T_Totler
09-09-2009, 06:19 PM
...then this collection is for you :)
The folks at Apple Corps and EMI – the empire the Beatles built – certainly know their stuff.
With the CD format in its final throes, they're making one last effort to convince music fans that their new boxed set of the entire Beatles back catalogue, available today for the first time in painstakingly remastered, digitized stereo, will make all your old Beatles recordings obsolete; and that the $300 asking price for the 13 studio albums, plus double CD of non-album, extended-play and alternative cuts, as well as a DVD of mini-documentaries with rare footage, voice-overs and photographs, is a small sacrifice for such a noble and exhaustingly complete post-modern masterpiece.
They're right on the money, of course. The new Beatles boxed set is a wonderful thing, containing some 217 songs repolished to crystalline perfection and reformatted deferentially into two audio channels without, for the most part, diminishing the enduring charm and excitement of the original versions of the songs, most of which were mixed and released in the single channel format, the standard format 40 years ago.
For subsequent generations who've grown up in a stereo world this set may be something of a revelation.
The songs do have additional dimension and clarity, with each sound ascribed a distinct position in the stereo spectrum. Musicians and hi-fi perfectionists may actually be able to hear the click of a plectrum on George Harrison's steel guitar strings, the spittle frothing at the end of Paul McCartney's tongue, the sardonic sneer that shapes John Lennon's vowels and even the occasional squeak of Ringo's bass drum pedal.
They will also hear succinct evidence of each player's individual technique: little errors in timing and quirks of musical judgment that were buried in the mono mixes for the greater good of the song.
And with the stylish extras – each album comes with a booklet featuring the original art work, liner notes, extra photographs and historical data about the recording – it's no surprise that Amazon.com has already sold out its original pre-release allotment and is taking back orders for future delivery.
The Beatles' marketers have been particularly cunning, however, by banking on the belief that high-end audiophile consumers, collectors and true Beatles fans will eschew the stereo jiggery pokery for a boxed set of the Beatles' 10 original mono albums (up to and including The White Album) cleaned up, digitized and remastered in glorious mono. It's on sale today too.
Again, they're on the money. The Beatles in Mono set, featuring miniaturized exact replicas of the original covers and artwork, costs about $100 more than the stereo collection and is selling twice as fast.
No surprise, really. To use one musical wag's analogy, listening to the mono set is like dipping into fresh, organic guacamole. Listening to the stereo set is akin to being served a dish of chemically enhanced avocados, tomatoes, onions, lime and salt, and a mortar and pestle. Make of it what you will, but it probably won't taste like the real thing.Source (http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/music/article/692701)
The folks at Apple Corps and EMI – the empire the Beatles built – certainly know their stuff.
With the CD format in its final throes, they're making one last effort to convince music fans that their new boxed set of the entire Beatles back catalogue, available today for the first time in painstakingly remastered, digitized stereo, will make all your old Beatles recordings obsolete; and that the $300 asking price for the 13 studio albums, plus double CD of non-album, extended-play and alternative cuts, as well as a DVD of mini-documentaries with rare footage, voice-overs and photographs, is a small sacrifice for such a noble and exhaustingly complete post-modern masterpiece.
They're right on the money, of course. The new Beatles boxed set is a wonderful thing, containing some 217 songs repolished to crystalline perfection and reformatted deferentially into two audio channels without, for the most part, diminishing the enduring charm and excitement of the original versions of the songs, most of which were mixed and released in the single channel format, the standard format 40 years ago.
For subsequent generations who've grown up in a stereo world this set may be something of a revelation.
The songs do have additional dimension and clarity, with each sound ascribed a distinct position in the stereo spectrum. Musicians and hi-fi perfectionists may actually be able to hear the click of a plectrum on George Harrison's steel guitar strings, the spittle frothing at the end of Paul McCartney's tongue, the sardonic sneer that shapes John Lennon's vowels and even the occasional squeak of Ringo's bass drum pedal.
They will also hear succinct evidence of each player's individual technique: little errors in timing and quirks of musical judgment that were buried in the mono mixes for the greater good of the song.
And with the stylish extras – each album comes with a booklet featuring the original art work, liner notes, extra photographs and historical data about the recording – it's no surprise that Amazon.com has already sold out its original pre-release allotment and is taking back orders for future delivery.
The Beatles' marketers have been particularly cunning, however, by banking on the belief that high-end audiophile consumers, collectors and true Beatles fans will eschew the stereo jiggery pokery for a boxed set of the Beatles' 10 original mono albums (up to and including The White Album) cleaned up, digitized and remastered in glorious mono. It's on sale today too.
Again, they're on the money. The Beatles in Mono set, featuring miniaturized exact replicas of the original covers and artwork, costs about $100 more than the stereo collection and is selling twice as fast.
No surprise, really. To use one musical wag's analogy, listening to the mono set is like dipping into fresh, organic guacamole. Listening to the stereo set is akin to being served a dish of chemically enhanced avocados, tomatoes, onions, lime and salt, and a mortar and pestle. Make of it what you will, but it probably won't taste like the real thing.Source (http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/music/article/692701)