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

Haven't read the entire thread yet, late to the party, etc.

Just put on the CD for the first time today. Right off the bat, it sounded LOUD with a lot of bass. Was not pleased. I turned down the bass and the volume and carried on.

Overall the stereo imaging sounds better and more natural to me. Almost mono on some tracks. There also seems to be more vocal clarity. For some songs there is an improvement, others not so much.

My first take overall, though, is I don't much care for the compressed, "modern" mastered-for-earbuds sound. Either way, it's enjoyable to listen to another take on a classic.

Will be listening more to appreciate some of the sonic improvements, but it's hard to improve on the genius of the content.

P.S. can someone recommend a decent mono CD mix?

 

The Beatles were involved with the mono mixes. That is a fact. What you hear on the mono mixes is what the band wanted. I wouldn't call them murky, either...the mixes, I mean.

I think Paul and Ringo approve of the new mix is because, as creative musicians, they don't dwell on the past like we do. They are not so stuck on everything being preserved just as it was in 1960-whatever. Ringo likes the enhanced drums because, well, he's the drummer! I understand that because I am a drummer too, and it's the first thing I notice when I listen to anything. Paul is the bassist. Yup, he likes that bass loud and clear! But, so did John, who was, BTW, the original bassist, if I recall Beatle history correctly. But, I have to agree with the people: the bass on ADITL is a bit too prominent.

Well everybody, we now have the mono, the old stereo, and the new stereo. Take your pick.

 

P.S. I wonder about the choice to master the CD so loud with so much bass. Is that why some are saying the vinyl sounds better? Also, if the aim is to attract an audience from yonger generations, did they really think that demographic would relate to Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds or Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite? Ok, maybe lucy in the Sky.

 

It's only been released on CD in mono twice and both are fine. I prefer the 2009 box CD, but the one in this 50th is also fine.

 

Wondering how the population of teenagers to 30 like this new Pepper mix if this mix was geared for the younger crowd of 2017. Interesting, I'll try researching it later.

 

Thanks! Did not get the box set for the new one. Will check out the 2009 version.

 

It seems to be selling like crazy (considering it is 50 year old music especially): The Beatles' 'Sgt. Pepper' hits No. 3 in Billboard 50 years later My 9 and 14 year old boys love the album (original mix and new mix), including those 2 tracks. I introduced them to the Beatles' original stuff early on, which they immediately warmed to, and they flipped over LOVE too. The Beatles have cross-generational appeal.

I do think the vinyl sounds quite a bit better than the CD version - though I don't find the CDs are " bad," just suffer a bit from use of digital compression (seems like they were indeed mastering for people using earbuds and cheap computer speakers - unfortunate but at least they aren't "brickwalled," turning down the volume a bit I find they are imminently listenable).

 

The problem there is the mono PEPPER was only released in a 2009 boxed set of ALL the Beatles' mono recordings, not separately. So you'll either need to find a copy of the box (highly recommended), or a loose used copy of the PEPPER album someone is selling.

If you like hearing the Beatles' recording session stuff you really should think about the new PEPPER box - the session material included is, I find, utterly fascinating and extremely worthwhile - and the box also has a nice sounding mono mix of the whole original album included.

 

It is indeed amazing that a 50-year-old recording can debut at #3 and be among the usual top 40 stuff. That is something to hang your hat on. Someone bought all those copies! But, who? I wonder if there are any available stats of exactly who bought it in the U.S...

 

Well I'd guess mostly older people bought the physical media. But for downloads probably a lot of younger folks. Would indeed be really interesting to see the buyer demographics but I'm not sure they even collect that type of info.

 

The CD I got (deluxe?) has a second disc with alternate takes. I don't usually care for alternate/out takes, because they were usually not used for a reason. But in this case, they ARE fascinating, because, well, it's the Beatles!

 

Seriously, what other 50-year-old record could do what Pepper did? It's just amazing that a record half a century old is moving that many copies (and I'm assuming it must be ALL physical copies, no downloads) that it cracks the chart. 1940s records in the 1990s? Or 1950s records in the 2000s? Nope. Despite being a clear reflection of its amazing era, Pepper has a sort of timelessness to it, and I think it will remain relevant for decades to come.

 

When you listen to the outtakes and the rest of the other discs you realize the remixed album could have been perfect instead of heavy handed.

 

Right and they are not (at least mostly) really "alternates" but more earlier/working versions or bits and pieces heading up to the final versions, helping to show how the recordings evolved. For an album this good and important, I think the big box makes good sense.

