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

Let It Be is the only one I could do without

interested in the new stereo remasters for peppers & MMT, but I guess I'm buying the mono box then.

were there even mono mixes of Abbey Road & Let It Be?

Saying that though, I'm listening to it (Let It Be) right now and I'd forgotten how good a lot of it is. It's probably my least listened-to Beatles album.

yeah, after going through a nitpicky stage about the Beatles, i decided that all Beatles albums are pretty great. Even the less-great ones.

haha, just thought I'd bring everyone the breaking news that the Beatles are great.

Thank you!

LET'S KEEP THAT IN MIND, PEOPLE

Seriously though, I've never owned all the original CD versions, only from Help! onwards; with the remasters I can see myself getting them all eventually, but right now I just want to gorge on Revolver, The White Album, Magical Mystery Tour, Sgt. Pepper and Abbey Road - getting to grips with those is going to be enough to last me months and months. I've never been fussed about box sets.

What I'm hoping for most with these is that they set a standard in remastering, and make a lot of artists think "fuck, I released / remastered some records that sound like dog shit; now's my chance to fix them before the apocalypse". So they'd better sound good!

yeah, seems like they're on the right path, if LOVE is any indication. As much as I loathed the mash up aspect of that release, it did sound pretty amazing.

Let It Be: now I can get car sick in mono

the rest of that press release:

The Stereo Albums (available individually and collected in a stereo boxed set)
The stereo albums have been remastered by Guy Massey, Steve Rooke, Sam Okell with Paul Hicks and Sean Magee
All CD packages contain original vinyl artwork and liner notes
Extensive archival photos
Additional historical notes by Kevin Howlett and Mike Heatley
Additional recording notes by Allan Rouse and Kevin Howlett
* = CD includes QuickTime mini-doc about the album
Please Please Me* (CD debut in stereo)
With The Beatles* (CD debut in stereo)
A Hard Day's Night* (CD debut in stereo)
Beatles For Sale* (CD debut in stereo)
Help!*
Rubber Soul*
Revolver*
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band* (also includes 1987 notes, updated, and new intro by Paul McCartney)
Magical Mystery Tour*
The Beatles*
Yellow Submarine* (also includes original US liner notes)
Abbey Road*
Let It Be*
Past Masters (contains new liner notes written by Kevin Howlett)
'The Beatles in Mono' (boxed set only)
The mono albums have been remastered by Paul Hicks, Sean Magee with Guy Massey and Steve Rooke
Presented together in box with an essay written by Kevin Howlett + = mono mix CD debut Please Please Me
With The Beatles
A Hard Day's Night
Beatles For Sale
Help! (CD also includes original 1965 stereo mix)+
Rubber Soul (CD also include original 1965 stereo mix)+
Revolver+
Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band+
Magical Mystery Tour+
The Beatles+
Mono Masters
Re-mastering the Beatles catalogue

The re-mastering process commenced with an extensive period conducting tests before finally copying the analogue master tapes into the digital medium. When this was completed, the transfer was achieved using a Pro Tools workstation operating at 24 bit 192 kHz resolution via a Prism A-D converter. Transferring was a lengthy procedure done a track at a time. Although EMI tape does not suffer the oxide loss associated with some later analogue tapes, there was nevertheless a slight build up of dust, which was removed from the tape machine heads between each title.

