The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Pretty self-explanatory
Post Reply
bronxapostle
Posts: 4914
Joined: Wed Jul 12, 2006 2:27 pm

Re: Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by bronxapostle »

maaan, with the talk of a six or nine disc box set release, i'll be quite saddened to think that PINK POP, REGENT and DOMINION portions are the only things not officially available in my home already. by my count, just 23 tracks... :cry: :cry: even the packaging all looks very familiar to things already in house for 40+ years. notebooks, comic books don't get it over the $75 mark in my math book. The PRINCE 13 LP SIGN O' THE TIMES looks much more a treasure trove.
Pigalle
Posts: 99
Joined: Thu May 14, 2009 3:04 am

Re: Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by Pigalle »

Not much of a consolation I realise, but if you order from Sound of Vinyl in the UK you can get 10% off by using the coupon:

SOV10OFF1

Note it must be entered as above I.e. as capital letters and numbers
User avatar
Fishfinger king
Posts: 620
Joined: Sat Feb 05, 2005 6:41 am
Location: On the border

Re: Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by Fishfinger king »

I don't think I could be more disappointed both over content and separately of price.
If it had been £60 to £80 I may have been tempted in spite of the lack of any real rarities. £180 -£200? No.
Who is this aimed at? Certainly not hard core fans from the looks of all our responses.
People with more money than sense who have heard of EC and want something to look good on the coffee table? Maybe.
Can't believe EC is promoting this after his previous spinning songbook comments.
Can't you see I'm trying to change this water to wine
sweetest punch
Posts: 5963
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 5:49 am
Location: Belgium

Re: Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by sweetest punch »

I think that after these exclusive vinyl boxes have sold out, more reasonably priced vinyl and CD releases will become generally available. Problably early next year.
This release is now exclusive to UMe / Spotify / Apple Music and Itunes Store.

And since they have the original 2” multitracks from The Regent Theatre and The Dominion Theatre, why not give us 12” vinyl (with more tracks) instead of the 10” vinyl?
Last edited by sweetest punch on Sun Oct 04, 2020 1:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Since you put me down, it seems i've been very gloomy. You may laugh but pretty girls look right through me.
Hawksmoor
Posts: 625
Joined: Mon Jun 16, 2003 2:51 pm

Re: Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by Hawksmoor »

Fishfinger king wrote:I don't think I could be more disappointed both over content and separately of price.
If it had been £60 to £80 I may have been tempted in spite of the lack of any real rarities. £180 -£200? No.
Who is this aimed at? Certainly not hard core fans from the looks of all our responses.
People with more money than sense who have heard of EC and want something to look good on the coffee table? Maybe.
Can't believe EC is promoting this after his previous spinning songbook comments.
Agree with every line. Had been really looking forward to this, and would have shelled out £50-£60 for a nice multi-CD package with (even a few) nice new rarities. £200, vinyl/download only, with all the studio out-takes I already have plus some live tracks?

'Leaving no musical stone unturned, no lyric notebook unrifled through and no detail left out'. Seriously? The only surviving tapes from the Armed Forces sessions are demo/alternative versions of 'Green Shirt', Big Boys' and 'Busy Bodies'?

Sorry. Too rich for my blood.
User avatar
And No Coffee Table
Posts: 3521
Joined: Thu Aug 21, 2003 2:57 pm

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by And No Coffee Table »

Apple Music says "Busy Bodies (Alternate Version)" has a track length of 2:59, while it was about 3:45 on the Rhino Armed Forces. Is it a different alternate version or just an error on Apple Music?
Last edited by And No Coffee Table on Fri Oct 02, 2020 7:58 pm, edited 1 time in total.
User avatar
verbal gymnastics
Posts: 13637
Joined: Wed Jun 11, 2003 6:44 am
Location: Magic lantern land

Re: Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by verbal gymnastics »

sulky lad wrote:
verbal gymnastics wrote:Disappointing and costly.

