Talking Heads
Brick
(Rhino/Warner)
DISCS: Eight DualDiscs, which is like eight CDs and eight DVDs.
TRACKS: 205, counting all the different mixes and videos.
YEARS: 1977 - 1988.
DETAILS: It's what Talking Heads fans have been waiting for -- all eight of the seminal New York new wavers' studio albums, properly remastered for CD. But on the aptly named eight-disc box set Brick, remastering is just the start. Everything has been refurbished, expanded, supplemented, revamped and upgraded with enough goodies to keep fans occupied for hours. No fooling; to get the full Brick experience, you're gonna need a CD player, a DVD player, a home theatre and a couple of days. Every CD comes in DualDisc format. On one side, you get the original album, augmented with a handful of high-quality B-sides, outtakes, working tracks and alternate versions (an acoustic version of Psycho Killer with tons o' cello? Killer indeed). On the other side you get the same album remixed in stunning 5.1 Surround Sound by guitarist Jerry Harrison, who recasts the cuts as widescreen cinematic epics, with stabbing guitars that ping-pong from corner to corner and keyboards that swirl around you. From the edgy early discs like Talking Heads 77 to overlooked later works like True Stories and Naked, Harrison's expansive mixes make you hear the Heads with new ears. (Best of the batch: 1983's African-influenced, percussion-laced, Eno-produced funk freakout Remain in Light, which drops you smack into the middle of a psychedelic drum circle.) Every disc also comes with a couple of video clips, including early live performances, German TV footage and latter-day music vids. Toss in booklets with full lyrics, liner notes, plenty of pictures, blurbs by Harrison on the 5.1 mixes, art-print cards -- then put all the discs in white-backed jewel cases that fit snugly inside a white moulded-plastic box covered in raised song titles -- and you've got a box that's exhaustive, entertaining and extremely arty. The kind of box that comes along ... well, once in a band's lifetime.
QUIBBLES: 1) The CDs have cover art but no song titles on their all-white backs, so you have to pull out the booklets again and again, which is a pain.
2) Exhaustive as Brick is, it's missing a few no-brainers. Like the video for Once in a Lifetime. 3) Not all the CD bonus tracks are remixed for 5.1. What gives, Jer? 4) We got two copies of one art card -- which means there's at least one other buyer out there with the same complaint.
DAMAGE: About $200. But if that's too much, be patient; individual discs are due in a few months.
SUN RATING: 4.5 (out of 5)
Ray Charles
Pure Genius: The Complete Atlantic Recordings
(Rhino/Warner)
DISCS: Seven CDs & one DVD.
TRACKS: 155 on the CDs; 10 on the DVD.
YEARS: 1952 - 1960.
DETAILS: You've seen the biopic. You've rented the video. You've heard the soundtrack. Maybe you've even sprung for a Ray Charles compilation. But if you really wanna get the full Ray experience, you're gonna have to shell out for a box set at some point. There's no time like the present. Rhino has two exhaustive sets on the market: The reissued version of 1997's Genius & Soul, which provides a solid overview of nearly every facet of the soul pioneer's decades-long career (and which we wrote about a few weeks back); and the new Pure Genius: The Complete Atlantic Recordings, which, as the title makes clear, focuses on the singer-pianist's seminal recordings for Ahmet Ertegun and Jerry Wexler. These two industry legends gave Charles the support and rein he needed to forge his unique hybrid of soul and gospel, resulting in most of his best-known numbers -- Mess Around, I've Got a Woman, Drown in My Own Tears, Leave My Woman Alone, (Night Time is) The Right Time, What'd I Say and more all came during this groundbreaking, prolific period. And all of them -- along with every other track Charles cut for the label, including live recordings, duets with vibraphonist Milt Jackson, sideman sessions with saxman and longtime bandmember David (Fathead) Newman, and more -- are compiled here for the first time. Included with the mother lode is some buried treasure: A lengthy, informal 1953 rehearsal with plenty of chatter between Charles and Ertegun; outtakes and full-length versions of previously edited songs; recordings of Ray's arrangement suggestions to Quincy Jones; and a DVD with a 45-minute live set from the 1960 Newport Jazz Festival and a 15-minute interview with Ertegun by Ray director Taylor Hackford. As if that's not enough, Pure Genius comes with an 80-page hardcover book full of anecdotes and liner notes. And just to make it even more drool-worthy, it's all packed in a box modeled after an old portable record player, complete with real metal hinges, handle, snap-lock and even a faux cardboard turntable inside. Genius indeed.
