First there’s the matter of the front cover: designed pretty badly, it’s got a stock b-&-w photo of Jackie W. in a tux against a denim-blue background. Boring. That’s good, though: since thematic compilations earn a lot of their cool by surprising listeners with quality that they might not have expected, the duller the cover is, the better. Records like these do a favor to the songs they contain by shrouding them in nondescript sleeves. Next, there’s the liner notes -- the label that released this record is the massive U.K. reissue house Charly, which seems to have every early-sixties soul record ever made in its vaults, and their customer base includes a lot of recording-session-details mavens, so their liner notes focus a lot on what was recorded where and when and with whom, and what the record did in the charts. I like this for the same reason I like naval historians: I can’t imagine what would drive a person to make this sort of data their sole focus. “’I Still Love You’ was the first of Wilson’s hit singles to be written by The Chi-Lites’ lead vocalist Eugene Record, this time in collaboration with Carl Davis (although he may have had some unofficial input into ‘Whispers’ because of his close association with Barbara Acklin),” the liner notes inform us, and while I sincerely do find this information interesting -- well, what about “I Still Love You” itself, whose recording is so very interesting (the horn section so far back in the mix! the muffled drums! the backing vocals that seem to be coming from the next room!) and whose performance is so wonderful (the rock-skipping-across-a-pond guitar prefiguring funk and referencing West Coast jazz! the chunky, flat-toned bass! Jackie greatgodalmighty Wilson!), and whose effect on a room is electrifying? Nothing about that. Just details.