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

there is almost no compression on these, so they are not going to sound bass-heavy compared to some other remasters. I can see how this could be bothersome depending on your playback system. I lost my good earbuds and have had to listen to mp3s of these through the stock apple ones and they're really treble-y, but the cds on my stereo at home through good speakers sound very well rounded, no bass issues at all. the beatles aren't meant to have booty shaking bass.

I dug out "Help" soundtrack from the Capitol box, and boy there's some weird stereo "echo" on "Ticket to Ride", like it's playing on someone's transistor from down a tunnel. Stereo *and* mono versions.

Say it ain't so, someone!

As with all Capitol Beatles albums up until Rubber Soul, Help! was "Dexterized." The process (adding assloads of reverb, and making shitty "duophonic" mixes) refers to Capitol's Beatles-hating A&R man, Dave Dexter. He reportedly assembled the Help! soundtrack in a single evening.

don't be stupid guy, obviously its better than the mono bcz it was done later

duh

Geir especially misses the point of the mono mixes when he states that we "naturally" hear in stereo, therefore all mixes should be done in stereo. I can't speak for Geir, but I've never witnessed a musical performance in which I could only hear the singers' voices in my left ear and could only hear their instruments in my right ear. It's the height of un-naturalness to hear music this way.

Only if you think that music=live concerts. To me, concerts mean zilch and nada. What matters is what is created in the studio, doing things as perfectly as possible. The ones reaching the highest levels of success in this matter would be acts such as 10cc, Steely Dan or "Brothers In Arms" era Dire Straits. Obviously, The Beatles didn't have the equipment back then that could possibly make their recordings sound as good as those, but the stereo mixes is an attempt to try to get just a little bit closer to the audio perfection of the aforementioned bands, which IMO is always a goal to at least try to reach. One should always try for as perfect audio quality as possible. Which was of course not on the same level in 1963 as it was in the golden age of hi-fi in the 70s and 80s. But still...

http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/facepalm.jpg

The guitar on Drive My Car really snaps

maybe it's years of 'seperation' in cinemas and on stereo / 5.1 dvds but i can't understand this whole mono love at all. listen to I FEEL FINE for example and tell me that sonically and every which way it doesn't just sound a million times better. it's the 21st century! this is how it's meant to sound now!

the stereo mixes is an attempt to try to get just a little bit closer to the audio perfection of the aforementioned bands
If that was so, Geir, then why didn't they work harder at it, hm?

I'm not a mono purist by any means, and lawd knows I love me some stereo, but regardless I'd rather hear the thing that was laboured over and loved, rather than the thing that was slapped together at the last minute to fill a smallish but growing (and therefore commercially but, evidently, not artistically, at least not in this case significant) segment of the market.

YMMV, obviously.

I don't understand your point at all Geir. (tqh I haven't understood any of your upthread points either so I'm probably asking for it but whatever). Those early mono mixes, as far as I can understand, were a complete labor of love for The Beatles and Martin...mixed to be as pleasing to the ear as possible. Right? Can we accept that at the very least? If that can be an accepted starting point, then I don't understand why just the plain fact of it being in 'mono' negates anything they've put into the mix. I don't get how you dismiss it out of hand just for being 'mono'...as though that were a bad thing or that the sounds contained within are somehow inferior. The first half of Wizard Of Oz was filmed in black and white...doesn't mean it's necessarily worse than the technicolor half. Bad analogy but gah, I'm at a loss to understand where you're coming from.

Forget it, Jake, it's Geirtown

lol

I don't understand your point at all Geir. (tqh I haven't understood any of your upthread points either so I'm probably asking for it but whatever). Those early mono mixes, as far as I can understand, were a complete labor of love for The Beatles and Martin...mixed to be as pleasing to the ear as possible. Right? Can we accept that at the very least?

