The problem with the music

while i agree that (some) newly recorded music sounds like it was recorded on a kenner close n play i disagree that cd's have some how been overlooked by the engineer's in the studio & that the recordings are geared to mp3 format with the exception of brittany spears type crap.

my tastes in music are very wide from artist like miles davis & red garland to sepultura & disturbed with the recordings having been made right from the very introduction of cd's to the disturbed cd im listening to right now that was released a little over a year ago & for the most part im very satisfied with the quality of the recordings.

allthough i dont agree with cinematic systems delevery of what he said or even the fact that nrchy's rig was commented on in such a way i do agree that you cant just plop any old cd player into a rig & expect it to give a great performance & the same thing can be said about spinning vynal,my rig sucks with vynal but excells to the extreme with digital.

also for a guy to say that NEW MUSIC SUCKS shows me that no matter how the music is recorded he will not be happy with it,who would think its recorded well if they hate the artist?

keep in mind im not commenting on nrchy's rig here as i know absolutely nothing about his set up but i also gotta agree with cinematic systems comment on power cords,i see a ton of members who arent happy with the sound they are getting spend ridiculous amounts of time & cash fartin around with power cords,power conditioners & cabling trying to make a poorly matched system give acceptable sound & it will never happen.

if your not happy with how your rig is presenting the music weather it be from cd or vynal you will not fix it by swappin a few cables around you need to fugure out which component is causing it & deal with accordingly.

im no expert on anything but i do know that if anybodys blaiming the recording industry & their supposed lack of recording skills for why their rig aint makin it then its gonna be one hell of a long haul.

mike.

Cinematic_systems while I am not as smart as you, so I am incapable of putting together a quality system (appearantly only people with the same gear as you are capable of this, does this mean that all the other manufactureres should just go out of business?), you ignore the comments made by Mike Large. He is deeply involved in the process, but maybe he too doesn't know as much as you.

What level of system does a person have to own to be able to hear or comment on the quality of recordings? If I only have a boombox will that prevent me from hearing the difference between and good CD and a poorly recorded, mastered, or produced CD?

Nrchy: Please forgive the tone of my last post, and then let me explain its point. You seem to attribute the poor quality you find in many recordings to the quality of the equipment used in recording studios. I think you're wrong about that. People I've talked to who do recordings generally choose their equipment carefully. They have to think about more than just sound quality, but they will not tolerate anything less than great sound quality. And they know it when they hear it, which is their business. It's only our hooby.

The variability in quality comes not so much from the equipment as from the decisions they make about everything from mike placement to EQ. Getting a good sound is no easy task, as anyone who's tried it will tell you. Plus, they have to make a recording to sound good in a wide variety of environments and systems.

Now, it's often suggested that the majors engineer recordings to sound good on earbuds and boomboxes. There may be some truth to that, especially for pop releases, many of which seem to have little in the way of dynamic range, for example. I haven't heard a really bad jazz recording in a while, though I have heard some with very different recording styles. Depending on your tastes, you might like some styles more than others.

Nrchy,

Just typical audiophile crybaby BS in response to a criticism of your system. I thought being a biker you might have a little thicker skin. I think I tried to make it very clear that I wasn't attacking you or taking a cheap shot.

Yet instead of asking me why I would say what I said, you assume I've got something to sell or my opinion is related to a decision you didn't make that I would have, "buy my system its better." Well that wasn't my answer, infact I was going to engage in a process to help you figure something out that I already know.

There are many ways to solve your problem (better equipment clearly isn't one of them) but you have to make a decision about 2 things, Can you give up the best of what you have now to elevate the quality of a majority of recordings? and Can you define what is missing from so many recordings that it prompted you to make this post in the first place?

Lets fix this problem, I 'll see if i can't get someone who has given me a chance to do what seems to be the impossible around here...make most CD's sound very good on their system.

Now which has a better long term outcome?, having most of your CD's sound good? or continue bitching about the quality of CD's something you have no control over.

What's funny is most people just want to tell me i'm full of it and Mike Large's doom and gloom is acceptable "grumble, grumble". instead of having a curiosity about how I've been able to do it in my system and many others.

Have you seen my system? DIY speakers, Yamaha M35 amp, Cambridge DVD Player....hardly the kind of equipment you have and yet i'm very happy with cd quality.

PS: I'm listening to a compilation disc I got from Paste magazine with many low budget recordings on them and the sound is good and listenable. System (GO8, SCA2, SCM20A-2)

I am not a recording engineer so I am just going by what I have been told...but I thought that the root of the problem was the use of dozens of mics with mixdown happening months later in a studio perhaps in a different country. This is driven by the great cost of hiring an orchestra, and the need to keep sessions short. Going back to play it again because a mic was not perfectly positioned is a NO- NO. In this scheme it is the mixing engineer who really determines how the product sounds, as best he can with the tracks he has to work with. One recording of the Sant Saens Organ concerto was produced by recording the orchestra in one hall, and some time later the organist in another hall (wearing a headset). In this instance it worked quite well.

The Tacet and MDG discs that I recommend always give credits, along with the musicians, to the technical staff, (tonmeister) and usually list the equipment such as mics used. In the Apollo space program one important thing that was done to assure quality was very simple… having a label on every piece of equipment bearing the signatures of the people who assembled and tested the unit.

It is unfortunate that the number of recording labels that do strive for sonic quality are few, and the selection of music therefore limited.