Blur 21: The Box

"THIS IS THE NEXT CENTURY...."Whenever a box set comes out, I approach it with caution. Let's face it, these things can be costly. However, let's really think about what you're getting here. Over the past three to five years, we've seen box sets around this price that are commemorating JUST ONE SINGLE ALBUM! Pearl Jam "Ten", The Who's Quadrophenia, etc. However, here you have 97% of their output... in beautifully designed packages, and the sound is spectacular. So, in this review, I'll discuss the content, and try to silence the skeptics.First, I've read a lot of "But I already have all this stuff. Why would you need it?"A - Standards, first of all. If you are a casual fan and don't care about the bonus material, this isn't targeted at you anyway. Second, if you primarily listen to music on the free earbuds that come with your iPhone, well, you may not care about remastering. HOWEVER, for those of you that love music and love Blur and have standards, the remastering came out spectacularly!Frank Arkwright is AGAINST the Loudness Wars and he does NOT "Just make things louder". He sonically improves things. He did a fantastic job with The Smiths' catalogue, and has done it again with this one! It's not just louder.PLEASE LET ME EXPLAIN WHAT REMASTERING IS: They take the original MASTER tapes, and use MODERN 2012 technology to create a new master. That's what happens when you do it properly. Frank Arkwright is an engineer who does original masters too. He knows this stuff. When the artist or producer isn't involved, and when they hire some unqualified record company schlub to remaster, you may get them simply running a CD mix through an equalizer and pumping up the volume. This isn't the case here. They remastered the songs from the original master tapes. The albums say they're remastered - the demos and bonuses don't specify it. However, most of the bonus material is being mastered for the first time, rght? Make sense? Well, last thing, remastering is NOT remixing! They're not remixing anything! I don't know why people don't get this. This isn't a remix. The sonic improvement is great!You get all of the albums in their original UK release form. This means, the UK version of "LEISURE" had the track "Sing", so it's included here on the album, but did not contain "I Know", so it isn't included on CD 1. Instead, it's included on the bonus CD. Same goes for "Modern Life Is Rubbish". In the U.S., ours had bonus tracks like the Single-only release "POPSCENE". Like "I Know", "Popscene" is now on the Bonus disc. Also important to point out is the fact that the version of "Chemical World" we had in the U.S. was never the original UK version. It was a re-recording for the U.S. I actually preferred this re-recorded version, and the vocal is completely different. But it isn't included here. You get the original U.K. album version and the UK single "Re-worked version".Apart from these details, it all sounds wonderful. Songs like "Fade Away", "Best Days" and "Yuko and Hiro", all from THE GREAT ESCAPE, have all been given new life. The breaking bottles that open the track "Parklife" appear as though they're breaking around your feet. Does it sound like that on your 1" HP Computer speakers? How could it? Your crappy free iPhone earbuds? No. On GOOD speakers? It's fantastic!You don't get EVERYTHING, like The Who cover "Substitute", but... you get all you'd ever want as even the most diehard fan.Some more specifics about the box:The box is a fabric-covered, sturdy box that perfectly fits all of the albums and bonus discs. Each album is presented in a Mini-LP Digipak CD with Disc one in one end, and Disc two (Bonuses) in the other side. These are beautiful. You get two bonus 2-CD albums of Rarities from each Era. Example, CD 1: Seymour and Leisure Rarities, CD 2, Modern Life Is Rubbish Rarities - and so forth. The final bonus Rarities CD includes "Fool's Day" and "Under The Westway". You get 3 DVDs that cover 3 live shows from different eras of the band. These are great to have and are not available individually. These DVDs are all REGION 0, NTSC.Let me be clear: there is just one edition of this box. It's on FOOD/Parlophone Records (EMI). There isn't a risk of the DVDs not playing in your country. The DVD isn't formatted with a region restriction. They work on ANY Player, whether cheap or expensive, on your PS3 too, wherever you may be in the world. They look and sound great and they do NOT have a UK version in PAL, and a U.S. version in NTSC. NTSC works in the UK and everywhere else. You're not limited to watching DVDs on your computer.You get the Seymour 7" single "Superman" inserted nearly in the box alongside a sturdy, full-color 7" x 7" hardback book. You also get a download code to download all of these songs (except "Superman" curiously) in 320kbps MP3 form, and you can download bonus songs and PDFs and even get a 10% off discount code from the Blur shop so you can buy that expensive yet cool throwback t-shirt you once impressed the girls with in the 90's. They have new shirts and stuff, too.This set is essential for any Blur fan. You already have this stuff? Upgrade! The sound and bonuses are well worth it. Trade those old crappy versions of the CDs you have into your local record shop and apply it to your favorite Blur Vinyl Re-issue. Those, too, are gorgeous. The NEW CDs in this box look identical to the original issues, with the Food/Parlophone logo on each. The CD covers too have those logos (It's NOT on Virgin. My box says Virgin nowhere on it.)If you truly are a Blur fan, this is well worth the dough! They were uniquely British and that served me well in the 90s when everyone was trying so hard to sound grunge/American. I'm proud to be American, but give me some originality! Were they the best British Band? It's tough to put them above early Suede or 90s PULP, but they're incredibly inventive and amongst the best ever - and if you feel this way about Graham and Damon and the boys, you will LOVE this set.A side note: the individual CD Re-issues come in a bonus lift-off box and postcards that have each single's artwork. This box, in order to fit everything, does NOT include that bonus box or postcards. However, I don't miss it and would rather have the DVDs and Rarities discs that aren't available separately!FINALLY, on a very limited basis, there's an Incredible FREE, yes FREE, BLUR app for the iPad and iPhone. Grab it while you can! It has interviews for all of the albums and eras. The videos show them in 1992, and throughout the years, discussing each album, and interviews from NOW too. It also includes EVERY Blur music video! All for FREE! It's a great time to be a Blur fan...