I wonder if he’ll comment on the cost like he did with the Deluxe Spinning Songbook box set.
What a shame we just missed your birthday too - what dos MiniVG 1 want for hers :wink: ??!!???
It’s funny you should say that. And what with her sharing your birthday...
Who’s this kid with his mumbo jumbo?
User avatar
krm
Posts: 1141
Joined: Sun Oct 21, 2007 6:10 am
Location: Sweden Skåne

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by krm »

Back to topic: I just listened to the three tracks that are available on spotify, and ...wow! We get tracks by EC and the Attractions wherer they are on fire. This is exactly why I got stuck with EC in the first place. That moment I heard El Mocambo the first time and I was stuck for real. What we are going to hear on those LPs are music history that are not going to be repeated etc etc etc (you all know what I try to say... :-) )
The costs are a bit high, but as someone said: That's the price of love, A debt you pay with tears and pain
jardine
Posts: 801
Joined: Sat Sep 11, 2010 12:59 pm

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by jardine »

mocambo, yes. was living in toronto at the time it was broadcast live (either CHUM-FM or CFNY-FM), me w. a cassette machine up against a speaker
sweetest punch
Posts: 5963
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 5:49 am
Location: Belgium

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by sweetest punch »

Since you put me down, it seems i've been very gloomy. You may laugh but pretty girls look right through me.
User avatar
wardo68
Posts: 854
Joined: Wed Jul 14, 2004 10:21 am
Location: southwest of Boston
Contact:

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by wardo68 »

Were this a three-, four-, or five-CD set under $100, I'd pony up the cash immediately. Vinyl may sound better, but at these prices they're just too expensive to play, if that makes sense.
Ulster Boy
Posts: 317
Joined: Mon Sep 18, 2006 3:27 pm

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by Ulster Boy »

krm wrote:Back to topic: I just listened to the three tracks that are available on spotify, and ...wow! We get tracks by EC and the Attractions wherer they are on fire. This is exactly why I got stuck with EC in the first place. That moment I heard El Mocambo the first time and I was stuck for real. What we are going to hear on those LPs are music history that are not going to be repeated etc etc etc (you all know what I try to say... :-) )
The costs are a bit high, but as someone said: That's the price of love, A debt you pay with tears and pain
Re the three live tracks issued.

Goon Squad sounds awfully fast to my ears, certainly way faster than the version previously released on Hollywood High. As it comes from an outdoor festival show, maybe they were under a time restriction (though the other parts of that show widely available on bootlegs don’t suggest that so much as the performance being very “energetic”j.

Pump it up, perhaps included for historical rather than musical reasons as it’s no more or less remarkable than any version from 1978. Of the three it’s the one that sounds least well recorded.

PLU sounds great - is that Nick Lowe briefly on vocals?

Bit of mystery as to including a couple of songs each from the Sydney and Dominion shows, they were only a couple of weeks apart. Maybe the entire Dominion show isn’t that great performance wise, as was reported at the time?
sulky lad
Posts: 2425
Joined: Fri Jul 29, 2005 5:21 pm
Location: Out of the kitchen,she's gone with the wind

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by sulky lad »

Goon Squad is played in the key of E minor so it's at the right speed, it is just played really fast !
User avatar
And No Coffee Table
Posts: 3521
Joined: Thu Aug 21, 2003 2:57 pm

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by And No Coffee Table »

Ulster Boy wrote:PLU sounds great - is that Nick Lowe briefly on vocals?
Yes, EC introduces him at the end.
sweetest punch
Posts: 5963
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 5:49 am
Location: Belgium

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by sweetest punch »

Since you put me down, it seems i've been very gloomy. You may laugh but pretty girls look right through me.
User avatar
And No Coffee Table
Posts: 3521
Joined: Thu Aug 21, 2003 2:57 pm

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by And No Coffee Table »

You can get 30% off from the US UDiscover store with the code *SHRIEK*30

(It's still expensive though!)
User avatar
And No Coffee Table
Posts: 3521
Joined: Thu Aug 21, 2003 2:57 pm

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by And No Coffee Table »

And No Coffee Table wrote:You can get 30% off from the US UDiscover store with the code *SHRIEK*30

(It's still expensive though!)
New 30% off code: AUTUMN!30
sweetest punch
Posts: 5963
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 5:49 am
Location: Belgium

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by sweetest punch »

https://www.superdeluxeedition.com/news ... n-its-day/

Elvis Costello says that CD is a medium that has seen its day

Elvis Costello will issue a vinyl-only super deluxe edition box set of his 1979 album Armed Forces in next month and has defended the lack of a CD version, saying that the compact disc “really is demonstrably inferior to vinyl, as a sonic storage system”.

