Top 5 Awesome Reissues of 2012

1

maudlin of the Well - Bath and Leaving Your Body Map

Antithetic / Blood Music reissue

Together, these two companion releases create one of the most beautiful musical experiences ever recorded. But you'd never know that, seeing as these two albums are nigh-impossibly hard to find. Any time these two see a reissue you can guarantee they'll be gone in a heartbeat, but we should still thank Antithetic and Blood Music nonetheless for the public service of making these excellent albums available again.

2

Sleep - Dopesmoker

Sargent House reissue

What could be better than sixty minutes of stoner metal? Though Dopesmoker is unarguably one of the greatest stoner metal albums around, with no less than four different versions of the same album running around (some under the title Jerusalem), it was hard to tell what it was that the band actually wanted you to hear. Sargent House thankfully has stepped in to reissuie the definitive version of the recording, making the, for lack of a better term, "correct" version of the piece that much easier to find and more widespread.

3

Pink Floyd - The Wall

Experience Edition

Okay, sure, Pink Floyd's recent reissue campaign has been really hit-or-miss, but this expanded version of The Wall actually provides a lot of material that's worth your time to hear. The early demos included on this album, incomplete though they may be, still provide an enlightening glimpse into the development of this legendary piece. Certainly worth your time and money to hear (and certainly more so than the similar Dark Side of the Moon reissue).

4

Paul Simon - Graceland

25th Anniversary reissue

It's very easy to feel that pop music can be very overdone and repetitive. But that's actually why this album is so easy to love: it's an absolutely perfect display of the diversity and beauty open to the genre that you don't seem to hear very often. This particular edition, in celebration of the album's 25th anniversary, helpfully collects all of the bonus material from the previous 2004 reissue, as well as adding some new material of its own. Sure, everyone has heard of this album by now (even if no one can exactly remember the correct title of "You Can Call Me Al"), but even after all this time, it's still a particularly enjoyable forty minutes.

5

Rush - 2112 Five Point One

Mercury

Rush aren't exactly big in the reissue market--aside from updating all of their albums to CD, they've more or less stayed away from them entirely. However, last year's 30th anniversary reissue of Moving Pictures opened the floodgates, and that's led to this year's update of their other classic album, 2112 Five Point One. Though it contains some live bonus material (as if Rush didn't have enough available), the real treat is in the fantastic new 5.1 mix. It's about time that Rush started catering to some of the audiophiles, and this recording won't disappoint.

- Sarah