Andy is mad...

Posted by: Andrew L. Weekes on 26 November 2002

Not in a bats in the belfry kind of way, but in a seething annoyed, I hate record companies kind of way.

See my comments in the 'New Foos' thread for more info, but basically, as has been commented elsewhere some of the new copy-protected disc (I'll refrain from calling the CD's) seem to skip even in conventional audio players.

The issue for me is will the audio manufacturing companies take this lying down, and just leave the issue to their customers, or will they get involved in campaigning. Do the small manufacturers even have any clout....

Investing large sums of money in an excellent music system is starting to become a mockery if the CD manufacturers start producing corrupted discs in quantity - Naim and others have gone to great lengths to extract the music from these shiny discs, only to have their efforts buggered up by the intentional corruption of the discs themselves.

It would be interesting to know Naim's position on this, I intend to contact a few other companies and see if I can ascertain their repsonses.

Ivor T once wrote to me in some comment I'd made about Linn's lack of support, on their own music label, for the vinyl format, that whether Linn manufactured released records or not would not affect my enjoyment of my LP12.

I wonder if the fact that their customers enjoyment of CD's could well be affected by the record companies intentions would provoke a different response?

Any thoughts, ideas etc. - my impression from looking into this is that the campaigns that are running on this seem flawed and are typical of many such things on the net; confused, mixing different issues, and lacking real substance.

What it needs is some industry input, IMO - our musical futures are at stake, meanwhile, I think I'll stick with the radio and dragging a rock round a lump of plastic wink

Andy.
Posted on: 26 November 2002 by ejl
Kit,

I'm surprised that you thing "Lateralus" is incredible sounding. I was immediately disappointed with the sound on this album, which seems to me mushy and confused, with a thin and hollow-sounding bass. I don't, of course, know if this is down to the copy protection or something else like bad production. But at 79 minutes of program plus copy protection material this disc has almost certainly had to cut corners somewhere.
Posted on: 26 November 2002 by Andrew L. Weekes
"Tool's Lateralus is an incredible sounding disc"

Agree totally - awesome stuff.
Posted on: 26 November 2002 by ejl
quote:
Agree totally - awesome stuff.


So can we infer Andrew that your anger is misplaced, since the copy protection -- assuming your version has it -- isn't detracting from the sound quality? Or is it just skipping that you are mad about?

For comparison, maybe try a CD recently produced by Albini, who I think is one of the better rock producers working right now, and who exerts a fair bit of control over the production process (although I don't know for certain that his stuff isn't also copy protected, I doubt it is).

After reading this post I just re-listened to part of the Tool album, and then compared it to a recent Albini production, "Mclusky Do Dallas". The Mclusky has a dynamic freedom and energy that makes the Tool seem plasticky and distant by comparison. (This is is not intended as a comment on the band, of course.) Again, I don't know if the difference is down to copy protection and maybe it isn't.
Posted on: 27 November 2002 by Andrew L. Weekes
I think as has been commented elsewhere, not all discs have the protection, my copy of Lateralus certainly does not, AFAICT.

The audible impact of copy protection is what I'm frustrated about, skipping is a very audible manifestation of the problem, and it is due to the copy protection scheme used on this disc.

If I can't hear it I don't care. One could argue that if the effect is not obvious that one will never know is the music is degraded, since the opportunity to hear it without isn't available, but at the end of the day, if I enjoy the disc, that's all that really matters.

Purposefully placing errors on the disc though can only make the playback system more prone to audible errors, the longer term effect of which is greater cost to the consumer.

As CD mechanisms degrade they become less tolerant of errors, this means that we will be required to have more frequent repairs to our players, to allow them to cope with corupted discs.

Andy.