Beach Boys Pet Sounds & Surf's Up DVDs

Have these been released yet and has anyone heard them? I'm dying to know what they sound like and how they separated the tracks. Also is there any bonus material on there. Thanks

 

>>>I'm sure they will be just like the 5.1 tracks on the "Endless Harmony" DVD.....and those were FANTASTIC!!!

 

No, these haven't been released yet. I don't believe there is even a street date yet. I've looked at dvdplanet.com and not even an option for preorder.

 

Yes, the tracks on the "Endless harmony" DVd are a preview and quite good. "Surf's Up" is EXCELLENT!

 

But the original quadraphonic mix was even BETTER (ALL the LPs were quad). I wish they would use the original mix AS THE BEACH BOYS ORIGINALLY RECORDED IT! It wasn't an after the fact remix like most quad LPs---The Beach Boys were among the most active and vocal proponents of multi-channel in the 70s--Got To Know The Woman & Cool Cool Water off of Sunflower were the 1st quad tracks ever released. Surf's Up and Carl And The Passions...So Tough were also released only in quad. Unfortunately they were encoded in the little-used EV-4 system, so it was hard to decode them perfectly, but SQ does a pretty good job of it. I would KILL for a straight transfer of these tapes, but don't expect it as the Endless Harmony tracks are new remixes.

 

I guess I'll have to get DVD-A for Surf's Up AND SACD for the Stones/Who. I wish the price on the Pioneer player would come down (there website says it's $6000).

 

I didn't notice that Pioneer Elite has a SACD/DVD-A for $1200 (that's still about $700 more than I want to spend).

 

I got an album by the Flame, on brother records produced by Carl Wilson.
It says on the cover STEREO-compatible Quadrophonic Sound.
I wish I had a scanner so I could show you this paper that comes with it
that shows a diagram to hook up two extra speakers to hear the quad.
It says:
"This recording uses the patented Dynaco, Inc sytem for compatible quadrophonic sound. Of course, the recording may also be played, with superior results, in stereo or mono. Quadrophonic sound, like stereo, uses two main speakers in front of the listener. But quad gives the listener two more speakers-at the rear-which disseminate ambient information not heard through the two main speakers. This recording, played back on quad equipment, totally enjulfs the listener in sound, almost transporting him to the studio in which the Flame recorded this album. Two extra speakers and some wire are all that are needed to convert from stereo to Brother compatible quadrophonic. For additional technical information, wire Brother Records, 154 North Ivar, Hollywood CA 90028."
It's on a label like the Warner Bros. type Brother label, but it says manufactured and distributed by Starday-King records.
The guitarist, Blondie Chaplin, and drummer Ricky Fataar later played live with the Beach Boys.
I bought this in a 7-11 type store bargain bin in Mississippi for a buck.

 

Struck up a conversation with a fellow Stones remaster customer at Best Buy who owns Pioneer's universal unit. He said he got his for $599, so you may want to check around. I'm not sure if that unit is reviewing particularly well, but at that price, having universal playback capability is pretty cool.

Kind of makes all of the "format wars" threads pointless.

 

I also have this LP and it sounds great in quad! (If the LP isn't rare enough for you, try to find one with the poster!) The setup for Dynaquad is easy. Just wire the rear speakers on the same inputs as the fronts but CROSS the negative wires (in other words, LR+ connected to LF+, RR+ connected to RF+, LR- connected to RF- & RR- connected to LF-). This throws out-of-phase material into the back speakers--it was the cheap way to quad in the 70s (it was pretty much how the Dynaco passive decoders operated, with a resistor thrown in to lower the rear volume). The Beach Boys used controlled out-of-phase info to get their surround, taking advantage of this phenomenon. It also worked great for synthesizing quad out of some stereo LPs.

Starday-King was supposed to distribute all non-Beach Boy product on Brother, but, as far as I know, only the Flame LP came out this way.

 

is this not how dolby pro logic works? anyone tried listening anyof these w/ dpl? should it work w/ the cds or are the vinyl special?

 

Not quite. DPL is based on SQ quad, but it basically moved one of the back separate channels & made it the center channel, leaving mono surrounds instead of the stereo surrounds SQ had (the back channels are mono now because only 1 channel was now left for the rears). If you play these back using DPL, pretty much everything gets sucked into the middle speaker. Dynaquad or EV-4 used out-of-phase info for the rears & had no center (nor did any OTHER quad system).
The older Caribou CDs did decode very nicely into SQ (not an exact channel match with the original Dynaco mixes, but pretty close). I read when the new Capitol versions were released that the quad was stripped off them, but I don't see how that would have been possible , since the quad was built into the original mixes. I haven't been able to check out the new ones since my DVD-A player now takes up the 5.1 input I used to have my SQ decoder plugged into, & I don't have a switcher yet.

 

wow, i didnt know that later beach boys stuff was quad-ish too. I'm a'gonna have to rig something up and listen to this stuff!

 

Since I've owned Surf's Up on every format (except the Quad LP and reel to reel) I'll buy the DVD-A even if I never buy a player.

 

A man after my own heart.

Gardo

 

Well, as nobody else is gonna chime in with this, FWIW Mr. Fataar was also in the Rutles. Neato, yeah?

-D

 

...and played drums for Bonnie Raitt for at least ten years, including on her breakthrough "Nick Of Time" CD.

 

There is no "Quad LP". The REGULAR LP is the quad LP. The Beach Boys' quad stuff was single inventory. You already own the "Quad LP"!

 

I've listened to "Surf's Up" and "Carl & The Passions" through a Dynaco Quadaptor, Electrovoice EV-4 decoder, Fosgate Tate SQ decoder, and a Sansui QS decoder. The QS decoder did the best job of decoding these discs by a long shot. However, that's not saying a whole lot. There are some interesting moments (most notably, "Cool Cool Water") but for the most part, you're not missing out on much here. The remixes from the "Endless Harmony" are a massive improvement. The Beach Boys dabbled in the Dynaco quad method of ambience recovery, but it was too little too soon and they shortly abandoned the idea of quad and never revisited it after it had a chance to mature a little.

In any event, I am certainly looking forward to the DVD-A titles that have been announced. The "Endless Harmony" DVD has been a tantalizing tease of what is to come.

 

Steve, ever since you first mentioned this we've been trying to determine if the Harvest LP is indeed an SQ quadraphonic recording (with "we" being a group of surround-sound nerds I correspond with).

I've listened to my original U.S. pressing and a German reissue, and they both perform pretty much the same through my SQ decoder. If they are SQ quad recordings, they were done very poorly. They don't offer anything more than the usual ambience recovery you get when you play a stereo recording through the SQ decoder.

I know you mentioned that the master tape box had a big "SQ" written on it. A friend of mine theorized that since Harvest was recorded at Quad Studios, that perhaps this lead to an impression that it is a quad recording. As you know, Quad Studios was just a name, and didn't have anything to do with quadraphonic recordings. The "SQ" on the box could have been someone's dyslexia when they meant "QS", shorthand for Quad Studios.

Anyway, just a few thoughts. I'd be curious to hear more about this because Harvest really doesn't sound like a quad recording to me.

 

How about Pro Logic II (which synthesizes stereo surround and a center)?