The discussion already started a bit in the thread about the 2014(!) U2.com gift. It's quite clear that we seem to have a desire of not wanting to start new topics?!
Anyhow, I was initially excited about this, as I am with any new release. It looks beautiful. But as I got thinking properly, I became pretty disappointed with this new set. I am very glad that the deluxe vinyl and CD versions have identical audio content. And the photo book and photos, while they will probably only be looked at a couple of times, do seem quite nice. But here are my criticisms. Some of these criticisms may overlap with each other.
1. The concert is missing four tracks - The Unforgettable Fire, Help!, Bad, and Spanish Eyes. This is presumably done in order to fit everything onto one CD. That's a shame.
2. The decision to include new remixes instead of demo versions, as was done with the Kindergarten versions on the Achtung Baby set. From the list here, it looks like we're only getting one alternative mix from 1987, the other seven are new:
- One Tree Hill 2017 Remix (St Francis Hotel)
- Bullet the Blue Sky 2017 Remix (Jacknife Lee)
- Running To Stand Still 2017 Remix (Daniel Lanois)
- Red Hill Mining Town 2017 Mix (Steve Lillywhite)
- With or Without You 2017 Remix (Daniel Lanois)
- Where The Streets Have No Name 2017 Remix (Flood)
- I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For (Lillywhite Alternative Mix ’87)
- One Tree Hill Reprise (Brian Eno 2017 Mix)
3. The single edit of Streets is missing. I don't really care, but as far as a complete set goes, it's not here, yet it made the 20th anniversary re-release.
4. Where are the tracks from the same era that appeared on compilations only? I'm thinking about:
- Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)
- Jesus Christ
- Maggie's Farm
- Springhill Mining Disaster
5. No Blu-Ray or high-definition audio? Achtung Baby had a downloadable 24-96 version available for its re-release.
6. No 5.1 surround sound mix? Many "top" artists are creating these for their re-releases.
7. No video content? The 20th anniversary set included a concert, promo videos, a documentary, and other unreleased videos.
8. The price is pretty excessive. Only the eight aforementioned tracks are new releases (the concert has been available on Wolfgang's Vault for download for several years). In comparison to the Achtung Baby release, it's a bit outrageous. That release (the "super" version) gave far more new material for only a little bit more money than is being asked for this release.
9. I'm restating it, but a Kindergarten-like CD would have been a very nice addition to this package.