He had a late career renaissance with The River In Reverse 2006 (with Elvis Costello), The Bright Mississippi 2009, Songbook 2013 and American Tunes 2016 (released posthumously).
This collection is a best-of from his four seventies records that tried to turn him into a solo star- From A Whisper To A Scream 1971, Life, Love and Faith 1972, Southern Nights 1975, and Motion 1978. The compilation pulls the stronger material from each record, and is a fine set of Toussaint's New Orleans soul-funk-pop. From A Whisper to a Scream and Night People (both covered by Robert Palmer), On Your Way Down (covered by Little Feat), What Do You Want The Girl To Do (Bonnie Raitt), and Southern Nights (Glen Campbell) all sound as good here as their more famous covers.
The rest of the songs are equal to the more famous ones, with What Is Success, Soul Sister, Motion and Happiness showing off Toussaint's sly funk-soul to good effect, and several fine examples of Toussaint's way with a ballad. Drawing 3-6 songs from each album makes for a very strong collection, without a weak song in the set.
Originally released on CD in 1991, it saw its way to vinyl in 2017 as a three-sided LP. Although Toussaint generally preferred his work behind the scenes, he was a fine performer, and returned to touring outside of New Orleans (post-Katrina) in his later years. I had the extreme pleasure of seeing him live in Cleveland in 2014 with The Preservation Hall Jazz Band just a year before he died while on tour in Spain, and he put on a fabulous show.
You can't go wrong with this collection. I'm sure it leaves out quite a few other good songs, but the ones that made the cut are all top notch.
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