Wurst

To celebrate over 25 years on the industrial music scene, KMFDM collect all their best cuts on Wurst, their first truly killer compilation since 1998’s Retro. While that one went by the book, this one tries a little harder, arranging tracks in a non-chronological order for maximum listenability and picking 12” versions, single versions, or remixes if longtime leader Sascha Konietzko deems them better than the originals. Some of the tracks are just simple “edits,” most likely because of run time and the desire to have a fat track list, and while this may disappoint the purist, nothing seems overly slashed. Everything the newcomer wants is here with no major hits missed but the liner notes are a bit skimpy and not at all bibliographic, going as far as to declare this set of tunes was produced, mixed, and engineered by “everyone.” Anyone who wants the full story is better off with the simultaneously released Greatest Shit, which features a bonus disc of deeper cuts geared toward the longtime fan along with informative liner notes. Still, with 19 well-chosen cuts from 11 albums shaped into 72 minutes of prime industrial bedlam, anyone looking for a one-disc KMFDM compilation couldn’t do much better than Wurst. ~ David Jeffries