Timely as ever, I just want to belatedly offer a few more thoughts on some of the releases added to the everythingsgonegreen music vaults across 2020. When it came to compilations, reissues, and box sets, it was a fairly heavyweight line-up.
Starting with perhaps the heaviest of
them all, reputation-wise at least. Digging Deep: Subterranea, which offers a
barely anticipated but very welcome 30-track Robert Plant solo career overview.
One that sees the more obvious “hits” like ‘Big Log’, ‘Ship of Fools’, and ‘In
The Mood’ sitting snuggly alongside a whole bunch of far less obvious stuff.
And as any Plant fan will tell you, it’s the latter category where the real
gems can be found. Digging Deep: Subterranea collects work from all but a
couple of Plant’s post-Zepp solo releases across nearly four decades. The only
notable absentee being work from the superb Alison Krauss collaborative effort,
although Jimmy Page himself would surely argue that particular point. There’s
three new (or previously unreleased) tracks to be found, the best of which is
the Patty Griffin duet, ‘Too Much Alike’. More than anything, the album
highlights what an exceptional career Plant has had. And still has.
In December 2020 the pop world found itself mourning all over again with the realisation that a whole 40 years had (or have) passed since John Lennon was so needlessly gunned down outside his NYC apartment. Naturally, without wishing to get too cynical about it all, a lot of fuss was centred around a new collection of Lennon post-Beatles work in the form of Gimme Some Truth. At 36 tracks in its deluxe form, it’s a balanced mix of his (and Yoko’s) best known material, alongside the not so well-kent stuff. I grabbed it, because I wanted to play the game, I like a bit of John, and of course I needed a long overdue companion set for my 2007 remastered version of Shaved Fish (1975). Apparently.
A far less-hyped late-in-the-year compilation release from a band that rarely put a foot wrong during its pomp of roughly a decade ago, was The Kills’ Little Bastards. Which is everything it promises to be on the tin. Rough, ready, raw and rudimentary rock n roll, across 20 tunes, the vast majority of which are hugely improved from their original form thanks to 2020 remastering. Highly recommended, and all that.
Speaking of rough and rudimentary, the long lost and I guess, very overdue, obligatory White Stripes Greatest Hits set was sitting in my collection before I even knew I needed it. Which I very much didn’t. I’m a Jack White fan, I don’t mind owning that … what else can I say? I’m also a bit of a Meg fan, if I’m being completely vulnerable and honest about everything. You’ll know all of these so-called greatest hits, or more shamefully, you might be someone who knows only ‘Seven Nation Army’. If you’re the latter, don’t sleep on this one, the White Stripes’ Greatest Hits album is here for you, not me.
Which brings me to a couple of compilations that aren’t really compilations because they appeal as being a little more niche or specific than that broad brush stroke might allow. New forms of old work:
Foals Collected Reworks Volumes 1, 2, & 3. More than four hours’ worth of the Oxford band’s finest moments reconfigured for what appears to be a rather large heavily lit dancefloor. Although it’s nowhere near as dubious as that may sound. Volume 1 is actually rather good, with serious producer-types, the likes of Hot Chip, Alex Metric, Purple Disco Machine, and Solomun, for starters, going mental on a career-spanning collection of Foals’ best stuff. In fact, Solomun’s edit of ‘Late Night’ is the stand-out track across the entire three volumes, which can all be picked up separately - as opposed to the full set I managed to snare. It is however a three volume set that falls slight victim to the law of diminishing returns. I felt a little jaded by the end. Volume 1 is probably quite enough techno-fried Foals, thank you very much, despite the best efforts of Jono Ma Jagwar Ma, Lindstrom, Mount Kimbie, and Trophy Wife on the second and third instalments. File this one away under: good to have, but not essential.
A little more essential for me, and another release that was both new material and yet not quite new material, was another intriguing instalment in David Bowie’s Changes series. This one - ChangesNowBowie - being specific to a radio special the great man recorded back in 1996. Featuring tunes like ‘The Man Who Sold The World’, ‘Aladdin Sane’, and Tin Machine’s ‘Shopping For Girls’. How much Bowie is too much Bowie? … wash your mouth out with soap. Reviewed here.
Reissues and deluxe sets: yet more heavyweight carry-on.
I’m probably preaching to the converted here, but New Order’s Power Corruption and Lies deluxe reissue, and Joy Division’s 40th anniversary edition of Closer proved irresistible additions, even though I’m sure I already have both albums in their original form somewhere. Maybe even on cassette. The key thing worth noting about each work is the way these albums made a mockery of the age-old “difficult second album” cliché. Of the two, I think the New Order release was the best value for money, if indeed deluxe releases are ever really value for money, with an Extras disc featuring those pesky non-album singles and previously unreleased versions of many of the album cuts.
Another landmark album celebrating its 40th anniversary in 2020 with a multiple disc deluxe edition, and yet another release I didn’t really need but couldn’t resist, was Ultravox’s Vienna, the highlight of which was the “Rarities” disc featuring early versions (‘Sleepwalk’), soundcheck versions, the single version of ‘Vienna’, the 12-inch version of ‘All Stood Still’, and a bunch of live takes (at St Albans City Hall and The Lyceum) from the year of its release. Some of this stuff is incredible to listen to again, and a timely reminder of just how special Ultravox was during its pomp.
An eight-volume deluxe set of Prince’s Sign of The Times, anyone? Probably unnecessary, but wow … the quality of the material he didn’t release when he was alive is all the testimony needed, if ever needed, for indisputable proof of Prince’s sheer genius. Or his commitment to his art. Or his perfectionist stance on releasing music. I found more than a few hidden gems modestly tucked away amongst the 90-plus (count em) tracks included on this deluxe set of an album I’d always previously (wrongly) regarded as being slightly inferior to Parade. I'm quite sure Parade didn’t have this many quality cast-asides, but that may yet remain to be seen. Just wow.
Last, and probably least, to be fair, a Bandcamp name-your-price I picked up was Pitch Black’s Electronomicon Live, which was essentially a prelude to the first ever vinyl release of the duo’s fantastic second album, Electronomicon, which celebrated its 20th birthday in 2020. As difficult as it might be today to process the fact that the relatively DJ/club-friendly original album had never previously been the beneficiary of a vinyl release, the live version - with tracks sourced from hours and hours of DAT tapes/live recordings from the era - stood up pretty well I thought.
Right, we’re nearly there, albeit weeks after the fact, I’ve got just one more 2020 retrospective blogpost to come, one that looks at the best EPs I picked up during the year.
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