Is New Vinyl Exempt from Loudness Wars?
Lp2cd Lp2cd - can you tell us why this is with the Horseflies album. Why the sound would not translate well ? |
I'm not at all surprised by ct0517's finding of Natalie Merchant's work. I've never worked with Natalie, but I've known her in passing and also know several of the people she works with rather well. They all are VERY aware of their sound and the technical considerations that go into it. A group that Natalie has worked with, The Horseflies, recorded and produced a CD several years ago that still blows me away - "Until the Ocean". http://www.thehorseflies.com/store.htm Unique and phenomenal music, but also a remarkable and brilliant use of the best capabilities of digital studio production. Needless to say, it is not needlessly compressed. But for much the same reason, it's not available on LP, as I doubt that its sound would translate well to that medium. |
Again(since you brought it up)- A presentation, by Harman International:http://www.distortionofsound.com Another site that may be of interest to some: http://dr.loudness-war.info/ There are a number of LPs and their DRs listed. A search is available, via either artist or album title. Sorry, if others have already mentioned the site.. |
Here is one I find really interesting. Natalie Merchant. Tigerlily http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/list?artist=natalie+merchant&album=tigerlily+ Note the values for CD, Vinyl, HD Tracks, 2 lp 45 rpm vinyl (vinyl entry 2nd from bottom) |
Geoffkait re: Adele 25 I suspect the real question is, why are both formats so POOR? You know, on the Dynamic Range Database the lowest number for a rating of Good Dynamic Range is 14. The number 8-13 are transitional, and 1-7 represent BAD dynamic range. That DR database has been around forever and it pops up in forum discussions here and there. I do find it is pretty consistent but I have not let it guide my music buying. Its easy enough to look up on your phone when buying new or used music. Some findings. I played 3 new for me cd's including Adele 25. Diana Krall - Stepping Out '93, Adele 25, Bizet Carmen - Classical Gold '94 Diana Krall Stepping out from 1993 cd first. Set the preamp gain and volume levels. Enjoyable listen. Then I put the Adele 25 cd in. Holy moly. I stopped the cd bring out the Diana Krall Cd again, and start taking spl measurements - curious. The SPL Meter was set to 90 db as the midpoint for Krall's album. Peaking at the meter sitting next to me it went from low 80's - 95 db. With Adele 25 - no change in preamp settings, the SPL meter needed to be set at the next notch - 100 db midpoint (so as not to break the needle). The Adele 25 album in my room A went from 90 - 100+ db at my listening position about 13 feet from speakers. The space is easily pressurized by the speakers/amp. The 3rd Bizet cd - again enjoyable levels like the Krall CD. Diana Krall Stepping Out - The Early Recordings (original CD) 1993 13 12 15 lossless Unknown - All Green http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/list?artist=diana+krall&album= Bizet Carmen Classical Gold 1994 London Festival Orchestra - can't find this Cd on the database but it's a good recording. The Bizet's shown in the database high green marks. http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/list?artist=Georges%20Bizet Now here's the thing. Most long term audio music friends I know - have 2 if not more system kits set up in their house. With my two system kit setups In the room that plays full range and is easily pressurized I found the CD way overblown with huge bass extensions. And I say this as a music lover. But I am pretty sure from past music, since I haven't done it yet, in my example, if Adele 25 gets played in room B on the Quad 57 system with no sub/s and their 45hz limits - It will sound much more listenable. But the more important thing here to me - the music, and its message. I can see females blaring this out in their car with windows down. If they are I would steer clear of them. hold on - ok... put my teflon suit on. GK - so getting back to your question. Why are both formats so POOR ? and this thread's topic In this example the DR ratings show the vinyl album with slightly better transitional ratings versus the cd's poor ratings. Is vinyl enough to save this one ? Let someone come on hear and tell us since I haven't heard the vinyl. I do think if engineers think the music is going to played mostly in a car or mobile, they will turn up the bass. If they think its staying indoors on a turntable, they do what they can to make it better. In this case maybe just putting lipstick on a Pig ? They (engineers) know what they are doing. This is about making money. Look to the target audience. Happy (DR) Listening. |
