How's the SQ on the 2011 Sundazed mono CD for If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears

What I want to know mainly is if there's any clipping.

If somebody could load the CD image into a program like Audacity and take a screenshot to show me, I would be eternally grateful

Like this, but for the entire CD image

 

I don't know if this will help you or not, but if you go to Sundazed own website, they have some clips of the songs there?

http://www.sundazed.com/shop/produc...=2066&osCsid=1c058fdd7aa64e7d5e2c48de1d2e6a91

 

I've listened to the clips but they offer little help, since they are only clips. I would need the whole song (or whole album) to check for clipping

 

A sound clip should still give a decent idea. Being this is from Sundazed, it's the work of Bob Irwin. He's one of the good guys.

 

I don't do CD images, but think this CD sounds good. As it's the only way to get the mono mix on CD, I say go for it.

 

I had a previous Sundazed CD, I think from '05, that had terrible clipping. So I can't assume that just because it's from Sundazed it's gonna be good. The clips offer some help but I want to check if there's any clipping at all, or, in other words, if the full dynamic range has been preserved

 

I love the sound on this disc, it's about as good as it's ever going to get. I don't do waveforms, but my ears tell me you're not going to find a better copy of this album, and I have 4 different releases of it as well as mono/stereo vinyl.

 

The sound is good and most importantly it's the only way to get the mono version on cd so it's a no-brainer if you want it in mono.

 

I love the sound on this one.

Darryl

 

How does this compare to the Steve's MCA of 16 Greatest Hits?

 

Steve's disc is all stereo, iirc.

 

The Sundazed cd is a limited edition and reasonably priced. Get it before it's too late. Bob Irwin might not be Steve Hoffman or Barry Diament, but his work is generally okay. MONO BABY!

 

I just bought a used copy on eBay for $7 in great condition!

 

Boy you said it...

I don't know if it's just me and my obsession with mono, but if it were up to me, every CD remaster of every album would include both the mono and stereo mixes of that album

 

I think it sounds nice, albeit fairly hissy. It's definitely from a tape souce.

As for their mono "The Mamas & The Papas" album on Sundazed (their second album), a friend of mine who has friggin' bionic hearing tells me the second album on Sundazed is a vinyl dub. He says what they did on some of the song openings and endings is they folded the stereo tape version down to mono and dubbed it into the vinyl version. I would be skeptical about this, but honestly, this guy has ears of GOLD and has been involved with CD mastering himself. He listened to it in depth, and if he tells me the Mama's & Papas second album on Sundazed -- both the vinyl and the CD -- is a disc dub, I believe him.

 

That's very interesting what you said about the second album. It wouldn't actually surprise me if Sundazed did something like that and not actually mention it.

From the Sundazed website for the second album on CD
http://www.sundazed.com/shop/product_info.php?products_id=2421

So if they actually did do the CD from a disc, that would definitely be false advertising and they could be sued. They specifically said it was mastered from tape.

 

Well, I hope my friend is wrong, and perhaps he is, but I'm telling you he can spot a disc dub from a mile away.

 

Show this to your friend. I don't have a photo of the second album, but Sundazed provided this photo of the first album's EQ master. If they say it was cut from tape, it was.

 

Slight (but pertinent, I think) threadcrap

Has anyone compared the Sound Quality of the Sundazed "If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears" CD vs. the Sundazed "If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears" LP that was released at the same time?

.

 

No reason to, as my friend says the first album IS from tape on Sundazed. It's only the second album he's talking about.

 

Gonna bump this thread for a bit. First, to get OP's original question outa the way... no, there's no clipping here at all, no track peaks at -0.00 dB or even crosses it. You can see the DR log here: http://dr.loudness-war.info/album/view/19827

But second, I'd like to address another issue someone else here (@Brian W. ) brought up, because this is very interesting to me.

I saw that picture before, and I agree the first album's def from tape, which as Sundazed said, is a "Mono EQ master from Western Recorders, recovered from UMG UK" (but IMO I think it sounds good fwiw). I'm more interested in what you have to say for the second album, though. How did your friend come to the conclusion that the Sundazed 2nd album CD is a mix of a needledrop AND a fold-down of the stereo mix? I'd really like to know that...

 

I know that you can use that website and DR values to show if there's any clipping by looking at the peak levels. If a value of any sample is above 0 dB then there's obviously clipping, correct?

But what about using DR values to check for hard limiting, which in essence, is the same thing...Can you check for that??

 

I just listened to and analyzed the Sundazed issue of the second album. I'd say that I'm about 99% confident that at least large chunks of the album are from a needledrop. Here's why:

1) Obvious noise/distortion in places.
2) Changes in tone after intros/before fades.
3) Changes in spectral view that correspond to #2.

Quite obvious in three songs:

Dancing Bear - At 0:40 there's an obvious shift in tone, and from 0:40 to 0:49 the high end is quite poor. At 0:49 the high end gets better (all of which can easily be seen in spectral view). At 3:33 there's very obvious distortion, then at 3:34 the tone clearly changes. None of these issues are present on the mono LP.

Dancing In The Street - At 0:45, the tone changes, and everything goes from clean to very distorted. And at 3:37 the situation is reversed, plus there's an obvious change in spectral view.

Even If I Could - At 0:06 there's an obvious change in spectral view. The song is quite distorted throughout, and at 1:55 the tone changes and everything goes from being very distorted to perfectly clean.

The same seems to be the case for everything else on side 1. At the moment I'm less sure about side 2 outside of Even If I Could. Thus far I haven't noticed much obvious. So it isn't clear if they used 1) mono tapes, 2) stereo tapes folded down, or 3) a better mono needledrop. I'll have to compare with my needledrop of the mono LP later to see if anything stands out (at the moment I just have Dancing Bear at my fingertips). No question that a good chunk of the album is from a needledrop though (and not a particularly good one).