Originally posted by Larry Naramore
Larry speaks with tongue in cheek and foot in mouth - Well Patrick it doesn't take a genius :) to see that there are 3 times as many members now. BTW who asked me anyway. :(
I don't mean to sound rude, but we covered the question in this thread in detail more than once already.
Here's an old post by David Goodwin on the thread from last August:
Honestly depends. Several in the series are absolutely useless, as they just take the audio from the ABKCO discs (I think No. 2 has the intro-stereo-rest-mono Heart of Stone, for example...). Not worth it. Some of the others, like After-math, BUttons, Majesties, and BLeed, aren't wonderful, but are significantly better than previous mono versions that I've heard. BTW, DON'T buy any of these for the bonus tracks, as they're often from OLLLD sources (for example, Beggars has the skipping Downtown Suzie, instead of the upgrade from the Allen Klein Collection).
And, BTW, these aren't flawless transfers, as someone mentioned...Lady Jane has a huge, unmissable skip in it, for example.
By Eddieginger:
Well, I bought a few and although the packaging is great, the sound quality for the ones I have seems pretty average, not to say poor. The only one I would absolutely recommend is the 'Stereo' one (that's what it's called). However, I must point out that the ones I tested were the early ones: "1", "2", "Around and Around" - given my experience with those I was not tempted to try the later ones. Take a look at
http://www.recordpark.com/ - you should find the whole selection on sale there
By TommyTunes:
I purchased the entire series of Stones boots that you are refering to, other than the Rolling Stones and No. 2 they are all pretty bad. Plus the bonus tracks are lame and have all been heard before. I'm still not sure why I bought them since I have all the original UK Stereo vinyl editions and most of the mono ones (only missing Buttons and Aftermath in mono). These CD's were maded from noisey vinyl and then were heavily no-noised. About the only thing that's nice are the digipacks themselves. Do yourself a favor and leave them alone.
By me:
Anyway, as Scott said, they're a mixed bag -- some digital sourced, some vinyl sourced. Quality varies pretty widely. You do get the UK lineup for Buttons, which I much prefer.
I wouldn't advise paying actual money for them (except maybe Beggar's, cause the LP is rare and expensive). Some of the bonus tracks are fun.
[I also mentioned the digital glitches on Gimme Shelter, but I didn't quote it here.]
By Scott:
Ok, those Digipacks are made of a hodgepodge for collectors. A few of the cute ones that seem neat are mostly the "Roling Stones/Rolling Stones No. 2" twofers (London rips from German and Japan CDs), there are others made from other companies like the Beggars Banquet Mono digipak with the cheezy art fold and the detestful sound quality. Yes, some of them are from LP and to boot (no pun intended) they soaked them in Soundforge noise reduction to be hip. Yep, they took the "suck" knob and cranked it.