hi-fidelity...aka: as long as we're re reminiscing

Killjingle · Post by **Killjingle** » Tuesday Mar 28, 2006

I love listening to Hendrix's recordings.

If 6 Was 9, Voodoo Chile, Are You Experienced, Red House, are so incredibly intense to listen to ALL of the depth. The breathing. The white noise. The sound of the pick. The stereo movement. U can hear Jimi chewing gum in 6 Was 9 in the bridge. Most of his recordings still give me goosebumps. I cant even fathom how to put that much audio-orgasmic energy into a recording.

I love the ambiance of the Doors early albums.

Early Zeppelin has to get some props here as well.

I hate Mp3's... especially anything less than 160kbps... but it serves a purpose.

Banned · Post by **Banned** » Tuesday Mar 28, 2006

The album "Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus" by Spirit (1970) is very well recorded. They were going for that California psychodelic music for you head and it works.

Captain Beyond is well done, and an underappreciated album, "All The Young Dudes" by Mott the Hoople (produced, particall written by, David Bowie who also whales some mean sax on it)

I think today Zakk Wyld's albums (cd's) are well recorded.

Killjingle · Post by **Killjingle** » Tuesday Mar 28, 2006

I love Rubin's work on Cash's albums.

Rubin knows what not to clean up and to clean out, to not cut. Every now and then the guitar goes out of whack, it buzzes, it sounds a bit hot(fuzzy), to hear Johhny's voice tremble, to hear him gasp, to hear him breath.

I think too many producers are trying to pull those real elements out of music, because they want recordings to be "clear". I want to hear something new everytime I listen to a song. I want to hear my beard brush against the pop screen as I get ready yo enter into a new vocal passage. I want to hear the click of a stick that didnt quite hit the snare right, but yet that hit was oddly enough the instance that started off the chorus with a strange emotion. Sometimes its cool to hear the bass sort of burp a low note. To hear that pick squeal panned hard left and hard right, and they are slightly out of tune (just a few cents).

I love music more than anything... especially GOOD music.

lonewolf · Post by **lonewolf** » Tuesday Mar 28, 2006

I always thought the 44.1Khz sampling rate wasn't cutting it on the high end. I went thru all the math and FFT analysis on why compression should have a 20hz-20khz bandwidth, but when push comes to shove, those upper frequencies are only semi-accurately synthesized from sampled data.

For example. Both piano and piccolo have a range up to B7, or 7.9Khz

A piccolo has a simple rounded triangular waveshape whereas a piano has a very complex modulated waveshape.

If you sample 7.5Khz (Bb7) with each instrument at 44.1khz, you will only get 6 samples per waveshape. Raw data from both will look like a sawtooth wave. The FFT transform doesn't have much data to work with and it will not reproduce either sound accurately. They will sound roughly the same.

That is a fundamental frequency...imagine what it does to harmonics.

Gallowglass · Post by **Gallowglass** » Tuesday Mar 28, 2006

Killjingle was commenting on the unintended "real" noises that one can hear on recordings. I agree. I think of some of my favorite recordings and it is those sounds, the sound of a singer drawing a breath, or a pick scraping on the string that give life to a recording and make each take unique. Many of Jimi's recordings come to mind. I always noticed how on a lot of Black Sabbath recordings the sound of Tony's pick on the string is really distinctive. It's like an identifiable "stamp" that I associate w/ his tone. Same w/ a lot of Maiden. You can really hear how the pick touches the string. A lot of jazz records from the 60's have a great warm tone that is full of ambient noise. Many producers today would have a hernia trying to eliminate those sounds, consequently I find many of today's recordings to sound overproduced and lifeless-even though the "quality" of the sound may be pristine.

lonewolf · Post by **lonewolf** » Wednesday Mar 29, 2006

Many of Pink Floyd's old albums have all sorts of well placed add-in sounds, but I'd have to say that Dark Side Of The Moon has to be one of the all-time greats for this.

How many of you overlooked the fading heartbeat at the end and missed the comment:

"There is no dark side of the moon, really...matter of fact its all dark."

Staceman · Post by **Staceman** » Wednesday Mar 29, 2006

As far as good headphone music goes...

The obvious, Led Zeppelin's Whole Lotta Love, is great through headphones.

As are early Black Sabbath albums, especially the song After Forever off of Master of Reality, during the solo.

On a different note... back in the day I used to install and fix car stereos for friends. A song I always tested things with, was Hats Off To (Roy) Harper, from Led Zeppelin III. Since the vocals came from one speaker, and the guitar from the other, it was a great way to make sure the wiring was right and not shorted out anywhere to make it mono.

ASB10 · Post by **ASB10** » Wednesday Mar 29, 2006

There's also somehting to be said for spinning those bastards backwards. Recently while going through my vinyl collection, I noticed that on the inside of Motley Crue - Shout at the Devil, it states under the band pic "Caution:May contain backward messages"

I wonder if Dark Side would do anything when spun backwards...they are tricky enough to try shit like that

on another note...if anyone happens to have decent vinyl of Zeppelin 1 or Dark Side PM me if you would consider selling.....

