Brain Stew

Since The Greatest Rock-N-Roll Band in the World re-released their back catalog on SACD recently, I was wondering if there were any plans to remaster the Beatles catalog in the near future. I only have Sgt. Pepper, White Album, and Abbey Road, and would appreciate any information that people can provide before I plunk down more cash.

hal9000

I've been wondering about this lately also. I figure the minute I finish buying all of the current versions, Apple/Capitol/EMI will re-release digitaly re-mastered versions. So right now I'm holding off in an attempt to call their bluff.

Andalusia

I bought all my Beatles CD's in '87, and have been waiting (and hoping) ever since for re-masters. In '99, we finally got a re-issue of "Yellow Submarine" (minus George Martin's instrumentals). As for the others, I wouldn't hold my breath. Go ahead and purchase the Beatles CD's and enjoy them now.

The Antipodean

I finally bought the last Beatles album I was missing a few months ago ("Yellow Submarine," the original version, not the remastered one) so by my reckoning the new versions will come out in about ten minutes.

Scorpio

Doesn't Michael Jackson still hold the rights to some of this material? That was the stupidest thing Paul McCartney has ever done, though Michael was supposed to sell them back to him.

Decker

What was? Not outbidding the insanely rich Jackson? Paul didn't sell the catalog; he didn't own it to sell. Michael was a total ***hole by outbidding his "friend" to snap up the rights. In delayed Karma, however, Michael has fallen on hard financial times (Obviously Sony Records and Tommy Mattola are to blame ) and he may have to unload one of his most valuable assests, the Beatles catalog. I hope that really happens soon.

Captain Harlock

As the story goes....

The rights to Northern Songs ( the Beatles catalogue) were held by UK music mogul Sir Lew Grade. Then Sir Lew put them up for auction back in 1985. It was a "closed envelope auction", meaning that the buyer's identity wasn't known at the time.

Here's where history is a bit fuzzy. I've heard one account that Paul had bid $45 million and then Michael had eeked him out and bid $47. Of course Paul had no way of knowing because it was a closed envelope auction. Another version of the same story says that because Paul had bought the rights to the Buddy Holly catalogue, he didn't have the capital he needed to put in a higher bid than Jacko. I'm sure another version of this story will emerge somewhere down the line.

Now what's happened recently, is that Jacko had to put up the Beatle catalogue as colateral to finance his new album/tour. If he defaults then Sony music would get control of the Beatle rights.
Personally I'd rather see the Beatles music in the hands of Sony than Jacko.

DJLinus

I'd give it about 8 1/2 minutes, since I bought five Beatles CDs last month.

Spiderbite

Are you saying that The Beatles released their back catalog on SACD???

Brain Stew

"The Greatest Rock-N-Roll Band In The World" is a moniker that the The Rolling Stones gave themselves sometime after The Beatles broke up. It's very similar to Howard Stern calling himself "The King of All Media."

AtlDVD

Jackson owns the publishing rights. Totally different from owning the actual recording masters.

He simply makes royalties when the songs are sold/played.

He has nothing to do with whether the beatles CD's get re-issued or what label they are on.

atlantamoi

Do the discs need to be remastered? I bought all mine pre-1990 and I never thought they needed to be improved. Isn't most of this stuff mono anyway?

redhenry

The first four albums were originally in mono...vinyl and CD.

I am still holding out for a reunion.....ok so two of them are dead....but hey, surely with modern electronica we can rig up something...or maybe John Edwards (psychic dude) could lend us his ears and get John and George on the line! Let's see how good he is

T

Tyler_Durden

[bump] since Let It Be... Naked is now out and I feel there are many others besides myself who still desperately want the rest of the Beatles catalogue remastered. I haven't heard anything concerning possible re-releases other than McCartney's comments about how they'd be able to do wonders to the quality of the original masters with modern technology. Does anybody have further news?

Jason

Rush relreleased their catalog again?!? Wow, I totally missed that. Thanks for the heads-up!



New Beatles remasters are definitely needed. The current ones are clear, but a little flat.

Hollowgen

there must be plans to do so... remastering/releasing the albums with original lp artwork, etc. would be insanely profitable, i'd think. music fans/collectors (including myself) love that sorta crap!

auto

Grrrrrrrr.....I hate Rush.