Despite having the big box I bought the 2 CD version (and 2 LP version!!!) myself - partly due to collector's fever but also because I liked having a pre-programmed "alternate album" in the 2nd discs of the 2 disc sets. While it is true the 2nd disc on the 2 CD version creamed off much of the best of the sessions stuff, there are still many great/interesting moments in the material on the box that aren't on that 2 CD set - plus the box including the original mono mixes of the full album and the "Strawberry Fields/Penny Lane" single is a huge bonus. As much as I find the new stereo mixes trounce the original stereo mixes (mastering quibbles aside, it is really no contest to me), I still find the original mono mixes are "the ones," the go-to versions, if I had to pick. They are essential. Finally the book (and I mean book) included with the big box is extremely good, both for the pictures/memorabilia (for example, a pic of a hand-wringing memo from EMI to Capitol leadership in the lengthy period leading up to PEPPER speculating on whether the band may indeed be finished as rumors were suggesting might be the case - and another internal memo from EMI griping about the Beatles' pricey and unprecedented request for a special picture sleeve for the "Strawberry Fields/Penny Lane" single - stuff like that, remarkable in illustrating how much the business has changed - they'd made EMI a mint and that is the thanks they get???), but also really good analyses/insights about the album and the general time period in the essays and session descriptions.

 

Interesting... Maybe I'll try this approach next time I listen to the 5.1 mix. Cause there where sone things that made me a little sad the 1st time I heard it. For instance, I don't like the sidepanning of the drums in the 1st track. And he (Giles) could have let some vocals wander around instead of dead centering them.

 

yes I do

 

At least to my ears, that buzzing has always been there. It is just more clearly audible in the new remix, I think because it has upped the ante in terms of transparency. Does sound like an organ to me. As I understand it they used compression and boosted the volume gradually to prolong the last chord far beyond the duration of natural decay of the sounds. Perhaps this created some distortion on the organ part or it is just the sound of the organ itself, but it is now peeking through more audibly out of what used to be a rather homogenized murk.

Someone else earlier in the thread commented on an odd "scraping" sound in "Penny Lane" as it enters the last chorus, as if that was some kind of flaw or distraction also - but it's another thing that has always been there (I very clearly recall wondering what it was as an 8 year old kid listening to the original stereo mix of the song), but is simply more audible now due to the greater transparency of the mix.

A lot of the comments pro and con about the remix make me think of how people have now come to think of some of the great Renaissance paintings as being very dark and muted by design, and yet this isn't always the case. Many, as near as we can work out, were bright and vibrant originally but have long since faded and become dirty; but since we've only seem them that way we think that is how they "should" always stay. I don't think it is a foregone conclusion that intervening on a painting (e.g. cleaning) to restore vibrancy should be viewed as problematic or "revisionist." It's more complicated than that.

In the case of Beatles recordings it is perhaps even more complicated than for old paintings - because technological limitations that don't exist now influenced the outcome of the original mixes and (crucially) vinyl masterings everyone grew up with. For example, shaving off bass to prevent mistracking and other unfortunate measures were known/standard practice in vinyl mastering then - meaning that it is quite probable that the vintage pressings of all Beatles records were unduly bass-shy relative to the original tapes (this may well account for all the angst about the ABBEY ROAD stereo CD remaster from a few years back supposedly having bloated bass - my guess is that is more what the tapes sounded like than the original album).

So anyway one could I think make a strong argument that in creating a new remix from the working/tracking tapes, the sound of those original working tapes/tracks should be the reference standard determining what the new mixes should sound like - not the vintage technology-limited old mixes. I'm not saying that is unequivocally "true" or "right" of course but just saying I think it is every bit as valid a viewpoint as the "make it sound like the originals" argument. Neither has inherently more logic or "rightness" from where I sit.

Giles has commented in articles that when he heard the original tracking tapes for PEPPER he was amazed at how powerful and vibrant and, yes, even LOUD they sounded. I'm really glad he allowed us all to hear that as well rather than "toning down" what was on the tapes just so the product would more closely match what has already been available to all of us for 50 years.

 

On the plus side, I could finally make out what was looped on the runout track at the end. "Never could be any other way" is what I heard. On the other hand, it takes away a little mystery.

 

Yesterday I ripped the surround audio material to my hard drives and noticed that buzzing noise, too. But between 'Strawberry Fields' and 'Penny Lane'. I thought this was a transfer error in my Audacity project...

 

Totally disagree with just about everything you typed. What takes the mystery away isnt the clarity so much as the remix decisions. Im sure the fellas that mixed it originally would appreciate you calling them amatures.

And the rest of your statements: How would you know that the artistic intent was to totally be something opposite of what was originally done?

In fact, if you want to go with "artistic intent" McCartney has went on record for the past 30 yrs as the mono being how Pepper should be heard. Of course being hip and positive Paul he will give a to anything that puts him in the mix (no pun intended) and relevant. Ringo as well.

Its cool if you like the remix, but dont slather a bunch of BS about how "this is how they originally wanted it"

 

That's what I always heard it as.

 

What you hear in the mono mixes was the best representation of what they wanted given the limitations of technology available to them.

As far as their artistic intent, I won't pretend to guess what they'd have done differently. But functionally, if they could have kept adding additional parts without having to deal with bouncing and everything that came with it, you know they would have.

 

Which is why I'm so happy many of the albums I love only had 4 or 8 tracks available to them when they were recorded.

As you mention, if people have 32 or 64 tracks available they tend to want to use them, to the detriment of the music sometimes.

 

Sounds like the tapes were remixed by Sirius/XM for SUV speakers
(it's not the original LP with the She's Leaving Home swap anyway).
Glad I didn't order the box. Fool me once (+1), twice ....

 

It certainly could have been much much better.