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Related Items:

• Fast Japanese Spin Cycle
• Propeller
• Vampire on Titus
• Under the Bushes Under the Stars
• Get Out of My Stations
• see more

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Disc 1:

1. Old Battery
2. Discussing Wallace Chambers
3. Cyclops
4. Crux
5. Portrait Destroyed by Fire
6. 3 Year Old Man
7. Dog's Out
8. Proud and Booming Industry
9. Hank's Little Fingers
10. Artboat
11. Hey Hey, Spaceman
12. Tumblers
13. Bread Alone
14. Captain's Dead
15. Lips of Steel
16. Visit to the Creep Doctor
17. Everyday
18. Barricade
19. Get to Know the Ropes
20. Can't Stop
21. Drinking Jim Crow
22. Trap Soul Door
23. Common Rebels
24. Long Distance Man
25. I Certainly Hope Not
26. Adverse Wind
27. Future Is in Eggs
28. Great Blake Street Canoe Race
29. Slopes of Big Ugly
30. Paper Girl
31. Navigating Flood Regions
32. Earful O' Wax
33. White Whale
34. Trampoline
35. Short on Posters
36. Chief Barrel Belly
37. Dying to Try This
38. Qualifying Remainder
39. Liar's Tale
40. Radio Show
41. Airshow '88
42. Order for the New Slave Trade
43. Hard Way
44. Drinker's Peace
45. Mammoth Cave
46. When She Turns 50
47. Club Molluska
48. Pendulum
49. Ambergris
50. Local Mix-Up/Murder Charge
51. Starboy
52. Blatant Doom Trip
53. How Loft I Am?
54. We've Got Airplanes
55. Dust Devil
56. Squirmish Frontal Room
57. Tricycle Looper
58. Crutch Came Slinking
59. Fantasy Creeps
60. Sopor Joe
61. Crunch Pillow
62. Indian Was an Angel
63. Don't Stop Now
64. Bite
65. Greenface
66. Deathtrot and Warlock Riding a Rooster
67. 2nd Moves to Twin
68. At Odds With Dr. Genesis
69. Please Freeze Me
70. Scissors
71. Postal Blowfish
72. Crocker's Favorite Song

Rating: - This is a great deal.
I love this box set. If you like early GBV you have to own this. I've had the set on vinyl for a few years and love it so much I bought the set on CD. The vinyl set is much better (it just sounds right), but the CDs are more convenient and now I get to listen to these albums more often.

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Rating: - shut up and listen already!
When you listen to this you must realize that these albums were recorded for the fun of doing it. There was no record deal or pressure from the public. No one outside of Dayton even new who these guys were.
I think this shows in the music. A fuzzy sounding 4 track recording from this band is so much better than the polished crap that todays groups take three years to release.
My personal favourite is "Self-Inflicted Aerial Nostalgia". I don't think there is a lousy one in the bunch. This is a good place to see how it all began.

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Rating: - Underwhelming early material paired with fantastic outtakes disc
If you like "Propeller" and "Bee Thousand," this set is worth purchasing just for the surprisingly excellent "King **** and the Golden Boys" disc, which is largly made up of outtakes from those sessions, including a demo of the best song Robert Pollard's ever written, "Don't Stop Now."

The rest of the material, comprising the four pre-"Propeller" Guided by Voices records, is hit-and-miss and pretty underwhelming overall. It wasn't really until the "Vampire on Titus" album that GBV really found their signature sound. On these discs, Pollard mostly sounds like he's worn out several copies of R.E.M.'s "Murmur" and is striving to recreate it as closely as possible. There are some minor gems like "Liar's Tale," "Captain's Dead," and "How Loft I Am?", but most of the songs fail to make much of an impression. It's an interesting but ultimately not-so-compelling look at a young band yet to hit upon the distinctive sound and style that would make their later albums so iconic.

So, this is a 5-disc set with one or maybe two discs' worth of material that's really worth getting excited about, even for a big Guided by Voices fan. But since it can be found new for around $30, it's still a worthwhile purchase if only for "Golden Boys." (Heck, "Indian was an Angel" is worth $30 all by itself!)

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Rating: - Ready to take the plunge?
This is a big investment, and not one to be taken lightly. There is just not a ton of music in this package. The first four albums, each on a separate CD, average about 30 minutes a piece. The outtakes album is a little longer, but nowhere near the possible 80 minutes. Overall, we are talking well under three hours of music.

The first album, Devil Between My Toes, starts off really well, surprisingly well. Bob knew what he was doing from the beginning. The songs are quirky and charming at the same time. The second half gets a little dull however.

The second album, Sandbox, is typical sophomore fare, with fewer memorable songs but nothing particularly distasteful either.

The third album, Self Inflicted Aerial Nostalgia, gets more interesting. The band starts to take advantage of the studio with tape effects, noise, etc. Things start getting more experimental. When you first hear it, you will probably have a quizzical look on your face from time to time, but this one will grow on you just like any of the other best GBV albums.

