stop making sense

scottyboy76 · January 2011

Just watched talking heads stop making sense for the first time with my new sdas, jesus, the synth flies around the room, voices sound more {in the room}than with anything i have ever owned, by far.

It didnt hurt that i discovered i had accidentally turned on the B speakers switch on the receiver, thereby cutting in half the power going to the polks.

I read somewhere that hifi vhs is a superior audio source, of course the video is not.

Has anyone heard that, i still have a fine sharp hifi deck, as well as the talking heads, stevie ray, u2 and other tapes i would love to hear from a better source than i have otherwise.

Thanks for input.

Schurkey · January 2011

scottyboy76 wrote: »

It didnt hurt that i discovered i had accidentally turned on the B speakers switch on the receiver, thereby cutting in half the power going to the polks.

Only if you had speakers connected to the "B" terminals. If the terminals were open, it did not affect the power delivered to the speakers connected to the "A" terminals.

scottyboy76 wrote: »

I read somewhere that hifi vhs is a superior audio source

Superior to WHAT? Certainly better than Compact Cassette; superior to compressed (Lossy) mp3. Superior to CD? I doubt it. Superior to LP? Depends on who you talk to; and what their turntable/cartridge/phono preamp is like. Hi-Fi VHS is superior to **** LP; and not superior to top-class LP, I suppose. Some folks go all goofy over LP; and I guess if you have enough money to buy the top-class equipment--maybe it really is better than CD. (Not in MY house, though. YMMV.)

I played the game (Hi-Fi VHS) for about half-an-hour; (dubbing CDs to Hi-Fi VHS) until the speed variation on the VHS playback caused me to return the deck in disgust. Found out later that if there's no video signal on the tape, the deck may not play properly. (The retailer blamed it on my failure to buy gold-plated interconnect cables, as if that would change wow 'n' flutter generated by the tape transport.)

I have exactly one Hi-Fi VHS music tape; and I like it just fine. (****, washed-out, poor-color, grainy video, adequate audio.)

Pre-recorded Hi-Fi VHS audio was "not bad at all" but I would not, in general, call it audiophile quality. Of course, cheap decks sound cheap, and properly-designed and well-implemented decks sound considerably better.

GOOD music played on a K-mart table radio is better than **** music through state-of-the-art equipment.

comfortablycurt · January 2011

I have sometimes found that some of my VHS tapes have better sound than their DVD counterparts. My VHS copies of both "Top Gun" and "Independence Day" are good examples of this. The VHS copies just seem to have a more dynamic, "full" sound than the DVD's.

Possibly the fact that it's analog, versus digital?

Schurkey · January 2011

comfortablycurt wrote: »

The VHS copies just seem to have a more dynamic, "full" sound than the DVD's.

Possibly the fact that it's analog, versus digital?

Anything is possible.

I'd be more inclined to believe that it's more a matter of the "mix" that gets recorded onto the tape vs. the "mix" as recorded on the DVD.

Higher recording level, lack of surround-sound channels, possibly restricted dynamic range resulting in "louder" quiet passages...and the list of potential differences goes on.

scottyboy76 · January 2011

i have a denon dcm 400, and a lg blu ray to play audio.

Jerry j12 just gave me a basic technics turntable, nothing fancy.

Really just got to thinking about vhs while i was watching the heads,thought about digging out vcr and playing stevie, heads and such.

Think i will, nothing better to do in this town

Tour2ma · January 2011

The HQ of VHS vs. DVD is as real as that of vinyl vs. CD...

Tape saturation, the amont of signal per sq inch, was/ is the enemy of magnetic recording. Clearest example of this was the low-fi of 8-tracks and cassettes. Overcoming, or at least minimizing, the limitations of the latter made Mr. Dolby a rich man.

At the high-end of home magnetic recording were open reels rumming at 15 ips, but had 7.5 ips settings for "economy". The effective ips rates for spinning head, Hi-Fi VHS units were very high (over 40 ips IIRC). In the absense of a video signal to track, full featured VHS Hi-Fi decks generated a tracking signal to prevent playback issues.

With their ultra-low signal densities VHS could faithfully record a full analog signal with an effective dB range approaching 100 against a dead silent background. Like CD's, DVD's audio tracks are sampled...

Must be true.... why else would I have dropped $1000 for my Zenith VR-9800 Hi-Fi VHS in 1981... and that was mail order discounted...

I have the Stop Making Sense DVD... would love to compare it to the VHS someday...

scottyboy76 · January 2011

now im really looking forward to hearing them, and i dont even know what the hell you just said.

Big Dawg · January 2011

I remember seeing this movie at a crummy movie theater when it first came out (I was in college, only theater in the small town). I've always been a big Talking Heads fan.

I too have that on VHS - still love it, but would prefer to someday get a well-produced Blu-ray version someday. Of course, will need a Blu-ray player first....

Tour2ma · January 2011

scottyboy76 wrote: »

... i dont even know what the hell you just said.

LOL... that makes two of us...

dcmeigs · February 2011

Stop Making Sense was the first concert video I ever bought (VHS). I still drag out the VHS player once in a while and watch that. It remains one of my favorites.

But here is an interesting trivia item. The film came out in the early 80s IIRC (edit, no '84). Back then a few old theaters still had their big tube amps and Voice of the Theater speakers, but the new cinemaplexes had **** for sound. Back then, if one went to see a film like Apocalypse Now, for instance, one picked the theater carefully and still the sound wouldn't be cranked like it would today. Concert level audio was just unheard of. At least in the provinces.

So The Talking Heads released this film and toured it in lieu of a concert tour. By that I mean the band stayed in New York and sent the film out to do the work for them. David Byrne's no dummy. They we're already big then, at least in my demographic and could call some shots. They required that it be played at full concert level and with a proper sound system. Because it was billed as a tour, it only played for one or two nights (I was living in Tulsa then and I saw it twice; I imagine that was all she wrote or I would have been back for a third) It sounded great and the film just blew us away. It wasn't like MTV videos at all, it was like being at a concert. The audience was amazed by the sound. We had no idea that those old theaters had that kind of sound; we just had no clue because they just never turned it up. That was a very innovative contribution from a very innovative band.