Following on from previous archival box sets and the acclaimed Get Back documentary from late last year, the latest Beatles release is a deluxe reissue of their seventh studio album, Revolver. The 1966 album was both a high point for the Beatles as a creative force and one of, if not their most, beloved LPs. So giving this album an archival box set makes perfect sense.
The album saw the band continue the transformation they started on their previous album (1965’s Rubber Soul) from a pop rock group to a more serious rock band. In it they expanded the sonic and conceptual experiments they played around with on Rubber Soul, and added a whole extra dimension to their sound.
Other than their infamous drug use, the main influence on the Beatles at this time was American music; for example The Byrds, and artists on the Stax record label such as Otis Redding and Issac Hayes. Initially they planned to record the album at the Stax recording studio. But the plans fell through, and so it was recorded in their own EMI/Abbey Road Studios.
Another influences was traditional Indian music, which would become more and more important over the next few years. Listen to tracks such as Within You Without You and The Inner Light. The album was also influenced by the book The Psychedelic Experience, a Manual Based on the Tibetan Music of the Dead, which inspired the first track Tomorrow Never Knows.
Their collective decision to stop doing live shows and tours helped them out creatively as they no longer needed to recreate songs from their albums live on stage. This allowed them more time to develop ideas. They had been disenchanted by their last tour in early 1966.
In fact the idea of making something that couldn’t be replicated on stage was initially tried out with the non-album B-side Rain, as the use of backwards vocals and all that studio trickery would have have beenimpossible to replicate live in 1966. Luckily the A-side Paperback Writer was playable live, and became the last original that the Beatles played live until their final concert atop Apple Corps rooftop in 1969.
As Revolver turned out to be one of the Beatles’ most influential albums, I went down to talk to someone at the influential East London record store Rough Trade East to see how it was being received. “We had it on earlier today,” he told me, “and it’s still a great album, still an influential early psychedelic rock album”.
The reissue box includes both a new remix of the album and a reissue of the original album in mono, alongside two disks of studio outtakes that give the listener a glimpse into the creation of the album.
It’s also got a remix of Paperback Writer and Rain, as well as the the original mono version of both, and some session highlights. At Rough Trade, pre-orders and first day purchases for the boxset looked promising. “We had a stock of fourteen for the four LP disk set and ten have been bought. For the five disk CD set out of the ten, five have been put aside and already sold. Out of the five two disk CD’s, five have been put aside and already sold. So it’s probably the biggest in terms of bulk that we’ve gotten in and both in price as-well”.
The remixes were only possible because of the de-mixing technology used for the Get Back documentary. Previously it would have been unfeasible to achieve this type of remix.
The previous remaster for this album was released in 2009, to mixed reception, with the main issue being the hard use of panning in stereo. This boils down to having most of the instruments on one side and the vocals on the other rather than having a fair balance between the two. “It’s kinda similar to the Abbey Road and White Album ones,” the Rought Trade guy told me. “It brings them to life and modernises it without losing its charm. Giles Martin brought it to the 2020’s whilst keeping what was good and what was special about them then”.
On the remix front it will be interesting to see what happens next. Given the potential of AI technology, hopefully we will get a remix for Rubber Soul.
Edited by Freya Barnes
