These box sets and reissues make a strong case for buying the music again

Box sets. Super deluxe editions. Reissues. Whatever you want to call them, it is the season for record companies to give consumers the opportunity to spend their hard-earned cash on previously issued material in new formats, usually buttressed by music you haven’t heard or at least haven’t heard in this particular form. Reissues are cash cows, designed to extract additional money from people who have already purchased the same music multiple times already: LP or cassette, then CD, then some digital format, then maybe you bought the record again after you sold your vinyl in favor of CDs.

But then it gets complicated. There’s the 10th anniversary remastered CD; some time after that, it’s the new and revolutionary format that will soon become outdated or forgotten (anyone remember SACD? Or half-speed masters?), the 15th anniversary set with bonus material and special Dolby remix, the commemorative 20th anniversary box featuring new and unreleased demos and outtakes, the 25th year celebration edition, the 30th year anniversary box, the 40th year re-remastered remaster using the Plangent Process (or Atmos! Or a new format that will not have an impact on 99.9% of the people buying and listening to it), and the list will continue to go on as long as there are tapes in the vault and customers with money.

These items only used to exist around records that were considered canon or at least landmark. Nowadays, everyone wants to get in on it, and not just for financial reasons. Artists embark on these projects for historical/legacy reasons — it’s their chance to present their work with the benefit of time and experience, rectify errors or oversights — as well as for the gravitas of having this kind of package exist for your music. So the list of box sets and reissues has grown exponentially each year. It’s still less expensive to reissue something you already own than it is to put money towards artist development and new bands or musicians who could be great if they had the chance to grow and develop.

Then there’s the packaging. Nowadays if you want the fanciest of the fancy box sets, you have to buy the vinyl version (which may or may not come with a download card so you can have a digital version to listen to on your portable device) if you want to get the benefit of the re-imagined packaging, archival photos, and (hopefully, but not guaranteed) extensive liner notes. Otherwise, get out the magnifying glass (no matter how old you are) to read the liner notes in a CD-sized booklet.

The question most listeners and fans ask is simple: Is it worth the money? It might sound great, but how much better does it sound than the thing I already own in at least two versions? There’s outtakes and demos? Again, how much of that detritus exists, and how essential is it to the story of the band or the album? Are we talking about half a dozen alternate takes that basically sound the same, but have a couple of lyrical differences and an extra guitar solo? Is it everything someone found in the vault that was recorded in that time frame, and thrown in without regard to what these tracks mean to the artist or the project?

Within this framework, here’s some thoughts on recent reissues that might be a good fit for your holiday gift lists. (And for the record, your columnist bought all of the following releases with her own money.)

“Horses” has been commercially reissued three times previously: in 1996, it was digitally remastered as part of a box set of Patti Smith’s 1970s work on Arista; in 2005, they released a “Legacy Edition” that was also remastered, and then there was a 2012 Record Store Day reissue that audiophiles across the internet actively dislike.

Comparing the remaster with an original pressing (not a flex, I’m just old) on a very analog stereo system sounds fantastic. Given the fact that both Lenny Kaye and Tony Shanahan (credited as the reissue producer) have their names all over the 50th Anniversary version, this is where you want to put your money if you don’t own a copy of the record or hadn’t upgraded it since your original purchase. It’s worth it.

The outtakes are (with one exception) previously unreleased, taken from earlier rehearsals or alternate sessions in 1975 and then several from Electric Lady as well. There’s always something interesting to find in early demos and outtakes; “Snowball” is a bright, poppy number but not at the level of the rest of the material in that time period, there’s what sounds like an initial take of “Break It Up” that has Verlaine’s guitar work higher in the mix, and if you haven’t heard Patti’s version of the Marvelettes’ “The Hunter Gets Captured By The Game,” she always — still! — infuses her delivery on these songs with the same kind of always-smiling verve that you’d have experienced in the audience at any Motown Revue.

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There’s also an early version of “We Three,” the torch song she wrote with Tom Verlaine, which would later make it onto “Easter.” But it is, perhaps unsurprisingly, an alternate take of “Birdland” dated from the September album sessions at Electric Lady Studios, that stands out, an embryonic but still magical version of the improvisational number that would appear on the album.

Because there aren’t any liner notes — there’s a paragraph reprinted from Smith’s “Bread of Angels” —  we don’t know why these takes were selected, or their particular significance, but even without that kind of curatorial guidance a careful listener can posit that the bonus tracks (which are identical on the CD reissue, points for not making people buy both to get everything) are meant as a mirror to the official release. Perhaps it was an alternate track listing at some point, or maybe it’s just meant as a window into the past, a small analog time machine letting you sit in the corner while the band works through their material.

(Fire Records) The Dream Syndicate – “Medicine Show: I Know What You Like” (Deluxe Edition)

Nervous breakdowns! Substance abuse! A revolving door of band members! This is more than a reissue; it is a reclamation and a delightfully obstreperous collection of material. First of all is a remastered version of The Dream Syndicate’s sophomore 1984 album, something that had been AWOL thanks to major label rights issues. The band won their fight, but under the condition that it could only ever be released on their own record label. So guitarist/songwriter Steve Wynn revived the indie label he started back in the ’80s and “Medicine Show” was free again.

“Medicine Show” was a record that either confounded or delighted fans of “alternative music” back in the early ’80s. “Medicine Show” was “Radio Ethiopia” in terms of the sonic and energetic fields it encompassed compared to the band’s debut, “The Days of Wine and Roses,” which gave them their spot in the New American Underground. They made their first record in a couple of hours and then signed to a major label, got a fancy producer in Sandy Pearlman (best known for his work with Blue Öyster Cult and the Clash), and then founder Steve Wynn had a substance-enhanced nervous breakdown. “Medicine Show” was the result, and you loved it, or you hated it, but if you hated it, you were probably in the wrong place to begin with.

