Not many details yet, but there will be a Deluxe Edition of my favorite album of the last 30 years, Steeltown by Big Country, released on April 28. Based on the photo at the Amazon UK listing, it'll be part of Universal's 2-CD Deluxe Edition series and my fingers are crossed that they've uncovered some high-quality live material from the subsequent tour since that's one of the few eras that hasn't been adequately documented. I'm sure they'll also include all of the era-appropriate b-sides, many of which are monstrously great (including their cover of Roxy Music's "Prairie Rose"). Considering my longtime Imwan avatar, I though it was appropriate that I would be the one to start this thread.

The current lineup of Big Country is also touring this year in support of the 30th anniversary of Steeltown. Mike Peters is no longer fronting the band, so they're splitting lead vocals amongst everyone.

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Added by Linda -- this release is now scheduled for September 29th:



CD 1
1. Flame Of The West
2. East of Eden
3. Steeltown
4. Where the Rose Is Sown
5. Come Back To Me
6. Tall Ships Go
7. Girl With Grey Eyes
8. Rain Dance
9. The Great Divide
10. Just A Shadow

CD 2
1. Wonderland - Single A - side ( 3:56 )
2. Giant - Single B - side ( 3:56 )
3. All Fall Together - Giant Remix ( 5:05 )
4. East of Eden - Radio Edit ( 4:11 )
5. Prairie Rose - Single B - side ( 4:46 )
6. Where The Rose Is Sown - Radio edit ( 4:07 )
7. Belief In The Small Man - Single B - side ( 5:17 )
8. Bass Dance - Single B - side ( 1:39 )
9. Just A Shadow - ( 4:28 )
10. Winter Sky - Single B - side ( 3:16 )
11. Wonderland - Work In Progress Take 1 ( 4:12 )
12. Wonderland - Work In Progress Demo Take 2 ( 4:27 )
13. East of Eden - Rough Mix ( 4:50 )
14. Tall Ships - Rough Mix ( 5:17 )
15. Where The Rose Is Sown - Rough Mix ( 5:32 )
16. Come Back To Me - Rough Mix ( 4:50 )
17. Bass Concerto ( Bass Dance ) ( 5:41 )

Amazon USA
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00IGK8FCQ/?tag=imwan-20

Amazon UK
http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00IGK8FCQ/?tag=imwan-21

This is great news. I am also a fan of this album and although I have the 1 cd remaster with bonus tracks (including Prairie Rose) I'll be getting this one as well if it has additional unreleased stuff on it.

Universal did a fantastic job with the Deluxe Edition of "The Crossing" so I have high hopes for this one. Big Country is one of only a handful of bands where I've collected all of their singles, EPs, b-sides, live material, offshoot projects, etc, yet somehow there was a lot of material on the D/E of "The Crossing" that I didn't already have. My fingers are crossed that the same thing happens with "Steeltown."

I was told this was happening as well as others so let's hope "The Seer" appears before long.

This is great news as this was such a fantastic album and went to #1 in the UK, yet only #70 in the US despite MTV playing "Where The Rose Is Sown", "East Of Eden" and "Just A Shadow".

The Roxy Music cover best appear because that is sterling gold my friends!

I just hope the 2nd disc isn't muffled sounding demos.

Pete, I assume you got the D/E of The Crossing from last year, right? The sound quality on that was very good. There were some muffled demos but a lot of the extra material sounded great, and a lot of it was very rare. I literally have about 40-50 Big Country CDs, including all nine volumes of their "Rarities" series & at least a dozen official live albums, as well as just about every 7", 12" & CD single they ever released. The fact that the previous D/E offered stuff I didn't already have was pretty impressive.

Why Steeltown was so overlooked in the US is beyond me. The production was much more dense than on The Crossing but there were several songs that were radio friendly to at least be Top 20 hits.

Yeah, I think one of the reasons for its lack of success was the dense production. I loved the "wall of sound" on the album but it didn't make for accessible listening. Also the lyrical content and overall mood of the album is pretty bleak. Again, I liked that--I remember thinking that the lyrics were stronger than on the crossing, more vivid and striking--but I don't think those lyrics made a lot of sense to Reagan-era Americans.

