Today is the first Record Store Day of the year (there’s another ‘drop day’ on 18 June!) and while some of us may not have even headed out yet, no doubt a few will have been queueing in the early hours and are already back home with your purchases! The rules have changed again this year, so leftover stock will not appear online until 8pm on Friday 29 April (last year it appeared on websites at 6pm on the day).
If you haven’t checked out yesterday’s SDEtv RSD preview then you should do so, but today’s Saturday Deluxe is all about how you’ve got on today with RSD. Did you find what you were looking for? How were the prices? Good ‘banter’ in the queue with other physical music fans?
I’m always interested in how different record shops deal with Record Store Day. What was yours like? Product behind the counter or was it out in the racks? Were sensible limits and systems in place or was it a free for all? Was there a decent quantity of in-demand items or too few?
Get posting in the comments section about how things are going and don’t forget you can upload photos in the comments now, so let’s see some pictures of where you are and what you managed to buy!
Good luck today and enjoy it. The weather is great in London, which makes a real difference!
Tomorrow is the first Record Store Day for this year and SDE has got its mitts on a selection of exclusive releases for your viewing pleasure! Have a great day tomorrow if you are venturing out and we hope this video gives you a small insight into some of the product.
Peter Gabriel has today made available a previously unreleased version of his song ‘Shock The Monkey’. It was the first single from his fourth self-titled album (aka Security). It was more successful in America than it was in the UK, peaking at number 29 in the Billboard Hot 100.
The new version of ‘Shock The Monkey’ is only available digitally via Bandcamp and is called ‘Shock The Monkey (EarthPercent x Earth Day Mix)’. I should stress this is not some sort of modern remix, it’s a completely unheard alternate version from 1982 and it is really good!
Money from the sale of this track will to got EarthPercent and contribute to the charity’s Grantmaking Fund, which supports organisations doing vital work to help tackle the climate emergency
This version of the song is being made available for a limited time in support of EarthPercent x Earth Day, where over 100 artists have contributed a combination of new, unheard, exclusive and archival tracks. You can see the list of other tracks here.
Elton John’s 1971 album Madman Across The Water will be reissued for its (belated) 50th anniversary in June.
The album was Elton’s fourth and it spawned the singles ‘Tiny Dancer’ and ‘Levon’ (the latter wasn’t issued in the UK). Recorded at Trident Studios in Central London in February and August 1971, it was the first album where all five players of Elton’s fabled band line up (Dee Murray, Nigel Olsson, Davey Johnstone and Ray Cooper) were featured. The album also featured Yes keyboardist Rick Wakeman, who plays Hammond organ on three songs.
The album was actually only a modest hit in the UK (peaked at #41) but reached number eight in America paving the way for Elton’s mega-years and six consecutive number one albums!
The 3CD+blu-ray super deluxe edition of Madman Across The Water (click image to enlarge)
There are four physical formats for the 50th anniversary of Madman Across The Water and all of them contain Bob Ludwig’s 2016 remaster of the main album. A 3CD+blu-ray super deluxe contains rarities including piano demos of the album and the audio of the BBC Sounds For Saturday concert, broadcast on BBC in 1972.
The blu-ray contains a 5.1 mix by Greg Penny (originally issued in 2004 on the SACD), plus video of the Sounds For Saturday concert and Elton’s 1971 Old Grey Whistle Test performance. The box set includes a 104-page hard-cover book with introductions by Elton and Bernie, photos and notes featuring interviews with many who helped make Madman Across The Water, plus a reproduction 1971 poster, as well as memorabilia and artwork taken from the Rocket Archive.
The 4LP vinyl box set of Madman Across The Water (click image to enlarge)
All the audio from the three CDs in the super deluxe set will also be available on a 4LP vinyl box. The box set includes photos, an essay with interviews with those who helped make the album as well as memorabilia and artwork taken from the Rocket Archive. The album will also be available as a limited edition blue and white coloured 180g LP.
A 2CD deluxe is effectively discs one and two from the super deluxe edition and there’s also a limited edition single LP pressed on coloured ‘propeller’ vinyl (D2C only).
