The Beatles Revolver

I agree! What the Beatles did with Giles Martin is ART!  Tampering with the original tapes is in effect to produce something that is NOT the Beatles creation! The CD cover should say " Revolver - An interpretation by Giles Martin in Multi-Channel sound ".

From what I have read, only remix will be issued as a CD.  As far as I know, there is no 5.1 multi channel Blu-ray being issued.

The original was all mixed using tube (valve) equip.

There is that.

The only raison d’etre for me would be for a 5.1 release.

That of course would be the only scenario in which Jason would actually be right. Har har.

His atmos mixes are stunning, so are his 2 channel mixes in hirez, pick your flavor (or get both like I did)

Yes I know, John Lennon preferred the mono mixes so you might as well ditch your stereo mixes if you want the classic version:

Maybe my memory fails, but I remember reading in (where was it, in the L.A. Times?) that from the days of "Beatles 65" on, George Martin relentlessly multi-tracked the Beatles' recordings. As my stereo systems continued to get better and better, the multi-tracking became more and more obvious, something that made me appreciate the Beatles less and less. To my ears, the White Album comes off as sometimes absurdly over-produced. It was only in Abbey Road, the final album they recorded(?), where George Martin's hand became a little less heavy...a bit more subtle. In any case, I was transported to seventh heaven when Punk/New Age Rock came on the scene and true, live-in-studio ensemble playing once more found its way onto discs.

I guess my point was in 1966 the band and George Martin put out the album with the technology they had and it still holds up today. To remake it adding or subtracting to it seems wrong. The music The Beatles made to me was special I’m 67 I grew up this music. To strip it down and reassemble it is just not right. But then I don’t have to buy it. So there you go just my 2 cents worth

My take? If I like how it sounds, thumbs up. If I don't like it, in the bin. 

The remix of Taxman from Revolver is available on Spotify.  It sounded pretty good!

Check out the Beatles Love LP.  I think Giles was involved in that and the SQ is great.  It is a total re-engineering of the originals, but I like the fresh take.

It reminds me of the Kinks. Ray Davies always said he hated stereo and did not know how to use it. 

At the time of Revolver and before (and maybe even after) the Beatles mostly left the mixing to others.

Even though I listened to the original stereo mixes for years, I mostly love Giles' remixes of the 1967-1968 material, and I bet the Beatles would, too.  He does things like separating instruments or voices that were originally mixed together so you can hear the timbre and lines of each more clearly, and it adds power to a song like "Birthday" when the guitars are hard panned rather than sharing the same channel.

I forget about audiophile notions of hearing musicians in a space when I listen to most rock music from this period.  I just accept that the mix is a work of art in itself. However, I don't like it when a drum set is panned unrealistically wide--a problem even in newer jazz recordings as well as classic rock recordings.

I bought the other three and I’ll buy Revolver when it comes out.
 

Nuff said.

What he did with Beatles at the Hollywood Bowl is a game changer. But lots of liberties were taken. Small parts weren’t from the actual live recording. I own it...I love it. You can hear how hard Ringo hits.

His Abbey Road reissue sounds great and punchy and you do hear things not before heard but it does sound like a modern interpretation as someone earlier in this thread put it.

In the end I prefer the original recording. It has stood against another previous reissue as well. Something is gained but no doubt something is lost. I can’t put my finger on it but there it is.

ANYTHING released from Beatles, Stones and a few select others is simply

TIRED, BORING and a money grab for whoever decides it's time for a new "super" release.

Spend the money on a minty first press-at least that's got SOME kind of intrinsic value. Play it once to put it on you NAS setup or CD. Now you can enjoy endless perfect LP sound along with an album that will be worth $10 bucks more in 50 years.

I fundamentally reject altering someone else’s art as a means of updating it for modernity as a replacement, in this case, if it were being done so that forever more we hear nothing but the new stereo product.

“Is Revolver remixed in multi tracks still Revolver?”

Absolutely not.

Yet I welcome a respectful experiment that gives us an opportunity to appreciate their art from a different angle, so to speak, that illuminates their art such that we can better appreciate the original.

The things is, we’re at a remarkable threshold of technology.

So-called ‘AI’ (which at present is really only brute force machine processing with no intelligence at all and requires a knowledgeable human handler who necessarily must add his input) does have the capacity to do things we could hardly imagine.

