what in the WORLD is this clicking noise on 'rocket man' on my US gr hits LP????

I have heard your clip, and sounds like it was mastered so that symbols seem very close to microphone.
There is also a lot of vinyl crackle.

 

I wish there was a way to get steve or one of the other mastering guys to listen to this. People, I'm positive that noise is not a cymbal. There IS a cymbal in the song obviously. If the cymbal is somehow triggering the clicking noise, I'd be really interested to hear theories on how it ends up making that metronome sound. And why sometimes it's there when the cymbal isn't being hit and vice versa

 

You mean 1st pressing of gr hits, right? If so this must have just been a botched mastering, wouldn't you think.

 

It's on several different MCA pressings of Greatest Hits, some of them late ones. I borrowed about a dozen copies from friends to verify. I think this is a very jacked up mastering.

 

Now that's dedication!

Well, I've been thinking about it and am now wondering if it could be DBX compression/expansion artifacts.

 

Isn't it also on more than one pressing of Honky Château too? I would think mine being such a generic, run-of-the-mill one...

I am really surprised no more people seem to have that curiosity on their copy or haven't noticed this so far. I guess I don't have such a leaden ear after all... :O)

 

Okay, I just realized I have a copy of my own (take note of this thread: Question for those whose collections number in the 5 figures... ) and mine doesn't have the clicking. Mine is a Canadian pressing with these numbers etched in the dead wax :

Side B ("Rocket Man" side):

MCA-3007-B MCA 587 W28

(envisioning Canadian pressings of the LP suddenly going for 3 figures on eBay )

Side A is:

MCA-3007-A MCA 586 W27

 

Well, Steve can certainly shed some light on this sound as he mastered the DCC version of Elton's greatest hits.

 

I guess you are referring to the Greatest Hits (which I don't own).

Here are my matrix codes for "Honky Château", Canadian beige MCA labels:


Side 1:

MCA 9-3135A-WII #3 -K-

Side 2:

93135B-WI #2 (K)

 

Of course Steve's input would be welcome since he has personal experience with the tape. I noticed this strange sound when I originally bought the album. What was it? 1975? It does not seem to be so prominent or odd sounding on the original vinyl of Honky Chateau or the CD I've got of Honky chateau (remaster). There's just something hinky about this cut on this GH album, and it's always been there from day one. I never listen to it, and haven't thought about it for ages, but whenever I did listen, I noticed it. It is obviously percussion of some type, distorted by something in the recording/mixing/mastering process.

 

Interestingly enough...I got a copy of Honkey Chateau that I bought recently that I just hadn't got around to playing yet and it does have it.

On the back cover
MCA 2017
(formerly 93135)

Bizarre. At first I thought it was over modulation, but now that I hear it on a cleaner copy it almost sounds like a faulty mix got through, with the metronome track accidentally left in.

 

is there a beacon we can send out electronically to suggest that steve read and comment on this thread?

 

Have you tried sending him a PM?

 

thanks for helping out with this!

 

What is Rocket Man 03?

 

are we supposed to do that?

 

Its a click track .
Leaky cans on Nigel ?

 

I had the very same album and know exactly what you mean. It sounds like (to me) some sort of artifacts from "sweetening" the audio a tad too much on the drums. When I bought that album on CD years later, it wasn't there...

 

A click track with occasional syncopation?...

...unless of course THEY don't follow it steadily enough...

 

Junk. A lifeless sort of dance remix:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_C2BIpBtG6Y

 

You beat me to it, Tony.

I was just looking for the link.

Click on it at your peril, jonboy71. I, of course, have the CD... Somewhere!

 

I hear it on the MP3 posted by the OP and it sounds like vinyl anomaly to me. I can make out both the hi-hat hits and the click at the same time. Doesn't sound like metronome to me. Can anyone find this sound on a CD copy...? Or have I missed a post? Sounds clean on my MFSL but that's the only copy I have.

 

Maybe it's just so high that it sounds like clicking? (I have a hearing loss and sometimes high notes will sound like clicking in music.)

 

I'd say it's "thicker" than a click if that makes sense. Like a pop/click hybrid. Weird to describe. If you listen to the sample with headphones, the positioning of the sound is different from the hi-hat, which although panned right is also slightly towards center due to the nature of vinyl stereo separation. This clicking sounds more panned to the right than anything that would've been part of the tape or mix, leading to my guess that it's a physical anomaly

 

Yes, you can actually do that. It's not like you're walking down a long corridor, finally coming to a room with a large screen, belching smoke and fire, along with a loud and evil voice saying "Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!!! I am the great OZ! How dare you come before me!!!!lol. At least that's not the reaction I got when I sent him a note.