Wesley Willis and The Dragnews – Greatest Hits Volume 3 / 2003 Alternative Tentacles / 25 Tracks / http://www.alterativetentacles.com / Released 14 October 2003 / Reviewed 31 October 2003

It was incredibly sad to hear that Wesley Willis moved onto ey’s next life, but time marches on, and Alternative Tentacles released this album soon after Willis passed on. While the title Greatest Hits may be a little odd – a large number of these tracks are only to be found on albums that were unreleased at the time of Willis’ death – the fact is that most of these tracks are relatively uninspired. Yes, I was one of those people who liked “Jello Biafra” and “Alanis Morisette”, but a number of these tracks only modify some of the same ideas that are central to Willis’ success – for example, “Verbal Assault” uses the same exact guitar track as “Jello Biafra”. Still, however much some of these tracks are just basically other tracks that Willis had released, the fact is that this is the perfect drinking and sing-along disc.

The disc comes along with pretty descriptive set of liner notes which include a number of pieces of Wesley’s artwork, as well as an extended biography. What will really sell this disc is the added bonus of a computer-only gallery of Wesley’s work, as well as a few minute-long clip of the forthcoming Wesley Willis documentary. Where most of the songs on this disc are pretty formulaic, some of the tracks are definitely memorable – “Your Way Right Away” is about the fatty foods of Burger King and incorporates some interesting clips and chord progressions that simply aren’t found on the rest of the disc. “Make My Joyplane Crash and Burn” has an interesting vocoded-style set of vocals that sound almost like “My Monkey” off the seminal Marilyn Manson album, “Portrait of An American Family.” While “Oprah Winfrey” suffers from similar vocal delivery as the mass of the tracks on this disc, the instrumentation on Willis’ Casio really makes that leap from simple programmed demo into something greater.

“Love God” finally moves from the synthesized works of the rest of the disc and into the realm of an pseudo-metal song in which the screeched-out vocals of Willis actually sound fitting to the track. Sometimes, Willis’ only saving grace on some of these tracks is the harmonics of eir’s own voice; take into consideration the vanilla “My Keyboard Got Damaged”. If you are a fan of Willis, this album is essential. If you are just ambivalent about ey’s music, don’t bother with it.

Rating : 5.9/10

Top Tracks : Your Way Right Away, Love God