Neil Diamond - The Bang Years 1966-1968

Neil Diamond's recordings for Bert Berns' Bang Records label have a tortured release history, so it is good to see the release of the 23 track The Bang Years: 1966-1968 CD on Sony Legacy, a long-promised, but much-delayed, collection. The set presents nearly all of Diamond's Bang recordings in their original, rockin' mono mixes (but omits two Bang era tracks, "Shot Down" and "Crooked Street," for reasons I am not entirely clear on).

I primarily know these songs through a 2 LP set released by Bang in 1973 called Double Gold. Double Gold, while containing some great music, is a fairly thorough butchering of Diamond's early hit records. It features a couple mono recordings, some of the inferior stereo mixes, some horrible sounding fake stereo remixes with annoying panning effects, and some mono recordings that have had (unnecessary) stereo overdubs added to them.

Confused? That's okay, someone named K.F. Louie has done an admirable job of sorting out the whole mess with a handy chart and track-by-track analysis. Many of the tracks were also re-released on Early Classics on the Frog King label and Classics: The Early Years on Columbia. These LPs featured remixed stereo recordings (also with added overdubs), and while they sound good in their own right, they're identifiably different from the classic "hit" versions of the songs. The In My Lifetime box set corrected some of these errors by presenting 11 Bang era tracks, plus an alternate take of "Cherry, Cherry" in their original mono mixes with no overdubs, and sounding very good indeed.

Despite its sonic flaws, Double Gold presents a very compelling portrait of the artist as a young man. "Cherry, Cherry," "Solitary Man," "The Boat That I Row," "Girl, You'll Be A Woman Soon," "I'm A Believer,"  "Red, Red Wine," "Kentucky Woman," and others are classic tracks, strongly rooted in the Brill Building tradition, but also seriously rock and roll as well. Even if you think (as I do) that Diamond went off-track later in his career, the greatness of this material is hard to deny, and Diamond more than earned his reputation as "The Jewish Elvis" with these recordings.

As much as I would like to say this new Sony/Legacy release finally rights all the historical wrongs done to Diamond's Bang recordings, I can't quite bring myself to say so. The music has been mastered too loud and too bright, as if the producer decided the material needed to sound more "contemporary." Despite these flaws, it still sounds much better than most of the material on Double Gold, but unfortunately not as good as the same material on In My Lifetime.

It looks like I'm going to need to track down mono versions of the Bang LPs, The Feel of Neil Diamond and Just For You, if I want to hear this material sounding its best. I guess there are worse things I could have to do.

Update: The more I listen to this, the less enamored I am with the sound quality. There is a very hard, edgy quality to it that I do not find appealing at all. It sounds to me like the upper midrange has been boosted a lot, creating a sound that is excessively bright. I picked up a few 45s and they sound much nicer. The CD is more dynamically compressed than the 45s, but not by a huge amount (typically around 2 to 3 dB louder on average).  I guess it was too much to expect them to get this 100% right after such a long wait, especially given the checkered release history of this material.

Neil's liner notes are very thoughtful and frank. He talks at length about the critical role Ellie Greenwich (RIP) and Jeff Barry twice played in getting his career started, showing faith in his abilities when no one else did. He also gives them the credit they deserve for the critical role they played in the studio to help shape these songs into hit singles.

Nick Lowe - Labour Of Lust Reissued At Last

It was nearly three years ago that I lamented the fact that Nick Lowe's impossibly perfect second solo album, Labour Of Lust, was out-of-print. Since that time Yep Roc has continued reissuing classic Nick Lowe albums, and now I am happy to report a historic injustice has at long last been rectified as Labour Of Lust gets the deluxe reissue treatment:

As the bassist and primary songwriter for Brinsley Schwarz, Nick Lowe was one of the catalysts of the pub rock phenomenon in the early 1970s. As the co-founder and house producer at Stiff Records, he would help create the blueprint for the modern indie rock label and usher in British punk and new wave, helming historic recordings for The Damned, Elvis Costello, and The Pretenders. Here, his landmark second solo album Labour of Lust gets the deluxe reissue treatment, sporting an expanded 12pg. booklet with period photos, new essays and artwork by groundbreaking graphic artist Barney Bubbles.

The reissue also includes Nick's biggest US hit "Cruel To Be Kind," the originally U.K.-only "Endless Grey Ribbon" and U.S.-only "American Squirm" plus bonus B-side "Basing Street." Labour of Lust is the only of Lowe's solo albums to hold the distinction of featuring Nick's Rockpile cohorts Dave Edmunds, Billy Bremner and Terry Williams on every track. Originally released in 1979 and out of print for nearly twenty years, the album has been remastered from the original source, reintroducing this masterpiece to a new generation of pop music obsessives.

It's hard to believe an absolute classic album such as this could have been out-of-print for so long.  CD reissue date is 03/15/2011 with an LP reissue to follow on 04/12/2011.

Soft Boys/Robyn Hitchcock Reissue News

IMPORTANT UPDATE (09/16/11): Please see my update on the reissue of Underwater Moonlight before considering purchase.

I have a couple items of news to report on The Soft Boys and Robyn Hitchcock reissues front.

As many of you probably know, The Soft Boys' two proper albums A Can Of Bees and Underwater Moonlight have been reissued by Yep Roc. The CD versions of both are currently available for sale.

I was a little disappointed to learn that all the bonus tracks for the two CDs are being made available only as lossy compressed (192 kps MP3) downloads. I understand making the bonus tracks download only, The Feelies did this with their recent reissues in order to retain the artistic integrity of the original albums, and I approved of the idea. So while I'm fine with download only bonus tracks in concept, I do wish Yep Roc had also made lossless audio versions available as an option (as was the case with the Feelies albums). Also, none of the bonus tracks would have been new to me, which is probably a good thing since I would have wanted to hear them in better than 192 kps quality.

None of this should prevent anyone who doesn't already own both albums from buying them in this configuration, but it does make them less attractive to long time fans and obsessive collectors of all things Hitchcock, Robyn such as myself.

But that doesn't quite close the door on The Soft Boys reissue front. Originally the vinyl reissues of the two albums were to have been sourced from 1993 DAT copies of the masters that had been prepared when the albums were reissued on CD by Rykodisc. But it appears that the resulting DAT sourced test pressings were judged sonically lacking by the golden-eared former Soft Boy and current vinyl enthusiast Morris Windsor. As Hitchcock relays in an email:

Hello dear vinyl-hunters,

Many apologies for the delay in getting the latest A Can Of Bees and Underwater Moonlight out to you. The LP test-pressings were sent over for Morris Windsor to check (as he has both a record-deck and ears that work well) and he felt that the cut was inferior to the originals (which he also has). We had been mastering from the 1993 DAT tapes, as the best reference source for these old recordings.

