Search - Tempters :: Complete Singles

An excellent, comprehensive collection of a great band

David Goodwin | Westchester, NY United States | 05/21/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Hoh boy. Apparently, in the 60's Japan followed America's example with regard to releasing singles; whereas the British concept of a "single" tended to be a non-album track packaged with a B-side, in America singles were often part of an album.Consequently, The Tempters "Singles Collection" is, without a doubt, essentially a "greatest hits" collection, but a startlingly comprehensive one; generous portions of their four major albums are sampled, to both good ends (you get TONS of music here) and bad .... But if you're coming here from the GS I Love You Too compilation, be advised that this is a *great* purchase.Because the Tempters were, for a brief period, an excellent little band. If anything, if one wants to consider the graph of popularity and talent, they were the Beatles of Japan, being almost as popular as pre-fab groups like The Tigers but also being startlingly more talented instrumentally, vocally, and (most importantly) with regard to their homebrew songwriting talent. The band could swing easily from pumping out Zombiesque pop numbers to Bee Gees styled orchestrated excess (as their second album 5-1=0 shows...you get quite a bit of that here, also). Indeed, their only real misfire was the "In Memphis" album, but as that's essentially a Kenichi Hasigawa solo album, it's hard to count that against 'em.Is this compilation perfect? Not exactly. While many of the tracks it doesn't sample from the first album make sense (most of the covers, while excellent, probably weren't quite single material), the lack of the startlingly good "All Day I Call Your Name" is a big downside. Two, while it's nice to have the rare single version of "Ame Yo Furanaide" on CD finally, the fact that it shows up here only means that, irritatingly, the disc is a necessity and not just a good introduction to the group. Thirdly, Teichiku's remastering leaves quite a bit to be desired, and the overuse of no-noise here is just as bad as on the standard catalogue discs.In summary, though, if one has a passing interest at all in pursuing the Japanese GS period, this is a great purchase with which to begin."