Burt Bacharach box set to be released on Hip-O Select

[Harry]

A new Burt Bacharach box set!

The following info comes from Mike Ragogna at Universal through one of our sometime regulars, Scott B.:

We're aiming at an August release on Hip-O Select. You can let leak that "The Source" (you can use my name) said it will have every Kapp and A&M recording including the unreleased (in the US) live album and the previously unreleased track "Etta's Theme," the rare Liberty single "Juanita's Place" and "Nikki," the movie instrumental version of "After The Fox," the complete Butch Cassidy soundtrack since that's officially a Burt Bacharach album, "Arthur's Theme" from the movie soundtrack and if possible (it's what's holding up the project), the Burt & The Backbeats tracks. These last three Backbeats tracks are the most difficult to license.

This is terrific news, and will be a definitive box set of Burt's own recorded works. I'm looking forward to this one, particularly the rare live album and some of the rarities.

Harry
...passing along the news, online...

 

[Mr Bill]

Now if they would just get their forum back up and running. Maybe the Motown groupies scared them? Their posts certainly outnumbered A&M requests by about ten to one, so it wasn't us...

--Mr Bill

 

[Harry]

Yeah, that forum's been out for awhile now.

I'm hoping that they don't forget Burt's Christmas tune, "The Bell That Couldn't Jingle". The only official CD mastering of that one that I've seen came from a bad 45.

Harry
...looking forward to this one, online...

 

[Dave]

Well, I hope it has good selections from all of his A&M works!

Dave

 

[Rudy]

Sheesh! Try reading the original post.

This is terrific news, and will be a definitive box set of Burt's own recorded works. I'm looking forward to this one, particularly the rare live album and some of the rarities.

One thing about the Arthur soundtrack: it was an unusual album. Side two was instrumental, featuring themes from the film, which I believe were "Bacharach" recordings (arranged, conducted, etc.). Side one had "Arthur's Theme" followed by a few tracks that were some of the same tracks from side two but performed by popular artists/bands of the day. So while those other side one tracks were other artists recording Bacharach songs, the rest of the album was a Bacharach recording. It was briefly on CD as an import, but never domestically released.

I wonder if it will include any other tracks from "Casino Royale" and "After The Fox". The former was represented on the Rhino Burt Box, but not the latter.

I take it Kapp's recordings are owned by Universal now? (Didn't Kapp sort of end up being merged into MCA many years ago?)

 

[Rudy]

Now if they would just get their forum back up and running. Maybe the Motown groupies scared them? Their posts certainly outnumbered A&M requests by about ten to one, so it wasn't us...

--Mr Bill

The Verve forum was also unceremoniously shut down a few years ago. I think they either got tired of moderating it, or users were causing too many problems that they didn't want to deal with.

 

[PJ]

Great News !

Playing Burt Bacharach Collection 2 CD set with 50 tracks at the weekend , I did wonder whether in Burt's 75th Birthday year ....a special release / Box set would be due

Hopefully include more of Burt's soundtrack songs & music and many rarities from throughout his career and ideally Herb Alpert has authorised his definitive recording of This Guy's In Love With You on this release as missing from 2 CD set

Peter

 

[Harry]

Playing Burt Bacharach Collection 2 CD set with 50 tracks at the weekend , I did wonder whether in Burt's 75th Birthday year ....a special release / Box set would be due

Hopefully include more of Burt's soundtrack songs & music and many rarities from throughout his career and ideally Herb Alpert has authorised his definitive recording of This Guy's In Love With You on this release as missing from 2 CD set

Peter

I think this set will include only Burt's own recordings that he did for various labels: A&M, Kapp, and any others. Herb's "This Guy's In Love With You" resides on the main "other artist" box set of Burt's, The Look Of Love from a few years ago.

It should also be pointed out that any Hip-O Select release will be limited in scope.

Harry
...hoping for more details, onlline...

 

[Mike Blakesley]

I'm looking forward to this too. I wish it would include the instrumental from the ARTHUR 2 soundtrack, "The Best of Times." A very nice, midtempo instrumental with some excellent trumpet and sax work. But that album probably only sold about 2 copies so it's not likely.

Still, having nice clean versions of all the A&M material will be outasite!

 

[Rudy]

Looks like all of the A&M *and* the Kapp recordings, with a few extras as a nice touch. I never did get any of the CDs past "Burt Bacharach", so it will be nice to have these (and save me doing needle drops). Let's just keep fingers crossed they get someone to master it well!

 

[Brasil_Nut]

I've always been a huge fan of Burt Bacharach -- this is sensational news. And, although albums such as REACH OUT hold a special place for me, I'll be glad to have some of the later material I somehow never acquired.

