Question for those with “Golden ears”, and a frustration! (The Loudness Wars)

lowrider57
Very cool personal history. I miss MTV Unplugged series from the 90's.
I wish I could purchase the Don Henley episode on CD or DVD.
Happy Listening!

Worst gripe for me. 
  The CDs that are recorded so loud, the music distorts and gets too loud way to early on the volume knob. Drives me nuts. 
 I will put the cd on my cheap 99$ computer, run it through audiolab 3.0 and lower the entire album to a more listenable level.
then record to a cdr. Sounds much better to me this way. 
 Not a fan of 3000 decibel recordings on newer CDs (some)

@lowrider57 ,

Thanks for the 'inside' information - mystery solved.

The fact that they can tweak the sound for broadcast probably renders it impossible for the OP to get a commercial equivalent of his preferred version of The Joshua Tree.

The fact that they sometimes actually improve it can also be a little frustrating when the supposedly official version fails to match up. 

I've experienced similar situations where I wanted a recording of a certain song from a film only to find the version on the official soundtrack album significantly worse sounding and/or edited/ truncated.

[Elvis Presley's Wooden Heart from G.I. Blues and Oom-Pah-Pah from Oliver! are two examples, but there are  numerous others.]

In the end I would sometimes resort to downloading the music off the preferred YouTube clip and then fixing it in Audacity if required. 

In this laborious way I've managed to back up quite a few of my preferred versions of  favourite recordings over the years to a USB stick. Before anyone asks, yes I have also backed that USB up to a hard drive. 


@arcticdeth, 

I sometimes do the same thing with MP3Gain if the CD is recorded a little too hot for its own good.

It kind of works but then I worry that I've destroyed the precise balance that was intended, as MP3Gain tends to average out the differences in volume between the various tracks

Or if I can I just try to find a better mastering. 

On a side note - one of my friends bought all the remastered Scott Walker albums (1-4 and maybe Til the Band Comes In, I think) to replace his originals only to later have to admit his mistake and then go back and find copies of the originals!

WOW! 1500+ views! I’m humbled! Thanks all! And, as a final note, I’m gonna buy a Japanese pressed CD of: The Joshua Tree, in the faint hopes, I can actually HEAR a better sound then the sonics of the song: The Streets have no name, on YouTube! Pathetic. But true. Honestly, the sonics on Beatles: Sgt. Peppers CD sounds like a very recent recording, SERIOUSLY! What’s U2’s excuse?? Probably wasting my $$, but Amazon let’s you return ANYTHING! To the BASTARD RETARD WANKER that mastered this work of art, The Joshua Tree album: I HATE YOU!!!! I HATE YOU!!!! I SO HATE YOU!!! A 2 y.o. could have done a better job than YOU!!! YouTube DOES a BETTER job than YOU!! So glad I got fourth row seats to the first Joshua Tree Tour!! But they never released a live version of that album/tour. Would have sold GREAT! Hopefully, would have SOUNDED great!!?? Does the LP sound noticeably better?? I just thought to ask. If so, would you buy an original copy? Or, these 180 gram LP’s??? Or, does the LP sound as crappy as the CD?? I own three versions, all sound equally crappy.🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬🤬
God bless you all! God bless our Country! MAGA!!

Lowrider57, I bet you’ve got either a lead-sled, or a SWEET Harley or Indian! Anyways, how would I record the audio of the official video of: U2’s “The streets have no name”?? Only problem is the disk-jockey talking above the song about the AWESOMENESS of U2 pissing off the LA police by doing the video, and attracting 30K+ people to see the music video being done on the roof of a liquor store. I need a clean version. The drums sound SO good! As opposed to the CD recording. 🤬🤬🤬