KMA2662 Phil Collins – Take A Look At Me Now (Boxed Set)

Y’all maybe don’t know this, as I haven’t written much about him yet, but I have been a huge Phil Collins fan for years. His music has been a soundtrack to many things, for me. He’s one of those artists. You know the kind.

Because of this, I own all but the new one from this set already. Moreover, this doesn’t have any info with it, and only the cover artwork is new. I didn’t notice any bonus tracks, at quick glance (I’ll investigate deeper). There are no extra discs with the albums. And generally, I don’t care about remastering jobs. Usually, unless it’s an old blues recording from the 30s or something, I don’t notice much difference anyway.

I did not need to buy this, really.

I bought it anyway.

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No reviews on this one – this post is simply to share this find.

There are a couple of versions (I opted for CD):

One is in a boxed set with gatefold digipak CD cases (for about $40-$50 CAD), and this one that I got, which is all the same albums in slim cardboard wallet sleeves in a clamshell case ($20-$25 CAD). With that price difference between the two, let’s be honest, who cares about digipaks? Some people probably would. I didn’t!

What you get is the first (main) discs of the 2017 remastered editions of these huge albums:

Face Value
Hello I Must Be Going
No Jacket Required
…But Seriously
Both Sides
Dance Into The Light
Testify
PLUS: Going Back – The Essential

Probably I ought to have bought the individual RM sets, for the extra stuff. I likely still will. But I am very happy with this set, nonetheless. It gives me an excuse to go play all these records again. As if I wouldn’t play my old copies anyway. But shhh. I don’t tell myself these things…

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Here’s another cool treat:

A lot of these albums had close-ups of Phil’s face as cover art. For the remasters, Phil re-did them with his current face. I love that he did this. Of them all, the only one that isn’t all that interesting is Dance Into The Light (as you’ll see, below), but the rest are cool.

I’ve put them all side by side for you. Check it out (original on the left, remaster on the right):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And the last record, of course, doesn’t have an old version, per se, but it has two covers. The one in this set is on the right.