New Releases and March of the Black Queen Surprise

Well I have taken the plunge and purchased the new remastered releases and Deep Cuts Volume 1 and I must say that overall I am pleased with the remastering and the snippets on the bonus discs. I haven't had chance to listen to them all yet in detail but I must say that the first album in particular sounds great, and an improvement to the excellent Hollywood release of 91. The backing vocals on GKR and TNCD in particular are a fantastic improvement.

The highlights for me of the bonus tracks is the extended ending to SSOR, the acapella of BBTLB and the truly spectacular live rendition of YTMBA from Hyde Park. Running through the Deep Cuts album I was dissapointed that Tenement Funster / Flick Of The Wrist / Lilly of The Valley are not the stand alone versions but as they appear on SHA. Lily of The Valley track starts again with 'baby you've been had' from FOTW!!!

Surprise of the day was the ending to MOTBQ on Deep cuts. I was expecting a fade out where FHLI begins and not the soaring backing vocals outro as appears here...very nicely done. Ogre Battle also benefits from an extended gong outro and again, not fading in to the Fairy Feller.

Do I regret buying these...not judging by the first listen. These are an improvement on what has come before forgetting the DTS mix of ANATO. I hope and pray that one day we will have 5.1 mixes of all the albums...dream on!!

Dean

Thanks, Dean!

"The March Of The Black Queen" and "Ogre Battle" were the two most significant reasons I'd buy Deep Cuts (that and my completist nature wouldn't ever let me not buy it at some point). It's great to know that some care went into these two tracks being proper stand-alone, non-segued versions. A fadeout would have been the bare minimum of acceptability, but "clean" single tracks is almost more than I ever hoped for or expected.

I have to wait till May to get my copy, living in Canada, but it's good to have another thing to look forward to in addition to the Deluxe Editions.

Sorry for the double reply, but here is the Deep Cuts "Black Queen" on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eC9HUEuLlYo

and "Ogre Battle":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-m-Q-ti9syY

Certainly sounds better to me.

It must be just me then, but I thought the ending of MOTBQ was very badly executed.  There's a gap before the last "aaahhh" and it sounds like it's just been "dropped in".

..and I agree about the SHA trilogy - if it's so important to play them consecutively, make them one track.  If they're on a compilation like this, they should be separate.

Agree with PG, sounds contrived and cut and paste-y.

Yes the end of MOTBQ sounds tacked on. Very disappointing. There must be a master tape of the original ending somewhere.
However I'm quite pleased with the end of OB.
The SHA trilogy, though - very sloppy.

Well I have read the comments on this thread and have revisited the MOTBQ ending many times. I think I may have been still in shock of hearing a stand alone version when I left my initial charitable comment! Maybe a better way to have described it would have been to say, nice idea, poorly executed!

Dean

I think part of the problem isn't that the vocals sound tacked on, I don't believe they are or that any editing was done them after 1973, let alone for this collection. What is jarring is the fact that the instruments cut out at the end, which I think are only drums and piano in that last 2 seconds. They simple vanish, rather than the notes being allowed to finish. It's hard to say if that's how they appear on the master, but I think that's what's throwing people off, the piano note underneath being cut off.

Also, our ears expect to hear one more note, too, under the highest "AHHH"s at the end, and without it, it sounds weird. On the album, that note is achieved with the first note of FHLI, which comes in right there. Here, though, we're left sort of hanging, waiting for a note that doesn't come, and the vocal then sound unsupported, like they're left dangling.

Here is the count for the end of the song:

"Now it's time to be Gone!   [La La La]       Forever! [Forever!]"  [La-L-La La Laaaa  Ahahahahahaha   ahhhh  Ahhhh  AHHHHH!
    1      2     3      4         1          2         3     4   1     2        3     4        1       2     3       4      1       2      3     4       1     2     3    4   1   2  3  4
Instruments------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------->

All that being said, I do like this stand alone version.

rhyeking wrote: I think part of the problem isn't that the vocals sound tacked on, I don't believe they are or that any editing was done them after 1973, let alone for this collection.
That is definitely an edit done especially for this compilation - that is a digital edit, not analogue.

They will have taken Ludwig's new remaster and then done a new mix of the backing vocals (easily done - Justin Shirley Smith etc have access to all their digital transfers of multitracks). Shove those 2 stereo tracks into Audition, mute the backing vocal track until the last bit , fade out what you don't want on the finished remaster and bob's your uncle. Doesn't cost anything to do.

I'm sure there's no way you could actually have known this, but Bob is, in fact, the name of one of my uncles. I'm not kidding. :-)  I know it's a another saying for "and there you go!", but since it's true in my case, it's always funny when people say that.

As for whether they remixed the ending...(shrug)

I still think the reason it bugs people is the aforementioned dropout of the instruments. It would sound nicer for that last 1st beat to appear with a piano note, to punctuate the vocals. Most popular music in 4/4 time will have that last 1st beat, sometimes the 2nd as well.

Whatever the case may be,  a missed opportunity due to shoddy workmanship.  As Roger says, it's his legacy to fuck up, if he doesn't care, why should we?

Honestly, and I know this is a point of contention, so don't bite my head off for disagreeing, I don't think any remixing was done. I think the master drops out the way we hear it and that's what we get.

IF (and I emphasis that) that is the case, what would you have them do? Should they have added or remixed to make it sound "better"? I'd rather have to the raw track, warts and all, rather than having them "fix" it. I'm also glad they didn't just fade out on the FHLI intro. This is something unique and, to my ear, is as it was on the master.

Lastly, why re-invent the wheel, so to speak? Why go to the trouble to remix the end (assuming those who believe it are correct) when the master would have the complete, uncut performance and that could simply be transfered over, as was done with "Ogre Battle" (and "Tenement Funster," and "Flick Of The Wrist," and "Lily Of The Valley" and "Funny How Love Is")?

Call me naive or whatever, but I don't believe there is remixing here. If there is, I still enjoy the end result, hence my shrug. I hope no one took that as indifference to others' opinions. I have enjoyed this dialogue and respect the other thoughts expressed. I will keep it in mind.

Sad to hear that they did not create a real convincing ending to "March of the Black Queen". That makes this release completely unimportant for collectors.

The clean ending of "Ogre Battle" is not that exciting. It was always there - it's what you hear backwards playing in the beginning and you can easily reverse it and then edit it to the end....

Has anyone already tried to merge this version with the unique Funny How Love Is standalone from a 3" cd-single (which runs 2:52 min). Cannot recall where this version can be found, but I think it was the German or Japanese 3" cd-single set.

If they merge perfectly and sound like the ones on Queen II, then you know that the TMOTBQ edit was done correctly.. or not?