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Not Remastered? Not Quite!



>QUAD was not remastered for the Gold Disk (nor was TOMMY; I have them
both). 
>They did use the Master tapes, and they both sound better...much better,
in 
>the case of TOMMY. 
 
I think the fine people at Mobile Fidelity Sound Labs would be quite amused
to learn that neither the Tommy nor the Quadrophenia Ultradiscs were
remastered.  In fact, as their materials repeatedly point out, all of the
Ultradiscs are digitally remastered from the original master tapes.  
 
Perhaps you meant to say that those discs weren't re-MIXED, which is true. 
 
 
So this is where things now stand:  all of the Who reissues to date (Live
at Leeds, A Quick One, Sell Out, and Who's Next) have been remastered --
that is, a new analog to digital transfer was prepared.  In addition, Live
at Leeds was completely remixed from the original multitracks (and a new
vocal line or two was recorded for  Heaven and Hell).  Sell Out has also
been remixed from the original multitracks (though I'm not sure about some
of the link tracks).  Some (perhaps most) of the bonus tracks on A Quick
One have been remixed, but none of the album tracks were.  The multitracks
for that album (as well as the Happy Jack and Pictures of Lily singles)
are, to put it charitably, "missing."  Half of the album tracks on the
expanded Who's Next reissue were remixed, the other half were remastered
(supposedly from the original masters, but I don't believe it) because,
once again, the multitracks are, ahem, "missing." As for the bonus tracks,
all of the Record Plant tracks were remixed from the multitracks (funny,
isn't it, that bootleggers never seem to have any trouble holding on to the
multitracks).  I don't know about the other bonus tracks. 
 
The Ultradiscs (Tommy, Quadrophenia, and Who are You) were all remastered
from tapes supplied by Pete Townshend, which Mobile Fidelity believes to be
the original two tracks masters.  The packaging for the Who's Next gold
discs implies that it was remastered from the original two track master
tape, but I don' t believe that this is true.  Although MCA has previously
claimed to have the original master, Mobile Fidelity, which wanted very
much to do a Who's Next Ultradisc, concluded otherwise, and I find them a
little more credible.  Furthermore, Stereophile has reported that MCA's
audiophile Who's Next LP was mastered from a dub of the original master
tape. 
 
As for the box set, don't believe the packaging.   Quite a few tracks were
remixed -- the High Numbers tracks, most (if not all) of the outtakes, the
Sell Out tracks, the Live at Leeds tracks (unique mixes, since they were
remixed once again (at JE's insistence) for the reissue) , Join Together,
etc.  Many were not (e.g., the studio Tommy tracks).    
 
Finally, songs from Quadrophenia were remixed for the film soundtrack, and
at least one Tommy track (Tommy Can You Hear Me?) was remixed for the Kids
are Alright soundtrack. 
 
If you haven't figured out the difference between remixing and remastering,
don't worry -- neither has MCA and Polygram.