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Beatles sound Quality, purple,orange, ect

chfphoto

chfphoto

Active Member
Hi
What is the difference in sound quality between original issues and re-issues(orange,lime,purple,apple). I'm trying to get good sounding copies to play, not to collect, so price is a big factor. I know re-issues in nm condition can be affordable I just wanted to know what to stay away from.
thanks
chris
 
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In order of best fidelity, generally speaking:

1.) early '80s black/rainbow
2.) late '70s-early '80s purple
3.) '70s Apple or green or '60s black/rainbow (tie)
4.) '70s orange
5.) late '80s digitally-mastered Parlophone repros

#1 and #2 are the best by far. Some of these were cut by Wally Traugott! These also happen to be some of the least collectible (ie: cheapest) versions!
 
If you want good playing copies at a reasonable price, I recommend a UK 'Blue Box' from the late 70s. All-analogue, mastered and pressed in the UK, about $300-400.
 
Do a search for KeninDc's recommendations. His will probably correlate with beatcomber's.

As I recall, Japanese pressings are in the Pantheon as well.
 
vinyl1 said:
If you want good playing copies at a reasonable price, I recommend a UK 'Blue Box' from the late 70s. All-analogue, mastered and pressed in the UK, about $300-400.
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The Blue Box discs are the best sounding Beatles LPs that I own, and I've owned/listened to a lot of them. A bonus is that the earlier LPs are UK track sequences, which are superior IMO to the USA Capitol releases.

I passed on the Blue Box when it was available new in stores thirty years ago. It was pricey and I had all of the Capitol releases at that point anyway. Better to spend my hard earned money at the time on more exciting Punk LPs. :)

It took thirty years to find an 'affordable' copy of the Blue Box, but I did, a couple years ago. NM vinyl, the whole set for fifty bucks. Dig long enough and hard enough and you'll find the deals out there.

Aside from the Blue Box, I've got a couple of Purple Label Capitols that sound quite nice. The White Album on white vinyl, and Sgt. Peppers on marble vinyl, both bought new 30+ years ago.
 
UK Parlophone 2 box reissues pre-DMM best (for Apple UK titles pre-DMM best). For Capitol Purple or Late Rainbow is actually better sonically than earlier copies and cheaper to boot.
 
Any Beatles on Capitol always inferior to any UK pressing. The main reason: - UK LP's were sourced from original tapes, US LP's were sourced from dupes, usually 2nd or 3rd generation tapes. Of course I'm talking about pre digital era pressings (pre 1987).
 
cr-rc said:
Any Beatles on Capitol always inferior to any UK pressing. The main reason: - UK LP's were sourced from original tapes, US LP's were sourced from dupes, usually 2nd or 3rd generation tapes. Of course I'm talking about pre digital era pressings (pre 1987).
Click to expand...

Capitol also added artificial reverb and changed the track order. In some cases, they cut up albums in order to sell more units.
 
I listen to a lot of FM on my Dynalab Hybred Tuner and am very impressed with a lot of beatles music I hear. I'm assuming there using CD quality format. Pehaps the mastering of their material was better than average which would allow both the CD and Vinyl formats to sound so good if it's transfered properly.
 
For my tastes most Parlaphone pressings are clearly superior. Well balanced, deep rich bass, smooth cymbals. Although my original purchased (played hundreds of times) Yesterday and Today Capital Mono sounds wonderful. I have a silver label "Hey Jude" LP that is near "perfect". I also have an Apple German pressing of Abbey Road that knocks me down every time I put it on. A few others of mention: Silver label stereo Help and Sgt Pepper - both wonderful pressings. Yet my silver Rubber Soul and Hard Days Night are just average. The most I spent for any of these is $27 for Abbey Road/$25 for Hey Jude. My wife bought me the MFSL "Collection" at full price ($399.00)when it came out. It is very good, but many of my Parlaphone pressings are better and can be had for much less....again for my tastes. YMMV.
 
Yes, as with any pressing some are good some are less than, but I have found the most consistency with the Parlaphone label. The Brits seem to take more pride in their LP work. I have also found a few great Parlaphone Yellow label pressings, but a few dogs too. I have a very nice Yellow label mono Revolver (I don't think its a first pressing, but its an early one). I also have a very poor Yellow label mono Help!

I am like you, a player not a collector (so to speak). As I said before, the most I would spend is $30, maybe $40 tops. I have 3 to 7 vinyl versions of each Bealtes disc...all different labels and pressings and Parlaphone sits at the top for me....although with that being said, I have a couple of great Apple pressings (German and UK).

My advice, start buying what you can afford of your faves. If you can spend $25 or whatever bucks for Help (if thats a fave) go for it and start listening for yourself. Compare it to your UA version. My first was the Yellow label Revolver I mentioned above....my jaw dropped and I never looked back.
 
Jack Lord said:
Do a search for KeninDc's recommendations. His will probably correlate with beatcomber's.

As I recall, Japanese pressings are in the Pantheon as well.
Click to expand...

That's a collector's myth.

Japanese pressings were certainly done on high quality vinyl and are very quiet in the groove... but Toshiba's mastering on most Beatles albums SUCKS.
They made some bad EQ choices on some of them (smiley face), and often they were cut from clearly inferior source material. I have some that have tracks that were dubbed from scratchy 45s!!!!

The very best versions of the Beatles' catalog are the early yellow and black label UK pressings mastered with tube gear. Unfortunately those are super-expensive now, but I'll let you in on a dirty secret: the early 1-box and 2-box Parlophones from around 1970-71 were often pressed from the original tube-cut stampers, and can be found for $25-$30. Look at the matrix numbers in the deadwax - depending on the album, a -1 or -2 suffix usually indicates a tube cut.

The '70s and early '80s solid state cuts are quite good too. These usually have "HTM" scribbled in the deadwax, meaning they were cut by Harry T. Moss at Abbey Road. The solid state cuts have more detail and crispness, but lack the midrange warmth of the tube cut pressings.
 
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I just picked up a while ago a Abby Road with the green apple, and compared
to the orange and purple it sounds so much cleaner with better bass.

Tube
 
I have the first 3 Beatles albums that I got in the mid 80's as UK imports, with the black/silver Parlophone label. They sounds great, dare I say better than the remastered CD's? I would recommend them if you can get them cheap.
 
tube-a-lou said:
I just picked up a while ago a Abby Road with the green apple, and compared
to the orange and purple it sounds so much cleaner with better bass.

Tube
Click to expand...

It may be an early pressing, ie: 1969 or '70.

The orange label Capitols (circa 1977) usually were pressed on crappy recycled vinyl.
 
vincei said:
I have the first 3 Beatles albums that I got in the mid 80's as UK imports, with the black/silver Parlophone label. They sounds great, dare I say better than the remastered CD's? I would recommend them if you can get them cheap.
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The remastered CDs sound quite good, but the compression and EQ'ing kind of bug me, although they used a fairly light touch to 'modernize' those old recordings. The analog UK pressings are still my first choice when I want to hear the Beatles!
 
beatcomber said:
It may be an early pressing, ie: 1969 or '70.

The orange label Capitols (circa 1977) usually were pressed on crappy recycled vinyl.
Click to expand...

Hi,
That's pretty sad I guess they wanted to save money back then, I
was also in a best buy and they were playing a Abbey Road record and
it sounded pretty bright and was warped to boot!:thumbsdn::no:

Tube
 
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