Anniversaries

I was just reading about Priest releasing a 25th Anniversary single for "Painkiller" for the upcoming Black Friday shopping day. It got me thinking about whether or not these things should be celebrated and if so, which ones? I know these are not always the band putting them out and are sometimes the record label (Metal Blade), but the question is still the same. Conceivably, you could have an anniversary of every one of a bands albums throughout their career, so which ones get picked? Best selling? Most well known? Fan favorite? Also, with regards to Deluxe Editons/ Legacy Editions, who picks which albums to be given the deluxe/ expanded treatment? Thank you for your input.

To clarify, you mean they are doing a reissue of the "Painkiller" SINGLE for black Friday?

To that, I say no. I mean, I don't care if it exists...but it is so utterly useless to me. It will probably cost the same or more as buying a brand-new copy of the (inferior) Painkiller CD remaster or a used copy of the original pressing.

But I see people buying the recently released Iron Maiden singles and all that stuff so I guess there's a market for it. To me all this stuff is just pointless and relies on people's completist complexes, OCD/music hoarding tendencies and just all around compulsion to just buy shit.

People are of course free to spend their money however they see fit, but it just such a weird practice to me. And as far as your question about deluxe/legacy/anniversary editions of full albums...again, pretty useless to me unless there some bevy of unearthed/unreleased stuff that makes it worth it. I do think anniversary tours are cool when the band plays albums in full. I wish Alice Cooper did that.

If a record label thinks there is any possibility of earning more potential profit by doing a reissue the reissue will happen.

Whether that particular reissue interests me enough to buy it is the only part I concern myself with.

These days I've gotten spoiled by some fine deluxe reissues of material that adds a ton of enticing new details. 5.1 mixes, stereo remixes, instrumental mixes, flat transfer of the original master tapes, unreleased session recordings and often the new reissues offer blu-rays or DVDs or hi-res audio files. Those are the kind of packages that interest me, the ones I can tell were put together with care and truly offer something new to the fan.

Just slapping "25th anniversary" on something, compressing it even louder and maybe tossing in a couple demos or live tracks isn't going to entice me to buy it. It has to offer a new experience, a new insight into something I consider to be worthy of further study.

Painkiller is 25 years old. Geez, that means the last time I saw Judas Priest live was a quarter century ago. Gack!!

Anyway... the "anniversary single" is probably a cool little collectible but I wouldn't bother with it.

My standard response to any and all reissues is this: If it's something I've already got on my shelf, it had better have some pretty frickin sweet-as-hell bonus goodies attached in order to make me double dip. I'm not an audiophile so remixes/remasterings mean jack-sh*t to me, and as for "bonus tracks," maybe cough up some demo versions of songs that didn't make the cut for the record, single B-Sides, hell, maybe even a vintage interview or something cool like that. If they're just gonna tack on a couple of live versions of album tracks, they can bite me.

I can pretty much count the number of times I've re-bought a CD over the years on one hand. I'd rather use my $$ to add new stuff to the collection rather than constantly updating things I already own.

Fat Freddy wrote:

maybe even a vintage interview

Personally, that for me is the worst thing to put on a CD. If you do feel inclined to include an interview, make it a separate disc man. Crappy demo tracks and live tracks ruin the flow of an album enough as it is, let alone an interview that *might get listened to once. Even a 2-minute interview would be annoying, but I've had CDs that had 10-minute interviews tacked on at the end. That is a terrible thing to do, in my opinion.

ZombieHavoc wrote:

Fat Freddy wrote:

maybe even a vintage interview

That is a terrible thing to do, in my opinion.

Depends on who the interview-ee is I guess.

The only way a bonus track or interview could interrupt the flow of an album is if you stuck it somewhere in the middle of the record. If it's at the end of the disc and you don't want to hear it, the stop button was invented for that purpose.

Most of the reissues I've bought recently carry all the bonus material on a separate disc. Really the best option if you have enough material to fill it. If you don't have enough material then maybe the reissues itself is a waste of time.

I like Anniversary releases if they are done well with an exhaustive treatment - I want single versions, b-sides, live tracks, DVDs, thick booklets, novel packaging, etc...

Then again, I am the maniac that bought almost every CD version of the Diamond Head catalog and wrote a huge 2 part article on it. So maybe I have something wrong with my brain. I do admit that I like trying to parse out a catalog and figure out where all of the material came from.

