I want to follow-up on this return question. I received an email yesterday from both Warner and PayPal. Both said that a credit had been issued to my Visa for the Rhino return. While I am grateful for Rhino's diligence, they could have had much better communication throughout the process. There was never an email acknowledging the receipt of the return or an update during the process.
Liking or disliking something only requires knowing what you like and dislike, however if you’re going to do a review of anything you should be able to discuss it intelligently especially if you want anyone to take your view seriously
I'm not hearing that much unique transfers and mastering among the small amounts of musical minutia you mention about "Introduction". I've got the CTA CD and it is louder than the Group Portrait version, just not the blaring loud kind associated with brickwalling.
Well, IMO, one shouldn't be using YouTube for their regular music fix, anyway. Don't buy them. More sales will just encourage them.
Oh yeah. I saw this video. He sounds like a shill for Tim Jessup. I understand he's a huge fan, but how can I take him seriously when he has that cheapo-Crossley rekkid player in the background?
Yeah, that's the issue! I'm listening to Q6768 right now and it's just...awful. The EQ is just bizarre. He also sucked all the energy out of the band on this tune specifically. No clue what he was going for but we know it wasn't competence. Interesting to note that the compression on the drums must have been applied during recording as it's very much still here. "Does Anybody..." is nearly missing drums. Guess they weren't important or something. Those are the only tunes I intend to listen to. I'll go back to my original Columbia CD and Quadio and be quite happy. Ed
For god's sake, don't listen to "Introduction". Your head will explode! The only other things I can think of is if there is something seriously wrong with his monitoring system, out-of-phase wiring, or he mixed with headphones, which would have been the most amateurish thing.
I don't agree with him. Calling it in his words "pretty decent" tells me he doesn't have much of a sound system to hear it.
I'm more surprised there's a dude that young that even knows or even cares about Chicago history much less the CTA album. His replies to negative YouTube comments on the remix has him vacillate too much with vague, generic descriptions of what he hears without specifics to which songs he's referring to as a non-combative counter argument. But at least he replies.
Then those tapes on both Group Portrait and CTA imbue a nasally overall resonance to the brass making vocals a bit bright especially on "Does Anybody Know What Time It Is". Or who ever EQ'ed the brass preferred pinching mid-range. A trombone should have a full bottom end sound so that it doesn't get mistaken for a Chuck Mangione flugelhorn. That's what I listen for, not tape drag. Just sayin'.
I don't. But I believe that if you're someone that has even a passing intrest in the band you should at least be able to sample a more representative sound of Chicago. Which any of the Rhino masterings are definitely not. I was listening to my just arrived CD of VII on Chicago Records last night a couple of times in a row and that is the sound of the group that people should be hearing.
For the record: I love the Rhino record label. It's one of the best around. I don't blame them at all for what has become the sonic mess of the Chicago catalog. That fault rests squarely on the shoulders of Lee Loughnane.
The recording is the recording. The mix is the mix. Yet, some releases have additional problems not on others. Like the aforementioned tape drag.
Eh you’re making a pretty weird generalization. Plenty of people his age, myself included, care about bands and their unique history to this degree, it isn’t that special. What would be special is someone who doesn’t sound like they’re being fed lines by their estranged uncle when it comes to defending the legacy of their favorite classic rock act because their knowledge is surface level at best
Don't know why or how you took my comment as a weird generalization. I take it you're the same age as the young YouTube CTA reviewer, so that might explain it. I based what I said on the youths I live among and around in my Texas community. And I can tell you in the tourist town I've lived since 2007 not one out of the thousands of teens & twenty somethings all partying on the river, sightseeing in their cars or in the local parks with car audio system booming away, did I hear them play one Chicago song. Not one wore any t-shirt or swag with a Chicago album cover design or logo.
It is so interesting to compare the remixing approaches behind this remix and the latest Tull remix (Stormwatch). Stormwatch turned out soooo overly great to this ears. Although I think the original mix didn't need a "fix" the remix is so great. Completely true to the spirit of the original mix but so much more clarity and what not... And all that without the overbroading self-confidence of the remixer....
The Mastersound didn’t have more magic than the MFSL—just a slightly different flavor, and a little different fade-in on “Free Form Guitar,” if I remember correctly.
