The Police "Every Breath You Take - The Singles" (1986)

Every Breath You Take - The Singles (compilation)
release date: Oct. 25, 1986
format: vinyl / cd
[album rate: 4 / 5]
producer: various
label: A&M Records - nationality: England, UK

Compilation album by The Police containing twelve A-side singles listed in chronological order and spanning all of the band's five studio albums from 1978 to '83. This is the band's first official compilation. The first three albums are each represented with two singles, whereas three singles stem from each of the last two studio albums. Only "Don't Stand so Close to Me '86" (track #6) is a new recording with a different arrangement from the original 1980 single.
Since the first issue, this album has been re-issued, re-packaged and remastered in various editions with new titles by A&M Records. An identical repackaged version was released as Their Greatest Hits in 1990, which appears as the blue-print for the expanded Greatest Hits (1992) - a 16-track release with four additional non-singles thrown in here and there, and then Every Breath You Take - The Classics (1995), where the original '86 release was expanded to a 14-track single cd, only adding two tracks to the original tracklist. In '96 that very same issue became Greatest Hits (of course: a 'new' title requires a new cover... but they are identical). The curious thing is that the two 'Greatest Hits' issues ('92 and '96) were released by the same label (A&M, who have released all official albums by The Police) but these two albums have different tracklistings, whereas the 'The Classics' (95) and the 'Greatest Hits' ('96 version) appear as identical issues with different titles and covers. Well, profit in the making.
Personally, I like the idea of releasing all singles in chronological order, regardless sales numbers and popularity. As often is the case with this kind of releases, the money men of record companies soon focus on how you attract most customers, and you may not do that by putting the band's most popular songs at the end or by including songs that wasn't big hits, but in this case the various reissues are quite close to the original idea - and then of course: there's only one version of an A-side singles' issue.
[ allmusic.com 4,5 / 5, Rolling Stone 4 / 5 stars ]

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4 other similar issues from A&M

Their Greatest Hits (1990) (new title, new cover but identical tracklist)	Greatest Hits (1992) (expanded to 16-tracks, 4 additional tracks thrown in here and there)	Every Breath You Take - The Classics (1995) (remastered & expanded to 14-tracks with 2 additional tracks apperaring at the end)	Greatest Hits (1996) (new title, new cover but identical to '95 compilation 'The Classics')