Madman Across The Water will be reissued on 10 June 2022 via UMC/EMI.
Compare prices and pre-order
Elton John
Madman Across The Water - 3CD+blu-ray super deluxe
The Now That’s What I Call Music team step back again to the year of 1981 for a fourth full volume of their popular Yearbook releases. NOW Yearbook ’81 comes as a 4CD deluxe hardcover book edition and a 3LP set pressed on red vinyl.
More Lennon on CD 3 (we know why) is followed by Sheena Easton, Randy Crawford, Dollar’s ‘Hand Held in Black and White’, and pop nuggets from the likes of Stray Cats, Bad Manners, The Nolans and Elaine Page!
The final disc in Now Yearbook ’81 is a mix of New Romanticism (more Duran Duran, Spandau etc.) with a healthy dose of synth-pop and some alternative post-punky stuff thrown in for good measure (ABC, OMD, The Jam, Siouxsie and The Banshees, The Teardrop Explodes etc.).
The 3LP edition of Now Yearbook ’81 is pressed on transparent red vinyl (click image to enlarge)
The limited edition 3LP red vinyl version offers a cut-down 46-track selection from the above. Full track listings for both editions can be found below.
Now Yearbook ’81 is released on 20 May 2022.
Compare prices and pre-order
Various Artists
Now Yearbook 81 - deluxe 4CD set in hardcover book
Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood’s 1968 duet album Nancy and Lee is to be reissued by Light in the Attic Records next month.
Nancy and Lee arguably represents the pinnacle of the collaborative efforts of one of pop music’s most unlikely pairings. Featuring lush orchestral arrangements by Billy Strange, and boasting the talents of famed Los Angeles session musicians The Wrecking Crew, the album went on to sell over a million copies worldwide.
This first ever official reissue is described as ‘definitive’ by the label since it comes with Nancy’s involvement and sees the audio remastered from the original analog tapes by engineer John Baldwin. There are two bonus tracks in the form of ‘Tired Of Waiting For You’ and ‘Love Is Strange’ both recorded as part of the album sessions.
The vinyl edition is pressed at RTI (see video above) and is presented in a gatefold sleeve and comes with a 20-page booklet with an array of photos from Nancy’s personal collection along with an in-depth Q&A with Sinatra, conducted by the reissue’s co-producer, Hunter Lea. As well as standard black vinyl, there’s various coloured editions available, including a gold vinyl edition.
The reissue is also available as a digipak CD with booklet (no oversized hardcover book edition this time), cassette tape and even 8-track (if you order direct from the label).
Nancy and Lee will be released on CD on 27 May, with the vinyl following a week later on 3 June, via Light in the Attic.
George’s “last work” is dusted down to promote the Olderreissue
An ‘uncut’ version of the 2017 George Michaeldocumentary Freedom will be released theatrically in June this year.
Freedom was first show on TV in the UK on 16 October 2017, two days after the appearance of the much-delayed reissue of Listen Without Prejudice (which had been held back in part to benefit from Freedom‘s appearance on the TV schedules). Both projects were conceived while George was still with us, but he didn’t live to see either come to fruition.
Freedom takes us through the now familiar stages in George’s career – Wham!, tight shorts, Top Of The Pops, Making It Big, Going Solo, Mega-stardom with Faith – before finally slowing down the frenzied pace in the very late 1980s when George attempted to step back from the rather crazy level of fame he had attained at that point. There is a particular focus on Listen Without Prejudice (presumably to promote the reissue of the album) and that court case although the documentary is overly reliant on celebrity endorsements with the likes of Liam Gallagher, James Corden and Stevie Wonder queuing up to listen to tracks such as ‘Praying For Time’ and telling us how good they are.
SDE reviewed Freedom at the time and concluded that is was a “disappointing documentary that skims the surface of a complex artist”. When broadcast in America (on Showtime) the LA Times reported that Freedom was “essentially a glorified sizzle reel stringing together interviews and TV performances any serious fan is likely to have already seen”. The Guardian in the UK called it “preposterous perhaps, but also honest and brilliant”.
