Thursday 5 April 2012

Paul Weller ['Modern Classics' The Greatest Hits]

Paul Weller's Greatest Hits are certainly a subjective choice, i guess this compilation isn't called 'The Best Of Paul Weller', or it would be even more subjective, who chose this compilation?, i guess it was Paul Weller himself, or rather if they're greatest hits, it's what got into the charts and was successful, but who chose what to throw into the charts?, and of course it's Paul Weller again, i haven't heard every single Weller album, but i was touched by certain songs that aren't included here, plus there's a tendency to send the commercial stuff into the charts, and yet it's a great snapshot of the oeuvre of Weller, i played this just over a year ago [16th March 2011].

Paul Weller is English, born in 1958, he's now 53, this disc was compiled in 1998 [wow! do we need a new Greatest Hits package], i like the visuals that come with this disc, even though the front cover photo is not that great, there's a certain hazy fuzziness to it, a dreamy walking through the wheat fields, the front booklet and back inlay work as one big letterbox picture when the CD case is opened out, and the booklet is full of good pictures, the lettering on the front is great, and the track listing on the back is inspired too.

I really liked listening to everything here, i appreciated a lot of his music that i thought was merely very good before, only tracks 2 & 10 i thought were the weak links, and they were good, it was track 15 'Broken Stones' that i thought was the gem of the bunch,

Here's Paul Weller singing 'Broken Stones' on YouTube.