Rubber Soul CD - Canadian Pressing Featuring Original UK Mixes?

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by button, Apr 9, 2006.

  1. RobertKaneda

    RobertKaneda New Member

    Location:
    Paris, France
    It would seem, therefore, that very few Beatles collectors are buddhist. Should we take a POLL?
     
  2. Sean Murdock

    Sean Murdock Forum Intruder

    Location:
    Bergenfield, NJ
    Mal, that was hilarious, and I laughed out loud ----- but I actually agree with Robert. Sometimes we "discover" things in plain sight simply because we're looking for them. I know that all the intense scrutiny over Capitol Albums vol. 2 have made me go back to my U.S. LP needledrops and listen more closely. I hadn't remembered the "bump" in "Run For Your Life" or the drop-out in "Kansas City" ... and I never would have listened for them in the vol. 2 CDs -- but I will be NOW. I call this the "remaster effect": I get the "latest and greatest" remaster of Album X, I sit in a quiet room with the headphones on, and I listen in awe at all the things I "never heard before." Inevitably, if I play the OLD CD, I discover that those things WERE there -- I just wasn't listening for them.

    There's been so much internet chatter in the last 2 weeks about "right" and "wrong" mixes for "Help" and "Rubber Soul" -- it was only a matter of time before someone took a closer listen to their Canadian CDs that they've heard 1000 times without ever wondering about the mix.... and viola! A little CD miracle appears!
     
  3. CardinalFang

    CardinalFang New Member

    Location:
    ....
    It would be inaccurate. The poll would only apply to Beatles collectors registered on this forum. Very few "easterners" here. :laugh:
     
  4. brainwashed

    brainwashed Forum Hall Of Fame

    Location:
    Boston, MA
    Mix Magazine, CDAUDIO, RECORD COLLECTOR...all articles from 1987...Martin actually gives some conflicting information...for instance, he insists they never released STEREO LPs of Please Please Me or With the Beatles...when quite obviously they did. He mixed some of these himself....as did engineeer and co-producer Ron Richards. We've re-printed some of these articles in the past...try searching the archives for Beatles remasters...Ron
     
  5. RobertKaneda

    RobertKaneda New Member

    Location:
    Paris, France
    Of all the many things I've laughed about while reading all these threads, Mal's quip (at my expense) was the funniest of them all. If we're not laughing about all this, we really are too far gone.
     
  6. pcain

    pcain Forum Resident

    Location:
    Minneapolis, MN
    Did anyone else read Mal's quip in Groucho's voice? My chuckle got a few stares from my co-workers! :)
     
  7. CardinalFang

    CardinalFang New Member

    Location:
    ....
    http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/showpost.php?p=1557531&postcount=69

     
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  8. Jack White

    Jack White Senior Member

    Location:
    Canada
    Disque Americ has a plant in Quebec and North Carolina. The Canadian Beatles CDs were most likely pressed at the Quebec facility.
     
  9. Paul Grayson

    Paul Grayson New Member

    Location:
    UK
    Well, Martin didn't prepare any stereo masters. EMI used just two-track tape for pop music in those days. Vocal music was recorded with the backing on one track and the vocals on the other in order to allow them to re-record the vocals for one of the continental European markets without re-recording the backing. Stereo wasn't even a thought then.

    However it looks like someone further along the chain decided it would be a good idea to exploit the stereo market by releasing these albums in stereo, which was nothing more than a direct issue of the two-track tape. In fact the stereo issue of Please Please Me appeared a few weeks after the mono issue, making it look like an afterthought.
     
  10. JJ75

    JJ75 Forum Resident

    Location:
    London UK
    Erm, sorry but no it wasn't. There are edits and variations in the Stereo, which you don't find in the mono. The stereo releases do use tapes specially prepared for stereo release, not a complilation of the twin-track session tapes.

    JJ
     
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  11. Jack White

    Jack White Senior Member

    Location:
    Canada
    I spent the morning at the CD shops. The current stock of Beatles' CDs are pressed by EMI. Sorry!