I don't care for the fourth album, Same Place The Fly Got Smashed, at all. It is a concept album about drinking. Yippee. While it is the antithesis of everyone's favorite whipping boy, the Do The Collapse album, it is just as bad. I find it sloppy, rambling, and unfocused. For this reason, I suppose it is a good thing the CDs were kept separate instead of being combined together.

The fifth CD is a bunch of rarities from 1988, 1991, and 1993. The two 1988 songs compare favorably with anything on Sandbox and are as good as the best songs on Devil. The five 1991 songs are okay but I wouldn't go as far as to call them essential. The Bee Thousand outtakes from 1993 are really interesting. Some of the songs are good but might have sounded repetitive on the album. Some of them you will recognize as being cropped and spliced into other BT tracks. This is usually for the better. The songs do not quite hold up as well on their own. It was really a masterstroke by Bob to do it that way on the final version.

At the price being charged here, I would hardly consider this to be a gift to fans. It is just too expensive. However, if you have and like Propeller and Vampire on Titus, and are ready to take the plunge, go right ahead. Even if you are not getting your money's worth, you will still find some really good music that isn't available anywhere else.

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Rating: - Searching for a heart of gold? Look here...
This is simply a must have set,GBV fan or not. It gives you 6 albums of great music AND points the way to even more GBV triumphs yet to come. This collection contains the band's independantly released albums right up to Vampire On Titus plus it adds a disc of cuts that you can only get with this set. There are more valuable gems that exist here than in all of the diamond mines in the world. I choose this vinyl version,which has been like a best friend to me since 1995, only because you get Propeller as a bonus. 6 lp's of the finest music you will ever hear...yes Virginia there is a God!

Devil Between My Toes is Gbv's first full length release. Dropped in 1987 (!),this is the sound of a band searching for it's voice. Still, "A Portrait Destroyed By Fire","Dog's Out","Hank's Little Fingers" and "Captain's Dead" point to the ground the band would mine in the future. Listening to the band create their sound out of scratch is something any fan should hear yet it's a compelling listen in it's own right.

Sandbox was also released in 1987. "Every Day" and "I Certainly Hope Not" are the cream here but "Lips Of Steal","Drinking Jim Crow","Trap Soul Door","Long Distance Man" and "Adverse Wind" are among the other solid tunes. A fine lead into....

Self Inflicted Aerial Nostalgia is among the 5 best GBV album's yet released. "Paper Girl" and "Liar's Tale" never fail to find the express way to my heart. There are too many other good songs to list here but the band got it good here. I would have loved to hear this album in 1989 but I was a mid-teen convinced that Motley Crue and Aerosmith spoke to me. I doubt I could have found a copy had I tried but I sucked so much during this time that it's a moot point. Classic GBV.

Released in 1990, The Same Place The Fly Got Smashed is a concept album about drinking. Anybody who's seen GBV in concert knows that Bob likes his beer. As concept album's go, this is one of the best. It's a drunken Tommy. The down side of alchohol (and the craziness it can produce) run wild here: "Airshow '88","The Hard Way","Drinker's Peace","Mammoth Cave",When She Turns 50","Pendulum"(one of my faves from this set),"Blatant Doom Trip" and "How Loft Am I?" are the strongest tracks on a very solid album. It's not trying to tell you what to do, it's just telling a very good story. Listen and learn and just like Bob grab a beer and rock.Great stuff...

Propeller is included on this vinyl version but not on the cd set. It's jam packed with outstanding tracks but "Weedking","Particular Damaged","Exit Flagger","14 Cheerleader Coldfront" and "On The Tundra" stand out. If you get the cd version you HAVE to get Propeller on cd as well. You must...

How good was GBV during this period (1987-93) that lead up to it's 2 best albums (Bee Thousand and Alien Lanes, the best in my humble opinion only-mind you)? Check out King S*it And the Golden Boys, a record of previously unreleased tracks from 1988,1991 and 1993. This record of "table scraps" is better than most group's greatest hits collections. "We've Got Airplanes","Crutch Came Slinking"(a great song),"Sopor Joe","Crunch Pillow","Indian Was An Angel","Don't Stop Now","Greenface","Death Trot and Warlock Riding A Rooster","2nd Moves To Twin","Scissors"(which makes a serious claim as being the best Tobin Sprout song of his GBV stint),"Postal Blowfish" and "Crocker's Favorite Song" are all songs that would have fit well on regular GBV albums. This is not an album of toss away's-it's an album of stuff they had no room for.

If you are building a collection of this band's work, then get this excellent box set to see the whole picture. Any fan will tell you that this is good,good stuff. This early GBV stuff paved the way to bigger exposure and a bigger sound (Do The Collapse and Isolation Drills) and as such it's a crucial document in the career of arguably the best rock and roll band that America has produced in the last 20 years. Steal it,harm people to claim it or prostitute yourself to own it.....just get it. Most (if not all) of your record collection will cower in it's shadow.