The Legendary Pink Dots - CanTa MienTras Puedas

The title is Spanish for "Sing While You May," which has been the Legendary Pink Dots' unofficial motto for most of their existence. This 1996 anthology puts that phrase on the cover of the best single-disc summary of their first half of the nineties, following Stone Circles the same way that set had covered the eighties. For a band whose catalog runs past a hundred titles and intimidates almost everyone who approaches it, this is the door that actually opens.

The sequencing is generous from the first note. "Belladonna" leads with acoustic guitar and one of Edward Ka-Spel's most disarming melodies, "I Love You in Your Tragic Beauty" follows it, and the two together make an opening pair that has converted more listeners than any other stretch in the discography. "Princess Coldheart" brings the swirling keyboard swing and its big anthemic close. Elsewhere the collection pulls from Crushed Velvet Apocalypse, The Maria Dimension, Malachai, 9 Lives to Wonder, From Here You'll Watch the World Go By, and the Chemical Playschool sessions, moving between psychedelic folk, gothic cabaret, and full electronic drift without ever feeling like a shuffle.

Two closing tracks, "A Velvet Resurrection" and "Friend," appear here in remixed and extended versions, which makes this more than a pure repackaging job for anyone who already owns the source albums.

Originally issued on Soleilmoon in the US and long a difficult title to find on CD, this is the compilation to start with if you have been circling the Dots and wondering where to begin, and a clean way to fill the gaps if you have been collecting them for years.