The directors are credited as “George Michael and David Austin” and when shown on TV in 2017, Freedom ran for 95 minutes. Then in 2018 a ‘Director’s Cut’ version, which ran for 114 minutes, was screened at over 25 festivals, including the Edinburgh International Film Festival and the Raindance Film Festival. It won a total of five ‘Best Documentary’ awards. The newly announced Freedom Uncut runs for 108 minutes, meaning it’s actually six minutes shorter than the Director’s Cut shown in those festivals in 2018.
Given it’s nearly half a decade old, I always wondered why Freedom was never issued on blu-ray or DVD and it seems odd that Sony and team GM are scheduling a theatrical run all these years later. The press release makes no reference to the TV screening in 2017 and if you weren’t paying attention you might think this is something brand new. So why is this happening? The only answer I can come up with is they’ve dusted down this old documentary to help promote the Older reissue, which comes about two-and-a-half weeks after this “global cinema event”.
Freedom Uncut will be shown at cinemas from 22 June 2022 and tickets go on sale next Wednesday (27 April). It’s not clear how long the run will be but more information is available via the special Freedom Uncut website that has been set up.
The trailer for the 2018, 114-minute Director’s Cut of Freedom which was shown at film festivals
After careful consideration and consultation with artist, record label and fans, SDE is today announcing a second pressing of the SDE-exclusive blu-ray audio of Tears For Fears’ acclaimed album The Tipping Point.
The band’s seventh album has been a massive commercial and critical success, when it was issued in February, hitting the top ten of the charts on both sides of the Atlantic and peaking at #2 in the UK.
The SDE-exclusive blu-ray contains Steven Wilson’s Dolby Atmos Mix and his 5.1 mix of The Tipping Point and is the only way to physically own these mixes (in fact, the 5.1 mix is totally exclusive). Steven’s work on this album has been raved about by the band, Tears For Fears fans and surround sound enthusiasts. It has also been noted that when the Dolby Atmos mix folds down to stereo, it’s significantly more dynamic than the standard stereo mix!
The good thing about listening to the Dolby Atmos Mix is you don’t have to listen to an album multiple times to get all the ear candy going on.
Roland Orzabal
The first edition was limited to 2,000 copies worldwide and it has become very clear over time that this figure significantly underestimated demand, leading to many fans either missing out or resorting to paying over the odds on sites like eBay and Discogs.
Back in March, I consulted with SDE readers on a possible way forward. Over 500 of you voted in a special poll. The question was: if we were to produce some more, how should we do it? The options were to come up with a ‘new and improved’ blu-ray or simply produce some more of the original one. Your voice was heard and 60 percent voted for the latter, deeming it an all round fairer solution to all parties (and in particular, people who own the original blu-ray).
Therefore, this second edition of The Tipping Point blu-ray will have exactly the same content as the first. However, both the disc and the rear of the cover/insert will state ‘Second Edition. June 2022‘, differentiating first pressings from second pressings.
Wilson has absolutely made excellent use of the surroundscape on every track, placing background vocals in the rears, adding synthesizers behind the listener sweet spot, plus layering reverberant ambience reflections from the back, with a wall of sound pouring across the front speakers
Review on hiresedition.com
To be clear, the second pressing is still a limited edition, but this time the number produced is limited by time, rather than quantity. The pre-order window for the second edition opens today, 20 April 2022, and closes on 4 May 2022. If you recall, the first pressing sold out in 24 hours, but this time you have two weeks to get your pre-order in. Please do not miss out. The total number being produced will be published on SDE when we go into production.
The release date for this second pressing of this Tears For Fears The Tipping Point blu-ray audio is 17 June 2022. This product is only available via the SDE shop. To pre-order, use this link or the button below. Your order will be shipped during that week of release. We will endeavour to get your blu-ray to you as close to day of release as possible, but please note that is not a guarantee.
