Beatles - At The Beeb Vol.1-12 (12CD BOXSET)

NOTE : This review was written before Disc 6 was repressed. So some flaws may have been rectified.

Review by TM :

I recently secured a copy of the new Yellow Dog
Beatles 12 Cd BBC box and I have some mixed feelings
on the matter. For the most part, I think this set is
an upgrade over previous issues (Great Dane and Purple
Chick). However, it does have some flaws. Yellow Dog
had some quality control problems during the mastering
phase of this box. There are annoying "skips" on
several tracks, mainly the opening numbers to each cd.
The good thing is that most of the opening numbers are
either Pop Goes The Beatles or From Us To You. It
doesn't really bother me that much, although one would
think they would get it right due to its' magnitude.

I have only listened to selected tracks. I discovered,
to my dismay, that two programs, PGTB (the program
with Carol and Soldier of Love) and Easy Beat from
June of 63 (Some Other Guy and Thank You Girl) sound
noticeably worse. In fact both shows sound distorted.

The packaging is nice. 12 single cd's are housed in a
black box. YD uses the covers from the Beatles at the
BEEB LP's from the late 80's. Each cd has extensive
liner notes, although they were directly lifted from
Mark Lewisohn's Chronicles book.

In spite of the flaws, I noticed that there are
numerous upgrades to report. Some that come to mind:
the Swinging Sound show where the Beatles performed
two numbers at the Albert Hall in April '63. Their
last BBC program, The Beatles Invite You to Take a
Ticket To Ride sounds a little better, at least on
tracks such as The Night Before. Keep Your Hands off
My Baby sounds pretty good to my ears as well. The
recently discovered programs are in fair to poor
quality. But, at least they're new!!

Tape sources were substituted for previous vinyl
sources. Even when YD did not use an improved tape
source, they managed for the most part, to improve
upon its sound quality. YD also included the guest
performers for each show.

In the end, I am pleased with this box, although, I
think the packaging of the Great Dane box was better.
IMHO, it is a worthy purchase.

Hope this sheds some light..