Beat Dis: The Very Best Of [CD]

Beat Dis is certainly not the 'greatest hits' of Bomb The Bass and doesn't quite tell the full story about DJ/producer Tim Simenon. The compilation has been put out by Sony/BMG who acquired the back catalogue of BTB's first record label - indie dance outfit Rhythm King in 1991. BTB moved to Island Records in 1994 who put out the excellent Clear album and singles - Bug Powder Dust, Darkhart, 1-2-1 Religion, Sandcastles etc. In my opinion it's probably Sony/BMG having free access to Rhythm King's back catalogue - they've done a similar compilations for S'Express and The Beatmasters and not wanting to pay Island to licence the tracks from Clear which creates flaws in this compilation. These are compounded by a rather odd choice of tracks from BTB's Rhythm King period. The good points are the inclusion of the original 12" mix of Beat Dis, Megablast - rap version, Don't Make Me Wait, Shake It, On The Cut (2000 AD) and Don't Make Me Wait which capture the excitement of old skool UK dance music culture in 1988's 'summer of love' and electro trip hop of Liquid Metal and Dune Buggy Attack from 1991's Unknown Territory. The bad points are the criminal omission of Love So True/Keep Giving Me Love and the single mixes of Megablast - Hip Hop On Precinct 13, Say A Little Prayer and Winter In July which in my opinion were better than the versions included here. Furthermore makeweight filler tracks like Dynamite Beats and the Megamix could have easily been omitted! To be honest I only picked this CD up as I have the cassette versions of Into The Dragon/Unknown Territory which have been deleted and it was on sale for £[...]. BTB were at the beginning of the UK dance music revolution in 1988 and if you like them from the Clear album, want to know how Tim Simenon started off and don't want to buy the earlier albums second hand it may be a reasonably worthwhile addition. However I would have sooner seen a compilations which better reflected the complete range of Tim Simenon's BTB project - perhaps a double album which also included his production work for other artists as well - most notably Seal and rescuing Depeche Mode from their mid '90's oblivion with his production work on their excellent Ultra album. Cheers!

I Agree with the first reviewer of this cd. Unfortunately this is not a complete best of not only because the entire third album "clear" is absent but also because almost the entire second album "unknown territory" is absent too except the singles "winter in july" and "the Air u breathe" but the other two singles from this album "Keep giving me love" and "love so true" are not here.

So this compilation is incomplete. It contains almost all the first album "In to the dragon" and just two singles from the second album.

Personally i love the following songs "Beat dis", "Winter in July", "Say a little prayer" and "Don't make me wait" and all the third album clear.

Let's hope we will have a more complete compilation in the future.

Until then stick to the three bomb the bass albums and avoid this one.

only bought the CD for winter in july, however the re-mix version on this is nothing like the original, if its a very best of album it should have the tracks as they were