I am a remaster junkie. I hear something has been remastered and I just can't help myself: I must possess it. I must own it, pore over its lush new packaging, read the densely packed liner notes, and repeatedly play it over and over. If I still own the previous issue, I'll listen to both back-to-back and see what sounds strikingly different, what new little bits of sonic minutia has been uncovered in the remastering process. The most exciting part is that very first listen - usually moments after the new case has been slipped from its shrinkwrap.
I will often abstain from listening to a soon-to-be reissued album, preferring the well-embedded memories of the placement of instruments, volume, clarity, etc., be left in check right up to the moment the new issue enters my CD player. I don't, however, tend to do this on purpose - I just seem to stop listening for a while, as if deep in my mind I know that it will be all the more rewarding when I listen to it again, fresh and clean as if newly showered.
Remasters, in my mind, are nearly always an improvement over the original issue on CD, especially of anything produced before CDs emerged in the marketplace. The issue becomes more complicated when there are remasters of remasters, as has been happening more and more often lately. While I understand that the first remastering processes may have been lacking in some areas, especially for the very earliest ones where there hadn't been many precedents set on how they should sound, I do still balk at the thought of having to pay, again, for something I have already owned at least once, and sometimes twice before. However, each time I cautiously approach these remastered remasters, I am rewarded with something even more revealing than I could have hoped.
The motherlode of remasters, however, is the "mastered from original tapes" remaster, or whatever they want to call it. For whatever reason, it seems many of the original masters of many classic albums were misplaced, and when the remaster campaigns of the mid-90s occured bands were forced to employ the use of secondaries or "safety" copies, which were one or more generations removed from the master. This may seem like a trivial issue, but when it comes to improving something, you really need to go back to the very first pressing of that music in its final form, otherwise there is always some level of improvement that could be made.
Article comments
1 - Eric Olsen
I totally dig this one Tom.
2 - Tom Johnson
Thanks, Eric. I've been out of the review-loop for a couple weeks, but this one revved up my motor enough that I leapt at the opportunity. I may not post often, but I try to make it worth the while for everyone when I do. :-)
3 - Eric Olsen
Good man, thanks.
4 - Jim Carruthers
Great, I already have this on the 95 version, how many more times do they expect me to buy this album? Couldn't you have got it right THE FIRST TIME!
It's like the Elvis Costello catalogue, how many times do you expect me to buy your first 10 albums? Just let me know, and I'll buy them on the last cycle.
5 - The Theory
i should get this. sometime.
peace.
6 - Tom Johnson
Jim: In general, I agree. But this remaster is different, if you care about sound quality. It truly does sound better than the previous one. The source used for the '95 remaster was not the master but a secondary. Like I said, it doesn't seem like much of a difference, but it really is - if you're a sound-quality geek like me.
7 - Jim Carruthers
Tom, I am in agreenance about the sound quality (hey, good enough for Fred, good enough for me), but if the industry could just give me some foreward notice about bigger, better, faster and whatnot.
It just really pisses me off that Universal expects me to buy the same record over and over with incremental improvements.
That said, sigh, I'll probably have to go out and get this because it is such a good record.
8 - Tom Johnson
They should offer a deal whereby you turn in your '95 remaster for a better deal on the '03 Deluxe, you know, kind of like pro-rating batteries and tires.
9 - Chris Harwood
Tom:
Thanks for your comments. I have been listening carefully myself to the new release, even some side-by-side comparisons (home stereo, Sony studio monitor headphones). The sound quality is much warmer, less separation and more "punch." As with the "My Generation" and "...Leeds" deluxe editions the additional material is a real bonus as well (at least for Who fans and audiophile nuts like me).
I was wondering if you've noticed the differences in track lengths between the new edition and the 1995 edition. On "Baba O'Reilly," for example, the opening synth sequence is longer in the 1995 edition - the patterns have additional motivic fragments interspersed. Do you have any knowledge why the 1995 issue, if pulled from a secondary source, would have additional meterial? If anything, I'd expect it to have less. Unfortunately, I am out of reach of my original LP, which I would hope would further inform me about the sequence of the original version.
Just wait, everyone, until CDs fall off the map and a new "concrete" format takes over -- we'll be buying all these albums again and again, I suppose...
10 - Tom Johnson
Chris: I read last night that the 1995 issue came from a master that had 8 seconds (8 measures maybe?) or so of extra synth. This version came from the true master, which did not have that additional material. It is kind of odd that a secondary master would have extra stuff.
I'm sure it'll only be a few years before we're all buying SACD versions of all of this stuff . . . again . . . and then again when something else is invented after that . . .
11 - Chris Clark
The re-re-re-rerelease of greatest hits in "new and improved" formats simply soaks the most dedicated fans for music they've already memorized.
12 - Tom
Chris: I guess if you want to put it in the most simplistic terms, yes. The fact that they are indeed truly "new and improved" negates that, however. Hearing startling sonic differences, to me, makes it worthwhile re-buying something. And really, look at it this way: the remaster of Who's Next came out in 1995. This Deluxe Edition came out in 2003 - 8 years later. If $15 or so dollars you spent in 1995 weren't worth it for 8 years of music, then there's no need to replace it with a better version. Me, I think a $15 investment for 8 years of use is pretty good, and I'll gladly re-up for an improved dose. In contrast, I won't be buying the remaster for Dark Side Of The Moon - I heard it and I'm not convinced the new mix is startlingly new enough for me to pay for another copy of it. It just sounds louder to me in general, and I'm pretty picky (and also lacking the SACD equipment with which to enjoy the new surround-sound mix.) I'm also not a huge fan of DSotM, either (Animals - now THAT is a classic Floyd album to me!) But I can easily say that Who's Next is most definitely one of the best albums I've ever heard in my entire life. Regardless of how many times I've heard it, I will likely always enjoy listening to it. I can justify spending a little extra on that once every so many years.