Around August 25, 20011, Judas Priest and Sony will release their complete UK CBS / Columbia singles, for the first time ever. The “Single Cuts” box set holds 20 CDs in all and contains 52 tracks spanning their entire CBS/Columbia career, from “Diamonds and Rust” (1977) to “Night Crawler” (1992). “Presented in a deluxe, numbered box, Single Cuts boasts a massive 52 tracks across 20 CDs, featuring original singles artwork, vinyl replica discs plus booklet including sleeve notes and photos.”
In the official press release the band stated that there would only be one manufacturing run of this box set, which can be preordered right now.
My take: The past Judas Priest remasters were perhaps the best examples of how not to reissue older material. The sound quality was abysmal. With that listening experience in mind, I would think twice before preordering this set and will risk waiting until people have commented on its sound quality.
On top of that, I have never really been a fan of all of these singles collections containing CDs with a mere two to four or five titles. A package like that sounds like a huge waste of resources to me.
Warning people that there will be only one manufacturing run is an old and tried marketing ploy, meaning that if demand still exists, there might well be another manufacturing run in the future. With Judas Priest and a singles box set I am not so sure, so I tend to think that if you want a copy, you should probably order one now.
As a last thought: Should this release actually turn out to be well-mastered, I would patiently sit and wait for later remastered full albums which might then possibly be reissued later with that new mastering.
1977
Diamonds and Rust
Dissident Aggressor
1978
Better By You, Better Than Me
Invader
1978
Evening Star
Starbreaker
1978
Before The Dawn
Rock Forever
1979
Take On The World
Starbreaker (Live at the Agora Ballroom, Cleveland 1978)
White Heat Red Hot (Live at the Agora Ballroom, Cleveland 1978)
1979
Evening Star
Beyond The Realms Of Death (Live at the Agora Ballroom, Cleveland 1978)
The Green Manalishi (with the Two-Pronged Crown)
1980
Living After Midnight
Delivering The Goods (Live In Tokyo)
Evil Fantasies (Live In Tokyo)
1980
Breaking The Law
Metal Gods
1980
United
Grinder
1981
Don’t Go
Solar Angels
1981
Hot Rockin’ 3:03
Breaking The Law (Live)
Steeler
You Don’t Have To Be Old To Be Wise
1982
You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’
Exciter (Live)
1982
(Take These) Chains
Judas Priest Audio File
1984
Freewheel Burning
Breaking The Law(Live from US Festival May 1983)
You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’
1984
Some Heads Are Gonna Roll
The Green Manalishi (With The Two-Pronged Crown) (Live)
Jawbreaker
1986
Turbo Lover
Hot For Love
1986
Locked In
Reckless
Desert Plains (Live)
Freewheel Burning (Live)
1990
Painkiller
United
Better By You, Better Than Me
1991
A Touch Of Evil
Between The Hammer And The Anvil
You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’ (Live)
1992
Night Crawler
Breaking The Law (Live)
Living After Midnight (Live)
Related Posts
- Sony botched the “Miles Davis: Complete Columbia Album Collection”
- The Complete Billie Holiday on Columbia
- Fleetwood Mac: The Complete Blue Horizon Sessions
- Guilty Pleasures: I
- George Shearing – Classic Album Collection (1951-1956)
- The Complete Joe Newman RCA-Victor Recordings (1955-1956): “The Basie Days”
- Buddy Rich Sessions
- Don’t Make Me Bleed!
- 16,000 Tunes and Counting
- UFO: Walk on Water
http://www.bravewords.com/news/167384
Seems Judas priest has delayed this release until October 10th for technical reasons but you can still pre-order the set through the band’s website…..price is $100 U.S.!
Now I’m not sure what this is going to sound like but I’m going to guess that the bulk of the tracks are going to come from the remaster series that came out years ago. I agree that those remasters from 2001 were not done well. If you take a look at the collectible box for the remaster series (I own it!) and this singles box, they are almost identical. The sound lacked balls, too much high end and compression to make it sound louder.
What bothers me is the same remasters from 2001 were used for the 2004 Metalolgy box set. That was a 4CD retrospective from Rocka Rolla thru Demolition and included some bonus tracks, as well as, the Live Vengeance ’82 DVD that had previouly been released on it’s own. It’s easy to tell, and I believe I read it after I had bought it, that the remastered tracks came from the 2001 remasters. The only hope right now is that they remastered the bonus tracks properly. I can’t see myself buying this for $100 but I do like collectible pieces so I will wait until I read a few reviews in October…..I’m also going to do some research on the live tracks, if I can get them from another source legally I will just acquire those.
I still own my original pressing of all the Priest albums on CD and I reach for them before any remasters.
Steve
Heavy Metal Addiction.com
Steve,
welcome back to the new livingwithmusic.com. :)
I get all aggressive when I think about the sound of those remasters. I know that just about any remaster today is trying to stay “competitive”, meaning that executives want their pet projects to be as loud, shrill and obnoxious as those their competitors put out (probably a radio play thing), but it is beyond me how the musicians themselves put up with that, if they have a say in it at all.
In case of Judas Priest, I guess every single member must be virtually deaf by now so they won’t notice, but to put it as plainly as possible, they are ruining their musical legacy themselves.
Those people who know/knew and love(d) their music just know they never sounded as wimpy and crappy as they do on those botched remasters. If they want their fans’ ears to bleed, it should be by representing their music the way I heard it way back when and not by presenting a frequency range that makes pigs squeal on any farm less than 50 miles away. That is simply idiotic.
I’ll give up on the Priest then and hope that once the executives have croaked, some kind soul will come along and restore the Priest sound to its former glory.
And thanks a million for the info on the changed release date, Steve!