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Posted by Bee K
on 9/21/2009, 8:35 am, in reply to "Against Remasters"
Message modified by user Bee K 9/21/2009, 8:43 am
Some clarification:
Remixing = going back to the original tapes and manipulating the original, separate tracks for a new mix. This was not done here.
Remastering = The final, blanket treatment for the mix by a separate mastering engineer. Mastering gets tossed a bit too casually these days now that anyone with a few pieces of software feel they can claim to have mastered a disc (backyard-mastering). A good essay on the art of mastering was written by Bob Ludwig and can be found in the new Arcana release by John Zorn.
Mastering involves transferring the source material from the original tapes or digital software and preparing it for CD/Tape/Vinyl. When you've recorded on something like a tape or hard drive, you have a lot of space to hold high quality recorded information...some of my recorded projects, with all their individual tracks, are 5-7GB. To transfer a recording to a storage medium (CD/etc) with a much smaller capacity to store information and retain as much of the sonic detail as possible requires a lot of care, the right equipment, and a good ear. A trained ear. There's also an overall compression and EQ treatment involved.
When CDs came out in the mid 80s, the methods to transfer analog source material to a digital CD was not as advanced. For people who were used to listening to records, there was a huge, noticeable DROP in the quality of the sound. Nuances that used to be present in old records and tapes was not there. For people who enjoy the details of a piece of music, this was terrible. Imagine being used to seeing a Van Gogh painting in the gallery and then one day having those paintings replaced by life-sized posters. Sure the picture and the colors are the same and you can witness the brilliance of the artist, but you can't see the globs of paint on the surface anymore that rise off the canvas...it's just flat without that subtle 3-dimensional aspect. Plus the colors seem a little off.
This is what listening to the original Beatles CDS was like in 1987. And many other artists as well.
As digital technology has gotten more advanced, mastering engineers can now transfer the information from those original master tapes and retain much more of the original sonic detail...those globs of paint. The BEST way to listen to the Beatles would be to go to the recording studio, have them pull out the tapes and play them for us. Obviously we can't do that. in 87, the CDs didn't come close to doing that. Now, with the remasters, the CDs come much, much, much closer to replicating the experience of hearing the original tapes in the studio.
"Power doesn't corrupt people, people corrupt power." - William Gaddis
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