Greatest Hits

A greatest hits album (sometimes referred to as a "best of" album) is a compilation album of successful, previously released songs by a particular music artist or band. To increase the appeal of the album – especially to people who already own the previously released material – it is common to include remixes or alternate takes of popular songs or new material, with new songs often being released as singles (and themselves sometimes becoming successful).

Greatest hits albums are typically produced after an artist has had enough successful songs to fill out an album release. Some artists, such as Queen and Billy Joel, have released multiple greatest hits albums through their career. Some greatest hits albums are released only at the end of the artist or group's career, as was the Stone Temple Pilots' Thank You. They are aimed at fans who liked a few of their songs or singles, but not enough to buy an artist's entire catalog as well as potential new fans who want to sample the most famous work of an artist or group with just one purchase.

In British pop music, when a band releases a Greatest Hits album, in most cases after three or four studio albums, it is usually taken as a sign that the band are about to split up. Examples include Greatest Hits albums by Atomic Kitten, Steps, S Club 7, Blue and Take That, although the latter band would reform nine years later. Recent exceptions to this "rule" include Westlife, Girls Aloud and Sugababes, who have either released or are committed to releasing new material after their greatest hits collections.

Some bands refuse to release a greatest hits album, notably AC/DC and Metallica. Manic Street Preachers initially refused to do a greatest hits, but in the end Forever Delayed was released. Radiohead also refused to do such a compilation, but upon their departure from Parlophone Records, one was released. Also, the country music star Garth Brooks long opposed the release of a greatest hits collection, but agreed to it in 1994 but only for a limited time (his release, The Hits was quickly deleted, but not until selling well over ten million copies).

Greatest hits collections can also boost a falling music career. The Beautiful South's first Greatest Hits album, Carry on up the Charts, was originally strongly opposed by the band. However, upon release it became one of the fastest selling albums in chart history.