![]() It was professionally recorded but it’s not as pristine as you might have been led to believe. “Georgia Peaches” is where the action is and its eight songs find Iggy & the Stooges in fine form. “Hey Peter” is an outtake for good reason and the vocal re-mix job sounds far too contemporary for its own good. “I’m Hungry” is an early version of “Penetration” with different lyrics that avoid intravenous injecting allusions but sticks with sex it’s pretty good and holds up to repeated plays. The rarities disc is mostly no such thing: “Gimme Danger” and “Your Pretty Face Is Going to Hell” are the 1996 mixes (probably compressed to the shithouse, one informed guess opines) while the versions of “Shake Appeal” and “Death Trip” aren’t startlingly different to anything heard before. Don't ever say we're not full of good ideas. The book’s very nice if low on fresh insights - Henry Rollins’ piece on the Iggy re-mix does its best to say how good it was (and of course you may disagree) – while the truly obsessed might frame the postcard style pictures that come in the elegant black envelope. The slipcase also accommodates a re-issue of the impossibly-rare Japanese seven-inch “Raw Power” vinyl single (looks and sounds nice on our jukebox), as well as postcard-sized photos and a gorgeous glossy booklet. It’s four discs (the album re-issue, the live “Georgia Peaches” show, a CD of supposed rarities and a DVD documentary) in a fold-out inner sleeve. And while we're handing out brickbats, let’s send a giant "Get Fucked" the way of Sony's Australian office which couldn’t be bothered doing the parent company’s bidding and even servicing us with a no-frills CD-R advance release for pre-release review. So now you know how to screw the system that would screw you. Using “other channels” (payment via Paypal, having it shipped to a US friend and paying her to send it on) the real cost was less than half that. So is it worth the extra outlay? My call (admittedly from a fan-atical perspective) is Yes – provided you’re not paying the $50 international shipping cost Sony and/or its gouging mail order fulfilment company is charging overseas customers. This deluxe edition is only available on-line, the bean counters at Sony deciding they wouldn’t move enough copies through the few record shops left standing to make it worthwhile. It’s probably the extras you’re interested in anyway so let’s dive in. This one doesn't scorch the carpet as badly. Let’s just say the Bowiefied disc sounds more at home and familiar than its immediate shiny silver predecessor. Reviewing comrade Bob Short says the earlier digital version sounds warmer but that’s probably by relative degrees, given that we’re talking about CDs. These (damaged) ears tell me it’s a bit crisper but with only the vinyl to compare (the ‘80s CD version having been stolen years ago) it’s hard to say. Whether the transfer from master tapes to CD has worked is still contentious. So there's this disc one of this re-issue. Haphazard, crazed and reflective of the times. Bowie’s supposedly ham-fisted 1973 mixdown was, in hindsight, the definitive article. Too much red-lining and vocals that were way too high in the mix conspired to consign that re-issue to the back-shelf. Even so, it was a struggle to find a sound system on which to play the damned thing without blowing a hole in the speakers. I must be one of the few people who found at least some redeeming qualities in Iggy’s re-mix, namely in the way the drums and Ron Asheton’s bass-playing were thrown into sharper relief. You probably know the back-story about the core package (the straight re-issue of the Bowie mix with live disc appended) so let’s cut to the chase and talk about the Deluxe Ediiton.
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