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Not once have I detected a whiff of substandard sound quality on a Beatles CD. They sounded as good as they sounded on vinyl in the '60s due to the best sound-recording technology at the time (i.e., not exquisite but at the same time not half bad). And then they sounded a little bit better when they were remastered/enhanced for CDs in the '90s. But they were never any kind of "problem." Which makes the coming 9.9.09 release of all 12 Beatles albums in a digitally remastered state seem extremely dubious. It's just greed, man.

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Posted by Jeffrey Wells on April 7, 2009 at 8:42 AM

comment #1

lonniechung says ...

The cd transfers actually are somewhat poor - it was cutting edge in the late '80s when it was done, but never compared to the vinyl. Unfortunately, the new remastered versions will more-than-likely just be louder to compensate for the mp3 players, which will not improve the sound. The remastered vinyl from a few years back are probably the best sounding versions available, but the original vinyl is still pretty good.

Posted by lonniechung at April 7, 2009 1:29 PM

comment #2

BoshBarnetWonkyDonkey says ...

Have you listened to Love? The mash-up album thing. It sounds absolutely great. If they spruce up the albums like that, you'll notice the difference.

Posted by BoshBarnetWonkyDonkey at April 7, 2009 1:33 PM

comment #3

Richard_Stone says ...

Nah, The Beatles' recordings have always sounded a little degraded to me, especially the more engineered, bounced and layered stuff, the higher frequencies in particular. Their best recorded stuff were some of the one-take BBC recordings without any effects or overdubs added.

Anyways, The Beatles wrote some good little tunes, but man are they the most overrated music makers in history. I wish baby-boomers could move on. I know a lot of people of my generation celebrates them as well, unfortunately.

There comes a time when some "masterpieces" must be destroyed (symbolically) in order for the culture to evolve.

Posted by Richard_Stone at April 7, 2009 1:34 PM

comment #4

DavidF says ...

Bosh beat me too it - If you listen to LOVE you can totally hear the difference in fidelity.

You don't have to be an audiophile to know these remasters were much needed and while I'd like to say there's no way I'm buying them I've known for years this day would come and they will be worth it.

As for Richard's comments - everyone is entitled to their opinion. That said, I think a lot of people can't appreciate what kind of game changers The Beatles were and how many little things you hear all the time are because of them. It's easy to sneer at Sgt Pepper's when you've heard, say, Dark Side of the Moon but you have to remember how innovative they were at the time and take a step back.

Heck, it was virtually unheard of for musicians to write their own songs before The Beatles!

Posted by DavidF at April 7, 2009 1:41 PM

comment #5

corey3rd says ...

It's been over 20 years since the original CD were released. They weren't mastered that great. Sure it's better than vinyl, but that's like saying your VHS is good enough and you don't need to spring for the Blu-ray.

I only wish they'd gone the extra step and gone into the vault for the extra takes and mixes that are featured on the various bootlegs.

Posted by corey3rd at April 7, 2009 1:43 PM

comment #6

Rich S. says ...

I agree about Love. And the 5.1 digital DVD is even more amazing.

When he was compiling Love, George Martin commented on how pristine the original master tapes were. So I would definitely love to hear this.

That said, not only are the releasing all 12 albums in remastered stereo, they are also releasing several of the albums in remastered mono. That does seem a tad excessive to me.

But like a dope, I'll probably buy them anyway. After all, it has been 20 years since I bought the first CDs.

Posted by Rich S. at April 7, 2009 1:46 PM

comment #7

moorish says ...

You can definitely tell the difference between the old CD's and the Love album.

Also, a lot of the band's early recordings were in mono (they themselves regarded these as the "proper" versions) and the stereo mixes were just tossed off without much thought (leading to great mixes like having all of Ringo's drums in the left channel and all the guitars in the right). A proper, ground up stereo re-master will make these songs really pop.

And anyone saying the Beatles were overrated needs to recognise that we are talking about the band that rewrote the rule book. All of it. The most sonically inventive pop group of all time.

Posted by moorish at April 7, 2009 1:51 PM

comment #8

bluefugue says ...

>Anyways, The Beatles wrote some good little tunes, but man are they the most overrated music makers in history. I wish baby-boomers could move on. I know a lot of people of my generation celebrates them as well, unfortunately.

>There comes a time when some "masterpieces" must be destroyed (symbolically) in order for the culture to evolve.

The Beatles wrote a *lot* of good little tunes. And little tunes is pretty much what rock songwriters are in the business of making, the occasional epic aside (and the Beatles made epics too: Side B of Abbey Road being a sterling example, one of the few successful forays into "symphonic" form in a rock context). Never has so much songwriting talent been concentrated in one band; 75% of the lineup were world-class tunesmiths.

Maybe "masterpieces" should be destroyed, but not the ones with the quotes off. Enduring works of art endure for a reason. I was born years after the last Beatles record was released, and their music is relevant to me -- more importantly, it makes me happy, energizes me, thrills me, makes the world a more interesting and satisfying place to inhabit.