Gallowglass · Post by **Gallowglass** » Wednesday Mar 29, 2006

Interesting point. When I was a kid my friend and I would sit around and try to play my albums backwards. I remember finding some cool shit on the intro to "Hell Awaits" by Slayer, "Still Life" by Maiden, something from Alice Coopers' "Special Forces" album, and others. We used to watch this guy who had some religious show who preached about the evils of rock music and used to make specific references to backwards masking messages. I had a lot of the albums he targeted. One day we tried the Holy Grail of backwards masking and played "Stairway to Heaven" backwards. I didn't really think we would find anything, but there is something interesting during the line, "As we wind on down the road, our shadows taller than our soul...". We always thought it said something like "Satan my sweet Satan", but it certainly could have been young minds reading into things. Anyone else try this? It would be interesting to see a thread develop for discovered/hypothesized backwards messages.

songsmith · Post by **songsmith** » Wednesday Mar 29, 2006

Rush -- 2112, Hemispheres, and Caress Of Steel
Floyd -- The Wall

The reasons beans and Rat Shack headphones were invented.

-------------->JMS

ZappasXWife · Post by **ZappasXWife** » Wednesday Mar 29, 2006

Love vinyl, but has anyone ever noticed how bad early Stones records sound, compared to other records of the day? It was mostly when their label was LONDON (still is? not sure). I don't necessarily dislike the Stones now, but back when I was first getting into rock in the 70's the sound of their records turned me off to them initially.
My guy got the deal of lifetime - drove past a yard sale, we stopped, and within 5 minutes he had bought an excellent pair of Yamaha speakers and a Bang & Olufson turntable (not a real old one either, and the cartridge is decent too) all for $20.00!
I myself inherited a B&O from a friend who passed away (one of those ones with linear tracking) but it needs a new cartridge....I have priced them and I can't even afford a new needle & cartridge for one of these things.

stlrzfan1 · Post by **stlrzfan1** » Thursday Mar 30, 2006

I can't really rember the specifics, but I read an article in rolling stone a few months ago about high end studio's being shuttered because artist's won't invest the money for the sound quality as the MP3 format renders it moot. (If your gonna steal music, you get what you pay for, Itunes does a much better job with digital clarity IMHO).
That said check out the SACD of Layla and other assorted love songs. Superb audio quality through-out but just being able to discern who is playing what during Layla is worth every cent I've spent on audio equipment. By the way I'm old enough to have listened to DSOTM (zoso, van halen 1, Boston 1, Trower Caravan to nowhere, etc)through "high" quality headphones (in an altered state of mind) and I think this is something that is lost.

stlrzfan1 · Post by **stlrzfan1** » Thursday Mar 30, 2006

caravan to midnight ( hang's head in shame)

bassist_25 · Post by **bassist_25** » Thursday Mar 30, 2006

I forget which one it is, but there's a Stones album that was recorded entirely with the guitar out of tune.

Bag · Post by **Bag** » Thursday Mar 30, 2006

E.L.P.'s "Brain Salad Surgery" was pretty cool on vinyl. Floyd's "The Wall" too.

greaser · Post by **greaser** » Thursday Mar 30, 2006

The Clash released "sandinsta" as a 3 record package in '79/'80. I gotta say that this album(s) is great on vinyl thru headphones...I know it might be hard to imagine a punk band putting out something like this, but if your into wax it is definatly worth checking out.

YankeeRose · Post by **YankeeRose** » Friday Mar 31, 2006

Oh yeah, ELP and for me, any Floyd goes without saying - on my list are also ELO's "Eldorado", Boston's 1st album and any number of Bowie, Cream, Kansas, etc.

I close my eyes and my brother and I are back in our parents' living room...we didn't have a fine audio system like many of you, but the Music played on just the same...
Thanks for the memories, yet again.

Banned · Post by **Banned** » Friday Mar 31, 2006

lonewolf wrote:I always thought the 44.1Khz sampling rate wasn't cutting it on the high end. I went thru all the math and FFT analysis on why compression should have a 20hz-20khz bandwidth, but when push comes to shove, those upper frequencies are only semi-accurately synthesized from sampled data.

For example. Both piano and piccolo have a range up to B7, or 7.9Khz

A piccolo has a simple rounded triangular waveshape whereas a piano has a very complex modulated waveshape.

If you sample 7.5Khz (Bb7) with each instrument at 44.1khz, you will only get 6 samples per waveshape. Raw data from both will look like a sawtooth wave. The FFT transform doesn't have much data to work with and it will not reproduce either sound accurately. They will sound roughly the same.

That is a fundamental frequency...imagine what it does to harmonics.

Some interesting shit. I actually understood some of it.

BTW what is your home audio setup these days?

rickw · Post by **rickw** » Friday Mar 31, 2006

It's really cool so many mention ELP! The quad thing again..... saw them at the civic arena on a starlit night (they actually opened the dome). Quad PA and Emerson's keys swirling 360 degrees.

songsmith · Post by **songsmith** » Saturday Apr 01, 2006

Right on, Lonewolf. What I hate about mp3 is that weird phasey robot sound on material with a lot of presence (8kHz and up) , like the live acoustic music I prefer. I do have a question, though... what is FFT analysis? it would help me understand better to know that.----->JMS