What's the Beef with Beatles "1"?

Double Evan.

Not only do I have the CD, I also have the 2 LP set. The LP set has nice packaging, great big poster and four photo cards of each Beatle. Great to look at, hold, but not so great to listen to.

 

Beatles 1 is a good example of how *not* to master a cd. Instead, it became a kind-of reference point, I think. Look at all the bad-sounding discs that have followed it. It reminds me of those crazy stereo mixes on Rubber Soul/Revolver. Entirely crazy (were they assuming we'd have one speaker in front of us and one in back?) and yet, *so* many other albums were mixed the same way, simply because the Beatles did it.

 

Yeah, it was bought by suckers like me, just looking for a nice newly remastered Beatles comp. I played the thing once and it sounded awful. I couldn't play it again. At the time I didn't know that mastering engineers where maximizing and compressing the life out of recordings. In my naivety, I thought new remasters would be better because of the latest digital hardware. In fact, some of this new digital hardware contributed to this horrible sounding cd.

 

The biggest problem I have with this CD is the overuse of Noise Reduction. Listen to the intro of Paperback Writer or Let It Be. It sounds like there's a noise gate around the music... like it's been shrink wrapped and all the air and life and realism has been sucked out. That's the noise reduction pumping along. Once you learn what it sounds like you can never ignore it. Simply no excuse for over using it like this on recordings that sound good in the first place. Modern Abbey Road remasters are generally plagued with NR abuse.

 

About "buzz-cuts." Just because a soft limiter was used instead of a brickwall limiter, doesn't mean the compression sounds any better or worse.

You can't really tell much about compression zoomed all the way out like those screenshots anyway. To see the dynamics, you have to zoom in on a 5 or 10 second section.

 

All I know is I listened to this CD once, through headphones. Poor choice. I physically felt pain and had no desire, no I had an aversion, to listening to any other music for about 3 days afterward. It is still not too late to take up a collection to gather all existing copies of this CD and launch them into the sun. And the sun could sing "Here Comes The 1." Yeah.

 

Sales ain't everything.

 

Beatles 1 has ONE saving grace

The one saving grace:

Peter Cobbin and company fixed that annoying dropout in Day Tripper. Probably by cutting and pasting some guitar and percussion from earlier in the song. I heard that a radio station actually also did this in the 80's and that was without the benefit (?) of ProTools!

 

I like the dropout. They should put it back. Another reason to dislike that cd.

 

TM Century did that back in the 80's also.

Remember the old Dennis Miller Joke about Ted Turner colorizing the first and last parts of Wizard of Oz? Just thought I'd mention that. Seemed appropriate.

 

For me, this is a NEGATIVE. The song doesn't sound right without the dropout. No, they didn't intend for it to be there, but it is, and after 40 years, it's become part of the song. Just like the distortion on Roger's "yeah!" scream in "Won't Get Fooled Again", the song simply sounded WRONG without the original flaw. "Day Tripper" without dropout = :thumbsdn:

 

It's not that big a deal so why'd they even worry about fixing it? Did people even notice it... I mean besides us super geeks with Internet access.

 

I believe EMI's research proved that the Beatles would have been more successful without the dropout in "Day Tripper". It completely held them back over the years! I mean, other than geeks like us, who even remembers them today?

 

I was wondering whether or not to buy "1" back when it came out, but a columnist in Stereophile referring to it as "the best these songs have sounded on CD" got me off the fence. Go figure.

 

That's too funny.

 

Many gave this as a Christmas gift: right timing, right price, right songs, right group. I know people who rarely if ever bought CD's, who bought this one. I still don't have a single Beatles CD. I do have everything in vinyl, however.

 

Yeah, and let us not forget the NR experience that is "Let It Be Naked."

How sad that such great recordings from such a great band have to be released like this...

And how lucky are those who kept their vinyl lps... Like Steve once said, those lps may be the best sources we will ever have!

 

The screenshot above means nothing. Ya gotta hear how it is. It's not that "1" sounds that bad, but that it's not good, either.

 

Is there any truth to the rumour that I heard that '1' sounds so bad because as well as being compressed in an audio sense the actual data on the disc is in some kind of compressed form so as to allow EMI to be able to fit all the songs on one cd?
William
(has anyone ever ever done a comparable comp using the songs from other sources to see if they fit on one disc?)

 

It even sounds awful on a boombox. The songs sound like they are suffocating, gasping for air.

 

Stereophile also raved about the sound quality of Let It Be... Naked, so go figure twice!

 

Yeah, "fixed" that (not sure if that actually is a dropout), but used the crappiest mix of that song. They should have used the mono or the ORIGINAL stereo mix of that song, not that weak Beatle Oldies mix. It would have gotten ruined anyway with the added compression/limiting, bad Eq, & NR, so what does it matter...

 

I don't remember LIBN having lots of NR, but then again I don't play it much as I prefer Spector's sequencing and mixes. Since they were remixed from the original session tapes, there shouldn't be that much hiss there anyway. What songs did you feel had excessive NR on them? What would be the best example(s) for me to re-check?

Derek

 

Do keep in mind the session tapes were about 35 years old when this compilation was put together.

For a noise reduction example listen to "For You Blue". Ringo's drums have no punch to them and the high end on George's vocal is very unnatural sounding. Both "Get Back" and "The Long and Winding Road" sound very muffled, as do most tracks - no "breath of life".

 

It's hard to pick out one song or one example because there's just so many NR artifacts all over the whole album. It's pretty much the defining sound of the CD!

Listen to Get Back. Hear the sound close around the snare drum? Hear the metallic fluttery, chirpy sound? That's the NR. Listen to the upper harmonics of the piano on Let It Be. Listen to what's left of the air in Paul's voice. There are NR artifacts all over. This album is a great showcase for abusive NR practices. Schmucks!

It all sounds as if it's already been converted to MP3 and played off an iPod.