Gentle Giant - Unburied Treasure Box Set - 1st album in 5.1 - Steven Wilson mix

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ctoelle

300 Club - QQ All-Star
Joined
Oct 9, 2006
Messages
350
This was just listed at Burning Shed, a massive box set from Gentle Giant, Unburied Treasure. Lots of unreleased music here (mostly live), and a blu-ray with the 1st album complete and remixed into 5.1 by Steven Wilson. At the the time Three Piece Suite was done, not all of the multi-tracks were available, but they have been found apparently. Very expensive though. Really should of included all the other 5.1 mixes.

Gentle Giant - Unburied Treasure








gentle giant unburied treasure boxset.jpg
 
I'm glad this is finally seeing the light of day, and that Dan Bornemark's multis of the first album were finally utilized (their existence was known in the community before work on Three Piece Suite, but apparently not by the band), but...
Very expensive though. Really *should've included all the other 5.1 mixes.
...yeah. I don't care much about the additional live material, despite my love for the band. For those who do, maybe the price seems more reasonable. Then there are the questions of sources and sound quality, getting into the territory of the U.K. box debacle wherein included concerts had been available with better sound quality as bootlegs. Not a good look. Will the same happen here? The band held an online survey a while ago in preparation for this box, asking for suggestions of content to include and for contact information if anyone had sources for live recordings, so hopefully not.

But the elephant in the room is, obviously, a lack of surround content. There already exist two full plus three partial albums mixed in (or upmixed to) 5.1 by Steven Wilson, as well as two albums mixed in quad but not released at the time only to have received botched releases on lossy DVD-V a number of years ago. In my response to the survey, I suggested that the band include all available surround content losslessly on Blu-ray. I know that others made this same suggestion. This would have been a perfect opportunity to correct the swapped channels on the quad mixes and present them without Peter Mew's mastering. Alas, we get only one as-yet-unreleased SW mix.

Having said all that... I'll probably buy this. I only own (in some cases multiple copies of) the studio albums up through ĭn′terview, and no live content outside of Giant On The Box. And I can't pass up the full SW first album.

EDIT: I missed this bit of information:
All music on the 29 CDs has been newly remastered by Pete Reynolds
I guess I need to look into the work of Pete Reynolds.
 
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It really pains me to say this, because I really do love Steven Wilson's 5.1 surround mixes, and I like Gentle Giant's music too, but I really need to draw the line on a box set like this.

Yes, this is not the only ridiculously expensive box set that is being released later this year. The other obvious set would be Pink Floyd's "Later Years" box set (and the big, bloated box set for Gene Clark's "No Other") but in all honesty, I see SO much more value in the Pink Floyd box set than I do in this Gentle Giant, and not just because I'm a bigger fan of Pink Floyd than I am of Gentle Giant.

Let's break it down:
-Pink Floyd's set contains 6 Blu-ray Discs, including 3 full studio 5.1 surround mixes (one released for the first time, which would be "A Momentary Lapse of Reason" and another released with full video for the first time, which would be "The Endless River"), 4 live films (3 of which contain 5.1 surround mixes), and a whole host of music videos, bonus live and rehearsal videos, screen films, documentaries, and more, so yes, it is still expensive, but it has a lot of great content spread out across the 6 Blu-ray Discs!

-Gentle Giant's set contains only 1 Blu-ray Disc with only 1 5.1 surround mix, and 3 of those tracks have already been released in discrete 5.1 surround before, leaving only 4 new 5.1 surround tracks on this disc (and let's face it, "The Queen" isn't much of anything)

Now, maybe I would be willing to buy the box set if the band had elected to include the following material on any number of Blu-ray Discs:
-All 12 original studio albums in remastered high-resolution stereo
-Full Steven Wilson stereo, instrumental & 5.1 remixes of "Gentle Giant", "Octopus" (including the 3 upmixed tracks), "The Power & the Glory", "Free Hand", and "Interview" (plus the additional 7 remixes from the "Three Piece Suite" release covering the remixed tracks from "Acquiring the Taste" and "Three Friends")
-Remastered 1970s 4.0 mixes of "Free Hand" and "Interview" (originally released in 2012 on DVD)
-Plus, maybe even all the video footage encapsulated on the band's DVDs "Giant on the Box" and "GG at the GG - Sight and Sound in Concert"

You put all that together on some Blu-ray Discs, and you now have a great set!

Finally, I know I'm usually the one to squash talk of any cheaper releases of surround mixes locked away in expensive box sets, but I think this Blu-ray Disc will see the light of day outside of this set next year, when Gentle Giant's 1st record reaches its 50th anniversary. Then the band will probably release a more common CD/Blu-Ray set of the 1st album with the new Steven Wilson stereo remix on CD and The Blu-Ray from this set.