Consider what Peter Jackson did by steadying and colorizing WWI footage.

If, in say, 1975, one went to The Beatles and explained that it were possible to ‘correctly’ do the transfer from mono to stereo, as with today’s technology, I wonder what they would have replied, and I readily admit that their answer might well have been no.

I’d like to hear Paul’s and Ringo’s opinion on the matter; in fact, they should be involved in the project.

I’m not against remixes in general. It wouldn’t be done if Paul, Ringo, Yoko and Olivia didn’t approve it.

The Beatles were one of the first groups to push the envelope on what could be done in the studio, so it seems likely to me that they would still want to push that envelope.

Geoff Emerick, who was the engineer on many of The Beatles’ albums, says the guys were always pressing him to get different sounds for their songs, to the point where other engineers didn’t want to work with them because they weren’t happy if you couldn’t produce the sound they wanted. Oh, and they worked late and did marathon sessions too.

So, I’ll give it a listen and keep my copy of the original mix too.

Yes it’s still Revolver the new Beatles remixes so far have all been excellent.

Looking afresh at any recording doesn't detract from the original. Aside from the technology involved here any album mix that involves multitracking of any kind (even four track) is representative of a set of views at a point in time. Other perspectives can give additional insights into the music because producers and mixing engineers are constantly having to prioritise what the listener gets to hear, and, in consequence, what s/he doesn't.

I, for one, am looking forward to hearing the new mix.  Last year, I heard a bootleg remix from someone who dubbed himself Lord Reith who de-mixed and re-mixed most of the Beatles' material, and when I heard his new version of Revolver, it was an absolute revelation. 

There seems to be two reasons the mono mixes are usually preferred: the first is that the mono mixes were the priority since that is how most fans would actually hear the music (and therefore somehow more "authentic"), and the other is that the stereo mixes of the pre-Sgt. Pepper material often interfere with the "willful suspension of disbelief" since they commonly have the elements hard-panned to the left or the right without much blending across the middle; hearing the drums in just one speaker, for example, is just plain weird.

So when I heard the Lord Reith remix with the instruments and vocals blended across the channels much more naturally, I really connected with it in whole new way.  In fact, the final track, "Tomorrow Never Knows," never made much sense to me, but with that remix, it suddenly came alive.

So if a very talented guy somewhere on the Interweb using an alias can create such a magical version, I can only wonder what someone with the last name Martin can pull off.

It Revolves around MONEY.

While I clearly understand the desire to remix songs from days of yore, my personal feeling is that you get to choose to purchase them or not.

I like the original vinyl that I bought new back then and will always play it.  If, for some reason, I happen to like the remixed versions, I will put my hard-earned money on the counter and make the purchase.

So far, I have only heard one "remix" song.  It is from the Eagles, and I don't care for it.  Unfortunately, I have to look hard on the internet to find the original version as I don't happen to have the vinyl.  I will, however, purchase it if I find it.  Oh, the song is one of my favs, and best, IMO, in the original mix:  Please Come Home for Christmas.  (The Bon Jovi version, while not as good, is by far the sexiest video I have ever seen, and they perform it with their clothes on!)

Cheers!

The sound engineer of Revolver, Sgt. Pepper,  Abbey Road was Geoff Emerick. George Martin was the producer. So for technical recording stuff Geoff was the responsible person. For their time Revolver was the revolution in sound engineering. The Beatles were involved in the recording process too and they gave a lot of new ideas to the recording engineer team.

It has been said for years that the mono version of Sgt Pepper was far better than the stereo version because George Martin focused most of his time on the mono version and very little time afterwards on the stereo version and this was the case on all of the Beatles albums through Pepper. I have both versions on early releases and while I didn’t think the stereo version was terrible I did enjoy the mono version more. I can also say this about most of their earlier albums where I prefer the mono releases.

The only Giles remix that I have purchased so far is Sgt Pepper and I have to say that I think he did a great on the remix and it is for more engaging than the original stereo version. So bravo!

I will be ordering the Giles remix of Revolver but mainly because I only have the original stereo version that was released in the US on Capitol and it does not include three Lennon compositions that were on the UK release. I believe they were released on Yesterday and Today in the US. Regardless, looking forward to Giles Revolver in stereo and hoping he dd as good a job on this as he did with Sgt Pepper.

