The Red & Blue compilation albums are being re-released on November 10th. All remastered & with extra tracks (the Red album is now all stereo) & the last track on the Blue album is the last track The Beatles ever recorded, Now & Then (I've never heard it). I'll be buying the CDs, the LPs are very expensive, but that's what you get for buying vinyl.
Not being much of a Beatles fan, I nonetheless had those two albums -- on a cassette copied from my dad's LPs. So I have a soft spot for them. Would be cool to own in physical format at some point.
Not being much of a Beatles fan, I nonetheless had those two albums -- on a cassette copied from my dad's LPs. So I have a soft spot for them. Would be cool to own in physical format at some point.
I bought the last two releases of these albums (I think that would be the re-re-mastered versions) for £2 each in a charity shop (still shrink-wrapped), I'm sure they'll be no such luck this time.
I've been pretty curious about "Now And Then" ever since tidbits of info began leaking out. I don't set my expectations too high, though--George had no interest in finishing it off. I think the end result is whatever Paul and Ringo were able to do, if I'm remembering correctly. I recall reading that they did even further tweaking on FAAB and RL. So we'll see.
I'm VERY curious about the new stereo RED tracks, though. I want to know how they sound. Maybe they were able to use DESS processing or some such. It will be interesting to hear the results.
I remember people complaining that they could have fit all the songs onto a single disk each and sold them at a cheaper price.
The Red yes, but not the longer Blue album. The old Red had 26 tracks, the new Red album has 38, so that wouldn't fit onto one CD now (& the old Blue had 27 tracks & now has 37).
Well, that sucks that the Blue album will NOT have FAAB and RL included. The new song is pleasant enough, but I will just pick up the CD single. I heard the stereo remix of "Love Me Do" and, as nice as it is, it's not incentive enough for me to triple-dip for the Red and Blue--it's on the CD single anyway.
I guess it's the squandered opportunities that annoy me the most.
I'm just buying the Red album for now, it's full of new transfers & it'll be interesting to hear those new stereo versions of early stuff like Love Me Do & Please Please Me ect. I pre-ordered it for £21 from a company on eBay, which for a double CD seems fair to me (a LOT cheaper that a double CD soundtrack). I will be buying the Blue sometime next year.
I'm just buying the Red album for now, it's full of new transfers & it'll be interesting to hear those new stereo versions of early stuff like Love Me Do & Please Please Me etc. I pre-ordered it for £21 from a company on eBay, which for a double CD seems fair to me (a LOT cheaper that a double CD soundtrack). I will be buying the Blue sometime next year.
Yeah, I'm still intrigued about the new Red mixes. I have a feeling I'll probably cave in on that one.
Sneaky bugger that I am, I captured the audio of both songs from YouTube and loaded them into Audacity. The waveform for "Love Me Do" looked just like it should--proper dynamics and range. For "Now And Then"... surprise!... brick-walled. The mix sounds very crowded and compressed, like there is no space around the instruments--and I guess that's the reason. It is extremely unlikely to have been caused by whatever software YouTube uses.
I got inspired after the release and talk of the new song. As I said earlier in the thread, I only ever had two Beatles albums, as I was never much of a fan (which is weird, because I'm a huge fan of many artists that were inspired by them, like the aforementioned Supertramp and Alan Parsons): the red album and the blue album. Both copied to cassette from my dad's LP sets some time in the late 80s. The blue album is definitely my favourite of the two, as they move beyond the happy-go-lucky pop songs of their most popular era, and into quite complex soundscapes.
I was just thinking that now that the tech is advanced enough to be practical, the time would never be better to use it on the Decca audition tape. Those recordings are a lot of fun and I think it would be worth a try (not to mention a nice, tidy revenue stream).
And if the powers that be decide to do that, can the Star Club recordings be far behind? Of the Hollywood Bowl tapes, for that matter?
I will be getting these two in time. A little on the expensive side. Some of my complaints about these are they could have added a remaster of the two newest songs, Free As a Bird and Real Love. Does not make any sense why only Now and Then is added? With the red album they wanted to add more George Harrison songs. Great. But why Roll Over Beethoven? George had many more songs to add to this instead of a forgetful cover. What about I'm Happy Just To Dance With You, I Need You or It's Only a Northern Song?