So in summary, this box set receives a "Hell no!" from yours truly.

:)
 
For anyone interested I have a sealed 5.1 mix of Steven Wilson's Gentle Giant DVD & CD of The Power And The Glory in the trade section of this site.
I'm hoping that there will be a single disc of the debut album on DVD or Bluray
 
I have all of the released 5.1 sets as well as the two quads. I can't see buying this for a few more tracks from the debut album in surround. I also don't listen to enough GG to care too much about the live material. I'm only at that level with King Crimson and perhaps Yes. Disappointing. If it had all of the 5.1/4.0 that I have and I could have at least sold those off, I'd have been in.
 
I thought Gentle Giant also had Wilson mix Free Hand In 5.1, if so, I wonder if Gentle Giant are holding onto that for the next box set that no one can afford
 
It really pains me to say this, because I really do love Steven Wilson's 5.1 surround mixes, and I like Gentle Giant's music too, but I really need to draw the line on a box set like this.

Yes, this is not the only ridiculously expensive box set that is being released later this year. The other obvious set would be Pink Floyd's "Later Years" box set (and the big, bloated box set for Gene Clark's "No Other") but in all honesty, I see SO much more value in the Pink Floyd box set than I do in this Gentle Giant, and not just because I'm a bigger fan of Pink Floyd than I am of Gentle Giant.

Let's break it down:
-Pink Floyd's set contains 6 Blu-ray Discs, including 3 full studio 5.1 surround mixes (one released for the first time, which would be "A Momentary Lapse of Reason" and another released with full video for the first time, which would be "The Endless River"), 4 live films (3 of which contain 5.1 surround mixes), and a whole host of music videos, bonus live and rehearsal videos, screen films, documentaries, and more, so yes, it is still expensive, but it has a lot of great content spread out across the 6 Blu-ray Discs!

-Gentle Giant's set contains only 1 Blu-ray Disc with only 1 5.1 surround mix, and 3 of those tracks have already been released in discrete 5.1 surround before, leaving only 4 new 5.1 surround tracks on this disc (and let's face it, "The Queen" isn't much of anything)

Now, maybe I would be willing to buy the box set if the band had elected to include the following material on any number of Blu-ray Discs:
-All 12 original studio albums in remastered high-resolution stereo
-Full Steven Wilson stereo, instrumental & 5.1 remixes of "Gentle Giant", "Octopus" (including the 3 upmixed tracks), "The Power & the Glory", "Free Hand", and "Interview" (plus the additional 7 remixes from the "Three Piece Suite" release covering the remixed tracks from "Acquiring the Taste" and "Three Friends")
-Remastered 1970s 4.0 mixes of "Free Hand" and "Interview" (originally released in 2012 on DVD)
-Plus, maybe even all the video footage encapsulated on the band's DVDs "Giant on the Box" and "GG at the GG - Sight and Sound in Concert"

You put all that together on some Blu-ray Discs, and you now have a great set!

Finally, I know I'm usually the one to squash talk of any cheaper releases of surround mixes locked away in expensive box sets, but I think this Blu-ray Disc will see the light of day outside of this set next year, when Gentle Giant's 1st record reaches its 50th anniversary. Then the band will probably release a more common CD/Blu-Ray set of the 1st album with the new Steven Wilson stereo remix on CD and The Blu-Ray from this set.

So in summary, this box set receives a "Hell no!" from yours truly.

:)
I completely agree with everything you've said, yet another missed opportunity. It makes the Floyd set look like an absolute bargain, although I doubt I'll be dropping £430 on that either!
 
YAAB. Tempted, though, to buy, keep unwrapped, and sell at some future date.

(Does that make me a bad person? As someone who came late to the game, I prefer the word "vengeful" :p)
I'd hang fire, I'd be surprised if they sell all 2000 at that price with that content, but who knows! It will probably be half the price 6 months after release and if they do sell out of the box, I'd say there's even more chance of a separate CD/Blu-ray release next year... If you want to be bad / vengeful you would be better off buying 8 copies of Tull's Stormwatch and waiting a couple of years, the second hand prices for the Tull releases is silly!
 
I've heard about GG's upcoming massive box set. While it's too rich for my blood, I hope that GG will do a standalone release for the 5.1 Blu-Ray of the debut album (as well as a 5.1 release for my favorite album by the group, Free Hand). Let's hope for the best as the band celebrates the 50th Anniversary of the first album in 2020.
 
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