Blondie - Greatest Hits (CD+DVD)
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Free Music Notes for Greatest Hits (CD+DVD)
Free Music Review: MAKE THIS YOUR NUMBER ONE ! (this CD/DVD is Blondie's best compilation so far)
Hit: 4 Stars
To go along with their well-deserved induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006, Blondie released this 2-disc Greatest Hits (CD+DVD) collection, and it's a package that does justice to Debbie Harry and the band's legacy.
Of course, Debbie Harry is obviously the star here. Mixing little-girl enthusiasm with a punk-ish new wave attitude and her ex-Playboy Bunny sexuality, she blossomed into a beautiful and fascinating superstar who always remained true to her feminine spirit. Where Madonna and Pat Benatar sold out an important element of their femininity in exchange for power, Debbie seemed only to do what came natural to her and let the universe just take care of itself.
Greatest Hits (CD+DVD) has the classics; Call Me, Heart Of Glass, One Way Or Another, The Tide Is High, Dreaming, Atomic, Rapture, Sunday Girl, and more (all digitally remastered, but single edits). Also included here are new remixes of In The Flesh and Good Boys, which are enjoyable, but not particularly any better than the originals. Rapture Riders, a new "Blondie vs. The Doors" mashup that mixes Blondie's Rapture with The Doors' Riders On The Storm, is really cool though.
The videos are essential. They're sexy and fun, but also show a certain vulnerability and honesty that has always been an intriguing part of Debbie Harry's charismatic personality. The liner notes aren't much; very little song information, the album cover images, and that's about it.
There is the single-disc Blondie - Greatest Hits from 2002, and it's a little cheaper; but even though it includes two songs that aren't here (X Offender and I'm Always Touched By Your Presence Dear), I still recommend this one because it has the new remixes and the video DVD.
"...Tonight, make it magnificent."
Free Music Review: Missing a few but a solid collection
Hit: 4 Stars
This collection contains most of Blondie's best with a few exceptions, most notably, "X-Offender" and "I'm Always Touched by Your Presence, Dear." Hardcore fans have noted different versions here, but the casual fan will be satisfied with this set. Blondie has always been about style over substance, but definitely has influenced such artists as Madonna and Gwen Stefani. The range of music they cover from rap to reggae also demonstrates rock's amazing ability to encompass many different sounds and this demonstrates Blondie's impact on popular music.
The DVD has a different effect. While the music has a timelessness that will hold up, the videos are like a time capsule showing how much this art form has changed and now ends up being a curiosity. For the most part they are lip sync performance clips with a few very dated effects. You'll watch it once and then forget about it.
Free Music Review: One of The Best Blondie Greatest Hits
Hit: 4 Stars
A terrific collection of their greatest hits. Excellent sound quality and comes with a bonus dvd! Although, the re-make of "In The Flesh" I thought was boring and rather dull. Should have just put the original on the line-up and left it alone. It was their first break through hit and the original recording is really pretty. The original recording of "Good Boys" should have been put on there as well. I think the whole thing would be truly excellent had they done that. Otherwise, great collection for Blondie fans and the non alike!Free Music Review: Audio remixed and remastered; DVDs flawed but worth having
Hit: 3 Stars
If you want a Blondie greatest hits record to collect the classic tracks in one place *as you remember them from back in the day*, steer well clear of this record: The remasterer has been at work, and most, if not all, tracks have pretty clearly been remixed as well as remastered, not to mention shortened. While newer listeners may like the updated sound (in some ways it's a sympathetic update - mostly just a little more bass and drums, and it's fairly subtle - but not so subtle that you can't notice it!) many of us older buzzards will feign righteous indignation that anyone could have dared to meddle with such pop perfection. This is DEBBIE HARRY for crying out loud. Is nothing sacred?
A much better bet for those old timers would be The Best Of Blondie, which was released about 1984, and contains most of the essential tracks, as recorded and (mostly) unedited.
What this collection *does* offer old timers is two things: Firstly, a good quality recording of "Rapture Riders", the mash-up of Blondie's Rapture and the Doors' Riders on the Storm. Purists hate it, but I think it's pretty cool.
Secondly, the original videos. Now Debbie Harry in the late 70s and early 80s was like nothing else on the planet for a boy my age, and to see it on a good sized plasma now, while dated, still sends a shiver down the spine (notably the early ones - Debbie's gorgeous backlighting in Picture This and Heart of Glass deserve a special mention). But, candidly, many of the other videos are of historical interest only: Blondie fizzled out just before the MTV generation hit it off, so televisually slick this is not: while we should indeed think ourselves lucky that there even are contemporaneous videos of our pop goddess in her prime, most are somewhere between silly and unconvincing (Atomic, Hanging On The Telephone) embarrassing (The Hardest Part, which sees Debbie in S&M gear sporting - some would say wisely - a ridiculous long black wig and dark glasses) and downright bizarre (The Tide Is High - the band in New York with superimposed giant goldfish at the window, a mutant Darth Vader and then - of course! - some stock NASA footage of a Saturn V rocket) and the in any case dreadful Island Of Lost Souls). On the other hand there is a video for Shayla, which is a wonderful bonus.
Nonetheless there's enough of that Debbie Harry Magic to make this worth the purchase for the DVD alone.
But audiophiles: your best bet would be to go back to the Albums: Parallel Lines and Eat To The Beat (the latter of which I am proud to say was the first record I ever bought, aged 12) are outstanding records, but you only catch a glimpse of them here.
Olly Buxton
Free Music Review: In The Flesh BUTCHERED
Hit: 3 Stars
I was never a huge Blondie fan, still not, but holy sh*t is Atomic and Hanging on the telephone addictive. So when I heard about this cd coming with a dvd, I decided to buy it instead of any of their other albums. It has the songs everyone knows: Heart of Glass, The Tide is High, call me etc, so it seemed like a decent album to start with. Ughh then I got to "In The Flesh", a great song that for some reason they thought it would be a good idea to put a remix and not the original. Totally Unlistenable. Anyway watching their chessey videos is fun and since I didn't pay full price for this thing I'll live.