The Essential Journey

The Essential Journey is a compilation of songs from the rock band Journey. Released on October 16, 2001, it is part of Sony BMG's "Essential" series of compilation albums. The album includes most of Journey's major and minor hits that have charted on Billboard Hot 100. It covers material recorded while Steve Perry was lead singer of the band, from 1978's Infinity to 1996's Trial by Fire, neglecting Journey albums recorded before and after his membership. The first disc is Greatest Hits with some minor changes: tracks are in a slightly different order, "After the Fall" replaces "Be Good to Yourself" (which is on the second disc instead), and "When You Love a Woman" is included (this song was recorded after the release of the original edition of Greatest Hits, but was added to the 2006 CD edition).

The Essential Journey was certified as Platinum in the United States on February 2, 2005 and Double Platinum in the United States on March 3, 2016. It had sold 1,156,000 copies in the US as of August 2013.

Personnel

 * Steve Perry – lead vocals
 * Neal Schon – electric and acoustic guitars, backing vocals
 * Jonathan Cain – keyboard instrument, rhythm guitar, backing vocals
 * Ross Valory – bass guitar, backing vocals
 * Steve Smith – drums, percussion
 * Gregg Rolie – keyboards, backing and co-lead vocals
 * Aynsley Dunbar – drums, percussion