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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Another trawl through the huge back catalogue, 25 Nov 2002
12 years on from the double cd set 'very best of' comes another updated set to take us through the 12 years of hits that have passed since. Well almost....... Eltons biggest seller 'Candle in the wind 97' is not included here - ok 'Something in the way you look tonight' is but that was never the reason people bought the single (good song though this is).So what's been dropped from the previous set ? US chart topper and 'Sergeant Pepper' favourite 'Lucy in the sky with diamonds', 'Pinball wizard', 'Part time love', 'Passengers' and 'I don't wanna go on with you like that' plus the two new tracks included previously (but not big hits) 'Easier to walk away' and 'You gotta love someone' Now included are 'Island girl' (strangely not on 'Very best of..' even though it topped the US charts), plus, well all the hits from 1991 onwards including the Lion King stuff and the superb singles from Eltons recent 'Songs from the West Coast' album. The music quality is high throughout and whilst one may debate endlessly about the choice of cuts, this comes highly recommended. If you haven't got any Elton John, this is an opportunity to plug the gap in your cd collection. Buy the bonus 3 cd set if you can whilst stocks last...
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15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Fantastic selection let down by the 90s material, 2 Nov 2002
It's been a few Christmases since there was a complete Elton John hits package released, so I suppose this one was due and might even be justified. In some ways, Elton's a bit like the Beatles and the Stones, in that his singles output, albeit at times fantastic, isn't really representative of his album work. That doesn't really matter though, at least not when your singles output is this good... The 70s pop is sensational, and even the much maligned mid-80s output sounds like good solid power pop in retrospect. The only letdown (and I suppose it's for the sake of completeness) is the number of tracks culled from the 90s, most of which are bland and over-produced. So many greatest hits compilations fall into this trap - by trying to represent an artist's career, they give too much emphasis to the periods when they simply weren't very good. Thankfully the package redeems itself at the end with the Songs from the West Coast tracks, which were something of a return to form. Equally thankfully, it's the original versions of Candle in the Wind and Your Song that are present. Disappointingly, Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, Passengers, I Don't Wanna Go On With You Like That, Ego, Healing Hands, Empty Garden, Part Time Love and the Thom Bell sessions are all missing - but I suppose that's more of a comment on how many great songs Elton (and Bernie Taupin) have written than a fault on the compiler's part. So kick back, forget who is and who isn't meant to be cool nowadays, and revel in, quite simply, some of the best pop ever written.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Classic. Enduring. Reg strikes back with a revised Best Of., 27 Nov 2002
Any thorough Best Of that Elton John releases is always going to be something of a mixed bag, due in part to the artist's colossal canon of material. This release is wisely timed, a year or so after Songs From The West Coast, an album that has managed to become something of a Goodbye Yellow Brick Road II. Almost. As an audience, our ears are now retuned to the expansive sounds of classic Elton and reacquainted with chewy Bernie Taupin verse. Our bubbling hunger for more, then, is suitably satisfied with at least the first CD of this double-disc set.Throughout, John's neat vocal phrasing and skilfully-executed piano playing sound open and roomy, qualities distinctly perceptible in every single bar of Rocket Man. Candle In The Wind (not so much a homage to Marilyn Monroe as a social criticism) is one of a handful of examples where the lyrics turn provocative: "Even when you died/Oh, the press still hounded you," John slates, awash with empathy and shrewdness, despite him "never [knowing her] at all". It is with such probing celebrity/Hollywood interest that he delivers the rather jerky Bennie and the Jets, a fantasy tale of a female rock star. His adaptive voice rides each song with spirit and ambition, and by the time it reaches Saturday Night's Alright For Fighting, it is capturing the exuberance of his then hedonistic lifestyle. Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word, which ends the first disc, is a pensive song that sees John in a mature, reflective light, a mood mirrored musically by sparse, almost forlorn, chord structures and a charming trickling piano interlude. In Disc 2, though, his material alas shifts from classic magic into a decidedly syrupy province that is renowned as his eighties' and nineties' diversion. Nothing in the bulk of this second half is agonizingly dire (in fact, it never really comes close), and if many other artists had produced such music one wouldn't bat an eyelid; but compared with the melodramatic sheen of Someone Saved My Life Tonight and coming from the rocket man that could once rock with the best of them, the music sounds somewhat robbed of artistic ingenuity. Consequently, it all starts to sound pretty tame and, even more unsettling, run of the mill by his former standards. Love songs like Blue Eyes may very well be palatable, but will hardly keep George Michael awake nights. It is, however, on a note of splendour with which one leaves this collection. This Train Don't Stop There Anymore serves as a sort of grand showcase whose lyrics stage an allegory of Elton John's heyday status: "I used to be the main express/All steam and whistles heading west/[...] Riding on the Storyline/Furnace burning overtime." Too right.
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