I have had it up to here waiting for the Beatles catalogue to be remastered

Anyone heard the original 1965 stereo mix of Rubber Soul, which is included in the mono box set? Just curious to know how it stacks up to George Martin's 1987 remix.

> This is midweeks, though

which, given that it came on on wednesday, is only two days

i bought it on LP in the early-'80s. so maybe. all i can recall from the last time i put it on is that there was some severe separation/panning going on between the two channels. still, i remember Revolver being even more noticeably annoying in that regard.

xp

According to The Financial Times EMI shipped 5 million units to retail and the mono box has sold 50,000 through presale.
Not bad.

Abbey Road sold 7,164 copies.

I have to say that I think I prefer the Capitol stereo mixes of the really early stuff to these though, definitely.

Just to be sure, you're talking about The Capitol Albums, Vol. One? I never got around to buying that, but I think I will now. I love comparing all the different mixes of the same songs.

The Norwegian hitlists run from Wednesday to Wednesday, so will get quite some impression here by the middle of next week, as it will then include a full week of sales.

ysi?

It's kind of interesting that Mono Sgt. Pepper doesn't sound particularly "squished" in any way. The effort that must have gone into the mix is kind of staggering. If you don't think about it much, you don't even notice that it's mono. I'm listening to it on headphones right now, and not really missing anything in terms of stereo.

The thing that hits me most is that Pepper was the first rock album I ever heard, and this is probably the first time in umpteen years that it sounds the way I remember it sounding. I'm not suddenly falling in love w/the music again just like the first time, but it does pack a pretty powerful nostalgia hit. Keep getting flashes of sitting in my parents bedroom, where the stereo was, trying to make sense of the album art. Really hated Within You Without You back then, so that's changed...

I'm finding from listening to these remasters that Beatles is a very sensory, place-time kind of band for me. The songs I know, the songs I loved, I can see who I listened to the songs with, where I was, what I was eating...maybe a lot of that comes from listening to a lot of it when I was pretty young. It's not as strong with other bands as it is with these guys.

Drums on mono mix of "Your Mother Should Know" - WTF????

Watching the First US Visit on the toob...staggered/amused/wtf by the DC show where they had to move their equipment after every song to face each section of the crowd. Ringo's yanking away on the drum riser for what seems like years before some old geezer realizes 'Oh hey, he might need some help'. Crikey!

Ha! I was loving that too.

I'm finding from listening to these remasters that Beatles is a very sensory, place-time kind of band for me. The songs I know, the songs I loved, I can see who I listened to the songs with, where I was, what I was eating..

There's a bit in the Albert Goldman biography where he says that Lennon disliked hearing Beatles songs - not because he thought they were bad, but because it brought him down to remember the circumstances in which they were recorded: who he was with, the arguments, the miserableness and drugs he was taking at that time...

How trustworthy is the Goldman book? I was intrigued when I read it as a teenager around the time of the Anthologies, when it was pretty much the first exploration behind the music that I'd done. But he doesn't seem to have access to the main players, relying instead on secondary characters and unnamed sources, and it doesn't tally that much with anything I've read since. I'm also suspicious of how Goldman can write about private meetings and motives, a lot of which he doesn't appear to have any conceivable access to.

Of all the many Beatles books I've wasted my life reading, I think it all boils down to this:

Insider perspective: Beatles Anthology
Outsider/sociological: Can't Buy Me Love

They are the yin and yang of Beatles bios.

Picked up "Abbey Road" last night and was listening on my decent stereo system, and man . . . there's a roundness to the guitars and a sweetness to the Moog that I remember hearing on vinyl but not on the 87 CDs. Frankly, so far, these CDs sound more like vinyl than any others that I can recall.

Also, I A/Bed a bunch of songs for my wife from all three albums I've bought, and she was consistently able to pick out the remasters. She's hardly a "golden ears" type, but even she was pretty impressed.

Just curious but does anybody know sales numbers for these reissues (expected or actual).

Billboard expect 600,000 sales by Sunday http://www.billboard.com/news#/news/beatlemania-hits-retail-as-cd-reissues-sell-1004011616.story There was an interview with McCartney in Billboard which suggested that it was likely that the Beatles album sales could overtake Eminem (32 million sales) and become the biggest selling album act of the decade. Currently they're on 28.2 million.

I guess the biggest album seller of 2009 is still between The Beatles and Michael Jackson though...

I hope this is never remastered.

How did I forget that Help is the greatest song ever?

xpost...I guess it's true, I CAN like that song less.

anyway yeah these all sound great, the mono box in particular is really a thing of beauty, PPM sounds right and proper there. The only thing I'm kind of disappointed in is the kind of shoddy packaging on the stereo versions; they couldn't have sprung for thicker cardboard, or at least real digipacks? I ahte these slippy envelop things, and the spines of all of mine were squished in the box.

I quite like the stereo packaging; maybe the card could have been thicker, aye, but at least there's no spindly bits to break.

And, y'know, MASSIVE LEAP FORWARD from the 87 packaging.

