Much talk in the press and among friends about Mr Wilson's London concerts at The Royal Festival Hall, temporarily known as The Hall Of Grateful Weeping Men while he is there, spotlighting a Great Lost Pop Album, "Smile".
I am not a Beach Boys devotee (just as well – my wallet couldn't take the strain), but I do have my own favourite Great Lost Pop Album. At least, lost in the sense of never being reissued on CD, or indeed ever available on CD at all. Until this month.
The album is "Bite" by Altered Images from 1983. I've been waiting twenty-one years for this.
The reissue, "Bite… Plus", follows the other two Altered Images album reissues in being very nicely put together, with bonus tracks and sleevenotes, and at mid-price too. But my enjoyment is marred when Track 2, "Another Lost Look" turns out to be an inferior, unfinished, guitar-heavy demo version where Ms Grogan is barely singing at all. As opposed to the full, synth-drenched vocal-soaring version on the original vinyl album that I'm familiar with.
Quite interesting to have this demo version, but not at the expense of the one I wanted. The proper version hasn't been included on any of the group's many CD "Best Of"s, either. Ah well, I shall have to put up with my scratchy-vinyl-to-mp3 version for ever more. I do wish these reissue people would do things properly. But I suspect it's only me who minds.