I've got mine on order. I prefer the Beatles music in stereo except for the early ones where all the vocals are in one channel..... 

I do remember the same opinions when "Let it be - Naked" was released.

It's the same with all art work. Alternative versions do have a place for those who want to explore them and if they like them play them more. I really don't see an issue here. And of course its about making money but if someone feels so strongly about the original version they don't have to part with their money. The original Revolver on vinyl can be found very easily for a few dollars! 

Something New? Because? You Can’t Do That! Let it Be!  Tomorrow Never Knows…. Help!

I thought Giles’ “White Album” sounded great. Totally cool if someone owns an OG UK vinyl, or is willing to pay huge $ for it, but this would be another, totally sensible option to me.

At the point technology is now, not sure what’s so heretical by these gimmicks they’re tossing into their promotional speech (I say ‘gimmick’ in regards to marketing language, not the actual process of AI audio separation)

Is what they’re doing here so much mote intrusively futzy than other modern remasterings? They’re probably tossing in all the tech-y speech to garner public interest to make the release more commercially viable.

I am looking for to the new mix of Revolver.  I remember listing to the new mix of The Beatles "1" by Giles Martin and thinking the balance of the mix sounded the same.  Then it dawned on my the artificial placement of instruments and sometimes vocals to hard left or right was changed to a more realistic placement of them.  Think about it, do you ever see the drummer placed anywhere on stage other than the center.  Same with voices on stage are never to the extreme left or right.  Then his soundtrack to the Cirque du Soleil show "Love" was such a thrill, buying it on the day of release.  It I would say could be thought of as an interpretation but it still was The Beatles' vocals and instruments.  To those who think it's simply a money-grab, do you really prefer the unnatural stereo of the original releases?  Have you ever noticed a mistake in the panning of Paul's vocal in "Eleanor Rigby" at one point as he sings "all the lonely people"?  From what I have read The Beatles did not take part in the mixing of the stereo versions through "The White Album".  If you haven't read it I strongly recommend reading "Here There and Everywhere" by Geoff Emerick.

Yeah, this is like when they colorized black and white movies.  No sane reason to do it, but some people thought otherwise.  Feel free to ignore or love it to death, after all It's only rock and roll.

I have no problem with "artistic interpretation" of original works.  Just keep the original intact, and in safe storage.

Like the moon landing.

I ordered the 2 vinyl record edition based on how much I liked the 50th anniversary versions of Sgt. Pepper and Abbey Road as well as the mono versions of both .

As for the information or disinformation of the recording technique the Beatles used 4 track recording for all releases except Abbey road which was 8 track .  But this does not mean that Giles had only 4 tracks to work with since the Beatles would record on the 4 tracks and mix them down so they could have many tapes that were used to create the final 4 track version , so all these tracks can now be edited using a 32 or 64 track tape .

" Artistic Interpretation "  I like Jimi Hendrix's version of the Star Spangled Banner much better that that of the original British pub drinking song .

The article I read about it mentioned that Sir Paul McCartney was along side of the mixing decisions on the Giles recording. It is showing up on Qobuz but only Taxman is available. But I'll listen to it. As well as the rest of the added content that may have some enlightenment or humor tossed in. I listened back and forth between the original and the new Taxman and it merely had a larger presence to me. Seemed to have similar integrity however. 

Why not if it improves and balances the soundstage in stereo? It is still the original information. Revolver, my favourite Beatles album and I’m really looking forward to receive my copy 😃

I'll get it when it is available.

ozzy

My final thought is yes I’m sure this may sound better. But  in the car world this would be called a Resto Mod. There’s a market and it will sell so it has to be done I guess. But I just have to say Is Nothing Sacred Anymore.

I gotta tell you that I don't think I've put any Beatles record on the turntable in this century. The same goes for cueing a Beatles tune up on a streaming site. But, yeah, I do occasionally get out the acoustic guitar and play/sing a Beatles tune.

