The Beatles The White Album

Description

The Beatles’ acclaimed original studio album remasters, released on CD in
2009, make their long-awaited stereo vinyl debut Manufactured on 180-gram,
audiophile quality vinyl with replicated artwork, the 14 albums return to
their original glory with details including the poster in The Beatles (The
White Album), the Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart Club Band’s cut-outs, and special
inner bags for some of the titles The titles include The Beatles’ 12 original
UK albums, first released between 1963 and 1970, the US-originated Magical
Mystery Tour, now part of the group’s core catalogue, and Past Masters,
Volumes One & Two, first released individually in 1988, featuring non-album
A-sides and B-sides, EP tracks and rarities. With this release, The Beatles’
first four albums make their North American stereo vinyl debuts The Beatles
(double album) packaging includes double-sided photo montage/lyric sheet and 4
solo color photos There has always been demand for The Beatles’ albums on
vinyl. Indeed, 2011’s best-selling vinyl LP in the United States was Abbey
Road. Following the success of The Beatles’ acclaimed, GRAMMY Award-winning
2009 CD remasters, it was decided that the sound experts at EMI’s Abbey Road
Studios should create new versions of The Beatles’ vinyl LPs. The project
demanded the same meticulous approach taken for the CD releases, and the brief
was a simple one: cut the digital remasters to vinyl with an absolute minimum
of compromise to the sound. However, the process involved to do that was far
from simple The first stage in transferring the sound of a master recording to
vinyl is the creation of a disc to be used during vinyl manufacture. There
were two options to consider. A Direct Metal Master (DMM), developed in the
late seventies, allows sound to be cut directly into a stainless steel disc
coated with a hard copper alloy. The older, alternative method is to cut the
sound into the soft lacquer coating on a nickel disc – the first of several
steps leading to the production of a stamper to press the vinyl A ‘blind’
listening test was arranged to choose between a ‘lacquer’ or ‘copper’ cut.
Using both methods, A Hard Day’s Night was pressed with ten seconds of silence
at the beginning and end of each side. This allowed not only the reproduction
of the music to be assessed, but also the noise made by the vinyl itself.
After much discussion, two factors swung the decision towards using the
lacquer process. First, it was judged to create a warmer sound than a DMM.
Secondly, there was a practical advantage of having ‘blank’ discs of a
consistent quality when cutting lacquers The next step was to use the Neumann
VMS80 cutting lathe at Abbey Road. Following thorough mechanical and
electrical tests to ensure it was operating in peak condition, engineer Sean
Magee cut the LPs in chronological release order. He used the original 24-bit
remasters rather than the 16-bit versions that were required for CD
production. It was also decided to use the remasters that had not undergone
‘limiting’ – a procedure to increase the sound level, which is deemed
necessary for most current pop CDs Having made initial test cuts, Magee
pinpointed any sound problems that can occur during playback of vinyl records.
To rectify them, changes were made to the remasters with a Digital Audio
Workstation. For example, each vinyl album was listened to for any ‘sibilant
episodes’ – vocal distortion that can occur on consonant sounds such as S and
T. These were corrected by reducing the level in the very small portion of
sound causing the undesired effect. Similarly, any likelihood of ‘inner-groove
distortion’ was addressed. As the stylus approaches the centre of the record,
it is liable to track the groove less accurately. This can affect the high-
middle frequencies, producing a ‘mushy’ sound particularly noticeable on
vocals. Using what Magee has described as ‘surgical EQ,’ problem frequencies
were identified and reduced in level to compensate for this The last phase of
the vinyl mastering process began with the arrival of the first batches of
test pressings made from master lacquers that had been sent to the two
pressing plant factories. Stringent quality tests identified any noise or
click appearing on more than one test pressing in the same place. If this
happened, it was clear that the undesired sounds had been introduced either
during the cutting or the pressing stage and so the test records were
rejected. In the quest to achieve the highest quality possible, the Abbey Road
team worked closely with the pressing factories and the manufacturers of the
lacquer and cutting styli An additional and unusual challenge was to ensure
the proper playback of the sounds embedded in the ‘lock-groove’ at the end of
side two of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Requiring a combination of
good timing and luck, it had always been a lengthy and costly process to make
it work properly. In fact, it was so tricky, it had never been attempted for
American pressings of the LP. Naturally, Sean Magee and the team perfected
this and the garbled message is heard as originally intended on the remastered
Sgt. Pepper LP.

Features:

Product Details:

• Is Discontinued By Manufacturer ‏ : ‎ No
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Product Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 12.6 x 12.4 x 0.47 inches; 1.45 Pounds
• Manufacturer ‏ : ‎ EMI
• Item model number ‏ : ‎ 28931424
• Date First Available ‏ : ‎ June 25, 2012
• Label ‏ : ‎ EMI
• Number of discs ‏ : ‎ 2
• Best Sellers Rank: #9,863 in CDs & Vinyl (See Top 100 in CDs & Vinyl) #195 in Folk Rock (CDs & Vinyl) #272 in Pop Singer-Songwriters