TECHNICAL NOTES: This blu-ray audio requires a blu-ray player. Decoding the Dolby Atmos mix requires a Dolby Atmos-certified soundbar or a Dolby Atmos-compatible AV Receiver/Amp. The Dolby Atmos mix will ‘fold down’ to 5.1 or stereo if a Dolby Atmos decoder is not detected. The DTS HD 5.1 mix should work with virtually all home cinema set-ups.
EU SHIPPING NOTES: If you are ordering from the EU please be aware that that goods may be subject to import VAT when they arrive from the UK. The prices the SDE shop charge you do not include VAT.
Tracklisting
The Tipping PointTears For Fears /SDE-exclusive blu-ray audio
An 8CD box set compiling the Fontana Years of The House of Love will be released in July. Burn Down The World: The Fontana Years 1989-1993 features albums, singles, B-sides and rarities.
The package includes expanded versions of the band’s second album, 1990’s The House Of Love (aka Fontana or ‘The Butterfly Album’), 1992’s Babe Rainbow and 1993’s Audience With The Mind. Additionally, the A Spy in the House of Love compilation (from 1990) is expanded to three CDs offering a massive 60 tracks, 46 more than the original collection! These discs offer never before heard demos, lost tracks and live recordings sourced from Fontana’s archive, alongside rare fan club-only releases, compilation appearances, promotional versions and tracks never before available on CD
The last two CDs – Live in Leicester 1990 and Live in London andNew York 1991-1992 – offer 30 previously unreleased live tracks from the era.
In total, Burn Down The World offers 139 tracks, and has been produced in association with founder, frontman and principle songwriter Guy Chadwick. Sleeve notes include a new interview with Chadwick and unseen imagery from the band’s archive.
Burn Down The World: The Fontana Years 1989-1993 will be issued on 29 July 2022, via Cherry Red. Don’t forget to offer your rating of this offering via the SDE Reader Rating box at the top of this page!
Julian Lennon has chosen to perform his dad, John Lennon’s song ‘Imagine’ for the first time, publicly. He said he felt “compelled to respond” due to the War on Ukraine adding “I had always said, that the only time I would ever consider singing ‘IMAGINE’ would be if it was the ‘End of the World’… But also because his lyrics reflect our collective desire for peace worldwide”.
A new T. Rex box set called 1972 brings together studio recordings, broadcasts and performances by Marc Bolan and T. Rex and is available as 6LP coloured vinyl and 5CD editions. Tony Visconti-signed editions still available.
Billy Mackenzie / Satellite Life: Recordings 1994-1996 (3CD set)
25 years since Billy’s death, Cherry Red present a three CD set highlighting his mid-nineties collaborations with Steve Aungle. Curated by Steve and featuring his sleeve notes this set re-assembles past recordings with several previously unreleased songs (including some collaborations with Dennis Wheatley and with Laurence Jay Cedar.
Pretenders’ 1979 debut album is reissued on vinyl. This features Chris Thomas’ 2018 remaster which hasn’t been issued on the format. 1981’s Pretenders II gets the same treatment.
I had a few days away this week in the wonderful city of Glasgow, where I was born. I took my mother and my wife and we stayed in the Hillhead area, which is to the west of town.
It’s a vibrant area full of independent restaurants and retail with lots of culture on offer (the Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum is nearby). I hadn’t been to Glasgow for ages, so it was great to potter around, stop off in cafés, visit galleries and the like. I didn’t really ‘do’ any record shops while I was there because it was primarily a family break but I did what turned out to be the next best thing and popped into the Oxfam Music shop on the Byres Road.
This was a fantastic place and it’s been a long time since I’ve looked through racks of secondhand CDs and come across so many things I immediately wanted to buy! A Lloyd Cole fan, for whatever reason, had decided to offload a big collection of CDs which I greedily snapped up. I’m a Cole aficionado myself, but that doesn’t mean there are not gaps in my collection. For example, while I own the vinyl of his 2013 album Standards, I never acquired the CD and German label Tapete really did a lovely job of the packaging, with a ‘debossed’ gatefold card sleeve. £3.99 seemed fair enough. For some reason I do not own 2010’s Broken Record at all, which defies logic, so I was very pleased to pick this up on CD, especially since the condition was mint. That one was £4.99. This album is next for the reissue treatment, by the way.
