Stupid question: Has Pete changed his story on why only half of the album is getting the 5.1 treatment? I had thought I read somewhere that the original multitracks had been somehow corrupted by overdubbing, but in googling the matter this evening, it is increasingly unclear to me as to what the official reason is (or was) for this.

The box set is very nice and the booklet is outstanding. The album sounds identical to the 1996 remix (although, there's a shreiking wind-instrument sound mixed in at the 0:41 mark of "5:15" that's not on the '96 version). I have no idea how the Rolling Stone reviewer came to the conclusion that Daltry's vocals were higher in the mix on this release. The demos sound fantastic and are enjoyable in a Scoop kind of a way. I noticed that "You Came Back" and "Sea and Sand" are edited down from the Scoop versions, although, the sound quality is much better here. I think I would have started off the demos with "Recorders" from Scoop, which doesn't appear here.

The letdowns for me are the lack of a complete 5.1 mix (Pete rambles on in the liner notes about wanting to record/mix the album in quad at the time), no band outtakes (assuming there's more than "We Close Tonight"), and basically using the same 1996 remix.

Also, if you register and validate your purchase on the albums official site (as it mentions in the booklet) you're supposed to get an extra track for download titled "Ambition" that Pete discusses in the liner notes. Don't bother if you only want the track, as the website says it's not going to be made available after all, saying it was impossible to save (salvage?).

Isn't that what the Lifehouse box was?

No. Pete released a Lifehouse box through his website with some of his demos & a radio play, & I forget what else. But it didn't actually have the Who's Next album or any band stuff.

There is no problem with the multitrack tapes. The two reasons that have been given are "there wasn't enough time" and Pete wanted to "establish whether there is sufficient demand from fans for a complete 5.1 mix" before doing the whole album.
http://www.nakedeye-online.com/QuadrQua ... erview.pdf

Aside from original album, this new set doesn't have any band stuff either, so they aren't that much different.

The book that comes with this package is easily worth $50-60 by itself. The entire thing looks pretty damn impressive on a shelf. I will soon be diving into the 5.1 stuff.

I get very tired of defending Pete when he pulls crap like this.

That said...I never understood why 5.1 mixes have never been more widely available on DVD. It makes sense--many people already have DVD theater systems, so why make them buy yet another piece of expensive hardware that will play but a handful of special discs? I have the 5.1 "Tommy" but have never played it for exactly that reason; I got excited about the 5.1 "Quadrophenia" for no better reason than I have an existing setup that will actually play the disc. Beyond the DVD in the recent Pink Floyd sets, the only 5.1 music I have actually played (I probably have more SACD hybirds that I realize) are the Dual Discs that everybody hated so much. (Dual Disc never bothered me all that much for exactly that reason, but if people love to hate them, I guess that's their business.)

So when Pete complains of a lackluster response to a 5.1 "Tommy", it's because he, like apparently most in the music business, believes that only audio snobs would be interested hearing music being played over five different channels. One of the reasons the DVD was so successful (and why Blu-Ray has been so slow to replace it) is because it brought radically improved picture and sound into the average living room without much effort; Blu-Ray has thus far failed to eradicate the DVD for much the same reason that SACD failed to eradicate the compact disc.

So now Pete says he will offer the full album in 5.1 next year via bittorrent. Fine...I hope there's some uncomplicated way for me to somehow burn the tracks to a DVD-R and play them in my living room, but it's not a project into which I plan to invest more than a half-hour. More to the point--I hope this doesn't become yet another one of those projects that Pete has vague plans of releasing some time in the future but never does.

Do we yet have a thread dedicated to Pete's memoirs, which he says will be published in October 2012?

I can only hope Pete does get to finally releasing the full Quadrophenia in 5.1 sound. But for now I will have to live with what I have in this box....which for me isn't bad (I am a big Who fan).

I have the 5.1 mix on right now and its a bit of a disappointment. Doesn't have the power or presence I was hoping for but its still an interesting listen for hardcore Who-a-files.

Pete would really need to go back and work on this with a real surround guy (Steven Wilson or Elloit Scheiner) to make this sing.

The whole mix sounds like its playing in another room instead of the band being right here before me. Pretty wimpy. But some of the spacial aspects are ok.

So far I've listened to I Am The Sea/ The Real Me/ Quadrophenia/ I've Had Enough (with Had Enough being the best so far).

