Capitol versions: Which Beatles records were remixed by Dave Dexter?

To answer the original post, for the true Dexter treatment, the ones to listen to are:

1. The Beatles Second Album - awash in layers and layers of echo, the entire album (esp. during the oldies tracks Roll Over Beethoven, Money, Long Tall Sally) sounds like its about to capsize. The most prominent sound on this album would have to be "cymbals." Very exciting.

2. Beatles '65 - The essence of Beatlemania in America and a glorious Dexterized mess. I Feel Fine and She's a Woman (which sounds like it could have been on Led Zeppelin II) are the heart of the album, but throughout, George's solos had echo that Carl Perkins could only dream about. "Rock on George, one time for me."

 

Actually, the only two tracks on "Beatles '65" that have any added reverb/echo or other tinkering at ALL are "I Feel Fine" & "She's A Woman". Everything else is exactly as it was on the UK "Beatles For Sale" and "A Hard Day's Night", echo-wise. Mind you, they destroyed those two tracks so severely ("I Feel Fine" & "She's A Woman") that there's more than enough echo for an entire album.

 

Don't forget the all-important medium of AM radio. That was the delivery mechanism that most kids use to hear songs first before buying the albums. Those Dexterized songs sounded particularly exiting when played on AM mono radio stations, rising above the general noise floor inherent in AM broadcasting.

And my goodness, how terrific those Dexterized songs sounded on the family's car radio!

Harry

 

I can't believe this. I don't have the records with me, but "Honey Don't" has no tampering? My strong recollection is that it sounded quite different on my version of Beatles 65?

 

Maybe there are two different versions of the album, just like "Rubber Soul"? My vintage Rainbow copy doesn't have any added echo on "Honey Don't" nor does the Capitol Albums Vol. 1 "Beatles '65" CD.

 

Here's a quote from Bruce Spizer:

http://www.beatlescollecting.com/the-beatles/faqs/the-story-of-the-capitol-albums.html

Harry

 

Thanks, Harry. Not sure I agree with Bruce's "While most of Capitol's duophonic mixes sound great..." comment though.

 

Capitol didn't butcher anything. Meet The Beatles is a stronger album than With The Beatles. It certainly showcases more of their original material and opening the LP with I Want To Hold Your Hand and I Saw Her Standing There was brilliant. Of course this meant the next album was going to be covers-heavy, but it rocks along quite nicely for the most part. The sound however took a drastic step backwards... lots of extra reverb and compression. However, we did get true stereo versions of I Call Your Name, Long Tall Sally, Matchbox, Slow Down and Thank You Girl. It took more than 2 years for these mixes to be released in the UK... and in the case of TYG, more than a decade later. The only oddity is that From Me To You was somehow omitted. Especially odd because the album had so few originals on it. And let's not forget, US record labels released albums with 11-12 tracks on them, not 14. This was the norm back then, not some illicit way for Capitol to issue 4 albums to every three UK ones.

Another major issue was the complicated "soundtrack" contracts. United Artists was given the soundtrack rights to A Hard Day's Night in the US, while the non-soundtrack songs could be issued on a regular Capitol album. No such contractual issues in the UK. Same thing with Help. This time Capitol was granted exclusive rights, but they were forced to issue the incidental music (by Ken Thorne) leaving the non-soundtrack songs without a home. It took a few albums to place the non-soundtrack songs.

So, for many reasons, the Capitol albums were changed, augmented and shortened by a few songs, but they were never butchered. A few terrible remasters, namely I Feel Fine and She's A Woman... some songs given that evil duophonic process (sometimes because EMI hadn't sent proper stereo mixes when they existed, and sometimes for reasons unknown) and a couple of soundtrack albums with non-Beatle involvement. Some songs were released in the US before they were released in the UK. A few somewhow got lost in the shuffle, From Me To You, Misery and There's A Place being left off albums altogether (although released as 45s). Overall, it was business as usual in the mid-60's. No one set out to destroy the Beatles creative artistry. Ron

 

I have a feeling that may be the case. I'm pretty sure I've heard a copy of I'll Be Back with added reverb.

 

I believe "I'll Be Back" on my (70's orange label) Beatles '65 LP has added reverb. It's locked away somewhere but I'll see if I can find it.

