Search - UFO :: Best Of: Ten Best Series

An Excellent, Inexpensive Short Compilation of UFO

Antinomian | Washington, DC | 01/30/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"First off, the February 18, 2006 review gives a lot of information about the original album locations of the songs and is recommended to read.



I have recently had or still have in a box, UFO's vinyl records from Force It to No Place To Run, and at one point owned or had recorded on tape, UFO Live (early 70's) and Phenomenon. I have played these albums and tapes quite a bit. However, like many people who own records, record player's are seldom used, it's become so much easier to play a CD, and they have to decide if they want the past classics on a CD. This is where compilations shine. For I certainly do not want to have several CD's of songs I've already know very well, nor do I want to spend the money on them, nor have them take up more space in my already crowded abode, bursting in the past with several hundred CD's. What I want is a single CD with some of the excellent tunes I know whenever I need a UFO fix. I also want some money to spend on other band compilations from the 70's: Blue Oyster Cult, Kansas, Styx, Journey, etc, etc. That is where this CD shines. It has 10 absolutely excellent selections and is a budget CD (note price at top of website). Personally, I wanted this when I moved overseas and was able to download my entire CD collection onto my laptop and could leave the CD's themselves behind. I rushed to purchase a bunch of CD's and several compilation discs will eventually add up in total cost. This CD was just what I needed.



For those wanting something more comprehensive, I suppose there's the Essential UFO I've read a lot about, but I haven't readily seen it available. There is also the Best of UFO: Gold. In some ways this is interesting as I had known of the many albums UFO put out in the 80's, but didn't hear, and frankly wasn't interested in, since Michael Schenker departed UFO. The Gold compilation has a smattering of songs from those albums, and so could be of some interest to buyers. However, this compilation covers from Phenomenon 1974 to No Place to Run 1980, which exactly covered my interest span in UFO. When only putting on 10 songs on a compilation, some goods ones will be left out, but that wasn't a concern for me as I already knew the songs. But the songs here are great and are orders of magnitude better to own this than nothing at all. The decision to include two live songs was excellent, as all those that know UFO, know how incredible Strangers In The Night is. Also, as many, I generally didn't like No Place To Run, it was where I lost interest in UFO, but I did like some of the songs, and with the exclusion of the synthesizer Alpha Centauri, I like the song selection here taken from that album.



As many may know, Michael Schenker rejoined UFO in the 90's and did tour. I saw them at an absolutely packed to the gills house at the Limelight in NYC, which really emphasized how many fans of UFO there still are. They did release an album around that time called Walk on Water, and another good compilation covering songs from that CD and past live tunes is called Then and Now. So to really follow UFO's later career you may have to get two compilation CD's.



Selecting between this compilation and Gold may be a difficult choice. Gold intriguingly has 80's UFO songs, but I find the 70's song selection on this CD better as it includes Strangers in the Night songs, and better tunes from No Place to Run. I suppose if you want to cover almost all bases, then 3 separate CD's would be a good choice: 1) Gold, 2) Strangers in the Night (this has been remastered and has 2 new songs and so would cover a lot of the songs from 70's UFO), and 3) either Then And Now or Walk On Water. For those that want just one CD, covering UFO from 1974 to 1980, and inexpensive, this would be the CD. But whatever you do, make a selection. Not having any UFO at all is not a reasonable option.



Enjoy!"