Never been too fussed about buying remasters before but i'm a bit tempted now .Interested to hear PC&L, Low Life and Brotherhood remasters.

Thanks for your helpful answers NotAMod. I have all the NO albums on CD originally purchased in the early noughties and I've often thought "something" was odd about Low-Life thru Technique, but I was never sure what, possibly the mastering. So I am keen to try something that has been reworked. Those albums (and republic and get ready) have been significantly underlistened to by me relative to the earlier ones and WFTSC (and Substance) and it's time that they get a bit more love. I only have up to PC&L on vinyl. I've always loved "Love Vigilantes" but never got into LL as an Album, as a whole, in it's own right. Only really recently rediscovering Brotherhood too ("All Day Long" a recently rediscovered favourite)

As a side-note, I find "digesting" albums that were originally vinyl LPs much easier when they are thought of in that format: the whole "sides" thing is lost when on CD/digital, so things like Brotherhood being divided into a guitar side and a synth side is kind-of lost, or the Bowie albums with all the instrumentals on one half, or U2's Joshua Tree which has all the good shit on side A and the dross on side B... but understanding the split is a key part of understanding the album as a whole IMHO

As for where to buy 'em: I've got two options. I have some gift vouchers from a reward programme at work that I can get as either Amazon or iTunes (but sadly not 7digital or qobuz who would/could offer lossless downloads). I'll almost certainly go that route. The other option is if I can part-ex some records for credit at some local record shops, and if the LPs (which are not the 2015 masters!) have download codes, the downloads are likely to be the 2015 ones. It's a bit of a long-shot, and I doubt I'd get much credits fro the stuff I'm trying to flog (90s trance/dance, remixes, white label stuff etc.) as nobody seems interested.

Aside #2: we're deep into a 80s revival at the moment. It's almost embarrassing at times. I'm wondering whether we'll get a full on 90s revival, with people paying hundreds for Fat Boy Slim 12" remixes and what-not. If so it's probably at least 5 years off, and I don't think I can be bothered to sit on this stuff that long on the off-chance. There's also *so much* stuff from that period. It seems like every second person did a bootleg remix of a top 10 tune and pressed it on a one-sided white label. Perhaps it will always be considered junk and never have its second-time in the sun. As for why I've got boat loads of this shit? A friend moved house and had to clear his attic out.

Aside #3: I'm also waiting for the 'analogue synth' revival thing to pass and for the 'unashamedly digital' synth revival to start, things like the Casio CZ series, http://www.vintagesynth.com/casio/cz1000.php , synths that weren't shackled to their analogue past and tried to fully embrace the possibilities of digital. Once we're finally over this love affair with fake-analogue, who knows what might be possible...

Egads I've written an essay. In closing:



If there's one place on the Internet where NO fans can or should be a bit trainspotterish, surely this is the place! And given the mess that the re-issues have been for the last 10 years (as you say, the standard issue albums in most shops now being the original 80s masters, and the 2008-era reworks being a total cock-up, and it being pretty damn hard to tell whether a given 2008-era deluxe ed is one of the knackered or fixed editions, having to go by serial numbers on a post deep in the old forums on this here site...) it's surprisingly hard to get a reasonable good quality copy of the albums. Much more effort than should be necessary for a band of NO's stature.

Aside #4: A really interesting series of blog posts from a Ryko record exec on the subject of Bowie's back-catalogue: great stories about archive-diving etc. https://jeff-rougvie-1f6...arespace.com/bowie-blog/

Edited by user 20 January 2016 03:23:02(UTC)  | Reason: moar essay-like nonsense

Cool - is it obvious from the packaging that it will be the most recent remaster? (having spent a bit on the 2 CD Collector's Editions a few years ago only to find those have been subsequently remastered too!)

The whole 80s revival thing has been going on since the late 90s. I remember going out clubbing a lot in Hollywood when Electroclash and "80s clubs" was a big thing. I wouldn't even call it a revival anymore, it just keeps going. Since you mentioned it, I've actually been starting to see "90s night" type club events popping up around my city. I've been to a few and they mostly just play rap and r&b. Plus fashion wise, everyone looks grunge in this city. It's 99% jeans, flannel and hooded sweaters all around me.



I kind of agree as well, although I do love my analog synths and will most likely be buried with my Juno-60, haha. I got myself a DX11 and DX100 not too long ago and love all the weird, glitchy sounds I can mangle out of them. They are much more exciting to experiment with than analog. I also own a CZ-101 (the smaller CZ-1000), but programming it isn't very fun. There's no data slider and you have to keep tapping buttons to edit the parameters. You don't really get as many happy accidents on it like you can with the DX synths.

Edited by user 17 February 2016 12:33:10(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

That's what bothers me. I've got the original CDs for all of them and "The Factory Years" deluxe CDs with all of the original mastering errors but I've held off from buying new copies as there doesn't seem to be any way of guaranteeing that I'll get the "best" versions.

Does anybody know a foolproof way to get them?

The new remasters are only on the digital formats so far.

Quite honestly I never hear the difference in remasters so I rarely bother with them. Radical remixes are different.

I'll take your word for it. There are only so many times you can retread the same ground.

I'm honestly not sure how the mechanics of digital downloads work, but I imagine that most of the stores, including the fronts where you redeem codes from, have access to a feed of music from somewhere "upstream". So when the other retailers (iTunes etc) have all of their stock updated to be the 2015 remasters, I imagined that the mp3 code redeeming websites would too. But I've no idea.

I didn't buy any of the 2008 remasters in any format. The redeemed Technique sounds a bit better/different to what I'm used to ('89 CD master), less of a dramatic difference than Movement or Low-Life, but then it would whether it was the 2008 or 2015 remasters, so that doesn't help :)

If anyone is curious and has a confirmed 2008 or 2015 remaster of Technique and would like to 'compare notes' please PM me.

ok, got the 'waiting for the sirens call' vinyl for cheap also. haven't listened to it yet.

- republic on vinyl sounded ok, didn't notice much of an improvement

- get ready, again didn't notice much of a difference, however the volume seemed low on it.


just have to wait for 'singles' to be released now.


later
-1

My local JBHiFi here in Oz tonight had vinyl remasters of Still, Movement and Brotherhood for 24.95 AUD. Already have BH, was tempted to get the others. But I was listening to Movement (Original GAP pressing) last night and man, not sure how that sound could be bettered...