Eurythmics - The Ultimate Collection
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Free Music Notes for The Ultimate Collection
Free Music Review: Annie and Dave Come Out Swinging and Still Sound Undiminished on Two New Tracks
Hit: 5 Stars
You could hardly go wrong with this compilation if you are a true Eurythmics fan. I remember very well seeing them in concert in 1987 when they opened their show pulling down a gigantic zipper on the curtain to perform the powerful "Sexcrime" from the "1984" soundtrack (which is sadly not included here). Annie Lennox has one of the genuinely great voices in rock, and coupled with Dave Stewart's synthesizer-heavy arrangements and effects-laden production, it soars with supple, soulful power. As Eurthymics, their sound was inescapable during the 1980's, and they are forever marked by the cool asexuality of their early hits - "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", "Who's That Girl?" and "Here Comes the Rain Again".
For me, however, Eurythmics peaked around 1985-87 when they became particularly inspired by Detroit-based soul and R&B. High points include the Memphis-style horns blaring through Lennox's scream-and-shout vocals on the vindictive "Would I Lie to You?"; the percolating roll of "It's Alright (Baby's Coming Back); the double-barrel shotgun duet with Aretha Franklin on the feminist anthem, "Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves"; the harmonica-swinging purgatory, the vituperative monotone vocal and insistent drum beat of the double-entendre "Missionary Man" (that Frankenstein laboratory video is still memorable); and the savagely sexy "I Need a Man" with defiantly lacerating vocals by a honey-dolled Lennox sounding like a searing combination of Nina Simone and Joan Jett. Other gems include the pulsating 1960's-influenced "Thorn in My Side" complete with a wailing saxophone, the pop-soul of "You Have Placed a Chill in My Heart" and the entrancing ballad "The Miracle of Love".
There is a mellowing that came after a twelve-year break with the calming "I Saved the World Today" and the back-to-basics "17 Again" that has a gentle nod to "Sweet Dreams" and a particularly lovely vocal, both songs from their 1999 "Peace" album. The newly recorded songs match up well to their predecessors with the only noticeable change the lived-in throatiness of Lennox's voice sounding more emotionally resonant than ever - the teasing opener "I've Got a Life" with the Barry White-sounding disco-swing arrangement and the Al Green-like "Was It Just Another Love Affair?" with lush Bee Gees-type harmonies. This is a wonderful compilation though a bit frustrating for the omissions, for example, any track from 1989's wondrous "We Two Are One", and truthfully, the programming of songs on a greatest-hits package eliminates the thematic aspects of the albums and tends to trivialize the output as a whole. Regardless, this is essential listening for any fan.
Free Music Review: Excellent pop group
Hit: 5 Stars
Eurythmics are an excellent pop group and dominated the mid 80's. They had three main strengths - Annie Lennox's terrific voice and unique, soulful personality , an advanced sense of melody , and their ability to develop as musicians and become more sophisticated as their career progressed. I always really liked them back in the 80's, and had the good fortune to see them in concert on 01/12/1989 here in Hobart on their We Too Are One tour. Here they are again with a second, updated hits package, and not surprisingly it's very a good CD.
This compilation spans 1983 until the present day, and like most hits compilations it includes two new tracks to make the CD more enticing to casual and long-term fans alike. They're not going to set the charts ablaze, but both new songs are pretty good.
Always with such a successful group that has more than one CD -worth of hit tunes, you wonder whether a 2CD set would be better, but I'm satisfied with this as I'm sort of intending to purchase the group's back catalogue albums on CD anyway. In particular the remastered sound is excellent. My old CD of the Eurythmics 1985 album Be Yourself Tonight has much inferior sound on the loud, rocking #1 hit Would I Lie To You (which I love) when compared to the improved sound quality here.
Favourite tracks ; Right By Your Side ( holiday /carnival vibe, lovely) , Would I Lie To You (brilliant rock vocal performance, ace guitar playing) , When Tomorrow Comes ( routine melody but lovely lyrics) , I Saved The World Today ( gorgeous melody, great singing) , Here Comes The Rain Again ( cool melancholy vocal , atmospheric instrumentals) , There Must Be An Angel ( Playing With My Heart) ( sweet vocals, terrific harmonica guest performance from Stevie Wonder), Miracle Of Love ( one of the best 80's radio ballad hits with lovely lyrics) .
I hope newer listeners unfamiliar with this music might wish to try out this package of hit songs, all of which are really good.
I would imagine however that most fans of this band would already own most of these tracks, so the only selling point then is the improved sound quality.
I 'm going to give this 5 stars because I like all the songs on this disc a lot.
Free Music Review: Phenomenal collection of Eurythmics' best songs!