From the onset, considerable thought was given to what audio restorative processes were going to be allowed. It was agreed that electrical clicks, microphone vocal pops, excessive sibilance and bad edits should be improved where possible, so long as it didn't impact on the original integrity of the songs.
In addition, de-noising technology, which is often associated with re-mastering, was to be used, but subtly and sparingly. Eventually, less than five of the 525 minutes of Beatles music was subjected to this process. Finally, as is common with today's music, overall limiting - to increase the volume level of the CD - has been used, but on the stereo versions only. However, it was unanimously agreed that because of the importance of The Beatles' music, limiting would be used moderately, so as to retain the original dynamics of the recordings.
When all of the albums had been transferred, each song was then listened to several times to locate any of the agreed imperfections. These were then addressed by Guy Massey, working with Audio Restoration engineer Simon Gibson.
Mastering could now take place, once the earliest vinyl pressings, along with the existing CDs, were loaded into Pro Tools, thus allowing comparisons to be made with the original master tapes during the equalization process. When an album had been completed, it was auditioned the next day in studio three - a room familiar to the engineers, as all of the recent Beatles mixing projects had taken place in there - and any further alteration of EQ could be addressed back in the mastering room. Following the initial satisfaction of Guy and Steve, Allan Rouse and Mike Heatley then checked each new re-master in yet another location and offered any further suggestions. This continued until all 13 albums were completed to the team's satisfaction.

New Notes/Documentaries Team

Kevin Howlett (Historical and Recording Notes)
Kevin Howlett's career as an award-winning radio producer spans three decades. His music programmes for the BBC have included many documentaries about The Beatles, including 'The Beeb's Lost Beatles Tapes.' He received a Grammy nomination for his involvement with The Beatles' album 'Live At The BBC' and, in 2003, produced the 'Fly On The Wall' bonus disc for 'Let It Be... Naked.'

Mike Heatley (Historical Notes) Mike entered the music business via HMV Record Stores in 1970, transferring to EMI Records' International Division three years later. He eventually headed up that division in the early Eighties before joining the company's newly created Strategic Marketing Division in 1984. In 1988, he returned to International, where he undertook a number of catalogue marketing roles until he retired in December 2008.
During his career he worked with many of EMI's major artists, including Pink Floyd, Queen, Kate Bush and Iron Maiden. However, during the last 30 years he has formed a particularly strong relationship with Apple, and has been closely involved in the origination and promotion of the Beatles catalogue, besides solo releases from John, Paul, George and Ringo.

Bob Smeaton (Director, Mini-Documentaries)
Bob Smeaton was series director and writer on the Grammy award winning 'Beatles Anthology' TV series which aired in the UK and the USA in 1995. In 1998 he received his second Grammy for his 'Jimi Hendrix: Band of Gypsys' documentary. In 2004 he gained his first feature film credit, as director on the feature documentary 'Festival Express.' He subsequently went on to direct documentaries on many of the world's biggest music acts including The Who, Pink Floyd, The Doors, Elton John, Nirvana and the Spice Girls.

Julian Caiden (Editor, Mini-Documentaries)
Julian has worked with Bob Smeaton on numerous music documentaries including 'Jimi Hendrix: Band of Gypsys' and the 'Classic Albums' series, featuring The Who, Pink Floyd, The Doors, Elton John and Nirvana among others. He has worked on documentary profiles from Richard Pryor to Dr. John to Sir Ian McKellen, Herbie Hancock and Damien Hirst and on live music shows including the New York Dolls and Club Tropicana.

The Abbey Road Team
Allan Rouse (Project Coordinator)
Allan joined EMI straight from school in 1971 at their Manchester Square head office, working as an assistant engineer in the demo studio. During this time he frequently worked with Norman (Hurricane) Smith, The Beatles' first recording engineer.

In 1991, he had his first involvement with The Beatles, copy¬ing all of their master tapes (mono, stereo, 4-track and 8-track) to digital tape as a safety backup. This was followed by four years working with Sir George Martin as assistant and project coordinator on the TV documentary 'The Making of Sgt. Pepper's' and the CDs 'Live at the BBC' and 'The Anthol¬ogy.'

