About Compression,
One of my long time complaints against overly compressed audio has been
from hearing both on FM and AM broacast, the active compressors
broadcasters use to make their signal " louder " in relation to each
other. To the point of being unlistenable....IMNSHO
Compression does helps AM get more volume for the RF power involved
without overmodulation.
I wonder if the record companies aren't trying to emulate what the
broadcast industry has given the public for years ?
Does any one of this generation really know how uncompressed audio is
supposed to sound ? The phrases compressed and uncompressed are in this
case not related to digital processing.
Of course, take a music CD which already has too much compression to
it, and run it through a agressive broadcast level compressor and I
don't see how AYTHING could sound acceptable !! All broadcasters aren't
guilty of this.
My 2 bits...
BH
scottp@xxxxxxxxx 6/17/2006 1:03 PM >>>
It was the good cop / bad cop part of recording/mixing/mastering
before
CD's. There were so many technical restrictions placed on recordings
because of the limitations from multiple end uses/users of a recording
that everyone had to actually understand all the details. Phasing,
play
times, levels, and dynamic range had to be just right, and multiple
versions made for various media use. Remember different cutting levels
or low end that had to be different for songs on the outside vs. the
inside of an LP? I have great respect for Bob and/or any good
mastering
engineer and what they have had to contend with.
The learning curves were painful for everyone, myself included.
However,
I think that the forced discipline was a very good thing, listening to
clipped/compressed-to-death 'modern' CD's. I often wonder if someone
decided to just let the compressors do the mixing for them. Not the
CD's
fault I think, just the industry's abuse of the tools to make them...
I'd be interested in Goran's opinion on this.....
Enough of my rant..!
Scott
:>)
-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
[mailto:ARSCLIST@xxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Richard L. Hess
Sent: Saturday, June 17, 2006 11:16 AM
To: ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Stereo records.
I recall the mastering...and remastering of "Organs of New York Vol I"
that Bob Ludwig did for me. While I could track the original test
pressing on my Technics SL-1100A and Stanton 681 EEE cartridge, the
organist couldn't track it on her turntable. Sadly, I had made a
mistake
of giving her a Shure M55 (IIRC) ... the operative word is giving...
She was incensed that (a) I gave her something inferior and (b) that
it
wouldn't track HER record we actually cancelled the project at one
point
and I sent money back to pre-paid orders. It finally came out, but it
was my last LP. Two tracks from it have been re-released on a Priory
Records CD.
Anyway, from then on, I used ORTF recording rather than widely spaced
omnis which sounded better...
Cheers,
Richard
At 12:04 PM 6/17/2006, Scott Phillips wrote:
I was around Criteria Studios in Miami in the -80's as chief
maintenance engineer. I recall that our disk mastering consoles did
have variable low end 'crossovers' that could be set to combine to
mono
at whatever frequency you wanted. It was never used on tapes made in
our studio, but outside tapes sometimes did because of poor
recording/mixing engineering or phase shift from inexpensive mixers in
the record process. If you didn't watch out, you'd cut a master that
had low end that either couldn't be tracked by a consumer grade
turntable, or wouldn't allow you to cut at decent levels or playing
time.
I agree, mixing/mastering without a scope around is not a good idea,
and even back in the '-70's' every recording studio and mastering room
I was involved with used one at virtually all times.
Richard L. Hess email: richard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Aurora, Ontario, Canada (905) 713 6733 1-877-TAPE-FIX
Detailed contact information:
http://www.richardhess.com/tape/contact.htm
Quality tape transfers -- even from hard-to-play tapes.