Starting with a band's Greatest Hits

Music
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Bought the Greatest Hits / Best Of compilation, enjoyed it, decided to dig deeper:

  • The Pogues
  • R.E.M.
  • Scott Walker
  • Supergrass
  • U2
  • Violent Femmes

Bought the Greatest Hits / Best Of compilation, enjoyed it, never felt the need to listen to anything else they’d released:

  • Ash
  • Barenaked Ladies
  • Barry Manilow
  • Barry White
  • Cat Stevens
  • The Divine Comedy
  • The Doors
  • Queen
  • Travis

How about you? Which Greatest Hits comp ended up being your gateway to fully-fledged fandom? Which Best Of satisfied your interest and left you with zero appetite for more?

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8 Likes
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First option:
The clash - hoovered up most of their albums after being grabbed

Second option:
INXS - an underrated best of but despite being a good time I’m not going to go down the album route

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First option: Neil Young - Decade

Second option: The Jam - Snap.

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Bought the Greatest Hits / Best Of compilation, enjoyed it, decided to dig deeper:

  • The Cure
  • Depeche Mode
  • The Smiths
  • New Order
  • Led Zeppelin
  • Jimi Hendrix

Started with a live album (essentially a compilation), decided to dig deeper:

  • Descendents
  • Pink Floyd

Bought the Greatest Hits / Best Of compilation, enjoyed it, never felt the need to listen to anything else they’d released:

  • The Beach Boys (not till decades later)
  • Supertramp
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Spoon - bought it because they put out the CD for a cheap price, assumed it would be the only album I would ever need by them but they ended up gradually becoming a huge favourite and I bought a load more albums

Funny that when it came out in 2019 there were a few thinkpieces about whether there’s any point in releasing a best of in the streaming/playlist age but it worked on me

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My auntie bought me the Nirvana greatest hits…I don’t think I listened to it for three or four years. ‘You Know You’re Right’ pretty much the perfect introduction to any band ever.

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That’s a good point. Live After Death was what made me an Iron Maiden fan.

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Picked this up in a charity shop about ten years ago. It’s not on streaming sadly but it is wall to wall smashes.

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Queen

Still think Greatest Hits 1 & 2 are amongst the best albums ever.

The actual albums… Meh.

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Come to think of it, pretty sure it was for me too.

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13

Is there an agreed difference between a Best Of and Greatest Hits?

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These were 5 pivotal releases in my record buying as a teenager, all leading to exploration of the artists and their influences/peers

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Greatest Hits is released singles, Best Of is just their best songs (in the opinion of whoever).

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Death to the Pixies

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Tea for the Tillerman is arguably a Cat Stevens greatest hits in itself.

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Just checked the track list: 6 of the 11 tracks from …Tillerman appear on the ‘Very Best of Cat Stevens’ compilation that I’ve got, so that album is roughly 55% prime cuts.

See also: I Should Coco by Supergrass (7 out of 13 tracks made it onto their ‘Supergrass is 10’ compilation).

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Got this from Our Price without a case/cover for £2 when I was 14. Big day for young colossalhorse, that.

2 Likes
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  • Barenaked Ladies

Isn’t this just that one week song 20 times in a row?

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