Jay & The Americans

The definitive Jay & the Americans collection, Come a Little Bit Closer: The Best of Jay & the Americans, collects the highlights of the band's career with each of its lead singers, Jay Traynor and Jay Black. Traynor was the voice behind the group's first big hit, 1962's "She Cried," as well as singles like "Dawning," the melody of which cleverly mimics Edvard Grieg's "Morning Mood" and a laid-back version of "Tonight" from West Side Story. It's too bad that the Americans didn't wait to record that last song until Black had entered their fold. His impressive range and theatrical delivery made songs like "Only in America" sound like they were from some forgotten musical and made the band's version of "Crying" closely rival Roy Orbison's original. Along with the title track, "Come a Little Bit Closer" also features the hits "Cara Mia" – one of the best showcases for Black's vocal prowess – and "This Magic Moment," as well as sound-alike follow-ups like "Let's Lock the Door (And Throw Away the Key)," "Some Enchanted Evening," and "Sunday and Me".

This triple-disc 79-song compilation looks pretty impressive, and in some ways it is, representing most of the best work of each incarnation of the Drifters from 1953 through 1976. There's a lot of classic music here, including all of the big hits and many interesting (even musically glorious) flops and B-sides, but the limitations of three CDs make this less than ideal. Atlantic had already released a pair of two-CD sets, Let the Boogie Woogie Roll: Greatest Hits 1953-58 and All-Time Greatest Hits & More: 1959-1965, eight years earlier, each of which covers those major periods in question far more generously than does this box – although it must be conceded that the sound on the cuts included on Rockin' & Driftin' is improved over those late-'80s digital transfers, good as they seemed at the time…