The Beatles Remasters
Not to start yet another Beatles argument, but is anyone pumped about the Beatles remasters? I haven’t heard them yet, but based on the latter part of the Pitchfork review of the complete set that goes into the differences in RMS and instrument separation, as well as an opportunity to hear the songs in their intended Mono, I’m pretty excited to grab them all and give each album a thorough listen.
Comments
Obviously I have no intention of buying or even listening to any of these. However I did thoroughly enjoy the recent article in Rolling Stone which was ostensibly about their breakup, even though it covered a good chunk of their career and all the tension and anger simmering throughout most of it. I liked it mostly because it was yet another example of how they (but mostly John) were basically all completely full of shit. Yes, John please lecture me again about the virtues of love and peace when you can’t even fucking stand your own supposed best friend or your own wife.
That was a good article. John Lennon did (and has in the past)come off as a dick and I was surprised that Paul McCartney wanted to keep the band together so badly. I mostly felt bad for Ringo though…he looks miserable in a lot of the photos from that period. He has an “are you and Mommy divorcing because of me?” look.
As for the reissues, I’m going to pass. I don’t have a speaker system or headphones good enough to notice any great difference. I’ll stick with the older versions.
NPR with some clips of some of the differences between the mono and stereo versions: http://www.npr.org/blogs/allsongs/2009/09/mono_or_stereo_help_2.html
has anyone else noticed the oversaturation of Beatles-related crap in the past few years? an entire Cirque du Soleil show in Vegas devoted to them, an entire video game (“special” overpriced plastic instruments and all) based on their career, a complete box set of remasters & god knows what else.
Beatles fan or not, it’s kind of annoying & whoreish.
Well, to be fair,
- The Beatles didn’t have any control over their music till Jacko’s death a few months ago.
- the Cirque du Soleil show was CdS’s idea, not The Beatles.
- The video game is fucking stupid. At least Guitar Hero Metallica makes sense.
- The remasters are the last gasp of the CD as a format. When they first transferred them to CD in 87, it was done very poorly. This needed to be done.
1. Paul McCartney needs to fill his coffers so he can, in fact, prove that The Girl is finally his and not Michael’s.
2. John and I were discussing his fourth point yesterday. We’re witnessing the last great cash grab by the music companies as physical media and the Old Way of Doing Business lurch to their ignoble death. This is the last chance! Quickly! Someone scrounge up some more special edition Radiohead!
3. Rock Band Beatles sounds like the most boring thing in the history of boring, and I really LIKE Rock Band. But half the fun is getting to just randomly dick around with a wide range of songs from a wide range of bands.
Hmmm…you all raise some very valid points and there’s much food for thought within the erudite repartee contained within this thread that seems to request….nay demand a counter. To wit:
- The Beatles suck.
- The Beatles are boring.
- Half of the Beatles are dead.
- The Beatles were not very good.
Ah, Kevin, a succinct and agile counterpoint, to wit! But it seems you have forgotten:
- You are dumb.
- You are deaf.
- You let non-musical factors like fan-obsession and AM radio plays ruin otherwise great music
- Half of the rock and pop you listen to ever was inspired by — nay! — ripped off from The Beatles.
- You are ugly like Ringo.
- The Beatles could play circles around even some of the prog rockers that came after.
John Hutchinson (johnhutch) wrote:
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hahahahahah, oh crap. I forgot to check that. Everyone was writing about how they can’t wait to go buy all this expensive Beatles bullshit (stereo or mono! oh noes!) so I wrote:
“I can’t wait to go pirate both the stereo and the mono and then give me two to four hundred dollars to a considerably more deserving indie label.”
Or something like that.