Bing Crosby's career was so long, and it featured so many landmarks, that it's easy to lose sight of the forest for all those trees. Unfortunately, his edition in the voluminous
Gold series doesn't help matters much. Yes, it reels in 50 tracks from his career, but there's little rhyme or reason to the program, and his most innovative decade (the '30s) receives very little attention. That said, nearly all the major hits are here somewhere on this two-and-a-half-hour track listing, beginning with one of the biggest ("Swinging on a Star") and including "White Christmas," "Don't Fence Me In," "Where the Blue of the Night (Meets the Gold of the Day)," "Blue Skies," and "Pennies from Heaven." There are many more hits than misses, but even boasting 50 tracks, exclusions are all over the place, usually in favor of middling songs from his '50s past-prime days such as "Gigi" and "Busy Doing Nothing." [
Gold was previously released in 1996 with a different cover and title (Best of Bing Crosby).] ~ John Bush