Battleship Potempkin on vinyl and cd (2023 remaster)

[Danimal]

I expected the Hochhaussymphony to be the actual performance, but it is a documentary that I stopped watching after 10 mins, fast forwarded through the rest to see whether the actual performance is in it, but no.

Yeah, the initial description for the release made it seem as if the live performance would be included, which would essentially mean we got an extra live album, so the fact that's it's a documentary instead of one of the live stagings is disappointing.

Over the weekend I ripped the vinyl to 24 bit/96,000 khz audio, dithered it down to 16 bit/48,000 khz, and played it on my good stereo system. The vinyl is beautifully mastered with a clarity that's unusual for a PSB release; I heard many details in the audio I've never noticed before. On vinyl the electronics and orchestra compliment each other extremely well and the album is gorgeously mixed. There are tasteful fades at the end of each side and though I didn't try to seamlessly edit the four sides together for an uninterrupted experience, even with the gaps and fades the vinyl rip flowed together very well and was a joy to listen to. In terms of an audio companion, this is probably PSB's best executed "art project" thus far.

[TwizzleUK]

I watched the Blu-ray on Saturday, and can confirm it does contain the longer version of the soundtrack - I think at least 'Men And Maggots' is longer.

Edit: I was able to see the chapter timings with the Blu-ray in my laptop's USB player, and have put a list together below comparing all three versions (original CD, remastered CD, Blu-ray soundtrack). It's definitely 'Men And Maggots' that's longer (almost double its length with an extra 4 mins 49 secs). The other tracks are exactly the same duration, give or take a second or two here and there (probably due to ever-so slight differences in where the chapter markers were placed on the Blu-ray, compared to where the track markers are on the CDs).

Note that the first and last tracks have longer running times on the Blu-ray, but that's due to the additional credits at the start and end, which are accompanied by silence. Also worth noting that the audio on the Blu-ray has a wider dynamic range, meaning the audio is less compressed and has a wider gap between the quietest and loudest parts (at 0.0dB), with an RMS of -18.7dB, versus -11.3dB on the remastered CD, and -12.5dB on the original CD.

TITLE | 2005 | 2025 | Blu-ray
1. Comrades! | 3:52 | 3:52 | 4:34 (3:52 excluding intro silence)
2. Men And Maggots | 4:57 | 4:57 | 9:46
3. Our Daily Bread | 0:52 | 0:52 | 0:51
4. Drama In The Harbour | 9:01 | 9:01 | 9:01
5. Nyet | 6:14 | 6:14 | 6:13
6. To The Shore | 3:12 | 3:12 | 3:12
7. Odessa | 6:51 | 6:51 | 6:50
8. No Time For Tears | 4:32 | 4:32 | 4:31
9. To The Battleship | 4:34 | 4:34 | 4:34
10. After All (The Odessa Staircase) | 7:23 | 7:23 | 7:23
11. Stormy Meetings | 1:32 | 1:31 | 1:30
12. Night Falls | 5:55 | 5:55 | 5:55
13. Full Steam Ahead | 1:50 | 1:50 | 1:48
14. The Squadron | 4:24 | 4:24 | 4:24
15. For Freedom | 3:16 | 3:19 | 4:26 (3:19 excluding outro silence)

So, this release gives us the full length, unedited movie soundtrack at last! My MakeMKV software seems to now be updated to accommodate the copy protection on this Blu-ray, so I'm now able to rip the movie and soundtrack into digital video and audio files to enjoy on my laptop, digital media players and phone.

[mgkoeln]

To me, personally, the Hochhaussinfonie documentary turned out to be the real hidden gem on this release. Loved the empathic portray of the elderly ladies living in the building with their GDR backgrounds. Yes, there's hardly any Pet Shop Boys in it, but as a social documentary it's top notch - at least if you're German and get the subtleties of the talking protagonists.

Potemkin itself, of course, is a large step up from my home made DVD (which now isn't a rarity anymore). Crisp picture (albeit with all those scratches from a hundred-year-old movie) - and now with the red flag being hissed. No surround upmix, but still sounding quite voluminous on my Denon system.

I was a little disappointed, though, about the packaging just being a slipcase over a plastic shell. I had somehow expected this Limited Edition to be in the same cardboard style as the "It couldn't happen here"-Blu-ray, but it isn't. Still a great release after almost 20 years of waiting.

