Best of the Beast question

Ascendingthethrone

Ancient Mariner
Yesterday, I managed to pick up a near-mint condition copy of Powerslave on vinyl. I am dead chuffed with the find in a local record shop and for £25! The reason I mentioned this is because I think this is the first time I have heard a Maiden album pre-1995 with it's original mastering.

This brings me to Best of the Beast. My dad brought this for me in 1999. The booklet has all but fallen apart so I am not sure if the pre-1995 songs on the album are taken from the original masters or the 1995 Castle CD's. Does anyone know?
 
When you make a compilation, you usually send it to a mastering engineer, to get even levels between songs, but quite often you make frequency balance adjustments, to smooth differences out and make the playback experience more coherent (Check out "The Essential Judas Priest", for some heavy compilation remaster work). It's not just a media transfer.


Remastered at Chop 'Em Out by Simon Heyworth and Murray/Harris.
 
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Quite doubt that's the case here. My money is on the first option I supplied though.

Strange to leave Janick or Nicko outside of the process, being the great team players they are (like Davey).

For what is worth, I have checked my original copy of Best of the Beast and could not find any credits for the mastering.
 
Yesterday, I managed to pick up a near-mint condition copy of Powerslave on vinyl. I am dead chuffed with the find in a local record shop and for £25! The reason I mentioned this is because I think this is the first time I have heard a Maiden album pre-1995 with it's original mastering.

This brings me to Best of the Beast. My dad brought this for me in 1999. The booklet has all but fallen apart so I am not sure if the pre-1995 songs on the album are taken from the original masters or the 1995 Castle CD's. Does anyone know?

The castle cds weren't remastered, so it's the original mastering
 
When you make a compilation, you usually send it to a mastering engineer, to get even levels between songs, but quite often you make frequency balance adjustments, to smooth differences out and make the playback experience more coherent (Check out "The Essential Judas Priest", for some heavy compilation remaster work). It's not just a media transfer.


Remastered at Chop 'Em Out by Simon Heyworth and Murray/Harris.

Booklet says Murray Harris not Murray/Harris so could be a bloke called Murray Harris:lol:
 
Scroll down far enough and you’ll see “Acoustics by Murray Harris and Jochen Veith”…
This is from https://audiomediainternational.com/studio-spotlight-alchemy-mastering/:
"Phil Kinrade started his career as a runner at Dick James Music (DJM) in 1978 before moving into their recording studios and operating the editing and transfer room. When DJM was bought out by Phonogram, Kinrade founded the Sound Basement with Murray Harris, offering mastering and duplication. "

So yeah, Discogs is likely wrong here.
 
Keep in mind that “mastering” could be as simple as pressing a disc. So of course technically Best of the Beast could be called “remastered” as it’s a compilation of songs likely normalized and stuck on a new disc.

As for the production itself, I’d need to look at my copy, but I’m pretty sure the comp was released by Castle records, so whatever sound they had going on their run of the catalog is probably what’s on the compilation.
 
Keep in mind that “mastering” could be as simple as pressing a disc. So of course technically Best of the Beast could be called “remastered” as it’s a compilation of songs likely normalized and stuck on a new disc.

Yeah on a compilation it's probably no more than getting the volume levels on the different recordings the same. Also, the fade in and outs of the live tracks.
 
Booklet says Murray Harris not Murray/Harris so could be a bloke called Murray Harris:lol:

The more I think about this, it's more likely a bloke Murray Harris, than Dave Murray having anything to do with it:lol:
 
Keep in mind that “mastering” could be as simple as pressing a disc. So of course technically Best of the Beast could be called “remastered” as it’s a compilation of songs likely normalized and stuck on a new disc.

As for the production itself, I’d need to look at my copy, but I’m pretty sure the comp was released by Castle records, so whatever sound they had going on their run of the catalog is probably what’s on the compilation.
It is differenr than the 95 castle releases, you can see so on the link I posted, castle 95's are better
 
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