1. The Smiths: The Complete Smiths. This box is worth the purchase if only for the remastering job, which takes the crappy sounding old CD versions of all of the Smiths records and totally overhauls them.
2. Beach Boys: Smile! After the Brian Wilson/Wondermints version, this might be slightly anticlimactic, but it’s still an amazing accomplishment, unfinished at that. Uncut’s #1 bootleg of all time is now official.
3. The Radio Dept: Passive Aggressive (The Singles 2002-2010). Really great collection of singles (some of them non-album!) and b-sides. “Heaven’s On Fire” is stellar, as is much of the rest. I’m not sure what to make of the dude on the album cover, though. *shudder*
4. U2: Achtung Baby. The twentieth anniversary (!) of U2’s best overall album brought a massive 6 disc box set, which included cleanly remastered versions of both the album and the underrated companion Zooropa, along with b-sides, early demos, and two discs of mostly underwhelming but interesting remixes that show the influence of British dance pop and techno on the songs.
5. R.E.M.: Life’s Rich Pageant (25th Anniversary Edition). Continuing an excellent series of reissues, although missing the live album that came with Murmur, there are some cool demo versions of tracks from this classic. And then there’s Part Lies, Part Heart, Part Truth, Part Garbage (1982-2011), the first comprehensive hits set (released not long after the breakup announcement) that has some flaws (WAY too much from Green!) but sums up the career nicely. And I can’t think of a better career coda than the final track, “We All Go Back To Where We Belong”.
6. The Jayhawks: Hollywood Town Hall and Tomorrow The Green Grass reissues. Nicely remastered, with loads of bonus tracks and demos recordings, these were a nice treat in the year when the Jayhawks returned.
7. Smashing Pumpkins: Gish and Siamese Dream reissues. No band screams ‘90’s alt-rock’ more than the Pumpkins, and Billy Corgan takes a lot of crap (much of it justified because he seems like a giant tool), but these records have aged well. The success of bands aping the Pumpkins sound (I’m looking at you, Silversun Pickups!) just proves that these records seeped into the musical DNA of contemporary indie rock deeply. Great boxed set reissues, with b-sides, demos, and (best of all) full show DVDs from each era.
8. Archers of Loaf: Icky Mettle. Often passed over as North Carolina’s version of Pavement, these guys were WAY better than the overrated Pavement. “Web In Front” might be the most representative of the slacker sound of the 90’s, and this reissue (with the Vs The Greatest of All Time EP) makes the case that Archers were one of the lost bands of the era.
9. The Waterboys: In a Special Place-Piano Demos For This is the Sea. Rarely are demos discs much more than curios, but these early, solo piano versions of tracks from This Is The Sea, often featuring different lyrics and alternate melodies merit revisiting. More than once.
10. Nirvana: Nevermind (20th Anniversary Edition). I’m not a huge fan of this record (but I eagerly await the In Utero reissue, hopefully with the ‘unlistenable’ original Albini mix) but it has its charms. Some of the best tracks Nirvana put out come from the b-sides around the time this album was released, so it’s nice to have them all together.
11. Manic Street Preachers: National Treasure-The Complete Singles. I’m kind of a novice to these guys, so this career-spanning collection of all 39 singles is a solid introduction to a long-standing Britpop band.
12. Ben Folds: The Best Imitation of Myself/55 Vault. The entire career, from Ben Folds Five to the Nick Hornby record, as well as new tracks, rarities, and a live disc. The 55 Vault adds to the mix with 55 more rarities of various quality. Over 100 tracks of Ben…tasty!
13. Material Issue: International Pop Overthrow (20th Anniversary Edition). This reissue is a sad one, considering that the talented writer of these songs committed suicide in 1996. But the reissue, loaded with bonus tracks (many from the great Eleven Supersonic Hit Explosions LP), including covers of Thin Lizzy, The Sweet, and Simon and Garfunkel, is essential power pop.
14. Jesus and Mary Chain: Upside Down-The Best Of. All of the main studio albums from JAMC got expanded reissues this year, but I haven’t shelled out for those yet. This two disc set, though, offers a full screen view of the best of all phases of the Chain’s evolution, from the early, noisy stuff (“Just Like Honey”, “Never Understand”) to the later, poppier stuff (“Head On”, “Far Gone and Out”) to the cool duets (“Sometimes Always” with Hope Sandoval, “God Help Me” with Shane MacGowan). Feedback-covered gold, all.
15. Tindersticks: Claire Denis Film Scores 1996-2009. Always a cinematic-sounding group, Tindersticks (and individual members Stuart Staples and Dickon Hinchcliffe) have put together mostly instrumental scores for six Claire Denis films. This beautiful box collected them, in loving fashion, to soundtrack your rainy afternoon of reading existentialist poetry and pensively smoking.
16. Pete Yorn: musicforthemorningafter (10th Anniversary Edition). This record was released in 2001, but is rarely discussed amongst the great alt-country/Americana records of that year (Ryan Adams’ Gold, Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot), and sadly so. Some of Pete’s best songs, and the inclusion of the excellent covers EP that followed the record’s release only highlights how good his playing and singing are.
17. Ocean Colour Scene: Moseley Shoals(Deluxe Edition). Of course, this UK-only reissue (the band never made a dent in the US consciousness) piles a bonus disc (23 tracks in all) worth of b-sides from a wildly popular, Weller-influenced Britpop record. OCS always had a little more soul and grit than most of the rest of Britpop.
18. New Model Army: Anthology. A comprehensive double-disc set of hits and deep album cuts from a band with a massive back catalog. A more than capable introduction to the band’s broad span of styles, from crustpunk to postpunk to aggro-folk.
19. Josh Ritter: Live at the Iveagh Gardens. Idaho-bred songwriter Josh Ritter is huge in Ireland. This live double album, with included DVD, shows a rabid Irish fanbase soaking in a set of Ritter’s best songs and his charismatic stage presence. Best straight-up live record of the year.
20. Upside Down: Original Soundtrack. There’s nothing unreleased or rare on this double disc collection of Creation Records tracks, put together to soundtrack the excellent documentary on the label. But any soundtrack with Ride’s “Taste” and Oasis’s “Live Forever” and the Boo Radley’s “Wake Up Boo!” and Teenage Fanclub’s “The Concept”…
21. Billy Bragg: Fight Songs. Compiling Billy’s politically charged free downloads from 2001-2011, these tracks cover anti-Bush and anti-Iraq War tracks, to later criticisms of Wall Street bailouts and (best of all) Rupert Murdoch’s journalistic nightmare (“Don’t Buy The Sun”). If you have a strong favorite in January’s Iowa caucauses, you probably will not like this. Just sayin’.
22. Against Me!: White Crosses/Black Crosses. Shortly after releasing White Crosses on Sire in 2010, Against Me! left the label. They quickly started their own label and re-released White Crosses, including some of the bonus tracks available on only some versions of the original record, alongside a standalone bonus disc of demos, much rougher in form and function than the Butch Vig/Alan Moulder versions from the album.
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