What loudness-war victim depresses you the most?
Aug 20, 2009 at 7:12 AM Post #47 of 76
Quote:

Originally Posted by West726 /img/forum/go_quote.gif
How can the vinyl be so different? Or. . . why?


It was mastered in a completely different way by Steve Hoffman and Kevin Gray.

It's all in the mastering.
 
Aug 20, 2009 at 7:39 AM Post #48 of 76
Quote:

Originally Posted by crazyjeeper /img/forum/go_quote.gif
This is true, but Morningrise is (IMHO) mostly black metal nonsense, where still life is actually really well done.


????? Do you know what's black metal? Morningrise is no more black metal than Still Life, it's one of the proto-melodeath albums.
 
Aug 20, 2009 at 7:46 AM Post #49 of 76
Quote:

Originally Posted by tintin47 /img/forum/go_quote.gif
Remasters are not always bad. Most of Bowie's albums were remastered in 1999 or 2003, and they are great. My CD/SACD copy of Ziggy Stardust is one that pops into my mind when I think "fantastic rock recording". Bob Dylan's albums have been remastered wonderfully as well. Then you have the coming beatles remasters, which are supposed to be great. At the very least, the mono will be great, as limiting was avoided entirely. Also, the Dire Straits recent remaster of Brothers in Arms is very good.

Now, that isn't to say that there aren't a lot of bad ones, but don't just write off a cd when you see "remaster" on the cover.


I agree on the Bowie and Dylan. I have several of their SACDs and have been happy with them. "Brothers in Arms" is a pretty good CD to begin with - the original pressing sounds good. The SACD version is wonderful, and I also have an ordinary LP I found for $4 that sounds amazing.

Quote:

Originally Posted by thisbenjamin /img/forum/go_quote.gif
Have you heard the DVDA? It's not bad.

I'd say nearly every single "remastered" album can be thrown into the brick walled, overly compressed, smiley faced EQ of death pile. There are exceptions, obviously - just not enough to matter. Thankfully used CDs are easy to find, and cheap
smily_headphones1.gif



No, I haven't heard the DVD-A. I don't have a DVD-A player but... oh, what the hell, I should probably pick one up. A good "Yoshimi" would be worth it. I also think there are a few REM discs on DVD-A I'd like to pick up and I think "Pet Sounds" is available. I wasn't planning to start in on another format, but why not?
 
Aug 20, 2009 at 9:06 AM Post #50 of 76
Agree on Mastodon. Leviathan is rather brickwalled, but I still thinks it sounds very good for a metal album, not much clipping and distortion. Blood Mountain is very bad though with a LOT of clipping and distortion. Crack the Skye is better than Blood Mountain but far from Leviathan.
 
Aug 24, 2009 at 3:49 AM Post #52 of 76
I'm a huge Coldplay fan, but the crappy mastering on Viva La Vida and the new follow-up Prospekt's March make it unbearable when you're listening on good equipment. Chris Martin's vocals are absolutely drowned out at times by the guitars. It's almost like the audio engineer bumped up the guitars and forgot to turn up the vocal track to match.
 
Aug 24, 2009 at 7:45 AM Post #53 of 76
I'm not really fussy about recordings unless they have truly terrible - and Metallica's Death Magnetic CD is truly horrible. Much worse than nearly anything else I have heard.
 
Aug 26, 2009 at 2:42 AM Post #55 of 76
I picked up a Philip Glass album about a month ago - the new release of Koyaanisquatsi. It's not too bad, but I can tell it's been brickwalled a bit. Some of the more complicated sections are more muddy than I'd like. Looking at the bitrate on Foobar, it's clear the album is indeed hot. This was a big dissapointment to me, as the music is so obscure I really wasn't expecting it to have loudness compression. Additionally, the classical genre generally escapes this brickwalling debacle.
 
Aug 26, 2009 at 4:09 AM Post #56 of 76
could you explain what brickwalling is for me, -_-
 
Aug 26, 2009 at 1:40 PM Post #58 of 76
Quote:

Originally Posted by DoYouRight /img/forum/go_quote.gif
could you explain what brickwalling is for me, -_-




In digital domain highest point of volume is 0db. Spikes that go above that are cutted and distorted. Record companies want their products to be louder and louder and when stuff go above 0db, they compress the dynamics (Meaning the difference between loudest spikes and most silent parts) to minimize parts that distort. Music becomes just a wall of 0db noise with no difference between loud and silent instruments, just a constant line of sound, a brickwall with occasional distortions.

Watch this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gmex_4hreQ
 
Aug 26, 2009 at 6:51 PM Post #59 of 76
thanks for the awesome links. Its really annoying that this is done. I feel ipod has a part in it, since most use the ibuds and they do this to make it sound better.
 
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