the importance of analog sound in prog

Surrealist wrote: Nothing wrong with a little bit of tape hiss, or some light clicks and pops when playing a record. No different than being at a jazz club and hearing people walk by behind you, toasting wine glasses or other external noises that are natural to the surroundings but not to the music. The whole idea of total silence in a recording that digital strives for is another reason many don't like it. A little tape his sounds more honest.

progbethyname wrote: Catcher10 wrote: When I listen to vinyl I cannot hear any hiss, it does not exist enough to hear it. When there is hiss on CD it is heard easily....Why? Because you are right, you hear everything on a CD. On a 24bit 96k PCM their is no hiss my friend. It's completely clean. 16 bit track recording. Yes. Absolutely, but it's minor if you have good amp/headphones. On a 24bit though omg welcome to blissful listening!!

Where is the hiss on 16-bit track? And where do these 24-bit recodings come from?

progbethyname wrote: Dean wrote: progbethyname wrote: Catcher10 wrote: When I listen to vinyl I cannot hear any hiss, it does not exist enough to hear it. When there is hiss on CD it is heard easily....Why? Because you are right, you hear everything on a CD. On a 24bit 96k PCM their is no hiss my friend. It's completely clean. 16 bit track recording. Yes. Absolutely, but it's minor if you have good amp/headphones. On a 24bit though omg welcome to blissful listening!! Where is the hiss on 16-bit track? And where do these 24-bit recodings come from? Well the 16bit is really minor and only the most decerning ear picks that up.

Surrealist wrote: And we feel sorry for you guys.. believe me...

Dean wrote: Catcher10 wrote: When I listen to vinyl I cannot hear any hiss, it does not exist enough to hear it. When there is hiss on CD it is heard easily....Why? Because you are right, you hear everything on a CD. This is why I avoid subjective comparisons, you can contradict yourself and still make it sound like your prefered medium is better. Either you can hear more detail off vinyl or you cannot - you cannot do both. It is black and white, even subjectively.   "Hiss" is high frequency noise that predominately comes from magnetic tape and is due to the particle sizes in the magnetic material. There are other sources of high frequency noise in your system but as you have said you don't hear it when listening to vinyl then we can ignore those. The noise "from" CD (actually it's DAC noise, the CD itself is 100% noise free as far as audio is concerned) is completely different and doesn't sound like hiss and the noise from vinyl is competely differerent and also doesn't sound like hiss. So since a CD is obvioulsy not a tape then this hiss you can hear must come from somewhere in the studio recording, and that's easy find if you are talking about vintage analogue recordings. Ah, you say, but I cannot hear it from a vinyl copy of the same studio recording ... and you would be right - the vinyl noise is louder than the studio tape hiss so it masks it, but vinyl noise has a lower frequency spectrum (it does not sound like hiss) that puts in in the same range as the music you are listening too, so that masks the noise from the vinyl. There are rare occasions where the tape noise on a master tape is so bad you can hear it from a vinyl copy.

Surrealist wrote: A little tape his sounds more honest.

To you because that's what you grew up on and you are too obsessed with that paradigm to appreciate another.   What is honest is what is done without mikes or any other interference and represents the authentic sound of the singer or the musician playing his instrument.  Rock has never been about that at all, so it's just your likes and dislikes talking here, not "what is subjectively right (sic)". 

Surrealist wrote: The advantage of the early prog artists were that they could play better than the typical rock artist.  Now anybody thinks they can sound like a progger with enough digital editing..  and the music suffers.

As if any more proof was needed that you still live in the 70s.  Please, who exactly wants to sound like a prog rock band?   I am glad that there are prog rock bands who try to keep the style alive but prog is not exactly a hot commodity in the music business anymore. 

I agree with NotAProghead.  There have been several talented artists over the last two decades or so, viz, the 'digital age'.  Your bias is unfortunately going to stop you from giving them a fair shot.   Jeff Buckley may or may not have matched his father Tim Buckley's virtuosity in all aspects but he was surely not too far behind when it came to using falsetto.   That's talent, not digital editing, for crying out loud.   Jeff is long dead but even if he was alive, I don't think he would exactly be desperate for your validation of his talent. 


Edited by rogerthat - October 21 2012 at 03:44

Catcher10 wrote:   These are very expensive and the music offering is very minimal, based on what most here listen to. So really are insignificant to the music scene....I doubt these will ever take over because of cost, DVD-A has not become the norm nor do I think it will....again cost. Plus you need a player to support DVD-A, another added cost.

Something came to my mind just now and I had to come back here to ask. To all of you.

Let's say you're on your mom's house, auntie, neighbour, store, supermarket, whatever. One of your favorite songs/band starts to play on the radio or in the tv, a normal tv.

You can't enjoy yourself and the moment with your favorite song because the audio is inferior??


Edited by ProgShine - October 21 2012 at 09:31

Dean wrote: Catcher10 wrote:   These are very expensive and the music offering is very minimal, based on what most here listen to. So really are insignificant to the music scene....I doubt these will ever take over because of cost, DVD-A has not become the norm nor do I think it will....again cost. Plus you need a player to support DVD-A, another added cost. Cost is not an issue to an audiophilist. When you must spend (another) $1000 to appreciate vinyl () then a few bucks on a DVD-A player is peanuts by comparison. Catcher10 wrote:   A well assembled redbook player system will perform to a point where you would not know the difference. I have a couple 24/96 albums and they are not any better than the 16/44.1 version.....I have a few jazz albums that are really nice but again I am not gonna spend the price for anymore.....Does not seem anyone else here is going to either. Where these might make sense are for the people who listen to a lot of classical music, those apperantly sound brilliant. 24/96 removes (practically) all the negative points that people who prefer analogue level at CD - the top-end cut off is now 48Khz (tape bias removal filters cut off tape recordings at around that frequency and as I have said before, vinyl mastering also removes them) and the extra 8-bits can do nothing but improve the "detail" that everyone bangs on about. If you cannot tell the difference between Red Book and 24/96 then I can't see how the audible differences between Red Book and vinyl are due to the reasons that analogue enthusiasts say it is.