"The Best Of The Doors" 1973 Quad & original stereo Audio Fidelity SACD, adventures in mastering.

Not of this album.

 

1980 re-issue was in stereo

 

I possess both the quad lp and the stereo version.

 

As far as I know, it was a stereo cut, but from the quad masters.

 

I hate when world travel gets in the way of my music collection.

 

Mine arrived today. Should be a fun evening.

 

My unprofessional opinion.

1. Who Do You Love - I didn't expect it to start off with a live track and had to check to make sure I had the right disc. Sounds good, especially Ray's bass keyboard. Not that different from Absolutely Live.

2. Soul Kitchen - Jim's doubled vocals have an eerie echo on them. The drums all seem to be to the left and everything else to the right.

3. Hello I Love You - The drums are in the rear.

4. People Are Strange - Nice use of surround. Both the keyboards and guitar are in the rear during key points.

5. Riders on the Storm - I don't remember the bass being this nice. I need to check the DVD-A version. The thunder effects move around. Really good mix. More pronounced percussion.

6. Touch Me - I expected a bit more from this one. The horns seemed muted. The sax solo is in the right channel.

7. Love Her Madly - Really aggressive mix, though most of it remains in the front. I like it.

8. Love Me Two Times - Jim's vocals sound a bit odd, like he's in another room.

9. Take It As It Comes - Smooth vocal mix, though the drums are to the left and keyboards to the right. Not bad.

10. Moonlight Drive - Lots of piano. Nice surround mix.

11. Light My Fire - Really different guitar sound that had been buried. Drums to the left again!


Overall, a welcome change for a Doors reissue. Surround mixing in the early 70s is less "natural" than it is today, with the mix drawing your attention to certain elements. The only negative is I don't like how the drums were usually isolated in one channel and would have preferred them to be spread around. I'll need to pull out Perception for the first time in years and compare the tracks.

If you set aside the wonky mixes the disc sounds teriffic. I'll try the stereo next.

B+

 

Got mine and will be playing any minute now. Only got it for the quad though...I'm good Doors stereo-wise

 

For the first go-'round I ran though all the songs quickly. The quad is VERY different than the stereo, and I don't mean just because of the addition of two rear channels. With the exception of the opening track (which I'd never heard performed by The Doors before), these are very familiar tunes presented in a totally "new" and interesting manner. I have 5.1 mixes of some of these songs but I think I like the quad versions better. I know that was the case for me with the DSOTM multitracks. I'll have to spend more time with this new SACD to really evaluate it in detail but so far I'm liking what I'm hearing, both in stereo and in quad.

I think it was noted previously in this thread but I want to again mention that the original slightly slowed down version of "Light My Fire" was used for the stereo layer and the "corrected" (A-minor) version was used for the quad layer. The stereo clocks in at a bit over 7 minutes while the quad comes in just under.

 

Who would have ever guessed we'd get Doors quad mixes digitally before we get mono mixes.

 

I did a quick tour through the stereo layer and it sounds very nice. It's an interesting compilation and sequence of songs.

 

They're saving that for the fiftieth anniversary.

 

Guess we're just lucky! It's certainly a great time for surround fans.

 

I've always liked this Doors compilation and am somewhat surprised that it's never been released on CD (although I'm sure that it's been long trumped by newer, more inclusive compilations).

 

Certainly a favorite album back in the day - almost everyone I knew had this album! Redundant now, though. As is Weird Scenes, but people bought that when it was reissued on cd a few years ago, so who knows?

 

I'd buy it. It was my first Doors compilation.

 

That's because on the first album (second also?) the drums are on 1 track. They can't be spread around, just mono.

 

My first time saying._. "mine shipped today"._

 

I love fact or fiction.

 

I'm assuming in this case "spread around" meant "mixed to more than one channel" rather than "stereo/quad drums". I.e., in the front two channels, in the rear two channels, etc.

 

Could be. The verb "spreading" threw me off in this case, but then again English is not my mother tongue.

 

You are correct. I listened to the same tracks on the stereo layer and they were similar. It's a relic of the production techniques of the time.

 

I received my copy just now. It is numbered 1050.... I got a few others with the same shipment so I plan on giving it a listen tonight or tomorrow and will report back in.

One thing.... The front case was cracked. I replace these cheap cases with new Lift-lock cases so its not a big deal BUT I will let ImportCDs know.

 

Mine is #2223