the refrain, "The next voice you hear will be your own."
And sweet and cute is his ode to a pretty girl, from the movie Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982): "Well just look at that girl/With the lights comin' up in her eyes/She's got to be somebody's baby...she's so fine"
There are fifteen songs in the album from an artist who was really a poet as well as a gifted musician with a fine eye for the culture and a sensitive feel for human relationships.
Interesting Collection November 3, 2006
Steven Sly (Kalamazoo, MI United States)
This compilation of Browne's career is ok, but there is a lot of material missing that could have been included. In fact a more recent two CD retrospective was released a few years ago that covers a lot more ground than this disc does. The choices of songs selected for this album are not necessarily Browne's "greatest hits" although several of his big ones are included ("Doctor My Eyes", "Running On Empty", "Tender Is The Night", "Lives In The Balance"). The collection includes one track from each of his studio albums so some of his better album tracks are included here as well ("Late For The Sky", "Barricades Of Heaven"). The album also includes two new recordings "The Rebel Jesus" and "The Next Voice You Hear" both of which are good. All in all this is a good collection, but might disappoint those just looking for Browne's hits.
 Jackson Browne's work is better represented elsewhere February 7, 2006
J. Houzet (Chicago, IL)
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
Like others have said, I'm glad Rhino/Elektra eventually put out a two-disc collection of Jackson Browne's music to do his career justice as well as please the fans, because this single disc Best of from 1997 is disappointing. I can fully understand the focus on his early '70s music, but to almost completely ignore his great songs from the '80s before moving to second-rate stuff from the '90s was inexcusable. Apparently Browne himself chose the songs for this compilation but it looked like it was to please himself rather than his fans.
Let's consider what's on here and what's not. The first five songs adequately represent his early career and Jackson gave nods to all his early albums here. The problems start with how he represented Running on Empty, which was a zillion-seller album with lots of great tunes. In fact, musically (as opposed to lyrically), it's probably Browne's best album. It was brilliantly, musically diverse. Live cuts were interwoven with studio cuts and one track was even recorded on the tour bus! "The Load Out/Stay" should definitely have been included on even a single disc Best of, but no, it was not.
Skip ahead to 1983 and the album Lawyers in Love. The title track was a huge hit as well as a really good song. But Browne did not include it on this Best of. Thankfully he did include "Tender is the Night." Lives in the Balance from 1986 was also woefully underrepresented by just two tracks: the title cut and "In the Shape of a Heart." The big single, "For America" was neglected. Then most criminally of all, Browne completely ignored 1989's World in Motion. What's up with that? It was more low key than his other '80s stuff, but it was still a fine album with at least one single that did fairly well - "Chasing You Into the Light" - and even better album tracks - "I am a Patriot" and "When the Stone Begins to Turn."
Not even Browne's '90s albums are well represented here. I'm Alive's best songs were "My Problem is You" and "Everywhere I Go". Likewise, the best songs from 1996's Looking East were "Some Bridges" and "It is One." None of those songs made it to this Best of.
One man's best is another man's.... May 4, 2005
Greg Brady (Capital City)
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
The story goes that the selections here are the "best" according to Jackson himself..snapshots over the years of what he was thinking between 1972-1997. However, artists are often their own worst critics..re-thinking songs that were classics into piffle ("Don't Stand so Close to Me '86" anyone?) or according status to tunes based on how they felt in their personal lives at the time (Paul McCartney has said that he loves the Beatles' "You Know My Name (Look Up the Number)" because of the great time he and John had in the studio making it. That's fine for him, but for the rest of us, it just sounds like screwing around.)
What that means to casual fans (i.e. ones who only own 1 or 2..or no...Browne albums) is that some of the songs you remember loving from radio will NOT be on here. "Rock me on the Water" is M.I.A. "Here Come those Tears Again" is absent. No pleas to "Stay" a little longer. If you were singing the phrase "mating cries of lawyers in love" in the Eighties, forget it...it ain't here. So if you're hoping for a single disc to gather his hits, you'll have to keep waiting.
Those who are bigger Browne fans will no doubt, question why more of his latter period work (arguably lesser material) is included at the expense of his early-mid 1970s songs. You can argue that "Stay" isn't here because it's a cover and Browne wanted to feature his self-written material but that doesn't explain why you can't find "Rock Me on the Water", "Here Come Those Tears Again", or "You Love the Thunder" here.
In the end, only completists will be pleased with this collection including as it does "Somebody's Baby" (the hit from the movie "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" that's only appeared until now on that abysmal soundtrack) and new songs "The Rebel Jesus" (a Christmas song taking America to task for materialism at Yuletide) and "The Next Voice You Hear".
BOTTOM LINE:
There are some great selections here, but many great ones missing. It's hard to argue that this makes the best case for Browne as a significant artist in a single disc. People arguing that the problem is that it HAS to be 2 CDs aren't being realistic...an artistically and commercially satisfying single disc CD for casual fans COULD have been made, but this isn't it.
I suggest buying "Very Best of" used for about $10. (ASIN B0001GOH98). With that double disc set, you'll get most of the glaring omissions plus some fine album tracks.
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