Speed, music and time.

treitz3

Okay, so you are sitting there listening to something that you have heard many times throughout your life. I posted this in the 2-channel thread but I have experienced this with movies as well. As you are listening (or enjoying the movie) the s o u n d s gets s l o w and then resume back to speed. As if you had a dial on a tape deck or LP player to speed up or slow down the playback.

What gives?

Most of the time I notice this, it's on digital. Drives me freakin' bonkers I tell ya'. Does this have to do with the clock or am I WAY off in left feild? If not, I would be curious as to why this happens. Let's have a cordial discussion as to why this may be.

Tom

tonyb

No your not wacked. I've noticed this too depending on time of day. Could be the ambient noise going on around the house that contributes to how we hear the presentation. I've noticed mine sounds way better at night, lights low, when I can concentrate on what I'm hearing. During the day, and other noises going on, seems like your attention is scattered a bit. I know that sounds crazy, but hey, never claimed to be normal either. LOL

Also noticed this on digital or cd's, so source isn't the cause. I'm thinking visual also effects this to a degree. For instance, I feel a better sound in a darkened room at night. With no visual taking up room in my brain, your other senses compensate, like your hearing. As a further example, a walk in the woods during the day sounds different than a walk in the woods at night. Your hearing compensates, becomes more acute with lack of vision. So it's only normal that our perceptions of sound differ between different environments. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

apphd

Maybe it is related to power fluctuations, combined with some of the other sensory/psychological inputs tony mentions above. Lets see others thoughts on this.

tonyb

Good point, though I would imagine those power fluctuations would have to be substantial.

txcoastal1

Enough to dim the lights

heiney9

I'm with Tony about ambient noise, distractions, etc. I also think it has to do with each individuals frame of mind at the time. I find when I am tired or distracted, etc this phenomenon can happen in varying degrees. Some nights sitting and listening the rig is absolutely glorious, other nights it's just so, so even with the same artists and music playing. That's why some nights when I'm really "feeling" the music and into the moment, I stay up wayyyyyyyyyyyyy to late listening and enjoying because the next few time I plop down in front of the rig I might not get the exact same feeling again for awhile.

State of being/mind influences everything we do and how we experience and perceive things. Even if it's minor.

Does this make sense?

H9

brgman

I'm on board with tony and heiny.So many factors effect the overall you have at every "listening session".
Sometimes the stars align and you get a sense of euphoria from the music and how great the rig is sounding.
The next day you go back and it's meh.
Music is a mood thing as we all know but I must admit the only time I heard the music sloooow down and speed up was in the 70's,and it wasn't the power grid that was causing it.

treitz3

Okay, I am apparently not hearing what it may be that some of you are and perhaps I should have clarified a bit more. What I am experiencing I do not believe would be caused by power fluctuations. The dead giveaway for why this would be is because the slow down of the music is consistent and repeatable at the same playback areas.

Now I'll be honest, I feel like having someone kick me in the ol' keister for not providing an example of what I am hearing. What prompted me to post this was that I had just heard a song on the radio that did the same thing as what I am experiencing at home. Knowing this, I decided to start a discussion in the wishful hopes that something could possibly be done to thwart this from happening in the first place.

The best way I could explain it would be that it sounds like I am running with a tape deck and the motor slows down for a bit and then resumes speed. I would presume that it may be in the master recording but as I mentioned before, it seems to happen when I'm listening to a digital source. The LP's I have with the same selections don't seem to [off of memory] have this lag. Every time I run across the issue, it is repeatable and consistent, even if I pause it and start back up while the slow down occurs.

What I meant by it being the clock was the clock in the CDP. I'll be honest, I do not know what the clock's function is within the CDP but just putting two and two together, I would think that the clock monitors playback speed. This is where I do not know whether or not I'm off in left field with my thoughts. I will be doing some extensive listening in the next few weeks and when I run across an example, I will share it so that we can narrow down exactly what I am experiencing.

Tom

BlueFox

No. The closest thing to this is going to someone's home where the pitch was slightly off on their turntable. A minor tweak fixed that.

11tsteve

if it is repeatable, can you make it happen with the same cd days apart in different listening sessions?
The kicker is having it happen with a radio session....

treitz3

11tsteve wrote: »

if it is repeatable, can you make it happen with the same cd days apart in different listening sessions?

Yes.

Tom

BlueMDPicker

Hi Tom,

Can you provide an example for us to test on our media copies?

Mike

heiney9

The clock in a cdp has to do with jitter between the sending and receiving of bit of digital information, nothing to do with pitch or speed. With digital it's either playing or not. It's not at all like analog tape or lp where the speed can be varied and is audible, think wow and flutter. There are cdp's that have a pitch control for something like dj'ing. But the speed is physically manipulated after the analog stage.