 

Just to be clear. I personally don't think it was OK to mess with the track order, or that it was OK for them to put singles on the albums, or for Dexter to make some of the tracks a sonic mess. I have a UK Parlophone stereo Beatles for Sale - it sounds gorgeous and it is one of my favorite albums. I wish that everyone could have one. That said, the Beatles Second Album and Beatles 65 just kick ***.

 

Is the copy stereo or mono? I grew up with the mono, although I may have a stereo copy somewhere.

 

It's ok to agree to disagree, no harm there . I think that being from the UK has biased you some though. The US had a far different market and vastly larger music buying public than the UK and they undoubtedly felt they knew best what would to do in order to sell a lot of records. It's not just the Beatles either... most US record companies altered the albums of nearly every British act back in the 60's. I can't recall if ANY pop/rock albums were released in the US as they were in the UK. As mentioned, US albums had between 10-12 tracks on them. Royalty issues the prevailing reason for this. Pop/rock albums just did NOT have 14. So right there issues would crop up. Not to mention that in the US, the hit singles were almost always featured on the then current album, not so in the UK. It was definitely a selling point in the US market. No one felt ripped off buying a 45, then having the songs featured on the LP too. However, in the UK, EPs were very popular and they typically featured album-only tracks. FOUR songs from one LP. Where was the value there?

Back to the Beatles specifically. For the most part, it's the duophonic mixes that sound bad. The process, be it used for Sinatra, The Beach Boys or The Beatles was not very effective or good-sounding. The company mandate that mono mixes could NOT be used on stereo LPs was perhaps a bit misguided, but that's what they had to work with. The true mono and true stereo mixes were not altered all that much. A bit more compression and reverb for US AM radio play and modest hi-fi setups, but not the sonic mess many, including you, infer. In most cases, the added reverb on the true mono and true stereo tracks is really quite modest. The biggest issue regarding sound was that Capitol was sent tape copies, so at best we're talking 3rd generation by the time the tapes were pressed into LPs. The quality from that standpoint was always a bit worse. Hardly Capitol's fault. They had to work with whatever EMI sent them.

The Beatles Second Album is THE anomoly in the Capitol canon, no question. The entire record seems to have been dipped in an excessive wall of reverb for reasons no one seems to know, or can recall. Even the mono album sounds thick as mud and awash in echo. However, the stereo version is pretty good, some songs like Roll Over Beethoven and Please Mr. Postman sound more exciting and rocking with the added echo. It also features five tracks in true stereo that the UK didn't get to hear for many years.

On the other hand, the next album, Something New sounds great. The stereo mixes are sharp and unaffected by additional reverb and compression. The mono mixes, most are alternate remixes that George Martin made expressly for Capitol, are very nice indeed. Thinking the single-track vocal of And I Love Her and the longer edit of I'll Cry Instead. These songs have little additional processing (if any), in fact, some of the songs have LESS reverb on them than the standard UK mixes.

Beatles '65 is also a very good-sounding record. The mono album is clear and unaffected with little, if any, added reverb. The stereo album is excellent, except for the aforementioned, I Feel Fine and She's A Woman which were treated with the dreaded Duophonic process because EMI failed to send stereo masters to the US. In fact, both songs were remixed into mono for the US market (it's quite possible that extra reverb was added at this time). Again, how can Capitol be faulted for the sonics of these two songs? The remixes done by Martin may not be all that great to begin with.

Beatle VI contained the leftover Beatles For Sale tracks and the non-soundtrack sides from Help and is a very good album on it's own. I like the sequencing quite a bit. Many of the Help songs predate their UK release by more than 2 months too! It features, little, if any, additional tweaking, and it included the UK B-side, Yes it Is and Bad Boy (a song that inexplicably was left in the can until it found a home on the Oldies...But Goldies comp a year and a half later).

