It may have taken them a little while to get going, but when
the Eurythmics hit their stride with their second album
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This), they began a hit streak that defined them as one of the most commercially successful and musically satisfying new wave bands of the '80s. For six years, the group was reliable, turning out at least one great single on each album, none of which sounded identical, yet all were recognizable as the work of
Dave Stewart and
Annie Lennox.
Greatest Hits summarizes those glorious years and while it misses a couple of hits -- a bad thing when the sublime "Right by Your Side" is concerned, but not when "Sexcrime (Nineteen Eighty-Four)" is -- it remains an excellent collection. It might not follow a strict chronological order, but it flows nicely, revealing that the band that produced such chilly synth-pop classics as "Sweet Dreams," "Here Comes the Rain Again," "Love Is a Stranger," and "Who's That Girl?" were capable of delivering equally captivating light pop and ballads ("There Must Be an Angel (Playing With My Heart)," "Don't Ask Me Why," "Thorn in My Side"), ersatz soul ("Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves"), and hard-driving rock & roll ("Missionary Man," "I Need a Man"). Few of their contemporaries were capable of such range and
Greatest Hits proves that the best of
the Eurythmics' work were undeniable pop classics.