David GrayGreatest HitsReview

The trouble with Greatest Hits is that putting work together like this is it allows comparison and the unfortunate truth is that the songs from White Ladder stands head and shoulders above everything else David Gray has produced. Mythically that album was a self-financed last-throw-of-the-dice from an artist whose previous three albums had gained a lot of critical respect not sold in any great quality. The alchemy of undoubted talent blended with backs-to-the-wall desperation and gilded coffee tables across the world multi-platinum.

There is a certain a bittersweet quality to the White Ladder songs that transcended his folk rock milieu. Take the keening beauty of "Sail Away". It contain no greater lyrical genius than any of his latter work but the passion in his voice makes a believer out of you - listen to the way the way that he spits out ‘I been talking drunken gibberish’.

Equally "Babylon", his breakthrough hit, and "Please Forgive Me". It is not just the skittering electronica wedded to the elegantly simple acoustic guitar that makes these songs stand out but also the honest and raw emotions conveyed on them. Compare them to the heartless and smug "One I Love" which sounds like it belongs on the soundtrack from a bad movie (actually that’s "This Year's Love") or the new number "You're The World To Me". They sound formulaic and passionless: one part Gray yodelling, some stringy swoops, a bit of plinky plonky piano, a title and lyrics on the theme of committed love, et voilá, David’s loyal fan base have one more reason to ask for the album for Christmas.

The fact of the matter is his the majority of his best work is all on that fourth album. Chuck in a couple of others such as "Dead In The Water", the opener from A New Day At Midnight that is sadly missing here and you have a David Gray album infinitely more worth buying than this effort which is strictly for the completionistas.