Audiotomb, The simple answer is money. People will buy them because they think that new vinyl carefully remastered must sound better than the original stuff. Not so. Now, in most of the cases, the remastered stuff has been carefully remastered by very competent folks. I won’t mention names. The problem, as I have seen it, is HOW GOOD is the original master tape. Let’s just use an example of one of my fave classic rock bands; Jethro Tull. I’ve got original first pressing Island Pink,Chrysalis,Reissues by DCC,MoFi. The sound quality is all over the lot. Usually, I prefer first pressing stuff from Germany. Nothing sounds more open and real to me than those pressings. In the case of Aqualung, I’ve got just about all the important varieties including the Classic Records 45 rpm Clarity Vinyl version, and you know what ? They all sound like shit. Because, in a nutshell, the original master tape is just that. Not good. The Clarity Vinyl version is the best of the lot, but still not good. Sad, because I love Aqualung, and its hard for me to listen to any version. That said, most of my re-issue stuff ( and I’ve got a lot ), is very good. But there are some bad ones too. It’s hit or miss. The reviews by the major mags can help a little, but they don’t review them all, so you’re taking a chance. In many cases the master tapes are old and have degraded over time. Remember that the good first pressings were made from fresh master tapes, and the reissues were made from aged master tapes. The stuff from the 60’s and 70’s is now 40-50 yrs old. As an example, the last Doors re-issues that used the untouched master tapes were those by DCC. After that the master tapes had deteriorated so much that they needed some digital repair. That said, I have one of the box sets made that way and they are quite good. For the record, I’ve got a fair amount of Sundazed re-issues. Most of them are excellent, but not all. It’s hit or miss with those and any re-issue. Cheers, Crazy Bill P.S. I must disagree ( though only a little ) with Raul about forgoing vinyl and going all digital. While I still prefer vinyl over digital, digital has improved. And as Raul has correctly pointed out, to a point where it is crazy good and very real sounding. But be advised that I’m basing my findings on some very high end digital stuff. My stuff is pretty good ( computer source and three DACs: ifi IDAC2, Weiss DAC202, and Auralic vega played back through high end headphone set-ups ) My buddy’s set-up is actually surreal it’s so good, but between everything ( power,source,DAC and headphone set-up, we’re talking a quesstimate of 70-75K ). Right now, as I write this, I’m listening to the ifi through Sennheiser HD650 w/ Cardas cable, and I’m feeling no need to stop. For a diehard vinyl junkie like myself, that is saying a lot. So, while I myself will never give up vinyl, Raul’s advice could be totally appropriate for many of you. Cheers again, Crazy Bill |
Sound82 amen i switched my buying to used lps from the era unless there is a great analog review here The sound is so much more open the rare stylus damaged record even better finding first UK pressing sound better than my pristine japanese copies why do companies put out old reissues that sound terrible? 4 guys sundazed the Amy Winehouse releases the latest Peter Gabriel 45s etc |
"The Dr database reveals. http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/list?artist=adele&album= Adele 25 2015 ratings 05 - 04 - 08 lossless CD Adele 25 2015 11 - 09 - 12 lossless Vinyl Adele 25 (96/24 LP Needle Drop) 2015 11 - 09 -12 lossless Vinyl Why is vinyl rated higher ? Has anyone heard both the cd and vinyl versions ? Curious....." I suspect the real question is, why are both formats so POOR? You know, on the Dynamic Range Database the lowest number for a rating of Good Dynamic Range is 14. The number 8-13 are transitional, and 1-7 represent BAD dynamic range. If I'm not mistaken there’s actually a recording somewhere in the dynamic range database with a 0, zero, goose egg for dynamic range. So for the Adele releases listed above on the Database, both CD and vinyl, the numbers for Average, Lowest and Highest Dynamic Range are what should probably be described as abysmal. |
and if you analize the RIAA curve you can see that exist a significative compression in the bass frequency range that latter on the phono stage have to be " restablished " through another RIAA eq. degradation mechanism. It does not matters what any one name it of course exist that bass compression that as I said the digital alternative has not. Regards and enjoy the music, R. |