It does as much a disservice to hitch the Beatles to baby-boomer fatigue, as it would to somehow associate Beethoven with the excesses of the Napoleonic wars. (I am not insinuating, by the way, that the lads from Liverpool are the equal of Ludwig, but the point stands all the same.) Art stands alone when the historical debris has washed away. "Daytripper" isn't just a snapshot of an overexposed cultural moment. It's a fantastic example of pop-music craftmanship.

Posted by bluefugue at April 7, 2009 1:57 PM

comment #9

rr3333 says ...

Compared to 95% of the artists that remaster their shit every 2-3 years, I think the Beatles, waiting over 22 years to come out with remastered versions, isnt too bad a deal.

George Lucas releases new Star Wars 'remaster' dvds every 5 minutes. McCartney, Ringo, (that awful) Yoko, and George Martin waiting 22 years?? Not so bad.

Quite frankly, I'm shocked that it took this long. The originals really needed some updating. Their stuff came out when cds were really still in their infancy.

Posted by rr3333 at April 7, 2009 2:24 PM

comment #10

Chris Willman says ...

They weren't remastered in the '90s. They came out in 1987 or thereabouts and haven't been upgraded since, which is really pretty incredible. If you've heard the "Love" CD, you'll know how much better this material can sound. It's not greed. Every hardcore Beatles fan has been demanding remastered CDs for over a decade and can't understand why it took this long. There will be great rejoicing Sept. 9.

Posted by Chris Willman at April 7, 2009 2:35 PM

comment #11

cwratliff says ...

Chris is right-- The Beatles CDs were essentially dumped onto CD in the late 80s with little regard to the sound quality. You can listen to those, and sure, they sound "fine" in that you can HEAR the songs, but I'd say that corey3rd's VHS comparison is really apt. (I can remember trying to explain what was wrong with "pan & scan" to people who didn't see what the big deal was, and their attitude was that it looked just fine, ie they could "see" all the important stuff on their TV screen.)

It was the same with the original Bob Dylan CDs that Columbia put out in the 80s-- when they remastered a bunch of those in 2003, it sounded like the previous versions had been playing from inside a plastic bag-- I could actually hear instruments that I'd never noticed before.

If anything, I'd say the "greed" part with the Beatles was the way they've been selling the old, crappy CDs for all these years, knowing that a lot of the people buying them would end up having to shell out for better versions later on. They should have done this a decade ago...

(Jeff, for someone who pays such attention to the quality of movies-- transitioning from DVD to Blu-Ray, for instance-- I'm guessing that this post reveals that you fundamentally care less about music than you do about film, right? Or are there examples of albums that you've been really impressed with their improved sound in a new edition?)

Posted by cwratliff at April 7, 2009 2:57 PM

comment #12

Krazy Eyes says ...

Hopefully they don't add excessive grain to these new remasters.

Posted by Krazy Eyes at April 7, 2009 3:17 PM

comment #13

Deathtongue_Groupie says ...

For someone with kids just about at the right age, kinda hard to believe you got this so wrong - another factor is the marketing to a new generation of listeners. So far, every new generation seems to have a large segment that gets into The Beatles. Makes sense, if you get them interested, best make sure the audio is state-of-the-current-art. Beatles fans tend to be music nerds who take their sound quality VERY seriously.

Not to mention, their are plenty who didn't go for that last big set in the 90's and simply bought the first CD re-issues (I am one of them).

Posted by Deathtongue_Groupie at April 7, 2009 3:26 PM

comment #14

shawn says ...

David F says: "Heck, it was virtually unheard of for musicians to write their own songs before The Beatles!"

Tell that to...deep breath...Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis, Brian Wilson, Smokey Robinson, Johnny Cash, Bob Dylan, etc.

Posted by shawn at April 7, 2009 4:47 PM

comment #15

SpinDozer says ...

Jeff's got a tin ear. If these are superior to the Purple Chick or Dr. Ebbetts boots then I'll buy.

Posted by SpinDozer at April 7, 2009 5:09 PM

comment #16

vp19 says ...

Some years ago, Capitol remastered its catalog of Frank Sinatra albums, which were made before the Beatles' releases, and to be honest with you, I noticed no difference. In fact, the earlier CDs were slashed to a lower price, so I saved some cash in the process.

I love the Beatles, and I hope the remastering (will George Martin be involved?) will be good, worthy of the band, especially for the earlier albums, some of the freshest, most timeless pop music ever made. ("Sgt. Pepper" and later stuff was okay, but in retrospect a bit pretentious.) And I'm glad they will be released in both mono and stereo versions -- keep in mind that in those days, rock acts were primarily concerned with getting a good sound over AM car radios.

Posted by vp19 at April 7, 2009 7:14 PM

comment #17

lazarus says ...

Sorry, have to agree with Wells here. Perhaps the original Beatles CDs sound like shit to freak audiophiles, I think Capitol did a good job considering when they were made. The Sgt. Pepper's and White Album booklets were really well done, too.

If you want to talk ACTUAL bad classic rock CD masters, what about the original pressings of Led Zeppelin's catalogue, or the Rolling Stones discs that Columbia put out in the late 80's? The Beatles stuff sounds FAR superior to that shit.

