I bought this CD 5 years ago & my copy has a minor defect.During the middle of the song "When You're Young & In Love" the counter on all the CD players I have played it on suddenly starts counting backwards,which means if I program the player to play this song,the song suddenly stops right in the middle. It plays the song correctly if I play the CD straight through,though. I wonder if anyone else who bought this CD has this problem.

Although the Marvelettes were among Motown's more successful acts, and seem to have had an album for virtually every year of their career, few if any of these are in print or have been issued on CD. Instead, there are any number of compilations, either purely cherry-picking or also exhuming a taster of unreleased material from the vast Motown vaults. This collection from the 20th Century Masters series falls squarely into the former category, selecting eleven prime Tamla-label A-sides for its tracklist.

Included, of course, is the big hit that marked their 1961 debut, Please Mr Postman, as covered by the Beatles, and with Marvin Gaye on drums. It marked Motown's first US number one in the pop charts. Also found here are perhaps their best-known later hits, Don't Mess With Bill, written by Smokey Robinson, and When You're Young In Love, already a hit for Ruby and the Romantics.

The first three or four tracks feature the fabulous throaty vocals of Gladys Horton. Thereafter, their secret weapon, the sexily voiced Wanda Young gained frequent prominence. She became their regular lead vocalist when Smokey Robinson took an interest in the group. He was looking for a singer to replace Mary Wells, who had defected from the label, and concocted masterpieces for her colourful and playful inflections such as The Hunter Gets Captured By The Game and My Baby Must Be A Magician, remembered also for the bass vocal part contributed by Melvyn Franklin of the Temptations.

The good news is that all eleven tracks have been meticulously remastered in stereo. This marks the stereo debut of the single version of Please Mr Postman, brings back into catalogue two or three other stereo mixes and may be the first time I'll Keep Holding On has appeared in true stereo on CD. The Hunter Gets Captured By The Game is not the single, but a longer version completed a couple of months later with an extra verse, unreleased until Anthology in 1975, and previously unavailable on CD as far as I know. Many have covered this song, including Blondie and Smokey himself with the Miracles, but none have equalled the Marvelettes snappily joyous original. When You're Young In Love also appears in a rare alternative mix. Every track on here is a finely-honed gem and the CD is over far too soon.

The bad news is that one reason why the CD is over so quickly is that it has a scandalously short running time of 28:42. On any CD of new recordings this would be notably poor value; on a collection of re-issued material that has recouped its production costs many times over in the intervening forty years or more, it is simply unacceptable. The year before this compilation there was a Marvelettes CD released entitled The Ultimate Collection, which had 25 classic tracks on it, including all 11 found here. Therefore, I would have to recommend that in preference to this unless, like me, you need to have them all in stereo. Whichever you choose, though, choose one.

Before the Supreme's and long before Dastiny's Child we had the Marvelettes.Probably the best of the 'Girl Groups'.The Marvelettes consisting of lead singers Gladys Horton and Wanda Young and background singers Georgeanna Tillman and Katherine Anderson.The Marvelettes were vasty underrated and unappreciated by motown.But motown may not be at fault.With so much talent at motown during the 60's.Some of it was bound to be overlooked or neglected.But even with the lack of full support by the powers at motown.The Marvelettes with there harmonizing voices still manage to create such hits as,the most famous phone number on earth 'Beechwood 4-5789' the sweet 'Wnen You're Young And In Love' and watch out for that 'Playboy'.The Marvelettes gained legions of adoring fans with these songs.The Marvelettes set the standard and rose the bar for all female groups to follow.During the 60's their music was the life of the party.The Marvelettes came to motown with a hit already in their pocket.The song was 'Pleaes Mr. Postman' and I think that song turned out to be their biggest hit.And their careers just took off from there with more hits like 'Don't Mess With Bill' and 'The Hunter Gets Captured By The Game' all these songs are on this album.Also on this album we get to hear some of the early work of some of motown's greatest songwriters like Marvin Gaye,Van McCoy,Holland-Dozier-Holland and Smokey Robinson.It's unfortunate that the Marvelettes never got the credit due them.But with albums around like this one.Their music will be around for a long time.For future generations to enjoy.Just as I have.

When I purchased this compilation, I was happy mainly because the music of The Marvelettes is so difficult to come by. If you look at the listings for their compilations on this website, you will only find a small handful of results, as they have very few compilation releases anyway. This is even moreso in the stores. This was the only complete Marvelettes compilation thatI could find out of "Strawberry's", "Newbury Comics", "Cheapo's Records", "Skippy White's", "Wal-Mart", "Best Buy", or anywhere for that matter. Except for the "Winning Combinations" compilation (5 songs by The MArvelettes,and and five by "Martha Reeves and The Vandellas"), this was sadly all that I could find. However, I was greatly pleased with all of the songs, including "Beechwood 4-5789", "Don't Mess With Bill", "The Hunter Gets Captured By The Game", and "When You're Young & In Love". Needless to say, I nearly wore this compilation out. I highly recommend it to Marvelettes fans, Motown fans, and "Girl Group" fans.

It's nice to have a CD full of the group's best, as well as rarities. Alternate mixes of their hits make it worth buying, even if we already have all the songs on the CD.
Now all I need is the "extended" or alternate-mix of "Please Mr. Postman" that I can't find anywhere. Someone please help!