However, in the course of our conversations, Morris discovered an original production master (copy of the original mixes) of UM deep in his attic. This transpired to have the long-missing version of Old Pervert that graced the 1980 release of UM, amongst this uniquely surviving set of 1/4" mixes. This was like finding an ashtray in a pub these days: enchanted and wicked. So Morris FedExed (yes, it's a verb) the tape to the management office in LA where Richard Bishop (who had released the original UM 30 years ago on Armageddon Records) had the tapes baked. They go into a kind of pizza oven to prevent the ferric oxide falling off like liquorice.

At this point we decided to re-cut A Can Of Bees from a pristine vinyl copy. This was supplied by Geoffrey Weiss, a long-term music supporter in the quagmire of showbusiness; Geoffrey also kindly supervised the cut, along with Richard. The re-cuts were FedExed back to Morris who pronounced them very good. Morris is not given to hyperbole, and I have always favoured his judgement, when he gives it, over my own.

YepRoc have patiently waited for the improved LPs, and done their best to reassure anxious purchasers of these items who paid for them a while back and have seen nothing yet for their money. If you are amongst them, please again accept my apologies on behalf of the former Soft Boys, and I hope that the quality compensates in some way for the delay.

Best wishes from the old country,

Robyn Hitchcock

So, in short, the LP reissues of Underwater Moonlight and A Can Of Bees will be sourced from an original production master and a pristine vinyl copy respectively. For those not familiar with the terminology, a "production master" is a (typically first generation) copy of the original master tape that would have been used to cut the original LPs. I believe the original master tapes for both albums were lost long ago, so the discovery of a production master for Underwater Moonlight is very good news, especially in light of the fact the original LP version of "Old Pervert" has not to my knowledge graced any previous Underwater Moonlight reissue.

Some might be disappointed to learn that A Can Of Bees will be sourced from LP, but I do not find it hard to believe that a pristine copy of the LP would be the best sounding surviving source, easily surpassing the quality of a DAT copy made 17 years ago. If transferred using good quality equipment, the new LP should sound excellent (within the limitations of the original recordings, obviously). There is a certain stigma attached to sourcing reissues from LP, but I applaud Yep Roc and The Soft Boys for choosing the best sounding available source rather than relying on dogma to produce these LP reissues.

I also wanted to note that Wounded Bird Records is reissuing Robyn's 1996 solo album Moss Elixir as a two CD set with its companion album Mossy Liquor. This will mark the first time Mossy Liquor has been made available on the CD format, having been originally released only as a vinyl LP, and subsequently made available for digital download. I'm glad to hear that Mossy Liquor will be made available on CD in advance of the format's complete extinction. Personally, I will be holding onto my vinyl copy of the album until my own complete extinction.

In other, completely unrelated, Robyn Hitchcock news, my eight year old son Will spent the better part of the day yesterday in his bedroom listening to "The Man Who Invented Himself" over an over. He now has all the lyrics memorized, as do the other other occupants of our house, including our two cats. He also took a break from Scooby Doo and Gamera videos to watch the I Often Dream of Trains in New York DVD with me. He declared "Ye Sleeping Knights of Jesus" his favorite (or perhaps favourite) song on the album. I'm thinking if he memorizes the lyrics of that one, he can perform them for his grandparents this Christmas.

Fables Waveforms

It's been a while since I posted any waveforms here, but with the controversy over the mastering of the 25th Anniversary Edition of R.E.M.'s Fables of the Reconstruction, I thought I'd give it another crack.

The first waveform is a screen shot of the track "Cant Get There From Here" taken from my needledrop of the original 1985 LP. (For technical details, see comments).

"Cant Get There From Here" (1985 LP Needledrop)

The next waveform represents the same song taken from the original 1985 IRS/MCA CD.

Some have criticized me in the past for comparing waveforms taken from LP needledrops to those taken from CDs. The argument against doing so is that the manifold noise and distortions inherent to LP playback make any such waveform comparisons invalid. But as you can see below, the needledrop and CD waveforms look remarkably similar. In terms of dynamic range, I found less than 0.5 dB difference between these two tracks, so whatever distortion LP playback adds to the picture here, it is of a low enough order not to have a tremendous impact on the track's dynamic range.

"Cant Get There From Here" (1985 IRS/MCA CD)

That is not to say the two tracks sounded identical. While similar in terms of dynamic range, to my ears the CD track sounded somewhat thin and bright compared to the LP sourced track. This is not to say that the CD sounded bad, but to my ears it lacked the depth and fullness of the needledroped track.

Finally, we come to the remastered 2010 version of "Cant Get There From Here." As expected, the remastered version is louder than the other versions, around 8 dB louder on average. With an average RMS value of approximately -12 dB, this is hardly the most compressed remaster I have seen (that distinction belongs to Iggy Pop's remixed Raw Power, which averages around -4 dB). For a more reasonable point of comparison most tracks on the recent Deluxe Edition of Exile On Main St. average around -10 dB.

"Cant Get There From Here" (2010 Capitol Remaster)

So, how did the remaster sound in comparison to the other tracks? Well, most obviously it was louder. A lot louder. I had to turn my stereo way down when switching to the new remaster. In order to precisely match sound levels I needed the help of my computer. Once I matched levels and compared tracks it seemed the remaster had a slightly hollow sound compared to the other tracks, and tonally I thought it was brighter than either the older CD or the LP. I also noticed that Michael Stipe's vocals seemed to be boosted slightly in relation to the instruments. The remaster did not sound bad, but I did prefer the two earlier versions.

It's been my experience in listening to compressed remasters that the most regrettable consequences of compression only reveal themselves over time, not in quick back-and-forth comparisons. As I have noted before, heavy compression tends to take a sense of excitement out of the music, resulting in albums that do not hold up to repeated listening.

So while the remastering of Fables could have been worse, it also could have been better. A lot better. Ironically, in 2010 if you want to hear a really good sounding digital version of Fables Of The Reconstruction, you'll have to digitize your old LP.

Newsweek Calls Out R.E.M.'s "iPod Ready" Fables Reissue

I was very surprised to see the so-called "loudness war" get a mention in Newsweek, where Seth Colter Walls criticizes the recent 25th Anniversary deluxe reissue of Fables Of the Reconstruction for having been mastered too loud (Shiny Happy Remaster?). Colter Walls rightly points out that the atmospheric Fables is not the sort of album that particularly lends itself to today's pumped up, super-compressed mastering aesthetic.

Having compared the remaster to my original LP, I agree that the remastering was louder than it should have been, and I definitely preferred the sound of the original LP. (I have never heard the original CD, so I can't offer any insight on that). That said, I also thought the differences I heard were more subtle than is often the case with contemporary remasters, and this album is far from the worst remaster I have heard. As I noted in my original post, "I suspect only the very pickiest of audiophiles would seriously object to the sound quality of the remaster." It seems I was wrong about that, as Colter Walls clearly does not consider himself an audiophile but nonetheless had serious issues with the sound quality of the reissue.