My "Quadrophenia" box left the Fedex Smartport in Orlando a little over fourteen hours ago (4:12AM, 11/16). Estimated arrival is Saturday, 11/19.

Three (well, closer to three-and-a-half) days to travel 106 miles.

*checks watch*

Things improve a bit with the rocker Doctor Jimmy and Roger's great vocals (Is it me for a moment?) and we are about to get to The Rock with a big finish of Love Reign O'er Me. Hope that at least works.

yay! I heard Keith bang out the drums to The Rock.

Aside from the above, we know there is "Four Faces" (released on the soundtrack album) as well as "Bank Holiday" and a band version of "Wizardry" (both unreleased). And there's got to be at least some alternate takes that are interesting... Moon generally didn't play a song the same way twice. There's another Townshend interview floating around (can't find it right now) where he says there "wasn't room" to include Who outtakes, but that they also might be released next year via download along with the rest of the 5.1 mix.

This month's MOJO magazine honoring Quadrophenia.

What are the two unreleased Who demos?

Cut My Hair and Joker James. The same versions that are in the Super Deluxe Edition.

Thanks John for the reviews. I should have my box anyday now, I'm very excited to get this! And yeah, I heard about the book being a killer, something like a hundred pages.

Rick A.

Wow.

First of all, this is worth every penny (and I've not yet listened to either of the demo discs). The book that comes with this is a massive coffee-table sized book loaded with everything you could ever possibly want to know about the creation of the album--photos, memorabilia, etc--along with a "studio diary" detailing the studio activities of the Who in the summer of 1973. Such studio chronologies for the Beatles and Bob Dylan have been floating aroudn for years; it's nice to see the Who finally getting similar treatment. Not only that, purchase of the set also provides access to a special "Quadrophenia" webpage containing even more photos and memorabilia relating to the album.

In other words, this is a set that requires a bit more time to completely peruse than I had anticipated. Let's face it--I enjoyed the "Dark Side Of The Moon" box, but perusing the marbles, booklets (consisting almost entirely of photos) and trading cards consumed all of about five minutes.

Could the box have been better? Maybe. But as it stands, it is certainly more than worth the money I spent on it.

Oh, and I have played the 5.1 disc, and I was blown away. For years, I'd never heard a mix of "Quadrophenia" that completely satisfied me, but this had me transfixed. You've got "Love, Reign O'er Me" in 5.1. I mean, what else do you need? Oh yeah--"The Real Me" in 5.1?

Wow.

I still have to go through the book and all the demo CDs. I've already tried the 5.1 disc and that was underwhelming to me but still an interesting listen for sure.

I'm quite happy with my purchase.

Love the Quadrophenia box set. The Townshend essay alone is almost worth the price of the set. It gives me high hopes for his autobiography next year. In fact, the only other thing I could have hoped the set would have included was a live set from the '73 tour (there really may not be suitable material available for that, given my faint memory is that the Who was scrounging around for one as far back as the mid-90's...wasn't there an ICE article about that).

However, I do have one fear. I'm afraid that this month may be the high-water mark for these sort of archival releases. I mean Smile, Achtung Baby, Aqua Lung, Wish you Were Here, and now Quadrophenia..how will that run ever be topped? In fact, with the rumored demise of the major label CD format in 2012, there may not exist the manufacturing system for the production of these sets. I sure hope that it's Internet gossip.

Which brings up my next question. Realistically speaking, what album is left out there that would deserve the super deluxe reissue treatment? Now I don't mean fan favorites like next year's Thick As A Brick." (Love it, but I would rather see A Passion Play). I mean what album would have historic importance, artistic merit, sales, the whole package. All I can think of right now is "Led Zeppelin IV". A package with the remastered album, all the Hedgely Grange songs in their original form, a live concert from the period and a book with Page, PLant and Jones essays. That would do the trick. But I'm afraid we may not get there.

I'm just a few pages into Pete's "Quadrophenia" essay, but it is a treat. Call him greedy, or call him what you will, but it is obvious that Pete put a great deal of personal effort into this set--this isn't one of those deals where he (as he is often accused) signed off on some compilation through his people. Is this an ego project for Pete? For crying out loud, he wrote every note of music and every lyric on this album--who better him to put together a package such as this?

There's so much cool stuff in this package, but one thing worth mentioning is a photo of Keith and Pete inside at the mixing console of Ronnie Lane's legendary mobile studio. There aren't really a lot of photos of that thing; I wonder where it is today.