Hot Potatoes: The Best of Devo

Excellent introduction to DEVO but one or two 'Classics' missing!

     

Hot Potatoes serves as a fantastic introduction to one of the most creative bands of the late seventies/early eighties. All DEVO's well known "Hits" are here, including the infamous 'Whip It', 'Jocko Homo', 'Mongoloid' and their brilliant re-invention of the Stones' 'Satisfaction'! Hot Potatoes lifts tracks from DEVO's first five, better known albums, a wise choice given the quality of the albums that followed! Rather than having a chronological tracklisting [perhaps in some people's opinion to hide their creative decline over the 5 years of material featured, which isn't a fair statement] the compilation mixes the old with the new, suddenly going from three tracks from their post-punk debut 'Q: Are We Not Men? A: We are DEVO!' to the electro-pop of albums such as 'Freedom of Choice', 'New Traditionalists' and 'Oh, No! It's DEVO!' before slipping back to a mix of both. Possibly worth of the full five stars were it not for the fact that there are some truly fantastic tracks that really should have been included! 'Smart Patrol/Mr DNA', 'Sloppy', 'Gut Feeling/Slap Your Mammy' and 'Planet Earth' to name four. Also tarnishing the album is the fact that DEVO [or whoever] decided to include the truly DIRE 'HMS&M Remix' of 'Whip It' at the end of the record straight after 'Big Mess' finishes the job so well! Well worth listening to for a 'full' experience of the band's unparalleled output, which continues to gain a cult following for itself and influence many bands after 20 years!