Led Zeppelin I-IV 2014 remasters considered the best?

I think there's some truth to this - but only some. While I think @SibilanceSegs isn't quite right when he says Page is the final word on the sonics, I do agree with him that we should give special weight to Page's view - and so I don't think that Page should be totally uninvolved either. Many of the Classics are great - but some are not. Zep II and III in particular have issues sonically. And while Zep I and Houses are excellent, they are IMHO by no means radically different-sounding or better-sounding than other top masterings.

I think Zep is a tough catalogue to master just right across all the albums. I don't understand exactly why that is, but the evidence seems to bear it out. Including the Classics, there are four major masterings of the catalogue, and not only is there very little agreement on which is the best for each album, you'd be hard pressed to find any single individual on these forums who clearly prefers a single mastering for all 9 albums. Most folks seem to think it's a mixed bag.

 

I'm not making any statements, I'm simply defending Jimmy, which most of you disagree with, or maybe I have a different way of hearing things. I'm not going to be cornered by a bunch of keyboard warriors...so whatever you guys win. I still stand by what I said.

 

Listened to the 16/44 flac of the 2014 Led Zeppelin III the other day and thought it was outstanding.

 

"Keyboard Warrior" was always one of the top lost albums.

You think SMiLE is the holy grail lost album? Nothing compares to "Keyboard Warrior" by ELP/CS&N. I dont know why Neil had to be such a stick in the mud though. Prog was hippie anyway.

Another lost opportunity. Will this ever come out??

 

Let's say, just for the sake of argument, that Jimmy Page developped some sort of hearing loss in the high frequencies. As a result, he would need to increase those same frequencies to make the music sound ''normal'' to him. Or, his hearing could have been perfect, but he mastered the catalogue on equipment that were dull in the highs, therefore needing to boost the highs. In either case he would be ''right''. One of the reasons most - if not all - bands give the tapes (or files) to an outside person (besides his obvious mastering qualifications), is to have a fresh set of ears, someone using different equipment in a different space, and having the ability to cross-reference with other recordings. Whether this was done or not, I'm not the one to say.

 

To the extent you can't or won't come to agreement with others, that's cool. But when you can't or won't agree with those who are trying to agree with you, then that's on you. It's silly to call others keyboard warriors when you're one yourself.

 

a listener - with ears
one of many multitudes that feel Page really missed the boat on these reissues

there is a reason that Classic Records copies prices actually went up after the newer releases.

there is a standard - particularly when you are listening to acoustic instruments

Just because Donald Fagen's Morph the Cat is way way too bass heavy for a neutral system , his and Elliot Schiner's involvement shouldn't allow one to be critical? really

Steely Dan and their engineers set the standard way back then
even the all digital The Nightfly is audiophile quality heaven and
for the most part now
Two Against Nature was too bright
Everything must Go was wonderful sounding and spontaneous but too many subpar songs
Morph - great except for that way over the top bass
Condos - back to great sound

Those Roxy Music flat transfer sure came out nice

if they were improved on, then I would give you this

what I hear is more familiar and better sounding

 

Of course, he wants us to agree with him. He didn't remaster them for himself. He's got a vault full of master tapes.

 

Someone has an opinion that challenges your own and you put them on the ignore list?

I'm not sure how you can "disprove" the fact that there is identical bleed into the other channel in the Rain Song intro on both the Marino and Davis and not the Diament? Besides any audio issues I think the tape box from after the album release date in the super deluxe book is some significant evidence they didn't actually use the first gen masters for HOTH.

 

All in all whatever Jimmy was hearing he did a great job with these remasters and IMO they are the definitive digital versions to date. So well done Jimmy!

 

Probably more they are Analog cut and not Digital. Digital Vinyl is a dirty word to Audiophiles. Look at all the griping and moaning about the Beatles Stereo Vinyl. When a Vinyl Campaign is announced for band X or Y the first thing asked: Analog or Digital?

 

Obvoiusly, I would have prefered an analogue cut for the Beatles stereo, but digital or not, I think they are amazing. Way better sounding than the all-analogue Capitol versions.

 

Try a doing a comparison test with both the iTunes and hi res files with Foobar and the ABX plug in. You could be surprised.

 

Yet it is amusing how many wax lyricals on the Brothers in Arms MFSL LP when it is sourced from a 1985 16bit digital recording. So I wouldn't clump all audiophiles together having that opinion. Perhaps I shouldn't comment because to my ears I prefer the 2009 CDs for most of the Beatles catalogue, though I have to say the 2014 LPs are no slouch either.

Personally I don't really care if it is DDD, AAA, ADA, DDA, DAA, ADD or whatever. I generally go for what is to my ears the best sounding version of any album and across my collection there is no correlation with that. The magic is always in the source material and the production of it by the mixing and mastering engineers, and of course the stereo and listening room characteristics.

 

You people have all twisted my words around. I merely said these reissues are solid....Didn't think you guys would go all George Lucas (original Star Wars Trilogy) on me... Which I did not once say these new remasters are the best, I haven't heard all the pressings, so I my opinion is well beyond void. They sound great .. for $30 these are a solid releases....and that's ALLL I AM SAYING. If you disagree, fine.... Didn't realize Jimmy Page the audiophile was not welcome on this thread. I've said what I have had to say, I respect all over your input on other releases I will consider them if I ever come inherit a lump sum of money in the future.

