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Now I'm wondering whether the mythical 5th CD was ever assembled, and if so, whether the SQ would be on par with the other Jedi Anthology tracks. As mentioned before, I recall Lukas answering my question stating that he had the assembly on cassette somewhere, so it must have been at some stage of inception.

 

We need that cassette!

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1 hour ago, Amer said:

No Need. Better quality tales did resurface for JEDI and Matessino did confirm to me years ago. So nothing is lost here. Matessino is a wunderkind for restorations and once the day comes it will be mind blowing. Lets keep some optimisim here. 

 

That's great news! Any idea what the newly discovered source was @Amer? First generation masters? Multi-track masters on superior tape stock to the source used for the SE? Any word on the lost cues like Jabba's concert arrangement or Max Rebo's Band?

 

Should we assume it was this newly discovered source that was used for the Demasters, which have mixing issues but an impressive clarity improvement over the SE?

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5 hours ago, crumbs said:

 

That's great news! Any idea what the newly discovered source was @Amer? First generation masters? Multi-track masters on superior tape stock to the source used for the SE? Any word on the lost cues like Jabba's concert arrangement or Max Rebo's Band?

 

Should we assume it was this newly discovered source that was used for the Demasters, which have mixing issues but an impressive clarity improvement over the SE?

 

I have no clue on those details but I suppose the demasters did use the same quality as evident?  Infact its one of the better sounding demasters. Since that OST demaster was a 'reconstruct' Most likely the actual album masters were used entirely or in part? Who knows?. 

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1 hour ago, crumbs said:

Should we assume it was this newly discovered source that was used for the Demasters, which have mixing issues but an impressive clarity improvement over the SE?

 

Jedi is the only demaster that has a satisfactory mix.

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42 minutes ago, Jurassic Shark said:

 

Jedi is the only demaster that has a satisfactory mix.

 

It sounds a bit narrows in some tracks, to my ears anyway (just compare the separation of channels on track 1 with track 2, the latter sounds borderline mono).

 

Presumably it's a stereo downmix from multi-track masters, potentially even a three-track master (which is notoriously difficult to downmix to stereo). But technical details are scarce when it comes to Star Wars scores. 

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On 4/7/2020 at 2:22 AM, Manakin Skywalker said:

 

Yep of course. The four takes on the SE set are all actually used in the full version of the main title; takes 16-20 were split up into sections to construct it. Hearing them on the SE was a big revelation for everyone when it came out, hearing what could have been in some alternate universe.

Listen thankyou so much for your insight. I always skip pass the Main Titles so that's how I missed it. 

17 hours ago, Jay said:

 

The 1997 SE track titled "Tales of a Jedi Knight / Learn About The Force" is comprised of 4 short cues. 

  • 0:00-1:39 (1:39) = 4M2 Obi-Wan Kenobi
  • 1:39-2:40 (1:01) = 4M2A The Force
  • 2:40-3:31 (0:51) = 4M3 The Princess Reappears
  • 3:31-end (0:57) = 4M4 Ben and Luke (originally written as 4M4 A Home Destroyed, bars 1 through 14)

 

If you watch the film, you'll plainly see each cue is completely separated from each other, scoring 4 different scenes.

 

This spreadsheet might be of interest to you:

 

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1NTJGw3zWk6qamNFBPNCfrQiMefuO2BQCDlovHwi6ud4/edit?usp=sharing

 

 

 

We've had that opening chord since the 1993 4CD box set; it opens disc 4.  And there are 5 takes (takes 16-20) of the Main Title at the end of disc 1 of the 1997, not 3.  The final version of the Main Title was constructed using portions of takes 18,19, and 20, like this:

 

 

Dear Jay. Thankyou very much for this. I had a hunch that little cue was split up and I felt those were separate little cues. I hadn't realised the alt Main title was on the Anthology set which I still have. Thing is I always skip past the Main Titles so didn't notice. 

    Its funny that with each and every release of the complete SW  soundtracks, certain tracks have continued to be sandwiched together incl "Tales of a Jedi Knight/Learn about the Force". Is it too optimistic to hope one day that an official future release will be crafted with every track separated as per the way Mr Manikin has done it? 