It's easy to trash the Capitol albums, but a careful listening and knowing some of the facts helps one to understand that things aren't nearly as dire as some surmise. It really doesn't matter if Dexter didn't like Lennon (and just HOW much did they know one another?). It's not like the Beatles recorded at Capitol when touring the US. As for the Beatles themselves trashing the Capitol albums... I don't think they minded making millions on sales. I'm sure as time went on, and as they grew in status, they got more touchy, but they didn't make a stand until Sgt. Pepper. I think this is rather telling. One other thing, George Martin sequenced the original UK LPs, the Beatles had no input whatsover on this. Ron

 

It seems to me this could simply have been a case of differing EQ line-ups. Lewisohn documents quite clearly that Abbey Road used CCIR line-up, but many other studios (UK aswell as US) used NAB, and this is what contributed to playback problems with Hey, Jude with the engineers saying there was "absolutely no top end on it".

Surely this worked the other way around. A CCIR tape sent to Capitol would have sounded tinny and lifeless if they just stuck it on any of their usual tape machines lined up to their usual calibrations.

So it stands to reason Dexter would, looking at things purely on the surface, see tapes that were "technically abysmal". I would hazard a guess the EQ standard wasn't even checked or thought about, just that "well, our machines are perfectly aligned, so if these British tapes sound like crud, it's them and their problem".

Perhaps it may have been this one little detail that, if investigated and checked into, may have resulted in Dexter hearing how the tapes were supposed to be heard, and could have simply dubbed from a CCIR machine to an NAB one and use that without much further tinkering.

Indeed, there's another example. Paul McCartney, in his 1989 Radio 1 interview series "McCartney on McCartney", tells Mike Read that when he had completed a session with Mary Hopkin for "Those Were The Days", he was disappointed at how it sounded played back in the Abbey Road control room, and that it just didn't work at all. He went on to say that they ran out of time there and went to Trident Studios to finish it off, and that "something must have happened on the taxi ride over there, because I don't know why, but it just sounded GREAT". More than likely, differing EQ standards again. Although you would expect the opposite to be true (unless the track was actually started AT Trident and overdubs were being done at Abbey Road at which point the original stuff sounded lacklustre).

It's not a far-fetched hypothesis, given that Dexter's complaints ring exactly like similar complaints that are noted and documented for all to see in Lewisohn (and that have been since 1988, despite never being mentioned since then).

 

ccir/nab would hve been an every day event for Capitol/EMI
they were the same company.

 

Ive had an idea for a radio play
Dave Dexter jnr in the capitol green room with John Lennon
lots of good material to pillage.
later they are joined by GM and the others
chairman of EMI Sir Joseph Lockwood, has to breakup a reeperbahn style fistfight
Roger

 

Yes. Brennan's site refers to it.

 

On paper, yes. In practical, day-to-day terms, they were chalk and cheese. Each had their own way of doing things and had little interest in the way the other did things (technically, I mean - not commercially, of course).

 

Just listened to Beatles 65 Capitol Mono. That's not added echo on I'll Follow the Sun and Honey Don't?

 

Some points:

1. Of all the processed/Duophonic Beatle tracks, You Can't Do That makes I Feel Fine/She's a Woman sound like audiophile nirvana! And I do find She's A Woman in its dry version to be perhaps one of the Beatles' most boring tracks. Maurice Long was on the right track in his processing, but he way overdid it.

2. Dave Dexter was not the only one who didn't like the sound of some of the early Beatle tracks. Neither did George Martin! Which is why he did some handiwork on the 1976 U.S. Rock n' Roll Music comp.

3. I'm just guessing here, but one other thing Dave Dexter may not have liked about the early Beatle songs was the twin-track stereo. Dave must have thought he was hearing something from 1957! He must have also cringed when those early records were referred to as "full dimensional stereo." Other Capitol records with that reference were sounding a lot more sophisticated.

 

But Dexter had rejetced the Beatles having heard actual 45 singles, not the tapes. the 45s would play the same on any good system.

 

Let's see, Thank You Girl released April 1963 in mono, first released in Stereo in Britain in September 2009- yes, 46 years, that's definitely 'more than a decade later'. Good idea, I think I'll use this mathematical formula next time I'm asked my age - "Well, I'm more than a decade - and some!" Excellent.
In fact NONE of those songs were issued in stereo in the UK until well over a decade later - on "Rock'n'Roll Music" in 1976.

 

This is incorrect. Tony Barrow relates how The Beatles spent three days on tour deciding the order of songs on Revolver.
There are also little jokes which i think may be Beatles-hatched- "Hold Me Tight" is followed by "You Really Got a Hold On Me" on With the Beatles for instance.