Many years ago I used to have all the Doors albums on vinyl. What with scratches, loss, theft, divorce (oh, I just said that) and changes in technology, last Thursday I owned no tracks at all by the Doors. On Friday I walked in to JB Hi Fi and discovered they were having a sale which included a rack of stupidly cheap “Best Of” CDs. I picked up the CD and every track was a gem but strangely I could barely recall any other tracks of the pile of albums I had. And then I realised, they did crap, lots of crap on every album and I used to skip it. So here they were without the detritus - the Best “Best Of” Band of all time.
A special honorable mention to Prince, the tracks on his BO are equally tasty but I have never owned a Prince album because everything I have heard that wasn’t a single I hated.
No The Band don’t count because Music From Big Pink, The Band and Stage Fright as well as others are great, great albums. Not nearly enough crap from those guys. The other suggestions look good - I was actually going to get The Cars (mainly because I like the drum kit tones they used in their mix) but after thinking through a few tracks I changed it for Joy Division.
Good choice An Arky the only stuff I have by U2 is the best ofs: 1980-90 and 1990 - 2000. And as my question requires I can’t think of anything extra that I would want.
The Pogues fall into this category for me. Legendary band, and some of their songs are in my all time top ten (after a few drinks my top ten all time is exclusively Pogues songs ), but they never released a great album. Maybe ‘If I should fall from grace with God’ could be called great, but the rest are v uneven IMHO.
Donovan’s Greatest Hits is one of the top records of the 60s, bar none. It would rank even higher if they had used the original versions of “Catch the Wind” and “Colours”. Forget the Dylan comparisons, he had his own sound.
The Very Best of Hall and Oates–has all the hits, no filler. The Best of Nick Lowe–great compilation of his pre-1986 stuff. A Decade of Steely Dan–perfect for the casual fan. The Savoy Brown Collection–nice retrospective, includes most of “Street Corner Talking”.
Oooh, I knew my answer as soon as I saw the thread title… my choice is
NRBQ: Peek-A-Boo: The Best of NRBQ 1969-89 (Rhino)
Rolling Stone Record Guide drew the analogy of this 2-disc set to the sifting of all NRBQ’s golden nuggets from a pebble-filled stream. I have practically every album in their 35+ year career and, as much as I love them, most folks would only need this set. When I get around to it, I plan to burn a compilation of my remaining NRBQ favorites to supplement “Peek-A-Boo” and I won’t have trouble limiting myself to one disc.
Tom Petty, bless his heart, waited several decades to release a Greatest Hits album, and the result is an 18 track CD, none of whose contents you want to skip.
I also came in here to nominate Tom Petty, and now I feel bad about it. I’ve seen him in concert twice, and even though the only Petty CD I’ve owned and heard all the way through is a Best Of, I knew all but one of the songs he played.
I have to disagree here. Joshua Tree is a great album. Even if some tracks are below others (really, what’s above “Where the Streets Have No Name” or “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For”?), none are really skip-worthy. The entire second half of the album is full of songs that couldn’t stand as singles in any universe, but are a great atmosphere piece altogether.
On topic: Queen’s two disc Greatest Hits is definitely more than enough for me. I don’t know a song not on the discs that I would want to own. Unfortunately, there’s also a number of tracks that are on the set that I’d be quite happy to have had omitted (“Flash”, anyone?).
(Another thread to be made is “Single Albums that might as well be Greatest Hits.” I haven’t heard a song I’ve liked outside of INXS’s Kick or Carole King’s Tapestry.)
Man, it’s so irritating when people completely misunderstand an OP but respond anyway. The OP is asking, What bands made really mediocre individual albums, but whose Greatest Hits compilations, having cut the filler, are GREAT?
New Order fit this bill perfectly - not one of their albums is actually solid or impressive, but to listen to the Substance compilation, they’re the best band ever.
I wholly disagree with Prince - the majority of his albums are very solid whole works, especially those from his heyday like Sign of the times.
Every track but one from Parallel Lines is included on the two-disc best-of Platinum Collection, and the missing song is also pretty damn good. (It’s a great album.) The single-disc Best of Blondie doesn’t include all their great songs. Blondie, Plastic Letters, and Eat to the Beat all have some filler as well as good tracks that don’t show up on the best-of.
In short, I think Blondie’s too good to qualify for the OP, even if they do have a decent amount of crap.
I disagree; I don’t skip a single track on Technique and I think that’s a really solid album. Their other albums (I haven’t listened to the newest one yet) only have one or two skip-over tracks each.
I’ll nominate Guided by Voices. When they were good, they were really good, but their albums always had their share of filler. Though I don’t skip over anything on Isolation Drills either, the GH compilation is much better. Really, a classic album.
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark – The albums consist of failed experiments, punctuated with a few incredibly catchy singles. Soft Cell – Actually, the more I think about it, the more I get the feeling that they were blindly playing around with a synthesizer. Pulp – Their hits are anthemic, but everything else is ridiculously forgettable.
Jefferson Airplane – Similar to the Doors, only with more psychedelic jams.
XTC come close, but its more like 50/50. I’m upset because they had the potential to release one of the best albums ever, but… didn’t.
I’m not going to go out and buy every Nick Lowe record, but I’ve got The Doings four disc boxed set- great songs throughout. A “Best of” wouldn’t be enough for me. I’ve also picked up some Brinsley Schwartz CDs- that’s the band he fronted before going solo. The Brinsleys’ stuff was reissued as two albums per CD a few years ago.
A few mentions of Tom Petty. He’s another where I feel you need the boxed set. Again, I’m not going to buy every album but a Greatest Hits ain’t gonna cut it. Also, both the Greatest Hits album and the Boxed Set came out before Wildflowers, which is one of his best albums.
I’ve seen him in concert twice, and even though the only Petty CD I’ve owned and heard all the way through is a Best Of, I knew all but one of the songs he played.