Pros: Six Hot 100 singles, including Ballroom Blitz and Fox On The Run.
Cons: One of four different re-packagings of the same Ten Best Series CD from Capitol-EMI.
The Bottom Line: Six Hot 100 hits at a cheap price, but with four versions in print with the same tracks but with different covers, try not to buy the same album twice.
Don_Krider's Full Review: The Best of Sweet: Ten Best by Sweet
The folks at Capitol-EMI came up with the budget "Ten Best" series of CDs a decade back which feature hits by a number of one-time major Capitol-EMI acts.
One of those acts, The Sweet, famed for Top 5 singles like Ballroom Blitz and Fox On The Run, is featured on the 1997 CD release Ten Best Series: The Best Of The Sweet.
An interesting thing...
A quick note, though. This 1997 CD has been released at least four times, always with the same ten tracks, with different covers on each release (including The Best Of The Sweet on Collectables Records).
Most recently it was released yet again via Best Buy stores as part of their Rock On Breakout Years collection (CDs set up in a separate section in the store with a different artist featured for a different rock year; in this case, The Sweet for "1975").
The cardboard box around the enclosed jewel box (with a 2006 release date on it) in this collection has a new UPC code # of 6 28261 11172 5, but the CD inside (which you can't see the cover of until you remove the cardboard box after getting home with your purchase) is actually the 1997 Capitol-EMI "Ten Best" album with a different bar code of 7 24231 94152 2.
The original release on Capitol-EMI wasn't much to remember (no CD booklet, just a photo on a card in the jewel box).
The repackaged Best Buy CD (manufactured by EMI Special Products and distributed by Madacy Entertainment) does feature a brief biography of the band on the outer box, a welcome addition, and the cardboard box has a nice cover photo of the band performing live.
Another plus to this re-release is the Best Buy price of $5.99 in store. But to release the album four times with different covers, that just doesn't seem right (not nice to try to trick customers). What I'm reviewing here is the old CD within the new cardboard box I bought the other day (what a deal!).
I would also note that a far better, slightly more expensive collection is The Best Of The Sweet from 1992 on Capitol with 16 tracks, including hits from the band's pre-Capitol years like Blockbuster, Little Willy and Wig-Wam Bam.
This collection
The so-called "Ten Best" on this 2006 re-release of the shorter Ten Best Series: The Best Of The Sweet from 1997 aren't the band's best, though there are great moments here.
Missing are some great bubblegum pop tracks written by Nicky Chinn and Mike Chapman from the band's early years, like The Sweet's 1973 Top 5 Bell Records hit Little Willy, one of the band's nine Billboard Hot 100 hits released in the U. S. between 1971 and 1978.
What is on this CD are the band's final six U. S. hits on Capitol Records: Ballroom Blitz (another Chinn-Chapman-written tune which peaked at #5 in 1975), Fox On The Run (#5 in 1975-76, the band-written song sold a million copies to earn a Gold Record Award), Action (#20 in 1976; since covered by Def Leppard), Funk It Up (David's Song) (#88 in 1977), Love Is Like Oxygen (the long version, which hit #8 in 1978) and California Nights (#76 in 1978).
The remaining four tracks are the non-U. S. hits Dream On, Love Is Like Oxygen, The 6-Teens and Teenage Rampage.
Save for a short bio on the cardboard cover of the Best Buy-stocked release (if you buy the Capitol-EMI CD in regular stores, you won't even get that), there is no CD booklet to speak of, hence no lyrics, no photos and nothing to explain why The Sweet were a wonderful glam-rock band in the 1970's (whose music has been covered by artists like Def Leppard and Pat Benatar).
The band
The Sweet scored hit-after-hit in their native England, performing songs mostly written by people not in the band in the group's formative years. Their earliest recordings only had lead singer Brian Connolly on the singles, with studio musicians playing the music on vinyl, while the band members toured and played the music live.
