John Lennon would have wanted it this way....

I found this on a bootleg that features Winston Leg-thigh and Dennis Elsas at WNEW in NY for the release promotion for Walls And Bridges. Here, John Lennon and Dennis discuss, for a short spirt, John's embarassment with the way Capitol treated the Beatles in the states, and how he prefers the original mixes over the Stereo ones that we become partial to.

Note that this is around 1974. The Red and Blue albums were out in 1973, I believe. it's a stereo discussion that is all to familiar to us. It starts as they talk about the Beatles Second Album (Capitol)

A mono Mp3. About 543k. http://home.attbi.com/~sckott/lennon.mp3

Enjoy.

 

Interesting piece Sckott!

 

Thanks for that Sckott. Too bad the studios didn't take John's comments to heart.

 

At least he didn't *totally* lose his mind after meeting Oko Yono.

Mud-

 

Yeah. I love it. If I was remastering the Beatles and heard this, I would be very positive that John would feel the same way in 2002 if he were still alive.

Something to think about when discussing Beatle matters and wishes of reissue. Notice he wasn't ever happy about Revolution in stereo. I never heard the MONO until I picked up the Capitol reissue of Hey Jude in 45 which has the correct mix. That was about 1980. Big big difference, folks, ands just an example.

Now it's a bit of ice cream in Stereo! :/

 

Lennon isn't around to defend himself, and doesn't EVERYONE want to "update" and "modernize" the mixes of all of the reissues, these days ? Even Elvis is getting the treatment!

This is remixing to me.

 

"It's all in the past, isn't it?" I'm sure if John and Paul were asked to supervised the creation of a stereo version of some of the tracks some very different results would have materialized; perhaps a flat out veto; who knows, but SACD and DVD-A sure bring the past up the the future and that valued asset will be messed with again and again and again.

Richard.

 

Sckott, what boot is that from? I love old radio air-checks and would like to hear the rest of that show.

 

>>>>Guys, John is commenting on FAKE STEREO. He's obviously getting confused with a different compilation that used fake stereo mixes of some of the tracks.

I dont interpret his comments as being directed towards the true stereo mixes of the Beatles hits.

Listen again.

 

Fake Stereo from Mono is what John's referring to. Your right Mikey!

 

The interview is from Lennon's September 18, 1974 appearance on WNEW in New York. I first heard parts of it on the "Lost Lennon Tapes" radio show. Parts of the interview, minus the music, were issued on a CD called "John Lennon: In His Life", which I bought at a Best Buy.
That disc uses almost 40 minutes from Lennon's 2 hours on the air. Again, the music and commercials have been removed so this is more like half of his time on the show that day.

I am sure the entire broadcast has been bootlegged somewhere. It is perhaps my favorite Lennon interview because he's just having so much fun reading the weather and station promos, plugging his soon to be released Walls and Bridges album, and talking about the Beatles. He even comments that he could picture the group getting back together some day to do something but probably not tour.

I have always interpreted the section that Sckott presented here as John saying the mono mixes were always the correct mixes but only because of his specific criticism of "Revolution" in stereo.

In the same interview, he jokes about having to go back to the studio and do a quad mix of Walls and Bridges "for the twelve people who buy quad."



Thinking back on things I remember hearing in the "Lost Lennon Tapes" series, John was something of a techno-geek. So it is possible he may have taken a keen interest in CD and DVD technology. Too bad we'll never know.

 

Aw, what does John Lennon know about the Beatles anyway!

Doh!

Wouldn't it be a blast to get to discuss rock & roll with Lennon? The only artist I am aware of that kept Spector on a short leash. Ironic that only allowing him to construct a "fence of sound" would result in some of his most moving & powerful production work ever (Plastic Ono Band).

-Michael

 

Thanks for posting the mp3 Sckott, very interesting.

Unfortunately, it looks like the whole show isn't on one disc, according to this that I found on the net;

"The "Listen to this..." is not the complete show. Parts of this show ended up also on the "Teddy Boy" boot and "The Beatles Downunder 2" album. Bits not on these were also transmitted on the Lost Lennon shows and more ended up the "John Lennon-In His Life" interview CD."

 

Your correct that the interview comes from his talk with Dennis Elsas on WNEW, but the interview is actually from September 28, 1974. It's been frequently re-broadcast in the past, and excellent quality dubs do circulate among collectors. However, it's never really gotten the full bootleg treatment.

And just to set things straight, John does talk about the fake stereo stuff, and his distaste for the stereo mix of 'Revolution'.

Undoubtedly, one of the best Lennon interviews ever, and well worth seeking out.

Chip Madinger
www.8-arms.com

 

I'm not sure about that. John may have been refering to Please Please Me, I Want To Hold Your Hand, and I Feel Fine oustside of his specific mention of Revoution. I just pulled out my original Canadian vinyls of Red and Blue. I didn't find any fake stereo versions here. Are the mono "mixes" fold downs of previous fake stereo versions or something?

Here's what I found.

All songs are in stereo except where indicated:
1962-1966
Side One
3. Please Please Me ("wonky" stereo version)
5. She Loves You (mono)
6. I Want to Hold Your Hand (sounds almost like that Capitol Duophonic processing)

Side Two
1. A Hard Day's Night (mono)
4. I Feel Fine ("wonky" mono version with added reverb, thanks Capitol! )
5. Ticket to Ride (mono)

1967-1970
Side One
2. Penny Lane (mono)

Side Two
2. Hello Goodbye (mono)

Did the original UK/German/Japanese/Australian...releases of Red and Blue have the correct stereo mixes for Penny Lane, Hello Goodbye, I Feel Fine, etc. ?


Thanks.