Jimi Hendrix Experience Electric Ladyland (50th Anniversary Edition) 4-CD Box EH/Sony Nov. 9

You're right. It's a lot to ask. Many moons have passed since 1968, so a certain latitude should be granted for any 5.1 mix this far removed from the fact. These mixes are Kramer's artistic statements, because, well, Jimi isn't around. Does he honor Jimi, or try to copy 1968, or does he even have the ears for it in 2018? Each will have their own opinion.

Like I said, the only umbrage I take are the added digital effects, because to my ears they sound way out of place.

Otherwise, hey, from my understanding they moved a lot of copies of this 50th set.

Just the other day I was reading the Amazon review. I kind of liked this headline: "Bernie Grundman Blows a Wad on CD Remaster. Redeems Himself on 5.1 Mix" Whatever that means. Ha!

 

Unfortunately Jimi died before any of the Quadraphonic formats had taken hold aside from Open Reel Tape. But based on the stereo mixes and all panning back and forth and Jimi's love of experimenting with new stuff, I tend to believe that he would have done recordings with Multi Channel in mind and even re-released earlier titles in Quad. Unfortunately we will never know.

 

Sounds like he turned the tides gently, gently away.

 

My understanding is that the compression/limiting is added at the mastering stage?

 

Once again- I don't care for 5:1 and I'm certainly allowed to express that opinion. You are ridiculous.

 

So how does the fact that you don't care for 5.1 make the release a money grab?

 

The consumer has to buy surround equipment.
Maybe being paranoid but I do believe surround sound is very much industry driven.

 

It's a specialized niche format. I doubt very much that it's a big money maker for the industry at this point. You could argue that any reissue was just a cash-grab.

 

Certainly as the home video market grew (in the U.S. at least) that led to the rise in surround sound capable receivers. I know I've had a surround sound set up (admittedly probably poor quality/basic ones in the beginning) since at least 1993. In fact, I just replaced that '93 PSB Alpha center channel a year ago! Space is certainly an issue with a surround sound setup, so if you live in a place where space is at a premium, it can be a deterrent as well. The fact that these receivers (particularly with the introduction of HDMI) has allowed the industry to once again release surround sound music (thinking of quad prior to this), is sort of just icing on the cake so to speak.

 

Where I live it's a mainstream format for the middle class. Like electric cars. Status symbol for middle aged guys .

 

I don't know why this made me chuckle aloud. Cool.

 

Agreed regarding Pepper. With EL, Kramer added elements that detract from my listening experience, and left out a lot of details that make the album great to me. It just sounds lazy to me on his part. The original stereo has a sort of 3D sound to it anyway, so I expected that to go even further with the 5.1 mix, and it doesn't. With Pink Floyd and other 5.1 remixes, the sound and intent from the stereo version is left intact while expanding the sound field. When Steven Wilson does 5.1 mixes, they still sound like the same album to me because he didn't add, or subtract any important elements. The EL 5.1 doesn't sound like EL. It really sounds like someone mixed it without hearing the original mix, or having any idea about Hendrix in general. I will keep giving it chances to have some sort of positive impact on me, but so far, my impression of it gets worse with each listen. I mean, Kramer even left in an extra hi hat hit at the beginning of Voodoo Child (Slight Return) that isn't there on the original. It was left out for a reason. It isn't executed well, so they left it out of the original mix and waited for the next hit before the hi hat enters with a much stronger intensity. I honestly don't think Hendrix or Mitch Mitchell would be happy with that left in there like that.

 

Indeed, and Grundman isn't known for adding very much of either effect when he masters something. It's pretty easy to run his mastering through a limiter after the fact, and that's probably what happened. Someone at EH thought it was a good idea. A lot of times, they're wrong to do what they do in my opinion. This is one of those examples.

 

Totally agree! The SACD of "Machine Gun - 12/31/1969..." all but proves this theory; it's the same mastering, just more dynamic than it's standard CD counterpart (or the 96/24 download for that matter).

 

Obviously any answer can only be speculation: but why only do this to the 2.0 & not the 5.1?

For awhile EH had cut way back on the brickwalled releases; but this is a return to the bad old days..........

 

Jeez, this isn't hard to figure out.

Whether it's EH or any label, they don't want you to have an easily-copied disc with a clean mastering on it. Few will go to the trouble to rip 5.1, and fewer will care to distribute it. So they will give you a crappified-for-the-earbud-masses 2.0 copy for $XX, and a clean hi-res (ie, hard-to-copy SACD) for 2 x $XX.

