Best American Music Hits 1955 - Classic Songs Collection for Parties, Road Trips & Nostalgic Listening

This is a part of a series of collections that British-based Acrobat Records has of American pop charts. This is an expanded edition of their 1955 compilation (the original edition containing twenty-five tracks). Acrobat summarizes it is as follows: "This great-value 109-track collection comprises every record that peaked in the Top 15 of the Billboard Best Sellers In Stores Chart or the Cash Box Chart, and any other records which peaked in the Top 10 of any of the Billboard Component Charts (Most Played In Juke Boxes, Most Played By Jockeys, or the Honor Roll of Hits)." For a chart fanatic like me who enjoys music of a bygone era, this collection is a treat, including some rather obscure records that you don't normally here (like "Fooled" by Perry Como).1955 was a very interesting year. It was the year before Elvis, so it was the year before rock and roll took hold, but there certainly are rock records included (like Bill Haley's recordings). But there are also plenty of middle-of-the-road pop hits, like those of Jaye P. Morgan, and what I would call "hybrid" records that straddle pop and rock and roll (such as the Fontane Sisters' recordings, the Crew Cuts' recordings, and a song such as "Tina Marie" by Perry Como). This collection, like other Acrobat Recordings, contains a detailed booklet that annotates these recordings, including chart positions.My one complaint is that, while the sound quality of the records are generally good, some are a little murky. (Ironically, these include some of the biggest hits of the year like "Sincerely" and "Cherry Pink and Apple Blossom White." It may be that because these are public domain recordings that have been around for a while, they haven't been remastered. I'm not sure. I have found this issue among other non-Acrobat compilations that I've gotten on Amazon, where the quality of recordings vary somewhat because of the public domain issue.) But most of the records sound fine, and if you want to know what people were listening to on the eve of the rock and roll revolution, you really couldn't do better than this compilation.