Roxy Music - The Best of Roxy Music
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Artist: Roxy MusicEdition: Music CD
Audio: English (Original Language)
Published: 2001-06-08
CD Release Date: 2001-07-03
Music Label: Virgin Records Us
Soundtracks:
- Avalon
- More Than This
- Jealous Guy
- Over You
- Same Old Scene
- Oh Yeah
- Angel Eyes
- Dance Away
- Both Ends Burning
- Love Is The Drug
- Out Of The Blue
- All I Want Is You
- Mother Of Pearl
- Street Life
- Do The Strand
- Pyjamarama
- Virginia Plain
- Re-Make/Re-Model
Music reviews of The Best of Roxy Music
Music Review: A Perfect Introduction That'll Leave You Craving More
Rating: 5 Stars
Categorizing the magic of Roxy Music is rather difficult. They fall into some ambivalent left-of-centre area that can range from frantic glam, smooth love songs, disco grooves and experimental fervor. Having undergone such a constant and ultimately dramatic evolution, constructing a compilation that presents the ever-changing face of the band is a hard task. Various collections have tried and failed. Some of them have included material from singer Bryan Ferry's solo career. This compilation, however, sticks purely to Roxy Music and looks at the material the band released from 1972 to 1982. However, it tackles the issue of evolution in an interesting way: the tracks are presented in reverse chronological order. This logic, although somewhat puzzling at first, serves to be key in ensuring this compilation's success.
The music:
1. Avalon- From 82's "Avalon." An incredibly smooth track, slick production, mellow and with female backing vocals. This is how the band sounded at the end of their run.
2. More Than This- Also from "Avalon," but with a poppier sensibilty. Flawless production, masterfully crafted and catchy as you might hope.
3. Jealous Guy- Cover of a Lennon track. Subdued even compared to the the surrounding songs.
4. Over You- Poppy and clean, not at all obscene. A clear example of latter-day Roxy.
5. Same Old Scene- Things get slightly moodier on this track :)
6. Oh Yeah- Bland pop, and a weak spot. But then it leads us too...
7. Angel Eyes- Almost a throw-away disco song, if not for its infectious pulse, slightly sci-fi effects and memorably sugar-coated lyrics.
8. Dance Away- The softer counterpart to Angel Eyes. "Dance away the heartache/dance away the pain," gives you an idea of the subject matter.
9. Both Ends Burning- Disco of a dark sort. Excellent.
10. Love Is The Drug- Again, disco-ish: a pulsating bass line drives the song, which itself is a great little ditty about going out "to score" some of that "love" drug. Hanging out with the ladies of night, Bryan? Of course.
11. Out Of The Blue- Experimentation time. Flanger effects sweep the majority of the track, and its all the more rousing for it. Energetic and exciting are the best ways to describe the pace of this art-rock journey.
12. All I Want Is You- Things get a bit more conventional here, but not quite. You'll see that in many ways, this song could have been made by any 70s band but at the same time, its execution is pure Roxy Music.
13. Mother Of Pearl- It starts out as a fast-paced rocker, with Ferry liberally employing with idiosyncratic delivery to great effect. And the, more than a minute into the song, it collapses into a beautiful mid-tempo piano ballad. Only Roxy!
14. Street Life- The classic early phase starts here. Completely unforgettable, grade A track.
15. Do The Strand- "There's a new sensation"... it's the strand! Marvelously produced and delivery with a canny sense of fun that makes Roxy Music stick out from the pack.
16. Pyjamarama- The simple chords that introduce the song lead us to a song whose melodies and textures you'll never forget.
17. Virginia Plain- A classic, hands-down.
18. Re-Make/Re-Model- Back to the very beginning. Ferry's quirk and energy stand in stark contrast to the crooner we see 10 years later. The music itself is also jarringly different. It's production is hardly dated, and the music borders prog and glam. And the song structure is playful, and it gets you every time: You think its going to end, and it fools you for more than 3 minutes. One of the best songs I know.
So what did we see? We begun with the best make-out tracks ever and ended up with some iconoclastic musical geniuses. The compilers made an excellent choice by framing their selections in this manner. Rather than seeing a band "devolve," "sell out" or "lose its edge," we see a band that exchanged certain elements for others throughout a 10 year period. Once that mindset (along with the cracking tunes) is embedded in you, you'll gladly go out and seek out the albums from the period that appeal to you the most.
This excellent compilation is readily available, has excellent tracks, boasts great sound quality, is well assembled and is a perfect introduction to an incredible influential band.
Description of The Best of Roxy Music
Roxy Music Photos
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More from Roxy Music
 Country Life |  Avalon |  For Your Pleasure |
 Roxy Music |  Stranded |  Siren |
Roxy Music appeared to have beamed in from another planet when they appeared in the early '70s. Impossibly alien and exotic, they bucked trends by being kitschy, avant-garde, and unashamedly pop. Bryan Ferry was the sensual frontman, Brian Eno threw his deconstructionist spanner into the works, and they played songs that sounded like demented, sexy logarithms. After Eno left in 1973, frustrated that Ferry was marginalizing his input, Roxy became a different beast entirely, developing a suave, sophisticated pop-soul sound and abandoning the art-rock niche to enlist a wider audience. This lush compilation, released to accompany their reunion tour (minus Eno), captures both sides of Roxy and, true to the subversive spirit that informed their early years, does so in reverse order. This anti-chronology means they open with the languid, supper-club croon of 1980s hits "Avalon" and "More Than This," plus the beauteous cover of John Lennon's "Jealous Guy," then peel back the years through midperiod gems such as "Dance Away" and "Love Is the Drug," before closing with the hyperventilating, superbly twisted bubblegum of "Pyjamarama" and "Virginia Plain." The sequencing may be bonkers, but this is an essential souvenir of a band in a million. --Ian Gittins
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