well recorded CDs

Hmmm.......I found this poorer by far than the original WEA cd? G

Same here.

Gave it to my ex wife.

Stu.

APT,

Hope you are enjoying the Sara K and Chris Jones album?

Here is another great sounding CD for you to try.

The first track is also very handy as a system setup test track.

Stu.

What should one quote when recommending a CD for excellent sonic quality?

Which issue of (any given) CD are you quoting?

The year of issue?

It’s country of issue?

The CD disc manufacturer (and the actual CD factory where it was made) ?

The barcode number?

And this is before you get to re-master or originals...

We all know original usually sound far better sonically, but not absolutely always.

Recommendations on a cd that sounds good, bad or indifferent is often a case of fairly useless information without knowing exactly which very issue one is quoting.

~<>~

Graeme & Stu,

Just goes to show that what i said earlier in this thread.

Perhaps you too have different factory made duff copies, hard luck.

My copy is a fantastic example of a very well recorded/remastered CD.

This very edition has also been mentioned before by other forum members for it's very fine sound quality.

Debs

Thanks Stu,

 Yes I am enjoying the listening to the 3 CDs. I will check out the American Beauty soundtrack.

Regards

Debs,

I still like my original more.

Heard a few of the so-called betters fromJapan over the years.

The 45rpm vinyl is meant to be  good though, a lot of people rate it as the best.

Some one we both know was going to pick me up a copy on one of his trips.

Not heard it yet though.

Stu.

Stu,

i happen to know you far prefer the vinyl version to CD anyways...

and [on the phone not so long ago] ...that you've: had your fill of Rumours -

too many listens?

So reasons you gave away your Deluxe Edition to ex-better half has not very much to do with sound quality of this fine reissue

Debs

True,

I am Rumoured out just like i am DSOTM out.

My ex was never a better half 

It suffers from loudness wars.

We all hear in a diff way? but i used to play it on the same CDP and psu as you.

I still have CD copies and its on my Mac and Vortex box.

The original still sounds best to me.

Will go and have another listen in a min after i have been up the pool with Jethro Tull.

Stu.

Stu,

If your copy suffers from LOUDNESS! 

Then i'm very sorry to hear it (pun intended).

But my copy isn't louded at all, and sounds fab!  

Played it lots on the cdi when i first got it a few years ago...

now enjoying it on the cd5x

Debs

I'm convinced that a lot of this loudness stuff is if you want it to be  a problem, then it is. If you just listen to the music and can get into it , then no problem.

I have a new philosophy not to be annoyed about these perceived problems, they then don't exist.

Howard,

I have a shed load of new philosophies .

If something goes up?It must come down? unless its chewed blotting paper stuck to a ceiling 

Stu.

With you on this one BigH!

+2 

Some CD and vinyl re-masters are dire, but the majority are OK and if the music is good then can be enjoyable. The only one that really annoys is MCC's The Calling as that is sacrilege.

ELP's official bootleg series though are best avoided - anything with Sir Keith playing on it interests me, but even I draw the line as these travesties  - high price and appalling sound - believe me it could be me playing organ on them and the sound is so bad you'd never know. Ofd course, I've ripped to my music library and am too stupid to delete them even though I'll never play them .... I have plenty of well recorded albums with Emo on them to keep me happy.  (Just added that in case anybody thinks of buying them). 

Nils Lofgren - Acoustic live. Nice album and a superb recording to boot.

James

Two recordings that I find stunningly well done. Listen to the dynamic range Pirates, especially on Traces of the Western Slopes. Great music, too.

Bad For You Baby, in particular, 'I love you more than you'll ever know'. Gary Moore

I've found all of my Ry Cooder's CD's to be recorded fairly well, albeit with varying musical quality.

Talking Timbuktu is exceptionally well done, one of the best recorded cd's in my collection.

Debs

With you on that one Debs.  G

Very interesting: take any of the tracks on this remaster and load them into something like Audition - which is what I did after noticing something odd about the sound the first time I listened to the album. The reason the remaster sounds more impressive first pass is partly because it is much louder... if you look at the waveforms they have really whacked the compression on and the dynamic range is actually reduced compared to the original CD.

If you stick the original CD to a player, leave the volume at the level that makes the sound comfortable and then stick the remaster in without altering anything, you can hear how much louder the compression makes the remaster sound. Just don't stand too near the speakers when you play the remaster!

Even more interesting is that the HD Tracks hi-def download apparently comes off this remaster. Being charitable, the reason may well be because the original master was so thin that no-one would release it ever again, but I personally find the eighties CD transfer better listening than this remaster. Great album though. Even better to listen to after you have read Mick Fleetwood's autobiog.

Andrew

Andrew,

I am well aware of what a louded cd sounds like, and my copy of Fleetwood Mac deluxe edition are no where near louded. I play it using the usual volume setting for 'very good cd recorded' position.

Also, i can always hear louded when it's there, it's not just about how much volume is being used.

It would seem the deluxe edition 'discs' may originate from different factories [and maybe in different countries] being very popular would have been mass produced in very high numbers for world wide market.

This means people would have discs of varying quality.

Sorry if you have a couple of duff discs.

Debs

Well every discography I can find says that Rumours was released on CD in '77 and remastered in 2004 and that was it, Debs. All the other pressing are simply duplicates of those two, unless there is a third one.

The copy of the remaster I have here is exactly the one you linked to on Amazon, which is what caught my attention in the first place. Have you posted the wrong link to your the Amazon CD, by any chance? If so I would really love to get my hands on the pressing you have, as, I am sure would the others who have passed similar comments on the remaster the rest of us have.

If the cut you have has better sound quality it can't be anything to do with where it is made, because although the compression on the remaster is nowhere in the Red Hot Chilli Peppers territory, they have run the levels right up onto a 1dB cut in places, and that cannot be due to where the disc was pressed.

In 1977 Rumours was my favourite album so i purchased a copy on vinyl.

I think you'll find that CD was not invented back in those days ; )

But perhaps you meant to say the original Rumours CD release was 1984? ... and the very release which got many very poor quotes in reference to it on many threads and years on this very forum, [probably from the vinyl die-hards].

Although personally i've not had the pleasure of listening to the 84 CD, it may or may not be any good for all that so i don't like to comment upon it, and besides it's not the release in question as far as my recommendation on this thread.

After the release of the 2004 remaster (complete with the fabulous disc 2 of bonus material outtakes) there have been past forum quotes in reference to say it's far superior to the horrid original '84 version. I can't confirm this myself because i don't own an '84 version and also it's not what i'm contesting, i'm only reporting the facts that my 2004 remaster has the most wonderful reproduction, another fact is it's not anywhere near LOUDED and can be played at ones usual volume setting.

Also, you shouldn't just assume any given cd release automatically has the same qualities, as i pointed out before, they are made in different factories in US, Canada, EU, Australia, Japan, Brazil, Korea, who knows where etc.

A factory which made fine copies one year may change to a inferior blank-disc supplier and start producing poorer quality sounding cd's the following years.

This is marketing for money making profit after all, so their first concern is not about standards of quality.

http://www.stevehoffman.tv/for...wthread.php?t=161992

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