Tag Archives: best of

Another Day, Another Wings Compilation….

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Announced yesterday out of the blue a new Wings “best of” compilation to accompany the forthcoming book, Wings – The Story of a Band on the Run (and possibly the new documentary film, Man On The Run):

WINGS – The Definitive Collection will contain purely Wings songs (in other words no Paul McCartney solo, or Paul and Linda McCartney releases) and it will come in the shape of a 3LP set, a 2CD set, a 1CD, and there’ll be a separate, exclusive Blu-Ray Audio Disc with Atmos mixes for the first time.

This 3LP set will also be offered as a McCartney Official Store limited edition coloured vinyl exclusive:

If you don’t want to pay US$20.00 for a lithograph and a sticker sheet then you can get a standard 3LP set without the trinkets:

And there’s a single LP on black vinyl containing 12 tracks in all:

The first “exclusive”, “limited edition” coloured vinyl release of the 1LP has been announced. It’ll be available on green vinyl through Target stores in the U.S., in FNAC stores in France, also from jpc in Germany and Austria, and at JB Hi Fi in Australia. In other words, it looks like one retailer per territory will get the “exclusive”. Will this be the first of many colour and cover art variations like we saw with McCartney III?

If CD is more your thing then the 2CD set has all the tracks from the 3LP sets, including the poster:

While the 1CD replicates the 1LP track running order:

The McCartney Store and the SuperDeluxeEdition site are offering an exclusive Blu-ray Audio disc which is likely to be the format that most excites McCartney fans. As site owner Paul Sinclair writes, “For the first time, tracks are available in Dolby Atmos on a physical product. The mixes are by Giles Martin and Steve Orchard. 14 of them have been available in recent times on streaming, but 17 of them are unheard in this format, including tracks from un-reissued latter albums, such as ‘With A Little Luck’, ‘London Town’ and ‘I’ve Had Enough’ (from 1978’s London Town) and ‘Getting Closer’ and ‘Arrow Through Me’ (from 1979’s Back to the Egg). 7 out of the 10 tracks from the US version of Band on the Run also feature on this compilation.

Blu-ray Audio audio streams summary:

  • Dolby Atmos Mix (48/24)
  • 5.1 Surround Mix (48/24)
  • Hi-Res Stereo Mixes (96/24)

This blu-ray audio contains 32 tracks and is presented as a ‘softpack’ with a 16-page booklet:

The  WINGS – The Definitive Collection packaging has been designed by Paul and Aubrey ‘Po’ Powell of the famous Hipgnosis design studio. The two have worked together extensively in the past, not only on album artwork but also the art direction for McCartney tours. The first thing that hit us though was that front cover with the word WINGS populated with a photo montage of the band, and the inner sleeve replicating that was a little bit derivative. Some other band from the past used a very similar idea way back when…..

For the full news story and background on this release see the official Paul McCartney page.

WINGS – The Definitive Collection is out on November 7.

New John Lennon Compilations – Gimme Some Truth

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Just officially announced: it’s Gimme Some Truth. Again………..but different.

10 years ago we got a four CD compilation box set called Gimme Some Truth.

Today comes the announcement that, as part of the celebrations for John Lennon’s 80th birthday, a new selection of his solo recordings have been completely re-mixed from scratch for a new collection called (you guessed it), Gimme Some Truth:  Huh? What’s this all about, and why?

This is yet another “Best Of” selection, this time around chosen by Yoko Ono and Sean Ono Lennon, and in physical format it will be issued in a plethora of ways:

1 CD (19 tracks); 2 LP (19 tracks); 2 CD’s (36 tracks); 4 LP Box Set (36 tracks); and a Deluxe Box Set with 2 CD’s + Blu-Ray (audio only with High Definition 24-96 Stereo,
5.1 Surround Sound and Dolby Atmos mixes) + 124 page book, poster, postcards and sticker (36 tracks).

Of the 36 tracks on offer here, 30 of them were already included on the 2010 Gimme Some Truth box.

However, the Lennon official site says that what differentiates this 2020 Gimme Some Truth is that all the tracks have now (quote) “…been completely remixed…using brand new transfers of the original multi-tracks, cleaned up to the highest possible sonic quality…radically upgrading their sonic quality, presenting them as a never-before-heard Ultimate Listening Experience.”

This new box set has been mixed and engineered by multi GRAMMY® Award-winning engineer Paul Hicks.

It was Hicks who did the mixes for Imagine – The Ultimate Collection in 2018 and, it has to be said, he did an exceptional job so it’ll be interesting to hear the improvements to these 36 tracks.

“After weeks of painstaking preparation, the final mixes and effects were completed using only vintage analogue equipment and effects at Henson Recording Studios in Los Angeles (formerly A&M Studios, where John had recorded some of the Rock ‘n’ Roll album), and then mastered in analogue at Abbey Road Studios in order to ensure the most beautiful and authentic sound quality possible.”

Have a listen and make up your own mind on this preview track on YouTube:

So, there will be the inevitable claims of another cash grab and that this is another go at selling us music we already have. Personally, I’m looking forward to these tracks being presented in the best possible audio. But that’s just me. What do you reckon? Let us know in the comment section below.

The question a lot of collectors are now asking is does this mean we won’t be getting the rumoured big re-issue campaign for Plastic Ono Band, John’s 1970 masterpiece which has its 50th anniversary later this year? It seems we won’t.