Why is DSOM Pink Floyd Not on DVD-A

I am confused why is Dark Side of The Moon not coming out on DVD-A.i thought that the fact that it is a EMI/CAPITOL and EMI is backing DVD-A and not SACD that it would never come out in the Super Audio Format.

 

What Sony wants, Sony gets.

 

Yes, Steve, but didn't Sony pick up some of the bill, and gave James Guthrie and Doug beter freedom in production? I thought this project was 1st touted as DVD-A, but through what Sony provided and what they wanted to do, the announcement was changed from DVD-A to SACD? Curious...

In any case, and I apologize openly to DVD-A~ers, but I would sincerely rather this title come out in Hybrid SACD/Mch. It makes so, so much sense to put out DSOTM like this....

 

Sony is a giant corporation that has a lot riding on the success of SACD. There have been rumors that they've used questionable business tactics to achieve market penetration, and a title such as DSOTM has been viewed as the "killer app" for the competing hi-rez formats. This has fueled more rumors that they went over-the-top to get this title. I have no idea if the rumors are true or not. Pure speculation on my behalf.

 

Sony help us all.

On DVD-A there would have been room for the Quad mix.

 

Nah, I don't think it was questionable at ALL. Heck, pay for production? Assistance? You have to understand, Sony keeps the proprietary format under lock and key.... If you have an SACD to produce, it must be done with Sony involved. Call it domination, but honestly, it does take care of wrongful misdoings in the chain.

I don't call what Sony is doing as questionable. I call it fairly brilliant. Lon Neumann was present at Steve's CCR sessions to insure the SACD encoding went within specs. It's damn hard work, and takes a few tries too....!

 

Is that to say there *wouldn't* have been room for the Quad mix on SACD?

Keep in mind that just because there's room doesn't mean the parties involved will use it.

 

I agree with this. The fact remains: Fans of the album might not have been too happy with the Q8 quad mixdown. It does have sections and effects not in the original 2-track mix.

I know that sounds stupid, but I'm starting to believe it's true. You must make a product that is familiar with many fans, or they'll say it "doesn't sound like DSOTM, so it's crap".

The 5.1 mix will be great, but for historical purposes, hold on to your Q8 conversion....

 

Well, SONY had been accused several times of arm twisting to get titles on SACD. I'm curious about what happens with The Beatles.

 

Indeed. I have no strong preferences either way, but I was a little surprised to learn that it would be on SACD. I thought for sure that, given PF's reputation for having a highly visual component to their music, the people behind the hi-res reissue would want to throw in a couple of video extras on DVD-A.

BTW, I got the RW reference, Michael. Heh.

 

I do not think that SONY is about to let "the VHS thing" happen again without a fight!

 

I'll say this with all respect. What the heck is wrong with paying for production costs, especially knowing since DVD-A authoring is expensive as all hell?

 

Which is why I personally wanted to hear it in hi-res.

If they ever seriously considered the quad mix for the SACD, this would undoubtedly have been a consideration. It's a much safer route to put out a new surround mix that's similar to the stereo, as opposed to re-releasing the quad, which would sound "wrong" to people who don't know it's a legitimate alternate version.

 

Here's hoping that the massive success of DSOTM on SACD will convince EMI and Apple to put out the Beatles catalog on Hybrid SACDs!

 

If most people buying don't even know there is an SACD layer, should SACD be credited for the success?

 

High end fans will buy the disc for SACD, if not because they have an SACD player, it's the fact that they will.

This isn't just any DSOTM either. Possibly one of the only time it's done with these wonderful circumstances....

Sounds nieve though, that people will gravitate to the disc in wild numbers just because of the SACD layer, but we'll see....

 

Well, subsidizing surround formats isn't a new idea by any means.

During the '70s Quad era, JVC funded the costs of a number of CD-4 Quadradisc issues by Arista and other labels.

And DTS is doing the same thing these days with their 5.1 DTS Music and DVD Audio discs as they noted on one of the panel discussions on launching new surround formats at CES 2003 in January.

 

Hey Steve, Where do I sign up to get on that Quagmire waiting list?

 

"And DTS is doing the same thing these days with their 5.1 DTS Music and DVD Audio discs as they noted on one of the panel discussions on launching new surround formats at CES 2003 in January."

Very interesting Brian. Is there an HFR story on this?

So everyone is bribing everyone - that certainly puts Sony's efforts in a proper light. But I say, who cares?

Isn't this just good business strategy for a new format?

I suspect the title race is going to be more important than the hardware race because the mainstream will buy into formats based on titles, not player brands.

 

I read an article with an EMI executive discussing the release and he was asked this same question. His response was that Sony offered a very lucrative deal to put the disc out on SACD, including all production costs, etc. It was too lucrative a deal to turn down. When asked why EMI would agree to that, given it has announced support for DVD-A, he said that EMI had not formally committed to DVD-A at the time of the DSOTM deal but subsequently has.

I know SH commented, “Doug and James wanted it on SACD.” But clearly there is a lot going on here beyond what the engineers preferred.

It raises an interesting question. If the deal to do DSOTM on SACD was made before EMI committed to DVD-A will future Floyd releases be on DVD-A?