5 Album

Absolutely 💯 worth the money 💰. Classic music from the 80s. Ian Mcnabb is a class song writer in the same realms of Mike Scott. Pure music heaven.

Great package of great band

Following the hugely disappointing Cherry Red reissues of The Small Price of a Bicycle / If You Want To Defeat Your Enemy / Blind albums (which all had some of the worst remastering I've heard on any CD release) this package is a delight. Firstly the clarity of the sound is the same high quality as Beggar's own reissue of the first album (The Icicle Works) from a few years back. This means that the music shines through, and this applies to all carefully chosen bonus tracks as well some of which are real rarities. Secondly it's great to have each album housed in a mini-vinyl replica sleeve for the first time; although the booklet simply details the credits for each album and nothing else, it's absolutely what's expected at this incredibly low price. Therefore you cannot go wrong with this box set - 4 of the best albums ever made, an excellent rare live album thrown in, and superb sound and packaging. Great value Beggars Archive - thanks for making these recordings available again as they should be heard.

Fantastic box set of the bands best 4 studio albums plus a live one. Lots of great songs with brilliant lyrics to sing along to. The Icicle Works should have been as big as Echo and the Bunnymen and The Scaffold (what ?) Easily one of my favourite bands of the 1980s that I still listen to today.

If you only buy only one 5 album box-set ever make it this one! I can't believe I only finally caught up with the band properly this year but they are outstanding, This box-set covers the first 4 albums plus a live 1986 concert in an exceptionally good value 90 song total, It includes the one UK hit (unbelievably only one when you listen to these albums! ) plus great songs like 'let it all come down' 'understanding Jane' and 'Who do yo want for your love' to name a few, but honestly they are all good songs and incredibly varied. The bonus tracks include some bluesier, raw and darker moments and are well worth a listen. I caught them live in Holmfirth recently and they still sound great, as they do on the eighties concert included here. Sublime listening and songwriting.

Having been a child of the 80s, this is one of those bands that I somehow remembered enough to get into Ian McNabb's solo stuff as I got older, and that lead me back to The Icicle Works as well. So when I saw this box set, and at such an amazing price, was too good to let go. And this is more than just the original albums, each comes with added extras, which I assume are B-sides and other lost gems, all of which add up to five albums and around six hours of music. Listening to the albums again, amazing how much of their stuff I remember, and how some of it really has stood the test of time, ok, not all of it, but let's not get picky. And some of the extra's are fantastic and show the diverse influences that the band clearly had. If you were a fan of either the Icicle Works or ian McNabb, then this is something you should have, everything by the band in one easy box.

Keep it quiet but this is a criminally underpriced cd box set, beautifully remastered. I owned the IW best of and enjoyed the sound and so when I saw this boxed set I thought it worth a try, and I am so glad I did. Well crafted songs, with great lyrics both insightful and intelligent. It is definitively an ‘80’s sound’ but nothing wrong with that, and I will be listening again to all these albums again for sure as there was only a couple of duff songs in the 90 or so in this release. For the rest they were consistently engaging so much so I bought the omitted album Permanent Damage immediately. IW join a number of overlooked bands, that give me the greatest musical pleasure, for so many bands it’s about the calibre of their management unfortunately…

What can I say except what a fab band the ices were, saw them live in the early 80s and when they started playing the guitars and Ian started singing I was hooked, never looked back since, got these on vinyl so when the box set came out I bought it to keep my collection going, so glad I did, nice box all cds in original cardboard sleeves and at a good price. Some excellent songs here, birds fly, starry blueyed wonder excellent tune, Evangeline an early single, and many many more fab guitar songs and a few ballads! Well worth buying

良い曲がたくさんあるのに驚き。これはというセンスが溢れています。おすすめ

Brilliant music from an iconic 80’s band!!

While it is lacking detailed liner notes, the amount of amazing music--released and unreleased--that is included in this box set makes it worth the purchase.

Probably one of the most underrated UK post-punk guitar pop groups that ever had a hit, outside of their first album the Icicle Works are a somewhat unknown band in the U.S. As much as I've loved their first LP for years, I never got around to checking out anything else by them prior to acquiring this set. Even though it is an import, the price (around $25-30) is very fair for all the music you get and less expensive than tracking down all the albums separately. Each album comes in a cardstock mini-LP sleeve and the booklet in the set is minimal, but the overall package is a bit nicer looking and less flimsy than the budget CD sets from labels like Columbia, Rhino, Sony, etc. Disc 1 covers the band's first (and best album) along with several strong bonus tracks. Here the sound is a highly atmospheric and pop-oriented take on the 80s neo-psychedelic sound (produced by the excellent Hugh Jones) and there are very few weak points. The disc follows the UK running order, which might take some getting used to if you are accustomed to the U.S. Arista-issued LP. One minor disappointment for me is that the U.S. version of "Waterline" is not included anywhere. Disc 2 is the sophomore album and contemporaneous bonus tracks, which was apparently never issued in the U.S., which explains why I rarely see it in the used bins. There is some debate over whether this album or the third LP is their second best record. My personal opinion leans toward this one. The sound (stripped of some of the first LP's atmosphere) does lean toward the heavily melodramatic at times and seems to lean on 60s influences a bit more than the first LP. Even though the album utilized a handful of producers, the sound is uniform enough throughout. Disc 3 covers the third LP, produced by Ian Broudie this time around. If you've listened to a few productions by him from the 80s, you'll know that his heavy-handed style (slick, fond of synths) hasn't always aged that well. That is definitely the case here, which makes it my least favorite of the first 3 albums. If you can get past the production, there are some strong songs, although the bonus tracks on this disc can be a bit weak. The Van Morrison cover in particular misses the mark. Disc 4 is where things take a turn for the worse. "Blind" shows the band going in a hard rock-ish direction, perhaps somewhat similar to what the Cult were trying to do with their "Love" LP, but this is nowhere near as good as that album. I'd rate this album as poorly dated at best, awful at worst. Frankly I had a tough time even getting through it. Disc 5 redeems the set with a good quality live album from 1986. Here the band feels a bit looser and rougher around the edges compared to their studio LPs and the result is mostly positive. In fact, I'd like to hear more live material from the band if Beggars or some other label ever gets around to issuing it.

I must say that any set of music featuring 4 studio albums, bonus tracks, and a live cd for 26 bucks is a steal. Perfect for the beginning listener or long time fan. Comes with small booklet and cardboard lp replicas. Nice outer box.