Bob Marley's pre-Island material has been packaged and released in countless editions, some legally licensed and some not, and given Marley's tendency to re-record songs at different stages in his career, the resulting discography is a mare's nest of confusion. This two-disc set mixes in tracks produced by Ted Powder in 1969 ("This Train," "Thank You Lord"), Leslie Kong in 1970 ("Soul Captives," "Soul Shakedown Party," "Go Tell It on the Mountain"), and Lee "Scratch" Perry in 1970 and 1971 ("African Herbsman," "Sun Is Shining," "Kaya") to provide a kind of sketchy overview of Bob Marley & the Wailers' mid- to late pre-Island period when they were still working firmly within the Jamaican production system. The Westernized sound that most of the world associates with Marley was still a couple of years away, and many feel that the period covered by this anthology was Marley's most accomplished, particularly the material recorded with Perry. ~ Steve Leggett, All Music Guide