The Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's 50th Anniversary (Content, Sound Quality & Discussion Thread Only!)

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by hodgo, Apr 5, 2017.

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  1. Tim Müller

    Tim Müller Forum Resident

    Location:
    Germany
    I listen now through the outtakes discs (discs 2 and 3 of the Deluxe Box Set), where the outtakes are arranged in chronolical order of start of recording...

    They started off with some extremely good songs:
    Strawberry fields.
    (Sixty-Four, a song McCartney wrote when he was a teenager. Maybe just a song, McCartney used because he needed to provide a song after Lennon popped up with the great Strawberry Fields.)
    Penny Lane.
    Day in the Life.
    Sgt. Pepper.

    And then, the quality of the songs, or their arrangements, became worse than the songs mentioned above:
    Good Morning (at least there's some 5/4 beat bars in it, unusual for the 4/4 beat feel of standard rock songs).
    Fixing a hole. The outakes show and reveal how clueless McCartney was on the direction how this song should go to...
    Mr. Kite. (Lennon already had at least a clue of direction for this song.)
    Lovely Rita (a pop tune by McCartney).
    Lucy in the Sky (a tune, where Lennon made up the tune as he sang lead through the first few takes).
    Getting better.
    Within you without you.
    Leaving Home (another McCartney's sweeties).
    Little help from my friends (a good song with not-so-good arrangement. Joe Cocker tought them later at Woodstock how to perfom that song right.)
    Sgt. Pepper Reprise (quite good, but just a reprise of an earlier song).

    The programming of the album, with the greatest song Day in the Life being the last, introduced by the long segue of Good Morning and Pepper reprise, makes up a bracket with the intro segue of Pepper and Help from my Friends. However, there's still some not-so-good songs in between.

    The two outakes discs of the Deluxe Box Set make that clear, as the outtakes are presented in chronoligical order of recording. As opposed to the 2-disc Anniversary Set, where selected outtakes are presented in the order of the programming of the released album.


    I feel, that the sound of the drums is better on the outtakes of Pepper than on the "released" version or mix.
    On the outtake, the drums really have punch and power.
    On the released version some of that power is lost.

    I atrribute some of that drum's power to the not-so-much reduced dynamic range of the outtakes, compared to the released versions. From my experience, percussion instruments gain their power from dynamically unlimited first transients. Decay of sounds may be dynamically compressed, but first transients should retain their full impact, with peaks well above the average loudness.

    Best regards
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Aug 20, 2017
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  2. A well respected man

    A well respected man Some Mother's Son

    Location:
    Madrid, Spain
    Actually, the name of the studio was not Abbey Road. They changed it to that some time after the album came out.
     
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  3. Tim Müller

    Tim Müller Forum Resident

    Location:
    Germany
    Yes, you are right. The name was EMI studios. Or maybe, E.M.I. studios.
    I didn't want to extend my posting overly lengthy...
    That's why I left out a lot of details...

    Best regards
     
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  4. soundQman

    soundQman Senior Member

    Location:
    Arlington, VA, USA
    There is a terrific in-depth article, Inside Track, about the Pepper remix in the August issue of Sound On Sound magazine. It includes an interview with Giles Martin and Sam Okell about the project as well as loads of technical detail about the equipment used and how they did the work. Graphics include Pro Tools screen shots and a couple of nice photos of vintage hardware from Abbey Road studios that they retrieved and used.

    Magazine contents
     
    Last edited: Aug 21, 2017
  5. Tim Müller

    Tim Müller Forum Resident

    Location:
    Germany
    I just listen to the original stereo l.p.
    I process it through my ProLogic II decoder in music mode.

    Very interestingly, it processes the backing vocals of the intro song, and Ringo's vocals on Help from my Friends into the rear channels. This processing provides more of an in-depth surrounding surround sound feel than the dedicated 5.1 re-mix on the Blu ray or DVD.
    Also, the bass guitar is very present on this original stereo mix.

    Ironically, this original stereo mix provides much more surround sound than the new surround re-mix.
    However, the sound sometimes is somewhat slightly muddy. Maybe, because the transients of some instruments may have been reduced because of the tape-to-tape copies made during reduction mixes or bounces.

    Best regards
     
  6. Tommyboy

    Tommyboy Senior Member

    Location:
    New York
    Was Abbey Road really behind other studios. What about the creation and use of Artificial Double Tracking?
     
    Last edited: Aug 21, 2017
  7. Tim Müller

    Tim Müller Forum Resident

    Location:
    Germany
    Trident Studios - Wikipedia
    Trident had 8-track while EMI still used 4-track.
    Olympic Studios - Wikipedia
    Olympic had the first 4-track in England.

    Best regards
     
  8. Tommyboy

    Tommyboy Senior Member

    Location:
    New York
    Great, but you didn't really answer my question. Did both of those studios have ADT?

    Other than the tape machines, how did Abbey Road compare technologically to the other studios in London?
     
  9. Lemon Curry

    Lemon Curry (A) Face In The Crowd

    Location:
    Mahwah, NJ
    Take anything from Emerick with a grain of salt. He's been proven flat-out wrong on some of his recollections.

    When I put all the sources I've read together, Abbey Road emerges as a place that put sound quality at such a premium that it refused to ever be on the cutting/bleeding edge, hence the delay for 8 track. But they were highly competent and even groundbreaking within the boundries of the tech they had deployed.
     
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  10. Psychedelic Good Trip

    Psychedelic Good Trip Beautiful Psychedelic Colors Everywhere

    Location:
    New York
    Just wanted to share this.


     
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