Jethro Tull's Thick As A Brick Stereo/5.1 remix will be released on October 15th.

I'm with you. I just want the 96/24 5.1. The rest would never get played. Even the CD in the TAAB set will remain unplayed. Now I would prefer a BR with stereo and surround 96/24 lossless and I will just rip the streams to flac.

 

The book is 40 pages monochrome on matte paper and around 64 pages colour on glossy paper. I don't get unduly excited by these booklets, but it adds serious value to the package and means that it is entirely reasonable for TAAB to cost more than the KC remasters, where the booklet is much smaller and only 16 pages.

Personally, I would have rather had TAAB on Blu-Ray: not for the audio resolution but because you would then be able to read the newspaper pages, which play along with the disc and are pretty illegible on DVD.

I guess that you are perfectly entitled to demand the highest sound quality at the lowest price, but when I see someone on these forums who claims that a low-cost item with high audio specification is priced too high & spec'd too low, I tend to be grateful that I set the bar at a more attainable height.

 

It would be a no-brainer for me if the same set, at the same price, just included lossless audio. Is that so hard to understand?
Or maybe you think the King Crimson/Porcupine Tree/Steven Wilson/ELP editions spoiled us? "a more attainable height"? Come on!

I don't think the TAAB Deluxe is very expensive, as opposed to the Aqualung one. I don't understand why they didn't issue a CD+DVD-A set for this one, they would have sold much more and lost less to pirating.

Anyway, I'll probably get the TAAB Deluxe as a present for Christmas...

 

Up until the age of twenty, I listened to nearly all my music on compact cassette. All the music I loved I heard through a veil of tape hiss. So yes, I do find it hard to understand why someone would find it a deal-breaker that a fresh mix of material they purport to love would be available at a fractionally lower quality than very, very, very high quality.

I suppose that it's in the mindset of the forums to demand the very highest quality but, absent the ideal, I certainly wouldn't let the best be the enemy of the good.

 

You are oversimpliflying the argument. Both of his complaints are reasonable because he is looking for a happy medium that is not being offered. It is possible to make a Blu-Ray set affordable. Look at Rush Moving Pictures. It's a two-disc set (CD + Blu-Ray) for $25.

With Thich as Brick, we have an affordable set but with only DTS surround. With Aqualung, we have Blu-Ray, but in a huge, expensive box with a lot of stuff that some folks don't want or need.

 

The point is that the best quality is not out of reach, so it is not unreasonable to expect it. A Blu-Ray disc with hi-rez surround was obviously an available option. DTS in 2012 is a disappointment.

 

Blu-Ray is not as ubiquitous as DVD, so issuing on Blu-Ray alone cuts down your potential sales. Unless you issue a set with both Blu-Ray and DVD (such as the Grace for Drowning deluxe set), when you get a hard time for making people pay for discs they won't spin. I much prefer Blu-Ray myself, but I don't see that we've reached the point that everything has to be issued in that format (and perhaps we never will).

The MLP lossless solution is the DVD alternative, but although I have the KC remasters, I don't even know how to access MLP. I don't object to having the MLP information on the disc (why would I?) but I'd be surprised if more than a tiny percentage of owners ever exploit it.

DTS is the best way of hitting the majority of users. The number of people who want better than that is very small and they're probably all here.

 

Fine, but there are examples of affordable Blu-Ray sets. It is understandable for folks to question a DTS release in light of other releases that frankly offer more bang for the buck (e.g., Moving Pictures, Damn the Torpedoes).

 

I like the idea that you can buy an all vinyl two lp set or the CD set. I had to buy the Aqualung set to get the best sounding record of this album available. I have the vinyl set preordered so I'm set.

 

A few images of the packaging at The Jethro Tull Forum. CD/DVD
http://jethrotull.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=albums&thread=2165&page=1#32513
Thanks to (maddogfagin) Graham

 

I've been waiting a few weeks for this. According to the USPS my TAAB set should be here tomorrow. I've tracked it to Dallas. Cautiously optimistic! I have a lot of faith in Steve Wilson and expect a quality surround mix here.

 

My local Indie, Zia, is advertising the CD/DVD for $24.99 which is less than Amaz. Interesting.

 

If you don't have a universal player that does MLP (like some Pioneer's and most, if not all, Oppo's) and you're on a PC, then you can:
1) Install foobar2000 and a special MLP plugin (also you may add the ASIO plugin to guarantee the proper 24-bit output);
2) Install Winamp and a special MLP plugin (also you may add the ASIO plugin to guarantee the proper 24-bit output; personally I haven't tested Winamp for MLP);
3) Install ShaPlay (a special freeware player intended for MLP playback only; can also use ASIO output but, IIRC, can't down-mix multichannel to stereo on its own - unlike foobar2000);
4) Install VLC (albeit its MLP ability is too raw and unfriendly).

 

Has anyone received their replacement dvd from Amazon UK?

 

Nary a peep from any quarters on the replacement disc. BurningShed still shows item 'out of stock' and Amazon US still has it on hold.

 

Thanks for these intructions. I'm actually on Mac, but I have an old PC with foobar on, so I may try these out. I think you'll agree, though, that MLP is a pretty esoteric format, however high its quality.

 

Actually MLP is also used on the Dolby and DTS "Master Audio" tracks on Blu-Rays.

 

If you mean that it's used before the production of the BluRay, that doesn't prevent its being esoteric. If you mean that it's somehow the same format, I'm surprised that it isn't automatically decoded on all domestic BR players.

 

Does anyone know if I can still obtain a replacement disc for the DVD?

 

Is this set OOP?

None of the usual suspects (Burning Shed, Amazon US/UK/CA, Import CDs etc.) have stock.

 

This set was one of my biggest letdowns in terms of re-releases

They only corrected the mastering on the DVD, but they didn't bother to do the same with CD

Such a shame, because I know it could and should've sounded much better

 

Didn't realize the CDs were botched too.
The DVD will be my go to for listening, as with many sets of this type the CD will never get played.
But it's still a shame and inexcusable.

I'm seeing differing descriptions and SKU numbers for this set.
Was there a 2 CD 40th Anniversary set minus the DVD?

 

Only the 5.1 mix was fixed. The Hi-Res stereo on the DVD still has the bad mastering, but it is less unbearable.

 

The added brightness was not appreciated.
Fixed TAAB - No mastering on the 5.1. + the flat (original mix) stereo transfer are the highlights of this TAAB DVD.

 

Just so I'm clear, the hi-rez original mix is OK, it's just the hi-rez re-mix that's messed up?