Sade: Best of Sade Review

Released in 1994, Sade's "Best of Sade" CD carries an Epic record label. This CD is a compilation of Sade's best music spanning the past decade and a half. Sade's music is a fusion between jazz and pop rock, ensuring a large and loyal listener base.

Track List

1. Your Love Is King
2. Hang On To Your Love
3. Smooth Operator
4. Jezebel
5. Sweetest Taboo, The
6. Is It A Crime
7. Never As Good As The First Time
8. Love Is Stronger Than Pride
9. Paradise
10. Nothing Can Come Between Us
11. No Ordinary Love
12. Like A Tattoo
13. Kiss Of Life
14. Please Send Me Someone To Love
15. Cherish The Day
16. Pearls

Sound Quality
Allow me to start off this portion of the review by saying; "Don't listen to this CD on crappy speakers". If your speakers have weak bass response or cannot play clearly at loud volumes, don't waste your time getting this CD. This CD demands good audio equipment to be faithfully reproduced. From the very start, this CD transforms your listening area into a room of sound with "Your love in King". The bass notes pipe out on this song and if your speakers aren't up for the task, do one of the following:

1. Trash your speakers in favor of newer and better ones.
   
2. Get a subwoofer. (You will thank me when watching movies, etc)
   
3. Don't listen to this CD on your current set-up.

Go to a friends house and listen to it, if they have a better system. "Smooth Operator" is a fun and musical song. I find it amusing sometimes to change the lyrics to "just wipe you're a-s with some smooth toilet paper." "Nothing can come between us" is a good song to test for coloration in the midrange of the particular loudspeaker you are listening too. "Love is stronger than pride" is a great song to listen how well a speaker can reproduce the very subtle nuances. Believe it or not, "Paradise" is an excellent song to troubleshoot bass phasing problems in your system. When we initially installed our reference system, the subs cross-over setting was not optimized to blend with the mains and was thus causing phasing problems with the main speakers.

We played "Paradise" through the system and realized the bass notes did not sound correct. Instead of sounding deep and tight, they lacked the low end punch and had difficulty sustaining the notes. I easily fixed this problem by adjusting the sub's crossover and a few seconds later, I was in musical bliss. Sade's music is both soothing, passionate and alive. I can't think of a better example of a CD that covers the entire audio spectrum as this one does. The only negative thing I have to say about this CD is that some of the songs tend to sound a tad bright, but that is a fault of the original recording, not the re-mastering for this particular CD. In summary, you really can't go wrong with this CD from a sound quality and a musical content standpoint.