Do you like/idolize/enjoy The Beatles?

[!STiTCH!]

Then stop bitching, extolling the virtues of HiDef / Hi Fidelity recordings. It isn't about the bit rate, sample rate or any of that garbage. Its about Muuuuuusssssssiiiiiiic!!!! I say stop the snobbery and focus on making good songs. (So says the guy who hasn't shared shit with the forum)

[eaverell]

I agree!

There's always a little place at the top of the tree for them.



Although i'm shareless too....

[Khazul]

I respect them for their musicianship etc, but I utterly hate most of their music - allways have even though I'm actually old enough to have been alive when they were still realeasing new stuff.

John Lennon's solo stuff OTOH was much much better.

Some bands are just well suited to primitive recording and publishing formats - means you never gets to hear them in much detail - thankfully!

[eaverell]

exactly!

re-record anything like that and you loose the vibe.

[Tone Deft]

Hendrix's recordings were far worse and he's considered the best individual player in the genre. his recordings abuse panning the same way turntable scratches were abused and pitch correction is abused today. stereo was relatively new in his time. good example of performance over production.

my favorite example is the eponymous Violent Femmes album, sounds like shit but it a classic album. cue Pitch Black with that album that was recorded in 14 bit (I forget...)

this is unfortunately a very electronica oriented forum, the most likely place you'll find people that haven't bothered to really listen to the Beatles catalog.

I'd take this to the 'would u release on tape?' thread. 'cause everyone knows that music never sounded good prior to the invention of the compact disc.

[Mister Natural]

for clarity's sake - RESPECT is the right word to answer the OP original question

[anybody human]

There will never be anything like The Beatles, of was a miracle. It's impossible today to imagine how important they were, or the way they made people feel. They were also the first to use the studio as an instrument in the context of popular music, something we all do every day now.
As for this thread, The Beatles had better mics, compressors, preamps, rooms, instruments, engineer, producer, ideas, and songs than most folks nowadays so I guess I have no idea what you're on about. Their records are not lo fi if that's what you think. Put on Rubber Soul/ Revolver or Abbey Road, they sound heavenly.

[anybody human]

What I'm saying is, they perfected the studio as instrument on songs like A Day in the Life and Strawberry Fields Forever, and they stripped it down on The White Album or Let It Be era tracks like Dig a Pony. So I just don't get the OP siting of The Beatles as an argument for or against anything.

[Angstrom]

This book is very much worth reading.
It wasn't "The Beatles" who were using the studio as an instrument, it was this guy.
At the time he didn't even get a namecheck, he was just "the technician", while George Martin did the arrangements (etc)


http://www.amazon.co.uk/Here-There-Ever ... 1592401791

[yearlongyeti]

I absolutely love the beatles, but to use them or Jimi Hendrix as arguments for not concentrating on sound quality and it only about the music is a bit wrong. They both pushed the boundaries of sound and cared very much about its quality. I'd agree with Bob dylan being used for this argument but for me I think the Beatles today would be as much about the sample rate as the music. Wizards in every aspect of popular music.

[leedsquietman]

Love the Beatles and especially John Lennon. They were a bit cheesy early on when they were still clearly under orders dressing in matching suits and moptops and singing corny love songs, but from Rubber Soul upwards they were creative and inventive. Technology wise, they were using tape loops, Mellotrons and Moogs/analogue synths in recordings before most of their contemporaries, Lennon even coined the term 'flanging' and the effect of an engineer slowing the pitch by putting hand friction on the tape reel ever so slightly to get the phase/flange effect. You can't tell me a track like 'Tomorrow Never Knows' didn't just blow the whole music scene up. They were very much into pushing technology. I think Lennon was under-rated as a solo artist too, people just wanted him to keep on churning out accessible pop tunes like Imagine and Jealous Guy, but songs like Working Class Hero, Mind Games, #9 Dream are amazing. Double Fantasy is one of THE best sounding albums of all time, Jack Douglas and Lennon with their engineers nailed the perfect analogue 24 track recording, it's immaculate sounding, great mic choices, super low noise floor, great mix balance and excepting a couple of the tracks Yoko wrote and sings, has great songs.

McCartney on the other hand - Band On The Run by Wings was a decentish album but almost everything else is poor.

Hendrix's recordings were quite noisy in terms of engineering noise and also extreme in use of the few effects available. However, Voodoo Chile (Slight Return) still blows me away. That was a benchmark in guitar playing for me.

I'm not for all these rejigged and remixed and remastered albums though. Happy with the originals and not so insane a fan I will buy expensive box set collector editions and this rehashed stuff.

[Tone Deft]

They were a bit cheesy early on when they were still clearly under orders dressing in matching suits and moptops and singing corny love songs

surely you're heard about their early days in Hamburg? they were playing strip clubs and passing around the hookers they were banging. they spent YEARS doing that before they were whisked off into 'the machine' which I can see necessitated heavy management. talk about a massive headfcuk, it would be completely overwhelming. even then they weren't on too tight of a leash. the anti-Lennon album burnings, the classic photo of John sniffing a Coca Cola bottle from Hard Day's Night, dunno if that label really applies. those were much mellower times.

I'm not for all these rejigged and remixed and remastered albums though. Happy with the originals and not so insane a fan I will buy expensive box set collector editions and this rehashed stuff.

the remastered version of 'Let It Be' called 'Let It Be... Naked' is heaven sent. I don't like listening to the original anymore. I promise it's that good, check it out.

[Machinesworking]

As for this thread, The Beatles had better mics, compressors, preamps, rooms, instruments, engineer, producer, ideas, and songs than most folks nowadays so I guess I have no idea what you're on about. Their records are not lo fi if that's what you think. Put on Rubber Soul/ Revolver or Abbey Road, they sound heavenly.

/thread
low noise floor =/= great recording

[nathannn]

i like the beatles, i dont love them.
when listening to them i do sometimes wonder what they would sound like if recorded today.
some of the panning used on their recordings is just awful.
maybe in the future when listening to surround we will look back and think todays surround records are horrible also.

im going to listen to the beatles now.

i forgot to mention that i only like the beatles when they became experimental.. i really cant stand their early teeny bopper crap.

[anybody human]

This book is very much worth reading.
It wasn't "The Beatles" who were using the studio as an instrument, it was this guy.
At the time he didn't even get a namecheck, he was just "the technician", while George Martin did the arrangements (etc)


http://www.amazon.co.uk/Here-There-Ever ... 1592401791

That's why included "engineer". But it was a group effort, a perfect combination. Everybody contributed ideas but I see what you mean.
Great book too.