H9

treitz3

Hello Mike, yes. I will be providing one as soon as I hook my rig back up and I find a good example. If memory serves, I recently listened to a disc that is in the small pile of discs stacked up near the rig, so hopefully it will not be too long before I find an example.

Ah, thanks H9. Apparently I was off in left field with that.

Tom

drummer86

My first inclination was that something may be off in the way you're perceiving the sound until you said that you can rewind and reproduce the effect. I'd probably blame the spinning speed of the disc, but it's odd that it would happen at the same moments in the recordings even when you rewind. My best advice would be the next time you find an instance of this to swap in a different cd player and see if you can reproduce it there.

brgman

If you listen to the same song a few times does it only do it maybe once? If at all?
Or could it be the source?

treitz3

Hello, drummer86. I can say with complete certainty that it is repeatable on different players. The first time I noticed this, that was exactly what I did.

Tom

heiney9

drummer86 wrote: »

My first inclination was that something may be off in the way you're perceiving the sound until you said that you can rewind and reproduce the effect. I'd probably blame the spinning speed of the disc, but it's odd that it would happen at the same moments in the recordings even when you rewind. My best advice would be the next time you find an instance of this to swap in a different cd player and see if you can reproduce it there.

The disc either plays or it doesn't. A cd/cdp won't slow down or speed up the information and output it in the analog stage, it's physically impossible. Perhaps it's in the original recording and that's why it's on a cd and repeatable. As an extreme long shot, maybe something is out of whack in the analog section, but it would happen more times then just at the specific moment on a specific cd. Highly, highly unlikely it's the cdp. My money is that it's on the original analog master that was transferred to cd or the problem was created during the analog transfer to cd.

H9

treitz3

heiney9 wrote: »

My money is that it's on the original analog master that was transferred to cd or the problem was created during the analog transfer to cd.

I think I would be safe to put my money on that as well.

Tom

heiney9

I remember reading articles in the late 80's and early 90's about how poorly some analog masters were being transferred to cd. The haste to get cds to market caused some sloppiness like L and R channel swaps, incorrect editing, loosing parts of tracks, uneven levels, noise, too much compression, etc, etc. In the case of the first Zep pressings, they didn't bother to track down the original masters and transferred 3rd 4th or 5th generations from the master to cd.

I'm sure this stuff still happens, although probably less frequently. Or maybe it was just an honest error in Tom's case.

H9

drummer86

heiney9 wrote: »

The disc either plays or it doesn't. A cd/cdp won't slow down or speed up the information and output it in the analog stage, it's physically impossible. Perhaps it's in the original recording and that's why it's on a cd and repeatable. As an extreme long shot, maybe something is out of whack in the analog section, but it would happen more times then just at the specific moment on a specific cd. Highly, highly unlikely it's the cdp. My money is that it's on the original analog master that was transferred to cd or the problem was created during the analog transfer to cd.

H9

Learn something new every day. The chances that something went wrong in the transfer is very likely. Hadn't even considered that.

drummer86

treitz3 wrote: »

Hello, drummer86. I can say with complete certainty that it is repeatable on different players. The first time I noticed this, that was exactly what I did.

Tom

Gotta be the media then. I'm kind of curious now which recordings you're referring to. I'd like to experience it for myself. Kind of like how people collect misprinted money and trading cards haha.

apphd

Considering that this happens at the same time repeatably, and had even been heard with the same track of a radio broadcast, and Tom thinks that he has not heard it on the same track from vinal, I would have to go with this:

"I remember reading articles in the late 80's and early 90's about how poorly some analog masters were being transferred to cd. The haste to get cds to market caused some sloppiness like L and R channel swaps, incorrect editing, loosing parts of tracks, uneven levels, noise, too much compression, etc, etc. In the case of the first Zep pressings, they didn't bother to track down the original masters and transferred 3rd 4th or 5th generations from the master to cd"

If not on the master then something in the production of the cd. In a pure digital file (never transfered to cd) I can't think of a thing that would do this.

treitz3

Well, I thought I had ran across one instance but after closer listening I think it was just a weird sounding instrument. Song 10, at the very beginning on the Eagles The Long Run album.

Tom

apphd

treitz3 wrote: »

Well, I thought I had ran across one instance but after closer listening I think it was just a weird sounding instrument. Song 10, at the very beginning on the Eagles The Long Run album.

Tom

There were a lot of releases of this album, ( http://www.discogs.com/Eagles-The-Long-Run/master/59516 ) so maybe if something like H9 suspects and the cd was not taken from the master but a different pressing of the album than the one you have and do not hear it.

apphd

I have another thought on this. But it is nothing more than a what if, so not much value. With the release date being 1979 and CD production and sales starting in the US in 1984 could there have been some damage to the original tape master while in storage? Which could be the reason it shows up on digital tracks but not vinyl. Are other cases of this you've seen also something that would have been originally anolog mastered with some time before being transfered and released to digital?