Deathstars – The Greatest Hits On Earth

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With only three albums to their name a greatest hits set from Swedish industrial goths Deathstars can only really be of value if it provides a substantial amount unreleased or bonus material alongside the selections from the regular albums. This is especially true when one of the three albums (2009′s Night Electric Night, contributing five tracks here) is notably weaker than the other two. People interested in Deathstars may just as well watch a couple of the official music videos on YouTube, and then buy Synthetic Generation (2002, four tracks here) and Termination Bliss (2006, five tracks) if they like the style, because things don’t vary very much across the three albums. Just two new songs are included, and all the rare demos from various limited edition versions of the albums are missing. Of the new songs Metal finds Deathstars sounding as much like Rammstein as they ever have and is the stronger of the two, while Death Is Wasted On The Dead is more or less on par with the best of the cuts from Night Electric Night, putting it somewhere in the middle of their catalogue in terms of quality. As an introduction to Deathstars, The Greatest Hits On Earth probably covers their limited career so far comprehensively enough (albeit strangely without the song which gave the disc its title, The Greatest Fight On Earth), but given that Termination Bliss provides almost all of the best songs on display (Tongues, Blitzkrieg, Play God), that album would serve such a purpose just as well. A compilation album this soon looks suspiciously like a contractual obligation ahead of the next studio album appearing on a new label, but even if that’s the case, a full live album would have been a far better idea.

Written by Andy Lye
More: 2011, Compilation Albums, Industrial, Quick.Play Reviews, Deathstars