Tina Turner Simply The Best CD

Live Recording

Personnel: Tina Turner, Rod Stewart (vocals); Dan Hartman (acoustic guitar, electric piano, organ, keyboards, programming, background vocals); Tony Joe White (guitar, harmonica, synthesizer, bass); Jeff Golub, Jeff Beck, Pat Thrall, James Ralston, Gene Black, Barney Kessel (guitar); Edgar Winter, Gary Barnacle, Plas Johnson (saxophone); Nick Plytas (piano, synthesizer); Kenny Moore (piano); Phillipe Saisse, Casey Young (keyboards); Greg Mathieson (synthesizer); Bob Feit, Bernard Edwards, T.M. Stevens, Carole Kaye (bass); Art Wood, Graham Broad, Graham Jarvis, J.T. Lewis, Phil Collins (drums); Simon Morton, Frank Capp (percussion); Lance Ellington, Tessa Niles (background vocals).
Producers include: Dan Hartman, Tina Turner, Rupert Hine, Terry Britten, Albert Hammond.
This includes a bonus DVD disc.
Personnel: Tina Turner, Rod Stewart (vocals); Dan Hartman (acoustic guitar, electric piano, organ, keyboards, programming, background vocals); Tony Joe White (guitar, harmonica, synthesizer, bass); Jeff Golub, Jeff Beck, Pat Thrall, James Ralston, Gene Black, Barney Kessel (guitar); Edgar Winter, Gary Barnacle, Plas Johnson (saxophone); Nick Plytas (piano, synthesizer); Kenny Moore (piano); Phillipe Saisse, Casey Young (keyboards); Greg Mathieson (synthesizer); Bob Feit, Bernard Edwards, T.M. Stevens, Carole Kaye (bass); Art Wood, Graham Broad, Graham Jarvis, J.T. Lewis, Phil Collins (drums); Simon Morton, Frank Capp (percussion); Lance Ellington, Tessa Niles (background vocals).
Producers include: Dan Hartman, Tina Turner, Rupert Hine, Terry Britten, Albert Hammond.
Simply the Best is surrounded by some of the best situations a compilation can hope for. Tina Turner's work for Capitol past Private Dancer was spotty, she made a bunch of appearances on soundtracks and other artists' albums, and most of the tracks on Private Dancer are good enough to own twice. Almost half of Private Dancer shows up on Simply the Best, but you don't have to endure the way the original album spiraled down into slick fizzle. Instead you have to endure a misguided, pumped-up house remix of "Nutbush City Limits," but that's it. Everything else here is either top-notch or campy, certifiable fun. A duet with Rod Stewart on "It Takes Two" supplies the fun along with the new track, "I Want You Near Me" (Turner to lover: "You're so good with your hands/To help me with a hook or zip"). The two other new tracks tacked to the end beat out most of the album cuts the collection passes on, plus you get the bombastic "We Don't Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)" without having to buy a dull soundtrack. The oldest cut by years is the monolithic "River Deep-Mountain High," which is a bona fide classic but sonically out of place here. Reprogram the disc to play it at the beginning or end, skip the new "Nutbush" completely, and you've got sparkling, nearly perfect overview of Turner's postcomeback career. ~ David Jeffries
There's good news and (just a little) bad news about this Tina Turner greatest hits package. The good news is that what's here is across the board terrific stuff, from her stunning update of Ann Peebles simmering r&b classic "I Can't Stand the Rain," to the more rock oriented songs like "Better Be Good to Me" (the most convincing imperative in all of recorded music) and ""What's Love Got to Do With It". Best of all, the version of "River Deep-Mountain High" here is the original '60s track, re-mastered and re-equalized by genius producer Phil Spector himself. The bad news? The set came out in 1991, and thus misses out on "I Don't Wanna Fight" (from the Turner bio-pic WHAT'S LOVE GOT TO DO WITH IT?) and her sensational mid-'90s remake of John Waite's "Missing You."