Re: [ARSCLIST] From ProTools to Vinyl? was [ARSCLIST] Fred Layn's post on the Studer

[steven austin <stevena@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

How do we feel about listening to the early recordings that were
"mastered" by having the artist send sound into a horn, direct-to-disc
or -cylinder, which have been available to us on disc or tape (when they
are) as re-mastered-from-media-playbacks? There's no way to get back to
the original "warmth," which already may have been miles from what the
musicians heard in the studio. Even if we could get clear separation of
the musicians on a Kid Ory recording, say, would it be legitimate to do
so?

In that band's case, audio purists might have to consider that they
played unamplified in loud, rowdy drinking halls. Recordings were an
afterthought. In this case, perhaps loud, hissy, primitively-mastered
78s are more appropriate to the listening experience than a crisp, clear
digital signal.
Maybe there should be a chatter-and-glasses-clinking track added? Or
gunshots?

I think some recordings (all pre-digital recordings) are meant to be
heard as they were heard at the time.

What about the producers who mixed LPs for cheap players at home and 45s
for car radio speakers...how do we justify which of the two mixes we
choose now for audiophile pressings and for digital remastering? What
about recordings that came to us only with weird mixes, like monaural,
duophonic, simulated stereo, quadraphonic, binaural, etc.)? How do we
justify our remix/remaster?

I think the best experience in every case (and I might argue, the
"truest" and "warmest") comes by recreating the original listening
context with archival reproducers. A mono 45 spun on a cheap player,
heard through a two-watt amp driving a four-inch speaker. I wish I had
room for all the systems that would do justice to what's in the archive.

I wouldn't mind vinyl-releases mastered to digital and written to CD if
they would only sound like vinyl. That should be the goal, not to create
some new experience from the old source. And if someone could master so
well as to recreate system context, that would be heaven.

Steven Austin
stevena@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx



-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
[mailto:ARSCLIST@xxxxxxx] On Behalf Of andy kolovos
Sent: Wednesday, January 12, 2005 7:08 AM
To: ARSCLIST@xxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [ARSCLIST] From ProTools to Vinyl? was [ARSCLIST] Fred Layn's
post on the Studer

Folks,

While we're on the topic of analog v.s. digital here, I just want to
present something that has vexed me for a while.

What in the world is the point in pressing LPs or 45s from
digital-source studio recordings and then marketing them as "analog"?  I
mean, outside of "marketing" that is.  Sure the resulting playback
format is analog, but if the source recording is a born-digital
multi-track studio recording, then the analog LP has been derived from a
digital source.  It's like after-the-fact-analog or something.  With an
"audiophile vinyl" markup to boot!  Please correct me if I'm wrong here,
but the only "analog warmth" (or whatever) present would be the result
of whatever artifacts got added to the signal through the
digital-to-analog conversion the signal went through to make the disc
master, the surface noise of the disc, the pre-amp, etc, but not a
natural part of the recording from the get-go.  Does surface noise add
"warmth"?--Sure it does.  Is surface noise the source of all that people
love about analog?--I don't think so. At that point I'd rather have my
CD player reconstruct the bits and feed me the sound.

I understand that DJs (meaning dance club and Hip-Hop DJs as opposed to
broadcast DJs) have a whole other set of reasons (scratching, cueing,
complex mixing and other stuff that works well in the analog domain) for
working with LPs that don't generally apply to the home listening
environment, and I also realize that they are a big market for vinyl
pressings of born-digital audio.  But for the rest of us it seems kinda
like an audiophile/nostalgia racket.

When I buy LPs, I always try to make sure that the source recording was
analog to begin with--otherwise I'd rather buy it on CD.  And, from the
other side, I prefer to get analog source recordings on LP rather than
CD. Am I being an over-sensitive madman here?