Norah Jones

Listening to the album again tonight and instead of focusing on the music, I was focusing on the recording. Yes, wolf_garcia, it does sound darker than her previous recordings. But it is nowhere as dark as the "Rising Sand" album from Robert Plant/Alison Krauss. That album is so "syrupy" or like "thick molasses".
This album is so much better. I have no complaints on the CD. If you forget about the recording and listen to the songs, it does not matter.
Now someone should compare the CD Vs the hi-rez downloads.

On the CD I found the bass guitar to be one-note-ish and sort of non-directional, muffled. And not a lot of top end stuff like cymbals, not much work for my tweeters to do on some songs. I don't think it's a great recording.
The music is pretty good, but IMO not close to her first.

I bet the recording was done utilizing state-of-the-art gear by experienced pro recording engineers, so something must have gone wrong in the mixing or mastering, or a wave of ear wax removal among all of the participants caused an unnatural sensitivity to high frequencies…yeah…that's it...

The new album is just ok in my book. Sound quality not up to par with 'Come Away With Me', and definitely far short of 'Not Too Late', which I believe is her best recording. Day Breaks sounds compressed and a little closed in to my ears.

I am firmly in the "just ok" camp.