Ting Tings

Sony Music's Pure… Pop Anthems box set collects 68 contemporary radio hits over the span of four discs, with highlights arriving via '80s classics like "Africa" (Toto), "Down Under" (Men at Work), and "Total Eclipse of the Heart" (Bonnie Tyler), and some 2000s chart toppers from the likes of Rita Ora ("Radioactive"), Pitbull ("Hotel Room Service"), and MGMT ("Kids").

The title makes plain the purpose of this five-disc set: to provide a perpetually pumping soundtrack for a workout. To its credit, this set is neither predictable nor monotonous, containing only one kind of high-energy sound. It jumps and skips from sound to sound and era to era, with Apollo 440 rubbing shoulders with Jackie Wilson, Dr. Feelgood’s “Milk and Alcohol” feeling quite out of place next to Adam Ant’s “Goody Two Shoes,” but that’s the appeal of this schizophrenic set – it provides all kinds of high-octane rhythmic hits, all capable of keeping the heart rate at an elevated rate, but it’s also just as entertaining when it’s listened to outside of a workout.

Top Gear: Sub Zero Driving Anthems was the eleventh compilation album produced by BBC Worldwide and released in 2008 on EMI/Virgin Records' TV subsidiary. 42 tracks were spread out over two discs.