Greatest Hits Doesn't Mean A Collection Of Shit

So I'm looking around and being the X-Mas season is revving up the greatest hits packages are starting to appear everywhere. Now a good hits collection is wonderful and if done right can be worth the purchase. I've seen some great collections and some awful collections from artists who have a lot of hit material. Then there are collection which are low cost poor quality or newly recorded versions which usually miss the mark completely.

For example of a good collection look at "Edward The Great: Greatest Hits" by the legendary Iron Maiden. The band's most popular material is included with an excellent live version of "Feat Of The Dark" which is a bonus and wouldn't matter if it wasn't included. Now this is what a collection that is supposed to be a greatest hits package should look like. Other bands have excellent ones too from Def Leppard's perfect "Rock Of Ages: The Definitive Collection" to Cheap Trick's 2004 package along with ZZ Top's 1992 collection. These are strong and have great value when buying a collection spanning a bands career.

Then we start to see the bad ones and there are so many of them I won't even bother what I'm writing about more so are artists who get a greatest hits package but don't really deserve the moniker. Let's start with this seasons release of so called greatest hits albums we have Jay-Z with a collection but c'mon nothing in this untalented rappers catalog is even close to decent let alone great and outside of one or two singles he's never even had hits. I know lots of singles have been released and maybe he's had some urban radio success but overall the guys more famous for perfume, clothes, illegal activity and signing much more talented artists to his label than making hit music. Another one is Lil' Wayne sure he's been featured on a few singles that made an impact but outside of "Lollipop" really he's never had a major hit single. There seems to be a new collection of best this and that all the time re-packaging crap and adding outtakes and such.

Then you see Nelly Furtado releasing a greatest hits package who really doesn't deserve to have one as of yet. She's released what three albums had a couple of actual hits from her debut one from her sophomore album and her big and admittedly decent third album had I believe another three and with that tiny amount of real hit songs she's going to have a collection now. That's crap and any consumer that appreciates how they spend their money won't buy into this cash grab.

Now Pink who also is releasing a greatest hits package actually has enough material to pull this off. She has released twenty-eight singles not all were major hits but easily she has enough with the always included new song to make an album worth buying. There is value in a Pink collection and putting a copy into someones stocking at X-Mas is money well spent.

The last part is about those artists that have overstepped their boundaries and put out too many collection packages to rip their fans off over and over again. The two biggest purveyors in my opinion are Nazareth and Kiss. They have more hits packages than albums. Bon Jovi is becoming another member of the repackage previously released material to get our fans to buy the same stuff over and over again gang. I know for sure Nazareth are well over thirty releases deep in the greatest hits game and Kiss is over forty in 2010. So in the end don't fall for the greatest hits scam buy albums buy singles but unless you are getting a great compilation that doesn't have a bunch of live versions or remixes of their hits don't fall for re-paying for music you probably already own.