"I bought my first copy of Let It Be when I was 15 and it unlocked my lifelong love of the Replacements. Soon I was hunting down albums, bootlegs, zines, T-shirts-I even agreed to clean my high school biology teacher's snake and guinea pig tanks for several weeks to borrow his VHS tape of a live performance at the Orange County Speedway from 1989."
"In the pre-internet everywhere days of the '90s, searching for your favorite band's live, unreleased, or rare music took this level of commitment. And the Replacements rewarded this madness. Digging through used CD stores was the only way to hear the band's first B side and first great drunken ballad, "If Only You Were Lonely," or one of their chaotically awesome (or awesomely chaotic) live shows."
"Fast-forward to 2025, when Rhino is releasing a 4-LP (or 3-CD) box set of Let It Be, stocked with unreleased tracks, photos, essays, and an entire concert (plus a BONUS live show if you pre-order). But the weird part is... it's routine at this point. Let It Be is the fifth Replacements deluxe edition from Rhino, following Rykodisc's remasters of their entire catalog back in 2008."
A fan discovered Let It Be at 15, sparking lifelong devotion and obsessive collecting of Replacements albums, bootlegs, zines, T-shirts, and rare videos. Pre-internet searching required persistence, trades, and favors to access live and unreleased recordings and B-sides. Rhino has issued multiple deluxe Replacements editions over the years, culminating in a 2025 4-LP/3-CD Let It Be box set with unreleased tracks, photos, essays, and complete concerts. The reissues reveal the band's ability to balance contradictions—smart and dumb, punk and pop, skilled and sloppy—and offer an in-depth look into the effort behind their apparent effortlessness.
Read at SPIN
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