The Police - Reggatta de Blanc on CD: Blind Listening Test Poll

After my disappointing Signals poll, I said that I wanted to do Moving Pictures next. However, I thought a Police test would be more interesting. Of all the band's albums, Reggatta de Blanc is the one that I'm having the most trouble with when it comes to picking a favorite CD mastering. Naturally, I chose this album for this poll.

To make it easier on everyone, this poll will only have 4 samples to choose from. Each sample is roughly 3 minutes and 15 seconds. They each contain approximately 1 minute sections of 3 songs: Message in a Bottle, Bring on the Night, and Walking on the Moon. I know, the song choices were kind of obvious... The absolute phase of each mastering was identical, so no inverting was applied. I used ReplayGain on the samples, but if they didn't turn out perfectly leveled with each other, then my bad.

The rules for this thread will be the same as they were in @grandegi's other blind listening threads:

• If you intend to vote, it's recommended reading the discussions after you have listened to the samples and voted, in order to escape confirmation bias.
• It's recommended listening to the samples and discussing what you heard. Please take into account that discussions based on visual inspection of waveforms, spectral plots and DR values might condition the poll results while the poll is open, if folks read the discussions before listening to the samples.
• You can choose no more than one sample.
• You can't view the results before you vote, in order to escape confirmation bias (the results are viewable to everybody when the poll closes).
• Votes are publicly displayed.
• This test will expire in exactly 10 days from now and you can change your mind until the end.
• The sources will be revealed after the expiration of this period, when the poll is closed (and it's impossible to vote).

Click here to download the samples.

@ricks, hopefully you can chime in!

 

Man, this was a tough one. Each sample has something I like and don't like on it.
First listen through I went with "B" as it seemed to have a better separation than the others.
Subsequent listens brought me to choose "D" as I hear the instruments more levelled out in the mix and not overpowering the others like I hear on "A", "B" & "C".

 

I wasn't able to download the samples (there's no option for that this time), so I listened online through my PC speakers. That said, I chose B. I was able to clearly hear and ''feel'' the bassline in Message that I couldn't hear in the others. Likewise with Bring On - the kick thump at the beginning didn't seem to have the lower frequencies shelved off. B also had the widest dynamics - methinks.

 

There should be a download button on the page that I linked to. If not, try clicking on the sample to see if "Direct Download" pops up.

 

It doesn't, but since I've already voted, I'll leave it as it is. It may be a problem with Java or something. Thanks anyway!

 

This one is an easy choice for me. Sample D

Sample A sounded a little muddy to me while Samples B and C were extremely loud. (CD source?)

 

By loud, do you mean compressed, or were these samples merely at a higher volume than the other 2? As I stated in the initial post, I may not have done the best job at applying ReplayGain. What I did was put the 4 versions of a song into Audacity and applied ReplayGain through there. Rinse and repeat for the next 2 songs. If this wasn't the correct way to apply RG, then I apologize. This might account for why B and C are louder than A and D, assuming you weren't talking about compression.

 

Thanks @Diablo Griffin for setting up this blind test. Of the samples I prefer D with C in second place.
I'm also pretty sure which samples belong to which masters, but I wouldn't want to sway anyone's votes...

 

Thank you @Diablo Griffin, this is going to be a very interesting poll.
I'll chime in later, in the next few days

 

I don't find this hard at all.

B sounds like my dad's old vinyl copy. I grew up with this record.

The rest sounds more or less tinkered with. And C and D sounds awful (IMO).

 

What don't you like about those samples? Just curious.

 

I could just go with the lack of bass, but in fact the worst part of sample C and D (and to a lesser extent A) is the unnatual cripy highs that makes Walking On The Moon sound like its being recorded next to a nice and cozy fireplace.

It may come across as details for some. I don't like it.

 

B

A - Not sure but may be from one of the comps or SHM. Too bright.
B - Original A&M for sure. Nice Bass, controlled Treble.
C - SACD?
D - Compilation. (EBYT?) No Bass, too bright.

I've been doing a lot of my own listening tests for The Police recently. My preferred format is Original Vinyl or CD. Vinyl has the edge for me as Walking on the Moon on Vinyl has all the harshness tamed. I don't know why later releases were all boosted in the highs so much but it makes everything since the originals hard to listen to.

 

I hope you don't mind Diablo, but i have a clip of Walking on the Moon from Original vinyl for anyone interested. It's a night and day difference compared to later releases:

Dropbox - Walking On The Moon.zip

 

I always thought this album was mixed brightly. All the samples above could be described as bright, only sample B has the top rolled off.

