You're "mixing" several different things, I believe. Keep it simple This is Spars Code: SPARS code - Wikipedia AAA – A fully analogue recording, from the original session to mastering. Since at least the mastering recorder must be digital to make a compact disc, this code is not applicable to CDs.[1] AAD – Analog tape recorder used during initial recording, mixing/editing, Digital mastering. ADD – Analog tape recorder used during initial recording, Digital tape recorder used during mixing/editing and for mastering. DDD – Digital tape recorder used during initial recording, mixing/editing and for mastering. DAD – Digital tape recorder used during initial recording, Analog tape recorder used during mixing/editing, Digital mastering. Each letter refers to a very specific step in the audio production chain. What happens in the studio immediately before or immediately after that specific step can be a multitude of different things. As for mastering and what mastering is (what specific step can be called mastering?) is strangely vague these days... but yes, in general, each different media (or format) is a different specific mastering. Now, that can still be true if all of them used the same single "pre-mastered" source.... and that's when it gets a little confusing. But in any case, putting "anything" to a final format is always called Mastering, I believe.
So then anything originally recorded with a digital tape recorder can NEVER use the phrase, mastered from the original analog tapes" as there wasn't one.....andthe nightfly was DDD....thanks for the breakdown....makes more sense now
The CD is DDD. The downlod is DDD. The vinyl is DDA. If digital tapes were used, the term 'from original master tapes' can be used.
It depends. If the master tape is analog, regardless of what steps occurred before, then it is the Original Analog Master Tape. I think this happens quite a lot, albums that were partially recorded and/or mixed in digital and then transerred to analog to make the actual Analog Master Tape.
Actually I don't quite agree with the words/terminology used on this SPARS explanation from wikipedia: I used it as a quick reference, but now looking closer it really isn't quite what I would think those are...
If anyone has heard the 12" single promo's from The Nightfly. I.G.Y. (LP version) / I.G.Y. (edit version) and New Frontier / The Goodbye Look knows that this album CAN sound great on vinyl. The promo's were cut by Robert Ludwig and were done at 33 1/3.
For vinyl it has to be converted to analog to cut the disc, so mastered to analog? Those codes were designed for the digital market?
I think just like CD must always end with a D (because the mastering format itself is digital), vinyl LP must always end with A (because the mastering format itself is Analog).
Take the recent Pink Floyd remasters - they were remastered in the digital domain by Guthrie, but cut to vinyl from the master, by Grundman. Going by the SPARS definition of the last letter indicating the mastering domain, then I would consider most of those AAD. They are clearly not AAA. I think the confusion lies in if the last letter indicates the mastering domain or the medium. By what I've seen and the article you linked then I understand it to be the former. I also vaguely remember having some Telarc LPs in the '80s that were labeled DDD (boasting of it, ha!). I don't have any of those anymore so don't have a pic. I will be glad to be corrected, if someone knows otherwise.
I think a lot people here already have a good sounding Vinyl copy of The Nightfly. I'm not gonna pay $100.00 for this. Not only that, I listened to it the other day and it reminded me of elevator music.
Not the elevator music I have heard. And I don't know if elevator music has the wit and sophistication of Donald Fagen. Look, Fagen was not trying to write a rock record here. He was trying to capture an era from a particular perspective. If you're expecting "Reeling In The Years", "My Old School" or "Peg", he wasn't trying to give it to you here.
There are no bad-sounding copies of this album. The Target is allegedly not good but mine is fine. That last sentence is, IMIO, silliness. As has been said, I've never heard elevator music that sounded the least bit like Fagen. LOL! Es
OK, maybe that last sentence is a little over the top. I was just trying to say I don't need this or want this in a super duper version.