There are a couple things I would take issue with in the article. First, I disagree with the author's contention that recently remastered CDs are typically the safest bet when looking for good sound, and Fables represents something of a special case exception. In general, I have found that the more recent the remaster, the more likely it is to sound bad, although there are enough exceptions that I would hesitate to take things on anything other than a case-by-case basis. Second, I'm not so sure that the increasing loudness of CDs can be so tidily pinned on the iPod. After all, the iPod does feature a "sound check" function that normalizes the volume of all songs on it without effecting dynamic range (although I have no idea how many people use it). Beyond that, the movement toward louder CDs predates the iPod, it's just that we've seen a steadily escalating situation.

For what it's worth, here is my take on why we are seeing louder and louder remasters: There is a strong incentive for labels to produce remasters that sound "different" from what has come before. And making a release 6 or 7 dB louder than previous CD issues will give a lot of people an initial "wow" factor if they don't understand the need to carefully match volume levels in order to make a valid comparison. If you compare the exact same track but only turn the volume up, 9 out of 10 people will immediately say the louder version sounds "better" even if there is no difference at all. So a louder remaster can initially "grab" the listener and give him or her a false sense that what they are hearing is "better," when really it is just louder.

With careful work and using the best current analog-to-digital converters and other equipment it is certainly possible for today's mastering engineers to create remastered CDs that surpass the sound quality of CDs produced ten or twenty years ago. However, if the original CD was well done (not a safe assumption) the improvement in sound tends to be subtle, and not the type that will hit you in the face immediately. To hear the improvement you'll need a decent stereo system and have to know what to listen for. But let's face it, that describes a tiny percentage of the possible market for a reissue like this. It's so much easier for a record company to just to make a remaster louder. Most people (music critics included) will hear that difference instantly and assume it is a change for the better.

In other words, you can fool most of the people all of the time, and the the rest will just complain about it endlessly on blogs and internet discussion boards in such an arrogant and dismissive manner that the rest of the world will assume they are the equivalent of coffee connoisseurs who will only partake of coffee beans that have been crapped out by animals.

That's the unfortunate reality, and I don't see any way around it. I try to educate on my site, but I think that can only help at the margins, and maybe help people who already understand these things to make an informed purchasing decision. So it's good to see the problem being addressed by someone outside the confines of blogs and audio discussion boards, and I hope Colter Walls continues to listen carefully and draw attention to this problem.

It has come to the point with CD reissues where I pretty much just ask myself if I am willing to pay the price of admission for the bonus tracks, because I assume in the end I will not like the remastered sound as much as what came before, especially if I have a decent copy on LP already. The 25th Anniversary reissue of Fables of the Reconstruction is hardly the worst offender in the ongoing loudness war, but there is no doubt in my mind that it would have sounded better had the mastering engineer applied less compression than he did. Perhaps with journalists like Seth Colter Walls drawing more attention to the problem we can have reason to hope for a better sounding deluxe reissue of Lifes Rich Pageant.

R.E.M. Fables Of The Reconstruction 25th Anniversary Edition

In his excellent (albeit brief) liner notes to the new edition of Fables Of The Reconstruction, Peter Buck attempts to clear up the misconception that the members of R.E.M. do not actually like the album that was yesterday honored with a 25th Anniversary deluxe reissue:

"Over the years a certain misapprehension about Fables Of The Reconstruction has built up. For some reason, people have the impression the members of R.E.M. don't like the record. Nothing could be further from the truth. It's a doomy, psycho record, dense and atmospheric. It creates its own strange little world, illogical but compelling. It's a personal favorite, and I'm really proud of how strange it is. Nobody but R.E.M. could have made that record."

Fans of R.E.M. might be forgiven for thinking the band held the album in less than the highest regard given all of the ambivalent to negative comments certain band members have made about the album over the years. But Buck goes on to make the very important point that the way the band feels about the album is inextricably tied to the circumstances surrounding its creation:

"All four of us were completely out of our minds at the time. We had just spent four straight years on the road; we were tense, impoverished, certifiable, and prime candidates for rehab. And it was cold. My main memory of that period is making the hour commute to Wood Green on the Tube and then walking for twenty minutes through invariably inclement weather, usually sleet."

Likewise, how the average R.E.M. fan feels about Fables Of The Reconstruction is no doubt inextricably bound to the circumstances under which they first heard it, and their memories of that time period.


I had just turned 16 when I picked up Fables at my local Sam Goody. I have a memory of listening to the album on my walkman as my Mom drove me home. I can still smell that "new cassette" smell if I concentrate hard enough when listening to the opening chords of "Feeling Gravitys Pull." Personally, Fables is my favorite R.E.M. album. But then it was also the first R.E.M. album I bought, and the strange and compelling "dense and atmospheric" music contained within it opened up a whole new world of music for me.

Soon after I purchased Fables, I picked up R.E.M.'s earlier releases. After that, there was a virtual cascade of intriguing new music finding its way into my walkman. Peter Buck played mandolin on "I Will Dare" by The Replacements, so I picked up Let It Be. He produced The Good Earth by The Feelies, so I got that. I heard Wire and The Soft Boys were an influence on R.E.M., so albums by those bands were soon in my collection as well. Those purchases drove me in a hundred new directions that I am still branching out from today.

But for me, R.E.M.'s Fables Of The Reconstruction is still there at the root of it all. I don't think it is any kind of exaggeration to say that the album changed my life. And I still regard Fables Of The Reconstruction as one of the finest rock albums ever made. I like it as much or more than anything recorded by The Beatles, or anyone else.


The 25th Anniversary edition adds a bonus disc of demos that were recorded in Athens, GA before the band left to record Fables with famed producer Joe Boyd in London. Buck remembers the band as being hard up for new songs after exhausting their stockpile of songs on the first two albums, and feeling "dangerously unprepared" as the band departed to London, a view he was forced to revise upon listening to the demos again. Maybe R.E.M. really were exhausted, drugged-out and low on inspiration at the time, but from the audio evidence available from the demos they sound like a band in complete control of their destiny and bursting with musical ideas. Perhaps they were receiving divine guidance. Most of the arrangements for the songs were already worked out, and I suspect Boyd's role in shaping the album was minimal, more along the lines of helping the band realize the sound they were searching for than providing direction.

R.E.M. would never again record an album remotely like Fables Of The Reconstruction, and for me personally their music would become less compelling over the years as their commercial fortunes expanded. Don't get me wrong, I've enjoyed much of the music they've created since Fables, it's just that I never again loved it or was fully captivated by it in quite the same way. Perhaps that would have been asking too much, especially considering that their music could never again be new to me in the same way.

The remastered sound of the new CD is yet another example of the trend toward excessive dynamic compression of reissues. The reissue is around 7 to 8 dB louder on average than the original, although it sounded fine to me while listening to it in the noisy environment of my car. However, I'm a little skeptical that the sound quality will hold up as well for me on my home stereo. Perhaps the best part of the beautifully executed box that the remastered set comes in is that there is room in it for a CD-R needledrop of the album.

Update: After listening to the album on the stereo I suspect only the very pickiest of audiophiles would seriously object to the sound quality of the remaster. Despite the fact that it is more compressed than what I would consider ideal, the overall result is still very good.