They worked more on it back then because mono was a bit like 5:1 is today, some futuristic format that people maybe didn't believe in (plus they probably didn't expect to become "canon" at that stage anyway). But it's a question of taste, and I don't like the supposed "bunch" that tended to come with mono mixes either. In the case of Motown, it sounds much more polished in stereo, with less "punch", and that is partly why I like the stereo better.

I can buy that maybe the mono masters of the first two albums are preferrable for some people, because two channel stereo sounds really weird in headphones not least. But from "A Hard Day's Night" onwards, stereo is all that counts. And, as for "Sgt. Pepper", it was said for a long time that it was the first stereo mix they really worked on, maybe not Beatles, but surely George Martin alone, and it's only in recent years that people have started speaking so nicely about the mono mix being the only bit that counts. Like, then, why did George Martin work so carefully with the vocals on "A Day In The Life" going from side to side, for instance?

"Stereo" you mean? (first sentence)

As I've said before, Mono is harder to mix.

Plus, Stereo is "right, take the settings that we noted for Mono, stick guitar over there a bit, bass over there a bit, pan the vocals out, yup, sounds good, go."

i.e. if they were *only* mixing stereo, it would take almost as long to do as Mono *and* stereo.

I prefer stereo to mono, and by quite a margin, but Geir you talk a lot of nonsense about this subject.

The only thing lost in stereo mixes are those few overdubs. Overdubs are really a disgrace seen in retrospect, but I can understand why they did it back then. Now, the only case of a really crucial overdub in the Beatles catalogue is "I Am The Walrus", which was also the reason why the stereo mix becomes mono halfway into the song. But there are some glaring cases in other catalogues, like Beach Boys "I Get Around" and Status Quo's "Pictures Of Matchstick Men", which cannot really be corrected. Which IMO sucks, but obviously they didn't think of the stereo mixes as important then. Today they are though, also stereo mixes of 60s material.

There was that famous "extra snare hit" on the Zombies' "She's not there" that was added during the mastering process, and so is missing from the stereo version.

Until they called up the drummer recently, and he still had the very same snare, so he popped along and they re-recorded it. and it sounds the same as it did!

Would have been considerably harder to get the exact same radio noise on "I Am The Walrus" though. :)

I believe the most recent stereo version of "Itchycoo Park" had more phasing added to sound more like the mono mix though, so it's not always impossible to work on the stereo version afterwards.

Well, the "Ogden's" was mixed so that tracks flow from/to, originally.

The stereo one ended up being separated trackwise. I believe, anyway...

listening to the mono box now....these early albums are so vastly superior and tougher sounding!

weird thing though: does anyone else get this weird brain trick thing happening where i SWEAR certain things in the mono mixes seem like they are slightly right or slightly left, but I know this is not possible!

like i wonder if it's just sort of my brain arranging things based on years of listening to stereo mixes.

like i wonder if it's just sort of my brain arranging things based on years of listening to stereo mixes GEIR

fuck dude, what if Geir is like my inner rockist Tyler Durden and I've been posting all this bullshit about Travis and Coldplay?????????

http://blog.redfin.com/sfbay/files/2008/04/drjekyllmrhyde.jpg

I've been rewatching the Anthology on youtube and they talk about mono v. stereo recording/mixing here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=98BZDVmmTN4&feature=PlayList&p=B9CA9F960CB897F7&index=57&playnext=2&playnext_from=PL

a couple minutes in. Obviously no John.

"Every Little Thing" off Beatles For Sale is such a great song. The Lennon creepy misanthropic shit off this album is high level songwriting.

Maybe 'Run For Your Life' is a BFS leftover.

yeah that takes it the creepy extreme but "no reply" has that sorta stalkerish vibe too

Speaking of For Sale, I think I prefer the stereo on this one (listening on headphones to decent bitrate mp3s).

Was going to start listening to more Beatles, but I'm still waiting for the hype to die down.

Hahaha. Yeah, you wouldn't want to find yourself sharing the Beatles with anyone else!

Agreed about how awesome the stereo version of "Beatles for Sale" sounds.

