No Vacancy: The Best of The Motels

No Vacancy: The Best of The Motels is a 19-track collection compiling songs from 1980s group The Motels. I've decided to do this review in two sections.

The music itself gets a grade of B+ from me. Most of the songs are good, some are great, but a few are a tad fogettable. The standout tracks: "Danger," "Only the Lonely," "Suddenly Last Summer," "Icy Red," "Total Control," "Take the L.," "Remember the Night," and "Bonjour Baby."

The song selection, however, gets a grade of B- from me. While generally good, some of the less interesting album tracks could have been passed over for some of the omitted hits. For example, "Forever Mine" is the set's most glaring omission, but its B-side, "So L.A.," made the cut. Other fairly popular Motels tracks which are not included (in my subjective order of importance): "Footsteps," "Shock," "Days Are OK," and "Mission of Mercy." However, I do understand that the space constraints of a single disc set would have made it hard to include all of those along with some of the quality album tracks that are here. Perhaps a Best of, Vol. 2 would have done the trick?

Despite some quibbles with song selection, this set is generally good and probably deserves a solid four out of stars on a rating scale.

Tracks:
1. Danger
2. Only the Lonely
3. Celia
4. Shame
5. Careful
6. Suddenly Last Summer
7. So L.A.
8. Cries and Whispers
9. Icy Red
10. Apocalypso
11. Total Control
12. Take the L.
13. Trust Me
14. Remember the Nights
15. Bonjour Baby
16. Little Robbers
17. Annie Told Me
18. Kix
19. Whose Problem?