RR Mapman - Sounds right to me Are you sure Raul/Mapman. I think it depends on who is involved in doing the "audio job" from start to finish. And I give just one example from today. My wife brings home from shopping the Adele 25 cd. $12. She said they had stacks of the cd in the store - Costco. She saw me watching the NY concert so she bought it. I know Adele is really, really, popular at Audiogon - 8^0 - with two recent threads dedicated to her. So in the subject of this thread I look deeper into this. The Dr database reveals. http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/list?artist=adele&album= Adele 25 2015 ratings 05 - 04 - 08 lossless CD Adele 25 2015 11 - 09 - 12 lossless Vinyl Adele 25 (96/24 LP Needle Drop) 2015 11 - 09 -12 lossless Vinyl Why is vinyl rated higher ? Has anyone heard both the cd and vinyl versions ? Curious..... |
Dear mapman: Today the best 32/384 digital recordings ( if well recorded. ) playingback with units with 32/384 technology beats the analog experience. Today we are not on those old times of the CD " terrible sounds ". Digital grow up and still does and the players are improving day by day where the analog experience was not so dynamics in that grow up as digital. The true analog experienc at home is an expensive alternative on what we need for the LP really can shines: right TT, right cartridge ( more than one. ), right tonearm, right phono stage, right line preamp, etc, etc where that " right " means a expensive and well designed items. In my case I justify not only the very high analog experience price but the in deep learning knowledge and skills we need to " handle LPs" in the right way because I own over 6K LPs where many of them I can't get it in digital format. If you don't own a good number of LPs my advise is try to improve your digital alternative and just forget the analog experience. Analog alternative is full of anomalies and ditortions during playback and many of those anomalies starts in the recording " land ". Only to name one of those anomalies/added distortions exist two heavy equalizations proccess with an LP: RIAA equalization during the whole recording process and the inverse RIAA eq. during playback through the phono stage. In both cases both proccess makes a heavy degradation to the musical signal. These not happens with the digital alternative and many other " things ". I can tell you that I enjoy the music even in my car audio. Music has no " formats ", is just MUSIC. Regards and enjoy the music, R. |
"they will send the master digital file with the understanding that the LP mastering engineer will deal with it as needed. " Isn’t that pretty much what they sent the CD mastering engineer as well? The end result will depend mostly on what determines how it will be dealt with at that point. Is it individual discretion? Maximizing the sound quality? Or compromising it in some way for whatever other reason? My guess is as mentioned earlier it probably depends on the company and their target customers. That is assuming it costs more to produce a high quality product than otherwise, which is usually the case. Costs will be managed accordingly and differently by maker. In the end is it any different than last go round with records? Most are compromised (like CDs) but a few labels (and maybe some particular artists with clout) focus on sound quality more than others. Those are the ones that might be worth it it seems to me. Unless one just likes to play records regardless (we already know how that ended last time). In the end it sounds like a very mixed bag, not any different than CDs, except with a format where the ceiling is theoretically higher at least in terms of dynamic range, something mostly only select few audiophiles with really good systems might care about. Resolution as well but the actual significance of the technical differences there are even more debatable. And only a very few these days would even begin to think about large format tape formats, which is probably the only format historically that most would agree is the real champ. High res digital can stake a claim even today I think in some cases if one looks hard enough. Someday perhaps not too far off I expect high res digital will in fact gain traction and exclusively claim a significant niche as the high end for home audio fidelity. Records may survive as well not so much because of sound quality but because records are a nice product you can hold, read look at whatever, you know, teh physical connection that we largely lost with tiny CDs. |
