Nazareth (2) – Loud & Proud! The Box Set

I have Salvo Remastered versions and I think sounds way better then this version

Normally, I don't comment on releases I don't own, but seeing as I have every Nazareth album in their original forms, as well as live stuff and b sides, I felt the need to comment on a few things.

First off, who is this set supposed to be for? The hardcore fan, right? Well, the hardcore fan already has almost everything here. The BBC stuff has been available for years, either as bootlegs or officially. The Bob Harris show stuff is from the recent Union Square Music reissue campaign, and the 1980 show has been bootlegged for years under various names ("Malice In London", "Razamanaz In Wonderland"), as well as being broadcast as late as the early 2000's by Westwood One here in the states.

The B-sides and single versions were on the most recent remasters as well as other remasters, the unreleased studio material came out on Union Square Music's "The Naz Box", and there was even a compilation of the b-sides from 71-83 called "From The Vaults". The studio albums included in this set are also from the recent Union Square Music reissue campaign (if you look at the credits, it says the rights are from USM - UNION SQUARE MUSIC) - so you are basically RE-BUYING the most recent remasters you may already have. Another thing I find funny, is they took the bonus tracks from these discs, and put them on separate discs. Why? There was more than enough room on each disc for those bonus tracks. Why make more discs? To raise the price of the set? Plus, most fans would probably prefer to listen to the bonus tracks in the context of the specific album and time period of which they were released.

Now, I know that the vinyl stuff says "first time on vinyl", which is fine - but is it enough to justify such an expensive set? Do they sound much better than the CD's/digital versions out there? I doubt anything was sourced from the original tapes (in fact, the BBC stuff is most definitely not, as they were notorious for erasing their masters of older shows to reuse the tapes, hence why there is a whole lot of Beatles, Stones, Yardbirds stuff that hasn't been heard since it was originally aired). Still, I hope they release the original version of "Expect No Mercy" included here on vinyl on it's own one day.

The posters, adverts, and sheet music are pretty cool for a Nazareth fan to own, but then again, a lot of hardcore fans might already have this stuff as well. As for the liner notes, do they offer anything new? Or is it just Dan and Pete, like it always is? Is there any input from Manny, Zal, or Billy? Billy seems to get overlooked in the Naz canon, despite being the one thing that brought Naz back to life after Manny was fired. It would be nice to hear his take on things.

And in regards to the live stuff on this set, there are many more (and better) shows that were recorded that have never (officially) seen the light of day. There was even an entire live album recorded in 1979 while Zal was still in the band that was supposedly "lost", with only one song from those recordings surfacing - an acoustic cover of "Cocaine", which ended up on "The Fool Circle" album in 1980. During this tour, a song called "The Wrong Time" was in their set, and other than bootlegs from the 79 period, this song was never officially released. A studio version supposedly was never done, but who knows. My point in all of that? You would think that with all of the "lost" recordings that have been "found" as of late, they could've come up with something truly rare, that Naz fans have wanted for years.

So basically, it's a nice box, with some fancy inserts, and "kinda-rare" tracks...? Kinda hard to swallow when you've spent decades (and lots of money) collecting the original albums, b-sides, bootlegs and various remasters to round out your collection. As I said, this is confusing to me, because this set is supposedly targeting the hardcore fan, but the hardcore fan doesn't really need any of this, and the new or casual fan won't really care about most of this. A missed opportunity. This is why I stopped buying box sets a long time ago.

the only catch i see is none of the discs from the 1970s through the 1990s catlog have the bonus tracks that where on all the reissues from back in 2003, regardless this looks like a killer box set, it sure is tempting.....................

Only complaint would be the printing on the cd sleeves is way too dark and contrasted. Otherwise amazing set! Vinyls sound great.

Did not listen yet to the vinyl but the CD remasters sounds amazing.