At some point, success, and the band's ability to play the music on stage to huge, enthusiastic crowds throughout Europe, gave the band the power to demand to play on their own recordings (it was their faces on the album covers, after all). By the time of their Capitol years, The Sweet were a tight outfit in the studio and they were writing their own songs.
The bad boy image was real. Brian Connolly had his throat kicked in during a bar fight, but he recovered and continued to sing with one of the most distinctive voices in rock until his death from liver failure in 1997.
Drummer Mick Tucker, who passed away from leukemia in 2002, pounded the skins as hard as any stickman ever did. Guitarist Andy Scott, he of the muscular, aggressive, sizzling guitar sound, and rock-steady bassist Steve Priest filled out the band's sound.
For a cheap price, this isn't a bad CD, but I fault Capitol-EMI for the constant repackaging of the set.
The music
The version of Action presented on Ten Best Series: The Best Of The Sweet is the U. S. single version, not the longer, more inspiring album-version on the Give Us A Wink LP from 1976.
Action is a driving little number, with quirky guitar riffs and a backup vocal styling that reminds me of Queen circa the same time period ("everybody wants a piece of the action").
Ballroom Blitz, from its pulsing opening drumbeat, through the novel idea of identifying the band members in the song's intro ("...are you ready, Steve? (uh-huh) Andy? (yeah) Mick? (okay) Alright fellas, let's go!..."), and featuring some sizzling rock 'n' roll, is a cool song.
The lyrics on "Ballroom Blitz" (new to the U. S. in 1975, but a non-band-written hit from their British superstardom days) are priceless, too ("...and the man in the back said everyone attack, and it turned into a ballroom blitz..."), helping cement The Sweet's image as bad boy rockers.
On the synthesizer-driven Fox On The Run, a band-written favorite, that image of party-loving rockers is carried further ("...fox on the run, you scream and everybody comes a-runnin', take a run and hide yourself away, foxes on the run...").
The band's fourth and last Top 10 single in the U. S., Love Is Like Oxygen, is presented here in the glorious long version instead of the short single version that hit the U. S. charts. The band is more experimental here, with an acoustic guitar and keyboard work on the bridge that reminds one of bands like Yes in its execution.
Love Is Like Oxygen ("...you get too much, you get too high, not enough and you're gonna die...") goes through a lot of changes during 6 minutes and 53 seconds, at one point a simple rocker, at others a Queen-influenced rave-up, while at others a classical masterpiece. The band was seldom better than they are here.
Dream On is flat-out gorgeous, a piano-based, string-soaked ballad that has nothing to do with the Aerosmith tune of the same name. The lead vocal reminds me of the late, great Freddie Mercury here and the Queen-styled harmonies are to die for ("...gentle like a baby, I'll keep you warm tonight...").
Vintage Sweet numbers like Sweet F. A. (with some amazing lead guitar-work by Andy Scott), The 6-Teens and Teenage Rampage seem pretty dated now, but I remember when I was a teenager who thought such tunes were great little anti-conformity anthems ("come join the revolution now, and recognize your age, it's a teenage rampage...").
On tracks like California Nights ("everybody's dancing, California nights") The Sweet explored disco-inspired boogie nights, while on Funk It Up (David's Song) the band travels in a James-Brown rhythm and blues direction that seems off course.
Final recommendation
Overall, as an inexpensive $5.99 list CD with a running time of 41 minutes and 57 seconds, Ten Best Series: The Best Of The Sweet isn't a bad deal. But, a better collection is the slightly more expensive, still-in-print Capitol Records Best Of The Sweet from 1992 with 16-tracks that cover the band's entire career.
And, for the people that are already fans, you can't beat complete albums like Desolation Boulevard and Give Us A Wink for your listening pleasure.
Related CDs by The Sweet:
Desolation Boulevard (featuring the Top 5 hits, Ballroom Blitz and Fox On The Run, the album reached Gold Record status and peaked at #25 in 1975-76): http://www.epinions.com/content_132562325124
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