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I picked up the new Madonna CD "American Life". I looked around, and there were no hi-rez version(s) available. I remember reading about a DVD-A version of this record. What happened?Anyway, I am stunned by the quality of the sound on this CD. Even on a small system like mine, it sounds HUGE, with lots of punch, extremely soft and detailed at the same time, lots of synths layers, outstanding bass, this record is maybe even better than Music. I can't imagine what it could sound like on a high end system.
What's my point? I think the quality of CDs has greatly improved lately, and the gap is narrowing with some high resolution titles published. Perhaps studios are taking advantage of higher resolution machinery, or they have improved something in the process, but the sound of some recent CDs is outstanding. There is obviously still a lot to extract from the old 16/44.1 format.
My other point is that I wish they would publish some stuff of that caliber on DVD-A.
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Follow Ups:
U2 should address this, all their albums sound as though they were made for $80 boom boxes.
Madonna knows how to get an exciting sound. Thankfully there are many others who make the effort, which is why we invest so much in good systems.
Roger Waters claims not to be an audiophile, but his production leads me to believe otherwise.
but, I think I read about Lanois doing some work on older stuff in higher resolutions on the HRH. I thought the "Best Of" album of U2 (the one with the alternate versions and remixes) had improved in sonics over the previous versions for many titles. (the third DVD disc was a rip-off, BTW)With CDs, I can adjust my expectations, but it takes time. The problem is that after playing a CD like American Life, you cannot play another CD for at least an hour.
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is easy to make sound good on today's CD's. It's all electronic, so how can you tell what "original" sound is supposed to be like? Everything is produced and made up by engineers!Real, acoustic intruments that has a live reference would provide better reference.
Having said that, I agree that a lot of recent "commercial" CD's sound terrific.
I'm not going to discuss electronic music as reference material: some paintings do not reflect or represent anything "real" or found in Nature.There's a lot of acoustic stuff also in that album, although I think everything has been heavily processed. The intriguing part in this record is not the bleeps and synth gimmicks, but the more subtle variations on her voice, obtained through electronic processing, which are fascinating. Apart from the vocoder-type treatment (similar to that found on Music), on one track her voice goes from female to male, and on another one (Track 9) her voice is transformed into a child's voice (herself as a child, judging from the lyrics), and then you will hear many other variations. Track 9 is a killer.
Anyway, try it for yourself, but make sure you fasten your seat belt.
:)
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Howard Cohen, the music critic, reviewed American Life and while he didn't care for the title track all that much, he did make reference to the large, clear sound coming from his system. I don't think it'll be coming out on DVDA anytime too soon so I either drive down to Virgin Megastore and hunt out the LP or I get it on CD. My last two Madonna LPs (Music and Ray Of Light,) both German pressings, had nasty surface noise so I'm wondering if it's worth the trouble?
the critic is right, the title track is not the best IMO (the James Bond one is not so great either). It takes 2 to 3 listens to get into some of the tracks, but there are some fantastic ideas in there, and some excellent feeling. Again, try to listen to track #9, "Mother and Father", this is a fascinating tune.I don't know what the LP sounds like, but I know the CD is superb (sonic wise). The sound is staggering.
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Same goes for Linkin Park’s "Meteora". Perhaps the hybrid DVD-A failure is the cause?
I don't mind Meteora so much (actually I'm pleased because I know my daughter would play it night and day for 2 weeks), but Madonna was another golden opportunity missed. That record will sell zillions.
I hope they do an MCH version anyway.Best
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