I grew up with the Beatles. I bought the original 45's of songs like "I Want to Hold Your Hand"  back in the early 60's, still have them. As such I think I didn't realize how revolutionary and extremely talented they really were until recently when I watched the "Get Back" series. Since that I've listened to more Beatles than I had in the past 40 years along with solo work by all of them (except Ringo who despite being  the perfect drummer for the Beatles, was not as creative as the rest)

So my take..Hearing the new mixes with improved fidelity is a treat..  "Abbey Road" in Atmos especially on the DVD is stunning. A Revelation. A completely new and wonderful experience. I also have and enjoy the rest of the remixes. 

According to this there will be also be an Atmos mix of Revolver ..I'm sure I''ll get it too

https://www.thebeatles.com/announcing-revolver-special-editions-0

one more thought.. if you haven’t heard the remixes in Atmos you really shouldn’t be commenting. I’m not talking about "fake" Atmos from your TV sound bar. I’m talking about true 7.1.6 Atmos from a high end theater. If it doesn’t impress you then you simply don’t like the Beatles because it is AWESOME.

I also agree with the idea that if the Beatles didn't mix it in the first place then you really aren't adulterating "their creation" by having it remixed

To me it stinks of pandering to a generation that has limited attention span, doesn't care about sound quality and won't watch a classic movie without having it "colourized".

Something for the grumpy old men. 
 

To me it stinks of pandering to a generation that has limited attention span, doesn’t care about sound quality

I’m going to venture a guess that you haven’t heard any of these remixes or you wouldn’t make such ill-informed statements.

First, how is sitting down to listen to an album related to a limited attention span? Second, the sound quality is superb. It blows away any previous versions.

@Herman 

could not have stated it better.  All the remixes are superb.

I'm so sick and tired of reading comments like "it's all about the money" as if there is something wrong with private enterprise. At the end of the day, that's how society develops and moves forward.

Is there really anything wrong with creating an income stream? Simple, if you don't like it, don't buy it, but allow others to decide for themselves.

One thing I consider of note is what Ringo had to say when he heard George Martin’s mix of The Beatles first album: "Where’s me kick?" George Martin was not a Rock ’n’ Roll producer, and I think the groups early albums (pre-Rubber Soul) suffered for it. The vocals are imo mixed far too high, the drumset emasculated. The bass frequencies on early Beatles albums are noticeably rolled off, presumably to prevent mistracking of the styluses on most teenagers hi-fi’s. I don't consider the sound of Beatles LP’s to be sacrosanct, but I'm also not interested in the Giles Martin redo's. Abbey Road was released over fifty years ago, and I didn't much care for it then. I don't care if I never hear it again.

I remember being startled by the change in sound from the Rubber Soul album to the "Paperback Writer"/"Rain" single, and loving it. That change was even more pronounced in the Revolver album. Rock ’n’ Roll was getting tougher (The Yardbirds leading the way), and The Beatles were starting to sound kinda tame. Lots of the British Invasion groups didn’t keep up, and got left behind.

I have read that Rubber Soul was the last album recorded using valve (tube) electronics, Revolver being made on solid state. And of course Geoff Emerick was the new recording engineer for that album as well. The drumset sound on Revolver is drastically different from that on Rubber Soul; much brasher, and far louder in the mix. The guitar sounds are much different too, the Gretsch and Rickenbackers replaced with Epiphone Casino’s, the Vox amps with Fenders.

@bdp24 - ... and I thought I was the only Beatles fan for whom Abbey Road was not one of their favorites.

It had some great stuff on there, and it also had 'Octopus' Garden' and 'Maxwell's Silver Hammer' to break up the continuity between the good stuff! 😄

I can appreciate Abbey Road but it just never really did it for me all that much; still much preferred it to 'Let It Be', though...

Of course the goal is to make money. So what? If someone wants yet another incarnation of some Beatles stuff - great. I have the Mofi Beatles collection with every US release (at least that's how it was sold) and it sounds great to me. I did supplement it with Hey Jude (on a Japanese pressing), which has some songs that weren't on the US releases and a couple of repeats.

At some point I was given the Beatles soundtrack to Cirque d'soleil (called Love) and it is OK for the car, but it is just a new piece of (inferior in my opinion) art that changes the original intention of the Band. Kind of like elevator music.

Sometimes I like variations, like some live albums, and sometimes not. For the "collectors" this is what it is. I don't know why you wouldn't just pick out your favorite version and just play that one, but that's me.