TGF album on vinyl! Options

[brianblank]

On Facebook...

Kevin Martin > The Gracious Few
What a great day, CT turns 40 & as a special little treat I get the Vinyl masters of our record to approve for production! It sounds AMAZING, get ready for a whole new aural experience!!! Happy Birthday Brother, hope you get everything you have ever dreamed of! KM

Woohoo vinyl!

Edit: On sale update (2/9/11)

Vinyl Album Release Next Tuesday, Feb. 15!

Finally...the way hard-hitting rock n' roll was meant to be heard! The Gracious Few's album will be released on 12" double gatefold vinyl exclusively at independent record stores next Tuesday, February 15th! Please support TGF and head down to your local indie record store next Tuesday to pick it up or find your local indie record store.

This post has been edited by brianblank: Feb 9 2011, 6:42 pm

[OutToDry]

I was personally told that they are doing a mastering session for the vynil record.

If the record sold 100K consider that a success. I think over time it will be a classic seller!!!!

I don't agree with your synopsis that the record can sound better. They had the best engineers working on it.

This post has been edited by OutToDry: Dec 5 2010, 9:17 am

[mattdm11]

I was personally told that they are doing a mastering session for the vynil record.

If the record sold 100K consider that a success. I think over time it will be a classic seller!!!!

I don't agree with your synopsis that the record can sound better. They had the best engineers working on it.

Of course the record can sound better. So can the CD, if they remastered it. Here is the wavefom of Crying Time:



It doesn't look (or sound) that terrible, but look at the compression. The quiet parts are almost as loud as the loud parts. The dynamic range is gone.

A comparison....here is "The Chain" by Fleetwood Mac. Look at the quiet parts and the loud parts...you can see the difference, and you know the loud parts will actually sound loud.





Another comparison....White, Discussion off of Throwing Copper. I love TC, but sonically, the album is atrocious. White Discussion sounds horrendous. When the "loud" parts kick in, all it is is a compressed mess. On anything other than in your car or on your MP3 player, it sounds like crap.



I understand the whole addage that you can't judge sound by looking at the waveform, and that's true. Radiohead's In Rainbows LOOKS compressed, but sounds pretty damn good. But by and large, most albums today could sound significantly better if the compression was eliminated.

My point is that when albums get remastered for vinyl, they cannot be that compressed or the needle would literally fly off of the record. So there are two options....keep it compressed and lower the volume, or spend more money to remaster it for vinyl, which is a niche market. You tell me what option you think most bands will choose.

Again, this is not a bash on TGF. I am amazed at how good their album sounds considering all of the compression. It is a bash on how mastering is ruining all my favorite music.