Not Saying Anything To Paul McCartney

ES-Say #30 "Houston, we have a problem..." The loss of Tug Of War

As Tug Of War(1982), is scheduled to be re-released on October 2nd, there is an issue. A HUGE issue. Unless your willing to shell out a ton of money for the box set version, the original studio mix will not be included on the standard or delux versions. What those reasonably priced version will include instead, is an brand new 2015 remix from the master tapes. Not the version that was remastered in 1993 or the original version from 1982.

I think I understand what this means. A remaster from the Master tapes basically cleans up a recording. You can hear individual channels(voice, piano, drum recordings) a record a bit more richer, either more or less predominantly to achieve an improved sound. However, it rarely features new sounds because that would change the entire album completely. Yes, that's exactly what's going to happen here with the 2015 version. It will sound significantly different because they(Paul and whomever, I won't know til I read the new liner notes) are going to start from scratch. Using the master tapes and basically do a hack job(not necessarily with bad results), newly remixing the album with an intention to present a different version (that's what a remix does). I would hope no brand new recordings(2005) would be added in with the 1982 recordings, but having a "new" remix in general is fine and welcome.

What's not so fine and welcome is that I realised I no longer have the 1987(?) CD copy of the 1982 LP Vinyl. I need to buy a used copy as the previous cd copies are out of print. I thought I could be able to find it on iTunes. It's nowhere to be seen on iTunes, being replaced with pre-orders for the standard and delux 2015 versions. EBay didn't seem to have many people selling the '87 or '93 Holland remasters(I recommended all of the latter CDs). I'm not sure I will win the eBay copy I'm watching(an eBay option to keep an auction saved on your account).

I think I feel this should be in comparassion(poorly) to the plot of Paul's wonderfully overlooked Turkey film(which I personally love), Give My Regards To Broad Street. For those of you who forgot or choose to forget what the facacta plot was, here's my version in a nutshell.

Paul McCartney stars as himself in 1984 trying to find the Master tapes of his "new" album which has been reportedly "stolen" by an employee\friend named Harry. Paul's faith in Harry drives the film into a 90 min brand new live version sing-along of previously released Beatles, Wings, and Solo songs peppered with a few new songs. Actual some of the songs from "Tug Of War" were performed live in the movie, and released on the movie sound track.

Now, I've confused myself completely, I was going to point out that in the film the original tapes are feared destroyed. Basically what's happening now if you remix and entire album and scrap\distroy the old one from existance (ignore the fact that the old '82 version is included in the 2015 box set because its not as widely accessible to the "AVERAGE PERSON"...). So, with my trying to make a point with the original version of Tug of War suffering from this new 2015 remix version(essential trying to forget about the original), I have discovered something else.

The soundtrack to Broadstreet(1985) features new recordings of at least three Tug of War(1982) songs- Ballroom Dancing, Wonderlust, and Take It Away(maybe the song Tug Of War also, but I'm too lazy to look at the CD soundtrack). This means that parts of Tug of War('82) have already, technically, been re-recorded with different arrangements. So not only has the idea of changing songs on Tug of War('82 LP, '87 CD) been done for Broadstreet. Those several songs are going to get a THIRD rearranged version?????????? There wasn't anything wrong with the 84 versions, they did sound very good but a THIRD version, 31 years later?!?!?

I really need a lie down...