Beatles catalog to be digitally remastered
:D:cool::D:cool::D:cool::D:cool:
Beatles catalog to be digitally remastered
:D:cool::D:cool::D:cool::D:cool:
Will the audio experience be noticeably different for the average listener? (By that, I mean a typical Beatle fan who hears the “beep” in the middle of Tomorrow Never Knows, cringes at the rough splice in This Boy, and sings along to the “Frere Jacques” in Paperback Writer, but isn’t an acoustics expert?)
My one bump – 'cause I’d like it if someone out there could tell me if they think this is something I should be excited about! (and pay money for)
It’s hard to say if it will be worth it… We haven’t heard the new discs yet, and the pricing isn’t available yet. But I’d guess they should be noticeably better. The older CDs are from 1987, IIRC, and mastering technology has improved since then.
There’s going to be a stereo box set and a mono box set. Depending how much they are, I think i’ll start out by buying the mono set. I figure this way, I’ll at least be hearing the Beatles in a way that I haven’t before. And if reviews for the stereo set are good, I’ll probably pick that up too.
Beyond the sound quality, these discs will have new and improved liner notes, and the box sets will have a DVD with documentaries about the making of each album. So that’s something to also get excited about!
I also think this thread might have more replies if the title was changed to something more specific…
Based on the amazing things George Martin and his son did with the Beatles catalog with the Love project, it is possible that they could do amazing things to clean up the technical flaws. Who knows if they did?
I am cautiously optimistic. I have the entire catalog on vinyl and CD, and I became a CD convert after hearing the Beatles “cleaned up.”
I’m sure I will end up buying the lot if the first one I buy has noticable differences. Now…hm…where to start.
Maybe I’ll start with Revolver.
Here’s a more in-depth article - the original press release:
I’m looking forward to it. This is a serious project, not simply something new.
[del]I can’t remember where I read it, but someone[/del] I think it was Chuck Klosterman who once said that “digitally remastered” to him meant exactly one thing: “louder.”
I’ve never owned all their records on CD. I think maybe now is the time for me to buy them.
Sounds like I won’t be bothering. From the press release:
The albums have been re-mastered by a dedicated team of engineers at EMI’s Abbey Road Studios in London over a four year period utilising state of the art recording technology alongside vintage studio equipment, carefully maintaining the authenticity and integrity of the original analogue recordings.
No interest then. Sorry, but the blessed “original analogue recordings” are filled with generation upon generation of original analog tape hiss as they bounced from tape recorder to tape recorder to build the songs.
Nope, I want to hear the result of taking the original 3 and 4 track tapes from earlier in the process, digitizing them, cleaning them up in Cedar, and carefully reproducing the mix and release them sounding as good as modern technology can make them, not some analog purist’s idea of preserving the original tape hiss in all it’s glory. Love went back to the 3 and 4 track tapes to build a surround mix and it sounds astonishing.
This stuff was very well recorded, but the Beatles and George Martin were pushing the limits of what was possible at the time, and it shows. We need to use the technology available to us right now and make this music sounds as good as it can.
My brother is on some audiophile forum, and he said people are talking about the quality of these recordings already (no idea how they got them or what they know). I’m sure this is not news to audiophiles, but he explained to me the idea of “brickwalled” digital mixes. I guess the waveform of the latest Metallica release is brickwalled (JPG of waveform) while the Beatles releases are not (example, not from the actual Beatles release).
I’d be inclined to believe that previous digital releases are crappy for sure. I actually don’t have any - my current collection is bootleg mono/stereo releases taken from a collector’s pristine vinyl collection. The idea of messing up George Martin’s work with someone else’s fancy new tools has always been offputting to me. But I believe in this new work and am looking forward to it for sure.
They definitely are. My dad has the major Beatles releases on CD as well as his original vinyl copies.
Despite, obviously, being older, the vinyl sounds infinitely better than the CDs, which have some really goofy stuff going on in them (particularly, in my experience, Sgt. Pepper).
I’m really looking forward to the mono boxed set. Hope the price is reasonable.
This is another reason I’ll be starting with the Mono set. Apparently the stereo discs have been dynamically compressed (been made louder), although no one can say how much yet. The mono discs are not going to be compressed.
Here’s an interesting example I found on Wikipedia - Four different waveforms of “Something” over the years… File:Cd loudness trend-something.gif - Wikipedia