Greatest Hits

1	Welcome to the Jungle
2	Sweet Child O' Mine
3	Patience
4	Paradise City
5	Knockin' on Heaven's Door
6	Civil War
7	You Could Be Mine
8	Don't Cry (Original)
9	November Rain
10	Live and Let Die
11	Yesterdays
12	Ain't It Fun
13	Since I Don't Have You
14	Sympathy for the Devil

Barnes & Noble

Although the very notion of this album caused a seismic shift significant enough to get Axl Rose and Slash on the same side of a lawsuit filed in an attempt to block its release, Guns N' Roses' Greatest Hits is an effective distillation of the band's career through 1991 -- the last time they released new material. The 14-track disc contains the Gunners' best-known hits -- "Welcome to the Jungle" and "Sweet Child o' Mine" provide a strong one-two punch at the onset -- but a good bit of the set is given over to covers and harder-to-find material. Their version of "Sympathy for the Devil," previously available only on the soundtrack to Interview with the Vampire, fills both of those criteria, and it makes for some fascinating listening. A remake of Paul McCartney's "Live and Let Die" leans a little too much on studio excess to connect with any power, but the band's take on the Dead Boys' (via Peter Laughner) nihilist manifesto "Ain't It Fun" carries a brass-knuckled impact. Hits is rounded out by a passel of the sweeping epic tunes -- "Civil War" and "November Rain," to name a pair -- that Rose and company sprinkled across the Use Your Illusion discs. This is a reminder of how powerful a force Guns N' Roses were for a fleeting moment in rock history. David Sprague

All Music Guide

Guns N' Roses' Greatest Hits may bear all the hallmarks of a hastily assembled compilation -- there are no liner notes, the cardboard packaging is flimsy, the remastering isn't notable -- but it does offer all the band's biggest hits: "Welcome to the Jungle," "Sweet Child O' Mine," "Patience," "Paradise City," "Don't Cry," "You Could Be Mine," "November Rain," and "Live and Let Die" among them. While there are certainly several noteworthy tracks missing -- charting singles like "Nightrain" and "Estranged," and essential album tracks like "It's So Easy," "Mr. Brownstone," and "Used to Love Her," for instance -- for listeners who want a collection containing the group's biggest hits on one disc, this disc will serve their needs nicely. (Of interest to diehards is the band's cover of the Rolling Stones' "Sympathy for the Devil," previously only available on the Interview With the Vampire soundtrack and making its first appearance on a GN'R album here.) Stephen Thomas Erlewine