Click images for desktop size: "Trust Nature" by Pixel Hust Just waiting for the season opening game. Listening to experts ridicule my choice of the Dolphins to get the mild upset.
There was that commercial for the new Bob Dylan album available on iTunes. I read Dylan's comments on why he's finally decided to distribute his music digitally, “The new recordings sound terrible. When I heard the masters of the new album I couldn't believe how it sounded nothing like what we were doing in the studio.”
I guess that music sounds so bad now why not just throw it out there on iTunes or whatever. If Bob weren't so rich already you could make a lot of accusations. Thing is that most of Bob's attack was launched at CD's!
I think most of his complaints have to do with the horrific mastering job they're currently doing. I prefer the sound of analog tape recordings being digitally mastered. It gives a near perfect clone of the original recording. The White Stripes have killed using this technique. It also explains the brilliant sound of some of the retro stuff I like.
Straight digital records have a sharp hollowness that I find fatiguing but the worst part is that re-mastering engineers have taken digital and gone berserk with it. The old RAIA standard called for heavy compression to pump up the lead voices and instruments without losing the background. Now the compression can be even more extreme and the overall sound level pumped up to the max, sometimes coming distorted before they are even played. They do sound louder when played through any equipment and that seems to be the point.
I think Bob's complaints have to do with the re-mastering process and not the recording step. I've looked at the aiff's of the new album, Modern Times, and they are as squelched as Green Day's! Somehow even Bob seems to have little control over this.
The best thing out of all this was the comments coming from Kid Rock's manager. I like Kid Rock a lot. But . . .
His manager refused to let Kid's music go digital because he doesn't like people only being able to buy the tracks they like. He was actually making that incredibly stupid argument that “the album has artistic integrity that should not be allowed to be decided by the consumer” . . . RAH!
The Devil Without A Cause a work of art?!? I shouldn't be allowed to decide what is a good track?
I liked it better when it was just pop music.

Other than that it was just another day. Nothing more and it couldn't be much less.
My puppy found a mole. It was sick. She's nursing it. She is very serious about this.

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