These following compilations are all worthwhile.

V/A : African Scream Contest - Raw & Psychedelic Afro Sounds from Benin & Togo 70s
V/A : African Scream Contest Vol​.​2 - Benin 1963​-​1980
V/A - Bobo yéyé: Belle époque in Upper Volta
Emahoy Tsege Mariam Gebru - Jerusalem (or any of her other releases which are archival compilations)
Mulatu Astatke : New York - Addis - London: The Story of Ethio Jazz 1965​-​1975

gotdamn wrote: Tue Jul 09, 2024 11:30 am If we're talking fan made stuff, I don't think there's a better way to discover the wild world of Silkworm than the Weeks Since I Had A Good Fuck "comp" someone made on the old forum.

I've always meant to do the same with The Leaving Trains, who are a stunner of a band but with hit/miss albums.

Pretty sure my sister made that hahaha!

I would add that I loved comp cds back in the day. The Ground Rule Double one blew my mind.

Not Crap.

Had my parental units buy this K-tel metal comp in the early-80's. It's fairly rockin' but the song that's remained a constant is "Who's Behind the Door" by Zebra. Figures the prettiest song on a metal comp is my favorite. So dreamy and Zeppelin-y.



Also from the 'rents was this bubblegum pop comp that I listened to endlessly. I've always appreciated how 1910 Fruitgum Company leaned into their name with the über-poppy "Simon Says." Christ, I loved that tune. So simple but there's something enchanting about the arrangement of notes into a thing that's annoyingly arresting. The writers of the theme to Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? owe royalties. Other faves were "Little Willy," "Windy," and "Julie, Do Ya Love Me."

Not crap, so many good varieties of compilations: b-sides, various artists with all (or mostly) new and unreleased tracks, non-album single collections (Buzzcocks's Singles Going Steady for example), comprehensive discographies. A couple of my favorites:

¡Cinco Años! and Love & Napalm series on Trance Syndicate
Singles Going Steady
Pathological Compilation (The one with Godflesh, Carcass, Napalm Death, Coil, etc.)
Anti-Disc 1 (The flexi-disc compilation with Circle X. I still can't believe I managed to get a copy of it decades ago.)
The Lake of Fake series
Unwound's Numero reissues
Skinny Puppy's Back and Forth series
No New York
DNA on DNA

I can continue for way too long.

Waffle factor for "greatest hits"/"best of..." compilations. I'd rather get the original albums at that point (Exception for musical acts whose songs were as everywhere and whose record labels just constantly released redundant albums, which happened especially before the 1960s. Those "greatest hits" compilations are not crap.) or skip listening to them altogether if their work overall is that spotty. Lots more waffles for "greatest hits" made in this century and record label contract fulfillment obligation. Those are just made for landfills.

You could do much worse than the Trojan Dub Box. Speaking of old metal comps on vinyl, I have two, 10 Commandments of Metal and Doomsday News, that are pretty blistering. The latter is Noise Records. Comps definitely aren't crap.

Krev wrote: Fri Jul 19, 2024 9:15 am You could do much worse than the Trojan Dub Box.

Maybe it was already mentioned, but these Trojan comps are fabulous. So many fun gems of stuff that are otherwise forgotten. And really, I thing ska, reggae, dub, etc... is best listened to as a singles comps.

Cardholder wrote:Anti-Disc 1 (The flexi-disc compilation with Circle X. I still can't believe I managed to get a copy of it decades ago.)

This is a wonderful record. But a damn obscure one. Warms my heart that anyone else appreciates it. Was originally included w/an artists' book put together by the members of Circle X, and extra copies were given away to friends and perhaps a few were sold around NYC.

What's cool about it is how different the musicians all sound from one another—sound artist Peter Van Riper is nothing like Circle X's noise rock, which is quite different from the wild rockabilly of Bodeco. Yet the concept behind the compilation and the social circle it covers are both very specific and narrow. Plus, it somehow hangs together musically as a journey. Would be a beautiful reissue on hard vinyl (as opposed to flexi), but I'm not holding my breath.

Krev wrote: Fri Jul 19, 2024 9:15 am You could do much worse than the Trojan Dub Box. Speaking of old metal comps on vinyl, I have two, 10 Commandments of Metal and Doomsday News, that are pretty blistering. The latter is Noise Records. Comps definitely aren't crap.

The two big metal comps for me were two budget priced ones:
1. Speed Kills (1985) which gave me a crash course in thrash when I was 10 and knew nothing about the genre besides Metallica and Anthrax
2. Grindcrusher (1989, Earache vinyl) which gave me a crashcourse in death/grind att the time when it was still novel and fresh.
Both these were gamechanging for me.

Otherwise, the Back from the grave-and Pebbles franchises were crucial for me geting inte 60s garagerock and 'Dub gone crazy must surely be the best introduction to 70s dub there is...

The Rhino DIY punk compilations made a huge, huge impact on me, and it would have been really hard for a kid in the mid-90s in Idaho to hear most of these bands otherwise. Still prefer the Dangerhouse versions of the X songs thanks to these!

The Enigma Variations comp in 85 introduced me to so much great US underground music. At least the first three sides did.