Well, definitely not bubonic plague

Congratulations on hitting 300 and printing a wonderful November 2018 issue. The White Magic report about The Beatles was especially illuminating. There’s one issue, however, that needs light shed on it. In the story, Paul Du Noyer writes, “Ringo even absented himself entirely, feeling burnt out and a little unloved.” Ringo’s departure from the band has never been properly explained. The storyline goes that Ringo felt, “I was not playing well and I left.” With all due respect that’s absurd; there’s no evidence that he started playing poorly or made any mistakes. Peter Brown’s book, The Love You Make, presented Ringo’s departure as a result of Paul (and possibly John and George) recording drums without him. Mark Lewisohn’s Complete Beatles Recording Sessions points out that on August 20, 1968, Paul was working with Ken Scott and “wanted an open effect on his drums… Ringo walked in and you could cut the atmosphere with a knife.” Ringo left two days later, feeling “unloved”, but his departure was not because of his performance. He chose to claim incompetence instead of exposing what the others were doing; he wanted to cover for his pals. Vin Maganzini, Tufts University, Massachusetts

The Beatles’ White Album was the first album I ever bought for my new record player back in 1969, and I now have eight vinyl and CD versions. As regards the newly remixed album, it seems to me that the sound has more clarity, but is it better? There are some arguable improvements. Ringo’s vocal on Goodnight stands out better in the mix, and the ending of George’s Long Long Long sounds magnificent. But in future, while dipping into the new offering, I think I’ll be sticking with the original or the 2009 remaster. It seems to me that, with the new clarity, the remix has lost some of the beguiling woozy sound of the original. As we found when CDs first came out, clarity doesn’t necessarily mean better. One opportunity missed is that there are marked differences in the original mono version of the album which could have been presented in stereo – like, for example, Don’t Pass Me By, where the mono version was faster and had more fiddle parts included. It also seems to me that there are some questionable inconsistencies with the session tracks included in the Deluxe seven-disc set. Do Lady Madonna and The Inner Light really belong on this set? Why are there not remixed versions of the album’s companion single, Hey Jude/Revolution? After all, Penny Lane/Strawberry Fields remixes were included on last year’s Sgt. Pepper set. Finally, maybe priority for remixing should have gone to earlier albums like Revolver and Rubber Soul, where the original stereo mixes really do leave something to be desired.