Mott the Hoople – The Hoople, All the Young Dudes & Mott [SACD Hybrid Multi-Channel/Stereo]

The music is great and the sound is tremendous but I'm slightly frustrated with how the music has been packaged on the discs. The Hoople is on disc 1 with 5 tracks from Dudes and the other 4 Dudes' tracks are on disc 2 with the Mott album. My preference would have been The Hoople on disc 1 (in Quad) with the the other two albums on disc 2 (in Stereo). Given the price point this may have been a way of keeping down costs but as this set is likely to be mainly attractive to audiophiles (given it's a SACD) I'd suggest 3 discs would have been a better option. Notwithstanding my frustration this set is well worth buying.

Vocalian dutton. A hybrid SACD at the price of a standard CD. What's not to like?

Great set, but I have to agree with Glen, having one album split between two discs isn't ideal. I'm pretty sure there would have been enough space to have one SACD disc with the The Hoople in multichannel & stereo mixes and another with both All the Young Dudes & Mott in SACD Stereo. However, the limiting factor would be the CD compatible layer, which wouldn't have the capacity for the two albums on one disc. Given the vast majority of these discs will probably be bought for the SACD content, it's a shame that ensuring compatibility with a standard CD brings about this compromise. I guess they could get around this by making the SACD and CD content different for each disc, but maybe that'd be too complicated for the CD user?It was the same situation with the Argent release. Another consequence of this arrangement is that, as my Oppo is set to default to multichannel, it doesn't actually see the 5 stereo tracks (10-14) on disc 1 unless set to stereo via the audio button on the remote.Having said that, it's great to have these 70s multichannel releases seeing the light of day.

I agree with other reviewers that splitting Dudes over 2 discs is annoying but I can see that Vocalion had no choice really. Dudes and Mott together clock in over 80 minutes which is too long for a CD. More annoying is the gap between Jewel and Dudes and I’ve docked a star.The Hoople quad mix wasn’t done by the band and they weren’t keen on it. I’ve only played it in stereo and I won’t be going back to it. It’s good that it’s out there and maybe it’s better in surround.That’s all the negative stuff. The music is of course great and so is the sound. Lots of detail. It’s fabulous.Highly recommended

Firstly let me say Vocalion have done a great job on this , finally releasing the quad mix of The Hoople which was only available on vinyl and Stereo Mixes of All The Young Dudes and arguably their best album Mott all on two SACD’s.Now the controversial part for the purists, Dudes and Mott have been sonically enhanced, there has been some gorgeous bottom end and mellow midrange added, which give the overall sound the power Overend & Buff craved, however an aftermarket close echo has been added on top of what was already there in a few places, as these albums were not remixed from the multitrack tapes, just remastered and enhanced.Dudes was always a great sounding album, the same is so here the sonic lows and mids adding to that.Mott is a revelation, this album on original or remastered vinyl or CD sounded ‘boxy’ compressed and claustrophobic, even harsh, this version is the best sounding version by far, it has a depth and presence that was absent before, Whizz Kid shines, Hymn For The Dudes reaches new heights, Ballad Of Mott is damn incredible, so is everything else.So The Hoople in Quad, I used to have the Quad vinyl version of this but could only listen to it in stereo, I cannot be sure if this has had echo added or has been sonically enhanced, the stereo mixes of the other albums are ingrained on my brain, but this mix is unique, mainly because unlike a lot of quad or surround sound mixes it does not cross reference the stereo version whatsoever, making for a totally different album, somewhat a novelty.The Hoople had well documented issues with the recording equipment at the time, the drums and the bass are still dull and buried in the mix which is a great shame, the vocals are very high in the mix too, it has lots of overdubs that were hidden or not used originally, you can actually hear Lyndsey De Paul on Alice, on Marionette the start of the wonderful slide guitar Solo is obscured under the descending violin that is not faded to let the guitar be heard the vocals are amazing though.Pearl N Roy has the guitar mixed out at start and it is almost brought in as an afterthought, Born Late 58 ..... great, Roll Away The Stone is other worldly here, it sounds like you are listening to it in a dream,The songs are as good as they ever were, Mott is the best it has ever sounded , Dudes has on the whole got more balls, The Hoople is just plain kooky, The few niggles aside I absolutely love it, the whole package shows those silly people at Universal who did a dreadful job with their Mental Train box set what a great band can sound like in the hands of someone who cares.