Tool 10,000 Days - Is there a decent sounding version

AsSiMiLaTeD

Title says it all, looking to see if there's a decent version of this I'm unaware of. Vicarious is probably my favorite Tool song but is damn near unlistenable, even on my more forgiving rigs...

Nightfall

Album sounds great to me too, strange.

drummer86

Third one for sounding great. Lateralus sounds pretty great to me too. Had it for 12 years before I noticed it's an HDCD.

AsSiMiLaTeD

How are you guys not hearing the compression on that opening track? It's recorded hot, measurements show this so it's not in my head. The mix is fine, but there is really bad compression on this album.

AsSiMiLaTeD

Here are the dynamic range measurements for this album. For those not familiar with the dynamic range database it's a good reference for see how hot an album is recorded. Higher numbers are better, green is good yellow is acceptable red is bad.

As you can see, Vicarious, which is my favorite on that album, has the worst compression.

Note this website only deals with dynamic range compression (loudness wars), which is only one of several important factors that determine sound quality, but it's very useful information.

http://www.dr.loudness-war.info/details.php?id=4000

Toolfan66

I love that album on my rig.. The Vinyl version I have was very well done..

AsSiMiLaTeD

I agree overall on their albums and think even this one is very well mixed, which is why I was hoping for a better version.

AsSiMiLaTeD

Toolfan66 wrote: »

I love that album on my rig.. The Vinyl version I have was very well done..

I thought the vinyl copies of that in circulation were all fakes? Did Tool do an official vinyl release of that album?

Toolfan66

AsSiMiLaTeD wrote: »

I thought the vinyl copies of that in circulation were all fakes? Did Tool do an official vinyl release of that album?

Correct, but you would never know it, who ever did them did them justice. I was shocked at how well they were done, ask Mike, he is the one that got me to take the plunge on it..

AsSiMiLaTeD

Well my ears usually hear dynamic compression AS distortion, that's the problem I guess. On Vicarious I'm picking up distortion all over the place throughout the track. Start that track at about 45 seconds in when the drums and guitar kick in, there's distortion caused by compression at almost every leading and trailing edge of guitar notes and drums. Go to 2:44 in the track and listen to the hits on the toms that are panned into the right speaker, distortion galore. At 5:31 it also starts up pretty badly again. It's almost as if the whole song were recorded with a layer of grain on it, but I know that isn't it because it's not consistently there throughout the whole song.

Maybe I'm being too critical, but my ears tell me it's there and the measurements back up what I'm hearing

AsSiMiLaTeD

By the way, anyone who doesn't believe me (or the measurements I posted) about the loudness on this album and the resulting compression, you can easily test this for yourself if you have Lateralus handy. Put Lateralus in and adjust your volume to a comfortable listening level, not too loud or this next step is really gonna hurt. Now leave the volume where it's at and put 10,000 Days in and hit play, see how much louder that is?

They push everything in the mix up (to Skip's point above at least they don't futz with the actual leveling of instruments) which compresses it at the top and is whatI assume generates the distortion / compression that I'm hearing.

drummer86

I also don't turn these albums up too much. Ticks and Leeches from Lateralus is the track that not-so-politely informed me what my Totem Mites CAN'T do. I'll give them another, more critical listen and see what I notice.

AsSiMiLaTeD

Actually, Ticks and Leaches is a perfect example of a very dynamic track. Listen to that and Vicarious back to back, hear how much cleaner the drums sound on T&L? It's the same with the guitars, it's just much cleaner sounding overall, and both songs are recorded with about the same amount of distortion so it's not like Vicarious was just supposed to have a grittier sound...

drummer86

I did a quick comparison of Ticks & Leeches and Vicarious and there is an obvious difference in the dynamics. Part of it can be attributed to the music itself but the volume has certainly been boosted on the newer disc. Leaving the volume in the same spot I was shocked to hear how much louder the opening track to 10000 Days was compared to the Lateralus disc. Didn't give it a real critical listen yet so I didn't notice any obvious distortion at very moderate volume.