        Also one of my favourite moments in all Star Wars music is what must be the shortest cue written for the entire series of 9 movies. Its the little add on moment of The Moisture Farm. Is there an official title? Or is it just "Moisture Farm 2"?

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5 hours ago, Jurassic Shark said:

 

Jedi is the only demaster that has a satisfactory mix.

Jay said that Star Wars: A New Hope is the only overall better sounding in the demaster lot. 

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Jedi sounds pretty damn good and is the only one without issues. SW's brass could be a lot more bright and alive in places.

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Yeah, just did a side by side comparison of the Disney and SE. Demaster mops the floor with the SE in terms of AQ, night and day (especially in cues like the Emperor's Death.)

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27 minutes ago, Amer said:

Jay said that Star Wars: A New Hope is the only overall better sounding in the demaster lot. 

 

It's his right to be wrong. The demaster of A New Hope contains unforgivable mistakes.

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4 hours ago, stravinsky said:

Its the little add on moment of The Moisture Farm. Is there an official title? Or is it just "Moisture Farm 2"?

 

This is why I linked you to my google doc, the answer you seek is within that.

 

It's 2M4 R-2

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It's bizarre hearing the differences in the 3 best sources we have for ROTJ. The mix is completely different on the Demaster, the Sony and the Anthology. Main Title sounds totally different from one to the next, with instruments prominent in some and inaudible in others. Brass is mixed very hot on the Disney but is oddly distant on the Sony. The Anthology seems like the best of both worlds.

 

I don't know how Mike is ever going to make sense of this. It's hard to comprehend the "true" sound of these scores, unless Williams personally oversees the project. And considering there's probably no one quality source, it could be another Dracula situation with various tape masters comprising the one assembly.

 

Anyway, it's just pointless speculation because Disney don't seem to be in any rush to expand these bloody scores.

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8 hours ago, stravinsky said:

Its funny that with each and every release of the complete SW  soundtracks, certain tracks have continued to be sandwiched together incl "Tales of a Jedi Knight/Learn about the Force". Is it too optimistic to hope one day that an official future release will be crafted with every track separated as per the way Mr Manikin has done it? 

 

Unfortunately I don't think that would ever be possible. One reason they do this is to save disc space (another reason is to combine cues that belong together chronologically). I think for something like ANH it would be possible, but it's very rare that expanded releases emulate the recording session format, so I don't imagine that will ever happen.

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5 minutes ago, Jurassic Shark said:

You must be joking.

 

Well it's at least partially true. Obviously another reason is for the album presentation; to combine cues that belong together chronologically. Those are really the only two reasons.

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3 minutes ago, Manakin Skywalker said:

 

Well it's at least partially true. Obviously another reason is for the album presentation; to combine cues that belong together chronologically. Those are really the only two reasons.

 

I'd say it's very rarely done in order to save disc space. It's usually done to create a listener-friendly presentation of the music, and the joined cues don't have to be chronological either.

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17 hours ago, Amer said:

The 5th Disc was abandoned because Lucasfilm started working on the Special Editions and it was decided to redo the soundtracks as complete definite editions led by Nick Redman. 

 

I know, and it's a huge shame that it was, especially as those editions are hardly definitive.

 

14 hours ago, Jurassic Shark said:

Jedi is the only demaster that has a satisfactory mix.

 

Ironic since it's a dreadful presentation of the score, probably the saddest album assembly JW has ever put together.

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3 hours ago, Jurassic Shark said:

I'd say it's very rarely done in order to save disc space. It's usually done to create a listener-friendly presentation of the music, and the joined cues don't have to be chronological either.

 

True, but they should be.

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14 minutes ago, Jurassic Shark said:

Sader than CE3K?

 

You've been paying attention I see ;)

 

CE3K is up there for me, but ROTJ takes the cake. They may as well have released a 7" with Lapti Nek and Parade of the Ewoks and called it a day.

 

Return of the Jedi Single.jpg

 

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Yay! I found a kindred spirit here at last.

 

Now I need to quickly remove that ROTJ single cover before Bespin has a meltdown.

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10 hours ago, Jay said:

 

This is why I linked you to my google doc, the answer you seek is within that.

