Duophonic (Fake Stereo) or Fold Down (Fake Mono) which one is better

I've read a lot on here about fake stereo (duophonic) from mono mixes and fake mono or fold downs from stereo mixes. Which one works better to achieve it's intended effect? Or does it just depend?

 

I like, and don't mind a little of both.

 

I don't know but thanks for the fact that I finally know what the hell "fold down" means

 

Both bad, but in different ways. Duophonic was a process Capitol had that used EQ, phase inversion and delays to create a kind of wide fake stereo that did not fold down to mono well at all. Fold-down mono does not give you the same balance in mono that a mix made specially for mono gives. Attempts were used to try to dodge this fact by Atlantic/Atco on some late-1960s singles (these state CSG PROCESSED MONO MASTER on their labels) but the results are so-so.

 

I'm not sure it's so much 'which is better' as much as it's 'which is less worse'.

 

Fake mono normally has all the recording levels way off. At least a somewhat untampered with fake stereo recording at least keeps the mixing balance (depending on the fake stereo type of course!)

Both are not ideal though.

 

There are some fold downs which I find tolerable.

All fake stereo that I've heard sounds very bad.

 

Fake stereo, ERS, Duophonic etc are never acceptable to my ears. Stereo folded down to mono...why? I mean what would be the purpose if you already have a perfectly fine stereo recording to make a mono recording from it? All one has to do is use their mono switch on their preamp if they want to hear glorious stereo in monotonous mono.

 

I probably shouldn't say this, but stereo folded down to mono to accommodate those who still had mono cartridges in the stereo age is less of an abomination than Duophonic.

 

A stereo stylus could be fitted to a mono cartridge and then no harm would come to the stereo record. I did this with my Voice Of Music record player.

 

Strictly speaking - I think duophonic does a better job of "fooling" your ears into thinking their hearing real stereo than does electronically reprocessed mono (imho).

I heard a duophonic Beach Boys song "409" that tricked me into thinking it actually was stereo so much that I was in disbelief to discover that it was only ever originally a mono recording.

I don't particularly like either style of mixing but I appreciate them from a historical perspective (such as the Beatles & Beach Boys Capitol duophonics being a part of the US Capitol canon for each artist).

Also, I think that they could charge a little more money for a stereo LP than a mono LP - perhaps it was more greed than artistic creativity.

 

I would think it's a case by case deal.

 

What's the difference? Isn't the former just one of many proprietary names of the latter?

 

For those who had not yet made the jump to stereo. Not to mention that many of the stereo mixes of the era in question were by no means "perfectly fine" to begin with. I'm not blindly a "mono rulez, stereo droolz" type of guy (thanks to @MLutthans for the quote) but give me a nicely balanced mono mix over drums hard-panned left, vocals hard right, etc. stereo mixes.

 

duophonic is terrible. Folded stereo to mono can actually work well, not much different than pushing in the mono button on your receiver if you have one.

 

Duophonic is awesome I love Ticket To Ride from the US Help soundtrack. It's a combination of reverb and a touch of echo and some phase shifting. I also love SheLoves You and I'll get you from Second Album. They sound great.
Actually this same type of rechanneling has been used for BONUS TRACKS(!?!?!) on some UK reissues by the Move and Small Faces.

Any kind of rechanneling with reverb is OK in my book (Beck Bolero, Kinks -Kinks Size lp, Who - Direct Hits etc). The rechanneling I hate is no bass on one channel and no highs on the other. Unfortunately a majority of rechanelled lps use this type.

The is also a French Kinks double lp comp that uses some neat phase cancellation so you can hear voices and instruments 'move' depending on the frequencies. Mono rules of course but not all rechanneling is bad. Stereo fold down mixes are totally useless in my book, just laziness on the part of the producers or else was done on the cheap in the late 60's to produce miniscule amounts of copies for consumers that only had mono players (and back then a mono cartridge was not able to track a stereo record). That mono consumer market pretty much dwindled in the US by '68 but continued on in the UK until 1970 and even longer in South America.

 

The Duophonic process is markedly different from the Electronically Reprocessed Stereo process. They do achieve the same "end" result but go about it differently and you can actually tell a sonic difference between the two products. Neither is desirable, but I think Duophonic does a better job of it (imho-in keeping with the thread title).

Technically, Duophonic actually splits the mono signal with a time delay and other EQ frequency alterations (additionally adding reverb, phase-shifting, etc ...) between L-R which creates a stereo image in the mind's ears (a lot more work goes into this technique than does ERS). ERS usually just the splits the mono signal and then alters the bass and treble frequencies between L-R with no time delay or other frequency alterations between the channels creating a default stereo image between the L-R channels.

There are some threads here that go into some detail on that process.
http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/duophonic-and-other-fake-stereo-lets-get-technical.321914/
http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/fake-stereo-reprocessed-duophonic-etc-any-difference.33686/
http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/is-a-fold-down-of-duophonic-rechanneled-stereo-mono.60243/
http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/when-did-reprocessed-stereo-start.35082/
http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/electronically-reprocessed-for-stereo-question.86712/
http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threads/mono-reprocessed-for-stereo.87280/

 

Neither. But fold down mono is less annoying.

 

Duophonic is NEVER better.

Yes, I grew up with the US duophonic "I Feel Fine", and the others which were all we knew; and yes and we loved them anyway, etc etc.
It took me a while, but I finally came around to the fact that the original 'clean' UK mixes are way superior to distorted tonal mess.

 

There are fold down to mono's done so well serious fans argue whether they're dedicated or not. And even listening to them -- they're darn hard to tell without a bonafide mono mix to compare them too.

And there are fake stereo mixes done so discreetly they're not obvious. Spencer Davis Groups greatest hits on the UK island label is a good example. Compare the mono original to the 1970's 'stereo' cutting; very narrow channeling without any obvious tweaking. It took me some balance fiddling to realize the stereo was not mono.

 

This. Which Raunchnroll just expanded on in the post above this one.

Generally, though, I avoid fake stereo if at all possible. There's a lot of mono fold-downs, however, which are perfectly fine (such as many things recorded at RCA Nashville in the '60s, with the stereo mix was designed to fold down properly to mono).

 

The question posed here reminds me of that old "Death or chi chi" joke.

 

In general I might agree. But sometimes ("Hey Jude") this is apparently the intent.

 

Is the punchline "death by chi chi"?

 

Wasn't it death by "snu snu"?