    As far as I can figure, Disque Americ was pressing Beatles CDs from the late '80s (1989 perhaps) to 1994 ('Live! At the BBC' [1994] is pressed by DA; 'Anthology 1' [1995] is pressed by EMI). So, in those five or six years they must have pressed tens of thousands of these unique 'Help!' and 'Rubber Soul' discs. They should not be that rare.
     
  12. Muddy Holly

    Muddy Holly Senior Member

    While I'm a Beatles Fan (as apposed to fan), I guess you could say I'm not a FAN. When I purchased the RS CD, the LP began to gather dust (space restrictions, convenience, yada yada yada). I never had any complaints about my (Disque Americ) CD and I guess now I know why - but I didn't have anything to compare it to so I didn't know it sounded any different from (almost) everthing else out there. I'm sure this is the case for many people.
    When searching for the Canadian Disque Americ version, as I stated in my earlier post, while the spines may look the same on different Canadian releases, the "Beatles/Apple" disclaimer doesn't appear on the back of the Disque Americ version, to the best of my knowledge.
    Dave
     
  13. brainwashed

    brainwashed Forum Hall Of Fame

    Location:
    Boston, MA
  14. musicfan37

    musicfan37 Senior Member

    Wow! Another Beatles thread that seems to be taking off. What a surprise. :D
     
  15. Jack White

    Jack White Senior Member

    Location:
    Canada
    That's correct.

    The identifying features of the Canadian CD UK mixes of 'Help! and 'Rubber Soul' are:

    (1) on the inner hub of the disc Disque Americ is identified as the manufacturer;
    (2) the identifying serial numbers on the CD spine are C2 46439 for 'Help!' and C2 46440 for 'Rubber Soul';
    (3) 'Rubber Soul' is 36:00 in length [Sorry don't know the length of DA 'Help!'];
    (4) on the back cover the Apple logo appears;
    (5) on the back cover 'Made in Canada' is printed and
    (6) on the back cover the copyright/ trademark protection statement, "Beatles, Apple and the Apple logos are Trademarks of Apple Corps. Ltd.", does NOT appear. This statement only appears on the later EMI pressings.
     
  16. brainwashed

    brainwashed Forum Hall Of Fame

    Location:
    Boston, MA
    JJ is absolutely correct. Except for Love Me So and PS I Love You, Martin and Ron Richards mixed each and every song on Please Please Me for stereo and mono. He did this for the next single session too. From Me To You and Thank You Girl were mixed into stereo AND mono. The stereo and mono mixing for PPM was done concurrently on 25 February by George Martin and Norman Smith, the stereo mixes are NOT simple 2-track transfers. Ron
     
  17. cvila

    cvila Senior Member

    Location:
    USA
    Nice, thanks. Can you edit in the timing differences to make this the definitive reference post for the archives?
     
  18. RobertKaneda

    RobertKaneda New Member

    Location:
    Paris, France
    Well, we've got Robert Lan in Taipei. We could skew the poll to give his vote extra weight. But if he's a Westerner in Taipei (as by all indications, he is), should that count?
     
  19. EMI Canada or Capitol/EMI as they were known in those days released the Twist And Shout, Beatlemania! With The Beatles and Long Tall Sally LPs in stereo in around 1978, not 1987 on the Purple Capitol label. Later they were re-pressed on the black/rainbow retro label in around 1982-83 or whenever Capitol started using the famous 60s label again. I have stereo LP pressings with both label variations.
     
  20. munson66

    munson66 Forum Dilettante

    Location:
    Toronto, Ontario
    There's a bit of "broken telephone" going on here. The Canadian pressings of Help! and Rubber Soul have the following on the inside band, readable when you're looking at the label side: "made by / fabriqué par DISQUE AMERIC <logo> CANADA."

    The Capitol trademark copy at 3 o'clock on the disc includes "Made in Canada," as does the copy on the tray liner (see my scan of Help!).

    The back page of the Help! booklet also reads "Printed in Canada."

