The 2001-2014 re-releases era: an appreciation
Sept 26, 2024 9:20:51 GMT
Alan, jj, and 1 more like this
Post by rickyrocknroller on Sept 26, 2024 9:20:51 GMT
With all of the disappointments surrounding this year's Waterloo anniversary, I've been starting to feel nostalgic for the 2001-2014 era lately. While there always seems to have been some sense of discontent amongst the fans, and I won't exclude myself here, I think, in retrospect, it were actually pretty decent times.
I think was fueled by a lack of closure with ABBA, with frustrating apperances like BBA at the 5th year Mamma Mia anniversary in 2004 or A-B-B-A at the 2008 Mamma Mia The Movie premiere. With what started in their 2016 together appearance and A&F singing TWOFD, culminating in the gigantic Voyage affair and so far having come to a close with them appearing together at the Swedish Royal awards, I notice I have come to peace with the 2001-2014 years and arrived at re-evaluating them actually better than I had lived through most of them as an ABBA fan.
What strikes me particularly in difference with the clunkily called 2022 "CD Albums Box Set" or the recently announced ghastly The Singles The First 50 Years, is how neat and professional the releases looked. From the 2001 Remasters and the Definitive Collection, albeit suboptimal remasters, the 2008 Gold/More Gold makeovers and The Albums, over to the DVDs with beautiful digipack versions of The Movie and In Japan, to the Deluxe Editions, they are superbly designed and packaged. They all are in style and true to ABBA's aesthetics. Even the era's budget compilations like 18 Hits and Classic ABBA beat the recent 50 Years The Singles lookwise. There has been a sense of direction and good research in the release programme, with attention to detail, bonus sections and rich booklets with extensive liner notes, whereas today we are back to repackaged albums with reduced track lists and quickly mashed-together Greatest Hits compilations.
And whilst there may have been a sense of discontent with many of the interesting releases being on DVD and happening in the visual department, with DVD releases having disappeared, I find them remarkably straightforward now. They kicked off with the promo videos on the Definitive Collection in 2001 and went over to the live feature films In Concert in 2004 and The Movie in 2005 (even a downsized DCMA release in the CSR box). And they got it right immediately, with new restorations and even some extra material, with stylishly designed menues, booklets and sets that still hold up excellently a whopping 20 years later today.
With the Arrival Deluxe Edition in 2006, they started with releasing most essential TV specials like ABBA-dabba-doo!!, ABBA in Switzerland and ABBA in Australia on the ongoing series together with supplementary TV performances. ABBA in Japan ended up as a seperate release, again lavishly packaged and expanded. Even the compilartory Number Ones DVD was used to feature quite some TV bonus content.
While some of the Deluxe Editions DVDs (particularly The Album and Ring Ring) fall short on content, the 2001-2014 DVD release programme as a whole today makes up for a great collection. It's really nice to have much of the key visual material, which is an essential part to ABBA's legacy, sourced in good quality on official, physical releases that even look great on the shelf and are a joy to browse through every time. They get elevated further by often featuring exclusive alternate mixes or live performances.
During these years, here have been a lot of complaints of hardly any unreleased material surfacing, particularly as audio. Yet, with the 2012 FATSTAPA medley and the 2014 Wembley live album, this happened in ways that have gotten almost unthinkable again. Then, the Polar team went great lengths to unearth some unavailable mixes starting with the RR & VV Remixes for the Definitive Collection, the Early Mix of Waterloo for the 2005 CSR box and even getting the corrected Dream World and the full length OAOAO in Stereo out of the vaults for the VV and ST Deluxe Editions. With the 2014 The Singles box, there was even an accidential slip of an Andante Andante Alternate Mix. And that's just actual audio.
A lot of alternate mixes and live performances I can't even all list were released on the various standalone and Deluxe Edition DVDs. Most of the time, they came via the original video soundtrack like the early mix of WIKTT and the proto-DCMA lives of DDD and WDIHTBM in ABBA-dabba-doo!!. But some times, what's on the audio track apparently was newly done.
While the "live-live" TWOFD from Words and Music appears as a flat analogue dub on the ST Deluxe Edition, the audio of its inclusion as a bonus on the In Concert DVD is crystal clear and highly dynamic. It appears to have been sourced from the original master or even entirely remixed from the original multitrack recordings. This was the case for the five DCMA tracks released on a DVD in the CSR box: it's a new 2005 downmix from the original multitracks by Bernard Löhr, supervised by Benny, in stereo and 5.1 (!).
The ABBA in Japan DVD features new "rougher" mixes of the three live songs. It's not entirely transparent what happened there. Does anyone of you know if they are from 1978 or were they also newly mixed from the multitracks in 2009? I suspect this could be the case and the motivation for these at all, for I reckon the original 1978 TV mix was done in mono, as were most then (DCMA, Switzerland, ABBA-dabba-doo!!, ...). The Japan DVD gets extra brownies for supplementing the early version of IIWFTN as a bonus. Since it is in stereo and as far as I understood CMP's TCRS 2017, they actually sourced it from the 1978 master tape, which makes it a somewhat hidden, albeit actual audio release.
