[RushNerd]

(full image http://cdn.head-fi.org/6/63/63819d00_1egFy.jpeg) Some CD's i've been meaning to buy, some I knew I would like, and others i've seen the album cover a million times and heard talk online about. Either way they will all be interesting and hopefully worthwhile.

 

[MorbidToaster]

Loaded up on Juno Reactor, eh? Good choice.

 

[Mrtn77]

Stereolab - Sound Dust, Elektra
Beethoven / Quatuor Talich - Intégrale des quatuors, Calliope
Liberation Music Orchestra - Not in our name, Verve
Schubert / Dietrisch Fischer-Dieskau, Gerald Moore - The Song Cycles, Deutsche Grammophon
Schumann / Laurent Cabasso - Piano works (Kreisleriana, Fantasiestücke, Bunte Blätter, Nachstücke, Gesange der Frühe), naïve

 

[killerweed]

Aimee Mann - Live at St. Anne's Warehouse
Alabama Shakes - Boys and Girls
Brian Bromberg - It is what it is
Cassandra Wilson - Another Country
Deacon Blue - The Best Of

 

[PanamaHat]

Lana Del Rey - Born to Die
Kanye West - My Dark Twisted Fantasy
Kendrick Lamar - Good Kid, m.a.a.d. City
Flying Lotus - Until the Quiet Comes
Kanye West - Cruel Summer
 

 

[TJ Elite]

 
               Burzum - Det som engang var                                       deadmau5 - 4x4=12
 
 
                Massive Attack - Protection                                    Tangerine Dream - Ricochet
 

    Wintersun - Time I [limited edition, CD+DVD]

 

[TopKatz]

Kendrick Lamar - Good Kid, m.a.a.d. City
 
Cody ChesnuTT - Landing On a Hundred
Bat For Lashes - The Haunted Man
The xx - Coexist 
Miguel - Kaleidoscope Dream

 

[Mrtn77]

Bill Callahan - Sometimes I Wish We Were an Eagle
Randy Newman - Randy Newman
Wagner / Bernard Haitink - Die Walküre
Vieux Gaultier / Hopkinson Smith - Pièces de luth
Ousmane Sacko & Yakaré Diabaté - "La nuit des griots"

 

[MorbidToaster]

Dark Tranquility - Haven (Blue LPs)
Raekwon - Only Built 4 Cuban Linx (Purple Marbled LPs)
Burial - Kindred (LP)
Queen - The Game (LP)
David Bowie - BBC Archives 68-72 (1 Blue Marbled, 1 White, 1 Purple Marbled LPs)

I now have 2 copies of OB4CL. This legit one and my older promo. Burial was the favorite find, Bowie was the gem though. I bought it for the girlfriend as she's a huge Bowie fan but did not expect such a great package.

Best looking of the bunch is the Bowie white LP. Completely black labels (no text) on white vinyl is gorgeous.

 

[PleasantNoise]

Orbs- Asleep Next To Science
The Contortionist- Intrinsic

 

[Achmedisdead]

Borrowed a few Clapton CD's.....
461 Ocean Boulevard
August
Journeyman
Pilgrim

 

[OscarWilde]

Neil Young & Crazy Horse - Psychedelic Pill.
Ride Baby Ride!

 

[TJ Elite]

 
                         Adele - Skyfall                                        Godspeed You! Black Emperor
                                                                                        'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend!
 
 
   Isabelle Faust - Bach: Sonatas & Partitas Vol. 2                     Jack White - Blunderbuss
 

       The London Steve Reich Ensemble
               Reich: Different Trains

 

[DTrewwye]

Infected Mushroom - Vicious Delicious
Ip Man Soundtrack
Trust Company - Dreaming in Black and White
 
Also for those who have heard Skyfall, is it me or do the vocals sound a bit too 'shouty' to me?  Or is Skyfall a victim of the loudness wars?  I really can't stand the segment 3.37 - 3.43 - it gets WAY too loud and the orchestra behind sounds like a congested mess.

 

[TJ Elite]

Quote:

Also for those who have heard Skyfall, is it me or do the vocals sound a bit too 'shouty' to me?  Or is Skyfall a victim of the loudness wars?  I really can't stand the segment 3.37 - 3.43 - it gets WAY too loud and the orchestra behind sounds like a congested mess.

 
Here are the waveforms for the vocal and instrumental versions, plus a picture which shows a zoomed in portion of the vocal version near one of the points where it hits +1.0. The red vertical lines indicate where a sample hits either +1.0 or -1.0. The CD version for the original song has clearly been peak limited to make it louder and it does sound somewhat squashed when you listen to it, but compared to a hell of a lot of other recordings I have this isn't actually all that bad really. As you can see, the quieter sections are quite dynamic, so only the loudest parts of the song have suffered. With a lot of music I have the entire song looks just like the loudest parts of the vocal version, and often even worse, so I wouldn't call Skyfall a victim of the loudness war; this is just how majority of recordings are mastered these days. That's a bit sad but when I think back to recordings that were released about ten years ago things have actually gotten A LOT better for the most part.
 
 
 

 

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Edit
 
For comparison here's the waveform for one of the tracks (Love Interruption) on Jack White's Blunderbuss. I haven't listened to the album yet, so I can't comment on how it sounds, but I sure wish a lot more albums were mastered like this one with all of the peaks preserved.