While recuts of individual records occurred regularly throughout the vinyl era, there were at least three instances where "bulk" recuts occurred, these being singles recuts in 1976 and 1982 and EP recuts in 1979.
1976 SINGLE RECUTS
When EMI's contract with The Beatles expired in early 1976, EMI started a worldwide campaign to reissue all official Beatles singles. EMI (Australia) jumped on board, but by 1976 only one of the first 18 singles was still in print, the ever popular 'Rock And Roll Music'/'Honey Don't'. Thus 17 singles would need to be reissued to join the remaining 12 singles that were still available.
In June 1976, EMI (Australia) made the decision to recut six of these deleted singles for reissue. The singles selected were: 'From Me To You'/'Thank You Girl'; 'She Loves You'/'I'll Get You'; 'I Want To Hold Your Hand'/'This Boy'; 'Love Me, Do'/'I Saw Her Standing There'; 'I Feel Fine'/'She's A Woman'; and, 'Ticket To Ride'/'Yes It Is'. The tracks were cut in stereo, with the exception of 'From Me To You', 'Thank You Girl' and 'I'll Get You', which were mono, and 'She Loves You', 'Love Me, Do' and 'Yes It Is', which were fake stereo. Documentation indicates that locally-stored tape sources were used for some of the singles (stereo where available), but others, including (at least) 'I Want To Hold Your Hand' and 'This Boy', were freshly sourced from EMI UK.
Along with the standard stereo mix of 'This Boy', EMI UK despatched for reasons known only to them the October 1963 stereo mix of 'I Want To Hold Your Hand' rather than the later November 1966 stereo mix that was made for A Collection Of Beatles Oldies. EMI (Australia) dutifully used what it was sent; it didn't care about the mix, just the title, so little did they know that they were about to create the first and only single appearance of the mix in the world. Two EMI (Australia) engineers were responsible for the recuts. Five of the recut singles carried the original UK matrix numbers, but without trailing lacquer numbers (for example "7XCE 17329" instead of "7XCE 17329-1N"). This can confuse collectors, who often assume that by carrying UK matrix numbers the singles were pressed from UK mothers. However, the sharp-eyed will notice that these cuts had handwritten matrices, not machine stamped matrices like UK cuts. These new cuts were reissued on 19 July 1976.
1982 SINGLE RECUTS
In preparation for the Australian 20th Anniversary Singles Collection release in October 1982, the remaining eleven deleted singles were recut by EMI (Australia) engineers Alan Parsons and Otto Ruiter. Due to a damaged mother, 'This Boy' would also receive a recut.
Bruce Hamlin assisted EMI (Australia) in selecting the (stereo) sources for these recuts. The matrices were the single catalogue number, with a trailing "A" or "B" to denote the side (although 'This Boy' kept the 1976 matrix number, but with a new sequential lacquer number, as due to EMI (Australia) sending their master tape copy to the US without making a copy for themselves, it was cut from a dub of the 1976 vinyl single).
In balancing cost, EMI (Australia) considered the masters for the remaining singles sufficient, so they were not recut at this time. This created an odd situation where, from 1982, the 1963-1966 era singles were primarily in stereo whereas the 1967-1970 era singles were in mono!
1979 EP RECUTS
In December 1978, EMI (Australia) deleted all EPs from their catalogue. In June 1979, the ten GEPO 70000 series EPs were recut. Most of the recuts were sourced from existing stereo LP tapes but mastered in mono — the reason being to 'maintain the feel of the original sound', however, more accurately they had temporarily lost the original mono EP tape—PARLO 99—that contained all the EP tracks in glorious mono!
Only five tracks: 'Long Tall Sally', 'I Call Your Name' (both Requests), 'I Want To Hold Your Hand' (Further Requests), 'No Reply' and 'I'm A Loser' (both Beatles For Sale) appear in stereo. The Help!, Norwegian Wood and Penny Lane EPs were recut from the original tapes, so appear in true mono.
The GEPO 8000 series EPs were not recut at this time as they were not reissued.
Please visit the dedicated LP, EP and Singles pages for more information on individual recuts and sources used.