Talking Heads box set 11/11

With the grand exception of James Brown's STAR TIME, Robert Christgau has had a long-standing hate-hate relationship with box sets. Although he gets his for free, his consumer advocacy obliges him to condemn them for their redundancy, carefully sprinkled unreleased tracks, and profit margin.

Also notice that he almost never has an opinion about the sound quality of a reissue. Does ONCE IN A LIFETIME sound better than the available Talking Heads CDs? As we've debated on this thread, it certainly sounds different, but the CONSUMER GUIDE has no comment.

While I agree (several times on this thread now) that ONCE IN A LIFETIME features the stupidest, most impractical CD packaging to overdecorate record shelves since the intentionally-designed-to-rust metal box of THE COMPLETE BILL EVANS ON VERVE, I don't think the vanity wrapping disqualifies the music within, which is why I hope most people bought this $60 set.

 

I have mixed feeling about the box set... better sound as the originals, but not as good as I expected!

 

Thanks for sharing the link...I read Christgau pretty religiously, as he sometimes can really cut through and find the essence of an album pretty quickly. I also agree with his overall grading scheme, in that most albums are proficient and enjoyable (warranting a B+), but fewer rise to long-lasting greatness. With that said, when Bob is off, he is really OFF - whether due to extreme pretentiousness (e.g. his article this year on Lucinda Williams' World Without Tears is undoubtedly one of the worst pieces of writing I have ever read) or sheer uselessness (e.g. this capsule of the Heads' box, where all the musical opinion we get is that he thought the last couple of Heads' album sucked. Gee, thanks for the insight into the box, Bob!)

Yes, for one more time from me - the packaging sucks unless you are an art student, but the music? Totally essential, sequenced great, well-selected, and sounding great to boot. Rock solid, as fitting a monument to the Heads as Star Time is to James Brown.

 

I went into this boxed set with that expectation but found myself pleasantly surprised by the material from those two albums. Actually, I thought I'd like CD 2 the best since included the songs with which I was the most familiar. (I'm at most a lukewarm Heads fan - before I got this set, I owned the "SMS" DVD and that was it.) However, I found myself moderately disappointed with CD 2 - maybe because the "SMS" versions of the tunes I knew are better - but rather liked CDs 1 and 3. The songs chosen from "True Stories" and "Naked" generally seemed pretty decent, with only a couple of duds...

 

I thought it was great.

 

Quoth Rob't Christgau: "Most pretentious objet de rock ever. Unique 5-x-17-inch design, suitable for storage with spare lumber, assures that the appreciations by Rick Moody, Mary Gaitskill, Maggie Estep, Dick Hebdige, Kyoichi Tsuzuki, and last but not least David Fricke will come loose if you dare read them. Illustrations include lovely water-colory thing of young teenager with severed *****. Fourth disc a DVD. Third disc loaded with True Stories and Naked, which I once thought overrated. I was wrong. They sucked. C "


I'm not a big Christgau fan, but I think his comments about the size of the package and the notes and illustrations are hilarious.

 

After a few months with this box, I can say I'm a bit dissapointed. For some reason, I don't think the remastering is different than the CD's. Out of the three Talking Heads albums I own, the one that I felt benifited from the remastering was More Songs About Buildings & Food, as that disc is thin. I found nothing too special about Fear of Music, besides the fact that the tracks from the box are taken from the original master tape. Remain In Light wasn't different at all; it was just compressed, and jacked up on bass. For some reason, the sound quality really annoyed me. The compression just made everything sound cluttered, IMO.

Thankfully, besides the tacky artwork and unimpressive remastering on everything post-1979, the bonus DVD, few rarities, the insightful booklet, and improved sound on the tracks featured on Disc One make it quite worthwhile. I'm going to start buying TH discs again, except for '77, which I'm pretty sure can't sound too great.



(BTW, I wonder if my copies of Fear of Music and Remain In Light are one of those secret WEA remasters. I'm 99% sure that RiL is, because it is an "RE-2" and it is written in the more modern font on Rhino/Warner discs. Fear of Music is an "RE-1", but strangely, after that code, there is a "2". All the other WEA discs that I own don't have a "2" after the serial number.)

 

My copy of "Fear of Music" is the original TARGET version - and it sounds as if it is sourced from a tape that has some dropouts on it (actually it sounds like some of the cuts on the tape got "bent" or "crinkled" - as it has that kind of sound as if the tape isn't make great contact with the heads of the machine it was mastered from. They are very subtle, but heard well enough that I will get a remaster when it is available. It probably has been secretly remastered since I purchased it new way back when, but I will wait for the "real" remaster.). Anyway, I enjoy the Talking Heads boxset, and feel that the sound quality is better than most of the regular CD versions I currently own of the individual albums.