Public Image Ltd. "album"

I've updated Public Image Ltd.'s 1986 album artwork especially for your iPod or other portable player. This seems appropriate since the collection of songs known as "album" on LP, "cassette" on cassette, or "compact disc" on CD is currently available as an mp3 download, but appears to be out-of-print on CD. Rhino recently reissued album on LP and did quite a nice job of it to my ears. Elektra's vinyl tended to be quite noisy toward the end of the LP era, so it is good to finally have a really nice sounding copy of this on LP.

I think this is the only album I own that features Steve Vai on guitar, and I still find it really weird that Lydon played with Ginger Baker, considering that in 1981 NME published an "April fool" announcement that Baker had joined PiL. Despite the strange (one could argue inappropriate) cast of musicians producer Bill Laswell chose to surround Lydon, album holds up. No, it's not as adventurous as Metal Box or Flowers Of Romance, but it is a strong set of songs and nice time capsule of the sound of "alternative rock" circa 1986.

Of course it's well known that John Lydon nicked the concept of a "generic" album from Flipper, whose 1982 debut was called Generic Flipper (or possibly Album or Album Generic Flipper).


Anyway, while Flipper obviously did it first, it should be pointed out that from a design and conceptual standpoint, Lydon did it better. And Flipper did get some measure of revenge by titling a later release Public Flipper Ltd.

The Jayhawks (aka The Bunkhouse Album) Finally Reissued

Lost Highway recently reissued the Jayhawks long-lost, self-titled debut on CD, LP and as a digital download. This marks the first time the album has been available in any form since its initial release on Bunkhouse Records in 1986 as a 2,000 copy limited-edition LP.

I hadn't heard anything about the reissue, but spotted the LP for a mere $10.99 in the new arrivals bin at my local record shop and picked it up. Honestly, I wasn't overly excited by the find and the record sat in my "to be vacuumed" pile for a week or so after purchase (yes, I even vacuum clean my new LPs). Why wasn't I excited to finally hear this lost-classic that is highly regarded among Jayhawks fans? I guess mostly because I wasn't aware that it was a lost-classic that is highly regarded among Jayhawks fans.

I first became aware of the Jayhawks in 1989 when I was serving as music director of my college radio station and Twin/Tone sent a preview copy of The Blue Earth. It's fair to say I liked the album. I immediately put it into heavy rotation and regularly played a few of the tracks on my own radio program ("Two Angels," "Five Cups Of Coffee," and "The Baltimore Sun" definitely caught my ear at the time). I liked the album enough to buy a copy for myself, but not enough to buy it again when Restless reissued it with bonus tracks several years later. And I didn't like it near as much as the albums the band released later on Rick Rubin's American imprint both with and without Mark Olson.

Despite some excellent songwriting, I found the consistently slow tempos dragged the album down, and some of the songwriting struck me as indistinct and too beholden to the band's obvious Gram Parsons influence. For me, The Blue Earth remains an embryonic version of the kind of music The Jayhawks would do with far more confidence and individuality in later years, and I assumed The Bunkhouse Album--recorded a full three years before the Twin/Tone release--would sound like an even more embryonic version of that. Also, let's face it, when a limited-edition first album by a band that eventually gains a sizable following like the Jayhawks stays out-of-print for nearly a quarter century, it's usually because the band has good reason to leave it collecting cobwebs in the attic. For all these reasons I had relatively low expectations for The Jayhawks. I assumed the album would be a curiosity worth a listen or two and little more.

All of which is to say that I was not prepared for the energy that comes pulsating out of the grooves of The Jayhawks' feisty debut record. Mark Olson's songwriting is already surprisingly sharp; highly tuneful county-tinged rockers like "Falling Star," "Let The Last Night Be The Longest," "People In This Place On Every Side," and "Let The Critics Wonder" quickly found their way into my head and stayed there. There are a few places where Olson succumbs to easy country cliches ("The Liquor Store Came First") and some tracks sound like filler ("Cherry Pie"), but these tracks never slow things down enough to blunt the album's overall impact. Olson and Louris had already found a comfortable way to harmonize, although at this point Olson is clearly the group's leader (a fact reinforced by the cover photo that depicts Olson standing in front of the rest of the band lounging on a porch behind him) with Louris confined to the role of guitar picker and back-up singer. The production is predictably rough, but it never gets in the way of the music either.

What struck me the most however, is the fact that Gary Louris' guitar playing positively rips, and drummer Norm Rogers (later of The Cows) keeps things moving along at the kind of peppy pace that is altogether absent from the more contemplative The Blue Earth. To my ears, The Jayhawks has more in common with an album like The Long Ryders' raucous Native Sons than it does with the overly-mannered Blue Earth, and I regard that as a very good thing. If I had been one of the lucky 2,000 to hear this album when it was released in 1986, I probably would have become a big fan of the Jayhawks sooner than ended up being the case.

I admit that this is still a somewhat embryonic effort, and The Jayhawks would find a better balance between fast and slow tempos on Hollywood Town Hall and Tomorrow The Green Grass. Also, both Olson and particularly Louris' songwriting would mature in the passage of time, and Rick Rubin at American would spend a lot more money recording their albums than their then manager Charlie Pine could muster at Bunkhouse Records (a label he founded specifically to release this album). Nevertheless, The Jayhawks (aka The Bunkhouse Album) is a very promising debut album from a great band that can also proudly stand on its own merits twenty-four years after its initial release.

Update: No Depression is running a contest to win a signed copy of the LP and CD. You must be a registered No Depression user and leave a comment listing your five favorite Jayhawks songs in order to enter.

Exile In Pixelville

Do you see anything wrong with the image below?


I see plenty wrong with it, and any visual artist I know would absolutely hit the ceiling if their work were reproduced in this way. The image is, of course, the iconic cover to the Rolling Stones' Exile On Main St album that features a Robert Frank photograph of a photo collage that he discovered on the wall of a tattoo parlor. This is a scan of the new deluxe edition artwork. Resolution issues aside (which are partly the fault of my scanner), the first thing I noticed about the new cover is that the color balance is off. The whole cover has a reddish tint, while the original LP had no tinting whatsoever. To my eyes the tinting looks "wrong," although I admit it could be considered a legitimate artistic choice. But as you will see below, there are some other things about the way the image was manipulated that are very hard to understand.

More annoying to me is the fact that to fit the original square-shaped cover to the rectangular dimensions of a digipack, someone has done a Photoshop hack job on the image. Take a look at the blue highlighted selections below. Do they look familiar?


They should, as they've simply been cropped out of the original image and repeated. See the areas highlighted in red below to see the parts of the image that have been duplicated.


Once I noticed this repetition of images, I found it incredibly distracting. My eye is continually drawn to the elements in the image that are repeated. I understand that they needed to do something to fit a square image to the rectangular dimensions of a digipack, it's just that I feel they found the worst possible way to do it.

Here is a photo I took of my Exile On Main St LP cover using nothing more than a Canon Digital Rebel SLR camera with stock lens:


I cleaned up the image slightly in Photoshop then cut the text to a separate layer. Next, I used the "desaturate" adjustment to make sure the cover was truly black and white. This probably took me around ten minutes.