 

You missed DAD, Chooke!☺

 

I don't understand why some get finicky with their vinyl, when it comes to having some digital in the chain. There have been some fantastic sounding reissues recently that are not all analog. The Davis cut of Presence and In Through The Out Door are two examples. I think part of the reason I rarely played Out Door before 2015 was the way it sounded. I find myself playing it much more often since I purchased the Davis cut. The syrupy muddyness no longer plagues the album. Presence is Led Zeppelin's best sounding album (my opinion), and there so many various pressings that sound fabulous. While I agree that Zeppelin recordings are not audiophile, Presence gets damn close, and the Davis reissue does not dissapoint. Whether it's all analog or some digital, it's about the sound.

 

For what it's worth, I agree with pretty much everything you say here: I agree the reissues are solid. I agree they are affordably priced and great to have.

 

Thank you...That is all I was trying to say.... apologies to all of you if I came off defensive earlier... home life is really stressful at the moment. I would love to hear some of the other pressings, hopefully someday they will come down in price.

 

I have all the Classic Records LZ (asid from the BBC sessions) and agree with most of what you wrote here. The only classic I find disappointing really are II and III. LZII is, as you say, not quite right. It's way too bright and it's also cut with some bad sibilants, much like the one you mention from Tea For One on Presence. LZIII initially sounds like it's a revelation since you can really hear so much detail but ultimately, the highs are tremendously cranked on it. I did an EQ match comparison with early Canadian and US Mastercraft pressings and in each case the highs on the Classic were boosted as much as 15dB! It also sounds like they ran it through one of the stereo width enhancers. Plus there's a weird flaw in Hats Off to Roy Harper I've never heard in any other version. The new John Davis vinyl cuts are quite good right through the line-up with the exception of the pressing flaws that showed up on HOTH and PG. Once those were fixed, all were fine.

 

Here's a new one for you. The EQ comparisons you mentione dmy doing were back when the iTunes versions came out. In one sense, they were "apples to oranges" since I was using a pbthal needledrop of an RL LZII and of course the cartridge/stylus/phono stage can have an impact when comparing to digital versions.

This weekend, I needledropped my LZII RL and my John Davis LZII. Both were done using my Denon DL301II Mc cartridge through a Lehmann Black Cube phono stage with exactly the same levels, no extra processing, no EQ other than the same iZotope Ozone 7 high-pass filter to remove subsonic grunge. Here are the results using Voxengo's excellent CurveEQ plugin for EQ matching comparisons:

Here's the two EQ curves (RL in green, JD in white). Very close!



Here's the EQ curve required to make the John Davis LZII vinyl match the Bob Ludwig version most of the way through it's less than a 1dB difference with biggest extreme 1.2dB in the treble (so much for the Davis being so terribly bright as some claim!)


Inverting the curve gives you an idea of what you need to do to an RL to make it match the Davis version: Boost the bass around 48 Hz, give a very low Q boost to the midrange and a slight treble cut in the extrem top end (where most of us age 50 or over can no longer hear anything anyway! )



So, all in all, there's not a big difference when one eliminates factors and uses the same equipment for both. I might add that this similar to the result I got when I compared the iTunes LZII
(which we now know is the exact same John Davis mastering) with pbthal's LZII RL needledrop. The variation in EQ was much less between those two than between the RL and either the Diament or Marino versions.

That's EQ. since there are those who believe DR measurements are valid for vinyl (I don't but whatever), I'll add that my RL comes in at DR15 eityh no declicking and DR 14 with declicking (it's pretty old). My JD is DR14.

And for those who complain when someone posts these graphs, calm down, take a deep breath and relax! I currently have 19 different vinyl versions of LZII (yeah, finding the best one has been a mini-obsession), and I'll simply say the Davis sounds very good when cranked. The RL has a certain something to it that probably has more to do with the tapes being fresh and likely some tubes in Ludwig's gear chain, but the Davis is very close in sound. The Mofi version is nice too although flawed, some Canadian pressings are nice, the Japanese ones I've owned have been utter crap (never had the original JP pressing), one 2nd UK pressing I own sounds like it was pre-compressed for FM radio, a Geroge Piros version I own is ok but not nearly as good as the Davis or RL, and on and on.

YMMV

 

It has been my belief that Jimmy Page and John Davis were attempting to get as close to the RL mastering with a couple of minor tweaks to improve on it. Your analysis seems to show this.

I am sure both listened to an RL pressing prior to remastering LZ II. I am also sure that Jimmy knows all of the preferred masterings by fans for each of the albums.

 

I don't know, and maybe it's just me, but if you turn it up loud enough it doesn't really matter who mastered it when I'm air drumming the poop out of When the Levee Breaks (or any Zeppelin track)!

 

Yeah, agree with you here. It is not that it is an invalid measure, just that most are not clear on what it is actually measuring. The main point is that a DR of an LP cannot be compared with a DR of a digital recording. Even comparing DR measurements between LPs is fraught with errors.

 

Interesting observation. I have never heard a Classic LP version of III, you wouldn't happen to have a sample to link? I have the plum label which IMO is lacking in detail. However, I preferred it over the anemic Diament III CD. This is why I was so impressed with the 2014 remaster, it just sounds great with detail and delicacy, even if it is a little bass shy compared to the other two.