No one has mentioned it because no one has it anymore. Everyone apparently sold it - except me. I got one as a Xmas gift. Could not sell it back to any local used record store because they were swamped with copies. I kid you not. The old Record & Tape Exchange in College Park, Maryland had a discount bin just for this box set!
That sort of happened to me too. My usual record store wouldn't take it and directed me to a pawn shop down the street, saying, "they'll take anything." They did, and at least I got a few bucks for it.
Gotta be the Maximum R&B box for me. Got the 95 Sell Out remix when it came out, a few of the remix changes pissed me off but overall I really liked it enough... for me to splurge on the Maximum Monstrosity. Got as far as listening to the Franken Quick One and yanked it out. First and last time I listened to it and tucked away into my closet where it sits to this day.
Tear For Fears - The Seeds Of Love has six, count 'em, six versions of Sowing The Seeds Of Love but NOT the original 6:44 CD single version.
My complaint with Coat of Many Cupboards is that it goes way too wild with the pregap music. Like, if you really think " Shaving Brush Boogie" was worth releasing, put it in plain sight.
I've got a beef with boxed sets where something went wrong and the label won't fix it. The King Crimson Heaven & Earth set is just spectacularly good but DGM refused to issue replacement disc when they discovered that hours of material was transferred to disc at the wrong speed. Now personally I would never have spotted the difference and I don't even know whether the flaw bothers me but I feel sour that they wouldn't do the right thing and correct it.
I know that Zombie Heaven, the Zombies' bis set, receives a lot of praise. 4 CDs dedicated to a band that only released 2 or 3 albums plus some singles and EPs. But they still managed to exclude the mono mixes for their best album, Odessey And Oracle, and the vintage stereo mixes of some of their singles such as Whenever You're Ready.
Indeed—that was my entry to going deeper into Reed’s solo work, and I already had “Perfect Day” on Transformer so I didn’t miss that. It’s a pretty good box all in all.
I think there's an assumption that EVERY seemingly 'classic' album can be repackaged as a box. Unfortunately there's not often enough contemporaneous material (live, outtakes, lost tracks etc) to justify the price. Which results in a lot of filler and disappointment. The Japan 'Quiet Life' box included a live recording sourced from an audience recording (a bootleg, basically) and umpteen remixes collected together. Could/should have been a 2-disc set, with the live set available as a download.
I've commented before that the 1990 Zeppelin box (not being a complete albums box, as that wasn't the norm then) could have excluded enough irrelevant songs and included songs left off that eventually made the 1993 part II box. I had to go back and check the user but it was @Price.pittsburgh who I agree with on the Elvis 1970s Essential Masters box set of Elvis having a lot of songs that could have been scrapped and replaced with some darn good ones that didn't make it. The Beatles 2009 Stereo box should have had the additional Help! and Rubber Soul 65 stereo versions and not the Mono box.
Yes's In a Word (5 cd): no And You And I. Wtf? In the old Yes Years box set (4 cds) : 'And You and I' live in 88 Wtf?#2
The original book format release of Dr Feelgood's All Through The City box set had a fault on disc 2 - the whole disc is mastered way too loud, to the extent that there's audible distortion and clicks. Apparently this was fixed on the jewel case reissue, although I've heard that has problems of its own. Such a shame as otherwise it's a stunning set.
It was almost impossible to f**k up a live album with one of the greatest performers ever, but with that box they did. They could have record a gig in Scranton, put out a double and reach legendary status. No: they released that cut/paste mess. Not an easy task, I guess.
I know what you mean, although I have to say I love the packaging on all three so I'd struggle to choose if they all had to be the same.
All this was made worse by the fact that most Springsteen fans had live bootlegs that blew this box set away. Or we'd seen him live. Or both. So we knew how good things could get. I saw him on the 1984 tour and had little need to have that commemorated with a box set. But I would have liked to have heard some of the bootlegged performances in better quality. I remember one from college which was from the Main Point. Another from the Bottom Line. I think these were 1974 or so. Riveting stuff.
Possibly, but I've also had people ask if there was a more curated version of the Matrix set, ie one version of each song etc. I pointed them to this box, and they've been happy.
