Erasure will release a greatest hits album and double-disc DVD on October 28th. Aptly titled Hits!, the nineteen-song collection includes Erasure's cover of Abba's "Take a Chance on Me," as well as the original and remixed version of "Oh L'Amour."

"It's quite strange compiling a thing like this," says Erasure keyboardist Vince Clarke. "Every track has its own memory. 'Oh L'amour' was written for the first album. It was a brilliant time for myself and Andy [singer Bell]. We were getting to know each other. It was exciting making a record. It's special for people who followed our whole career."

Spanning the duo's nearly two-decade career, Hits! includes clear-cut choices such as "Oh L'amour," "Chains of Love" and "A Little Respect," as well as lesser known tracks like "Stay With Me." "We pushed to make sure there were songs from all of the albums," says Clarke. "Even the less successful ones. It's important for us to show the range of things we've been doing for the last eighteen years."

Titled The Hits! The Videos, the double-DVD will feature a disc of live footage, short films and TV performances and another consisting of thirty-five videos. "There's all sorts of things on there," says Clarke. "It's the history of us getting older and fatter."

Clarke and Bell also recently finished an album of acoustic versions of older Erasure songs including "Spiralling," "Rock Me Gently" and "Home," which Clarke expects out next spring. "They're tracks we felt should have been singles," says Clarke. "We put them together with banjo and mandolin. It was good fun to do. The songs themselves were mostly written on acoustic instruments anyway, so it wasn't hard to transfer them over."

Hits! track list:

Oh L'Amour
Sometimes
Victim of Love
Ship of Fools
Chains of Love
A Little Respect
Stop!
You Surround Me
Blue Savannah
Chorus
Love to Hate You
Breath of Life
Take a Chance On Me
Always
Stay With Me
In My Arms
Freedom
Solsbury Hill
Oh L'Amour (remix)

COLIN DEVENISH
(October 15, 2003)