First pressing John Lennon Imagine

No , the other was "Shaved Fish". I bought them both as soon as they were issued in the UK, there were complaints about the "hiss" and EMI then reissued both discs and offered an exchange to early purchasers ( how about that !) .
I took them up on the offer and exchanged both discs for "improved" versions. Its so long ago now that I cant tell you what the differences were, but I remember not being able to hear much difference on my very early CD system. Wish I'd not done it now

Cheers
John

 

Rocky....I have that same disc..just found one recently...mint condition..(mine is an "AR 1A4 TO" pressing....) your description of the sound on this disc is right on.....it sounds fantastic...very open..as open as this recording can be.....those clicks on the first track are a sure way to tell if you have an original pressing that was not no noised.....all later pressings removed those clicks..and also Georges "4" on the intro to "Oh My Love"..also deleted from later pressings. Wheather you have a Japanese issue or a UK issue the design on the discs are the same..mfg by Toshiba EMI...only the UK disc has the UK CD-PAS 10004 markings under the box with the catalog number and the word "Stereo".
The knock in "8 Arms To Hold You" about this disc being too hissy and the no noised version better is one of the few dissagreements I've had with that book...all I can say is I'm glad I found one of these....

JF

 

I have been keeping up on this thread, and just a few comments. The gold disc mentioned earlier is actually quite a bit different than the Toshiba disc in question, different master or something. I have heard the gold disc and I have compared it in a direct A/B comparison to my Toshiba and the gold disc has the reverbs on John's voice, that Phil Spector "wall of sound." As far as I know, the Toshiba is the only disc I have heard that contains the no-reverb version of Imagine. Another thing, since there is no dis-agreement that this Toshiba exists, does anybody know how many were pressed in that short period that they had this master in their possesion. I am very curious because I haven't come across very many of these Toshiba Imagines, and it does go so good with the Toshiba Abbey Road. Actually, the Toshiba Abbey Road is by far the Best version of Abbey Road in existance, bar none.

 

I'm not sure if this was mentioned, but the CDP 7 46641 2
CP32-5451 pressing (see scan above) also has the "clicks" on the 1st track & George's "4" on the intro to "Oh My Love"....

 

You have to be careful if you are looking for the Toshiba/EMI pressing of Imagine. I bought a copy that the same booklet and inlay as the the one posted by Vinylrec but had the later NoNoised Disc in it I gave it away.

Later I found and bought both the regular (original)Toshiba/EMI disc and the Gold Disc version. Much better!

 

Well, I've just checked mine.....

My copy of Imagine, even though it has a "manufacturer property not for sale" sticker on it is the no noised version.

My version of Shaved Fish is the Toshiba version with all it's hissiness.


I remember thinking when I got the Imagine CD how much better the title track was without all that nasty hiss...

Ah, hindsight is not necessarily a wonderful thing. Just done an a/b test with Imagine (clicks and hiss) from Shaved Fish to the No noised Imagine CD.

You know, you folks are right.... it sounds so much better!



Nobby.

 

Be aware that "Imagine" on the non no-noised Shaved Fish is not the same as on the non no-noised Imagine CD. The Shaved Fish one has more distortion/clicks and is brighter.