Question for those with “Golden ears”, and a frustration! (The Loudness Wars)


Hello! My first text! My user name, is short for my Companies name.
  Anyway, I ALWAYS wondered, which sounds better to you with $$$$ equipment? The Led Zeppelin Rhino Black box of Japanese made, mini copies of the record album sleeves CD’s of ALL the albums? Or, the large sized four CD disk boxset with the crop circle picture on the front(1990 release?), and the later small box, that had the songs missing from the four box “crop circles” box? The mini-album Japanese CD’s sound pretty damn good to me!  Any thoughts? Which sounds better to you? Those with CD based systems I can only dream of owning?  As to my rant, I went to the Wiki article of: The Sound Wars! And there was a link where you can put in your CD or album title and artist, and it tells you if it’s been compressed(LOUD!), or, not. Specifically: CD’s, (if it’s compressed, the VU meters will stay locked in the red) My favorite Fleetwood Mac CD, The Dance, all in the RED, BAD! 😢 U2’s Joshua Tree (special boxed edt.) All in the GREEN (GOOD). But I swear, the drums/cymbals, IMO, sound awful on that CD! Especially the cymbals! NEVER could find a good sounding Joshua Tree CD that the drums and cymbals sounded good. 🙁 That was my FAVORITE concert!!! 4’th. row seats!! AWESOME! Other albums, NIN CD’s all in the red, Van Halen as well. And the worst, totally unlistenable, got it for Christmas many years ago, Led Zep., The Mothership CD’s. 🤮

Thank you all!!!
savroof9849

Showing 3 responses by arcticdeth

Most original LP releases sounded better. 
 Love the Japanese releases of everything, they just sound better.


  They lose and gain something when transferring to a CD. 
  My dogs will not stay in the room for long when a cd is playing.  They will lay next to me or in the room when an LP is spinning. 
 
Picked up a few of scorpions CDs from Japan few years ago.
the shrill highs are so up front and in your face, I sold them and dug out my old Mercury and bmg releases of them on cd. 
 They are so bad, I think of the sound even now, I press my jaw together and hope it’s over soon.


anyone else get some of those scorpions releases on cd?

  
Worst gripe for me. 
  The CDs that are recorded so loud, the music distorts and gets too loud way to early on the volume knob. Drives me nuts. 
 I will put the cd on my cheap 99$ computer, run it through audiolab 3.0 and lower the entire album to a more listenable level.
then record to a cdr. Sounds much better to me this way. 
 Not a fan of 3000 decibel recordings on newer CDs (some)