Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band [VINYL]

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The project could easily have been one of those cynical commercial exercises where an arbitrary engineer creates a new master that the label pawns off as an improvement but is really just louder. The soundtrack was a combination of elements – classical, Indian sitar, English vaudeville and psychedelic rock. Since this was 1983 and mastering technology had improved since the late 1960’s, the sonic result was said to be spectacular. Yellow Submarine is one of their more underappreciated albums, but it is still my favorite to this day. I haven’t heard the LP version, but I’d expect it to be significantly better since it was derived from the original analog tapes.

Giles Martin’s remix is a vast improvement on the old stereo version – more muscular, with an unexpected emphasis placed on Ringo Starr’s drums – although the original mono mix, also here, is the one with the Beatles’ fingerprints on it. Some clients were very technical and specific and others were musicians, and spoke more on a musical, emotional level.And when I worked at EMI in Australia, there was an engineer there who had worked at Abbey Road at that time, named Richard Lush – I think he was the original assistant engineer on Sgt. When they built the Australian EMI studio in Sydney, they based their studio operation on the Abbey Road system. And, using the much vaunted mastering board, they followed what were then considered to be state-of-the-art production methods, including the half-speed cutting process and heavier virgin vinyl.

It featured acolorfulcollage of life-sized cardboard models of famous people on the front of the album cover and the lyrics printed in full on the back cover.Their fans are lovely and the band want to take them home, life is getting better and a splendid time is guaranteed for all – including traffic wardens, worried parents of errant teens and cosy sexagenarian couples. Soon, a red and white plastic clamshell model arrived, along with a Japanese pressing of Yellow Submarine. Yet for most fans the Anniversary Edition’s promise is for greater authenticity, better sound, and less clunky stereophonics. He still owns it and indicated it has a clarity and immediacy missing in the other analog-sourced stereo versions he has heard. Then one day, a producer wanted to be present when the record was cut, and they told Richard they wanted to make adjustments.

Moss versions, the original Holland pressing, the Mobile Fidelity standard issue and UHQR, and the Japanese, UK and Australian red vinyl editions.It’s all beautifully done, as you might expect: few organisations part fans from their cash with such good taste and elegance as Apple Corps. The band concluded that, after the song’s monumental orchestral crescendo, ending with a hum was anti-climactic. For this reason, whether we’ve purchased the album on vinyl or as a CD, most of us have been exposed to it only in stereo guise.