Category: All Posts

Not Framed for Murder

I don’t have Noir Alley framing sequences with Eddie Muller introducing this movie, A Blueprint for Murder. It’s from 1953 and stars Jean Peters, which is all the intro I need!

Jean Peters, who became Mrs. Howard Hughes, had one of those perfectly beautiful and captivating faces I admire so much.

Jean Peters

The closest comparison I can think of today, that won’t be a surprise to my buddy Bismo, is Rebecca Ferguson.

Rebecca Ferguson

I have known one woman who had comparable beauty. I have a photo of her at age 25 that would be a perfect match to those images of Peters and Ferguson, but I’d be in big trouble if I shared it.

Then, of course, there is incomparable Prue.

Prudence Bury, age 17

Beatles Rotator

I recently played my big sister’s original American copy of the 1966 Beatles album Revolver.* It’s in mono, and I was surprised by how good it sounds, considering the damage it endured. Here’s ‘Good Day Sunshine’.

Monitoring the playback with Audacity, I was impressed with how dynamic the sound is. There’s no compression going on here.

For comparison, here is the official online copy of the song.

Looking at the peaks, some loudness compression was apparently added to the recording. The 2009 mono Beatles set reportedly was transferred from the master tapes with dynamic range left intact, so perhaps this is a YouTube effect.

Okay, so let’s find out. What about ‘Good Day Sunshine’ when played from the Beatles 2009 CD mono box set? No loudness compression is confirmed.

* A 60-year-old record on a 50-year-old turntable, with a 30-year-old cartridge and a relatively new stylus.