[oakey]

So the soundtrack on the CD is the same as the original release, which is a pity. Hoped it would be the longer version as well as a red book CD can easily hold over 80mins of music these thays (I own several classical CDs that are over 80 mins). Someone will no doubt compare the remaster with the original release but usually modern day remasters are rarely an improvement over the originals.

For me, this release will be shelved next to It Couldn't Happen Here. Curiosities never to be watched again Or at least not the next few years.

[retrofuturist]

Greetings,

2. Men And Maggots | 4:57 | 4:57 | 9:46

So if I'm understanding this correctly, Men And Maggots is the only track that was meaningfully shortened for the CD release?

Retro.

[Dog]

Greetings,

2. Men And Maggots | 4:57 | 4:57 | 9:46

So if I'm understanding this correctly, Men And Maggots is the only track that was meaningfully shortened for the CD release?

Retro.

Yes, Neil and Chris thought it was too repetitive without the visuals so cut it down for the soundtrack version.

[psbfannyc]

I had never seen this before. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c28gRrp87Zw

[lalolalo]

Just buy a Didar Bluray player. Job done

USD 200 later, job done.
By the way, I love you Gabby but that doesn't answer my question.

The Didar isn't (by a long stretch) the best BluRay player out there, but it does the job for me. It has one little weirdness - the first time you put in a UK BluRay it gives you an error saying it wont play (which is quite alarming when you hoped it would play right away) but if you press the "Menu" or "Top Menu" button, lo and behold it plays just fine and you never have to see that error again.

Any region of DVD plays on it right out of the box without issue.

God, I sound like an advert for them - trust me, I am in no way affiliated, but these little beasts have saved my bacon with multi region discs.

Hey hey! Thanks for your answer!!! You're the best. I looked into the Didar option but at least for what I found out, they don't have multi region BR options.
What I ended up doing was asking a friend that works in a hifi shop. They do customer support for insurance companies and he told me a hacked Playsation 3 is all I needed.
I'd already got a PS4, which is more expensive and I didn't really use since I'm too old to spend hours playing
So I just told him if he can do all the work getting and hacking a PS3 and getting it ready for me, I'd just trade mine (Including like 20 physical games and original controllers and what I think is a camera, though I never used it) for that one.
So now I've got this hacked PS3 that plays everything, and I mean EVERYTHING. CDs, BRs, DVDs from any region. And I can download any game I want if I wanted to.

So I'm pretty happy and have watched BP a couple times and all the extras for It couldn't happen here as well.

[Gabby]

USD 200 later, job done.
By the way, I love you Gabby but that doesn't answer my question.

The Didar isn't (by a long stretch) the best BluRay player out there, but it does the job for me. It has one little weirdness - the first time you put in a UK BluRay it gives you an error saying it wont play (which is quite alarming when you hoped it would play right away) but if you press the "Menu" or "Top Menu" button, lo and behold it plays just fine and you never have to see that error again.

Any region of DVD plays on it right out of the box without issue.

God, I sound like an advert for them - trust me, I am in no way affiliated, but these little beasts have saved my bacon with multi region discs.

Hey hey! Thanks for your answer!!! You're the best. I looked into the Didar option but at least for what I found out, they don't have multi region BR options.
What I ended up doing was asking a friend that works in a hifi shop. They do customer support for insurance companies and he told me a hacked Playsation 3 is all I needed.
I'd already got a PS4, which is more expensive and I didn't really use since I'm too old to spend hours playing
So I just told him if he can do all the work getting and hacking a PS3 and getting it ready for me, I'd just trade mine (Including like 20 physical games and original controllers and what I think is a camera, though I never used it) for that one.
So now I've got this hacked PS3 that plays everything, and I mean EVERYTHING. CDs, BRs, DVDs from any region. And I can download any game I want if I wanted to.

So I'm pretty happy and have watched BP a couple times and all the extras for It couldn't happen here as well.

Yeah, they don't advertise it as a multi-region BluRay player (I don't know if there are rules around advertising it as such) but can confirm it absolutely does play all regions of BlurRay as well as DVD.

Fair play on getting the PS3 unlocked though. It might be something I should look into for a PS4 I have kicking around which I recently managed to resurrect from the dead.

[matt74uk]

Currently the BFI limited Blu-ray and CD set is on sale for £7.99 at Rarewaves

https://www.rarewaves.com/collections/b ... blu-ray-cd