David Bowie / Five Years 1969-1973: new CD and vinyl box sets

Paul,
I just picked up “5 Years”. Which of the two Ziggy cds would you recommend listening to primarily and why did they include the 2003 Ken Scott remix plus the other version of the more recent recording? I assume there must be some advantage to 2003 recording.

Due in September – features a Steve Schapiro image on box cover.
(BowieWonderWorld)
No more details at this moment

I just saw the Cd box set at Amoeba Records Hollywood and the US release is NOT Japanese style mini lp quality at all. Not sure if same for Europe. I compared it to the Beatles in mono box and the Bowie box half inch smaller in width and Height. I can only imagine how puny the sleeves are inside, less than 5 and 1/ 2 inches. Very disappointing. I will likely opt for HDtrack box download or wait to see if Japan will release their own, would rather pay the extra price.

This is a thing of beauty…

Also ordered mine from Wow HD – was on backorder at time of ordering but it arrived a week and a half later, a steal at £57 or so quid. Was worried there would be custom charges as despite the ‘.co.uk’ suffix on their website they are actually based in the UK but it arrived with no problems! This weekend will henceforth be known as ‘Five Years in Two and a Half Days’…

A living legend. A musical pioneer able to transform his music and his image with each release. Not many artists can hold a candle to him.
He has influenced many veteran artists and continues to do so to today’s artists. Deservedly getting all his releases compiled and boxed. Whether
is Major Tom, Ziggy Stardust, Aladdin Sane, the Thin White Duke that touched you… no one has the impact that he has in music and a great actor and performer as well…. adding theatrics to his stage act and many movie appearances as well. Quite the chameleon if there ever was one. May he continue to dazzle us for many many more years to come.
I order my boxset and cannot wait to receive it.

A fantastic quality vinyl box set. I’ve listed to three of the albums and thought they all sounded great and very good quality pressing.
The covers are also high quality reproductions of the originals. I am happy with the purchase and looking forward to the next set. I already owned the originals of 75% of the box but many were over played. These sound so much better.
Still have to listen to the bonus material, I was going chronological with bonus material at the end.

Mine arrived last Friday from WOWHD. No problems and 30 quid less than RRP. Bargain!

Vinyl boxset arrived safely from Italy yesterday. A beautiful package, worth every pound! “Hunky Dory” sounds sublime, the original “Ziggy Stardust” is far nicer than the 2003 mix but I wasn’t as impressed with “Aladdin Sane”. “Re:Call 1” is superb, sounded fantastic on the headphones late last night and is without doubt the best Bowie singles collection on vinyl. Today I’m going to delve into “Pin-Ups” and “The Man Who Sold The World”. Did anyone get an inner sleeve with TMWSTW by the way?

Price just dropped to £89:72 on Amazon

I bit confused and annoyed. I received the Vinyl box set today… no digital download code.

What does the vinyl box set sound like?

I haven’t even had an email saying it’s been shipped yet! Already I am hearing about people receiving their copy and am getting impatient.

Anyone have any idea how long I will have to wait for the vinyl set from Amazon Italy? As the release date approaches I’m wishing I’d spent the extra cash and ordered from the UK site. I can imagine everyone getting their copies and me waiting and waiting…

I would keep my fingers of wowhd.

Well https://www.highresaudio.com/index.php are advertising the download of the box set for £60 in their Preview window. So it will be 24bit and hopefully at least 96kHz :)

WowHD (formerly CD WOW) are currently doing the CD box set for the knockdown price of just over 71 quid!

Press release states:

“The ten album / twelve CD box, ten album / thirteen-piece vinyl set and digital download featurs all of the material officially released by Bowie during the nascent stage of his career from 1969 to 1973.”

Since “Live Santa Monica ‘72” and “Ziggy Stardust: The Motion Picture Soundtrack” were not released in that time period but included here as a bonus along with the 2003 Ken Scott Mix of “Ziggy…” we should have the addition of “Bowie At The Beeb”… but here’s hoping Parlophone Records will issue a full BBC box set on CD and LP formats after they issue the next Bowie box, 1974-1979!

Does anyone know if this will be available as a hi-def download (preferably 96/24)?

does the vinyl box set include mp3 downloads?

not sure anyone cares about this like I do, but I’ve learned from Dr. Rhino (emailed) that all of the vinyl for all regions will be presed by Optimal in Germany. This is one of the very best in the world (RTI wins the #1 honor). I bring this up in case anyone is on the fence about the big price tag. You won’t be paying for shoddy pressings by GZVinyl (see the Rod Stewart vinyl re-issues) or by United in the U.S. (horrible pressings for the new Madonna record, etc) – – -Optimal has great attention to detail and care and high-quality standards.

So fellow collectors out there. Which country will release the highest quality vinyl? Germany?

For your information, Amazon Italy has currently best prices for the sets.
Cd-set 119,99€ and vinyl-set is 201,14€. I had locked pretty good price from Amazon France, but decided to change it to Italy since it does not greatly matter from which Amazon you order from.
I havent studied the prices and how they have gone on daily basis, but I believe that these 2 are now the best prices so far. Will have to look how the prices change near the release-date and then order it from there.