Once I started looking at the original cover, I noticed something interesting: I had originally assumed the repetition of images for the deluxe reissue was needed to prevent cropping the image, but in fact someone cropped a significant amount of material out of the original image to create the deluxe artwork. See the highlighted areas below to see what was cut out:


This makes the choice to repeat material even more mystifying to me. Somebody actually chopped off some of the horizontal information, which makes no sense if you are trying to transform a square image into a horizontally aligned rectangular one.

If they had merely cropped the image in the way you see it below, it would have fit the dimensions of the digipack perfectly with no need for repeating images. Yes, some of the original cover would have been lost, but no more than was cropped out anyway.


If they wanted to keep the entire original album cover intact, they could have added some sort of sidebar, as I often see on such deluxe reissues. I created a possible example below, although I am sure someone more creative than me could do something much more interesting. But at least this way none of the iconic album cover is lost.


I didn't spend very long manipulating any of these images, and I admit they are far from perfect. If I had better equipment, a better source, and more time I could have done a lot better. Nevertheless, I think the options I've presented here would have been preferable to the very strange and unappealing artwork that was created for this deluxe reissue. Of course if they had chosen to go with standard jewel case packaging, none of this manipulation would have been necessary in the first place. I personally don't believe digipacks are mandatory for deluxe reissues, although they do seem to be the norm.

Okay, I realize there are bigger problems in the world than botched CD reissue artwork. I'm honestly more puzzled by this than anything: the more closely I looked at the artwork, the more questions I had, and the less sense any of it made to me. I'd be interested to hear possible explanations for what I consider some very strange choices. But considering how iconic this album cover is (John Lydon has admitted that it was a huge influence on the visual aesthetic of punk rock), I think it is a real shame to see it treated with so little respect.

If I haven't said anything about the music on Exile On Main St yet, it's because I assume you know it's great: a near perfect fusion of rock, blues, country and gospel. It is the fullest realization ever of what Gram Parsons envisioned as "Cosmic American Music" despite the fact that it was (mostly) made by five Brits living in France.

The deluxe reissue is worth picking up for the bonus disc, but not, in my opinion, for the remastering. Target is selling an exclusive "rarities edition" that is just the bonus CD for $10. It's refreshing to have an option not to repurchase the original album but still be able to get the bonus tracks for a reasonable price.

I know Exile is supposed to be a "bad" sounding recording, but if you find a good copy on LP and play it back on a decent system, it is actually a very lively and real sounding recording. The warts and all sound shocked a lot of people back in 1972 because the Stones chose not to adhere to the post-Abbey Road norm of slickly produced multi-track rock music. The album sounds all the more vital today because of that fact.

Unfortunately, the new remaster does adhere to today's norm of dynamically compressing older recordings, which to my ears ends up emphasizing the murkier aspects of the recording. For the best sounding Exile on CD I recommend finding a used copy of the 1994 Virgin reissue that was remastered by Robert Ludwig. Better yet, find an Artisan pressed original UK or US LP, as none of the CD reissues have bettered it sonically.

Update:

I looked at the non-deluxe edition CD in a record store today, and the cover art on that also features some strange repetition of images, even though the image is rectangular. Some of the images that were cropped from the bottom of the original cover reappear, but there is another band of repeated images at the bottom. Weird.

The Feelies - The Good Earth Reissued

I wanted to provide yet another Feelies update now that my vinyl reissue of The Good Earth has finally arrived.

I will admit to a small amount of consternation when I first learned that the vinyl reissues of Crazy Rhythms and The Good Earth would not be mastered from the original analog master tapes. Now that I have actually heard them, I will also admit that any sense of concern about that was totally misplaced and misguided. Major kudos are due to Andreas Meyer from Tangerine Mastering for the magic he has worked in remastering these albums for vinyl.

In my previous post I noted that I was hard pressed to hear any differences between a Stiff original pressing of Crazy Rhythms and the Bar/None reissue. I could hear differences between a Coyote/Twin-Tone LP pressing of The Good Earth and the Bar/None reissue, and they were mostly in favor of the reissue. First off, the reissue is a better, quieter pressing than the Coyote original, which is a helpful thing because there are some long quiet passages on the album. Beyond that, the reissue has a subtly crisper, more open sound without changing the essential sonic character of the album in any way.

I also had an original Coyote CD on hand for comparison, but the less said about that the better, because it is an absolute sonic disaster. The old Coyote CD turned an album with a warm, inviting sonic character into something shrill and unpleasant. The old CD only reminded me of why I hated CD sound for such a long time.

As with Crazy Rhythms, I downloaded the album plus bonus tracks in WAV format, and once again, while they sounded good, it was obvious they were slightly dynamically compressed compared to the LP. Nevertheless, the new digital version sounds far better than the original CD. The download-only bonus tracks are not quite as interesting as was the case with Crazy Rhythms. The two covers were previously available on the No One Knows EP, and a recent live version of "Slipping (Into Something)" once again proves the reconstituted Feelies have not lost a step.

The only quibble I have with the reissue (and it is a minor one to be sure) is that about ten seconds of silence present on the original LP between "Tomorrow Today" and the album closer "Slow Down" has been removed. I always kind of liked the way "Slow Down" came in after such a long quiet period ("Tomorrow Today" also features a very long, slow fade out). Curiously, this silence is also not present on the original Coyote CD, so it's arguable whether it is necessary for the sake of "authenticity." I always kind of liked the effect, but its absence is not enough to prevent the reissue from becoming my new "go-to" version of the album.

Finally, a few words about the music itself. If I haven't said much about it to this point it's because I assume you know it's great. Crazy Rhythms seems to be the album that has gotten the most attention over the years, probably in part because it has been out-of-print longer. It would be a shame if The Good Earth were overshadowed by the earlier album, because its charms are at least equal to those of its predecessor.

The Good Earth showcases a less jumpy and nervous version of the Feelies. The rhythm section of Brenda Sauter (bass), Stanley Demeski (drums) and Dave Weckerman (percussion) was less aggressive than the Crazy Rhythms-era combo of Anton Fier and Keith De Nunzio. This, combined with a greater amount of strummed acoustic guitar, led to a more relaxed, pastoral sound which is beautifully reflected in the cornfield photo and earth-tones on the album cover.

Despite the more laid-back vibe, there is still plenty of interesting stuff going on rhythmically, but it emerges from the mix in a more subtle fashion than previously. Some of the songs reflect Mercer and Million's longstanding interest in Brian Eno's ambient music, but the influence of country and folk music is just as clear. All-in-all, it makes for an entirely unique, and highly appealing sonic concoction.

I simply cannot recommend both of these long-overdue reissues highly enough, even to those who already own the albums in other forms. The LPs sound absolutely gorgeous, and the digital tracks sound very fine as well. Both albums, as well as a limited edition 7" of "Fa Ce La," are available directly from Bar/None.