And so it continued. I do own the 2001 Collected Recordings 4CD box set, which includes the ‘lost’ 2001 albums Etc. and Plastic Wood, but I don’t have the individual releases, and there they were in this Oxfam shop, so I snapped them up. These were issued on XIII BIS Records, as was The Negatives album, which again I only have in that box set so I bought the original CD of that as well. I passed on the 2CD deluxe of Rattlesnakes believing I definitely owned that only to return the next day having woken in a cold sweat concluding that I was mistaken and that particular edition wasn’t on my shelf!
I don’t think I’d ever seen a seven-inch of Lloyd’s ‘Downtown’, single #3 from his 1990 debut solo album. Probably because it didn’t chart at the time. There was a copy in Oxfam for £1 and the good front cover plus the inclusion of a live version of ‘A Long Way Down’ on the B-side meant it was an easy purchase.
Aside from Lloyd Cole I picked up a massive pile of Tori Amos UK/USA CD singles (‘God’, ‘Caught A Lite Sneeze’, ‘Spark’, ‘Pretty Good Year’ etc.) for 99p each and finally acquired the 2CD+DVD deluxe of Sheryl Crow’sTuesday Night Music Club which I’ve never seen cheap anywhere and even in Oxfam cost me £8.99. I bought a few other ad hoc items (the 12-inch of Malcolm McLaren’s ‘Duck For The Oyster’ and a press pack for Bryan Ferry’sTaxi) and by the end of a good hour in the store I parted with over £70 but was extremely happy with my purchases and felt rather pleased with myself!
The other story I feel obliged to share, which is a bit embarrassing, has to do with Luke Haines. He is on tour with REM’s Peter Buck at the moment, promoting their new album Beat Poetry For Survivalists. The tour has been delayed for two years due to COVID, but the pair were finally on the road. I knew they were playing two nights at London’s 100 Club next week (Monday and Tuesday) and was planning to go to one of them, but before we left for Scotland, I spotted that they were also playing in Glasgow on a night that we’d actually be in town! It fleetingly occurred to me that it would be great to go and see them but I dismissed it because a) I didn’t know where the venue was in relation to where we were staying and b) I thought the idea was a bit anti-social since “going to see Luke Haines” is not necessarily either my mum’s, nor my wife’s idea of a good night out!
Anyway, Thursday morning was the day we were checking out of our hotel (The Grosvenor). I was sat there with my mum tucking into a ‘full Scottish’ (you can’t beat a bit of Lorne sausage) and who should I see wander in and say “breakfast for one”? Only Peter Buck! What the hell…? He sat down at the very next table. The penny of course dropped and a quick search on my phone revealed that Luke Haines and Peter Buck had played in the Òran Mór venue which was literally right across the road from the hotel. FFS. We’d had an early dinner at The Ubiquitous Chip on Wednesday evening and retired back to the hotel for a relatively early night. I could have easily popped over and enjoyed some live music. Argh! What an annoying missed opportunity. I’ve met and chatted with Luke a few times (you can read this old interview) and had visions of saying hello at the intimate venue and enjoying a late night, post-gig beer with Haines, Buck and band! Oh well. Of course, I left Peter Buck in peace to enjoy his breakfast and will just have to ‘make do’ with seeing them at The 100 Club on Tuesday! Tickets are still available. If you want to buy the new album, links are below.
Lloyd Cole also happens to be on tour in the UK this week. Tickets here.
The Rolling Stones‘ complete Madison Square Garden live show from 2003 will be released in June as Licked Live in NYC, across a number of formats.
This gig formed part of the band’s 40th anniversary tour, which started in 2002 and saw them perform 117 shows in theatres, arenas and stadiums. This MSG show features a guest appearance from Sheryl Crow (on ‘Honky Tonk Women’) and includes previously unreleased performances of ‘Start Me Up’, ‘Tumbling Dice’, ‘Gimme Shelter’ and ‘Sympathy For The Devil’.