Posted by lazarus at April 7, 2009 7:44 PM

comment #18

Pinko Punko says ...

If they play the loudness game I will be disappointed. And there will be riots if there is any clipping.

Posted by Pinko Punko at April 7, 2009 8:22 PM

comment #19

DavidF says ...

Shawn - a) I did say"virtually" unheard of.
b) Perhaps I should have specified ROCK acts and clarified the time grame. Buddy Holly is certainly a great example of an exception (albeit one who sadly was not charting when The Beatles came up) but in 1963 Dylan was straight folk, Cash was country...I'm not sure what Brian Wilson was doing that early.

Anyway, the important points are that everyone thinks Jeff is wrong and DZ hasn't shown up in the thread at all and most of us will buy at least some of this stuff in September.

(I think the mono albums should have the original mono mixes, the stereo albums should have the stereo mixes etc. Why would anyone buy an entirely mono set? To remember how great it was to hear Sgt. Pepper on AM radio?)

Posted by DavidF at April 7, 2009 8:45 PM

comment #20

Richard_Stone says ...

Thanks for the civil responses and replies to my earlier comment.

I wanted to clarify my comment but I don't want to come across as a troll, just a guy with a different take on this. In short, however good it is, and it is, I don't think the Beatles' music warrants a forty-years old obsession on purely musical grounds.

I've known so many baby-boomers still in love with the Beatles, but absolutely deaf to new music being created in the present. The Beatles are so loaded with cultural and nostalgic associations that I don't think of the Beatles' song as intemporal music, but music firmly grounded in the 60's, relevent to our times today mostly for historical reasons. Beethoven's music, for whatever reasons, is not so loaded with such narrow and precise cultural associations, in my view at least, and is a different type of music.

I went through a period of discovering the Beatles catalogue in my teens and I enjoyed it. Their music is enjoyable and indeed they di change the game. Eventually, I moved on to other stuff and wasn't interested to come back to them, although their music is still present everywhere in this culture, whether I like it or not (hence my perhaps ill-conceived and written comments in this thread).

Posted by Richard_Stone at April 8, 2009 12:59 AM

comment #21

MAGGA says ...

Richard Stone, I feel there's been a huge backlash against The Beatles and everything else sixties-related in the last five years or so, but I don't think it's really warranted. It's mostly a reaction against that generation's canonisation of that particular era at the expense of later, or even earlier, music, and I would agree with the common assesment that reading a Best-Of list by Rolling Stone and such magazines is dull precisely because of this fetish for what they consider The Golden Age. But The Beatles, Dylan and certainly The Velvet Underground are worthy of respect, re-releases and whatever technology we have to make them sound as presentable as possible on modern stereos. There's no Lucas-ing involved here. We'll probably get some amazingly cleaned up sound on In An Aeroplane Over The Sea in a couple of decades, and I'll get that as well.

Posted by MAGGA at April 8, 2009 5:28 AM

comment #22

jamesO.incandenza says ...

Beatles CDs sound like CDs mastered in the 80s, which is to say marginally competent, flat, dull, lifeless. The original Dylan, Hendrix, golden era Stones CDs sounded like this as well. Compare any of these to the original vinyl and you'll notice a major loss of color, depth and dynamics. Thankfully these others have been rescued. No catalogue in pop music cries out for remastering (remixing is the more accurate term--"remastering" often veers much closer Friedkin territory than people acknowledge) more than the Beatles. Remember, these recordings--not just the songs and/or performances, were the gold standard of their day. The current CDs do not make this in any way self evident. It is simply not right for the Byrds to have sonically superior CDs. Don't get me wrong, I love the Byrds, but they're second rate, they don't walk among Kings with the Stones and the Beatles and Dylan and Neil Young and Pet Sounds. As such, it's practically criminal that the remastered Younger Than Yesterday sounds infinitely superior to Revolver on CD at the moment. That just makes no sense at all.

Posted by jamesO.incandenza at April 8, 2009 8:14 AM

comment #23

George Prager says ...

Beethoven, Sinatra, Miles Davis--overrated, time to move on.

I've been trying to buy Beatles LPs to replace my worn out ones. I got a great mono version of RUbber Soul and a British reissue of Revolver last year.

Posted by George Prager at April 8, 2009 9:05 AM

comment #24

SpinDozer says ...

http://beatles.com/core/home/

Posted by SpinDozer at April 8, 2009 10:11 AM

comment #25

Movie fan09 says ...

Which makes the coming 9.9.09 release of all 12 Beatles albums in a digitally remastered state seem extremely dubious.

anyone notice the beatle trivia on that release date?

it's an old song of theirs (one after 9-0-9)

Posted by Movie fan09 at April 8, 2009 8:43 PM

comment #26

Bob Violence says ...

This was completely standard procedure for stereo mixes at the time. This isn't to say the Beatles' stereo recordings are great or preferable to the mono versions, but the sort of extreme separation you're referring to here wasn't shoddiness -- it was simply the dominant practice. Even Yellow Submarine (which was originally mixed in stereo) was done in the same style.

Posted by Bob Violence at April 9, 2009 8:01 AM

comment #27