BLOOD, SWEAT & TEARS : GREATEST HITS [CBS - ESP 1990] LP/RE

Blood, Sweat & Tears "Greatest Hits" LP

(CBS)  1990 made in Spain

cat. num. LSP 982374-1

#rock #blues rock

You've Made Me So Very Happy 3:26

I Can't Quit Her 3:38

Go Down Gamblin' 2:46

Hi-De-Ho 4:05

Sometimes In Winter 3:08

And When I Die 3:26

Spinning Wheel 2:39

Lisa, Listen To Me 2:58

I Love You More Than You'll Ever Know 5:58

Lucretia Mac Evil 3:07

God Bless The Child 5:57

Sometimes, a greatest-hits set is timed perfectly to gather together a group's most successful and familiar performances just at the point when that group has passed the point of their maximum exposure to the public, but before the public memory has had a chance to fade. That was the case when Columbia Records assembled this compilation for release in early 1972. At that point, Blood, Sweat & Tears had released four albums and scored six Top 40 hits, each of which is heard here. But lead singer David Clayton-Thomas had just quit the group, so that the unit that recorded songs like "You've Made Me So Very Happy" was not working together anymore. And even when Clayton-Thomas returned, the band would continue to decline commercially. As such, BS&T's Greatest Hitscaptures the band's peak in 11 selections--seven singles chart entries, plus two album tracks from the celebrated debut album when Al Kooper helmed the group, and two more from the Grammy-winning multi-platinum second album. Using the short singles edits of songs like "And When I Die" emphasizes their radio-ready punch over the more extended suitelike arrangements on the albums, but this selection gains in focus what it lacks in ambition. For the millions who learned to love BS&T in 1969 when they were all over AM radio, this is the ideal selection of their most accessible material. (A later CD reissue of Blood, Sweat & Tears' Greatest Hits replaced each singles edit with the original full-length version.)