Judas Priest is an example of a band that does not give a damn about their back catalog though. They have mostly crap remasters and they conveniently skip albums that weren't huge successes - for instance, there's no 30th Anniversary edition of Point of Entry and no 70s material has gotten the treatment. Also, they never include bonus material that they should - interesting exclusive singles, etc... Let's take the Defenders 30th Anniversary Edition as an example. They didn't include the single version of "Freewheel Burning," they misspelled Metallian as Metallion on the back of the package, the booklet is lame with no lyrics or anything interesting, and it wasn't released until 2015 which is actually the 31st Anniversary of the album! They need a good archivist to sort their catalog out and do a proper job of it.

S.D. wrote:

The only way a bonus track or interview could interrupt the flow of an album is if you stuck it somewhere in the middle of the record.  If it's at the end of the disc and you don't want to hear it, the stop button was invented for that purpose.  

I am of the camp (and this is a development over the past few years as I used to not care) that wants only the original album on the disc. Certainly I can stop the disc. Or I can put it on my iPhone and leave off any material I don't want. But since we're discussing stuff we like or don't...

I enjoyed collecting the Deluxe Editions of the Sabbath catalog when they were being released, but as far as Anniversary editions I am not sure I have any to be honest. Edit - I just made a passing glance over my collection and the only Anniversary Edition I saw was The Sickness 10th Year A. by Disturbed. As far as I can tell it has no bonus or extras of any kind besides a cheesy hologram cover.

ZombieHavoc wrote:

S.D. wrote:

The only way a bonus track or interview could interrupt the flow of an album is if you stuck it somewhere in the middle of the record.  If it's at the end of the disc and you don't want to hear it, the stop button was invented for that purpose.  

I am of the camp (and this is a development over the past few years as I used to not care) that wants only the original album on the disc. Certainly I can stop the disc. Or I can put it on my iPhone and leave off any material I don't want. But since we're discussing stuff we like or don't...

I don't see it much anymore, at least not on the stuff I generally buy. I had a friend that felt the same way and only wanted the original album on a single disc so I get it. I can't think of the last disc I bought where the bonus material wasn't on either a bonus CD or a DVD/blu-ray, etc.

Yeah, I don't see why they'd only reissue the single. Full length albums, or even EPs, absolutely, but not singles. I can't see people buying physical copies of singles. I mean, not even that many people buy physical copies of albums, even though I still do.

Funny thing is, my dad prefers digital to physical, and he's in his late 60s. I'm his son, and I still prefer to own physical copies, as opposed to buying albums digitally.

I like the Deep Purple 25th anniversary editions. Machine Head comes with the original and an alternate mix on a separate disc, unreleased bonus tracks and a commentary/biography.

In Rock doesn't have the alternate mix, but it has out-takes and stuff, AND autographs printed on the cover, which is odd.

Anyway, they were well worth the purchase for someone who didn't have them on CD.

I don't mind anniversary editions anyway. At least it keeps the album on the shelf and available for new fans.

I have a few others, like Tarot's Spell of Iron re-recorded version. I believe Sonata Arctica also re-recorded their Ecliptica album for a 15th anniversary. I think that's a bit silly. But whatever, no-one's forced to buy it.

Though one danger in Anniversary Editions and re-recordings is that they replace the original print. That's basically what's happened with Megadeth (except they weren't really "anniversary editions", but that's a thing that could happen).

I think I'd rather hear new live albums rather than re-recordings. Live albums are always good for a listen, and they never replace anything. A band can release a million live albums, and I wouldn't mind. I don't have to buy them all. It's just nice to have them conveniently available. And it's always a different version. Some bands, I only anymore listen to (official) live recordings. They give a different vibe, and are always listenable even if you are burnt out on the original studio recording. It gives your favourite songs a second life.

S.D. wrote:

Just slapping "25th anniversary" on something, compressing it even louder and maybe tossing in a couple demos or live tracks isn't going to entice me to buy it.  It has to offer a new experience, a new insight into something I consider to be worthy of further study.

I have to second this. There have been both a lot of excellent reissues and a lot of rather lame ones in the last few years. Fortunately, I see more companies getting the point and upping their game than not, so I'm hopeful that trend will continue.

It's also a question of intent. If the goal is just to put something back in print, just put the damn album back in print and don't waste our time with "25th anniversary celebration of this album selling NO copies on release!" The idea of a proper "anniversary" edition, to my mind, is that you're adding something to the experience.

What is the experience?

Well, first you have to leave the damn sonic quality of the album alone or improve it. No question on that.

Also, keep the flow of the album. That means putting your bonus stuff on a second disc instead of goofing up the flow of the album - which was carefully arranged originally if the band was worth talking about a few decades after the fact. Nothing torques me off more than not being able to find a copy of Superunknown by Soundgarden that doesn't have that awful "She Likes Surprises" song tacked on at the end. Even if the song were half decent (which it's not), you can't beat "Like Suicide" as an album closer with a stick. It's perfection. Don't mess with perfection.