Ugh, I hate the pocket-style packages more and more CDs use nowadays- they just aren't cut out for long-term storage and taking the disc out and back in without accumulating scratches.

How are the mono discs different? Thought they used the same packaging for the individual discs...

Nah, the mono box has very VERY authentic recreations of the original LP sleeves - down to the photocards and top-loading sleeve of the white album.

Yes, plus dinky little inner slip sleeves. Basically exactly like the original vinyl releases in every way but scaled down to CD size.

I cranked out the Help! LP loud on the stereo last night. Filled the room with its noise, it sounded effing amazing. The early albums (mono at least) sound much, much better this way than through headphones.

For the longest time, Help! was my favourite Beatles album. I think it might be again, tbh. It hits a sweet spot right between the early rumbustious Beatlemanic LPs, and the later, darker, more intricate, more introspective ones.

The packaging on the mono CDs is lovely. The packaging for the White album is pretty much identical to the 30th anniversary reissue.

In a fit of OCD I just listened to Help! in the stereo remastering first, then the mono remastering second and lastly the mono remaster's 1965 stereo mix. I was actively annoyed by the stereo remasters, because the album has many Lennon drones and the stereo separation allowed my attention to linger on that. So the album ended up sounding much same-ier than I remember. The mono versions are much better in this regard. I am no longer annoyed with Help!.

Moving on to Let It Be now...

i wish i had a spare two hundred pounds, now

Hate to encourage your OCD, but I'd be interested in more comparisons of the stereo/mono.

(x-post)

i wish i had a spare two hundred pounds, now

― thomp, Sunday, September 13, 2009 11:37 AM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this. got 'abbey road'. fucking amazing.

The stereo "Please Mr. Postman" tops the mono. The stereo version keeps the rhythm section mostly in the left speaker, which means you can focus on it while the vocals moan on the left side. On the mono it's a big whirrrr, cool but not as seductive as the stereo. Ditto for "Roll Over Beethoven"; the hand-claps on the right channel are nice.

On the other hand "Money" works better in mono than in stereo, because the mono version keeps the piano more front-and-center. Actually, I think I prefer the 1987 mastering of "Money", but maybe that's because I've listened to that version so much...oh wait, the bass throb at the end of the mono remaster is excellent.

Abbey Road is revitalized.I honestly can't hear that much of a difference on Magical Mystery Tour apart from "Baby You're a Rich Man," which has much more clarity.

Still wish they'd iron out that switch-to-mono bit a better in the middle-eight of "I Am the Walrus."

With the Beatles sounds better to me in the new mono version, I've decided. I don't listen to this album for the instruments, so their overall blurred-ness isn't a problem. The vocals on the other hand are front-and-center and sound tremendous. "All I've Got To Do" is devastating in mono, with wincingly beautiful Lennon vocal.

Never noticed the crazy bongo playing (I think it's bongos) in "You're Going to Lose That Girl." It sounds like someone's just banging away while drunk.

The improved sound has me listening to/appreciating songs I had always skipped over in the past. Always hated "Something," but I'm digging Paul's sublime bass playing. And I'm marveling at the pure musical invention of "Good Morning Good Morning." You just don't hear music like that on the radio anymore.

(x-post Alex)

Is that "Walrus' bit still not fixed? I remember it being almost painful on the ears to listen to on headphones.

I'm reconciled to the fact that I'm going to be buying both stereo and mono - probably wait to buy a cheaper second hand mono set a bit further down the line when the hysteria has dampened down.

the mono Pepper's is a revelation! never going back to stereo.

According to Billboard article linked above week ending Sept. 6, the band's entire catalog shifted a total of 21,000
So the week before the remasters 21,000 people bought Beatles albums. Wonder if they're kicking themselves about now.

It's payday on Tuesday.

Should I drop for the Mono remasters or is cherry picking the stereo versions a better idea?

I'm swinging from 'i can afford to but this' to 'I can't afford not to buy these'.

One of my favourite bits of trivia is that in the sequence at the end of 'Good Morning, Good Morning', each animal is capable of eating the one before. Never been able to work it out myself, but I love learning stuff like that.

The former! Then buy Abbey Road in stereo and you're done (if youaren't a big fan of Let It Be like myself)

Should I drop for the Mono remasters or is cherry picking the stereo versions a better idea?

I'm swinging from 'i can afford to but this' to 'I can't afford not to buy these'.

― my opinionation (Hamildan),

The former! Then buy Abbey Road in stereo and you're done (if youaren't a big fan of Let It Be like myself)

― iago g.

sorry, forgot to xref....unless you have the patience of a saint and can wait to have sgt pepper individually released in mono. that's the one that's knocking my socks off. it's not overstating it to say it's revelatory, and much better

friend at work got the mono box and i generally agree with the sentiments here...thought the white album i'm not sure i prefer the mono to the stereo mixes...does anyone else feel that way?

Yes, President Emeritus, I agree--the White Album is the one case where I don't feel I can make a definitive judgment in favor of stereo or mono. I can possibly see reaching for the stereo version down the road though