Good Albums/Good Artist......bad sound quality

[Blues]

I think my ears are not working right but...man...there are some recent albums that i really like but are hard to listen to because the sound quality is bad to me...here a couple examples...


Prince "Musicology"....1st off..i'ma a huge prince fan...one of the greatest entertainers of our time BUT. This album sounds bad to me...yet i love the songs! The guitars are harsh and spitty with a 2D POD-ish sound. The drums lack weight, the bottom end is decent-average and the mixes seems to lack the depth that was on his early 90's albums. Is this just me hearing this?...who mixed this album?...were the mixes good but the mastering engineer messed everything up? I love the song "What Do You Want Me To do" on this album btw....the drums sounds like preset midi kits from the Boss Dr 5 but it has so much style in the overall song.

The Roots "The Tipping Point" Again...i love this album..i like it better than the new one actually. But what the hell is all this sibilance i hear on Thought's vocals!!! The mixes sounds waaaaay too hyped and squashed. "Star" had a pretty decent mix but it all goes downhill from there....the bottom end seems a little cloudy in some songs. And the new Roots album..forget about it..i aint feelin the sonics at all..trashy is good...but what i'm hearing is downright 'muddy'. Public enemy and Wutang can pull that lo-fi shit off..i didnt feel this album captured that well....Clock With No Hands is my shit though...amazing song...


Paul Wall's solo album..okay the album musically was a huge disapointment but i like some verses paul has spit...the boy got some swagger to him..but his album sounded like complete shit mixing wise...OH MY LORD THIS ALBUM IS BAD....i've recorded dry takes of ideas that sound better than this guy's finished product..it aint his fault tho..WHO WAS THE MIX GUY?....What Label Exec what allow that shit to be pressed up to go on shelves?


For an example of a newer release that I find enjoyable on both the musical and sound quality is an artist by the name of Janita. She's an r&B/Jazz vocalist from Denmark i think. Listen to her album....the mixes are very present and "modern" but still retain spatiality and warmth. My ears can reach forward and hear 'into' these mixes....Sade's Love Deluxe & Lovers Rock was like that too.


discuss.

[Steamy Williams]

Prince's "Musicology" is the loudest CD I own, and I would have to agree with what you said about it. If you compare it to something like Sign O' The Times, it's twice has loud and half as deep. Fortunately, the rough and ready sound doesn't get in the way of the tunes too much, but I guess I would listen to it a little bit more if it sounded smoother.

Haven't listened to the other albums you mentioned, although I also think Sade's "Lovers Rock" sounds pretty good

[xj32]

I agree too, because of the sheer volume and frequencies, Musicology is entirely useless when lsitening on my car stereo.

Xj

[DRC]

I have a perfect example of this although the guy isnt a hip-hop artist.

Iron & Wine - The Creek Drank The Cradle

I think this is one of the best collection of songs, that showcase some of the perfect marriage of melody/harmony and lyrical imagery. I mean beautiful stuff that totally puts you in a place. But.....

The guy delivered an album recorded on a f*cking 4 track cassette!! The noise is unbearable. I would give anything to get him to re-record that whole album. Thing is, as painful as it is, I still listen to it at least once a week. The songs are that good.

[beat you down]

a lot af hiphop albums coming out lately i think sound like trash.
no transients at all, i recall 50's masacre and this g-unit album have some songs where there's like NO kicks, just one big whoomp of squashed lows.
gotta hate it.

oh, pharrells in my mind?, i thought MY mixes are bad.

[nickp]

Another non-hip hop: Neutral Milk Hotel (all of his stuff tends to be lo-fi, but for pinpoint precision let's go with In The Aeroplane Over the Sea.)

And hate if you want, but early Sage Francis (well, pretty much anything before Non-Prophet's Hope, Joe Beats has come a looonggg way).

And the demos to the Gravediggaz 6 Feet Deep are pretty dope.

Tonedeff's Hyphen EP, as well as parts of the E-F@mm album.

[con?one]

Paid In Full - Eric B. & Rakim. one of the most important albums for hiphop, sounds like shit though

[WideawakE]

cody chessnuts "headphone masterpiece"

that new Murs

any of eminems latest ish

[Peter Project]

EDAN. This new record from a production point of view is TOTALLY off the wall. Completey bananas. The sound quality is SOOOO shit, and SOOO compressed though, I can only make it through about 3 songs.

[rekidxkavada]

yeah Edan's shit raw as ****. beauty and the beat along with funkadelics first album is the reason I got into tape delay and copped a space echo.

[Rotterdam]

its no boss drummachine but a linn drum. prince been using that for ages.
and check out that new justin timberlake album for the same drumsounds

[Steamy Williams]

Originally Posted by Rotterdam

its no boss drummachine but a linn drum. prince been using that for ages.
and check out that new justin timberlake album for the same drumsounds

I think some of the drums that Blues was referring to on "Musicology", which sound like a Boss drum machine, may even be the acoustic drums. There are some programmed drums, sure, but I'm pretty familiar with the sound of the Linn LM-1 that Prince uses (especially on his classic stuff), and I don't it recognise it much on "Musicology".

[echoplexed]

Blues... I have to agree with you on Prince's new record. All the tones sound very stock, like presets, I wish he would try to push the limits a bit more, like he used to. I totally disagree with you about Game Theory though. It is pushing the limits of what hip hop albums are doing now. It's pissed off, it's aggressive, it's very creative, I think it sounds unbelievable, especially Russ Elavado's mixes. Russ has a distinctive low end approach but I don't think it's muddy at all. Peter Project... That edan record sounds perfect. If it was all clean and nice it wouldn't have the same impact at all. The sound matches the style, which I think is rare now. It stands out amongst a lot of records that sound the same. I'm really sick of people just trying to cop Dre's style or insert big name here's style, let them do that, they are the only one's good at it. Make your shit sound like nobody else's. Game Theory and Beauty and the Beat are prime examples of this. Unique sounding records, what a concept. They should be applauded.

[Neruk]

The new Thursday record, the vocals are far to low.

[Rotterdam]

@ Steamy, Blues is reffering to What Do You Want Me To do, that is definetly a Linn drum. Used on so many prince tracks eg Ballad of Dorothy Parker.

[Steamy Williams]

Originally Posted by Rotterdam

@ Steamy, Blues is reffering to What Do You Want Me To do, that is definetly a Linn drum. Used on so many prince tracks eg Ballad of Dorothy Parker.

My bad. I should have read Blues's original post again before I posted. I usually skip that track, so I was thinking of other songs when I said I couldn't hear it. I particularly love the sound of the Linn on his older stuff like "Erotic City", "Head", "Kiss" and "When Doves Cry".