ADRIAN THRILLS gives his pick of the tempting Christmas treats for the music lover in your life

Still looking for a gift for the music fan in your life? A bumper crop of box sets may provide some inspiration. 

The Mail’s music critic ADRIAN THRILLS rounds up this year’s best…

Joni Mitchell has always bristled at the notion that she is a folk singer.

 Given that her music has encompassed pop, jazz and world beats — as well as the acoustic songs with which she made her name — that’s no surprise.

But listening to a new box set that charts her formative years, that folk tag is hard to escape, and she knows it. 

‘I didn’t think folk was a good description of what I was,’ she says in the liner notes. ‘And then I listened, and it was beautiful. I had this realisation . . . I was a folk singer!’

A rather special one, too, on the evidence of the coffee house gigs, demos and radio sessions pulled together for the first time on Archives Vol. 1: The Early Years (Rhino)

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Until now, Mitchell has avoided trawling through the vaults. To her, excavating the past was a form of ‘burglary’, meaning that her fans have been unable to enjoy anything along the lines of Bob Dylan’s Bootleg series, Neil Young’s Archives or Bruce Springsteen’s The Promise. 

But the wait has been worth it, and this five-CD box (£54), to be followed by further volumes, contains fascinating insights, despite some tracks cropping up more than once.

Also out on vinyl as a stripped-down single album (£19) and triple LP (£47), it chronicles Joni’s growth as she moves from teenage covers of traditional folk tunes such as House Of The Rising Sun in 1963 to singing her own material at a 1967 gig in Michigan.

By that point, just months before the release of her 1968 debut album Song To A Seagull, she sounds like the fully formed artist who would become the queen of the Laurel Canyon singer-songwriter scene, with classics such as Both Sides Now, The Circle Game and Chelsea Morning, all included in fledgling form here.

Elton John has used lockdown to curate his latest deluxe release. As such, the sprawling, 148-track Jewel Box (UMC)  is as much a personal history as a chance to explore unreleased gems. 

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Out as an eight-CD set (£80), it’s also available on vinyl as a double (£24), triple (£33) and quadruple album (£60).

On the eight-CD version, the first two discs are given over to Elton’s personal favourites — his ‘deep cuts’, including the excellent Ticking (from 1974’s Caribou) plus songs from The Union, his duets album with Leon Russell. 

Another two CDs feature B-sides of varying quality, and there’s a disc of songs mentioned in his 2019 autobiography, Me.

The high points arrive on the three discs of rarities and demos from the 1960s (when Elton Hercules John was still plain old Reg Dwight) and 1970s.

There’s a previously unheard Elton and Bernie Taupin track from 1969 in Sing Me No Sad Songs, plus piano and vocal versions of future classics Skyline Pigeon and Burn Down The Mission.

The overall picture isn’t one of a brash hitmaker in super-sized glasses. On the 50th anniversary of his breakthrough year — 1970 saw both his first Top 10 single in Your Song and his fabled American debut at The Troubadour — it showcases a prolific singer-songwriter in thrall to country, soul and Americana.

Amy Winehouse didn’t leave behind a huge body of work when she died, aged 27, nine years ago.

The most gifted singer of her generation finished just two studio albums, with only a smattering of songs left over.

But the recording booth, unlike the stage, was clearly the place she felt most at home. The bulk of her recorded output is gathered on The Collection (Island, a five-CD set (£15) 

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that features those two albums (Frank and Back To Black), the posthumous 2011 selection Lioness: Hidden Treasures plus two discs of live takes and remixes.

As much as it reiterates her talent, it’s also a reminder of what might have been.

Back To Black remains peerless, a creative peak that took the Shangri-Las, Motown and 1950s doo-wop and created something fresh on Rehab, You Know I’m No Good and the heartbreaking Love Is A Losing Game.

The jazzier Frank stands up superbly, too, while Lioness contains a beautiful take on the Shirelles classic Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow, plus Body And Soul, a duet with Tony Bennett recorded in 2011 that turned out to be Amy’s swansong. Bennett calls her ‘one of the most honest musicians I have ever known.’ It’s easy to see why.

n After a foray into electronic rhythms on 1997’s experimental Pop, U2 returned to rock and roll in October 2000 with All That You Can’t Leave Behind (Island,)

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The group’s belated response to Britpop, its release prompted lead singer Bono to claim the Irish quartet were ‘re-applying for the job of the best band in the world’.

It was an auspicious comeback, fuelled by the rocking singles Beautiful Day and Elevation and superb ballads Stuck In A Moment You Can’t Get Out Of and In A Little While. But whether it warrants the over-the-top treatment of a 51-track reissue is another matter. It’s a fine record, but the expanded editions contain plenty of padding.

Repackaged as a ‘super deluxe’ CD set (£80) and vinyl collection (£180), it’s thankfully also available in more digestible formats — a double LP (£27), double CD (£14) and single CD (£10).

There are worthwhile out-takes in the unreleased Flower Child and an acoustic Stuck In A Moment, but the remixes (four of Elevation alone) on the expanded versions are largely superfluous.

New Order’s second album Power, Corruption & Lies (Rhino) 

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has also been repackaged as a bumper, five-disc bundle (£91). First released in 1983, it ushered in the Manchester band’s run of brilliant 1980s albums, its hypnotic beats hinting at a growing fascination with New York dance. Extras include non-album single Blue Monday plus live material and demos.

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Christmas singles  

With Mariah Carey’s All I Want For Christmas Is You on course to top the UK charts for the first time today — 26 years after it was released — the festive singles season is here. 

Among the others getting in on the act this year are Ella Henderson, below, Andrea Corr and Alanis Morissette.

Henderson even namechecks Carey’s song — ‘Mariah’s on the radio’ — on her soulful Blame It On The Mistletoe, a mid-tempo duet with American teenager A.J. Mitchell, although there’s something a little suspect about extolling the joys of stealing a kiss under the mistletoe during a pandemic. 

Corr’s Christmas Songs is more reflective: a four-track EP inspired by the singer’s visit to a Dublin hospice, it combines traditional carols with one original. 

The latter, Begin Again, is a Corrs-like Celtic ballad that nods to God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen. 

Morissette made her name with angry confessionals, but there’s nothing abrasive about her take on John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s Happy Xmas (War Is Over), a song accompanied by a video capturing the Canadian singer, her husband Souleye and their three children.

And Paul Heaton and Jacqui Abbott deliver a wry take on a relationship in turmoil with Christmas (And Dad Wants Her Back), a tale of toppled trees, burnt dinners, excess brandy and crestfallen children.