Foreigner is one of my favorite arena rock bands of the late 70's and 80's. Not unlike many others, such as Eddie Money, Loverboy, Night Ranger and Bruce Springsteen, they followed a general patten of moving from a classic rock sound in the 70's to a more hard pop/rock sound in the 80's--succeeding greatly in both areas!

They've since had three greatest hits albums (RECORDS in 1982, which only has a small collection of their early songs), this one, and 2002's COMPLETE GREATEST HITS.

1977's SELF-TITLED DEBUT:

-Cold As Ice

-Feels Like the First Time

I can't argue with these choices. I'm not very familiar with the band's first three albums outside of the hits, so I truly don't know what may or may not be missing, but I think "Long Long Way to Go" was a radio hit.

1978's DOUBLE VISION:

-Hot Blooded

-Double Vision

These are easily my two favorite early Foreigner rock songs, the title track in particular - with its catchy medium tempo - pointing towards what would become their 80's sound. I actually do know the piano-based classic rocker "Blue Morning Blue Day" was another hit not included.

1979's HEAD GAMES:

-Head Games

-Rev On the Red Line

-Dirty White Boy

This was easily their most hard-rocking album (and the least emphasis on pop), so, consequently, I listen to it the least, but I like the tltle track. Again, I'm not sure of any other hits to emerge from the album.

1981's 4:

-JukeBox Hero

-Waiting For A Girl Like You

-Urgent

Ah, the first album I know so well! Obviously, these three smashes had to be on here, but I wish the underrated semi ballad-type arena rocker "Break it Up" and the 60's styled hard rocker "Luanne" - both hits - were included too.

1984's AGENT PROVOCATEUR:

-That Was Yesterday

-I Want to Know What Love is

This is where the band really started to not get credit for alot of their material. These two hits from this somewhat uneven album, were both great, but the low-key power ballad "Down on Love" and the harder title track should've made the cut too.

1987's INSIDE INFORMATION:

-Say You Will

-I Don't Want to Live Without You

Again, I'm seein' a pattern. These were the two best songs, but nowhere near the only worthy ones that should've seen the light of day here. The abscence of "Heart Turns to Stone" (a rocker slightly harder than "Say You Will") is hard to excuse.;)

1992 NEW songs:

-Soul Doctor

-Prisoner of Love

-With Heaven on Our Side

I had my doubts as to whether these songs would be any good or not, but I proved myself wrong -- (1), an energized, guitar-based rocker, probably one of their heaviest songs, not unlike the upbeat material on INSIDE INFORMATION...

(2) A mid-tempo rocker akin to a slowed-down version of Journey's "Only the Young" (especially the synth opening), sounding closest to their early/mid 80's power ballads, and...

(3) a slightly uptempo ballad with a deeper vocal from Lou. I'd call this a much stronger version of the style of ballads on his 1989 solo album LONG HARD LOOK.

Overall, the somewhat new COMPLETE GREATEST HITS is pretty similar overall to VBO, but I still slightly prefer this one for a few reasons. Out of the 3 new songs here, only one ("Soul Doctor") made it there. Secondly, CGH put edits on a few songs, whereas this has the full-length versions of every song. The good points of CGH is that it has a few 80's songs not present here ("Girl on the Moon" and "Heart Turns to Stone") and new liner notes.

This is stil the best starting point for new fans of the band (and for diehards to pick up the three "new" songs).

I found myself disappointed after grabbing and taking a listen to Foreigner's first greatest-hits compilation, `Records'. Many of the songs were slightly-shorter radio edits. Another slight letdown was the lack of `I Want To Know What Love Is', one of the group's subseqent top hits. So not only is `Records' a collection of the cut-down Foreigner hits, it's incomplete as well (though not intentionally so)!

Fortunately, I discovered `The Very Best... And Beyond!', and found myself in for a pleasant surprise: all of the great tunes from their late 70s-to-mid-80s heyday, and they're all the full, uncut renditions! There were even a couple of new tracks, although I didn't think too much of `em-they sounded to much like their old cuts. But as far as low points go, those tunes are no biggie.

So if you're in a quandary over which Foreigner `greatest hits' album to get, you should definitely grab this one. It's no no-brainer!

`Late

This compilation is close to being perfect with two major problems though. The first problem is the addition of 3 new songs, all of which are stinkers. Luckily those songs are the first songs on the CD so one could simply start on track 4. I know one could go on and on about such and such tracks should be included but releasing a Foreigner compilation without Long, Long Way from Home as this compilation does can't be justified. This was one of their biggest hits on Rock stations, basically a staple on such stations and also a top 20 hit. Omitting that song is similar to deleting Let the Good Times Roll on a Cars compilation, not a huge hit but a staple at Rock stations. It also omitted Blue Morning, Blue Day but that is not the same travesty.

Sound quality is decent; recent re-mastered compilations provide a slight improvement but the difference is nothing to write home about.

If you only want a single Foreigner CD compilation with full length versions, this is a decent buy, provided you could live without the above mentioned tracks. If you can live with edited versions for radio airplay, get the single

which is a definite greatest hits compilation but falls short on being complete due to shortened versions of some of the songs. My choice is The

, a 2cd with all the songs plus the main album tracks in full length versions. Oddly, Rhino has discontinued that album and released (yet) another compilation, decent but not as good as the Definite Collection.

The Very Best and Beyond collects more hits than Foreinger's previous hits complation Records,which had a skimpy 10 songs.The Very Best and Beyond covers Foreigner's career up to 1992,they've only had one new studio album since this complation was released.The Collection Starts out with three new songs,then we are left with 14 hits.Besides most of the songs from Records we have Say You Will,That Was Yesterday,I Want to Know What Love is, and the album track Rev on the Red Line.While hits complations always lack personal favorites The Very Best and Beyond delivers with the exception of Rev on the Red Line,don't think I've ever heard it on the radio,Blue Morning Blue Day was a minor hit and would have been a better choice, other than that The Very Best and Beyond is a fine introduction to 70's supergroup Foreigner.

This album covers all of Foreigner's career, it covers all of their hits, not just the first 4 albums like "Records" did. It features 3 brand new tracks, Soul Doctor, Prisioner of Love, & With Heaven on Our Side.

Also featured are the essential classics by Foreigner, Hot Blooded, Waiting for A Girl Like You, I Want to Know What Love Is, & Feels Like the First Time. The band has always haed great chemistry & a serious propensity for producing top-notch hits no matter how much the band has changed.

The under-rated classics are what makes the album though, Juke Box Hero, Cold As Ice, Double Vision, & Rev on the Red Line are Foreigner at their best, some serious hard rockers which made them staples during arena rock's heyday.

The material after 1984 slips off somewhat, but is pretty good. It is too bad that Unusual Heat was skipped altogether when this album was released. I loved their pre-Records career the best, especially the gritty sound they had on Double Vision & Head Games.

The only flaw is that there are only 17 tracks here & one or two from their latest CD Unusual Heat would've been nice as well. The photo & info on the band in the sleeve is kinda skimpy also. The only new info worth anything value to me is the lyrics of the 3 new tracks.

Overall, another classic hit-laden album by a band that is used to having several of those kind of albums in the career. Foreigner rules!