In 1997, MGM/UA were preparing to reissue the film 'Yellow Submarine' and, with the permission of Apple, asked that all of The Beatles' music be mixed for the film in 5.1 surround and stereo. Allan requested the services of Abbey Road's senior engineer Peter Cobbin and assistant Guy Massey and, along with them, produced the new mixes.
Two years later, he proposed an experimental stereo and surround mix of John Lennon's song 'Imagine' engineered by Peter Cobbin. Following lengthy consultations with Yoko Ono, the album 'Imagine' was re-mixed in stereo and the Grammy award-winning film 'Gimme Some Truth' in surround and new stereo. This led to a further five of John's albums being re-mastered with new stereo mixes and the DVD release of 'Lennon Legend' being re-mixed in 5.1 surround and new stereo.

Further projects followed, including The Beatles 'Anthol¬ogy', 'The First US Visit' and 'Help' DVD and the albums 'Let It Be...Naked' and 'Love' along with George Harrison's 'Concert for Bangladesh' DVD and album.
For a number of years now, Allan has worked exclusively on Beatles and related projects.

Guy Massey (Recording Engineer)
Guy joined Abbey Road in 1994, and five years later assisted on the surround remix for The Beatles film 'Yellow Submarine.' This led to The Beatles' 'Anthology' DVD and later, along with Paul Hicks and Allan Rouse, they mixed and produced 'Let It Be... Naked.' In 2004 he left the studios to become freelance and has engineered The Divine Comedy: 'Victory for the Comic Muse,' Air Traffic: 'Fractured Life,' James Dean Bradfield: 'The Great Western' and Stephen Fretwell's 'Magpie,' co-producing the last two. Since leaving, Guy is still a vital member of the team, and has been the senior engineer for the re-mastering project and was responsible for surround and new stereo mixes for the DVD release of 'Help!'

Steve Rooke (Mastering Engineer)
Steve joined Abbey Road in 1983 and is now the studio's senior mastering engineer. He has been involved on all The Beatles' projects since 1999. He has also been responsible for mastering releases by John Lennon, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr.

Paul Hicks (Recording Engineer)
Paul started at Abbey Road in 1994, and his first involvement with The Beatles was assisting engineer Geoff Emerick on the Anthology albums. This was followed by 'Yellow Submarine Songtrack,' 'Anthology' DVD and 'Let It Be... Naked.' Like Guy Massey, he has also become a freelance engineer and since leaving the studios he has been responsible for the surround mixing of Paul McCartney's DVD 'The McCartney Years' and The Beatles' 'Love.' Paul has been in charge of the mono re-masters.

Sean Magee (Mastering Engineer)
Sean began working at Abbey Road in 1995 with a diploma in sound engineering. With a wealth of knowledge in analog and digital mastering, he has worked alongside Paul Hicks on the mono re-masters.

Sam Okell (Recording Engineer)
Sam's first job as a member of the team was in 2006, assisting Paul Hicks on Paul McCartney's DVD 'The McCartney Years,' and during that same year he was responsible for the re-mastering of George Harrison's 'Living In The Material World' CD along with Steve Rooke. This led to him restoring the soundtrack to the Beatles film 'Help!' in surround and stereo, in addition to assisting Guy Massey with the song remixes.

Sam has re-mastered 'With The Beatles' and 'Let It Be.'

Simon Gibson (Audio Restoration Engineer)
Simon joined Abbey Road in 1990. He has progressed from mastering mostly classical recordings to include a much wider range of music, including pop and rock, with his specialized role as an audio restoration engineer. Apart from the re-mastering project, his other work includes George Harrison's 'Living In The Material World,' John Lennon's 'Lennon Legend,' The Beatles' 'Love' and the 'Help!' DVD soundtrack.

