Here’s some background info on the re-issue of “It’s Time” as well as the other 2 Quality/Legend Records issues “Shakin’ All Over” & “Hey Ho (What You Do To Me)”.

I had contacted the National Library of Canada’s music division regarding the Randy Bachman collection (his collection of tapes, discs, memorabillia, ect) and specifically the “early” Guess Who/Quality Records recordings. Richard Green from the music division was very helpful. The NLC had master reels that Randy had obtained from Selkirk (which bought out Quality in the 1980′s), and also mint original pressings of the first 3 albums. The “Quality” masters were on several reels, jumbled together with different GW tracks. (Remember, Quality put out a few compilations and leased out the tracks after the GW hit it big, so the original “master” compilations of the first 3 albums do not (possibly) exist anymore.) The NLC did transfers off both the master reels AND the original vinyl pressings. What versions Randy and Legend records decided to use for the reissues is still unknown to me. Its miraculous that these tapes survived at all.

Also, the “3 “Legend” CD’s are processed to simulate stereo, and I don’t know if this because Quality re-mastered the tapes in the late ’60′s for “stereo” (for their compilations and the leasing copies) or if this was done “post-tape transfer”. Another theory is that the “mono” tapes were played back on a 2- track machine during the transfer, which introduces sound problems to begin with. A close listen of the CD’s on headphones will reveal one “channel” sounds “dirtier” than the other. Again, I am unable to get this clarified. That’s one reason why the sound isn’t quite right. They sound MUCH better when I flick the “mono” switch on my amp.

The audible tape “glitch” on “Baby Feelin’” is also apparent on the original vinyl pressing. Maybe the tape got damaged at the plant, maybe it’s a bad edit splice. Who knows. That was 42 years ago.

Amazingly, however, the songs that appear on “It’s Time” and the other 2 CD’s appear in better sound quality (with some tracks appearing for the first time in STEREO!!!) on the Sundazed collection “Shakin’ All Over”. I did not get a reply from Sundazed yet, but I believe they used some of the tapes that were originally in the “Scepter” records archives. Or maybe they used the NCL tapes and this time the transfers were done with better gear. Again, this needs to be confirmed. I know the Scepter subsidiary “Wand” used some true stereo mixes on thier 1969 compilation “Made In Canada – Sown & Grown”". I have this LP. It has a very unique version of “One Day” that was recorded at Scepter in 1965 and has a slightly faster tempo with a “poppier” feel than the “It’s Time” version. This mix has never been issued since, making this particular album a collector’s item.

Anyhoo, just some background info on this album and its reissue. Hope it was informative and entertaining. Cheers.

Keltie Harding
Shoeless Wonder Productions

I realize, and respect, that you are listening very carefully to the technical sound quality in these recordings. For what it’s worth, I enjoy all of the music posted on this site a great deal, regardless of the lame encoding or sample rate.

I hate to make an assumption, as I said, no hard feelings (we appreciate feedback of any nature), but if you are working on a project that truly requires sound files of pristine SQ, my guess is that you should be talking to the original artists or labels rather than searching the internet for free downloads.

I realize its a record. I grew up with records. I have thousands of these. Records sound better than CD’s. However, the poor sound of the tracks distracts from enjoying the music. I’m not knocking that this is available, but I would like to obtain a clean copy. I can’t even clean it up with advanced audio tools without further degrading the sound. I have remixed it, which does hide some of the flaws, but that in itself takes away from the orginal recording. I am compilling Canadian stuff like this with bands such as Witness Inc. (Streetheart) 49th Parallel, Checkerlads, etc.. All I need is some of the very early Guess Who stuff and my first volume is complete. However, the tracks must be as pristine as possible or fixable, but these tracks cannot be fixed so they can be enjoyed. I guess I’ll have to buy the CD’s. Even if an mp3 is available, everybody in the world seems to encode at 128kps (crap quality). 192 isn’t bad but still isn’t CD quality sound. Its about the same quality as a cassette tape. As I stated, all music should be encoded with Lame, varible bit rate/joint stereo. The difference between the orginal and CD is not distinguishable unless you are a dog. I did manage do download all three early albums at once (torrent). Every song is bits and pieces of the orginal. Duh.