It seems they are also expecting an Art Pepper Meets the Rhythm Section SACD around that same time in early March, though, of course, these things do sometimes get pushed back a bit. We shall see! And they have released several other SACDs over the past year (early Ornette Coleman, late Bill Evans...)
But it's all about the mastering. You have zero control of that with streaming at this time. "Is this the Steve Hoffman version?" Who knows.
Yup, I'll have to get my copy of You Must Believe In Spring (Hybrid SACD) soon; I noticed several titles and merch being sold out, so one shouldn't sit on the fence too long.
I agree, and I’m not trading in any of my Steve Hofmann Board approved CDs no matter how many times they are remastered and streamed hi-res. I think the newly released Joni Mitchell 24/192 transfers are extremely tasteful and well done, but they don’t all live up to that standard. I’ve been disappointed by the aggressive EQ and compression on others.
SACD's...yes...Ive been collecting them since they first came out. Why? SURROUND SOUND- thats why! Have all those early titles and just picked up a bon jovie "this left feels right" from a goodwill which has an absolutely incredible surround mix and SQ. All of his hits re-imagined from rock to pop. Incredible clean bass and acoustic guitars. Back in the 2000's I purchased some kinks sacds that were supposed to be in surround but they were only stereo. I also have some dylan stereo sacds. These sacds all have more high end, but they don't sound better than my original cd's, just different. If I'm gonna spend $30 bucks for a piece of plastic its gonna have surround on it...KUDOS to dutton-vocalion!!!!!!. To answer the thread question, I am pleasantly surprised sacd production has gone up and hasn't disappeared (like DVD audio did -luv those advanced resolution discs and cases). On a side note, I have shanias "up" album in sacd surround and dvd audio surround and the sacd sounds better with more dynamics and clarity!
Just received email from Elusive Disc....SACD of "Barbra Streisand Live at the Bon Soir" is shipping. Barbra Streisand Live at the Bon Soir Hybrid Stereo SACD
No surround sound on a recent live recording. Wow. Pass on this. Tennessee Ernie Ford SACD in stock at Acoustic Sounds. Just ordered it along with the Stones GRRR Live Atmos. Qty Item Number Price Total Item -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 1 CAPP 126 SA $ 35.00 $ 35.00 Tennessee Ernie Ford / Country Hits...Feelin' Blue 1 CMER 814836 $ 35.98 $ 35.98 The Rolling Stones / GRRR Live! plus sales tax!
Yup, thank you Dutton/Vocalion for licensing those Columbia, RCA, etc. 1970s quad masters and remastering them to multi-channel hybrid SACD; not just classical, but pop and disco as well - Earth, Wind, & Fire, Helen Reddy, Donna Summer, and more! Thanks also goes to Pentatone as well for doing the same for Decca and Deutsche Grammphone quad titles. Nothing really wrong with getting stereo-only SACDs if that's what the title was originally mastered in; I'd rather have a properly mastered recording instead of a butchered remix. Be it stereo or multi-channel SACD, underlying it is DSD - still technically better than CD's 16/44.1 PCM. Of course, if you want the multi-channel experience from your stereo SACDs, you can switch in Dolby's or DTS' surround sound processing technologies- they don't sound too bad, depends on the title's mastering. Harmon International also has Logic 7 but since the mid-2010s - and definitely after Samsung acquired them in 2017 - they're a 'has-been' in the home hi-fi scene, more or less. Too bad, I liked their products and to my ears Logic 7 sounded better than Dolby Pro Logic II.
From about 2006-2014, Vocalion put out a large number of highly-regarded and welcome reissues of very rare UK modern jazz recordings, mostly from the Decca archives, as well as certain Decca folk offerings such as Barbara Dickson. They are certainly able to make good digital transfers but the current reissue choices give off every impression of desperation, as they don't seem to be able to license UK material from Decca or similar. It's all very well discussing "specs", but the SACDs don't actually sound any better than their previous CD offerings, which were stunning and had a very high standard of CD mastering. It's also notable that the majority of the material they're currently putting out has been available for many, many years. It's all a bit sad. And I don't think merely providing a multichannel offering passes the "so what" test.
10 years ago I bought the PF DSOTM, lately been buying Chinese Flute & Blues SACD whatever I can find they are super rare.
It's too bad Vocalion pulled those titles from the market. It wouldn't surprise me that their license with Decca for those titles was limited and/or they're subject to a 'no-home' release restriction (similar to being unable to catch live local sports games on broadcast TV). As for the Dutton Columbia and RCA quad titles, some (if not all) haven't been released as multi-channel offerings since the days of quadraphonic LPs back in the 1970s. Further, at least here in the USA, Sony has given up on releasing SACD format titles. It's easy enough for them to license off titles for niche markets - they don't have to put up with the manufacturing costs for a small-size demand and they still make money from the licensing.
Obviously no one can improve on that. But if there is a good master tape, and a cr@ppy mastering on your streaming service, you are SOL. The reason I started buying some mid-70s Stones LPs is because the squashed streaming versions were laughably bad. 96/24, too. Mastering is king. Maybe one day streaming services will offer variants of a title. (The "Steven Wilson", the "Steve Hoffman", etc). Until then, I'll keep adding (mostly used) physical media to my collection.
In the US, the major music labels all license their music to reissue labels for release on SACD. Not so much overseas where labels like Japan Universal Music or Japan Sony Music release their SACDs directly. As for manufacturing cost, Sony makes money off of pressing those SACDs since it owns two out of three SACD pressing facilities on the world. And I am suspecting we are now down to the Sony facilities for SACD production.
Im surprised at the number of SACDs that are released solely in Japan while the US gets only a paltry CD release. Im looking at you Sony Japan. It seems like they are leaving money on the table by only distributing and marketing in Japan since they are a world wide company. Tower records have had a few Japan only releases of opera music on SACD as well. Hopefully the release of the Solti Ring on SACD will convince them there is a worldwide market for hi res classical music. probably not.
The fact that the new Solti Ring SACDs are priced so high and of questionable mastering (noise reduction and compression) does not help matters.
Yup; American audio enthusiasts and music lovers just haven't climbed on board SACD like their counterparts across the Big Lake (or the Pond for that matter). Me wonders just how much more in terms of production costs would it be to produce hybrid SACDs over CDs. And perhaps if Sony and Philips had come out with hybrid SACDs from the get-go then there wouldn't have been less market confusion, and hence greater possibility of acceptance & adoption of the format at the time. Got to hand it to the bean counters; Sony makes money from licensing and pressing, and they don't have to swallow producing low number production runs just for the 1% of the market. Let the indies deal with handling those OCD types...Hold on, don't some of the big guns own some indies too? For example, Craft Recordings is part of Concord.
as far as cost, $500 today would have been about $50 in the 60s, which is about what you would have paid for the complete set on vinyl (I'm guessing, but Im thinking it could have been more, not less). As far as the mastering, we will have to see. I think most of the issues seem to be with the Golden Ring release. I haven't heard anything about the actual releases yet.
Not sure where else to post this, but I just discovered something a bit odd. Anyone know of another SACD release that was ONLY available through a record club? While going through my collection on Discogs I noticed that the Everlast album White Trash Beautiful was available as an SACD but only through the BMG music club.
Hmmm, that must not be logged on Discogs then as it is super obvious that mine’s a club edition by looking at the barcode.
I wish that I could get more excited about collecting this format, but I generally find the selection of SACD reissues to be rather dull and conservative, a lot of safe picks from the 70s aimed squarely at older audiophiles--which is easy enough to understand given that this is the niche target market for such things.