When the vinyl is cut from a digital master the engineer must TONE THIS DIGITAL MASTER LOUDNESS FACTOR DOWN. He/she has no choice on this because of actual physical limitations with the cut grooves on the record, and noise itself. This statement does not sound right. We've yet to encounter a digital master file that we had to 'tone down'; what you are dealing with here is simply that you have to find the right level to get everything in the groove (so this could be simple semantics), but IME you don't have to limit or compress the signal going into the grooves to do that. You don't have to limit the bass either. You do have to be on the lookout for out of phase bass, which can occur in multi-tracked recordings; this can be dealt with by a passive process that senses the out-of-phase bass and makes it mono below a certain frequency for a few milliseconds. But if you are careful and spend some time with the recording, quite often even that process can be avoided simply by changing the groove depth and perhaps adjusting the overall level by a db or so. One or 2 db can have a huge effect when mastering an LP; -3 db means half as much power in the cutterhead- half as much excursion. So reducing the level by only a db might be all that is needed to make the project work, and in the end result that db is hardly audible. It really comes down to production- if the producer is smart they won't send the LP mastering house the same file that was used to master the CD (which often has limiting, EQ and compression), instead they will send the master digital file with the understanding that the LP mastering engineer will deal with it as needed. But in all cases the LP is being mastered with something very much like the master digital file, whereas the CD likely is not. Further, people do still master with analog tape, which is great when it happens. This is why the LP usually sounds better- its closer to the source if nothing else. |
The Dynamic Range Database is a good resource for comparing new vinyl and CD releases, at least in terms of raw dynamic range: http://dr.loudness-war.info/ The vinyl releases aren't always there, but are listed enough such that I use it as a resource when buying new vinyl. It's also interesting to look at older releases and compare the CD and vinyl versions. |
Speaking as someone who masters for production, I can tell you that, broadly, everything said above is true. Essentially, it is all in the mastering, and there is no reliable way to tell if a given LP has been mastered appropriately for that medium. Proper LP mastering is distinctly different from CD mastering in nearly all cases. With LPs, there is no absolute 0 dBFS ceiling to compress up against, as well as a number of other aspects of LP production that require very different mastering considerations. (That’s why LP vs. CD "shootouts" of the "same" recording are, in nearly all cases, simply bogus.) But none of that means that the same, highly compressed, CD master can’t, with some exceptions or minor modifications, be cut to an LP. The LP in that case will likely sound like crap, quite possibly worse even than the "identical" CD, but there is no way for the buyer to know that in advance. I work with both LPs and digital media a lot. As far as I’m concerned, except as an artifact and as still arguably the best archival media, LPs should otherwise be obsolete. There is no theoretical reason why Redbook CDs, respectfully and properly mastered, shouldn’t in all cases sound as good as or better than any LP. The fact that they often don’t speaks more to the irresistible temptation to abuse the remarkable power of digital technology than to some intrinsic sonic superiority of the LP. In short, I’m sorry, but, as a consumer, there is no reliable and consistent answer to your question. Good luck and more’s the pity. |
It's hit or miss with the new stuff, for reasons stated above. You have to make sure where it's sourced from. However, if you go with the established re-issue labels, such as MoFi, DCC, Classic Records and many others, it's clearly stated the records were cut from the original masters, i.e. analog. Do a little research. There are MANY vinyl records being re-issued from many, many labels now that go back to the ORIGINAL ANALOG MASTERS. I'd give some links here to internet sellers that specialize in this. There is a TON of good stuff out there sourced from the original analog masters. However, I don't know if it's allowed to give a direct link in this case. If it is, someone please advise and I'll throw a few out there. If it's not and you want to know, send me an e-mail and I'll answer directly. I've got a LOT of the re-issue stuff, and it's very,very good. WAY Better than any CD version, and usually better than hi-res digital files. Be advised, as a disclaimer, I am a resolute vinyl junkie. To me the best vinyl always trumps the best digital. Cheers, Crazy Bill |