I bought this set after only owning a couple of Blur albums. I have always been interested in Blur, but never got the chance to explore their whole discography (until now). Onto my review:The packaging is good (not great). The CDs are housed in very nice looking cube in which the front end of the top lifts open. The book, 7" single, and download card are in the very back of the box. The CDs slide into individual slots. At first this looks awesome, until you unwrap all of the CDs. Once you free the CDs from their very tight shrink-wrap, you can then take the discs out and open the gatefold. The CD cases are the digipak (no tray)/cardboard sleeve types, in which you have to slide the discs out. You could potentially scratch your discs this way, but if you are careful it shouldn't be a problem. The problem with the CD cases, however, are the gatefolds. They do not stay closed all of the way. If you lay them down on the table, one end will always be slightly open. Normally, this wouldn't be an issue, but since you have to slide them into these little slots, it does become an issue. To insert them into the slots, you have to hold the case together relatively tight (to prevent the gatefold from opening) so they will fit in all of the way. Not really a big deal, but whatever.Onto the content of the discs. All of Blur's studio albums are here in 2-disc special editions: Disc 1: Original album; Disc 2: B-sides/bonus tracks. It should be noted that only the first five albums have been remastered. I compared the original Parklife to the remastered one. The remaster is slightly louder (volume wise) and the low end is clearer. None of the remasters are victims of the loudness war. I don't think the remasters will trounce your original copies, so if you get this set, don't get it for the remasters. I am willing to say that these are the definitive editions of the studio albums.Now, the rarities discs. You get four rarities discs spanning their entire career. I wasn't really intrigued by discs one and two, but three and four were amusing, I guess. It was interesting to hear early versions and demos of some my favorite songs of theirs. The rarities discs were a nice addition to this set, but I wasn't blown away by any of them. I was very happy to see that Fool's Day and Under The Westway were included.The DVDs include two live shows and a video rarities disc. The live shows are nice to have. Showtime was only released on PAL on VHS, and the Wembley concert was previously unreleased. The quality isn't great, but it's great to have two more live Blur shows. The rarities disc is a bit different. It includes "13" live and other promo videos. This disc almost seems like a companion to the "Blur: The Best Of" DVD. If you own "Blur: The Best Of" DVD, you will now have all of their music videos if you buy this set.Also included is a book. This very nice hardcover book contains an interview and many high quality pictures. It was nice to read the interviews that corresponded with each album. The 7" single is worthless, sadly. I didn't feel like busting out my record player just to listen to this, but I listened to it online, and it isn't very good. It is terrible quality. Two things baffle me about this: One, why would they put a vinyl single in the CD box, but not in the vinyl box? Two, why isn't this track (Superman) on the rarities disc?You also get a download card to download all of the CD (not DVD) content onto your computer with some bonuses such as archive footage and every issue of Blurb magazine. As other reviews have stated, this is set is missing some previously released content. I'm not going to go into detail, like other reviews have, but I will say I was slightly disappointed when I realized "Colours" wasn't on this set.In conclusion, I really enjoy this set. It is excellent to have all of Blur's albums in one place along with some worthwhile extras. The price may seem big, but come on, you get 21 one discs, 6 which include previously unreleased content. As I stated earlier, if you buy this set, don't buy it for the remastered albums if you own the originals. It is up to you to decide if you want to buy the whole set for the rarities discs, DVDs, and the book.

I have to admit that my musical purchases in the 90's through choice of employment were directed to the other side of the spectrum, the insane explosion of dance music as an entertainment medium. I would not have got much work in the clubs if I played Seattle grunge or Brit-pop but I always had my ear to the ground or eyes glued to the television checking out the rockier side of the scene and it was Blur who always seemed to attract my attention.If, like me, you don't own any of the bands catalogue The Blur 21 box set is a great place to start and finish because 98% of it is here save for a few live recordings released since their first hiatus and (according to another reviewer) a couple of non album tracks. And when I say a couple I really do mean a couple as in two or three, maybe four. All the albums are the 2cd expanded editions and there's also four additional audio discs with more content (a journey through the Blur archives if you like). The major bonus for me are the three dvds which have live performances on them, two of which are full concerts. These dvds are exclusive to the box set. There are two minor omissions from the set and they are the best of dvd with all the videos and the individual album booklets with lyrics etc but all other info is contained in a nicely printed hardback book that comes with the collection.If you've yet to make a purchase of this outstanding box set, I'm afraid your time is running out as it was released by EMI records. A company which went bust, has now been bought out, split up by two other major record labels and as such have pretty much deleted all the back catalogue from their roster. If you can find this boxset for a reasonable price I suggest you pounce on it as soon as possible. I can't see it ever being re-issued in the foreseeable future and it is outstanding value for money."And The Radio Says This Is A Low But It Won't Hurt You..."post note...17th September 2017 The download (and access to an online Blur archive) voucher which expired in 2013 that is included with this box set was still active at time of writing. If you own a set and had difficulty accessing the bonus content in the past it might be worth another look.

This came very quickly and was good value for money brand new item as well the box contents are great really liked blur live set from 1994 on dvd plenty of rare stuff including when they used to be called Seymour on 7 inch record and six tracks on cd well happy with my purchase recommend highly

Perfect and in mint condition with all the CDs individually shrink wrapped in the box.IMPORTANT: The download code for this boxset has now been phased out years ago, so unfortunately you will not be able to download the digital content from this boxset anymore.

The delivery box has been damaged and the wrapping has been peeled off a little, but the contents are completely satisfactory! The box was cute and satisfied my desire to keep it. :-)

Excellent