Remastering The Beatles

This follows on from my review of the Yellow Submarine songtrack (http://www.progarchives.com/Review.asp?id=70307) . The songs on this CD have been either tidied (a mistake in the double tracking of McCartney's vocal at the start of the first verse of "Eleanor Rigby" has been removed), enhanced (the vocals at the beginning of "All you need is love") or altered (Lennon's repetitions in the last verse of "Yellow Submarine" start after the first line instead of the second).
I'm personally not in favour of removing all the glitches and errors from Beatles records as, for me, that's part of their attraction - to what extent do you think The Beatles' (or indeed any other band's) old recordings should be remastered or altered?


Edited by chopper

I like to hear old recordings as they were.

I'm no authority on The Beatles, but my friends father has nost of their albums - original releases on vinyl - he's looked after them well, and they sound fantastic! In fact MY vinyl of Sgt Pepper sounds better IMO than my CD..

Sometimes Vinyl is better!!

Weren't the Beatles albums delayed for a long time before being released on CD (cf. advent of commercial CDs) - didn't this have to have Michael Jackson's approval, as owner of the songs' copyright?????? Every one was remastered as far as I remember too?

yankeerose wrote:  move on chopper god  enuff allready with the beatles

If you're so fed up with Beatles threads, why do you keep reading and posting in them? Anyway, if you read it properly, this was intended to kick off a discussion about remastering any band's old recordings.


Edited by chopper

chopper wrote: The songs on this CD have been either tidied (a mistake in the double tracking of McCartney's vocal at the start of the first verse of "Eleanor Rigby" has been removed), enhanced (the vocals at the beginning of "All you need is love") or altered (Lennon's repetitions in the last verse of "Yellow Submarine" start after the first line instead of the second).

God knows what the reasoning is behind this kind of thing. "Uh oh, The Beatles' reputation will be in tatters if consumers, on purchasing this cash-in compilation, are subjected to the same minute imperfections they grew up listening to!"

I haven't heard a Beatles CD release with sound I actively object to, though

Yeah that whole Ozzy debacle is an absolute disgrace....the older versions have sadly been deleted now though I believe, so newer fans will hear those synthetic versions instead.

As for The Beatles and remastering? I definitely think the albums need remastering and upgrading, but if there's one thing I hate it's revisionism/remixing when it's not required. If it's not broke, why fix it?

soundspectrum wrote: holy sh*t...i didnt think it was true.....thats so screwed up. Ozzy....that sucks man.

Lee Kerslake and Bob Daisley's roles were replaced by Mike Bordin (ex Faith No More) and Rob Trujillo (Metallica).

The 2 albums have lost their originality!!

      I pretty much hated the Yellow Submarine remixes, I found them too
clean, adapted to 90s production aesthetics, the guitars were suddenly
over-effected, smooth and harmless, they'd lost all the edge and bite that
the original Beatles really had...Rock music was meant to make people
slightly uncomfortable, which doesn't work when you smooth out the hard
edges.

     On the other hand, the remix on Let It Be was sort of an opposite
process. Phil Spector had over-produced and watered down the original
recordings with schmalzy string arrangements, and the new mix returns
them to a rawer, clearer state, which is clearly an improvement.

Edited by RoyalJelly

Yes analog sound has much more sound matter, weight, low goes lower and tighter, more dynamic, image, more eeverything...and i don't even talk about the highs.