Wait a minute. What was this thread about again?

Supermallet

Also, I remember reading somewhere the the Beatles 1 collection was remastered. Never bothered to check it out, though.

As for Let It Be...Naked, I sincerely hope that when the Beatles catalogue is remastered, they also remaster the original Let It Be. Some of the changes on the new version left me with a bitter taste in my mouth.

MGBGT

I heard from a good friend that George Harrison was the one that had publicly mentioned around the time that the Yellow Submarine Songtrack was released that he'd love to see the cataolg remastered again for CD--I guess that was NOT meant to be a promise that it would happen, but I would have suspected that the YSS was an indication that we'd see the remasters of the rest of the catalog at some point. Well, that was 5 years ago.

I guess even dreaming of bonus tracks is out of the question right now...

As for Let It Be...Naked, my ideas for titles:

Let It Be...Stupid
Let It Be...Pointless
Let It Be...Stripped of Any Spontaneous Moments That It Once Had and We'll Put Them on a Separate Disc
Let It Be...Something That Resembles Let It Be
Let It Be...Wannabe
Let It Be...So Not Let It Be
Let It Be...Not Even Get Back
Let It Be...The Revenge Against Phil Spector
Let It Be...An Excuse To Empty The Record-Buying Public's Wallets
Let It Be...On Your Head

Andalusia

Hey MGBGT, that's a lot of anger you have for that album. Why don't you just... let it be.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

MGBGT

I'm really not that angry, Andalusia, I just wanted to see how much I could come up with.

I did like "Across The Universe" on LiB...N, however.

I think the best thing they could have done regarding Let It Be would have been to release the original Get Back with the best material from the Rooftop performance recorded on 1/30/69 as a bonus disc or even on the same disc if it fit.

Andalusia

I agree, that would be really cool.

Ya know, I still haven't heard "Let it Be... Naked" yet. I wonder what the fuss is about...

whaaat

A lot of the Beatles stuff available on CD has been 'no-noised' (to get rid of tape hiss, but also messes with the whole top end) and compressed (makes it louder, and messes with the dynamics) to a point where the CDs available no longer sound like the master tapes. The Beatles (White Album) and IIRC, Let it Be are actually the better sounding discs out there. Given the comments in the liner notes to LIB-Naked (something about digital work being done to remove the 'crackle' of tape hiss-WTF? how does tape hiss 'crackle'?), this trend is likely to continue even if the back catalogue is remastered for SACD or DVD-A.
Remember, remastered does not always mean better sounding. The best sounding (closest to the master tape) CD of Abbey Road was issued in 1984 in Japan. If you can find it without paying an arm and a leg for it, it's sonic bliss.
There's a Remaster the Beatles petition link over on the Steve Hoffman discussion boards, and if interested, you can also find out a lot about mastering techniques, and flaws in the current Beatles CDs.
The sad fact is, most audiophiles either listen to original UK records, or CDs burned from them, as for the most part the Beatles-approved mixes (mono Sgt. Pepper, Revolver, etc.) are unavailable on CD at this time.

Eplicon

The Beatles catalog is in need of being re-done. A Hard Day's Night is so shrill to the point of being unlistenable at times. It's a pity that older Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab LPs sounds 100 times better than their CD counterpart. I find the sound for these CDs to be quite "dated." What sounded great in 1987 when CDs were taking off and digital technology was great is quite awful by today's standards.

I do know that George Martin actually tinkered with the mixes of Help! and Rubber Soul, which is why those are the only two of the Beatles albums that have the "ADD" mastering label on them. But purists balked at what he did. The red/blue album compilations also have songs that are in true stereo (i.e., for the early stuff) or have much better sound than on the regular album.

The packaging also needs to be done correctly. They should have reproduced the art work on the back, rather than butchered it into sections inside the booklet. And Rubber Soul is still the wrong color. The British version has the redding-orange tinge on it, and does not say "Capitol Records" on it.

milo bloom

Where would be a good place to start a Beatles CD collection. I bought the 1's CD, and I've been listening to classic rock stations alot and I'm digging the Beatles more every time I hear them.

I'm guessing the red and blue compilations, the white album, Rubber Soul, Sgt Pepper's, and Revolver.
I'd also like some of the solo stuff.

What's the best starting point?

tks