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ARSCLIST  August 2015

ARSCLIST August 2015

Subject:

Re: Remastering realities

From:

Tom Fine <[log in to unmask]>

Reply-To:

Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List <[log in to unmask]>

Date:

Thu, 13 Aug 2015 19:16:07 -0400

Content-Type:

text/plain

Parts/Attachments:

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text/plain (184 lines)

Chad wrote up a lengthy description of his mastering process in one of his catalogs, maybe a year or 
two ago. There's lots of info at his website. He's very clear about this because it's a selling 
point, why he can charge $50 per 2x 45RPM LP albums.  The ORG guys do the same kind of marketing. 
It's a big status thing in the LP reissue world to have photos of master tapes being played as 
lacquers are cut, with detail shots of the tape boxes.

I make it a point to keep track of Mercury Living Presence reissues, and their sources. My goal is 
always to prevent lousy sound quality in the end product, because I feel it betrays a brand built on 
high fidelity. Sometimes that involves discouraging the brand owners from chasing quick money and 
instead investing in quality for long-term gains.

-- Tom Fine

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "John Haley" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, August 13, 2015 9:47 AM
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Remastering realities


> Very interesting.  And also how you know all this stuff!
>
> Best, John
>
>
> On Thu, Aug 13, 2015 at 9:34 AM, Tom Fine <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>> John, that assumption is not always correct. Analogue Productions, for
>> one, won't work with digital masters. They have deals where real-deal
>> masters get shipped or hand-delivered to Kevin Gray in California, Ryan
>> Smith in NYC or Willem Mackee (sp?) at Berliner Studios in Germany, and
>> vinyl is cut all-analog from the tapes. Speakers Corner operates similarly
>> when they can get a deal. I think ORG also tries to work all-analog, but I
>> know for a fact they were not given first-generation of any Mercury master
>> tapes, nor was Speakers Corner; they were given second-generation 3-2 mix
>> tapes made at the time of the original LP cutting, which I think is an
>> inferior-sounding source compared to the 1990s CD digital files, which were
>> 3-2 mixes made from first-generation tapes.
>>
>> -- Tom Fine
>>
>> ----- Original Message ----- From: "John Haley" <[log in to unmask]>
>> To: <[log in to unmask]>
>> Sent: Thursday, August 13, 2015 9:06 AM
>> Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Remastering realities
>>
>>
>> I have always assumed that these guys who are cutting the fancy LPs do not
>>> get their hands on a genuine master tape, but rather a digital dub
>>> provided
>>> by the record company that owns the master.   It is hard to imagine the
>>> record company actually shipping out its real master tape for an important
>>> recording and then hoping to get it back.  Wear and tear, possible damage,
>>> whatever--what a bad idea when a good digital copy can be provided and
>>> nobody will know the difference.
>>>
>>> Also, as we know from Jon Samuels, the RCA Classical Division made a new
>>> tape "master" every time it reissued an existing recording.  The new
>>> "master" was just a tape dub of the last such "master."  So "master" tapes
>>> could be several generations away from the original master.
>>>
>>> Best, John
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, Aug 12, 2015 at 11:38 PM, Carl Pultz <[log in to unmask]>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>> In connection with that, I'd like to know how many passes the guys are
>>>> willing to take, or the owners allow, when working with first generation
>>>> masters. Tones don't always indicate peaks, right? Maybe being
>>>> conservative
>>>> in a digital transfer isn't such a compromise, but in cutting a lacquer,
>>>> there's less room for error. Of the premium LP reissues I have, most are
>>>> cut
>>>> not very loudly. That may be because they try for more bass than was
>>>> typical
>>>> originally, or maybe necessary caution. When it was new, they could play
>>>> the
>>>> tape repeatedly until they got what they wanted.
>>>>
>>>> I'd like to hear a discussion of the practical realities and limitations
>>>> of
>>>> that work, understanding that, "we could tell you, but then we'd have to
>>>> kill you."
>>>>
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List
>>>> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Tom Fine
>>>> Sent: Wednesday, August 12, 2015 8:57 PM
>>>> To: [log in to unmask]
>>>> Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Ordering from HDTracks
>>>>
>>>> By the way, I should clarify something. As far as I know, in almost all
>>>> cases, even when an LP reissuer like Chad is able to get access to a real
>>>> master tape for his LP cutting guy, he doesn't get any rights to make and
>>>> then sell a digital download (or CD for that matter). In some cases in
>>>> recent years, with Sony's RCA Living Stereo catalog and with some
>>>> Concord/Fantasy titles, Chad has been able to get rights to issue both an
>>>> LP
>>>> and an SACD. The Chesky brothers aren't in the LP reissue business
>>>> anymore,
>>>> so I don't think this business model interests them. They are strictly in
>>>> the high-resolution download business as far as their core product. They
>>>> seem to have a fulfillment system to sell others' LPs, somewhat along the
>>>> lines of how Mosaic Records also had the True Blue Music store.
>>>>
>>>> -- Tom Fine
>>>>
>>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>>> From: "Tom Fine" <[log in to unmask]>
>>>> To: <[log in to unmask]>
>>>> Sent: Wednesday, August 12, 2015 8:42 PM
>>>> Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Ordering from HDTracks
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> > Lou, they don't have a choice. The record companies simply don't farm
>>>> out
>>>> tapes for a dowload
>>>> > seller to remaster as they like. The HD market is emerging this way, in
>>>> my
>>>> experience.
>>>> >
>>>> > 1. the record company decides to put out a new album or remaster an old
>>>> one
>>>> >
>>>> > 2. these days, you still have to focus on the CD physical product and
>>>> the
>>>> MP3/AAC download market
>>>> >
>>>> > 3. however, only a luddite moron works in CD resolution anymore. If
>>>> you're
>>>> making an original
>>>> > album, you track and mix and master at 96/24 (or greater). If you're
>>>> remastering from an old
>>>> > analog source, you transfer and remaster mostly likely in 96/24 but
>>>> some
>>>> of us do it at 192/24.
>>>> >
>>>> > 4. since you end up with a 96/24 master, you include HD in your
>>>> availability universe. HDTracks
>>>> > seems to sign up for more product that Chad Kassem's download
>>>> operation,
>>>> but I think Chad is
>>>> > catching up. I don't know anything about overseas high-resolution
>>>> download
>>>> sellers.
>>>> >
>>>> > 5. Mastered for iTunes is pretty much mandatory nowadays, at least in
>>>> the
>>>> world I work in. They
>>>> > want 24-bit, and at least at UMG, they want to submit 96/24 to Apple.
>>>> >
>>>> > So, Dave Chesky is correct. He gets the remasters provided to him by
>>>> the
>>>> record companies. They,
>>>> > or in some cases the artists, control who does the remastering and how
>>>> it's done. We've lamented
>>>> > plenty here about lost opportunities to make things substantially
>>>> better.
>>>> In many ways, the
>>>> > business is as it's always been -- artist X or A&R man Y are most
>>>> comfortable working with
>>>> > mastering guy Z, no matter how tin or golden his ears are. So, over
>>>> time,
>>>> the remasters tend to
>>>> > sound about the same with more or less bad processing or digital
>>>> garbage
>>>> (ie early CD masters were
>>>> > plagued with the effects of jitter and low-resolution A-D conversion,
>>>> later ones had less of both
>>>> > and so could sound better from the get-go, but bad processing decisions
>>>> and bad ideas about
>>>> > dynamics compression often made that not the case).
>>>> >
>>>> > -- Tom Fine
>>>> >
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>
> 

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