by admin on January 21, 2010
When The Beatles were recording their legendary albums in the 1960s almost everyone listened back to their music using a mono playback system. Since nearly everyone was listening back to their music in mono it only made sense that The Beatles spent most of their time perfecting their mono mixes while basically just “throwing together” the stereo mixes. In fact, according to Geoff Emerick (who worked on many of The Beatles recordings) the band itself spent almost no time on the stereo mixes.
The first 10 Beatles albums were all mixed in mono as well as in stereo (the first two albums were only mixed in mono. ) And now as a part of The Beatles Mono Box Set all 10 of those albums are included in their original mono mix. This is a huge deal to Beatles purists who want to hear their songs as they were originally meant to be heard.
But it’s not just “purists” that should be interested in hearing these mono mixes. Many have claimed that the mono mixes are not only how these albums were meant to be heard but that they actually sound far better in mono than they do in stereo. For example John Lennon himself has said that the 1967 classic Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band sounds much better in mono than it does in stereo.
And even if it doesn’t sound “better” (that’s a subjective statement anyway. ) It certainly sounds different! There are many differences in what you can hear in the mono versions of Sgt. Pepper and the other Beatles albums from what you can hear in the stereo versions. Certain instruments are mixed more loudly. There are certain effects (such as an echo on the vocals on “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”) which were lost in the stereo versions. If you’re a big Beatles fan like I am then you are curious to hear this alternative version. Particularly when you think about how this is the way most people heard it for the first time back in 1967!
Along with those first 10 Beatles albums (all of the UK studio albums including Magical Mystery Tour even though it was initially released only as an EP in the UK) there’s also a non album songs set called Mono Masters which is included. Mono Masters has all of The Beatles songs which were never included on an album which were mixed in mono. If you’re thinking that non album means that they aren’t very good songs then you are definitely mistaken! Many of The Beatles greatest songs were never included on an album including huge hits like “Day Tripper” and “I Want to Hold Your Hand. ”
The Beatles final three albums (including Let It Be & Abbey Road) are not included in the mono box set. Why not? Because they were never mixed in mono in the first place. By 1969 mono had been so completely phased out that The Beatles didn’t bother mixing their albums in mono at all. How quickly things changed in the 1960s!
CLICK HERE to learn more about The Beatles Mono Box Set including how you can order it online 24/7/365 at the best price without paying any shipping fees. Also buy The Beatles Stereo Box Set.
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by admin on December 16, 2009
Few songs have sparked as much debate over lyrical meaning as the Beatles I Am The Walrus. Released in 1967 as the B-side to ‘Hello, Goodbye’, the track’s bizarre wordplay and pastiche of vocal and musical samples have confounded amateur rock scholars in cafeterias, basements and garages for decades. In addition to its single release, ‘I Am The Walrus’ was also featured on the album ‘Magical Mystery Tour’. The album was tied in with the television film of the same name, a rambling piece of cinema verite that never really left the ground.
Like many of the Beatles’ seemingly incomprehensible songs, ‘I Am The Walrus’ was a result of the amalgamation of three separate ideas that John Lennon had been working on. These random points of inspiration ranged from Lennon writing a verse to match the rise and fall of a police siren he heard driving past his house to a re-jiggering of a nursery rhyme he had sung as a child.
The catalyst for the fusion of these disparate ideas came when Lennon was contacted by a British student who explained to him in a letter that he and his classmates had been asked to analyze the lyrics of the Beatles in order to find their true meaning. It tickled Lennon to no end that a professor had decided to make his musical work the subject of such scrutiny, and he decided to try and create the most confusing set of verses he possibly could. He grabbed the bits and pieces of the songs that had been floating about in his head and pasted them together, creating the Beatles I Am The Walrus with a kind of malevolent glee.
Lennon went on to explain that the glue holding the strange elements of the song together was a series of acid trips that he had gone on prior to the final arrangement. Parts of the song are self-referential, including snatches of ‘Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds’, while others sampled monologues from Shakespearian plays. The entire track is arranged as a blustery, winding-up explosion of sound, layering vocals on top of strings on top of noise. The ‘walrus’ in the song had been derived from a Lewis Carroll poem recited in Alice in Wonderland, while the ‘Eggman’ was thought to be a reference the Eric Burdon, who was at the time the lead singer of the Animals. His nickname of ‘Eggman’ referred to one of his more bizarre sexual predilections.
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