I'm not getting rid of any of my Mosaic sets. That said, I usually create playlists (or CD-Rs) of the original albums. In most cases, I'd rather listen to the music as sequenced on the original LPs. I always find that it's easier to "digest" the music that way. (Obviously, this doesn't apply to sets with pre-LP era music.) Also, for the most part, I've already traded in music -- on LP or CD -- that was duplicated when I bought the Mosaic sets. There are few exceptions. But not many.
DIGRESSION ALERT!
I feel like I should stick up a bit for 32 Jazz. It seems to come in for a lot of stick on the board, and I can understand that to certain extent. Yeah, those plastic boxes are not cool. And, yes, some of the cover art is dreadful. But you've also got to admit that the sound on most 32 Jazz CDs were a BIG improvement over Muse's own CDs. And in some cases the sound is improved over the original Muse LPs. One example: I recently bought Pat Martino's Head & Heart, a 32 Jazz 2-disc set compiling two Muse LPs: Consciousness and Live. I already owned Consciousness (on a Muse CD), but I didn't have Live (in any format), so I plopped for the set. Just for kicks, I compared the 32 Jazz CD with the Muse CD. No comparison. Sound-wise, the 32 Jazz CD thrashed the Muse CD. I've found this to be consistently true. Muse CDs generally don't sound very good.
Turning back to the issue of cover art: I would argue that in some cases, the 32 Jazz art is an improvement on the original. Muse didn't have an Andy Warhol or Reid Miles like Blue Note did. They didn't have any photographers like Francis Wolff. Most of the time, Muse LP covers were merely functional; often they were boring; some were flat-out bad. So it's not like 32 Jazz CDs were replacing innovative, top-shelf graphic design with something worse.
A couple examples comes to mind. Which of these is more impressive?
The original Muse LP?
Or this 32 Jazz reissue?
Speaking of Woody Shaw, here's one of my favorites. Is this Muse cover "art" really that much better than the 32 Jazz version?
This is boring, really dull. And the fonts don't match -- either from a color or design perspective.
This is overly cluttered and busy. And what's the deal with the table??? But at least there's some color and font consistency -- unlike the (orange and pink?!?!) text on the Muse cover.
One last point and I'll stop beating this already dead horse: 32 Jazz filled an important void. Denon/Savoy, who now owns most of the Muse catalog, will likely never release this music on CD. And the only music that they've made available as downloads is the music that 32 Jazz first released on CD. (And talk about dreadful art: Have you seen Savoy's "art" for their Muse downloads! Ugh.) The Muse catalog is full of IMPORTANT music that deserves to be heard -- and not just music by Woody Shaw (whose Muse recordings happen to be the ONLY ones Mosaic has chosen to reissue). If it weren't for 32 Jazz then it would be MUCH MORE difficult for people to hear this music. Anyone without a turntable would be out of luck -- and that would be a shame. So I'm grateful to 32 Jazz for everything they did. I only wished the company would've lasted longer and been able to reissue more.
O.K. That's it. Didn't mean to hijack the thread, and I hope it wasn't too rant-y.
_forumlogo.png.a607ef20a6e0c299ab2aa6443aa1f32e.png)
IMHO, this is the worst Muse cover: Is this some sort of attempt to be "artistic"??? This Hank Jones cover is awful too: BTW, this music is OUTSTANDING -- even though the cover is practically shouting, "We couldn't care less."