Rolling Stones – Beggar Banquet Beta Mixes (SODD-091)

The Beggars Banquet titled sessions have surfaced in infinite incarnations over the years. There are really way too many to mention and, frankly, would probably take up enough space to constitute at least half of an average review.

I have taken SODD-091 and compared it to what I considered to be the best of the rest of the above: “Sympathy For The Devil”/Beggars Banquet Outtakes on the Sister Morphine label [Morph 21]. One proud owner of Morph 21 offered the following thoughts: “You will never find these tracks in any better quality. They are so clear, they must be from the original master tapes, they are that good. Packaging and quality surpass even official Decca releases. SUPERB…!”

The Decca releases don’t hold a candle to SODD-091 or Morph 21. The fidelity on SODD-091 is phenomenal and will surely satisfy most. I would venture to say that I have not heard better mastering of these sessions on any other silver label issue to date. However, Morph 21 was released on professional CD-R issue and still remains in a class all of its own.

I found the gain to be nearly identical between the above 2 sources. The bass is tighter and significantly deeper on Morph 21 which really helps to balance out the incredible mid and upper register sounding mastering. SODD-091 sounds too bright on certain tracks and mildly distorts on the low end as well. I felt the metallic crunch effect with SODD-091. What’s interesting, again, is that the gain is quite comparable between the 2 sources considering that the latter source pushes to the red intermittently.

These sessions are outstanding and reflective of pure genius. Once given the opportunity to break them open, they are so hard to put down. And when all is said and done, that’s all that really matters…