New Wax Wednesday

Oh, I can feel it coming . . . and no, I’m not going to finish that line, because you should already know the rest of it — not to mention your (and my) anticipation of how we all must reflexively partake in the beyond-iconic air-drumming moment that will soon enough follow. (For the record, that moment happens at exactly 3:16 into the song.)

The reason for my citation of this particular slow-build to the power payoff on the Phil Collins solo album from whence “In the Air Tonight” came, February 1981’s Face Value, will be seeing an expanded 45th anniversary 4LP box set somewhat cleverly dubbed Face Value (Full Value) via Atlantic/Rhino on September 18, 2026.

The Face Value (Full Value) 4LP box set will feature a half-speed remaster of the original album as done by Miles Showell at Abbey Road Studios on LP1, while LPs 2-4 will include a fine collection of rare live cuts, demos, and unreleased bonus tracks. (More on the content of the latter 3LPs in a bit.)

The SRP for the Face Value (Full Value) box is $79.99, and it can be preordered from Music Direct here, and/or via the MD link graphic that appears ahead of the tracklisting selection below, nearer toward the end of this post.

For all my fellow CCs — Collins Completists — out there, a companion Blu-ray edition featuring a Dolby Atmos mix of the core album as done by the ever-ubiquitous Steven Wilson will also be made available on September 18, and its SRP is $24.99. I have, of course, already preordered that BD edition as well, especially given Wilson’s deft handling of the Atmos version of Collins’ February 1985 Atlantic album No Jacket Required that was released on BD by Craft/Atlantic in September 2025.

Naturally, I am quite eager to hear Wilson’s 360-degree take on “In the Air Tonight,” among other fave FV tracks like “Hand in Hand” and “If Leaving Me Is Easy” — and I will likely cover that release in full over on our sister site, Sound & Vision, once it arrives a few months from now and I’ve had time to live with it.

Meanwhile, the first single from the new FV (FV) 4LP collection is a previously unreleased performance of “You Know What I Mean (Live, Perkins Palace 1982),” and it can be viewed and listened to below, via its official YouTube clip.

Besides new liner notes from music journalist Tom Doyle that feature a brand-new interview with Phil talking about the album, LP2 consists of seven other “of era” live tracks (dates and locales not yet specified, although we do know they were previously available on CD), while LP4 holds 10 demos (half of which were previously released on CD).

The FV (FV) 4LP set also includes rare, stripped-back, first live performances of “In the Air Tonight” (LP3, Side 1, Track 1) and “The Roof Is Leaking” (LP3, Side 1, Track 2) from The Secret Policeman’s Other Ball that was held at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in London over four nights in September 1981. Both tracks feature Phil and his longtime solo-band guitarist, Daryl Stuermer.

Two unreleased live performances fill out the rest of FV (FV) LP3, Side 1: “This Must Be Love (Live, Irvine Meadows 1985)” (Track 3) and the aforementioned “You Know What I Mean (Live, Perkins Palace 1982)” (Track 4).

Flip LP3 over, and you’ll get an unreleased outtake of Phil’s experimental cover of The Beatles’ “Tomorrow Never Knows” (LP3, Side 2, Track 3) and a previously unreleased full version of “Over the Rainbow” (LP3, Side 2, Track 4), the latter of which appears as the briefest of excerpts at the end of Side 2 on the original Face Value album. Collins and I talk about both of those songs just a few paragraphs below, in fact.

Before I get into our Q&A, however, I should mention that Analogue Productions’ October 2023-released, Atlantic 75 Series 45rpm 180g 2LP version of Face Value — which was mastered by Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman Mastering, cut to lacquer from a 1/4in EQ’d Dolby tape copy of the original master tape, and pressed at QRP (and, alas, remains sold out as of this posting) — is a true wonder to behold, and to spin. Ratings-wise, I gave the Atlantic 75 version of Face Value a 10 for the Music and 10.5 for Sound — though, as I also noted last year (specifically, on August 27, 2025) in the back half of this post, in an assessment that I continue to stand by — “In the Air Tonight” on its own rates a full 11. We’ll just have to see how the new Miles Showell mix fares on the 2026 FV once I have it in hand, on table, and in-ear.