QUIBBLES: 1) Aside from the one disc of rehearsal recordings and arrangement suggestions, almost everything here has been released before; 2) Your friends are going to hate you when you wave this treasure under their noses -- and then refuse to loan it to them.
DAMAGE: $220.
SUN RATING: 5 (out of 5)
The Band
A Musical History
(Capitol/EMI)
DISCS: Five CDs & one DVD.
TRACKS: 102 songs & nine videos.
YEARS: 1963 - 1976.
DETAILS: They barnstormed with Ronnie Hawkins. They helped Dylan go electric. They virtually invented contemporary roots-rock. And they bowed out with one of the most famous last waltzes in history. The Band's long, unique career is an unforgettable tale. So it's only logical that the six-disc set A Musical History comes packaged in a 112-page, full-colour hardcover book with a reverent, detailed bio and gorgeous archival pictures. Of course, the real story is told in the five CDs and one DVD -- and it has never been told as fully as here. Executive produced by guitarist Robbie Robertson with input from mad-scientist organist Garth Hudson, these 102 cuts leave no rolling stone unturned. You get a ton of prehistoric artifacts from their apprenticeship with Hawkins and their early solo work as Levon and the Hawks. You get tracks from their Basement Tapes with Dylan and from their infamous U.K. tour of '66, when he was booed for plugging in his guitar. You get their 1968 debut masterpiece Music From Big Pink -- including Tears of Rage, The Weight, Chest Fever, This Wheel's on Fire and I Shall Be Released -- virtually in its entirety. You get most of their striking self-titled second album -- with Rag Mama Rag, The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down and Up on Cripple Creek -- along with all the vital tracks from their other seven studio and live releases. Seeded throughout the set, you get about 40 unissued or rare outtakes, live recordings, demos and song sketches (and a bunch more that were only issued on 1994's Across the Great Divide box or the expanded CD reissues of their catalogue in 2000). And you get a 45-minute DVD of live footage from 1970 - '76, including two previously unseen tunes from their Festival Express stop in Calgary, two from a Wembley Stadium festival in '74 and three from their final TV performance on Saturday Night Live. Best of all, you don't get anything from their unremarkable, Robertson-less reunions in the '80s and '90s. That part of the story, most would agree, is best forgotten.
QUIBBLES: 1) There's a little too much Robertson in the book, while good ole boy drummer and vocalist Levon Helm is pretty much MIA, presumably over decades of bad blood between the duo; 2) As mentioned, some of these rarities are recycled from previous sets -- but not enough for you to sell those old CDs and replace them with this box.
DAMAGE: $115.
SUN RATING: 4.5 (out of 5)
Jelly Roll Morton
The Complete Library of Congress Recordings
(Rounder/Universal)
DISCS: Eight.
TRACKS: 128, including interview cuts.
YEARS: 1938.
DETAILS: A grand piano. A bottle of whiskey. A giant stack of aluminum recording discs. A few questions from folklorist Alan Lomax. And the inimitable wit of Jelly Roll Morton. Those are the basic ingredients of this box -- but they blend into a compelling chronicle of the early days of jazz, spun by one of its most colourful characters. In 1938, the down-and-out Morton -- a former pool shark, pimp and patent-medicine hawker who went on to become an unsung pioneer of New Orleans jazz -- sat down for a series of interviews with Lomax. What emerged is a fascinating, freewheeling narrative that encompasses everything from his own biography to the history of jazz, populated with the nefarious characters of the setting and infused with the hoodoo and voodoo of the era. As he ambles down memory lane, Morton accompanies himself on the piano, illustrating his stories in what amounts to the very first Storytellers episode. Only much of this probably wouldn't make it to air; as he warms to his interviewer (and to the whiskey), Morton dishes up ribald cuts like The Dirty Dozens, If You Don't Shake You Get no Cake and a long, expletive-laced Murder Ballad. It's all superb, mesmerizing and essential for any jazz connoisseur. And even though much of it has been issued before in various forms, this box finally gathers all the unedited recordings, refurbishes the sound, corrects the fluctuating pitch of the ancient recordings and puts it all in order. Also included: Lomax's subsequent 350-page biography Mr. Jelly Roll, another 80-page book on the recordings and the participants, a CD of interviews with Morton's contemporaries, and a 244-page Adobe PDF transcript of all the interviews, annotated with Lomax's notes. Plus it all comes in a piano-shaped box with a keyboard, a cardboard lid and a cover illustration by R. Crumb. Open up a bottle of whiskey, turn down the lights and enjoy.
QUIBBLES: That beautiful packaging is also a bit too fiddly and delicate -- especially for a box that's going to get as much handling and use as this.
DAMAGE: About $200.
SUN RATING: 5 (out of 5)
