Faith No More - The Very Best Definitive Ultimate Greatest Hits Collection

Rating:

* * * *

Following Faith No More's break up in 1998 - after 15, often fraught years together - it was singer Mike Patton who made the biggest name for himself. He went on to more weird and wonderful things with his many musical projects and record label, Ipecac - a home for heavy, odd and obscure sounds.

But this two-disc collection, released to coincide with the band's reunion announced earlier this year, makes you realise it was very much about the band and not just the singer.

Early songs like

The Real Thing

, with its death metal underbelly, the hip-hop, funk, metal hybrid groove of

Epic

from the late 80s, and the demented heaviness of early 90s tunes like

Be Aggressive

, sound timeless compared to the music of contemporaries like Rage Against the Machine.

And later songs like the spacy epic

Ashes To Ashes

, the beautiful, candlelight funk of

Evidence

, and the 1992 cover of the Commodores'

Easy

, showed the musical scope of the band.

Also included here are pre-Patton songs

R'n'R

and first anthemic sing-a-long hit,

We Care A Lot

, as well as a second disc of rarities and B-sides for die-hard fans.

Now, when did they say they were heading to New Zealand?

Scott Kara