NewsBoomtown Rats / Classic Album box
Universal Music will issue a Boomtown Rats Classic Album Selection box set on 21 October 2013.
This collection features the Dublin band’s six original albums – The Boomtown Rats (1977), A Tonic For The Troops (1978), The Fine Art Of Surfacing (1979), Mondo Bongo (1980), V Deep (1982) and The Fine Art Of Surfacing (1984) – and all come packaged in card wallets. The CDs will feature the bonus material included with previous reissues.
The Boomtown Rats were at their peak in the late 1970s when they notched up two UK number one singles with Rat Trap and I Don’t Like Mondays, but by 1984 their popularity was declining rapidly and Bob Geldolf would subsequently become more famous for Band Aid and Live Aid than as a member of the Boomtown Rats.
Despite this, Geldolf announced earlier this year that the Rats have reformed and they will be touring the UK and Ireland in October and November 2013. This box set and a new ‘best of’ – Back to Boomtown: Classic Rats Hits – are released to coincide with the tour.
Classic Album Selection box set
- • UK Pre-order: Classic Album Selection: Six Albums 1977-1984
- • GERMANY Pre-order: Classic Album Selection
Back to Boomtown: Classic Rats Hits
- • UK Pre-order: Back To Boomtown : Classic Rats Hits
- • USA Pre-order: Back to Boomtown: Classic Rats Hits
- • CANADA Pre-order: Back To Boomtown: Classics Rats Hits
- • GERMANY Pre-order: Back to Boomtown: Classic Rats’ Hits
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“The Boomtown Rats’ 1984 album is called ‘In The Long Grass’ rather than ‘The Fine Art of Surfacing’.”
To be fair, i’d always suggest listening to Surfacing twice rather than one spin of each.
And no sign of the 7 inch version of Rat Trap on CD either, which is particularly annoying as it’s just featured on this week’s rerun of Top Of The Pops from 1978, shown each week here in the UK on BBC4.
For those in the UK, every Thursday they are rerunning TOTP from the same week in 1978, with an edited version shown at 7:30, and the full show later in the evening. However they are not showing those hosted by Jimmy Saville, nor DLT, so it’s about 4 in 6 shows that make it to air.
The Boomtown Rats’ 1984 album is called ‘In The Long Grass’ rather than ‘The Fine Art of Surfacing’.
Since these are just a repackaging of the 2005 reissues, you’re going to get the most ear bleedingly brickwalled CD’s I’ve ever come across. Zero dynamic range. Had they remastered them properly for this release, I would have begrudgingly purchased yet again…
Couldn’t agree more. I bought the debut as it’s only available on CD in remastered form, and it’s just unlistenable. It’s so compressed that almost laughably, there’s no room anywhere for any sax or guitar solos to flourish, so they just get piled on at the same levels as every other instrument. Painful.
I agree as well….terribly brickwalled…such a shame, if done properly they would have sounded great.