album reissues with Universal confirmed on the 40th Anniversary

It is a real shame that some of the Multitrack masters are missing, 10 in all as far as I know, though some may have been recovered. They are also missing the original stereo masters to "Queen" and "Flash Gordon".

Holly2003 wrote: rhyeking wrote: The Rainbow '74 (SHA Tour) concert did get released, though very limitedly, as part of the Box Of Trix.

I'd love to see the full, unaltered concert released in a 5.1 mix.
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That's why I said "still no proper release" ...
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And that's why I said "very limitedly" and that I'd love to see the full concert someday.

I wasn't disagreeing with you, Holly.

Re: Remasters
As discussed in "The Best Remasters, Track by Track," the 1991 HR remasters were compared against the other remasters, such as the 1994 Digital Master Series (UK) and the 2001 Digital Remasters (Japan) and consistantly came up with top marks. There are some that are better, such as the Mobile Sound Fidelity Lad Editions, which only cover four albums, but the rest are either highly compressed and/or favour the high-end and low-end frequencies.

Peter Mew, whom I took the time to email, even said that the Japanese remasters he did were specifically required by the record company to be much more intense. The result is that they are not  as well balance as others.

Peter Mew is renowned for his over use of noise reduction and mostly works at Abbey Road I believe - he's considered by many to be one of the worst remastering engineers out there. Hopefully the new remasters will be done by someone like Bob Ludwig or Steve Hoffman. And I wish they'd let someone else do a new transfer of the tapes, but I'm sure whoever they use will only be given the existing digital transfers to work with.

Whether Peter is the best or worst I can not comment on. All I know is that he was the first to admit his 2001 remasters were ramped right up, because that's what he was told to do by the record company. He felt the 1998s (Crown Jewels set) were more balanced by his terms.

He didn't work on the 1991 HR remasters, which when compared against the later remasters, Mew's included, sound way better to my ear.

All this is leading to is a realisation that what needs to (MUST) happen is that the very best QUEEN minds / ears are allowed to work on the project in order for re-mixing (should that actually be required), re-mastering and production of the original masters to be done to the highest standard.

Is it too odd a suggestion to say that Brian, Roger and John are not able to be objective enough to be involved and this should be handed over to outside parties for it to be done properly?

I think the best people to do Queen 1 are Brian, Roger and John. Only they know what they wanted Queen 1 to sound like, but couldn;t make it happen due to the limits imposed on them by Trident. I'm not convinced any of the other albums need any radical remastering by anyone, as they are the way the artists wanted it at the time.

Benn wrote: All this is leading to is a realisation that what needs to (MUST) happen is that the very best QUEEN minds / ears are allowed to work on the project in order for re-mixing (should that actually be required), re-mastering and production of the original masters to be done to the highest standard.

Is it too odd a suggestion to say that Brian, Roger and John are not able to be objective enough to be involved and this should be handed over to outside parties for it to be done properly?

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It's a sticky area, suggesting the creator of the work is not objective enough to present it in it's highest standard. As the artist, their word should be taken as law: This is how we want it and this is how it should be!

However, the MEDIUM adds certain levels of complication to the process. It's been nearly 40 years since some of these releases have been issued and technology has advance considerably. Added to that, we know the band did not create the original masters by themselves, there were engineers and producers involved after the band approved the final mixes.

There is no primary producer who the band worked with most of their career, like Beatles had George Martin. They used Roy Baker, Mack and David Richards, and co-produced themselves.

So, who do you put in charge? My best guess would be David Richards, who could produce the remastering, supervising whichever engineers could do it best.

so much to address... but the main issues I want to comment on:

Brian and Roger are not nostalgic... Brian has said he believes Bob Ludwig's HEAVILY compressed Absolute Greatest remasters to be the best sounding versions of their catalog hits to date.  To me, as someone with experience and knowledge in recorded sound, that says he's not going to revisit Queen I or any of their past work and try to "preserve" it as it was intentionally created or as it originally sounded.  The MFSL releases, of the original masters, are STUNNING - and they feature no noise reduction, no compression, and no volume limiting.  I have personally analyzed the waveforms (lossless rips) and can attest they are truly the original masters with a broad dynamic range.

That being said, i agree with Rhyeking and others here who have said, from a marketing perspective, Queen's fanbase is a bit segregated.  Some know only WWRY, BoRhap, etc. and LIKE the songs, but have no intention of buying even a 2-cd set of hits that's over $15.  You have to offer general market products, and they have to be mastered DIFFERENTLY to stand up to over-compressed music of the last decade on every kid's iPod.  Clearly AG met that need.

I honestly don't know Peter Mew's other remastering work.... but i've looked quite closely over the past months at his QUEEN work from the past 12 years.  I would consider myself an aural snob... i can tell you whether a remaster is simply bathed in compression or if it was done with care.  And I will go on record here to say PM, in my opinion, is more of a remastering artist than Bob Ludwig or many others who seek a fomulaic  end-result.  I LOATHE the muffled results of over-using noise reduction.  I do NOT prefer the neck-high water sensation of actively-compressed FM-radio masters of today.  But in a perfect world, recorded music doesn't sound right without some adjustments being made.  Mastering is an art, and it takes a master.  Does everyone love PIcasso or Monet?  no...

Rhye - to your point about the Singles Collections - i agree they are sort of a miss, both for hardcore fans and casual fans... i think that was a bit of a self-indulgent venture.  I think they're unique, fun, and sound GREAT... but very cost-prohibitive to most.

ultimately, i desire what i think all of us here do... some kind of attention to detail.  Certainly Queen Productions can appreciate that the mentality that has fueled this band for nearly 40 years - one of perfectionism, among other things - is very much what the fans expect in preservation of the vintage material for us now and in years to come...

GinjaNinja wrote: They are also missing the original stereo masters to .............."Flash Gordon".

Mmmm - not quite sure how much sleep I'm going to lose over that!!! :-)

Just my thoughts concerning the talent of Peter Mew.

He did a great Job on the recent re-issue of Stormbringer by Deep Purple (1975), released in 2009.
If the work on the Queen-Material is done like that, the new releases could be very promissing.

cmsdrums wrote: GinjaNinja wrote: They are also missing the original stereo masters to .............."Flash Gordon".

Mmmm - not quite sure how much sleep I'm going to lose over that!!! :-) But now we may never see a properly remastered version of Arboria (Planet Of The Tree Men)! :P