According to what was posted on the Ampex List, a former Columbia engineer had made personal dubs of
some of the S&G tapes, and Sony was very happy to borrow or buy those tapes to make recent
remasters, because the original 2-tracks were indeed worn out.
-- Tom Fine
----- Original Message -----
From: "Doug Pomeroy" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, April 08, 2015 8:53 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] More tales of woe from the tape vaults
>I remember seeing some of the Simon & Garfunkel master cutting
> tapes at Columbia which were literally worn out from over use. The
> tape seemed to have become very thin and the audio level diminished.
>
>
> Doug Pomeroy
> Audio Restoration and Mastering Services
> 193 Baltic St
> Brooklyn, NY 11201-6173
> (718) 855-2650
> [log in to unmask]
>
>> Regarding Robin's posting, I don't think there's any blanket "wisdom" about old tapes getting
>> "dulled out," but I have heard stories about older tapes that were used to cut a lot of LP
>> masters
>> get so they don't Dolby-track well and other things related to certain frequencies falling off
>> more
>> than others over time. I think it could be that the tapes passed over slightly magnetized
>> transport
>> parts or heads here and there, or were exposed to weak magnetic fields for long periods of time,
>> or
>> even lost enough oxide for it to be audible just because they were played so many times. After
>> all,
>> playback is not a frictionless exercise.
>>
>> -- Tom Fine
>
>
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