Steinberg SpectraLayers: Repairing "Congested" Recordings?

[nxrm]

Some of my favorite stereo recordings from the 60s-mostly recorded in the best Hollywood studios and issued by major labels-sound congested where instruments and vocals sound smeared and confused. This typically happens when the vocals and/or orchestrations get busier in the track. I don’t know if this was due to poor mic placement and/or improper baffling techniques, but it’s hard to imagine engineers like Henry Lewy or Larry Levine making such errors. https://www.discogs.com/artist/259822-Henry-Lewy

https://www.discogs.com/artist/276888-Larry-Levine 1

 

Attached is the track from my Verve edition of the CD album. https://www.discogs.com/master/111848-S%C3%A9rgio-Mendes-Brasil-66-Look-Around?format=CD&label=5041&country=US&image=6946416.SW1hZ2U6MTg0ODM3Nzk%3D 1

 

As for what SpectraLayers 10 Pro (version 11 said to be out this year) and my skill level can do for troubled recordings like Look of Love:

 

1.) If you can hear the congested/smeared sound during the louder, busier passages of Look of Love, might there be any way estimate how many different instruments I’d have to unpack from that mix before I could identify where that disturbance (s) is coming from? Most likely, the less instruments I’d have to (attempt to as a newbie) extract from the mix to find and fix the problem the better chance for best sounding results.

 

2.) However, what I fear might be the biggest “baked in” problem with Look of Love is that the amount of compression originally applied during mastering to fold the acoustic energy of those instruments into a vintage two track analog recording (for 1/4" analog stereo 4-track 7.5 ips open reel tape and vinyl media) is what may be causing the congestion. And if that’s largely the case then how much-if at all-can SpectraLayers *decompress* two or three stems and/or the entire stereo track? Indeed, IF SpectraLayers can actually do some amount of decompression might it fix much of the audible problem?