Article: The Best Version Of ... War

[Josh Mound]

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[Josh Mound]

3 hours ago, ted_b said:

I'd love to hear Josh's take on the Atmos mix of The World Is A Ghetto (Apple Music or Tidal).  I say that having not heard it in Atmos (will tonight) but worried cuz it's a Warner label, and they've been delivering fake immersive almost 100%.

For apples-to-apples reasons, I only look at stereo mixes in TBVO, but I’ve enjoyed listening to Atmos mixes of some favorite albums (such as Pearl Jam’s No Code, as recommended to me by @The Computer Audiophile). It honestly never occurred to me that either album could be in Atmos, since it’s clearly not like War is getting tons of reissue attention! But I’m really excited that it exists. I’ll check it out!

[Josh Mound]

A quick correction: At one point (now fixed), I referred to the great engineer Chris Huston as Tom Huston. I suppose this is an occupational hazard of writing a dissertation that involves the Nixon administration. Needless to say, Tom Huston was considerably less great than Chris Huston.

[Josh Mound]

30 minutes ago, bbosler said:

question on the graphs.. does the Y axis indicate absolute dB levels i.e is each division on the vertical scale = 1 dB so far the most part we're looking at fractions of dB differences?

 

Yes, the scale is on the left for each graph. But note the “x 10 dB” clarification by “Magnitude.” So a 1 dB difference on the scale is really a 10 dB difference. 
 

That said, a cool part of Har-Bal is that it also has an EQ-matching feature, which (when in doubt) I’ve used to bring the EQ of one mastering into line with the EQ of another, leaving at most fractions of a dB differences in a few spots. When I placed those into ABX software, I could still reliably hear the difference, which I think was primarily about transfer quality, rather than EQ.

[Josh Mound]

9 hours ago, firedog said:

Saw some of the prices out there for the Gastwirts: pretty insane.

Anyway, listening on Qobuz to the NOT TBVO versions - and it sounds good to me.

Article inspired me to have a WAR listening marathon.

 

I certainly don't think any of these are bad masterings. We're really, at most, talking about a B- to A+ mastering range with these. It's not like any of them is a D or F.

[Josh Mound]

55 minutes ago, Mr Wensleydale said:

Josh, Rhino has recently released its Quadio of The World Is A Ghetto and the blu-ray contains a new hi-res stereo mastering alongside the quad. Will you be updating your TBVO to include the new stereo option?

Yes! It’s already in the works. I hope they release the currently vinyl-only expanded 50th anniversary version in digital soon, too.