 

It's 2M4 R-2

 

Doh! Of course. By the way I was fascinated to READ your notes in relation to  "early never recorded versions" of 13 cues. How did you find out about this? What a dream it would be to track down the scores and have this material re-recorded. But that's asking too much. 

     I've also often wondered if Williams actually wrote music for scenes which were later cut from Episode IV although I suppose if he had done they would've been released by RCA in 1997.

    Lastly I've just been on Discogs to track down the credits of an old tape I bought when I was 13 years old because I wanted to hear the music for E. T 

     I vaguely remembered what the cover looked like but couldn't remember the band or conductor. Turns out it was an old "Music for Pleasure" release with suites from E.T, CE3K and Star Wars. Some guy called Frank Barber conducted the LSO and National Philharmonic. The album was never released on CD. 

6 hours ago, Manakin Skywalker said:

 

Unfortunately I don't think that would ever be possible. One reason they do this is to save disc space (another reason is to combine cues that belong together chronologically). I think for something like ANH it would be possible, but it's very rare that expanded releases emulate the recording session format, so I don't imagine that will ever happen.

Yes I guess you are right. Well whenever you finish your latest editions will you let me know? I'd love to hear them. 

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12 hours ago, stravinsky said:

I was fascinated to READ your notes in relation to  "early never recorded versions" of 13 cues. How did you find out about this?

 

The sheet music leaked years ago

 

Quote

I've also often wondered if Williams actually wrote music for scenes which were later cut from Episode IV although I suppose if he had done they would've been released by RCA in 1997.

 

Just one scene with Vader talking to someone else I think, probably one more I'm forgetting, but nothing major. Everything recorded is on the 1997 set., except the original end credits opening which has still never been released.

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5 hours ago, stravinsky said:

   I've also often wondered if Williams actually wrote music for scenes which were later cut from Episode IV although I suppose if he had done they would've been released by RCA in 1997.

Landspeeder Search! It was partially deleted but scored fully before that.

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On 4/7/2020 at 4:10 PM, Jay said:

The point is, a future expansion should include a track called "The Imperial March (Alternate)" that presents the concert arrangement again, but using the takes chosen for that scene in the film for those parts (and any other interesting different takes for the rest).  If you don't care about that, then simply skip past that track when listening to this potential definitive release.

 

This would make me happier than anything if this happened. I am not being even remotely sarcastic and I am deadly serious! 

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12 minutes ago, aj_vader said:

 

This would make me happier than anything if this happened. I am not being even remotely sarcastic and I am deadly serious! 

 

Me too. It's an awesome march and the OST recording is awesome, so I wouldn't mind another version of it on CD!

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On 4/11/2017 at 8:43 AM, phbart said:

0:00 to 0:08, tk.19

0:08 to 0:43, tk.18

0:43 to 1:31, tk.20

1:31 to 1:43, tk.18

1:43 to end, tk.20

 

My God, didn't even remember I worked on this. It's been 3 years already?? How time flies! Thanks for bringing that up, @Jay. Now that memories about this are coming back, I do recall it was a real pain in the @ss to sort this out. I actually splitted all the 5 takes to make it easier to go back and forth and figure out which take was used and where. Believe it or not, that was more laborious than working on the editing itself. For the editing I just used good old Cool Edit Pro 2.1 (now called Adobe Audition) because it's so much easier to work with, and I upsampled all from 16bit to 24bit as recommended when editing because of quantization errors when manipulating digital audio, and kept the original sampling rate of 44.1kHz all the way.

 

It was indeed a more pleasent listening experience than the already assembled track 2 of the 97 SE CD1. However, when the 2018 release came out, I didn't realize how "bright" the raw takes from the 97 SE sounded. The dismaster version sounds better to me, so I kind of forgot about my own assembly as time went on. BTW, when it comes to the OT's OST, the dismasters are indeed my got versions to when it comes to SW and Jedi (Jedi specially), and partially when it comes to Empire. I just wished they used the actual album take of "Detention Block Ambush" portion of the "The Last Battle" track. They used the film take instead.

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I don't think any of the Star Wars soundtracks had album specific recordings. JW just recorded concert suites during the film sessions and assembled his OSTs with a mixture of suites and film cues.

