Fatima’s 2020 Box Sets & Reissues
Top Ten
1. Prince | Sign O’ The Times (Super Deluxe Edition: 8 CDs + DVD)
2. Focus | 50 Years 1970-1976 (9 CDs + 2 DVDs)
3. King Crimson | The Complete 1969 Recordings (20 CDs + 2 DVDs + 4 BluRays)
4. Hank Williams | Pictures From Life’s Other Side (Book + 6 CDs)
5. Eric Burdon & The Animals | When I Was Young (The MGM Recordings 1967-1968: 5 CDs)
6. The Alabama Box | 1950s & 1960s Oddball Labels (8 CDs)
7. Porcupine Tree | The Delerium Years 1991-1997 (13 CDs)
8. Bobby Bare | Sings Shel Silverstein (8 CDs)
9. Neneh Cherry | Raw Like Sushi (30th Anniversary Edition: 3 CDs)
10. Peter Kowald | Duos (3 LPs)
Top Twenty A-Z
The Associates | Perhaps (2 CDs)
Colosseum | Colosseum Live (6 CDs)
The Fall | The Frenz Experiment (2 CDs)
Bobbie Gentry | The Delta Sweete (Expanded Edition: 2 CDs)
Tom Jones | The Complete Decca Studio Albums Collection (17 CDs)
Marillion | Script For A Jester’s Tear (4 CD + BluRay)
Paul McCartney | Flaming Pie (5 CDs + 2 DVDs)
Joni Mitchell | Archives Vol. 1: The Early Years (5 CDs)
Tom Petty | Wildflowers & All The Rest (Super Deluxe Edition: 5 CDs)
Porcupine Tree | In Absentia (3 CDs + BluRay)
Prince | Up All Night With Prince (The One Nite Alone Collection: 5 CDs + DVD)
Lou Reed | New York (Deluxe Edition: 3 CDs + DVD)
The Rolling Stones | Goats Head Soup (Deluxe Edition: 3 CDs + BluRay)
Michael Rother | Solo II (7 CDs)
Sigue Sigue Sputnik | Flaunt It! (4 CDs)
Nina Simone | Fodder On My Wings (CD)
Ultravox | Vienna (Deluxe Edition: 5 CDs + DVD)
U2 | All That You Can’t Leave Behind (20th Anniversary Edition: 5 CDs)
Wilco | Summerteeth (4 CDs)
Frank Zappa | The Mothers 1970 (4 CDs)
Top Five Compilations
1. Further Perspectives & Distortion | An Encyclopedia Of British Experimental And Avantgarde Music 1976-1984 (3 CDs)
2. Kraut! Die innovativen Jahre des Krautrock 1968-1979 (8 CDs + 450 pages of liner notes & pictures)
3. A Slight Disturbance In My Mind | The British Proto-Psychedelic Sounds (3 CDs)
4. Jobcentre Rejects Vol. 4 | Ulta-Rare Swedish Heavy Metal 1978-1983 (LP)
5. Peepholes In My Brain | The British Progressive Pop Sounds Of 1971 (3 CDs)
Hell’s Ditch: Box sets gone wrong #1
Neil Young’s »Archive II« is the perfect example of what you end up with when The Artist is in charge of his own history. Apart from the price/availability issues that were widely discussed, the contents of this box are an insult to any collector. OK, an artist is clearly entitled to re-configure and change his own work as much as he pleases – even if he keeps on issuing false claims as the set being »complete« and including »everything«. The (truly fantastic) amount of previously unreleased material in this box is joined by two albums (out of several) already issued in the run-up to this release (with added bonus content here, to make you feel like a complete idiot if you bought these). And to add to the confusion the original albums from this era are newly compiled with unreleased versions or songs thrown in for good measure – and some tracks and albums are missing entirely.
And what’s the point of reproducing vintage newspaper and magazine articles in the accompanying book if you don’t have proper scans (as a result the text is mostly unreadable)? Archives, eh?! Decades of research, you say?!! (By the way, you can read a fair amount of these articles in some of the Uncut and Mojo Special Editions from the last few years – properly typed out and proof-read…)
If you still don’t feel that you’ve been cheated: the very same book will be reprinted as a lavish coffee-table hardback for Christmas this year, and the CDs are to be reissued as a much cheaper package in March (hopefully with some of the typos corrected – or did Neil really release some tracks a full year before they were recorded?)
Hell’s Ditch: Box sets gone wrong #2
Equally weird is the outcome when The Artist bows down to the demands of The Big Label. Elvis Costello’s new edition of »Armed Forces« only came out on viny, and the so-called »extra« tracks were all pulled from an 18-year-old CD reissue. The alleged »complete« live gigs had fewer tracks than previous issues – so what’s the point? And to make matters even sillier – the packaging artwork was said to be an hommage to the work of original album designer Barney Bubbles. Problem was, half of the set’s contents were wrapped in stock art pictures and bad recreations of foreign festival flyers (which Barney had nothing to do with). If the designer had checked the Barney Bubbles book (highly recommended, BTW) he would have found several artworks from the era that have never been reprinted since, such as advertisements for singles, and promo and songbook art. Of course, the artists of the French »Bazooka« team – who provided the illustrations for the original wrap-around cover – are still active and working in Paris and Lyon.
At least, other than Neil, Elvis had (as he proudly announced) »professional help with the scans« of his notebooks, so that’s reassuring. Problem was, the notebooks were reprinted in diminished size, so you need extra-strong glasses to enjoy these – indeed: pin-sharp – reproductions. Oh dear.
Did you vote?