To the Q&A now! When I had the honor of interviewing Phil Collins in person in his suite at the Gramercy Park Hotel in New York City on February 4, 2016, we, of course, talked a good bit about Face Value. (The original 1981 Atlantic LP cover is shown above.)

Here now is the FV portion of that chat, together in one place for the first time. Note that Phil starts the thread, as he was the one who initiated our discussion of some of the material found on the second CD in the 2016 FV reissue that was dubbed Extra Values. None of those 12 additional tracks were part of that year’s concurrent Face Value vinyl reissue, but all of them will all be on vinyl on the new-to-2026 box set on the earlier-cited LP2 and LP4.

Phil Collins: There’s a bonus track on Face Value that came from a cassette.
Mike Mettler: Right, “The Roof Is Leaking,” with Eric Clapton. Even though there is a good amount of tape hiss on that one, from the historical perspective, it’s worth hearing his performance and how it complements your vocal there.
Collins: Yes. That only existed on cassette, so they mastered it off cassette.

Mettler: As you shifted further into your solo career, the emphasis in the mixes was more on your voice and having us hear the emotion throughout different parts of the songs — and where you choose to place inflection is deliberate for what you intend us to hear and feel.
Collins: I don’t know; is it? (laughs) You’ve obviously been listening. But like you said earlier, it’s like writing a novel. There are certain songs like “The Roof Is Leaking” — which is more of a story song — where you use inflection and psychological warfare with the audience to bring them into the story.

My memory says most of those lyrics came to me like, “Oh my God, I’ve just said this.” Obviously, I would have had to have filled in a few gaps, but for the main part of that one, I just sang it, and I kept it. And then I came in and out of lines I didn’t have, once I’d written them.

Same thing with “In the Air Tonight,” though the [final] vocal for that one was re-recorded at The Townhouse [in Los Angeles].

Mettler: Yeah, and that’s not a bad way to start an album, either. “In the Air Tonight” has taken on such an incredible mantle over the years. We’ve heard that song many, many times, but I’m still amazed with the way the drama builds into the drum break, which was actually all about increasing the volume at that point of the track. Did you know it was going to have such an impact?
Collins: We didn’t know at the time, but we thought it was good, obviously. There were different stages for that song. I had my demos, and a bit of them are on there. [At the time of this 2016 interview, Collins was referring to the above-noted Extra Values bonus disc, but now “Air” and nine other demos are on the 2026 4LP box set.]

I did the demos over the period of a year, not knowing I was making an album. I was just filling my time, and writing songs for the ex[-wife] — messages.

Collins: Then I went up to London. In between writing my stuff, we [Genesis] were writing the Duke album [which was released in March 1980, on Atlantic]. I went up to London to play the Duke album for [legendary Atlantic Records founder/president] Ahmet Ertegun. We were great friends at that point, and he knew I had been going through some stuff. He said, “What have you been doing?” I said, “I’ve been writing,” and he wanted to listen to it. I had the cassette on me, and we listened to it — and he said, “Wow! This has got to be a record!” And, at that point, I knew it was a record.

Mettler: Before that, you weren’t really sure.
Collins: (nods) I didn’t know what to do with it. So, then it was going to be a record.

Later, after we had finished mixing some of the songs, Eric [Clapton] came down to the studio to re-record the song we talked about before, “The Roof Is Leaking.” And I missed the plot — lost the plot, really. What he does on that demo is what it should be, and what he did in the studio is what it should be. I wanted him to do the same thing each time.

Mettler: But that’s not who he is as a player.
Collins: He’s not that guy! (chuckles) It was my mistake, and I don’t know what the f--- I was thinking about. Eventually, I got someone else [Joe Partridge] to do the same thing every time, but he doesn’t have the “thing” that Eric does.

