SIDE 1.
HELP! - THE BROTHERS FOUR
HEY JOE - THE BYRDS
HOMEWARD BOUND - CHAD & JEREMY
CLOUDY - THE CYRKLE
YOU DON'T HAVE TO SAY YOU LOVE ME - JOHN DAVIDSON
I WANT YOU - BOB DYLAN
SIDE 2.
THESE BOOTS ARE MADE FOR WALKIN' - THE NEW CHRISTY MINSTRELS
YOU'VE LOST THAT LOVIN' FEELIN' - POZO-SECO SINGERS
JUST LIKE ME - PAUL REVERE & THE RAIDERS
DOWN IN THE BOONDOCKS - BILLY JOE ROYAL
WE'VE GOT A GROOVEY THING GOIN' - SIMON & GARFUNKEL
At first, I thought this album should be called 'popular artists play the hits of '66' or something of that nature. For the most part, it is just that (although many of the groups aren't so popular). Then a strange thing happens: at the end of each side, there is a hit song sung by the original artist. So why then is it laid out like this? Could it have been that hard to get their hands on the release rights 10-12 original hits from 1966? I don't think there was as tight of a ruling on releasing individual songs on best of albums at the time, so I don't think it's that.
A little bit of research told me that the Dylan and S&G songs came out in '66 while the cover version originals mostly came out in '65 or '64, so maybe the covers were hits in '66. However, aside from the Byrds song, there are few reference to the others as having any success as covers. To add to that, they mostly are pretty hokey. Perhaps Columbia records had the license to these versions and that made for a quick and easy release of this record.
The record is full of great songs, but I would way rather listen to it if those songs were all the original performances. Luckily I don't have any of the future volumes of this series, if any ever came out.
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