The box set – which is only available via Costello’s store and Universal Music channels – contains nine pieces of vinyl: three 12-inch albums, including a remastered Armed Forces, three 10-inch records, including highlights from the notorious Riot at The Regent concert at Dominion Theatre on 24 December 1978 and three seven-inch singles.

Costello says this release is “as much, if not more, than you’ll ever want to know about Armed Forces” and the box really highlights Barney Bubbles’ artwork and features seven custom notebooks containing updated liner notes from Costello and his handwritten lyrics from the era.

In an interview for Australia’s ABC Radio National, Costello, unprompted, addressed the issue of not putting out a CD version of this celebration of Armed Forces:

“I think that’s because, it seems to me, it’s been decided – for better or for worse – that that is a medium that’s seen its day and I can’t say I shed any tears about that. It was always an inferior compromise that involved not paying the artist properly, and really is demonstrably inferior to vinyl, as a sonic storage system, so it’s Armed Forces day now, it’s victory over CD. I a lot of people got rid of their record player – I told them not to do that. I think most people like the instantaneous access [offered by CD] but I know people like both, as well; they like the object to hold, the paraphernalia of records. Well, you don’t truthfully get that with a CD. All the artwork is cramped down into a horrible little booklet which gets ripped the second time you take it out of the plastic sleeve. This way, you can have either. You can have the instantaneous, portable version, that you carry with you [i.e. streaming/downloads] or you can have something beautiful… on vinyl, in cardboard.”

It’s worth noting that Costello is still issuing his latest album – the forthcoming Hey Clockface – on CD so fans are arguably being sent mixed messages and let’s not forget that while vinyl is undoubtedly in the ascendancy, and the popularity of the CD format is waining, in the UK last year 23.5m CDs were sold compared to 4.3m vinyl records (read this ‘format wars‘ article for more on that).

Of course, it’s unlikely that a CD box set of Armed Forces could retail for the £200+ being asked for the vinyl package, so there is that.
Since you put me down, it seems i've been very gloomy. You may laugh but pretty girls look right through me.
sweetest punch
Posts: 5963
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 5:49 am
Location: Belgium

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by sweetest punch »

New releases:
Green Shirt (remastered 2020): https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=J-xJQSvXTZE
Green Shirt (Live at Pinkpop): https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KuDsEATiJMw
These will be available after midnight!!
Last edited by sweetest punch on Thu Oct 22, 2020 10:43 am, edited 3 times in total.
Since you put me down, it seems i've been very gloomy. You may laugh but pretty girls look right through me.
jardine
Posts: 801
Joined: Sat Sep 11, 2010 12:59 pm

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by jardine »

i am really tempted to cancel my clockface cd order, having already cancelled the vinyl order. this bustle of cd/lp/video not available crap is not my idea of a good time. figure it out, phone me when you're done. don't text. i don't have a cell phone.

this used to be enjoyable when I could go to a record store and come upon something new. now it simply blends into the fake news, click-bait, false nose, noise. I no longer want to keep track of the colours of plastic and I no longer want to be subjected to having to sort my way through it all. Bull****.

done. cancelled. October Surprise!!!!
sweetest punch
Posts: 5963
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 5:49 am
Location: Belgium

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by sweetest punch »

Three tracks available on Apple Music:
Green Shirt (Remastered 2020)
Green Shirt (demo)
Green Shirt (Live At Pinkpop1979)
They sound great!
Since you put me down, it seems i've been very gloomy. You may laugh but pretty girls look right through me.
WindUpWorld
Posts: 100
Joined: Tue Oct 14, 2014 4:10 pm

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by WindUpWorld »

jardine wrote:i am really tempted to cancel my clockface cd order, having already cancelled the vinyl order. this bustle of cd/lp/video not available crap is not my idea of a good time. figure it out, phone me when you're done. don't text. i don't have a cell phone.