Feelies Reissue Update

I just wanted to provide a quick update on the Feelies reissues. I finally got my vinyl copy of Crazy Rhythms (still waiting on The Good Earth). In terms of sound quality, the LP reissue is outstanding. I had an original Stiff pressing of the first album on hand for comparison. As hard as I tried, I could not hear a difference between the two, which was kind of surprising considering we know the reissue was digitally sourced. The digital source must have been better than CD resolution, because I could see frequency content extending all the way up to 40 kHz. The pressing was very quiet, which is a really good thing considering that some of the song intros feature extended periods of near silence.

The LP comes with a cute little business card with a code for a digital download. The download is administered through Domino, who offer the option of downloading the album as a CD resolution WAV file. The download sounded fine as well, although I believe it was slightly compressed. The download-only bonus tracks are terrific. I had never heard the 7" version of "Fa-Ce-La" or the demos of "The Boy With The Perpetual Nervousness" and "Moscow Nights" before. What struck me about these versions was that although the sound quality and performances were cruder than the later versions, the arrangements were very much locked into place early. These versions also apparently date to a period before Glenn Mercer hit puberty, because he really sounds like an awkward teenage kid on these cuts with a far different voice than what would appear on Crazy Rhythms in 1980. (I guess if I want to hear the b-side version of "Raised Eyebrows" I will have to shell out for the Insound exclusive 7"). The live tracks from 2009 show the band has not lost a step in terms of energy and tightness despite the long hiatus.

Well done and highly recommended!

For anyone bummed the cover of "Paint It Black" included on the 1990 A&M reissue was omitted from the new reissue, here it is:

Paint It Black [click to download]

Step into the wayback machine...

For a little perspective today's The Beatles reissues, check out this article published in The New York Times in 1987; "Beatles On CD: Yeah, Yeah, Nah." Reviewer Allan Kozinn grumbles about the fact that both the mono and stereo mixes were not being made available for each album, but in general he is very complimentary of the sound quality of the CDs:

On the four CD's just issued, the sound is magnificent - solid, crystal clear, beautifully textured and fully detailed. One hears very little in the way of tape hiss or extraneous noise; heard side by side with their equivalent mono Parlophone LP's, the CD's sound, for the most part, as bright or brighter on top, and a good deal richer in the bass.

As much as people have complained (rightly to my mind) about the sound of the 1987 remasters in the ensuing years, as far as I remember at the time of release, the original Beatles CDs were considered state-of-the art. Most reviewers commented on what a revelation it was to finally be able to hear the music of The Beatles in the shiny new CD format.

Anyway, it's worth keeping in mind how perspectives can change over the years as you read contemporary reviews of the new remasters.

Finally! Feelies Reissues Coming Sept. 8!

You might remember that I passed on the news that The Feelies classic first LP, Crazy Rhythms, was going to be reissued by a label called Water Records back in early 2008. To the disappointment of many, that reissue never materialized (although a worthwhile reissue of the group's third album, Only Life, appeared in its place). But good things come to those who wait, and I am very pleased to announce that The Feelies first two albums are going to be reissued by Bar-None Records with full approval of the newly reunited band.

I made an inquiry with the band's management and got the following details about the upcoming reissues.

First of all, the really important part:

Release date for both The Feelies re-issues on Bar None: September 8, 2009.

No fooling around this time, this is really happening (honest).

The albums will be reissued on both CD and LP. Bonus tracks will be download only:

Both albums will be issued in original sequence with download cards included in each package that will give purchasers access to bonus tracks as well as the original albums. The band felt that the original records functioned as discrete works on their own that should not be compromised with additional tracks not part of the original sequence, hence offering bonus tracks thusly

Crazy Rhythms CD/LP reissue track listing:
Side One:
1. The Boy With The Perpetual Nervousness
2. Fa cé-La
3. Loveless Love
4. Forces At Work
Side Two:
5. Original Love
6. Everybody's Got Something To Hide (Except Me And My Monkey)
7. Moscow Nights
8. Raised Eyebrows
9. Crazy Rhythms
*** NOTE: Their cover of "Paint It Black" was left off the reissue as per the band's request. A&M added it without the band's permission and it was a recording from the late 80s with a different line-up than what was the "Crazy Rhythms" line-up.

Crazy Rhythms bonus tracks:
1. Fa cé-La [single version] - originally released as a 7" on Rough Trade.
2. The Boy With The Perpetual Nervousness [Carla Bley demo version]
3. Moscow Nights [Carla Bley demo version]
4. Crazy Rhythms [Live] - From the 9:30 Club (Washington D.C.), recorded March 14, 2009.
5. I Wanna Sleep In Your Arms [Live] - From the 9:30 Club (Washington D.C.), recorded March 14, 2009. Modern Lovers cover.

The Good Earth CD/LP reissue track listing:
Side One:
1. On The Roof
2. The High Road
3. The Last Roundup
4. Slipping (Into Something)
5. When Company Comes
Side Two:
6. Let's Go
7. Two Rooms
8. The Good Earth
9. Tomorrow Today
10. Slow Down

The Good Earth bonus tracks.
1. She Said, She Said - originally on the "No One Knows" vinyl EP on Coyote Records through Twin/Tone Records (US). Beatles cover.
2. Sedan Delivery - originally on the "No One Knows" vinyl EP on Coyote Records through Twin/Tone Records (US). Neil Young cover.
3. Slipping (Into Something) [Live] - From the 9:30 Club (Washington D.C.), recorded March 14, 2009.

Download cards will be included in each respective CD & LP reissue. The full album + bonus tracks will be included on each. Domino will be the hosting site for the downloads as they have the rights to the albums outside the U.S. & Canada.

I have heard some grumbling about the fact that the bonus tracks will not be included with the physical packages, but I agree with the band's decision. The Feelies have always had their own way of doing things, whether it was only playing holiday and weekend gigs in the early years, taking 6 years before releasing their sophomore album, or refusing to sell t-shirts ("because a t-shirt is something you wear under a shirt"). The band is very sincere about not wanting bonus tracks to interfere with the artistic integrity of the albums. Some might find it pretentious, but the band really thinks of their albums as complete artistic statements (and having listened to these albums hundreds of times over the past decades, I happen to agree). The Feelies probably consider offering bonus tracks as downloads a pretty big artistic compromise.

Personally, I have always found The Feelies' absolute commitment to their artistic vision (even if it meant less money) refreshing, and inseparable from the their overall appeal. If this is the way they want to present their work to the public after it's been out-of-print for so long, I respect that absolutely. Just because there is space on a CD for bonus tracks doesn't mean they belong there, and these albums really do work best as cohesive entities, or "discrete works," if you prefer. Just because it sounds pretentious to say so, doesn't mean it isn't also true. I also agree that "Paint It Black" was best left off Crazy Rhythms altogether. It never made any sense to include a track recorded so much later by a different line up. I always strongly suspected that A&M tacked the track onto the album without approval from the band, and we now have confirmation that was the case.

I also got a few details on the vinyl pressings:

Bar/None's LP reissues were mastered by Andy VanDette at Masterdisk in NYC
www.masterdisk.com
Pressings will be handled by Rainbo Records and will be 180 gram
www.rainborecords.com

Now for a little bit of bad news:

Original tapes were unfortunately not found. Andreas Meyer from Tangerine Mastering used digital files for both.

