Have your say & ask the experts

[quote user="the_record_spot"][quote user="Damien Buckley"] I auditioned some MA RS6's at a dealer yesterday which he had hooked up to a Moon Cd/Amp combo. The set up sounded great with ... but absolutely awful with Ministry of Sounds' Ibiza 2007 album... [/quote] Are you sure this wasn't more to do with the content than anything else Damien...?!

(Sorry, couldn't resist...!)[/quote] Nah, its all good - I like a bit of doof doof every now and then, reminds me I'm 33 not 53. That said, its startling what a difference the player can make - that cd along with the others sounds fine on my current system at home yet played back on the Moon setup, the Norah Jones and Dire Straits sounded great but the MOS sounded bizarre. Like, really dull, muddied and distorted. I actually tried it because the bassline on Mason's 'Exceeder' is really thumping but this system trashed it. Just goes to show how careful you've got to be matching kit.

My favourite Sting CD is Brand New Day, his best work IMO.
The sound is very good but the vocals are having a bit of sibilance problems. I can't believe they did not fix that.
When you hear the first song 'a thousand years' it's almost too much. 

I also listen a lot to jazz/fusion records and the production is (most of the time) fabulous. Put on Dave Weckl - Perpetual Motion or Sypro Gyra - The Deep End and you'll hear what a real great production is like.

 

 

 

It is clear it seems that some albums are produced with care and sound brilliant while others (in greater numbers?) sound awful, are produced carelessly or even cynically with no respect for the listener... Now this leaves me with the question: given the relatively small number of flawless recordings,  how sane is it to spend thousands of pounds on audio reproduction setups? I'm not against expensive setups per se, but sometimes I do get the feeling that more money and care go into the playback arrangement than were invested in the recording procedure... You get the feeling with some albums that they were recorded with crappy budget electronics (see the already mentioned U2 recordings...) - so what's the point in replaying them with high-end top notch systems?

The only thing rendering such high-end setups rather "useless' seems to be the very quality of most recordings itself... I mean these systems are meant for playing RECORDED MUSIC right?

And, one more question: is it only me or some CD's of older recordings do sound worse than the previous vynil versions of the same recordings?... I am pretty sure I have heard such differences. What could this mean? Are the mastering engineers less gifted these days? I would appreciate any thoughts on that from you good people...

Have a great week!

Razz 

"I find it kind of strange that people will spend a small fortune on hi fi equipment, and therefore quite rightly research via the likes of What Hi Fi, but there is nothing to give people a 'rating' of how well produced an album actually is?"

 There are ways to find out before buying- check out the stereophile site at www.stereophile.com. Look for records2die4 (the title says it all). This page features a large collection of album reviews of all genres of music, including AC/DC's Back in black by the way.

Since you're interested in heavy metal/rock albums, why not check out Aerosmith-Young Lust: great music, very good quality production!

For an album with great dynamics...."O" by Damien Rice.....but note how on the follow up album "9" (after he and the record company had made a bit of money) those dynamics are nowhere near as dramatic...hmmm?

 Its not just CD's....I am a real vinyl devotee. Some of it is down right appauling and should never have been committed to our 12inch friends. Case in point, the other day (having bought yet another box of records from Ebay) I had the misfortune to be listening to a Phil Collins album (Please dont flame, I always give all of the records a play when I get them)...it sounded flat, compressed, uninspired etc etc....such contrast to loads of ofther vinyl that I have from the 70's and before....maybe this recording was the victim of early compression techniques?

 And yet a OK Computer by Radiohead on 180g vinyl (now how anal) makes everyone I play it to speechless!

 

Funny old world.

Also check out any discs you have which are mastered by Nimbus. You can see this by checking the very innermost ring of a CD closest to the centre hole. They've a long and well respected pedigree in disc mastering and you probably already own some. Seriously worth a listen. They even make Oasis sound good!

If you're a jazz fan, Verve Records do some amazing-sounding re-issues.

I'm currently listening to a 96kHZ, 24-bit digital transfer of Ella Fitzgerald's 'Sings Sweet Songs for Swingers' album (now how that meaning has changed since it was released in 1959!!). It's awesome....

[quote user="Clare Newsome"]If you're a jazz fan, Verve Records do some amazing-sounding re-issues.

I'm currently listening to a 96kHZ, 24-bit digital transfer of Ella Fitzgerald's 'Sings Sweet Songs for Swingers' album (now how that meaning has changed since it was released in 1959!!). It's awesome....[/quote]

 

I wouldn't be too sure about the meaning having changed over time, just us honkeys getting it - Alan Freed may have been the first person to use the phrase "rock n roll" to describe a musical style but NO WAY did he invent the term! For those not aware of the roots of the term, it is descriptive of the effect that an act incvolving two consenting adults has on a car...

