In article <5hb8tv$9hq@portal.gmu.edu>,
Michael E Harding <mhardin1@mason2.gmu.edu> wrote:

>CSM / Madora McKenzie Kibbe (C-csm@clari.net) wrote:
>: (The following is reprinted from clari.living.music, with permission from
>:  both clarinet and the Christian Science Monitor) 
>: The Beatles, as They Were Meant to Be.
>: By Madora McKenzie Kibbe
>------Clipped Stuff-------- 
>:    And it sounded so good because it sounded the way it had when it  
>: first came squishing out of an old transistor radio or a Neanderthal 
>: monaural hi-fi. I know I'm sounding dangerously like a geezer, or 
>: perhaps a geezette, but I really think I'm on to something here.

It's not geezerhood or geezette-hood, it's called being slightly clueless. 
:-) 

The original writer, Ms. Kibbe, misunderstands AM radio. These
broadcasts were indeed in mono; but AM was not "hi-fi", not by a longshot! 

>: The Beatle sound is supposed to be raw, compressed, kind of scratchy. 

Codswallop. And you may quote me. :-) George Martin's careful production,
even simple and direct as it was in the early days, was aimed at folks
whose interest was in buying records. I can't think of a single quote from
George Martin or any of the other highly esteemed stable-of-engineers at
EMI/Abbey Road Studios that would suggest that mixes were done with the
AM-radio listener in mind. They put much more music in the records than
can be heard via radio...but that's the deficiency of radio.

It's true that many of us (I was one) never owned a Beatles LP in the
sixties...not because we didn't want to, but for various reasons---hiding
our mania from parents, inability to afford the records, poor sound
systems at home; and our only recourse (being incurably besotted by the
Fabs) was to listen to them on AM radio...FM not yet being an option for
Beatles fans in the early sixties (since FM stations didn't play them!).

And lately I've been listening to the local AM station that plays all
Beatles. It's rather quaint, hearing it that way again after so many
years. Brings back memories of ivory plastic boxes and silver grilles and
soft leatherette cases....I could tell you intimate details of all my
much-beloved transistor radios. But I won't. 

What I wish I could remind Ms. Kibbe is that the music was (and is) *in
the vinyl*...much more music than one would apparently gather she ever
heard at the time. 

Any reasonably good sound system now will demonstrate this. Just take an
old Beatles album and give it a spin. Listen with headphones. If it's not
too terribly beaten into a pulp by relentless years of turntable mania,
you'll see what I mean.

I first found this out in the seventies, haunting record swap meets,
buying apparently beat-to-shreds singles from the sixties that after a
little TLC (a dusting, sometimes a warm bath...yes, it *can* be done :-)
gave forth remarkable inner-groove treasures. I had no idea the music
sounded that good. But most of us heard these things on AM, or on
indifferent (not to mention cruelly primitive) home stereo or "hi-fi"
systems. Once these selfsame singles were applied to platters on
audiophile-level systems, they were liberated. All that sound was hidden
in the record! And you'd never know it unless you played it on a decent
system.

Nothing is perfect, of course, but in the realm of pop music, Martin's
concern for doing justice to the Fabs' talent---and the Fabs own musical
and lyrical artistry---shines forth from all those old records. And
despite all the subsequent digital fiddling (I do *not* intend to get into
a digital/analog war here...and I'd be out of my element to argue the
mono/stereo debate as well, so put away your boxing gloves :-) of the CD
releases---which will probably never reflect the "right", "proper",
audiophilically-correct reality for every music consumer---those CDs
aren't really that far off the mark. 

Neither were the Mobile Fidelity releases of the 1980s, gorgeous
half-speed-masters recordings on virgin vinyl, which are an
experience-and-a-half in themselves. I don't own the MFSL records---wish I
did---but have cassettes of them, and even on cassette the sounds of the
Fabs are infinitely more fab. 