Mapman - what follows is a copy and paste of some of the research I did and posted on my system thread on Loudness Wars. you might recall seeing it? Due to the unfinished state of virtual systems I am not able to link it, so I copy part of it here as I feel it is relevant to your thread. I spoke with Maegan Ritchat of Lacquer Channel a couple of times last year about this to get some answers about Loudness Wars and the real differences I hear between Vinyl and Cd. http://lacquerchannel.com/the-engineers/maeghan-Ritchat/ Lacquer Channel is one of the largest mastering studios in Canada. translated from my conversation with Maegan. ********************************** When the vinyl is cut from a digital master the engineer must TONE THIS DIGITAL MASTER LOUDNESS FACTOR DOWN. He/she has no choice on this because of actual physical limitations with the cut grooves on the record, and noise itself. For example. If the band is bass heavy like a rock or reggae band, the bass may need to be filtered at 40 hz, or put into mono below 40 hz. This prevents the grooves from being cut too wide (<------->) and even running into one another. One of the factors deciding this is how long the songs run on the vinyl side being cut. On the high frequency end depending on how SSSSShhhhh or how Tizzy the digital file sounds; if it was captured sounding a little harsh, a 16k filter can be used as one option with the vinyl. Just one reason vinyl may sound a little more rolled off, smoother, compared to its digital equivalent on some records. The end result is a less fatiguing sound with vinyl, once this "loudness" has been toned down. Maegan said in her experiences to date with customers who have heard digital and vinyl from redbook CD level source files on resolving systems...customers generally prefer the vinyl. So a couple reasons above why the sound differs between the vinyl and cd, even though the digital master might have been done at 44,1k Hz 16 bits the red book cd standard. Now if the Digital master file is higher than the CD standard 44,1khz. 16 bits This leads to... the second finding and Higher Rez files. When Higher Rez Digital files are available like 96khz/24 bit or higher - it makes sense to use them and these are indeed usually used for the vinyl cut. So when you buy the vinyl you are probably getting the LP's made from the higher rez files if available. Maegan confirmed this. This however would need to be confirmed on a per LP basis with the mastering studio involved. The genre makes a difference from a general perspective. She agreed that Classical, Opera and Jazz for example are in general terms, better files to begin with, in that they are more dynamic than your typical rock, pop group digital masters which have more loudness factor and compression. |
My experience has been mixed. I though the Annie Lennox and Bennet/Gaga LPs from last year excellent while Florence & The Machine's How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful was compressed garbage. I also found Adele's 21 almost unlistenable in both CD and LP - compressed with annoyingly audible distortion. I believe it's all in the mastering. Good masters sound good, bad ones don't. Happy listening! |
Don, I know its all digital but that does not preclude having a superior recording in terms of dynamic range on a record compared to CD. Its all a matter of how done and who is the target audience. I suspect new vinyl targets the masses and is not up to potential as a result. Mostly the same mastering as on CD but released on vinyl for something new to sell. But I’m hoping I’m wrong. I would buy new vinyl releases of some popular recordings I like if I felt confident that the vinyl product is superior. My daughter has bought one or two new records recently. One is Thriller. I’ll have to give it a listen and compare. Of course that is one of the best quality original pop recordings of all to start with. You’d think the recording industry would learn that you have to deliver an exceptional product in all regards to have success like that. Will be interested to hear how the new vinyl sounds. |
Atmasphere I know it can be different for that reason. My question is if it is in fact done that way? What is the intended audience? Audiophiles that care about the best possible sound or Iphone and Bluetooth speaker users looking for a new toy? At Urban Outfitters on 5th ave Manhattan, over the holidays, they had a large section dedicated to electronic toys. It included things from the cheapest Crosley to several entry level turntables. Also a decent selection of new records $30 a pop or more. I wonder if the records are made to just sell new junk to the masses or to truly take advantage of the format? I suspect the former to a large extent. A lot of the new record releases had nice packaging and artwork, etc. and seemed substantial, but is that just a glossy package? |
