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Why do the new 2009 Beatles CDs sound so good?

It seems a small (maybe big) miracle what they've done with the Beatles 9/9/09 cd box. These were always piercing and grainy (since 1987), and now they are just about the best CDs I have (and this includes SACDs). If it can be done here, it seems like this could be done with other popular music discs.
It seems that the problems in digital are not in the medium itself, but the way the recordings are made.
Companies like DCC and MFSL tried to improve things, but the Beatles box seems to surpass these by far.
A lot of people are quick to criticize digital vs. vinyl, but, to my ears, the Beatles now sound better than vinyl ever did. Anyway, if anyone could shed light on how this was accomplished, I'd be curious.
rgs92
magfan
1,583 posts
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loudness_war

Slanski,
is this what you're talking about?
josh358
286 posts
 
I don't like them. The stereo remasters have been compressed, which makes them sound louder and "better" in a quick A/B comparison, but that does violence to the music. The mono remasters weren't compressed, and to my ears, they are the better of the three (original stereo, mono and stereo remasters).
stefanl
296 posts
 
Yes,but all CD music is compressed if you are coming from analogue tapes especially.Anyway,George Martin himself put his foot in it years ago when interviewed about the original CD issue.Talked about only achieving a "harsher" sound than they would have liked and that the early stereo albums were terrible,not worthy of release.They did a pretty good job apparently to get them out,much like today.
unsound
7,315 posts
 
Mapman, I would suggest that the re-release of the Beatles material doesn't "fly in the face of the mantra often heard that all newer loudness wars CDs are bad recordings...", it further confirms it. Remember that even though these re-issues may have come from earlier re-releases, all those earlier versions were done without digital clipping so prevalent today. The newer versions are just able to use the greater dynamic range of newer technologies, just as todays well recorded classical recordings can. I don't think anyone is saying that all new CDs are bad, just way too many of them are bad.
rgs92 OP
974 posts
 
I have the Yellow Sub. from a few years back and have listened to it happily several times (really love this album),
but the box-set one just is more balanced for me, with no ear-bleeding sounds. And that goes for all the albums,
especially the early ones, which bordered on unlistenable for
the high-pitched overtones [unless you were listening on Harbeths or Sennheiser 650 headphones :) ].

The latter albums were much better (Abbey Road, Let it Be, and Let it Be Naked), but still, I much prefer the rounded vocals and overall sound of the box set ones.

Is that Band on the Run a CD or a FLAC file that I need to burn or something? I'm not really up on computer audio.
(But I LOVE my Quad 9L speakers with youtube music. I spend way too much time with them.)
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