The Beatles Digital Production Master Tape

While not shown on this page, EMI UK sent cassette production master tapes to EMI (Australia) in 1971 (PARLO 179/180/181/182). EMI (Australia) initially used these tapes for its cassette and 8 track cartridge releases. The track sequencing for the cassette follows the order of the cassette production master tapes, however, for the 8 track cartridge release, EMI (Australia) reversed sides 3 and 4, resulting in the album ending with 'Revolution 9' rather than 'Goodnight'. It's worth noting that the UK cassette also reversed the two sides, although the reason for doing so is unclear.


The cassette release was prepared on 30 August 1971, with the four sides running very close in time: 23:26, 23:33, 23:35 and 23:25.


Cassette copies spell 'Raccoon' as 'Raccon' and 'Sexy Sadie' as 'Sexie Sadie' on both the J-cards and cassette shells. Due to ambiguity on the Acceptance Sheet, every cassette release incorrectly carries Parlophone logos.


Sides 1 and 3 of the LP were recut from these tapes on 22 October 1982 by Don Bartley. PARLO 182 had a pen notation against 'Revolution No 1' stating "* Use 70hz bass cut". On the engineer's cutting sheet Don noted that on side 1 there are "NO SPIRALS" and on side 3 at 19:38 there is a false ending so "WATCH IT!".


At some later point the tapes were re-sequenced to the correct LP running order, with the following notes added:


To celebrate the 20th anniversary of Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band in June 1987, EMI (Australia) decided to release a limited red vinyl edition. Along with Sgt Pepper's, they chose to go further into the coloured vinyl craze of the day by following two months later with two other obvious Beatles titles, the The Beatles and Yellow Submarine, on white and yellow vinyl respectively.


Sgt Pepper's was mastered by Warren Barnett at Festival Records and is the subject of another story. The Beatles and Yellow Submarine, however, were mastered by Allan Parsons at EMI Homebush.

Shown above is the tape (and outer box sticker) created and used for The Beatles. As you can see, it is not analogue but digital, made on a Sony beta machine. Allan Parsons had taken the original 1971 analogue cassette production master tapes and transferred to beta tape using a Sony PCM-701 digital converter. The Sony PCM-701 was an early consumer format, inferior to 1610/1630, and was how digital was created at EMI at that time.

While transferring, it can be assumed that Allan re-EQ'd and processed with dynamic range enhancer (there was a dbx 3BX in the rack). In essence, that makes this (and Yellow Submarine, which followed a similar process) true locally-produced digital remasters, just not sanctioned by EMI UK.

The Beatles was cut by Allan in the Direct Metal Mastering (DMM) suite on 12 July 1987, with side 4 recut by Allan on 22 January 1988. This configuration remained in use until replaced by new DMM cuts made again by Allan in November 1988, this time from the official EMI UK CDs. More information on DMM can be found on the "Direct Metal Mastering" page under the "Made In Australia" Reference menu item.

The album, along with Yellow Submarine, was pressed by Festival Records (as EMI (Australia) didn't press coloured vinyl) and released on 24 August 1987. It sounded truly awful and today is nothing more than a collector's piece valued for its white vinyl. Having said that, the reissue spent 13 weeks on the charts, reaching #23, albeit mainly off the back of the CD.

In September 1988, Leon Zervis did something similar with The Beatles 1962-1966 and The Beatles 1967-1970, although by then EMI had the Sony PCM-1610 in its chain.

NB: The beta tape shell is actually red, not black as the scan suggests.