Adrian Thrills reviews the greatest music box sets for Christmas

As Christmas approaches, so too does a fresh batch of box sets, greatest hits packages and deluxe albums. Could there be something for the music lover in your life? The Mail's music critic has a listen...

Queen: Queen I (EMI)

They recorded through the night because they couldn't afford the expensive day-rates at Trident Studios in London, but Queen were never fully satisfied with their self-titled 1973 debut album. 

They thought the drums sounded too thin ('too American,' according to Roger Taylor), and Brian May's riffs didn't jump loudly enough from the speakers.

With the help of digital trickery, those flaws have been eradicated on a new mix of the album, re-titled Queen I. 

Overseen by drummer Taylor and guitarist May, it's an accomplished rebuild that keeps the original arrangements intact, but adds a more dynamic, 'live' sheen. Packaged in purple, it's out as a single CD (£11), double CD (£20), vinyl LP (£28) and box set (£150).

All the ingredients that would later turn the band into superstars were in place — the boundless ambition, Freddie Mercury's complex songwriting and May's blend of electric and acoustic guitars. My Fairy King, with its layered vocals, sounded like a dry run for Bohemian Rhapsody two years later.

Of the bonus tracks, the unreleased demos are the pick. Some informal studio chat also captures the excitement Queen felt at being on the cusp of greatness. 'It's you, Bulsara, it's you that's flat!' jokes May, referring to his singer by his original surname.

Music executive Jac Holzman, who gave the band a U.S. deal in 1973, predicted that pop's future was 'a band called Queen'. He wasn't wrong.

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Cher: Forever (Warner)

With her memoir in the shops, and hints of a Glastonbury appearance next summer, it's hard to avoid the feeling it's Cher's world... and the rest of us are merely living in it.

Now we've got Forever, a 21-track compilation of her greatest hits, out on CD (£11) and an array of coloured vinyl LPs — sea blue (£28), silver (£33), and translucent red (£40).

Cher will tell you she's 'not a great singer', but she's doing herself a disservice. A first-name-only pop diva long before Kylie and Adele, she has an instantly recognisable contralto — and a very un-diva-ish sense of humour. I saw the opening night of her most recent UK tour, 2019's Here We Go Again, in London. 

It was a show in which she rode around the stage on a mechanical elephant and began the fun and games by telling fans: 'I have one more thing to say before I start my extravaganza: what is your granny doing tonight?'

All the hits are here, from power ballad If I Could Turn Back Time to last year's festive banger, DJ Play A Christmas Song. Gypsys, Tramps & Thieves is a classic story-song. The computer-enhanced Believe, from 1998, turned her into the queen of auto-tune.

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Bryan Ferry: Retrospective (BMG)

Spanning his five-decade solo career, the latest Bryan Ferry anthology is a superb overview of a singer who specialises in champagne-soaked melancholy. Whether he's crooning his own material or stylishly revamping a standard, you can usually picture him elegantly drowning his sorrows in a trendy dream home or neon-lit lounge-bar.

He began his solo career, in parallel with his role in Roxy Music, in 1973. His early solo albums were dominated by jazz and blues covers — You Go To My Head, Let's Stick Together and These Foolish Things all feature here — but it was 1985's Boys And Girls that cemented his stature as the master of sophisticated pop.

Out as a single CD (£15), double vinyl LP (£32) and 5-CD box set (£110), Retrospective is beautifully curated. On the 81-track box set, there's one disc of 'essential' tracks, one that contains his best self-penned songs and another that concentrates on covers.

Less essential is a disc given over to The Bryan Ferry Orchestra, a swing ensemble he launched in 2012. A revamp of Roxy Music's Virginia Plain is barely recognisable as the same song, but there's ample compensation in a jaw-dropping cover of Back To Black that adds Ferry-esque twists to an Amy Winehouse classic. 

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The Beatles: 1964 U.S. Albums In Mono (Apple)

Greeted by screaming fans when they touched down in New York in February 1964, The Beatles dominated the U.S. charts that year. 

Launching 'the British invasion', they'd clocked up six No.1 singles and four chart-topping LPs by the year's end. As a new box set shows, however, the phenomenon was experienced rather differently across the Atlantic.

With the group's American label, Capitol, compiling their own track listings, seven Beatles albums hit American record shops between January 1964 and March 1965. Now reissued as a vinyl box set (£240) — with six of the titles also out individually (£33) — the LPs tie in with today's new Disney+ documentary Beatles '64, but they offer an oddly haphazard journey through Beatlemania.

A few of them — notably The Beatles' Second Album and Something New — are random grab-bags, fleshed out with tracks from British singles and EPs. But, this being The Fab Four, even these contain moments of magic, including John Lennon's raucous take on Money (That's What I Want), and Paul McCartney's Things We Said Today, originally a UK B-side.

Certain albums are more coherent. Meet The Beatles! takes a UK release, With The Beatles, as its template, but replaces all but one of its cover versions (Till There Was You) with originals. Opening with the triple-whammy of I Want To Hold Your Hand, I Saw Her Standing There and This Boy, it's a powerful statement of songwriting intent.

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Dusty Springfield: The BBC Sessions (UMR)

With her peroxide blonde bouffant and black eyeshadow, Dusty was an icon of Swinging London. She was also one of Britain's greatest female singers, and a remastered version of her BBC sessions album celebrates her peak years.

Covering the period from 1962 to 1970, it charts her move from folk-pop to blue-eyed soul, and is out as a double vinyl LP (£35).

It's the dramatic R&B material that best suits her. Charles And Inez Foxx's Mockingbird has a live feel, and she hits some big notes on a brassy cover of Jackie Wilson's Higher And Higher. There's also room for her signature hits, including Son Of A Preacher Man.

Less polished than 1969's Dusty In Memphis version, it reiterates her natural vocal ability.

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