    Legitimate manufacturers don't play fast and loose with this stuff, especially when the goods are destined for the stated country of origin.

    It's still tough to pin down how these versions of "Dizzy Miss Lizzie" or "Run for Your Life" ended up on CDs. Taken from US-derived LP masters? Seems like a lot of effort, and editing. To get the UK running order of Help!, you've got to bring together elements from the US Help, Yesterday & Today, Rubber Soul, and Beatles VI. Geez, that's a lot of splicing tape. Then you've got to create a digital master. Only then can you send a digital tape to Americ to make CD masters. So much easier to take whatever tape you got in the mail from Thorn-EMI (either directly, or from the Tower) and send it to the pressing plant for mastering.

    As noted, Cap of Can has made some interesting independent decisions. But this looks more like a mistake that originated in the UK and wasn't caught or noticed in Canada. Since EMI in the UK were supposed to be in command of all catalog decisions from here on in, I don't even think we can accuse Canadian Capitol of being delinquent in their duties.

    "Here's the new Rubber Soul master."

    "Thank you. Hey, how come it doesn't sound like the RS master in the vault?"

    "That's the US LP master. This is the definitive CD master. Everybody's getting the same one. And it'll sound exactly the same, no matter where in the world you buy it. We like to call it a [using Dr. Evil-style air quotes] 'digital clone.'"

    "Oh, okay.... Hello, Drummondville? Crank up the presses! And put the new Glass Tiger on hold."
     
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  21. CardinalFang

    CardinalFang New Member

    Location:
    ....
    :laugh:

    Was Glass Tiger still relevant in 1987? :winkgrin:
     
  22. Paul Grayson

    Paul Grayson New Member

    Location:
    UK
    Sorry, my mistake. Never even heard a stereo copy of the first two albums, well at least since after the CD was released. My sister did get a copy from a record club in a mystery mail-out, but it went to a friend.
     
  23. Jack White

    Jack White Senior Member

    Location:
    Canada
    I don't have the DA 'Help!' and therefore do not know it's length. I did edit in the length info of 'RS'.
     
  24. munson66

    munson66 Forum Dilettante

    Location:
    Toronto, Ontario
    Mostly, but not exclusively, British material. A couple of early Rich Little recordings are in the 6000 Series. And they'd pick up the odd American title that had come out on Tower in the US (Dean Martin had a couple of these, and one by Harry Nilsson, and of course "The Pink Floyd").

    Around '66, a bit of a Canadian A&R program began to develop, with acts like The Staccatos (later the Five-Man Electrical Band). With the CanCon boom of the late '60s and early '70s, there was Anne Murray, Edward Bear, Shirley Eikhard, Pierre Lalonde (later a host of a cheesey Canadian game show called "The Mad Dash"). There was also one more Beatles album in the 6000 series: little something called Let It Be (#6351, the box-set version with the book).

    There certainly were some mix-ups at C-of-C around this time. I got a late reissue of Beatles VI, catalogue #ST-2358, with the bumf about the Full-Dimensional Stereo on the back of the sleeve, and inside there was a mono record! My LP of Help! (C1-46439) had the movie songs in mono, with side 2 in stereo. Currently sitting somewhere in storage, or else I'd give it a spin and see which "Dizzy Miss Lizzie" is on it.
     
  25. Jack White

    Jack White Senior Member

    Location:
    Canada
    My thoughts exactly. It's most logical that this mistake originated in the UK. Someone intially made a digital master for H! and RS when the Beatles CDs were in pre-production (i.e. pre 1987 release date). These masters were rejected and placed in storage. A couple of years, when Capitol/ EMI Canada wanted to press domestic CDs instead of importing them, they asked for the digital masters from EMI UK. Someone simply sent them (probably digital dups of the 'wrong' digital masters) the 'wrong' ones by accident. Upon arrival, they were probably sent immediately to DA who then were contracted to press the CDs.

    What I'm wondering is, did someone notice this and correct the digital masters when DA's contract expired and EMI Canada started to press their own discs?
     
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