The Best of Roxy Music

Performer: Roxy Music
Distributor: EMI Music Distribution

Notes: Personnel includes: Brian Ferry (vocals); Andy Mackay, Phil Manzanera, Brian Eno, Paul Thompson, Graham Simpson, John Porter, Eddie Jobson, Rik Kenton, John Gustafson, Neil Jason, Alan Spenner, Gary Tibbs, Neil Hubbard, Andy Newmark, A. Schwartzberg, Jimmy Maelen, David Skinner, Paul Carrack, Yanick Etienne, Fonzi Thornton, Richard Tee, Michael Dawe. Producers: Roxy Music, Rhett Davies, Chris Thomas, John Punter, Peter Sinfield. This is an Enhanced CD, which contains both regular audio tracks and multimedia computer files. Liner Note Author: Doctor I.D. Smith. Photographers: Karl Stoecker; Antony Price; Anthony Price; Anton Corbijn. What other pop band from the 1970s and early '80s conjures up the image of a debonair man in a dinner jacket ordering a dry martini and, with a devilish smirk on his face, sidling up to a voluptuous stranger in a red velvet dress? With the seductive croon of resident cad Bryan Ferry and the band's amalgam of smooth balladry, soulful R&B, and quirky pop-rock, the sound of Roxy Music is unmistakably lush, sophisticated, and difficult to resist. Devotees of the group will want most of the individual albums, including COUNTRY LIFE and AVALON. But for the casual fan or uninitiated listener, there is no better package than this 18-track compilation. THE BEST OF ROXY MUSIC has the band's best-known singles, including "More Than This," "Love Is the Drug," "Virginia Plain," and an excellent interpretation of John Lennon's "Jealous Guy." Sequenced in reverse chronological order, the music morphs from Ferry-directed smooth pop to earlier, Brian Eno-influenced, experimental glam rock. (Eno left the band after the second album.) For a fine assortment of decadent pop gems, it's hard to beat this collection.

Q (8/01, p.161) - 4 stars out of 5 - "...The songs still sound fantastic..."

Like Bowie, Roxy Music delivered art-rock with a heavy dose of irony, a scarce commodity in the mid-'70s. Bryan Ferry's lounge-lizard persona meshed with Brian Eno's pioneering electronics and Phil Manzanera's highly textured guitar work to create a decadent but humorous sound that influenced many '80s new wave bands on both sides of the Atlantic, from the Cars to Duran Duran.

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