Not so fast!..... Are we jumping the gun with announcing that all those different pressings are Steve's? I'm not saying they aren't but I would like a little more analysis before drawing any conclusions. I just analysed tone ded freb's English disc and got the exact same EAC peak levels for each track as I got from analysing my English disc (they have different pressing numbers (mine is a "1:0" and his is a "1:2"). Why would these other pressings have slightly different peak levels on a few tracks if they were clones of these English discs? Just to clarify: English discs: 90.7 --- 91.7 --- 90.8 --- 88.9 --- 96.3 --- 86.1 --- 97.5 Other's being claimed as clones of the English discs: 90.8 --- 91.7 --- 90.6 --- 88.7 --- 96.3 --- 86.2 --- 97.6 Also, I directly compared a CRC pressing with my English one and they were definitely not the same (the CRC had noticeably less controlled bass for one thing). I don't know what the matrix code for that discs was and I've since got rid of it - are there different CRC pressings? Food for thought.....
Good question. Well, they are not exact clones. The leading silences of the songs are different, the indexing could be slightly different, and maybe that difference causes EAC to round differently after the comma. (?) I can only say that your .wav clip and Leppo's earlier .wav clip both cancel out completely in a null test when compared against my disc. (The leading silence was of quite different length, though.)
Your disc must be the JVC pressing. The CBS/Sony pressing has "CSR COMPACT DISC" repeating in the plastic ring and "DIDX-55" in the matrix code. It also has "DIDX-55" under the catalog number at 3 o'clock. The JVC pressing has no text stamped on the plastic ring and "MCAD-37214" in the matrix code. It does not have "DIDX-55" under the catalog number at 3 o'clock.
OK, so maybe using EAC peak levels is not the most reliable test. What we really need to know is why Kevin stated that Dave's disc was not Steve's mastering in post #32. Did he ever divulge his source for that conclusion?
It seems to me that this is the definitive test. Andreas, could you explain in more detail how you did it? Since the clips are short, how do you align them with your .wav file of the full track?
My theory is that all early pressings are either Steve's or Roger's but not both. I've yet to find an early pressing with different mastering. However, there are variations with indexing. For example, with some pressings the tracks begin at 00:01 instead of 00:00.
Dave, I have that pressing and it's definitely the same mastering as the one now claimed to be Steve's.
Thanks Keith. You've described mine perfectly--it's a JVC, and hopefully, it IS Steve's, based on what I've read here.....I think.......
Has the mid range hole as well as Steve told Joel Cairo who has the exact same pressing that it wasn't his.
This thread has taken on a sort of Strawberry Fields quality to it. Any chance Steve misidentified Mal's pressing? Because if Mal's pressing and Joel's pressing are the same, he had to misidentify one, right? Cranberry sauce.
I open a wave editor and delete leading silence on both tracks. I have to do this manually, and increase the resolution so that I can choose individual samples. Then I invert the shorter file (both channels), and mix it with the longer one, in a way that the shorter file gets mixed in at the beginning of the longer file. The result was complete silence exactly as long as the shorter file was. Of course, I can only guarantee that they are identical over the length of the shorter sample. If you want, you can post a complete song via youesendit.com, so I could check if other tracks are identical.
Another UK Hoffman disc? Is this another example of Steve's mastering on a UK release? 10 sec clip here EAC extraction logfile from 23. September 2005, 19:05 for CD Steely Dan / Aja Used drive : _NEC DVD+-RW ND-6450A Adapter: 1 ID: 0 Read mode : Secure with C2, accurate stream, NO disable cache Read offset correction : 0 Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out : No Used output format : Internal WAV Routines 44.100 Hz; 16 Bit; Stereo Other options : Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes Delete leading and trailing silent blocks : No Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000 Track 1 Filename C:\Documents and Settings\A\Desktop\aja\01 Black Cow.wav Peak level 90.7 % Track quality 100.0 % Copy CRC 013E0C46 Copy OK Track 2 Filename C:\Documents and Settings\A\Desktop\aja\02 Aja.wav Peak level 91.7 % Track quality 100.0 % Copy CRC DEDA79D7 Copy OK Track 3 Filename C:\Documents and Settings\A\Desktop\aja\03 Deacon Blues.wav Peak level 90.8 % Track quality 100.0 % Copy CRC A6605A00 Copy OK Track 4 Filename C:\Documents and Settings\A\Desktop\aja\04 Peg.wav Peak level 88.9 % Track quality 100.0 % Copy CRC 2396419D Copy OK Track 5 Filename C:\Documents and Settings\A\Desktop\aja\05 Home at Last.wav Peak level 96.3 % Track quality 100.0 % Copy CRC FB73F409 Copy OK Track 6 Filename C:\Documents and Settings\A\Desktop\aja\06 I Got The News.wav Peak level 86.1 % Track quality 100.0 % Copy CRC 85AE9975 Copy OK Track 7 Filename C:\Documents and Settings\A\Desktop\aja\07 Josie.wav Peak level 97.5 % Track quality 100.0 % Copy CRC 49CAF1A1 Copy OK No errors occured End of status report
I believe Andreas has a German "Katy Lied" from the same series as his Aja and it is Steve's mastering. I'll post a 10s clip of Black Friday from my English CD (from the same series as my aja) when I get the chance - I'm fairly confident it will turn out that it will be Steve's too (it sounds better than any other pressings I've heard).
I found a very weird (at least to me) copy of Aja this week-end. No barcode, DIDY is on back inlay, spine and cd. Back inlay also says CRC below "JOSIE" and CRC is on the CD too below DIDY 55. Disc. is USA made. Times out at 39:58. I A-B'd to my JPN made US disc, and, I believe I hear the "breath of life" on the JPN. one. Lush, full, all that good stuff, no hole in the midrange. When you a-b, you immediately hear it. My JPN. one times out at 40:00 exactly. The weird thing about the USA disc is the inner matrix ring. It's clear, but has no machine stamped info. Instead, on the silver edge immediately after the clear plastic ring ends, there are 3 series of hand-written letters/numbers, 2 of which are xxxx'ed out. Here they are: CI-05098-4 (Crossed out) CI-5950- (Crossed Out--and NO, I did not forget a number after the last hyphen) CI-5650-1 (Not crossed out) Does anyone know what pressing this is????
Perhaps I wasn't clear freb... Joel Cairo's and my versions are not Steve's mastering as confirmed by Steve himself. Mal's was confirmed to be Steve's by Steve. For Katy Lied, only Leppo's has actual Steve confirmation.
So do you think the EAC differences Mal provides indicate his pressing is different from other early pressings or are the peak differences too small to be significant? If Steve correctly identified Mal's pressing, it has to be the former, right? Which is why I'm confused because I thought I was reading the latter in this thread, that the peak differences were too small to be significant. What of the problem with Mal's sample clip canceling out with other early pressings? I'm scratching my head trying to reconcile these last two with Steve saying your version and Joel's version aren't the same as Mal's, that is to say aren't Steve's.
