The three-CD retrospective set was compiled with Thompson's co-operation and consent. Thompson has often been reluctant to look backwards at his career and dig through the archives, but he took the pragmatic view that if somebody wants to assemble a set of this nature they'll do it anyway and so he might as well collaborate with them if possible. He had right of veto over the selections, and recorded one track ("Poor Wee Jockey Clark") specially for the project.

About a third of the selections are live, and five had never been released on any official Thompson release. Some of the material was donated by collectors of Thompson recordings.

The set extends chronologically from 1969, when Thompson was a member of Fairport Convention, through to 1992. However it is not sequenced in chronological order.

Notable inclusions are

The set includes a booklet with details of each recording, some rare photographs and essays by Greil Marcus and Leslie Berman.

All songs are written by Richard Thompson except where noted otherwise.

...
Wikipedia