Great sounding records... with awful, awful music

[Lisandro_P]

Has this ever happened to you? You fall in love with the way a record *sounds*, but just can't stand the music. A friend of mine brought Linkin Park's "Meteora", and while i can't stand that band the production is so good i gave it a few listens before i really had to change it . It's a pitty, i know some great bands (take Gravity Kills for that kind of music), that doesn't get that kind of recording quality, and most probably never will.

The reverse works too... my previous copy of Pink Floyds' "The final cut" (not the digitally remastered one) was pretty much a digitalization of the vinyl LP... love that album, but when i finally heard the new version it was like removing a q-tip from my ears.

[DrewP]

Find this very hard to comment on. If the music is shite, I'll very quickly "turn off" and will tend to ignore the production. The entire system goes into shutdown

Crystal clear and precise reproduction of dross is still dross. I'm afraid "garbage in, garbage out" still holds true here, even for well produced garbage.

Of course, the opposite also holds. Take "Anchorage" from Michelle Shocked, "Short, Sharp, Shocked". Absolutely stunning and sublime track. Georgeous piece of music, rarely listen to it cos the production is shite. BUT I rate it as a perfect piece of the songwriters art (and if you've ever heard her sing it live...)

Converesly, there are Chesky and numerous other special demo tracks that may be technically the ducks guts, but if I don't like the music, forget it.

People often waffle on about high end stereo systems giving them goosebumps and chills down the neck. To me, this is crap.
Play me Jennifer Warnes doing "The Song of Bernadette" even on a shitty midi system and I'll get chills and shivers, no lack of prodution or reproduction can kill the feeling, images and so forth that this song evokes. To say you need a megadollar system to give you chills is to say that you're academic with little/no appreciation for a good song.

Of course, this is Just IMHO and should be filtered through 4 beers and a large glass of good South Australian red.

Enjoy the brilliant music and sod the production I say.

Wine will make the production irrelevant, crap songwriting is unredeemable.

Drew

[mrfeedback]

Play me Jennifer Warnes doing "The Song of Bernadette" even on a shitty midi system and I'll get chills and shivers, no lack of prodution or reproduction can kill the feeling, images and so forth that this song evokes

And on a good system that track almost gives me a hard on.

Eric.

[Brett]

Originally posted by DrewP
Find this very hard to comment on. If the music is shite, I'll very quickly "turn off" and will tend to ignore the production. The entire system goes into shutdown

Crystal clear and precise reproduction of dross is still dross. I'm afraid "garbage in, garbage out" still holds true here, even for well produced garbage.

Agreed.

Of course, the opposite also holds. Take "Anchorage" from Michelle Shocked, "Short, Sharp, Shocked". Absolutely stunning and sublime track. Georgeous piece of music, rarely listen to it cos the production is shite. BUT I rate it as a perfect piece of the songwriters art (and if you've ever heard her sing it live...)

I play it a lot and don't care whatsoever about the production quality. Maybe I'm lucky because the first copy I ever found was a Japanese import at $A35, so maybe it's been tweaked. Not the best production, but, not vomitous.

Arkansas is my fave disc and I have the entire catalogue now except for Artists Make Lousy Slaves. Don't have a spare copy?

As for live, did you see her at Easter? Awesome, but the only problem was the set length was too restricted by the Bluesfest format. I was one row back from the front fence, just off centre. Didn't even matter that I was nearly drowned on the way in....

People often waffle on about high end stereo systems giving them goosebumps and chills down the neck. To me, this is crap.

Hell my crappy standard Fairmont sound system gives me goosebumps

[SY]

Do NOT get me started about the crap that audiophiles play over and over and over. And we can start with Casino Royale.

When I was in grad school, I helped make ends meet by building amps and preamps. It came as a shock to me that nearly all my customers had unbelievably elaborate and expensive sound systems, and averaged 10 records apiece. And the records always included such musical "gems" </sarcasm off> as The Track Record, Jazz at the Pawnshop, and Amanda McBroom. There may have been an exception, but damned if I can remember even one. This was the beginning of my continuing deep cynicism regarding high-end audio.

[janneman]

Musical beauty is in the ears of the beholder

Jan Didden

[Brett]

Originally posted by SY
Do NOT get me started about the crap that audiophiles play over and over and over. And we can start with Casino Royale.

When I was in grad school, I helped make ends meet by building amps and preamps. It came as a shock to me that nearly all my customers had unbelievably elaborate and expensive sound systems, and averaged 10 records apiece. And the records always included such musical &quot;gems&quot; &lt;/sarcasm off&gt; as The Track Record, Jazz at the Pawnshop, and Amanda McBroom. There may have been an exception, but damned if I can remember even one. This was the beginning of my continuing deep cynicism regarding high-end audio.

Well, the Track Record is worth having as a test disc, but not to actually listen to, and Cardiganed Swedes Do Bad Jazz makes a muso friend of mine laugh. He swears it has to be a pysstake*.

It's fun on boring days sometimes to go to a High End store to audition gear, then ask to play "Won't Get Fooled Again" by the Who, loud, and watch the cat-bottom faces appear on the saleshacks.

*This was the spelling I learned whilst undergoing 'sensitivity training' at the local wymyn's collective.

[SY]

If a system can't do The Who at concert level, it has no place chez moi.

Hey, I've got a new word today, "pysstake." I've heard a similar-sounding word to describe what happens when you laugh a bit too hard. As I almost did at your post.

[fdegrove]

Hi,

Cheers,

[jh6you]

Do you know Japanese famous audio magazine, Stereo Sound?
In the magazine, one audio critic visited an audiophile who is owning a dream-set of high-end audio equipment at home. If I name the names of the equipment, everybody will easily know them. By the way, the audiophile said to the critic, I hardly listen to songs from the beginning to the end, not even one song. I just listen to the parts where there are nice sounds. -- The end of a non-fiction --