By 1991, the CD box set—full of unissued and rare tracks offering a definitive overview of an artist—had become a record-business staple. Robert Johnson’s Complete Recordings box, from 1990, went gold within months—the first time the bluesman’s sales measured up to his legend. In early 1991, the first edition of Bob Dylan’s Bootleg Series sold enough to guarantee countless volumes well into the future. “It was a seller’s market: ‘OK, we can sell this music all over again, and it’s a hell of a lot cheaper than making records,’” recalls Alan Leeds, the co-producer of the CD era’s most important—and, not to mince words, greatest—box set, James Brown’s Star Time.
Released May 7, 1991, Star Time spans five hours across four CDs and covers Brown’s career from 1956 (his debut single “Please, Please, Please”) to 1984 (his Afrika Bambaataa collaboration “Unity Pt. 1”). Upon release, it handily summarized one of the most daunting catalogs in pop—and set a standard for pop-music historicization, thanks to deep-dive liner notes, accurate session information, and a thrilling track sequence that emphasized the heft of Brown’s work.
Though rarity-stuffed box sets preceded the CD era proper, the one that defined the market was Eric Clapton’s Crossroads, from 1988. “With Crossroads, you’re fleshing out the story with unreleased material or extended versions of things,” says Star Time’s supervising producer, Harry Weinger. The James Brown catalog, especially, was ripe for that kind of tinkering. “The challenge for me was that James Brown never really had a good album, with the live albums excepted,” Weinger continues. “You can’t say It’s a Man’s World is a great album—it’s just filler. I wanted to make a record that I would be able to sit down and listen to. I wanted his philosophy and his commercialism all wrapped into one.”
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