Kylie Minogue, THE BEST OF KYLIE MINOGUE cd/dvd

Back in July 1987, Kylie Minogue hit the pop scene. It's now 25 years later, and EMI Catalogue celebrates her career longevity with The Best of Kylie Minogue, an album containing 21 of her hits from the years (and their accompanying music videos).

The Best of Kylie Minogue covers Kylie's career from her first hit -- her cover of "The Locomotion" -- to her most recent album, Aphrodite. As such, the album shows her evolution from a perky teen pop singer to, er, a perky disco-inspired pop singer. It's not much of an evolution (her voice is decent from her early work to the present), but it's impossible to tell from this collection, which eschews chronology and simply mixes the songs up. Perhaps this is deliberate, demonstrating that her early and later songs are interchangable; it's not exactly a compliment. The music videos show how Kylie used her image as much as her voice, with later music having more glamour and choreography than the basic early videos.

While this collection is missing is anything extra. There are no new songs, no rarities, and no live tracks (as there were on her Greatest Hits collection, covering her more recent music). The lyrics to all her songs are in the cd booklet -- but not which albums they came from, or her thoughts on the songs, or anything the singer has to say about her 25-year music career. Eighteen of the songs made the top 5 in the U.K., and five of them made number one there -- but I learned that through the description on Amazon.com; none of that info is included here.

Kylie Minogue has always enjoyed more success overseas than in America -- despite her brief return to the charts here with "Can't Get You out of My Head" -- so it's both ironic and appropriate that The Best of Kylie Minogue is an import album in the United States. While it's hard to capture 25 years of music with 21 songs, this collection demonstrates Kylie Minogue's ablity to create danceable, fluffy pop -- which, depending on the listener, makes her a producer of enjoyable, simple pop or someone who's done nearly the same thing for 25 years. Either way, The Best of Kylie Minogue should have had something new, to add to what was already out there.


Overall grade: C
Reviewed by James Lynch