Marianne Faithfull - 20th Century Masters: The Best Of Marianne Faithfull (2003)

There is no shortage of Marianne Faithfull collections, but the compact, digitally remastered, 11-track 20th Century Masters set comes close to being the best document of her post-comeback period, which began with 1979's Broken English. That addictively eccentric album is well-represented here with the title track, Shel Silverstein's "The Ballad of Lucy Jordan," and John Lennon's "Working Class Hero" making up the three leadoff tracks. Faithfull's '80s versions of "Sister Morphine" (which she co-wrote with the Rolling Stones' Mick Jagger and Keith Richards) and "As Tears Go By" are also here, along with her exotic cover of Patti Smith's "Ghost Dance" and the anti-ballad "So Sad." Faithfull's witchy voice is a spellbinding instrument that makes every song an expressionistic experience. The whiskey-soaked "Trouble in Mind" and the Tom Waits-penned "Strange Weather," both from Faithfull's jazz-dabbling period, are perfect vehicles for her moribund-melody delivery. For a best-of collection, there is an almost thematic coherence as the singer lowers the gloom-and-angst shroud like few other vocalists can. Songs like the aptly titled "Sleep" are so sparse and devoid of momentum they seem to exist in a psychic netherworld that only the singer herself can fully comprehend. The one wild card is the dance-funk of the 12" version of "The Blue Millionaire" (which Faithfull co-wrote and originally released in shorter form on 1983's A Child's Adventure). Complete with brass bursts, croon harmonies, and the sardonically ironic line "There is no such thing as the wrong man," Faithfull still manages to get the voodoo in there. This is a seductive collection from a true original. Long before Stevie Nicks twirled her shawl, there was Nico and Marianne Faithfull.