The care and knowledge that went into these releases is obvious, and I've been thinking lately, these efforts should be lauded more than they have been before.
I think was fueled by a lack of closure with ABBA, with frustrating apperances like BBA at the 5th year Mamma Mia anniversary in 2004 or A-B-B-A at the 2008 Mamma Mia The Movie premiere. With what started in their 2016 together appearance and A&F singing TWOFD, culminating in the gigantic Voyage affair and so far having come to a close with them appearing together at the Swedish Royal awards, I notice I have come to peace with the 2001-2014 years and arrived at re-evaluating them actually better than I had lived through most of them as an ABBA fan.
What strikes me particularly in difference with the clunkily called 2022 "CD Albums Box Set" or the recently announced ghastly The Singles The First 50 Years, is how neat and professional the releases looked. From the 2001 Remasters and the Definitive Collection, albeit suboptimal remasters, the 2008 Gold/More Gold makeovers and The Albums, over to the DVDs with beautiful digipack versions of The Movie and In Japan, to the Deluxe Editions, they are superbly designed and packaged. They all are in style and true to ABBA's aesthetics. Even the era's budget compilations like 18 Hits and Classic ABBA beat the recent 50 Years The Singles lookwise. There has been a sense of direction and good research in the release programme, with attention to detail, bonus sections and rich booklets with extensive liner notes, whereas today we are back to repackaged albums with reduced track lists and quickly mashed-together Greatest Hits compilations.
And whilst there may have been a sense of discontent with many of the interesting releases being on DVD and happening in the visual department, with DVD releases having disappeared, I find them remarkably straightforward now. They kicked off with the promo videos on the Definitive Collection in 2001 and went over to the live feature films In Concert in 2004 and The Movie in 2005 (even a downsized DCMA release in the CSR box). And they got it right immediately, with new restorations and even some extra material, with stylishly designed menues, booklets and sets that still hold up excellently a whopping 20 years later today.
With the Arrival Deluxe Edition in 2006, they started with releasing most essential TV specials like ABBA-dabba-doo!!, ABBA in Switzerland and ABBA in Australia on the ongoing series together with supplementary TV performances. ABBA in Japan ended up as a seperate release, again lavishly packaged and expanded. Even the compilartory Number Ones DVD was used to feature quite some TV bonus content.
While some of the Deluxe Editions DVDs (particularly The Album and Ring Ring) fall short on content, the 2001-2014 DVD release programme as a whole today makes up for a great collection. It's really nice to have much of the key visual material, which is an essential part to ABBA's legacy, sourced in good quality on official, physical releases that even look great on the shelf and are a joy to browse through every time. They get elevated further by often featuring exclusive alternate mixes or live performances.
During these years, here have been a lot of complaints of hardly any unreleased material surfacing, particularly as audio. Yet, with the 2012 FATSTAPA medley and the 2014 Wembley live album, this happened in ways that have gotten almost unthinkable again. Then, the Polar team went great lengths to unearth some unavailable mixes starting with the RR & VV Remixes for the Definitive Collection, the Early Mix of Waterloo for the 2005 CSR box and even getting the corrected Dream World and the full length OAOAO in Stereo out of the vaults for the VV and ST Deluxe Editions. With the 2014 The Singles box, there was even an accidential slip of an Andante Andante Alternate Mix. And that's just actual audio.
A lot of alternate mixes and live performances I can't even all list were released on the various standalone and Deluxe Edition DVDs. Most of the time, they came via the original video soundtrack like the early mix of WIKTT and the proto-DCMA lives of DDD and WDIHTBM in ABBA-dabba-doo!!. But some times, what's on the audio track apparently was newly done.
While the "live-live" TWOFD from Words and Music appears as a flat analogue dub on the ST Deluxe Edition, the audio of its inclusion as a bonus on the In Concert DVD is crystal clear and highly dynamic. It appears to have been sourced from the original master or even entirely remixed from the original multitrack recordings. This was the case for the five DCMA tracks released on a DVD in the CSR box: it's a new 2005 downmix from the original multitracks by Bernard Löhr, supervised by Benny, in stereo and 5.1 (!).
The ABBA in Japan DVD features new "rougher" mixes of the three live songs. It's not entirely transparent what happened there. Does anyone of you know if they are from 1978 or were they also newly mixed from the multitracks in 2009? I suspect this could be the case and the motivation for these at all, for I reckon the original 1978 TV mix was done in mono, as were most then (DCMA, Switzerland, ABBA-dabba-doo!!, ...). The Japan DVD gets extra brownies for supplementing the early version of IIWFTN as a bonus. Since it is in stereo and as far as I understood CMP's TCRS 2017, they actually sourced it from the 1978 master tape, which makes it a somewhat hidden, albeit actual audio release.
The care and knowledge that went into these releases is obvious, and I've been thinking lately, these efforts should be lauded more than they have been before.
