Blondie - Against The Odds 1974 - 1982 (Super Deluxe Collectors’ Edition Boxset)

There’s a certain un-assuming barn just outside Woodstock, New York. It’s easy to picture; the deep mythology of pop music history assures that much. For nearly two decades, the bulk of Blondie’s audio and visual archive sat inside.

One hundred reel-to-reel tapes, half a dozen cassettes, a few storage tubs crammed with records, bits of promotional flotsam, flyers, a stray Warhol print, and mirrored dressing room signage from four sold-out January 1980 nights at London’s Hammersmith Odeon. All of it lay silent through twenty humid summers, twenty frigid winters, and 20,000 rodents.

There were knives collected in Asia and sex worker advertisements pilfered from the UK’s red telephone boxes of the late 1970s. In a corner, a dust-caked RIAA-certified gold record for Eat To The Beat reclined against a wall, its protective glass scarred by a bullet hole.“Iggy and I were shooting guns at a wall in my basement one night,” guitarist Chris Stein told us. “This was a casualty.”

From this chaotic hoard of ephemera, this long-gestating project was born.

Over the years, Blondie’s many partner record companies have done an exemplary job archiving the band’s recorded legacy, given the miles it’s logged and the oceans it’s had to cross. From Larry Uttal’s Private Stock Records to Terry Ellis and Chris Wright’s Chrysalis, which was absorbed by Capitol and then Universal, the band’s reels have been moved, transferred, baked, re-boxed, remixed, and barcoded more than a few times. We pored over every foot of magnetic tape and, thanks to our brand new 24-bit, 192KHz transfers, have expanded the dynamic range of Blondie’s six LPs.

We’ve scoured the earth for era-appropriate photos, pic sleeves, lyrics sheets, fan club newsletters, postcards, jukebox strips, and even eight-track tapes. There will always be more to find. Whether it’s a mislabeled cassette tape squirrelled away in a New Jersey garage, a previously unknown Thai 45 variant, or a roll of film excavated at the Long Beach flea market, slivers of Blondie will continue to poke into our collective unconscious until there ceases to be any consciousness to poke.

What the seven members of Blondie set to tape over those first eight years remains among the most timeless music of its era, or any era. This is not hyperbole. Walk into a grocery store and Rapture fills the air. Spend an hour with any classic rock, ’80s throwback, LITE FM easy listening, or rockin’ oldies station and you will rediscover Heart of Glass.

Watch any given documentary on the birth of punk or hip hop, read any “Best Albums of All Time” list, and the stark three-color imagery of Parallel Lines will undoubtedly flash by. Visit any sports arena in the world and count the moments before you hear Call Me.

Blondie has transcended the realms of mere bands, evolving out of pop and punk to become a vital strand of American music’s core DNA.

Let this box set serve as a map of the genome.

The Studio albums:

LP 1 - Blondie:

1. X Offender

2. Little Girl Lies

3. In The Flesh

4. Look Good In Blue

5. In The Sun

6. A Shark In Jets Clothing 

7. Man Overboard

8. Rip Her To Shreds

9. Rifle Range

10. Kung Fu Girl

11. The Attack Of The Giant Ants

LP 2 - Plastic Letters:

1. Fan Mail

2. Denis

3. Bermuda Triangle Blues (Flight 45)

4. Youth Nabbed As Sniper

5. Contact In Red Square

6. (I'm Always Touched By Your) Presence, Dear

7. I'm On E

8. I Didn't Have The Nerve To Say No

9. Love At The Pier

10. No Imagination

11. Kidnapper

12. Detroit 442

13. Cautious Lip

LP 3  - Parallel Lines:

1. Hanging On The Telephone

2. One Way Or Another

3. Picture This

4. Fade Away And Radiate

5. Pretty Baby

6. I Know But I Don't Know

7. 11:59

8. Will Anything Happen

9. Sunday Girl

10. Heart Of Glass

11. I'm Gonna Love You Too

12. Just Go Away

LP 4  - Eat To The Beat:

