Hear Yourself

This set collects the Hollies' first two U.S. albums, 1964’s Here I Go Again and 1965’s Hear! Here!, on a single disc. Both LPs were originally released in the States by Imperial Records, a label founded in 1947 by Lew Chudd, who had sold his rights in the imprint to Liberty Records in 1963. Liberty began leasing material by popular U.K. artists for U.S. distribution that same year, which led to the Hollies' initial single in the American market, a cover version of Maurice Williams & the Zodiacs' 1960 hit “Stay.” Although several of the cuts found here got extensive radio airplay in the U.S. at the time, “Just One Look” and “Here I Go Again” from 1964 and “I’m Alive” and “Look Through Any Window” from 1965 among them, the Hollies didn’t really break through on the continent until a year later in 1966 with the hits “Bus Stop” and “Stop Stop Stop,” and neither of those songs is found here. Aside from the singles, most of the cuts on these two albums are covers of American R&B tunes that are done capably but without a whole lot of originality. The end result is a portrait of a promising band just beginning to come into its own.

The ultimate compendium of a half century of the best music, now revised and updated. 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die is a highly readable list of the best, the most important, and the most influential pop albums from 1955 through today. Carefully selected by a team of international critics and some of the best-known music reviewers and commentators, each album is a groundbreaking work seminal to the understanding and appreciation of music from the 1950s to the present. Included with each entry are production details and credits as well as reproductions of original album cover art. Perhaps most important of all, each album featured comes with an authoritative description of its importance and influence.