Forget about all those repackaged compilation CDs of the Tempts' work...and believe me, Motown constantly does this. EMPERORS OF SOUL is the ONE and ONLY Temptations collection you should have, outside of the original, individual albums (and the Temptations' LOST AND FOUND CD). You get five CDs of hit after slammin' hit, plus those rare b-sides that you never hear anymore and never-before-released songs...from the very beginning in the lean years, when the Tempts were Otis Williams and the Distants, right up until late 1994. It's also very fitting that the collection ends in 1994, since original Tempt and bass Melvin Franklin passed away in 1995, soon after this was released. This is a great tribute to his career, and to a group who has shown the world just WHY they so richly deserve the title "Emperors of Soul"! No other group can boast about having so many hits AND talented lead singers involved with them during their lifetime...David Ruffin, Eddie Kendricks, Dennis Edwards, Paul Williams, Ali Woodson, Ron Tyson...and that's just scratching the surface! For the Tempt fan past and present, this is a MUST HAVE. A bit pricey, but if you spring for this, you will NOT be disappointed in the least.

The Temptations are truly one of the greatest groups of all time and with 5 discs in this collection it's not hard to see why. It starts with "Come On" which for is not as well preserved as the earlier Motown masters but hey that wasn't Motown. Other notable tracks on the album are: the acapella of "My Girl" from the original session, Paul's incredible live version of "For Once In My Life" from the 1968 TCB special, the incredibly catchy "No More Water In The Well", the gritty self describing song "Power", the down to earth "Lady Soul", and David's centerpiece "I Wish It Would Rain". Only half of this set is stereo which makes a couple of songs lose their power like "Get Ready" and "Ball Of Confusion". I don't understand why they can't use the stereo mixes on the whole set because I know they are available and would make some of the songs sound a lot better. It still deserves 5 stars though.

If you are a fan of the Temptations, and as well as everyone should be, then this is the only set you need. With around 110 songs that they recorded through theyears digitally remastered on 5 CD's, you get almost every song they every had. Not to mention the highly detailed case and accompanying book with biographies, background information, albums, songs and their highest spot reached on the top #100 and tons of interesting stories and facts about the group, tons of pictures, oh yeah did I mention the tons of great songs that come along with the package that they released throught he years. A must have set for true fans!!

My daughter who is in her early twenties bought this CD collection a couple of years ago. She and my twelve year-old grandson are die hard Temptation fans. Even though I grew up listening to the Tempts', they seem to know more about them than what I do. I went and purchased my own Emperors of Soul. I like every one of the CDs. I especially like the fact that the great Paul Williams does a lot of the leads. David Ruffin always was my favorite Tempt', next is Eddie, then Paul, then Melvin, Dennis and Ollie. If you're a die hard Tempts' fan, then this collection is a must.

As someone who has followed the Temptations for 40plus years I looked forward very much to the release of this collection,and as far as collections go it's really good,one thing you will find though is that a lot of the early songs like The way you do the things you do,My girl and others are in mono and yet the original albums when they were released on cd these songs were in stereo,the version of old man river on this collection for me wasn't as good as on the Temptaions live album,I definitely feel you should still have this collection but albums like Temptations sing Smokey,Temptin' Temptations,and just about all of their 1964-1975 music is timeless after they left Motown for a short period in the late 70's and returned they have never seemed quite the same but occasionally they'll do one like the Phoenix rising cd which gave us Stay,but hey I'm a fan for life just in a different way...