Post Description

The career of Alanis Morissette has been long and winding, despite the fact that the average music fan cannot see past her 1995 breakthrough "Jagged Little Pill," the best-selling album ever by a female artist. Now, it is finally catalogued on "The Collection," a disc that spans the last decade of the Canadian singer/songwriter's music. 

Those of the opinion that a hit package from Morissette would essentially be a repackaging of Jagged Little Pill have a point; she has released only a handful of hit singles since that juggernaut. Nevertheless, in paving the road that subsequently ensued she released records that were true to herself and did not cash in on her initial success as an "angry" young singer/songwriter. The result has yielded her a rabid fanbase and music that has affected many listeners in a positive way, which is hardly something to look down at. 

Nevertheless, "The Collection" is a rather iffy collection that comes off sounding disjointed when it comes to summarizing the Morissette's last decade. Right off the bat, anyone who has even a minimal knowledge of her career will see that some notable singles are missing such as "All I Really Want," the swashbuckling "So Pure" from 1998's "Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie" and "Precious Illusions," a sharp radio-ready single that reached the Adult Top 40 in summer 2002 but ultimately went over everyone's heads. Also, two "personal favorites" she chose for the collection, 1999's unplugged performance of "Princes Familiar" and 2002's excruciatingly sad "Simple Together," sound completely out of their element on a retrospective. Perhaps a better idea would have been a "Hits" and "Misses" pair of releases a la fellow Canadian songstress Joni Mitchell. Still, her unforgettable staples such as "Thank U" and "Ironic" are dutifully included and have not lost their power with the passage of time. 

Info:
Audio CD (November 15, 2005) 
Original Release Date: 2005 
Number of Discs: 1
Label: Maverick 
Covers: Yes (Front, Back, CD, Inlay, Inside) 
EACLogfile: Yes
Cuefile: Yes
M3Ufile: Yes
Par2: 10%