I get a little tired of reading posts about what a great recording this is or that is (posting stuff myself).
What about crappy music? What about crappy music recorded crappily? These are just some crap highlights of my collection…
Ok, I will start:
Pat Benatar: I used to enjoy her and Neil’s stuff… never loved it… Love is a Battlefield is probably the best quality recording of the bunch… most are crap.
Acid House Kings - Sing Along with Acid House Kings … Swedish band… I like this band… a bit of an embarrassment… I don;t think they are crappy but I bet you would
.38 Special. Crap.
Brown Sabbath. Crap… but check them out! Really interesting crap.
Bush. Crap. Sorry, it is crap… no really… crap… yes I am talking to you! They are crap.
Cher… gak… barf… yes I actually have one of her discs and use it in case of poisoning… if you swallow something poisonous, play this disc… barf… up it comes.
I have a lot (I mean a LOT) of cdrs made from cds, LPs, and tapes of collector material from Hendrix, Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk, Charles Mingus, Duke Ellington and others from years of trading with collectors. MANY, many cdrs. I had a lot of fun making cover art for them, and getting them to sound their best. Some sound good, a lot sound . . . well not good. Many persons wouldn’t listen to them, but I will, I know how to listen into them and beyond the limitations. Some incredible music!
Crappy music? I’m sure there are some that I listen to others would call “crappy,” but I don’t keep it myself if I consider it “crappy.”
I have quite a bit of badly recoded music. Mostly early 90s CDs. Even when I go to listen to music at dealers and friends house I will take some badly recorded music. The reason is because I love the artist and the song. Back when I use to be an “Audiophile” I found myself listening to about 10% of my collection. I would put something on and all I would think about was how I could improve things. You know how can I make the soundstage wider, what if I change this piece of gear, what if I try this tweak, etc.
Now I consider myself a music lover and not an Audiophile. Being a music lover I just love to listen to music.
You are brave. I have been soundly pilloried for posting an opinion which only leaned toward the negative. Many people are very sensitive when it comes to their musical taste.
While I have no personal attachment to any of the music mentioned. I have heard of some of them. I don’t find it brave to insult bands that others may enjoy.
Quality of a recording, sure mention it, but content is telling someone that your taste in music is better than theirs.
There are a number of MTV era bands that I find overrated, but I see no point in posting their names.
We are getting older, it is easy to hear artists on SNL or any of the late night shows and not understand why they are popular. I can still remember my Dad going off on The Beatles, “that’s not music”. His musical journey ended with the big band era. Yet my Mother, who still had an open mind liked some of the new music.
We all started somewhere, what someone is calling crap, may have led to a lifelong love of music.
IMO the whole topic is bad. It helps no one.
These poorly recorded albums come to mind:
Parliament Mothership Connection
Hank Williams Jr Greatest hits
Most early Chuck Berry
I’m sure I have lots more but none come to mind at this second
I don’t have any that I wont listen to just because they are poorly recorded.I do have a few that I just don’t like the music and they have only been played once or twice
Bruce
Most of Duane Eddy on Jamie and the early Rolling Stones are pretty badly recorded and no amount of skilled remastering even by Tom Moulton (of Duane Eddy) appears to be able to bring out the best in these tapes.
On the topic of remastering I’d like to ask a question. Why is the SACD version of an album automatically considered to be superior to the Redbook?
With 3.13 on my DMP, I am getting to a stage where the system is sounding really, really good. In fact, The Olympics DDC CD released in the late 80s sounds surprising good.
I have various versions of Otis Redding’s "Otis Blue:, # 78 on Rolling Stone’s Greatest Albums of All Time, vinyl and rebook CD. I also have it on SACD and paid a pretty penny for it. I’ve listened to it once or twice and been totally unimpressed - the sound is flat and totally lacking in the characteristic Stax bass even compared with the UK vinyl version in mono I bought in 1966. Rationalizing that the DMP with 3.13 and the DSD with Snowmass was as good as my system can be, I played the SACD at a volume level of 45 on the BHK Preamp and racked it up to 55. The sound was meh. I then listed to the Rhino 2CD release mastered by Bill Inglot and Dan Hersch and both the mono and stereo versions of Otis Blue sounded so much better at a volume of 45 than the SACD. Dire Straits on SACD is an improvement on the Redbook, why does Otis Blue not achieve the same distinction?
Totally depends on the mastering, CD can be much better. Just often on the same hybrid discs, where CD and SACD layer have different masterings, the SACD mastering is better as then it’s mostly the improved one and they left an old simple mastering on the CD layer.
SACD or other hi-rez formats are all founded on the source tape. The source tape may not be “The Tape”. Master does not mean original. Record companies are infamous for not knowing the provenance of a given tape, or where “The Tape” is located or even exists.
I have a checkbook and am ready to buy hi-rez downloads… got my DS DAC… ready to play those beautiful hi-rez files… NOT… I keep getting burned on downloading classic music in hi-rez format… my old CDs just sound better. Its all in the provenance.
This industry sure knows how to screw up a good thing.
Its not the mastering… mastering is only a final tweak to whatever file the last company/process received to then make the sellable format. The word “Master” implies something it is not. The tape that is the “best”, is usually the “Source Tape”… goes by a few names. This is the mixdown from production. Folks incorrectly think this is the master… it is not. A master may be a copy of a copy of a copy… that last tape, or whatever, is given to someone/company to tweak it for final conversion/transfer to a sellable medium… that medium could be a downloadable file, or squeezed onto a CD… or SACD etc. That last step is called Mastering… a word that is very misunderstood. Mastering may include compression, expansion, equalization, limiting, stereoizing… whatever.
Note I said “usually” the source tape is the best… but not always. George Martin was furious when someone put out Beatles releases (one of the many re-re-re-re release cycles) and did not master the tape. The intent was to put out the “best” possible sound. Well… Mr Martin purposly mixed down the Beatles “hot” or unnaturally bright. He did this because he knew the tape would be continually copied multi-generation and distributed around the world to record processing plants. When tapes are copied and then copies made of that one, the first thing to go is the top end. Mr Martin expected whoever to then cut the discs to apply equalization to lower (if needed at this point) the high frequencies… (this is mastering). So the moral: not all source tapes are good for distribution.
I have a German print of Rubber Soul where the left channel is completely… yes completely different from the right. The intent was to mix it down for mono or processed for stereo. Cool but terrible.
You are not at all arrogant. You are spot on that ultimately, it is what you like in a recording. I have two main issues: 1) that we understand the typical process and use the right words (and there is no “official” lexicon), and B) That the record companies sell us their highest quality product. Just because something is hi-rez does not mean it is the highest quality version of that recording out there. I have been burnt by buying older recordings in hi-rez. I want hi-rez. But I am learning that what I really want is high-quality first.
These L2 recordings are some of the best quality I have ever heard. http://www.2l.no/hires/index.html
Mastering shmastering… they are great.