Regarding Neil. It is certainly imperfect (don’t have physical version yet, much cheaper one coming in March), but the music is superlative and his choices regarding what goes on each CD are very sound I think. Makes you view that period in a somewhat different way which is surely the point. As for repeating previous archive releases in the box, well he did that with Archives Vol 1 so we knew what to expect and it is no surprise. I have picked most of them up on vinyl so don’t have them on CD.
Sure did vote – where do you think does the single vote for Bobby Bare come from? 😉
Crikey – that’s a lot of music, Fatima…
It’s the result of being able to listen to my record collection while working – that’s 8 or 10 hours a day. The problems begin with those additional DVDs – I’ve still only watched the »Moving Waves Classic Albums« film twice and still haven’t figured out everything (if you speak German you understand most of the Dutch, but not all…)
And then there’s the books:
https://chickswithdisks.wordpress.com/2021/01/06/books-of-the-year-2020/
The Focus DVDs are terrific, aren’t they? The RTE film seems to capture a lot about Irish society in 1973, let alone the music of Focus. I can assure you that the ‘Moving Waves’ documentary is EVEN LESS understandable if one can only speak English 😀 – although it’s amazing how much one can infer from body language etc. Like the bass player’s views on Akkerman playing bass on half the album. Even when speaking in English, Akkerman has a tendency to use a lot of word play and quirky turns of phrase – I imagine that’s even more the case in Dutch. So I wouldn’t try too hard to make literal sense of whatever he says in the doc!
I only have one of your Top 10 Box Sets @fatima-Xberg and that`s Eric Burdon & The Animals, my pick as Box Set of the year is Tom Petty`s `Wildflowers & All The Rest.` I`m a sucker for Box Sets and have bought many in 2020 and yes I`ve listened to them all.
I may have bought the Porcupine Tree, Focus, King Crimson sets in another time but I`ven gone off a lot of Prog.
Where is the `Kraut! Die innovativen Jahre des Krautrock 1968-1979` available? While my love for Prog has waned, I still love Krautrock.
Archives II: what a load of b@ll@cks from Warner, a blind man with his hands tied behind his back or @SteveT could have done a better job of distributing the orders. However the quality of the unreleased tracks has helped me get over the issues from Warner and the price.
Rough Trade has them – https://www.roughtrade.com/gb/s/genre/krautrock/label/bear-family?_=1609950919268
The Kraut! project is available (see above) as four 2-Disc sets. Each has a 100-plus page booklet with detailed liner notes – in German. But the credits, line-ups are understandable even if you don’t speak the language. And the books have lots of pictures of rare posters, flyers, record sleeves and labels.
Thanks @fatima-Xberg & @yorkio.
One of the funniest unboxing videos ever – Mr. Super Deluxe on Neil Young’s Archives:
He’s still angry that nobody told him about the “secret” compartment in Vol. 1. 😉
I agree that the Prince box is top of the pile – by some distance.
Like the very rude @Baron-Harkonnen I also have the Eric Burdon one which I like very much.
I just bought the Colosseum one too but have yet to listen to it all the way through.
The Armed Forces one is odd – completely overpriced and ,as you say, very few gems. I wanted it on CD but Declan is being perverse in releasing it on vinyl only. I was tempted but not at the price it is being sold at. Understand it is sold out now so seems his strategy worked – expect to see it on cd some time in the spring now he has earned his dosh.
By Jove @SteveT I compliment you and what do I get?
Why I`m here a Box Set from Cherry Red in 2020 I recommend Jerry Jeff Walker `Mr. Bojangles ~ The Atco / Elektra Years (5CD)`
@Baron-Harkonnen would also recommend the Bob Stanley curated Cafe Exil which is first class.
Only a single disc but excellent and branches out a little from just German to more pan European.
Like the look of the jerry Jeff Walker set. Cheers me old mucker.
Looked at the Bob S. curated album a couple of times, I may buy it.
I’ve checked out the track listing on the 4 Kraut Die Inovativen sets and I have 75% of the tracks on the many Kraut Rock comps I already own.
Me too – I checked the Rough Trade site and only vol 4 was in stock, so I took a look at the tracklistings. If it had been as good as I was hoping I would have eventually begged, borrowed or stolen the 80 sovs for all four volumes, but as you say, there’s far too high an ‘already have that’ rate to justify selling the wife’s early Buddhist treasures while she’s not looking.
The “Café Exil” compilation is currently the source of hilarious laughter and jokes in Germany.
The writer of the liner notes clearly has no clue what was going on in Berlin (especially Kreuzberg and at the Café Exil) or Germany at the time. And while the song selection is quite interesting, the connection to Bowie is purely imaginary. And the cover image is from a building on the other end of Berlin, as far-fetched as you can imagine. (It’s like picturing the BBC TV Tower on the cover of a compilation of 1967 Notting Hill hippie music.)
@Fatima-Xberg I too thought the link to Bowie was completely ridiculous and I think most Bowie fans would think that too..
The music is pretty good though.
@Fatima-Xberg
Can you elaborate on the Tom Jones box? Remastered ? Good catalogue of albums?
The Tom Jones box has all his sixties Decca albums plus 2 discs of singles, B-sides and various rarities and EP or compilation tracks. As the title makes clear – no live albums, thank god. And the music is mostly stomping, rhythmic Beat music – the MOR album filler tracks are nearly all saved by his vocals. Only complaint from me is that the covers only reproduce the front (with generic back sides). I would have loved to see the original rear sides and liner notes…
But most of all – the set is priced around 40 euros in Germany!!
Ooooh, good call. 89 quid over here!!
*heads to amazon.de*
@Fatima-Xberg I too thought the link to Bowie was completely ridiculous and I think most Bowie fans would think that too..
The music is pretty good though.
Y’know I’m sure someone has already made that point @SteveT!