I’ll be absolutely furious if Don’t Sit Down isn’t included on the first album.

Well that was a bizarre post!

I read many complains regarding this re-issues not pleasing the “loyal fans”. Same complains in every thread of this great forum.

I’m sorry to remind you guys that this “artists” are in the music “business” and the record companies take care of those business.

The business is to manufacture a product under a budget and make it attractive enough to sell it to costumers and make a profit, not to please “fans”.

Maybe the artist, the producer, the re-mixer, the designer, the curator of the tracklist and everyone in the creative process wants to please the fans, not the record company, their job is to sell a product, a good product we all hope, but the executive of the company is in charge.

And remember always that the record company will use any marketing tactic to sell you colorful carboard boxes with paper and plastic inside. (Not mentioning compressed data with attached colorful jpgs). That’s the product, if it comes with clicks, muffled sound, mis-labeled tracks, etc. … too bad. The selling point is “remaster” “200 grams” “bonus this” “exact replica of that” and we all get excited for those things, but be careful, its a silver bag of chips full of labels and flashy things outside… and the same potatoes inside, with maybe a useless bonus toy.

So, a new Bowie product is coming, some fans are happy, some are not. I will wait for the quality reviews and see if those potatoes could make me happy again.

FYI: Available exclusively from the Official David Bowie Online Store free with your pre-order is The David Bowie Pin Ups Radio Show 10″ [with the vinyl version. or an additional CD with that version]. Previously only available on Spotify, this program was issued to mark the 40th Anniversary of the album ‘Pin Ups’ in 2013. This collectable, one-sided EP features snippets from the Pin Ups album interspersed with observations from David Bowie regarding the bands he covers on the album. Link here: http://davidbowie.parlophonestore.co.uk/en

Thank you SDE for getting further info about this amazing box that no on else has been able to get.

Can you please find out who did the mastering, and where the vinyl edition will be pressed?

Thanks very much.

I hope the packaging is actually MADE IN JAPAN like the Beatles Mono Box. or the Led Zeppelin Definitive Collection…but somehow I doubt it….

I would have liked the US promo edit of Space Oddity which has never been reissued, unlike the UK single, which has.

Isn’t there an Arnold Corns single missing too?

David, still a big fan of yours but this product just don’t it cut-it. Thanks but no thanks!

Considering all the amazing bootleg material available I would have thought some new official soundboard audio could have been included here. It was an amazing period and needs more coverage of the touring done at the time! Love Ziggy x

This is all about a business transaction for Bowie. In my opinion this is another missed opportunity for the definitive reissue of these titles.

Cheapest I’ve seen online for the CD set is £79:99 so already £20 off.

“Remastered from analogue” does not necessarily mean “cut from analogue”. It’s very likely (unless the label confirms it) that there’s some kind of digital intermediary. Similar to the latest Bruce Springsteen vinyl releases.

Google play is taking pre orders for digital version at £51.49 so does this mean a price drop is probably on the horizon for the physical copies?

Paul, dude, you’re supposed to be trying to get people to buy the stuff you advertise!

1) This is a mass market product for those who want to pick up all those albums in one go in the same spirit as with Leonard Cohen, Nilsson, Cheap Trick etc. These sets sell signficiant numbers of units.

2) Have these albums already? Don’t buy them.

3) This is a mass market product for those who aren’t that interested in vast amounts of rare material. If you want such material, these sets aren’t actually aimed at you.

4) Annoyed these sets don’t include outtakes or 5.1 mixes? Don’t buy them.

5) Sure, I’d love expansive sets for these albums.

I pre-ordered from amazon.co.uk since I figure we’ll have a price drop at some point between now and then and I can always cancel if it stays at 99.99. Comparing this to other box sets from Leonard Cohen, Roxy Music etc I’m quite astounded at the price. Why is it so expensive?

Maybe it isn’t him making the decisions?

If ever you needed proof this is simple a commercial exercise rather than a love letter to the fans – exclusive content from Bowie’s site, exclusive content from Japan….. so to get a “complete” set I need to spend at least £300. So cynical.

What happened to Bowie? Why does he care less about his music than we do? And why does he milk his fans over and over again?

Not sure if anyone else has noticed this but the Japanese edition will have exclusive content (on top of the mandatory Japanese booklet). No details as yet.

I’ve cancelled my Amazon order and ordered from Palophone via Bowie’s official site to get the bonus disc of Pin Ups Radio Show.
How come All the Madmen is described as previously unreleased edit while Janine is listed as mono – weren’t the two issued together as a US 7″
And why include a mono Janine when they omit the mono Black Country Rock b side of Holy Holy….? I agree that a mono Janine is much rarer and so pleased to see it listed but you’d think they’d include BCR for completeness wouldn’t you?

Is anyone really interested in single edits as part of the bonus stuff? Urgh! For me, the most interesting stuff are live recordings.