My First one

Hello,

Ok so I have never done one of these before so I guess I will start with saying what this blog will hopefully be about. I am planning on focusing on music, possibly mainly the music of Hawaii, maybe if this goes well I could expand to include all kinds of entertainment (movies, music, books, comics, dance, etc.) but lets see what happens. Before I start I just wanted to say thanks to the lovely lady who writes the Hot Robot blog for all her help in getting me started with this blog stuff. Well here goes.

Beatles for Sale

So the big news in the music world over the last week was that The Beatles catalogue has been re-released in special edition remastered CDs. The process of remastering, according to reports, has taken nearly four years and done by George Martin (the man behind the scenes of all the original Beatles recordings including the recent "Love" CD).

What is the difference between these new Remastered CDs and the original CD releases from 1987 (which have been the only available Beatles music for quite some time)?

1. The sound of the new releases are louder than the 1987 releases

2. McCartney's bass guitar is much clearer on the new releases

3. On certain albums it is much easier to hear the different instruments being played

4. All the new releases come with new archival photos and brief liner notes, which were sorely lacking on the 1987 releases.

5. Each new release CD has a four minute "mini-documentary" about the making of the album which is playable on Quicktime in your computer.*

6. New cardboard digipack cases instead of the plastic jewel cases.

*one complaint I read about these "mini-documentarys" is that when the disc is put into the computer for instance to load the songs into iTunes the documentary pops up and makes it difficult to download the songs into iTunes.

So if you already have all the 1987 CDs, these New Releases may not be worth all the money. Except for the most diligent listeners most people will not be able to spot vast differences unless they play the 1987 and the New discs back to back. As the music has thankfully not been remixed so drastically that the songs no longer resemble the ones we know and love. If you don't own any of the Beatles albums (sad but it can happen) these will certainly please your ears. The Beatles catalogue contains some of the finest rock and pop music to ever be recorded and judging from the bestseller list on sites like Amazon and Barnes & Noble many people are snatching up these new releases. If you're a Beatles Fanatic (you know who you are) you probably already have bought these new releases weeks ago and if you are a fanatic and have not bought them the new liner notes and mini-documentarys are some prime incentives.

If you are a casual listener and already own the 1987 CDs you'll be fine, but if you are really curious to hear the difference borrow the new Remasters from a Beatles Fanatic near you, come on we all know at least one Beatles Fanatic.

take care and thanks for reading.