It's probably like a good drug trip (I'm guessing now :-) to hear those
extra-grade vinyl discs. Nearest I can come to explaining it is to say
that the digital CDs often allow you to see each musical facet of the
Beatles in sequential chromatic clarity; MFSL, on the other hand, seem to
let you view their oeuvre from *inside* the gem of their genius, all
facets fascinating the ear at once.

And Ms. Kibbe thinks someone added this in after the fact? :-) If someone
sat her down to listen to the Mobile Fidelity records, she'd resign her
post at the Monitor, I guarantee it, and spend the rest of her life glued
to her headphones, atoning for her journalistic transgression. And maybe
she'd throw out all her AM radios too.

>: .................. The overly examined anything tends to take the 
>: fun out of life. And leaves you with, well, a lot of over-amplified 
>: wifwaf. 

One woman's aural wonder is another's wifwaf, I guess. As one of my
coworkers used to say, no accounting for taste.

>I agree. A good thing can be ruined by too much rework, especially when
>the original was crafted under specific conditions. The same applies
>to black and white movies that are colorized.  They lose the effect
>that directors intended for a black and white medium. Can you imagine
>A Hard Day's Night colorized?

Mr. Harding makes an analogy that's not really accurate here. One may
argue that the digital transfer to CD is not really to one's liking; I've
done so in the past, particularly when (as I suspect) Mr. Martin or others
took out or suppressed little details I used to love in the vinyl (a
particular whoop just as the instrumental break takes off in "I Don't Want
To Spoil the Party" comes hauntingly to mind). 

But CDs needn't be "colorized"  vinyl, and whatever argument one may have
with remixes like "Yellow Submarine" on "Anthology" (which actually has
extra elements it didn't have in the single release), on the whole the CDs
are reasonably representative of the erstwhile records...unless, of
course, you're a vinyl die-hard. I know your type. :-) So listen to the
records.  They're *definitely* not "colorized"!

>The original Beatles recordings (and others of that era) were meant to
>be raw; hence their appeal.

I can't agree that the official Beatles releases are "raw". They're
carefully delineated, well produced, extraordinarily played and sung pop
materpieces. 

Bootleg recordings, like music on Anthology volumes, are raw;  here you'll
see working versions, demos, half-finished renditions. But this is the
nature of the work. These were not meant to be heard by anyone but
engineers. One of Paul's early complaints about releasing outtakes was
that listeners might not know (after a few decades) what was the canonical
version and what was just a preliminary one. I wonder if that's really Ms. 
Kibbe's complaint, above? 

>There is an innocence in those recordings
>which is lost when they are rechannelled, remixed, and reprocessed.

Which is why there's a movement afoot to leave well behind us all the
"fake stereo" and rechanneled balderdash that bedeviled our innocent ears
all those years ago. That stuff came out in the sixties, too. 

Nowadays older and wiser listeners are rediscovering the joys of mono. I
think this might well be the next big thing in Beatles releases. It's
about time we thought less of bells-and-whistles revamps and more of
historically (or audiophonically-correct rereleases! 

>Even though the Beatles were characterized by other musicians as an
>extremely "tight" performing group, who cared deeply about the quality
>of their performance, you cannot remove their recordings from the 
>technology of the 60s.

You can though. Just play your sixties vinyl on a nice, modern sound
system. Wonder of wonders, you'll find what was really there at the time!
You just couldn't hear it on your parents' hi-fi. :-)

>For those of us who remember their songs
>"croaking" out of AM radios, phonographs with bad needles, and tinny 
>TV speakers, remixing the songs borders on heresy.

Then let's forget the remixes. Throw out the CDs if you want. Sit down,
dim the lights, light a candle or two. Use headphones if you want. And
listen to your vinyl copy of "With The Beatles". Put on "Meet the Beatles"
if you're really daring.

Go on, we won't laugh.

Trust your ears. 

They're all you need. And if you don't hear something pretty darn
special...well I have a broken needle I can loan you, anytime you think
you really prefer it. :-)

-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
"Just about everyone is tired of the Beatles except the buying public".
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
saki (dlm3@midway.uchicago.edu)