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Re: [ARSCLIST] Cedar, was: Aren't recordings original sources?

No, I was talking about CD's. Low-grade lossy downloads are something that only the foolish pay money for.

CD's aren't antiquated because they necessarily sound bad -- in fact there are plenty of examples where they sound great if proper care is taken during recording and mastering -- it's that they are inconvenient for most users and are overpriced (note that pricing has crept back up to where it was during the collusion of the 1990's).

A properly-valued model would have at least CD-resolution individual songs available for download at $1 or so and CD-length albums for $8 or so. This would still be very profitable because there would be zero manufacturing costs and very low distribution costs. Plus, if the megaglomerates had one inkling of future-thinking or basic business acumen, they'd be selling directly to customers rather than paying a middleman fee to Apple and others.

The low-grade lossy stuff should be commodity priced, around 25 cents per song or a couple bucks per album. This price point is low enough that there will be a quantity leading to plenty of revenue and also it's a good entry point for someone who either doesn't care about sound quality but wants zillions of tunes in their iPod or someone who wants to try out an artist or, for instance in the case of a jazz fan like me, save a little dough on albums I know were poorly recorded so stand little chance of sounding good in any resolution.

As an aside, Apple's standard iTunes format works just fine for older recordings, mono material sourced from disks or early tape masters, if the A-D transfer was done right, especially over earbuds. No, it won't work to play back those files over a big corner horn to try to get every last ounce of music out of the signal -- a lot of it was stripped out by the lossy format. I'm just saying that, for car or earbud listening, the format is not as objectionable with that kind of format as with higher-fidelity stereo material, which tends to be plagued by digi-swishies and other super-annoying artifacts.

Back to the main point, today's technology also offers the opportunity to offer for download better-than-CD resolution. Some small players (Chesky, for example) are dipping toes in these waters. But this is another factor making the physical CD sold in retail stores an antiquated way of selling recorded music.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- From: "Clark Johnsen" <clarkjohnsen@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, October 24, 2008 2:06 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Cedar, was: Aren't recordings original sources?


On Fri, Oct 24, 2008 at 1:54 PM, Tom Fine <tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>wrote:

Given the current state of the music business, I would say consumers are
voting with their wallets. I definitely believe that part of the business
cratering is due to putting out an overpriced, bad quality product in a
format that has been antiquated.


You're speaking of course about MP3...

clark



-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- From: "Clark Johnsen" <clarkjohnsen@xxxxxxxxx
>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, October 24, 2008 1:02 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Cedar, was: Aren't recordings original sources?


On Thu, Oct 23, 2008 at 7:29 PM, Tom Fine <tflists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>wrote:

Well, I'm certainly not vain enough to speak for anyone else on this list,
but ...

Then we apparently don't have on this list the majority of reissue
producers and remastering engineers out there. Their lousy work speaks
for
itself.



And there you have it!

But one must wonder whether joining this list would serve the cause.

Perhaps an outreach effort should be made?

clark



-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- From: "Parker Dinkins" <
parker@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, October 23, 2008 6:20 PM

Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Cedar, was: Aren't recordings original sources?


I think most people here are aware of all that.


--
Parker Dinkins
CD Mastering + Audio Restoration
http://masterdigital.com


on 10/23/08 3:53 PM US/Central, Tom Fine wrote:

Not when it's overused and sucks what little life is left out of the

sound.
With all digital NR, it's a very fine line between slightly improving
clarity
and sucking the air, space and depth out of the sound. My own bias is
always
toward less but I've made and heard others' examples of judicious use
of
digi-tools where audibility and clarity are improved. Rare with
well-recorded
full-range music; the trained ear seems to prefer some hiss or surface
noise
with the entire pallet of music as opposed to a quieter background with
some
colors muted.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message -----
From: "Parker Dinkins" <parker@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, October 23, 2008 3:52 PM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Cedar, was: Aren't recordings original sources?


Tom Fine wrote:


Also, many 78 transfers made for CD sets are awful. People do seem to

lop
off the bass -- these records had plenty of low end, it was the TOP
end
where they had no musical content. Yet people roll off the bass
(maybe
because they have rumble-plagued playback systems) and crank up the
EQ
on
the upper midrange, which just accentuates the surface noise and
unnatural
resonances from the original recording devices. Then you apply an
overly
aggressive treatment with CEDAR or whatever else and you get ...
crap.


Seems like CEDAR would be just what is required after all that
torture.

--
Parker Dinkins
CD Mastering + Audio Restoration
http://masterdigital.com







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