Universal Music release Eels: The Complete DreamWorks Albums, 8 disc vinyl box set, which includes the band's first five studio albums - Beautiful Freak ('96), Electro-Shock Blues ('98), Daisies of the Galaxy (2000), Souljacker ('01) and Shootenanny! ('03) - plus the Electro-Shock Blues Show double live album (available here exclusively for the first time on vinyl)...

The Eels The Complete DreamWorks Albums contains 8 albums on 180 gram vinyl as well as an MP3 download code to download the albums so you can listen to them on the move. You can buy this either as a box set, or pick up each album (minus Electro-Shock Blues Show) individually.

I discovered Eels many many moons ago, by mistake. I'd decided that each week I'd go into the local Virgin Megastore (remember those) and buy the top 10 albums in a bid to keep up with popular music trends. Eels's Beautiful Freak was one of the albums that I got months of play out of.

I picked up Daisies of the Galaxy when that was released - not by design, but because I just happened to spot it when I was looking for something else. While I enjoyed that album I didn't find it as compulsive listening as the first album. And then I forgot about Eels. Occasionally I'll dig out both albums and play them, but I assumed the band had ceased releasing albums until the press release for this collection arrived in my inbox.

I had no idea I'd not only missed Electro-Shock Blues, in between the two album I already owned, but that there were more albums (Eels have released 10 studio albums to date). To be honest, though personally, I don't think I missed much by skipping Electro-Shock Blues and Shootenanny!, but I really enjoyed discovering Souljacker for the first time.

For me, Souljacker moves the band forward, whilst paradoxically returning to their roots of melodic, off the wall, rock-based weirdness. It's a lot of fun and conjures up numerous bizarre images in the listener's head. 'Fresh Feeling' beautiful combines strings with the Eels rock sound to produce arguably this collection's most beautiful track. Likewise, 'Dog Face Boy' drags out their signature rock sound.

We received digital files to review from, so can't comment on the presentation of the vinyl box set. If you're a lifelong Eels fan then this is a no brainer.

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Nick Smithson