Since the sixties, when Dusty Springfield was London's sturdiest girl hitmaker, her distressed mezzo-soprano has magnetized listeners. As shown by this anthology of Seventies and Eighties duets, soundtrack songs and live recordings, she could go uptown and still retain her white-hot rock-soul fire; for instance, when Burt Bacharach produced Springfield on "The Look of Love," the result was her greatest track. That's why this often showbiz-y collection works: Springfield turns "(But It's a) Nice Dream" into pure regret, sings the splendid hell out of "Private Number" with Spencer Davis and, onstage, grabs — authoritatively — the Drifters' "Up on the Roof." Her voice was like a Ferrari engine, great at 135 mph but sublime at 70 because of the sensed possibilities of wilder speeds.

“Let My Love Open the Door”

A peppy, hopeful love song, "Let My Love Open the Door" became a U. S. Top Ten hit for Pete Townshend in 1980, anchored by the kind of repeating synthesizer figures that he'd used in some of the Who's recordings in the previous decade. Although Townshend brushed the song off as "just a ditty" in Rolling Stone shortly after its release, in 1996 he revealed it was about love of the holiest sort. "It's supposed to be about the power of God's love," he remarked. "That when you're in difficulty, whether it's major or minor, God's love is always there for you."