The Best-Sounding Beatles CD's

This is a beautifully-packaged set with all of the original UK EP covers and liner notes. EP's or extended-plays were quite popular in Britain and in Europe, and some even made the singles charts, even though they had more than 2 songs on them and were more expensive than singles. Although this set duplicates songs from the Beatles' albums and compilations on CD, it's well worth getting for the superior mastering. Most of the songs sound significantly better than their other releases on CD and the others sound at least as good. Also this set has many mono mixes which are different and in most cases better than the stereo mixes. The biggest improvements in my opinion are Twist and Shout, Nowhere Man, I Am The Walrus, Flying (the mono mixes)... actually I could go on and on! The sound is very smooth and natural. You can really hear the bass notes distinctly and follow the bassline on the songs. As well, She's A Woman has a count-in edited out of most other releases.
Expensive, but revelatory, sound-wise.

This has THE best mastering

The EP box set was the most recent collection issued by EMI, in the early 90s, and has the most up-to-date remastering. The CD catalog of 1987 sounds nothing like this, and even the CD Singles box set, which thankfully has the mono singles, but is still not as clear sounding as this EP box. Please Please Me is the litmus test: listen to the Singles box set version, and the actual Please Please Me CD, and then put this on from the EP box set...WOW. It's like a new world. This is by far the cleanest, clearest, most dynamic mastering of ANY of this material. From Me To You, She Loves You, Hold Your Hand, Slow Down, Can't Buy Me Love, I Feel Fine, Yesterday, all of these songs are in their best sonic incarnation on this box set. The EP box was indeed a well-kept secret. Basically, if you want to hear any Beatles song that was issued on EP, you need this. The sound quality is far superior over anything else currently available, and all of the songs here are in their glorious mono mixes, apart from the stereo/mono Magical Mystery Tour EP. And regarding the stereo Mystery Tour, it is NOT redundant to have it issued again in this box set, because as I've said, it has benefited enormously from more recent remastering, so the stereo versions of songs like Walrus, Fool on the Hill, and so on, sound better here than on the stereo CD from 1987. Contrary to the previous review, we HAVE been done a favor by having both versions of Magical Mystery Tour included here. It keeps the EP box set authentic, as MMT was originally issued in both formats, and once again, the stereo version sounds better here than anywhere else. If you're looking for the best sound, this EP box is a must.

Treasured versions, along with tons of redundancy

This is a collection of the original British EPs with bonus material of questionable worth. We get one CD for each EP (for the most part, four songs per disc) in individual sleeves donning the original cover art. Thankfully, the two MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR discs--one mono, one stereo--each contain all six songs from the film (originally, the six songs where spread between two EPs in one package).

With this boxed set, we get more than our fair share of redundancy. 31 of these songs are the same mono versions that can be found on the group's first four albums--which have been available on CD since the late 80s--and the same mono versions of "From Me To You," "Thank You Girl," and "She Loves You" can be found on PAST MASTERS VOLUME ONE. Many of these 34 songs--again, the same mono versions--can also be found on the other compilations as well as THE BEATLES CD SINGLES COLLECTION boxed set, which gives us the rare, but exquisite mono versions of "I Want To Hold Your Hand," "I Feel Fine," "Day Tripper," "Paperback Writer," "Eleanor Rigby," "I Am The Walrus," and others.

Bootlegs aside, the mono CD versions available only in this boxed set are those of: "Long Tall Sally," "I Call Your Name," "Slow Down," "Matchbox," "Yesterday," "Act Naturally," "You Like Me Too Much," "It's Only Love," "Nowhere Man," "Drive My Car," "Michelle," "You Won't See Me," and five of the six songs from MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR ("Walrus" comes with the SINGLES COLLECTION mentioned above).

A major reason why I jumped to buy this release was to get my hands on the mono version of "Slow Down." The stereo mix is a mutilation, severely sapping this white-hot performance of its delirious intensity and power. Indeed, the stereo presents a masterpiece that has been hacked to pieces--the balance of the vocals, rhythm section, and guitar solo detrimentally altered. Here the mono presents a perfect sonic picture, a band in one of the hottest rock 'n' roll performances ever. The stereo mixes of "Long Tall Sally," "I Call Your Name," and "Matchbox" also reveal gross deficiencies when compared with their mono counterparts. (These four songs share one EP; the stereo versions are found on PAST MASTERS VOLUME ONE.)

"Yesterday" was not released as a British single but was released as a single in the U.S. (with "Act Naturally" as the B-side) in September 1965. It was a huge hit in America, holding the number one position for four weeks. Strangely, the British YESTERDAY EP was not released until March 1966--all four of the tunes coming from the previous year's HELP! album. The stereo version of "Yesterday" has the guitar to the far right and has the string section (somewhat buried) to the far left, both unnaturally disconnected from the vocals. The mono immediately sounds much more realistic, having presence and full, rich sound. And the strings have bloom instead of sounding like they've been squashed into a corner. "Act Naturally," "You Like Me Too Much," and "It's Only Love" also sound much better in mono, more nourished and focused (as if the band were right in front of us). The stereo versions suffer from the typical treatment: drums and the rest of the rhythm section hard left, one or two guitar parts and occasional percussion hard right, and vocals in the middle, sounding detached.

"Nowhere Man" was also issued as a single in the States but not in Britain. And it too was issued on a British EP with three other songs from an album (RUBBER SOUL) that had been released months prior. The stereo mixes of both "Nowhere Man" and "Drive My Car" shove most of the rhythm section far left and the vocals far right. This peculiar split gives us a lopsided, artificial sound, with the vocals undesirably sounding as if they have been pasted into the sonic picture. The same is largely true regarding "You Won't See Me"--except for Paul's bass, which sounds as though it's coming from a backroom way off somewhere. The stereo "Michelle" places Paul's vocal to the right and the harmonies to the left. The abnormal separation does not add to the song's intimacy but in fact destroys it. This mono EP restores the realism and impact to these phenomenal tunes.

In this set we get both the mono and stereo versions of MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR. Although the mono is welcome, the stereo versions of these songs have been available on CD since the late 80s. (Advertising makes it sound as though we have been granted a favor by the inclusion of both the mono and stereo.)

And then there is the EP that was issued well after the 13 British originals. It was formerly included as a bonus with an earlier incarnation of a Beatles EP collection issued as a boxed set in the early 80s. The information listed on the back of the CD sleeve is now outdated and, of course, erroneous. The stereo version of "The Inner Light" (the notes making it out to be a rarity) has been available on PAST MASTERS VOLUME TWO since the late 80s, and the stereo version of "Baby You're A Rich Man" has been on the CD version of the MAGICAL MYSTERY TOUR album for as long. The differences between this stereo "She's A Woman" and the well-known stereo version are miniscule. Finally, this stereo version of "This Boy" is included on PAST MASTERS VOLUME ONE.

Do I recommend this release? Yes, but only to people like me who are willing to pay quite a lot for the mono versions of a few Beatles tunes that are unavailable elsewhere.