U.S. Media Contacts UK Media Contact
For Apple Corps Ltd.: For Apple Corps Ltd.:
Shore Fire Media MBC PR
Matt Hanks Moira Bellas
(718) 522-7171 / mha✧✧✧@shoref✧✧✧.c✧✧ 0 20 7483 9205 / mo✧✧✧@mb✧✧✧.c✧✧ Brendan Gilmartin
(718) 522-7171 / bgilmar✧✧✧@shoref✧✧✧.c✧✧
For EMI: Jennifer Ballantyne - EMI Music North America
(323) 871-5494 / jenni✧✧✧.ballant✧✧✧@emi✧✧✧.c✧✧

let's all randomly guess how much the complete box sets are going to cost:

stereo set: $240
mono set: $150

well the stereo set will obviously be twice as much as the mono set

the mono set is gonna be ludicrously expensive because its for collector fuckos and all exclusive to the set

RIAA pullin out the old tricks again. I'm a generation removed from the Beatles and already I've bought their albums on three formats. Can't wait for 2025 nanobot ear implant remaster of "Magical Mystery Tour". It'll cost $1000 so I'm starting to save now.

Seriously this audiophile thing has to stop. But it's the only marketing ploy the Industry seems to have left. "Oh you stopped buying CDs cos 'records sound better maaaan'? Well shit, here, we'll press these 180gram vinyl." "I don't download MP3s I only download FLAC cos it's lossless and that's so important cos I listen to everything I own in an isolation chamber with $1000 headphones on." It's like everyone in the world has turned into George Fucking Lucas.

I pity the baby boomers who have had to buy new Beatles records consistently over 4 decades now. That line in Men In Black about having to buy the White Album all over again: it's not just funny, it's the RIAA's quarterly projection! And if you don't buy it, that's a lost sale to them. Too many lost sales and they're gonna need a bail out!

I'm downloading all this shit. One nice big torrent.

*golf clap*

http://mike.karikas.com/media/photo/hellyeah_mike.jpg

http://blog.antiquetrader.com/blog/content/binary/Antique%20Auction%20riot.jpg

too suave to write 'meh'?

yes, as a matter of fact.

look it's the fucking Beatles so I'll get this if I have the money, but what's the big problem with the current cds? Like, is there something I can listen for that will make me really anticipate this? Or is it something where if I had the vinyl, I'd understand this immediately?

orig vinyls sound way better...

download some of the mono mix bootlegs that are out there, done off of vinyl, i found one of revolver, very interesting to hear the mono mixes

yeah, it's true -- how I've listened to the Beatles is like 85% on CD, and I love the Beatles. Not like the supposedly shoddy remastering has stopped me from that. Even though everyone is saying the old CDs suck ... I've certainly gotten plenty of enjoyment out of them. Will I enjoy the new remasters more? MAYBE.

yeah the mono mixes are cool to hear for more than just sound quality, they just sound like DIFFERENT mixes, the way everything is leveled is fairly different and i think on some there are even more overdub tracks on the mono mixes

(haha btw tyler you being the bootleg ninja i'm suprised you don't have all those mono mixes already!)

yeah, i've got a bunch of those purple chick things ... but still, over the years, I'd say I've mostly listened to the standard CD releases -- and loved them!

I pity the baby boomers who have had to buy new Beatles records consistently over 4 decades now.

But why? I mean, Eric Clapton, Beach Boys, The Doors and CCR have had their catalogues remastered and reissued about 10 times as often as The Beatles. So why are you using this argument against The Beatles?

not saying i'm not excited for these remasters. I'm a sucker, what can I say.

So why are you using this argument against The Beatles?

It wasnt necessarily about the Beatles, more about the way the industry is run. The Beatles have only been put out on CD like once, compared with yeah the Doors or Jimi Hendrix, 10 zillion times, whatever.

I guess it's just I grew up with the original CDs, never thought they sounded bad, and now with these remasters keep reading about how horrible they were. Seems like alot of people towing the company line for the sake of fidelitism.

DAC converters being a shitton better than they were when those original CDs were done is not an RIAA sheme and not fictional

Once I heard the original vinyls and realized that yes they sound a little better than the CDs, I realized, ya know, they printing millions and millions and millions of those. I've found the entire catalog twice over at under a dollar apiece at thrift stores.