Makes Little Richard sound rather boastful when claiming to be ready, willing and able to rock n roll all night <G> I also wonder if Bill Haley knew what he was singing about in "rock around the clock"
 

Reading all all the replies there is not much I can add. After upgrading my HIFi set a little bit I found out some of my CD's sound now much better than previously. So I am desperately looking where to find more CD's of my favourite genre (hard rock) that give me the same sound quality. Unfortunately it seems the only way to find out is to listen to the CD itself.  Is there by the way a website where sound quality is part of the
review? I checked 'records2die4', but there is not so much in my genre...

[quote user="Jos@home"]

Reading all all the replies there is not much I can add. After upgrading my HIFi set a little bit I found out some of my CD's sound now much better than previously. So I am desperately looking where to find more CD's of my favourite genre (hard rock) that give me the same sound quality. Unfortunately it seems the only way to find out is to listen to the CD itself.  Is there by the way a website where sound quality is part of the
review? I checked 'records2die4', but there is not so much in my genre...

[/quote] Certainly, somewhere that reviews albums' production quality would be a useful resource!

"I checked 'records2die4', but there is not so much in my genre..."

Sorry about that, mate.

AC/DC's new release of "Back in Black" got a great review.

Maybe you could focus on record labels that pay attention to high quality recordings. MFSL, for instance, claims they get there cd's right from the digital source...

link: http://www.mofi.com/

They seem to have a hard rock cd in their collection, Megadeth's "Countdown to extinction", but again there doesn't seem to be much more of the genre you're interested in.

Maybe What Hifi could add a list of good albums to their already excellent website. From reading the What Hifi magazine for some years I gather that they're less inclined to test classical music alone.

 

I have to return to restore the honour of the CD's I slated on page 1 - now I have my new CD player and decent speaker cables those CD's are sounded much better.

Thats good to know Damien,  I'm having a similar trauma at the  moment (I have another '740A Satisfaction' post out there).  Some CD's just don't sound right and enjoyable.

I have MA RS6 speakers with a CA 740A amp CA 640C cd player - I seem to remember you have RS6's too?

Can I ask what interconnects and speaker cable you have changed too?  I have budget cables at the moment (Richer sounds is just too convenient!).  Was the difference very noticable and does it let you enjoy the music once again?

Cheers

bloney

I am afraid the subject of the sound quality of music as recorded on CD is but a symptom of a much greater problem. This was made clear to me by a lecture by Hifi / Technology Journalist (I can’t remember his name but he used to write for PC world as well as Hifi mags) in the late 90’s at a Hifi show in London. Basically he said that although technology is getting better, processor power faster, storage larger etc… The commercial drive to get more and more material out there (CDs, TV and DAB radio etc.) means that compromises have been made at the expense of quality (Quantity over Quality). The only reason “they“ can get away with it is a function of what the public expect. The MP3 generation have their expectation set by the technical limitations of MP3.The fact that so many people listen to music through their PC rather then a dedicated hifi/stereo system underlines this. The journalist went on to say that there was a survey done in the 70’s in Italy where teenagers asked what were the top 10 items they wanted. A quality Hifi was there at no. 4 or 5. The survey was conducted again in the 90’s and Hifi wasn’t there. Classical/Jazz audiences have different expectations and this is reflected in the quality of the CDs covering that genre. The older rock material is listened to by people who still remember the LPs, their expectation is some what more mixed based on their experiences with the general variability of the production/engineering standards in rock The transfer from the original master recordings (originally for LP) has also been an issue. A mixture of a technical learning curve for engineers to deal with a new highly revealing media (especially in the mid/late 80s) and the commercial need to transfer most of the music catalogue to CD as quickly as possible (cutting corners in the process). The result being a mixture (lottery?) of fine, ok and poor CD recordings. And again our expectation being set by our experiences then. Now the quality of DAB has come under scrutiny with many people saying its inferior to MP3! The BBC has come under suspicion that quality of Radio 3 has been downgraded to bring it in line with DAB standards. Again our quality expectations are being managed though this time there is resistance by the devoted radio 3 classical music brigade. I am not sure what the solution is other then returning poor CDs on the grounds of poor “technical” workmanship. The retailers would of course find the reason totally unacceptable.

The best recording I have is the SACD Columbia/Legacy (CS 65122) "The Dave Brubeck Quartet: Time Out" . Recorded in late 1959 presumably with valve equipment. The modern recordings I have don't come close.