For those of you not in the know, multi-platinum-selling act Nelson is unveiling their most comprehensive compilation ever on July 8th, 2022 on CD and digital platforms through Universal Music Enterprises (UMe).

Greatest Hits (And Near Misses) not only includes their smash (Can’t Live Without Your) Love and Affection and other hits from their two Geffen Records releases, but also notable tracks from the Nelson twins’ well-received subsequent albums.

Available starting today, pre-order and hear the first track, Too Many Dreams, which had previously only been officially available in Japan as a 1991 single and as an After The Rain (Japanese Edition) bonus track and is getting its digital debut.

Included are eight additional tracks, exclusively licensed from the Nelsons and their Stone Canyon Records label. Lightning Strikes Twice, which is often viewed as After The Rain’s true sequel (and even considered by some a stronger album), is represented by Take Me There, You’re All I Need Tonight and Call Me.

Rockstar hails from Peace Out (lauded by one critic as being quintessential Nelson from start to finish) while A Girl Like That comes from Life (praised as sparkling, melody-driven pop/rock by Allmusic.com).

Greatest Hits (and Near Misses) also includes the newly recorded acoustic version of Keep One Heart, a studio track that appeared on their Perfect Storm live album and as a bonus tune on After The Rain’s Japanese version. Two Heads Are Better Than One is a song movie fans will recognize from Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure.

This original unreleased version features Gunnar’s vocals as heard in the film (while the version on the soundtrack album featured another vocalist). The track is credited to Power Tool, a name the Nelson brothers used for this pre-After The Rain recording.

Gunnar and Matthew have also included What About Me? from their Brother Harmony album (that they released as The Nelsons). This twangy ballad reveals their musical connection to their late father, who helped pioneer the country-rock sound. The brothers further acknowledged their father’s legacy in a highly praised tribute concert that they have performed over the years.

1. After The Rain - from After The Rain
2. (Can’t Live Without Your) Love And Affection - from After The Rain
3. Call Me - from Lightning Strikes Twice
4. You’re All I Need Tonight - from Lightning Strikes Twice
5. More Than Ever - from After The Rain
6. Only Time Will Tell - from After The Rain
7. Too Many Dreams - Bonus track from After The Rain (Japanese Special Edition)
8. Cross My Broken Heart - from Because They Can
9. Won’t Walk Away - from Because They Can
10. A Girl Like That - from Life
11. (You Got Me) All Shook Up - from Because They Can
12. What About Me? - from Silence Is Broken
13. Keep One Heart (Acoustic Version) (New Recording)
14. I Can Hardly Wait - from After The Rain
15. Two Heads Are Better Than One (Previously Unreleased Original Version)
16. Rockstar - from Peace Out
17. Take Me There – from Lightning Strikes Twice

As for the music, well, come on now, all these songs still sound rocking even today! Like their aforementioned celebrated ’50s icon father, Matthew and Gunnar went for a polished, boy-next-door, albeit long blonde hair image. Much like wholesome sex symbols, if you will, but their music didn’t sound anything like their father’s!

Instead, their debut album boasted glossy, ’80s-sounding blends of corporate rock and arena rock (sort of White Lion meets Loverboy meets Bon Jovi, minus the bad boy element) even though it was released in 1990!

Rock critics tended to deplore and rail against albums like After the Rain, for example, but say what you will, tracks such as I Can Hardly Wait, Fill You Up, the chart-topping (Can’t Live Without Your) Love and Affection and other melodic cuts from their subsequent albums are all catchy and still very much likable.

OK, sure, the musical Gods had blown a new musical game our way come the mid ’90s, and so on 1995’s Because They Can Nelson had to pivot and subsequently delved into the underground market, settling for AC moods and riffs, but still the songs stand up today.

Granted, this type of pop/rock can easily become bloodless and mechanical, but the Nelson siblings come across as sincere, which meant that from the off, their albums, for all their respective slickness, were all heart.

For the record, all pun intended, where I honestly do applaud them for their homage to their father on 1999’s Like Father, Like Sons, as harmoniously melodic as the entire album was, it was a direction I don’t think they necessarily needed to go at the time, but they got back on the rock track with 2010’s excellent free flowing AOR album Lightning Strikes Twice.

Brothers Gunnar and Matthew Nelson found phenomenal success with their 1990 DGC debut After The Rain, which has been certified double platinum by the RIAA after selling more than 2 million copies and remained on the Billboard 200 Album Chart for over 60 weeks.

The twin brothers’ harmony-heavy melodic rock (Billboard described, a catchy hybrid of power-pop and hard rock) spawned four singles that cracked the top 30 on Billboard’s Hot 100: After The Rain, (charted in the top three and also hit number one in Radio & Records), More Than Ever, Only Time Will Tell, and the chart-topping (Can’t Live Without Your) Love and Affection.

I know that saying ’having a Greatest Hits record is a dream come true’ sounds trite, but in this case it’s totally accurate, says Gunnar. I’m just another songwriter/artist who’s dream to have a Greatest Hits record one day began in earnest at the age of 6. I truly love music, and I never rest until my work is the very best that it can be. Out of respect for my fellow music lovers and my musical mentors, I’ve always put everything I have into the songs that I hope will turn into the soundtrack of peoples’ lives.

I am SO proud of this Greatest Hits record, and all of the blood, sweat, and tears that it took through the decades to bring it to you now. It is the very best of the best that I have to give you.

When (Can’t Live Without Your) Love and Affection topped the singles chart, it marked the first time that one family scored a #1 hit across three generations. Gunnar and Matthew’s father, Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Rick Nelson, reached #1 twice with Poor Little Fool and Traveling Man, and their grandfather, Ozzie Nelson, had a #1 hit in 1935 with And Then Some.

Their breakout debut propelled the Nelsons from playing clubs to headlining arenas, performing over 100 shows per year while touring the world. The twins, with their signature long-blonde hair and photogenic good looks, became an iconic image of the early 90s. By the time Nelson’s second record, Because They Can, arrived in 1995, music trends had shifted, but the album still hit #30 on the Radio & Records Pop chart.

Greatest Hits (And Near Misses) revisits Nelson’s popular radio hits from their Geffen era, while also spotlighting songs from their well-received later releases. This compilation contains After The Rain’s four classic Nelson hits, including Only Time Will Tell, as well as I Can Hardly Wait.

Featured from the underappreciated Because They Can album is a trio of tracks: (You Got Me) All Shook Up, Won’t Walk Away, and Cross My Broken Heart. Notable too is the rarity, Too Many Dreams, which has officially only been available in Japan as a 1991 single, and an After The Rain bonus track (and is getting its digital debut).

This is the very first time in history that we have been able to deliver a comprehensive career-spanning collection of NELSON’s most shining moments, says Gunnar. Now that our own Stone Canyon Records label has officially joined forces with Universal, we can finally pull out all the stops. Start to finish, this is an album that we’re truly proud of… and the very first thing any music fan should pick up if they ever wondered what NELSON is all about.

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