In 1985 — you may remember this; perhaps we even discussed it — the NME published its 100 greatest albums of all time. Perhaps there were fewer of these lists then (definitely there were fewer of these lists then), or perhaps I was less jaded, or both, but I took this one quite seriously. Particularly since the No.1 album, What's Going On, was one I didn't even know. When pop music still worshipped novelty, and despised (most) history, you could grow up as a music fan and be completely ignorant of massive stretches of black music. Well, you could in middle-class Woking. And I'm pretty sure you didn't have this in your collection at the time. In the early '80s, I thought soul music meant Leee John and Imagination, and the term 'soul boy' was an insult at school.
A couple of years later — and I guess Q was being published by then, so history was coming into fashion — HMV brought out the 'Classic Collection' of sixteen albums, specially packaged in an attempt to create a "genuine piece of pop history". "We've severely limited the edition, so that the box set you now own can be classed as a collector's item." It's a naked and rather ugly appeal to the collector as speculative investor. Which, apparently, I fell for because I bought three of the albums in the series (though none that I already had in other versions). The sixteen albums are listed at the foot of the insert on the left (click the image for a large-scale, legible version). Also included in the box was a twelve-page large-format booklet about Marvin Gaye and the tracks on the album, written by Charles Shaar Murray.
But if this package worked as a means of promoting sales, I guess the costs of the extra packaging, and the low volume, meant that HMV didn't show much of a profit on it (any profit must have gone to the speculative investors who sold on their copies at inflated prices). The insert says they will be issuing further classic albums in this format, but I don't think they ever did.
As for the album itself, it's quite good isn't it? Not really my thing, but I find I enjoy it more and more each time I listen to it.
 MusicBrainz entry for this album
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