This is precisely the reason MQA came into existence. Label suits don't sense any pressing demand for clean engineering, but they're all kinds of interested in copy protection, and ultimately pay-per-play.

 

Well, duh! So, when they play Jimi Hendrix on top-40 radio his songs will slam! Nobody wants Jimi's music to sound weak when it's played between Ariana Grande and Kendrick Lamar.

 

The 5.1 is definitely not a cash grab for anyone with surround capabilities. The 5.1 surround of Electric Ladyland blu ray is really well done. The more 5.1 surround blu rays the better. If you are not interested in 5.1 or don’t want to purchase new gear, that does not mean this release is a cash grab. EL 5.1 blu ray along with the Beatles white album 5.1 are what surround sound fans really want.

 

Honestly this isn't just an issue with EH, but many other artists as well. I was recently having a discussion with a regular poster here about how many times I've had to downmix a 5.1 track to 2.0 just to get a reasonably dynamic stereo version. A quick search of the DR Database will show you what I mean. I mean, it's sad really. I have no idea why the engineers tend not to mess with the 5.1 like they do the stereo version. A more recent example...I purchased the 96/24 downloads of The Allman Brothers at the Fillmore in Feb 1970 (before the famous "Fillmore East" shows) as a download from Bear's Sonic Journals as they were not certain they were going to offer the raw tapes up on a physical format. Many of Owsley's tapes of these shows are incomplete, so they cobbled together various versions across the three nights to make one single CD and LP. They were afraid a "warts and all" set on CD just wouldn't sell. Well lo and behold, the downloads sold well enough that several months later they reversed course and offered up the 1 disc compilation and the 2 disc warts and all set as a 3 disc limited edition (only 1000 sets were pressed up). I bought the CDs so I could have a physical backup. First thing I noticed when I ripped these discs? The downloads are offered as uncompressed straight copies of the tapes. The CDs were further compressed digitally. Now the CDs aren't squashed and they still sound good, but I mean, why even do this in the first place??? It boggles the mind. Slam indeed.

NB: The highest gain in dynamics when comparing the 2.0 to a 5.1 mixdown in my collection is Bob Clearmountain's mix of Bob Marley's Legend 30th Anniversary. The disc I have where the 5.1 and 2.0 are almost no different (both squashed) is the Clapton/Winwood Madison Square Garden set. This last one makes me sad as I really love the music but man is it overly compressed!

 

My general experience with 5.1 DR vs 2.0 has been very similar to yours. Other than the Hendrix (VERY OBVIOUS) I have questioned whether it had more to do with the algorithms of my Oppo's down mixing or with the mastering. I do use Dr Loudness; I have compared 5.1 to 2.0 there.

 

I haven't found blu's all that easy to rip & especially to chapter (dvd's chapter easily), but I haven't spent a lot of time with it either. Hi res downloads are extremely easy to copy (no copyguards at all) & many non MQA's are quite good, though the loudness wars have been hitting 24 bit dl's badly the last couple years.

Resolution: post at least once daily on Dr. Loudness! I really wish HDT, AS, PSM, 7D, etc would post DR numbers, mastering engineers, & other relevant information..........

 

It's hard to say, right, although I use PC based software to downmix, so different methods yeilding similar results. Lastly, the downmixed waveforms could still be analized and viewed to see if they contain any clipped samples. In cases where the 2.0 is severely compressed compared to the downmix of the 5.1, I'd expect those waveforms (from the conversion) to appear to have a serious "haircut".

 

That's certainly true with freeware. I have some (admittedly overpriced) payware that makes it easy peasy. Seriously, it's a couple clicks, a lot of waiting (it takes a long time to rip), then you're done. Of course you have to have a Blu Ray drive as well. Not many of those come standard on computer equipment these days (if they ever did - my old laptop had a drive, but I've not personally seen another one that did). I use an external Blu-Ray drive now.

 

Very good point. Most (probably all) of my pc based audio programs that due waveforms are older and only go to 16 bit. I really do need to get a 24 bit audio editing tool more advanced than Trader's Little Helper!

 

I got lucky and bought CoolEdit back in the day for a mere $50, plus $50 for the necessary editing plugins. Once Audacity bought it, they priced it well over $400. I'm still using the CoolEdit to this day (and the software is 20 years old)!