1984 was also the year of Footloose, Thriller, and Purple Rain, right? Steeltown, along with a lot of other albums, got buried by some pretty huge records with very upbeat sounds and messages.

According to SuperDeluxeEdition, this Steeltown deluxe edition is the first of four Big Country re-releases scheduled for 2014. The others are The Seer, Peace In Our Time and No Place Like Home. They don't have details yet on how expanded these reissues will be, nor do they have a track listing for April's Steeltown D/E, but I'm sure they'll update their post as soon as that info becomes available. I'll try to update this thread whenever that happens.

Here's a link to that SuperDeluxeEdition post for anyone who's interested:
http://www.superdeluxeedition.com/news/ ... wn-deluxe/

I'm not as interested in Peace in Our Time and No Place Like Home (although I might pick up No Place Like Home as I've never heard the album), but would enjoy hearing more outtakes from The Seer.

Peace In Our Time has a bad reputation but I love that record. Sure, they Americanized their sound and it was jarring at first, but in hindsight the songwriting & musicianship are just as strong as the first three albums. It also features a couple of Stuart's most touching songs in "I Can Be Happy Here," "In This Place" and "Everything I Need."

No Place Like Home is an acquired taste. It was tough for me to accept that Mark Brzezicki was hired as a studio musician since he had left the band a couple of years earlier, and the production is very thin, but I appreciated that they tried out different sounds on that record. Plus, several of the b-sides from that era are great, which would make a Deluxe Edition very welcome.

One of my problems with "Peace in Our Time" is that the music--and especially the drumming--is so simplified compared to the previous three releases. I like some of the songs but the specificity of the lyrics is gone too, and I LOVED that about Steeltown: how literary and specific Stuart's observations were about working class life. I guess this was all is aimed at being a little more commercial? I haven't listened to the album in years, so I might like it more now, but I like the b-sides from that period much better than the actual album.

What do you think of the Restless Natives soundtrack? That's one of my favorite things by the band. I own that, the first three albums, and Buffalo Skinners. Been trying to find a dvd of one of their first concerts--the one from new years eve that used to get TV airplay in the eighties--but I think it's gone OOP.

The drumming on Peace In Our Time is just as intricate & impressive as on the previous albums, but the production mutes some of Brzezicki's contributions. It also didn't help that the lead-off single was "King Of Emotion," which was as simplistic as their music got. I love it, but I think a lot of fans jumped off the Big Country train at that point. You're definitely right about Stuart's lyrics being less pointed by this time as compared to Steeltown, but that's a lot to live up to and I still think his concerns about the state of the world were addressed with power & eloquence.

I love the Restless Natives soundtrack. I was so pleased when I finally found the two 12" singles that had both parts of the soundtrack back in the late-'80s. Even though much of it is set to programmed drums (I'm not sure how much Brzezicki contributed to it) the music is very strong. I'm glad they eventually released it officially with the first volume of rarities.

I still have that New Year's Eve 83/84 show on VHS, CD & DVD-Audio, but I never got the DVD video. They did release a special edition of it several years ago but it is OOP and very expensive now. I missed the opportunity to buy it at the BC show I saw in Edinburgh a few years ago when Mike Peters was fronting the band. I had already spent so much money on that trip that I couldn't justify another $30-$35. Now I would jump on it at that price.

Yes, I think I might be thinking of "King of Emotion" specifically when I remember that album. The drumming on that song did not sound like the same person who had done, say, "East of Eden." Maybe I will pick it up again though. Oftentimes I like an album more years later once I let go of all the expectations I had at the time of its original release (and I had a lot of expectations with Big Country back then).

Peace In Our Time was a good album but they abandoned most (not all) of their classic sound.

Ironically despite the US flavor, the album sold poorly here.

No Place Like Home is the worst BC album by far but I'm board for all of these.

My friend at Universal told me more were on the way last year (I think I posted that on The Crossing remaster thread) but I don't how far this goes.

I can only hope my 2nd fave BC album The Buffalo Skinners gets the treatment as well as the others), but with all the different labels involved I'm not sure if they go past No Place Like Home.

Also, am I wrong or was there a new song on 1990's Through A Big Country: The Greatest Hits album? I remember "Save Me" as a new song that fell just shy of the UK Top 40. I think by this point Pat Ahern was on drums. If so, was this the only song he played on even though he was there from 1989-93?