It's just odd, you know. If they did this back in the late 90s (and people have been crying for this sort of thing for over 10 years) back after I bought the Who remasters with all those awesome bonus tracks, I would have totally bought these. It's just weird that they've waited til now. What is the motive? Cos there definitely is one you can't deny it.

the motive is to make money by selling CDs! the record companies are businesses. i assumed this was well known.

as far as why they waited, i dunno i bet that's more to the whole paul/yoko/ringo/apple thing being unable to ever get shit done.

definitely have a point there -- seems like it would've made sense to launch a full reissue program in the post-Anthology period (mid to late 90s). But I think the whole Beatles world is fully different from even comparably big bands of the 60s. Lotta different factions, each with their own agendas, money to make, and with equal power over decisions.

i mean look at what a big deal it was to settle the whole apple thing, the beatles act like they should have a seat at the UN.

since they can't tour like the Stones the Beatles have to reissue stuff every 5-10 years to remind us they ARE THE GREATEST BAND OF ALL TIME etc etc

what's the big problem with the current cds?
Um, they sound like shit?

Like, is there something I can listen for that will make me really anticipate this? Or is it something where if I had the vinyl, I'd understand this immediately?
Yeah, listen to the vinyl rips. I mean, I getcha. I grew up with the vinyls and then I stopped listening to the Beatles for years. When I switched over to CD, I scooped up almost all their catalog and didn't hear any deficiencies because I hadn't heard the vinyl in a long time. Now that I have, it's a revelation; the early Beatles albums on CD sound horrible. It's not even close.
I repeat:
Beatles for Sale as it should sound

Seriously, download it and do a taste test.

I've actually found it really hard to find Beatles LPs, outside of the blue and red greatest hits things. It seems the reasonably priced shops get rid of them fairly quickly, while other stores ask ridiculous prices just because its THE BEATLES. I mean, there was a store near me that was asking $30 for a beat-to-shit copy of Sgt. Pepper's on vinyl.

that seems to be the trend, though I remember as a kid finding the later stuff -- Sgt. Peppers, Abbey Road, Let It Be in the used vinyl bins for cheap. But yeah, you look for it now and it's marked up, usually outrageously.

The record store I used to work at would drive people crazy when they would try to sell their old Beatles records

"YOU ONLY WANT TO GIVE ME A DOLLAR? THIS IS THE FUCKIN BEATLES MAAAN"

"Uh, yeah, that record sold three million units. There's no shortage of copies of that record floating around"

People thought because they had a vinyl copy of a record everyone owns that they were sitting on a goldmine.

There are probably hundreds of millions of Beatles vinyls currently floating around the known universe, new and used. I must just luck out, I see Sgt. Pepper and Abbey Road all the time at thrift shops, for at most $2. And people take care of their Beatles records so they're usually playable without skips.

Just wish they were offering something new, something a tenth as cool as the "Revolution" bootleg.

yeah, that's what's funny -- I mean in terms of actual rarity, Beatles records are not scarce. Like, they must've had the biggest initial pressings in history.

I'll try the Beatles For Sale thing right away. That's probably my favorite Beatles album at this point.

man i NEVER see good copies of the originals anymore...i kick myself for not buying all that stuff in the 90s...now all i see is bargain bin once all hashed up like with the record just thrown in the cardboard with no sleeve

starting to get that way with the prime stones stuff too, i paid 15 for beggars and i thought it was a good deal

I have a bunch of Beatles vinyl that I probably never listened to because I also have the CDs. :/

People thought because they had a vinyl copy of a record everyone owns that they were sitting on a goldmine.

OTM. Around Atlanta you can find lots of Beatles records in thrift shops (Goodwill $1-2, Last Chance $1.99, Value Village 40cents) but yeah go to an antique store and you will find any old Beatles record in thoroughly used condition going for something insane like $35.

yeah i always chortle when i go to this one secondhand flea market type place in my town, and there's a seller who has shit like Allman Bros. LPs for $30. Basic Beatles stuff, too -- with comments like "ORIGINAL PRESSING" and "RARE" ...