McCartney's vocals really jump out on "Baby's in Black". Also love the cymbal crashes on "No Reply", the acoustic guitar on "Honey Don't", and harmonies on "Eight Days a Week". Plus, the refined bass tone really rocks on "Rock and Roll Mucic" and "Kansas City".

All in all, this is my favorite remastering job of the first 5 albums.

Yeah the harmonies on "Baby's In Black" become more affecting in stereo somehow.

I really haven't a/b'ed these much yet, mostly going through the lot sequentially in mono first, but after listening to the mono For Sale I had to go compare the stereo.

ffs my Sgt Pepper CD skips in two different places - it's enough to put you off buying music.

I've been rewatching the Anthology on youtube and they talk about mono v. stereo recording/mixing here:

you lie!

could someone direct me to the definitive beatles album poll pls?

Not a poll but this 'Only Pick 10' thread threw up some interesting choices:
The Beatles OP10 (or, that would be, only pick ten)

Yeah - I watched that Anthology clip and sat through the Ballad of John and Yoko - easily my least favourite single of theirs. Is this the new rickrolling...

Ha, I must have posted the rong youtube, I'm sorry! I'll find it later, after I've had some caffiene.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2J9zIuredY

About 4 and a half minutes in.

argh, embedding disabled on request. screw it, watch it for yourself. :)

As for chart positions, the Norwegian chart has listed the stereo box as an item of its own, which places it at #3. The stereo box is now sold out though, so I would expect the single albums to climb considerably next week. So far, "Abbey Road", "Sgt. Pepper", "Revolver" and "The Beatles" are in the list, but only between 20 and 40.

So are there loads of Mono ones over there?

It's funny, I looked at the Mono box, and the back was all "ooh, you are obviously a discerning Beatles fan! Not for you the easy digipack of the Stereo box, with it's admittedly more CDs in it. This box has lovely facsimile replications of the sleeves and inners and extra inserts where applicable. And a book telling you about the importance of the mono mixes in the legend of the Beatles. But of course you know all that already, right?"

Both boxes are sold out, but apparently both are supposed to back in, at least judging from what Platekompaniet (the biggest chain here) are telling their customers, who can apply for ordering new boxes, both stereo and mono alike.

I already have my stereo box and have no intention of buying anything else at all.

I dug up my mono LPs, everything pretty much up to the White album.

Except for "Beatles for Sale", my nice German original Odeon one. ahhh....

Also, there's something about that green label on the "Hard days night" one as well.

(both of those are stereo)

Will be buying another remaster within the next week or two, and I'm completely torn.

White album? or Revolver?

And I have a dumb-ish question...Geir, you're exempt from this one, lol...is it worthwhile picking up the stereo remasters of any/all of the first 5, pre-Rubber Soul? I want the Mono Box so bad, but who knows when that'll ever happen...are any of the first 5 albums better now than before with the stereo remaster? I have 87's of Hard Day's Night and Help...
And I know this is basically what you've all been talking about since 9/9, but I think I've been reading so much that I've stunted my decision making completely. HALP :)

Every one of these remasters sounds better than what we've heard before. Unless you have a mono box pre-ordered, I don't think you'll regret picking up any of these in stereo.

I've got a late in the game Amazon order on the Mono box, but I'm pretty sure it's a pipe dream at this stage of the game.

thanks Nate!!

Well, if you're serious enough to order the Mono Box, you might wanna just wait? :)

Overall though, they took 4 years to remaster these from the original master tapes. They sound awesome and the packaging is really nice.

I just dug out all my old mono vinyl. Never really gave them much notice til all this hoopla. I'm still dying to hear mono Pepper.

Well...when I say "order"...it's in the hopes that my husband will take pity on my desperation and buy it for me for Christmas. But he thinks I'm 100% nuts.

The mono Pepper is what I'm going nuts to hear. In my mind it's been built up to be like the unicorn of recorded music. And I don't want any leaked mp3 guff...must have the real thing.

Seriously, these remasters have given me some kind of crazyperson disease.

wouldn't the real thing be vinyl?