Bad Recordings - The Meal Ticket of the HiFi Business

scottnbnj

last week my son was doing a sleep over and wanted his ps2 out of the system so he could bring it with him. some nasties have been creeping in lately, so i took the opportunity to re-route and reseat some cables, put the grilles on for company and move the tv back a few more inches. it's probably about a foot behind the front baffles now and is now a few more inches behind the plane of the front baffle's with slight toe-in.

so, i've been impressed with the results and have been happily going back through stuff i listened to before the clean-up. when stuff like this happens i usually pull out a few cd's that i've been unhappy with too because there are often pleasant surprises.

in particular i've had this old pressing of moody blues 'days of future passed' cd for several years that i bought used. it's poor performance has been a dissappointment since i remember the vinyl as outstanding. last night, the depth and width of this thing was just knocking my socks off, the stage was extending to the listening position with a solid floor effortlessly. it still doesn't make the upper echelon, but it does get some things very right now.

anyway, neat stuff.

)

George Grand

Fongolio wrote: »

But, just this evening I listened to a 200 gram version of Peter Gabriel's Up. Unbelievable sound. Deep room rattling bass but every subltly and nuance in the music clear and musical and the widest soundstage I've ever heard on a recording. Very much like surround but with two speakers and with the sonic holography on my Carver pre-amp off.

A great many arteests in the late 80's and 90's employed a recording technique called "Q" Sound. This was basically embedding a hologram onto the master tape, much like you could do at home with cassette or open reel and a C-9 Hologram Generator. Peter Gabriel, Madonna, and other people that had what appeared to be a passing interest in sound quality employed it.

shack

George Grand wrote: »

A great many arteests in the late 80's and 90's employed a recording technique called "Q" Sound. This was basically embedding a hologram onto the master tape, much like you could do at home with cassette or open reel and a C-9 Hologram Generator. Peter Gabriel, Madonna, and other people that had what appeared to be a passing interest in sound quality employed it.

http://www.qsound.com/spotlight/users/recording-artists.htm

I have several Qsound CDs. Interesting recordings.

bikezappa

Compressed recordings are ****. If the music has lost the dynamic range because an engineer is told to make the music sound hot the artist is the loser. Don't buy the recording of any misic that has been compressed.

I listen to a lot of FM and especially live uncompressed FM music. I'm lucky to have this option of WGBH and WHRB in Boston. These broadcasts are wonderful and have a wide dynamic range. If I like music that is played on FM, I then consider buying the CD. Very seldom will I now buy a CD without hearing some part of it on FM. Remasters are the worst in many cases. **** in, is **** out regardless of the equipment.

ckphoto

TSWisla wrote: »

Let me add one thing to this. I have paid an arm and a leg for remastered 180g or 200g vinyl that sounded very poor. Then I go to a garage sale and buy Willie Nelson's Songwriter for $0.25 and it blows my mind. I just do not get it...

Easter Sunday I went into my Mom's attic and pulled my parents old record collection there were a few Willie Nelson albums and the sound is just amazing.

markmarc

Let's remember, there is by necessity compression in 99.9% of recordings. The issue becomes how much. Unfortunately, in the past 10 years the level of compression has increased dramatically to abusive levels. The worst offenders are usually new acts that are desperate to get noticed, so the engineer will crank up the volume to make the song sound "better" in mp3 format.

What is sad is that some of the most powerful artists, i.e. Bruce Springsteen, Lenny Kravitz to name two, have allowed this to happen on their recordings.

One can hope with the end of DRM, the move to larger files size online recordings will help to reverse this trend. But ultimately, it is up to the artists and the recording engineers to stand up against the industry suits and say ENOUGH!

cnh

+1 on that, I agree above. On another note, since all that vinyl was 'mastered' on TAPE, wouldn't that source be 'superior' to Vinyl? As it is the first generation recording? Didn't people in the 60s and 70s actually run high end reel-to-reel equipment for the best quality sound? Or am I missing something?

cnh

mhardy6647

yup and yup, respectively.
A first-generation or 'safety' copy of a master tape on a good deck is a pretty amazing thing to listen to.

... and, by the way... some of us still do (listen to R2R), y'know? :-)

renowilliams

This is definately the most interesting thread I have read so far IMO. I have felt the same as many of you about inferior recordings. My sister has a habit of pulling out my parents old vinyl at christmas time and playing them on their old turntable. Last year she picked out a Nat King Cole album (don't remember which one) and it sounded great. I think it would have sounded great on any system. One thing I did notice was that those records were in immaculate condition. I bet they were only ever played a handful of times.
Man I gotta get a turntable and get some vinyl.

mhardy6647

renowilliams wrote: »

This is definately the most interesting thread I have read so far IMO.

hoo-boy, you need to get out more!

;-)

Systems

renowilliams wrote: »

Man I gotta get a turntable and get some vinyl.

Does your Yammy reciever have a phono input?I have a working Technics SLD2 collecting dust thats free to a good home.

renowilliams

GV#27 wrote: »

Does your Yammy reciever have a phono input?I have a working Technics SLD2 collecting dust thats free to a good home.

It sure does have phono in and thanks would love to take it and give it a good home. I see your in Ontario, how far from Peterborough?

renowilliams

mhardy6647 wrote: »

hoo-boy, you need to get out more!

;-)

Your absolutley right. Talk to my wife and get permission for me....lol

Systems

renowilliams wrote: »

It sure does have phono in and thanks would love to take it and give it a good home. I see your in Ontario, how far from Peterborough?

I will only charge for gas if you live north of Lansdowne st.;)I wiil try to give you a call later this evening.

powerestudio

powerestudio wrote: »

I´m looking to buy Lsi9
People with these speakers... crappy and bad recordings are showed with facility with Lsi9? so with good productions cd they sound amazingly and with bad cd´s they sing amazingly bad ?

so Lsi9 are very neutral and reveling speakers? because they show the truth..?

what about my questions ?

markmarc

powerestudio wrote: »

what about my questions ?

In the overall picture from my experiences, YES BUT. Mid bass and bass are quite good, but the Vifa tweeter is way too restricted by way of the x-over. This tends to make vocals and high frequencies instruments sound like they are about a third of an octave lower.
Will you enjoy them, hell yes! Is modification worthwhile? If you bought them used absolutely.