Licked Live in NYC will be issued as a 2CD+SD Blu-ray three-disc set (‘SD’ Blu-ray indicates the video isn’t high definition), 2CD+DVD, standalone 2CD and 3LP white or black vinyl. Both video formats offer seven bonus selections (including rehearsals) while the blu-ray additionally comes with ‘Tip Of The Tongue’ documentary and backstage footage.
Licked Live in NYC will be released on 10 June 2022.
Depeche Mode’s next 12″ Singles box set is coming in June and it concerns their 2001 album Exciter.
This box set contains eight 12-inch singles, faithfully reproducing original artwork and a poster. Three of the 12-inch singles in the forthcoming box are newly compiled, made up of tracks first released across CD singles throughout the album campaign.
Exciter: The 12″ Singles (click image to enlarge)
This numbered limited edition contains the following:
Dream On (12BONG30)
Dream On (L12BONG30)* – newly compiled 12” vinyl single
I Feel Loved (12BONG31)
I Feel Loved (L12BONG31)
I Feel Loved (XL12BONG31)* – newly compiled 12” vinyl single
Freelove (12BONG32)
Freelove (L12BONG32)* – newly compiled 12” vinyl single
Goodnight Lovers (12BONG33)
Exciter: The 12″ Singles will be issued on 10 June 2022.
See Jungle! See Jungle! Go Join Your Gang Yeah, City All Over! Go Ape Crazy!
The 1981 debut album from Bow Wow Wow will be reissued as a limited edition 180g green/yellow marbled vinyl pressing in May.
Thecontroversial group was the brainchild of Malcolm McLaren who, having pinched Adam Ant’s band, somehow persuaded 13-year-old Annabella Lwin’s mother to allow her daughter to join Bow Wow Wow as the lead singer.
Originally signed to EMI, after two singles and a cassette-only mini-album, the label dropped the group but they quickly signed to RCA Records and the debut album, See Jungle! See Jungle! Go Join Your Gang Yeah, City All Over! Go Ape Crazy!, was released in October 1981.
The controversial front cover (photographed by Andy Earl) depicted the band recreating Édouard Manet’s Le Déjeuner sur l’herbe. Lwin’s mother was understandably not happy with her then 14-year old daughter undressed in the image.
Despite all the controversy, the album was well-received (it would eventually earn BPI silver accreditation) and it delivered the band’s first UK top 10 hit single with ‘Go Wild in the Country’ in early 1982.
This new coloured vinyl pressing is limited to 2,000 copies worldwide (with only 800 for the UK) and will be released on 27 May 2022. Pre-order via the SDE shop using this link or the button below.
EU SHIPPING NOTES: If you are ordering from the EU please be aware that that goods may be subject to import VAT when they arrive from the UK. The prices the SDE shop charge you do not include VAT.
Tracklisting
See Jungle! See Jungle! Go Join Your Gang Yeah, City All Over! Go Ape Crazy!Bow Wow Wow/Limited edition coloured vinyl LP
Kylie Minogue’s 2020 livestream performance known as ‘Infinite Disco’ will be released on clear vinyl in May.
The 50-minute special performance featured tracks from Disco, alongside hits such as ‘In Your Eyes’, ‘Light Years’, ‘Slow’ (a mash up with Donna Summer’s iconic ‘Love To Love You Baby’) and ‘Say Something’, performed with the House Gospel Choir.
Infinite Disco was released on CD, DVD and blu-ray last November as part of the Guest List Edition Disco reissue but this released marks the first time it’s on vinyl. The clear vinyl pressing is limited to 6,000 copies.
Suzi Quatro/The Rock Box 1973-1979: The Complete RecordingsCD, Box Set, DVD
Chrysalis Records issue The Rock Box 1973-1979: The Complete Recordings, a 7CD+DVD collection of Suzi Quatro’s ‘70s output. Featuring six studio albums, a live album and a DVD with promos and rare footage.