When it comes to later efforts, WOMAN and FUTURES are two of my favorites.

Jon

 

[PJ]

Will this be a mid price Box set release on Hip -O ?

If so -fewer tracks and extras included for us all

Peter

 

[Rudy]

A thread "bump" since the subject of Hip-O and Burt are cropping up again.

I'm guessing this set is mainly A&M and Kapp tracks, since UMG owns both. From what I can tell, the only licensing deals will be the "After The Fox" theme (albeit not the vocal version ), "Arthur's Theme", and the Backbeats tracks (which were on, what, an independent label?).

August, huh? Only four weeks away. I wonder if it's on schedule. (Fingers crossed. )

 

[Harry]

An update from Scott B., in contact with Hip-o:

I just had a very nice long chat with the head of Hip-O Select that said they are hoping for the Burt box(5 CD's) to be the 3rd week of sept. The liner notes were all done. I didn't want to bug him with specifics as we were talking more about the business and other titles he is pursuing. He used to be a DJ!! I'll let you know if I get anymore details.

Harry
...passing the news along, online...

 

[Mike Blakesley]

Great news! I had been wondering about this.

I was thinking about something else too....as we all know, recently Universal released that Bacharach best-of WHAT THE WORLD NEEDS NOW. When they work up a set like this, do they go ahead and remaster the whole catalog at that time, and then just use the best-of as a market test before deciding to go ahead with the whole shebang? Or do they just remaster the tracks for the collection and do the rest later, if necessary. Just wondering.

 

[Rudy]

Given record company finances, they could just remaster what they need to. If you figure the number of hours they'd have to put into all those songs, and end up only releasing a CD's worth (out of how many albums), it doesn't seem they'd spend all that money on it. Unless they also planned to make those available via iTunes or another download service.

Really cool about the box set--I'm anxious, and saving up the pennies!

 

[Mike Blakesley]

The November issue of ICE magazine has this box set advertised. Looks like a maroon or brown book-style cover (not a long box) with a silver embossed stamped picture of Bacharach on the front, and nothing else...no name, title or anything. The official title of the collection is SOMETHING BIG: THE COMPLETE A&M YEARS...AND MORE.

It will be 5 CDs. According to the ad, "It took five compact discs to hold the magnificence....yeah baby!"

Unfortunately, no release date is given -- and it's not on the Hip-O Select website (yet) either! I wannit now!

 

[Rudy]

Five CDs is like anywhere from eight to ten albums worth of music. Let's hope this is a good seller for Hip-O!

 

[Mike Blakesley]

I did a quick mental calculation at work...this is far from exact, but:

REACH OUT: about 33 minutes
MAKE IT EASY ON YOURSELF: about 36 minutes
BUTCH CASSIDY: about 25 minutes
BURT BACHARACH: about 30 minutes
LIVING TOGETHER: about 36 minutes
FUTURES: about 35 minutes
WOMAN: about 35 minutes

...totals about 230 minutes. Five CDs hold up to 400 minutes of music, so there's plenty of room for extras. I'm really looking forward to this while trying to forget how much I spent on the Japanese imports! [shudder]

 

[Harry]

The import IN CONCERT album adds close to 50 minutes to your total.

The Kapp album, as released with extras by MCA, is 41 minutes.

CASINO ROYALE, released on Varese the last time around, but distributed by Universal, if included, would be another 34 minutes, assuming clearance rights for 'guest' appearances by Herb and Dusty Springfield are approved.

That's 125 added to Mike's 230, equalling 355 minutes. 355 minutes spread over 5 CDs averages out to 71 minutes each.

Harry

 

[Rudy]

I don't think Casino Royale is on this one (originally Colgems...not sure who controls the masters now), but Bacharach's albums released on Kapp (which UMG owns the masters for) are going to be on this set, along with the concert recording. Works out to about ten albums' worth on five CDs!

Casino Royale is no loss--typical soundtrack with a couple of good songs and a lot of incidental movie filler. After The Fox is about the same--a few good songs, but more filler based on the same few themes.

I'm afraid we'll probably have Butch Cassidy in all its CSG glory, too...but not much they can do about it without doing a remix from the multitracks.

 

[Mike Blakesley]

That's no biggie to me....that album consists mainly of 4 songs, with three versions of two. Although the instrumentals on it are great. I haven't listened to it in a long time, so I'm looking forward to revisiting it.

And I've never heard any of the non-A&M music, so that'll be great as well.

You can tell that the Hip-O people know that his A&M years were the coolest, since they titled the set the way they did!