"...through strange seas of thought, alone."

so lemme tell you about one of the best CD reissues i've ever encountered. lucky for me, it happens to be of one of my all-time favorite LP's and one of the greatest LP's ever recorded, imho - Nico's "The Marble Index." so lemme just say first, i'm not gonna get into the music of the album or how great it is, cuz this post is just about the supreme quality of this reissue. if you don't know the album, i urge you to pick up this CD and check it out - it's an amazing work of singular beauty. if you already like and own the album, even if you have an original (one of the best sounding LP's i've ever heard, fidelity-wise, though that's another post for another day), or the excellent Sundazed vinyl reissue, i still urge you to pick up this reissue, for numerous reasons i'm about to get into.

so the CD in question is called "The Frozen Borderline: 1968-1970", and it's a 2CD released by Elektra/Reprise/Rhino UK (what, you thought something this good would come out in the US? Ha!) in 2007. Disc 1 is "The Marble Index" and disc 2 is Nico's next LP, "Desertshore" (which is also great, but won't be addressed here; a future post, maybe). the packaging is a slightly-but-not-annoyingly bigger than jewelcase double-gatefold card-wallet. the discs are housed in the right and left flaps, while the center panel has a pocket containing the 16-page full color booklet (standard jewelcase size). the sleeve art (front pictured above) is simple and elegant, with the same lovely photo of Nico used for the front also on the back (but w/o the reverse-negative effect). the back cover naturally gives you the tracklisting and some credits. the inside gatefold flaps each show you a picture of the original LP jacket for the disc they house, while the center flap has a quote from "The Marble Index"'s 'Frozen Warnings' - 'frozen warnings close to mine, close to the frozen borderline.' the flip-side of the (inward-folding) right-gatefold flap shows a flyer for the "Marble Index" release/listening party, thrown by Warhol at the Factory on 9/19/68. heavy. you got all that? OK, then on to the CD contents.

tracks 1-8 are the original album. oh, everything has been remastered of course, and though that's usually a scary thing, the CD sounds great, extremely crystal and very faithful to the original LP. so have no digital fears. of course with an album like this, with such dense atmospherics and delicate instrumentation, that's a major major concern. so big test number one, passed. tracks 9-12 are the four unreleased tracks (!!!) from the LP session...three of which are sung in German! the album was recorded in only four days (one of many factoids you'll glean from the excellent booklet, getting to that) so the full recording session of 12 cuts is now here. tracks 13-19 are alternate versions of every track on the album, save for the 50-second opener, 'Prelude.' wow. i can't say any of the alt. takes struck me as radically different than the album takes, probably just minor differences in the arrangements, but maybe A/B'ing them all and outlining the differences can be a future post.

now, the booklet. this is the final triumph of this release, and really what ends up giving it the triple-crown and making this reissue a dream item for the minutiae-craving OCD head in all of us. across the six booklet pages dedicated to "The Marble Index", pictures of the following are shown: original magazine ad for the album, all three original-press LP labels for the album (US press, UK press, US white label promo; in a perfect world, this is something every good reissue depicts), and even the 8-track tape (still in package!), as well as the original LP sleeve back. terrific. i can't imagine much else if anything in the way of original-release era ephemera exists. so now, the liners - written by UK music writer Simon Goddard (can't say i knew of the cat before, but bravo Simon), these liners have it all. a very brief but not regurgitated background on Nico, the origins of the album (both from the artist and label ends of it), much terrific insight from the album's producer, Frazier Mohawk (dude cops to indulging in the inevitable free in-studio heroin during the sessions!), and even great insights from the too-oft-quiet John Cale (and certainly if you know this album, you know this LP is as much his album as it is Nico's). the liners goes on to talk about the also-inevitable critical and commercial failure of the album, and (briefly) what Nico did following it. now even if you're like me and you have read/watched/listened to every available (and unavailable) bit of info on Nico & The VU, you will still learn much from these info-packed six pages. they're truly all you can ask for in liner notes.

so yeah, that's pretty much it. the total package. a yardstick by which CD reissues should be measured, and an example to be followed. in these perilous times, joints like this one are few and far between. rejoice and be merry. 5 stars, highest possible commendation and recommendation.

one fascinating liner notes spoiler - the title "The Marble Index" is excerpted from Wordsworth's The Prelude, re: Roubiliac's sculpture of Sir Isaac Newton - "Newton with his prism and silent face, the marble index of a mind forever voyaging through strange seas of thought, alone." with that context revealed, it really makes the LP's title a haunting, prophetic self-exposition from Nico the tortured artist. and how appropriate then, the iconic original LP cover, the up-close black and white portrait of Nico's gaunt and pallid visage. fuckin' heavy.