 

However, I think both ANH and ESB had album-specific mixes, which were different to the film mixes. Which means a comprehensive release of either score needs both mixes (and considering the Disney Demasters completely fucked up their one job, I guess Mike will have to fix that mess when he gets handed the keys to the Lucasfilm archives).

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12 hours ago, crumbs said:

However, I think both ANH and ESB had album-specific mixes, which were different to the film mixes. 

Yes, the original Eric Tomlinson recordings of SW and ESB were pissed on remixed by John Neal for the original 77 and 80 album. Jedi used the original Tomlinson mix. I never understood why John Neal got Raiders right for the 1981 album, which was also recorded by Eric Tomlinson, but failed to do the same for SW and ESB. Raiders is the only case where I prefer the John Neal album remix over Eric Tomlinson's original mix, as heard on the 95 DCC release.

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Disney isnt just responsible for Demasters cds here. Apparently, they have screwed up the 4k restoration of THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK movie as well. A NEW HOPE was exclusively handled by Lucasfilm core teams and is being considered the best edition so far.  (Dont know about Jedi though) 

So Disney needs to learn all of this. 

 

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3 hours ago, phbart said:

Yes, the original Eric Tomlinson recordings of SW and ESB were pissed on remixed by John Neal for the original 77 and 80 album. Jedi used the original Tomlinson mix. I never understood why John Neal got Raiders right for the 1981 album, which was also recorded by Eric Tomlinson, but failed to do the same for SW and ESB. Raiders is the only case where I prefer the John Neal album remix over Eric Tomlinson's original mix, as heard on the 95 DCC release.

 

Raiders OST and DCC both sound good, just different from one-another. I prefer the DCC for its more natural rawness to the more processed sounding OST.

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1 hour ago, Amer said:

Disney isnt just responsible for Demasters cds here. Apparently, they have screwed up the 4k restoration of THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK movie as well. A NEW HOPE was exclusively handled by Lucasfilm core teams and is being considered the best edition so far.  (Dont know about Jedi though) 

So Disney needs to learn all of this. 

 

 

Wow, finally caught the reviews of this. How do you stuff up Empire yet again when fans have pointed out all the issues with the existing master since 2004? This time they've scrubbed the grain excessively and made it look like a digital mess, not a film. How hard is it to just let the film look like a film? 

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35 minutes ago, crumbs said:

 

Wow, finally caught the reviews of this. How do you stuff up Empire yet again when fans have pointed out all the issues with the existing master since 2004? This time they've scrubbed the grain excessively and made it look like a digital mess, not a film. How hard is it to just let the film look like a film? 

 

Because film stock is such an anachronism, they're scared people will complain it looks like "dirt" on the picture.

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Regarding TPM, the guy mentions:

Quote

For the film’s original DVD release in 2001, that interpositive was scanned in 10-bit 2K by Lowry Digital, resulting in the creation of a 2K Digital Intermediate (complete with digital VFX tweaks and a color grade supervised by Lucas). This source was used again for the 2011 Blu-ray release, though with a bit more Lowry Digital remastering (and still more digital VFX and color timing tweaks).

 

I didn't know they used the same source for the original DVD and the Blu-Ray. The image quality on the DVD is so bad compared to the Blu-Ray that I thought it was a new transfer, weird.

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That's incorrect for TPM. The Bluray master for TPM was assembled using the raw digital files rendered out at ILM. The 2001 DVD release was a more conventional scan of the film print (hence the vastly lower quality).

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21 hours ago, crumbs said:

That's incorrect for TPM. The Bluray master for TPM was assembled using the raw digital files rendered out at ILM. The 2001 DVD release was a more conventional scan of the film print (hence the vastly lower quality).

I don't think so because the 2001 DVD is not the same as the 1999 theatrical edition, so it couldn't have come from a film print. According to IMDb, the 1999 japanese laserdisc is the only released version of the theatrical edition (which I assume it was sourced from a film print).

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It's a different version to the theatrical edition, but it's still a crappy scan of the film print (hence all the ugly video noise/badly encoded film grain, further ruined by excessive edge enhancement and sharpening).

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I always liked the poor-looking DVD transfer. The grain might be excessive, but I think it gives it some character (and also masks some of the cheap CGI shots). The Blu-Ray scan makes everything look like silly putty.

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