Collins: Eric and the guys who came up with him came up to the studio. We played “Air” for them in the studio, and when the drums came in, everybody said, “F---ing hell! What the f--- is that?” Nobody had ever heard anything like that. Frankly, drums were never that loud. But it was my album, and it worked.

We were playing with psychological things. The audience is there going along with you, and then suddenly you knock them on the head with this thing: Bvoom! [Yes, Collins did actually say “Bvoom!” there.]

Mettler: Everybody was waiting for that moment. When the video came on, people gathered around, waiting for that energy moment.
Collins: (nods) Yeah.

Mettler: We also get the character of you as a player every time we hear you — no matter what the project is, or whoever you’re playing with. You’re able to adapt to what they want, and that’s not easy to do.
Collins: No, in addition to having a signature, yeah. Clapton, obviously, you know when it’s him, as you do with some others. Frankly, I’ve been playing all my life, so one would think that there’s a personality in it. But as you say, I adapt to whatever the person wants me to do — but you still hopefully tell it’s me, with or without the sound.

Mettler: Side 2 of Face Value closes with your cover of The Beatles’ “Tomorrow Never Knows,” with “Over the Rainbow” appearing a capella at the end of it. That’s still a nice touch.
Collins: Someone reminded me of “Over the Rainbow” today — Jill, my girlfriend at the time who became Mrs. Collins #2. It was at the Village Recorder in LA [Los Angeles], in this big live room. I was doing something in there, and I was singing, “Somewhere over the rainbow. . .” I really loved the sound of it, so I said to Hugh [Padgham, producer], “Record it!” But I didn’t know all the words.

So I asked Jill, because her mom knew the guy who wrote it. (chuckles) I called her, and her mother called the guy who wrote it. [That guy would be Yip Harburg, who died in March 1981, just a month after FV was released.] I wrote down the lyrics, and I sang them. Everybody only knows certain lyrics, but not all of them. That was a special moment to have.

And we just plonked it at the end of “Tomorrow Never Knows,” because it was the end of the album, and it fitted there.

When it comes to Face Value, I’d say it is both knowing and believing in the experience you have listening to it, so I very much look forward to the FV (FV) 4LP box set to get deeper into the full-value audio picture of it all.

PHIL COLLINS
FACE VALUE (FULL VALUE)
4LP (Atlantic/Rhino)

LP1, Side 1 – Original Album
1. In The Air Tonight
2. This Must Be Love
3. Behind The Lines
4. The Roof Is Leaking
5. Droned
6. Hand In Hand

LP1, Side 1 – Original Album (ctd)
1. I Missed Again
2. You Know What I Mean
3. Thunder And Lightning
4. I’m Not Moving
5. If Leaving Me Is Easy
6. Tomorrow Never Knows

LP2, Side 1
1. Misunderstanding (Live)
2. If Leaving Me Is Easy (Live)
3. In The Air Tonight (Live)
4. Behind The Lines (Live)

LP2, Side 2
1. Hand In Hand (Live)
2. I Missed Again (Live)
3. . . .And So To F. . . (Live)

LP3, Side 1
1. In The Air Tonight (Live At The Secret Policeman’s Other Ball)
2. The Roof Is Leaking (Live At The Secret Policeman’s Other Ball)
3. This Must Be Love (Live, Irvine Meadows 1985)*
4. You Know What I Mean (Live, Perkins Palace 1982)*

LP3, Side 2
1. In The Air Tonight (Ben Liebrand Extended Version)
2. The Roof Is Leaking (Nicka’s Stella Polaris Interpretation)
3. Tomorrow Never Knows (Outtake)*
4. Over The Rainbow (Full Version)*

LP4, Side 1
1. The Roof Is Leaking (Demo)
2. This Must Be Love (Demo)
3. Please Don’t Ask (Demo)
4. Misunderstanding (Demo)
5. Against All Odds (Demo)

LP4, Side 2
1. Please Don’t Break My Heart (Demo)
2. If Leaving Me Is Easy (Demo)
3. I Missed Again (Demo)
4. In The Air Tonight (Demo)
5. Hand In Hand (Demo)

* previously unreleased