Stephen Duffy

[ABOATES]

I love making records – I think this is my twenty fourth or something. I’m working on a 20-CD box set – it will be out in October 2024.

Instead of just repackaging all the albums, I’m making 20 completely new compilations involving mixes – and some songs – that have never been heard.

It’s taken such a long time – just making a nine-track album can take you months. I’m now making 20 albums – there are two CDs of live stuff that’s never come out and two CDs of unreleased stuff and demos and stuff like Cocksure, which I did with Stephen Street in 1985. That became Because We Love You, but it was before the record company tore it apart and stuck it back together.

It will also have Music In Colours in it, which I did with Nigel Kennedy – it had transition pieces on it, but we’re going to do an album without those, and then we’re going to do an album of just instrumentals and the transitions.

There’s something for everyone from each period – I’ve got a demo of Kiss Me, when I’m playing it for the first time on piano and it sounds like Blueberry Hill. If I’d have stuck with that, it would never have been a 20-CD box set…

[BigManRestless]

I've been looking forward to this box set since the idea was first floated. Does it include The Lilac Time or is it just 'solo' material?

The original CD of The Ups And Downs sounds quite thin, and the Cherry Red version mixed up the track listing with some alternative mixes.

[ABOATES]

I'm not sure. This is the first I have heard of this. I thought he was working on an "Astronauts" reissue. I do not know if this box set is Duffy solo, or also w TLT.