The Kinks 2018 digital (streaming/download) remasters

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by mindgames, Mar 22, 2018.

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  1. Maffune

    Maffune Well-Known Member

    Location:
    North America
    Well, there might be one issue. I think "You Really Got Me" is a fold-down of the fake stereo version. The fake stereo version of the song has some audio glitches on the right channel, while the Castle CD I recently acquired has those audio glitches in the center.
     
  2. Laservampire

    Laservampire Down with this sort of thing

    The first album is the only case where the UK and German PRTs are completely different. The UK is much brighter, and one of them has the fake stereo YRGM folded to mono (forget which one)
     
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  3. Laservampire

    Laservampire Down with this sort of thing

    I’ll check the track lengths on Monday :)
     
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  4. Maffune

    Maffune Well-Known Member

    Location:
    North America
    Ah, okay. I would assume that the Castle CD is based off the UK PRT CD then, because I recently posted the DR values of the Castle CD and they're very similar to the UK PRT CD that was posted earlier.
     
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  5. Stat1516

    Stat1516 Forum Resident

    Location:
    New York
    Are all the PRT’s from the 80’s the same mastering? The later editions have the blue bar at the top of the album artwork. Thanks in advance for the info!
     
  6. Stat1516

    Stat1516 Forum Resident

    Location:
    New York
    Laservampire, all the PRT’s from the 80’s the same mastering? The later editions have the blue bar at the top of the album artwork. Thanks in advance for the info!
     
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  7. Laservampire

    Laservampire Down with this sort of thing

    There are a number of different PRT versions, the UK PRTs, the West German PRT/Teldec CDs (with the blue bar) and some other variations like the Italian and Japanese versions, but all come from the same basic digital transfers.

    Not all of the albums were released on UK PRT CDs, so Village Green and Something Else are only in the WG PRT series.

    Except for a level shift, the WG PRTs are the exact same mastering as the UK PRTs with a couple of exceptions:

    - The first album is a completely different mastering on the UK PRT vs the German
    - some fades are marginally longer on the UK PRTs, some longer on the WG. This would indicate they came from the same digital transfers but different fades were applied in the mastering stage.
    - the sides A & B are in the wrong order on the UK Face To Face
    - the WG PRT "Hit Singles" sounds awful compared to the UK, this one is to be avoided

    Luckily (especially for our wallets) the very common 1989 Castle CLACD series of CDs are pretty much identical to the PRT masterings, apart from the stereo channels being swapped on most of the albums (except for Village Green)

    The CLACD Village Green is actually a better representation of the master tape than the WG PRT as it doesn't have the fades applied between tracks, it's basically a straight transfer of the stereo master tape!

    For the PRT compilations however, there is no later equivalent of the original UK ugly pink "Greatest Hits", "Hit Singles" and "The Kinks Are Well Respected Men"

    So really, grab what you can and avoid the WG "Hit Singles"!
     
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  8. Stat1516

    Stat1516 Forum Resident

    Location:
    New York
    Awesome info! Thanks again :)
     
  9. Maffune

    Maffune Well-Known Member

    Location:
    North America
    Might have made a interesting discovery:
    I bought a German PRT CD of the self-titled album and although it has better EQ in my opinion (less bright overall), it has a problem regarding the stereo image. For whatever reason, it seems as though all the songs have their left channels slightly folded in, and I think it is pretty apparent with "You Really Got Me", where the vocals and guitar seem to lean more to the right instead of being centered. Is there any sort of way of fixing this issue, or is it stuck like this? I'm posting a sample of both the German PRT CD and the Castle Classics CD to show what I'm talking about. The first sample is the Castle release followed by the German PRT.
     
  10. mindgames

    mindgames Forum Resident Thread Starter

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    As you know, this is a mono recording, and it sounds like the German PRT got slight faux reverb added in the left channel to make it sound like there's at least a bit of ambience in the room. So that's why the stereo image sounds off.

    Just collapsing to mono is always a bad idea, but in this case I don't even recommend the correct way of splitting both channels and using one of the channels. That's because if they tampered with it by adding reverb, you're never going to get back to what it originally sounded either way. But if you want to "risk" (by the lack of a less serious word) it, I think the right channel sounds clean and only the left channel is edited. Plus the German PRT has a much higher frequency range than your other example.

    What's wrong with the hi-res remaster from a few years ago?

    edit: Wait, I started this thread?! :laugh: And it's not a few years ago, it was last year...
     
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  11. mindgames

    mindgames Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
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    A question for y'all then: what is up with that 'Dead End Street' "stereo remix" as a vinyl exclusivity a year or 3 ago? I don't own that compilation, so I don't know what it is about. But I do know Russell Smith posted a while ago at a Facebook group there's no "stereo remix" of this song: hxxps://www.facebook.com/groups/154417481409369/permalink/1049946278523147/?comment_id=1049995855184856&reply_comment_id=1050053718512403&comment_tracking=%7B%22tn%22%3A%22R%22%7D

    So what is it? Is it a very convincing spectral edit? (Like this one: hxxps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EbubVWb0ocY) Or just an old school "duophonic" recording people over here mistook as a genuine stereo mix?
     
    Last edited: Feb 19, 2019
  12. Maffune

    Maffune Well-Known Member

    Location:
    North America
  13. Laservampire

    Laservampire Down with this sort of thing

    It's definitely real stereo. Russell has gone a bit loopy recently.
     
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  14. mindgames

    mindgames Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
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    Ah, I see. The deluxe edition release?