Inspiral Carpets / Revenge of the Goldfish (orange vinyl)
Inspiral Carpets’ third album was 1992’s Revenge of the Goldfish which featured the singles ‘Dragging Me Down’, ‘Bitches Brew’, ‘Generations’ and ‘Two Worlds Collide’. It’s now reissued for its 30th anniversary with this transparent orange vinyl edition. Follow-up Devil Hopping is also available on red vinyl.
Rhino reissue The Monkees’ second studio album (from January 1967) as a deluxe and expanded 2LP set. The first LP is the original album, while the second offers 14 bonus tracks.
Various Artists / Greatest Ever Twelve-Inch Mixes (4CD)
Wholly unoriginal, but still actually quite good, 12-inch remix compilation. It’s only £6 for four CDs, so worth getting just to keep in the car (assuming you have a CD player in your car!).
It has been a while since a box set has received as much negative feedback as the newly announced George MichaelOlder super deluxe edition. The SDE news post on Wednesday has over 200 comments and after 199 votes the 5CD+3LP box set has an SDE reader rating of just 1.7 out 5. Or to put it another way, only 32 people rated it higher than two stars. The main three complaints from fans seem to be as follows:
Why do I have to buy three vinyl records to get the five CDs?
Why is there virtually no previously unreleased audio and no video content?
Why is it £140?
On top of that there are those who are disappointed with no hi-res audio and no spatial audio mix. Also, at the £140 price point, the 40-page book looks to be inferior to what we get regularly from The Who or McCartney (normally around 128-page books, sometimes more than one) and so it seems clear this package hasn’t really hit the spot.
There has been no information at all about the remastering. Interestingly, the album was recorded entirely digitally on two Otari RADAR 24‑track hard disk recorders. These were only capable of recording 48kHz/16 bit audio. This means that a) there is no true analogue master for Older. And b) a 96/24 hi-res version is not possible unless they resample the audio. Read a great Sound On Sound article about the Older sessions here. Sample quote from engineer Paul Gomersall: “‘Free’ was originally twice as long as it appears on the album, and then it was hacked to bits on the RADAR, with chunks taken out and redirected throughout the piece. It was done mostly as an experiment, but it worked so well that the result sounds wholly intentional from the outset.”
To be fair, the 2LP vinyl packages look great, butyou can understand why CD fans feel very aggrieved when the options are to spend £140 or do nothing! Sony and George Michael (or team GM) have now reissued George’s first three solo albums and there are issues with all of them. With George no longer with us, there was a feeling that maybe we’d get something better at the third time of asking, but that hasn’t happened. Unless the personnel change within George’s camp, or they start listening to people who understand the marketplace, we’ll never get any decent Wham! or George Michael re-releases. With Older, if the goal was to give fans a great box set then, to put it bluntly, they do not know what they are doing. We all own examples of great music deluxe editions or box sets (XTC, Jethro Tull, Marillion, Tears For Fears, recent Lennon etc.) and can we honestly say that the Older box comes anywhere close to them?
Freed from the controlling nature of George Michael himself, it seems that his team are now, apparently, constrained by the ghost of George Michael, honouring his every wish however misguided or unreasonable that wish may be. This is in contrast to the Prince Estate who have opened the floodgates to a series of high quality reissues that mine his archive. These have been acclaimed by critics and fans alike.
Nik Kershaw to release ‘Songs From The Shelf’ – but only digitally
Nik Kershawhas informed fans via his social media channels that between 1989 and 1998, when he took a step back to focus on writing and production for others, he ended up with a “shelf full of songs” some of which made it out into the word, while “most did not”.
These are being issued as Songs From The Shelf, a series of curated releases with ‘Part 1’ coming soon. This sounds interesting, although sadly these are digital EPs and there’s no plans (at least at this stage) to issue these physically.
There has been some grumbling on Facebook about this, but the response from Nik HQ was that they “understand that record collectors” may be disappointed but that “the music speaks for itself. The tracks are amazing”.
Release date change for Associates and Rick Astley
I’m sorry to inform everyone that BMG have changed the release date for the AssociatesSulk deluxe edition and the Rick Astley reissue of Whenever You Need Somebody.
