Hello!
I am currently writing an article about the different Queen CD releases. As I would like to include as much technical data as possible, I am trying to get details of who were responsible for each remaster and where it was worked on. The thing is I am getting mixed data regarding the famous "Digital Master Series". Let me explain...
The "Digital Master Series" included the original studio albums from QUEEN up to and including THE WORKS, and also GREATEST HITS. These CDs were first issued during 1993/94 by Parlophone/EMI in UK/Europe and by Toshiba-EMI in Japan, and since then on nearly all the territories controlled by EMI - they remain the most widely available versions worldwide (at least, until now - but we'll see this year...). A lot of publicity material states that the series was "digitally remastered at Abbey Road" - even the UK/Europe booklets say so. THE ULTIMATE QUEEN BOX SET released in 1995 supposedly includes these versions (GREATEST HITS was not included). The accompanying booklet says that the corresponding albums were remastered by Kevin Metcalfe, assisted by Crispin Murray, at the Townhouse Studios in London - except for a couple that were remastered by Eddy Schreyer at Future Disc Systems in Hollywood.
This leaves me with some questions:
- What happened to "Abbey Road"?
- Why Parlophone commissioned new remasters by the same people that had remastered the albums just a couple of years before (yes, they were responsible for most of the 1991 remasters issued by Hollywood Records in the USA and Canada)?
- Who remastered the 1994 Digital Master Series version of GREATEST HITS, and where?
To make matters worse, I have undeniable evidence that SOME tracks were revised for the Japanese CDs (but the obvioulsy glitched Fat Bottomed Girls was not!).
Any help on the subject will be much appreciated.