Tapes obtained from the band were used for the Fa cé-La [single version], The Boy With The Perpetual Nervousness [Carla Bley demo version] and Moscow Nights [Carla Bley demo version]. The live tracks were recorded by their live sound engineer Andy Peters.

It's disappointing to know the original analog tapes for these albums could not be located, but if mastered properly (and Masterdisk usually does a good job) they should still sound very good. Honestly, I've always felt that because of the extremely quiet and long intros, that Crazy Rhythms was best appreciated on CD anyway (that's not something you will hear me say often by the way). I also really appreciate that the band's management was so forthcoming with information about the sources used for the reissues, as that is not always the case.

Collectors will want to keep their eyes open for a limited edition reissue of the "Fa cé-La" single:

Insound will be exclusively carrying a limited
edition 7" reissue of the original "Fa cé-La" single.
Side A:
Fa cé-La (single version)
Side B:
Raised Eyebrows (album version)

Pressing for this single will also be handled by Rainbo Records.

Steet date for the single is October 8, 2009, and it is available for pre-order from Insound now.

All in all, this is fantastic news. Not only are two of the best albums of the 80s finally being reissued, but long-time fans can also get some interesting bonus material.

Crazy Rhythms and The Good Earth are two of my favorite albums and it is great to see that they will be available again after being unavailable for far too long. I only hope that the reissue of Crazy Rhythms does not overshadow the reissue of The Good Earth. The first album has acquired more critical cache over the years, and the band will be performing it live in its entirety at an upcoming All Tomorrow's Parties event. But perhaps because it was my introduction to the band, but I've always felt The Good Earth was the artistic equal of its more celebrated predecessor. The album has its own pastoral charm that stands as a nice counter-balance to the jumpy nervousness of the debut.

Love Lost (and Found)

I came across some exciting news for fans of Arthur Lee and Love. Sundazed is releasing a previously unissued Love album from 1971:

Sonic archaeology! In a move that defies rational belief, SUNDAZED has unearthed an unissued 1971 album by revered Los Angeles rock band Arthur Lee & Love, languishing in the Columbia Records tape vault.

I assume this is the album that Lee recorded for CBS--tentatively titled Dear You--after his deal with Blue Thumb expired. While I was aware of the existence of this album, I have never heard it, and am not aware of the tapes ever circulating in traders circles (although I am not really up on these things). Either way, this is a major find, and I'm glad this material will finally see the light of day through Sundazed.

But [think of a Ronco infomercial here] that's not all you get! According to Sundazed:

And that's not all! We've also uncovered a marvelous batch of acoustic demos for the ‘71 album, featuring just the magical voice of Arthur Lee and his acoustic guitar. It's a thrilling twin-discovery of ultra-important material that no one knew existed.

As a precursor to the release of this breath-taking Arthur Lee and Love material (to be called Love Lost), we've created a 7” single of two knockout tracks from the demo sides. “Love Jumped Through My Window” is cut from the same fine cloth as every heart-stopping Love track you've ever heard. And the flipside, “Sad Song,” — in alternate take form here — will appear only on seven-inch vinyl. The Love maestro is in superlative voice on both of these exquisite unheard sides.

These two songs eventually appeared on Lee's 1972 solo debut, Vindicator. From the short 30 second clips Sundazed has made available these acoustic demos sound far better than the over-cooked hard rock of Vindicator, so this looks to be a very promising release. The single will be released August 25, and is available for pre-order from Sundazed now.

I don't have any information beyond that this at this point, but I have made an inquiry with Sundazed and will keep you updated as details emerge.

In other Lee/Love news, I noticed that a label called Friday Music has reissued a couple of Lee collectors items. The first is the Arthur Lee album that was first issued by Rhino back in the 80s that I reviewed a while back. The other is an album called Love Live featuring material Lee recorded with Bryan Maclean in 1978 (Rhino originally issued that one as a picture disc).

Galaxie 500 Reissues

Great news for Galaxie 500 fans. damon & naomi's label, 20-20-20, has reissued Galaxie 500's three studio albums on premium vinyl and as digital downloads. These albums have long been unavailable on vinyl, and the original Rough Trade pressings were nothing special to begin with. The band seems to have gone all out to make these LPs sound as good as possible. The vinyl was "remastered by Alan Douches and [original producer] Kramer at West West Side Music, cut by Kevin Gray at AcousTech, pressed to virgin vinyl at RTI, and packaged in old-fashioned tip-on style jackets at Stoughton." You really can't ask for better than that, so I'm very excited to hear these. (As an aside, I can't help but note that while these are being reissued on LP--a format declared dead around the time the albums were originally issued--they are not being re-released on CD. Who's the dead format now?)

The albums are available from Galaxie 500's official online store in a variety of ordering options. MP3s are have been encoded at 320kps, but even better the band has made Apple Lossless files available for download at the same price (a practice I hope more bands and labels will follow). If you only want the vinyl, you can order the LPs directly from 20-20-20 for only $15 a piece. This is a very reasonable price for LPs mastered at AcousTech and pressed at RTI, most labels charge nearly twice that much.

As for the music, I can say without fear of hyperbole that these are three of the best indie-rock albums ever released, as well as some of the best albums released during the 1980s. If you know Galaxie 500 you already know this, if you don't I strongly recommend you download the free MP3 of "Fourth Of July" as well as the video for damon & naomi's "Song to the Siren" (see below).

Happy 4th of July!

R.E.M. - Murmur Deluxe (Compressed) Edition

R.E.M.'s "Deluxe Edition" of Murmur has been getting a lot of good notices, including a rare 10/10 review at Pitchfork. Most of the reviews I've read, in addition to praising the original album and the killer 1983 live set included as a bonus, note that the remastered CD is a distinct sonic upgrade over previous editions.

But as BangSplat notes, mastering engineer Greg Calbi was fairly liberal in his use of dynamic range compression on this reissue. According to BangSplat's measurements, on the original CD the first track, "Radio Free Europe," averages -19.73 dB and -20.85 dB (left and right channels, respectively), while the remaster clocks in at -12.76 dB/-12.93 dB. In other words, the remaster is around 7 dB louder on average than the original. I recently transcribed the album from vinyl and after normalizing "Radio Free Europe" to 0 dB got a result that looks very similar to the original CD (-19.1 dB/-19.6 dB). You can see what the difference between the LP and remastered CD looks like below.

R.E.M. - "Radio Free Europe" LP (1983)

R.E.M. - "Radio Free Europe" Remastered CD (2008)

So what does the difference sound like? Not as dramatic as you might think. I hate to admit it, given the obvious application of dynamic range compression, but the deluxe edition sounds pretty good to my ears. Whatever peaks got compressed out are (in my opinion) not entirely essential to enjoying the music. I would have preferred a reissue that matched the original master tape a little more closely, but sonically the new version is decent.

