Re: Original Recording Reissued, Original Recording Remastered - Virgin 1994
Date: December 29, 2008 07:11
beware of 'better' verions or 'newly mastered' or 'remastered' etc..etc...blah blah...that kinda nonsense...much of what i've heard from the Stones and other great bands does not sound even close to the original stuff as approved and released by the artists and the original label....i hear crap on the radio, that is NOT in the best interest of peeps wanting to hear those original masterworks imo...steely thin digitalization of warm acoustics, electrics and wonderful singing, often sounds watered down...
everytime someone says with approval and excitement "you can hear things you NEVER heard before," i effin' cringe...
the market, for soap suds or muzic industry stuff, demands "NEW IMPROVED!!"_"NOW WITH (this or that crap)"
and to my ear, (i was a child abouty ten when the brit invasion hit and was already a huge fan of several early rockers and soul singers and got to experience all these classic albums as each and every one came out, and so spent a LOT of time with each album, waiting for the next release from my very favorites: stones, kinks, animals, yardbirds, beatles, who...)
and well, the original vinyl and first generations of cassettes, and yes even 8 track players, have wonderful fidelity in a (non digital) medium!!!...where they were created produced and released, envisioned and performed with such impact...
look i use cd's like everyone else and by no means think they are all shit, but i just say beware is all...those original artists are NOT as involved or caring as they were when a lot of this stuff was comptemporary for them....
i like the sound of the vl cd a lot...i do not know what's supposed to be 'better' than what the damn artists produced and released in the first place, when they were ON it and INTO it....
i'm sure it's been done 'right' by page himself in the case of zep, and others...
..but mostly i hate the steely miserable accentuation of stuff never meant to sound like that, or be that prominent, (which hides other more essential stuff potentially)...just my view...i turn on the radio and they played 'fool to cry' and it was a cringefest...then they played 'two of us' from 'let it be' and it sucked the energy out of the performances and felt very flat...and i KNOW these were good performances...I've HEARD them over and over again for so many years, and i personally feel that a lot of this stuff has been damaged and brought forth to newer and next generations, weaker, NOT stronger, that the orignals...
it takes one, imo, further and further away from these grand and beautiful and wildly exciting deep expressions of soul....
....totally off what the actual glims created, produced and released...it must be fun for 'new' fans or completists, but i really am not at ALL impressed with a lot of the absoulute crap that keeps getting further and further away from the original sonics, intent, and performances...
i realized that anything re-released has to be 'remastered' for duplications, but i think a lot of the people doing this stuff were NOT there to even hear or experience the original stuff, and have not a great perspective...so on comes more and more compression and DAMAGING eq, imo, not an improvement, but a devolution and depletion to some extent...
there is great stuff out there, but i say beware personally...
thnx for letting me sound off...