Although only new releases are generally reviewed here, this is a new release of older classics. MusicSpace, the people that brought us such dance collections as Fired Up! and Pulse put forth this new collection called Forever Freestyle which contains various freestyle classics that have not been included on previous compilation series.As expected, it's a collection of unmixed radio/single versions of some very carefully selected hits. This one includes 18 of them.
Here is the tracklisting:
01. Sweet Sensation - Sincerely Yours
02. Seduction - Two To Make It Right
03. Cover Girls - Show Me
04. Exposé - Point Of No Return
05. George LaMond - Bad Of The Heart
06. Lisette Melendez - Together Forever
07. Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam With Full Force - Can You Feel The Beat
08. Shannon - Let The Music Play
09. Linear - Sending All My Love
10. Company B - Fascinated
11. TKA - Maria
12. Cynthia & Johnny O - Dream Boy/Dream Girl
13. Stacey Q - Two Of Hearts
14. Nice & Wild - Diamond Girl
15. Exposé - Come Go With Me
16. Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam With Full Force - I Wonder If I Take You Home
17. Stevie B. - Spring Love
18. Rockell - In A Dream
This collection contains only a fraction of all the great songs that came out in what was the Freestyle era. The 18 songs that were chosen for this collection are quite good. All of these songs were pretty major hits and they span across most of the Freestyle era. No obscure album tracks or B-sides were chosen.
Some songs are in their original single or radio mix versions. A few were edited down from longer lengths for this collection. For some of them, it is very obvious that they were edited down, and for some it was not necessary as there's still almost 6 minutes on the CD that could have been filled with more music. Maybe even one more song. The sound quality of all the tracks is great.The only problems are with the last two tracks. With Stevie B.'s "Spring Love", it's not the same version that was played on the radio or the clubs. It's a whole other version. The vocals sound different and the instrumental production is different too. It seems that this one is from another collection, perhaps a greatest hits album where new vocals had to be recorded because of licensing and original rights issues. Then with Rockell's "In A Dream", it sounds like it came from a continuously mixed compilation. The beginning has remnants of another song. And the ending is faded instead of the cold ending in the original, possibly because another song was being mixed in at the end. Aside from those two obvious problems, the collection as a whole is so well done that the problems can be overlooked. It is worth noting that those are tucked in a the end. This is good for the casual listener or for the car.
The edition currently being sold in stores is a single disc compilation while the one sold on MusicSpace is 2 discs. It has additional songs, however, there's less songs per disc.
