This is one of those CDs where probably the single biggest reason for making it was only to make more money for the record company. This album is a collection of past Every Little Thing songs, made up entirely of ballads. When this album was first announced I wondered if it would include some new music, or entirely old music. Then when I found out there was nothing but old music on it, I thought, "I don't need that!" But I picked it up anyway. You know, because I'm a big ELT fan and I wanted to review it. This album, in fact, is entirely made up of past tracks from their previous albums; there is not so much as one new mix or one new song included, so don't expect anything. I suppose that if you don't own many of ELT's past albums and don't plan to ever buy them, then a purchase of this CD might make sense for you. Or if you particularly love their ballads, perhaps it could make sense. But for most of the big ELT fans who already own the group's past albums, I can't see this one making much sense for you. Included are songs from all parts of their career, despite the fact that they've changed so much in recent times. It's all-inclusive: It doesn't matter if the song is from before or after Mitsuru Igarashi left the group, it doesn't matter that their latest single prior to this album's release seems to be taking ELT in a whole new direction. Often overlooked songs, like "Over and Over" (due to its inclusion on their best album, but none of the original albums), are included here, which is good. There does seem to be a high concentration of music off their most recent album, "4 FORCE", which probably isn't such a good thing. At any rate, it's all there in its exact original format; no new mixes or anything. However, this album did come with a mini CD called "Every Merry Christmas 2001". The CD contains Every Little Thing versions of two Christmas classics, "Silent Night" and "White Christmas". They are both very decent performances, with Kaori's usual colorful vocal style. They were both arranged by the usual ELT people as well, including Ichiro Ito. The arrangement of "White Christmas" is particularly unique and worth hearing. The mini CD only has two songs on it, but it is a nice bonus, considering the dull album that it comes with. Unfortunately, it is likely that "Every Merry Christmas 2001" is only included with the initial printings of this album, and the ones that come out later (after Christmas) will probably not have this bonus, detracting more from the value of this album. At any rate, however, the mini CD is not reason enough to buy this album when you already own the others; it's not that great. Please understand that though we rate this album a five, it's not because the music on it is bad. These are all really great songs on this CD. They are Every Little Thing classics. That's why this album receives a five. Pushing that aside, it would probably be worth a rating of "1", due to the reasons already discussed above. It's great music. Only buy this if you need it or desperately want to collect it.
Buy it here.
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