The Associates moves back to 15 July (was 13 May) due to “unforeseen manufacturing delays”. Rick moves back two weeks from 6 May to 20 May 2022.
I’m highlighting this because it impacts anyone who has pre-ordered the exclusives via SDE. You will get an email separately for your records.
Rick Astley’s 2CD of Whenever You Need Somebody with SDE-exclusive 7-track ‘Never Gonna Give You Up’ CD single has now sold out, but you can still pre-order the 3CD+LP of Associates with SDE-exclusive ‘Party Fears Two’ CD single using this link or the button below.
The Chemical Brothers will release a 25th anniversary deluxe edition of their 1997 album Dig Your Own Hole.
The album entered the UK album charts at number one in April of ’97 which isn’t a surprise when you consider that the two singles issued beforehand – ‘Setting Sun’ (which featured Noel Gallagher) and ‘Block Rockin’ Beats’ both reached the top of the UK singles chart! The album was also very successful in America, selling half a million copies and peaking at number 14.
The 25th anniversary deluxe edition is available as a 2CD set or a 3LP vinyl package. The latter may well be exclusive to the band’s store, since it doesn’t seem to be available via normal retail channels. It’s limited to 1997 copies.
Both formats offer five previously unreleased tracks and alternate versions from the recording sessions. These include a demo version of ‘Elektrobank’ and alternate mixes of ‘It Doesn’t Matter’ and ‘Where Do I Begin’.
Dig Your Own Hole 20th anniversary edition is released on 22 July 2022.
Pink Floyd have surprised everyone by releasing new music in support of the people of Ukraine. The song is called ‘Hey Hey Rise Up’ and is the sees DavidGilmour and Nick Mason joined by long time Pink Floyd bass player Guy Pratt and Nitin Sawhney on keyboards and features an extraordinary vocal performance by Andriy Khlyvnyuk of Ukrainian band Boombox.
The track was only recorded on 30 March 2022 and uses Andriy’s vocals taken from his Instagram post of him singing in Kyiv’s Sofiyskaya Square. The song itself ‘The Red Viburnum In The Meadow’ is a rousing Ukrainian protest song written during the first world war which has been taken up across the world over the past month in protest of the invasion of Ukraine. The title of the Pink Floyd track is taken from the last line of the song which translates as ‘Hey Hey Rise up and rejoice’.
Gilmour explains how he came to know Andriy and his band Boombox. “In 2015, I played a show at Koko in London in support of the Belarus Free Theatre, whose members have been imprisoned. Pussy Riot and the Ukrainian band, Boombox, were also on the bill. They were supposed to do their own set, but their singer Andriy had visa problems, so the rest of the band backed me for my set – we played Wish You Were Here for Andriy that night.Recently I read that Andriy had left his American tour with Boombox, had gone back to Ukraine, and joined up with the Territorial Defense. Then I saw this incredible video on Instagram, where he stands in a square in Kyiv with this beautiful gold-domed church and sings in the silence of a city with no traffic or background noise because of the war. It was a powerful moment that made me want to put it to music.”
While writing the music for the track, David managed to speak with Andriy from his hospital bed in Kyiv where he was recovering from a mortar shrapnel injury. “I played him a little bit of the song down the phone line and he gave me his blessing. We both hope to do something together in person in the future.”
Speaking about the track Gilmour says, “I hope it will receive wide support and publicity. We want to raise funds for humanitarian charities, and raise morale. We want express our support for Ukraine and in that way, show that most of the world thinks that it is totally wrong for a superpower to invade the independent democratic country that Ukraine has become.”
The artwork for the track features a painting of the national flower of Ukraine, the sunflower, by the Cuban artist, Yosan Leon. The cover of the single is a direct reference to the woman who was seen around the world giving sunflower seeds to Russian soldiers and telling them to carry them in their pockets so that when they die, sunflowers will grow.
Obviously, there is no physical version of the song (at least for now). But you can buy the download and all proceeds go to Ukranian Humanitarian Relief.
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