Hundreds of Universal Music Group Titles now on Tidal Masters

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by Scott Richards, Aug 20, 2017.

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  1. Scott Richards

    Scott Richards New Member Thread Starter

    The first fruits of the announcement earlier this year that UMG will support MQA are now appearing, totally unheralded at Master recordings on Tidal. Besides the Beach Boys, I listed separately, I have found dozens and dozens of titles from artists sprinkled throughout their catalog. At this point it seems mostly focused on the Capitol pop catalog and the DG classical one, although I have seen a few Philips and Decca recordings, too. Sinatra, The Band, Nat King Cole, Glen Campbell, Iron Maiden, Tina Turner, Daniel Barenboim, Herbert von Karajan, Gustavo Dudamel...just to name a few.
     
  2. kwadguy

    kwadguy Senior Member

    Location:
    Cambridge, MA
    Is Universal still encoding copy protection into their music? And are these mastered from high resolution sources, or just upsampled to make them high resolution?
     
  3. Scott Richards

    Scott Richards New Member Thread Starter

    It's streaming, so I am not sure where copy protection comes into play. There appears to be hundreds of albums here. The first few I've listened to sound true hi-res but you'll have to ask them about the source for each one. I am seeing 96 or 192 kHz resolution on my Explorer 2. The sound quality on "The Band" was as good as I've ever heard and I am now listening to the classic Barenboim/CSO recording of Saint Saens Organ Symphony. I own this recording in several formats including the original vinyl and a Japanese single layer SHM SACD, and so far it seems to be of very high standard if without the last degree of sound stage that the SHM disc has.
     
    Last edited: Aug 20, 2017
  4. kwadguy

    kwadguy Senior Member

    Location:
    Cambridge, MA
    I shouldn't have called it copy protection--it's not. It's a watermark. Search for "Universal Audible Watermark" to read tons of discussion about it. And it does (or did at least) affect music available on all the outlets, including Tidal.
     
  5. Scott Richards

    Scott Richards New Member Thread Starter

    That could be. I mean, they do own the recordings, right? And it means almost all digital versions "suffer" from this watermark.

    I've seen a lot of this sort of discussion. But to me the ability to stream a nearly infinite library of music, and now at this extremely high level of sound quality, is just amazing value. Honestly, I don't care if they pass the master tape under the single eye of a voodoo shaman to get this level of quality in thousands of recordings (counting both Warner and now UMG MQA titles). It strikes me as a significant leap forward for people who both enjoy a wide range of music and care about having it in the highest possible fidelity to the original source.

    And I'm listening to it via a $199 DAC. Can't imagine yet how much better it will be when I get a significant upgrade on an MQA DAC.
     
    duggan likes this.
  6. tomd

    tomd Senior Member

    Location:
    Brighton,Colorado
    Could someone post a list of the pop/rock titles?
     
  7. Synthfreek

    Synthfreek I’m a ray of sunshine & bastion of positivity

    No they don't all suffer from this. The Universal streaming releases' sound quality is affected. It's not just some sort of unheard digital imprint.
     
  8. Scott Richards

    Scott Richards New Member Thread Starter

    I just hear good music. Please provide a couple of specific examples where, perhaps, I can compare with a vinyl original to suss it out. I'm not saying that they didn't do any watermarking, they may have. I just don't hear it. As a matter of fact I have just spent the evening listening to Tidal Master versions of UMG recordings I know well and a couple I didn't know but all along I heard great sound. I really can't wait to upgrade my MQA DAC to maybe a Mytek Brooklyn and hear what the format can really do.
     
  9. pbuzby

    pbuzby Senior Member

    Location:
    Chicago, IL, US
    The first time I noticed the watermark was "Resolution" from John Coltrane's A Love Supreme. Very noticeable in his sustained notes in the theme.
     
  10. tomd

    tomd Senior Member

    Location:
    Brighton,Colorado
    Did a search on Tidal (from my I phone) cannot find ANYTHING as far as master releases.Can someone PLEASE post a list of MQA/masters pop and rock titles?
     
  11. tomd

    tomd Senior Member

    Location:
    Brighton,Colorado
    Ok-Are we talking the usual UME hirez suspects here (Clapton-Layla,Allmans,Elton John -GBYBR,Beck-Sea Change) or actually some NEW artists and titles for a change?
     
  12. Scott Richards

    Scott Richards New Member Thread Starter

    The Masters recordings are only accessible from the Tidal app for PC or Mac. I keep finding more and more each day. And, yes, there are a lot of the usual suspects but also a lot of unexpected. Like a fair amount of Motown, all the Beach Boys and, maybe some new artists. Surprisingly Layla is not among them at the moment but Derek and the Dominoes live is.

    I know that there are a lot of new things from other companies. Jay-Z, Father John Misty, Ed Sheeran, War on Drugs, etc. But there is no easy way to find them all, just have to search. Some are listed on the front page in the Masters section but it is very small percentage of the total.
     
    Last edited: Aug 27, 2017
  13. Ryan Rocks

    Ryan Rocks Member


    Here are some nice surprises I have found:

    Animalization The Animals

    30 Greatest Hits Aretha Franklin

    Step It Up Jeff Lorber

    Dreamboat Annie Heart

    The Exciting Wilson Pickett

    Days of Future Past Moody Blues

    Simple Dreams Linda Ronstadt

    In My Life and Who Knows Where the Time Goes (Volume 6 and 8 of The 60s Collection) Judy Collins
     
  14. wipster

    wipster Forum Resident

    As far as I know, Masters are only available for listening on the desktop application, you can't play them on a portable app or a browser... yet. The albums and tracks are marked with a little square box with an M in it and when you play them (if your settings are set for it), Master shows up where it used to say HiFi. What I've heard so far sounds stunning! Bonnie Raitt's newest is fantastic as well as Petty's entire catalog.
     
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