VIA PRESS RELEASE | Punk rocker, soldier, Essex boy, folk singer, Skiffle aficionado, protest singers’ protest singer, patriot, optimist, lefty polemicist, author, soul miner, musicologist, champion of the underclasses, Cockney vocalist and all round decent bloke Billy Bragg will release a career spanning 14-disc deluxe box set (3 LP and single LP versions also available) entitled The Roaring Forty | 1983-2023 on 27th October ’23 on Cooking Vinyl. The Roaring Forty | 1983-2023 celebrates the remarkable and enduring musical legacy of a much-loved songwriter, principled activist and alternative national treasure.
The Roaring Forty | 1983-2023 compiled by Billy Bragg will be available in three formats: a single disc 13-song “primer” on orange vinyl, a 40-song 3 album collection on three shades of green vinyl (also available as a 2 CD and digital set) and… (saved the best ‘til last!), a 14 CD box set, containing more than 300 songs including each of Billy’s twelve studio albums, non-album singles and B- Sides, session tracks, rare live recordings, collaborations, and previously unreleased material from across his illustrious career.
The box set also includes a large format book containing images of 40 significant objects from Billy’s career, including the hand tinted flyer to his first solo gig, his first NME cover, the original lyrics to “A Lover Sings,” the Red Wedge manifesto, his membership card to the Smokey Robinson & The Miracles fan club, and much else besides, with fascinating commentary from the man himself.
Says Billy: “It seems like just the other day that I was handing John Peel a mushroom biryani and asking him to play my first record. The music business has changed dramatically since then, but my belief in the power of the song is undimmed.”
Billy Bragg has been a fearless recording artist, tireless live performer and peerless political campaigner for 40 years. He has released 11 solo studio albums: Life’s A Riot With Spy Vs Spy (1983); Brewing Up With Billy Bragg (1984); Talking With The Taxman About Poetry (1986); Workers Playtime (1988); The Internationale (1990); Don’t Try This At Home (1991); William Bloke (1996); England, Half English (2002); Mr Love & Justice (2008); Tooth & Nail (2013); The Million Things That Never Happened (2021); three albums with Wilco – (Grammy nominated) Mermaid Avenue (1998); Mermaid Avenue Vol II (2000); Mermaid Avenue Vol III (2012); and one album with Joe Henry—Shine A Light: Field Recordings From The Great American Railroad (2016). He released a mini album Bridges Not Walls in 2017. His performances at the BBC were anthologised in The Best Of Billy Bragg At The BBC 1983-2019 (2019).
Billy Bragg added best-selling author/musicologist to his CV with the success of his acclaimed 2017 book Roots, Radicals & Rockers – How Skiffle Changed The World. He has written two books of political analysis—The Progressive Patriot: A Search For Belonging (2006) and The Three Dimensions of Freedom (2019), which has been translated into German and Spanish.
To be expected from a career that has straddled many genres, Billy Bragg has worked with a wealth of celebrated musicians from different musical backgrounds including Eliza Carthy, Norman Cook, Dick Gaughan, Joe Henry, Kirsty MacColl, Ian McLagan, Johnny Marr, R.E.M., Natalie Merchant, Romeo Stodart, Danny Thompson, Robert Wyatt, Pete Seeger, The Philharmonic Orchestra, and US alt-rock band Wilco, with whom he created two critically acclaimed collections setting previously unheard lyrics by legendary American Folk singer Woody Guthrie to music.