I think the comp was remastered and expanded too but also unsure!

Yeah, that song was definitely an example of their record company telling them they had to record a radio hit. Why sign a band with such a distinctive sound and then make them sound like everyone else? Ironically, that became a huge fan favorite in concert, with the crowds always chanting the "1-2-1-2-3-4" intro. I do think you'll find a lot to like when you revisit Peace In Our Time without the weight of expectations.

Pete, as obsessive a Big Country fan as I am, there are plenty of holes in my knowledge when it comes to anything other than the songs. In addition to Pat Ahern they also had a guy named Chris Bell (I think that's his name...not the guy from Big Star, obviously) who did shows with them. I'm not sure which songs those guys recorded with BC, but in addition to the excellent single "Save Me" there were numerous b-sides and singles from that era between Brzezicki's departure and Simon Phillips taking over for Buffalo Skinners. "Pass Me By" comes to mind as an example of one of my favorites from that era.

I don't consider No Place Like Home their weakest album, unless you're talking about the production. I've always loved most of the songs from that record, and they obviously thought highly of it by re-recording two of the songs in much stronger versions for Buffalo Skinners. Why the title track of BS didn't appear on the album I'll never know, since it's definitely in my all-time Top 10 BC songs.

By the way, preliminary listings for the expanded/deluxe editions of the next three albums are up at Amazon UK, all listing August 4 as the release date. Should I include those links here, or in the first post above...or wait until more details are available for them?

Disc 1 is just the normal album

Disc 2


01#65294;
Wonderland (Single A-side)

02#65294;
Giant (Single B-side)

03#65294;
All Fall Together (Giant Remix)

04#65294;
East of Eden (Radio Edit)

05#65294;
Prairie Rose (Single B-side)

06#65294;
Where The Rose Is Sown (Radio edit)

07#65294;
Belief In The Small Man (Single B-side)

08#65294;
Bass Dance (Single B-side)

09#65294;
Just A Shadow (Radio edit)

10#65294;
Winter Sky (Single B-side)

11#65294;
Wonderland (Work In Progress Take 1) *

12#65294;
Wonderland (Work In Progress Demo Take 2) *

13#65294;
East of Eden (Rough Mix) *

14#65294;
Tall Ships (Rough Mix) *

15#65294;
Where The Rose Is Sown (Rough Mix) *

16#65294;
Come Back To Me (Rough Mix) *

17#65294;
Bass Concerto (Bass Dance) * ( * ) Previously Unreleased

Thanks for that info, jsayers. Other than the "Work In Progress" tracks and the rough mixes, I own all of this material. It's a bit disappointing that there's no live material included, since they were one of the most powerful live bands of their era (or any other). A missed opportunity but I'll get this nonetheless.

Rich:
I'd give those separate entries, although if they have the same date you could give them a group heading.

Rich:
Not just the production- the songs too on No Place Like Home.

Did not care for it at all then (crappy cover art too), but I can revisit it now and see what I think.

Weird note a dork like me would notice: Ahern replaced Brzezicki in Big Country and also did so technically in Ultravox. Warren Cann left Ultravox in 1985, and they used Brzezicki on the U-Vox album, then Ahern replaced him on tour.

I need to get a life.

Pete, I respectfully disagree regarding the quality of songs on No Place Like Home. The two songs they re-recorded for Buffalo Skinners, "We're Not In Kansas" and "Ships," are both excellent even if the other versions are a bit stronger. From the first time I played it I've loved "Dynamite Lady," "Keep On Dreaming," "Beautiful People," "Comes A Time" and "Into The Fire." Also, the non-album tracks "Kiss The Girl Goodbye" and "Freedom Song" are really good, and Stuart's guitar work throughout is impressive. I hope you feel differently about this album next time you play it, although the production won't sound any better all these years later.

Thanks for the info about Ultravox. Didn't realize Brzezicki played with them. I only own a couple of their albums, and U-Vox isn't one of them. I've always enjoyed his drumming on pretty much anything he's done: On The Air, Pete Townshend, Procol Harum, The Cult, etc.

..and don't forget the juggernaut that was "Born in the USA," which many people thought had an upbeat message, but in actuality did not. Man, that album and the Purple Rain soundtrack were everywhere in 84-85.