Album Review: Greatest Hits: The Ultimate Collection - Bon Jovi

Greatest Hits: The Ultimate Collection - Bon Jovi
4/5
It's 24 years since Slippery When Wet rocked so many worlds with its euphoric party-boy anthems.
And it would be easy to say Bon Jovi, who are performing in New Zealand December 4 and 5, have never lived up to that legendary third album with classics Livin' On A Prayer and Wanted Dead or Alive, but this collection provides a few good examples to prove that's not so.
Two versions of this Greatest Hits were released: A 16-song best-of, and a two-disc, 30-track monster. Strangely, Keep The Faith and Blaze of Glory are included only on the second disc.
Included across the set are four new songs, but probably the best Bon Jovi track of the past year was the Glee mash-up of It's My Life with Usher's Confessions Part II. Listening to the original here, it's still a great song, but it sounds terribly slow by comparison.
Lay Your Hands On Me from the 1988 New Jersey album is a welcome bit of nostalgia, but don't forget the great ballads, too, such as I'll Be There For You and Always. Cheesy, yes, but a guilty pleasure.