The Best of The Animals (1966 album)

The Best of The Animals
Greatest hits album by The Animals
Released February 1966
Recorded 1964–1965
Genre Rock, blues rock, rhythm and blues
Length 31:36
Label MGM E/SE-4324
Producer Mickie Most
The Animals U.S. chronology
Animal Tracks
(1965)		 The Best of The Animals
(1966)		 Animalization
(1966)
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic[1]

The Best of The Animals was The Animals' first greatest hits collection. It was released in February 1966 in the United States, but never put out in the United Kingdom (where a similar album, The Most of Animals, was also released in 1966). The album showcased The Animals' tough-edged pop hits combined with their more devoted blues and R&B workouts.

History

This was the first Animals album to feature new keyboardist Dave Rowberry in its photographs. Liner notes by Record Beat's June Harris extolled the musical and culture virtues of the group and emphasized how close she was to the group. However, overall copyediting was poor and four of the members' names were misspelled.

The album was a great commercial success in the U.S., peaking at number 6 on the Billboard 200, the highest such mark of their career, and remaining on the chart for over two years.[2] By July 1966 it had been certified as a gold record, their only album ever to attain that status.[3]

In his 1979 volume Stranded: Rock and Roll for a Desert Island, famed rock critic Greil Marcus selected The Best of The Animals for inclusion on same, writing: "This was trash R&B from Newcastle, England, and especially when the focus shifted from American blues to savage pleas for release from working-class slums, more powerful than it had any right to be."[4] In 1997, Rolling Stone magazine placed The Best of The Animals into the 1960s section of its Rolling Stone 200: The Essential Rock Collection list.[5]

Other compilation albums by the same name (and sometimes even the same cover) but different contents would appear in later decades.

Track listing

Side one
  1. "It's My Life" (Roger Atkins, Carl D'Errico) – 3:09
  2. "Gonna Send You Back to Walker" (Johnnie Mae Matthews, John Hammond Jr.) – 2:20
  3. "Bring It On Home to Me" (Sam Cooke) – 2:40
  4. "I'm Mad Again" (John Lee Hooker) – 4:15
  5. "The House of the Rising Sun" (trad. arr Alan Price) – 4:29
Side two
  1. "We Gotta Get out of This Place" (Barry Mann, Cynthia Weil) – 3:17 ("mistaken" US version)
  2. "Boom Boom" (John Lee Hooker) – 2:57
  3. "I'm in Love Again" (Fats Domino, Dave Bartholomew) – 2:59
  4. "Roberta" (Huey "Piano" Smith, Johnny Vincent) – 2:04
  5. "I'm Crying" (Alan Price, Eric Burdon) – 2:49
  6. "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood" (Bennie Benjamin, Sol Marcus, Gloria Caldwell) – 2:26

Personnel

See also

References

  1. ↑ Allmusic review
  2. ↑ "The Animals Biography". Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Retrieved 17 February 2007.
  3. ↑ "RIAA - Gold & Platinum Searchable Database". Recording Industry Association of America. Retrieved 19 February 2007.
  4. ↑ Marcus, Greil (1979). Stranded: Rock and Roll for a Desert Island (paperback). New York: Alfred A. Knopf. p. 255. ISBN 0-394-73827-6.
  5. ↑ "Rolling Stone 200: The Essential Rock Collection". rocklistmusic.co.uk. Retrieved 24 October 2012.
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