We've seen a lot of new product for fans of The Who lately: Eagle Rock released the Live in Texas 1975 DVD, UMe is planning a standalone release of the Hull show from 1970 that appeared in the Live at Leeds box set a short time ago, guitarist Pete Townshend's memoir - and now, Universal announces a newly-remastered vinyl box set of The Who's studio albums.
The simply-titled The Studio Albums features all 11 Who albums on 14 180-gram vinyl discs, from 1965's My Generation to 2006's Endless Wire. In addition to being remastered by the band's longtime engineer Jon Astley and Miles Showell at Close to the Edge and Metropolis Studios, all the original artwork will be replicated for these reissues. That includes everything, down to the original posters inserted into The Who Sell Out and Face Dances.
Advertised as "strictly limited," The Studio Albums is available November 19. Here's a look at what's included:
The Studio Albums (Geffen/UMe, 2012) (Amazon - U.S./U.K.)
Disc 1: My Generation (Brunswick LAT 8616 (U.K.)/Decca DL 74664 (U.S.), 1965)
Disc 2: A Quick One (Reaction 593 002 (U.K.)/Decca DL 74892 (U.S.), 1966)
Disc 3: The Who Sell Out (Track Record 612 002 (U.K.)/Decca DL 74950 (U.S.), 1967)
Discs 4-5: Tommy (Track Record 613 013/4 (U.K.)/Decca DXSW 7205 (U.S.), 1969)
Disc 6: Who's Next (Track Record 2408 102 (U.K.)/Decca DL 79182 (U.S.), 1971)
Discs 7-8: Quadrophenia (Track Record 2657 013 (U.K.)/MCA 2-10004 (U.S.), 1973)
Disc 9: The Who by Numbers (Polydor 2490 129 (U.K.)/MCA 1579 (U.S.), 1975)
Disc 10: Who Are You (Polydor WHOD-5004 (U.K.)/MCA 3050 (U.S.), 1978)
Disc 11: Face Dances (Polydor WHOD-5037 (U.K.)/Warner Bros. HS-3516 (U.S.), 1981)
Disc 12: It's Hard (Polydor WHOD-5066 (U.K.)/Warner Bros. 23731 (U.S.), 1982)
Discs 13-14: Endless Wire (Polydor 1709519 (U.K.)/Universal Republic B0007845-01 (U.S.), 2006)
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Wot! No Live At Leeds, no Odds And Sods, no Live at Isle Of Wight, etc., but we get the last three albums all of which have little or nothing to recommend on them. If only this set was being made available as separate albums then some of it would certainly be worth investigating.
Yeah, once Moon was gone, it really wasn't the Who anymore. I am going to see them on their Quadrophenia and more tour simply because I've never had the opportunity to see Daltry and Townshend before, but I'm not going to fool myself into thinking it's the same as with Moon and Entwhistle. I guess you could say I "Won't Get Fooled Again".
Or not.
I think it's great that these are availble again for those who missed them the first time around (or didn't exist yet!) but a large part of the Who was their live show, so hopefully next year will see a live album box.
Does anyone know if these are mastered from the original analog masters or from digital?
Honestly, the tragedy here is the self-styled mastering engineer and reissue producer Jon Astley has no history mastering vinyl.
Astley's balls-to-the-wall mastering technique in the digital domain has all the nuance of Keith Moon smashing a drum kit.
It is night & day however when it comes to brick wall-ing a digital master vs. teasing-out the complicated dynamic range and imaging that the rather tricky realm of a vinyl LP affords the mastering engineer.
The announcement of this project would actually be exciting if they had attached an engineers name to it that had an illustrious history of cutting classic vinyl in the 1970s.
(No need to name drop here, as you all can insert your own fantasy name of the legendary vinyl mastering engineer that you'd love to see attached to this project.)
The bottom line here is rather simple: The start-up budget for this project SAVED MONEY by using Astley rather than a high profile, big-ticket vinyl mastering legend.
The other problem with Astley working on this is that he has a history of using the wrong versions of songs. Hopefully he will have someone checking to make sure he has pulled the correct tapes.
Yes he did, I noticed that when he used a alt version of Trick Of The Light on the Reissued Who Are You CD. To which I still have the first generation W.A.Y CD. 😉
Didn't the remastered Who Are You also have an alternate guitar solo inserted into one of the songs? It's been a while since I heard it, but I'm thinking it was either "Guitar And Pen" or "Music Must Change." I was always under the impression that those "revisionist history" decisions were Pete's and not John Astley's, but perhaps I was wrong about that.