This is a set for the true believers, compiled in a spirit of genuine fan service. With the help of crack archivist Pat Thomas (whose recent credits include The Waterboys’ “Life, Death and Dennis Hopper”), they pulled together this doozy of a reissue, including the remastered album, unreleased bonus tracks, and loads of live and rehearsal tracks, including a 1984 Chicago show that was broadcast on WXRT and a proto-”Medicine Show” workout at CBGB’s in 1983 show. We get to hear a brief incarnation of the band with keyboards and the rotating bass player lineup, including several appearances by the great Kendra Smith before her departure.

What I think I love the most about this four-CD set is that there are no less than seven — both studio and live — versions of “John Coltrane Stereo Blues” on here, which is truly exceptional when you consider that the album version is almost nine minutes long and there is no version on this set that is shorter than that. There’s an almost-16-minute version from CBGB’s in 1983 that I might have been in attendance for, where Steve Wynn in the intro makes reference to “the debacle at the Palladium,” which was when the band opened for U2 on the “War” tour (I was definitely at that). “We figured it was a good time to jam for 15 minutes, so this is the song we jammed on in front of 5,000 people.” But this collection of versions isn’t just an inside joke (although it is that, too), it’s also useful archivism, as it lets the listener chart the evolution and development of an absolute epic. It’s also insane, in the best possible way.

(Rhino) The Replacements, “Let It Be” – Deluxe Edition

The Replacements have been absolutely outdoing themselves with box set reissues that are worth your money, assembled by the right people who have done an exemplary job at balancing the concerns of legacy and fan service. Now we’re back at the record that could have (and should have) made the band into a household name; there are many reasons that didn’t happen (there’s a great book that explains all of it in detail), but it wasn’t for lack of talent. They had it, and this box set will make you remember if you were there, and will make you wish you were if you weren’t.

The remastered album still sounds great; whatever improvements that were made aren’t overwhelming. But also, the people who worked on the original record were very good at their jobs, and given the low-budget constraints, the record sounded very good when it came out, and it still sounds great now. The set is accompanied by fantastic liner notes from the great Elizabeth Nelson — and even if you think you’ve already read everything written about The Replacements, you’ll learn something. Her perspective is full of both deep appreciation and keen insight.

Of course, there is the requisite disc of rarities and B-sides. The five tracks that appeared on the 2008 reissue of the record are present, including the awesome “Perfectly Lethal” and their dynamite cover of the Grass Roots’ “Temptation Eyes,” but the standouts have to be the two home demos of “Answering Machine.” One of the demos was on the 2008 issue, but the impact of hearing the two of these back to back is simply stunning. It’s the kind of archivism that will make you go back and forth between the alternates and the album track, comparing and contrasting minute differences in vocal inflection.

And then there’s a live show, from Chicago’s legendary Cubby Bear in August of 1984. It is, absolutely, an astonishing performance, and was professionally remastered for this release — but it’s still an audience tape from 1984 and unless you are still regularly listening to audience recordings of shows from the 1980s, you will likely struggle to listen to this more than once. This show ended up as part of the package because a fan gave Tommy Stinson a CD-R of the recording, but one has to wonder if there weren’t equally powerful shows that were captured with greater fidelity. If you just want to have all of the music, the CD version is probably the better investment here over the vinyl.

(Polydor Records) The Who, “Who Are You” – 7CD/Blu-Ray Super Deluxe Edition Boxset

There’s a popular Instagram series where the hook is, “I take this unappealing food and make it into something my family wants to eat.” That’s not bad framing with which to consider the latest reissue box from The Who, this time for 1979’s “Who Are You.” Unless you’re one of those people who have to purchase everything your favorite band has put out, you would probably nod and keep scrolling when you encountered the news of the “Who Are You” reissue  — which is what I originally did, despite the band consistently demonstrating that their retrospective box sets are always worth the money and demonstrate a genuine respect for their fanbase.

That’s because most of the news stories about this box set completely buried the lede, and I had to wait for a diehard fan to post about it. What’s essential about this super deluxe edition are the discs of live material, taken from both The Who’s 1979 tour and the discs of live tracks from the concerts that were staged in order for director Jeff Stein — back then, a fanatic Who fan who literally once stole film as it spooled off the projector — to have the definitive shots he felt he needed to end his pivotal documentary, “The Kids Are Alright,” back in 1979.

While the concert recordings exist in the robust network of fan bootlegs — acknowledging that that isn’t necessarily accessible to everyone — the Shepperton Studios material has not leaked, except for the two songs that feature in the film. Here, there are the six tracks from that performance, the last time Keith Moon played drums for The Who before he died, and although “Baba O’Riley” and “Won’t Get Fooled Again” were on the movie soundtrack, here they’ve both been cleaned up as well as texturized to feel grittier and more live, even if it seems impossible for that footage to be more powerful than it already was.

When you combine all of the above, plus your bog-standard disc of outtakes as well as a newly remastered version of the album and a very curious rejected version engineered by Glyn Johns that for some reason removes John Entwistle’s bass (or sounds like it), plus yet another exhaustively comprehensive 100 page hard-cover book compiled by long-time archivist Matt Kent, you now have a highly-desirable 8-disc box set in a season chock full of them. (It’s also very fairly priced for what it offers, coming in around $125 at press time.)