Edit: After listening to the samples again (downloading instead of streaming), I changed my vote to sample C as my favorite, and sample B as runner up.
To my ears sample C has transparent highs, tight bass, and the most clarity.

 

In my own tests i found the 2003 SACD to be similar to the original release but with a clearer high end, while keeping the lush low end too. I think C is the SACD.

I had a brain half asleep moment earlier. For some reason i forgot that the samples were from albums and started thinking about compilations too. I won't try and speculate what source A+D are then, but they are my least favourite. My favourites are the opposite way round from yours. B then C. I'm still almost certain B is an A&M Original.

 

I have to go against the grain here and go with sample C. It has the rich low end of B along with the clarity of D. I'd rank them in this order:

C: Reasonably balanced EQ and nice sounding vocals.
B: Decent, but the bass overpowers everything else. Sounds like it version came from a higher gen tape, at least IMO.
D: I don't mind the highs here, but the lows are lacking. Vocals sound good.
A: Very "muted" sounding. The bass drums during the intro to Bring on the Night sound dull and congested, with very little body. Easily my least favorite, though it's not a total disaster in the big scheme of things.

 

NO apologies necessary.

The volumes were significantly louder on B less so on C as compared to A or D. Reminded me of the Metallica Black CD.

 

B: Sounds like my old familiar vinyl version to me
C & D: Runner up... Kind of bright but not bad
A: Least Favorite...

 

This is tough... I actually don't care for any of them! LOL. (I have never found the "right" version of anything in the Police catalog). But "B" seems to have the best dynamics, yet it is way too muddy for me. Some of the instrumentation in the background seems to get lost. Whereas maybe the other masterings are trying to "fix" that issue, but going to far?

I need to compare again...

Okay, B sounds good but most of D seems to be nearly as dynamic. The problem I have with B is it sounds like a 2nd gen analog tape where the right channel maybe didn't copy as clearly as the left because the machine had too much dirt on the head or something. The rest all sound like remasters from that source.

C is pretty much out for me and probably A too. Although I seem to like different songs from different sources. But somewhere between B & D would work for me.

But that being said, I would probably end up trying to re-EQ B myself. I can't hear that working in my car on a noisy road trip... That being said, I'm being extremely picky about all of this... I'd listen to any of them and be happy. I love this album.

 

B was best for me. Best bass (goodly amount, not overbearing, whereas the rest of the samples sound thin on the bottom - a real shame when you have a bad mother bassist like Sting). Still plenty of top end (for my taste many masterings of the Police have way TOO MUCH top end, this is just right). I've recently said bad things about the mastering of the MESSAGE IN A BOX set so if this is from that one, I'll be having my crow with a little salt, please...

C was my second favorite, good dynamics/uncompressed sounding, but lacked bass.

A sounds compressed/lacking in dynamic range and subjectively aggressive/"loud." I couldn't listen for long before wanting to turn it off. I'm guessing this may be the Bob Ludwig remaster.

D also sounded like there was a little compression, but not as bad as A.

One huge caveat: I can only listen to FLAC files like this on my laptop, which has crappy speakers, so not an ideal test.

 

These tests are really tough. I may be making things worse by using the Foobar ABX Comparator and comparing samples directly with my AKG headphones. I'll try to listen to the samples one by one on my main system though.

I thought A & D sounded similar and B & C as well. The beginning of Bring on the Night was interesting. When compared directly, samples B & C almost seemed no-noised compared to A & D because of the amount of detail missing. I guess they must have goosed the treble on A & D. I did like the overall sound of B (especially the low end at the end of Message) but that missing detail in BotN bugged me when compared to A & D.

I chose A but like others, wasn't nuts about any of them all the way through.

 

I listened on my secondary system, but I'll have to listen again more carefully on my main system. None of the samples sounds bad to me (dynamics are good, maybe C being slightly "limited") but at the same time none of them turned out to be indubitably better than the other ones (B and D are close). My vote goes to B for now as it seems to be the most balanced to my ears

 

I played the samples through my blu ray player and came up with the same order of preferences. The only difference was that I like be better than I did previously, though C still gets my vote.

 

Hi,

I have some questions, and that is all they are

Other than replaygain, which is totally non-harmful as it's merely a tag, was anything else, no matter how minor, done to the samples? How were the samples obtained; Digital rip's direct from disc? Analog out captures? Other method?