this used to be enjoyable when I could go to a record store and come upon something new. now it simply blends into the fake news, click-bait, false nose, noise. I no longer want to keep track of the colours of plastic and I no longer want to be subjected to having to sort my way through it all. Bull****.

done. cancelled. October Surprise!!!!
That sounds complicated but rings very true. Frankly, on my income, any spending money goes on wine, women and song. Probably not a Super Deluxe Previously Unavailable On Certain Formats This Is The Last Time, Honest song though. But probably a woman as well drawn as any in his songs. And with regards the wine, obviously he's been on the wagon for years.
sweetest punch
Posts: 5963
Joined: Sat Apr 03, 2004 5:49 am
Location: Belgium

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by sweetest punch »

https://www.google.be/amp/s/www.udiscov ... story/amp/

‘Green Shirt’: Elvis Costello’s Pointed Pop Takedown Of Big Brother
The most adventurous track of the ‘Armed Forces’ album, ‘Green Shirt’ delivered sensory overload and captured the album’s paranoid tone.

Imagine that it’s 1979, and you’re hearing Elvis Costello & the Attractions’ Armed Forces for the first time. The first side would be one surprise after another. Compared to This Year’s Model, released only 10 months earlier, this was something new: complex arrangements, new instruments, denser production, and a heightened sense of melody. Then along comes the most surprising song of the lot: “Green Shirt.”

If one song bore out the ground that Costello and the band traveled between albums, “Green Shirt” was it. This wasn’t raw punk rock by any means, instead, it did reflect Costello’s professed love for Kraftwerk and Berlin-era Bowie.

Costello was no longer the guy writing vengeful songs about past relationships from My Aim Is True and This Year’s Model, “Green Shirt” reached deeper, taking the innocent topic of an attractive woman on television and spinning it into a paranoid look at media lust as a form of mind control. Not for nothing, the album’s original working title was Emotional Fascism.

Lyrically, “Green Shirt” ties in well with the album’s theme of everyday cruelty: On the surface it’s about seeing a fashionable woman on television, feeling a bit seduced by her presence, then wondering what kind of mind-control is going on here.

The shirt in question apparently belonged to BBC newswoman Angela Rippon. Though Costello has never confirmed the reference, photographer Chalkie Davis has claimed he was with Costello at the BBC just after he’d played Top of the Pops, when Rippon walked by in a striking green shirt and Costello began writing down ideas. The Quisling Clinic reference was also real – it was a building in Madison, Wisconsin that the band drove past on tour – but its use for ominous experiments was a product of the songwriter’s imagination.

By the song’s end, Costello is fully wrapped in paranoia: There’s a big investigation going on, and everybody’s under suspicion, but “you don’t want to hear about that” (and “you” could just as easily be the listener as the TV woman). The one consolation is that the broadcaster is as much a victim as everybody else.

“I’m not going to explain my songs,” Costello told Sounds in 1980. “If you can’t hear what’s going on from the song itself, then God help you. I’m not going to write a manifesto. I’m a better songwriter than that, surely.”

Years later, in the liner notes to the album’s first reissue in 2002, he did share the mindset that birthed the song: “Maybe the late hours and my chemical constitution were exaggerating the creeping threat, but the coincidences added the surreal edge into the sensory overload and the paranoid tone of ‘Green Shirt’. The thugs of the nationalist parties were parading in the streets of London.”

That “emotional fascism” idea pervaded many of the songs on Armed Forces – and if that sounds heavy, well, it was. But the music was light on its feet. Not for the last time, Costello and the Attractions took a cue from their musical passions at the time, which included ABBA and The Beatles, along with the above. None of this was served straight-up, but the influence was there. Punk was out, lush melodies and jittery rhythms were in. More often than not, the smoother sounds were used to ironic effect.

Just as impressive was the work of producer Nick Lowe, who’d been famous for making live-sounding records; his quotable motto was “Bash it out now, tart it up later.” On this album, he spent plenty of time on the latter, layering sounds into exotic combinations. Meanwhile, Lowe remained great at capturing the charge of a great rhythm section: Whatever happens on top, the pounding of bassist Bruce Thomas and drummer Pete Thomas remains vivid and vital.

