John Darko
A fresh remaster of Cocteau Twins’ Four Calendar Café was released last Friday so today we look at how it stacks up sound-wise against past versions, of which there are two: the original 1993 release and the 2006 remaster done by band member Robin Guthrie.
Fans and the music press didn’t really take to Four Calendar Café upon its release. For many die-hards, the jump from the staunch independent label 4AD to a major, Fontana, was a jump too far. That and their previous effort Heaven Or Las Vegas (the last for 4AD) was – and still is – Cocteau Twins at the peak of their powers.
However, Four Calendar Café was this commentator’s first proper exposure to the band and its candy-floss-in-summertime instrumentation I still find utterly beguiling — far easier to swallow than the band’s more angular and goth-tinged early work. See: 1983’s Head Over Heels or 1984’s Treasure.
The original CD version of Four Calendar Café from 1993 sounds excellent if a little flat in the low-end — not atypical for the time. Thankfully, this was just before the music industry’s big push towards the liberal use of dynamic range compression in the mastering studio. A push that would steamroll the band’s swansong Milk And Kisses to DR8. Run through MAAT’s DR Offline MKII, the original Four Calendar Café scores a much healthier DR11.
For context, Oasis’ (What’s The Story) Morning Glory? – the album that arguably kick-started the loudness wars – scores a dynamic range average of DR5. A result that’s almost as bad as it gets. Pull up a stream or drop in an original CD and you can hear that dynamic range compression in action: the entire album is an aural sledgehammer that pummels listeners from the get-go. If it were an email, it would be typed in UPPER CASE, ALL BOLD. The original master of Four Calendar Café is a pleasant lowercase italics by comparison.
The same cannot be said of Robin Guthrie’s 2006 version which rode the loudness wave of the time to push out a much more dynamically compressed mastering job. At first blush, it sounds more arresting and present than the 1993 original but by the end of its forty-minute run, we’re exhausted. DR Offline MKII reports DR8. This is especially egregious when those not tuned into the loudness wars would incorrectly assume ‘remastered’ and ‘by an original band member’ are indicators of betterment.
Unfortunately, that same 2006 remaster was used for 2017’s expanded reissue that appeared on Record Store Day as 2LP set and a DR9 digital download a few months later. No CD version of this deluxe edition exists, which is a pity as it includes the Christmas 1993 double A-side “Frosty The Snowman” / “Winter Wonderland” and five b-sides from Four Calendar Café‘s other singles “Bluebeard” and “Evangeline”. Why “Summerhead” was never an official single we’ll never know.
Side note: I suspect (but cannot prove) that the 2019/2020 vinyl editions of Four Calendar Café were also derived from Guthrie’s 2006 remaster.
But what of the 2024 remaster?
Perhaps Robin Guthrie wanted to atone for past mistakes or perhaps the futility of dynamic range compression is starting to seep into the music industry but – surprise surprise – the new version is a good’un. Even with Bluetooth headphones, we hear it as sounding closer to the 1993 original. DR Offline MKII reports DR11 but I think, thanks to a little extra mastering clarity, Robin Guthrie’s second spin of the wheel has produced the best-sounding Four Calendar Café to date.
At the time of writing, I see the 2024 CD version only on Amazon.com with the vinyl LP available from a handful of online retailers in the UK. Buy either with confidence. I scored my download from Bleep.com using a VPN.
Further information: Bleep | Amazon.com | Boomkat