In fact, I'm not at all surprised that many of the reviews of this set claim the deluxe edition is a sonic upgrade over previous editions. Compared to the original domestic CD, it almost certainly is an upgrade. The original CD of Murmur (released sometime in the mid-eighties) was a nasty sounding thing. It featured a harsh, grating midrange that made it all but unlistenable to my ears. I sold my copy a long time ago. It was exactly the kind of poorly mastered CD that forced me to the conclusion that "perfect sound forever" was a big lie. It was my repeated experiences with crummy sounding CDs like Murmur that made the idea that CDs are inferior to LPs something of a sacred cow for me.

But whatever the original CD's problems were, lack of dynamic range was not among them. As you can see from BangSplat's measurements, the original CD pretty closely matches the LP in terms of dynamic range.

Listening on headphones on my computer or my iPod, the new deluxe edition sounds particularly good. The version I ripped from LP also sounds good, but (after adjusting for volume differences) the new version sounds slightly more focused. I've always felt like there was a slight gauzy haze that hung over Murmur, and I hear less of that on the remaster. The version I ripped from LP sounds kind of like the album cover looks; like everything is in soft-focus. The remastered CD brings everything into sharper focus without really changing the way the album sounds too dramatically (don't worry--you still won't be able to figure out what Michael Stipe is singing).

But when I compared the two versions on my stereo it was a different story. The CD-R I made of the version I ripped from vinyl sounded far more appealing to me than the remastered CD. While listening through speakers instead of headphones, the remastered CD did not sound harsh or fatiguing in the way that overly-compressed CDs often do, but the LP sourced CD-R bettered it in ways that are difficult to quantify. The LP sourced version sounded bigger and more involving, and the gauzy, soft-focus quality of the album sounded both less noticeable and more appealing than it did through headphones. I'm honestly not all that inclined to pick apart the differences in sound quality between the two versions, the fact was the LP sourced CD-R was the version I wanted to keep listening to.

Honestly, I'm at a bit of a loss to explain why I preferred a version of the album sourced from an LP and digitized using an $80 analog to digital converter, but I don't think it had anything to do with dynamic range compression. Some of you will no doubt think I'm either nuts or deaf, but I know what I heard; at least when played through speakers, my LP sourced CD-R sounded better than the remaster done by a professional with access to the original master tapes. A lot better to my ears. I can think of a few possible explanations for this, but none of them involve me being some kind of sonic wizard; I'm just a nerd with a semi-decent turntable and a cheap USB analog to digital converter.

Analog and LP boosters are often quick to dismiss digital sound altogether, but my experience with digitizing music from vinyl has convinced me that there is nothing inherently wrong with digital sound. Even resolution limited 16 bit, 44 kHz CDs are capable of fantastic sound quality. This experience has forced me to the (inescapable?) conclusion that some aspect of LP playback adds something to the sound of music that I happen to find appealing, but which is not strictly speaking "hi-fi." And whatever that LP magic is, it can be captured digitally (or at least most of it can).

To sum up, the deluxe edition of Murmur will likely sound like a major sonic upgrade to anyone who is only familiar with the original CD. Those familiar with the LP (or Mobile Fidelity's mid 90s audiophile reissues) might feel differently. Oh, and sacred cows make delicious hamburger meat.

Tim Remastered

Despite my complaints about Rhino's remaster of Pleased To Meet Me, I went ahead and picked up the reissue of Tim as well. I'm glad I did. To make a long story short, they got this one right.

I wish I could compare the remaster to my original LP, but I can't. Years ago I loaned my LP copy of Tim to a friend who made the mistake of leaving it locked in his Ford Fiesta on a hot day. When he returned it to me it was warped to the point of being unplayable. I replaced the LP with a new-fangled CD, but I have never been happy with the way the album sounded on CD.

The remaster makes for a much more satisfying listen than the older CD (which was probably issued a couple years after the album was released on LP and cassette). The older CD suffered from the kind of thin and tinny sound I often associate with CDs from the mid 80s (which is what initially turned me off about the medium). Tommy Erdelyi's production had a tinny quality to it anyway, and the flaws in the original CD only exacerbated the problem. The remaster, while preserving the original qualities of the recording, sounds richer and fuller. So yeah, the snare drum still sounds like it's being channeled through a tin can, but it least it sounds like it's coming from a bigger tin can.

Unlike the Pleased To Meet Me remaster, Rhino preserved the dynamic range of the original this time. Yes, the volume is boosted a bit compared to the older CD, but I see (and hear) little, if any, evidence of dynamic range compression. Likewise, the dynamic shifts between songs have been preserved on this remaster (the quiet songs don't sound as loud as the loud ones). I'll try to post images when I get a chance, but for now you'll have to take my word for it.

Tim was the first Replacements album I bought, and as such holds a special place in my heart. And I have to say, nostalgia aside, I still think it's a kick ass album. Look at that album cover. What the fuck is that? It's awesome. And the songs. Nearly every song on this album is killer. Yes, the hard-rock numbers "Dose Of Thunder" and "Lay It Down Clown" sound a little forced. But even though "Clown" is the weakest song on the album, it still contains the classic line "the only exercise you get is the shakes" (which I have to believe was written about Bob Mould). You can't entirely slag a track with a line like that. Every other song on the album is a bona-fide classic.

I'd go so far as to say that it is very difficult to think of a run of classic albums as strong as the Replacements had from Let It Be through Pleased To Meet Me. Maybe the Stones from Beggar's Banquet through Exile On Main Street were better. But as great as those Stones albums were, I'll always have more affection for the Replacements, because they were a band that I felt belonged to me, not to some bunch of sell-out old farts whose primary pleasure in life seem to consist of lecturing me about how much cooler everything was when they were my age. On these albums Paul Westerberg and his crew spoke directly to the issues and concerns of alienated kids coming of age in the late 80s in a way that "classic rock" couldn't.

Little things: There's a little less bonus material on Tim, but what's there is great. As others have noted, the short bit of studio chatter that precedes "Left of the Dial" has been eliminated on the remaster (personally, on a scale of 1-10 this rates somewhere between 0-1 as a concern for me, although I realize others feel differently). "Nowhere Is My Home" an Alex Chilton produced track previously only available on the Boink! EP is clearly sourced from vinyl (it doesn't say so in the liner notes, but I guarantee it). I have no problem with this whatsoever. The truth is, sometimes a vinyl copy is the best source available. I'd rather hear a good vinyl transcription over an attempt to reconstruct a deteriorated master tape any day. (And who knows, maybe this is one of those masters sitting at the bottom of the Mississippi?) They got the cover image right, with yellow text that matches the original LP art instead of the white text on the old CD (that always bugged me more than it probably should have). The liner notes by Bob Mehr are first-rate, shedding a lot of light on Westerberg's songwriting and the creative tensions within the band at the time.

This goes a long way toward restoring my faith in Rhino as a premier reissue label and trustworthy guardian of our musical legacy. This reissue is a nice, I would say essential, upgrade. Oh yeah, one more thing: Hey kids, things were so much cooler when I was your age.