1. Dreaming

2. The Hardest Part

3. Union City Blue

4. Shayla

5. Eat To The Beat

6. Accidents Never Happen

7. Die Young Stay Pretty

8. Slow Motion

9. Atomic

10. Sound-A-Sleep

11. Victor

12. Living In The Real World

LP 5 - Autoamerican:

1. Europa

2. Live It Up

3. Here's Looking At You

4. The Tide Is High

5. Angels On The Balcony

6. Go Through It

7. Do The Dark

8. Rapture

9. Faces

10. T-Birds

11. Walk Like Me

12. Follow Me

LP 6 - The Hunter:

1. Orchid Club

2. Island Of Lost Souls

3. Dragonfly

4. For Your Eyes Only

5. The Beast

6. War Child

7. Little Caesar

8. Danceway

9. (Can I) Find The Right Words (To Say)

10. English Boys

11. The Hunter Gets Captured By The Game

Bonus Tracks 7":

1. Moonlight Drive -  Previously unreleased

2. Mr. Sightseer - Previously unreleased          

10" LP Out-takes & rarities ('Out In The Streets'):    

Side A - (1974 Session): 

1. Out In The Streets (1974) - Previously Unreleased

2. The Disco Song - Previously unreleased

3. Sexy Ida - Previously unreleased  

Side B - (Betrock Demo): 

4. Platinum Blonde  

5. The Thin Line

6. Puerto Rico - Previously unreleased

7. Once I Had A Love (1975)

8. Out In The Streets (1975)

LP 2 - Out-takes & rarities ('Plaza Sound'):   

1. X Offender (Intro) - Previously unreleased

2. X Offender (Private Stock Single)

3. In The Sun (Private Stock Single) 

4. Little Girl Lies (Private Stock Mix) - Previously unreleased

5. In The Flesh (Extended Intro) - Previously unreleased

6. A Shark In Jets Clothing (Take 2) - Previously unreleased

7. Kung Fu Girls (Take 8) - Previously unreleased

8. Scenery   

9. Denis (Terry Ellis Mix) - Previously unreleased

10. Bermuda Triangle Blues - Flight 45 (Take 1) - Previously unreleased

11. I Didn't Have The Nerve To Say No (Take 1) - Previously unreleased

12. I'm On E (Take 2) - Previously unreleased

13. Kidnapper (Take 2) - Previously unreleased

14. Detroit 442 (Take 2) - Previously unreleased

15. Poets Problem    

 LP2 - Out-takes & rarities ('Parallel Beats'):    

1. Once I Had A Love (Mike Chapman Demo)  

2. Sunday Girl (French Version)

3. I'll Never Break Away From This Heart Of Mine (Pretty Baby) - Previously unreleased

4. Hanging On The Telephone (Mike Chapman Demo) - Previously unreleased

5. Will Anything Happen (Instrumental) - Previously unreleased

6. Underground Girl      

7. Call Me

8. Spaghetti Song (Atomic Part 2) - Previously unreleased

9. Die Young Stay Pretty (Take 1) - Previously unreleased

10. Union City Blue (Instrumental) - Previously unreleased

11. Llámame         

LP 3 - Out-takes & rarities ('Coca Cola'):     

1. I Love You Honey, Give Me A Beer (Go Through It) - Previously unreleased

2. Live It Up (Giorgio Moroder Demo) - Previously unreleased

3. Angels on the Balcony (Giorgio Moroder Demo) - Previously unreleased

4. Tide Is High (Demo) - Previously unreleased

5. Susie & Jeffrey  

6. Rapture (Disco Version)  

7. Autoamerican Ad - Previously unreleased

8. Yuletide Throwdown - Previously unreleased

LP 4 - Out-takes & rarities ('Home Tapes'):

1. Nameless (Home Tape) - Previously unreleased

2. Sunday Girl (Home Tape) - Previously unreleased

3. Theme From Topkapi (Home Tape) - Previously unreleased

4. The Hardest Part (Home Tape) - Previously unreleased

5. Ring of Fire (Home Tape) - Previously unreleased   

6. War Child (Chris Stein Mix) - Previously unreleased

7. Call Me (Chris Stein Mix) - Previously unreleased

8. Heart of Glass (Chris Stein Mix) - Previously unreleased