[tintin47]

Big question. Are the stereo remasters going to use crossfade to eliminate the hard stereo from the 1987 masters or are they going to preserve the hard stereo?

 

[DoYouRight]

good question tintin I wanna know also

 

[evanft]

Quote:

Originally Posted by donunus /img/forum/go_quote.gif what do you mean by this?

They're the same stereo mixes that have been available for years.

 

[donunus]

oh ok, so youre saying they wont change the blending of the instruments(mixing) in the remastering process but just clean up the sound

 

[donunus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tintin47 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Big question. Are the stereo remasters going to use crossfade to eliminate the hard stereo from the 1987 masters or are they going to preserve the hard stereo?

That was what I meant with my question above but not just as simple as a basic crossfeed circuit. I was thinking more like a total butchering of the original mix where some instruments are put mid-left some mid-right, some eqd to sound like its at the rear, etc... hehehe Purists wont like ity but if the experts know what they are doing, we could get a modern sounding beatles box set

Of course many audiophile ears plus Ringo and Paul will also have to like it before they put it out :d

 

[evanft]

Quote:

Originally Posted by donunus /img/forum/go_quote.gif oh ok, so youre saying they wont change the blending of the instruments(mixing) in the remastering process but just clean up the sound

Exactly. The stereo versions of Rubber Soul and Help will have the 1987 remixes that were done for the original CDs and the mono discs will have the original stereo mixes in addition to the mono mixes.

 

[donunus]

so the stereo box set will have old stereo mixes except for the 87 Rubber Soul and Help while the mono box will have all mono plus ALL the old stereo? wow, so that mono box set will be so much more expensive with all the discs in it

 

[DoYouRight]

I would like to know that too, according to amazon it just has mono + stereo of the 2 albums.

 

[DoYouRight]

do they charge on amazon when you preorder? or not until they are released?

 

[DoYouRight]

well I just preordered the mono set

 

[suhaybh]

So guys I have the 24bit USB Apple files on my computer and alot of the recording has that hard panning discussed in this thread. Would you guys recommend converting the stereo sound to mono?

 

[bigshot]

Flattening out the stereo is not the same as the mono. The mono recordings are completely different mixes, optimized for mono.

Honestly, I think the general consensus of the stereo set being the one to get is wrong. I think the mono set is much better, but you would have to supplement it with the stereo versions of Magical Mystery Tour on.

By the way, it appears that most third party sales of Beatles boxes on eBay and Amazon marketplace are bootlegs. The only way to tell is to look at fine details in the typography and the kind of sleeve used in the jackets.

 

[Doctor Fuse]

Great explanation! Thank you.

I've know the Beatles oeuvre almost my entire life, but almost exclusively in stereo. Those early recordings sound very artificially constructed, but in an endearing, attractive way. Abbey Road definitely sounds more modern and natural, although at the same time more ubiquitous and less exceptional.

 

[rfernand]

Thread, rise from the dead!

A lot has changed since this thread was alive and kicking…

• In 2014 we saw a re-release of the Beatles in Mono in LP box set, with new mono masters different from the 2009 CD release.
• The 3 LP “Mono Masters” collection from the box set is also sold separately. This collection is analogous to the stereo “Past Masters”.
• “The Singles”, mostly in mono, out in LP box set in 2019 or so.
• “Eight Days a Week: The Touring Years”, from 2016, gloriously remixed so you can actually hear them sing with a little bit of public, with a lot of engineering from Giles Martin.
• Martin has also remixed #1 (some tracks in mono), Sgt. Pepper’s, The Beatles, Abbey Road, and Let It Be (the latter available for preorder, out mid-October).

The CD stereo releases of the ‘naughts are hard to enjoy, especially the early stuff. In a recent interview, Martin explained why this is: the early work was not only intended to be mixed in Mono (stereo was still a gimmick back then), but in the studio, there weren’t that many tracks in the masters. This is why you get drums and bass on L and voices and guitars in R - they were each together in the master tracks!

Martin has done wonders with his remasters, and for the completionists, he was instrumental in Cirque du Soleil’s Love, where he clearly became very familiar with everything they made.

There is an obvious appetite to hear what he could do for the rest of the records. Martin says the software is not quite there yet at Abbey Road to separate instruments from those early recordings and produce meaningful stereo/5.1 mixes (it was however good enough for cleaning up the Hollywood bowl tapes for “Eight Days”). But it’s getting there. So maybe we get Magical Mystery Tour and Revolver next while the neural net matures enough and helps us scream and shout in stereo.

In the meantime, crossfade makes the early stuff at least tolerable for headphones. And your local record shop may have some mono stuff somewhere…