On September 9th, Abbey Road (Remastered) is going to be released.
Am I really going to hear something significantly better than the original?
I always wonder what I’m missing–remastered editions always sound exactly the same to me! Am I remastery deaf?
If, like me, you can’t hear the difference between CDs and MP3s I would bet the remastered edition won’t sound much different. I’m a big music buff but luckily my ears aren’t that discriminating.
There’s a difference between CDs and MP3s?! I have never heard it.
Will the secret of Paul’s death and the subsequent coverup be revealed?
Actually, it’s going to be all of their studio albums!!! I’m really looking forward to this because I’ve always felt that the intial EMI CDs sounded flat and lifeless.
If you’re skeptical about how much improvement you’ll hear, just try comparing the recent Love remixes with any of the current CD releases. Keep in mind that the inital CD masters were done when CDs where still new tech and producers and sound engineers hadn’t really learned how to fully take advantage of the digital medium.
From what I understand, there will be two versions, a mono and a stereo one. While the mono version will have the original dynamic range, they are planning to compress the stereo versions to be “louder” - making the quiet parts louder and reducing the dynamic range, making them sound worse then they ever have.
Love was unique in that they went back to all the carefully preserved master tapes and recovered tracks that had been subsequently “bounced” down from tape to tape, adding layers of tape noise and distortion and built a unique soundscape from music over their entire career. This doesn’t sound like they are planning anything of the sort. Instead:
…which to me sounds like “carefully copying the final, mixed down master tape and lovingly preserving all the tape hiss and saturation”. I would LOVE to hear George Martin and his son to go through the Beatles catalog and re-create the original mixes on modern equipment so we’d have amazing sounding versions of the classic albums with the fidelity that was recorded on the original tapes, carefully cleaning the tape noise built into the technology of the period at the individual instrument level - which is the only place where it can be done without any sonic degradation - and then reproduce the original mixes.
Which is not going to happen on these recordings. Nope, we’re going to have yet another perfect preservation of the sonic flaws of the time.
There are several possibilities:
a) You’re tone-deaf.
b) You’ve never done the comparison on anything better than on some poor sound source. Try doing the comparison on some decent equipment.
c) You’ve never really listened to music attentively and have totally non-discriminating ears. (Basically, the same as a, except due to laziness rather than some innate inability.)
I realize you’re being snarky, but you’re technically incorrect in several areas:
MP3 compression does not, in any way, alter the pitch of music. One can have perfect pitch and not hear the difference between lossily compressed and uncompressed music.
While better speakers or headphones can make the artifacts more clear, when you know what to listen for, you can spot compression artifacts on the cheesiest and cheapest equipment. I can show you why 128k bitrate is not enough on a $30 music MP3 player, a $10 pair of earphones and a track featuring applause.
Again, snark. The compression algorithms were chosen specifically because they lose data in areas that the vast majority of listeners will never notice - like when two sounds happen at the same instant, the quieter sound is masked, so the compressor drops it.
No, if you want to hear the difference, capture some tracks from a CD so you start with 16 bit files and compress them. Choose songs with a live audience applauding at the end - the fast “transient” sound of hundreds of hands clapping is very hard to encode - bad encoding sounds like a “washing” sound or bacon frying. Or a track with two very different sounds in the hard left and right channels - acoustic guitar on one side, a woman’s voice on the other. Eventually you’ll find a piece of music that you know very well that has passages that will reveal the limitations of the encoder. Then you can adjust the bitrate of the encoder so those problems are not noticeable. Or you could just encode everything at a high bitrate.
But the truth is, with a good encoder at a high enough bitrate, on the vast majority of popular music, most people won’t hear a difference even when directly comparing the compressed and uncompressed material.
Wow, way to win friends and influence people!
The first thing I’d say is that not all remasters are created equal. But my experience with particularly good remasters is that the mix sounds cleaner. You tend to hear elements in the music you didn’t hear before, stuff like that. It’s usually best to listen with headphones, in my experience.
That sucks. I might have to re-evaluate plans to buy. I guess I’ll wait for the reviews to come in and, If they’re less than stellar, I’ll just stick to my DESS Blue Box bootleg encodes.
Disappointing to say the least.
I’d say this is pretty much true. After 192kbps bit rate, I really can’t tell the difference. 160 is just distinguishable enough from the uncompressed file, but 128kbps gets on my nerves. For me, the distortion is most clear in the higher frequencies, like high hats, ride cymbals, and cymbal crashes. These sounds all seem to exhibit a sort of “flanging” effect (a kind of warbling sound) which drives me up a wall. It’s obvious at 128 kbps, subtle at 160 kbps, and I don’t notice it at all at 192kbps. Others may have better ears, but I’m sure anyone will be able to hear the difference at the 128 kbps bitrate.
Not all ripping software is equal to the task.
Possibly. But I’ve never heard an acceptable 128kpbs MP3. OGGs (Vorbis) and WMAs at 128, sure. Still noticeable, but not terrible. But MP3s? No.