The Best of the Diamonds: The Mercury Years (1996)

About this title: Twenty-two tracks from 1956-61, including most of their hit singles (the 1958 Top 20 entry, "Kathy-O," is oddly missing). "Little Darlin'" and "The Stroll" are quite obviously the class of the bunch, and there's a higher quantity of inferior pop-inclined covers of R&B/rock numbers than you might remember ("Why Do Fools Fall in Love," "Words of Love," "Silhouettes," "The Church Bells May Ring"). It's certainly the collection of choice, though, including a 1959 Australian single that was previously unavailable in the U.S., and the previously unreleased 1961 track "Chimes in My Heart" (written ... read more

Tracks:

1. Why Do Fools Fall in Love? [Lymon/Santiago/Merc]
2. The Church Bells May Ring [Craft/Willows]
3. Cool Cool Baby [Mullan/Richards]
4. Ka-Ding-Dong [Jordan/McDermott]
5. My Judge and My Jury [Mysles/Kosloff/Pack]
6. Ev'ry Minute of the Day [Leiber/Stoller]
7. Little Darlin' [Williams]
8. Zip Zip [Kaye/Booros/Colombo]
9. Don't Say Goodbye [Stevens/Goodman/Sto]
10. Words of Love [Holly]
11. Dance With Me [Brackens]
12. Daddy Cool [Slay/Crewe]
13. Silhouettes [Slay/Crewe]
14. The Stroll [Otis/Lee]
15. Walking Along [Weiss/Willis]
16. High Sign [Stevens/Stone]
17. She Say (Oom Dooby Doom) [Mann/Anthony]
18. Batman, Wolfman, Frankenstein or Dracula [Alfred]
19. Oh! Carol [Sedaka/Greenfield]
20. Believe Me [Austin/Gaudio/Villa]
21. Chimes in My Heart [Medley]
22. One Summer Night [Webb]

Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is further described below.