Depending on the band, if you're going to do a special re-release, something important to consider is that it's an ARCHIVAL release. The original album already exists. If you're trying to add to that, peel back the curtain a little bit. If there are decent demos or live versions of tracks that are different enough from their studio counterparts to be interesting, throw that stuff on there. Barely listenable cassette demos that sound like a toilet backing up or note-perfect live renditions with stupid stage banter need not apply!

Oh, and put all the damn b-sides in your extra tracks! Seriously, it's not archival if you're leaving out chunks of the story. This, for me, is one of the biggest sticking points in a lot of these re-releases. You can cut all the live crap in the world (few bands are that interesting to listen to in "live" recordings anyway), but that goes DOUBLE if what you're taking room away from are studio out-takes and released b-sides.

So, while a lot of metal bands don't have big archives of unreleased material (most of them were too broke to afford the studio time to rack that kind of thing up), I still think this setup applies. Improve the sound quality or don't touch it at all, don't mess with the running order and, if you're going to append bonus cuts, actually do your work and round up EVERYTHING they put out at the time. This doesn't seem like it should be too hard to pull off.

Personally, something I find troubling (aside from all of the bands whose master tapes and multi-tracks have been swallowed by the ether) is the notion that a lot of tapes for albums we'd consider classic are either becoming unusable or starting to deteriorate past the point of usability altogether. Prime example is the recent David Bowie box set. This may be so much tilting at windmills, but there are a lot of fans insisting that they can hear tape damage on those earliest albums (i.e. the sound drops out). These labels that keep dipping back into the well are going to eventually find that the tapes are beyond repair and that the last go-round actually is the LAST go-round for those songs from the multi-tracks. Every crap remix/remaster release we get is one more pass on a finite number of passes those tapes have before they go to that big analog roundup in the sky.

For my money, that should be the imperative to get it right NOW while the raw material is there to be worked with. Maybe I'm a little idealistic there though.

WOW! Excellent responses folks. This forum wins the internet.

Witchfinder wrote:

I like Anniversary releases if they are done well with an exhaustive treatment - I want single versions, b-sides, live tracks, DVDs, thick booklets, novel packaging, etc...

Then again, I am the maniac that bought almost every CD version of the Diamond Head catalog and wrote a huge 2 part article on it.  So maybe I have something wrong with my brain. I do admit that I like trying to parse out a catalog and figure out where all of the material came from.

Judas Priest is an example of a band that does not give a damn about their back catalog though.  They have mostly crap remasters and they conveniently skip albums that weren't huge successes - for instance, there's no 30th Anniversary edition of Point of Entry and no 70s material has gotten the treatment.  Also, they never include bonus material that they should - interesting exclusive singles, etc...  Let's take the Defenders 30th Anniversary Edition as an example.  They didn't include the single version of "Freewheel Burning," they misspelled Metallian as Metallion on the back of the package, the booklet is lame with no lyrics or anything interesting, and it wasn't released until 2015 which is actually the 31st Anniversary of the album!  They need a good archivist to sort their catalog out and do a proper job of it.    

This. Right here. I could not agree more.

There definitely should have been a 30th of "point of Entry" with the much better European cover and b- sides, rare live bonuses and a thick lyric booklet. The 2001 re masters are awful and the bonus tracks are cool to have but don't match the time frame of the album they are tacked onto. The only good thing about them is how they make up the burning JP symbol when they are in the right order on a shelf.

As for the "Defenders" Anniversary release, I'm happy to not have to chase the "ABC Defenders" bootleg anymore and the sound quality on the live stuff is good. I agree on the misspelling of Metallian  and the lack of the single version of "Freewheel" drops it a few points in my book. The first disc could have been a dual disc with videos and commentary, but, oh well.

I used to be more inclined to pick up singles when I saw them and they were cheap enough (pre mortgage and pre baby on the way) and had some rare b side or live track. If it's a pre release and I get it before the album proper is released, that's one thing. If it is years after the fact I see it as just a collectable with no real function and it takes away from buying something I don't have yet.

If an album had a bad mix and the band re-releases an anniversary edition with the mix the way they wanted it then thats cool...Adding live tracks doesn't do it for me..Demos and unreleased tracks is what I would be looking for in an anniversary re-release...in some ways I would rather a band celebrate an anniversary by just releaseing a new album filled with Demos and unreleased tracks and some cool artwork and biography notes....