Exclusive: More News About the Tom Petty Box Sets

According to mastering engineer Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman Mastering, all of the albums in both box sets were mastered from the analog master tapes with the following exceptions:

Mojo and Hypnotic Eye were mastered from the original high resolution 24 bit 48K digital masters (these were originally recorded digitally and sound so IMO).

She's The One and Greatest Hits were mastered from high resolution (24 bit 96K) digital copies of the original analog masters.

And here's some really good news: While the original releases of Wildflowers, Echo and Last DJ were mastered for vinyl from digital sources, for the 2016 box set release, they assembled the original analog masters for the first time, and mastered vinyl from that. According to Bellman, "the sound quality is especially better on these albums."

And there you have it! Keep in mind that many recordings produced analog are not mastered analog because of the time and expense involved in assembling cutting reels, which is probably why those three were cut from digital sources.

For instance, the Rick Rubin produced Johnny Cash albums were all recorded to analog tape but the tapes were never assembled for vinyl record production so those records, good as they do sound, are all digitally sourced.

When they were reissued a few years ago there was talk of assembling and cutting from tape, but no one was willing to deliver the scratch, which is too bad!

One last factoid: according to Chad Kassem, while his QRP pressing plant pressed most of the MCA era box, it did not press all of it. Two of the records, the first two Tom Petty albums, reverted back to Tom, who later licensed them to Warner Brothers. So even though they are in the MCA box, the pressing was done under Warner Brothers control and Chad says he doesn't know who pressed them.

P.S.: I'm so glad I checked the copy because auto-spell changed the first sentence to:

According to mastering engineer Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman Mastering, all of the albums in both box sets were massacred from the analog master tapes with the following exceptions:

COMMENTS
Dorian Workman's picture

Let's hope the albums not pressed at QRP aren't!

SLS's picture

Let's hope the lps that ARE pressed at QRP are (centered)!!!

jaytnelson's picture

All great news -
but one question remains:
Will these be available individually??

Michael Fremer's picture
Yes, you can buy as many box sets as you wish...... INDIVIDUALLY? I don't know..
Mick's picture

Michael, did you mean Highway Companion?

theboogeydown's picture

The header for the article STILL has massacred. Which is a bit foretelling.

cjp123's picture

I don't know how they are remastering this, but the copy I have sounds fantastic--mastered from analog by Steve Hoffman and Kevin Gray and sounds amazing- I would be very surprised if these lps were not issued individually. I have Wildflowers (sounds great) too, as well as Mojo and Hypnotic Eye, so I'm going to be patient and wait for She's the One to come out individually.

vinyl_lady's picture

Appreciate you tracking down this info. Looking forward to these releases.

teachscience's picture

If they are truly massacred from the master tapes!!

Paul Robertson's picture

Much appreciated Mike, thank you! The info that is NOT volunteered as much as we would all like it to be, that is for sure. I didn't know Rick Rubin had done anything to tape before. It would be cool to know what else he might have done analog also.

jhannigan's picture

Not a Petty fan but it caught my eye, still says "massacred" before you click the link!

where's the Stones review??

AnalogJ's picture

"P.S.: I'm so glad I checked the copy because auto-spell changed the first sentence to:

According to mastering engineer Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman Mastering, all of the albums in both box sets were massacred from the analog master tapes with the following exceptions:"

I suppose, though, that the term WOULD be appropriate if he had been mastering Alice's Restaurant. ;-)

SLS's picture

wasn't this title originally on Shelter? Am I missing something?

Jondubb35's picture

It was. The first two albums, Self titled and YGGI, were both originally Shelter. When Shelter folded and was absorbed by MCA, all future reissues at that time bared the MCA rainbow label. Then in 2010, since TP owned the rights to his masters, the subsequent reissues for those 2 albums were under the Reprise label, which is the bands current label. I’m not sure if TP & The Heartbreakers catalogue will remain with Reprise, now that Tom is no longer with us.

TexDave1212's picture

Did anyone ever found out what pressing plant was used to on Vol. 2, especially the Vol. 2 owners that have opened their box set?

Mile High Music's picture

Thank you Tom Petty for all your great music! May you rest in peace.

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