It should come as no surprise that after the David Crowder*Band announced their breakup--which sent shockwaves through the worship music industry--a great hits collection would soon follow. Here we are over a year later and that Hits collection is finally surfacing, and all the top songs are represented.
 

Such collections have always faced an uphill battle, but I think there's even more challenges facing them in the age of digital music where everyone already has their own personal "greatest hits" playlists for an artist long before the artist ever releases an official one. These collections always run at least two huge risks: the fact that most loyal fans already have most (if not all) of what's being released, and the fact that any band with a remotely lengthy discography will likely be unable to cover even all of their biggest hits, let alone every fan's favorite songs. From the start, at least some fan-favorites will not escape being left out of such collections, which will alienate some potential buyers. And that's assuming they'd consider shelling out the money for the collection anyway if they have most of these songs already.
 

Greatest Hits have always seemed to target casual fans who follow a band's singles but not their whole albums. And they also traditionally throw on a few new goodies to attract those who have the songs to consider purchasing the collection.
 

So how does this album fare in these terms? Pretty much exactly as I just described. Many of the bands most recognizable radio hits are here. "O Praise Him (All This For A King)," "Our Love Is Loud," "Wholly Yours," "Open Skies," "Here is Our King" and "Everything Glorious" are all included. There are a few lesser-known cuts such as "The Glory of It All."

There's the excellent cover of the John Mark McMillan breakout classic "How He Loves." These are all excellent songs and great reminders of why it is we love DC*B and are so sad to see them go. All of their major albums seem to get as fair representation as possible given the tracklist. And yes, there are some new goodies. Some of the bands new songs get new remixes and included here. And lastly, there is a sneak preview track from David Crowder's forthcoming release under his new moniker, Crowder. 
 

The new remixes sound exactly like remixes. If these are your things, that'll definitely be a plus for this collection. However, those who aren't fans of remixes already will probably not be won over by these. (Although "No One Like You" has an interesting new musical approach that adds some fine emotional layers to it.) The songs are still good but one cannot help but wonder if their originals would've made for more accessible inclusions when the number of regular hits is fairly small at just 10--excluding the bonus goodies. 
 

The collection closes with the aforementioned new track from Crowder. "This I Know" has a bit of a country sound to it and is definitely a new musical direction for Crowder, while the chorus still has some hints of where he's been with his band. Lyrically, Crowder is just unashamed of Christ as ever: "Lift me up to feel your touch / it wouldn't be that much for you / this I know." It'll be interesting to see what the final product looks like. It should be a fine new chapter is one of CCM's most recognizable names. 

 

Listeners will have to determine for themselves if this hits collection is worth their purchase or not. While DCB fans will likely want to check out the new track and perhaps the remixes, if they have all of the other songs already, they might be content with just hitting up digital retailers for the new stuff. However, if somebody has only been a casual DCB follower thus far, this is a solid collection of hits and they might consider giving this hits collection a shot.

Song to Download Now:
"This I Know" (Get it on iTunes here.)