Hit: 5 Stars
Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart of Eurythmics made some memorable songs in the '80s. They made synthesizer based pop, but they sounded just as strong as any live band of musicians. I still love Sweet Dreams are Made of This. They had the rarity of releasing two albums in 1983, both Sweet Dreams and Touch. The Touch-released singles came mostly during late '83 and early '84. But I have found myself playing Who's That Girl a lot, since I felt that it didn't get as much a response as their other singles. I liked their soul and live horns direction with Would I Lie To You and Sisters are Doin' It for Themselves in 1985. Didn't follow them as much in '86-87, but the songs I heard were solid on here. They balanced synth pop with rock songs in most places. I like the two new songs, which I thought were off their '80s albums. I've Got a Life has a little bit of the triangle/bells sounds from Sweet Dreams in it, so they recall their past as well as keeping up in 2005. Would have sounded good on Annie's last album, Bare.And Was It Just Another Love Affair sounds like it could have been recorded in 1987. But they both blend well with the 15 '80s songs and 2 '99 songs that dominate this collection. Some of the songs were those I heard for the first time since I heard mainly the hit singles from those albums. I could understand them taking a long break since each were so focused on their solo and musical projects. Annie's singing is so phenomenal. Dave's musical prowess is just astounding on all the songs. Here Comes the Rain Again still sounds moving every time. I love the comfortable I Saved The World Today. The Miracle Of Love was something I really liked on this album. I Need a Man has that rocking feel to it. Missionary Man still has that funky groove to it. Sometimes, a few of the numbers reflected the '80s with the synth pop sound so common in several artists and groups. But the music still holds up and there is a loyal audience that still listens to it two decades later today. Also, Eurythmics performs on the American Music Awards on November 22nd, so this feels full circle seeing them perform again. This compilation is just superb chance-taking pop that gave them many platinum albums and awards.Free Music Review: Excellent single-disc compilation.
Hit: 5 Stars
All single-disc greatest hits albums by bands with as deep a catalog as Eurythmics must leave some great songs off, and this one is no exception. The songs were chosen based on their success as European singles, and represent rather well their chart success through the Eighties. I personally find "Revenge" to be one of the weaker albums, so I disagree with representing it with 4 songs, which necessitates exclusion of material from "In the Garden" and "We Two Are One." As a single disc greatest hits already exists for the band, it would have been nice to have a double-disc set that also included strong tracks such as "The Walk" and "Beethoven" and "Don't Ask Me Why," among others.
But let's focus on what is here. The first track, "I've got a life" is a 4-minute summary of the Eurythmics' career, starting with a stripped-back, plaintive sound reminiscent of "Bare," and ramping up to an all-out techno-disco number reminiscent of "Sweet Dreams," synthesized bells and all. It is truly one of their great singles, and does not come off at all as a half-hearted attempt at something new. The other new track offered, "Was it just another love affair," is a solid ballad.
After "I've Got a Life," the album then moves into a stunning hat-trick of singles--"Love is a Stranger," "Sweet Dreams," and "Who's that girl," which are three of the very, very best technopop songs ever recorded, and all in one year, 1983, to boot. "Here Comes the Rain Again," "Would I Lie to You," "Missionary Man," and "It's Alright, Baby's Comin' Back" are my favorites of the remaining tracks, but all of them are solid 80's pop singles. Even the MOR flashes of "Revenge," though not my favorite Eurythmics moments, have stood the test of time, while other examples of the genre (Remember "Starship" and "Heart" circa 1985?) have not.
The remastering is good, and makes a noticable difference from the earlier CD versions of these tracks
This compilation collects the strongest singles (if not songs) from their best albums, and forms a great companion piece to the remasterd reissues. If you own no Eurythmics, start here, and you will want them all.
Free Music Review: falling on my head like a memory
Hit: 5 Stars
If popular music is your compass, your religion (and for better or worse, it's always been both for me, since I'm eight years old), then you're a fool if you don't recognize and appreciate fully the trail blazed by Annie Lennox --- granted she wasn't alone, she had Dave Stewart as a bandmate in Eurythmics, and she had Debbie Harry and Pat Benatar and a handful of others around her in the arena of pop --- the trail that Madonna and Cyndi Lauper and Courtney Love and Christina Aguilera and Pink would all walk down. Using audio AND video to skew and shatter perceptions of what women were capable of in music, in artistic expression, Lennox --- better and more so than anyone else (save, perhaps, Madonna) who came of age musically in her time frame --- is a complete chameleon. She'll change colors on you before your very EYES. Consider this about the Eurythmics' daring music: it had an extremely unique flair (in '83, in '86, in '05, for crying out loud, you KNEW when you were listening to a Eurythmics song; be it that stunning, still-unmatched intro to "Here Comes the Rain Again" or that haunted, maddened quasi-wail that opens "Who's That Girl" or the beyond-clever reprise of "Sweet Dreams" that closes their most underrated single "17 Again," there was NO doubt when it was Annie time on the radio) without having a homogenous sound. That's terribly crucial, and it sounds easy but it's not: the music had the same general flavor but it had different, specific tastes. (Contrast that, for example, with those hapless, hopeless martyrs Creed, whose music is ALL THE SAME: "My Sacrifice" is exactly the same song as "Higher" isn't it? And wasn't "Higher" just a half-beat step up from "My Own Prison"? And if "One Last Breath" wasn't "Arms Wide Open" all grown up, I'll eat this keyboard.) The vast palette of colors with which Lennox and Stewart created musical masterpieces remains riveting 25 years past their first collaboration, and this career retrospective --- the best I've seen since George Michael's best-of seven years ago --- is a pitch-perfect way to close chapter one of their journey.