"Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" SACD will be mixed from a digital source!

I was just reading in the new ICE (issue 200 - 11/2003 - a whopping 62 pages), that the Elton John "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" deluxe-edition, which will be a CD/SACD hybrid (single inventory - just like the upcoming Who "Tommy") is being remastered from digital copies of the analog tapes.

Here is a quote from the issue I mention above:

"Luckily, the original analog masters of the album were safely kept in th Island vaults in England. Penny (Greg Penny) retrieved them there, transferred the tapes to digital for his new stereo master and carried them back to the U.S."
"The transfers are very, very good, and they keep the original analog tapes in pristine condition..."

They do mention though that the 5.1 mix was sourced as such:
"Penny utilized the original multi-track masters for the surround-sound layer, which he also glows over."

So much for giving us the best possible sound on SACD in stereo at least!

 

DSD is digital. Not enough information to make judgements.

 

You are correct. I guess I made an incorrect ass-umption.

 

Since I planned on getting it on DVD-A for the extra content (and to have it all on 1 disc), I'm not panicking either!

 

We'll see about this one. I am a bit concerned if they made a PCM copy from the analog masters and then made the DSD master from the PCM copy. The question I have then is, if a PCM copy was used, what were the specs. (wordlength and sampling rate)?

 

What is the release date for the SACD hybrid? Does the DVD-A come out on the same day?

 

SACD 11/11, DVD-A sometime next year.

Ryan

 

Track list?

Any word on the track listing on this issue? I have heard different things, one being the album will be split over the 2CDs to simulate the track breakdown on the original LP and that it will only have 4 bonus tracks?

That will be extremely disappointing when compared to many of the other Deluxe Editions of other artists. How about live versions of some of the lesser know tracks on this album, "Roy Rogers" "I've Seen That Movie Too" and "Ballad Of Danny Bailey" would be perfect live selections.

 

According to ICE, the album will split over two SACDs to mimic the LP, with 3 B-sides and the stripped-down "Candle In The Wind" on Disc Two. There will also be a 3-disc set available, with the third disc being the "Classic Albums" show on DVD-V.

The DVD-A will include all the audio material on one DVD-A, plus the bonus DVD-V.

Ryan

 

Decisions........I don't know if I could wait for the DVD-A! New Year....jeez...

 

The surround DSotM SACD was mixed in 24/96 PCM (and god knows how many other SACDs that we are in the dark about), so this doesn't frighten me a bit.

The mastering itself will have a greater impact on the sound quality.

 

This is why DVD-A will win the format wars, you can fit MUCH more info on 1 disc and still have hi-rez quality. Having this LP (AND Blonde On Blonde, and probably Tommy & Quadrophenia also) going back to 2 discs from prior 1 disc releases is a MAJOR step backwards. Compare what we get with Pet Sounds on ONE disc with these releases.

 

Which is why IF the Beatles make it onto hi rez....the only hope of seeing a mono mix is on DVD-A.

 

Hopefully one day they will put twenty seconds of silence in the middle of the discs to mimic turning the LP over.

 

Your reasoning is faulty. The SACD is 2 discs because of the 80 minute time length limitation of the CD layer of the SACD hybrid disc. Remember, DVD-A does not have a hybrid configuration. You cannot fit Redbook CD on a DVD-A disc. Your argument is "penalizing" SACD for being a hybrid. It is a shortcoming of DVD-A that it CANNOT be a hybrid; it is not a shortcoming of SACD that it CAN be a hybrid.

 

You are correct here with regard to the 80 min limitation, but it still really doesn't explain why "Blonde on Blonde" was spread out over 2 SACDs. When you look at the timing on that album it clocks in at around 74 minutes or so - well short of the 80 minute time restriction.

I really couldn't care less if Blonde on Blonde is on 2 discs or not (which, come to think of it, may have been necessitated by the fact that there is both a surround and stereo SACD mix on the current remaster), but we still have to remember, as you do state, SACD can be portable if it is a hybrid - DVD-A cannot at this point in time.

This is quite true. As we must not forget that the new Steely Dan SACD of "Gaucho" is also PCM based.

It just seems that I would always rather take direct from analog to DSD recording over PCM to DSD in theory - it just rates better psychologically.

 

MikeT,
You are correct about Blonde on Blonde. I was really responding about Tommy, and Quadrophenia.

 

Michael said:

Many people (not necessarily here) that are committed to SACD and DSD and bemoan PCM probably do not know this. I wonder if their impression of the Dark Side of the Moon SACD would change if they did. "Gee, now that you mention it, the SACD is fatiguing. It sounds digital and harsh."

We should not get caught up in the formats. The mastering is the concern.

 

And you can't play an SACD in surround on a CD player, but you CAN play a DVD-A in surround on a plain DVD player--I CAN penalize SACD for this (I have MANY friends who would love to be able to listen to Dark Side Of The Moon in surround--they can't, but if it was a DVD-A, then they could). Both formats have their different pluses & minuses. I just feel that DVD-A's advantages far outweigh CD compatibility.

The 80 min time limit for CDs HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS ISSUE! These are ALL discs that fit on 1 CD previously, and besides, if that was the case, why not put the entire SACD program on disc 1 and just CD disc 2 on the second disc? Because the SURROUND mix is taking up all the space. That's why My Generation & Police Live are on 1 disc despite their length (and why BOB had to go on 2)---no 5.1.

 

Ok.. but isn't Tommy and Quadrophenia coming out as "Deluxe Editions" - where it seems the marketing premise behind these re-issues is to give us 2-discs regardless of whether the album (and bonus tracks) could fit on one full disc anyway. So this seems to be just as much a marketing issue, as it is a limitation of the CD.

Also, maybe I am wrong, but was Quadrophenia ever on a single CD? I don't remember ever seeing one.

 

Well, the only attraction, content-wise, for me is the Surround Sound mix and the new mix of "Candle In The Wind". The three b-sides just don't do anything for me, they are not all that difficult to find. If you have the remaster of "Don't Shoot Me..." then you have them already.

There must be something better to add to this Deluxe Edition to make it truly deluxe than 4 extra tracks. Very disappointing indeed.

 

No, but that's my point. At just over 80 minutes, it WILL be a single DVD-A.

 

You should advise your friends to put an inexpensive multi-channel SACD
player in the same system that they have already set up for surround. That would solve that. The reason I don't listen to DSOTM in multichannel is because I don't have a surround sound rig, not that is not on DVD-A or DTS or anything else on the DVD platform.

 

I'm the only one I know who's crazy enough to own both SACD & DVD-A, and have them split out to fit in one 5.1 analog input. I don't expect them to run right out & replace almost new DVD players. If it's on DVD-A, they don't have to. Everybody doesn't have the unlimited funds that we do . By the time an inexpensive all-format 5-disc changer comes out (because nobody that I know will go back to a single disc, and changers don't exist yet at a reasonable price point), then some of them will upgrade.
Anyway, since you don't have surround, none of this matters, but if you do, it does.