Earlier this week we recommended two gorgeous vinyl box sets for the music aficionado in your life – Smashing Pumpkins Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness and Jethro Tull’s Thick As A Brick 1 & 2 (read about them here). We’re going the deluxe music route again today with two huge sets from Universal Music Canada that celebrate two moments in time – the massive fan frenzy of early 60’s Rolling Stones, and one of the greatest albums of the 1980’s, courtesy of Peter Gabriel.
Read all about them after the jump!
With the Rolling Stones marking their fiftieth anniversary in 2012, it makes sense that they’d celebrate it big time. There was their five date 50 and counting tour, their pay-per-view, a coffee table book and a greatest hits titled Grrr, which was available in a variety of configurations and featured two new songs from the band, Doom and Gloom and One More Shot. But for the real die hard fans in your life, the must-have Stones product that appeared this year is the Charlie Is My Darling Super Deluxe Box Set. A rare film that captured the Stones on tour of Ireland in 1965, the film was never officially released until this very year. You’ll be totally amazed at the sheer pandemonium that surrounds Mick, Keith and the rest of the fellows as they’re attacked on stage and off by overzealous fans, both male and female. It’s a brilliant moment thats been captured and now readily available.
While you could grab the film on its own on Blu-ray or DVD, the Super Deluxe version is the one real Rolling Stones collectors will want in their collection. Not only does it contain the director’s and producer’s cuts of Charlie Is My Darling on both DVD and Blu-Ray, it also contains the film’s soundtrack, another cd of previously unreleased live tracks from England in 1965, a live vinyl disc, a book, poster and way more. It’s all packaged together in a seriously cool box. While the Grrr greatest hits set got the publicity this fall, the Charlie Is My Darling Super Deluxe Box Set is the real gift to fans from the Stones for their fiftieth birthday.
Speaking of anniversaries, 2011 marked the twentieth anniversary of Peter Gabriel’s defining studio recording, the classic 1986 album, So. Everyone and their mother had this one back in the day, thanks to big hits like Sledgehammer, Big Time, Red Rain and Don’t Give Up. So, and its multiple videos, helped make Peter Gabriel a huge pop artist for a brief moment in time, and it makes sense that he’s celebrating that pinnacle moment in his career with the stellar So box set.
Always one to go big, this set features four cds, two DVDs and two vinyl albums. The cds include a remastered version of So, a disc of demos titles DNA and a two disc, previously unreleased live concert filmed in Athens. The first DVD is the visual representation of the Live In Athens, mastered in 5.1 Surround Sound, while the second is an instalment of the Classic Albums series, covering, of course, So. You’ll also find a copy of the album on vinyl, along with an absolutely gorgeous hardcover book that goes in-depth in the creation of the album. Oh, and for the digital folks, you can also download a hi-rez version of the album thanks to a download code included in the set. If there’s a Peter Gabriel fan in your life, their gift is set, believe me.
Purchase Charlie Is My Darling here, and get your hands on Peter Gabriel’s So right here.