They’re especially strong on “Green Shirt,” the album’s most adventurous track. Melodically the song is sprightly enough to bear out that ABBA influence, but the song’s real hook is the bass/drum quadruplet that comes down like a blow to the head after every lyric line: “You can please yourself, but somebody’s gonna get it,” leaving Pete Thomas to drive it home with a well-placed hit on the ride cymbal.

Steve Nieve keeps a pulsing rhythm on a sequencer and plays lead on the Minimoog, an instrument he hadn’t used in the past – and seldom would again. Unique among rock’s first-division keyboardists, Nieve has largely remained a staunch piano-and-organ guy.

According to Costello, the recording process for “Green Shirt” wasn’t that much different from anything on This Year’s Model. Both were recorded at Eden Studios in London and as Costello said in the original liner notes, “It seemed as if we were making an impossibly sophisticated leap from the sound of This Year’s Model, but listening now there are very few production devices that sit between the listener and the songs.”

What you’re really hearing is the synchrony of him and the Attractions as a band. Listen to the original solo demo of “Green Shirt,” which appears on the new Armed Forces reissue, and you’ll hear how far it came: The tension and the tune were there, but the jittery rhythms, pulsing synths, and drum hook all came in once the band got hold of it. “We probably never had quite this level of consistent musical agreement again,” Costello wrote.

Though “Green Shirt” became a fast fan favorite, it wasn’t a single and got precious little US airplay – but then, obvious classics like “Accidents Will Happen” and “(What’s So Funny About) Peace, Love & Understanding” weren’t all over the radio either. Save for a handful of adventurous stations, FM radio in America was still terrified of anything New Wave, with only a few token tracks by the Cars, the Knack, and Blondie. They stayed away even when the album was a hit, and Armed Forces was one, making the US album chart at No.10, the best showing of Costello’s entire career.

“Green Shirt” would have a long tenure as a live number; it was still in the setlist for his last pre-shutdown show with the Imposters in London in March. The expanded edition of Armed Forces also features a live version from the Pinkpop Festival in the Netherlands, when the album had only been out a few months and the crowd was still hearing it fresh. Fans warmed to it soon enough; when Costello began playing it in his acoustic sets, and audiences would bang on their knees, their seats, or anything else within reach to fill in that drum riff.

In later years, the song would also take on a notable change of lyric: In the recorded version the words are “She’s listening in to the Venus Line, she’s picking out names, I hope none of them are mine.” That meaning is clear enough: Whatever mating ritual the TV woman is doing, the singer wants no part of it. Later on, the lyrics were changed to, “I hope all of them are mine,” and that one changed word made all the difference: There’s a possible bit of warmth, a definite bit of lust, and a willingness to join those mating rituals after all.
Since you put me down, it seems i've been very gloomy. You may laugh but pretty girls look right through me.
User avatar
docinwestchester
Posts: 2321
Joined: Thu Apr 08, 2010 7:58 pm
Location: Westchester County, NY

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by docinwestchester »

In later years, the song would also take on a notable change of lyric: In the recorded version the words are “She’s listening in to the Venus Line, she’s picking out names, I hope none of them are mine.” That meaning is clear enough: Whatever mating ritual the TV woman is doing, the singer wants no part of it. Later on, the lyrics were changed to, “I hope all of them are mine,” and that one changed word made all the difference: There’s a possible bit of warmth, a definite bit of lust, and a willingness to join those mating rituals after all.

I've been loving that lyric change.
Harry Lime
Posts: 152
Joined: Tue Jun 26, 2007 6:55 pm
Location: West of the Hudson

Re: The Complete Armed Forces (Super Deluxe Edition)

Post by Harry Lime »

docinwestchester wrote:In later years, the song would also take on a notable change of lyric: In the recorded version the words are “She’s listening in to the Venus Line, she’s picking out names, I hope none of them are mine.” That meaning is clear enough: Whatever mating ritual the TV woman is doing, the singer wants no part of it. Later on, the lyrics were changed to, “I hope all of them are mine,” and that one changed word made all the difference: There’s a possible bit of warmth, a definite bit of lust, and a willingness to join those mating rituals after all.

I've been loving that lyric change.
He always sings it with a devilish look in his eyes.
Who put these fingerprints on my imagination?
Post Reply