On first inspection this seems to be a reasonable attempt at covering the Punk and New Wave genre and indeed if one only hears the first disc on its own then someone might describe it as "Anthemic". There are some great surprising inclusions in the collection as well such as Richard Hell's "Blank Generation", The Flamin Groovies "Shake Some Action", The Flys "Love And A Molotov Cocktail" and Talking Heads "Psycho Killer".
That said I would have chosen alternate tracks for some of the bands ("Lovers Of Today" for the Only Ones, "Your Generation" for Generation X, "New Rose" or "Neat Neat Neat" or both for the Damned and "Love Goes to Building on Fire" for the Talking Heads)and in the subsequent discs some of the song choices (Human League - Being Boiled?) and bands (The Records?, Monochrome Set?) are by no means the best possible, in some cases quite obscure, certainly not anthems and as such, my own view is only half the tracks on this collection are actually "anthemic" in any sense of the word.
In a number of cases (Stranglers, Blondie, Buzzcocks and Talking Heads etc) they use too many of a band's songs detracting from their real anthems. Yet, at the same time, other seminal Punk and New Wave Bands such as the Jam and the Sex Pistols only get one outing (others get no outing at all - a point I will return to). Where is "Anarchy" and "Pretty Vacant"? Where is "In The City", "All Around the World", "Down in The Tube Station", "When You're Young", "A Bomb", "Eton Rifles", "Strange Town", "A Town Called Malice" and so forth. Whilst there are many good New Wave tracks in this collection, the number of "Anthems" declines disc by disc until the final disc, where well over half the tracks can hardly be described as Punk or New Wave at all. As great as some of the bands were, bands like Simple Minds (who were previously the punk band 'Johnny and The Self Abusers', the Alarm (who were previously the Mod Revival Band 'Seventeen'), Be Bop Deluxe (who pre dated New Wave), the Knack (a rock band), and R.E.M. (who only started recording when the Punk/New Wave period was pretty much over) are simply not Punk or New Wave per se. Basically, it seems like the compilers ran out of authentic punk and new wave bands before they got to the end of the collection.
This is the strangest aspect of this collection (that they seem to have run out of authentic punk and new wave bands) for when you look at who and what is missing from this collection you begin to realise that as many, if not more Punk and New Wave 'Anthems' are missing than are included.
So off the top of my head here are some of the major punk and new wave bands and some of their anthems that don't appear - The Clash("White Riot","Capitol Radio", "White Man in Hammersmith", "Should I Stay", "London Calling" etc), The Police ("Fall Out","Roxanne", "Can't Stand Losing You" etc), Squeeze ("Take Me I'm Yours","Cool For Cats" etc), Joy Division ("Love Will Tear Us Apart"), Elvis Costello ("Alison", "Red Shoes", "Chelsea", "Oliver's Army", "Girls Talk" etc), Nick Lowe ("Breaking Glass, "Peace Love And Understanding" etc), Joe Jackson ("Sunday Papers","Is She Really Going Out With Him", "It's Different For Girls" etc), Chelsea ("Right To Work"), The Cortinas ("Fascist Dictator"), The Boomtown Rats ("Lookin' After No. 1", "Rat Trap", "I Don't Like Mondays" etc), The Slits ("Typical Girls"), Billy Bragg ("New England"), The Cure ("Boys Don't Cry" etc), Dictators ("Search & Destroy"), Runaways ("Cherry Bomb"), Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers ("American Girl", "Anything That's Rock N' Roll" etc), Rezillos ("Can't Stand My Baby","Top Of The Pops", "Destination Venus" etc), Graham Parker & The Rumour ("Hey Lord Don't Ask Me Questions" etc), Cock Sparrer ("Runnin' Riot"), Ultravox ("Young Savage", "RockWrok" etc), Tubeway Army ("Cars", "Are Friends Electric" etc), Slaughter & The Dogs ("Where Have All The Boot Boys Gone?"), Pretenders ("Brass In Pocket", "Stop Your Sobbin"), Tourists ("Loneliest Man In The World"), Jonathan Richman and The Modern Lovers ("Roadrunner").....and that's not even considering the host of material from Mod revival and Ska bands (Madness, Chords, Purple Hearts, The Beat, Selecter, The Bodysnatchers, Lambrettas, Secret Affair, Squire, Back To Zero, Low Numbers, Dexy's Midnight Runners etc) that including The Specials in this collection brings into scope.
Of course arguably the inclusion of the Specials is another example of a band that isn't strictly 'New Wave' but given their association with the Mod Revival they do have a far better case than some of the bands included.
So, all in all, either the compilers should not have been quite so ambitious and cut the number of discs in the collection to a maximum of three or they should have been far more careful in selecting the bands and tracks because as it stands this falls well short of being the '101 Punk and New Wave Anthems' that it claims to be on the packaging........
And talking of 101 - thats another anthem that's missing - where's the '101'ers' "Keys To Your Heart"?