Beggars Banquet in its Record Store Day 2023 incarnation arrives with an obi, an 11" x 18" poster featuring an outtake from Michael Joseph's 1968 photoshoot that produced the album's gatefold photo and the back cover of Hot Rocks, and lots of splattered color visualizing that "swirl of grey and black and white" Mick sang of on the enduringly moving "Salt of the Earth".
Cute gimmicks like that are par for the course for RSD editions, but how does the record sound? A/B'ed against the 2018 stereo edition, the music on this new one sounds like it was cut a tad quieter, and there's a touch of surface grind. However, the vinyl is flat with a well-centered spindle hole, and there's nary a trace of popping or crackling. Although you might have to turn the volume up a touch, the mastering sounds terrific and is most likely the same one used on the 2018 edition.
The music, of course, is pretty much as good as music gets, but if you need more than that, you can just mosey over to my review of that 50th anniversary edition to get yer ya-ya's out.
