I wouldn't say bright. Maybe a little upper midrange forwardness creating some artificial clarity. If you believe that's a characteristic of my system, fine. I have no heartburn with that. :-)
Does Steely Dan sound bright to you?
This is going to sound like a somewhat random question but I’m wondering how many of you find Steely Dan’s recordings to sound a bit bright. I’m particularly thinking of Gaucho, and Aja but some other recent recordings, too, such as Fagen’s Nightfly.
My typical media include streaming (CD and HD quality) and CD’s. I have not played my old vinyl because I’m presently without a turntable.
At first I thought it was my system and it was driving me a little bit mental; eventually, I decided it wasn't my stuff, it was their stuff. Because most other recordings on the same system with no other changes don’t typically have the brightness of Steely Dan.
Whether or not you’re a fan (I am) Steely Dan has often been a go-to for testing out equipment, so I imagine there will be experiences people have had about this.
P.S. Any other recordings which, for you are unnaturally bright?
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@dinov No, not all were top notch. Read guitarist Denny Dias on the DBX fiasco of the Katy Lied album. https://sdarchive.com/dennys3.html |
Only Nightfly sounds a little bright...antiseptic to me. @Hilde45 got to the Katy Lied master tape fiasco just ahead of me....and back when I read about what happened I was depressed for days, wondering what we had all missed (and the sound of Katy Lied as-issued is great). IMO, SD faded a little after Katy Lied (not professionally or any of that....just a little bit inspirationally....but, one could argue they had done all there was to do in that particular vein....or maybe "veins" or whatever hastened that somewhat numbed atmosphere that seemed to hover about in their later tunes). To my huge dismay, Steely Dan's entire recorded output went up in smoke in the disastrous Universal Studios Hollywood warehouse fire in June 2008 (see NYT "The Day the Music Burned"). Along with countless other seminal artists (UNI literally doesn't know the full extent of what was there), we will never hear any unearthed studio gems from any of SD's countless song takes since they literally went up in smoke. |
Hilde45, not at all. If they are bright on your system then you have a peak in the 3 kHz to 10 kHz region. If there is no sibilance it is in the 5kHz to 10 kHz region. It is probably the room doing this as most speaker manufacturers know not to do this or they lose sales. Some like Wilson intentionally put a dip between 3 and 5kHz to avoid sibilance. This is where a measurement system becomes extremely useful. Dayton's Omnimic system is fabulous in this regard and costs only $300, worth every penny. Add a Minidsp SHD preamp and you have total control of both channels independently. You can tweak them within a dB of each other from 100Hz to 10 kHz, get rid of the brightness and improve your system's imaging capability. |
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