Why the Stones? Why not some music that could benefit from the better sound quality of SACD? Obviously, the record companies are trying for something with immediate sales potential. I think that most people interested in the Stones would have their stuff on LP or CD or both. Very strange move since you can get Beatles on CD at discount prices up here in Montreal, but ABKCO, in all their wisdom, apparently insist on retail price maintenance so the price of a CD of early Stones stuff is around $31.99 a piece. If you add our sales taxes, that's another 15%. The only good thing is that ABKCO may have finally realised that more volume could be had by lowering the price. What it all means here in Canada is anyone's guess. I know that, since my LPs were so old side B played on Side A, earlier this year I ordered "England's Newest Hit Makers", "Out of our Heads", "Rolling Stones Now!" and "December's Children" on CD from Amazon. It was cheaper than buying locally. Now low priced SACDs. What will they think of next? I bought a Sony SCD XP-670 for $200.00 CDN (a model not available in the US, it seems). I have all of two SACDs at present and with the prices anywhere from $38.99 to $45.99 for a single disc up here (+tax) , I doubt I will be the one whose purchases will save this new format. I see that most recordings available are of old chestnuts (Bruno Walter's "Pastorale", Glenn Gould's Goldberg Variations, Miles Davis' Kind of Blue, etc.), all stuff I have on LP and on CD. No compelling reason to repurchase everything on SACD. The fact that the multi-channel thing is seen as some kind of adjunct to 5.1 HT is not the best guarantee that audiophiles will buy into the format and run out to buy it. The vast majority of users would not know what to do with any added resolution and general improvement of sound quality, since it is wasted on portable players and boom boxes anyway. The only hope, HT system owners wanting high quality audio. Too bad, because despite disparaging remarks from diehard stereo only proponents, multi-channel, for ambiance at least, is a distinct advantage over stereo. I used the JVC XP-A 1010 processor for over a decade and mc adds tremendously to the listening experience. Ambiance synthesis is not a perfect solution, but at least it is user adjustable so that the listener is not at the mercy of a fanciful recording engineer. SACD may very well falter.
Stones on SACD - Tempting?
With the announcement of a large number of Rolling Stones reissues on hybrid-SACD, done by a well respected recording engineer, is SACD-capability in your system more likely? There's no question in my mind that this is the right type of thing to energize the market for SACD, though for me personally this announcement won't push me over the edge. If this happened for, say, three of my favorite longtime bands, coupled with a half dozen new releases I was interested in being released in hybrid-SACD format as one of their initially released formats, I would get SACD capability for my system in some form.
Even if it doesn't prompt me to buy SACD capability immediately, it's nice to know I can purchase the hybrid discs and use them until I get SACD capabilty. So, they might not sell me a player yet, but they'll probably sell me a couple more discs than I would have bought. -Kirk
Even if it doesn't prompt me to buy SACD capability immediately, it's nice to know I can purchase the hybrid discs and use them until I get SACD capabilty. So, they might not sell me a player yet, but they'll probably sell me a couple more discs than I would have bought. -Kirk