Metallica - Death Magnetic - new album discussion

I'd say Christ Illusion is a good comparison. Loud? In your face? Brick wall? Haze of distortion under instruments when they get going? Yep.

-HM

 

I've read a lot of bad reviews about the sound at amazon (Germany). Most said... horrible mix!!!

 

sheesh... I haven't been here in quite some time. Heard some clips of the new tracks and the sound sucked so I just plopped down over $100 for the 5LP set thinking it would sound better.

Should I cancel my order and get the cheaper 2LP version? I also ordered the 45RPM's of MOP and RTL. I have those along with KEA at 45RPM on Music for Nations that are not that bad.

 

I can't image the 5 LP sounding much better than the 2 LP. If the email's to be believe, Ted Jansen says the final master is messed up, so there's little anyone can do. Unless re-recording and remixing is an option.

-HM

 

You would hope that the band had saved the tapes they used to make the final mix from. Couldn't we just re-mix the album to deal better with the loudness issue? I would agree on the mastering phase; these folks are doing the best job they can, given what is handed to them.

Re-mixing the final album isn't a small task by any means, but it's such a shame if all that hard work is tossed away by brickwalls of distortion. What's the use? You may as well point a microphone at a washing machine and record that for an hour. Hmm...now I really wish I was at that Danish record shop where Metallica hung out last night.

 

Ask and ye shall receive. From 2LP Vinyl. Listening to track one I saw where some drum hits come in and here's what I found:

http://img291.imageshack.us/my.php?image=sp3212092008143127mv6.jpg

 

Boy this really has me in the dumpers... I could save myself over $100 if I settle for the 2lp version. Sounds to me like people are pointing at the mastering engineer when they should be pointing their finger at the mix engineer.

The box set does come with these extras:

This must have 5 180g LP Deluxe Edition box set of Metallica's Death Magnetic features 5 individual sleeves and includes a Bonus CD of the entire album, a lithograph, downloads of two entire shows from this summer, 2 hours of additional exclusive fly on the wall footage and 250 exclusive photos!

I now have to figure out if it is even worth it....

 

Only a few bands go back to remix and remaster, and usually the backlash isn't so hot. But this tends to be because the original release was just fine.

One I can think of right off the bat is Megadeth. Mustaine remixed and remastered a lot of his catalog, even re-recording parts where the original tapes were lost. He added reverb in places, stripped away reverb...all kinds of changes. I think he made everything worse, except in the case of the "Peace Sells" album, which had so much reverb originally, that stripping it down helped quite a bit (but I'm still a purist, so I listen to the original).

Iced Earth did the same thing for their first three records with better success. Much less changes than Mustaine (but I swear he re-recorded the drums). The first two definitely clean up some of the deficiencies in the originals. I personally believe he made the mix for Burnt Offerings, the third CD, too stark. The original had way cool reverb and was very open. The new one is too in your face for me.

-HM

 

In terms of a re-mixed album, I wouldn't want to make any changes to the sounds. I'd leave the album as it stands. I'd just want to deal exclusively with the compression and flattening and distortion. This is why it would be smarter to move quickly on this, instead of waiting any number of years. Over time, the temptation to needle your earlier work and "re-write" is too hard to avoid. Mustaine's Megadeth remasters are a warning of what not to do.

But, surely, there has to be a rebellion in the music industry. All of the engineers and technicians are outraged at the Loudness Wars. The only ones interested are the suits, and they're just seeing green. Which they are all losing, btw. That's what gets me. This business is going bankrupt. You'd think someone in charge would figure out it's because they're needlessly sabotaging their product.

Ah, well, work's done! Time to hunt for D-Mag records!

 

That's very cool. So, the LP is the way to go?

 

Now THAT'S what I'm talking about!

Now, to nitpick, we would need to compare this section against what's on the CD, to verify that the magnitude of the clipping is the same. But besides that, this is fairly incontrovertible proof that that 2LP mastering (and, very likely, the 5LP mastering) is no superior to the CD.

 

Well, I look at it this way. Kevin Gray mastered/cut the regular 2LP edition. You know you're going to get world class mastering/cutting on that version. He's done the best with what he had to work with. But, you're not getting all the extra goodies the box set has. You save $100+.

For the 5LP 45RPM set you're getting all the goodies. But, the vinyl will be 1/2 speed mastered/cut by MOFI which will probably not best the 2LP set done by Kevin. You spend an extra $100+.

I was going to buy the 5LP set, but now that it's confirmed that KG did the 2LP set, I'm going to get that instead.

 

However, Ted Jensen mastered the CD and KG did the 2LP Vinyl. There will be mastering and thus sonic differences between the CD and Vinyl versions even though the same crappy source was used. No? Unless KG mastered the Vinyl from the CD of TJ's. Say it ain't so.. NOOOO!

 

All indications point to the mixdown having the clipping. If that's true, the odds of KG and MoFi receiving alternate mixes are, well, really f* cking thin. It's possible but there's really no good reason or evidence for them to do so.

 

As I understand it, there are no "goodies" with the 5LP set, only the CD as a bonus. There is a $125 "coffin" box that has T-shirt, guitar picks, DVD, etc.

 

Well I am stuck... My order has been shipped... But I talked to the guy that I placed the order with and he said. "if it sucks we will take it back" Sounds good to me to be a guinea pig. I will eat shipping back to them and get the 2LP version.

With this recording I have learned what I have known for a looooong time is that you can't polish a TURD!

 

You are correct! It's a 5 LP + 1 CD - [no goodies] Deluxe Edition

 

Not according to Musicdirect's website and also Metallica's website. I shall see and report in 4 days or so.

Quote from Music Direct's website:

This must have 5 180g LP Deluxe Edition box set of Metallica's Death Magnetic features 5 individual sleeves and includes a Bonus CD of the entire album, a lithograph, downloads of two entire shows from this summer, 2 hours of additional exclusive fly on the wall footage and 250 exclusive photos!

 

Too late! Bought it!

Playing DM. Musically I totally love it.

Sonically....oy! The bass kicks sound like plastic plates. Overall it has a splashy, crunchy sound. Protools plug-in musta done most of the damage.

As I said, musically, great! Sonically....luckily this bottle of Hacker-Pschorr Weisse beer is taking the edge off!

 

That is probably the case. Now, wouldn't KG master these mixes for his vinyl version and Mofi master these same mixes for their vinyl version? If so, the 2LP set and 5LP set will have different mastering/cutting done to them and therefore be sonically different. No?

Someone should ask SH to ask KG to get the lowdown on this one...

 

This is probably correct. However there have been conflicting reports in the past. This is the first I've heard about the downloads + 2 hours of footage + 250 photos. Sounds cool, but still pricey

 

I'm listening to the 2LP set right now. You do have to crank it to get it loud, but the same problems that plague the CD are on here for the most part. I'd bet money the problems were created in the mixing stage. The vinyl masks some of this, but it's here. If I would've spent more than $15 bucks on this I'd return it.

BTW: I really dig the music on this record....too bad it's a sonic disaster.

 

I've gotten emails in the past from Mission: Metallica detailing their special editions, but here's the quick take:

http://www.missionmetallica.com/preorder

-HM

 

I'm getting no image here. Any chance of an reupload? I'll post an picture from the CD of the same spot if you could do that.

Thanks in advance.

 

You'll love this:

Ethan Miller from Howlin Rain, who are singed to Rubin's American label, talks about Rubin/mastering....