    Ok, this is a better example, since this is a stereo cut. I can't tell precisely what they've done exactly from this short sample without the vocals (which are completely in the left channel with reverb/leakage in the right in this original mix), but it's clear they messed with the stereo balance. The right channel has been brought up about 5dbs and was put almost 1 sample out of phase. All not good.

    No one over here ever worked on a Kinks project, and he did, why would he be mistaken...
     
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  15. Laservampire

    Laservampire Down with this sort of thing

    The UK and WG PRTs of the first album are completely different digital transfers.

    Based on the other two masterings of the stereo mix (2001 Pye Albums box and 2011 Deluxe edition, which I believe use the same digital transfer) I'm guessing that the UK PRT is closest to the sound of the tape, and the WG has been doctored.
     
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  16. Laservampire

    Laservampire Down with this sort of thing

    Because he worked on this stuff years ago, and a lot of tapes have been discovered since then.

    Dropbox - Dead End Street (Stereo Mix) 30 sec sample.mp3

    I haven't worked on a Kinks project but I have two ears and can hear that's real stereo.
     
  17. mindgames

    mindgames Forum Resident Thread Starter

    Location:
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    Fair enough :laugh:! Wow, no question about it. When is a digital collection coming with remixes?!
     
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  18. Laservampire

    Laservampire Down with this sort of thing

    No idea unfortunately! I'm pretty sure that's the only stereo Kinks remix that we haven't got on CD at this point.

    I concur with your assessment of the WG PRT too, I dropped the right channel by 3db and lined up the samples and it's much better than it was. EQ definitely is not as obnoxious as the UK PRT.
     
  19. Mike D'Aversa

    Mike D'Aversa Senior Member

    After listening to the full clip of the stereo “Dead End Street” on YouTube (& considering all the erroneous/confusing info beginning with thr ‘Anthology’ set in 2014), it seems pretty clear that Sandoval found enough to create a stereo remix. However, I think it got nixed from that project at some point, and was laying around in 2016 when this “best of” was being assembled. One thing that really stands out for me, and possibly why it never made inital release, is the almost complete absence of the very prominent acoustic rhythm guitar part throught the original mono/single mix (you can hear it, but it’s so low in the mix that it makes me think it waa either replaced or doubled “live” during the original mixdown).

    Curious as to whether anyone has tried asking Andrew about this yet?
     
  20. mindgames

    mindgames Forum Resident Thread Starter

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    The one I linked to? That's a mono to stereo spectral editing version. Which is absolute spadework, and all a bit of a waste when there's apparently a true stereo remix out there...
     
  21. Mike D'Aversa

    Mike D'Aversa Senior Member

    Sorry for being vague, but no.
    This one: - which appears to be a needledrop (notice the slight rumble distortion at the very beginning) of the legit version based upon the comments that follow as well as matching the first 30 seconds of the mp3 posted by Laservampire in both content and limited 160 kbps fidelity. The missing acoustic (which becomes the musical focal point in the outro) is virtually nonexistent...
     
  22. mindgames

    mindgames Forum Resident Thread Starter

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    Ah, gotcha, the true stereo version is up on YouTube as well. My bad, I thought all versions on YouTube were spectral edited versions, and I didn't hear this one.
     
  23. InStepWithTheStars

    InStepWithTheStars It's a miracle, let it alter you

    Location:
    North Carolina
    I have the 2011 deluxe series for everything except Arthur, and while I'm glad to have those for the extra content, I am looking for a sound quality improvement in the albums themselves. As it always seems to be, this new hi-res series is not definitive. I like the debut in mono, and even though they are out of phase, I'm glad it has the original mixes on Something Else. But, Arthur is missing intros (has there ever been a CD series that wasn't missing intros on one album or another?) and Lola is even more compressed than the Lola/Percy CD (though it seems Percy is improved for some reason). Presumably Arthur is going to use this same mastering (with the missing intro) on the super-deluxe box? Or perhaps it will get fixed and have a standalone CD like Village Green last year?

    There's the Castles/PRTs, but those have the debut in stereo and the remixes on Something Else. I could get the Reprise for those tracks, though I believe all the Reprise CDs have muffled sound due to copy tapes... and I'd prefer a consistent series where I don't need to adjust the volume between releases. Seems the best way to go is hi-res for Kinks mono, Face To Face mono, Something Else stereo, PRT for Kinda Kinks and Kontroversy (mono only), Village Green and Arthur (stereo), and the 2014 two-fer for Lola and Percy. Matthew B. had a great list of recommendations, but I believe that pre-dated the 2011 deluxes and thus wouldn't have Lola/Percy two-fer and the hi-res. Would appreciate an updated recommendation list!
     
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  24. InStepWithTheStars

    InStepWithTheStars It's a miracle, let it alter you

    Location:
    North Carolina
    Too late to edit, but this is the Matthew B. recommendation post mentioned: The Kinks PRT CD Discography?
     
  25. InStepWithTheStars

    InStepWithTheStars It's a miracle, let it alter you

    Location:
    North Carolina
    Has anybody compared the 2018 HD of Face To Face with the recommended K2 mini-LP? I think I've got my mind made up on everything else, mono up through Something Else and stereo afterwards:

    HD Kinks, PRT Kinda Kinks and Kink Kontroversy, 2011 mono Something Else from deluxe edition, Castle VGPS for the non-fades, PRT Arthur, 2014 Lola (from two-fer, seems to be better regarded than the 1998 - correct me if I'm wrong).

    Also not sure about Percy. Matthew B. recommended the 1998 over the PRT, how do those compare with the 2014 and the hi-res download?
     
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