Around 1993 vinyl sales had reached their nadir. Sales had plummeted as cassettes and now CDs had surpassed in sales and seemingly noone was buying records anymore. Apart from DJs and some weird class of being called an audiophile.

Island recognised all of the above. In what looks like a cost cutting measure they released their albums in a generic packaging. For the fun of it they decided to title this 'brand' Audiophile Limited Vinyl Edition. I have this album, Jah Wobble's 'Take me to God' and the soundtrack to 'Young Americans' in this series. In each of these records they very generously throw in a copy of the CD booklet. (Incidentally if you have other titles, let us know.)

At the time, I remember being impressed by the words, not the packaging and strangely not the sound quality/pressing. Recently I decided to try this record out again. I was wrong. very wrong.

This record is a complete delight to listen to.

The music was, of course, absolutely massive on both sides of the atlantic. This was largely due to the fact that MTV(in the days when it played music) picked up Linger as a heavy rotation song.

Linger is great but not the best song on the album. The whole album is fairly standard melodic indie guitar music but is elevated by the gorgeous melodies and the angelic voice of Dolores O'Riordain. And this is of course before they turned into a horrendous grungey band with terrible haircuts.

Everything about this record and the sound of it is bliss. The soft brushed percussion, the chiming guitars and the softest sweetest voice with that gorgeous Irish accent.

Linger is a beautiful slow ballad, but my other favourite tracks are the faster Dreams and Wanted.

If you can find this on vinyl I think its a wise purchase. Its not challenging or groundbreaking but its an album you'll listen to again and again. It may not be that difficult either. For while it was initially numbered, the immense popularity meant that Island continued to release it in unnumbered packaging.

Oh and my number is 1280 :)