Review Summary: If you ask me, greatest hits albums can either be
1) Representing the greatness of a band
2) Meaning that the band is going to split soon
In this case, it's definitely 1. Hopefully, not 2.
First off, I would like to state the obvious by informing you that this is Our Lady Peace’s greatest hits collection. The Canadian edition features some bonus stuff like a live DVD and other stuff.
Ummm...technically, OLP has been around for more than 10 years, but I guess it is necessary to release a greatest hits collection now that they are at the peak of their career. Also they released Naveed in 19
95 and Healthy in Paranoid Times, released in 20
05. That’s why it’s called
“The Decade”. They have been highly underrated throughout those 10 years (it’s too bad if you ask me).
There are two new songs on this album, which are
“Kiss On the Mouth” and
“Better Than Here”.
When you start to play the CD, you hear a calming acoustic rythim from the song
“Starseed” from OLP’s debut album
“Naveed”. The song picks up a few seconds later and Raine Maida’s vocal range truly shows in this and all other OLP songs. But following “Starseed” is a song very similar, which is
“The Birdman”. It’s pretty much a second helping of the first song. The third track however, is
“Naveed”. Which features a slower, more calming mood than the first two, spanning at least 5 minutes long. The fourth song is one of my favorite OLP songs,
“Superman’s Dead” which isn’t about, uh, superman being dead (I’m just saying).
Now, I’ll fast forward to the songs from the
“Gravity” era, for these songs got me into OLP in the first place. If you enjoyed
“Happiness is not a Fish You Can Catch”, then you should look into this album. The very first song I’ve ever heard by these guys was
“Somewhere Out There”. As you would suspect, this song is about being far away from your girlfriend as I recall it (I don’t %100 recall, seeing that I haven’t listened to that song in a while). Another great listen is the ever-so-fun to listen
“Innocent”. When I first heard the song, I thought the opening drums were nice, but then it started to progress and when I heard these lyrics,
Oh, Johnny wishes he was famous
Spends his time alone in the basement
With Lennon and Cobain
A guitar and a stereo…
…I knew I would enjoy the rest of this song.
And now onto the songs from
“Healthy in Paranoid Times” which, to me, was more of a solo artist album, because Maida was the one with the most talent, even though he was backed up by great musicians. The main idea of that album was how badly the world messed up. I have an example to back that up.
Taken from [/b]Angels/Losing/Sleep[/b]:
looks like the holy ghost is gone
Now afraid of yourself
Over your shoulder you have to watch
Heaven fall into hell…
…Alright, not completely based on how bad the world is, but anyways it’s a good listen.
I now realize something, which is is that these songs were slingles at some point in time.
Anyways, another recommended listen is kiss on the Mouth witch starts off with guitar playing that gives you sort of a depressing feeling. But it lasts throughout the song, with chords too. Not just high strings.
Let me point out the ups and downs of this album:
+ Good musicianship
+ Features great songs like
“Starseed” and
“Innocent”
+ New songs
- Some songs can blend
- Could’ve been a better representation of Our Lady Peace
