Jim Croce
Photographs and memories

THE REVIEW

A great songwriter from the seventies, from the golden age of this craft, Jim Croce left us far too soon.

He released only three studio albums under his own name—one of which, “I Got A Name”, was released posthumously—and so this greatest hits collection manages to give us a rather complete idea of “his best”. The short time span between his first album in 1972 (“You Don't Mess Around with Jim”), his second the following year (“Life and Times”), and his untimely passing that same year, obviously didn't allow for any significant stylistic evolution, so all the tracks in this collection appear “homogeneous” and almost contemporaneous to each other.

The distinction, rather, should be made by considering on the one hand his more upbeat and faster songs (“Bad, Bad Leroy Brown”; “One Less Set Of Footsteps”; “Roller Derby Queen”), and on the other, the wonderful series of his introspective ballads.

The former are lively snapshots of American life and earned him excellent sales at the time, but in this edition, they suffer—for non-native speakers—from the absence of lyrics, making it a bit challenging to catch the meaning of each story. The latter—the romantic ballads—are instead much more “immediately” enjoyable, also thanks to his clear and at times velvety voice: Jim Croce's love songs are truly beautiful, free from sophisticated intellectualism (no offense, like Leonard Cohen or Joni Mitchell); they express in a simple and direct way the phrases we ourselves—even without succeeding—would like to offer to our loved ones.

“Operator (That’s Not The Way It Feels)”; “Time In A Bottle”; “I’ll Have To Say I Love You In A Song”; “These Dreams” and of course the title track “Photographs And Memories” are among my favorite songs of all time, ever.

Little-known in Italy, Jim Croce was a great: to be among the greatest—beyond time itself—perhaps he lacked just a hint of vocal originality (I find the references to James Taylor and also to Cat Stevens quite evident in his songs), but this album is an excellent compendium of his art and is well worth the price. Highly recommended.